Nate Foster (Daniel Radcliffe), a young, idealistic FBI agent, goes
undercover to take down a radical white supremacy terrorist group. The
bright up-and-coming analyst must confront the challenge of sticking to a
new identity while maintaining his real principles as he navigates the
dangerous underworld of white supremacy. Inspired by real events,
IMPERIUM stars Daniel Radcliffe, Toni Collette, Tracy Letts, with Nestor
Carbonell, Burn Gorman and Sam Trammell.
Feeling the force of antifascist pressure from NYC Antifa and others, the Black Bear Bar in Brooklyn finally decided to cancel the Oi!Fest 2016 skinhead concert they were hosting. The bar had provided cover to the neo-Nazis organizing the concert, just as they did previously by supporting the neofolk Operation Equinox tour, using the few multi-racial members of the skinhead bands as a cover. As people have noticed, this group of nationalist skinheads have reached out to nationalists of color to create a more “multi-racial” fascist subculture, and one that often confuses those looking for traditional racial separatism.
It was this multiracial character that Black Bear used to defend themselves as antifascists descended on their social media. On Facebook, they spent all evening defending themselves against allegations of aiding Nazi gangs. People from around the country, but especially New York, posted on there, sharing stories of Black Bear regularly supporting “Rock Against Communism” shows and using traditional Nazi insignia in the bar. The bar repeatedly tried to point to Asian and Latin American members of some of the bands as proof that this was a non-racist skinhead show, yet members of the community immediately posted information about neo-Nazism in Latin and Asian communities that they were attempting to create alliances with.
In a recent article, the Southern Poverty Law Center took a special look at the inclusion of people of color in this otherwise racialist scene . They pointed out that many of these street fascist movements, which this brand of skinheads inhabit in the United States, have had several attempts to “rebrand” themselves using a tenuous multi-racial alliance.
From the 1980s to the mid-2000s, the dominant brand within the far-right sector of skinhead subculture was neo-nazism, and such interracial co-mingling would have been unthinkable. In truth, there have always been skinheads of varying degrees of “whiteness” across the world who have sought to uphold strains of far-right politics.
A prime example of how race is falling away as the dominant organizer within the extremist skinhead music scene occurred in 2013.
Bound For Glory, one the first neo-nazi skinhead bands to emerge here, toured Japan with Aggro Knuckle, one of that country’s oldest skinhead bands. The two also released a split-record together. In that way, NYC Oi! Fest is an important microcosm of the landscape of “hate music” worldwide. Last year’s installment brought bands to New York City from as far away as Finland and Mexico.
“Oi,” after all, encapsulates a broad range of skinhead-oriented punk and rock ‘n’ roll. Most Oi! fests and concerts book bands who offer little-to-no political overtones or messages. Their songs and the shows themselves often revolve around drinking and other subcultural markers, like banal expressions of patriotism. By inserting “Oi!” into its title, the fest’s promotors –– Dennis Davila of United Riot Records chief among them –– are putting forth their version of what skinhead identity and music should exist as, while directing hostility towards outsider and those they “other.”
There is, of course, historical precedent for this. Efforts to reframe skinhead identity and music were first undertaken by the neo-Nazi political party National Front in England in the early 1980s. The efforts of those organizing NYC Oi! Fest –– a long-standing crew calling itself the 211 Bootboys, of which Davilia is a member –– aren’t wholly dissimilar from the National Front’s attempts to attract skinheads to their worldview.
They go on to outline the violent homophobic and nationalist lyrics of bands in the Oi!Fest line-up, including Brassic. They have allowed Nazi skinhead crews to make Oi!Fest an annual meet-up point, and bands like Brassic have had explicit Nazis set up their shows around Europe.
Anti-fascist writer Spencer Sunshine outlines the complicated nature of these seeming “multi-racial” alliances that we are seeing in this skinhead event, as well as in circles like National Anarchism and radical traditionalist circles.
Today, neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan are no longer the only groups that endorse White separatism. This is partly due to the secessionist fever that has spread across the U.S. Right, uniting Right Libertarians, conspiracy theorists, Christian theocrats, Sovereign Citizens, neo-Confederates, and traditional White separatists. New groups advocate “pan-secessionist” ideology, and seek to unite the right-wing secessionists with those traditionally closer to the Left, like (bio)regional separatism in Vermont and Cascadia, former Leftist Kirkpatrick Sale’s decentralist Middlebury Institute, and nationalist organizing by those who, in the old anti-imperialist terminology, are “oppressed nations” (Native Americans, African-Americans, Latinos, and other people of color).
