I learned of Carl Joseph's suicide because I was facilitating a dialogue about identity and bullying at Renaissance High School on the second anniversary of his death. Tiffany is one of several dozen students from six high schools preparing to meet each other at South Hadley High School on April 30. Students from the different schools have expressed a mix of trepidation and excitement about getting past the stereotypes they hold about each other. Can these youth find reasons to bond with each other despite the stereotypes, rather than staying within comfort zones of familiar identification with people they already know or identify with as 'the same as me'?
shielding ourselves from the light?
This screenshot of a future technological wasteland is from Katy Perry's music video, E.T., featuring Kanye West. A brief scene near the end includes two museum-style placards denoting a problematic relation between homo sapiens and other species sharing Earth. In 2011, what lenses are we using to block knowledge of extinctions coming within mere decades?
A complicated, evolutionary relationship unfolds over the course of Katy Perry's song. Listening past the dominating lyrics, fluctuations of volume mark incursions of alternate reality, loud bursts punctuating the sensual quality of the steady soft tones. The softer sounds persist, providing solid ground for the ethereal. It's as if there's a conversation within the music between the physical and the spiritual.
In the class I'm teaching on Media and Culture, several students recently attended DayGlow's Escape Reality Tour. Some of them enjoyed themselves so much they are practically desperate to repeat the experience. I have to admit, it sounds incredible, a kind of collective audience culture that I know about by reference not personal experience. This generation's style of celebrating the body with dance-and-party is in high form at remix concerts by performers like Girl Talk – who, I'm just sortof starting to wonder – may have taken the musical form originated by rappers & hip hop artists and are now pushing that envelope in their own directions.
I'm not a musicologist, so don't take my unresearched hypothesis as fact. What really strikes me is a difference in tone and intent (technically, what linguistic anthropologists call "indexicality") between white-skinned remixers and many of their brown-skinned inspirations. Again, my exposure is limited, but sample this youtube video taken during the DayGlow show at UMass which captures lead performer "STARKILLERS" emblazoned across the monster projection screen, and a pounding lyric repeats "SATISFACTION" several times.
Kanye, as well as many other artists, have been trying for years to portray their struggles to the world, and make it evident that just because someone is successful in the music industry, television industry, etc., doesn't mean that they live the perfect life. While reading deeper into the lyrics of my favorite hip hop artists, I gained more respect for all of them, and realize that their lives might not be as eas[y] as everyone might think.
Kenny signals a painful fact: the ability to escape reality is a privilege.
This past weekend, I attended a Gala Fundraiser in memory of a wannabe Morehouse Man who took his life two years ago in the nearby urban setting of Springfield. There were 350 people in attendance, including me and Tiffany.
She knew at least a dozen people there but kept me company throughout the evening, despite my nosiness about her texting (Hi Ashley!) and Facebook activities 🙂 Come on – I had to know if she was carrying an extra battery pack so she could stay plugged in! She met another young person at our table; I returned from getting dessert to see them communicating nonverbally. "Are you showing her your rings?" I asked. "Something like that," she replied. Uh huh. Not for me to know!
What's this got to do with Hip Hop?
"Yo SB I think its my time.
Sirdeaner Walker, Carl's mother, is a fount of inspiration and goodwill. Her activism and compassion are evident in a series of interviews with 22News. Gwynnetta Sneed received overflowing praise for her vision and follow-through in creating the Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover Foundation and making the Gala happen. We got to witness her character in action, public misbehavior inviting public rebuke. Members of my community also made me feel proud. I had been wondering about their involvement, not sure of the details of Carl's story.
"It is considered a given in group and organizational life that issues are taken up by whatever group is most affected by them; however, often that group is then accused of taking up only these issues for reasons of self-interest rather than for the benefit of the whole" (Connolly and Noumair, p. 328 in Off White).
Near the end of the event, one of Sirdeaner Walker's co-workers approached and thanked me, assuming I was a member of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. (I look the type, wink!) Her approach allowed me the chance to ask about GLSEN's presence.
It turns out that GLSEN offered help . . . and their help was welcomed! This embodies the sentiment expressed by Susan Skaza in her essay about how to stop bullying by "simply being a good example." Here are two communities – stereotypically riven by homophobia, heterosexism, and racism – joining together in a common cause to end bullying of everyone's children, for any reason.
I thought it was especially impressive when the Christian minister, Reverend Peter Sylver, said he didn't know what God thinks about what people do when they go to sleep, but he knows what God expects of us during the day: radical love.
The Chinese fortune reads, "Opportunities multiply as they are seized, they die when neglected."
Whatever one's spiritual beliefs, including agnostics and atheists, the savagery of bullying is only going to end when members of groups reach out, radically, across differences to forge new bonds on the basis of shared experiences or common values. Bullying is children's version of grown-up violence. As long as adults continue to justify and promote brutal competition over planetary resources, children will act out what they see modeled. Radical love means embracing the foreign, accepting the alien.
This brings us back to Hip Hop. Katy Perry is pop, but for some reason Kanye decided she must have something to say to Hip Hop, otherwise he would not have contributed 'bookends' to her video. The layers of that conversation can be interpreted in many different ways. For me, what matters is the moment when conversation – the trading of verses – turns to dialogue.
Dialogue is the special form of communication in which participants are open enough to allow themselves to be changed by interacting with the foreign and alien other. Change of this kind is the ultimate evidence of radical love.
Race, religion and other differences impacts us all in very different ways. It can cause us pain through prejudice, rejoice from upcoming and uniqueness that can only be celebrated. But with this difference can bring many different opportunities for everyone, or for some to capture while others cannot. For example, suburban white children get far better education from those in urban situations that also can be filled through violence, drugs, and gangs. Suburban kids get all the new toys and are predominantly spoiled with all the things you need to live plus more. I am not trying to make judgements about anyone, I am one of these suburban kids myself. Than we go onto college and get an education to raise another wealthy suburban family. These kids are so fortunate they ultimately do not see all the things they are privileged to do. I realize going to a university to learn is a privilege while other kids suffer from all the expenses of college that I do not think about. Or about attending fun events such as dayglow or other concerts or sporting events, I think of that as a "night out" or an event I am use too, while urban kids cannot afford going to these events. I am extremely fortunate and blessed to have everything I do and yet, most of the time, I am blind of all the opportunities I get to experience while others do not. The best illustration of this race consciousness idea is from the movie "Blind Side" and the main character Michael Oher (African American) has nothing, and gets taken in by a wealthy white family and gets his own room. The first time he sees his room, he is in awe, the mother asks if this is his first room before, he replies saying "this is my first bed". This blindness concept is clearly alive today and my only suggestion of stopping this sharing the power and wealth and donating to charities and such. However, our country and economic system of lassie-fairre goes against this idea of sharing the wealth, thus I am unsure of anyway stopping this struggle.
I identify as a straight, white, able-bodied female from the middle to upper-middle class, based upon how I identify, I was born into life of privilege because of how my DNA, chromosomes and genes decided to mesh. I'm from a predominantly white, Catholic suburban town right outside of Boston and yes it's safe to say I grew up slightly sheltered from cultural exposure and variation of difference amongst people. However, that never stopped me from always viewing myself as a very excepting person who yearned for an exposure to cultural diversity and exposure to the unknown.
Even still, in my high school we had some diversity, ranging from different races, religion and sexual orientation and what I found was that I was very fortunate to grow up in a high school that was very excepting of all types of people. But once again I will reiterate the fact that this is not the fortunate case for all high schools. Bullying is a problem; a very serious problem, not just on the east coast but around the country. We live in a society that trains and brain washes us from the moment we come out of the womb. We are constantly being conditioned to believe stereotypes and social structure of how to view the world. Don't get me wrong I was brought up the same way however even though I was conditioned to believe certain things, I'm aware of that and am working on being more conscious of my thoughts because that is the first step.
I became much more aware of how serious bullying was when I came to Umass Amherst. Meeting so many different people from an array of places we began to talk about our experiences from the past. What I noticed was that I was someone who had an unbelievable college experience, I was never worried about going to school or afraid to be myself, I was never targeted for my identity or spiritual choices however I found that I fell into the minority for people having a similar experience. I was a lucky one and we can thank social identity and structure for that.
