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This Texas mayor is 'more fearful' of white guys than refugees. His reason is pretty simple.

Mayor Mike Rawlings and Sen. Sherrod Brown are onto something.

This is Mike Rawlings, the mayor of Dallas, Texas.

Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images.

And if there's one thing Rawlings is certainly not afraid of, it's Syrian refugees.

In an interview with MSNBC on Nov. 21, 2015, Rawlings voiced concerns about how we're responding to the terror attacks earlier this month in Paris — namely, that some leaders are reacting in-line with how extremists want them to.

"ISIS wants us to be divided on this issue," he said, later noting that "ISIS is no more Islamic than the Nazi senior staff was Christian."

"ISIS wants us to demonize these Syrian refugees," he said.

In indirect fashion, Rawlings was referring to the several presidential candidates and governors (including his own state's) who've come out in support of a ban on Syrian refugees in the wake of the attacks.

But then, Rawlings said something truly ... well, out of the box.


Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images.

When asked if he had any safety concerns about allowing refugees to enter the country, he got candid:

"There is never a 100% guarantee [of keeping terrorists out], and safety is my #1 concern, as it is [Texas] Governor Abbott's. We've got to make sure [those entering the country] are safe. This is a 21-step process to get in. 18 to 24 months to jump through these hoops. This is a serious issue. I am more fearful of large gatherings of white men that come into schools [and] theaters and shoot people up, but we don't isolate young, white men on this issue." (Emphasis added.)

Yeah ... it's that last part that's really got the Internet abuzz.

And yeah. Rawlings actually ... he made a really great point.

Hear me out. I'm not saying anyone should fear all white guys (#NotAllWhiteGuys), and I certainly don't think the mayor is, either. But Rawlings is simply alluding to the fact that in the U.S., you actually are more likely to become the victim of a white male terrorist than an Islamic jihadist, statistically speaking.

Since 9/11, 48 people have died from radical right wing terrorist attacks while 26 have died from jihadists.

Throughout the past 14 years, nearly twice as many people in the U.S. have died at the hands of white supremacists or extreme anti-government terrorists (such as Dylann Roof, who murdered nine people at a black church in Charleston, South Carolina, this past summer) than at the hands of jihadists (like the terrorists who bombed the Boston Marathon in 2013, killing four), according to a study released in June by the New America Foundation.

Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio hinted at that same statistic during a recent interview with NPR, according to CNN.

"I mean, since the beginning of the Bush administration when we were attacked, September 11th, we've not had any major terrorist attacks in this country. We've had individual crazy people ... they look more like me than they look like Middle Easterners — they are generally white males — who have shot up people in movie theaters and schools. Those are terrorist attacks, they're just different kinds of terrorists." (Emphasis added.)

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images.

In total, 48 people in the U.S. have died from radical right wing terrorists since 9/11 while 26 have died from jihadists. Although those facts may make some people uncomfortable, they certainly don't lie.

With his statement, Rawlings wasn't trying to imply white people are scary.

But white supremacists and extremists are just as much of a threat, if not more so. And yet, we do nothing to prevent all white men from accessing guns or even prevent white men with a history of extremism from accessing guns and weaponry. Rawlings was pointing out how ridiculous it is to fear (and ban) Muslims and Muslim refugees based on the harmful and false premise that many of them are extremists attempting to infiltrate the U.S. through our refugee resettlement program.

The good news is, there's no shortage of mayors from across the country who, like Rawlings, are committed to helping Syrian refugees.

Rawlings is one of 18 U.S. mayors, all part of the Cities United for Immigration Action initiative, who penned an open letter to President Obama, applauding his efforts to accept Syrian refugees and noting their cities will certainly accept more.

Mayors from cities like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Baltimore agree: Refugees aren't violent, and we should be doing more to help them.

Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images.

"It sends a horrible message to the world," New York's Bill de Blasio said of some governors' refusing to take refugees, according to CNN.

"It means we're turning our backs on the people who are the victims of terrorism. We're not going to turn our backs on children and families. It's not the American way. It's certainly not the New York City way."

In may have taken Rawlings making a bold statement to point out a surprising reality, but I'm glad he did.

After all, facts should be the guiding light of our policymaking. Not fear.

“This is a big issue, and we as a nation must step up and make sure we're secure," Rawlings told MSNBC. "But we must not do things that change the soul of who we are as well."

Education

Why didn't people smile in old photographs? It wasn't just about the long exposure times.

People blame these serious expressions on how long they had to sit for a photo, but that's not the whole picture.

Public domain images

Photos from the 1800s were so serious.

If you've ever perused photographs from the 19th and early 20th century, you've likely noticed how serious everyone looked. If there's a hint of a smile at all, it's oh-so-slight, but more often than not, our ancestors looked like they were sitting for a sepia-toned mug shot or being held for ransom or something. Why didn't people smile in photographs? Was life just so hard back then that nobody smiled? Were dour, sour expressions just the norm?