However, the most contentious question today is the direct participation of people of color in groups that espouse White separatism as part of their ideology. Loosely organized groups like National-Anarchists, Attack the System, and New Resistance, which actively embrace White separatism as part of their decentralized schema, should be excluded from progressive circles—including people of color who are members of these groups. This also includes members of groups that are multi-racial, but which promote this political view.
In addition to these groups, some people of color are involved in openly fascist circles. Neo-Nazi groups are active in countries such as Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Colombia, Mongolia, and Malaysia; and members of these movements reportedly have ties in the United States.
In the past, Leftists excluded White people affiliated with groups that espoused White separatism, such as White Aryan Resistance (WAR) and Aryan Nations. But this new secessionism is more complicated; for example, it has led to the spectacle of people of color advocating for the legitimacy of White separatism—by claiming either that all separatism is good separatism, or that a program of complete reciprocal racial separatism requires that all groups have their own geographical enclave.
Cooperation between racial separatists of differing backgrounds is a long-standing tradition. In the 1930s, when Mississippi’s arch-racist Senator Theodore Bilbo publicly called for the expulsion of African-Americans to Africa, members of Marcus Garvey’s movement (themselves proponents of African-American emigration to Africa) approached Bilbo as a potential collaborator. The Nation of Islam (NOI) also has a history of associating with White nationalists, including the Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party; Malcolm X cited these associations as one of the reasons he became disgruntled with NOI. WAR’s Tom Metzger has supported and donated money to NOI and has addressed the New Black Panther Party (NBPP). In Florida, one Black separatist organization even held joint demonstrations with a local Klan group.
However, calling for the exclusion of all supporters of White separatism should not be mistaken for a call for progressives to exclude activists who endorse nationalist forms of separatism for people of color, including Black, Native American, or Latino nationalists. It is only the advocacy of White racial separatism that is at issue. While the acceptance of what is called the “right to national self-determination” of racial and ethnic minorities as congruent with larger left-wing goals is not without its critics (including myself), it has a long-established history on the U.S. Left, and its advocates have included the Black Panther Party, the American Indian Movement, and the Young Lords. However, irrespective of the debates around it, national self-determination by an oppressed group of people is completely different from the “right” of White separatism. White separatism has never had a place in the Left, and its structural function is to reinforce—and not attempt to escape (regardless of whether this would work in practice or not)—existing social hierarchies. In the United States, White people as a group are firmly in control of the majority of economic resources and social power. White separatism is comparable to espousing gated communities for the rich: its purpose is to physically express existing hierarchical social and economic structures.
This type of alliance is something that white nationalists in all circles are going to continue to try and pull from in an attempt to show that “fascism is for everyone.” Even the most recent American Renaissance conference had a Mexican speaker discussing racial nationalism, and they occasionally post that they have Latino participants in their crowd who are there advocating for their own racial separatism. Japanese nationalism, often tied to romantic notions about Imperial Japan and national Shinto, is a special favorite for this crowd, and often is used by white nationalists as proof that they have a coherent ideology that is not just a vessel for angry bigotry. There are very few people of color associating with these white nationalists, but it is a rhetorical strategy that has helped to neutralize opposition who are not aware of these strategic developments on the far-right.
Black Bear eventually went to Twitter to announce that the show for Sunday, May 29th had been canceled.
The show is actually being moved to the Santos Party House, having just been announced at 3:30pm EST. That venue is co-owned by rocker Andrew W. K, who very well may not know what is going on. Fascists are hoping that the antifascist opposition will miss this news, but with a growing contingent in New York City looking to shut it down it will be hard for them to hide. NYC Antifa will be calling for a boycott of Santos Party House if the show is successfully held there.
Contact them and let them know what you think!
SANTOS STAFF:
Chip Su: 212-584-5492, booking@santospartyhouse.com
Bryan: bryan@santospartyhouse.com.
Jackalyn Tipchaieuh: live@santospartyhouse.com (out of the office but send her an email anyway!)
also: info@santospartyhouse.com
FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/santospartyhouse
INSTAGRAM: www.instagram.com/santospartyhaus
Also let Andrew W.K. know what is going on!
ANDREW WK on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AndrewWK
A crowd of skinheads and Nazi punks are feeling so emboldened in Brooklyn that they are having another party in Williamsburg tonight. Today is Oi!Fest, a Rock Against Communism show that neo-Nazi skinheads attempt to have annually.
