Month: October 2022

If there ever was a time to vocalize grievances toward Kanye West, now would be ideal, given that he has been suspended from Twitter and Instagram. Producer and longtime Ye collaborator Mike Dean appears to have done just that today (October 9) via Twitter.

Today. Dean posted a cryptic tweet, reading “Posting DM and texts from folks is the single most thirsty [thing] a person can do.”

Dean seems to be referring to the several Instagram posts Ye has shared over the course of the past week containing alleged screenshots of conversations between Diddy and Supreme creative director Tremaine Emory. Such conversations, including ones in which he allegedly made anti-semitic references to Diddy, are thought to have led to his suspension from Instagram.

Ye has been a controversial figure for years, especially with his outspoken support of Donald Trump, as well as the threats he’s made to comedian and actor Pete Davidson. But Dean continued to collaborate with Ye during those times.

In an interview with Variety last year, Dean said that while he enjoys working with Ye, the Donda sessions were rather chaotic, especially given the fact that he mixed 35 songs over the course of 10 days.

“We are like yin and yang,” Dean said of his relationship with Ye. “We are real opposite personality-wise, and have entirely different skill sets.”

It appears now that Dean may now use those personality differences as reasons to no longer collaborate with Ye.

If there ever was a time to vocalize grievances toward Kanye West, now would be ideal, given that he has been suspended from Twitter and Instagram. Producer and longtime Ye collaborator Mike Dean appears to have done just that today (October 9) via Twitter.

Today. Dean posted a cryptic tweet, reading “Posting DM and texts from folks is the single most thirsty [thing] a person can do.”

Dean seems to be referring to the several Instagram posts Ye has shared over the course of the past week containing alleged screenshots of conversations between Diddy and Supreme creative director Tremaine Emory. Such conversations, including ones in which he allegedly made anti-semitic references to Diddy, are thought to have led to his suspension from Instagram.

Ye has been a controversial figure for years, especially with his outspoken support of Donald Trump, as well as the threats he’s made to comedian and actor Pete Davidson. But Dean continued to collaborate with Ye during those times.

In an interview with Variety last year, Dean said that while he enjoys working with Ye, the Donda sessions were rather chaotic, especially given the fact that he mixed 35 songs over the course of 10 days.

“We are like yin and yang,” Dean said of his relationship with Ye. “We are real opposite personality-wise, and have entirely different skill sets.”

It appears now that Dean may now use those personality differences as reasons to no longer collaborate with Ye.

(SPOILERS for this week’s Atlanta will be found below.)

Last week’s episode of Atlanta focused mainly on Earn for what turned out to be a wacky Sunday with his family. Series frequents like Earn’s baby mother Vanessa and his close friend Darius were absent from the episode, while Paper Boi arrived in the second half as he got dragged into Earn’s series of unfortunate events.

In this week’s episode, titled Work Ethic!, the spotlight is on Vanessa who viewers follow as she spends and day with her and Earn’s daughter Lodi. Van brought her daughter on set to be with her as she was set to appear in a television show. The day turns for the worst when Lodi interrupts the set and an unseen producer takes a liking to Lodi’s youthfulness. As a result, Lodi is added to a number of shows being filmed on-site, but it proves to be too overwhelming for Van who is forced to put an end to it by the conclusion of the episode.

Here are some of the biggest takeaways that we have after season four’s fifth episode.

One Time For The Good Children Of The World

Lodi is a great kid. We see several examples to support that in Work Ethic! She doesn’t fuss when her mom doesn’t have snacks for her during their time on the TV site. She adorably defends her mom when Van’s character is disrespected in a scene from the show. Lodi is also well-behaved as Van gets her hair and makeup done in a trailer. Van and Lodi’s day on set was going to be a long one, and Lodi’s good behavior through it all made it a lot easier. To Van’s surprise, Lodi really enjoyed acting and interacting with the other actors. With all that being said, one time for the good children of the world like Lodi who make their parents’ days a bit easier.

They’re Always Watching

You can’t help but feel there’s some government-esque theme to the Work Ethic! episode. The tv production studio that Van and Lodi are at is run by a man named Mr. Chocolate whom the cast and crew of the shows have never seen in person. They’ve only heard his voice which blares from various speakers as he delivers instructions for scenes as he sits in his office watching everything go down thanks to a complex surveillance system set up to monitor the entire tv production studio. It certainly has a Big Brother feel to it, and when it comes to the world of Atlanta, there’s no doubt that they’re always watching. As for the real world, well, there are probably fewer differences than there are similarities.