Most often, people's serious faces in old photographs are blamed on the long exposure time of early cameras, and that's true. Taking a photo was not an instant event like it is now; people had to sit still for many minutes in the 1800s to have their photo taken.

Ever try holding a smile for only one full minute? It's surprisingly difficult and very quickly becomes unnatural. A smile is a quick reaction, not a constant state of expression. Even people we think of as "smiley" aren't toting around full-toothed smiles for minutes on end. When you had to be still for several minutes to get your photo taken, there was just no way you were going to hold a smile for that long.

But there are other reasons besides long exposure times that people didn't smile in early photographs.

1800s photographsWhy so serious? Public domain

The non-smiling precedent had already been set by centuries of painted portraits

The long exposure times for early photos may have contributed to serious facial expressions, but so did the painted portraits that came before them. Look at all of the portraits of famous people throughout history prior to cameras. Sitting to be painted took hours, so smiling was out of the question. Other than the smallest of lip curls like the Mona Lisa, people didn't smile for painted portraits, so why would people suddenly think it normal to flash their pearly whites (which were not at all pearly white back then) for a photographed one? It simply wasn't how it was done.

A smirk? Sometimes. A full-on smile? Practically never.

"Mona Lisa" by Leonardo da Vinci, painted in 1503Public domain

Smiling usually indicated that you were a fool or a drunkard

Our perceptions of smiling have changed dramatically since the 1800s. In explaining why smiling was considered taboo in portraits and early photos, art historian Nicholas Jeeves wrote in Public Domain Review:

"Smiling also has a large number of discrete cultural and historical significances, few of them in line with our modern perceptions of it being a physical signal of warmth, enjoyment, or indeed of happiness. By the 17th century in Europe it was a well-established fact that the only people who smiled broadly, in life and in art, were the poor, the lewd, the drunk, the innocent, and the entertainment […] Showing the teeth was for the upper classes a more-or-less formal breach of etiquette."

"Malle Babbe" by Frans Hals, sometime between 1640 and 1646Public domain

In other words, to the Western sensibility, smiling was seen as undignified. If a painter did put a smile on the subject of a portrait, it was a notable departure from the norm, a deliberate stylistic choice that conveyed something about the artist or the subject.

Even the artists who attempted it had less-than-ideal results. It turns out that smiling is such a lively, fleeting expression that the artistically static nature of painted portraits didn't lend itself well to showcasing it. Paintings that did have subjects smiling made them look weird or disturbing or drunk. Simply put, painting a genuine, natural smile didn't work well in portraits of old.

As a result, the perception that smiling was an indication of lewdness or impropriety stuck for quite a while, even after Kodak created snapshot cameras that didn't have the long exposure time problem. Even happy occasions had people nary a hint of joy in the photographs that documented them.

wedding party photoEven wedding party photos didn't appear to be joyful occasions.Wikimedia Commons

Then along came movies, which may have changed the whole picture

So how did we end up coming around to grinning ear to ear for photos? Interestingly enough, it may have been the advent of motion pictures that pushed us towards smiling being the norm.

Photos could have captured people's natural smiles earlier—we had the technology for taking instant photos—but culturally, smiling wasn't widely favored for photos until the 1920s. One theory about that timing is that the explosion of movies enabled us to see emotions of all kinds playing out on screen, documenting the fleeting expressions that portraits had failed to capture. Culturally, it became normalized to capture, display and see all kind of emotions on people's faces. As we got more used to that, photo portraits began portraying people in a range of expression rather than trying to create a neutral image of a person's face.

Changing our own perceptions of old photo portraits to view them as neutral rather than grumpy or serious can help us remember that people back then were not a bunch of sourpusses, but people who experienced as wide a range of emotion as we do, including joy and mirth. Unfortunately, we just rarely get to see them in that state before the 1920s.

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Family

Family health worker has a dire warning for parents who share photos of their kids online

She breaks down the case like a lawyer.

via Ruth Watts (used with permission) and Canva/Photos

A mother takes a photo of her child for her Instagram feed.

A recent study by Data Recovery found that 68% of parents admit to making posts and sharing photos about their children, and 73% of people don’t personally know everyone who looks at their page. This can be a big problem. While most parents think that “sharenting” is harmless, some real dangers can happen to children whose photos are shared online.

Should parents post photos of their kids online?

According to NPR, sharing photos of your children could result in them being bullied by other children, or they could have their photos digitally “kidnapped” and used by fake accounts. In some cases, the photos could wind up on child pornography sites.

Ruth Watts (@ruthwattshv on TikTok), a British family health worker, recently posted a viral TikTok about parents who overshare about their kids and she makes a point that everyone should hear. After scrolling through a typical parent's page, anyone can learn more about a child’s life than the parents would ever intend to share.