Let's face it, society won't be changed in a day however if we start by changing the views and ideas of people that live in our society little by little this world could be morphed into a pretty cool place. "Radical love means embracing the foreign, accepting the alien."(Steph) This way of thinking with such open-mind ness is a great start and with a little effort it would spread like wild fire. Because the truth is, the world isn't blinded from the truth, it's afraid of speaking out against it. No one wants to be that person who stands up against everything society says you're supposed to believe but we all need to be that person if we want change. We all need to spread some radical love!
Which brings me to my next point, Steph poses this question above, "Can these youth find reasons to bond with each other despite the stereotypes, rather than staying within comfort zones of familiar identification with people they already know or identify with as 'the same as me'?" And I think our generation is beginning to answer that question with a capital YES and we are finding this answer through music. Every single day people all over the world no matter what they look like, where they come from, what they believe or how they communicate are bonding and breaking stereotypical boundaries over music. Music is the one of the few things that you feel or hear first rather than see to judge whether you like it or not. This is why you have those "suburban white kids", "urban kids" and so on rockin out to the same artist. Even though we are different we all feel good about the same music which then translates into us feeling good about each other as we bond over the music. Slowly and slowly music is beginning to change the world; everyday people from everywhere gather at venues with people who are nothing like them and they only thing bridging the gap is music.
That's what music does; it drowns out the world, over powers the body and makes you feel alive. And at the moment in which you experience this it doesn't matter if the person next to you is white, black or Hispanic because in that moment you are all just people enjoying what makes you feel alive. That is where music overpowers the consciousness of race- where radical love takes over.
Then all of sudden, DAYGLOW sweeps the nations sucking in people all over the world like a tornado. When you log onto Ticketmaster to buy your DAYGLOW ticket all you are thinking about is that you want to be in the atmosphere DAYGLOW creates and who ever else has that same thought process you want to be there too. As you walk into the venue and look around everyone is different, people travel from colleges everywhere to attend and yet difference doesn't matter. There is no place for negative judgments and you literally "escape reality". The atmosphere that forms at DAYGLOW is like none I have ever experienced because the reality is if I was any where else with that many people portraying that many differences it wouldn't be the same. But the music brings us together and shrinks the diversity gap. It is an unspoken truth that if you are attending DAYGLOW you want the same thing as the next person; to feel the music and escape the complexities of the everyday world. That is where music brings us together, where DAYGLOW bridges the gap because everyone knows they have at least one thing in common with the person who is standing (extremely close) next to you. Since everyone there has something right off the bat they know makes them similar to the other, everyone loves everyone and that is where you'll see radical love at it's finest.
Granted, society will always have stereotypes and social identities will always exist however it is how much we let them control our lives and judgments as we work towards the future that will keep us from digressing back to ways of the past. We are a generation unlike any other, growing up with more pressures, more technology and more expectations than any other. On top of that, we do so in an environment that tells us how to live and we need to respond by not losing ourselves. So sometimes we need to escape, take a break from the harsh cruelties of the world and find common ground with complete strangers through not only DAYGLOW but music.
Which is why when Steph approached us and asked us to research deeper into DAYGLOW, ask questions and look into the three social relations, we as a class became defensive and responded first with a stern "NO!" and then eased out of the conversation with "What if we learn bad things?" We didn't want to know how they targeted their audiences, what producers or distributors they went through, if they were in fact illegally using music or did they work with certain music industries and is the paint made in an un-ethical environment? At this moment, we didn't want to know any of these answers; we didn't want to know if the three social relations that applied to DAYGLOW were good or bad. Because the truth is, DAYGLOW was and is are escape, we leave all of our troubles at the door and it facilitates an environment that is blind to color or cultural difference but sees the common ground of the human race as a whole and understands that when we enter we all are in an agreement that we simply want to be. And enjoy the overpowering feeling of the love for life you feel as you live the music. It aids an environment that is accepting of all who have the mutual understanding that for the next five hours they want to escape, love and live. DAYGLOW isn't just a rave with paint, it's one small step to altering society's distorted thoughts by trying to bridge the gap through music and joy. And if us as a class were to find out that our one method of escape was also corrupt and bad, well that is something that we just wouldn't be able to handle at the moment.
Often times in Comm121 Steph talked about the fact that many of us saw things in a "white way". We never thought about seeing things this way but it was seemingly apparent that we did. Seeing in a "white way" is similar to the idea of heteronormativity. Heterosexuality is unconsciously perceived as the correct way to live and therefore heterosexual individuals are unfairly privileged in the same way that white individuals are solely because of their race. As Sgershlak said, many white college students do not think about the opportunities they are presented with because they have always been there. Many of them have not faced much adversity if any at all and this has influenced their perspective on the world. Many hip-hop songs feature themes of constant struggle and turmoil the artists have faced in their lives. Although the messages may not be something some members of the audience, including white college students, can relate to, something about it keeps them interested. It may be that they are so interested because it is something they are so unfamiliar with and they use the music as a device to learn about another culture. The songs teach them about struggles they will never have to face in their own lives and it makes them more conscious of the world around them. They know they can escape reality, but it is not something everyone else has the privilege to do. Even if these kids will never deal with the struggles some of their favorite artists face, the music teaches them that they exist and teaches them to be more aware and understanding because of it.
"While reading deeper into the lyrics of my favorite hip hop artists, I gained more respect for all of them, and realize that their lives might not be as eas[y] as everyone might think." To branch from the previous comments, it is important to have an open mind, since everyone interprets race a bit differently. To say that you are privileged to be white and live in the suburbs, is an opinion based solely on your perception of how you view being a minority living in the city. Having lived in the city until 10 years ago, then moving out to suburbs, privileges are viewed as opportunities which vary from environment. Each environment, both city and suburb, offers its own unique opportunities. Would you say being isolated in the suburbs surrounded by predominately white households is really beneficial in further developing skills required for entering a well diverse work force? What about living in the city surrounded by the hundreds of possible negative influences, wouldn't overcoming these challenges and obstacles prove to be far greater and potentially life benefiting than any suburban education could teach you? Sure life at times is much easier being the majority than the minority, but that isn't to say that being the majority is by any means a "privilege". Would that imply that being; blind, deaf, homosexual,atheist, or handicapped are all unprivileged since they're not the majority but rather the minority? Each one of those has its own privileges that I'm positive give an individual who falls into one of those categories that delight of saying that they are privileged to be unique, just as I am privileged in stating "I'm the minority". How does this tie into hip-hop? Well hip-hop is most often written and performed by those who have over come adversity. However, would you care to hear the story of Kanye West, a former urban African-American living in poverty, if he wasn't the celebrity he is today? This is often what makes hip-hop so popular, because it can be related by so many people, waking up everyday and knowing they are not the only ones attempting to over come the adversity. I would go even further to say that music in general allows individuals to relate on issues that some believe they are the only ones experiencing. Given that times are changing for the best, would this imply that music would also change for the best? Since it will ultimately reflect the views of an equal opportunity society. I think life is not to be viewed as being thankful for being privileged or unprivileged, but rather being thankful for the uniqueness that each of us carries around. And that we all share common interest and accomplishments, whether its DayGlow, College Degrees, Radical Love, Music, Communication courses, these are all accomplishments and events which make us all so similar.
To continue….Music, such as hip-hop acts as a communication channel, which allows those who have struggled the opportunity to voice their day-to-day lives, in an attempt to get others to see life through a different perspective. Most communication channels themselves serve a similar purpose of connecting everyone together. Twitter for our course acted as our communications channel, which allowed each student to describe their day-to-day, minute-to-minute daily activity. These agencies which act as communication channels allow for social relationships which would have otherwise not exist. When talking on this issue I can only remember one particular scene from "RIP A Remix Manifesto", in which we further discussed in class. "This is who OWNS our CULTURE". This quote was shown while approx. 35 of the biggest music companies were shown in the background. It further reminded me of our class discussion, that ultimately these music corporations can control and manipulate how they want society and our culture to shift views. Given that we provide these corporations with more than enough information via social networking sites, corporations which sponsor and provide hip-hop can ultimately become a political candidates best friend.
