Cadbury's an English company (that is owned by Nestles, based in the USA) put out a billboard ad saying, "Move over, Naomi Campbell, there's a new diva in town" - the Diva being a Cadbury's chocolate bar.
Blacks are outraged and are crying racism, and the billboards have been taken down, but you may be sure a lawsuit will shortly be filed and everyone who works at Cadbury's will have to go to sensitivity training, ya da ya da.
This despite the fact that blacks, in a romantic mood, have been known to refer to themselves as chocolate. "Try a bit of this dark chocolate tonight,". Well, maybe I've seen too many Eddie Murphy movies.
What I find incredulous about this story is that the Cadbury's advertising department apparently devised this advertisement without asking for permission from Naomi Campbell to use her likeness. That is just advertising 101! You can't use the likeness of anyone, let alone a celebrity, without getting their permission and paying them to do so!
So I'd say whoever devised this advertising campaign deserves to be fired, but not because of "racist content" but rather because he or she obviously does not know the simplest rules of his or her job.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Message boards on sports sites
Okay, it's not exactly devolution media - it's merely a showcase for the de-evolved.
Case in point, the news article on the death of Brandon Everage, "a safety on Oklahoma's national football championship team." He drowned while swimming in a river in Texas.
There are only 2 pages worth of comments so far, but most of them focus on the "bad news" that this is for Oklahoma, and only a relatively few confine themselves to "So sad, RIP, prayers to family."
Of course you can tell the difference between a male athlete being injured or dying and a female athlete doing so. For female athletes, the poster always has something to say about how pretty she is, or if she isn't pretty (or if he doesn't think she's pretty), then they're like - why do we even care about this woman?
For the male athlete, it's only about how good a player he was perceived to be.
Case in point, the news article on the death of Brandon Everage, "a safety on Oklahoma's national football championship team." He drowned while swimming in a river in Texas.
There are only 2 pages worth of comments so far, but most of them focus on the "bad news" that this is for Oklahoma, and only a relatively few confine themselves to "So sad, RIP, prayers to family."
Of course you can tell the difference between a male athlete being injured or dying and a female athlete doing so. For female athletes, the poster always has something to say about how pretty she is, or if she isn't pretty (or if he doesn't think she's pretty), then they're like - why do we even care about this woman?
For the male athlete, it's only about how good a player he was perceived to be.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Only in Spain - I hope
You'd have to be sick to even write/act in this movie. But to watch it? Anyone who'd want to watch this has some serious problems.
FOX 411 in Cannes: Horrified Viewers Flee Antonio Banderas' New Flick Due to Extreme Sex, Violence Scenes
Spanish director Pedro Almodovar's latest thriller, "The Skin I Live In," had filmgoers fleeing the theater Thursday night at its gala premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, due to some aggressively violent and disturbing content.
The film, which stars Antonio Banderas and budding actress Spanish actress Elena Anaya, focuses on a mad but brilliant surgeon (Banderas) who kidnaps a man who raped his daughter.
The doctor's daughter killed herself from the grief and it drives him to take very drastic measures. This is where it gets complicated and disturbing.
Banderas then gives the rapist a sex change and transplants his deceased daughter's face onto his body.
He later has sex with the man he has brutally experimented on and turned into a woman.
The movie also contained several disturbing rape scenes and nudity.
Guests, among them a group of sweepstakes winners flown specially to Cannes by Stella Artois from the U.S. to enjoy a once in a lifetime movie premiere were horrified by the experience. That group of Americans left and did not come back to the theater following a partiularly violent rape scene in the middle of the film.
A second exodus occurred when Banderas' character had relations with his victim at the end of the film, when even some of the French, who have a reputation for a higher tolerance for disturbing themes than Americans, had had enough.
"It was the fact that the victim was supposed to look like the doctor's daughter. I couldn't stop picturing the girl in the beginning of the movie when he was in bed with her, with him, later," said filmgoer Marie-Elise Martin who left three-quarters of the way through the picture.
The latest from the Spanish director is based on a French novel, "Tarantula," and the hometown crowd for the most part (the ones who stayed in the theater) did give Almodovar a five minute standing ovation for the adaptation.
Critics have also fallen in love with the upsetting film and are placing it in contention for the highest Cannes honor, the Palme d'or.
FOX 411 in Cannes: Horrified Viewers Flee Antonio Banderas' New Flick Due to Extreme Sex, Violence Scenes
Spanish director Pedro Almodovar's latest thriller, "The Skin I Live In," had filmgoers fleeing the theater Thursday night at its gala premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, due to some aggressively violent and disturbing content.
The film, which stars Antonio Banderas and budding actress Spanish actress Elena Anaya, focuses on a mad but brilliant surgeon (Banderas) who kidnaps a man who raped his daughter.
