St.Vincent; the Digital Witness

by Lexie Thomas


       St.Vincent, personified by Annie Clark, is known for her polysemous lyrics and complex, intricate arrangement of musical instruments. Clark’s lyrics are often of a mysterious nature sung with an almost odd calmness and clarity, accompanied by “Hendrix-esque” guitar riffs and electronic melodies.  Clark has produced four albums up to date: Marry Me (2007), Actor (2009), Strange Mercy (2011), and the most recent, St.Vincent (2014). Going back to the bittersweet lyrics and the hauntingly beautiful orchestral sound of Marry Me, Digital Witness is a far cry from Clark’s previous work. However, St.Vincent hints back to some of her roots by integrating a robotic version of a “Big Band Era” brass section into many of her songs, being influenced by Clark’s collaboration with David Byrne entitled, Love This Giant. Clark’s most recent album is a collection of dissonance between electric guitar riffs and big brassy climaxes against her voice, which is angelic in its syntax; it sounds charming and clear in slow tempos and powerful and messy in faster ones. Digital Witness is the pinnacle of the electronic transition Clark’s music has taken over the years.

       Digital Witness opens with "Rattlesnake", an electronic and beat-based track that gives you the powerful urge to shake your leg or bob your head. This track is arguably the danciest, having electronic melodies and a satisfying dissonance that makes one want to play a totally justified air guitar. The lyrics are playful; Annie writes about a feeling we all can relate to, the feeling of being in a place by yourself completely, being unable to physically see anyone. But that isn’t the reality; you aren’t the only one in the world, even if it’s a lesson forgotten at times. On the track, Annie runs through the desert, seemingly alone; she decides to take her clothes off. She then sees a rattlesnake, from which she realizes she isn’t the “only one in the only world”. This is an interesting perspective and provides a story that blends funkily into the beat. The second track,one of Clark’s more popular singles, is called Birth In Reverse. It’s an upbeat track that carries one through a knotty and once again funky beat and acerbic synth and guitar solos that grind, but in the good way. Clark’s smooth yet rhythmic vocals contradict her edgy and synthy sound. The lyrics are some of the most deep and interesting off of the album.  She talks about carelessness; living life inside of an organized chaos you as an individual have created. When infants are born, we consider them to be fragile and innocent; a birth in reverse would be someone  who is impure reverting back to what they were like when they were born. Birth In Reverse is quite similar to Digital Witness with its opening bold and brassy statements. “What's the point of doing anything?...If I can't show it, you can't see me. Watch me jump right off the London bridge.” Clark sings, opening up to the reader about how society today posts countless thoughts on social media and how society depends on social reassurance to function properly. She asks, if everyone on social media doesn't care, what's the point of doing it?

These songs are an open and promising trajectory to the amazing and hyper-poetic album of St.Vincent. Her lyrics here are doing something that they've never before touched—they are giving the listener a peak into Clark’s poetic and beautifully quirky mind. She talks about her loneliness, her numbness from the work she does, anthems to her mother, things she wishes she would have said, etc. Clark’s latest album is one of the most relatable albums concerning young adults; some may dismiss the album as a completely weird and outlandish statement. However, they fail to let the rhythmic and intricate melodies move them and dive into the lyrics to see that Clark has regrets, family, issues and feelings that she brings to the table; a table that may not be too different from the one you and your family dine at.

     
Here is a different yet similar opinion on Annie Clark’s St.Vincent

Why SNAFU’s Deconstructive Elements Make it Such a Thought Provoking Show

by Jack Scheibelein

       Despite popular belief, not all Anime is pandering nonsense watched by guys in their twenties and thirties who live in their mom’s basement. No show exemplifies how expectations can flipped on their head better than My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU. The 2013 spring released Anime flew very under the radar and probably didn’t receive the amount of praise that it should have, given its insightful social commentary on the life of teenagers and the things people take for granted, even when coming from a Japanese perspective. Aside from its general likeability the show as much to offer as a Deconstruction of what is known as the slice of life genre.

       Slice of life is more specifically a genre in the medium of Anime in which a few characters simply live out their lives in whatever universe they happen to be in. There is no overarching theme most of the time, the genre is kind of a misnomer. The genre tends to be filled with shows that have a happy ending without really any struggle. It also is more commonly set in the soul sucking vacuum from which no happiness can escape that most people call high school. A few good examples would be shows like K-ON, Lucky Star, Chihayafuru, Kimi no Todoke, and a slew of other shows.

