Corporate America is complicit with this culture of racism.

Benish Shah, the New York-based chief growth officer for business gifting company Loop & Tie, minced no words in sharing her insights on race, protests and the workplace with Palette Group founder and Creative Director Nate Nichols during Thursdays Allyship and Action Summit, a virtual conference of panels, fireside chats and breakout rooms designed to find solutions for diversity and inclusion in advertising.

A former Philadelphian, Nichols and his colleagues came up with the idea for the summit and its accompanying pledge for action on June 2, a day known to many social media users as Blackout Tuesday. With discussions on race and equity, the summit was designed to educate professionals of all backgrounds on antiracism practices.

In addition to raising awareness for allyship and action in the advertising industry, companies are being invited to sign a pledge for a more racially equitable industry, and their progress will be tracked via the Allyship and Action website.

Were developing a technology platform that companies will use to post their latest evergreen or tentpole campaign projects, Nichols told Technical.ly via email. Theyll upload their staffing plans, well connect with the individuals that were on the project for them to self-identify and report that data back up to the companies page. Well have a minimum number of projects that must be equitably staffed for organizations to remain certified. The goal is to have brands and agencies be transparent and hold each other accountable.

Shah participated in one of the summits fireside chats with Nichols Thursday afternoon on how companies can support employees from diverse backgrounds in this moment. Technical.ly tuned in for their conversation and caught these three key takeaways:

Shah believes that white people should not be resistant to correcting themselves when saying improper things about race.

Its more about saying, I clearly said something wrong, Im sorry, how can I do better?' said Shah, who recently published some guidelines for discussing trauma at work. If you become defensive, you lose them. Dont make the trauma about yourself. Its about genuinely showing care and concern towards the person thats affected.

That self-awareness should apply to people of other races, too.

I am a person of color but not Black, she said. This moment of history is about Black people. As a brown person, its something we tell our brown friends all of the time: We have to step up our own empathy and own decentralizing.

Shah emphasized the need for offices to be spaces free of microaggressions and inappropriate comments.

If you are a person talking about microaggressions, you dont have a safe space. If the microaggressions are, Can I touch your hair? or Im almost as dark as you! or You got this job? all it does is make it easy for people to be racist without calling them racist, she said.

Intentions to create safe spaces without action arent enough: If you arent stopping these conversations its not the right answer.

For Shah, white leaderships buy-in to changing problematic office culture is a key component of shifting negative paradigm.

Dont rely on Black team members to all your questions, she said, emphasizing the accessibility of Google as an information resource. Create immediate change. The urgency of the moment is at the place where people are fearing for their lives on a constant basis.

Shah noted that actions like acknowledgement of racial strife are more important than words.

You also have to practice acknowledgement, she said. A statement from the company is cool, but are you actually talking about it with your team?

For further reading about how to talk about race at work, check out the latest episode of The TWIJ Show.

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3 things company leaders should understand about race, protests and the workplace - Technical.ly

Jun. 24, 2020 / PRZen / ATLANTA -- The Power of Girls, an Atlanta-based nonprofit organization with a mission to serve and inspire young girls has partnered with Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Company for a fundraiser to help reach their June fundraising goal of one-thousand dollars. This initiative will support The Power of Girls mission to continue to empower young girls to develop into confident, well-rounded global leaders through mentorship, team building, and cultural experiences. Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Company has pledged fifty percent of proceeds from every candle purchased right back to The Power of Girls. Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Company believes it is important to connect with organizations that are making a direct impact in their cities.

"We are so grateful to Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Company for wanting to partner with us with our June fundraiser for our organization! As we are in unique times, this will be a great way for the organization to raise money for our new cohort and invest in other activities for the girls during their time with The Power of Girls," says Tameka Kee, Founder of The Power of Girls.

Each year, the young women who are selected as The Power of Girls program participants engage in a year-long "Power House" curriculum focused on developing confidence, leadership skills, and self-awareness. The programming concludes with an international trip where the cohort participants can stretch their horizons, continue to build their confidence, and gain exposure to global cultures on their journey to become young leaders. Following the trip, The Power of Girls participants become part of the active alumnae group where they serve as program ambassadors, sharing the pivotal moments from their experience with future cohorts. Why international travel? Travel is a way to view the world through a broader lens, understanding different cultures, and widening perspectives. For young girls especially, travel is both eye-opening and empowering. It allows for the opportunity to stretch comfort zones, build confidence in new skills, spark curiosity, and explore ideas about the world around them. For The Power of Girls, travel is truly a transformative experience.

For more information about The Power of Girls, to donate, and for this month's fundraising initiative, visit http://www.thepowerofgirls.org and on social media @thepowerofgirls. For more information on Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Company or to purchase a candle, visit http://www.shop1122candles.com/power-of-girls-fundraiser. Media inquiries, please email Candice Nicole at candice@candicenicolepr.com.

About The Power of Girls

The Power of Girls is a nonprofit organization based in Atlanta. With the mission of serving, inspiring, and empowering young girls to develop into confident, well-rounded global leaders through mentorship, team building, and cultural experiences. Each year, The Power is Girls selects a class of The Power of Girls to participate in a year-long "Power House" curriculum focused on developing confidence, leadership skills, and self-awareness. The programming culminates with an international trip. Upon completion of the program, Power of Girls participants become part of our active alumni group. For donations visit, http://www.thepowerofgirls.org.

About Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Co.

Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Co. better known as the best handmade soy candles ever poured. Candle lovers Kyara and Melissa met at the illustrious Johnson C. Smith University in 2009 and during their college tenor, they both discovered the commonality of the angel numbers "1122". 11:22 is a reminder that you are on the right path to turning your dreams to reality.

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The Power of Girls Partners with Eleven Twenty-Two Candle Company for Fundraising Initiative During The Month of June - Press Release - Digital...

Jon Stewart left The Daily Show in 2015 after hosting it for 16 years

Releasing a new movie at a time the world is facing enormous challenges is "like showing up to a plane crash with a chocolate bar", as Jon Stewart put it recently.

"It feels ridiculous," the former host of The Daily Show told The New York Times. "There's tragedy everywhere, and you're like, 'Uh, does anybody want chocolate?'"

The coronavirus pandemic, coupled with worldwide protests sparked by the death of George Floyd in police custody, have left few people in the mood for frivolity.

But despite his characteristic self-awareness, the release of Stewart's new feature film will be warmly welcomed by those who miss his presence in the US TV landscape.

Stewart, now 57, hosted satirical news programme The Daily Show for 16 years. He was a highly influential figure, attracting a dedicated audience who tuned in every night to hear his shrewd take on the day's stories.

By the time he left in 2015 (to be succeeded by Trevor Noah), he said he was tired and ready for a new challenge. Which is precisely why he embarked on writing and directing Irresistible - a comedy about political campaign financing, as told through a small-town mayoral race in rural Wisconsin.

The film, which stars Steve Carell and Rose Byrne, was due to hit cinemas this summer, but is now being released online instead. It may not have been the planned platform, but that's something Stewart isn't too concerned about.

"Obviously having a movie that you made come out online instead of in theatres is maybe the greatest tragedy that is occurring in our world right now," he tells BBC News, tongue firmly in cheek.

"I mean, I know people are struggling with the pandemic, and hundreds of years of racial injustice, but when are people going to really think about how I feel?"

Irresistible sees retired marine colonel Jack Hastings (played by Chris Cooper) go viral after making a passionate speech at a town hall meeting in the fictional city of Deerlaken, Wisconsin.

The online video is brought to the attention of political strategist Gary Zimmer (Carell), who travels out there to convince Hastings to run as the Democrats' candidate for Mayor.

Story continues

Zimmer sets about moulding Hastings into the perfect candidate, but as his campaign gathers steam, they face competition from Faith Brewster (Byrne), who has been deployed to run the Republican campaign.

One issue the film highlights is how much money can be spent (or arguably wasted) on political campaigns. Without revealing any spoilers, the movie's unexpected ending is something Stewart hopes will challenge the traditional political structures we all take for granted.

"I've spent a lot of years detailing the daily foibles, and that's kind of a narrow view and it's myopic," Stewart says. "So this was a way of stepping back and really trying to look at [politics] as a system. Sort of like the difference between being a weather man and a climatologist.

"So I spent a lot of years as a weather man, and I decided to step back and go 'why is it always raining here? What's going on?!' and to look at it from that perspective.

"And the key to it is to hopefully have the audience kind of believing that they're watching this other movie that's buying into all the tropes that we're given. So that when you finally reveal [the ending], you can have that moment of 'oh right, why do we accept this system as it is currently designed?'"

Reviews of the film came out earlier this week, and some critics think Stewart succeeds in his mission.

"Taken on its own terms, this buoyantly funny comedy offers lip-smacking entertainment that will surprise many with its skewering of both sides," said David Rooney in The Hollywood Reporter.

But not everyone was won over. "The supposed satirical attitude of Irresistible can't conceal the fact that it's contrived, unfunny and redundant," wrote Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian.

The Telegraph's Tim Robey said: "American politics do such a sterling job of currently satirising themselves, it's hard to know where an electoral comedy like Jon Stewart's Irresistible gets off in the hunt for added purchase. Watching it proves the point: the film tries to scale a gargantuan mountain of a subject, and just keeps slipping repeatedly down the sides."

The point about real-life politics going beyond satire has been made so often in recent years it's become a clich. Countless writers and comedians have complained it's difficult to make fun of a situation which they already consider to be a parody.

But Stewart thinks there will always be a place for it in society.

"[Charlie] Chaplin made The Great Dictator during World War Two," he points out. "I think there will always be room and a need for that type of commentary.

"But I also believe that it's the least efficacious agent of change. So while I think it will always be there, I also think it's what you're seeing now - direct action in the streets brings about change," he says - a reference to the recent Black Lives Matter protests.

"Comedy bits are fun to pass around the internet, and this movie belongs to that oeuvre."

Shooting a film is a lot of hard work, to put it mildly. Cast and crew work long hours intensively for weeks or months on end, before the laborious post-production process begins.

But asked which is more gruelling, writing and directing a film or hosting a daily talk show, Stewart says: "Hosting a show, no question. No question. You're talking about 16 years.

"Now, if I had to work on this movie every day for 16 years then I'd probably say that's gruelling too, but the one thing you get when you're doing a daily talk show is it's not just all foreplay. The film has a different feel, you're working and working, but you don't get that thing you get on a television show, which is the performance and the audience right there for you.

