January 19, 2023
Old Stock at Wilton’s Music Hall: An Important, Relevant Work of Musical Brillianceby Randi / September 26, 2019It’s another Friday in the world which means I’m prettayyy prettayyy pissed off about something! Here are some things I hate.
Previous editions:
KICKSTARTER
Thanks to my pal Rachel from the greatest internet group OF ALL TIME, the PPK, for bringing this issue to my attention. So, you know how during the Industrial Revolution, workers – from babies to oldies – were worked to the bone, often killed due to dangerous practices, never given days off, fired if they were hurt or sick, and generally always suffering because there were no laws and so factories were run the Wild West? Well, naturally, the advent of modern labor law began during the Indy Rev as workers sought better conditions, the right to form and join labor unions, and a general agreement to not be docked pay if they had to sweep the cotton bits from under the enormous death machine while it was still on (although that was mostly for kids) (this is a true thing I learned about in Manchester’s science and industry museum! is horrifying!). These laws are vital, as you know unless you are literally a corporate overlord longing for the good old days but then seriously what are you doing on this page, as is the freedom to form and join unions in order to achieve stronger bargaining power and legal rights.
Unions are necessary in a capitalist society, but Kickstarter is like mmm I don’t know, those late 19th-early 20th century times were really fun for a lot of people. Due to the company’s preoccupation with I don’t know, manufacturing for war time and ladies beginning to show their ankles, Kickstarter has gotten into some union busting. The company is in an ongoing unionization effort, and two employees involved in the effort were recently fired. They think it’s because of the union activity, while Kickstarter says it’s for performance issues. And yeah, maybe it was, but that doesn’t explain why Kickstarter still doesn’t recognize its employee union, or why, when asked, the company stated it would not voluntarily recognize the union. I mean, wtf guys! Did Sally Field make those placards and win an Oscar for nothing? FOR NOTHING, PEOPLE? How dare you ignore her!
I know that past editions of the What’s Pissing Me Off Today post have been like “don’t shop at this place! They’re mean! Don’t give them money! I hate them!” but I can’t really do that for this one. What am I gonna say, don’t support interesting indie projects or small businesses who may need the site for fundraising? I mean, suggest one of the many other sites to them, but Kickstarter does have the most name recognition. I’m extra mad because the people who use Kickstarter shouldn’t suffer (probably). So maybe if you are looking to raise funds, just don’t choose them. And also, in general, don’t support union busters!
LAURA INGRAHAM’S ADVERTISERS
I hate that I’m talking about such a garbage person on my happy site but her brother made me. So Laura Ingraham is a Nazi monster, as we all know, such a Nazi monster (or…Nazster?) that her own brother has disowned her in a series of truly incredible tweets. What a Thanksgiving it’ll be this year! He can come to mine! The companies that continue to advertise with her are of course also Nazsters who do not, I repeat really do not, understand the first amendment, and who have been profiled in the past when e.g. she went after young activist David Hogg. She’s even shittier now than she was before, so here are her advertisers as of July.
South Beach Diet: LOL I remember when this was big when I was in high school and we made one of their cookie recipes, it was literally just egg whites and peanut butter and stevia mixed and then baked. PASS.
Fungi-Nail: Of course her viewers need this.
Rohto: Yeah I need eye drops too but I’ll get them from someone else chief.
SeroVital: These are like weird vitamins and HGH? Um.
NFL Network: We already know they are misogynist and racist monsters jfc they are THE WORST.
Waterpik: These fuckers too lazy to floss.
Stamps.com: Every podcast is now cancelled.
Coravin: None of her viewers have ever had to save a bottle of opened wine, gimme a break.
Takl: This is the worst brand name I’ve ever heard and people literally can’t even say mine.
Roman Pharmacy: This is my FAVORITE one on the list. You could not ask for something more perfect for Fox viewers. It is 104% perfect. So this is a health app, for men, that gets them medical service through the app so they don’t have to leave their homes/basement dungeons and actually go see a doctor. Oh the toxic masculinity in so much of this. And don’t with the ‘well some people are too ill to leave the house.’ The main service, and what their media coverage is mostly about, is for erectile dysfunction meds. It is perfect.
Energizer: fuck that bunny.
Bausch & Lomb: They test on animals anyway.
Sandals Hotel/Resort: YA BASIC.
Sheex: Is this when you eat at a Sheetz and then sheetz yourself?
Safelite Auto Glass Co: Checks out. I bet they are all terrible drivers.
Nutrisystem: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”
USAA: The extra A is for Asshole
MyPillow: This is another favorite of mine. Their twitter is overrun with supporters congratulating them for sticking with their fight for freedom and pledging to buy their pillows in THE NAME OF FREEDOM. People are so FORKING STUPID.