RAC is the alternative to the more left-leaning working class street punks and Oi! Scene, where RAC is an explicitly “white power” contingent that birthed the “white noise” movement. While the Nazi skinhead culture has waxed and waned, white noise music has been one of the best recruitment tools for the most extreme edge of the violent white nationalist movement.
OiFest! 2016 had been organized in relative secret as most of the skinheads at its reigns know it would be shut down if their venue is revealed too soon. Yesterday they had a large pre-party that brought out their crews and supporters at the Red Star bar in Greenpoint, a well known sports-bar in the area.
Tonight they are going to be having the first of two shows for Oi!Fest 2016 at Black Bear on North 6th avenue in Williamsburg. Black Bear has already caused controversy by hosting the Project Equinox tour from Heathen Harvest, with a line-up of well-known Neofolk bands with nationalist leanings.
It is unsure whether or not Black Bear is the venue for tomorrow’s show as well. The bands for Oi!Fest include well-known skinhead fare like OxBlood, Close Shave, Offensive Weapon, and Battle Zone.
Below we are listing all of the information for Black Bear, their social media, yelp, and contact information. Call in and let them known what you think about their choice to host a violent neo-Nazi show. This is an organizing tool that has real consequences and these events have a track record of being center points for violent racist attacks.
London: Hollywood star Will Smith has credited Muhammad Ali changing his life after portraying the boxing champion in the 2001 biopic Ali. Ali died on June 3 at the age of 74, following a 32-year battle with Parkinson's disease. His passing emerged days after he was admitted to a medical center in Phoenix, Arizona, for respiratory complications. Smith, who earned his first ever Oscar nomination for his role as the outspoken sports star in Ali, took to Facebook to honour the man he had come to call a friend. "You shook up the World! My Mentor & My Friend. You changed my Life. Rest in Peace," the 47-year-old actor wrote. Smith also shared two photos of himself with the late legend, including one behind-the-scenes shot from the making of Ali. Smith said channeling the heavyweight champion was "the greatest of all times. The champ looked at me and gave me the nod that I did a good job. I worked as hard as I could possibly have worked." Last year, Smith presented the Muhammad Ali Legacy Award to Jack Nicklaus at Sports Illustrated magazine's annual Sportsperson of the Year dinner where he praised The Champ.
"But when we think about the legacy of Muhammad Ali, what he did in the ring is not what we think about," said Smith. "For nearly two years, I worked to transform myself into the man who changed his name from Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali and shook up the world. That's really what makes my job so beautiful as an actor," Smith continued. "For four or five months at a time, I get to wear people's lives, so I got to wear Muhammad Ali's greatness. I got to study and feel and embody the soul of the man. From the foundations of Islam and the strength of his Muslim faith and his life to the beautiful wake that he always leaves in his magnificent path."
Things have been tense in Boston lately. Back in June, the subject of a “terror investigation” was shot and killed by police after he was said to have waved a knife at officers who confronted him. A couple weeks later, another man, with another knife, was also shot and killed by police. And earlier this month, the son of a Boston Police captain was arrested after his father tipped off the FBI that he’d been threatening to join ISIS. All of which, of course, comes in the continued psychological aftermath of the Tsarnaev trial, in which the Boston Marathon bomber was sentenced to death, and the larger national conversation about the horrific shootings in South Carolina. So, perhaps, you might possibly forgive riders on the city’s buses for being a little on edge, like they were last weekend, when a man wearing what appeared to be an arsenal of ammunition walked onto the bus. On the other hand, you might call them a pack of simpering, terror-addled babies who called the police over a guy in a punk rock costume.
That’s what happened to Kevin Young, a 26 year old resident of nearby Watertown on Friday, July 10 when he was trying to take the bus from Harvard Square to Allston—a bus route, as anyone who’s taken it before can tell you, that regularly ferries its fair share of punks, metalheads, and assorted members of the general Boston hipster diaspora.
Around 4:20 (nice) on Friday, according to the police report, officers responded to a call for a “person with a gun” at the intersection of Cambridge and Harvard Streets.
The bus driver, the report goes on, had “pulled the bus over and stopped due to the suspect [Young] who was inside of the bus walking towards the front of the bus wearing a gun tactical belt on his waist with what appeared to be military grade ammunition rounds wrapped around his waist area and ankles.” The driver informed officers that he had “caused a panic” in the bus, and immediately called 911.
