Some SuicideGirls have been modeling for the site for 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, or even 10 years. We thought it would be fun to show you a look back and some of the SuicideGirls throughout the years. This week we bring you GoGo. Gogo has been a SuicideGirl since 2005. She has changed so much since her debut... more

Some SuicideGirls have been modeling for the site for 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, or even 10 years. We thought it would be fun to show you a look back and some of the SuicideGirls throughout the years.

This week we bring you GoGo.

Gogo has been a SuicideGirl since 2005. She has changed so much since her debut set. Enjoy this look back at Gogo:

Here is GoGo's first photoset from 2005: The Fortified School








Here is Gogo's 2006 tribute to the film Leon



Here is a photo from her 2006 set Man Eater:



Her 2007 set shot by Sean: Pouty:






2007 set shot by Albertine, Victorian Maiden:






She took a year off in 2008 but came back with a vengeance in 2009. From her return set Blackwater Vengeance shot by Cherry:








From her 2010 set Nixe shot by P_mod:





From 2011 Darth Side of the Moon by Sean:





2011 photoset Summer Blues shot by Albertine:








In 2011 She shot a multi set with the beautiful AnnaLee called and The Wolf Caught The Bird...






and finally from her most recent photoset Wolfie shot by Cherry:





Hope you enjoyed the beautiful GoGo!

Become a member TODAY to see all 27 nude pin-up photo sets of GoGo - http://suicidegirls.com/join/

by Yashar Ali Every election season, I ask myself the same question: Why aren’t more women running for public office? Over the past ten years, I have been hopeful for the prospect and rise of women political candidates. While I never studied the numbers, I felt like we were heading in the right direction. more

by Yashar Ali

Every election season, I ask myself the same question: Why aren’t more women running for public office?

Over the past ten years, I have been hopeful for the prospect and rise of women political candidates. While I never studied the numbers, I felt like we were heading in the right direction.

I couldn’t be more wrong.

Reporter Kate Linthicum’s brilliant Los Angeles Times article sheds light on the City of Los Angeles’ problem with proper female representation on the city council. The fifteen-member council, which had five female members eleven years ago, currently has just one, Jan Perry.

Current statistics about women holding federal office are equally dismal: women hold fewer than 20 percent of House and Senate seats. The House faced its first decline in 30 years with respect to women members.

Women hold fewer than 25 percent of seats in state legislatures. This sort of decline has not been seen in decades.

Why are we slipping back after so many years of slow but steady progress?

There exists real obstacles for prospective women politicians: media bias, lack of financial support, mediocre recruitment efforts, underfunded organizations built to help women run for public office.

I want to introduce a not-so-prominent problem: the serious deficiency of women in senior positions on political campaigns. With the exception of political fundraisers, you find very few women running campaigns or serving in top management spots.

The absence of women operating behind the scenes of political campaigns has been largely ignored. This is made clear by the complete absence of studies tracking the numbers of women working in politics. Open your newspaper and turn on your TV. You usually hear a senior-level male staffer speaking for candidates.

This isn’t just about my ideology. This is personal for me.

For the past two and half years, I worked for California Lieutenant Governor and former San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. In my last position with him, I managed his 2010 race for Lieutenant Governor.

Lieutenant Governor Newsom and his wife, actress and documentary filmmaker, Jennifer Siebel Newsom (who made a brilliant documentary about women’s under-representation in positions of power and the limited and often disparaging portrayal of women in the media - see SG interview) expressed in this campaign their frustration and concern about the lack of women working on his campaigns.

Lieutenant Governor Newsom always asked, when we made hiring decisions, whether we could fill these posts with qualified women. This was not just a question for him. In his first year as mayor, he appointed San Francisco’s first female police chief and fire chief. He was also the first mayor to initiate gender analysis of budget cuts.

But I couldn’t find available and qualified women to take senior positions in his campaign. The few women I did know were already working on other campaigns.

Shawnda Westly, Executive Director of the California Democratic Party, saw a need to fix this problem in California. She, along with her colleague Robin Swanson, put their money where their mouth is, and launched a website called Political Women California.

Political Women California delivers a simple, but powerful mission: to give women working in politics a place to post their resumes so employers can find and hire them for campaigns, elections and political positions throughout California — and across the country.

Their site has been flooded with postings from women already working in politics in California. Even though I am not in the business of managing campaigns anymore, it helped me realize how many women are trying to work in politics.

Usually, people run for office after being exposed to a political campaign in one way or another. So the question is: how do we expect young women to motivate themselves to run for public office when all the people running campaigns are men?

This issue is not limited to Democrats. We need more women working on campaigns and in elective office across the political spectrum. Both parties should see the benefit of female leadership. But drawing from my personal experience, I want to speak to Democrats: There is no excuse. How can we demand equality for women in the workplace and fair wage laws, when we can’t manage to hire women for the campaigns professing these issues?

I spent the better part of two years working tirelessly for Hillary Clinton in her bid to be the 44th President of the United States. My passion for her candidacy was primarily based on my belief that she was the most qualified candidate for president. I felt her unique combination of experiences would serve our country incredibly well.

But there was another strong factor for my motivation. One I will not apologize for. I really wanted a woman president.

The dream I have for a woman president is not dead. However, if we don’t make conscious efforts to hire more women on political campaigns, we are not only limiting our talent pool, but we will also face an epidemic shortage of women running for office.

We must demand that candidates we support value diversity in their hiring practices. So, my message is for two people: the candidate and the campaign manager.

Next time you are walking through your campaign headquarters, take a look at the young woman who shows up everyday after her classes to volunteer. The same one who always pays her own way on public transportation to make phone calls and to help knock on doors. The same one that you are impressed by and think is better than half your paid staff. And probably the same one you take for granted. She could be president one day…if you give her a chance.


***

Yashar Ali is a Los Angeles-based columnist, commentator, and political veteran whose writings about women, gender inequality, political heroism, and society are showcased on his website, The Current Conscience. Please follow him on Twitter and join him on Facebook.

He will be soon releasing our first short e-book, entitled, A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy — How We Teach Men That Women Are Crazy and How We Convince Women To Ignore Their Instincts. If you are interested and want to be notified when the book is released, please click here to sign-up.

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by Steven-Elliot Altman (SG Member: Steven_Altman) Our Fiction Friday serialized novel, The Killswitch Review, is a futuristic murder mystery with killer sociopolitical commentary (and some of the best sex scenes we’ve ever read!). Written by bestselling sci-fi author Steven-Elliot Altman (with Diane... more

by Steven-Elliot Altman (SG Member: Steven_Altman)

Our Fiction Friday serialized novel, The Killswitch Review, is a futuristic murder mystery with killer sociopolitical commentary (and some of the best sex scenes we’ve ever read!). Written by bestselling sci-fi author Steven-Elliot Altman (with Diane DeKelb-Rittenhouse), it offers a terrifying postmodern vision in the tradition of Blade Runner and Brave New World...

By the year 2156, stem cell therapy has triumphed over aging and disease, extending the human lifespan indefinitely. But only for those who have achieved Conscientious Citizen Status. To combat overpopulation, the U.S. has sealed its borders, instituted compulsory contraception and a strict one child per couple policy for those who are permitted to breed, and made technology-assisted suicide readily available. But in a world where the old can remain vital forever, America’s youth have little hope of prosperity.

Jason Haggerty is an investigator for Black Buttons Inc, the government agency responsible for dispensing personal handheld Kevorkian devices, which afford the only legal form of suicide. An armed “Killswitch” monitors and records a citizen’s final moments — up to the point where they press a button and peacefully die. Post-press review agents — “button collectors” — are dispatched to review and judge these final recordings to rule out foul play.

When three teens stage an illegal public suicide, Haggerty suspects their deaths may have been murders. Now his race is on to uncover proof and prevent a nationwide epidemic of copycat suicides. Trouble is, for the first time in history, an entire generation might just decide they’re better off dead.

(Catch up with the previous installments of Killswitch – see links below – then continue reading after the jump…)



[THE KILLSWITCH REVIEW – CHAPTER SEVEN, PART TWO]

[THE SOCIETY OF THE LAST SUPPER]

[Previous Chapter]

Once Haggerty was cleaned up, Brian showed him how to clip the white unit to his waistband to keep it within reach and led him to the dining hall. Haggerty’s table, one of a half dozen forming a semicircle around a barren platform stage, was set with sterling cutlery, assorted crystal for drinks, and opulent porcelain dishes upon crisp white linen. His plush chair was made of real, elegantly carved wood, atop a floor of veined Italian marble that matched the walls of the large room, upon which were hung large mirrors in gilded baroque frames. A huge crystal chandelier floating at the center of the ceiling cast soft illumination to supplement the dim light from ornate silver candlesticks on each table.

The hostess had been right about the return of his euphoria. And the Happy Sticks had an interesting effect: Haggerty felt both languid and oddly clear-headed, mesmerized by his surroundings but aware of every absorbing detail. It was as though he were making love, his body everywhere caressed, but in no hurry to climax; the journey itself was the object. At a nearby table the lone occupant, a bearded male with a white rose in his lapel, sipped from a wineglass. The man nodded at Haggerty and raised his glass. Haggerty grinned back, the outside world forgotten.

“Your waitress will be with you soon,” the ape said politely, and left.

Haggerty sat transfixed by how the candle on his table reflected rainbow colors off a crystal goblet. He felt parched. Lifting the goblet, he took a sip of the purest water imaginable.

“Good evening, Mr. DeAngelo.”

The soft tektronic voice belonged to another exquisite android. She was dressed in the tightly laced corset and wasp-waisted gown of the Belle Epoque. Haggerty studied her splendidly sculptured face, the high cheekbones accentuated by long jet hair piled into what once had been called a Gibson Girl style.

“I’m Polly and I’ll be your waitress. You have an amazing meal ahead of you.” She presented a bottle for his inspection. “It’s over one hundred years old,” she said, her smile promising delight to come.

Haggerty frowned reflexively.

“This is the wine you ordered, isn’t it?” she asked anxiously.

Haggerty eyed the label; the French inscription was meaningless to him. He had sworn off alcohol long ago, but seeing how far he already had come tonight, he decided it was not worth refusing. He nodded that it was acceptable.

“Pity you’re an android,” he said as the beaming waitress uncorked the bottle with white-gloved hands and poured him a glass of ruby liquid. “I’d invite you to share a drink.” He lifted the glass to his lips. The wine was smooth on the tongue and utterly delicious, the best thing he’d ever tasted. He giggled like a child.

“There’s more coming,” she promised. “Do you prefer black or red caviar?”

“Is it real?” he asked.

“Of course,” she said. “Everything here is real.”

“Then I’ll have both red and black,” Haggerty said, and laughed, not only at the absurdity that caviar was accessible in this day and age but that the android found no irony in her statement that everything in the club was real.

“I’ll be right back,” she said, and swished her hips in the tight gown back toward what Haggerty supposed was the kitchen.

The wine certainly was real, he had to admit as he sipped it guiltily. At the far side of the stage, another lone man wearing a white rose was eating what looked to be a turkey leg. A large, heavy signet ring glinted with candlelight as he lifted the leg in his hand. Turkeys had been extinct since Vertibrate Spongiform Encephalopathy—what did they call it then? Mad Animal Disease — laid waste to America’s food supply and decimated its pet population long ago.

“That’s cloniform turkey he’s eating, right?” he asked Polly when she returned to the table.

“No, Mr. DeAngelo, it’s not. As I told you, everything here is real. We have access to genetic materials and the technology required to clone entire animals. We actually breed the most requested varieties. Turkey is a popular item. That particular guest is having an authentic, historically accurate Thanksgiving dinner. Cows are very much in demand but we can also accommodate more exotic requests like yours.”

She placed his appetizer tray before him, a small dish of black and red caviar, bread and Petit-Gris snails. He looked at them quizzically, torn by conflicting claims on his consciousness: a voracious appetite to devour every morsel set before him and the knowledge of the vast expense to clone an extinct breed for the sole purpose of his doing so — or DeAngelo’s as it were, and the club’s other patrons. The audacity of it, the cost of their illegal access to the genetic material alone, were obscene — and irresistible.