Watts says that by knowing a child only through social media, she can figure out their full name, date of birth, parents' names, birthday, where they live, the foods they like and dislike, the toys they play with, their diagnosis, the parks where they like to play and so much more.

@ruthwattshv

What’s your opinion on this? Let me know in the comments ❤️ #parenting #parentsoftiktok #parentingtips #mumsoftiktok #mumlife #mum #healthvisitor #responsiveparenting #gentleparenting #parentingtips #parentingrules #babytok #babyhacksandtips #gentleparentingtips #wholesomemomcontent #mumcontent #momcontentcreator #healthvisitor

We may not think we’re giving out much information about our children. Still, when you add up all the posts year after year, plus the comments, it would be pretty easy for a predator to learn a lot about a child based solely on social media posts.

“Can you guess how I know this child? I purely know them through watching them on social media,” Watts says in a video with over 500,000 views. “I purely know all of your information because the parents have chosen to share that private, confidential information about their child. And yes, a story here, a story there and upload here and upload there. It all creates a picture. It is a jigsaw that people notice. People pay attention to and the wrong people pay attention to.”

Watts also adds that when parents share pictures of children online, they put their children in a vulnerable position without asking for their consent. The video inspired over 500 comments, many from parents who thanked her for her brutal honesty and others who shared why they don’t share photos of their children online.

sharenting, parenting, kids onlineA mother takes a photo of her child for her Instagram feed. via Canva/Photos

“This is exactly why the majority of people have no idea I even have a child. The people that matter will see him grow up in person, not fake friends through a screen,” Mikita Blackmore wrote. “This is why I don’t post my daughter on social media; it’s so scary what people can do these days,” Clara Marie added.

“I always say if you wouldn’t go to the effort of printing the photo and handing it to that person, then they shouldn’t have access to that image,” Soph wrote.

Why shouldn't parents post photos of their kids online?

Watts says she created the video because she has 2 children and feels that kids everywhere deserve a voice. “I feel it’s important to advocate for children who are vulnerable and unable to consent to posting the images. Let alone the parents and children having no understanding of internet risks and security,” she told Upworthy. “How would people feel if I started posting pictures of them without consent? I’m sure they wouldn’t like it. So why is it ok for us to post our children?”

You can follow Watts on Instagram @RuthWattshv.

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Music

5-year-old Italian piano prodigy rocks Mozart at international competition and holy cow

Alberto has already won multiple international competitions.

Pianoforte/Facebook

Alberto Cartuccia Cingolani wows audiences with his amazing musical talents.

Mozart was known for his musical talent at a young age, playing the harpsichord at age 4 and writing original compositions at age 5. So perhaps it's fitting that a video of 5-year-old piano prodigy Alberto Cartuccia Cingolani playing Mozart has gone viral as people marvel at his musical abilities.

Alberto's legs couldn't even reach the pedals, but that didn't stop his little hands from flying expertly over the keys as incredible music pours out of the piano at the 10th International Musical Competition "Città di Penne" in Italy in 2022. Even if you've seen young musicians play impressively, it's hard not to have your jaw drop at this one. Sometimes a kid comes along who just clearly has a gift.

Of course, that gift has been helped along by two professional musician parents. But no amount of teaching can create an ability like this.

Alberto first started playing in 2020 in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Italy was one of the first countries to experience a serious lockdown, and Alberto's mother used the opportunity to start teaching her son to play piano. Alessia Cingolani and her husband Simone Cartuccia are both music conservatory graduates, and mom Alessia told Italian entertainment website Contrataque that she and her husband recognized Alberto's talent immediately.

She said that although Alberto spends a lot of time at the piano, he also has plenty of time for school and play and television, like a normal kid.

There's genuinely nothing "normal" about this kid's piano playing, though. Watch:

Wow, right? There are countless adults who took years of piano lessons and never got to that level of playing. It's like he's channeling Amadeus himself.

According to Corriere Adriatico, by the time he was 4 1/2 years old, Alberto had participated in seven national and international online competitions and won first place in all of them. His mother told the outlet that he started out practicing for about 10 minutes a day and gradually increased to three hours.

"He has a remarkable flair for the piano," she said. Um, yeah. Clearly.

Some commenters expressed some concern for the boy based on his seriousness and what looks like dark circles under his eyes in the video, but if you check out other videos of Alberto playing at home, he is more relaxed. Most of his playing and competition entries have been done online, so performing for a crowd is probably new for him. And in interviews, his mother has made it clear that they prioritize normal childhood activities.

Some children are just genuine prodigies, and Alberto certainly seems to fit that bill. Can't wait to see what kind of musical future awaits this kid.