Mother’s Intuition Is A Real Thing

From the very beginning, Van knew something was off with Mr. Chocolate’s appreciation — or rather — infatuation with Lodi. She sits Lodi down and makes it clear that she will take her home the second she doesn’t want to be on set anymore. Unlike Van, Lodi is having a blast on set but that doesn’t make Van any less worried. Things only get worse when Van, and no one else on set, can track down Lodi as she moves around the tv production studio as Mr. Chocolate, the unseen man, is the only one who knows of her whereabouts. Push comes to shove, and Van breaks into Mr. Chocolate’s headquarters to confront him and she eventually reconnects with Lodi. It’s clear that something weird is going on with Mr. Chocolate and his company, especially as he admits to owning the police, and Van lets her intuition drive her to find Lodi and get her away from Mr. Chocolate as quickly as possible.

Control And Consent Are Key

Control and consent being key are the main themes of the Work Ethic! episode. Mr. Chocolate wants and has control of every and anyone that works at the tv production studio. He doesn’t really ask for his cast and crew’s consent to have them do certain things, it’s his world and he decides what does and doesn’t happen in it. On the flip side, Van wants Lodi to have true control of her possible acting career, along with Van herself being able to control how much and when her daughter is used for filming episodes. With this, also comes Van’s hope that Lodi can at least be of age before consenting to everything that comes with an acting career. Van is raising her daughter to know that control and consent and two important things to have and be aware of in this world, something that Lodi will surely appreciate when she grows up.

FX’s ‘Atlanta’ airs on Thursdays at 10:00pm EST.

The Chicago Bears passing game has not exactly been humming this season. There are problems all over the place — second-year quarterback Justin Fields has really struggled to consistently show off the natural talent he possesses, the offensive line hasn’t done him any favors, the pass catchers struggle to consistently get open or make plays, and the play calling has left plenty to be desired.

There are, however, moments when things click and you can see some of the talent within this passing game. One such moment came on Sunday afternoon against the Minnesota Vikings, when Fields dropped back and tried to take the top off of the defense. His target was Darnell Mooney, who didn’t have any choice but to try and make a highlight grab. Despite having a defensive back draped all over him, Mooney was able to do a pretty admirable Odell Beckham Jr. impression by jumping, throwing one arm into the air, and reeling the ball in.

This is actually pretty well-defended by Chandon Sullivan of the Vikings, Mooney just went up and made an absolutely fantastic play. Three plays later, the Bears would go on to score their first touchdown of the game thanks to a run up the middle by David Montgomery.

Rick Ross has dabbled in the food game with his recent Wingstop franchise purchase, as well as the launch of his Rozay Cheddar flavored Rap Snacks chips. During a conversation with DJ Khaled for GQ Hype Debate, Ross revealed that he believes his chips are “the greatest snack of all time.” Khaled said that his personal favorite is Cinnamon Toast Crunch with almond milk.

Ross then admitted that he actually has not tried almond milk before, and onIy recently tried 2% milk.

“I’m still not up on the almond milk,” Ross told Khaled. “Rozay still frightened. And this the question: is it from the almond of the walnut? Is they squeezing it out of the peanut?”

Khaled responded, saying, “I don’t have that answer and I usually have every answer.”

Toward the end of the video, Khaled expressed that he would like for his image to be on a box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch one day, in the same way Ross has had his image on his own bag of Rap Snacks. Khaled also manages to get Ross to try Cinnamon Toast Crunch and almond milk.

You can check out the full debate and see Ross’ reaction to trying almond milk above.

A well-executed fake punt is a beautiful, beautiful thing. A poorly executed fake punt is also a beautiful, beautiful thing, with the main difference being that a poorly executed fake punt is a disaster.

Here is an example of that. The Seattle Seahawks have one of the best punters in the league in Michael Dickson, who is capable of sending a football to the moon when he connects on one. On Sunday afternoon, Dickson went onto the field for a punt on fourth-and-9 from Seattle’s 21 during a road game against the New Orleans Saints.

Instead of booting it, though, Dickson tucked it and looked like he thought about running. The problem was that Carl Granderson of the Saints was right there, so Dickson got leveled and the New Orleans offense got the ball at the Seattle 14.

Now, our hunch is that this was not an explicit fake punt — one thing you’ll see is that punters are coached to read what the other team is doing and make a decision to boot it or tuck it and run. Maybe we’ll hear what happened after the game, but it sure seems like Dickson thought he had a convoy of blockers ahead of him and that he could pick up the first with his legs. Or maybe it was just a brain fart that let the Saints score two plays later.

It might be a while before we hear from Kanye West. As of this morning (October 9), Ye has reportedly been suspended from Twitter. The suspension comes just shortly after Ye made a series of posts that were deemed anti-semitic by Jewish groups.

