Author: Jo Moses

Since this school year began, students from kindergarten to college have had to cope with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their education. Confined to their homes and dorm rooms, students across the nation have entered online school. After all, this is America, a nation built on lethal productivity. Taking a year off of school would be simply unthinkable.

On June 30, 2020, Candywriter released a gay pride-themed update for their popular life simulation mobile app, Bitlife; as a longtime fan of the game, I was greatly disappointed. The update was downright offensive, and as of September, the game (which updates quite frequently) remains unchanged…

What you need to know is right there in the podcast description: “A leftist podcast about your mee-maw’s genocidal Facebook feed.” Today’s mainstream media will rarely acknowledge the violence proliferating on social media. From Nazis recruiting teenage boys on 4Chan to anti-abortion minion memes from your grandma, it is undeniable that conservatives on social media have coalesced into a political force that frequently results in real-life harm, with those called the “alt-right” as its actors. As the Minion Death Cult puts it: “The world is ending. Your uncle’s Facebook feed is responsible. We’re documenting it.”

Last week it was announced that “Game of Thrones” showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss would be adapting the Chinese novel “The Three-Body Problem” into a Netflix series. Liu Cixin’s epic is “set against the backdrop of China’s Cultural Revolution, a secret military project sends signals into space to establish contact with aliens. An alien civilization on the brink of destruction captures the signal and plans to invade Earth. Meanwhile, on Earth, different camps start forming, planning to either welcome the superior beings and help them take over a world seen as corrupt, or to fight against the invasion. The result is a science fiction masterpiece of enormous scope and vision.”

A letter to the editor: Vladimir Putin’s puppet Donald Trump is a political dead man walking.  November 3rd is the scheduled date of Trump the traitor’s political execution which will be watched live on TV by hundreds of millions of happy people both here at home and around the world.  The end of Trump’s tyranny will be the beginning of hope and change for us all.

This weekend, I watched “Cars.” Since it’s quarantine, and we’re all doing some weird things, I decided to take another look at Pixar’s atrocious 2006 film. Directed by John Lasseter, the world of “Cars” is inconsistent and confusing, and manages to obscure the potentially poignant effect of the relatively simple storyline.

Netflix’s latest reality dating show, “Too Hot To Handle,” features a group of hilariously vapid contestants tasked with finding love while banned from any sexual contact. It was generally enjoyable, if only to scoff at; but unfortunately, I must report that it has joined the trend of mistreatment of bisexual women on reality dating shows.

Netflix’s new show “Midnight Gospel” bills itself as a spiritual successor to creator Pendleton Ward’s “Adventure Time.” The show proudly displays a classic CalArts animation style, complete with neon colors and a gauzy filter. However, “Midnight Gospel” is actually a clumsy translation of its star Duncan Trussell’s podcast into an animated sci-fi fantasy format.

Search “fake feminism” into Google. You’ll find endless think pieces on privilege, Ivanka Trump and Taylor Swift. But the thing that all those articles have in common is highlighting the way feminist rhetoric—any rhetoric—is used by those who promote causes that oppress women.

In 1935, “Sylvia Scarlett“premiered—an epic financial flop of a movie about a woman (played by Katherine Hepburn) who decides that she can help her debt-ridden father by dressing like a young man in order to commit crime more easily (#begaydocrime really rings true, doesn’t it?). In the process, she explores life as a man, and… Continue reading Forgotten queer media: Sylvia Scarlett