Bones of whale extinct for 300 years that were once stored in North Carolina couple’s garage are headed for Smithsonian

2022/1/12 
© Miami Herald

These bones originated from whales that have been extinct for 300 years or more, officials said. - 

Jeff Janowski/University of North Carolina WIlmington/TNS

A couple walking on a North Carolina beach made a rare discovery that could help researchers solve mysteries from long ago.

Rita and Tom McCabe were used to finding shells during their walks on West Onslow Beach in the 1970s — but then they started stumbling upon large bones. After years of keeping the remains in their garage, the couple gave them to the University of North Carolina, Wilmington.

It turns out, the bones belonged to a whale species extinct for about 300 years.

“We grew very excited because there was very little scientific information on the North Atlantic gray whale population because it was no longer here,” David Webster, a longtime professor and senior associate dean for the College of Arts and Sciences at UNCW, said in a news release.

The whale specimen — believed to be the “most complete” of its kind — found a new home at UNCW, where it remained for decades.

Now officials say the bones began a new chapter at the Smithsonian in late 2021.

Webster said he thinks the couple, who have both since died, would find joy in knowing their collection could continue to help researchers.

“I’m sure they are just tickled pink,” he said in the news release. “They are probably saying, “Can you believe it? We made it big time.”

The Smithsonian said it hopes the donated specimen will help offer clues about North Atlantic gray whales and what life was like hundreds of years ago.

“Specimens like these, tie to place and time,” Nicholas Pyenson, curator of fossil marine mammals at the National Museum of Natural History, said in a Smithsonian Ocean article. “They tell us how the world once was.”

The museum will have the bones on display, according to UNCW. But getting the massive load more than 300 miles from North Carolina to Washington, D.C., was no easy feat.

The bones were loaded onto a van that “looked more like a minibus” and were cushioned with “layers and layers of bubble wrap,” David Bohaska, a vertebrate paleontology collections specialist, told Smithsonian Ocean.

The journey was reminiscent of the time the couple first dropped the bones off at UNCW.

“They drove a small Chevy S10 pickup truck to campus, and they had bones hanging out all over the place,” Webster said in the news release for the school, which today has about 18,000 students.

After initially thinking the specimen was a humpback whale, researchers said closer examination revealed a more rare surprise. The bones have stains that helped them determine where the animal may have been.

“UNCW researchers discovered through radiocarbon tests that the bones are hundreds of years old and probably washed ashore after the young whale died of natural causes during a migration period,” the college said. “They theorize that the carcass floated into the New River Inlet and ended up in the nearby salt marshes.”

The remains, found along West Onslow Beach near the Camp Lejeune military base, also have marks that indicate Native Americans may have butchered the whale after it died, UNCW professor David La Vere said in the news release.

North Atlantic gray whales weighed up to 90,000 pounds and were found in the northern part of the world before they were last seen in the 1700s. Though the exact cause of their extinction isn’t known, their habitats near the shore made them vulnerable to whaling, the Smithsonian Ocean website said.

Student who worked on radiation project to represent Ireland at US science fair

Research Lives: Clare Reidy, SciFest STEM champion 2021 and sixth-year student at Our Lady’s Bower in Athlone


Claire O'Connell

SciFest STEM champion 2021 Clare Reidy

You won the SciFest National Final in November 2021, what was your project about?

I wanted to figure out the most effective way to build a brick that would block cosmic radiation on Mars. We are protected from cosmic radiation on Earth, but it would be a hazard for humans on Mars, and I looked at whether we could use material that is already on Mars to help build that protection.

Clever idea – what did you come up with?

I recreated Martian soil, or regolith, in a beaker, and used it along with different polymers to build bricks. These kinds of polymers would be pretty easy to transport to Mars. Then I tested to see how well the bricks could block gamma radiation, and I found that a brick containing regolith and about 20 per cent polyethylene is the most effective.

How did you know what Martian soil contains?

I found a paper online that detailed findings from space missions to Mars – particularly from the Pathfinder and Viking 1 rovers. Those missions analysed samples of the Martian regolith and the paper listed the components, which include a lot of oxides. The regolith I made in the beaker turned out a lovely purple colour, probably because of the high levels of iron oxide, which is rust.

Were the components easy to find?

Some were harder to find than others. I was struggling to find magnesium oxide, but then I saw that it is given to horses as a food supplement. We have a neighbour who has horses so I asked if he had any and he did.

You are due to represent Ireland at the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair in Atlanta, Georgia, in May – what are your plans for that?