"And the reward of working every day, was the dessert of getting to perform it in front of an audience. In a film you don't get that, but you get the quieter pleasure of being able to spend more time crafting something with a little more nuance than you might when you're just trying to get that 6pm deadline."

Earlier this week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced cinemas would be able to re-open from 4 July, as part of the ongoing easing of lockdown restrictions.

But Irresistible is continuing with its planned online release this weekend.

"I'm excited for people to get a chance to see it, hopefully it'll be a nice distraction," Stewart says. "You always design a movie for that social response, you love to see it with a group of people, but I'm also hoping that it's pleasant to watch in the comfort of your own home."

Irresistible is available to rent on VOD platforms on Friday.

Read more:
Jon Stewart: 'There will always be room for political satire' - Yahoo! Voices

Every Seven Minutes by Ken Preuss

Once again, Encompass Productions brings us a selection of short one-act plays. The evening started with Every Seven Minutes by Ken Preuss Performed by Ryan Brannon and Cate Olivia Directed by Jonathan Woodhouse

Two godlike type people in the every seven minutes room whose job is to ensure that things that happen every seven minutes occur. For example, apparently, every seven minutes a double rainbow appears, and these two make it happen. The chap (Ryan Brannon) takes it all in his stride and doesnt care what the consequences are of his actions. So, every seven minutes he makes a person drown, but doesnt have any interest in who that person is or what their circumstances are. To him, its just a job, whereas the girl, who is new in the role, seems to have trouble disassociating her actions from emotions. She rebels against the system that affects the lives of random people every seven minutes, leading to an unexpected end of the play.

A very nicely written show that really addresses the idea of only obeying orders. The male character is, I guess completely amoral. He is doing a job, he gets paid and if there are consequences which there are then so be it, he doesnt want to know. The introduction of the co-worker with a conscience really affects him, and both actors bounce off each other nicely as she tries to make him think about the consequences of his job.

Spread by Robbie Knox Performed by Gabrielle Macpherson and Robert Gallagher Directed by Rachael Owens & Liam Fleming

A brother and sister are trying to write an obituary for Moira, As they work, they reminisce about their mothers funeral and this leads to a discussion about the definition of being an orphan. As they go, they try to think of what Moria meant to them and how she should be remembered. This raises the point of how people leave their mark on the planet and those around them not just during their lives but for generations to come.

Again, a well-written show with some interesting ideas. How do you define an orphan, and do we all become one eventually as our parents die before us. Then there was the wonderful definition of the church being like Instagram for old people. Robert and Gabrielle really come across well and have that wonderful relationship that is often the hallmark of siblings. As I get older, I think about what happens to me when I depart and I have to say that if my life can be summed up in something as simple and effective as Moiras is, then I will have had a life well-lived.

Spud by Robert Wallis Performed by Liz McMullen and Richard Coffey Directed by Rachael Owens

A surreal story of two potatoes that come alive in an oven. Considering the two have only just gained consciousness and self-awareness but seem to have a lot of inbuilt knowledge of the world, not to mention Shakespearean quotes.

This is a short play and the well written script reminds me, in some ways, of the whale and the bowl of petunias, in the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. The sudden impact of self consciousness on the two potatoes is painful, as we, the audience, know that no matter how much they may complain and shout, they cannot escape their fate. The writing and performances were both good and actually made me feel a bit guilty that I had eaten a baked potato for lunch.

Like A House On Fire by Keith Gow Performed by Rachel Nott Directed by Liam Fleming

A play that starts with the words I set fire to a brothel once really sets its stall out early. As Penny talks to us, she stops every so often to light and admire a match. We learn that she has set fire to many things, and used to take pride that she only ever set fire to one of anything. One tree, one car, one TV, etc. As she explains things, she challenges the audience to judge her and it is easy to do so. However, this production shows, you should never rush to make snap judgements, and people are way more complex than we give them credit for. She has real pride in her work and really comes alive as she describes what a fire meant to her both emotionally and physically.

What a powerful play to end on. Rachel was totally mesmerising as Penny and its interesting, the night after the new Alan Bennett Talking Heads season starts, this play could, to me, easily have fitted into that series. Amazing performance and writing combined.

Full credit to Liam Fleming for not only successfully hosting the event but also turning his very talented hands to directing, and signing off the evening in one of the best ways possible.

Even in lockdown, it is brilliant to see that Encompass have managed to bring together a talented group of writers, directors and actors to put on such a good show. Like everyone else, I yearn for the day, in the hopefully not too distant future, when we can all get back to theatres and sit in an audience watching actors move about a stage in full view. But, until then, Encompass have proved that you can sit at home watching a screen and be as excited about the future of theatre once more.

Review by Terry Eastham

Encompass Productions presents BARE E-SSENTIALS, the acclaimed online edition of Londons best-reviewed new writing night, returning due to popular demand! Featuring short plays from established and emerging playwrights across a variety of genres, get ready for an incredible hour of bare-bones theatre as each piece is performed live and beamed straight into your homes and devices. The plays submitted from around the world include:

Every Seven Minutes by Ken Preuss Spread by Robbie Knox Spud by Robert Wallis Like A House On Fire by Keith Gow

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Bare E-ssentials Livestream - Review - London Theatre 1

For anyone trying to make sense of the new order in American politics, heres a dramatic concept to process: powerful white business leaders and politicians genuflecting, in essence, before Colin Kaepernick. Taking the knee has surpassed knee on neck in a manner that is imperious, glacial, Gandhian. The roar of peaceful uprising has been cathartic. Its impact is global.