“Is this not what you ordered?” the waitress hazarded.

“It’s just that I’ve never actually eaten them before,” Haggerty offered lamely, his mouth salivating.

“I’ll show you how,” she said, bending across to gather the appropriate utensil and extracting a snail from its shell with a deft twist of the wrist.

Haggerty opened his mouth and let her place it on his tongue. He chewed it hesitantly, groaning in delight. The snails had been cooked in a buttery sauce ever so lightly infused with garlic. He marveled at the taste of real meat from a real animal with its own distinctive flavor and texture, not the bland flesh produced in nutrient tanks everyone else in the country had to settle for. Delicious could not begin to describe it. Haggerty sighed with pleasure.

Polly beamed at him. “I’ll give your compliments to the chef.” She fed him another snail, her delicate movements as entrancing to Haggerty as the sublime ambrosia she delivered to his lips.

He closed his eyes, ecstatic. When he opened them again he glimpsed a cloche hat rising from beneath the tablecloth of the man across the way, followed by the head of a woman then revealed to be dressed as a flapper from the Roaring Twenties, dabbing her lips in apparent enjoyment. The man seemed equally pleased as he lowered the tablecloth back over his lap and smiled at Haggerty.

Appalled and aroused, Haggerty gagged just as Polly offered him another snail. Noticing his state, Polly followed his gaze.

She put down her utensil. “If you like, I’d be happy to perform that service.”

It took Haggerty a moment to recall that he avoided sex with androids on principle, even if the principle seemed questionable under the circumstances. He was here on serious business. Lives were at stake. It was hard enough to concentrate without an android’s sexual ministrations further clouding his mind.

“Maybe later,” he said. “I’m a little overstimulated at the moment.”

“As you wish,” she replied, refilling his wineglass. “The entertainment is about to begin. I’ll be back with your next course after the opening act.”

Haggerty reclined in his chair and turned his attention to the stage.

A large portion of the platform had descended and was gradually replaced by a rising twelve-man orchestra outfitted in white tuxedos. The dimly lit room went black, save for the candlelight on the tables, as the conductor lifted his wand. The band softly played a rhythmic, repetitive motif. A spotlight targeted the ceiling above the stage.

A skinsuit-clad girl floated downward on a swing, executing graceful gymnastic movements with supple flexibility and athletic strength. When the swing reached the stage, a young man emerged from the wings to help the girl alight and led her into a sinuous, sensual dance. Other dancers —eight of the most beautifully sculpted men and women Haggerty had ever seen — joined them from the wings, the floor, the ceiling, balancing on swings and hidden pulleys as the tempo escalated from the sensual to the erotic. Haggerty recognized a holostar whose image had appeared on magazine covers displayed at the newsstand in the BBI lobby. All the while the music increased by infinitesimal degrees in speed and volume. The performers’ beautiful bodies swirled and mingled, their movements progressing seamlessly from ballet to jazz to burlesque and culminating with the full strip of clothes and every imaginable sexual activity as the orchestra reached its crescendo.

Haggerty looked over at the man at the Thanksgiving table, who absently stroked the silk-stockinged leg of the waitress seated on his lap. Beyond him at the farthest table, a dark-haired woman sporting a white rose laughed giddily as her handsome male waiter poured wine for her. She might be thirty or a hundred thirty and was clearly enjoying the show. Haggerty was fully aroused when the music climaxed and the stage went dark.

“You can have any of the performers you like,” Polly murmured into his ear.

Her words, combined with her sudden materialization at his side, had a visceral impact, intensifying his arousal to the point of pain. Haggerty closed his eyes.

“Watching was enough,” he said through gritted teeth.

Polly smiled knowingly. “Saving yourself for your guest?”

He noticed with alarm the second setting at the table. Who the hell had DeAngelo invited? Would this guest blow Haggerty’s cover? His Happy Sticks glow faded. Haggerty found himself extremely annoyed.

“In that case, please come with me,” Polly said. “The club’s owner would like you to make a decision regarding your meal.”

Haggerty followed her. The floor was like air beneath his feet.

“She’s famous, isn’t she?” he asked Polly, indicating the holostar entangled with the bearded man and two of the other performers.

“Yes, she is,” Polly told him. “We provide nothing but the best for our guests.” She led him down a dim, marble-lined corridor.

“Is Traci working tonight?” he asked recklessly.

“She’s in the next number,” Polly said evenly. “Do you know her?”

“We have mutual friends.”

“I see. Will you require her services?”

“I’d like to meet with her as soon as possible,” Haggerty said eagerly.

“I’ll inform scheduling.”

The marble surface terminated at a smooth, transparent aquarium in which large, dim shapes moved through the confined water. The waitress halted, indicating that Haggerty should observe the contents. She ordered lights on; it took a moment for Haggerty’s eyes to adjust to the sudden illumination that filled the tank.

“Dolphins,” he said in awe.

“Your main course was difficult,” Polly said. “It took months, so they made more than one.”

Whoever was behind this place had performed a miracle. Dolphins had been one of the first species to exhibit VSE and become extinct. He had never hoped to see one alive, and here there were two of them. A dorsal bumped hard against the glass.

“That’s the male,” the android said. “I’d never heard of them before I came here. I watch them sometimes. They seem really smart.”

Haggerty recalled from textbooks that they were indeed highly intelligent, some claimed more so than humans. He watched them circle the tank just large enough to hold them, bobbing helplessly. His waning euphoria evaporated completely as he realized with horror that he was looking at his dinner. What a sick individual DeAngelo must be to have made such a request. Why on earth would he do it? Tears streamed down Haggerty’s face.

“Which one will it be?” Polly requested brightly, mistaking his emotion for joy.

Haggerty knew he must sacrifice one of these splendid creatures in order to save countless humans. But he could not bring himself to choose.

“I trust you are enjoying your experience thus far, Mr. DeAngelo,” came the hostess’s soft mezzo-soprano like a dream. She stood beside him, beautiful and dispassionate, his white unit extended in her hand. “It’s time for your second dose.”

He hadn’t even noticed that she’d unclipped it from his waistband. The counter turned over to “2” as he pressed. And then the hostess was gone, along with her unsettling gaze, and somehow the unit was back at his waist.

“Your choice, Mr. DeAngelo?” Polly asked again, her soft voice soothing, caressing.

Haggerty turned to the tank. How beautiful they were. A moment ago he’d been horrified. But the horror was muted now by pleasure. The female was near the bottom, barely moving. The male bobbed above her. It seemed to Haggerty the dolphin took note of him, making the decision for him.

“The male,” he said, the regret in his voice so dim that Polly did not hear it. “I’ll have the male.”

* * *

Excerpt from The Killswitch Review, published by Yard Dog Press. Copyright 2011 Steven-Elliot Altman.

Steven-Elliot Altman is a bestselling author, screenwriter, and videogame developer. He won multiple awards for his online role playing game, 9Dragons. His novels include Captain America is Dead, Zen in the Art of Slaying Vampires, Batman: Fear Itself, Batman: Infinite Mirror, The Killswitch Review, The Irregulars, and Deprivers. His writing has been compared to that of Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Michael Crichton and Philip K. Dick, and he has collaborated with world class writers such as Neil Gaiman, Michael Reaves, Harry Turtledove and Dr. Janet Asimov. He’s also the editor of the critically acclaimed anthology The Touch, and a contributor to Shadows Over Baker Street, a Hugo Award winning anthology of Sherlock Holmes meets H.P. Lovecraft stories.

Steven also bares ink on his body, and is bi, as in bi-coastal, between NYC and LA. He’s currently hard at work writing and directing his latest videogame Cursed Love, an online free to play gothic horror RPG from Dark Hermit Studios, set in Victorian London. Think Sherlock Holmes, Jack The Ripper and Dorian Gray mercilessly exploit the cast of Twilight. Friend Cursed Love (Official Closed Beta) on facebook and you can have fun playing out this tawdry, tragic romance with Steven while the game is being beta tested!

Diane DeKelb-Rittehouse spent several years in Manhattan as an actress before marrying her college sweetheart and returning to the Philadelphia area where she had been born. Diane first worked with Steven-Elliot Altman when they created the acclaimed, Publisher’s Weekly Starred-Review anthology The Touch: Epidemic of the Millennium, in which her story “Gifted” appeared. Diane has published a number of critically acclaimed short stories, most notably in the science fiction, murder, and horror genres. Her young adult fantasy novel, Fareie Rings: The Book of Forests, is now available in stores or online.

Interested in buying a printed copy of The Killswitch Review? Well, Steve’s publisher Yard Dog Press was kind enough to put up a special page where SuicideGirls can get a special discount and watch a sexy trailer. Just follow this link to KillswitchReview.com and click on the SG logo.

* * *

Related Posts:
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter One
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter One, Part Two
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter One, Part Three
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter One, Part Four
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Two, Part One
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Two, Part Two
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Two, Part Three
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Three, Part One
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Three, Part Two
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Three, Part Three
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Four, Part One
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Four, Part Two
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Four, Part Three
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Five, Part One
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Five, Part Two
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Five, Part Three
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Six, Part One
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Six, Part Two
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Six, Part Three
Fiction Friday: The Killswitch Review – Chapter Seven, Part One

(image) by Blogbot (image) [Voodou in Robot Lament] Artist / SG Member Name: Voodou Suicide Mission Statement: Art can be an escape, a personal thing, a social thing, a way to meet others. It has been all these things for me. I love making and doing things, so I don't think I could ever stop. Art... more

by Blogbot


[Voodou in Robot Lament]

Artist / SG Member Name: Voodou Suicide

Mission Statement: Art can be an escape, a personal thing, a social thing, a way to meet others. It has been all these things for me. I love making and doing things, so I don't think I could ever stop. Art is a huge part of what makes me, me.





Medium: Mixed media, some favorites include Copic markers, acrylic, fineliners, water colors and my Wacom tablet for computer work.

Aesthetic: Fun, colorful, graphic, most likely containing robots and/or dinosaurs.







Notable Achievements: I won Sappi ThinkAhead Graphic Design Student of the Year. I have passed my ISTD (International Society of Typographic Design) exam, making me able to put MISTD after my name. I have been featured in House & Leisure magazine (South Africa) as a winner of their reusable packaging contest. I have also been an Emerging Creative at Design Indaba (South Africa) in 2009.

Why We Should Care: Cause everyone could do with more fun and robots.





I Want Me Some: Find more of my graphic design on Tumblr and my T-shirts via my Etsy store. I also do commissions. Message me on SG if interested. Or email robot.factory.design@gmail.com








***

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by Bob Suicide (image) [Bob Suicide in Bears Beets Battlestar Galactica] To be completely honest, I never wanted or liked having Siri on my iPhone. My wishlist of features for future phones will never include the desire that my phone "talk to or at me more." The social implications of a world... more

by Bob Suicide


[Bob Suicide in Bears Beets Battlestar Galactica]

To be completely honest, I never wanted or liked having Siri on my iPhone. My wishlist of features for future phones will never include the desire that my phone "talk to or at me more." The social implications of a world filled with people who own phones that talk makes me shudder down to my very anti-social core.

Imagine if everyone who currently owned an iPhone had Siri on it; you wouldn't be able to walk down the street without hearing that robotic voice making appointments, giving directions, or doing some kid's math homework. People who used to quietly access information on their phone will now yell at it until it yells back. The implication being that it takes several attempts and ultimately frustrated yelling at the phone in order to get the artificial "intelligence" to understand your request.

After the social decline that I can see Siri ushering in, I'm afraid of the "dumbning-down" of the consumer interface. People won't need to learn how to use their phone to access information. They won't need to understand how apps function or how to navigate Google maps. All they have to do now is yell at it until it tells them what they want to hear. Why learn how to use your phone when a robot can use it for you?

So, given my ardent dislike of Siri, I'm not at all surprised that she isn't performing exactly the way people want. But, what does surprise me is what everyone seems to be complaining about.

Numerous media outlets are reporting that Siri is failing to point out abortion clinics. This oversight prompted both the rallying cry of an elaborate pro-life conspiracy on the part of Apple and the hailing of a new life-saving technological advance (depending upon which side of the debate you fall on). A pro-life group went so far as to congratulate Siri (and Apple) for the, "Numerous lives [that] will be saved as a direct result." While the ACLU called upon Apple to fix the "glitch" immediately.

