Miley Cyrus seems to be the latest victim of a celebrity death hoax that is making the Internet lose its mind.
The 22 year old singer’s fake death was the subject of a viral Internet post by a fake news website called Action News 3.
The site (which we won’t link to) is not an actual news organization and seems to be run by a shell company in Arizona that also runs other shady website including the now defunct mugshotsworld.com.
Read More: No Internet, Casey Anthony Is Not Dead
The site sure made it sound convincing though:
“Miley Cyrus’ lifeless body was found by her entourage in a bathtub at her Hollywood home on Wednesday, authorities revealed. Los Angeles investigators are trying to determine the cause of death,” the fake news site claimed. “Officials refused to comment on reports that the famed actress/singer drowned from a prescription pill overdose. They have, however, made it clear that there were no signs of foul play.”
The site used fake quotes from a LA police officer and even gave a very specific time of death- 2:17 PM PST. (Do you really think you wouldn’t have heard of Miley’s death by now if it were true?)
Cover Photo Credit: Screenshot
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How Strong Female Relationships In Pop Culture Make Real Positive Differences For Young Women
I met my best friend when I was fourteen.
Of course, she wasn’t my first best friend.
She’s not even my only one now.
Since I was little, I’ve surrounded myself with girls that push me in every possible way.
However, it wasn’t until recently that I really started to appreciate those relationships.
The lack of strong female relationships in pop culture is sort of like your heartbeat.
You spend years not noticing it.
But when you do, you can’t stop noticing it.
Even as I started to write this piece, I was shocked by how many of my favorite female characters don’t have a single strong relationship with another girl – at least not one the audience gets to see.
The moment I started to notice my heartbeat, I was still really young.
When I was 8, my favorite TV show was Wizards of Waverly Place.
For any of you who’ve ever watched it, you know that the relationship between Harper and Alex is incredibly strong and incredibly complex.
That was a friendship that changed my life.
I could see me and my friends, finally represented on screen, and it felt amazing.
Not only that, but I wanted to work to improve the friendships I had with other girls.
Nowadays, I hardly ever consume any pop culture that doesn’t have a strong female relationship at its forefront.
The best part is, they’re all different.
My favorite show is New Girl, where the relationship between Jess and Cece is both one of the show’s most subtle, while also being its very bedrock.
My favorite artist is Taylor Swift, someone who became widely known for the strong female relationships she developed.
Teen Wolf is unabashedly one of my favorite shows on TV, and its highlight of female friendships changed the way I think about them.
Photo Credit: rawpixel.com/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
This is a show that finds a way to put female relationships at its forefront, despite being centered around males.
The friendships between Allison, Lydia, Malia, and Kira, in all their different combinations, display an incredibly wide variety of relationships.
Some of them have dated the same boy, some of them have tried to kill each other, and some of them have every petty reason to hate each other, but they don’t.
This show has decided that its female friendships are more important than any love triangle, even though those do exist.
The show doesn’t pretend those obstacles don’t exist, they just demonstrate that the relationships formed among girls are way stronger than anything they could face.
They have found a way to put complex, varied, and oftentimes confusing female relationships on display, something I see in very few corners of the pop culture world.
I’m not the only one who’s felt the effects of seeing strong female relationships on TV.
I asked a few of my own strong female friends to talk to me about when they’ve seen their life changed by viewing those types of friendships in pop culture, and here’s what they said:
“Ann and Leslie [of Parks and Recreation] taught me that women should strive to build each other up, and that nothing is stronger than a female friendship built on pure love, loyalty, and trust. Female friendships don’t have to be filled with drama, and the best ones consider a five hour phone call about anything and everything equally as important as huge celebrations and milestones.” – Maggie
“Cristina Yang and Meredith Gray from Gray’s Anatomy depict what not only is a wonderful friendship, but a support system for one another. The fictional characters from the show have inspired me to not only be in my friends’ lives during the good times but to be there for support during the hard times.” – Sreelekha
More and more female friendships being represented is crucial, but the way they’re portrayed is also really important.
And while we like to think all female relationships in pop culture are great examples of representation, some miss the mark.
Here’s the biggest issue with the way pop culture sometimes displays female relationships – they exist only in a two-dimensional world.
An example of this comes from an often-raved about female friendship that just premiered this winter – Betty and Veronica on The CW’s Riverdale.
Now, I watch and love Riverdale, and I think there’s a lot of potential for the relationships to develop in new and interesting ways, but the way Betty and Veronica’s relationship exists now is very two-dimensional.
Disregarding the discussion of queerbaiting, and any sexual tension fans have picked up on, Betty and Veronica have the quintessential Strong Female Relationship.
Sure, they’ve both had feelings for the same guy, but that doesn’t matter!
They’re Strong Female Friends, and all they do is lift each other up.
The reason this comes across as a little unrealistic is because it is.
Look, I love my best friend with my everything I have.
I really would die for her, but sometimes I want to be the one doing the killing.
We’ve fought – a lot – and we have fought about boys!
The reason I consider our friendship one of the strongest in my life isn’t the fact that we’ve had jealous, petty moments – it’s the fact that we were able to move on.
Female relationships are just like any other relationship in life – they’re complicated.
The right way to portray a strong female relationship isn’t by following the rule book about what you think that should be.
It’s about embracing the different ways girls interact, the different ways they form bonds, and the different types of relationships that rise from those bonds.
One show that’s done this perfectly is HBO’s Big Little Lies.
Much of the miniseries is based on petty fighting between these women, but the end result (no spoilers here) is all the more satisfying because of that.
The show portrays female relationships exactly as they are – complex, frustrating, petty, and most of all, different.
All five of the main characters have extraordinarily different personalities, and the show doesn’t pretend those don’t exist.
