While Skaja is in the “real world” with a job that she is getting used to, it will be back to school next month for Boreen, who is working in a pharmacy and has three years of schooling remaining. The Whitecaps had pledged to work around her school schedule. Like Skaja, she cannot relocate to play for a team elsewhere, and Boreen said that just being a student, as opposed to being a student-athlete, will be a change.
Don’t forget the first victims when you go see Oppenheimer this opening weekend. Unforgivable not to include them in the narrative.
We love us some Nolan and Cillian but this is also a story that should never have taken place.
For further reading:
This is what happens when the US government goes nuclear-crazy during the Cold War and mines a shit ton of uranium. Lambs born with three legs and no eyes, and human stillbirths and agonizing deformities for those that survive. For decades it was referred to as a Navajo-specific hereditary illness. No one made the link to the mines and the drinking water.
!!!! Yes this! We know that the test sites are settings in the film. It’s not just shitty to omit it but it leaves this really nasty impression of “Oh well nobody KNEW,” which is absolutely inaccurate to reality. They didn’t know people would get leukemia in a decade, maybe, but you bet the military knew whether or not an area was populated before conducting a highly secretive and sensitive operation there. And they did not tell people about it.
I also don’t get the choices stated in the reviews to not depict the physical aftermath of the bomb in Japan, including stuff Oppenheimer himself obviously would’ve known about because he advocated against the use of the bomb in future. To be clear, he only had the guilt kick in later, and pushed for full-scale bombing in 1945. They have a “hallucination of his interior world falling apart” when the bomb is dropped according to a (glowing) Polygon review, for example, but given that Oppenheimer did in fact go to Japan in the 60s (though he declined an invitation to visit Hiroshima).
It took about a year until after the bombs were dropped on Japan for the general public to have access to images and videos of the bombings (taken and suppressed by the military), and John Hersey, a war reporter, also published a long piece describing the aftermath on the ground in graphic detail the same year. Even assuming the real life Oppenheimer had no extra informational access from his association with the military and government, if the film goes through the Cold War persecution of anti-nuclear (& primarily Jewish) scientists under McCarthy, there’s no reason to assume he’d never have seen or heard anything about it. And there is a lot of footage, photographs etc—you wouldn’t have to recreate it for a movie. That omission is deliberate.
This Mother Jones review about how it refuses to take modern historians’ work into account in order to promote outdated claims about how “necessary” the bomb was (making and using):
First on Trinity:
Notably, the new film barely touches on arguments that were expressed back then, not in retrospect, against using the bomb. Ditto the deadly radiation the new weapon produced, and the secrecy that surrounded it—starting with the Trinity test, when a radioactive cloud drifted over nearby villagers who were not warned, and were then lied to about the fallout effects. This combination of lethality and secrecy would have extensive and tragic results in the decades after Hiroshima.
Straight up barely mentioning Nagasaki, the more “controversial” bombing (even some people who argue the bombing of Hiroshima was wholly necessary bullshit have qualms about if leveling a second city was ‘too much’ and one city was ‘enough’)
Nagasaki’s fate is also ignored, save three or four brief and rather forced mentions in the final hour of the picture… In real life, it was the death toll from that second bomb that got to Oppenheimer’s conscience—however ambivalent he remained about the bomb’s deployment more broadly.
And on the “no other options” myth:
But Nolan’s most significant failing lies in not confronting—and in some ways sustaining—the popular narrative around the decision to drop the bombs, one that endures in government and media circles and among many historians, and is thereby reflected in public opinion polls.
That narrative holds that it was the detonation of the two bombs, and only that, which brought the Pacific war to an end. Simple cause-and-effect. The key scene in this regard in Nolan’s film, largely accurate, depicts the late-May 1945 meeting of the Interim Committee, President Harry Truman’s top advisory panel on the matter. One or two advisers question the necessity of deploying such a terrible weapon against Japanese cities, but their doubts are silenced by an officer who insists the Japanese won’t surrender otherwise, and a host of American soldiers will then have to die storming the country’s beaches. The panel is reminded of how savagely the Japanese have fought to the last man in other circumstances.
When one attendee suggests using a “demonstration” blast instead to compel a Japanese surrender, Oppenheimer shoots this down. The Japanese will only give up, he argues, if they see the full, city-destroying effects of the bomb. And suppose it’s a dud? Or, forewarned by a demonstration blast, the Japanese are able to track and shoot down the bomber shuttling the real thing? Another panelist remarks that he might very well be in that plane. End of argument.
These arguments form the core of the story that has held sway since 1945, despite new evidence and compelling arguments raised by numerous historians. From Nolan’s movie, you’d never know that many historians today believe that if Truman had waited just three days after Hiroshima for the Soviets to enter the war as the US insisted, the Japanese would likely have surrendered in about the same time frame. (That bloody invasion cited in the movie was still more than three months off.) Truman himself wrote in his diary in mid-July, after the Trinity test, that when the Soviet Union declared war it would mean “Fini J*ps”—even without the bomb.
