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33 Creative Halloween Costumes For Pregnant Women

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Pregnancy generally limits your day-to-day wardrobe options. But being pregnant during Halloween presents a great opportunity to get extra creative with your costume.


Here are 33 imaginative, funny and downright quirky Halloween costumes for expectant moms.



See more Halloween costumes ideas for babiescouples, women and more. 


Have a costume you want to share? Send a photo to HPPHalloween@huffingtonpost.com and you may be in an upcoming feature. 


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6 Things You Didn't Know About 'The Giving Tree' Author Shel Silverstein

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“I’ll tell you the story of Jimmy Jet -- and you know what I tell you is true. He loved to watch his TV set, almost as much as you.”


So begins one of Shel Silverstein’s classic children’s poems -- a macabre, Kafkaesque parable in which a kid morphs, slowly, into the object of his affection. It can be interpreted as a word of warning against technology addiction, or, simply, as an amusing ditty.


The author of Where the Sidewalk Ends and other such dark, silly collections is a polarizing figure in the world of kids’ books. While children devour his gritty, playful scenes, adults are more likely to find books such as The Giving Tree as grim, inappropriate representations of parenthood. Silverstein’s tenure at Playboy plus his reputation as a playboy himself only further justify the decriers’ concerns.


Love him or hate him, he’s been a major influence on so many American children, and he would’ve been 84 years old on Friday, Sept. 25. You might know a little about his influence on Johnny Cash, or his seedier, wild days in the Playboy mansion. But did you know he spent years selling hot dogs in a baseball stadium? To celebrate Shel Silverstein, we dug up some lesser-known facts about the controversial, but mostly beloved, writer and cartoonist.



One of his cartoons was used in psychological tests to gauge optimism.


At one point, it was his most famous work. In the comic, two prisoners are shackled to a wall, with a barred ceiling high above them. There’s clearly no way out, yet one of them says, “Now here’s my plan ... ”


In a 1961 interview, he’s asked about the comic, which the interviewer notes has been used in psychological tests, and by Alcoholics Anonymous to describe courage. Silverstein’s response to the myriad interpretations of his work is perfect: “You do something, you make it simple, and everybody else starts loading it up with deep meanings. Which is okay with me, if they want to do that. Everybody loves Rorshach tests.” So, he’d likely be amused, at most, by the polarizing reactions to The Giving Tree that’ve resurfaced in recent years.


He worked as a hot dog salesman in a baseball stadium for five years.


In the aforementioned interview, the interviewer asks Shel what he learned from his experience working in the Chicago Cubs and White Sox stadiums. He quipped: “I learned they like mustard. And they like a hot bun. Did you know that? If you steam the bun first, they’ll really like it.”


He actively hated happy endings.


Perhaps best known today for his morally ambiguous children’s book The Giving Tree, in which a boy repeatedly asks for more from the tree, and the tree happily relents, it’s no mystery that Silverstein wasn’t a fan of cut-and-dry conclusions. But in an interview with The New York Times, he made his viewpoint even clearer, publicly denouncing happy endings, saying they “create an alienation.” He said, “The child asks why I don't have this happiness thing you're telling me about, and comes to think when his joy stops that he has failed, that it won't come back.”


Of The Giving Tree, he said, “It’s just a relationship between two people; one gives and the other takes.”



He wrote songs performed by Willie Nelson and other big-time folk artists.


You might already be aware of the awesome trivia tidbit: that Silverstein collaborated with Jonny Cash on the writing of his goofy song, “A Boy Named Sue.” But the poet/cartoonist/songwriter’s contributions to folk went beyond that. He won a Grammy and was nominated for an Oscar for his musical efforts. His ditties were performed by Loretta Lynn, Meryl Streep, and, yes, Willie Nelson.


He spoke Japanese.


Or, at least enough to amuse himself, according to the playwright David Mamet, who wrote the author’s obituary in The Paris Review. Mamet describes Silverstein as an autodidact, fascinated with knowledge for knowledge’s sake. 


Silverstein picked up the language while serving with the U.S. military in 1950. He got a gig for Stars and Stripes, the American military magazine for which he drew sketches of soldiers, telling their stories.


He never owned a car, and lived, for a long time, on a house boat.


Silverstein might’ve traveled the world, but, resistant as he was to practical decision-making, he never owned a car. It’s not that he couldn’t afford it -- he grew up penniless, sure, but his association with Hugh Hefner and Playboy, and, later, his wildly popular books, made him a millionaire. So, his aversion to automobile ownership likely had more to do with his aversion to ownership in general.


