A corseted Japanese denim minidress ($810), a cotton canvas blazer belted with a coordinating bumbag ($1,100), oversized sunglasses ($460) and a brass-and-crystal earcuff ($420) will go on sale at a pop-up boutique in the Marais district of Paris on Wednesday evening, when Rihanna launches her luxury fashion house, Fenty. Rihanna’s arrival in the luxury fashion…
Month: May 2019
Politeness costs nothing, but it may stop people understanding you
Does it always pay to be polite? Dear reader, the answer very much depends. Academics in the US have analysed hundreds of thousands of answers on the Q&A website Stack Exchange, where users ask such vital questions as: “What is to the west of Westeros?” and “Are there any German nonsense poems?” They discovered that…
Billionaire pledges to pay student debt for 2019 class at historic black US college
Delivering the commencement address at Morehouse College in Atlanta, the alma mater of Martin Luther King Jr, the billionaire technology investor and philanthropist Robert F Smith made a surprise announcement: his family would wipe out the student debt of the entire class of 2019. Smith’s words to nearly 400 graduating seniors were greeted with a…
Muhlaysia Booker: an advocate against trans violence is mourned in Texas
A week after enduring a sustained beating in front of a jeering crowd, Muhlaysia Booker spoke out about her ordeal in the hope of raising awareness about violence faced by transgender women. “This time I can stand before you whereas in other scenarios we are at a memorial,” she said. A month later, Booker is…
Racism, sexism, Nazi economics: Estonia’s far right in power
A shadowy “deep state” secretly runs the country. A smart immigration policy is “blacks go back”. Nazi Germany wasn’t all bad. None of these statements would be out of place in the darker corners of far-right blogs anywhere in the world. But in Estonia as of last month, they are among the views of government…
Arthur: Alabama bans episode of kids’ show featuring same-sex wedding
Alabama Public Television has refused to air a recent episode of a children’s program that featured a same-sex wedding. An episode of the popular animated series Arthur, titled Mr Ratburn and the Special Someone, was deemed inappropriate for the state’s young viewers by Mike McKenzie, the director of programming for the station, saying broadcasting it…
Florida Man: what lies behind the Sunshine State’s crazy stereotype?
It is one of the nation’s favorite jokes – with an entire state as the punchline. And at its center stands Florida Man, the mythical yet mercurial figure whose bizarre real-world antics have come to personify the perceived craziness of life in the Sunshine State. Briefly, back in the spring, Florida Man became a global…
Austin Eubanks, Columbine victim who worked against painkillers, dies at 37
Austin Eubanks, a victim of the 1999 Columbine school massacre who became a prominent campaigner on the danger of opioids after he developed an addiction to painkillers, has died. He was 37. Eubanks was found in his home in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, and his death confirmed by a coroner on Saturday. Though the cause of…
Why the Spice Girls inviting Theresa May to their reunion show is not girl power
Back in the 90s, we had girl power. In 2019, according to Emma Bunton, we have “people power”. So she told The Sun earlier this year, when the Spice Girls announced their long-anticipated reunion tour: “We’re about equality and bringing everyone together.” In the same interview, Geri Horner heaped praise on Theresa May, insisting: “We…
From bleak to bustling: how one French town solved its high street crisis
On a lane in what was once considered eastern France’s grimmest town, a street artist is up a ladder finishing a mural, the independent bookshop has a queue at the till, the organic cooperative is full of customers and Séverine Liebold’s arty independent tea shop is doing a brisk trade. When Liebold opened Tilvist in…