Young, having sensed something was amiss, got off the bus stop, like so many punks before him have at this particular location just outside the rock club O’Briens and Stingray Tattoo, at which point a search for the potential shooter ensued.
Witnesses informed police that in addition to the ammunition, the suspect “was wearing all black clothing, black boots, black spiked fighter gloves, and black spiked bracelets,” which sounds like a shitty Rancid cover.
Once apprehended, although the police admittedly determined that the bullets were, in fact, replicas, and not dangerous, they arrested him anyway. The charges included “unlawful possession of ammunition,” “carrying a dangerous weapon unlawfully (spiked/studded gloves and arm bands),” and, for good measure, “disorderly conduct.”
At arraignment, Jake Wark, the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office spokesmen told me “prosecutors moved to dismiss the charges primarily on the grounds that the ammunition could not be fired and wasn’t intended to be fired.”
Under Ch. 140, Sect. 121, of the Massachusetts General Laws, he clarified, “a person may be prosecuted for possessing ‘cartridges or cartridge cases… designed for use in any firearm, rifle, or shotgun,’ but we determined that our resources were best directed elsewhere.”
I tracked down Young, who was in the midst of completing 20 hours of community service that he agreed to on the conditions of the charges being dropped, to ask him what happened. Young, an engineer who works in computer networks, is a Boston native, who runs the punk record label Serfs Up, and plays in a couple of bands, including the act Hexxus. The label is getting set to release a compilation cassette of punk acts from around the world to benefit the Baltimore Uprising.
Joined by New York punk band The Casualtiesand Los Angeles backyard favoritesAge of FearandSouth Central Riot Squad, for the ultimate celebration of punkAngela Boatwright introduces her film,Los Punks: We Are All We Have. House of Vans will host DIY workshops where guests can stud, patch, bleach and dye just about everything under the sun. Each screening will also offer a Q&A with the attending musicians and directors so guests can interact with the creatives behind the film.
Angela Boatwright’s profound 2016 Slamdance feature Los Punks: We Are All We Have tells the story of the backyard punk community in South Central and East Los Angeles. Punk rock is thriving in these communities, and the film documents a group of predominantly Latino teens and young adults who cobble together a tight-knit family interwoven into a subculture of thrash, noise and pits."I lived in New York City for half of my life and after four years in Los Angeles it’s an honor for me to present Los Punks to all of my East Coast friends,” expressed Boatwright. “Juxtapoz Magazine called Los Punks my “love letter to So-Cal punk” and it’s absolutely true. I can’t wait for New York to find out what’s happening here in L.A.!"
Rock on the Range is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, and what better way to celebrate the anniversary ?
Rock on the Range is considered one of America's leading rock music festivals and takes place in Columbus, Ohio, in May. ROTR attracts big name bands and solo artists for a full three days of rock in the Columbus Crew Stadium.
AC/DC performed the first European concert with Axl Rose as
lead singer Saturday night in Lisbon, Portugal. The band rolled through
a career-spanning set that included old favorites ("Back in Black,"
"Shoot to Thrill") and new ones ("Rock 'n' Roll Train"). The band also
played "Riff Raff" for the first time live since 1996 and "Rock 'n' Roll
Damnation" for the first time since 2003.
Green Room, which premieres in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight on
May 17, Saulnier has instead decided “to bob and weave.” The result is a
bloody siege movie in which a punk band, trapped in a green room at a
club, has to fight o ff a gang of white power skinheads.
. “This film goes back to my roots — the crazy genre films of the ’80s see this as a batshit crazy punkrock horror thriller.”
There are few situations more hellish than being trapped for 16 hours in
a music venue by a gang of murderous neo-Nazis in the Oregon backwoods.
The story follows the members of the hardcore band The Ain’t
Rights—Pat, Tiger, Reece, and Sam, whose lean names befit their means.
Low on gas, money, and energy, the band reluctantly agrees to one final
gig, the catch being it’s at a white-supremacist club just outside of
Portland. The musicians aren’t thrilled, but at least Pat (Anton
Yelchin) recognizes what may be the only upside to their situation: How
often does a band get the chance to cover the Dead Kennedys song “Nazi Punks Fuck Off” in front of a crowd of actual Nazi punks?