His close friend Mamet wrote for The Paris Review: “He lived alone in various houses, and moved from one to the next in response to no discernible stimulus. I assumed that, at some point, he felt it was just ‘time to move.’” 


One such home was a houseboat, docked in Sausalito, California. “But,” he said in an interview with Publisher’s Weekly, “I'm free to leave ... go wherever I please, do whatever I want; I believe everyone should live like that. Don't be dependent on anyone else -- man, woman, child or dog. I want to go everywhere, look at and listen to everything. You can go crazy with some of the wonderful stuff there is in life.”


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Happy Birthday Mark Rothko! BTW What Do Your Paintings Mean?

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On a day like today, 112 years ago, a little baby boy named Markus Yakovlevich Rotkovich was brought into the world. That little Rotkovich would go on to drop a few extra syllables in his name and become one of the most beloved artists of all time. 


Mark Rothko is known, of course, for his majestic color field paintings, made from intense and restless swaths of color that hover above the frame. The squares of pigment, lacking depth, shadow, fully formed contours, and other distinguishing features, loom instead like a mirage. The shapes bleed and breathe, evoking feelings, memories and sometimes spiritual possession. Through particular combinations of electric oranges and frazzled violets, swamp-heavy greens and weightless whites, Rothko attempted to visualize the infinite. The eternal. His works do not depict an image; they convey the imperceptible.


But, what if they didn't? What if we got Rothko all wrong? What if his paintings were not attempts to lure the viewer into a hallucinatory union with the impenetrable beyond, but, just, abstract renderings of everyday people, places and things? In honor of the late abstract artist's day of birth, we're imagining some possible alternate readings of Rothko's greatest hits.


In an alternate reality, Rothko's artist statements may look something like these. Don't take it personally, Rothko. We love you. Happy birthday and thank you for your work.  



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9 New York Tattoo Artists Work Their Magic On Some Rather Unusual Canvases

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New York City is home to many of the best tattoo artists in the world. Also, many of the weirdest. Case in point: A select group of them recently agreed to ink up a disembodied pig head for the sake of art. 


Brooklyn-based photographer Peter Garritano wanted to capture the vibrant spirit of the NYC tattoo scene in a way no one else had. So, he visited The Meat Hook, a Brooklyn-based butcher shop, and got himself some rather unusual canvases.


"Pig skin is similar to human skin," he explained to The Huffington Post. "It's easily tattooed and sometimes used by tattoo artists in training, but I'd never seen work done on heads before so I was curious to see what the artists would do." 



For all the animal activists out there, Garritano specified that his butcher of choice works "directly with local family farms so these were some happy, health hogs." Garritano then scoured the city for some of the best tattoo talent in the game, culling artists from a variety of styles and backgrounds, both traditional and contemporary. As word of his impending project spread, he had many interested artists offering to take part.


"There was definitely a bit of squeamishness at first but tattoo culture tends to intersect with the world of oddities and the bizarre so it wasn't too hard to find people who were up for tattooing a disembodied head," he added. "No one I spoke with had ever done something like this before so there was some intrigue in the novelty of it too."


The resulting images operate as still-lifes, featuring rose-colored pig heads, carefully adorned with skulls, daggers, hearts, geometric illusions and one tat reading "Hog Heaven." The celebration of tattoo culture, in all its creativity and strangeness, captures the rebellious energy of an artistic tradition that's evolving rapidly. We wouldn't, however, recommend showing this one to your parents. 


See the nine artists and their pig-centric works below. 



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12 Baby Names Inspired By The Hottest New TV Characters

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Nameberry

Fall is here, and the TV debut season is in full swing. Out of the many interesting character names on these shows, are there any that will break out as baby names the way Khaleesi, Arya and Daenerys did in "Game of Thrones"? Here are some that might have a chance -- if, of course, their shows catch on.


Agatha



Granted, this character name in "Minority Report" is not new or flashy, but it does beg the question of whether an attractive contemporary actress -- in this case Laura Regan -- can rejuvenate the image of a fusty name, which has been out of the Top 1000 since 1940.


Dazzle


It’s not often that a non-Disney animated character name catches on, but the new "Moonbeam City" has some doozies. This parody of '80s cop shows features the voices of Rob Lowe as Dazzle Novak, Elizabeth Banks as Pizzaz Miller, Kate Mara as Chrysalis Tate and Will Forte as Rad Cunningham. Too much?


