Medium: Pen and ink, paint, Photoshop, Vector, photography/photo-manipulation, and various crafts
Aesthetic: Morbid Kawaii is my favorite style but I like to switch it up and try different things. I like making comics the best, it’s just they are time consuming!
Notable Achievements: I was published in the Unite and Take Over book, which is a comic with various stories based on Smith’s songs that can be bought in a lot of comic shops and via Amazon.
Why We Should Care: I try to be varied and change up things to keeps things interesting. I get bored easily so you never know what to expect me to make next!
I Want Me Some: I am located on various internet spots. Most of my art can be found on DeviantArt.
RealDystopia.com is where you can find the zombie cartoon project I’m working on.
My own site will be called SuperSecredid.com. It will feature my own web-comic, Paper Heroes, a silly superhero serial, and cosplay photos of models. I’m always open to commissions or proposals for art projects. Email me at: jpmanz@gmail.com
It’s a weird thing, a girl’s heart. I like to think that no matter what my brain says, I can always make the right choice if I use both organs. Speak with your brain, think with your heart. As much as I wanted to open my mouth and protest as the last two important guys in my life let me go, I didn’t, because my heart told my brain that what they were doing was right, that we weren’t right, and it was time to be on my own again. I trust that my heart will always guide me, even if it sometimes gets lost. And I trust that even when I have to hurt someone else, I am only doing what’s right for me, and that’s what’s most important.
It was this situation I found myself in recently, and I still can’t help but feel so guilty for actually not feeling anything at all. I’m not sure when I arrived at the decision that I wasn’t exactly over my ex, but somewhere along the lines he crept back into my mind and there is nothing worse than a girl who can’t think straight who’s become involved with someone else. My “someone else” was another bartender, a fit and cocky guy who fit my unfortunate type perfectly. We had gone out a few times and what I thought was going to be something slow and fun quickly took a turn — this guy seemed to want to get serious almost immediately. I froze, unable to see his smiling face through the red flags that suddenly clouded my vision.
My brain started going a mile a minute. Was I scared to commit? If I didn’t want to be in relationship with this guy, why were we dating in the first place? Am I not ready to date? Or did I just know in my heart that he wasn’t the one for me? Was I just using these recent thoughts about my ex as a crutch to not have to feel anything for anyone right now? I was feeling overwhelmed and guilty almost immediately, even though I guess the point of dating is to get to know someone. If it wasn’t working out for me, all I had to do was end it. All I could do was tell the truth.
They weren’t kidding when they say the truth hurts. I kept faltering, stuttering, unable to find the words to say what I was feeling, unable to make this guy really understand why I couldn’t see him anymore. It was one of the scariest things I’ve ever done, and it did not go well. All I kept thinking was that at least I was being honest, but it’s never easy to hurt someone, even if you have only just started seeing them. I wasn’t ready for this, I had to clear my own head and heart before I was willing to let someone else into either of them.
The amount of relief I felt when it was finally over was so great that I could have jumped for joy, and at the same time I could have burst into tears. Knowing that someone out there was so hurt and angry with me was like a punch in the gut. I’m so used to being the one who gets hurt that I forgot what it was like to do the hurting; it isn’t any easier.
So now I’m back to just me; my usual lingering unwelcome thoughts about the ex, back to sleeping with the cat and brewing only one cup of coffee in the morning. I kind of like it; my choice to be alone rather than be with someone who wasn’t right for me just for the sake of being with someone. I always did sleep better alone, and it’s a sound sleep, knowing that my heart and brain were on the same page and for once, did the right thing.
Recently, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets in Moscow, Russia to voice discontent with parliamentary elections that they argue – with good reason – were rigged. These protests have attracted notice from both an international audience and the Kremlin – which claims that they represent unrest spurred on by foreign agitators within the US State Department, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Unlike much of the protest within Russia since 1991, those who added their voices to the calls for new elections were not simply Communist Party pensioners railing against a social system which has no use for the elderly. Instead, the 60,000 protesters tended to be young, college educated, and organizing through social networking sites.
While the numbers on Prospekt Akademika Sakharova seem to have fallen short of the 120,000-200,000 turnout figures that some activists have offered, these protests are the largest that Russia has seen since the end of the Soviet system. Likewise, they are the longest lived, snowballing from small rallies into the mass protests in Moscow’s Bolotnaia Square on December 10th and the even larger December 24th protest. Incensed at the results from the December 4th parliamentary results, which emerged amid a storm of Youtube videos of ballot-stuffing, Russian blogger Aleksei Navalny helped organize a rally against Putin’s United Russia party, which he labeled “the party of crooks and thieves.” This rally attracted a few thousand people and drew condemnation from government officials. Navalny became an internet sensation when Duma member Konstantin Rykov labeled the blogger a “cocksucking sheep.” Whether by accident or hack, President Medvedev’s twitter account repeated the slur. A number of these smaller protests led to the December 10th mass rally, which drew praise from famous Russians such as Gorbachev and Kasparov, and encouraged similar protests in St. Petersburg, Vladivostok, and many other Russian cities. The celebrity voices were joined by Russians less well known outside of the country, such as Boris Nemtsov (a liberal politician), Boris Akunin (an author), and Aleksei Kudrin (the former finance minister).
