YouTube star Etika, 29, found dead nearly a week after posting concerning video - USA TODAY
YouTube star Etika, 29, found dead nearly a week after posting concerning video - USA TODAY |
- YouTube star Etika, 29, found dead nearly a week after posting concerning video - USA TODAY
- Google pulls videos accusing it of election manipulation from YouTube... which it owns - RT
- Taylor Swift has angered many people with her 'You Need To Calm Down' release. Here's why - USA TODAY
- You'll be seeing a lot of videos like this once the regular season begins - Bucs Wire
| YouTube star Etika, 29, found dead nearly a week after posting concerning video - USA TODAY Posted: 25 Jun 2019 02:39 PM PDT CLOSE  The YouTube Gaming app will go away on May 30, but you'll be able to find all of your favorite gaming videos in the YouTube main app. Buzz60 YouTube star Etika has died at age 29. The New York Police Department confirmed that the gaming vlogger, whose real name is Desmond Amofah, was found dead nearly a week after he went missing. "On Monday, June 24, 2019 … police responded to a 911 call for a person floating in the waters in the vicinity of South Street Seaport," Detective Sophia Mason told USA TODAY in a statement. Mason said Amofah was identified Tuesday, and that the medical examiner will determine how he died. Authorities started a search for Amofah on June 20 after he posted a disturbing video titled "I'm sorry," which caused fans to worry about his well-being. "Have you seen Desmond Amofah aka Etika? He was last heard from June 19 at about 8PM by phone," the NYPD tweeted last week."He is a known @YouTube blogger and has many people concerned after a recent video." In the video, which was later removed for violating YouTube's Community Guidelines, Amofah shared suicidal thoughts, apologized for pushing people away and warned about the dangers of social media. More: Why YouTube's kid issues are so serious The official Twitter page for YouTube Creators called Amofah, who had over 130,000 subscribers on the platform, a "beloved member of our gaming creator community." "We mourn the loss of Etika," the account tweeted. "All of us at YouTube are sending condolences to his loved ones and fans." In another tweet, the YouTube Creators account provided the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline for others struggling with mental health issues. If you or someone you know may be struggling with suicidal thoughts you can call the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK (8255) any time of day or night or chat online at suicidepreventionlifeline.org. Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2019/06/25/popular-youtube-star-etika-found-dead-age-29-desmond-amofah/1563063001/  |
| Google pulls videos accusing it of election manipulation from YouTube... which it owns - RT Posted: 25 Jun 2019 01:04 AM PDT  Google's video platform YouTube is apparently no place for content that accuses the tech giant of political bias and election meddling. An expose based on a sting operation was taken down by the company a day after its release. The online behemoth found itself in the crosshairs of Project Veritas, a conservative action group that purports to expose pro-liberal biases at various American organizations through sting operations and by publishing leaked material. Its report on Monday claimed that Google deliberately tweaks its search algorithms to promote liberal agendas that it favors, and that this is intended to help "prevent the next Trump situation" in the upcoming elections. YouTube, the world's most popular video sharing platform, which is owned by Google, soon took down the videos that were uploaded by Project Veritas, its head James O'Keefe reported. The footage was removed "due to a privacy claim by a third party," a message now tells anyone trying to view it.