When asked to find a clinic, Siri says, "I didn't find any." And when you ask her this question in the middle of a large metropolitan area, whether you’re pro choice, pro life, or apathetic to the idea of children, it's clear Siri isn't looking hard enough.

Apple has since responded to the uproar by saying that Siri is young and hasn't quite learned everything she needs to know, but as she "ages" through updates she will become more knowledgeable. Clearly, no one at Apple sat her down and had "the talk" about the birds and the bees before launch. She'll just have to pick it up from the streets.

The reality is that there are a lot of things that Siri doesn't know about yet. When I first got her, I yelled "cylon" at her in varying tones for the better part of ten minutes, but she has no idea what their plan is. Just because abortion happens to be a hot-button issue, Siri is seen as having a political agenda rather than the incompetent software that it currently is. Us geeks have all lamented the missing or defective features in the latest iteration of our favorite OSs, and Siri's inability to find an abortion clinic or properly call my mother instead of my brother is another in that long list.

But, let's go out on a limb and assume that Siri really is a pro-life sentient software. Why are you complaining that this intelligent techno-butler doesn't share all of the same ideals as you? You can't have it both ways. You can't herald the creation of technology that will lead to sentient software and then get upset when that software appears to have a perspective that differs from yours.

You may be able to argue that Siri isn't properly doing her job. You might have hired her to give you all possible suggestions, directions, platitudes, and words of heartfelt encouragement, and if so, and you find Siri fails to do her job in any of these categories, then the solution is obvious: she should be fired. Get a new phone or stop using Siri and go back to accessing your phone's apps like the cavemen before you used to do.

In the mean time, let's all just laugh it off with some hilarious visions of Siri over-compensating for her latest faux pas:



For more Siri/Abortion hilarity visit HappyPlace.com/.


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by Bob Suicide (image) [Bob Suicide in Bears Beets Battlestar Galactica] To be completely honest, I never wanted or liked having Siri on my iPhone. My wishlist of features for future phones will never include the desire that my phone "talk to or at me more." The social implications of a world... more

by Bob Suicide


[Bob Suicide in Bears Beets Battlestar Galactica]

To be completely honest, I never wanted or liked having Siri on my iPhone. My wishlist of features for future phones will never include the desire that my phone "talk to or at me more." The social implications of a world filled with people who own phones that talk makes me shudder down to my very anti-social core.

Imagine if everyone who currently owned an iPhone had Siri on it; you wouldn't be able to walk down the street without hearing that robotic voice making appointments, giving directions, or doing some kid's math homework. People who used to quietly access information on their phone will now yell at it until it yells back. The implication being that it takes several attempts and ultimately frustrated yelling at the phone in order to get the artificial "intelligence" to understand your request.

After the social decline that I can see Siri ushering in, I'm afraid of the "dumbning-down" of the consumer interface. People won't need to learn how to use their phone to access information. They won't need to understand how apps function or how to navigate Google maps. All they have to do now is yell at it until it tells them what they want to hear. Why learn how to use your phone when a robot can use it for you?

So, given my ardent dislike of Siri, I'm not at all surprised that she isn't performing exactly the way people want. But, what does surprise me is what everyone seems to be complaining about.

Numerous media outlets are reporting that Siri is failing to point out abortion clinics. This oversight prompted both the rallying cry of an elaborate pro-life conspiracy on the part of Apple and the hailing of a new life-saving technological advance (depending upon which side of the debate you fall on). A pro-life group went so far as to congratulate Siri (and Apple) for the, "Numerous lives [that] will be saved as a direct result." While the ACLU called upon Apple to fix the "glitch" immediately.

When asked to find a clinic, Siri says, "I didn't find any." And when you ask her this question in the middle of a large metropolitan area, whether you’re pro choice, pro life, or apathetic to the idea of children, it's clear Siri isn't looking hard enough.

Apple has since responded to the uproar by saying that Siri is young and hasn't quite learned everything she needs to know, but as she "ages" through updates she will become more knowledgeable. Clearly, no one at Apple sat her down and had "the talk" about the birds and the bees before launch. She'll just have to pick it up from the streets.

The reality is that there are a lot of things that Siri doesn't know about yet. When I first got her, I yelled "cylon" at her in varying tones for the better part of ten minutes, but she has no idea what their plan is. Just because abortion happens to be a hot-button issue, Siri is seen as having a political agenda rather than the incompetent software that it currently is. Us geeks have all lamented the missing or defective features in the latest iteration of our favorite OSs, and Siri's inability to find an abortion clinic or properly call my mother instead of my brother is another in that long list.

But, let's go out on a limb and assume that Siri really is a pro-life sentient software. Why are you complaining that this intelligent techno-butler doesn't share all of the same ideals as you? You can't have it both ways. You can't herald the creation of technology that will lead to sentient software and then get upset when that software appears to have a perspective that differs from yours.

You may be able to argue that Siri isn't properly doing her job. You might have hired her to give you all possible suggestions, directions, platitudes, and words of heartfelt encouragement, and if so, and you find Siri fails to do her job in any of these categories, then the solution is obvious: she should be fired. Get a new phone or stop using Siri and go back to accessing your phone's apps like the cavemen before you used to do.

In the mean time, let's all just laugh it off with some hilarious visions of Siri over-compensating for her latest faux pas:



For more Siri/Abortion hilarity visit HappyPlace.com/.


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this was in another thread, and it got me thinking: RagleGumm said: (image) (image) But also (especially in the eyes): (image) (image) i've always thought that fractal looks a lot like natalie wood - an actress from the 60-70's, was in rebel without a cause, gypsy, the great race, etc. but i... more

this was in another thread, and it got me thinking:

RagleGumm said:




But also (especially in the eyes):




i've always thought that fractal looks a lot like natalie wood - an actress from the 60-70's, was in rebel without a cause, gypsy, the great race, etc. but i definitely see the resemblance above.

anyways, anyone else notice resemblances between any of the girls and particular celebrities?

(image) by Blogbot (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) Chemio the True Hairless Ratty (pictured with his mistress Ultima Suicide in More Naked Than You) INTO: Chocolate, playing with my mommy, and cats! NOT INTO: Carrots. I HATE carrots! MAKES ME HAPPY: When we go out and I stay on my mommy's... more

by Blogbot














Chemio the True Hairless Ratty
(pictured with his mistress Ultima Suicide in More Naked Than You)

• INTO: Chocolate, playing with my mommy, and cats!


• NOT INTO: Carrots. I HATE carrots!


• MAKES ME HAPPY: When we go out and I stay on my mommy's shoulder the whole time, looking around and seeing people shocked!


• MAKES ME SAD: When my mommy goes out without me.


• HOBBIES: I am a rat, so you know, rat stuff, like hiding from the world and playing the whole day with other ratties!


• 5 THINGS I CAN'T LIVE WITHOUT: Chocolate, hot blankets in winter, my toys, cuddles, my rat friends.


• VICES: I like to lay on my mom while she is watching a film.


• I SPEND MOST OF MY FREE TIME: Playing with my rat friends or my mom! It's so hard living as a rat!

(image) by Blogbot (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) Chemio the True Hairless Ratty (pictured with his mistress Ultima Suicide in More Naked Than You) INTO: Chocolate, playing with my mommy, and cats! NOT INTO: Carrots. I HATE carrots! MAKES ME HAPPY: When we go out and I stay on my mommy's... more

by Blogbot














Chemio the True Hairless Ratty
(pictured with his mistress Ultima Suicide in More Naked Than You)

• INTO: Chocolate, playing with my mommy, and cats!


• NOT INTO: Carrots. I HATE carrots!


• MAKES ME HAPPY: When we go out and I stay on my mommy's shoulder the whole time, looking around and seeing people shocked!


• MAKES ME SAD: When my mommy goes out without me.


• HOBBIES: I am a rat, so you know, rat stuff, like hiding from the world and playing the whole day with other ratties!


• 5 THINGS I CAN'T LIVE WITHOUT: Chocolate, hot blankets in winter, my toys, cuddles, my rat friends.


• VICES: I like to lay on my mom while she is watching a film.


• I SPEND MOST OF MY FREE TIME: Playing with my rat friends or my mom! It's so hard living as a rat!

One of my favorite kinds of interviews is when I end up just talking with a filmmaker about what movies they like. That’s mainly what I think about all the time, so it’s lovely to know we share that. That’s exactly how it went when I interviewed Wim Wenders, one of the original icons of the indie... more

One of my favorite kinds of interviews is when I end up just talking with a filmmaker about what movies they like. That’s mainly what I think about all the time, so it’s lovely to know we share that. That’s exactly how it went when I interviewed Wim Wenders, one of the original icons of the indie film movement. Having made movies since the ‘60s, Wenders has seen a lot of world cinema firsthand. His impact peaked in the ‘80s when Paris, Texas and Wings of Desire captivated arthouse cinemas. He’s made music videos for U2 and pretty much a movie a year, 33 in all plus shorts, television and segments in anthology films.

Wenders’ latest movie is worth discussing too. Pina is a documentary profile of the dancers in Pina Bausch’s company. Bausch unfortunately died before filming was finished so she herself could not be in the film more. Shot in 3D, Wenders captures her dancers occupying real space in their avant-garde performances.

Over a cup of coffee one morning during the AFI Film Festival in Los Angeles, Wenders sat with me to talk about Pina. In a quiet, unassuming German accent, Wenders revealed his art with a confidence and vulnerability. If you’re interested in dance or just looking for some obscure movie recommendations, here is my candid chat with Wim Wenders.

SuicideGirls: How did the screenings at AFI Fest go?

Wim Wenders: We could have sold 10 I think. We sold out completely. I don’t know if that’s normal but I was told it was not. Both times were a standing ovation. It was very overwhelming and long talks with the audience. They loved it. Very emotional.

SG: Is that a particularly rewarding group of audience and filmmakers to speak to at the American Film Institute?

WW: Yeah, it was a great audience. Even yesterday at four o’clock in the afternoon, the second screening, a beautiful day, it was packed. They had to send people home.

SG: As a filmmaker, do the dancers do a lot of the work for you?

WW: Absolutely. Absolutely because I’m not a choreographer and I didn’t want to interfere in any way with what they can do so well, what they had done for 30 years with Pina. I took it for granted they were going to be as honest with me as they were with Pina. For Pina, the honesty of the performance was more important than the perfection. Pina was not interested in perfection. Her aim was that everybody was as truthful to himself or herself as possible and I hope that they were. I was just hoping they were going to be as truthful with me as they were with Pina and not be too impressed with the camera.

SG: I think I agree with her philosophy. When I watch competition shows, I enjoy the ones who don’t look or sound like everyone else. They get eliminated for imperfections but I find them so much more interesting.

WW: Pina’s dancers are like common humanity. It’s not like in any other dance group where it ends at a certain page or where you have these athletic superhuman beings. Pina’s dancers are short and tall and young and old, skinny and some of them very voluptuous. They are common humanity. Pina wants them to be themselves as much as possible. There’s no role playing. They don’t pretend to be anything [other] than what they are. They don’t play nude parts. They wear clothes. Pina’s universe is very unique in the dance world.

SG: How did you choose the real world locations that some of the performers would dance in?

WW: I knew what they were dancing because we selected these dance responses to my questions about Pina. We selected them together so I knew what they were going to show me, trying to find a place, a specific place for each of these solos in the city, in the middle of traffic, in public places, in the forest and parks and industrial landscapes. I tried to find something that would bring out the best of each of them and really could help them to show me something very special so that the places also become a character.

SG: How did you place the camera to find the best three dimensional frame?

WW: I had to know all of the pieces by heart. I had to know them all by heart because it changes, it shifts. There’s lots of sequences that from one second to another you have a whole different image. So you have to know at any given moment where the best point of view is to bring up the architecture of the choreography. I knew all of these pieces that we shot completely by heart and I had little models where I could place my imaginary camera, because in 3D you organize the entire space into three ways, not just a two dimensional flat image. So you really have to imagine the entire space behind the dancers as well.