COVID-19 is teaching us to empathize better with one another; but the speed of hegemonic reversal has caught the chatterati unawares. Nike, having landed on the right side of history as far as Kaepernick is concerned, is looking like a reality show participant who has been declared safe for a week.

Other brands and their partner agencies, implicated to different extents in historically regressive practices, are scanning the horizon anxiously and hoping the situation doesnt escalate, go full-on French Revolution. They are making all the right noises by talking up anti-racism, rushing to declare Juneteenth a holiday and advertising their wokeness through Blackout Tuesday. Their social media accounts are protesting many thingsbut especially their innocence. Nice try, but they had better watch out: cancel culture is the equivalent of the old royals getting their heads lopped off.

Time for cultural strategy to take charge

Its one thing for brands and agencies to have left bare minimum interventions until the last possible second and quite another to be subsequently grandstanding. To offer a football analogy: imagine Brazil falling 7-0 behind against Germany and then anticipating applause and crowd support for pulling one back. Now more than ever before, brands must understand cultural flows; or they will meet their end quicker than Tony Soprano.

Any consumer who connects consumption with virtue wants brands to address three kinds of values: 1) universal measures of decency that empower humanity 2) causes that fit the ecosystem in which the brand operates 3) principles that matter to consumers and their families.

From Ben & Jerry's message on its website

Brands must also grasp that there are three windows of engagement: a) before the world catches on, by doing what Ben & Jerrys or Patagonia does, supporting tectonic cultural shifts quietly of their own initiative; b) spotting a trend early, like Nike did, and getting behind it; and c) succumbing, like the NFL, to panic and the need to catch up with a moment that is threatening to get away entirely.

These two factorsthe values matrix and the phase of applicationmust work together as a gear system to create moments of opportunity, with some responses eliminated and others elevated.

Cultural strategists must reimagine the disruptive capacity of residual, dominant and emergent codes but beyond that, also consider the issue of ethics and sustainability. Semiotics is often applied as a predictive tool to anticipate the next iteration or the next step for a trend. But its most advantageous use lies in understanding what sets of values are culturally sustainable and not a flash in the pan.

How do we extend the gains we have made? What fresh cultural or subcultural phenomenon might a brand bring to long-term prominence after Black Lives Matter in a way that doesnt feel like a marketing stunt?

Purpose is not the fix we need

Cultural strategy is steadily growing indispensable, but as an art it is still finding its range. Meanwhile the advertising, public relations and market research industries function like a Gramscian enforcer of the status quo, in the guise of an old boys' club (with a dinosaur serving as mascot). The back-slapping has long reverberated in echo chambers, which is why at times there is such a bizarre disconnect between output and reception. Times have changed; problem is, not everyones got the memo. Perhaps inertia rather than malice is to blame. The effect at any rate remains the same: too few see that obsolete solutions must urgently make way for new ones.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions; one of those being the fashionable ideology of purpose, which is designed to maximize efficiency by encouraging adherents to draw inspiration from core truths. Knowing what drives a brand brings clarity to all stakeholders. On the other hand, this serves a crafty agenda: to create a cult of believers willing to evangelize on behalf of a company's dogma. Purpose transforms brand comms into a siren call. Some companies are fueled by idealism, but many deploy purpose cynically. Rank and file workers are left to bear the brunt of capitalisms excesses.

Unconscionably, purpose keeps minorities in check. Minority talent already feels like it must outperform everyone to prove that it belongs. Now it must take things up a notch and perform a hysterical enthusiasm. Little surprise minorities feel reluctant to bring their whole selves to work: who wants to feel like an outsider? They lean in at the cost of their moorings.

Purpose is a wonderful starting point, and merits a place in business discourse. But it is a dangerous means to an end, and a poor substitute for self-awareness. Its moment is passing.

Lessons in authenticity from Marvin Gaye

For brands to find their moral authority, their most trenchant principles, their deepest voice, they must learn what it means to act grown-up. A company that embodies maturity takes on a whole form that is irreducible even in the face of gimmicks like purpose.

Its worth recalling how the Marvin Gaye album, Whats Going On, strikes the perfect balance between commerce and truth-telling. It was considered so unusual at the time for a Motown singeror any singerto be tackling themes like the Vietnam War, urban poverty and environmental pollution that impresario Berry Gordy insisted the eponymous track be scrapped. Gaye was adamant, and a masterpiece that resonates to this day was born.

Nobody dreams of connecting that kind of authenticity to marketing. When brands prioritize an equilibrium between ambition and goodwill, the profit margin practically takes care of itself. We stand at a fork in the road. The time for epiphanies is now. If brands are to really matter, they must stop trying so hard to sound human, and instead signal an understanding of what it means to be humane.

Vijay Parthasarathy is a New York-based semiotician and columnist who is managing partner at Stardust Insights, a global cultural consultancy.

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Talkin' bout a revolution | Advertising - Campaign Asia

If theres one thing women who have sex with older men love more than having sex with older men, its tweeting about it.

I know this because I am one of them.