Lifelock: That’s what her viewers are suffering from.
StarKist: tuno.
WeatherTech: These people care about their cars almost as much as their guns.
HomeToGo.com: For people who want to travel but like not really.
ClearChoice Dental: I mean at least some of them go to a dentist.
Tecovas: They make leather cowboy boots. It’s all like a stereotype.
Prevagen: This supplement claims to help memory loss. God her viewers are old. Just take algae-based omega 3.
Carfax: sell dem cars.
Elite Singles Dating Service: BUT YOU HATE THE ELITE!
The Zebra: Terrible name for car insurance! (Great name for a striped horse.)
Eli Lilly & Novo Nordisk: They do love Big Pharma.
What a bunch of idiots we share this planet with!
Maybe next time we can do a list of companies I love! Optimism! (Except there’s No Ethical Consumption Under Capitalism…so really I’d just be recommending that you watch The Good Place (BSE)). What’s on your list this week?
Related Posts
P90X3 Review: Week 1 – Boys & Girls, Buy My Products! Oh You Already Did?
If you can’t tell by the title of this post, I’m a bit peeved. Tony Horton has gone even crazier than he was before.
After hearing that “bum-ba-bum-ba-bum-bum BEACHBODY” title ditty nearly every day for the last five years, I was/am excited to try the fitness empire’s newest offering: P90X3. It will be very trying to give up my favorite workout, Insanity!, for 3 months, but I am curious to see if X3 really can provide the power plays of the original P90X in half the time. (God those P90X strength hours were boooooring. Thank goodness for Bobby Stevenson and Daniel Haas. And, of course, Pam the Blam, who I want to be president.) I decided to review X3 here to keep me motivated. In doing the newest X workout, I hope that 1) I will be able to do all kinds of creative pull-ups by the end, and many of them, and 2) I’ll restart Insanity! for the bazillionth time after finishing and do better than ever. (I’ll review that one too, when we get there.)
After hearing that “bum-ba-bum-ba-bum-bum BEACHBODY” title ditty nearly every day for the last five years, I was/am excited to try the fitness empire’s newest offering: P90X3. It will be very trying to give up my favorite workout, Insanity!, for 3 months, but I am curious to see if X3 really can provide the power plays of the original P90X in half the time. (God those P90X strength hours were boooooring. Thank goodness for Bobby Stevenson and Daniel Haas. And, of course, Pam the Blam, who I want to be president.) I decided to review X3 here to keep me motivated. In doing the newest X workout, I hope that 1) I will be able to do all kinds of creative pull-ups by the end, and many of them, and 2) I’ll restart Insanity! for the bazillionth time after finishing and do better than ever. (I’ll review that one too, when we get there.)
But after finishing Week 1, do you know what I’ve accomplished? I’ve been able to hold my shit together enough to not throw the 5-pound weight at the TV as Tony repeatedly and continuously reviews the selling points of X3 and mocks people who go to the gym instead. It bears repeating – he wastes most of his airtime trying to sell a system that the people watching HAVE ALREADY BOUGHT. It’s nigh infuriating. Has he lost his mind? Does he not realize what he’s doing? Does he not realize how annoying it is, or that many people, including yours truly, cannot harness the power of Thor and work out at her best when she is so annoyed?
It’s not all bad. Some of the workouts actually do provide a great workout in only 30 minutes. Some of them suck. Let’s review week 1!
It’s not all bad. Some of the workouts actually do provide a great workout in only 30 minutes. Some of them suck. Let’s review week 1!
Day 1: Total Synergistics
Kind of mad about this workout! During this mixture of strength moves, I didn’t break a sweat – and that is not a comment about how I’m so in shape or anything like that. It’s just slow and sparse with moves (yet it felt longer than my usual actually longer workouts). I hope that it is easier to balance out what is coming tomorrow, but I can’t help feeling cheated out of a workout today.
A few things:
- Cold Start, the 12-minute warm-up to add when it’s extra cold out, or when you are extra tight, is on every DVD. It’s not a separate DVD. This would have been helpful to know before starting, because I wasted 20 minutes looking for it and searching for “I didn’t get Cold Start DVD in my X3 package!” tweets.
- The Branon Boat is my favorite move from this. It’s a difficult ab move that I can pretty much do, but not easily, and I can tell that with practice I will improve. That’s how the exercises should be.
- Crawly Push Ups were fun, but they weren’t enough to make up for the lackluster push-up presence.