Kanye West made a strong point that many people believe that hip-hop artist live a perfect life. I've seen many Afican-Americans aspiring to be hip-hop artists because they see the lives that they live on TV. However many rappers stuggle outside of what the media shows us. A lot of these artist had a difficult childhood through poverty and violence and music is their way of expressing their feelings. It is a way for them to escape the realities of life that they had been going through. Some will say that rap music is bad for people to listen to since it speaks a lot upon violence and drugs, but the sad part is that they are speaking upon what they live through. These are their lives so you have to respect them for going through all of the hardships that they do and channeling it into music and trying to better themselves. Music can be an outlet for them and a way for them to stay out of trouble. Many hip-hop artist talk about how if it weren't for music than they would either be dead or in jail,so I really respect them since their lives are not easy.
Every aspect of a person's life, every moment, every interpretation, dictates the lens through which they will view the world as the mature and grow. Many are born into privilege, as SGershlak noted earlier. This privilege can often blind that person from the woes of others and the true ills of the real world. Often times, the most outspoken, raw, and real people you will meet are those who've been raised in a setting of neglect, or come from a background where they themselves have been let down, put down, or bullied. The former, separated from reality from the distractions and illusions of opulence, privilege, and luxury, rarely even contemplate what it would, and could, be like to be ostracized, neglected, or hurt. These individuals, those born or brought into privilege, are those often at the forefront of the modern bullying epidemic that seems to be sweeping through the U.S. and notably the world.
I know. I was bullied in elementary and middle school. I know how much it hurts. I never came from a privileged family. Nor was I the best looking or coolest person in my community, illustrating common themes that bullies often use to their advantage. And just this year, a young girl from my town returned from school one day and decided to end her own life. It turned out she had been bullied. It was an awful circumstance that I wouldn't wish on anyone.
I guess what I see from the bullying scenario is this: it is easier to have a mature, observant outlook on life if you realize how real and painful life can be. Living behind a veil of privilege disregards the real suffering of so many people in the world, and truly deflates any sense of altruism or even internally motivated activism one may feel if exposed to hardship and grief. Bullying not only affects the victim in obvious psychological ways, but it brings down the worth and eventual contribution to society that the perpetrator may add, as it sends them down a path of selfishness and disregard for others, hurting the broader community as a whole.
I think a lot of the rawness and emotion that steph notices in hip hop may stem from the black cultures "inferiority" to white culture, in the eyes of the mainstream. While incorrect, seemingly racist, and very immature, this is a view that has been permeating through european and american cultures for hundreds of years. The animosity and struggle emphasized in many hip hop lyrics, and this is pure theory, may be a lashing out at childhood notions of inferiority or a violent response to bullying applied indirectly through mainstream racist ideals or directly through personal instances of disenfranchisement, neglect, and personal harm.
As far as the concept of radical love is concerned, it is a progressive vision that could surely do a lot of good in this world. The real challenge will not so much be in breaking down existing stereotypes and changing peoples minds who seem to to reject notions of equality, but to change the broader societal notions so that children aren't born into prejudiced cultures. And to that, will take a lot of civil action, a lot of cooperation, and a lot of struggle. Yet isn't it worth it to struggle, if even one life could be saved?
Much of urban/ hip-hop music communicates a common theme of the struggles and tribulations of the less fortunate. Most rappers are black, and come from a less privileged background, and communicate this message through their work. People of the same racial and socio-economic background can easily relate to this. However most of us college students who are extremely fortunate to be in our positions, gain an appreciation for our own situations by listening to these messages. We learn from the lyrics of these songs and gain a better understanding of what it is like to be on the other end of the spectrum.
It is assumed that whites have more opportunity in the world. This is due to the socio-economic discrepancys. For the most part those who live in the suburbs are more likely to enjoy more privileges in life than those in an urban, low class setting. Music transcends socio-economic and cultural borders. It puts us all on the same wavelength and allows us to "escape reality", as dayglow did for us umass students. Music is a great thing because it allows us to see through the eyes of others and broaden our understanding.


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A hilarious addition to the holidays. This 4" X 4" box contains 100% premium, rough cut Anthracite coal and is boxed in our "Prancer Purple" packaging. The box comes directly from North Pole, AK with a postage stamp to prove it.


With the approach of yet another year, as the Director of IFS, I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for your interest and involvement in our collaborative work. It has been quite a year! Fortunately, our passion for supporting young researchers in developing countries – and their unrelenting drive to help their own countries and to solve local problems – have kept us inspired and dedicated. We know that the road is long and often hard, but we are making progress and we cannot, and will not, stop.


Mosaic Place/Yara FieldHouse have hired a new GM, to go along with the new advisory board and the new acting CEO they also just brought into the fold.
Graham Edge will begun his work as the General Manager of DFFH (Downtown Facility & Field House) effective January 15, 2018 .
According to a news release published by Ted Schaeffer, the current acting CEO, "Graham brings a great deal of facility and event management experience and knowledge to the position through his past work with Evraz Place, The Brandt Centre and the 2010 Vancouver /Olympic Winter Games"
According to Edge, he has "more than a decade of combined experience in driving operations and guest service within the food and beverage/hospitality industry. I have managed some of the most outstanding, high-profile events ever seen."
Aside from his work on the 2010 Winter Olympic Games, Edge was also responsible for the 2013 Grey Cup Celebrations and the 2011 Ford World Curling Championships.
Between 2011-2017, Edge was the Vice President of Food & Beverage at Evraz Place. One of his key accomplishments was bringing franchise restaurants into the venue (Tim Hortons, Subway and Western Pizza).
Before that he spent four years as the Director at Brandt Centre, where he "provided executive oversight of all Ticketmaster operations".
In 2017, the old DFFH board dissolved after a report from Meyers, Norris & Penny (MNP) exposed the board for questionable tactics that caused the buildings to fall into deficits.
Also, earlier this week, MJ Independent released info regarding the DFFH's new budget, and how they will no longer be budgeting to promote concerts; instead they will simply rent the space out to others who wish to do so.
Clearly, Graham Edge has the qualifications to host large events; only time will what sort of impact he will make at the DFFH.
Violent Drug Crimes on the Rise; Tax Payers Will Pay For It.


Between 12th and 16th of March 2018, Wattson Blue played host to a few students from University of Oxford, who joined us as part of a micro-intenrship programme. The students worked on various aspects of Wattson Blue, including business development, social media management, and full stack development. It was a hugely rewarding experience for us at Wattson Blue to work with some very exciting talent from Oxford, while we hope the interns also gained some invaluable experience working in a startup environment.
Oxford students can apply for these positions via the careers website.
How do I interpret my form, fatigue and fitness numbers?


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Happily Divorced: Looking Out for Your Father
by Amy K. Bredemeyer
Talk about an episode full of promise but didn't go anywhere! I liked the idea that Fran's dad may be a little less independent than he once was. I liked the idea that Peter spent way too much on an outfit to impress a guy. I liked the idea that Fran's dad could be a wingman for Peter. But in actuality, none of these storylines really did much. The part I liked the most ended up being Judy and Cesar listening in on Fran & Peter's conversation via pocket-dial. I never was enthralled with this show, so perhaps it's getting near the chopping block... we'll give it another couple of attempts to impress, though. Do you agree?
Happily Divorced "Daddy's Girl" (S02E03): Fran and Peter go to her parents' house and her mom makes a "fat" comment to her. [meh. normally I'd feel for Fran a little more, but most of the outfits that she wears aren't the most flattering choices.] Her dad is starting to miss things and forget things, so Fran is a bit worried and decides to try to stop him from driving. But, he won't let her in the car - so she makes Peter miss his spin class (for which he bought a new track suit to impress a guy) to go with him to the market. [I was slightly afraid that Glen wouldn't notice Fran standing in front of the car and he might bump her... glad that didn't happen!]