The doctor's daughter killed herself from the grief and it drives him to take very drastic measures. This is where it gets complicated and disturbing.
Banderas then gives the rapist a sex change and transplants his deceased daughter's face onto his body.
He later has sex with the man he has brutally experimented on and turned into a woman.
The movie also contained several disturbing rape scenes and nudity.
Guests, among them a group of sweepstakes winners flown specially to Cannes by Stella Artois from the U.S. to enjoy a once in a lifetime movie premiere were horrified by the experience. That group of Americans left and did not come back to the theater following a partiularly violent rape scene in the middle of the film.
A second exodus occurred when Banderas' character had relations with his victim at the end of the film, when even some of the French, who have a reputation for a higher tolerance for disturbing themes than Americans, had had enough.
"It was the fact that the victim was supposed to look like the doctor's daughter. I couldn't stop picturing the girl in the beginning of the movie when he was in bed with her, with him, later," said filmgoer Marie-Elise Martin who left three-quarters of the way through the picture.
The latest from the Spanish director is based on a French novel, "Tarantula," and the hometown crowd for the most part (the ones who stayed in the theater) did give Almodovar a five minute standing ovation for the adaptation.
Critics have also fallen in love with the upsetting film and are placing it in contention for the highest Cannes honor, the Palme d'or.
Friday, May 20, 2011
I Wonder What Her Parents Think?
She looks too young to have any kids...although what is "too young" these days? If she does have kids of newspaper-readable age, I wonder what they think? And then of course there's the people she works with - assuming she has a job. Will she be fired (as she would be if she made a racist or homophobic remark?) Or will she retain her job but be propositioned by every male she works with? Or treated by them as a pariah?
Would be interesting to find out the aftermath....
To explain, some woman at a San Jose Hockey game decided to flash her breasts for everyone near her to see, as well as everyone in the TV audience...
The sports media are reporting it of course. Here in the States you don't get to see anything, but I'm sure if it's reported in European countries they see the full monte. Not sure about Canada and England...they may well show her breasts as well.
Are we prudes, or are they too permissive? (England is the country that has a paper, the Sun, that has a Page 3 girl - a nude girl large as life, hopefully getting paid well to be a sex object.)
Anyway...I'm not really faulting the media on this one for reporting the story...I just wonder how many beers this woman had, or if she did the deed stone cold sober. Being a woman, I don't really understand the attraction of women's breats...certainly not bared like that, as opposed to in a sultry bedroom environment...but I guess guys are used to getting their thrills where they can find them.
(And women too, of course. Unfortunately)
Eager comments on fan's revealing display
SAN JOSE --- Not all the talk that centered around San Jose Sharks forward Ben Eager was about his check of Vancouver Canucks star Daniel Sedin.
There was a certain female Canucks fan who raised her jersey and flashed Eager as he sat in the penalty box during the third period of Game 2 of the Western Conference finals on Wednesday. The display was shown live on CBC, although Versus viewers here in the states missed out.
"I saw it, yeah," Eager said on Thursday. "I got a few text messages with the picture after the game, too. It was an interesting night, for sure."
Canucks spokesman Ben Brown told CBSSports.com the fan was removed from Rogers Arena immediately.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
The Love Child(ren) of Powerful Men
When Tiger Woods "fell from grace" with his 23 or more mistresses or - at any rate - sex partners - the media went ape trying to find out all about them... paying some of them big bucks for their exclusive stories. But at least they were grown women who would probably feed on the notoriety the press wanted to give them.
But a 10 year old illegitimate child of a famous actor? (Or for that matter, the famous actor's legitimate children? Although, they apparently have Twitter accounts and are sharing their private feelings of their own volition.)
Anyway, the media is not going to rest until they track down and interview this 10 year old kid. Sad.
Personally I think the conduct of the media over this is disgusting and embarrasing. The 10 year old son will probably never get over this, if these vultures track him down.
Newsmax.com: Palin: Schwarzenegger's Conduct 'Disgusting, Embarrassing'
But a 10 year old illegitimate child of a famous actor? (Or for that matter, the famous actor's legitimate children? Although, they apparently have Twitter accounts and are sharing their private feelings of their own volition.)
Anyway, the media is not going to rest until they track down and interview this 10 year old kid. Sad.
Personally I think the conduct of the media over this is disgusting and embarrasing. The 10 year old son will probably never get over this, if these vultures track him down.
Newsmax.com: Palin: Schwarzenegger's Conduct 'Disgusting, Embarrassing'
Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin expressed disgust with fellow former Republican California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for secretly carrying on an affair and fathering a son with a housekeeper. Schwarzenegger showed “bad character,” Palin said on the Fox Business Network.