SG: I always admire a dancer’s physique. What do you admire about a dancer’s body?

WW: What I admire is that Pina brought out the mot common language we all share on this planet which is the language of our bodies which most of us do not know. Pina brought out this language and really refined it and showed us a whole anthology of body movement, body language, a whole anthology we’ve never seen before, before Pina. We’ve never felt so much that we really have it in common. When I saw my first piece by Pina, my brain didn’t understand it but my body completely understood it. That’s what was so emotional for me and I wept through the entire piece because I felt I was connected. Until then, I was never concerned with dance. It didn’t touch me. It was an aesthetic thing. I thought that’s for others, not for me. With Pina, I felt this really spoke to me and my body totally understood everything. That is a very, very unique thing of Pina’s approach to dance.

SG: How different would the film have been if Pina had lived?

WW: The one thing that would’ve remained are the four pieces that are the backbone of my film now. The four pieces would have been the same. Everything else would’ve been different. All the solos by the dancers, all the outdoor shots, none of this was planned. With Pina my main interest was to shoot Pina’s eyes at work. We would have shot rehearsals, we would have shot the corrections the next day after each performance and we would have most of all traveled with Pina and the company and accompanied them on two tours to southeast Asia and South America. That would’ve been the bulk of the film. Pina would’ve been at the center of the film all the time.

SG: You were at the forefront of independent cinema in the ‘80s. For a whole new generation of moviegoers, what would you like them to know about your work?

WW: It’s more of an attitude that I’d like them to know. It’s more that film is a way of expression and film is a way of exploring the world and also a way to be honest with the world and with yourself. I always figured it was a very privileged way of living and working because while making a movie you can find out things about the world or in this case, I didn’t know much about dance. I didn’t know anything about choreography. I found out so much when I researched. I’d never been to Havana and to Cuba and I found such a rich universe, a joyful universe. You can make movies, even fictional stories, and use them as a way of exploring and that attitude is something I’d really like young filmmakers to get to know from my movies.

SG: Why do you think some films like Wings of Desire or Paris, Texas were more popular or acclaimed? Is it because you were able to explore something more fully in them?

WW: I don’t know. Of course these were much wider known. Wings of Desire was certainly in many ways a film that put my name on the landscape for many people. But I’m just as proud of, let’s say, Million Dollar Hotel or Until the End of the World that were also journeys into the unknown in many ways. It’s funny as a filmmaker, I’ll tell you the truth. It’s not necessarily the famous movies that appear on these 100 best lists and stuff, but it’s the ones that didn’t really cut the cake that are closest to your heart. For me Until the End of the World and Million Dollar Hotel are some of my own favorites but I know they never were commercial successes but I think they succeed in their own way. I’m happy with them.

SG: Is that like Pina’s philosophy that it’s the flaws and messy mistakes that give it soul?

WW: Totally. My favorite movies of other people are not flawless. They have flaws and the flaws give them their taste.

SG: What are some of those favorites?

WW: Ah, like Scorsese, my favorite Scorsese movie is The King of Comedy where DeNiro plays the comedian. It’s on nobody’s Scorsese list but for me it’s the greatest movie ever made. I know every second by heart. For me it’s a perfect movie and it has flaws all over but that’s what makes it so beautiful. It’s the same with most of my favorite filmmakers. Their flawless movies are strangely, if they’re perfect, there’s nothing in them.

SG: You know, I sometimes find Kubrick movies cold because they’re so “perfect” I don’t feel anything.

WW: But my own Kubrick favorites are also more flawed.

SG: 2001[/i[ is my favorite Kubrick movie.

WW: Yeah, that’s my favorite movie period.

SG: I thought The King of Comedy was your favorite ever.

WW: That is my favorite Scorsese. My favorite movie period, the one that I’ve seen more often than anything is The Rules of the Game by Renoir but right afterwards is 2001. Again, in terms of structure and God knows what, it has many flaws.

SG: What do you perceive as the flaws of 2001?

WW: In terms of it takes an eternity to expose the story. It takes so long and the end flows out, just sort of evaporates into nothingness. I think if the movie was made today, every story department of every major studio would say, “Come on. You’ve got to be kidding.”

SG: It’s funny, I’ve never even tried to interpret the final segment. I just watch the images.

WW: And each time I see it I think, “Wow, the guts to do that. The guts to just do it.” You imagine it as a script and nobody would sign this, “Let’s shoot this.” Everybody would say, “Come on, Stanley. Write a script.”

SG: I’m not as familiar with King of Comedy. What are the flaws you love?

WW: Maybe its the Jerry Lewis character. It’s strangely discombobulated. I don’t know what it is. It has a rhythm that it goes up and down and up and down. The character that DeNiro is playing so hopelessly likeable and unlikeable at the same time.

SG: When your films are commercial successes, is that still on an intimate level in the indie world?

WW: I’m sometimes amazed. I do travel a lot and people come and say, “Hey, my favorite movie of all times is Kings of the Road.” There is a young man, he wasn’t even born when I made that movie. I wonder how he picked this one. Or the other day, all these young people love Million Dollar Hotel. It had been a revelation for them and it was a financial disaster. It was really a flop. For them it was the greatest thing. So we never know how these movies have their own life maybe sometimes 10 years later.

Pina opens December 23 and expands on January 20.

By Justin Beckner The dawn of another brutal election year is upon us and the majority of the country has developed a feeling of distain for politics all together. Still, masses of protesters have flocked to the streets to speak out against corporate greed and corrupt government practices. Never has there... more

By Justin Beckner

The dawn of another brutal election year is upon us and the majority of the country has developed a feeling of distain for politics all together. Still, masses of protesters have flocked to the streets to speak out against corporate greed and corrupt government practices. Never has there been a better time for a band like Anti-Flag to make new record and gear up for another world tour.

Anti-Flag frontman, Justin Sane has relentlessly spoken out against injustice since he and his friends formed the band back in 1988. Sane has long been hailed as one of the most intelligent songwriters of our generation. While musically, Anti-Flag is a direct descendent of classic punk rock bands, lyrically they ring reminiscent of a Woody Guthrie or Billy Bragg. Anti-Flag had a few minor hits with songs like “Protest Song” and “Turncoat” which could be heard being played at almost any protest demonstration during the Bush Administration. It is rather common to find Anti-Flag playing shows at protests. They recently played at an Occupy Wall Street Demonstration. Sane draws a lot of his songwriting topics from his experiences playing at and marching in these kinds of events.

Aside from his rigorous touring schedule with Anti-Flag, Sane has also put out three solo records (one full length and two EPs) and is in the process of putting together another album. In these solo records, he has found a freedom to pursue different musical directions – often this means falling back into acoustic music and dabbling in different genres. The light-hearted solo albums are a glimpse at the other side of the charismatic frontman.

In the following interview, Sane and I discuss the roots of his love of music and activism, the causes and effects of the Occupy Wall Street Protests, and the new Anti-Flag album due out this spring.

Justin Beckner: It seems to me that there are a lot of ideological similarities between traditional Irish music and punk rock music. You came from an Irish household, is that where your passion for music and social justice came from?

Justin Sane: Yeah, it really did. My dad is from Ireland and both of my mother’s parents are from Ireland so I am 110% Irish. My parents were both really involved in activism as a result of their Catholic upbringing. In Catholicism, there’s something called “Liberation Theology” and that’s the kind of theology that Jesus preached – that you should help out in your community and work with the poor and stand up for people who can’t stand up for themselves or give a voice to those who don’t have a voice in the world. With the British occupation of Ireland for hundreds and hundreds of years, there’s always been that drive in the Irish people to work for their own liberation. I think that the idea of fighting for people who are oppressed was carried along with those who left Ireland. Those ideas have been well documented in Irish folk music which is something I grew up listening to and playing. My parents had nine kids because Catholics don’t use birth control. I was the youngest of the nine and we all played instruments. It was like our own version of The Pogues or Flogging Molly within our own family. I’m not Catholic myself, I’m not really religious, but I think that I was influenced by that Liberation Theology that my parents were so profoundly influenced by. They fought for civil rights and fought to make the environment clean for their kids.

JB: Were there any non-political bands that you were influenced by on a more technical level?

JS: Yeah, I mean I’ve always loved KISS. I thought they were really cool. I’m sure there were others – I listened to Jackson Browne a lot. I listened to much of the same music my older brothers and sisters listened to and a lot of it wasn’t political. The Beatles were a band that was unanimously liked by everyone in my family and they had their political songs and their non-political songs. So there was a lot of non-political music that I drew influence from.

JB: You’ve spent a fair amount of time at the Occupy Wall Street Protests. Do you think the message that is being sent by the protesters is getting through to those who need to hear it?

JS: I think it’s definitely getting through because the protesters are being addressed quite often with brutal physical force by a police force that has traditionally been used to work for the elite. I think what we have now is a police force that is propping up a corporatocracy. Let’s look at it from this perspective – if there were protests in North Korea where protesters were trying to make a statement by occupying a square in North Korea and the police came in a brutally beat people up and pepper sprayed them and hit them with non-lethal weapons, the State Department here in the US would be on Fox news decrying the authoritarian rulers of North Korea. But we have that exact same thing happening right here in a democracy where we supposedly have the right to free speech. We have peaceful protesters making a peaceful statement and they’re being beat down by police. I think that says something about the state of our nation and it says something about the concern that those in power have about a message like that being freely spoken. If they didn’t think that message was dangerous, they wouldn’t be sending the police out there to shut those people up. There’s a very clear and directed initiative to suppress that speech and I think that’s really tragic. I’m really proud of the people who are out there making that statement because it obviously needs to be made. People are waking up and realizing that the rich in this country have been taking advantage of the poor for a very long time. So, they’re waking up and making the statement that things in this country are very out of balance – in that respect I think it’s very important that statement be made.

JB: That sense of injustice and imbalance has certainly been getting much harder for people to ignore in recent years. The top 1% of Americans control 42% of the country’s wealth and assets. That’s a pretty staggering figure.

JS: Yeah it is and I think in America there’s a sense of fairness – that everybody has an opportunity to get ahead and that’s based on an assumption that there’s a level playing field that we all start out on. Now people are looking around and seeing that there isn’t a level playing field, things are vastly out of balance, and people with a lot of money are actually breaking the law in many cases and doing things that should be illegal to make more money – all this while the rest of us are just trying to scrape by. I think Americans are pretty fair minded – most people are just saying that they want a level playing field and that’s why we see a lot of protests popping up recently.

JB: Over the past couple weeks I’ve noticed major news networks belittling the protesters on Wall Street. How do you feel when you hear people say that the Occupy Protesters don’t know what they want?

JS: I think a lot of people have a hard time verbalizing it, but in their gut they know there’s something out of whack. That’s where I think the media does a really great disservice by putting out things like, “There’s these occupiers out there but they don’t know what they want.” Because the reality is that if you spent five minutes at any of the Occupy events and walked around and talked to some of the protesters, you’d very quickly find out that there are incredibly articulate people who can tell you exactly what they think the problem is, what should change, and they’d give you statistics to back it up. They’d tell you that the corporations have bought and paid for our politicians to the point that they don’t represent us anymore, they represent corporations, and we want corporate money out of politics so we can have our politicians back. Those are the messages that we don’t see on Fox or CNN. When I go to Occupy Wall Street, as I have a number of times in several different cities, I talk to people who are really articulate, and then I turn on the news and they’re interviewing some guy who can hardly talk and doesn’t seem to know why he’s there. It makes me wonder why the hell aren’t they running interviews with the people I talked to when I was there. But those people at the top of the food chain at Fox news and places like that don’t want a clear message coming out of there. They’re doing their best to make people look stupid but the amount of knowledgeable people down at these protests is unbelievable. I just wonder why we’re not hearing those voices on the news.

JB: With the dawn of another election year upon us I’ve got to ask, how do you think these protests are going to influence the elections in 2012?

