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Archives for July 2015

The Health Craze is Not Just a Phase, But a Gaze into History

July 29, 2015 by Nicole Yapijakis

Merriam Webster needs to make revisions to its dictionaries because society has altered the definitions of beauty and success once again due to the increased popularity of the health craze.

As a new resident of the Chelsea/ Flatiron neighborhood, I wasn’t surprised to find numerous Starbucks locations at my disposal, yet when I explored the area they appeared scarce compared to the overpopulation of juice bars. I never expected to stumble upon 7 spinning studios – 3 of which were SoulCycle.

spinning-771470_640SoulCycle reinvented indoor cycling when it opened its first studio in 2006 and became one of the top 10 NYC Google Searches of 2012. Ever since then, spinning studios have become part of the New York City lifestyle.

Companies like Juice Press and Blue Print have become popular names in the juice industry and they too are being integrated into our lives. They no longer just offer a trendy beverage for those who can afford it at $10 a bottle, but the companies, like spinning studios, have become part of our regimen.

“We see detoxing as a path to transcendence, a symbol of modern urban virtue and self transformation through abstinence…we indulge in expensive cold pressed juices and SoulCycle classes, justifying these purchases as investments in our health,” says Lizzie Crocker, journalist at the Daily Beast.

These days it seems like trends are ever so fleeting, but a few like these have become a part of who we are as a community.When you look into history, you see the trends that defined beauty and success have transformed drastically, while reflecting the times.

Look at the corset for example. In the 16th century it was meant to create a cylindrical figure, while flattening and raising the bust line. By the 18th century it transformed into an unhealthy device that created a hourglass figure. A trend that became a part of society for over 2 centuries evolved and changed to the point where it no longer was one.

In the past, a full figure meant you were wealthy enough to eat rich food. Due to this, such a figure became the definition of beauty and success for both women and men. Yet now, being skinny and fit has become the epitome of beauty. Just like in history, only those who can afford it have the opportunity to  become society’s ideal image.

In an interview with the Huffington Post, Eugene Lee Yang, video producer at BuzzFeed, said, “We’re so often preoccupied with current trends that we lose perspective on how fleeting our obsession with physical perfection has historically been.”

This recent health craze isn’t just a trend that reflects how we are fixated on obtaining society’s idea of perfection, but how perfection is made for the rich. If Merriam Webster needs help revising its definitions, here is a suggestion, “Beauty & Success: If you can afford it!”

 

Filed Under: Commentary and reviews, Culture and Entertainment, Featured, Lifestyles, Uncategorized Tagged With: Beauty, Chelsea, Craze, Fitness, Flatiron, Health, History, Juices, lifestyle, manhattan, New York City, Perfection, Society, SoulCycle, Success, Trends

Blast from the Past: Does Back to the Future still holds up as an 80’s cultural icon?

July 29, 2015 by KIMBERLY CHAVEZ

delorean-38103_1280“Roads? Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.”

These are the last lines from the 80’s sci-fi film Back to the Future. The film is having its 30th anniversary this month and the main cast has reunited in London to celebrate it. But one question remains: does the film still hold up as a film classic after all this time or is it as dated as the time traveling tropes that the movie created?

    Back to the Future is about a teenager named Marty McFly, played by Michael J. Fox, and his eccentric scientist pal, Dr. Emmett Brown played by Christopher Lloyd, and Brown’s time machine, a DeLorean, which lands Marty in 1955 with seemingly no way to return to 1985. While in 1955, Marty encounters his teenage parents, Lorraine and George played by Lea Thompson and Crispin Glover respectively, and he has to make sure his parents get together or else he may cease to exist.

After its release on July 3rd 1985, the movie became a cultural icon and even the president at the time, Ronald Reagan, even quoted the film in his 1986 State of the Union address stating, “Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.” The film became the top grossing movie of 1985 and spawned two sequels, multiple video games, and helped the DeLorean gain its iconic status.

   Back to the Future got everything right in terms of casting, script, and special effects. Fox and Lloyd had an undeniable chemistry and were able to play off each other in terms of comedic timing. Their characters were also believable in terms of actions and dialogue. The script was full of classic quotes, such as “I’m your density. I mean, your destiny.” and “If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits 88 mph… you’re gonna see some serious s#!t”

It didn’t feel as if the story was hard to follow or understand for traditional audiences. The special effects like the lighting hitting the clock tower and sending Marty back in time may feel dated for people accustomed to the CGI of today but for the time and what it was trying to accomplish, it worked beautifully. The movie doesn’t feel like a traditional sci-fi movie because it also has action, adventure and comedy. This allowed it appeal to a wider audience.