“It is irresponsible and pretty disgusting things that he did to deny that he had a child for 10 years,” Palin said. “I feel so bad for his children. It must be quite embarrassing for them.”
Schwarzenegger’s revelation about the affair and acknowledgement that it produced a child prompted wife Maria Shriver to leave the couple's home before they announced their separation last week. Schwarzenegger and Shriver jointly announced May 9 that they were splitting up after 25 years of marriage.
The affair, including the fact that the housekeeper was pregnant at the same time Shriver was, has prompted a media frenzy, including a flash mob of sorts when scores of reporters and photographers swarmed a quiet suburban cul-de-sac in the middle of California farm country amid unconfirmed reports it was the home of the love child’s mother.
Monday, May 16, 2011
Pau Gasol and the Tweets ridiculousness
Another "news" story - or I suppose blog story, that was up at CBS Sportsline a few days ago, and which I was unable to share here until too late - i.e., until the story disappeared.
So I'll try to recreate it from memory.
After the Lakers were defeated by the Mavericks, there were stories trying to figure out why. One of the stories was that Pau Gasol had played a lackluster series, because one of his teammates had slept with his wife.
And the story was that the teammate, whose name I'm blanking on, actually tweeted, to his 150,000 subscribers, that he had not slept with Gasol's wife.
And that is just so... unethical. First, to sleep with another person's marriage partner.
Second, to tweet your personal life, that kind of personal life, that you didnt' have sex with someone, to 150,000 people!
But that's what social media has done to the ethics and morals of this country. "Sexting" is the big thing now, where teenage girls will actually take nude photos of themselves (easy to do in this age of digital cameras) and then email them to a boy they'd like to sleep with!
And of course the boy turns around and shares this nude photo with all his friends, and the next day at school all the boys go around to the girl and suggest she come around to their home and "put out". They'll get free sex, she'll get a baby out of it, and they'll all be happy.
So I'll try to recreate it from memory.
After the Lakers were defeated by the Mavericks, there were stories trying to figure out why. One of the stories was that Pau Gasol had played a lackluster series, because one of his teammates had slept with his wife.
And the story was that the teammate, whose name I'm blanking on, actually tweeted, to his 150,000 subscribers, that he had not slept with Gasol's wife.
And that is just so... unethical. First, to sleep with another person's marriage partner.
Second, to tweet your personal life, that kind of personal life, that you didnt' have sex with someone, to 150,000 people!
But that's what social media has done to the ethics and morals of this country. "Sexting" is the big thing now, where teenage girls will actually take nude photos of themselves (easy to do in this age of digital cameras) and then email them to a boy they'd like to sleep with!
And of course the boy turns around and shares this nude photo with all his friends, and the next day at school all the boys go around to the girl and suggest she come around to their home and "put out". They'll get free sex, she'll get a baby out of it, and they'll all be happy.
Since when is a person's sexuality front-page news?
The Phoenix Suns president Rick Welts revealed over the weekend that he's gay, and had been living a "secret life" for years (pretending to be straight) and was interviewed in the New York Times.
And on the CBS Sports.com site, it's not exactly "top of the leaderboard," - the news about the Mavericks advance is, but it's right below that.
Don't misunderstand, I'm all for gay rights. The sad thing is that if a person in a high-profile job is gay, these days you'd think that it would not be newsworthy. But apparently it still is.
In the sports world, it's particularly disasterous for an athlete to come out, as remarks of various other athletes would suggest (as for example the NBA's Tim Hardaway.)
(But having said that...do people deserve to lose their jobs because they express their opinion that gay marriage is wrong, for example? Some Canadian TV reporter tweeted his opposition to gay marriage and was fired for it. That's wrong also. It's not like he'd said terrible things should happen to all gays! But it's like racism... let anyone call you "racist" - and if you criticize a minority for anything - justified or not - you can easily be branded racist - you can quite easily lose your job. People with differing opinions from the current norm should not be fired!)
And on the CBS Sports.com site, it's not exactly "top of the leaderboard," - the news about the Mavericks advance is, but it's right below that.
Don't misunderstand, I'm all for gay rights. The sad thing is that if a person in a high-profile job is gay, these days you'd think that it would not be newsworthy. But apparently it still is.
In the sports world, it's particularly disasterous for an athlete to come out, as remarks of various other athletes would suggest (as for example the NBA's Tim Hardaway.)
(But having said that...do people deserve to lose their jobs because they express their opinion that gay marriage is wrong, for example? Some Canadian TV reporter tweeted his opposition to gay marriage and was fired for it. That's wrong also. It's not like he'd said terrible things should happen to all gays! But it's like racism... let anyone call you "racist" - and if you criticize a minority for anything - justified or not - you can easily be branded racist - you can quite easily lose your job. People with differing opinions from the current norm should not be fired!)
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