As for the backup team, Dreya is back! But she is a shadow of her former self, and it made me sad. She can still kick some serious ass, but she no longer has an ass. :/
Day 2: Agility X
This was a much better workout than Total Synergistics, but it’s not even as good as Plyo X from regular P90X. Again, it just felt like half of that workout, not a more intense version.
So, this workout requires that you tape up your floor so you have exact points to aim for while you jump and run. I like that in theory, but in practice it sucks. Who has floors equipped for this? My tape slipped all over.
This workout has the famous plyo push-ups that we saw in the teaser trailer, and they are amazingly fun. I took it easy and didn’t go very high off the ground, because I like having the use of my wrists. How is this move harder than the power push-ups in Insanity, when you jump to your feet? It doesn’t make sense. But it is. Nice move!
All the running along the tapes seemed very silly. It would have been great to do during the warm-up, but it seemed lame to be the crux of the workout. In contrast, the jumping from X to X on one leg was a solid, difficult move. Approved!
The last 5 minutes of this video is the main reason for my annoyance at Tony. For way too long, he pretends to be a guy going to the gym, needing to change out of his suit from work, and using the elliptical machine and not getting good results, etc. Basically, 5 minutes of preaching to the choir that ‘this is the way to exercise’. Like, WE ALREADY BOUGHT THIS. What the hell is his point? It is actually revoltingly annoying.
It’s not helped by Tony’s repeated suggestions that one of the backup team members, Lauren, ‘Beyonce-ify’ everything. What the hell. It’s really annoying. Between the Beyoncification and Tony’s sales pitch, I dread doing this workout again.
Day 3: Yoga X3
Hot damn. Ok. So I know from the forums that Yoga X, the 90-minute Yoga from P90X, is one of the most polarizing issues since Anne Hathaway. So many people despise it. I adore it. I’ve continued doing it regularly even though I haven’t done the rest of X in years (save for ARX, because it’s the best). Needless to say, I had high hopes for this supposedly more intense version.
Instead of doing Yoga X3, I suggest that you do the first 40 minutes of the original Yoga X. Or really any yoga video marked intermediate or above. X3 is boring and barely made my muscles twitch. Yes, many of the positions are difficult, but you are only holding them for a few beats, not long enough to make a dent. It’s maybe worth doing once to see the man in the backup team, who is one of the most impressive yogis I’ve ever had the privilege of watching. Man alive! Or you can use it as a rest day video, as I might. But it’s not nearly strong enough to use on a full, hard workout day. So disappointing.
Day 4: CVX
Now we’re talking! This cardio workout pushed me the hardest yet, finally. It contains familiar cardio moves, some easier than others, but you do the entire thing holding a weight (or a ball). I used a 5-pound weight, and I was struggling by the end. I loved it. Now this is what a 30-minute workout should look like. It’s not impossible, but you feel like you actually broke a sweat. You might need a break, but you don’t feel silly taking it or like you are wasting precious time. Phew. Finally, a plus in the ‘pro’ column. I look forward to doing this workout again.
Day 5: The Challenge
This is one of those days when I wished I had time to do some cardio first, but I was counting on the video to provide a well-rounded workout. Although it doesn’t give any cardio, it is a solid strength workout, alternating entirely between pull-ups and push-ups, pull-ups and push-ups, until you can’t use your arms anymore. I quite enjoyed it, even though I still can’t do unassisted pull-ups. (Remember – if I don’t return it – that this is my major goal with using this system!) My upper body is super sore (in a good way…except for my neck, which is twingey), and I don’t feel like I wasted my exercise time.
I recommend, as I did, doing jumping jacks or running in place between each move. Otherwise, it’s too stationary. Also, the light cardio helps to loosen up your quickly dying upper body muscles.
You might be thinking, ‘it doesn’t seem like a good enough workout to get your approval after how harsh you are being.’ And you’re right. It’s just decent, but you know what pushes it over the edge? BOBBY STEVENSON! My aforementioned 3rd favorite part of P90X is back! He’s like 20 years older, gray, and the spitting image of Bill Nye the Science Guy, but I’m so glad my old friend is back.
Day 6: The Warrior
Yes! Now, this is the workout P90X3 promised to provide. Finally. Tony said (several times) that he brings this mix of push-up challenges and squat challenges to military bases around the world. It was a solid, difficult combination of isometric holds and explosive movements. My favorite move was the elevator push-up, when you start in plank and lower to push-up position and all ranges in between upon Tony’s call of floor levels (like, Floor 1 is down as far as you can, Floor 2 is a bit higher, &c.). That is really hard to maintain! It’s overall a great combo workout that I look forward to doing again. However, I’m glad I did a little warm-up on the treadmill to start, because it’s definitely more strength than cardio. If my time permits, I would do a good 10 minutes of extra warming up.