But the fun doesn’t last: Minutes after their set ends, the band
witness a brutal crime and realize their odds of getting home have just
dropped dramatically. The venue’s owner, Darcy (played by Sir Patrick
Stewart), mobilizes his most devoted foot-soldiers to take care of the
outsiders. What follows is a tense gore-fest, one that’s as grimy and
claustrophobic as the titular room. But scrape off the scum, and you’ll
find Green Room full of visual artistry, dark humor, smart
writing, and glints of humanity. The film’s bleakness and B-movie
trappings won’t appeal to everyone: The violence reaches demented
heights, and having the antagonists be neo-Nazis may come off as lazy
storytelling. But there’s a cool, macabre charm to the whole effort. In
short, Green Room has all the makings of a cult classic—one likely to find enthusiastic fans sooner rather than later.
Saulnier’s third feature film, Green Room bears many of the same sensibilities and characteristics as the director’s first two works, 2007’s slasher comedy Murder Party and the infinitely improved, Kickstarter-funded drama Blue Ruin,
which was the indie success story of 2013. The latter—a Coen
Brothers-esque tale about a man seeking vengeance for his parents’
murders—revealed Saulnier’s deftness at both writing dialogue and
cultivating silence, at knowing the exact moments to hold back or to let
the action spill forth. On the surface, Green Room has more in common with Saulnier’s messier debut, but it retains the cinematic flair and self-assuredness of Blue Ruin.
Neo-Nazi falls in love with a woman who has a black son and finds himself fighting with conflicting feelings.
If nothing else, the Finnish film Heart of a Lion (Leijonasydan) deserves a pat on the head for daring to set up one hell of a wacky premise: neo-Nazi Teppo (Peter Franzen) falls for a beautiful blonde Sari (Laura Birn) but then – surprise! – finds out she has a mixed-race son (Yusufa Sidibeh) from an earlier relationship. It sounds on paper like the makings for an insane, blackly-comic update on Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967) but maybe with an Oi!-punk soundtrack. Alas,Heart is, in fact, a painfully earnest drama, albeit one with thudding comic moments, that still manages to be offensive – but not in a fun way – as well as credibility stretching and tacky. Franzen’s fully committed lead performance represents one of the few redeeming features (young Sidibeh is another) which might partly explain why this ludicrous work from director Dome Karukoskihas secured program slots at both Toronto and Santa Barbara’s film festivals, as well as closer-to-home Goteborg.
When Sony dropped the trailer for Paul Feig’s reboot of Ghostbusters,
the reaction wasn’t even mixed — it was universally hated. Now, the
preview’s underwhelming status has been solidified in the annals of
YouTube history, as it’s officially the site’s most disliked movie
trailer of all time.
For one thing, the Internet is a hive of mob mentality, and that often manifests as hatred. Many of the other videos on the most disliked list are
things that have largely been appreciated by the general public, but
that detractors abhor with passion. Justin Bieber’s “Baby” video sits at
No. 1 with a hearty 6,042,981 dislikes. While there are objectively
some terrible things about that clip, the song also helped launch an
international superstar and has gone 12 times platinum. It’s also
simultaneously the 10th most viewed YouTube video of all time, so people
are certainly going back for more. Nicki Minaj’s “Anaconda”, Adele’s
“Hello”, three Taylor Swift songs, and even the classic “Charlie Bit My Finger — Again!” clip also all sit on the most disliked list.
The Ghostbusters trailer currently has 507,610 dislikes on YouTube. To put that in perspective, the Fantastic Four trailer from last year has only 20,175 dislikes. The Ridiculous Six trailer, which has an impressive 0% on Rotten Tomatoes, has only 5,803 dislikes. Could Ghostbusters be that much worse than either of those two movies? It’s seems unlikely knowing what we know about both Fantastic Four and Ridiculous Six. What is actually happening is that a certain subset of people on the internet have an unhealthy fixation with hating on the Ghostbusters remake and are teaming up to downvote it into oblivion.
Consider some of the rest of the videos on this playlist, which ranks the Top 100 most “disliked” videos on YouTube (current as of April 16, 2016). With 507,610 thumbs down votes, the Ghostbusters trailer
is the most disliked movie trailer in the history of YouTube and
currently the only movie trailer that even cracks the Top 100. The only
other movie-related videos on the list include two versions of “Let It
Go” from Frozen.
Justin Bieber’s “Baby” (#1 on the
list) has a whopping 6 million thumbs down votes, but that’s on 1.36
billion views for a 226:1 ratio of views to dislikes. Psy’s “Gangnam
Style” video (#4 overall) has almost 1.5 million thumbs down on 2.5
billion views for a relatively high ratio of 1,666:1. The Ghostbusters
trailer is remarkable in that it has 507,610 dislikes on just 28.7
million views. That’s a staggering 56:1, almost exactly four times the
amount of dislikes per view of Bieber’s aforementioned most disliked
video on all of YouTube. (By contrast, a trailer for a movie like Captain America: Civil War
has a 5,237:1 ratio.) It’s not just that people dislike it, it’s that
they’re disliking it at a highly disproportionate rate to other YouTube
videos.