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Glen and Peter go to a bar and Glen wonders how Peter can't get a man. [nice to see Glen so accepting and interested in Peter's life.] Glen then meets Keith (the gym guy) and introduces him to Peter. Glen owns a motorcycle shop (selling leather is "the Jewish doctor" of Peter's world, apparently). [did anyone else find this just plain odd?, oh, and "I've still got it." "So do they." was funny.] They head to the motorcycle shop and Glen buys a motorcycle, panicking Fran. [well, yeah. I would worry about an elderly man on a motorcycle!]. Fran begs Peter to help her steal it, but neither really know much about driving it, so they wind up crashing into the flowershop. [surprised they got that far without incident, actually.] Along the way, Fran pocket-dials Judy so she and Cesar listen to Fran and Peter argue about Glen. [driving along and getting gum in your mouth was about the grossest thing EVER!]
by Amy K. Bredemeyer at 12:00 PM Topics: Amy K. Bredemeyer, Happily Divorced, television reviews
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Home/Imagine All The People, Yoko reads/Rolling Stone: The Fight Over Fracking: Josh Fox vs. Big Gas.
Rolling Stone: The Fight Over Fracking: Josh Fox vs. Big Gas.
Josh Fox speaks during a press conference for the Safe Drinking Water act on Capitol Hill, February 17, 2011. Kris Connor/Getty Images
by Alexander Zaitchik, Rolling Stone
The Oscar-nominated filmmaker exposed the dirty secrets of gas drilling. Then the industry decided to play rough.
One afternoon in early April, Josh Fox sits in a café near his Brooklyn home and unfurls a peculiar map of the United States. Featuring a series of red overlapping blobs stretching from Colorado to New York, it resembles one of those Cold War maps depicting the blast radii of Soviet missiles. But it's decades more current than that. With a sweeping hand gesture, Fox explains that the red blobs mark nearly two dozen vast stores of natural gas that energy firms seek to open for drilling in the near future.
As he's done nearly every day in the 15 months since premiering his documentary Gasland at Sundance, the 39-year-old filmmaker describes his map as a visual recipe for environmental apocalypse.
"Drilling the red areas means the annihilation of the American Dream," says Fox, who minus his thick-black frames is a dead ringer for a young Lenny Bruce. "We can stop them from turning the country into an archipelago of unlivable toxic industrial zones, but the Gulf Spill reminds us you never know how much time is on the clock."
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Indeed you don't. Two weeks later, on the eve of the first anniversary of BP's Deepwater Horizon disaster, a well operated by Chesapeake Energy, the country's second-biggest gas producer, malfunctioned in the rural northeastern Pennsylvania township of Leroy. Tens of thousands of gallons of toxic drilling waste flowed into the local environment, threatening fishing streams and forcing the evacuation of nearby residents. The spill dramatically illustrated the downside of the controversial technology described in Fox's Oscar-nominated film: hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," the process by which raw natural gas is extracted from shale rock sediment and brought to surface.
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In essence, fracking involves shooting large volumes of water and sand laced with dozens of exotic toxins at extremely high pressure into the shale thousands of feet beneath the surface. This releases the raw gas for retrieval and refining. But the toxic waste remains a problem both above and below ground. Much of it is recovered and stored in what are often unguarded, open-air chemical sludge pools near the drilling site. The rest of the wastewater, sometimes up to half, remains underground, where it can contaminate nearby water tables and seep into the environment in ways that are still not completely understood. "We know there are significant risks associated with … the pollutants involved in fracking," says Anthony Ingraffea, a rock-fracture mechanics expert at Cornell University. "These drilling techniques result in amounts of toxic matter so large – in solid, gas, and liquid states – that, in effect, everybody is 'downstream.' You can't get far enough away."
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When speaking before audiences, Fox often employs his map to highlight the risks of secondary contamination. "When you include fracking's effect on local water tables, you can color in much of the rest of the country red," says Fox. "This includes some of our biggest cities."
As research deepens our understanding of fracking's environmental impacts, the incidents continue to pile up. Most of these fracking spills do not make headlines. An investigation conducted last year by Scripps Howard found that in Ohio alone, gas companies have in the last decade been charged with nearly 2,000 violations resulting in pollution and contamination of the local environment. Similar numbers could soon be reported across Fox's gas map of the United States, where 34 states are now being targeted for drilling.
Until Gasland, few Americans had heard of fracking. Unless you lived in one of the hundreds of rural communities affected – places like Wetzel County, West Virginia and Leroy, Pennsylvania, all lightly populated and far from the eye of media scrutiny – your image of natural gas was likely painted by the industry's aggressive, ubiquitous, and well-funded "Clean Gas" p.r. campaign, which uses sun-dappled images of pristine nature and laughing children to portray gas as the happy, lifesaving fuel of a brave new world – so domestically abundant and environmentally friendly you just want to throw it a ticker-tape parade, if not tickle its tummy. The campaign successfully created the perception, even among the otherwise environmentally savvy, that gas is a fossil fuel without the notorious downsides of other fossil fuels.
Fox himself knew nothing about fracking when an energy firm offered him $100,000 to drill on his family's land in rural Milanville, Pennsylvania, a couple hours' drive east of the recent Leroy spill. Before accepting, he looked into the experiences of others that had accepted industry offers to drill their land around the country. What he found made a dark mockery of the company's claims. Soon he was on the cross-country investigative odyssey documented in Gasland, which did for fracking what Rachel Carlson's Silent Spring did for pesticides. Upon its nomination for an Oscar, a broad coalition of environmental groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, issued a rare joint statement praising Fox for having "catapulted … hydraulic fracturing into the national conversation."
"Josh created a people's history of gas drilling," says the actor Mark Ruffalo, who lives in western New York state across the Delaware River from a Pennsylvania drilling site and was already active on the issue when he met Fox at Gasland's Sundance premiere. "He captured the human toll in a way that gives voice to people who didn't have one."
Rudimentary fracking technology has been around since the 1940s, but its use was rare until the last decade, when breakthroughs made its widespread application possible. Under the Bush administration, the quantity of gas procured by fracking rose from one percent to nearly a quarter of national production. Key to this growth was a seal of approval from Bush's EPA – a seal now judged by scientists and federal regulators as premature. The growth of fracking was given further impetus by a provision in the 2005 Energy Act, known as the "Halliburton Loophole," which exempted gas drilling from EPA enforcement of the Safe Drinking Water Act. As a result, gas companies are not required to report the chemicals they injected into underground gas veins across the country. (In November 2010, a Democratic Congress asked the EPA to review the Bush policy, and most firms have since agreed to voluntarily list the chemicals used. It's worth noting that reporting them does not render them less toxic.)
Since releasing Gasland, Fox, a veteran theater company director, has spent a good deal of his time in Washington, D.C., where he often visits, sometimes with Ruffalo in tow, lobbying Congress and federal agencies. "The regulators at the EPA and Justice Departments are dying to do their jobs – it's the lawmakers who are the problem," says Fox. "Obama's people are not listening. We led a letter campaign in which thousands of people wrote the president expressing concern over drilling in their communities. The White House sent back a form letter about the importance of national parks. We were like, 'Did they send us the wrong letter?'"
In early May, energy secretary Steven Chu announced the creation of a panel tasked with studying the environmental impacts of fracking and coming up with recommend guidelines for state and federal regulators. The panel of seven, which has six months to issue its report, is led by former CIA chief John Deutch, currently director of Cheniere Energy, a Houston-based firm and a major player in the development of liquefied natural gas. (The company's slogan is, "North America's LNG Gateway.")
Fox is trying to keep an open mind about the White House initiative, but does not find the line-up encouraging.
"It's worrisome that the panel is frontloaded by advocates of gas drilling," he says. "There is no one with established scientific credentials with a history of saying, 'These are the risks,' no one who has a track record of looking at issues such as drinking water contamination in the past three years. Why not pick experienced people?"
The anti-fracking lobby is not completely without allies in Washington. Democratic representatives Maurice Hinchey (New York), Jared Polis (Colorado) and Rush Holt (New Jersey) have appeared at events with Fox and Ruffalo and are working to close the fracking loophole in the Safe Drinking Water Act. But they are in the minority, standing against a rising tide of gas industry cash in the nation's capital.
"The gas industry has increased its lobbying efforts at the federal level considerably in the last decade," says Dave Levinthal of the Center for Responsive Politics. "In 2002, they spent $300,000 at the federal level. So far this year, they are on track to spend $2 million." The numbers get even larger at the state level, where the mountains of cash reflect the size of the local political stakes. According to Common Cause, gas companies spent $2.87 million last year in New York alone fighting a temporary fracking moratorium. Direct lobbying investment is matched by the industry's latest media campaign, launched in 2009, which spread an initial $80 million among a bevy of heavyweight advertising and p.r. firms, including Hill & Knowlton, a legendary D.C. firm that also represents the nuclear industry and specializes in the creation of fake grassroots organizations.