       Just for a bit of background on the plot, the show is about loner high school student named Hachiman Hikigaya. Seeing that he has absolutely no social life whatsoever, his teacher, Shizuka Hiratsuka, forces him to join the school Service Club, whose main goal is to help students at the school with problems that come up in their lives. This creates a story in which Hachiman is forced into solving everyone’s various problems, be it through physical work or through a conflict of ideas. Already in the club is fellow classmate Yukino Yukinoshita who seems to have a similar but slightly less pessimistic outlook on life. The story becomes less about his adventures in a high school club, which is what most Slice of Life stories turn into, and more about the ideological conflict between pessimist to the extreme, someone who is somewhere in the middle, and an optimist in the form of the service club’s third member Yui Yuigahama.

       This is where SNAFU shines the most. It uses what you would typically see from the from the Anime in the Slice of Life genre and creates a show centered around high school philosophy, and also constructs a story and characters that complete subvert your expectations, which is the entire concept of a Deconstruction. Although, this does only refer to the first season(The second season is an entirely different beast to take on).

       The first thing to note about this show is that almost nobody is happy.

Just like actual high schoolers, and unlike the high schoolers of the usual Slice of Life Anime, everybody in the story has their own problems and battles to fight. It’s not all sunshine, unicorns, and rainbows. This is most exemplified in the main character Hachiman. Because he was hit by a car while trying to rescue a dog in the street he is hospitalized for two months and does not start school until more than halfway through the semester. This is the main reason, as he likes to believe, that he does not have friends, but it is a lot more than that. Hachiman’s pessimistic attitude stems mostly from the fact that he got rejected by all the girls he asked out on a date in middle school. His attitude and general lack of confidence or empathy for makes him an outsider to everyone around him, except for Yukino.

       Yukino and Hachiman end up being at odds for most of the show despite being a lot more similar than either one likes to admit. It is because of this similarity and also her somewhat outcast status that she can relate to his pleas.

       Because the show centers mostly around the actions of the Service Club, it is through the way in which they help people with their problems that we see the members individual ideologies and how they perceive the world around them, and in credit to the two main characters more largely negative perceptions that we see a more realistic view of high school and a rather large shift from the happy go lucky attitude of most Slice of Life Anime.

       Another reason that differs in its storytelling is that high school is not the main focus is not on high school specifically. In Fact the dynamic might not be any different even if it was a story focused around a local charity. High School is really only used as an entry point into the minds of the teenagers and how they interact with each other.

       The purpose of the Anime is not to paint a picture of an absent-minded high school existence where the only thing they worry about is social status and grades good enough to get into college. Rather, as what constitutes a Deconstruction, SNAFU uses the high school setting as a battle ground for different outlooks on life.

       This is shown best in episode five, where Hachiman is confronted with his friend from middle school who needs his help in looking at his novel that he is attempting to write. In this case Hachiman’s friend still has a very child-like outlook on life, mostly because he has not grown out of his middle school mindset. In this cased high school is used as a barrier to separate Hachiman from his friend in their views of the future, with high school representing a descent into reality.

       The last thing that makes SNAFU stand out from the crowd is, of course, the philosophy. The shows overall message seems to be that there really is no one way to live life and that, in the end, is not ruled by a single narrative.

       Hachiman believes that nobody likes him and that his social outcast status has relegated him to bearing everyone’s burden. In his eyes, it is only logical that he should be treated as everyone’s slave, further enforcing the idea that he should stay in the club. Yukino, as mentioned previously, has a similar idea. In her case it is because of her popularity among a large population of their school and her wealthy status that she has been cast out as one of the “other.” This causes her to believe that she does not care about the opinions, while it is fairly obvious that Hachiman cares at least a little. Yui, who as a main character is largely ignored after the first couple of episodes, has a dependence on others for acceptance. At first she believes that she can only be validated through other people. Her ideas later change after talking to both Yukino and Hachiman for a long time. She goes from reliant to independent by the end of the first season.

       Life is a series of trials and errors where the errors seem to have more weight than any long string of successes. My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU presents an oddly more real “Slice of Life” than any other show in the genre, making it an amazing Deconstruction and even better Anime.

Here's a different take on SNAFU from Animenewsnetwork.

Candide and the Plight of Optimism

by Daniel Nicolette

       We all love a little blast to the past, but how about 300 years into it? Voltaire's Candide is a clever look into the Era of Enlightenment criticizing just about everything. Wars are bloodbaths with no winners, powerful religious figures are hypocrites, and death is just another day in the life of everyone. (except the guy who just died) Such sentiments weren't appreciated by the rulers and religious figures of 1700s Europe, so the book was harshly received by the establishment of the time.