The third party is probably Jen Genai, Google's head of 'Responsible Innovation,' who was featured in the report, discussing the company's policies in a secretly filmed interview with Project Veritas agents. She also addressed the expose in a blog post, saying that the people she met "lied about their true identities, filmed me without my consent, selectively edited and spliced the video to distort my words and the actions of my employer, and published it widely online." Genai said Project Veritas ambushed her to get "juicy soundbites" for their report, and insisted that she is not some powerful executive with influence on Google politics. The claim that Google was going to influence the 2020 presidential election "is absolute, unadulterated nonsense, of course," she said. Whatever Google does with its search algorithms and rankings is meant to prevent "foreign interference" and not to tip the scales in domestic debates, she added, which presumably makes the company's gatekeeping techniques all fine. Also on rt.com YouTube removes Project Veritas video on Pinterest's 'censorship of conservative views'Project Veritas previously had its videos taken down by YouTube. Just this month, its report on alleged suppression of conservative voices on Pinterest was removed from Google's platform, which again cited privacy violation as the reason for the move. This month, YouTube also banned or demonetized a number of creators after a complaint by Vox journalist Carlos Maza. The crackdown was done under the platform's new rules on content, which are meant to fight online harassment and hate speech. Critics say in effect they stifle political debate by allowing left-wing commentators to paint their critics as harassers and have YouTube take punitive action. If you like this story, share it with a friend!  |
| Posted: 21 Jun 2019 09:37 AM PDT CLOSE  Taylor Swift dropped a new song, "You Need To Calm Down," celebrating Pride. This is the second song from her upcoming album "Lover." USA TODAY Who would have thought that a sunny-sounding, outwardly LGBTQ-friendly single, released during Pride month with a video featuring many of pop culture's favorite queer faces, would make so many people hopping mad. But the controversy swirling around "You Need to Calm Down," Taylor Swift's newest single, extends beyond the normal splitting-of-hairs that accompanies everything Swift does. In the week since the official release of "You Need to Calm Down," voices around the internet have spoken out about the pop star using gay rights as a fashion statement and equating the online hate she's received to the violence that the LGBTQ community has historically faced. And since the music video's release on Monday, a scene depicting anti-gay protesters as country bumpkins has ignited new waves of criticism. This isn't the first time Swift has been hit with claims of cultural appropriation, from her twerking background dancers in her "Shake it Off" video to, more recently, Beyonce fans pointing out the similarities between her 2019 Billboard Music Awards performance and Bey's 2018 Coachella headlining sets. But with "You Need to Calm Down," critics aren't just responding to a scene or two of thoughtless imagery.Swift's intent with her new single seemed to be to alignherself with LGBTQ fans – filling her music video with queer stars, showing up at New York's historic Stonewall Inn to perform and sharing a call to action for listeners to sign a petition supporting the Equality Act. It's her most deliberate act of support of the LGBTQ community, following past donations to the Stonewall Inn and the Tennessee Equality Project, her 2017 performance with Haley Kiyoko at the Ally Coalition concert, and more recent public criticisms of Tennessee senators Marsha Blackburn and Lamar Alexander. And many fans have cheered her spotlighting of the legislation, with GLAAD reporting a spike in donations tied to the video's release, other cultural critics and members of the LGBT community met her efforts with a "No, thanks." Read on for many of the complaints being lodged against Swift by the song and video's loudest critics. She's using Pride as a fashion statement or marketing ploySwift has spent the past few years slowly revealing her political views after receiving widespread criticism for staying silent during the 2016 election, and with her "You Need To Calm Down" release, she's unquestionably using her platform for good, to preach unity and raise money for LGBTQ-supporting organizations. And yet, many critics wondered why it took so long for Swift to speak up about gay rights. "When it comes to making public statements in support of these issues, Taylor waited a relatively long time: until after Katy Perry, after Lady Gaga, after Kacey Musgraves," Jon Caramanica wrote for the New York Times, pointing out that her celebrity-filled video "is a worthy celebration, but it is also plausible cover" for her years of silence. Instead of sharing her views earlier in her career, at a time when LGBTQ issues were less mainstream, why did she wait until 2019, when polls have shown that more Americans than ever are supportive of the community's advancement? And considering the single's function in the rollout of her new album "Lover," the song's opponents also have wondered whether Swift is trotting out her support as a conveniently-timed promotional tactic. "Eight years after Lady Gaga's 'Born This Way,' which came from an artist who was out as a bisexual woman at a time when the gay rights movement had far less mainstream traction than it does now, "You Need to Calm Down" looks even more pathetic," Christina Cauterucci wrote for Slate. She's queerbaiting fansIn a Tumblr post, Swift strongly denied that she had any intention of queerbaiting her fans -- or disingenuously teasing her sexuality -- during her "You Need to Calm Down" rollout, specifically responding to an internet rumor that she and Katy Perry had planned to kiss at the end of the video. "To be an