Since HBO picked up the rights to Gasland last June, fracking has come under a level of public scrutiny that the industry – encompassing hundreds of firms involved in drilling, refining, and transport – has spent the last decade trying to avoid. It's easy to see why. The spotlight on fracking's risks has seriously retarded the industry push to gain access to the entirety of the nation's gas reserves. In statehouses around the country, momentum has been slowed and moratoriums proposed and instituted. The stage is set this year for especially raucous public showdowns in New York and Pennsylvania, which sit on the northern tip of the Marcellus Shale, a massive underground gas deposit extending from Southern Virginia to within spitting distance of the New York statehouse in Albany.
The deep politics of gas development will feature prominently in Gasland's sequel, which Fox is currently shooting for an early 2012 release. It will include cameos from those at every level in the debate, including U.S. senators, small-town inspection officers, and petition-wielding parking-lot activists. "On the one side is a very powerful industry and their political and media allies," says Fox. "But there are small groups of extremely dedicated activists fighting fracking in every state where it's a threat. It's incredibly inspiring to see these mini-labs in democracy in action."
Fox has made new friends working with these activists. He's also made some enemies.
Even before the credits rolled at Gasland's Sundance premiere, America's National Gas Alliance, the leading industry association, knew it had a potential p.r. problem on its hands. Fox says they sent a reporter from EnergyInDepth.org, an industry-connected website, to Sundance to bootleg the film. (ANGA denies this.)* The first signs of a counterattack appeared prior to the film's theatrical release in the form of dismissive posts on industry sites.
As long as Gasland stayed on festival circuits and in art houses, the industry response was muted. This changed when HBO bought the rights in June. Shortly after the announcement, oppo-research packets titled "DebunkingGasland" began to appear in the mailboxes of national media. Peter Applebaum of the New York Times forwarded a copy to Fox and asked for a response. "It was all misinformation and lies—all of it," says Fox of the industry packet. Because there was no way to answer the charges in a sound bite, Fox compiled a 39-page rebuttal (PDF) with more than 100 references. America's Natural Gas Alliance next "purchased" Fox's name and that of his film. The first result of Google and YouTube searches for "Gasland" or "Josh Fox" is a commercial called "The Truth About Gasland." Like all natural gas commercials, the spot views more like an ad for an anti-depressant or penile-dysfunction drug than a plan for the massive development of a fossil fuel. Full of beautiful beaches and beaming babies, but devoid of drilling sites or chemical waste pools, the four-minute video describes Gasland as a "dramatic but flawed [film] that contributes to a dialogue based on fear not facts."
The backlash against Fox and his film has taken some ugly turns. Fox's family property in rural Pennsylvania has been vandalized and subject to arson. Pennsylvania officials have issued bulletins to state law enforcement describing Gasland screenings as "eco-terrorist" events. In March, Pennsylvania's chief oil and gas geologist compared Fox—whose father and grandfather survived the Holocaust—to a Nazi propagandist. The geologist later apologized for the remark, but Fox says he remains more offended by the officials' support for the construction of up to 180,000 drill sites in his home state.
Fox says the industry tracks his media appearances closely, and aggressively lobbies producers for equal time. When he appeared on the Daily Show after the Oscars, Jon Stewart told Fox that T. Boone Pickens' people had called the show "like a hundred times" to counter his appearance. (Fox visibly darkens at any mention of Pickens, the energy magnate whose eponymous "national plan" calls for maximalist drilling and converting America's bus and truck fleet to liquified natural gas.)
Sometimes Fox finds media pushback in unexpected places. During a recent interview on The Dylan Ratigan Show, Fox was quickly put on the defensive when the MSNBC host began the segment by suggesting Fox had a "problem with capitalism." When Fox held up his gas map and attempted to explain what it meant, Ratigan, who was broadcasting the show from the University of Oklahoma—something like the gas industry's home field—cut Fox off, telling him, "I'm not interested in getting a propaganda speech from you." The interview left Fox fuming. "It was like an episode of The Fifth Wheel," says Fox. "Dylan Ratigan gets married to Natural Gas."
If the gas industry follows Fox as closely as he says, he doesn't make it easy for them. His life since Gasland has been a non-stop whistle-stop tour across the country—a blur of screenings, debates, and talks in more than 200 cities and towns. Most events are in small communities where he meets with local activists. But there have also been flashes of the exotic. In October, Fox found himself on a stage at the Yoko Ono Peace Prize Awards in Rejekavik between Ringo Starr and Alice Walker, playing "Give Peace a Chance" on Sean Lennon's guitar. In March, Canada's Blackfeet Indians bequeathed him with a ceremonial headdress and a Blackfeet name meaning, "He Survives."
"My life since Gasland has had this Forrest Gump fantasy quality to it," he says. "I try to keep a level head."
As he works on Gasland's sequel, Fox continues to agitate for a national fracking ban. Short of getting one, he's lobbying against the gas industry's official exemptions from environmental legislation such as the Clean Drinking Water Act and the Superfund Act. And the more prolonged the debate, the better. The longer the debate drags on and the more scrutiny the industry draws, says Fox, the more people will learn the risks of making gas a cornerstone of national energy policy. Incidents like the spill in Leroy County will continue to chip away at public confidence in its safety. Science, meanwhile, has begun to undermine other assumptions about the benefits of gas. In April, scientists at Cornell published a study suggesting the methane released by drilling and refining gas could undermine the fuel's credibility as a climate-friendly alternative to coal and oil. Another scientific study, conducted by a team at Duke University and published in a recent issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, officially linked gas drilling to the phenomenon of "flammable faucets", in which enough gas seeps into the water system that household drinking water can be lit on fire with a match.
As the science solidifies and the politics play out, there is no danger of the issue reverting to its pre-Gasland obscurity. "Fracktivists" across the country are organized to ensure drilling decisions cannot be made quietly behind the scenes in. Nationally, the future of drilling in Pennsylvania and New York is drawing widespread interest for its implications for the drinking water of millions living in the media capital of the world. "We're girding for a fight," says Roger Downs of the Sierra Club's New York office. "I don't feel confident about the future of the New York City watershed unless we get a permanent statewide ban."
As he keeps tabs on New York and dozens of other states where fracking has become an issue, Fox maintains the roughly equal measure of cynicism and optimism necessary for any long-term fight against a powerful foe like the natural gas industry.
"Oh, we'll win," he says. "There's too much at stake not to win. It's just a question of how many places get destroyed between now and then."
*Added: Attribution of claim to Fox; ANGA denial.
Josh Fox, director of Gasland, was one of the recipients of the 2010 LennonOno Grant For Peace along with Alice Walker, Michael Pollan, and Barbara Kowalcyk.
IMAGINE PEACE2011-05-18T17:44:35-05:00May 18th, 2011|Imagine All The People, Yoko reads|


TORONTO, Ont. — Can't get enough of Truck World? Jim Park has you covered with a wrap up and review of this year's show. Watch everything from day three including the Highway Star of the Year presentation, a celebration of women in trucking, and much more from the showroom floor.
SKANEATELES, NY – The Women in Trucking Association has a new friend. The group has a new 13-inch plush doll – Clare – manufactured by HABA in the United States.
Clare features an official Women in Trucking cap and an "I heart trucking" t-shirt. The package she is delivered in shares the story of how she made it into the driver's seat of her big rig.
MONCTON, NB – The Atlantic Truck Show returns to the Moncton Coliseum June 9-10, with a biennial event that typically attracts more than 12,000 visitors over two days, organizers say.
MISSISSAUGA, ON – Senior UPS executives were in Mississauga, Ontario on Friday, celebrating 10 years of a program that connects and mentors women in a traditionally male-dominated sector.
PLOVER, WI – For the fourth consecutive year, the Women in Trucking Association and Navistar are presenting the Influential Woman in Trucking award to a female role model and pioneer in the trucking industry.
When I look around and take stock of what this industry needs — what the entire world needs, for that matter — I see a monstrous waste of talent because women haven't been allowed to play a role.