       Voltaire's humor shines through when what seems to be hyperbole strikes the reader as truth. "What! Have you no monks who teach, who dispute, who govern, who cabal, and who burn people that are not of their opinion?" His commentary comes through the eyes of a candid man who continues to questions like these to various characters and in turn, to the reader.
       While Voltaire pokes fun of many social issues facing European society, his strongest message resonates today amongst readers. Candide, the candid man wandering to find his love, follows a philosophy of pure optimism. A mentality that everything was done for a reason, even the most brutal of savagery and horror. While important to see the glass half-full, overflowing the glass leads to incompetence and unwilling to take action against the unjusts thrust upon you in your daily life. This panglossian attitude, amply named after the philosopher Pangloss in the novel, is as dangerous today as portrayed in the book.
       "Optimism, It is the obstinacy of maintaining that everything is best when it is worst." To accept the worst as the nature of God or a predestined path forces you not to consider why such things are that way. Forgoing logic and reason due to tradition or feeling is a common theme seen in modern media. Voltaire was always one to combat tyranny and superstition, and this gleams in his work.
       Overall, Candide is an excellent afternoon read if you can push through 1700s French translated into English. A true classic to survive another 300 years. Stay a little skeptical of tradition, and it'll help you look at things clearer in the future.

Care for a different take? Click here to check out the historical context from The Guardian.

You're Never Getting Off This Train: The Psychology of the Hunger Games

by Loren Haas

"You're not leaving me here alone," I say. Because if he dies, I'll never go home, not really. I'll spend the rest of my life in this arena, trying to think my way out." -The Hunger Games

     Katniss Everdeen is one of many heroines who has become incredibly popular in a young adult literature. However, there is a price for being a hero. Like those coming back from military service, the choices you make and the things you see can and often will haunt you forever; PTSD is common among veterans and hard to understand for those who do not suffer from it and even sometimes for those who do, as it can take different forms for anyone - and everyone.

     Katniss Everdeen has perhaps the most obvious PTSD, as the reader witnesses the world of Panem from her mind and knows how she thinks, how she feels. The reader is aware of the nature of her nightmares and every detail of what haunts her from her experiences in the Games. However, even if the reader was not witnessing the events from her perspective, the reader could identify the signs of PTSD. The ADAA (Anxiety and Depression Association of America) gives three main symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder: reliving the traumatic experience (in ways such as flashbacks or nightmares), avoidance of people, activities, or places that are associated with the trauma, and "increased arousal," which presents itself as insomnia, difficulty concentrating, jumpiness, and being easily irritated or angered. Katniss Everdeen meets all these basic criteria: 1) she has nightmares throughout the Victory Tour, and, in the Catching Fire movie, she mistakes an animal she is shooting for Marvel and misses her shot, 2) Katniss cannot stay in her home in the novel when pressure gets high and conditions in Twelve worsen, so she goes out into the woods, which is not connected to her victory in the Games, and 3) Katniss frequently gets irritated and sometimes angry with Gale, Peeta, and the other Victors, and shatters a window upon President Snow's announcement that the 75th Hunger Games will have the Victors return to the Arena. Katniss experiences more symptoms than those basic three, however; she also experiences incredible and consuming guilt and feelings of worthlessness from her time in the Arena and stops participating in her regular activities, such as hunting with Gale.

Katniss Everdeen after a nightmare in District Thirteen

But the true beauty of Suzanne Collins's portrayal of PTSD does not come from Katniss alone; it is that she is able to represent post-traumatic stress in all of her characters who have experienced the bloodshed of the Hunger Games and the horrors of the Capitol. Coping with trauma through alcoholism is a path taken by many veterans returning from war and Haymitch Abernathy alike; more than two out of every ten veterans with PTSD also develop Substance Abuse Disorder, and veterans have a tendency to become binge-drinkers. Alcoholism has become a major outlet for the pain war and tragedy leaves behind, and Haymitch represents this tendency along with the pain behind it perfectly.

Haymitch drinking while mentoring Katniss

       Substance Abuse Disorder connected with PTSD does not just mean alcoholism; drug abuse is also common with A SUD. Johanna Mason begins to abuse narcotics after being tortured by the Capitol. She has displayed prior symptoms prior to abusing the painkillers in District Thirteen; she claimed to have no one left she loved, a sign of the dissociation from reminders of the Games and perhaps just from society in general that she and Katniss both experience. Also, Johanna is constantly portrayed with a deep, burning hatred and anger towards the Capitol and those she could possibly associate it with. in the words of Jena Malone, who played Johanna mason in the films, "As soon as I started understanding what that horror is, what that anger is, I realized that she had developed all these ways to be able to survive. She's using her humor, her combativeness, and her unpredictability to keep people at arm's length, but also to protect herself."

Johanna Mason before Katniss's interview

       All characters - and all people - respond to traumas differently. Some people blame themselves, and some people blame others. Some people get angry with the world, and some fall into a depression. Some seek out medical help and others self-medicate. The price for being a hero is one that is always paid in novels and in life, and everyone pays that price in their own way. In the end, one lesson all books teach us is that pain is relative.


Want to read more about PTSD in The Hunger Games? Check out here and here!