Diver



The LA-based true crime procedural drama, "Wicked City" has conventional character names -- except for this one. Evan Ross plays crime scene paparazzo Diver Hakes, and I can see this as a new occupational name possibility.


Jessamy


The Bastard Executioner, from the creators of Sons of Anarchy, is the kind of action-packed, swashbuckling historical drama that is also usually packed with some fascinating names, including our favorite, Jessamy. But there’s also main hero Wilkin, plus Milus, Calo, Toran, Ash, Annora and Petra.


Kara



Supergirl is the first female superhero since Wonder Woman in 1975, and so Kara Zor-El, a cousin of Superman, has a lot of strong role-model potential resting on her toned shoulders. Kara, also a Valkyrie in Norse mythology, was a Top 100 name in the mid-'80s, but now has fallen to 442. Can this power heroine bring it back?


Leofric


"The Last Kingdom" is a new testosterone-heavy historical BBC series set in the 9th century. The characters have a mix of Saxon, Norse and invented names, such as Ravn, Beocca, Alferic, Guthrum, Ragnar, Halig, Ubba, Storri and Beocca (male), and Brida and Thyra (female). Some Leo-loving namer might pick up on the novel Leofric.


Lowry, "Love"



I couldn’t resist a separate listing for this "The Bastard Executioner" name, as it looks to be one of the most promising. Worn in the show by Baroness Lowry Aberffraw Ventris, known as “Love,” Lowry is a Welsh surname more often used for males, but here with a decidedly feminine nickname.


Nimah


"Quantico," about young FBI recruits training at the Quantico, Virginia base, features a multi-cultural cast and some multi-cultural names, including the sweet Arabic Nimah, which means "blessing," and can also be spelled without the final "h."


Pippy



"Rosewood" is a new medical series set in Florida, starring Morris Chestnut as Dr. Beaumont Rosewood, Jr., who has a sister named Pippy. Could Pippy take Poppy and Pippa one step further?


Veil


"Into the Badlands" is a martial arts series based on a classic Chinese tale, complete with feudal barons and great warriors -- and some extraordinary names, including a male named Bale, a beguiling beauty named Veil and a female Zypher. I can see these names attracting fans -- if the series does.


Wolfgang



The name of the hero of Canadian spy thriller "The Romeo Section" has gone from long-haired German composer to scary animal name and now to spymaster character Professor Wolfgang McGee. Wolfgang is now Number 508 on Nameberry.


Zayday 


"Scream Queens," a campy horror show set in a college campus sorority house, which managed to snag the original "scream queen," Jaime Lee Curtis,’ also has a fantastic mix of names. Emma Roberts as Chanel, Keke Palmer as Zayday, Lea Michele as Hester (see Agatha, above), and Tavi Gevinson as Feather.


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Majestic Photos Show What It's Like To Sit At The Edge Of The World

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How far do you have to travel to feel like you're sitting on the edge of the world?


We asked EyeEm's community of photographers to capture the epic nature of locations so remote and so vast that they can make explorers feel like they've reached, as author and poet Shel Silverstein wrote, the place where the sidewalk ends.  


The eerie yet beautiful photos are taken from atop mountains, in the middle of deserts and at the shore of the sea. The photographs are so spectacular because they capture the quiet tranquility of nearly empty places, and make us want to step outside to take a deep breath of fresh air. Scroll through the images below to find out what it looks like to stand at the edge of the world. 



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These Anti-Catcalling Illustrations Pack A Feminist Latina Punch

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After dealing with catcalling, illustrator Debi Hasky turned her frustration with street harassment into art.


Inspired by the whistles she heard and comments she received while living in Panama, Hasky created a series of illustrations titled "Call Out Cat Calls." The 24-year-old, who was born and raised in Miami, Florida, aims to spread awareness through her work of the unwanted attention many women receive while walking down the street.


"With this series, I hope to provoke a conversation, especially in Latin America where catcalling is still a very present issue," she told The Huffington Post in an email. 



Hasky spoke to other women in Panama about their experiences with catcalling and felt so connected to the Spanish language while living there that she started the series in Spanish. Now, she is developing designs using English. She told HuffPost that her empowering drawings have sparked some negative commentary from "anti-feminists" and has seen the word "feminazi" pop up in responses. That doesn’t overshadow the positive feedback she’s received though, especially from her family.


