Culture
There is need to ‘shine a light’ on gender-based violence, Varadkar says
Tánaiste Leo Varadkar has said there is a culture in Irish society that has created an epidemic of attacks on women and there was a need to shine a light on gender-based violence.
Responding to questions about the disclosure overnight that the man who murdered 23-year-old Aisling Murphy was still at large, Mr Varadkar said that every one in the country was shocked by what had happened in Tullamore.
“I know people in Tullamore must be very worried at the moment because the killer is still at large. And I want to reassure people that all of the resources of the gardaí are going into making sure that this person is found and that they’re brought to justice and that people can feel safe again.”
Turning to the wider implications he said: “I think, though, it does cause us to think a little bit more about gender-based violence. And this is something that men and women alike need to combat together. And I think for men in particular, we need to make sure that we understand, and that we teach our boys that violence against women is never justified.
“It doesn’t matter who she is, it doesn’t matter where it was, it doesn’t matter what time of day it is. It’s never justified. It’s always wrong. And there is a culture in our society that creates the conditions in which violence against women happens too frequently. Not just in public places but also people’s homes and workplaces.”
He said men had a particular responsibility in that regard to understand the factors that had given rise to attitudes of violence against women. He said boys and teenagers need to be taught what is right and what is wrong.
He said there were things the Government could do including tackling gender-based violence and domestic violence. He said the Garda was putting extra resources into its rescue units, into education and into awareness campaigns, as well as for services to victims of gender-based violence.
He said society needed to face up to this.
“There is an epidemic of violence against women. It’s been going on for millennia, quite frankly, and men and boys, I think in particular, have a responsibility to start to have that conversation among themselves, about the kinds of factors, the kind of attitudes that … engender men to commit acts of violence against women.
Mr Varadkar, who was speaking at the opening of Aldi’s new head office in Naas, Co Wicklow added he was conscious that it is only a year since Sarah Everard was was killed in London and a year since a woman from Mongolia, Urantsetseg Tserendorj (48) was killed by a 15-year-old boy on the streets of Dublin.
Resources
Taoiseach Micheál Martin has said that gardaí are doing “everything they possibly can” and using all their resources to find the person responsible for the fatal attack on the young teacher.
Speaking at the Irish Institute of Music and Song in Balbriggan, Mr Martin said he had a private conversation with Ms Murphy’s family yesterday to express his solidarity with them. He said he had spoken the Minister for Justice Helen McEntee on Friday morning about the case.
Mr Martin was asked what he would say to the community and country who may be concerned that the perpetrator may still be at large.
“That is of concern, of course, to the people of Tullamore and to the people generally across the country. The gardaí are doing everything they possibly can and (using) all of their resources to protect people and to make sure people are safe, but also to find the person responsible for this and to bring that person to justice. I can say that without hesitation, that every effort will be made bring person to justice and to keep people safe in intervening period.”
Mr Martin said that Ashling Murphy represented “the best of that tradition of national teaching.”
“Our hearts and our minds go to the Murphy family, to her community, to her family and friends and in particular young pupils who no doubt would have been looking forward to Ashling’s presence in the classroom teaching music and sport, as well as the broader curriculum. I’ve always been of the view that the national school teacher, from the beginning of the State has been the bedrock upon which our society was built on. And in many ways Ashling Murphy represented and personified the very best of that tradition of national teaching.”
Mr Martin said he had a private conversation with Ms Murphy’s family yesterday.
“Obviously, the family are very devastated and I don’t want to say any more than that. I just wanted like everybody across the country on behalf of people to express our solidarity with them, and our devastation at the fact that a beautiful young woman has been taken from their lives.
“It’s just unconscionable, it’s something I think that the united the people of this country in revulsion against it, and it’s very, very sad for them. To take young woman through life, coming out of a teaching training college, back in her home location teaching in a national school doing what she loves best. It’s very, very devastating for the family and for the wider community, I think for all of us in the country.”
Earlier Minister for Justice Helen McEntee has said that “absolutely everything that can be done is being done” to bring the killer of Ashling Murphy to justice.
“People want to know that the right person is caught and the right person is brought to justice,” she said.
She said it was “very difficult to get your head around” the fact that the murder took place in an area where people felt safe, but added that most violence against women was carried out by “someone they know… in her home”.
She said that a “cultural change” was needed to establish a culture of “zero tolerance” towards violence against women.
She described the attack as “a woman’s worst nightmare” and said the killer would be caught. She shared people’s “anger” over the killing, which was committed in a public place that local people felt was always safe.
You may like
-
Daisy Lowe’s designer mother Pearl is putting her beachside bolthole up for sale for £1.8million after she transformed it during lockdown
-
‘Women Dressing Women’: The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s tribute to a century of great female designers | Culture
-
Chemistry Problems & Quantum Computing
-
Rich, Influential And Poorly Dressed: Powerful Men Have A New Uniform
-
12 Outstanding Tech Resources To Improve Your Skills
-
How News Helicopters Ushered A Fresh Television Genre In Los Angeles
Culture
‘Women Dressing Women’: The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s tribute to a century of great female designers | Culture
The Costume Institute’s fall exhibit at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) pays homage to female creation. Women Dressing Women is a statement of intent that starts with the exhibit’s very first panel. Women designers, artisans and artists have covered the female universe with their designs and different visions of women, always making them protagonists, sometimes turning them into objects but never passive subjects when it comes to clothing. Over 80 outfits from the Institute’s permanent collection are on display, and the exhibit covers the fashion industry chronologically, artistically and commercially. The pieces represent the fashion industry’s two main centers, Paris and New York, including names and labels that connect haute couture and street fashion, and the most refined traditions of the Old Continent, American avant-garde and utilitarianism.
The exhibition, which opens on Thursday and will remain on display through March 3, 2024, starts with a selection of black and white photographs, projected in a loop, showing the work of dressmakers, tailors and seamstresses at anonymous workshops between 1907 and 1962. There are also images of the first timid tests for a client and the first private fashion shows in salons at a time when designers didn’t have name recognition, let alone the planetary fame that they have acquired in recent decades (to say nothing of the attention they’ve received in recent years from celebrations like the great annual fashion exhibit at the Met and the museum’s fashion gala, the event of the spring).
This black and white tribute features the precursors of over 70 women designers, who bring dreams to life with their needles and thimbles. The exhibit traces the lineage of the last century’s most influential women-led fashion houses (although only a couple of them remain today, the House of Dior and the House of Chanel). It features the work of pioneers like Adèle Henriette Nigrin de Fortuny and her Venetian textiles; the exquisite Madeleine Vionnet; Spanish designer Ana de Pombo, one of the last at the French fashion house Paquin (1891-1956); and Elsa Schiaparelli, who led her own brand and was perhaps the first designer with name recognition. Indeed, the latter had an exhibition at the Met dedicated to her in 2012, in which she engaged in an imaginary dialogue with her famous compatriot, Miuccia Prada. Big names (Chanel, the aforementioned Miuccia Prada, Marchesa, Rodarte) do appear in the exhibit, but it highlights unknown women and those time has forgotten, as in the selection of ethereal creations from the first decades of the 20th century.