I am going to do some more work on my project, maybe figure out the optimum thickness for bricks to block radiation, as well as the composition.

Are there scientists in your family?

Yes, both my parents are chemistry lecturers at the Technological University of the Shannon at Athlone, and I have siblings who are scientists and engineers.

How does doing your own research project compare with the experiments you learn at school?

They feed off each other. You can get lots of ideas about projects to do and how to do them based on what you learn in school. Then if you do a project yourself, you understand more about what you are learning in school, you know the applications and why you are learning it. I think that makes it more interesting.

What would your advice be to anyone in secondary school considering entering a science competition?

I would say go for it. I have taken part in SciFest several times already and I did the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition one year too. Every time you do a project you are learning about the scientific method and you are getting better at research. Talk to your teacher about it; my teacher Julie-Anne Greaney was very supportive.

Between all the science and studying for your Leaving Cert, you are busy. How do you take a break from the books and experiments?

I love music, I have played piano, violin and cello since I was about five years old and I find it really relaxing. I also play Gaelic football, which I love. And tennis too.

NAMED AFTER A #CRYPTID
AFCON: Comoros 'Coelacanths' at AFCON for the first time

Nicknamed after an endangered fish, the footballers from Comoros are far from dying out. The Coelacanths have qualified for the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time thanks to minimalist tactics and team spirit.


Comoros kick off their campaign against Gabon on Monday

"My nose still hurts a bit," admitted Said Bakari.

The 27-year-old Comoros midfielder arrived in Cameroon with his teammates last week ahead of the small island nation's first appearance at the Africa Cup of Nations, and is still feeling the effects of the numerous COVID-19 tests.

Comoros — an archipelago with a population of around 850,000 in the Indian Ocean, just off the eastern coast of Africa — are the surprise entry at the 33rd AFCON and already one of the greatest sensations in the tournament's history.

In Group C against African giants Morocco, Gabon and Ghana, qualification for the last 16 appears unlikely on paper — but not impossible, according to Bakari.

"With all due respect, we're not scared of anybody," he told the Brabants Dagblad, a daily newspaper in the Netherlands where he plays club football for Eredivisie side RKC Waalwijk. "We've made it to this tournament, which means we're also good."
'We've made an entire people happy'

The national team of Comoros is nicknamed "the Coelacanths" (pronounced see-la-canths) after a endangered species of exotic fish found in the region.

But while the fish may be dying out, the team is enjoying an improbable new lease on life, qualifying for the tournament in March 2021 ahead of Kenya and Togo. After the decisive 0-0 draw with the latter, fans accompanied the team from the stadium to the team hotel and celebrated together late into the night.

"We have made an entire people happy," Bakari told DW at the time.

Midfielder Said Bakari was born in Paris and plays for RKC Waalwijk in the Netherlands — but has Comorian roots

Only a few years earlier, the prospect of Comoros competing at AFCON would have been unthinkable; the footballers from the three main islands Grande Comore, Anjouan and Moheli (plus contested Mayotte) only joined FIFA in 2005, a move which sparked a footballing boom.

Even the smallest FIFA members receive annual subsidies from the world governing body, especially when — like on the Comoros islands — sporting infrastructure is lacking.

Since 2005, the Comoros have benefited from $1.3 million (€1.1 million) a year in FIFA support, and have also become members of FIFA's development program. As such, they have been able to renovate the Twamaya Academy near the capital Moroni, while $11.4 million will have flowed into a new administrative building by the end of 2022.

What's more, the Mohamed Cheikh national stadium has been expanded to include an artificial pitch and floodlights.

The head coach for Comoros, Amir Abdou (right), had previously only worked in the French sixth division

Amir Abdou: Coach by coincidence

On the pitch, however, the key to success has been the appointment of Amir Abdou as national team coach. Initially, the 49-year-old was supposed to assist former Marseille and Raja Casablanca coach Henri Stambouli, but took full control when the Frenchman withdrew.

Abdou, born in Marseille but with Comorian ancestry, had previously only worked in the French sixth division but immediately set about restructuring the national team.

Finding players with Comorian roots predominantly in the south of France in the second or third divisions, Abdou slowly improved the Coelacanths' performance. Discipline and organization are key pillars of his work, but midfielder Bakari also describes an unshakable team spirit.

"At our clubs, we all work rather selfishly on our own careers," he said. "But with the national team, individual ambitions take a back seat and we fight as one for our country."