(emphasis & slur-censor mine)
And this bit which honestly makes for a good TL;DR
The main takeaway, relayed with passion and never contradicted, is that the bomb prevented an invasion, saved countless US lives, and ended the war. Yes, many Japanese died, and the script eventually puts a number on it, but Nolan fails to point out that 85 percent were civilians. Oppenheimer’s ambiguous qualms—mainly about making bigger bombs after Hiroshima—do little to disrupt the powerful central narrative.
This is pure art.
For those curious, this was taken at the Oceti Sakowin camp during the No DAPL protests in Cannon Ball, North Dakota. The photograph is titled “Defend the Sacred” by Ryan Vizzions. I did not find the name of the subject on horseback.
Her name was Marissa Blacklance. #Dakota38 rider, & front line water protector at Standing Rock. She was killed by a drunk driver in January of 2018. Her mother is using this tragedy to make changes benefitting our community with the Yellow Scarf tribute.
God I really wish carrying stuffed animals around with you was socially acceptable
I don’t mean to take over a post, but I actually did a project on this for my sociology of deviance class in college!
I carried a large stuffed rabbit whenever I went in public for about a week to observe the reaction of others. The point of the project was to do something harmless yet unusual to see if the action would be considered deviant, in which case someone had to try to correct or shame the behavior.
Long story short, nobody tried to correct my behavior. I was asked about it casually, had a few lingering stares thrown my way and when I was with my boyfriend, shop employees would direct questions to him instead of me. However, nobody refused to assist me when I was alone in a store, nobody said anything about the rabbit besides “oh, thats a cute bunny!” and I attended college classes without even a teacher questioning it.
In conclusion, it is socially acceptable to carry a stuffed animal, its just not a societal norm. ^^
DOING IT
My friend gave me a stuffed monkey plushy when I was struggling with uni, and I took him everywhere for like four years, usually velcrod to my backpack. No one said a damn thing, except my renaissance professor who saw it one day in the hallway and cracked the fuck up because I had a literal monkey on my back and he just looked at me like, “oh god, me too”. I used to leave him on desks during classes and exams (the monkey, not my prof). It was my reminder that someone cared if I was coping. But more than that it was soothing to have something to fidget with that wasn’t a pen. I used to ping those fucking things across the room I was so agitated. Harder to hurt people with a projectile stuffed monkey.
I got what I thought was a normal screen cleaning kit for my computer while I was in college. Much to my delight, instead of a little washcloth or whatever, the kit came with a tiny stuffed pig.
So I carried this pig in my backpack all through college, periodically taking it out, spraying my screen, and using the pig to wipe it off.
Now, I kept the pig in the side pocket of my bag where he was completely visible.
Then one day in screenwriting class I pulled him out to wipe my screen.
One of the guys sitting next to me looked appalled. “You’re wiping it off with your little stuffed animal??”
I explained what the pig was.
Turns out, the guy had noticed it and just thought it was adorable I carried a stuffed animal with me every day. He’d never mentioned it before.
Honestly, people do not care, and will not say anything. No matter the reason for your little stuffed animal friend.
And if you’re still really nervous about it keep a stuffed animal keychain on your bag. I have a cute little frog that stays on my backpack so when work gets stressful I can squeeze it.
For my anxious followers.
Confirmed. I take my Venom tsum tsum to uni when I need a little mental boost. The little goo always brings me good luck and overall makes my day just a tiny bit better. I haven’t received a single comment about them so far.
Bring your stuffed buddies to class/work/whatever, guys. People don’t care.
I have a couple of Ikea sharks* and have had cause to periodically carry them around in public - one of which I bought with the last $15 I had at the time, after making a series of big life changes. “This is frivolous and I don’t have to care about that because I’m getting paid shortly—I’m going to do it!”
The reactions I get range from amusement through delight and “WHERE DID YOU GET THAT” but so far, never disapproval.
The moral of the story is Carry Your Emotional Support Plushie With Pride, You Deserve It.
*pictured: not my shark
true story: I once had an appallingly awful day at the hell job and it coincided with my giant squishy Baymax being delivered from China, and no lie I hugged on that Baymax to keep from crying until it was time to leave
I travel with DC (”Don’t Care”) the Emotional Support Honey Badger. I go through TSA with him attached to my backpack, I hug him when I sleep in transit, I prop him next to me in cafes in cities, towns, and rural areas. The only time anyone’s ever so much as raised an eyebrow at me was the TSA agent who recognized what he was, and asked it he could get his picture taken with him.
People don’t judge. Kids think you’re awesome. You get a companion who never judges you. It’s all win.
I know probably everyone has seen this post already, but its too good not to reblog.
Don’t be afraid to carry your comfort items around with you! :D I take some of my stuffed friends to work sometimes, and no one ever bats an eye at them!
*looks at my pink teddy bear I named Ruby* you’re coming to college with me and that’s not a choice
This post made me cry bcuz sometimes i feel bad for having stuffed animals/plushies
i needed this a lot
Got a new sword for fencing 🥰
Because I’m ambidextrous, I ended up having to get a custom rapier because I didn’t like the designs that are regularly available that can be used on either hand. Look, if I’m gonna buy a sword, I also want it to look nice.
Bonus pics of Addy deciding to try to nom. Fencing sword is dull and not sharpened. He’s fine