The figure of the designer known by name was forged in the workshops where seamstresses, milliners, apprentices and tailors toiled for decades. As an introductory panel accompanying a selection of anonymous photographs notes, “in the centers of French and European fashion, women’s right to dress other women was a slowly won privilege,” since men dominated the industry. It took a long time for female professionals to gain a foothold, something that happened with the deregulation of the guilds. In the United States, however, this vocation was seen as a natural, industrious extension of domestic responsibilities: after all, sewing was an inherently female occupation.

At the press preview of the exhibit on Monday, Max Hollein, the director of the Met, explained that fashion created by women has helped empower women, as well as the designers themselves. “This exhibition invites reflection on the vital contribution women have made to fashion from the early 20th century to the present by amplifying historically undervalued voices and celebrating the celebrity they have achieved. The garments on display exemplify the countless women whose contributions were, and continue to be, the lifeblood of the global fashion industry as we know it today.”

Andrew Bolton, the world’s most influential fashion curator, senior curator at the Costume Institute and the righthand man of Anna Wintour (the all-powerful fashion Vogue editor and architect of the Met fashion gala), also spoke at the press preview of the exhibit. He noted that “women have been central to the success of the Costume Institute since its inception. Its founders include several inspiring women; that’s why the Institute remains dedicated to celebrating women’s artistic, technical and social achievements. They are part of fashion history.”

For Mellissa Huber, associate curator at the Costume Institute, the fall exhibition offers an opportunity to “learn the crucial stories of groundbreaking women designers who played a pivotal role in the conception of fashion as we know it. Women’s contributions to fashion cannot be quantified, but our intention with this show is to celebrate the Costume Institute’s permanent collection, which represents the rich history of Western fashion.” As Hollein emphasized, fashion is a symbol of female power and emancipation but also the result of tremendous collective work. Historically, conceptually and commercially, fashion is also the triumph of social progress, a powerful vehicle for women’s social, financial and creative autonomy. As Ted Pick, the co-chairman of Morgan Stanley, a sponsor of the exhibit’s luxurious catalog, points out, “the milestone that three Parisian haute couture fashion houses—Chanel, Dior and Iris van Herpen—are run today by powerful women” cannot be overlooked.

