This is taken directly from Boing Boing News rss feed but I thought it was important to talk about. I fell like these people should be jailed and not just fined. This type of behavior is one of the reasons I enjoy living in a poorer city.

The Los Angeles County Superior Court ordered James J. Jackson, vice president of legal affairs at Sony Pictures Entertainment, and his wife, Elizabeth, to pay 825,000 dollars to 60-year-old Nena Ruiz, who says she was kept as an indentured servant in the couple's home.

[Ruiz claims she was] emotionally and physically abused and forced to work 18 hours a day at virtually no pay for a year ... she said that Elizabeth Jackson had frequently slapped her and pulled her hair. During her year at the Jacksons' home, Ruiz said she slept in a sleeping bag on a "dog's bed" on the living room floor and ate days-old food, while she prepared fresh food for her employers' pets.

Here is the whole article.

I am eating the first popsicle of the summer. It actually seems kind of disgusting. It is not very sweet and tastes like plastic. It's especially weird to think it's made out of oil. Did we fight a war for popsicles?

Maybe it tastes bad because it's old. It probably has been there, on the shelf all summer, if not since last year because I really can't remember that many hot days where people wanted popsicles.

On another note, I found this really messed up picture of (e:matthew) 's white ice fish that died. I didn't know it was there till now. Someone must have used it while playing with the paint program on my phone. He was a cool looking fish but the other fish hated him and beat him up till he died. It was sad to watch as he didn't fit in and they scared him so much that he dug a little hole and would never come out.

I was listening to the iTunes streaming radio that (e:terry) had put on today. I really like it so I looked into where it was coming from. It was from the site of someone he knew from when he lived in las vegas.

The guys name is keith. This is a picture of him.



Anyways, it has some really great beats and lots of media. He also has some writings about Nocturnal Wonderland the biggest party of the end of the summer in SoCal. I remember Ronnie always wanting us to go there from AZ. I have to say my biggest problem with SE parties back in the day was the incredible amount of dust. The next day you would be blow black boogers out your nose. Not to say that partying in the desert doesn't have it's appeal.

Check out this girl's outfit.

m what is really going on. In my case it was the loss of this naivity and the important discovery of personal politicsm that ended partying for me.

I think a huge part of it , was also about an era change in American politics. Nowadays, I feel guilty in hedonist celebration. knowing that it is all at the cost of others. It's not just that people are celebrating that bothers me, it is that there is nothing realistic or political about raves. In a way that always surprised me. The beats are so powerful and the opportunity exists to use the music to move the masses into action and understanding of what is going on around them. Instead, the rave environment completly cuts the partcipant off from the society they live in for one night of total celebration. While many bands do that too, "band" style music has the ability to send important messages.

Here are some lyrics from a famous techno song that has been remixed into a thousand techno genres. It depicts the entire movement, both in a positive and negative light.


Something for your mind, your body and your soul..
It's the power to arouse curiousity.
The purpose, the goal which one acts on.
A journey of force, hot like the sun and wet like the rain.
Eternity has past..
wrong = right.
It's the point of greatest intensity.
Pleasures of the highest sense.
Feelings of warmth and security.
Willing and unwilling sensations of the mind.
A condition..
The ultimate seduction!!!


Maybe I should start politechno. Although, it probably already exists somewhere. Does anyone have any or know about any? This whole conversation with myself is so against what I had said ten years ago when I "raved" about the fact that techno music did not have extended, meaningful lyrics and was thus not subjected to the iron fist of propanagda.

I still just don't think that I could go to a party and not feel it is all fake now. Something has changed in me, and I find it hard to just let go and not care about the fact that world peace is crumbling around us. It is hard to dance knowing that someone is being shot by American soldiers, while we party it up. Maybe I am just old but I doubt that is it, something has really changed in America. I really like the music still, and I really like to dance, I just can't stand the fakeness of the environment.

If ravers are all about PLUR (peace, love, unity, and respect) why aren't there huge poltically charged "raver" masses marching in the streets instead of shopping at the mall. I think it is because no one can take a person dressed in candy seriously.

I thought that the obsession with the anorexically thin models was an american phenomena. I always just assumed it was part of the obsession with "the other" as America is pretty fat. While reading the Chinese news at xinhuanet.com again today, I came across this article about the "New Silk Road" beauties' swimsuit show Apparently, models from 40 countries come to a park in Hangzhou to participate in the pagent. They are prison camp skinny.



Apparently, starvation is an international symbol of beauty, at least for 40 countries. Wow how the times have changed. It really hits at the fact the human beings have moved so far away from the "natural" condition. Historically, being not-so-skinny was a sign of properity and beauty as it showed you had money, health, etc. Imagine how not-pretty an anorexically thin woman would seem if you were moving out west in a wagon train caravan and had to cross the salt flats, ford rivers, and traverse mountain ranges.

[size=m]Links[/size]
(e:sqb) added a link from a forum on the Central Terminal Project Site. It seems to be bringing a lot of traffic in. If anyone else uses any other local sites and has the opportunity to add links back to their journal, I encourage it. To find the internet address of a particular journal entry simply click on the little earth icon at the bottom of the journal. Once you click, a window will pop up with the direct web address to the entry.

[size=m]Beach[/size]
Last night we headed out to Tom's Beach house for a giant party. We saw a bunch of people I never expected to see and brought a bunch of peeps with us. It ended up being one of those hot summer nights, complete with skinny-dipping in the lake nights. (e:mike) actually got sick from swimming based motionsickness. (e:southernyankee) actually started to learn how to swim. I can't imagine not being able to swim, I guess I always took it for granted. Thanks mom for sending me to swimming lessons all of those very cold Buffalo summer mornings.

Roy from media studies was there with his wife. Apparently, his son works for for Tom's pet store [inlink]paul,1856[/inlink]. The new professor, Ste(v/ph)en from Media Studies, was also there. We hung out with him most of the night - he seems like a really nice guy. He lived through (e:matthew)'s tiraid on the plight of the Native American's in America. On the way home I thought the border Nazis would give us trouble at the border. Especially, because ste(v/ph)en was from Britain. At first they started hasling us, but as soon as we said where we came from they sent us right on through.

I actually tried to play tennis for a while. Not as in "by the rules" but as in "ran and chased after balls." It was kind of fun and made me think that I should possibly get more excercise. I felt bad for (e:rachel) because she is actually good at tennis and the rest of us sucked. We hit the ball back and forth a maximum of five times.