As the inclusion of “Let It Go” might indicate, the
majority of the list is filled with songs that were popular but quickly
became annoying. Justin Bieber, for example, has 11 of the most disliked
videos. But a more telling statistic is that the majority of the videos
on the list (59%) star or feature women or female characters. In
addition to the Ghostbusters trailer, there’s Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj, Madonna, and even Adele. Who hates Adele?!
There
is a lot of hatred directed towards the new trailer, primarily because
it stars four women (though the haters would have you believe misogyny
is not the real driving force behind their invective) and seemingly not
at all connected to its quality. Quickly the misogyny began to overwhelm
the comments under the Ghostbusters trailer and Sony Pictures
was forced to delete many offensive remarks, though it doesn’t take long
even now to find comments like, “When are people going to learn that
women aren’t funny?“ and “GhostBusters - Fat Dyke Edition”. The dislikes
eventually got to a point where it became a game among those who hate
the movie and frequently return to watch the numbers grow. When one fan
commented, “We made it to 500000 dislikes,” another followed up with an
enthusiastic, “Lets [sic] get it to a million!”
And that’s really the bigger problem here. It’s not that people disliked the movie on an organic level. As shown above with Fantastic Four and Ridiculous Six,
even when people don’t like a movie they don’t “dislike” it this much.
The thumbs down votes aren’t organic, they’re part of a coordinated
attack on the film by people who are opposed to its very existence.
There have even been reports across the web that angry fans are using
bots to artificially drive up the “dislikes” on the trailer. What’s
worse, there’s a culture of misogyny and toxicity to YouTube comments
that fosters this type of attitude. Just a quick look at the same
trailer posted by Sony Pictures to Facebook shows only 12,000 “angry”
votes (the Facebook version of the thumbs down “dislike”) on 22 million
views.
The good news is that while there are over a half-million “dislikes” on the Ghostbusters
trailer, there are still over 27 million people who watched the trailer
who either officially liked it or had nothing negative to say about it.
So while there may be a vocal minority trying to game the YouTube
voting system to bring down a movie with a female cast, they are still
the minority.
Sadly, at the rate they are going, it’s not crazy to think the video could reach 1 million dislikes by the time Ghostbusters
opens in July. At that point, who knows how much this campaign will
have hurt the movie and all this before we have any real idea whether
this movie itself is any good.
The Ghostbusters trailer currently has 507,610 dislikes on YouTube. To put that in perspective, the Fantastic Four trailer from last year has only 20,175 dislikes. The Ridiculous Six trailer, which has an impressive 0% on Rotten Tomatoes, has only 5,803 dislikes. Could Ghostbusters be that much worse than either of those two movies? It’s seems unlikely knowing what we know about both Fantastic Four and Ridiculous Six. What is actually happening is that a certain subset of people on the internet have an unhealthy fixation with hating on the Ghostbusters remake and are teaming up to downvote it into oblivion.
Consider some of the rest of the videos on this playlist, which ranks the Top 100 most “disliked” videos on YouTube (current as of April 16, 2016). With 507,610 thumbs down votes, the Ghostbusters trailer
is the most disliked movie trailer in the history of YouTube and
currently the only movie trailer that even cracks the Top 100. The only
other movie-related videos on the list include two versions of “Let It
Go” from Frozen.
Justin Bieber’s “Baby” (#1 on the
list) has a whopping 6 million thumbs down votes, but that’s on 1.36
billion views for a 226:1 ratio of views to dislikes. Psy’s “Gangnam
Style” video (#4 overall) has almost 1.5 million thumbs down on 2.5
billion views for a relatively high ratio of 1,666:1. The Ghostbusters
trailer is remarkable in that it has 507,610 dislikes on just 28.7
million views. That’s a staggering 56:1, almost exactly four times the
amount of dislikes per view of Bieber’s aforementioned most disliked
video on all of YouTube. (By contrast, a trailer for a movie like Captain America: Civil War
has a 5,237:1 ratio.) It’s not just that people dislike it, it’s that
they’re disliking it at a highly disproportionate rate to other YouTube
videos.