How to make your fleet a female-driver magnet, at little or no cost.
PLOVER, Wis. — Coming into its third year, the Women In Trucking Association has added a new director to the board, while three charter directors have submitted resignations.
MIAMI, FL – Ryder is introducing female-friendly trucks to its fleet based on recommendations from Women in Trucking, to encourage more women drivers to join the ranks of fellow truckers.


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Life As You Don't Know It Nov 4, 2015 9:25:01 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Nov 4, 2015 9:25:01 GMT -5
Things seem quiet in the underground dome that the five live in. Emmet in the other room possibly preparing meal proportions, David and Sallie taking a nap, and Charlie playing his gameboy. Typical morning for the group. As usual, Zeb starts his day searching the radio for any signs of life, convinced that the above ground world was wiped, yet with the possibility that somebody out there may have intel on what the hell happened. After an hour of nothing but static, he gets up from the table and walks into his room where paintings are hung up on ever inch of the wall almost. He walks to empty canvas before dipping his paint brush in water then the red paint.
"Shit, all out of red..."
Yet another color he has to stop painting with, aside from blue, red was his favorite to paint with. He's began to grow tired of the consistent routine. Glad he's safe underground, not having live in whatever hell the world outside that shelter door is now, yet he's still a man trapped in a cage. However, he still don't think he'd want to work up the risky nerve to ever open those doors. Closed and locked them on outbreak day, never opened them since. Nearly 2 and a half years later, he and the group are still living quietly underground. Zeb places the paint back into his basket and washes off the paint brush before heading into the room that Emmett's in.
"How's everything going?"
Popping the question while picking at dried up paint on his hand.
Emmett was counting all the cans and dried food packets, using the paper and clipboard to mark everything down. They were running a bit low in dried beans and it was going to require a trip to the surface soon. They had maybe a few weeks worth of beans left and she knew how vital that was for protein. Luckily enough they had lots of jerky, although she found the taste to be way to salty for her liking. She was coming around a stack of bags of rice when Zeb came in, nearly scaring her half to death in the dimly lit store room. She gasped and brought the clipboard against her chest.
"I need to put a bell around your neck Zeb. You just made me jump out of my skin."
When she finally calmed down a bit, she hooked the clipboard back up. It was up to everyone to check off what they came and got and sometimes forgetful minds left her wondering who was taking what.
"Everything is fine. Nothing out of place, as usual. We're running low on beans though. Any chance of making a trip topside any time soon?"
In a way, she wanted to get out there and see how bad things were, but in another sense, she felt safe, normal and protected here. Charlie was pretty protective of her, considering he was the one that got her down here and introduced her to Zeb. She also felt pretty protective of him and his family too. Like he was her own brother.
Life As You Don't Know It Nov 5, 2015 10:55:50 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Nov 5, 2015 10:55:50 GMT -5
As he stands there marking off some jerky under his name on the clipboard, taking a few bites, Emmett popped the question that she'd pop numerous times in the past. He finished swallowing the bits in his mouth before spitting out a typical response to that question.
"Emmett, you know that we can't do that. There's no radio signal meaning no life. There's a virus out there that'll make our skin melt if we are exposed to it and we only have one radiation suit. Big enough for a man and I won't go out there because I don't even think that'll work. Besides, we got plenty of jerky."
Presenting the jerky to her he can see the dissapointment on her face as she is eager to see what's out there. She's the only one besides Charlie that's been bugging the rest about it since they've gotten in there. But he knows that it's smart to stay safe until he can get a signal on the radio knowing it's say to breath in the outside air.
Emmett rolled her eyes as he spoke about them not going to the surface. He was enjoying the jerky and even offered her some that she turned away. She wasn't hungry and she didn't want to waste food if she didn't need to.
"Zeb, we can't stay down here forever. Eventually we're going to have to go up and we can't go just one person at a time. We don't know how people are...if there are any people left."
She turned back to the shelves and sighed crossing her arms over her chest. "Look, Charlie can take the suit and I'll back him up. You know I'm training with a rifle so I can take care of any threats. We're like mole people down here. We have to get more supplies."
Even though they probably had more supplies then anyone on the surface. They had an abundance that most on the surface would try to take. She had no idea how splintered morality had become or how people had become desperate animals trying to survive day to day. But they had to find out. She knew she was right about this.
"I promise, we won't be long. An hour, tops."
Hearing Emmett's offer to go up above ground without a suit on, almost made Zeb want to tear his ears off and feed them in soup form to the others. He looked on at her as she finished her proposal, as if she's crazy.
"Absolutely not. Are you insane? Put the boy in a suit is one thing but you going out behind him with nothing on to protect yourself from the toxic atmosphere is another. That's a big no no. All the times you've bugged me to go up, this has got to be the worst proposal I've heard yet."
He takes a step forward with a concerned look on his face and a lower volume to his tone so the others don't hear him.
"I get that we need supplies, but I can't risk sending more than one at a time out. We don't know how bad it is out there. For all we know, we could all have bad reactions to the radiation and die on the spot. We...we can send Charlie out there.....but that's the only way. I won't change my mind."
Finally giving in after a long while of everybody worrying about supplies, he's decided on putting his faith in the boy to get what they need.
Emmett rolled her eyes again and pushed past Zeb heading back for one of the main chambers. "Seriously Zeb? Or we realize that there's probably no radiation up there and we finally get the balls to go topside."
She took a few steps down the corridor when he spoke about sending Charlie up by himself. That made her stop and turn around to look at him.
"You would send him up there alone? Are you sure that's a good idea? Zeb, you think that kid can handle it?"
She would be willing to let Charlie go by himself, but she wondered if Charlie would want to go by himself. Would he be brave enough? Hell, would any of them be brave enough? She knew she wouldn't want to go up alone, but with only one suit and no way to know exactly what happened up there, it may just be the only thing they could do.
"I mean, what if something happens to him?"
Zeb leaned on the wall beside him picking jerky strands out of his teeth as he thinks on her question before answering with a solid answer. "Bingo, walkie talkies. I had some in my room. He puts on that suit. Makes his way to the tunnel that leads out so that if there is toxic fumes, it wouldn't get in here. And then, he'll see what he can find. That is if there's anything left."
Not sure if the plan would work since there's no signal from the radio nor any sort of clues as to what's going on. All they know is the world gone to shit so they hid in a hole. A hole that kept them alive for this long, surley not gonna risk it this time. But supplies are important. So Zeb takes a leap forward and puts hope in the boy. "He can do this. He will do this." With that he leaves the room in search of Charlie.
Emmett sighed as he turned and walked off to find Charlie and the suit. She hoped the kid would be able to hold himself on the surface. She made her thoughts clear to Zeb and he knew it would be on his shoulders if anything happened. Of course, she didn't want that. She didn't want Charlie to get hurt and she didn't want Zeb to be devastated if something did. She knew she had to have more faith then what was in her heart about it.
She decided to go back to her room that had a bunk bed in it. It looked like it was stolen from a jail with the sturdy steel beams that supported the structure. She used two thin mattresses to make a comfortable bed which could easily be taken apart if they had a flood of survivors. She didn't want that though. She was certain none of them did but it was getting lonely up here. She left her reasons for wanting to go up to the surface a secret from Zeb knowing she would be admonished for wanting to find company.
She picked up the book she had already three times and started from the beginning, touching her hand against the little light that worked on batteries and sitting back down on the bed. She wanted to keep her mind off that mission Charlie was about to embark on.
"WHAT!?" David said as Zeb finishes explaining his plan to the three.
"I don't like it as much as you don't David, but Charlie is fast and he's a perfect fit for this suit. He'll have this Walky Talky with him to keep connected with us. He knows his way back if..."
David steps forward as if he's attempting to threaten Zeb. "Hell no, i'm not letting my son go out there. He'll die!" blinded with anger, David begins to lose his cool getting in Zeb's face. Despite having this shelter for he and his family to survive thanks to Zeb, he can't throw away his sons life like this.
"Look, there's a chance he will die. That's a fact. But there's also a guarenteed fact that we'll all die if we don't get supplies. Down to the last shelf in the pantry. We won't last another month in here. Emmett brought that to my attention. I was blinded just like you are now. Not wanting to admit that we have to go outside sooner or later I made the decision to nominated Charlie. And quite frankly, the boy's 18 so it's not fucking up to you."