This article originally appeared on 5.4.22

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Here's the big reason why you're probably feeling bored all the time

There's a strange connection between overstimulation and chronic boredom.

via Canva/Photos

A woman who is very bored.

How can anyone feel bored in a world with social media, streaming movies, TV shows on-demand and the ability to download just about every book in the world? It may sound paradoxical, but according to a study published in Communications Psychology by Katy Y.Y. Tam and Michael Inzlicht, digital media makes us more bored.

Studies show that since 2010, the amount of time people report feeling bored has increased dramatically and the trend has intensified over the years. Interestingly, people began reporting greater levels of boredom shortly after we all started using social media on our new smartphones.

Why am I bored all the time?

According to researchers, here’s what’s happening. Given that we have access to entertainment whenever we like, the bar for what we consider entertaining or stimulating has increased. It’s like when someone is an addict and they keep needing more and more of the same substance to get the high they crave.

Further, when we engage in less stimulating activities, such as reading a book or attending a class, we feel even more bored than before the digital revolution because we have become accustomed to heightened levels of stimulation.

boredom, psychology, social mediaA woman who is very bored.via Canva/Photos

Another reason flipping through TikTok leaves you feeling bored and listless is that digital media fragments our attention, making it hard to focus on the activity at hand. We quickly switch between videos and activities, our phones pulse and beep with notifications, and texts pop up on the screen, so it’s hard to engage with the content deeply. Also, knowing that we can be distracted at any moment makes it harder to focus. “Digital devices intensify boredom by disrupting attention,” the researchers explain.

“Digital media increases boredom through dividing attention, elevating desired levels of engagement, reducing a sense of meaning, and serving as an ineffective boredom coping strategy,” Tam and Inzlicht argue in their paper.

These findings are supported by a report from the Netherlands’ Radboud University, which recently found that “phone usage wasn't an effective method to alleviate boredom and fatigue and even made these feelings worse in many cases.”

boredom, psychology, social mediaA man who is very bored.via Canva/Photos

As we pointed out with the Dorito Theory a while back, sometimes experiences that aren’t fulfilling can still be maximally addictive. As we scroll and scroll and scroll, trying to come across something that cures our boredom, it’s time to ask ourselves how we feel after the experience. Did logging in deliver the experience we thought we’d get? Or, did the frantic search for content keep us occupied until the boredom crept in again?

Tam says that we can have more meaningful and less boring experiences with digital media if we find longer-form content that we can immerse ourselves in. However, this may prove more complicated than years ago, as our attention spans are much shorter.

“If people want a more enjoyable experience when watching videos, they can try to stay focused on the content and minimize digital switching. Like paying for a more immersive experience in a movie theater, more enjoyment comes from immersing oneself in online videos rather than swiping through them,” Tam writes.





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'Freckled Zelda' wows America's Got Talent judges with magical rendition of Disney classic

Even Simon Cowell was stunned by her cover of “Colors of The Wind.”

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Freckled Zelda singing "Colors of the Wind."

Sometimes, it's easier to be our authentic selves when wearing a costume. That certainly seems to be the case for Freckled Zelda, who went from baffling judges to enchanting them on “America’s Got Talent.”

When then 19-year-old singer arrived on stage in 2022 in full fairy attire (a look inspired by a popular Nintendo character), she initially earned some quizzical looks from the panel. Introducing her instrument, the ocarina, didn’t seem to improve anyone’s first impression leading up to the act. Cowell could only offer the word “interesting,” which, let’s face it, seemed like polite rejection, at best.

But then, she sang. And all bets were off.

Freckled Zelda delivered a soulful rendition of Disney’s “Colors of The Wind” that blew every single listener away. Including Cowell, who admitted, “When you walked out, I thought, ‘wow, this really is going to be terrible,’ and actually you’ve got a really great voice.” She went on to receive a “yes” from all four judges that evening, moving her onto the next round of the competition.

Freckled Zelda’s song choice, with its themes of not judging others who look and think differently, feels entirely appropriate for the moment. Over on TikTok, where it's often cool to be weird, the self-proclaimed “music fairy” already has millions of fans who adore her ethereal persona. And yet, in the real world (and on a mainstream live television show, no less), being different isn't always entirely welcomed.

Freckled Zelda and her unique act received a flood of praise not only from the “AGT” panel, but from the YouTube comments as well. One person wrote, “I love how different she is. She wasn’t swayed when they acted as if she was weird and when she said she can’t change at all; that she would always be a fairy. I love how confident she was! People will support you only if you know what you stand up for.“


At the end of the segment, Heidi Klum noted, “‘America’s Got Talent’ is a variety show and we don’t all have to be the same.” The show has lately had some really diverse triumphs, from a Lebanese belly dance troupe to a Black country singing trio. That list can now include music fairies as well, and we’re here for it.


This article originally appeared two years ago.

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