JS: One thing that was really clever about the way the Occupy movement was structured was that there is no figurehead leading the movement. That’s a good thing because leaders can be coopted, they can be bought, they can be bribed, they can be stroked in different ways. The Occupy movement is a true democratic process and a true movement of the people. I think that politicians today are just too corrupt to bring this country back to some degree or normalcy. However they will do what they need to do to get reelected and in that sense the Occupy movement is a message of what the people want. It’s not a message of what the corporations want. Ultimately politicians have to bow to the will of the people, and little by little, as a result of the Occupy movement, we see that happening. So it’s a step in the right direction. I think that what the Occupy movement is going to do is change things on a broad scale and politicians in turn will be pulled in and forced to think about what the people want if they want to get elected.

It’s going to take time and it’s going to happen as a result of attitudes and ideas changing. One of those ideas that has to change is that we can have corporate money in politics – we just can’t. There are huge payoffs for these politicians. Say I get elected to the senate and I vote with a chemical company in my area even though I know it’s really bad for my constituents. I know that even if I get voted out of office the next term, I’ll still have a cushy job at that chemical company where I can use the friends I made in Washington to benefit my company. This is what happens over and over again. Our former senator or Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum, who is running for president right now, is a poster child for this type of thing. Dick Cheney is another stellar example – he was with Halliburton, then in the Senate, went back to Halliburton, and then was vice president. That is how these corporations use their influence - what we have right now is not a democracy, it’s a corporatocracy and it needs to change. The Occupy movement gives me a lot of hope. I think people went to the ballot box expecting change from Barack Obama and they didn’t get it. They’re realizing that change isn’t going to come from the ballot box and they’re going to find a new way to move the country in a different direction – it’s really exciting and I feel optimistic for the first time in twelve years!

JB: Switching gears back to music, I’ve been told the new Anti-Flag album is in the mixing process right now. Do you have a title or a release date?

JS: Yeah we’re tentatively titling it The General Strike. A general strike is generally where a city or a country is shut down to make a point that progress will not move forward without the people’s labor. The UK had a massive general strike which wasn’t even mentioned in this country’s news. They shut the entire country down. The idea behind calling the new album The General Strike is that it’s a worldwide general strike and Anti-Flag is a band that is talking about unity between all people. I think there really is a group of people who have unified in this world around the idea of equality for all people – and that’s the concept that the title came from.

JB: A lot has happened in the world since your last album; is there any certain subject matter that you focused on with the writing of the new record?

JS: After going to a number of Occupy Wall Street Demonstrations and witnessing the recurring theme of police oppression and the masses of cops working as a tools for what I refer to as the corporate state, that was certainly on my mind when I was writing for the new album. Because I’ll tell you what, when you’ve had a billy club shoved in your face or been pepper sprayed or witnessed innocent people being beat down for absolutely no reason – the videos are on The Daily Show so you don’t have to look very hard to see it – it makes you angry. Especially when it happens to an old lady or people you know, and when you see this happening day after day to peaceful people who are just expressing their democratic right to free speech. So writing about police oppression was something that happened on this record as a result of that. I’ve been having a really hard time looking at police and feeling good about them. It’s really unfortunate because I have police officers in my family and when police do their job and serve their community and protect people, it’s really nice to see them. But we keep seeing over and over again police acting outside what their role is. It’s really enraging and it’s something I’ve been putting pen to paper about because that’s my way of dealing with it.

We’ve also been writing about the exciting events that have been happening around the world like the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, the ousting of Moammar Gaddafi, and the changes happening in Saudi Arabia. And then we’ve got a song about skateboarding (laughs). There’s a general theme that the songs are about what’s going on in the world, but we like to have some fun too. It should be out sometime in the spring of 2012.

JB: There will be a tour ensuing the release of that album I’d imagine?

JS: Yeah, we’re looking at starting in Australia and then playing Indonesia for the first time which we’re pretty excited about. Then we’ll definitely be doing our dates in the states and the Europe. After that we’ll see what happens, were always looking forward to meeting new people, seeing new places, and experiencing new things.

JB: I also understand you’ve been writing some songs for a solo record. What do you get out of writing songs for a solo album that you don’t get from writing Anti-Flag songs?

JS: We had an idea when we started Anti-Flag that we wanted it to be a political punk rock band and when people started to follow the band that was the impression they got as well. When we stray from that formula people don’t accept it very well, some react pretty viscerally to it. On the record Bright Lights of America, which we released a few years back, we really tried to expand and go in some different directions and people either liked that about it or they hated it. [Instead of] trying to force people [to hear[ something that they don’t want from Anti-Flag, I write solo albums. With my solo albums, if I want to write about my cat or my girlfriend I can do that. With Anti-Flag I don’t feel free to write songs like that. Another thing is the ability to write different types of music. In my family we listened to so much music and it was so diverse that it almost makes more sense to come across me playing an acoustic guitar in an Irish pub than playing electric guitar in a punk rock band.

The solo albums give me a chance to do something else and that freedom is really exciting. It’s an opportunity for people to know the personal side of me. Sometimes in Anti-Flag people get to thinking that we’re just these serious political robots all the time – it’s kind of funny. Anyways, I’m hoping to get a solo album together in 2012.

During our previous conversation with Chuck Palahniuk, which occurred shortly before the publication of his Sunset Boulevard-inspired book, Tell All, he spoke about how the ultimate name to drop was God’s. For this interview, we reconvene to discuss the domain of the G-man’s nemesis –– Hell ––... more

During our previous conversation with Chuck Palahniuk, which occurred shortly before the publication of his Sunset Boulevard-inspired book, Tell All, he spoke about how the ultimate name to drop was God’s. For this interview, we reconvene to discuss the domain of the G-man’s nemesis –– Hell –– which serves as the setting for Palahniuk’s wickedly inspired new novel, Damned.

According to Damned’s canon, evolution is hokum and Charles Darwin is resigned to hellfire and damnation alongside Jimi Hendrix, Marilyn Monroe, and the entire Kennedy clan. Turns out you can end up there by committing all manner of trivial shit, such as dropping the f-bomb or honking your horn one too many times. Worshipping the wrong god will also land you in the hot spot, as will suffering the inconvenience of being a deposed one (thus the likes of Thor can also be found hanging out downstairs).

The topography of Palahniuk’s netherworld features a greasy Dandruff Desert, Great Plains of Discarded Razor Blades, a Swamp of Partial-birth Abortions, a Lake of Tepid Bile, and the Great Ocean of Wasted Sperm (where in Hell, “porn is creating an effect equivalent to that of global warming on earth”). Those that find themselves there have two main career options: pornography or telemarketing.

The narrative of Damned follows Madison Spencer, the somewhat chubby, eternally optimistic13-year old progeny of a self-obsessed Hollywood star and a billionaire businessman. As a reflection of her mother’s glamour, Madison is an abject failure, however, the upside of her troubled childhood is that after a lifetime (albeit a short one) of electrolysis and herbal high colonics, Hell holds little terror for her.

Having been resigned to Hell after inhaling marijuana, and eschewing an eternity being "ogled by millions of men with serious intimacy problems," Madison finds gainful employment in telemarketing, an occupation that she finds unexpectedly fulfilling. Ensconced in one of Hell’s endless call centers, which has banks of phones that are programmed to auto-dial the earthbound specifically at dinnertime, Madison finds redemption. The question is, ultimately, will she want it?

Being in the business of asking people questions for a living, I felt a certain affinity with Madison. For the start of my conversation with Palahniuk, it therefore seemed only appropriate to borrow a little something from her telemarketing script…

Chuck Palahniuk: Hello.

Nicole Powers: Are you there, Chuck?

CP: Yes, I am.

NP: It's me, Nicole Powers, calling from Suicide Girls. Do you have time for a few questions?

CP: I do. How thrilling!

NP: You're not eating dinner I hope.

CP: I never eat anything.

NP: Damn! So there's not some tasty hot meal that's going to be coagulating as we talk?

CP: [laughs] I didn't get that reference. Ask me about Q-Tips. Ask me about paint samples.

NP: Paint samples?

CP: I was trying to think of anything mundane.

NP: Well, according to your book, statistically speaking, I must be in Hell, because Hell's apparently responsible for 85% of the internet's total smut content, and right now SG's probably contributing heartily to raising the level of the Great Ocean of Wasted Sperm.

CP: [laughs]

NP: So the only logical conclusion that I can draw is that I have to be calling from some call center in Hell specifically created for the 100% of journalists that you say end up there.

CP: [laughs] Oh, I thought for sure you were going to say that you were a redhead. I had such a backlash from redheads about that.

NP: Well you know redheads are the new blondes.

CP: They are?

NP: Yes. When we did a survey [on hair color preference], redheads actually came out on top above blondes.

CP: Ah! Well, I know a lot of redheads that I can make happy now after making them really pissed off.

NP: How are you dealing with the ginger backlash?

CP: Boy, don't shoot the messenger, OK. It's not my fault. I'm just reporting here...I think redheads already know what they've got going. Too many cards already.

NP: This book is very tongue-in-cheek. In it you satire the arbitrary-ness of much of religious doctrine. A lot of what you're saying, I assume, is facetious. You get a sense of what you don't mean from the text, but you have to read in between the lines to try and figure out what you do believe. Would you agree with that?

CP: Entirely...Do you remember the Left Behind books that were for the Christians? They bought them by the millions because it made them right...They're these books that reinforce what people already believe, and I wanted to write a religious Left Behind series, but for secular liberals.

Yeah, it is. Madison has this line about how she'll tell you everything about herself except for the truth, and that's kind of the whole theme of the book -- that all the most true things are never going to be said out loud.

NP: As I was reading the book I was trying to figure out what your personal belief structure is. Is that something that you're willing to expand on or is that something that you'd like to leave up in the air?

CP: I'm going to leave it up in the air because I've got two more books to write in the series and I just don't want to let that genie out of the bottle before book number three.

NP: Without giving too much away, there is a "To be continued..." at the end of this one. Does that mean that we're going to see Madison back for two more books?

CP: Exactly! It's The Lord of the Rings kind of. It's based on Dante's Inferno. In the next book she is in purgatory. In the third book she gets to heaven. Things don't really improve much, but she moves along.

NP: I like the idea that you explore that Hell is more of a detox or a rehab spot. There's a quote where you talk about all of the things that you have to give up before you can go to Heaven...The meaningless things that we hold close. I often think about the lies that we tell ourselves and the truths that we ignore to make our lives bearable...What are the lies that you tell yourself?

CP: Wow! The lies that I tell myself? That I'm going to get through this. That if I can just make enough money, or if I can just write a book that's funny enough, or that reaches enough people, that I won't die. I'm not going to die. That's always the big, big lie -- that somehow I can transcend death.

NP: I think that's the goal of every artist, to leave something behind that's eternal.

CP: Every artist or every religious person or every parent. That's how [Martin] Heidegger talked about it. Those were the three main ways in which we sought immortality: through art, procreation, or through spirituality.

NP: [To paraphrase,] you just said earlier that you wanted to write a book [that would make you immortal], but you've already done that. The body of work that you already have has earned you that status.

CP: You know, years ago, maybe when I was 17 or 18, my grandmother got breast cancer and she called each of us grandkids and she said, "What are your three favorite colors? I'm going to knit you an afghan. I'm going to make everyone an afghan in their three favorite colors before I die so that you have something to remember me by." Of course she didn't die. It was dealt with, she lived 20 or 30 more years. Shortly before she actually did die a few years ago, she visited and she saw that afghan that she made and she was just mortified that this thing was her quest for immortality. She tried to get it back from me and she insisted that she could make me a better one. "Please don't let that be your memory of me. I've got to make you a better afghan." And so with every book it's me saying to people, "Let's forget the last one. I've got to make you a better afghan."

NP: I would say that you've already made some pretty damn perfect afghans, but I know that's probably, as an artist, not what you want to hear because you always want to be able to improve.

CP: I can make you a better one. Let me try.

NP: I'll let you try.

I also love this idea that you raise about whether it's blind faith that gets you into heaven or whether it's good deeds...I like to think that if there is a God he wouldn't be an asshole, and if you're doing good deeds for the right reasons, which is because it's the right thing to do, then that should take precedence above someone that's just doing something nice to get a spot on the VIP list.

CP: Exactly. Those people who actually do things because they loved them in high school, versus those people who did things because they looked good on their college applications -- that's the difference.

