Unfortunately, Brown’s chances of medaling at World’s this year are nonexistent. Brown was forced to take his only quad jump out of his program after suffering an injury, and winning without a quad is a complete impossibility.
That was hardly the case a mere four years ago at Sochi. While the quad has been an occasional feature in men’s skating since the 1990s, most skaters have chosen to rely on the execution of other elements instead of adding the physically demanding quad. At the 2010 Vancouver games, American Evan Lysacek took home the gold without a quad, and in 2014, Canadian Patrick Chan earned the silver medal with only two quads. Just last year, Chan was still critical of skaters who attempted more than two quad jumps, stating “the quality of skating is diminished” because “what you're going to end up seeing is just people moseying down the ice and setting up for a quad.” Chan has three quads planned for this year’s Worlds, but has never landed all three in competition. That brings us to the second U.S. men’s representative, Nathan Chen, who is competing at the senior level for the first time this year. Chen instantly broke ground with a program that features 5 quads which he always lands, making him the only skater in history to land 5 in competition. Quad jumps earn higher point values due to their level of difficulty, so landing them gives Chen an instant upper-hand. It allowed him to beat reigning Olympic and World Champion, Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan, at Chen’s very first international competition last month. This sets a precedent that raises the standard for male skaters worldwide, and certainly makes Patrick Chan’s comments about three quads seem antiquated. While Chen’s quads are an incredible feat, the focus he puts on them during training takes time away from mastering his other components. Brown, on the other hand, earns some of the highest technical scores in the sport, but will still need to add at least 2 quads within the next year to remain relevant. The top Americans are playing catch-up in opposite ways – unfortunately for Brown, it will be harder to gain athleticism than it will be for 17-year-old Chen to refine his craft. To be successful at next year’s Olympics, skaters are going to need to bring both sides of the sport to the table: athleticism and artistry. For now, a quad can certainly bring excitement – as Patrick Chan said, they’re “a slam dunk contest,” – but the most memorable performances are owned by veterans who demonstrate the long-lasting tradition of the sport.
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Amy Alexander’s recent commentary, Today’s Feminism: Too Much Marketing, Not Enough Reality, attempted to critique flaws in third-wave feminism. We who call ourselves feminists should be open to constructive criticism in addition to celebrating our achievements as a movement, but Alexander did not offer anything substantive to the conversation.
First-wave feminism gave women the right to vote and own property – if you were white. Second-wave feminism championed equal pay and the dismantling of traditional gender roles – if you were white. Luckily, third-wave feminism has been defined by inclusivity, fighting for women of all races, religions, sexual orientations, and gender identities. The movement isn’t perfect by any means, but Alexander’s editorial was an unfulfilled argument built on unsubstantiated claims. Alexander made many bold assertions: 2017 Feminism’s equality messages are superficial and don’t address real issues. The Women’s March was “tone-deaf” to working-class black women. Women of color who spoke at the Women’s March are “superficial and insufficient,” and asking them to participate is an opportunistic scheme created by white women to feign unity. Leadership does not consider intersectionality important when demonstrated by women of color. These would all be important, scathing arguments if there were facts, quotes, or examples to back them up, but Alexander provided nothing to support her claims. Moreover, it would seem 2017 feminism can do nothing to appease her; if feminism doesn’t address black issues, but it’s also “insufficient” when black women speak to those issues in the name of feminism, how are black women supposed to have a voice and be heard? Tearing down a movement without a justifiable reason to be holding the sledgehammer doesn’t solve anything. If feminists, both black and white, spent more time striving toward common goals instead of constantly criticizing each other, true intersectionality might be achieved. When people think of environmentally damaging industries, they usually think of “dirty” industries like oil, mining, and sewage. But what about the industries that make the shoes on your feet, your trusty pair of jeans, or your favorite mascara?
We rarely think about clothing and beauty products beyond our own closets, but the growing popularity of environmental activism has created a higher demand for environmentally conscious fashion and cosmetics. The fashion industry has been dubbed “the second dirtiest industry in the world next to big oil.” That claim has yet to be completely corroborated, but the severity of the fashion industry’s environmental impact is clear. Many smaller industries are involved in the process of producing clothing, including farming, processing, manufacturing, and shipping, all of which involve chemicals, water waste, and pollution. In fact, 4 of the top 10 polluting industries in the world are used in the creation of fashion items. The biggest area of criticism within the industry is “fast fashion,” which produces inexpensive clothing at a high turnover rate. Retailers like H&M, Zara, Forever 21, and Target are at the forefront of the fast fashion market, and they gladly supply the demand. The appeal is obvious; every time you go to Target to pick up a gallon of milk, you can glance at the clothing section and see something new that you have to have. Unfortunately, the desire for the “new” causes sweatshops and manufacturers to produce at all costs, using thousands of liters of water and several million tons of chemicals in production each year. But the impact doesn’t stop after production. When an item goes “out of style” after a short fashion season and consumers are ready to get rid of their clothing, thrift stores are unlikely to take the items; fast fashion items are often cheaply made to begin with, and because items go out of style so quickly they’re considered “worthless” and 75% of garments end up in the garbage. To make matters worse, many fabrics can take up to 50 years to decompose in landfills. Fast fashion isn’t the only industry contributor to environmental damage. High-end designers who use imported fabrics and ship their designs to-and-from their international fashion houses forget the impact that vehicle emissions have on their carbon footprint. For the average person, conscious consumerism is key to making sustainable fashion choices. Purchasing the majority of your clothing from resale shops and boutiques is an easy way to make sure you aren’t financially contributing to fast fashion. If you have more freedom in your budget, looking