No realizing how right Emmett was he feels like there's no way he's going to back down. However, David pushes him at that last comment as the two look as if their about to engage in combat. But, Charlie steps in the middle of the two before yelling out, "I'll do it! For the good of the group, I will take the suit and gather supplies."
Not appreciative of his son's decision, David speaks up once again with a serious tone in his voice, "No Charlie, you're...."
"You have no say in this dad! I'm doing this." Determined to help out the group, Charlie has made up his mind, with nothing on the planet able to change it.
Life As You Don't Know It Nov 11, 2015 8:07:01 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2015 8:07:01 GMT -5
Emmett understood why David was upset. She got it. It was his son and they were putting him charge of going up to the surface without even knowing what was up there. There was no clue about what was left and what was gone. Was anyone even still alive? Was anyone still friendly? Was it a nuclear attack or biological? They didn't even have windows to know. No one knew they were here. She heard the arguing and came out to see what was going on. She already knew but she felt she had to intervene even as Charlie made up his mind to go up.
"David, he has to learn. We all do. One suit, one at a time until we can figure out what's up there. Charlie is the best fit for it. He's the fastest out of all of us. If there is anyone that can get back safely, it's Charlie."
That seemed to call David down a little bit as she gave him confidence about his son's abilities. Zeb was raw when it came to negotiating. She was willing to be the one to go to the surface, but for some reason, Zeb was dead set on letting it be Charlie. She could only assume Zeb had a deeper reasoning. She assumed it was because he didn't want her to get radiation poisoning and die a slow, sick death below the surface. That would make her a burden.
Life As You Don't Know It Nov 11, 2015 11:51:43 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2015 11:51:43 GMT -5
With Emmett stepping in and calming David down, Zeb looked to Charlie before handing him a walky talky and pointing to the wall where the suit is hanging up. "You can communicate with us along the way and that suit will protect you from any radiation. I will unlock the door the the entrance in a little bit, but once you go through that door, I am locking it until you come knocking." Still in shock at the whole situation, Charlie tries to understand the situation as well as he can.
"I'll give you a bit to get ready, if you want, Emmett can supply you with a gun. Just try and find any canned foods, maybe see if there's any life left." Zeb puts his hand on Charlie's shoulder before speaking again, "I have faith in you and so do the rest of us. Sorry for laying such a heavy task on your shoulders, but you're the only one that can do this." With that, David and Sallie hug Charlie as he takes the suit and begins to put it on. After having help from Sallie to finish zipping it up, he turns to Zeb and says "I'm ready now" obviously not wanting any time to regret his decision. With that, Zeb leads the way as they reach the top where there's a door that leads to a room that contains a door that leads to the outside. To keep things safe, the entrance room was built for this type of situation. They opened up the door for the first time ever after Zeb went through the trouble of remembering the combination on the lock, and in Charlie went with instructions on how to open up the vault like door to the surface.
Zeb looks over at the worried group as they no longer see Charlie, "David, your boy is doing good for the group." With that, they hear the door open up before hearing it slam shut.
Emmett was pacing back and forth as Charlie left having no idea when he would be back. She told him to not be gone longer than an hour, but she really had no idea what was going on up there. Would he only need a few minutes or would his excursion take up a majority of the day. Either way, she told Charlie to get back before the sun went down.
She decided to separate from Charlie's parents and talk to Zeb privately and quietly. "I'm nervous about this. What if something happens?"
On the surface, Charlie would see a barren landscape surrounding the small city. Houses abandoned, doors and windows broken either by looters or weather. Cars broken down and already starting to rust lined the streets as they became inoperable and the only sounds above that could be heard were the leaves as they rustled down the street. Charlie stuck out like a large, yellow thumb against the landscape of grime that lined the windows and buildings.
To his left were a row of houses that were abandoned and to his right were the strip malls where people went about their daily lives, getting their nails done, shopping, picking up prescriptions and filling up their tanks of gas. Across the street were more houses and as Charlie climbed up out of the sewers, the attention he garnered from his movements was brought to his attention by a walker that slammed up against the front door of a home with a large curtain and window. The curtain had been drawn back, probably before all this happened and the walker was gnawing at the glass with rotten hands pressing against the window. That certainly caught Charlie's attention and he went across the road to investigate why this person was unable to let herself out.
As he wandered closer and closer to the window where the figure stood, he began to notice these awful details. Rotted teeth, yellow eyes, deformed face. Almost as if this person had gotten shot in the head, blowing off half her scalp leaving the brain exposed. Not used to the image, Charlie begins to puke a little in the suit as vomit splatters down the helmet and on his shirt. He then cocks his gun as he hears a scraping sound. Sure enough the sound is coming from yet another mutant. Only this time, it's crawling on the side of the street, with the bones where it's legs should be scraping against the concrete.
Coming at Charlie full force, he fires a shot. And misses, he fires another and hits it right on the temple, blowing it's head to bits. "Oh my go.." again Charlie pukes a bit. Obviously in shock of what's transpired just shortly after stepping foot on the surface. Not entirely understanding the situation. What these things are. What even happened. It's all new to him as the world has already adapted to it. He and the others, well they were shielded from this travesty. Unable to realize the horrors of the world.
As Sallie continues to calm David down in the other room, Zeb and Emmett speak privately about the matter.
"Well, if he doesn't make it.......we just have to hope Emmett. We've done good at it so far. We wait for him to speak to us through that walkie talkie."
With that, he sits the walkie talkie on a table beside him before plopping down on a couch next to David and Sallie.
Charlie begins to wonder about the person in the house. How they were forced to shoot themselves in the face instead of die by any gasses in the atmosphere. Maybe it was alright to take off the mask. Without little thought, he decides to take chances from here on out, hoping for the best. And with that, he unclips the neck and pulls the mask off breathing in the fresh air. It was nice. For once breathing in nature, even though the life on earth has been reduced, nature was the same as it always was.
As the group continues to wait, the radio crackle through and they at last hear Charlie's voice. "Hey"
"Charlie you hear me?? How is it?"
"The air....is...fine....but..."
"but..." he suddenly stops speaking as he hears a snarling sound from behind him, grabbing onto his shoulder. He panics and pushes it back towards the window where the other is. He proceeds to drop the walkie talkie and pull his gun back around to his arms before aiming at it. With one blow he shoots his gun, but misses, thus breaking the window allowing the other mutant to free itself. He stumbles to reload and drops his clip bringing him to a rush to get away. As he turns to run, he trips over the lifeless body of the mutant he had already killed, hitting the ground like a sack of potatoes. With his head smashing into the road, his vision grows blurry. Beginning to fade out of conciseness, his senses bring him back as soon as he feels teeth digging into the back of his head as well as his left shoulder. The mutants begin to feast on poor little Charlie as he screams out in horror, unable to break free of the tight hold the two mutants have on him.
Last Edit: Nov 14, 2015 19:12:56 GMT -5 by Deleted
Emmett was on the edge of her seat as she sat, waiting to hear from Charlie on the walkie talkie. When he finally broke through over the air waves, she sat up a little more and looked to Zeb. She wanted to ask him more questions, mostly about what the 'but' was, but as she started to reach for the walkie talkie, she heard the growling and sudden sounds of horror that came through. What the hell was attacking him?
"Zeb, what is it?"
Sallie and David had come into the room and immediately Sallie started to scream Charlie's name. Tears ran down her cheeks as she came to her knees and radio silence was all they heard after that.
"My God. Zeb, I have to go up there. I have to get him." Zeb wouldn't have a choice now. Whatever was happening on the surface needed to be dealt with and Zeb knew she was equipped. She worried he was being attacked by stray dogs or some sort of animal that was left in the streets. Maybe something got out of the zoo. She made sure she had a pistol at her side and that it was fully loaded as she went towards the ladder that led to the surface. None of them would have a choice at this point. She had to go rescue Charlie.