“The common thread that connects different generations of professional women reveals how subsequent generations have built on and expanded the legacy of their predecessors. The exhibit reflects the intergenerational dialogue between these designers in historical perspective and the talented women who worked with them from a contemporary point of view,” explains Karen Van Godtsenhoven, a co-curator of the exhibition. Indeed, to cite just one example of these silent conversations between the pieces on display, there is the direct thread between Fortuny’s characteristic pleating and Comme des Garçons’ textile origami; the austere scenography makes the connection stand out and reveals the continuum mentioned by the experts who organized the show. There’s a similar connection between Vivienne Westwood’s conceptual punk and the groundbreaking dress with pieces of metal inserted in silk with which the house Vionnet reinterpreted the syntax of ancient Greek ceramic painting in 1924: tradition as modernity and vice versa, along with the eternal aspect of fashion and art.
Indeed, to see one example of this legacy, look at the heads of the mannequins wearing the dresses in the pioneers’ room (the first room in the exhibit): they are topped with the enduring forms of classical Greek columns.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition
Culture
Rich, Influential And Poorly Dressed: Powerful Men Have A New Uniform
One of the best memes of this year is undoubtedly the photo of Justin Bieber turned into a caricature of himself, wearing yellow Crocs and tracksuit bottoms combined with a sweatshirt and a pink Nahmias cap. And next to him is his wife, Hailey Bieber, looking flawless in an impeccable red strapless Ermanno Scervino mini dress.

Justin Bieber and Hailey Bieber in New York in August 2023. Gotham (GC Images)
In the image, Justin Bieber is the personification of the scumbro trend, defined by Vanity Fair columnist Kenzie Bryant, who put together the words “scum” and “bro.” This trend defines the aesthetics of celebrities such as Pete Davidson, Tom Holland and Machine Gun Kelly. What defines this hectic style is an absolute lack of aesthetic coherence; they want us to know that they walked out of their houses wearing the first thing they saw in their closets. What is often striking (and incomprehensible) is that scumbros usually have a partner (like Hailey Bieber) who looks exactly the opposite; their outfits are neat, stylish.
“The strategy, in the end, is that celebrity couples dress alike, something that is accentuated when there are brands involved,” Leticia García, chief fashion editor of the fashion magazine SModa, says. “Everything is marketing, and the construction of the celebrity image is nothing more than advertising. The next step is the construction of the image of the couple, something that seems to me to be a way of stripping people of [their] self-identity.”
Looking disheveled on purpose
Going out looking messy and untidy — compared to one’s partner — is a strategy to attract attention, according to Pedro Mansilla, a sociologist, journalist and fashion critic. This is particularly true when we talk about celebrity couples, Mansilla adds. Famous men tend to do it when they are dating “women who have achieved notoriety on their own merits.”

Pete Davidson dressed to go to a premiere in 2022. Jamie McCarthy (Getty Images)
Mansilla points out that this happens primarily in heterosexual couples and adds that it could be due to the so-called bad boy attraction, with his characteristic sins: carelessness, unpunctuality, laziness, etc. There is nothing more attractive than a guy who — due to his status, and thus, power — can dress whichever way he wants, says Mansilla. In other words, according to this new trend (very ad hoc with the Silicon Valley power players who went from nerds to billionaires at the beginning of this century), for a powerful man, nothing is more exciting and vindicating than to dress as if he were powerless.
This style is, in fact, the result of an aesthetic decision. Actor Adam Sandler considers himself, perhaps, the last great purist of the scumbro style, someone who dresses this way out of sheer carelessness. When asked in an interview how he would define his aesthetic, he replied: “A man who opened a suitcase and threw something on.” The difference between Sandler and others — such as Justin Bieber or Pete Davidson — is that he is probably the only one who dresses this way in the most natural way possible. Nowadays, scumbros wear streetstyle brands such as Palace and Supreme, as well as clothing from big brands l Gucci, Versace, and Prada. Their style is more about being perfectly imperfect.