Bakari's own story is a good example. Born in a Parisian suburb, his talent saw him accepted into Paris Saint-Germain's youth academy — but he wasn't taken on when he reached adulthood. Instead, he spent a few seasons in the lower leagues in France and Belgium before signing for Dutch side Waalwijk in 2017. He has since made 92 league appearances, scoring four goals, helping the team to promotion to the Eredivisie in 2019.
Minimalist football

Comoros' progression through AFCON qualification was symbolic of Abdou's disciplined and organized approach: in the first five games, they conceded only two goals and scored only four themselves.

In the goalless draw against Togo which secured qualification, the Comoros didn't register a single shot on goal, but the "minimalist" approach had worked.


The Comoros didn't manage a single shot on goal against Togo in qualifying

"I wouldn't say I'm either defensive or offensive," said Abdou, who also coaches FC Nouadhibou in nearby Mauritius. "I adapt my tactics to the opposition."

The team's biggest strength lies in familiarity, having barely changed in terms of personnel since 2016. Abdou runs the group like a club team, regularly gathering the squad together in Comoros for training camps. The players know and trust each other. "We're like one big family," said Bakari.

Recently, however, the team has become somewhat nomadic, being unable to travel to Comoros for a year due to COVID-19 restrictions.

"We wanted to meet and train there but it just didn't work," said Bakari, lamenting what a shame it has been for the fans who have only been able to watch their heroes on TV. Due to the pandemic, fans won't be able to travel to Cameroon either — so at least they won't have to undergo the same painful COVID tests as Bakari.

"They'll still be behind us though," he said. "We want to make them happy."

This article was originally written in German (and translated by Matt Ford).

 

Jonathan Henderson's (PhD 2021) "Anechoia Memoriam" is a unique memorial to lost lives of color

January 11, 2022

The participatory installation, created by Henderson and collaborator Mark Dixon, premiered at the ReVIEWING Black Mountain College conference in November 2021.

Anechoia Memoriam is a participatory installation for the Selectric Piano, an IBM Selectric typewriter that electromechanically controls an acoustic piano. The score for the piece is composed of a list of 180 unarmed people of color killed by law enforcement in the United States. The score unfolds over seven hours, whether anyone engages with it or not. When typists participate, each letter typed is enunciated by specific notes on the piano. If no one types, the score scrolls by, accumulating on the floor in silence. Participation and non-participation, attention and inattention, ringing piano strings and silence are all elements of the performance.

View a short video demonstrating Anechoia Memoriam.

About Anechoia Memoriam, Henderson writes:

"The scenario of the performance allows for the list to pass by unnoticed. When typists participate, the names become music.... The presence or absence of a typist renders the composition indeterminate. The piece will transpire in part, or even largely, in silence."

"John Cage transformed our notion of silence from an absence to a presence. For Cage, part of what we call silence is simply inattention. Or perhaps we notice a sound but deem it unimportant: silence as judgement. Can Cage’s capacious notion of silence be useful in approaching political silences?  The growing mainstream awareness of state violence towards people of color is, in part, a reckoning with silence. As 'say their names' becomes a refrain of the Black Lives Matter movement, is a silence breaking? Anechoia Memoriam invites participants and observers both into and out of that silence.... We hope the play of sound, memorialization and listening invites embodied reflection on the politics of silence and the realities of state violence against communities of color."

Jonathan Henderson is Professor of Music at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine. Find out more about him and his work at https://jhendersonmusic.com/.

Mark Dixon is an Associate Professor of Art at Guilford College in Greensboro, NC. Find out more about him and his work at https://www.fmarkdixon.com/.

I PUT OUT UNDERGROUND NEWSPAPERS USING A SELECTRIC AND GESTETNER PRESS

US to close Gulf ports to Mexican fishing boats for poaching

The U.S. government will prevent Mexican fishing vessels from entering U.S. ports on the Gulf of Mexico, arguing the Mexican government has not done enough to prevent its boats from illegally fishing in U.S. waters

By The Associated Press
12 January 2022

MEXICO CITY -- The U.S. government will prevent Mexican fishing vessels from entering U.S. ports on the Gulf of Mexico, arguing the Mexican government has not done enough to prevent its boats from illegally fishing in U.S. waters.

Starting Feb. 7, Mexican fishing boats in the Gulf “are prohibited from entering U.S. ports, will be denied port access and services,” the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration wrote in a report made public Wednesday.

The move caps a years-long problem with U.S. efforts to protect valuable red snapper stocks along its Gulf shores.

Small Mexican boats frequently use prohibited long lines or nets to haul in snapper in U.S. waters, and then sometimes apparently even sell it back to U.S. customers. Such nets and lines can indiscriminately trap marine life.