On that note, it seems that the determination to make each workout about 30 minutes resulted in very awkward cuts, rather than solid planning. The warm-ups and stretches are virtually nonexistent. To be safe, you should probably warm-up and stretch on your own, or at the very least do Cold Start (which is a semi-decent way to get blood-flowing). Obviously, this throws the whole dramatic selling point of ’30 minutes!!!’ out the window. In workouts like Total Synergistics and Yoga X3, the cutting resulted in very disjointed, meager plans that don’t provide cohesive workouts, let alone make you sweat.
A few videos this week were great, and I hope that the remaining videos are even better. So far, I’m not sold, but I’m not giving up yet. I’ll be back next week reviewing either week 2…or week 4. I haven’t decided whether to skip ahead to check the different videos out before the 30-day return period is up. Eek. Not a great start Tony! I know only two things that will fix this — much harder, more intense videos to come…or Pam the Blam!
Voting with Your Dollar in Every Domain: Fashion, Vegan Food, & Theatre
As vegans, we know how important the concept of voting with your dollar is. Spending money is a political act: what and who you decide to give that money to matters, because it gives the recipient power. The power to operate, the power to continue doing what they’re doing. Often, this is a happy decision. We support small ethical brands so that they can keep existing and providing products that don’t harm the earth. We support decent people so they know we’re behind them. And the flip side is equally important: We know not to give our hard-earned money to the big evil corporations who test on animals and contribute to serious global and environmental health problems. And, of course, we vote by buying vegan food and products, making the statement that we don’t support animal cruelty. Although being cognizant of what brands, products, and entities to support is a constant undertaking, it’s not really too difficult. My general rule of thumb is ‘don’t support assholes’. However, I see other people supporting assholes all the time (like allll the time), and I wanted to share my reasoning for not supporting a few things today.
The first one is a popular fashion brand, one of the most popular actually. It breaks my heart to see a constant stream of happy shoppers spending tons of money there at all times. And true I haven’t written about fashion in literally years but this seems like a good way to get back into that. The second is a restaurant chain that I actually loved, but when I learned about its behind-the-scenes drama, I had to stop. The third is a big bummer, because it’s an exciting new Broadway production that I won’t be buying a ticket to next season. I’m not telling anyone not to support these brands or events; I’m simply sharing why I don’t so you can make your own informed decisions. I know I have a lot of work to do myself regarding what companies, restaurants, &c I continue to support, so I wanted to share this in case others can learn from it.
ZARA
When I was studying abroad in 2005, I discovered Zara. I adored most of their pieces – it was like the affordability and availability of H&M and Gap but tailor-made for my style. I was obsessed. But then the following year, we saw that they were selling bags with swastikas on them. Seems like a really basic thing to know not to do, but there it was. The bags were pulled as soon as a customer complained about the offensive symbol, but considering how many steps there are from design to production to stocking and delivery in shops, it seems incredible that no one along the way noticed this aspect of the design until customers did. Indeed, the company’s apology stated that there were no swastikas in the approved design, and that they were just as surprised as we were when the Indian company who supplied the bags added this element. It would be a believable story if it were a one-off.
But then in 2014, they sold the infamous children’s shirt that resembled the striped uniforms that Holocaust victims were forced to wear: blue and white stripes with a yellow Jude star. This one wasn’t excused away by a supplier issue but by a difference in intention: In their apology, the company said that the star was intended to be a sheriff’s badge. And while it did indeed say ‘SHERIFF’ on the yellow badge, the combination with the blue and white stripes is at the very least ill-considered. Also, it reminds me of another controversial star image that was excused as being a sheriff’s badge as an attempt to excuse its blatant anti-Semitism.
Amid these problems with obviously anti-Semitic products, the fast fashion giant was investigated for horrific sweatshop conditions at a Sao Paolo factory. Then, there was the, let’s say underdeveloped “White is the New Black” tee shirt which was received rather poorly by people who are against racism, as you might expect. Since then, they’ve been sued by a former Jewish and gay employee for anti-Semitic and anti-gay treatment. And I’m sure you remember that Melania Trump’s famous “I Really Don’t Care Do U” jacket, which was received as pointedly referring to the tragedies at the border concentration camps but really could be about literally anything the White House is doing, was from Zara as well, to literally no one’s surprise.
The parent company, Inditex, also owns brands Pull&Bear, Massimo Dutti, Bershka, Stradivarius, Oysho, and Uterque. Considering all of these issues they’ve faced over the years plus the allegations against those in positions of power in this company, I do not support these brands.