Adam Sandler well-dressed for the release of his own movie in 2022. Dia Dipasupil (Getty Images)
Proof that whoever dresses like this does not do it out of laziness, but with absolute intention, is that when a user wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that Diplo was starting to “look like a dude that sells you bad weed on the Venice boardwalk,” the musician posted a screenshot of the tweet on his Instagram profile along with the caption “Goals achieved.” Even Esquire magazine published an article in which it pointed out that celebrities dress “like teenage weed dealers.”
Brands like Balenciaga and Acne Studio have seized on this supposedly chaotic aesthetic. And, as Kyle Dinkjian — who runs the Instagram account JonahFits, which analyzes Jonah Hill’s looks — explained to The Wall Street Journal, this style inspires men who “don’t look like movie stars to get into their own fashion and make it their own.”
“People are tired of the ‘everything goes’” mentality, Pedro Mansilla counters. “Uglysm still dominates, but the sartorial order will prevail at some point. The anti-establishment style is showing signs of fatigue. The dandy is starting to come out of the closet,” he adds.
A new type of narcissist
But do these men really not care about their style at all? “When someone claims that fashion is banal and superfluous, it’s a sure sign that they are a person who thinks they are above the rest,” says García. “People dress not only as a way of expressing themselves, but also out of respect for others.” We must differentiate here, however, between two types of scumbros. One of them is Justin Bieber, who knows about fashion, has been nourished by it and has collaborated, in fact, with big brands such as Calvin Klein. His scumbro style is actually worth thousands of dollars. On the opposite side of the spectrum is something like Adam Sandler, who many Internet users defend for being someone who dresses according to his comfort and his own style. He is true to himself. Authentic.