The NOAA report slammed Mexico for “its continued failure to combat unauthorized fishing activities by small hulled vessels (called lanchas) in U.S. waters.”

“The United States is committed to working with the Government of Mexico to support its actions to address the issues identified in 2019 and 2021, and is ready to re-establish U.S. port privileges for Mexican fishing vessels operating in the Gulf of Mexico once actions are taken by Mexico,” according to the report.

Mexico's Environment and Economy Departments did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the ruling.

NOAA said in a previous report that the U.S. Coast Guard apprehended dozens of Mexican boats in the Gulf, including "a large number of Mexican nationals who are repeat offenders, some having been interdicted more than 20 times since 2014."

It noted the United States imported almost five tons of fresh and frozen snapper from Mexico in 2018, “raising concerns that these imports may have included fish harvested illegally in U.S. waters.”

The environmental group Oceana Mexico said in a statement that “Mexico has yet to implement fully its USMCA (US-Mexico Canada free trade pact) environmental commitments with respect to sustainable fishing practices."

Environmentalists say that Mexico's attitude on the Gulf fishing dispute mirrors its lack of effort to stop gill net fishing in the Sea of Cortez, or Gulf of California, that has driven the vaquita marina porpoise to the brink of extinction.

Sarah Uhlemann, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s International program, said “The United States has again rightfully sanctioned the Mexican government for failing to get a handle on illegal fishing."

“This time, Mexican officials didn’t stop boats from illegally entering U.S. waters to fish. Last fall, they couldn’t get fishermen to use gear that protects imperiled sea turtles," Uhlemann said, adding Mexico "can’t manage to stop rampant illegal fishing in the upper Gulf of California to save the endangered vaquita porpoise. The clear U.S. message is that the Mexican government has to clean up its fishing practice or lose a critical seafood trade partner.”

Workers push to unionize at the Jewish Museum in New York

The Jewish Museum workers would be following in the footsteps of the staff at the Museum of Jewish Heritage, also in New York, who voted in to unionize in November 2020.

By ASAF SHALEV/JTA
Published: JANUARY 13, 2022 

The Jewish Museum in Upper East Side, New York City.
(photo credit: VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS)

Employees at the Jewish Museum in New York have launched a unionization drive, adding to a trend across cultural institutions that have been destabilized by the pandemic.

The process officially began on Monday, when representatives of Local 2110 UAW filed a petition for a union election on behalf of Jewish Museum employees with the National Labor Relations Board. If the effort succeeds, the union will encompass art handlers, curators, development staff, educators, visitor experience and retail employees, and other administrative staff.

The workers organizing the drive said the union is needed because of job insecurity, wage inequities, hazardous working conditions, and a lack of sufficient transparency around employment policy at the Jewish Museum.

“Our goal is to create a workplace built upon communication, respect, and integrity, where staff are involved in setting the terms of employment and are allowed to sustainably grow their careers,” the unionizing workers said in a mission statement. “In keeping with our love of the Jewish Museum’s exhibitions, collection, and rich history, the staff is eager to realize a fairer, more inclusive, and more diverse workplace. We believe that collective bargaining with leadership can achieve these goals and strengthen our institution.”

The workers would be following in the footsteps of the staff at the Museum of Jewish Heritage, also in New York, who voted in to unionize in November 2020. That effort was organized through a different union, District Council 37.

''LEGO Concentration Camp'' by Zbigniew Libera, is pictured at the Jewish Museum in New York March 13, 2002. The sculpture is part of an exhibit called ''Mirroring Evil: Nazi Imagery/Recent Art'' which opens at the museum on March 17. The work of thirteen artists will be presented in the exhibit, which (credit: REUTERS)

Before petitioning for the workers of the Jewish Museum, Local 2110 UAW won union elections at several other institutions including the Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Brooklyn Museum and the Hispanic Society of America.

The Jewish Museum released a statement through a spokesperson: “The Jewish Museum is aware that staff have petitioned for a union election. The Museum greatly values its staff and will respectfully engage in any process that transpires.”

Labor organizing at museums has ramped up during the pandemic as many institutions closed their doors to visitors or shifted toward virtual exhibits, causing workers in public-facing positions to face layoffs and furloughs.

At least one unionized staff at a museum with Jewish roots, the Tenement Museum in New York City, filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board last year after the museum laid off 80% of its workers. Those workers, too, are organized by Local 2110 UAW.

“Unionization has become a necessity for museum staff,” Rebecca Shaykin, a Jewish Museum curator, said in a statement released by the workers behind the unionization drive. “As museum professionals, we’re expected to work long hours for low wages with little assurance of promotional opportunities. By forming a union, we can join together for conditions that recognize our value as a staff.”