As the inclusion of “Let It Go” might indicate, the
majority of the list is filled with songs that were popular but quickly
became annoying. Justin Bieber, for example, has 11 of the most disliked
videos. But a more telling statistic is that the majority of the videos
on the list (59%) star or feature women or female characters. In
addition to the Ghostbusters trailer, there’s Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj, Madonna, and even Adele. Who hates Adele?!
There
is a lot of hatred directed towards the new trailer, primarily because
it stars four women (though the haters would have you believe misogyny
is not the real driving force behind their invective) and seemingly not
at all connected to its quality. Quickly the misogyny began to overwhelm
the comments under the Ghostbusters trailer and Sony Pictures
was forced to delete many offensive remarks, though it doesn’t take long
even now to find comments like, “When are people going to learn that
women aren’t funny?“ and “GhostBusters - Fat Dyke Edition”. The dislikes
eventually got to a point where it became a game among those who hate
the movie and frequently return to watch the numbers grow. When one fan
commented, “We made it to 500000 dislikes,” another followed up with an
enthusiastic, “Lets [sic] get it to a million!”
And that’s really the bigger problem here. It’s not that people disliked the movie on an organic level. As shown above with Fantastic Four and Ridiculous Six,
even when people don’t like a movie they don’t “dislike” it this much.
The thumbs down votes aren’t organic, they’re part of a coordinated
attack on the film by people who are opposed to its very existence.
There have even been reports across the web that angry fans are using
bots to artificially drive up the “dislikes” on the trailer. What’s
worse, there’s a culture of misogyny and toxicity to YouTube comments
that fosters this type of attitude. Just a quick look at the same
trailer posted by Sony Pictures to Facebook shows only 12,000 “angry”
votes (the Facebook version of the thumbs down “dislike”) on 22 million
views.
The good news is that while there are over a half-million “dislikes” on the Ghostbusters
trailer, there are still over 27 million people who watched the trailer
who either officially liked it or had nothing negative to say about it.
So while there may be a vocal minority trying to game the YouTube
voting system to bring down a movie with a female cast, they are still
the minority.
Sadly, at the rate they are going, it’s not crazy to think the video could reach 1 million dislikes by the time Ghostbusters
opens in July. At that point, who knows how much this campaign will
have hurt the movie and all this before we have any real idea whether
this movie itself is any good.
The Ghostbusters trailer currently has 507,610 dislikes on YouTube. To put that in perspective, the Fantastic Four trailer from last year has only 20,175 dislikes. The Ridiculous Six trailer, which has an impressive 0% on Rotten Tomatoes, has only 5,803 dislikes. Could Ghostbusters be that much worse than either of those two movies? It’s seems unlikely knowing what we know about both Fantastic Four and Ridiculous Six. What is actually happening is that a certain subset of people on the internet have an unhealthy fixation with hating on the Ghostbusters remake and are teaming up to downvote it into oblivion.
Consider some of the rest of the videos on this playlist, which ranks the Top 100 most “disliked” videos on YouTube (current as of April 16, 2016). With 507,610 thumbs down votes, the Ghostbusters trailer
is the most disliked movie trailer in the history of YouTube and
currently the only movie trailer that even cracks the Top 100. The only
other movie-related videos on the list include two versions of “Let It
Go” from Frozen.
Justin Bieber’s “Baby” (#1 on the
list) has a whopping 6 million thumbs down votes, but that’s on 1.36
billion views for a 226:1 ratio of views to dislikes. Psy’s “Gangnam
Style” video (#4 overall) has almost 1.5 million thumbs down on 2.5
billion views for a relatively high ratio of 1,666:1. The Ghostbusters
trailer is remarkable in that it has 507,610 dislikes on just 28.7
million views. That’s a staggering 56:1, almost exactly four times the
amount of dislikes per view of Bieber’s aforementioned most disliked
video on all of YouTube. (By contrast, a trailer for a movie like Captain America: Civil War
has a 5,237:1 ratio.) It’s not just that people dislike it, it’s that
they’re disliking it at a highly disproportionate rate to other YouTube
videos.
As the inclusion of “Let It Go” might indicate, the
majority of the list is filled with songs that were popular but quickly
became annoying. Justin Bieber, for example, has 11 of the most disliked
videos. But a more telling statistic is that the majority of the videos
on the list (59%) star or feature women or female characters. In
addition to the Ghostbusters trailer, there’s Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj, Madonna, and even Adele. Who hates Adele?!