Pete Davidson dressed to go on television in 2021.NBC (NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images)
“A trained eye should always distinguish those who don’t care how they are dressed from those who do care, but pretend they don’t,” Mansilla explains. “These are the most interesting because, in principle, they set the upward trend. We have become so bored with seeing the integrated that we wish to see the apocalyptic, to use Umberto Eco’s terminology.”
It seems that stylistic laziness is less and less about laziness and more and more about strategy, especially when a closer look at their closets reveals that every garment and accessory is worth hundreds or thousands of dollars. If silent luxury has taught us that even the most basic white T-shirt can be a sign of social status, styles like scumbro are not precisely symptoms of passivity, but of careful decisions. Today’s narcissist has mutated: he is no longer just Christian Bale in American Psycho, he has also been spotted wearing sweatpants, a Hawaiian shirt and Crocs.
Culture
How News Helicopters Ushered A Fresh Television Genre In Los Angeles
By Darren Wilson
Fifteen minutes of fame was not enough for Johnny Anchondo. Local television devoted some 100 minutes of live coverage to this repeat offender, following one of the wildest chases Los Angeles has seen in recent years. In that time, the 33-year-old criminal ran a stop sign and caused an immense mobilization of the police as he stole two pickup trucks, rammed into dozens of vehicles at high speed and escaped from at least 15 patrol cars that were hot on his trail for some 12 miles. All of this was recorded by the all-seeing eye in the sky, news helicopters.
“Chases are the best. They are dynamic, they move fast. Things can change in an instant. Sometimes they seem endless from up there,” says Stu Mundel, one of the journalists who have been following events on the city streets from a helicopter for decades. “And I say this from the bottom of my heart, it’s genuine, but I always wish things would end well,” he adds.
In Los Angeles, chases are now a television genre in their own right. Journalists like Mundel fly for hours over a gigantic urban sprawl of 88 cities with 11 million people. From way up high, they report on traffic, crashes, shootings and fires in the metropolitan area. But few events arouse the audience’s interest as much as the chases through the city’s vast thoroughfares. The police chase starring Anchondo attests to that fact; the video has over 28 million views on YouTube.
The genre was born in this city. The idea came to John Silva, an engineer for a local television station, while he was driving his car on a freeway near Hollywood. “How can we beat the competition?” he wondered. The answer came to him behind the wheel. “If we could build a mobile news unit in a helicopter, we could beat them in arriving to the scene, avoiding traffic and getting all the stories before the competition,” Silva told the Television Academy in a 2002 interview.
In July 1958, a Bell 47G-2 helicopter made the first test trip for the KTLA network, becoming the first of its kind anywhere in the world. By September of that year, Silva’s creation, known as the Telecopter, already had a special segment on the channel’s news program. Before long, every major television network had one. Silva died in 2012, but his invention transformed television forever.
The chase genre’s crowning moment came in June 1994, when the Los Angeles police chase of a white Ford Bronco was broadcast live on television. In the back of the vehicle was O.J. Simpson, the former football star, whom the authorities had named the prime suspect in the murder of his ex-wife and her friend. Bob Tur (now known as Zoey Tur after a sex change operation), the pilot of a CBS helicopter, located the van on the 405 freeway being followed by dozens of patrol cars. Within minutes, there were so many helicopters following the convoy that Tur found the scene worthy of Apocalypse Now. The audience was such that TV stations interrupted the broadcast of Game 5 of the NBA Finals to follow the chase, which lasted two hours.
“It’s a very interesting thing. It may sound morbid, but it’s not. People follow [police chases] because they are like a movie, we want to know how it will end and how the story unfolds: will good triumph over evil? Or will this person manage to escape? We journalists are objective, but the adrenaline and excitement is genuine,” says Mundel. In his years of experience, he has seen how technology has evolved. In the 1990s, people used a paper map as a guide. Today, viewers can see a map superimposed on the images Mundel captures with his camera.
Four out of 10 chases are initiated after a vehicle is stolen. The second most common reason for them are hit-and-runs by drivers who are drunk or under the influence of drugs. According to the Los Angeles Police Department, most fugitives are hiding a more serious crime: homicide, rape or violent robbery. In 1998, only four out of the 350-plus drivers arrested after a chase were let off with only a traffic ticket; five hundred chases were recorded that year.
A growing phenomenon
In 2022, 971 chases were recorded. On average, chases last about 5.34 minutes and cover about five miles, although the vast majority (72%) end within five minutes and do not travel more than two miles. 35% of documented chases ended in crashes with injuries or fatalities in 2022. That figure represents a slight decrease from 990 in 2021. In 2019, there were fewer: 651 chases and 260 crashes.
A few decades ago, authorities tried to reassure Angelenos by claiming that a person had a one in four million chance of accidentally being killed in a police chase of a criminal. “There’s a better chance of being struck by lightning,” the police department estimated. But things have changed. An official report presented in April indicates that, over the past five years, 25% of chases have left people dead or injured. That almost always includes the suspect, but the number of innocent people who have been hurt has also increased.
Although there is plenty of material on the street, uncertain times for local journalism have limited coverage. Univision and Telemundo have dispensed with their helicopters in Los Angeles. Fox and CBS have joined forces and are using one aircraft instead of two. For the time being, KTLA, which invented the genre, remains committed to having a helicopter in the air.
The days may be numbered for these televised events. Some metro police departments have asked their officers to stop chasing criminals at high speed for the safety of the public. Instead, they have employed technology with high-definition cameras and drones to chase criminals, as has happened in cities like Dallas, Philadelphia and Phoenix.
The Los Angeles police have said that they are studying the implementation of the Star Chase system in some of their vehicles. Star Chase features a launcher that triggers a GPS transmitter, tagging a fleeing vehicle and allowing the authorities to track the position of the person who has escaped in real time. Another measure under consideration is the use of an industrial-strength nylon net that traps the rear axle of the fleeing car. All of this could yield dramatic footage for the eye in the sky.
Thank You For Your Support!
— By Darren Wilson, Team ‘THE VOICE OF EU‘
— For more information & news submissions: info@VoiceOfEU.com
— Anonymous news submissions: press@VoiceOfEU.com

Daisy Lowe’s designer mother Pearl is putting her beachside bolthole up for sale for £1.8million after she transformed it during lockdown

‘Women Dressing Women’: The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s tribute to a century of great female designers | Culture

Chemistry Problems & Quantum Computing

NSA asks congress to reauthorize warrantless data collection • The Register

Madonna’s Last Tour: Summarizing four decades of successes, scandals & cultural milestones in two hours

Resurrected mummies and ancient cities: The problem with AI-generated images | Science & Tech
Trending
-
Current3 days ago
The Implications Of Controlling High-Level Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI)
-
Technology1 week ago
Exploring the Enigma of Fermilab’s Quest for the Fifth Force in Nature
-
Culture6 days ago
Choco: Revolutionizing The FoodTech Industry With Innovation & Sustainability | EU20
-
Current1 day ago
12 Outstanding Tech Resources To Improve Your Skills
-
Current1 week ago
Excellent Opportunity For Investors In Liquid Cooling For Datacenters
-
Current8 hours ago
Chemistry Problems & Quantum Computing
-
Culture2 days ago
A Chilling Resurgence Of The “Vampire Fish” In The Great Lakes
-
Current3 days ago
How Automated Moveable Medians Redefining Traffic Flow And Revolutionizing Road Safety