‘A protective bubble’: Covid-sniffing dogs help scientists – and Metallica – spot infection

Researchers find four dogs can identify biomarkers associated with the virus with 97.5% accuracy

Cobra the dog sniffs a mask, a means of detecting Covid.

 Photograph: Florida International University

Adrienne Matei
Wed 12 Jan 2022 

With a sense of smell up to 100,000 times more sensitive than humans’, dogs have been employed in the service of sniffing out everything from contraband to crop molds to cancer.

Yet while researchers first began exploring whether canines could be effective agents in the fight against Covid-19 early in the pandemic, only in recent months have conclusive, peer-reviewed studies begun verifying the hypothesis that dogs know Covid when they smell it.

In late 2021, scientists at Florida International University published a double-blind study of canine Covid detection in which the four participating pups demonstrated a 97.5% accuracy rate in identifying biomarkers associated with Covid-19.

“It’s one of the highest percentages I’ve ever seen, and I’ve been doing this work for over 25 years with all kinds of detector dogs,” says FIU’s Dr Ken Furton, a leading scholar in forensic chemistry specializing in scent detection. “It’s really remarkable.”

Another study from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found dogs could identify Covid 82%-94% of the time, whereas recent German research put their success rate at 95%.

Dogs are capable of generalizing odors, meaning they can detect all currently known Covid-19 variants, similar to how they can recognize all manner of explosives when trained, explains Furton.

Yet Omicron has affected search protocols used by the Ohio-based Bio-Detection K9, a company that trained dogs to identify crop diseases prior to the pandemic, and that began providing Covid detection services in October 2020 to clients including Nascar and the rock bands Metallica and Tool.

“Omicron more than any other variant has changed the biology of the infection,” explains the company’s president, Jerry Johnson. Prior to Omicron, Johnson’s team of 14 dogs were trained to approach a line of people and sniff their hands or feet – where humans have many sweat glands – before sitting in front of those they considered infected. Because Omicron is expressed less through the lungs, which transfer the virus throughout the body and into our sweat, and more through the bronchial tube, people must now offer the dogs their worn mask for a sniff.

Johnson’s dogs are able to screen between 200 and 300 people ran hour, and require breaks every 20 minutes to maintain their enthusiasm for the job. When they work with musicians, the dogs are not screening audience members at live shows; rather, they hang out backstage, focusing on a much smaller group of talent, engineers and entourage.


US delivery apps have a new high-end ‘wellness’ product: Covid tests

“This is not a tool that you’re going to use to get 70,000 fans into the Rose Bowl,” says Johnson. “But we can be very effective if you’re trying to maintain a protective bubble.” That efficacy comes at a price; the daily rate for one of Bio-Detection K9’s teams – comprising one dog and its trainer – is $5,000.

Based on his experience with detector dogs, Johnson has a theory that canines are particularly adept at finding viruses because of a biological predisposition towards identifying and avoiding disease among their ranks. The logic is that a wolf in the wild couldn’t care less about cocaine and explosives, or other things we train dogs to find, but would be naturally interested in the health of their pack.

Some institutions are training their own dogs to detect Covid, such as the Freetown-Lakeville regional school district in Massachusetts, which worked with FIU to turn Labradors Huntah and Duke into school safety inspectors last summer.

Dogs are not yet an FDA-approved diagnostic tool, so if they flag someone as infected, that person still must take a Covid-19 test to confirm it. However, some research indicates that dogs may be more sensitive to the virus than PCR tests, identifying infected individuals even before they have amassed sufficient viral load to register on a test.

Sidney Poitier was a defining figure of distinguished Blackness

At a time when Black actors were forced into submissive or inarticulate roles, the actor showed strength moving through hostile white spaces with dignity

Sidney Poitier in They Call Me Mister Tibbs! 

Photograph: United Artists/Allstar

Todd Boyd
Tue 11 Jan 2022 

Upon the announcement of Hollywood legend Sidney Poitier’s death, I sent out a tweet that featured my favorite photo of him. The photo in question shows a shirtless Poitier, wearing dark sunglasses like Miles Davis on the cover of ’Round About Midnight, playing the saxophone alongside jazz man Sonny Stitt, while standing in the street, surrounded by a community of appreciative onlookers, otherwise known as “the people”. The reason I dig this photo so much is because it offers a more complex image of Poitier than the one that had come to define him at the height of his fame in Hollywood. I have never been able to confirm the context of this photo, but I have always assumed that it was taken while he was preparing for his role as the expatriate horn player in the film Paris Blues. Whatever the circumstances, though, the image itself suggests an authenticity, a certain street credibility that is much more complex than the conveniently integrationist symbolism that his persona has so often been reduced to.