at the fabrics and materials of your garments (no dyes or non-organic cotton) can prove valuable. As fashion designer Vivienne Westwood has said, “Buy less, choose well, make it last.” While it’s unlikely that the fashion industry will convert to an entirely sustainable model, many designers and celebrities are taking a stand against its bad practices. Eileen Fisher, Stella McCartney, and Ralph Lauren are leading sustainable designers, and several prominent celebrities, including Emma Watson, Zac Posen, and Lupita Nyong’o, have made bold statements about sustainability. Many beauty brands are beginning to adopt a sustainable attitude as well. It is fairly common for beauty items to be sold in sustainable packaging like recycled (or recyclable) paper, plastic, or glass. Some companies have taken conscious consumerism a step further to address the global impact of factory farming. Most cosmetics use animal products in their formulas, and many companies test their products on animals. By adopting cruelty-free testing and creating vegan products, companies are taking a stand against factory farming. Unfortunately, the beauty industry has not developed a fully accountable system in their environmental activism. Some brands that claim to be cruelty free are owned by parent companies that are not cruelty-free, which can raise doubts over product sourcing within the company. In addition, product labeling isn’t always clear, and consumers could easily think a product that is labeled “cruelty-free” is free of animal products altogether. It is important to note that cruelty-free products only address animal testing, while vegan products address the product formulas themselves. Researching vegan cosmetics involves a careful look at product ingredients. Ingredients to avoid include keratin (found in hair, nails, and horns of mammals,) squalene (made of shark liver,) collagen (made from bones, tissues, and skins from animals,) guanine (made from fish scales,) lanolin (made from the grease of sheep’s wool,) carmine (made from insects,) and beeswax. Luckily, there are many cosmetic brands that have jumped on the vegan bandwagon, from affordable brands you can find at the drugstore lie NYX, Physicians Formula, Wet n’ Wild, Milani, and E.L.F, to high-end brands like Tarte, Kat Von D Beauty, Urban Decay, and Too Faced. While animal-hair brushes still dominate the market, many cosmetic tools, applicators, and brushes are going vegan as well. Whether or not eco-friendly models in clothing and beauty brands will become mainstream remains to be seen and will likely depend on continued consumer demand. With luck, awareness of the environmental impact of bad practices will continue to grow, and the desire for every industry to become environmentally aware will rise in tandem. Pablo Neruda was a Chilean poet, well known for his political activism and exile. You’ve probably seen his romantic quotes on Pinterest, or books of his love poems featured prominently in bookstores and gift shops around Valentine’s Day.
Neruda also wrote poems about lost love, and about grief. No surprise, really since most of the people we consider to be “the greats” in creative fields were struggling with loss in one form or another. We can share commonalities and write what we can, but sometimes it takes an artist to put feelings to words. Read more at Too Damn Young: The Midwest Museum of Natural History needed a professional book to share with potential community corporate sponsors. The goal was to create a modern, minimalist design that could easily be updated with a new logo, font, and color scheme at the completion of the re-branding project. All content was developed based on previous sponsorship materials and research of comparable sponsorship/membership books. Growing up in a Christian home, it was never even a question of whether or not I would take my future husband’s last name. When you believe that marriage is a union under God and that two people are becoming one, sharing a last name is just part of the package. Of course I would take my husband’s name.
As I’ve gotten older, the thought of keeping my last name (or hyphenating) has crossed my mind once or twice, mostly in terms of my career path. As a female writer, it complicates things a lot when you have one body of work pre-name-change and another body of work post-name-change. But being single, I haven’t been in a position where I’ve had to think about it too much; there isn’t much for me to do except write with the name I have and cross the name changing bridge when I come to it. That said: Read more at Too Damn Young: As someone who has worked in fashion retail for nearly four years, it’s safe to say that I enjoy clothes, cosmetics and everything in between. It’s also safe to say that I enjoy the shopping that goes along with the fashion industry.
“Retail Therapy” is a very real thing. Sometimes the only thing that makes one feel better is a new pair of shoes. Of course, in my case, new shoes, new necklaces, new lipstick and new perfume doesn’t actually make me feel better. It makes me look adorable, and that might temporarily make me feel good, but it doesn’t solve anything. Read more at Too Damn Young: t’s very common for widows to lose 75% of their friends after their spouse’s death. When a couple is friends with another couple and a group of four becomes three, it upsets the “balance” and the intact couples will bail. Then there’s the matter of married women fearing that widows are “predators” who are after their husbands. It sounds absurd, but it’s a real thing. It has happened to my mom.
Read more at Too Damn Young: I’m really into opera.
It’s one of those super dorky things about me that I shout from the rooftops. I gave speeches about opera in high school. I wrote research papers about opera in college. I frequently spend my weekends going to Met Live in HD performances at my local movie theater. When I’m at a red light and the car next to me is blasting bass-booming hip hop, I crank up “Un bel di” and laugh at the confused stare I get from the adjacent driver. Who needs Kanye when you can have some Puccini, right? It’s weird, I know. Just roll with me for a minute. Read more at Too Damn Young: Vivian, our Too Damn Young founder, recently wrote a response to the recent Huffington Post article, “What It Is Like to Date a Girl Without a Mother.” She found it to be simplistic, demeaning, and stereotypical.
So did I. I am not without a mother, but I am without a father, and the assumptions the HuffPost article made are ones that have been made about me time and time again. “She will pretend she doesn’t have emotions.” “She will feel a sense of embarrassment when someone asks about her parents.” “Holidays will always be hard for her.” “She will cry a lot, but you won’t know when she does.” “She will hide, she will not accept your love right away, and it will take her a while to realize she is more than deserving of it.” As a girl who has lost her father, add some token ’emotional detachment’ and ‘daddy issues’ to that list. I resent being reduced to a list of obstacles to overcome. Read more at Too Damn Young: |
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