So Back to the Future still deserves its iconic status, even 30 years after its release because it can appeal to a wide audience and has the potential to bring in a new generation of fans because it has a unique story. It was also the forefather for the devices that time-travel films released after Back to the Future utilize like Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Project Almanac. Therefore, Back to the Future deserves the praise and recognition it gets from critics and audiences alike.

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Commentary, Commentary and reviews, Culture and Entertainment, Featured

Cultural Appropriation: Kylie Jenner

July 29, 2015 by o.stlouis

Oriella St Louis

When you have over 30 million followers, your actions have consequences. Especially in the case of Kylie Jenner and cultural appropriation. The media has always chosen to use the strictest definition of the phrase, especially in the case of celebrities. Particularly Kylie, a young woman who is primarily known for her beautiful, powerful, and often times controversial family.

Kylie has sparked controversy in the last few months for a variety of reasons. These include getting her lips enlarged at the ripe age of 17, and dating a 25 year old man with an ex wife and a kid. As startling as these actions are, that’s not why she’s getting heat. The young woman has recently been accused of being, for lack of better word, racist. Her prominent presence on social media has only backed this theory. Her posts vary from pictures of herself with braids in her hair, grills (an accessory for your teeth that premiered primarily in black culture), and even the shape and size of her backside.

These actions could be seen merely as showing her appreciation for black culture. However, Jenner fails to address the fact that this isn’t her culture. She often remains silent when it comes to black issues, and denies that she has any involvement with the culture at all. And it’s not just the media that’s voiced their concerns but her peers as well.

Amandla Stenberg a young actress who is known for running in the same social circles as Jenner, publicly expressed her disdain for Kylie’s recent photographs. Under a picture of Kylie with braids, Amandla comments, “[W]hen u appropriate black features and culture but fail to use your position of power to help black Americans by directing attention towards our wigs instead of police brutality or racism. #whitegirlsdoitbetter”. The comment sparked controversy on Instagram and Twitter causing Jenner to be bashed by thousands of fans.

While I believe her incessant interest and dabbling in black culture has earned her some backlash, I’m left pondering whether a 17-year-old should be so brutally scrutinized in the media. Despite her adult-like behaviors, she is still just a child.

Surely there is another place the media can focus their attention. Why are we discussing the braids in Kylie Jenner’s hair? There are more important issues to discuss such as the obscure death of Sandra Bland, who is speculated to have died in police custody rather than the reports that she committed suicide in her jail cell.

In times like these where the voices of the oppressed are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore, why are people so fixated on one person? She is not yet an adult, and is without a doubt not done learning all there is to know about the world and the ignorance that exists within it.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Maradona: The Greatest Soccer Player

July 29, 2015 by Leo Catapano

File: Diego Maradona Napoli 1987-1988.jpg
Maradona playing for Napoli.

 

In June, Lionel Messi and his Barcelona team won their fourth Champions League (European Soccer Club Cup) final together. Messi was the deciding factor in the game against the Italian side, Juventus and immediately comparisons were made to the all time greats, Pele and Maradona. Many fans and pundits alike began to ask, is Messi the best of all time? Despite Messi’s unquestionable ability that title can go to only one player, Diego Armado Maradona.

The usual candidates for the best player all time are the Brazilian Pele, the Argentine Maradona and his compatriot Messi. All three players were dominant in their respective leagues and time periods. All of them have an uncountable amount of trophies and goals. However, at the end of the day Maradona wins out for the best ever.

In terms of goals scored, Maradona lags behind Messi and Pele. Pele scored an incomprehensible one thousand goals in his career. Likewise, Messi has scored an astonishing four hundred goals so far. When compared to these two legends, Maradona’s mere hundred goals seems poor.

However, one must take into account the players’ different positions. Pele was a striker and his chief objective was to score goals. Likewise, Messi plays as a false nine, a form of striker, and is also expected to score goals. In contrast, Maradona played as an attacking midfielder and as such had other responsibilities than scoring goals. His main role was to set up his teammates and apply pressure on the opposition’s defenders with his speed and dribbling.

One must also take into account the league and era in which each player played. In his prime in the 1960s, Pele played in the Brazilian league for Santos. At that time, and still today, the Brazilian managers put a greater emphasis on attacking than defending. As a result games were often high scoring, which inflates Pele’s stats. Messi plays in the Spanish league in which the games are balanced between attack and defense, as managers often put their emphasis on the midfield. In contrast, Maradona played for the Italian team Napoli during his prime in the mid to late 1980s. At that time the Italian league was considered to be the most competitive league in the world, and managers put their priority in defense. This lead to low scoring games and deflates Maradona’s stats.