When I first began having sex with men old enough to be my father like, old enough to have intentionally fathered me, not just old enough to have been a teen baby daddy I was a senior in college. The man I was seeing at the time had a daughter a few years younger than me, and I remember looking at all the 18-year-olds in my advisors freshman seminar and thinking, I could literally be fucking any of your dads right now. No sooner had this thought crossed my mind than I felt compelled to tweet it. It made me feel powerful, smart and a little smug, not just because I had a dirty secret, but because it felt like I was somehow cheating a system.

Im not alone in this. While women dating significantly older men is obviously nothing new, in recent years, dating older men seems to have become a distinct online brand thats part self-satire, part earnest feminist revision of a long-running patriarchal dynamic in which much older men have historically held the power over the younger women they date.

This ironic I date older men internet persona can be read as a product of a broader societal moment Ive taken to calling Daddy culture. Last year, I described this culture as a pouty-lipped Lolita fantasy rebranded for the 21st century driven by a pervasive Lana del Rey-esque energy. Daddy culture took many forms: It was the appropriation of the word Daddy or at least this usage of it from the kink community by vanilla bedrooms near you. It was the early-2010s boom in sugar dating after Seeking Arrangement and other dating-with-benefits apps went mainstream. It was Lana, yes, and it was, as Ive suggested, at the heart of Dating Older Men Twitter.

But in the aftermath of the Chris DElia sexual misconduct scandal last week, which saw the comedian accused of harassing and grooming multiple women when they were underage, the tone surrounding relationships between young women and older men has shifted dramatically. DElia is just the latest in a string of high-profile sexual misconduct cases involving older men and underage girls (see also: R. Kelly, Jeffrey Epstein), and as more survivors come forward, its becoming harder to ignore that this kind of predatory fetishization of young girls isnt just a series of individual tragedies, but an epidemic. While Dating Older Men Twitter has always involved women who, while considerably younger than the men they date, are of legal age, conversations have increasingly begun to consider whether this culture, however ironic or tongue-in-cheek, might be a symptom of something more insidious.

The hallmark of Dating Older Men Twitter, which tends to find its most notable figures in twenty-something female comedians like Dana Donnelly and Anya Volz, is a dry, sometimes self-deprecating humor. Guys really like it when u constantly bring up that you were 12 when they were in grad school, tweeted Cosmopolitan editor Carina Hsieh in 2018, while earlier this year Donnelly tweeted that her exes should be more concerned about her well-being amid the pandemic because at age 24 i am the oldest girlfriend many of them have ever had.

These are women who know they are performing a schtick. They are aware, as the internet is often fond of reminding anyone whos taken to aligning themselves with a particular interest, that dating older men is not, in fact, a personality. The humor in this particular brand of internet identity comes from its self-awareness. It is a willful self-caricature.

And if these women arent above satirizing themselves, they certainly arent afraid of poking fun at the older men involved in these dynamics. As a recent tweet from Philadelphia-based stripper who goes by the name Marla on Twitter reads, Girls in their 20s love dating stupid older men please dont try to take that away from us.

Indeed, these women are often criticized or at least the relationships theyre in are. Look no further than the backlash surrounding every relationship Leonardo DiCaprio has been in for the past decade or so. In general, this criticism holds that the men involved, even when the women they pursue are technically of legal age, are exploiting a sexist, ageist and ultimately predatory culture that values very young women solely because they are very young. The women involved, if not victims, are then also complicit in fueling this toxic dynamic.

But the women of Dating Older Men Twitter are not doe-eyed Lana del Rey types helplessly romanticizing a regressive culture of patriarchal romance. These women openly mock the men they date for the very preferences which attracted those men in the first place. This ironic approach ridicules men for their role in perpetuating a sexist culture in which very young women are disproportionately valued over their arguably more age-appropriate counterparts, and in doing so redistributes the presumptive power dynamics. Its a modern revision of one of many age-old patriarchal dynamics in which men leverage power over women. Except this time, women are the ones doing the leveraging.

Not only does this ironic subversion of the traditional hetero May-December dynamic find men mocked for dating young women by the very young women they date it also finds them mocked for apparently not even being aware of it. Dating older professional men who arent interested in social media so you can continue your 9-5 of shit talking men in peace while being wined & dined after hours>, reads a viral tweet from 2018, by a user who goes by Michelle Amoree.

Older men dating younger women isnt anything new, of course. But with social media, the young women in these relationships finally have a platform generations of young women before them didnt, and one from which, to a certain extent, older generations are excluded.

But however subversive or tongue-in-cheek this schtick may be, many of its most prominent voices have recently spoken out about the larger culture of predatory fetishization that such dynamics foster, even when both parties are technically of legal age.

While I still contend that there is a spirit of feminist revision underlying much of the great 2010sDaddy renaissance, 2020 is not 2019. Lana del Rey and her regressive romanticizing have been quasi-canceled, and as mass unrest continues amid Americas great racial reckoning, society is increasingly reconsidering other patriarchal power structures and institutions as well, including the one that routinely puts older men in bed with much younger women.

We can laugh all day about the hack jokes made on here by women about older men being shitty, but IT IS HACK FOR A FUCKING REASON, tweeted comedian and writer Anya Volz, who just a few months ago questioned the pervasive criticism often hurled at men dating younger women, arguing that such criticism, while well-intentioned, has a tendency to strip the women involved of their agency.