NP: I've always thought that, in a way, believing or not, or picking a religion like picking a sports team is kind of redundant. As long as you're leading the best life you can, a higher power wouldn't be a dick. He [or she] would see that and let you in. It's like you can't lose as long as you're not a dick.

CP: Yeah, but religion does give you access to a community of people and it brings you together in a mutual and peer-supported way, like any kind of 12-step group, so that you can be accountable and you can state your goals to a group of people who will hold you accountable. I like that aspect of religion.


NP: A friend of Richard Dawkins, R. Elisabeth Cornwell, wrote me an essay on the evolutionary reasons for religion and it was very much about that. As a species we were more successful if we were part of a group. We were safer and we had better access to food, especially as we took up agriculture. So it became important for humans to "believe" and be part of a group, irrespective of whether we really believed.

CP: Also, it allows us to process our experience by converting it into language and make a kind of confession where we debase ourselves in front of our peers so we don't exalt ourselves on an ongoing [basis]. That periodically we invert the power structure and place ourselves on low, and then we're accepted despite the lowest aspects of ourselves, in the same way that people in 12-step groups make their confessions each week and they're accepted back into the community.

NP: I do believe in the function of a church -- when it's functioning well -- but I personally believe that the power of a church is below the roof and not above it.

CP: I do too. I think there's power there, but it's the power the people themselves generate too. So I think we agree on this.

NP: So much of what religion should be about has gotten hijacked by those that focus on the pettiness of it, which is something that you have great fun poking fun at in the book. I'm definitely going to Hell because I've honked my horn too many times, I've dropped the f-bomb way too many times. I don't think I've hit my farting in an elevator quota yet though. That's my one saving grace.

CP: That's kind of the core of the second book in purgatory. Madison has lied to her parents to encourage them to perform these behaviors, and in the second book, when she's stuck back on earth for a year, she realizes that her parents couldn't keep a secret and they founded this enormous major world religion that's based on doing these small inconsiderate rude behaviors, and she's actually made the world an infinitely worse place than it was before.

NP: Madison takes a lie detector test to see if she really should be in Hell or if it's all a big clerical error, and there are lots of questions that are asked that she doesn't know how to answer. She knows what's right in her heart, and then she knows what is written in the Bible -- or what's interpreted as being written in the Bible -- and so she asks this question: "Is God a racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic ass? Or is God testing to see if I am?" I just love that line.

CP: I love that too. It's something I didn't plan. I just thought it was terrific the way that it worked out.

NP: That was just one of those lines that tripped into your head?

CP: Right, like a little Zen koan where you couldn't really resolve it for yourself. I think those things live out in the world like crazy and they stay in people's minds.

NP: It is one of the great paradoxes of religion. Homosexual pastors, for example, when preaching the Bible, must constantly have this conundrum in their heads that can never be answered.

CP: And the idea that they might be speaking to pools of people who are already damned and there is nothing that they can do about them because of predetermination. There's all of those big unanswered questions that are just so much fun to spool out narratives and scenarios with. In a way, I think that is the greatest purpose of storytelling and, as a writer, it's so much fun to tackle these enormous and impossible stories, and to make up answers to them and then to support those answers somehow.

NP: I love the idea that Hell might be of our own choosing. At one point in the book, you make Hell akin to a neighborhood that no one cares about, but that people are capable of sprucing up -- they just have to be aware of that choice.

CP: Right. I think just stating that allows people a sense of power, that they're not just trapped in certain circumstances. They can't change the circumstance, but at least they can change their reaction to it, and that's a really powerful thing to start from.

NP: I often see that when I'm driving around the poor neighborhoods in Los Angeles...some of the homes are beautiful craftsman style houses, and they're just in the worst, most Hellish neighborhoods. You just think about what would happen if, as a group, people saw the potential in their existing world. What might happen if they did a little bit of what Madison did -- putting paper lilies on the sea of shit, so to speak.

CP: In a way, she's doing it all for her parents, because she's recognizing that, as ineffectual as her parents were, their motive was to try to provide her with a better world. She doesn't necessarily have to succeed, but she can at least return the effort by trying to provide them with a better Hell, a better afterlife. What redeems us is maybe not so much succeeding in that effort as it is making the effort for another person. That's one of the things that takes her mind off the fact that she herself is stuck in this awful place. Boy, that sounds lofty. Sorry about that.

NP: Also, just with the way she touches and affects other people. Her friends in Hell start off being a not very pleasant group of people, but through her sheer force of personality, they actually become really good friends and better people. And that goes to the effect that you can have on those around you just by being a little bit more pleasant yourself.

CP: Pleasant and accessible. There's a sense that Madison is denying the drama of the situation and denying a kind of social hierarchy. Everything that occurs is kind of equal for her, and that allows comedy to occur. When you deny the drama or the existing power structure, then comedy occurs.

NP: Madison is a very sympathetic character because of her parents. They have very misguided good intentions. If they do something good it's only ever in front of cameras. You have this line, "The road to Hell is paved in publicity stunts." It reminds me of the uncomfortable feeling I get when I'm at most Hollywood charity events...

CP: It really undermines the idea that anything can be good, and you sort of go back out into your life with a corrupt sense of altruism. That seems like the most insidious part of it, that you quit even believing that goodness is even possible because you always see it harnessed to a project or to publicity, to some sort of capital endeavor. That's the horrible part; you forget that there even is a heaven because it's all about making money or something like that.

NP: When you get some celebrity announcing that they've donated to something, the very fact that they've announced that they've done it diminishes what they've done.

CP: Exactly!

NP: Instead of seeing the beauty in that, and maybe this is a fault of mine, maybe this is me being not very generous of spirit, but I see the cynical side rather than the beauty, which saddens me. Maybe I should be a better person, see the beauty and brush aside my cynicism.

CP: I think that part of becoming a fully actualized adult is recognizing both. Being able to hold that paradox of both in your mind at the same time. Not being completely subsumed by pessimism, but also not being so gullible that you accept all of those things at face value.

NP: This idea of the duality of ideas, that you can hold two opposing ideas in your head and acknowledge them and not necessarily struggle with them –– just recognize they're there and accept them –– that seems to be a very Buddhist stance to take.

CP: In a way, it's a nice skill to have for life itself. You know, you're constantly in the presence of death and you have to deny that or you have to somehow hold the concept of life and death simultaneously. Every time you get on a plane or get in your car or eat something, you could suddenly choke to death and die. How can you live with that possibility without being destroyed by it? Having that skill of holding that possibility in the presence of life is such an important part of not going nuts.

NP: I know the only way that I can live my life -- and this goes back to the lies that we tell ourselves and the truths we ignore -- I have to completely ignore the idea of death. I can't think about it. The way that I live my life is by not confronting death in any way, which is probably not a good thing or a healthy thing.

CP: I think that's probably how the majority of people deal with it. That's also why my books never sell really strong. I always want to throw that possibility out there and play with it and rub people's noses in it maybe a little.

NP: I think that comes from the fact that you have had to deal with death directly in your life through personal tragedy, and I understand that you worked transporting terminally ill people for a while, so you've lived with the line of life and death in a much closer way. You have a much closer relationship to it than most.

CP: I've been developing all these different strategies, or ways of looking at it, ways of perceiving it without either denying it, dismissing it, or being shut down by it; finding all of these different ways to re-perceive it and to use the awareness of it to live a better life.

NP: How do you perceive death for yourself? Is it something that you're at peace with or horrified about?

CP: In a way, I'm kind of completely looking forward to it because most of the people that I love most in the world are dead. It seems like a club or a place where everyone I love has gone and I can't wait to be with them. But at the same time, I'm not going to use that as an excuse not to live my life and enjoy everything right now. It makes right now feel a lot more like a game, like something that is really here to take advantage of.

NP: There is a theme that Madison revisits several times in the book where she talks about how the living feel superior to the dead. Is that something that you feel?

CP: I think that's something that people have to feel. It's a defensive posture where you have to ridicule and dismiss and exclude the dead because, like you were just saying, it's too daunting a thing to consider all the time. We have to exclude it from our daily lives because we have no skills for dealing with it anymore. Especially now that so much of religious narrative has been dismissed. People used to have a way of framing those issues and dealing with them. Now they don't so those issues are even more frightening.

NP: That's something that I'd not even thought about, but there was a formalized way with religion of dealing with and acknowledging death. Without religion, people get put in boxes and put in the ground or in an oven, and we just brush it off and move on. I think religion maybe served a function in that it forced us to confront death.

CP: It provided a comfort and structure for how to live that portion of our lives and how to deal with that when it occurs to people that we cared about. Without that structure, without that comfort, we become much more panicked and reactionary, and that part of our lives becomes much more chaotic and full of suffering when it didn't need to be.

NP: Expanding on that, given that religion and religious ceremony helps people confront death, and that a funeral is very much about not so much remembering the dead, but is about being a form of group therapy for the living -- have you planned your own funeral? Because it is the final gift that you leave to the living.

CP: I really haven't. I'm haunted, in a way, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, who made such enormous plans for his funeral, mapped them all out, scripted them. They were going to cost a fortune, and by the time he died he was completely in obscurity and had no money, and so he ended up being buried in very modest circumstances. All of his plans were ridiculous in the face of how he was actually was buried. So that tempers me making those kinds of plans.

NP: It seems like you believe in an afterlife because you very much hope that you're going to be reunited with your loved ones. I guess everyone has a creative visualization of what it would be like. I know that in this book you're giving a very tongue-in-cheek, facetious view, what's more the glimmer of reality that you actually see?

CP: That's going to be in the third Madison [book]. Again, I don't want to go there until I have to go there. If you become too attached to that vision you're no longer in the present moment, and so I just try not to live that far in the future.

NP: There's a line in the book, "I can't believe there's no wifi in Hell." It's a joke, but no wifi, that's Hell on earth for me...What's your similar idea of Hell on earth?

CP: When people that I care about are suffering and I can't do anything, that is the most unbearable. When you have to be present to the upset of people you love, a health crisis or any kind of suffering, and you can't relieve it. That is Hell.

NP: I feel so bad because I know that you've had a lot of that in your life, and I'm so sorry.

CP: You know, it gives me books. It's another reason why I keep writing. Writing gives me a way to process each of these unbearable situations.

NP: Well, finally, a lot people in the SuicideGirls community were excited that we were going to be talking with you today, so some of our Facebook friends submitted questions. Is it okay if I ask you a few questions from the community?

CP: Sure.

NP: The first question is from Lindsay Mchugh. She asks: Is there a particular character you most identify with?

CP: From now on it will be Madison Spencer. Madison Desert Flower Rosa Parks Coyote Trickster Spencer, that fat little girl who reads books.

NP: The next question is from Johnny Reid: Do you find it more enjoyable to write female or male protagonists in your books, and which is easier or more comfortable?

CP: I kind of see them as equal because I almost write genderless characters. Madison is preadolescent and so she's genderless in that way. The narrator in my last book was a very old woman so she was kind of post gender, or post genitally sexual. Beyond that, my characters are pretty much based on action, so I see their names as either male or female, but I don't see them as one gender or the other.

NP: This question is from Raven Phoenix: Would you ever consider writing a sequel to Fight Club, given the popularity of the book and the movie?

CP: Of course I would consider it, but there's so many other great ideas out there that I would love to explore instead of that.

NP: This one's from Joby Cole: I'm a big fan of Snuff and would like to know which character you sympathize with the most and why?

CP: The Sheila character, the one who is kind of pulling all of the strings. I think it's the writer who is making things happen and setting things up. That's why I identify with Sheila.

NP: You are the puppet master.

CP: You kind of have to be.

NP: And a final question from Cara Stevens: "Are you still an insomniac?"

CP: No, I'm not. I discovered Ambien, so I more or less asleep all the time now, day and night.

NP: Do dreams help you write?

CP: No, but the best time to write is when I first wake up in the morning, before I've heard any language, any music, before anybody has talked to me. That is just a fantastic time to write.

NP: I always find that if I write and then sleep on something, I'll wake up in the morning absolutely knowing what I need to fix, what I haven't fact checked or what I've got wrong...In the morning things just bubble to the surface.