Sidney Poitier’s defiance, grace and style changed me – and shaped my life as an actor
David Harewood

By the late 1960s Sidney Poitier was the biggest box office draw in America. With movies like In the Heat of the Night, To Sir With Love and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, his films had become their own genre. Accomplishing this was no small feat. When Poitier began his career, most movies featuring predominantly Black casts were musicals. Black men who appeared in otherwise all-white films tended to be represented as inarticulate, child-like buffoons; racial clowns who scratched when they didn’t itch and laughed when nothing was funny. Poitier’s rise to the top of the Hollywood mountain changed this. He was often the lone Black person moving through hostile white spaces. His refined, erudite and dignified image was a counter to the coonery and buffoonery that figures like Stepin’ Fetchit, Mantan Moreland, Eddie “Rochester” Anderson, and Willie Best had previously represented. Like so many elite mid-century jazz musicians, Poitier wanted people to see him as an artist, not as a stereotypical entertainer. And in this he succeeded.

When perhaps his most famous character, Virgil Tibbs from In the Heat of the Night, demanded that the racist southern white cops put some respect on his name, “They call me Mister Tibbs!” Poitier was like Muhammad Ali who had demanded the same thing in the ring and in real life. In the film, the character of Endicott took offense to the fact that the “uppity” Tibbs had actually spoken to him as an equal, instead of like the fawning obsequious fool that he expected him to be. So, Endicott slaps Tibbs across the face for getting out of what he perceived to be his place. But quicker than the blink of an eye, Tibbs responded in kind, slapping the taste out of Endicott’s mouth, as it were. The “slap heard round the world” – this legendary cinematic moment when Poitier’s stardom afforded his character the opportunity to retaliate against a white man without fear of retribution – demonstrated that just because he was known for playing these proper gentlemen on screen, he could still handle his business, if need be.

Poitier’s image in film has often been associated with that of Dr Martin Luther King Jr; Poitier won the Academy Award for best actor the same year that King won the Nobel prize. But in this instance, when Tibbs slapped Endicott back, the character that he would most be associated with demonstrated that there were multiple layers to his complex persona. He may have reminded some of MLK, but in the late 60s when the civil rights movement was being challenged by assertions of Black Power, Virgil Tibbs did not turn the other cheek. Here he had more in common with Malcolm X than he did with Dr King, despite what his measured persona may have lead some people to believe.

Seeing In the Heat of the Night as a kid left an indelible imprint on my adult mind. Being a distinguished gentleman did not mean accepting humiliation, literally or figuratively. Demanding that those celluloid racists respect him and showing them that he could maneuver in a variety of ways said to me that being well-rounded and multidimensional, defying categorization, mixing supreme intellect with authenticity was indeed the way to go. This is what Tibbs, Poitier’s larger cinematic persona, and especially that photo of him playing the sax in his shades, surrounded by Blackness, came to stand for.

Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger in In The Heat Of The Night.

 Photograph: United Artists/Allstar

Many years after I initially saw Poitier in this groundbreaking film, I had the distinct pleasure of meeting him. In the late 1990s Poitier was the commencement speaker at the USC School of Cinematic Arts where I have spent the last 30 years of my professional life. Watching him as a kid, the lone Black man navigating labyrinthine white spaces, was comparable to the occupational life I found myself living in the rarified spaces of academia. Exhibiting a gentlemanly manner coexisted alongside an understanding that not everyone agreed that I actually belonged in such an elite space. Like Virgil Tibbs, I could be diplomatic, but as that hilarious malt liquor ad from the 1980s said, “Don’t let the smooth taste fool you.”

Standing on the graduation stage in full academic regalia, as I placed a PhD hood on a newly graduated doctoral candidate, thinking about how the people who created all of this higher education pomp and circumstance most certainly never imagined that a cat like me would be representing in this way, I turned around to see Poitier approaching me, with his hand extended, smiling broadly. His words, “Nice to meet you, Dr” echoed as I shook his hand. As we stood there, I absorbed the magnitude of the moment. He offered multiple compliments and pleasantries, as gracious in life as that of his persona. We shared a knowing laugh. But this was Sidney Poitier, not Virgil Tibbs. He understood what this all meant, and so did I. Things that are understood often need not be articulated.