In a recent Twitter thread, however, Volz points to the predatory fetishization of young girls as the result of a cancer in our society that does not begin or end with underage victims. Its insidious as fuck and seeps into our culture from all angles. Its in movies with all leading men being 50 and their girlfriends being 22. Its in porn with the #1 search result being teen or young, she wrote. Its in every single beauty standard that women are held to: bouncy, clear skin; perky tits; no gray hair; thin in a way that is normally only found naturally in..prepubescent children!!!

While I have previously argued that relationships between young women and much older men are not inherently predatory (and that common criticism painting them as such tends to unnecessarily victimize adult women who are more than capable of pursuing older men as willfully and actively as older men pursue them), it seems that I, and other women like me, have recently begun to reconsider the role we play in perpetuating a culture that preys upon underage girls.

Donnelly, a prominent voice of Dating Older Men Twitter who had initially agreed to speak with me for an article about the internet schtick, ultimately pulled her commentary after the DElia allegations broke, explaining that she, like many women, felt extremely triggered.

Stop sexualizing barely legal start sexualizing definitely legal beyond a shadow of a doubt, reads one of her recent tweets.

Perhaps what I have long read, in myself and in women like me, as the willful, empowered, self-aware pursuit of older men has always been little more than a defense mechanism. If, as many, many women have recently attested, all women encounter this kind of predatory fetishization of their youth in some form or other, then this kind of self-fetishization veiled in satire functions as an attempt to reclaim that narrative. You cant hunt us if we willfully hand ourselves over. You cant hunt us if we convince you and ourselves that were the ones hunting you.

In taking a pronounced interest in much older men, however sardonically, I recognize that I am complicit not only in fostering a culture that puts young women and underage girls in danger, but also in perpetuating a system that will one day be my own undoing.In a dynamic where youth is the currency of power, you are only on one side until you are on the other. As 20-something women having sex with 40-something men, we know that in 20 years, those 60-somethings will probably still be having sex with women half their age or younger, and we wont be.

What will we be doing? We have no way of knowing, because society doesnt seem particularly interested in letting us or anyone know what women over 40 are up to, unless it happens to involve being a celebrity who looks good for her age, in a bathing suit, in which case they might throw her a People magazine spread or a Page Six headline that refers specifically to her age.

This too, as Volz noted in her thread, is a symptom of the sexist and ageist culture that makes underage women the prey of older men. This insidious culture, she writes, is embedded in the way that women are not valued in a mainstream way after showing any sign of aging whatsoever. Not even just sexually, which is fucked up in itself, but in ANY WAY, she wrote. I remember my mom telling me she felt herself becoming invisible when she started getting gray hair.

As a 21-year-old college student looking at my fellow students and realizing I could be fucking any of their dads, I felt like I was cheating a system because I was for a little while, anyway. I felt like I had figured out something most other women my age hadnt: that youth was our most valuable asset and if we didnt exploit it or let others exploit it while we had the chance, wed be sorry.

The problem is well be sorry either way. As women born into a sexist, ageist society, we are playing a losing game from day one. Even if we play it perfectly, even if we think were winning at 21, age will catch up with us. We will watch our returns diminish year by year.

A dude replied to my thread about our cultures obsession with young girls & womens bodies that I was just complaining about being old, Volz tweeted shortly after completing her thread. Im 24. I rest my fucking case.

I realize that in trying to leverage this bullshit dynamic to my advantage for the very brief window of time I can, I am complicit in perpetuating it. In being a willful participant in Daddy culture, in dating older men and tweeting about it, however self-deprecatingly, I am complicit in fueling the very system that will one day, not so very long from now at all, render me invisible.

More:
Is This the End of "Daddy" Culture? - InsideHook

How often have you heard people mutter, Oh, Im not a creative type? Perhaps youve thought this yourself. This is a falsehood because to be human is be hardwired to be creative. To be a phenomenal lawyer, manager, doctor, engineer, or plumber requires immense amounts of creativity. Creativity is the nonnegotiable ingredient in developing the most amazing tech app, healing the sick, and leading dynamic enterprises. Yet our educational system teaches out creativity, and our boardrooms reference it as an afterthought. No wonder so many people who are pursuing innovation fail to actually innovate.

People throw around the word innovation all the time; sometimes we end up talking around each other without getting to the real definition. What do we mean by innovation? Innovation is invention converted into financial, social, and cultural value. And the engine for innovation is creativity. That means that if we truly want to innovate, then we must design systems, processes, and experiences in our work environments that allow us to be creative. Taking the leap to build an organization-wide creative capacity is the single best way continually innovate.

Creativity is not a mystical, magical process only accessible to a fewnamely, artists, musicians, actors, and novelists. But, like innovation, people struggle with understanding what exactly creativity is. I define creativity as the ability to toggle between wonder and rigor in order to solve problems and deliver novel value. Wonder is our capacity to exercise awe, pause, dream, and ask audacious blue-sky-thinking questions. Rigor is our capacity to exercise discipline and deep skills, to pay attention to detail, and to spend time on task for mastery. Both are necessary for creativity to thrive. In our age of augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and rapidly evolving technologies, a hybrid approach to creativity that incorporates wonder and analytical rigor is absolutely vital to business success.