Star Wars: Why Casting Female Leads Changed Everything

by Kaitlyn Wheeler

        How excited were you when Disney announced its creation of not just Star WarsEpisodes 7, 8, and 9, but also the spin off movies such as Rouge One? Chances are, a majority of you were ecstatic. After all, this is Star Wars we're talking about! It's one of the most successful, innovative series ever made! But one game changer that the creators of this next generation of movies made was the casting of female lead characters, which raised controversy. In fact, when Daisy Ripley was cast as the star of Force Awakens, there was fan outrage. It became so bad, that co-star John Boyega had to make several statements regarding the fans' outrageous hate surrounding Daisy, and his own casting (the hate regarding him revolved around his skin color). The outrage quickly escalated when they announced Felicity Jones as the lead of Rouge One. Many people of the internet claimed that this new consistency of having female leads would deter from the over all Star Wars experience, and blamed the new casting directions on Kathleen Kennedy, the president of Lucasfilm.

       But where many fans see a lack of originality in the double casting of women, what they should see is Star Wars doing what it does best: being innovative. How so, you might ask? Well did you know that between 2007 and 2012, 30.8% of speaking characters in movies were women. Many people argue that this is fair because Fewer women view movies. But this is far from the truth. In fact, about half of movie attenders are female (Statistics provided by the New York Film Academy). But how does this relate to Star Wars being innovative? It does because Star Wars is, by creating a pattern in casting female leads, doing something that has never been done before. It's presenting gender equality in its films. It is showing a plethora of female personas, such as the tough warrior Rey, and even the more feminine Leia. Even in a time where creating new things is difficult, it's being innovative.

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PETA is Not as Harsh as People Make Them Out to Be

by Willow Lewis
                 

       PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), was established in 1980; it is a nonprofit charitable organization, that protest for the rights of animals, and yes, sometimes their methods can be harsh, but they work. For instance, they did "flour-bombed" Kim Kardashian on the red carpet, because she wore fur. The organization operates under the principle that animals are not here for us to eat, wear, experiment on, or for entertainment.  PETA is known to be the most extreme animal rights protest group because they will do whatever it takes to protect and save the animals. The four major areas they focus on are factory farms, laboratories (that test on animals), clothing trade, and entertainment industry, these four areas are where they are suffering the most.  They care for the well-being of the animals and their goal is not to make sure they aren't offending anyone; it is to make sure that animals are heard. They see them as having just as many rights as humans do, and they should be able to live  their life in peace. Animal cruelty has been a growing problem and passive aggressive methods aren't going to get the message across; people aren't going to pay attention unless it's in their face. Allison Mariotti explains how PETA acts like a school bully and is childish. They wouldn't have to be childish if people didn't act like children. Kim Kardashian is known for acting childish. Lady Gaga is wearing a meat dress; that is going to grab attention and some of it is not going to be good. I do understand that PETA could use a different method that is not as violent, but you've got to give them credit for their dedication. PETA is not always the hardcore organization that people make them out to be. They also deal with helping people understand what they are trying to do in a calm manner, and they also help vegans and vegetarians by giving them food choices. PETA gets donation and signatures to help animals in need and they do this just by asking and not by using violence. It needs to be understood that this organization is doing everything it can to make sure animals have a voice. PETA stated that "We can eat better, educate ourselves better, clothe ourselves better, and entertain ourselves better without torturing and killing animals." Without PETA's "outburst" many would look over the animals and their issues. So yes, you could say their methods can be harsh, and many people do not agree with them, but when it comes down to it they are getting things done and getting the message across; and isn't that the most important thing?

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The Tennessee Walking Horse Industry

by Erin Shott

     Tenneseee Walking horses trying to get his or her horse to have a "big lick." This includes soring their feet, putting pads on them, and chains. This is no humane way to go about it. Yet, you see it in shows and training all the time.
 Anybody who owns a horse or is in the horse industry knows of the issue about owners who own
       To the FBI, the official definition of animal cruelty is: "intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly taking an action that mistreats or kills any animal without just cause, such as torturing, tormenting, mutilation, maiming, poisoning, or abandonment. Included are instances of duty to provide care, e.g., shelter, food, water, care if sick or injured, transporting or confining an animal In a manner likely to cause injury or inflicting excessive or repeated unnecessary pain or suffering, e.g., uses objects to beat or injure an animal..." This definition addresses the soring, chains, and pads. These are objects that hurt, burn, and injure the horse just so they can have a "big lick." "
       The show judges are encouraging this technique and behavior out of people, because they give the 1st place ribbon to the horse who has the "big lick" and did not put a stop to this ignorance in the first place. My question is why have they not been shut down yet? This has been going on for years with little progress. But, according to the FBI, and to anybody who cares about the health and well-being of the horse, this is abuse.

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