The situation seems clear to the rest of the group. They've lied dormant underground until now. Now everything is moving so fast. Zeb allowed the boy to go above ground, expecting the worse already but he can't allow the others to go. Especially Emmett. He's grown a very strong relationship with her over the time they've been held up there. Has a sense to protect her and the others. But he's afraid that they will unknowingly step into a shitstorm. He already feels so bad for sending Charlie out there just to get attacked. For all he knows, Charlie is dead. And allowing the others to go out there, means that there's a big chance they will die as well.
"No......" Replying to Emmett about going out there. This one word catches the attention of the entire group. Not understanding his logic here. "I can't allow you all....to go out there. It's...." before he can finish speaking, he hears the sound of a gun being cocked before turning his head to see a pistol being held mere inches from his face by David. Scared for his son yet pissed off at Zeb he begins to speak in a panicked tone. "You did this to him! My son is out there on his own, possibly dying by some creature and you want to stay crammed up in here like a little pussy? Well that's bullshit! You got him into this mess! I ought ta kill you where you fuckin stand!" His hand tenses up with his finger on the trigger.
With his hands slowly rising to the air Zeb attempts to calm him down..."Look David, shooting me won't solve anything...." David in an emotional state begins to develop angry tears coming down his cheek. With a huge debate about whether he should shoot the gun or not going on in his head.
Emmett watched as David angrily held the gun to Zeb's head ready to pull the trigger, yet she knew he wouldn't. This was escalating quickly and Zeb kept denying the inevitable. Charlie was in trouble on the surface and someone needed to go up. She knew she was the most capable one of doing it. Reaching down to her waist, she grabbed her handgun and released it from the holster, using the butt of the gun to smack it against David's head. It wasn't enough to kill him, but to just knock him out.
"Dammit Zeb, this is the way it is. I'm going up, getting Charlie and coming back down. You take care of David. until I get back."
She didn't even bother with trying to cover herself up. Instead, she went back to her room, grabbed a bandana and wrapped it around her face as a makeshift mask while heading to the tunnel that led to the ladder that led to the surface. It was already loosened from where Charlie went out and it was easy enough to open. She was bound and determined to find out what happened. She just hoped she found out Charlie was still alive and that gunshot wasn't aimed for him.
As David continues to point the gun at him out of frustrations towards his son being put in danger, Emmett comes from behind him with a gun butt to the head knocking David down to the floor. Sallie immediately drops to see if he's alright as Zeb focuses on Emmett who claims that the's going up to look for Charlie. He begins to speak as she leads her way through the entrance tunnel. "No Emmett you can't do this. Not on your own. Please. Emmett. You'll die up there!" He grabs her arm before pulling her to him. "I can't allow you to go Emmett......not alone...." Before he can say anything else Sallie with David holding his forehead in pain interrupts the two. "We've decided that we're going with you. And Zeb, you can't stop us." It's all happening to fast as the three proceed to open up the door as he watches. "Guys it's not safe...."
Emmett felt herself yanked down by Zeb who was pleading to her like it was more then just a simple check. He was speaking as if her life were in danger, which it very well could be, but she couldn't stay down here much longer. One bad decision was made and she didn't want another to be made.
"Stop it, Zeb!" She yanked her arm away from his as she moved back up the ladder that went up.
"You both stay down here. You're not prepared to deal with whatever happened to Charlie. You'll both be nothing but a burden to me if I have to protect myself and your asses also. Everyone stay down and that's an order!"
She moved back up to the hatch that was slowly pushed open. The stream of light poured into the underground, blinding her for a moment until she could adjust to the air. It was cloudy outside and the entire town looked gray as she looked across the street. That's when she saw the bodies shuffling across to a building, possibly a home. As she crawled out, she shut the lid down behind her and snuck over to a mailbox, crouching down so she could observe for now.
Highly upset at the fact that the day that he's been dreading for so long has hit so quick in the morning that he had no time to prepare. Lives were at stake. He knew how dangerous it would be, but knew as a leader he needed to make a decision. And once that decision backfired, his leadership over the group went south as the others wanted to go north. Emmett, dead set on saving Charlie demanded that nobody followed her. With a gun in hand, she was ready for the worst. She obviously looks to have taken in the situation pretty hard at the moment. With no hesitation of knocking David down nor climbing out of this place. She truly believes she can survive. And Zeb personally finds that foolish. He can't have anybody throwing there lives away after he's spent so much time preparing to keep them alive. Sure he's grown lazy and comfortable in the underground safezone, but it was always gonna be that one moment when his leadership was put to the ultimate test. Somebody needed to go up. He made the mistake of choosing a young boy when he should of went himself. Now a second life is being put at risk. He can't have that. He won't have that.
Emmett watched as the group of people converged on the house and they did not look human at all. They looked dead and she wondered what sort of disease had gotten them. Chemical warfare was a very real problem and threat before they all went underground and she wondered if they had been infected with something. As she stood up, she heard a growl behind her and a man lunged after her.
"Oh my god! What happened to you!" She had no idea what went wrong or what he had contracted, but he didn't respond. All he did was look at her through cold, dead eyes. His hands were coated with blood as the flesh dripped away and she started to wonder if Zeb was right. Was it too toxic to be up here? Instead of firing a shot at him, she shot up and ran up the sidewalk flanked by others that heard her cry out. She saw the legs of Charlie prone on the ground as the pool of blood crew around him. The yellow suit was an obvious sign that was him and he was not moving. Shit, she needed his radio.
Little did she know that Sallie and David were behind her, coming out of the hole in the ground and into the fray of walkers that were following her.
The screams were heard and a spray of blood splattered against the lid to the bunker before it clamped shut behind them. Zeb would clearly hear the attack above as she ran towards a nearby building, hoping height would be her friend.
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Ayita Hunt: sorry for the few months of inactivity. Life got a little hectic on my end and ended up having to have ankle surgery which has laid me up for a while. I'll try to start posting again soon. Jul 23, 2021 16:13:19 GMT -5
Tamara "Steel Wolf" Lyell: No problem, Ayita; I've been in the same boat at well. *hugs* Aug 14, 2021 1:14:34 GMT -5
Wyatt Thorne: it's all good Aug 20, 2021 18:54:11 GMT -5
Sean Delfino: oh Hey Aug 24, 2021 15:52:19 GMT -5
Dana Winchester: Evening, everyone Sept 2, 2021 0:41:58 GMT -5
Holly Brighton: Hey all Sept 24, 2021 3:01:31 GMT -5
Tamara "Steel Wolf" Lyell: Hey everyone, how's it going? Sept 24, 2021 10:01:09 GMT -5
Shauna Kelly: Hey how are you Sept 25, 2021 15:08:46 GMT -5
Catherine Smith: Doing pretty good; hope all is well with you, Shauna. Sept 30, 2021 19:01:19 GMT -5
Shauna Kelly: I'm fine, dispite new week ahead Oct 3, 2021 17:24:33 GMT -5
Tamara "Steel Wolf" Lyell: *hugs, hugs & more hugs* Oct 3, 2021 18:36:52 GMT -5
Shauna Kelly: That helped, thank you Oct 4, 2021 14:40:44 GMT -5
Ayita Hunt: dang, January was my last post.. Jeez it's been a hot minute. o7 guys, sorry for the complete disappearance, life got.. a little interesting this year. Oct 18, 2021 22:34:19 GMT -5
Hazel Farrell: discord.gg/ukhzVC5a Aug 18, 2022 7:48:30 GMT -5
Hazel Farrell: Trying to get some of the writing going again, click the discord link Aug 18, 2022 7:49:22 GMT -5
Hazel Farrell: discord.gg/qazxNaTM Aug 29, 2022 12:12:38 GMT -5
Benny Fleetfoot: *Looks around* Sept 17, 2022 9:20:28 GMT -5
Holly Brighton: discord.gg/sTGxf8Xw Sept 19, 2022 1:16:06 GMT -5
Sarah Sharpe: *looks around* Nov 17, 2022 3:30:54 GMT -5
Remy LaCroix: Wow, it's been a while Hello everyone and Happy New Year. Life is crazy busy for me. Jan 10, 2023 6:50:04 GMT -5
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"City Lights" Pre-Made was entirely designed and coded by ▼ ɹıɐlq ʎʇıuıɹ⊥ and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License. Original Sticky Menu Bar concept credited to Elli @ Adoxography and the city silhouette graphic found @ imgkid.com.