The election results were a clear rebuke to Vladimir Putin, offering only 49% of the popular vote and barely over 50% of the parliamentary seats to United Russia, despite over 5300 cases of documented voting fraud (according to Russian election monitor Golos) and implausible turnout. According to official numbers, for instance, the war-torn Chechnya had a 99% turnout and 99% of those who voted did so for United Russia, including 90% of those registered for the social democratic A Just Russia party.
“I’ve found, especially in this industry, one compromise leads to another…” – Nick Valensi
Few bands in the last few years have made such on impact on rock music and music in general than The Strokes. Their first album, 2001’s Is This It, set the bar very high in terms of sales and critical acclaim, so it was inevitable that their sophomore release, Room on Fire, didnt live up to expectations. They have just released their third album, First Impressions of Earth, and I got a chance to talk with guitarist Nick Valensi about their rise, stumbling a bit, then rising like a phoenix up through the granite of insecurity.
NOT INTO: Conservatives, racism, misogyny, fake breasts, war, animal cruelty, materialism, people who are afraid to be themselves, repression, meat, religion.
MAKES ME HAPPY: Boobies, kitties, robots, tea, cartoons, pretty ladies, drugs, bikes.
HOBBIES: Painting, bike cruising, dancing, walking, traveling, going to shows, making out, .applying makeup, philosophizing, writing, being kinky, drinking tea, fantasizing..
5 THINGS I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT: Sex, eyeliner, sneakers, hair dye, fruit, and lip balm!
I SPEND MOST OF MY FREE TIME: Cuddling kitties, walking, reading, rocking out, having sex, exploring my body, conversing, dreaming, cooking, watching movies.
It was a casual Sunday and I found myself walking through the local video game store. I’m always on the lookout for games that are influenced by real-world events, geopolitics or other revolutionary ideas as presented in digital form. While I’m still waiting for the ultimate game that portrays presidential elections, an upcoming release by a major global gaming studio has caught my eye and for possibly the wrong reasons.
Ubisoft is updating Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six series with a new sequel in 2013. Only this time, the baddies aren’t mysterious investment bank-type Arabs pointing Kalashnikovs. After seemingly an entire generation of blowing up Muslims, we’re finally getting a reprieve from the barrage of first-person-shooters that portray all of the Middle East as though it were one big underground weapons market.
So who (or what) has become the latest enemy of the state to be deemed a necessary kill for Clancy disciples in the video game world?
It just might be the 99 Percent.
You knew this would happen sooner or later. According to early press reports and box art, the enemy of America now comes from within. Rainbow Six: Patriots is a squad-based game that paints those who fight for economic inequality as a terrorist threat.
Early simulated clips that may or may not make the final release are indeed astounding. The opening scene of the first working imagery officially released portrays a home invasion – complete with the physical assault of the mother of a newborn baby – as undertaken by a band of anti-corporate zealots. Here’s a snippet of dialogue from a YouTube preview as released by Ubisoft…
“You really did cash in on everyone else getting foreclosed didn’t you? Today, you’re going to make up for that…”
Wow. I guess we’ve all been waiting for a blockbuster shooter that paints the 1 percent as victims. Thanks Tom Clancy. If violence again rears it’s ugly head at future protests, I guess we’ll know who is throwing fuel on the fire.
For those that don’t feel like watching the preview footage, what unfolds then is an exercise in violence gone amok as an apparently American-born, kevlar-vest wearing terrorist known within the game as a “True Patriot” proceeds to strap an explosive device on a docile target. It all ends in more violence as the well-armed hero Rainbow Six team can’t seem to solve the bomb problem, so they throw the target off a bridge in New York City which may or may not be the George Washington.
Given that some consider video games like these to be military trainers, many of the people whose voices gave birth to the Occupy movement are likely to be revolted and disgusted that some of their protest messages may now be fodder for what could turn out to be a very violent and very scary simulation.
Worse, does this game further encourage the militarization of domestic policing with respect to the portrayal of anti-establishment protesters?
The “True Patriot” moniker given the American terrorists in this game seems like a mix of Tea Party and Occupy movements. Granted, the game is in very early in development, but this ripped-from-the-headlines approach should upset some of the 99 Percent who hold nonviolent civil disobedience to be one of the founding principles that helped shine a spotlight on a progressive voice of unity.
If the new terror threat is indeed an underclass emboldened by cries of “this is what democracy looks like,” we’re all going to be in a lot more trouble than we think. By the end of many of the Occupy encampments, some of the public opinion voiced against those protesting was clearly being molded by a media that sought to vilify the Occupy movement as a stinking underbelly that needed to be held under the boot of a police state.
If the next step is really to turn weapons – even the digital kind – upon this group, a new front has been opened up in an entertainment propaganda / information war that civic, cloud-based journalism may find impossible to counter.
Seems the 1 percent has quite a few tricks up their golden-cufflinked sleeves.