The best way to navigate complexity is through creativity. Applying creativity simplifies complex problem-solving by juxtaposing and recombining previously unexplored ideas. Creativity leaps are the only way to solve the complex problems of our time and to innovate for the future. Since creativity itself is a complex system, the most effective tactical means to achieve creativity are the open-ended creative techniques of inquiry, improvisation, and intuition.

Inquiry is rooted in curiosity, which results from an information gap. You want to know more about something that you currently dont understand. Inquiry is the practice of honing your ability to frame and reframe questions, to use questions as a way of thinking through and processing. Inquiry is the root of wisdom and the precursor to empathy.

Improvisation is about building on ideas with minimal constraints. There is freedom to experiment, but there are also rules and fluid structures that help you to correct course and embrace mistakes. It is a deeply observant and adaptive process. Examples of great improvisation show up in jazz, rap, comedy, sales pitches, and scientific experimentation.

Intuition is the universal visceral, internal wisdom that allows for unconscious pattern recognition and insights for decision-making. Harriet Tubman, Albert Einstein, and Steve Jobs are examples of famous innovators and leaders who relied on and valued their intuition, coupling it with their rational intellect to make decisions.

So, how can you stress the importance of creativity as a core competency throughout your organization and encourage everyoneyourself includedto invest in becoming more creative? Here are a few practices and tactics to get you started:

Seek out opportunities for lateral thinking. Lateral thinking is the ability to learn from sectors and practices both adjacent to you and far away from the way you typically do business. For example, if you are a tech firm, you might explore theatrical productions to learn about project management. Lateral thinking opens possibilities for new landmarks and new benchmarks, while expanding your awareness of trends outside your industry that you should be paying attention to.

Welcome inquiry and build trust by leading with questions. To admit that you do not know something requires humility, self-awareness, andin these timescourage. When you put yourself out there to reveal that you have a question or an uncertainty, the environment must be primed for trust. When a leader asks questions, employees feel the courage to share not only what is on their mind, but also whats in their imagination.

Get comfortable with working together through chaos. Collaboration doesnt come from a bunch of meetings. True collaboration and creative synergy come through our ability to improvise with one anotherespecially when work is messy or messed up. By openly stating and owning whatever is going wrong, team members will build their capacity to adapt, learn, grow, and respect each others ideas.

Dare to listen to your gutand heart. In business, it often takes courage to stand up for your intuition in the face of data and rationale. But in a world of ambiguity and uncertainty, where wicked problems are everywhere, trusting your intuition is necessary. In fact, intuition is often how you make the leap from observation to plausible explanation. As internal a process as it is, intuition consistently requires us to pay deep attention to the world around us. Be brave and welcome your employees to join you in bridging gaps by having conversations across disciplines and boundaries.

Commentary by Natalie Nixon. Heres what youve missed? Highest Paying Creative And Media Jobs. Highest Paying Business Jobs. Highest Paying Engineering Jobs.

Excerpt from:
Creative Competency: Why to Make It Everyone's Priority for Your Business - CEOWORLD magazine

By Gayle Tzemach Lemmon, adjunct senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and author

When I applied to business school, I came across this question in the application: "Are your parents graduates of the Harvard Business School?"

I proudly checked "no." Naively, I thought it counted against you if you answered "yes." After all, why would the nation's best universities want to serve as finishing schools for the elite rather than launching pads for the determined?

Children whose parents are in the top 1 percent are 77 times more likely to attend an Ivy League college than those whose parents are in the bottom income quintile.

And why would the children of alumni require any boost in the first place? Why would they need anyone to cup their hands together as a step stool to launch them over the class barricade and into the Ivy League if they were born into it?

On the undergraduate side, around 15 percent of Harvard's Class of 2022 are so-called legacy students, according to The Harvard Crimson. The Wall Street Journal reported in 2018 that selective universities often accept legacies at double the rate of the overall applicant pool, while at Princeton University they're admitted roughly four times more often.

What I saw up close once I enrolled at Harvard Business School my first private school experience since local Montessori preschool was that those students given a lift by their legacy status didn't have more intelligence or ingenuity or resilience than those like me who came from homes without any college degrees. They simply had more access.

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The irony is that one great benefit of an Ivy League education is, also, access. Admission to Harvard Business School or any of its peers is the equivalent of Willy Wonka's golden ticket. Those who work hard and emerge from the gates of elite colleges and graduate schools go on to elite companies and elite government positions a reality illuminated once again by data recently obtained from the State Department.

We all are worse off if these gates open only a crack to people who don't already come from the economic and social high ground. Those who care about building structures and institutions of power that reflect and respond to all of America not only gated-community America could start by giving less of a leg up to those already enjoying the benefits of access.

Many of the Ivy Leaguers around me intuitively knew what I initially didn't, coming from a land of union-belonging single moms working two jobs: that graduating from an Ivy League institution communicated to others what those with less privilege don't always know how to translate. It said that you were smart enough to get into the elite institution, that you belonged to high-status networks from which talent was selected for prime posts and that you thus merited their assistance in finding opportunities.

So it is in the State Department, as Nahal Toosi's reporting in Politico shows. "Foreign Service employees with degrees from Ivy League schools have significantly better odds of earning a promotion early in their careers than colleagues who lack such credentials," Toosi writes. "At one point in the department's career hierarchy, their odds are more than 20 percent higher."