Sidney Poitier was a giant of American culture. He stands as one of the most important figures in the history of Hollywood, without question. The monumental legacy of Poitier’s style is evident in those that he influenced. Be it the career of contemporary Hollywood royalty Denzel Washington, or that of the nation’s first Black president, Barack Obama. Sidney Poitier, the distinguished gentleman of cinema was groundbreaking, inspirational, cool, complex and authentic as well. The era he represented is long gone, but the foundation he laid is one we’re still building on. Rest in power!


Dr Todd Boyd is the Katherine and Frank Price endowed chair for the study of race and popular culture at the USC School of Cinematic Arts

REST IN POWER

Ronnie Spector, pop singer who fronted the Ronettes, dies aged 78

Influential singer of hits including Be My Baby, who married abusive producer Phil Spector, dies of cancer

Ronnie Spector performing in 2014.

 Photograph: Samir Hussein/Redferns/Getty Images

Ben Beaumont-Thomas

Wed 12 Jan 2022 

Ronnie Spector, the singer who defined the sound of mid-century girl groups as the frontwoman of the Ronettes, has died aged 78.

A statement on her website states:

Our beloved earth angel, Ronnie, peacefully left this world today after a brief battle with cancer. She was with family and in the arms of her husband, Jonathan.

Ronnie lived her life with a twinkle in her eye, a spunky attitude, a wicked sense of humor and a smile on her face. She was filled with love and gratitude.

Her joyful sound, playful nature and magical presence will live on in all who knew, heard or saw her.

The Ronettes with Phil Spector. Photograph: David Magnus/Rex / Shutterstock

With her towering beehive hairdo and powerfully melancholic, melodramatic voice, Spector is among the most distinctive figures in American pop. Her hits with the Ronettes include the vastly influential Be My Baby – whose distinctive drum beat has been recreated countless times – as well as Baby I Love You, Walking in the Rain and a series of enduring Christmas cover songs. She also survived an abusive marriage to the group’s producer, Phil Spector, who was later imprisoned for murder.

Spector was born Veronica Bennett in New York in 1943, her heritage spanning African American, Native American, and Irish American. “When you don’t look like everyone else, you automatically have a problem in school,” she told the Guardian in 2019, saying her peers “would beat me up because I was different-looking”.

She formed the Ronettes in 1957 and the lineup quickly coalesced with her elder sister, Estelle Bennett, and cousin Nedra Talley. The trio earned a residency at a local club and a record deal, but early singles failed to chart. Estelle arranged an audition with Phil Spector, who signed the group, and whose co-written song Be My Baby became their first hit, reaching No 2 in the US in 1963, and No 4 in the UK.

With striking style based on form-fitting dresses and heavy makeup – “We weren’t afraid to be hot. That was our gimmick,” Spector later wrote – and backed by Phil Spector’s “Wall of Sound” production, the group had seven further US chart hits and contributed three songs to the 1963 compilation A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector. They toured the US in 1966 as a support act to the Beatles; the Rolling Stones supported them on a Ronettes tour of the UK. “They could sing all their way right through a wall of sound,” Keith Richards later said, as the Ronettes were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007. “They didn’t need anything. They touched my heart right there and then and they touch it still.”


Ronnie Spector: ‘I love #MeToo and Time’s Up – because men’s time is up’

The Ronettes split in 1967, Ronnie started a solo career, beginning with the George Harrison-penned single Try Some, Buy Some in 1971. She didn’t reach the chart highs of her previous group and an attempt to reform the Ronettes with new members failed in the early 1970s, but she continued to release music throughout her life.

In 1976 she duetted with Southside Johnny on the Bruce Springsteen-penned duet You Mean So Much to Me. “It was an honour to produce her and encourage her to get back on stage where she remained for the next 45 years,” said Steve Van Zandt of the E Street Band, who produced the song, paying tribute in the wake of her death.

She returned to the US top five in 1986 as a guest singer on Eddie Money’s Be My Baby-interpolating song Take Me Home Tonight. In 1999, she collaborated with the Ramones frontman Joey Ramone, who produced her EP She Talks to Rainbows. Her most recent album was English Heart, in 2016.

Her romantic relationship with Phil Spector began in 1963 as an affair while Phil was married. He divorced his wife in 1965 and married Ronnie in 1968, becoming controlling, paranoid and abusive during their relationship. Notorious behaviour included making Ronnie drive with a life-size dummy of Phil alongside her; he kept her imprisoned in their house and threatened her with murder. She eventually escaped in 1972, fleeing in bare feet as Phil refused to let her own shoes.

