Collateral Murder

This is a really horrifying video and I hope it gets picked up by the news. I also hope its not deleted from youtube. The Wikileaks people are getting in big trouble over this but the truth has to be heard/seen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rXPrfnU3G0&feature=player_embedded

Collateral Murder

WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff. Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded. For further information please visit the special project website www.collateralmurder.com.

Moments in America: In Screenshot pixelation

More of his stuff can be found here. They are by John Haddock

http://whitelead.com/jrh/screenshots/

Sandow Berk

This is the Life and Fall of Los Angeles
A series of five landscape paintings based on Thomas Cole's series "The Course of Empire".
The series follows the course of Western Civilization as epitomized by the City of Los Angeles, from prehistoric times to the present day, to an imagined future. The setting for each scene is the same view of the L.A. basin and the Hollywood Hills

He also has a piece called Death in a America which is 10 paintings of the leading causes of death in America

http://www.sandowbirk.com/paintings/death-in-america/

Anono-Chat

As you might of as seen from the cable news stations trying to remain relevant with pop culture, Chatroulette has become popular. It's amazing what we'll do for human connections as its the same as walking up to a stranger on the street and trying to strike up a conversation for them, but we rely on a computer to do it for us now, and when it does set us up, we do the weirdest things to hurt people.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qBFNaA7u1E&feature=player_embedded

or entertain them.

No words, just pictures

I don't know where these are from but I found them on the internet and thought they fit the 4am mood.


edit: I found the reference. It's from the Project Gutenberg Ebook of the North American Indian

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19449/19449-h/19449-h.html

There are more pictures inside.

World Water Day

Last Monday was World Water Day. Many Third World Countries live in conditions like this:


Its a boy swimming in Manila Bay, in the Philippines.

Even though its a bit late, be conscious of your water use because here are some facts:

1. Water problems affect half of humanity:

   • Some 1.1 billion people in developing countries have inadequate access to water, and 2.6 billion lack basic sanitation.
   • Almost two in three people lacking access to clean water survive on less than $2 a day, with one in three living on less than $1 a day.
   • More than 660 million people without sanitation live on less than $2 a day, and more than 385 million on less than $1 a day.
   • Access to piped water into the household averages about 85% for the wealthiest 20% of the population, compared with 25% for the poorest 20%.
   • 1.8 billion people who have access to a water source within 1 kilometre, but not in their house or yard, consume around 20 litres per day. In the United Kingdom the average person uses more than 50 litres of water a day flushing toilets (where average daily water usage is about 150 liters a day. The highest average water use in the world is in the US, at 600 liters day.)
   • Some 1.8 million child deaths each year as a result of diarrhea
     
   • The loss of 443 million school days each year from water-related illness.
   • Close to half of all people in developing countries suffering at any given time from a health problem caused by water and sanitation deficits.
   • Millions of women spending several hours a day collecting water.
   • To these human costs can be added the massive economic waste associated with the water and sanitation deficit.… The costs associated with health spending, productivity losses and labour diversions … are greatest in some of the poorest countries. Sub-Saharan Africa loses about 5% of GDP, or some $28.4 billion annually, a figure that exceeds total aid flows and debt relief to the region in 2003

So next time when you're in the bathroom, just be aware.

Bacon? Bacon.

I like bacon as much as the next person but America has a really grotesque obsession with the food and its pretty disgusting to see what they'll do with it and how they consume it. Just looking at it makes me feel a bit weird. It's odd how such a common normal looking food item could be made into something so terrible.

Poor piggy.

Against your own interests

Since Health care reform passed last week there have been a lot of crazy people getting a lot more angrier than usual in the form of protest... for getting health care.

They've been threatening President Barack Obama's life over this. The worst part is that a recent New York Times article reports that they also some of the most impoverished people in the country as well. The people who are most likely going to benefit from this. The article discusses how they're unemployed and how that misdirected frustration is leading to their anger at Obama. There are many things to be upset about over this presidency, but it's ugly how violent these people may become soon.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/28/us/politics/28teaparty.html?pagewanted=1

Two Unrelated Pictures

The first picture is a photoshop but just looking at it really creeps me out. I remember having a nightmare about something like that when I was a kid and when I came across it I had to post it to share.

The second one is a frozen homeless man in Detroit. I wish I had more information, like the year and the circumstances, but it's a shame there was nothing we could do for him and he had to die in such a terrible way.

Zdzislaw Beksinski

I am a huge fan of the fantasy genre as well as some post apocalyptic stuff so Beksinski's art is something I really enjoy. His website contains a lot more pieces. I thought he was a very good surrealist artist as well. He was murdered in 2005. The last picture is my favorite. His style reminds me of that Triumph of Death painting by Pieter Bruegel, another piece that I enjoy. http://www.beksinski.pl/

The Twenty-Eight Famous Murders With Verses

These pictures are from a remade 1988 print collection of The Twenty-Eight Famous Murders With Verses which is based off of the 1866 by Getsuoka Yoshitoshi. It's called "Ero-Guru… a type of Japanese illustration that depicts extreme acts of violence in an erotic manner. The word ero-guru means “erotic grotesque nonsense” and the loosely defined movement goes beyond illustration into literature, film and music."

I wish I had more information on it, or a link to the rest of the series.

A picture you may have seen

(Hopefully this picture comes out animated). We've all seen the still picture as one of the horrors of the Vietnam war but I personally never saw the film (or animated gif) of it. What's really grotesque, besides the obvious, is the following:

"Adams later apologized in person to General Nguyen and his family for the irreparable damage it did to Loan's honor while he was alive. When Nguyen died, Adams praised him as a "hero" of a "just cause"."

To be grotesque is to apologize for the truth.

Mass Graves

I don't know what to say about this picture to do it justice but I find it fascinating. If you start looking at it from the top, the scenery is beautiful. It's a clear blue sky, rolling green hills, but as you scroll down you see dozens of bodies being buried. I hope i'm not doing the "Whoa this is deep, check it out" type of thing, I just find this picture haunting on how it is laid out and taken.

Idealization of body forms

I always find it interesting when I see people outwardly project their notion of the perfect body. I also find that it often leads to the picture i've posted. I think this is more grotesque mentally than physically but I find the picture i've shown gives the reader the feeling I get when I think about the damage the media causes regarding this topic: Disgust. To subtly coerce a population into psychological trauma where many young men and women starve and abuse themselves to look perfect is something I find grotesque.