In fact, every episode up until the finale points in a certain direction that is the destruction of those bonds.
However, the final episode clearly puts on display the way relationships between women are stronger than anything else in this life, even if their personalities don’t exactly mesh.
Despite all of this, all strong female friendships are good, just like all strong female characters are good.
The reality is, when a girl sees two other girls being friends, whether on TV, in a movie, in a book, or in real life, she’s inspired to develop those same sorts of ties with her friends.
And the effects of that are really, really good – like, scientifically proven good.
A UCLA study from 2002 suggests that women respond to stress with a cascade of brain chemicals that cause us to make and maintain friendships with other women.
Hanging out with our friends can actually counteract the kind of stomach-quivering stress most of us experience on a daily basis.
Relationships among women aren’t only good for the women themselves, they’re a necessary foundation to our entire society.
When women build each other up, instead of tear each other down, everyone wins.
And as women work to unlearn the decades of media that taught them girls should always fight over boys, the representation of female friendships in pop culture will be more important than ever.
My list of strong female relationships in pop culture to check out, not already mentioned:
Rachel, Phoebe, and Monica: FRIENDS
Blair and Serena: Gossip Girl
Cher & friends: Clueless
Hailee Steinfeld’s music
The Clone Club: Orphan Black
Ginny and Luna: Harry Potter series
Sansa Stark and Margaery Tyrell: Game of Thrones
Selena Gomez’s “Me & My Girls”RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: rawpixel.com/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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House Republicans Nominate Paul Ryan As Next Speaker, Expected To Take Office Thursday
House Republicans overwhelmingly voted for Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) to be the party’s nominee to be the next Speaker of the House in a vote Wednesday afternoon.
Ryan made quick work of his only active opponent for the job- Rep. Daniel Webster (R-FL) and is expected to face a full house vote tomorrow before taking office. (Ryan is expected to easily win the full house vote, considering his party has a solid majority.)
According to the Huffington Post, the final vote count among Republicans was 200 votes for Ryan, 43 votes for Webster, 1 vote for Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN.) and 1 vote for Kevin McCarthy (R-CA).
If he is elected tomorrow, Ryan will be the youngest Speaker of the House since the Civil War.
Cover Photo Credit: Tony Alter/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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Tila Tequila Is A Desperate Little Nazi
Another day, another desperate celebrity trying to bring attention to themselves and revive their 15 minutes of fame.
Tila Tequila, who became famous back when MySpace was still a thing and we had a Bush in office, has upped the crazy meter on her antics to DEFCON One.
Read More: Tila Tequila Is Apparently A Nazi Now
In case you have either stopped listening to the news altogether since the November 8th Presidential Election, or you choose to ignore the growing white nationalist pride and racist rhetoric being spewed in this country, Ms. Tequila has decided that she wants to throw her hat in the race for craziest racist and modern day Nazi sympathizer.
Here is my problem with Tila Tequila.
She is a Vietnamese American sexually fluid woman who is named after a Mexican liquor who would have been exactly what Hitler would have tried to rid during his time in power.
She is everything white Nationalists want to get rid of. As much as she provides an outlet to spread the racist and vitriolic message that is promoted by the Nation Policy Institute, it also makes for strange bedfellows.
In an article in 2013 from Tablet Mag, they chronicle her journey from Jewish convert to her path to posing as “sexy Hitler” and openly and honestly explaining why she sympathizes with the man who proudly brought upon the deaths of over 12 million people who were deemed a problem and were not part of his perfect race.
Tila Tequila is not a credible person.
Having been a fan of Tila Tequila’s scandalous bi-sexual dating show “A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila” I can’t quite fathom how she went from being someone who was representing the LGBT community to turning around and supporting an ideology that wants to see the end of those who brought her credibility.
Her brand is extremely tarnished and now she will continue to spew whatever comes out of her very fragile, damaged brain in an attempt to bring further relevance to herself, without thinking about the long term repercussions.
Unfortunately in 2016, it is no longer about your message having meaning, it is only about the message you are putting out.
While Tila Tequila has had a rough go of her life since she hit peak fame during the course of her show, she does not have much to show for herself since. Her failed relationship and then death of her girlfriend Casey Johnson, her very public and nasty abuse lawsuit against former NFL football player Shawn Merriman, her attempted suicide and subsequent rehab stint, her numerous outlandish and offensive remarks about the Jewish people all paint the picture of a woman who is not mentally stable.
As a Jewish-American, I am of course baffled by the idea that white nationalist pride and the growing Nazi sentiment are becoming prevalent in 2016, but I am also baffled at people who are part of the “minority” lying in bed with the people who view them as lesser human beings.
Even though I am still a white male in today’s society, I also understand the struggles of those who are not as privileged as I am because of the horrific history of my ancestors, those who had to suffer so future Jewish individuals could live a better life than they did.
The growing anti-Semitism and white Nationalist pride and assault on free speech by those on the extreme right are damaging the reputation of this country, and the true reason for the founding of the original colonies here in North America.
Our settlers were looking to escape persecution and no longer live in fear because of their beliefs.
Now we have celebrities like Tila Tequila (and using the phrase celebrity is being extremely generous) being used by the very individuals who they support, especially if what is being supported is not well received or downright inhumane.
Read More: Watch A Young Barack Obama Rise In The New Trailer For Netflix Movie
America was, has been and will always be great, so if anything, we need to make America respectful again.
We need to make America tolerant again. We need to stop breeding hate and we need to be willing to turn away notions of racism, of sexism, of misogyny, of anti-Semitism, of xenophobia, fear of anything that is not homogenous with the dominant white patriarchy that has run this country for 240 years.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.
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