“I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I’m going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE,” read one of the rapper’s last few tweets. “The funny thing is I actually can’t be Anti Semitic because black people are actually Jew also You guys have toyed with me and tried to black ball anyone whoever opposes your agenda.”

The tweet was later removed from his Twitter page, and replaced with a message that read “This tweet violated the Twitter Rules.”

Earlier in the week, Ye had been banned from Instagram after sharing screenshots of an alleged text conversation with Diddy which also contained remarks considered anti-semitic.

A representative from Twitter wrote to BuzzFeed News, saying, “The account in question has been locked due to a violation of Twitter’s policies.”

At the time of writing, Ye has not yet used any other platform to reach fans. It is currently unknown how long Ye’s suspension from Twitter is expected to last.

The Buffalo Bills entered Sunday afternoon’s home game against the Pittsburgh Steelers as 14-point favorites. It is not a huge surprise — the Bills might be the best team in the NFL while the Steelers are giving rookie signal caller Kenny Pickett his first career start — but it’s still something to see a team favored by two touchdowns against almost anyone, let along Pittsburgh.

Anyway, Buffalo apparently thought it would be fun to help the Steelers out a little bit on the opening kickoff, as it was muffed and only brought out to the Bills’ 2-yard line. After an incomplete pass on first down and a run for no gain on second, things looked good for Pittsburgh’s defense and then oh god a 98-yard pitch-and-catch for a touchdown.

Davis didn’t even run any sort of special route here, he just managed to get behind the entire Steeler defense, and of course, it’s rare that Josh Allen will miss on this sort of throw when he has time to stand in the pocket and go deep. While it is early in the day, we are going to go out on a limb and say it’s going to be very difficult for anyone to have a longer touchdown than this on Sunday.

Which of Donald Trump’s many current scandals may actually destroy him? Will it be the shocking findings of the Jan. 6 committee? His absconding with highly classified documents? Spewing racist nonsense? Or will it be the lawsuit filed against his company and some of his children by the New York State Attorney General’s office? According to one of his former cronies, it’s the latter he should really be worried about.

Michael Cohen, the former president’s longtime lawyer and fixer — who is none-too-pleased that he did jail time for him — spoke with Salon about his new book, Revenge: How Donald Trump Weaponized the US Department of Justice Against His Critics. Cohen was asked if he imagines his old boss will ever be charged with a crime, maybe even forced to do an old-fashioned perp walk.

“I do,” was Cohen’s blunt, optimistic reply. “Right now, that case will financially destroy him.”

It’s already known that, should the lawsuit prove successful, Trump and his family will be barred from doing business in New York, which means he may have to sell some of the only things that actually comprise his wealth: his beloved New York City skyscrapers. But Cohen pointed out that New York AG Letitia James may demand a higher penalty than people realize.

“Now, a lot of people make the mistake and they say that she’s seeking $250 million,” Cohen told Salon. “That’s not accurate. What she said was, “There is a baseline of $250 million.” That’s because they don’t have the full amount. They just don’t.”

Since James’ lawsuit is a civil case, it won’t end with Trump in jail. However, Cohen points out, she’s already referred her findings to the Department of Justice. While Cohen’s says he’s “not thrilled” with current DoJ head Merrick Garland — he’s “operating so slowly, the exact opposite of Bill Barr,” he adds — she’s also referred it to the IRS.

“And Donald Trump has committed tax evasion, bank fraud, wire fraud, misrepresentation,” Cohen says. “He will not be able to get past that, and that is criminal.”

But at least he still has his supporters, even if these days they might be too terrified to show up at the Capitol.

(Via Salon)

Following his ban from TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram, internet personality Andrew Tate made an appearance on Piers Morgan Uncensored this past week.

He revealed that he specifically chose Morgan to interview him, as the host has also had his share of controversies over the years.

“You’ve certainly been the subject of your own divided opinions in the world,” Tate said. “There are people who’d say some of the things you say are dangerous or toxic, so I thought you’d be a good person to speak to about this.”

During his interview, he doubled down on his takes on what he describes as “traditional masculinity” and decried being labeled as a bad influence. He slammed rapper and pop artist Lil Nas X in the process.

“You have Lil Nas X twerking on the devil in music videos which our children are digesting,” Tate said referring to the music video for “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”, “you have drill artists rapping about stabbing people to death in the middle of a knife crime epidemic. You have all these insanities in the world…but I’m not the devil. There are certainly worse people than me.”

Lil Nas X caught wind of the comments, and shut Tate in a tweet, saying, “andrew tate please stop mentioning me! i am never gonna let u smash loser!”

Lil Nas X is set to perform his new song, “Star Walkin’” at the League Of Legends Worlds 22 Finals on November 5 at Chase Center in San Francisco.