She spent 15 years battling Phil with her bandmates for royalties they were owed, eventually successfully – in 2000 a New York court ruled that Phil owed them $2.6m. This decision was reversed in 2002 after judges found that the record deal the group initially signed meant that Phil Spector had rights to the recordings, but in 2006 the New York state supreme court awarded the group a lump sum, and ordered Phil to continue paying them yearly royalties. There were further legal complaints later that decade, with Phil accused of withholding royalty payments.

In 1982, Ronnie married her manager Jonathan Greenfield, with their marriage lasting until her death. She is survived by him and their two sons, Jason and Austin.

How we made the Ronettes' Be My Baby

The Beach Boys leader Brian Wilson was among those paying tribute, saying: “I loved her voice so much and she was a very special person and a dear friend. This just breaks my heart. Ronnie’s music and spirit will live forever.”

Anti-vaxxers are touting another new Covid ‘cure’ – drinking urine. But they are not the only obstacles to ending the pandemic

Those spreading misinformation are doing real damage. 

But big pharma and rich countries need to stop hoarding vaccines

Dangerous falsehoods are undermining trust in the Covid-19 vaccine. 

Photograph: Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times/Rex/Shutterstock

Tue 11 Jan 2022 

Arwa Mahdawi

I am starting to think that common sense really is not that common after all – we live in exceedingly stupid times. Exhibit 874: US anti-vaxxers are now urging people to drink their own urine to fight coronavirus. Over the weekend, Christopher Key, the leader of an anti-Covid-19 vaccine group called the “Vaccine Police”, posted videos online extolling the health benefits of what he described as “urine therapy”. According to the wizard of wee, there is “tons and tons of research … [and] peer-reviewed published papers on urine”; so if you do your own pee-search you will discover it is God’s own antidote to Covid-19. “This vaccine is the worst bioweapon I have ever seen,” Key said. “I drink my own urine!”

That is not the only questionable thing he does. Key was recently arrested for refusing to wear a mask and filming proceedings during a court hearing. The reason he was in court? He was arrested in April for refusing to wear a mask at a Whole Foods store. In August he made headlines for suggesting that pharmacists should be executed for administering coronavirus vaccines; in December he also set off on a road trip across the US with a fake badge and firearms, in a mission to arrest a Democratic governor over vaccine mandates. Very busy man, our Mr Key! I cannot help thinking that if his name was Mohammed his shenanigans would have had him locked up in Guantánamo Bay by now.

Key’s “urine therapy” is far from the only experimental – and highly dubious – Covid “cure” to be promoted during the pandemic. We all remember the former US president’s comments on the benefits of injecting bleach. Last year saw a prolonged bout of Ivermectin-mania. Now, along with urine, the right seems to be fixated on Viagra and colloidal silver. Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, who has repeatedly questioned the efficacy and safety of Covid vaccines, recently dedicated a portion of his show to hyping the potential of Viagra as a potential cure. Carlson seized on the story of a British nurse reportedly recovering from a Covid-19 coma, after being given a dose of Viagra, to sing the little blue pill’s praises. “Is there anything [Viagra] doesn’t cure?” Carlson joked. Yes, I am afraid it does not appear to cure stupidity.

Speaking of which, the conservative media personality Candace Owens recently told her social media followers that she takes a “teaspoon a day” of colloidal silver, a product that has also been touted as a Covid cure by the likes of Infowars founder Alex Jones. I am sure I do not need to tell you this but there is zero evidence that colloidal silver can help with Covid. On the contrary, taking too much can turn your skin blue permanently and, in rare cases, can even kill you. (I can never resist an opportunity to big-up my hero Wilkie Collins, so I urge you to read his underrated novel Poor Miss Finch, about a blind woman who falls in love with identical twins, one of whom turns blue after trying to cure his epilepsy with silver. The novel won’t cure Covid but it may provide temporary reprieve from existential ennui.)

The amount of misinformation about Covid cures is highly depressing, and it is important that we hold to account the people spreading dangerous falsehoods, and undermining trust in the vaccine. Still, let us be clear: the biggest obstacle towards ending this pandemic is not kooks such as Key and Owens. The obstacle is the rich countries that have been hoarding vaccines, and the likes of Pfizer and Moderna, who have been slow to license their vaccine technology (developed with taxpayer money) to poor countries. The fact that big pharma is making billions from a public health crisis is unconscionable. I am very pro-vaccine but I am running out of enthusiasm for boosters. The idea of potentially having to get a fourth shot soon, while so much of the world still cannot access a first dose, makes me sick. If only we had a vaccine for greed.


Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist