Stay sexy, Connect
Editor,
It’s obvious that people have a problem with the American Apparel ads, and I would like to say that I love them. I think they’re great, and I love that Connect is the kind of paper that would run them.
Do people complain about the strip club ads? Or the “call hot babes now” ads? Or is it just because the American Apparel ads are on the inside cover that people are so upset?
Anyway, the people complaining should ignore the ad. American Apparel is not marketing to you or your babies; they are marketing to people like me: attractive, young and perfectly able to fit into skin-tight, provocative basics. There are lots of us.
“None of us got the gist”: of course not! You’re old people in an office. It is not exploitive or offensive to their target audience.
But on behalf of them, I would like to say thanks for the complaints. American Apparel and the CEO are especially famous for controversy; keep up the buzz. And those comments really just voice your personal insecurities about not being hip, young or uninhibitedly sexy.
Don’t cave to prudes, Connect - stay hip, young and uninhibitedly sexy! (Because you can be those things and be sophisticated, intelligent and informed as well.)
Kristen Leigh Turner
Move on from racial issues
Editor,
Re: “Pride or Prejudice” by Stephen Sacco: Very interesting article and perspective of both Mr. Shabazz and Mr. Muhammad.
I emigrated to this country in 1975 from England and can assure Mr. Shabazz and Mr. Muhammad that I am not Jewish. To take the position that all Caucasians from Europe are Jewish is ignorant, not racist.
I do know a little bit about American history and England’s for that matter. Since England was one of the major exporters of slaves to the Americas, as was Spain, France, Portugal, Holland and many other seafaring nations including those of the Americas themselves.
Many of these slaves were taken, as they had been for centuries before the white man arrived on the scene by neighboring tribes, who would use the slaves to do the menial work around their village and to bring new blood into their own tribes by taking the women of other tribes to be their wives.
When the opportunity arose to sell these slaves as cheap labor to the sea captains the practice of raiding tribal villages and taking men, women and children to sale them for profit greatly increased. This practice continues to this very day in many parts of Northern Africa.
My home town of Bristol was very active in the slave trade, and for that matter so were many others. However, isn’t it time to move on? The Irish were slaves, the Chinese were slaves as were many other nationalities, and each paid a price in coming to the Americas.
In the article Mr. Shabazz states that he supports reparations and a separate black state. I would direct him to read about the founding of the Country of Liberia in 1823 when the United States not only offered apologies to all those surviving black slaves, they purchased what is now Liberia and offered to transport and provide for those who wanted to return to their homeland and live in Liberia. Many accepted this offer.
I’m sure Mr. Shabazz’ ancestors had this opportunity. I must assume they turned this offer down. Perhaps they, like many other immigrants, be they forced, indentured or voluntary saw the potential this country had to offer and elected to stay to take advantage of it.
On a personal note: I never experienced racism until I came to the United States. England has a very large Black community, partly because at some point in the history of the world England owned most of it.
We too made slaves of those who lived in these conqured countries, just like every nation that has walked this planet. It was simply taken as that was then, this is now.
We all need to move forward with ourselves. We cannot change our history, we can learn from it though. It is this point which I believe Mr. Muhammad was making.
However, I found in Europe and many others parts of the world all of these burdens have been set aside and the different ethnic groups are all working and accepting of each other to reach a common goal.
I find that only in America is this not the case at all. The Afro-American, African American or simply American is still trying to find his or her identity and when presented with obstacles many simply give up and blame others for their failures.
I hope this is taken in the manner it is presented and not out of context. I have many friends of color (for want of a better word), some have struggled others have succeeded. I treat them with the same respect I would expect, which is all I ask of anyone.
P. Peacock
So basically we’re screwed
Editor,
It is unlikely that mankind will significantly cut their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the short term.
A growing and developing population is likely to increase their GHG emissions (expected to double by mid-century), not so severely cut them so fast as to avoid runaway global warming.
Nature now soaks up about half of mankind’s CO2 emissions, but that is expected to reduce 30 percent by 2030. Furthermore, as the world heats up, carbon sinks will become carbon emitters.
In other words, whatever reasonable cuts we can expect mankind to make in their GHG emissions, they will be overwhelmed by nature. In particular is melting methane hydrate. Incredibly, hydrate contains twice the carbon of all fossil fuel, and whereas fossil fuel needs to be burned to emit GHG, hydrate needs only to melt.
Briefly, carbon in the soil is “eaten” by microbes, and in the absence of oxygen the microbes emit methane (CH4). Some of that methane gets trapped in ice called hydrate.
There is about 400 billion tons of methane trapped in permafrost hydrate (20 percent of the land on earth is permafrost). 50 percent of the surface permafrost is expected to melt by 2050, and over 90 percent by 2100.
A release of less than 30 billion tons of methane would be like doubling the CO2 in the air.
Worse, there is an estimated 10,000 billion tons of methane hydrate under the ocean. Substantial quantities of this has melted before with catastrophic results (55 million years ago-the PETM ushered in the Age of Mammals, and 250 million years ago-the “Great Dying” killed most life on earth).
In other words, the carbon cycle has been upset before (possibly by volcanic eruptions), causing a chain reaction. Mankind’s GHG emissions are over 30 times stronger a trigger than past severe runaway global warming events. This means the chain reaction will happen sooner, unfold faster, and therefore be much, much more severe.
And some suggest adaptation?
To summarize, the mitigation strategy of human GHG emission cuts is implausible, because soon runaway global warming makes them too little, too late. Furthermore, past runaway global warming events make adaptation implausible, because the climate change is too severe.
Therefore, the only solution is to remove the CO2 from the air after it has been emitted. Nature already does this but we are overwhelming her ability to cope.
I suggest improving nature’s ability to absorb CO2 with genetic engineering (perhaps seeding a genetically modified organism into the ocean).
Brad Arnold
New film critic needed
Editor,
As a student in my third quarter at the Savannah College of Art and Design, I would like to say thank you for supplying an entertaining and informative publication that is quite easy on the old wallet.
I have my tradition: once a week, I eat Chinese and read Connect Savannah. I thought I wouldn’t find a replacement for the wonderful (and strangely similar) paper I read back home in Texas, but you have more than fit the bill.
However, this is actually a letter of complaint. A complaint I’ve been biting my tongue over for quite some time.
You desperately need a new film critic.
The first time I read Matt Brunson’s reviews, I thought there was some sort of fluke. How could a man employed as a film critic not get films?
Today, I read his review of Grindhouse and decided that I couldn’t let Mr. Brunson get away with trashing most of this spectacular movie. He attacks Tarantino’s half for being dialogue driven and not true “to the style” of grindhouse movies while he praises Rodriguez’s half.
Anyone with a slight knowledge of the time would realize that Tarantino’s is far more accurate to the “style.” Exploitation filmmaking is usually a lot of pointless and boring dialogue separated by the little action the producers could afford (thankfully, Tarantino staves off the boredom by delivering yet another killer script filled with killer dialogue).
Rodriguez’s film is what Rodriguez does best: slight, cheesy and fun, but certainly not better than Tarantino’s work. Rodriguez’s is an affectionate parody... Tarantino’s is the real deal.
While I will certainly continue to read your paper, I will boycott the reviews of Mr. Brunson. Is this childish? Pointless? Yeah. Completely.
Making statements, though, is a blast.
Jacob Hall