The media are similar to the State Department in embracing Ivy League grads. As FiveThirtyEight put it, "There's no definitive data on where reporters went to school, but the newsrooms of influential media outlets in New York and Washington, D.C., are full of graduates from Ivy League or similarly selective colleges." The writer, Ben Casselman, had enough self-awareness to note that his outlet was "just as bad" as everywhere else: "The vast majority of our editorial staff, including me, went to elite, selective colleges. (I went to Columbia.)"

And then there is corporate America. In its top ranks, Ivy League representation remains well above its proportion of the population. Richard Zweigenhaft of Guilford College found that in 2011, although far less than 1 percent of Americans had ever earned undergraduate or postgraduate degrees from Harvard, 14.1 percent of those who sat on Fortune 500 boards of directors had.

It's no surprise that the Ivy League finds itself heavily populated by America's 1 percent. This is changing, as Yale University pointed out in February, but only slowly. According to a 2017 National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, children whose parents are in the top 1 percent are 77 times more likely to attend an Ivy League college than those whose parents are in the bottom income quintile.

This reality leads us to a closed system in which the few have the most. And this deprives the places that matter, that shape the country, its economy and its stories, of depth of experience. It shortchanges the nation of leaders who have seen want and known adversity and understand what it's like to fight and fight and fight for a shot. It seeds unfairness and entrenches a status quo, and it leaves us all poorer.

Let me be clear: There is nothing wrong with wealth. Quite the contrary. A shot at wealth is what every single mom working two jobs wants for her children. What is wrong is a playing field that is tilted away from those trying to teach their children that merit matters most and that access to opportunity is shared equally and depends entirely on hard work.

It shortchanges the nation of leaders who have seen want and known adversity and understand what it's like to fight and fight and fight for a shot.

Where I grew up, on the wrong side of the Washington, D.C., suburban class divide, earning your spot mattered it is what our mothers burned into us. Get up, go to work, do your best, do it again the next day. "Life is hard," my mother told me if I complained about getting up at 6:30 a.m. and being the first one dropped off at day care so she could get to work at the telephone company on time. In the evening, she sold Tupperware. "On a scale of major world tragedies, yours is not a three."

It matters that institutions that share America's story represent and reflect America's citizenry. And not just in the State Department, but across the government, the private sector and the media. We are stronger as a country when we draw upon those from all different experiences to drive us to the best outcome and the most creative solutions.

Access to opportunity matters. And it is in our shared interest to spread not hoard it. "Legacy" is not a synonym for "merit." And no one who comes from a family steeped in the Ivy League needs a helping hand when they were already born with a winning one.

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon is an adjunct senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. She is the author ofNew York Timesbestsellers "The Dressmaker of Khair Khana" and "Ashleys War: The Untold Story of a Team ofWomen Soldiers on the Special Ops Battlefield."

Continued here:
Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: Protests on race and injustice should make us look at how the Ivy League enables inequality - NBC News

2020 has proven to be a game-changing year, where the voices of our youth globally and locally have become louder. The status quo is being challenged and we, Trace, a youth-focused brand are all for it!

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Under the new brand mission, we challenged ourselves to build an ecosystem that empowers youth in everything that we do. Through core values of authenticity, innovation, diversity and of course empowerment, we have been able to provide a voice for youth not only in South Africa but around the globe through employment opportunities, content, music and film.

In film, we partnered with the Gauteng Film Commission to create the Trace x GFC Filmmaker competition, an opportunity for young creative filmmakers to win funding towards their documentary of choice that would educate and inspire. We also launched Your Voice, a new social TV show, that gives youth a mic to express themselves and see themselves on Trace TV channels.

We are also currently working with several governments, academic institutions, businesses and celebrities to create the Trace Academia platform. Through the platform we aim to help educate and entertain at the same time, Africas missing middle, those who cannot afford to go further than grade 10 due to socio-economic challenges.

Trace will continue providing the best Afro-urban music and entertainment but we will do it differently. We will embed our empowerment purpose in our existing media and activities and we will launch empowerment platforms and programmes, using the power of afro urban entertainment, to provide engaging vocational training, entrepreneurship, soft skills and wellbeing tools so that all our people can get real jobs and have a better life.

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#YouthMonth: Encouraging our youth to stand up and shine - Bizcommunity.com

Type Fives are known as the Investigators of the Enneagram. Inquisitive, objective, and analytical, Fives are private, intellectual types who love learning and acquiring new knowledge. Because they are mentally focused and can live in their head, it can take Fives a longer time to process emotions and express intimacy, which can come off as detached.

In a Five-One partnership, the Fives find value in the Ones' independence, curiosity, and similar mutual interests. Likewise, the Ones appreciate Fives' lack of judgment and steadiness which gives them comfort. The partnership can build a strong foundation of dependability and trust.

In a Five-Two partnership, this is a true meeting of opposites. The Fives' objectivity and strong boundaries are attractive to porous Twos, who have trouble stating boundaries. The independent Fives crave alone time and don't always want the Twos to overextend and help, which pushes Twos to take care of themselves. In return, the people-oriented Two can add cozy domesticity and a bustling life into the dynamic.

Read more:
Here Are The Enneagram Types That Pair Best Together In Relationships - mindbodygreen.com