CP: I think, going back to religion, that idle time spent sitting in a church, not really doing anything with an overt purpose, functions in that same way. It relaxes the mind. The Hindus might say that it allows you access to elephant mind, a kind of deeper understanding, or a deeper thinking than the every day chattering monkey mind would provide. I think that stillness that you're talking about allows you access. It's similar to what happens in a really good church.

NP: I haven't thought of it that way, but I think you're probably right. I know that when I'm not ready to write I go do something else. I'll clean the toilet or walk the dog. The best stuff happens when you're not trying to think about it, because you're letting your subconscious function in the way that it's supposed to.

CP: And your hands are occupied. You're doing a mindless thing where your hands are running themselves doing this thing. Yeah, I totally agree.

NP: What's your favorite little trick like that?

CP: Washing dishes. I'm always washing the dishes. I love that.

NP: That's where the best ideas come from? Washing dishes?

CP: Ironing, of all things, ironing clothes.

NP: I can see that. Ironing is very Zen. Ironing the creases out of things and neatening life.

Well, thank you so much for taking the time out to chat. I really appreciate it. I have to say that I love this book. It set the electrons in my brain firing like you wouldn't believe, just thinking about the big questions.

CP: Thank you, and thanks for making me laugh early on, that's pretty rare.

NP: You are very welcome...It's been an absolute pleasure and I can't wait to read the continuing adventures of Madison. I'm rooting for her.

CP: The next one is better than the first one.

NP: Well, this one was perfection to me.

CP: I can make you a better afghan.

NP: I'll hold you to that. I know you can.

Of the stunning sets of 2011, 5 I really, really loved: (image) Ceres: Channel U (image) Damsel: Le Chat Noir (image) GoGo: Rainy City Memories (image) Nya: Marilou (image) AnnaLee: Familiar Dream more

Of the stunning sets of 2011, 5 I really, really loved:


Ceres: Channel U


Damsel: Le Chat Noir


GoGo: Rainy City Memories


Nya: Marilou


AnnaLee: Familiar Dream

(image) by Jeckyl Suicide (image) Ingredients: Cake: 720ml castor sugar 120ml vegetable oil 120ml sour cream 20ml vinegar 20ml vanilla essence 120ml red food coloring 720ml flour 240ml cocoa powder 20ml baking powder 20ml salt 3 eggs Icing / Filling: 250g thick cream cheese 160g butter 4x250ml sifted... more

by Jeckyl Suicide

Ingredients:

Cake:

• 720ml castor sugar


• 120ml vegetable oil


• 120ml sour cream


• 20ml vinegar


• 20ml vanilla essence


• 120ml red food coloring


• 720ml flour


• 240ml cocoa powder


• 20ml baking powder


• 20ml salt


• 3 eggs

Icing / Filling:

• 250g thick cream cheese


• 160g butter


• 4x250ml sifted icing sugar


• 5ml vanilla extract

Garnish:

• 2 x egg whites


• 3 x fresh red roses


• 3 x toothpicks


• Castor sugar to dust


• Green food coloring


• 2 x rolls of ready to use soft icing

Preparation:

1. Start by washing your hands thoroughly.

2. Preheat the oven to 180 C / 350 F.

3. Place the 2 egg whites into a cup and whip lightly with a fork. Wash the roses thoroughly. Using a brush, paint the roses with the egg white. Make sure every petal is covered. Next, dust the roses with castor sugar. The result should be an iced looking rose. Place onto a baking tray and allow to dry for a minimum of 1 hour.

4. Sift all your dry ingredients into a bowl (flour, cocoa, baking powder, salt, castor sugar).

5. In a separate bowl, cream together all your wet ingredients (sour cream, red food coloring, eggs, vinegar, vanilla essence, oil). Once fully combined, pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, stirring the whole time to avoid having lumps. In the end, your dough should be a deep rich red in color.

6. Grease a round cake tin and fill with around a quarter of the dough then place into the oven. This should take around 15-20 minutes to bake. When the top begins to brown a little, take it out and place onto a rack for cooling.

7. Once cooled, take out the cake tin, wash it, grease again, then place another quarter of the dough into the oven. Repeat this process until you have 4 cakes.

8. In another bowl, cream together all the icing/filling ingredients. The result should be a slightly yellow, very thick icing. Refrigerate.

9. Once the cakes have all cooled, separate them into pairs and stick one on top of the other using the icing/filling. Brush both stacks lightly with egg whites.

10. Using something round (e.g a small plate) cut one stack of cakes so that they’re slightly smaller than the other. Roll out the soft icing and cover both cakes. Be sure there are no bubbles. You can even use your hand to smoothen the surface. Do not discard leftover soft icing. Place the smaller stack on top of the bigger stack for a pyramid effect.

11. Now, color the leftover soft icing with the green food coloring and measure out the circumference of each cake. Cut a medium sized strip of green and, using egg white, stick it to the base of the cake.

12. Once this is done, stick a toothpick into each rose and arrange on the top of the cake then dust the entire cake with more egg white.

13. Refrigerate the cake overnight, and serve at room temperature.

Tada!!

(image) by Jeckyl Suicide (image) Ingredients: Cake: 720ml castor sugar 120ml vegetable oil 120ml sour cream 20ml vinegar 20ml vanilla essence 120ml red food coloring 720ml flour 240ml cocoa powder 20ml baking powder 20ml salt 3 eggs Icing / Filling: 250g thick cream cheese 160g butter 4x250ml sifted... more

by Jeckyl Suicide

Ingredients:

Cake:

• 720ml castor sugar


• 120ml vegetable oil


• 120ml sour cream


• 20ml vinegar


• 20ml vanilla essence


• 120ml red food coloring


• 720ml flour


• 240ml cocoa powder


• 20ml baking powder


• 20ml salt


• 3 eggs

Icing / Filling:

• 250g thick cream cheese


• 160g butter


• 4x250ml sifted icing sugar


• 5ml vanilla extract

Garnish:

• 2 x egg whites


• 3 x fresh red roses


• 3 x toothpicks


• Castor sugar to dust


• Green food coloring


• 2 x rolls of ready to use soft icing

Preparation:

1. Start by washing your hands thoroughly.

2. Preheat the oven to 180 C / 350 F.

3. Place the 2 egg whites into a cup and whip lightly with a fork. Wash the roses thoroughly. Using a brush, paint the roses with the egg white. Make sure every petal is covered. Next, dust the roses with castor sugar. The result should be an iced looking rose. Place onto a baking tray and allow to dry for a minimum of 1 hour.

4. Sift all your dry ingredients into a bowl (flour, cocoa, baking powder, salt, castor sugar).

5. In a separate bowl, cream together all your wet ingredients (sour cream, red food coloring, eggs, vinegar, vanilla essence, oil). Once fully combined, pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, stirring the whole time to avoid having lumps. In the end, your dough should be a deep rich red in color.

6. Grease a round cake tin and fill with around a quarter of the dough then place into the oven. This should take around 15-20 minutes to bake. When the top begins to brown a little, take it out and place onto a rack for cooling.

7. Once cooled, take out the cake tin, wash it, grease again, then place another quarter of the dough into the oven. Repeat this process until you have 4 cakes.

8. In another bowl, cream together all the icing/filling ingredients. The result should be a slightly yellow, very thick icing. Refrigerate.

9. Once the cakes have all cooled, separate them into pairs and stick one on top of the other using the icing/filling. Brush both stacks lightly with egg whites.

10. Using something round (e.g a small plate) cut one stack of cakes so that they’re slightly smaller than the other. Roll out the soft icing and cover both cakes. Be sure there are no bubbles. You can even use your hand to smoothen the surface. Do not discard leftover soft icing. Place the smaller stack on top of the bigger stack for a pyramid effect.

11. Now, color the leftover soft icing with the green food coloring and measure out the circumference of each cake. Cut a medium sized strip of green and, using egg white, stick it to the base of the cake.

12. Once this is done, stick a toothpick into each rose and arrange on the top of the cake then dust the entire cake with more egg white.

13. Refrigerate the cake overnight, and serve at room temperature.

Tada!!

by SG's Team Agony feat. Kraven Let us answer life's questions - because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls. (image) [Kraven in Softcore] Q: I'm a 20-year old girl and I've been with my boyfriend for almost a year. Despite me being young, I am sure that I... more

by SG's Team Agony feat. Kraven

Let us answer life's questions - because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls.


[Kraven in Softcore]

Q: I'm a 20-year old girl and I've been with my boyfriend for almost a year. Despite me being young, I am sure that I want to get married, but he's said he doesn't think he wants to. I've stayed because I love him. We're only young (he's 23), and I hope he might change his mind. The problem is, I think he sees our relationship as having an end point due to this. I don't know if that's because he thinks I'll end it or he will due to not wanting marriage. I am quite paranoid and find it quite hurtful. He's also completely against the idea of living together, and if I subtly suggest it's due to his lack of commitment he gets quite angry/upset.

What is best to do about this? I am aware I'm young, and I don't want to get married till I graduate in 2 1/2 years, but is there anything I can do to maybe show him it's not that bad? Everyone says we're a fantastic match and I can really be myself around him.

Thanks!

A: If I have learned anything out of my past two relationships it’s that you cannot rush anyone to the alter. Marriage is something that both people have to take incredibly seriously and have to both be ready for, since, ultimately, it is intended to be forever. This is an issue that has broken up many people. Some are quite simply ready, others are not.

You are not wrong in talking about marriage and wanting that as a goal to look forward to. Much like myself, you want to see progress, and there is nothing wrong with that. However, when the other person does not have a similar attitude towards marriage, bringing it up and talking about it can begin to sound like nagging to them. They may also feel you are resenting them because it’s something you want and they are holding you back. As for if you’re too young to get married, that is not something I can answer. But you yourself said you know you aren't ready quite yet.

The issues you have with your relationship seem to go beyond marriage. More immediately you are just looking for him to show he is committed, and talking marriage at this stage may not be the right way to go about doing that. You want a sense of security, but what is scaring you or making you feel you need it? Especially when everyone tells you you are fantastic together and things are going good?

If there are issues now about this and things go sour when commitment is talked about, there may be underlying issues that need to be addressed. You certainly do not want to get married or pressure someone into staying with you through a marriage if there are these types of issues to begin with. I am not telling you this will end badly, I am just telling you from being in your exact shoes, you have to do what makes you happy, and while you love him and are willing to give him the world, he has to want and be willing to do the same. If he does not want to, then perhaps he’s not the man for you. You deserve better.

In terms of talking with him, you can let him know what you see in your future and ask him if he sees the same. He will tell you what he sees. If the goals are not the same, then it really is time to take stock and figure out what to do next. If the goals are the same, and in the future you both see marriage to one another, then you are on the right track. But do not pressure him into something that you admitted you are not ready for right this minute either. Live life, have fun, and be happy with one another. There’s a lot to be said for enjoying the moment (especially at your age), rather than concentrating so much on the future that you’re unable to enjoy the present.

When his is ready for marriage, he will let you know. You cannot pressure someone with regards to this type of issue, and if you do, you will more than likely push him away rather than bring him closer to you.

I really hope this helps as I have been in this same situation just recently. I know what you are going through. Stay strong and true to yourself and your values. And never settle.

Kraven

***

Got Problems? Let SuicideGirls’ team of Agony Aunts provide solutions. Email questions to: gotproblems@suicidegirls.com

Of the stunning sets of 2011, 5 I really, really loved: (image) Ceres: Channel U (image) Damsel: Le Chat Noir (image) GoGo: Rainy City Memories (image) Nya: Marilou (image) AnnaLee: Familiar Dream more

Of the stunning sets of 2011, 5 I really, really loved:


Ceres: Channel U


Damsel: Le Chat Noir


GoGo: Rainy City Memories


Nya: Marilou


AnnaLee: Familiar Dream

Ti West is becoming a major name in horror movies. His 2009 film The House of the Devil harkened back to 1980s atmospheric horror, to the point where it was available on VHS in a big plastic shell case. He’s been invited to speak on panels, such as 2010’s South by Southwest Film Festival panel “Directing... more

Ti West is becoming a major name in horror movies. His 2009 film The House of the Devil harkened back to 1980s atmospheric horror, to the point where it was available on VHS in a big plastic shell case. He’s been invited to speak on panels, such as 2010’s South by Southwest Film Festival panel “Directing the Dead” joining Zombieland’s Ruben Fleischer and Cloverfield and Let Me In’s Matt Reeves. He memorably spoke about the awkward moment where you have to direct a naked woman to show her breasts.

His new film, The Innkeepers, premiered at this year’s SXSW. After continuing to play festivals like The Los Angeles Film Festival and Fantastic Fest, the film comes to homes via VOD on December 30 and a theatrical release February 3. The Innkeepers is a horror comedy about two clerks at a defunct hotel’s last weekend in business. Claire (Sara Paxton) and Luke (Pat Healy) pass the time by speculating about ghostly inhabitants and attempting to record EVP.

Claire’s slapstick bumbling and Luke’s sarcastic comments are a change in tone from the popular House of the Devil. The Satanic cult movie was made up of silence and nary a laugh. West has also directed The Roost and Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever although he disowns the latter because it was taken away from him in editing. He also directed segments of next year’s films V/H/S and The ABCs of Death.
Midway through the festival in Austin, West and I didn’t have a full night’s sleep between the two of us. I was going on three hours and he just barely had me beat. Those are the glorious moments of film geekery, where you just push through the exhaustion on pure adrenaline because you just have to keep talking about movies.

SuicideGirls: Last year on the “Directing the Dead” panel you said when you had to ask an actress to do nudity, it reminded you that that's a human being.

Ti West: Yeah. I do mean that but I don’t mean it in a “That’s a person, that’s offensive” kind of way because I don’t care about that. I mean it as in when you actually say it to someone, you realize you’ve just said that out loud and you’re like, “This is weird.” You just feel like a creep is what I’m getting at. It’s an odd situation to be in that when you’re not in it seems like oh, it’s just business as usual. Then when you’re actually there being like I have to tell her, it’s not even like because she knows she’s going to be naked, but I’ve got to tell her, “You’ve got to turn your boobs more to the camera,” you’re like oh man, this is weird.

SG: I found it a compassionate point of view because it’s a staple of the genre we love. Should we feel a little guilty for enjoying naked boobies?

TW: No, I don’t think so. I’m just saying it’s just awkward to do it. As the person doing it, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it, it’s just when you actually say it out loud, and maybe this is just me being weird and insecure about it but the times that I’ve had to do it, it’s one of those I can’t believe I have to go up to this girl and be like, “You need to turn more this way because we can’t see.” They never care. Everyone’s always fine with it but it’s just you realize what you’re doing when you ask that.

SG: My take was you were being compassionate.

TW: I think that’s ultimately where I come from.

SG: Of course we hear stories of bad producers forcing naive young actresses to do it, but I take a positive perspective that that’s a cool girl, she’s sharing her hot body with me on screen, so thank you, lady. Maybe it isn’t always like that.

TW: It’s just weird because it’s people everywhere. The whole thing is just awkward. Whenever anyone says, “Sex scenes are so awkward to shoot,” it is. It’s just a weird thing to be doing. It’s part of it but it’s odd.

SG: When you’re doing a horror movie set in a hotel, is that dangerous territory?

TW: Well, I’ll tell you that the first time we put the camera on a steadicam and walked down the hallway, I was like, “Oh, shit.” Because you can’t not. As soon we did it, as soon as he walks down that hallway you’re like, “Oh man, The Shining.” What can you do? I tried to stay far away from that stuff. I think other than a few visual things like that you can’t avoid, I think we’re a standalone thing. But yes, that’s one of the greatest movies ever made. I’m uncomfortable making a movie that’s similar to a movie like that.

SG: They still make exorcism movies though.

TW: That’s true. I feel like movies, sometimes they use similar bell type sounds and you’re like dude, what are you doing? I don’t know. When there’s a movie that good, it’s best to just leave it be.

SG: Did you want to use humor this time around?

TW: Yes. House of the Devil was a movie about a girl that was just bummed. So I was just like I don’t want to make another bum out I don’t have any money kind of movie. My whole goal with this movie was to make something that was charming. I have had every kind of part time day job ever and I really like those relationships you have with people. They’re not your friends, they’re your coworkers but you spend eight hours a day with them and you develop these quasi-friendships with them and it’s usually snarky and there’s usually a lot of humor in there. That’s really where it came from is to really try to make a charming movie about these minimum wage jobs that turns into a horror movie.

SG: Charming is a good word. I described it as campfire style. The scare is part of the fun.

TW: I can see that. Certainly when she tells the ghost story especially but I like that hanging out, you’re just kind of making conversation because what else are you going to do? Then you kind of develop this rapport based on that. That’s what I thought these two characters having spent so much time just sitting at a desk together.

SG: Even just as far as the joy of being scared, versus the intense disturbing horror movies.

TW: Yeah, again, House of the Devil is a girl who’s bummed out and then it’s a Satanic cult and it’s violent. I’d just done that so I wanted to make something that was a little bit more kooky and mystical and go down that not really fantasy, but a little bit more abstract field and have humor and have kooky wacky like screwball comedy stuff, but still have it be scary, which is like an odd combination but I felt like the contrast of those two things would work well.

SG: Speaking of mystical, several movies this year dealt with the interconnection human beings have with each other and the afterlife: Source Code, Insidious, the documentary I Am. What do you think makes so many filmmakers explore that metaphysical theme right now?

TW: I think because even if you’re a skeptic, there’s some inkling that there might be some truth to that. Nobody really believes in vampires. Nobody really believes in werewolves. Nobody believes in zombies, but ghosts are something that’s like I don’t think I believe, but maybe. I think there’s something about that that audiences and filmmakers, your own mortality, there’s something you can’t help being sort of interested in that. That’s to me what’s always been interesting about ghost stories. That’s why I think those movies to me are always the scariest movies, because I don’t really believe they’re going to happen, but I’m not 100% sure that they won’t. I’m in the high 90s but there’s that little percent, whereas I have no fear of zombies breaking in here ever. So that’s just entertainment to me. It can be well done craft or social commentary but it stops there. Whereas the ghost thing I think hits everybody more personally. Also anyone that’s had anyone in their life die, that’s a really trying experience and that’s something you think a lot about, like what happens? It’s not even necessarily in a religious way. I guess like you said, in a metaphysical way.

SG: Have you explored that deeper in real life, any reading?

TW: I had a friend that used to listen to a lot of Deepak. Me having to always hear her tell me about Deepak, Ekhart Tolle, some of that made it into the Kelly McGillis character because I would hear all these things about consciousness and all this stuff. I cannibalized some of her ramblings to me and put them into there.

SG: What are your favorite obscure horror comedies?

TW: Ah, I don’t know because there’s not really that many that don’t go into the weird outrageously silly Troma territory. This isn’t totally a horror movie but Death Race 2000 is a great comedy dark movie. Eating Raoul is a great dark black comedy with horrific elements. But just straight up ones, there’s not too many. The Burbs is awesome. The Burbs is one of my favorites. It’s genius and it’s not straight up horror but it sort of is because it’s the creepy neighbors but The Burbs is probably the answer I’ll go with. Forget Evil Dead II. Let’s go with The Burbs.

SG: Are you drawn more to horror movies as a movie viewer?

TW: No, I have 1000 DVDs and the minority is horror movies but I do like provocative stuff. So I’m always going to respond more to that. I just feel when stuff is the same, another Transformers movie, another Fast and Furious, other than some effects, there’s nothing in that movie that’s going to be new to me. I’ve said this a bunch of times but Steven Soderbergh had a really good quote when they were like, “How come you’re taking some time off from making movies?” He said, “I just can’t get excited about another over the shoulder shot.” It’s like something else needs to excite me so I’m always looking for edgier more provocative movies that give you a visceral reaction because so much doesn’t anymore.

SG: Do you have Blu-rays?

TW: I don’t have a lot, I have maybe 10 to 20.

SG: What movies are in your main rotation, DVD or Blu-ray?

TW: Well, I did this interview for Criterion for the Hausu DVD and they gave me a stack of DVDs. So my beginning of Blu-ray was just all Criterion stuff. I was watching a lot of that, rewatching Videodrome and all that sort of stuff. I bought Scott Pilgrim which I like a lot. Because of Netflix I get everything on Blu-ray whenever it comes out and it’s a fantastic format. As far as DVD stuff, my purchase of DVD has slowed, much like everybody, has slowed down over the years.

SG: We don’t need to own anymore. There are all sorts of sources of instant movies.

TW: My Blu-ray player is a Playstation and I got it because of the Netflix Instant thing and that just blows my mind. I think that’s amazing. The more stuff that gets on Instant, I have this floor to ceiling thing of DVDs that I just look at like, “I don’t even need these.”

SG: What are your perennials?

TW: Golden Child, The Burbs, Karate Kid, Teen Wolf. Movies I grew up with. 48 Hours, Beverly Hills Cop I watch all the time. I think it’s great. There’s something about those movies, it was the last bit of not lowest common denominator. They weren’t attempting as much. It was before all the test screenings. 48 Hours is a comedy but also an action movie, but also really dark and also just really well written and really well shot by Walter Hill. How often do you get a really well known gritty director to do a Nick Nolte/Eddie Murphy buddy comedy racial tension action movie? It’s like whoa. That just doesn’t happen anymore. Those are the movies I grew up with and I really like that stuff.

SG: What is on your stack to be viewed?

TW: There’s a bunch of Criterion things that I haven’t seen. Friends of Eddie Coyle, I haven’t watched that yet. I might be pretty caught up. I don’t have a stack, I don’t think, of stuff to see. When I was in New York finishing all the sound for the movie, I was in a hotel so I would just sit and watch tons of stuff. I watched the whole Sopranos season so I caught up with that. I’d never seen that before. I got really into TV box sets because I like the long form of it.

SG: Do you ever go through your collection and pull stuff out to get rid of?

TW: No. The collector element in me, I hold onto it.

SG: I’ve had Cabin Fever 2 on my stack for two years and I still haven't gotten to it. Should I watch it?

TW: Uh, I guess. It’s not my movie. I’m sure there’s things in there that could be amusing. Yeah, I don’t know. It doesn’t bother me. I’m long passed it at this point but it’s a bummer, it’s a shame.

SG: But you know how it goes, you might want to watch it to see what you're talking about, but then it just sits there.

TW: Actually, you should watch it. Here’s why. The way that you brought that up knowing the history of it, it’s totally fine. If you didn’t know the history and you were like man, I loved your movie and now I’m going to check out this Cabin Fever one you made, I’d be like, “Don’t!” Because then it’s like you’re going in thinking this is going thinking this is going to be like those. Then you’re going to be like oh, what happened here? The fact that you are educated to know that there were problems and I tried to Alan Smithee it and all that stuff, then you can watch it as a sort of experiment I suppose.

SG: I didn’t know that when I first got the DVD, but I've learned about the whole history of it as it's sat on my shelf.

TW: But knowing that, I would encourage anyone to watch it because everyone in that movie, I don’t dislike any of those people. Good for them. It’s just even people who really like that movie, I don’t feel comfortable taking any credit for it. That movie, I was editing it, it was going well and then everything I did they deleted and someone else started from scratch and re-edited it. I just think they missed what it was. Some people say, “How different could it be? It’s the same footage.” It’s like Dane Cook telling Seinfeld jokes. The material’s fine but the delivery is all fucked up. He’s giving you all this energy and it’s not supposed to be done that way. The material’s still funny but no one’s laughing. That’s how I feel about Cabin Fever. It’s a local band covering a famous song where you’re like, “This is the same, it’s just not as exciting.” That’s how I feel about it.

SG: The longer it gets the more I wonder why I haven’t just watched it yet.

TW: It’ll pop up on Netflix Instant and you’ll see it like that. The Alan Smithee thing would’ve been cool because I would’ve been part of that club. I mean, it’s not a great club to be a part of but at least I could be like historically, I’m in the Alan Smithee club. It’s very hard to get that credit though.

SG: They did a movie about that.

TW: I know and I think that killed the Alan Smithee, it makes it almost impossible to get it now. It’s no one’s real fault. It wasn’t Lionsgate. A whole series of things happened that just didn’t work out.