There
is a lot of hatred directed towards the new trailer, primarily because
it stars four women (though the haters would have you believe misogyny
is not the real driving force behind their invective) and seemingly not
at all connected to its quality. Quickly the misogyny began to overwhelm
the comments under the Ghostbusters trailer and Sony Pictures
was forced to delete many offensive remarks, though it doesn’t take long
even now to find comments like, “When are people going to learn that
women aren’t funny?“ and “GhostBusters - Fat Dyke Edition”. The dislikes
eventually got to a point where it became a game among those who hate
the movie and frequently return to watch the numbers grow. When one fan
commented, “We made it to 500000 dislikes,” another followed up with an
enthusiastic, “Lets [sic] get it to a million!”
And that’s really the bigger problem here. It’s not that people disliked the movie on an organic level. As shown above with Fantastic Four and Ridiculous Six,
even when people don’t like a movie they don’t “dislike” it this much.
The thumbs down votes aren’t organic, they’re part of a coordinated
attack on the film by people who are opposed to its very existence.
There have even been reports across the web that angry fans are using
bots to artificially drive up the “dislikes” on the trailer. What’s
worse, there’s a culture of misogyny and toxicity to YouTube comments
that fosters this type of attitude. Just a quick look at the same
trailer posted by Sony Pictures to Facebook shows only 12,000 “angry”
votes (the Facebook version of the thumbs down “dislike”) on 22 million
views.
The good news is that while there are over a half-million “dislikes” on the Ghostbusters
trailer, there are still over 27 million people who watched the trailer
who either officially liked it or had nothing negative to say about it.
So while there may be a vocal minority trying to game the YouTube
voting system to bring down a movie with a female cast, they are still
the minority.
Sadly, at the rate they are going, it’s not crazy to think the video could reach 1 million dislikes by the time Ghostbusters
opens in July. At that point, who knows how much this campaign will
have hurt the movie and all this before we have any real idea whether
this movie itself is any good.
A new French movie is causing ructions over claims that it is too
incendiary for general release. The film is about a violent skinhead and
the origins of France's far-right political movement.
Marco is a skinhead, a real one. With his friends, Braguette, Grand-Guy,
Marvin, he hits the Arabs and glue the posters of the far right. Until
he feels that, despite himself, his hatred is abandoning him. But how to
get rid of violence, anger, stupidity that has in oneself? This is the
journey of a bastard who will try to become a good person. French Blood (original title: Un Français)
Connecticut-based hardcore/metal masters HATEBREED will release their new album, "The Concrete Confessional", in the spring via Nuclear Blast. The CD is being recorded with longtime producer Chris "Zeuss" Harris (ROB ZOMBIE, SUICIDE SILENCE, WHITECHAPEL) and will be mixed by Josh Wilbur, who has previously wirked with LAMB OF GOD and MEGADETH, among others.
In support of "The Concrete Confessional", HATEBREED will embark on a North American headlining tour. Joining them on the trek are modern metal stalwarts DEVILDRIVER, Nuclear Blast labelmates DEVIL YOU KNOW and Metal Blade recording artists ACT OF DEFIANCE (featuring former MEGADETH members Chris Broderick and Shawn Drover).
Comments HATEBREED vocalist Jamey Jasta: "New album and tour in 2016?! Let's do this!
"Our return to the states has been a long time coming and we could not be more excited!
"Fans have been asking for us to tour with DEVILDRIVER and DEVIL YOU KNOW for a long time, and we're pumped to have ACT OF DEFIANCE on some shows as well.
"Get your tickets and we'll see you in the pit!"
Iconic rock musician Prince died
April 21, 2016 at the age of 57. Police and EMTs responded to a 911
call at his Paisley Park studio in Chanhassen, Minn., on Thursday.
Sales of Prince's music have skyrocketed since the artist's death last week.
According
to Nielsen Music, in the three days following his death, there were 2.3
million Prince song sales, including nearly 1 million on Thursday, the
day he died.
Albums sales were led by "The Very Best Of Prince."The 57-year-old singer was found dead Thursday at his Paisley Park compound in suburban Minneapolis. An autopsy was conducted Friday. Authorities said it could be weeks before the cause of death is released.Carver County Sheriff Jim Olson said Prince's body had no signs of violence and there was nothing to suggest suicide.
South East Asia Dates:
March 15 - Bali, Indonesia March 16 - Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam March 18 - Immortal Bar, Bangkok - Thailand March 19 - Jb Rock Fest, City Plaza - Johor Bahru - Malaysia March 20 - Jakarta, Indonesia March 21 - Malang, Indonesia