Finally, one must look at the trophies that the players have won. The most important trophy is the World Cup, of which Pele won two, Maradona one, and Messi none. By this logic Pele would be considered the best player, but further analysis is required. Pele won the World Cup with Brazil in 1958 and 1970. Both teams are widely considered among the best teams ever, and included many other legends. For example, Brazil’s second striker Rivelino scored more goals than Pele in the 1970 World Cup. By contrast, Maradona almost singlehandedly won the World Cup for Argentina in 1986. There were no other household names on his team and he was the sole driving force behind their victory, scoring five goals and winning the player of the tournament award. Steven Pye of the Guardian said, “ It may be a little simplistic to state that the man single-handedly won the World Cup for his country, but that is what it felt like at the time. Think of Mexico 86 and Maradona always springs to mind.”

While Messi and Pele are both wildly good players, Maradona takes the title of the best player of all time. In the 1986 World Cup he was unstoppable for Argentina and he dominated the Italian league throughout the 1980s. Despite being a cocaine addict, cheat, and tax evader Maradona has survived to the age of fifty. Even today his name evokes emotions in soccer fans all over the world. Steven Pye said, “I may have detested the little genius at the time and wasted Blu-Tack on him, but if I’m ever asked who I think is the greatest footballer ever I always answer Diego Maradona.”

 

Filed Under: Commentary, Sports

Corporations and Elections: a Questionable Democracy

July 29, 2015 by Anastasia Krasilnikova

Money and politics. They are like rats and the NYC subway- nobody wants to see them together but history shows that they are inseparable. And with presidential race in full swing, more politicians are proving that money is far more valuable than a clear vision on current problems.

There is nothing wrong with supporting your favorite candidate by donating to his/her fund or a Political Action Committee (PAC). Democracy suffers, however, when powerful and wealthy players become donors as they overshadow everyone else.1280px-American_corporate_flag

Corporations, based on Supreme Court decision in Citizens United (2010), are people and, therefore, may exercise their First Amendment rights of free speech; many corporations decide to support certain political candidates by donating money.

The problem is corporations are not like people when it comes to incomes. A corporation is a lifeless, emotionless “machine” that has only one purpose– to make money. As the result, donations that many corporations are capable of far exceed the ones of an average citizen. According to 24/7 Wall Street, since 2012 a financial firm, the Goldman Sachs Group Inc. donated $4,769,994 to various political campaigns. Similarly, a casino and resort operator Las Vegas Sands Corp., donated $11,738,600. It’s certainly not what the average citizen can afford.

So how do these huge amounts of money hurt America? First, huge donations help donors get better treatment than everyone else. A politician feels the need to help generous donors after a couple of millions are thrown his or her way. This means signing exclusive deals with that corporation, “closing their eyes” to corporation’s misconduct, passing or vetoing a new law. For example, a controversial Keystone pipeline bill that’s been repeatedly vetoed by Obama was passed in Congress with 270 members voting for it. According to Think Progress report, all 270 congressmen received generous donation from big oil company totaling about $31 million.

Does this sound as a democracy?

The second problem is that no politician can advance without big donations. Even the ones with strong moral values fall to the temptation of having better resources. Money enables candidates to run campaigns and bombard voters with ads and commercials. This is evident in current presidential elections; Austin Barbour, a Mississippi-based operative interviewed by USA Today, said that, “anybody who is thinking about running for president has got to have a group of donors out there aggressively backing them.” Running for president costs a lot–some experts say that Obama spent $1 billion on 2012 presidential elections.

The GOP candidates have started fundraising early. According to The Washington Post, $4 out of every $5 raised so far on behalf of GOP White House candidates has gone to independent groups rather than the official campaigns. These independent groups are not supposed to be controlled by the candidate but often are. Independent groups also do have the same restrictions on the amount of money that can be raised that campaigns do; donors donate how much they please and don’t even have to disclose their identity. Do you see the problem with that? Politicians might get millions of dollars from wealthy people whose name is not disclosed to the general public. When we vote, we are clueless about who candidates are working with behind the closed doors.

The Democratic candidates, unlike many believe, catch up with the Republicans on fundraising as they accept money from powerful people. Hillary Clinton, for example, is the first Democrat ever to publicly embrace her Super PAC which is expected to raise $200 million to $300 million. Super PACs are similar to independent groups as there is no limit on donations and donors’ name can be concealed.

Experts say that the current presidential race will be the most expensive one yet. This seems likely. But, as more candidates accept money from profit-thirsty corporations, American democracy breaks apart.

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, News

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