ally is to understand the difference between advocating and baiting," she wrote. "Anyone trying to twist this positivity into something it isn't needs to calm down." That being said, certain aspects of Swift's "Lover" album cycle raised suspicions among some fans that she was leaning into the long-simmering public speculation that she is bisexual. First, Swift raised eyebrows by teasing an announcement timed to Lesbian Visibility Day on April 26, which was later revealed to be her previous single "Me." Adding to the questionable optics, some viewers pointed out that one of Swift's wigs in the "You Need to Calm Down" was dyed in the blue/purple/pink colors and pattern of the bisexual flag. She's distracting from the video's point with her Katy Perry sceneCritics also pointed to the video's headline-grabbing final scene, in which Swift and her former frenemy Katy Perry hug and make up, as a distraction from the video's entire LGBTQ-centric point. "The video closes with a reconciliation between Swift and longtime rival Katy Perry—two straight women—detracting from the pro-gay-rights theme," Jordan Julian commented on the Daily Beast. "katy perry and taylor swift became friends just in time to exploit pride month that's a funny coincidence," a Twitter user commented. And, as Wesley Morris wrote for the Times, "There's something risible about the idea of these two straight, well-intended, politically hapless women providing the dismount for a plea for equal rights while actual gay people have just been throwing gay-wedding cake all over each other." She's comparing online harassment to anti-LGBTQ hate crimes"You are somebody that I don't know / But you're taking shots at me like it's Patrón" Swift begins "You Need to Calm Down," going on to sing about tweets and internet lurkers in lyrics that seem to focus on the online harassment she's experienced throughout her career. And then, in between, the song pivots to criticizing harassment of LGBTQ people, with the line "shade never made anybody less gay" and further references to parades and gowns. To remove any doubt who she's singing about, the song's lyric video re-stylizes the line "Why are you mad when you could be glad" to read "GLAAD," referencing the leading LGBTQ advocacy organization. But some fans saw "You Need to Calm Down" as guilty of conflating Swift's internet haterade with the perils the LGBTQ community has faced on the road to mainstream acceptance. "Its breathtaking argument: that famous people are persecuted in a way meaningfully comparable to queer people," Spencer Kornhaber wrote about the song for the Atlantic, pointing out that, while a snarky online comment may constitute Swift's aforementioned "shade," that's much different than "a parent who disowns a trans kid, or a lawmaker who tries to nullify same-sex marriages, or a church member who crashes a gay soldier's funeral." She's mistakenly depicting anti-LGBTQ protesters as hillbilliesBeyond the song's lyrics, the depiction of anti-LGBTQ protesters in the "You Need to Calm Down" video also bothered some viewers, in which a dusty-looking mob, distinctly coded as blue-collar, yells at Swift and her fabulous cohort, holding signs reading "Adam + Eve, not Adam + Steve." For Esquire, Dave Holmes criticized Swift's approach, joking, "If there's one thing that has been shown to get through to homophobes, it is casting them as ugly and poorly-educated. They take it to heart and it works every single time and it is a shame more people don't do this." Criticizing the video's scene turned out to be a uniting factor for critics on both the left and right sides of the political spectrum, who echoed the common argument that Swift's depiction of anti-gay protesters as rednecks was an unfortunate misstep. "I think it's especially disappointing though because Swift started her career creating music that appeals to the demographic she is now maligning as bigots," the Daily Caller's Amber Athey tweeted about the scene. "You hate to see stars turn on their fan base, and she should know better than to promote this stereotype." Meanwhile, writing for the Independent, Nathan Ma argued that, instead of spoofing the rural working class in her video, Swift could have directed her criticism at a more powerful group -- politicians that support anti-LGBTQ legislation. "It's not hard to imagine an easier target for Swift's flying of the rainbow flag than low-income rural communities," he wrote. "Where is Mike Pence, who voted against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act in 2007, which would have banned acts of workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation? Or the president himself, who has repeatedly demonized transgender people and limited their access to the resources they need?" Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2019/06/21/how-taylor-swift-angered-everyone-you-need-calm-down/1512715001/  |
| You'll be seeing a lot of videos like this once the regular season begins - Bucs Wire Posted: 25 Jun 2019 02:09 PM PDT Hey, welcome back! I know we are in that dead period of time between minicamp and training camp where NFL news is slow and hard to come by, so thanks for stopping by. Still, that doesn't mean we can't get excited about the regular season, which is just a little over two months away. For Tampa Bay Buccaneers fans, the season can't start soon enough. With Bruce Arians aboard, big things are expected from this team, or, at the very least, an improvement on the 5-11 record they've finished with the past two seasons. One way they'll be able to do that is to get wide receiver Chris Godwin more involved in the offense, and, according to Arians, Godwin could very well be close to a 100-catch guy this year (you listening, fantasy owners?). If that's the case, then you can bet we are going to see plenty of highlights like this one next season between Godwin and Bucs quarterback Jameis Winston. Take a look.  |
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