BY CHLOE
Some of you vegans or vegan-friendly eaters are probably aghast at seeing this popular NYC-based chain here. “What!” you might be saying. “I love Chloe! She’s the best!” Yeah, Chloe is the best, and that’s why I don’t support ‘by CHLOE’ anymore. After working her ass off for years and years to develop her own hugely successful brand, Chloe worked her ass off to build ‘by CHLOE’, a hugely successful vegan restaurant that now has more than half a dozen locations. But Chloe herself was forced out a few years ago, and the issues surrounding her ouster are complicated, to say the least.
There were rumors that her business partners – Samantha Wasser, enormous hospitality group ESquared, and Wasser’s father Jimmy Haber, who is the CEO of ESquared – wanted to start serving meat under the ‘by CHLOE’ name. They’ve denied that claim, but that part is the least of it. It seems at the very least understood that there were many differences of opinion in how the business should move forward, and considering that it would all come across as being under Chloe’s own name, she understandably had strong thoughts about these next steps. However, an arbitrator ruled against Chloe. I’d normally show respect for that decision, but given the David vs. Goliath set-up of this dispute, it’s clear there’s more to it. And there is: in a lawsuit Chloe filed last year, she states that the group ousted her after she rejected Haber’s sexual advances. I don’t know about you but I believe women, and there is nothing easier to believe than an all-powerful white male CEO taking advantage of a beautiful young woman he has power over, and then acting out when he doesn’t get what he wants.
To top that off, nothing riles me up more than people abusing intellectual property law. (Okay obviously apart from abusing women, children, animals, &c.) This year, ESquared sued Chloe over her new pop-up restaurant Supernatural, which she runs with celebrity chef Supernatural and which I visited last month in NYC. ESquared sued her for trademark infringement, stating that this pop-up – with a completely unrelated name – would be too confusing to fans of ‘by CHLOE’ and they would think it was related, simply because it’s Chloe doing something else. By their logic, or lack thereof, brand confusion would arise whenever anyone did more than one thing. This dick move seems too much like a petty attempt to stop Chloe from working in food in NYC at all and I will not stand by while jerks try to use my beloved trademark law to defend something so weak and so clearly not a violation.
ESquared Hospitality also owns several non-vegan restaurants which you can find listed here.
WEST SIDE STORY ON BROADWAY
I know, with this one you’re like ‘what in the world’, but there’s a reason. Next season on Broadway, mega-producer and well-known bully Scott Rudin is mounting a new production of West Side Story with director Ivo Van Hove (whose past directorial works in London have always smelled of misogyny). The cast of this much-anticipated revival was just announced this week, and in the prime role of Bernardo is New York City Ballet dancer Amar Ramasar, which decent people who love theatre are justifiably angry about.
If you don’t follow NYC culture news, Amar’s name has been discussed a lot in the past year for his involvement in a disgusting, disturbing case of sexual harassment and all-around despicable behavior at the ballet. He and friends of his (all men who should be in jail with him for their actions: Chase Finlay, Zachary Catazaro, and Jared Longhitano) from the ballet (all either dancers or donors) shared private (sexual) pictures and videos of female ballerinas in group texts and joked about all the crimes they would commit to them and other ‘sluts’. One of the victims – a young ballerina whose reputation and thus career was harmed – brought a lawsuit, and Finlay resigned from the ballet while Ramasar and Catazaro were suspended and then fired. Allegations in the lawsuit state that this sort of behavior was condoned from the top, as the NYCB and the School of American Ballet were well aware of the extensiveness of this type of behavior and did nothing to stop it, at one time asking the men to simply keep such actions in NYC, where it’s ‘easier to control.’ Obviously, the NYCB is on my shit list as well.
However, Ramasar and Catazaro were just reinstated at the ballet: the American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA) appealed their case to an independent arbitrator. So fuck the AGMA too. The arbitrator, whose identity I can’t find but I have a feeling it was someone with a penis, said their termination was inappropriate and suspension should have been enough. You know what else is inappropriate? Rape culture. While Catazaro declined to return at present because he is dancing with Bayerisches Staatsballett in Munich (another ballet company I won’t be seeing anytime soon/ever, hi Munich), Ramasar is back and now with two unbelievably coveted jobs in New York, two jobs that are both the kind that most people only dream about obtaining: a prime position at the NYCB and a starring role in a huge Broadway musical. COOL GUYS. Also Bernardo shouldn’t be 37 YEARS OLD.
You know what, fuck this revival anyway for not using Jerome Robbins’s classic choreography.
Okay those are my thoughts on this topic for this week. Considering my proclivity for complaint, this’ll probably be a regular series. What similar things have you just learned about that you want to share with the class?