"I have received an overwhelmingly positive response from my family and Latinas everywhere," she said. "My family is Panamanian and I grew up surrounded by strong, independent women who have always encouraged me in any venture I have pursued." 


Aside from the support she's received, her experience with catcalling had another surprisingly positive side effect. On the day she was harassed and called a "mamacita" on the streets of Panama, Hasky had been trying to come up with an idea so she could enter a scholarship contest for the Istituto Europeo di Design (IED). The catcalling experience sparked the idea behind "Call Out Cat Calls," and she submitted three illustrations for the contest which embodied the theme "Design for a Better World." She is now living in Barcelona, Spain studying graphic design at IED, thanks to the scholarship she earned.



Hasky is proud of the conversation her illustrations have started so far and hopes the dialogue surrounding catcalling continues. She also hopes they encourage people to take a stand and express what they're feeling.


"As a whole, I hope my illustrations inspire people to embrace their unique qualities, giving them the courage to express their emotions," she said. "Know that your feelings are valid. You are not alone."


See more of Hasky's illustrations below and head over to her site for more of her work.






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104-Year-Old 'Yarn Bomber' Spreads Her 'Graffiti' All Over Town

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When you think of grandmas knitting -- you might think of them making sweaters for their little grandchildren or blankets to put in cribs. But this 104-year-old great-grandma is part of a group using their knitting and crocheting talents to brighten up an entire community.


Grace Brett is part of a group of "yarn stormers" who are taking to the streets to showcase their craft. As part of a week-long arts festival in Scotland, Brett and the Souter Stormers knitted and crocheted dozens of pieces to display across three cities. Among the pieces were a bench covering, a cover for a classic British red phone booth and various other hanging ornaments -- all of which spruced up the city with colorful yarn. 


"I liked seeing my work showing with everyone else's and thought the town looked lovely," Brett told SWNS. "I thought it was a really good idea to decorate the town and enjoyed having my crochet included."


Brett reportedly learned crochet and knitting as a teenager and has enjoyed it ever since -- often making bedspreads for her children and grandchildren. 


Other knitting-enthusiasts have also used their craft for a good cause. Earlier this year we wrote about Australia's oldest man, who at 109 spends his time knitting tiny sweaters for little penguins who have been exposed to oil spills. 


Check out the amazing photos of the Scottish "yarn-bombing" below:



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The Myth Of Busyness

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In chapter five of“Through the Looking-Glass,” Alice finds herself in a dark shop, where she tries to purchase an egg. “I never put things into people’s hands — that would never do — you must get it for yourself,” the shopkeeper tells her. Alice, bewildered, asks herself “why it wouldn’t do?”


The shopkeeper has given her what Craig Lambert, a former long-time editor at Harvard Magazine, would call “shadow work,” the not-quite neologism that serves as the title of his latest book.*(Hover mouse for note.)


Lambert’s idea of shadow work includes any task that isn’t done for its own pleasure and that is in some way “in the service of an institutional master.” For him: 



“Shadow work includes all the unpaid tasks we do on behalf of businesses and organizations. Most of us do not recognize it or realize how much of it we are doing, even as we pump our own gas, scan and bag our own groceries, execute our own stock trades, and assemble our Ikea furniture.”



For Lambert, this shadow work isn’t just “a marginal nuisance snipping spare moments away from the edges of life,” but rather “a fire-breathing dragon, operating 24/7 throughout the industrialized world” that amounts to what he calls “middle-class serfdom.”


“Shadow Work: The Unpaid, Unseen Jobs That Fill Your Day,” published earlier this year, is part of a genre we might call American Busyness Studies; which is to say, it is another attempt to diagnose whatever societal morbidity derailed John Maynard Keynes’ 1928 prediction that by 2028 our wealth and technology would permit us all to work 15-hour weeks and dedicate our lives to leisure. 



... our collective obsession with time pressure is part of a cycle of credulity...



 


Lambert points to diverse examples of time-sucking shadow work foreclosing on genuine leisure time, and in some cases they ring true: At one point, he notes that we’re willingly spending hours handing over data for companies like Facebook to sell, or learning new apps and software intended to make our lives easier. But other, mostly anecdotal examples miss their mark. In his chapter on shadow work in “home and family life,” he addresses the prevalence of parents driving their children to school, writing, “Millions now [log] shadow work as unpaid school-bus drivers. This was hardly the childhood norm for the Baby Boom generation.” But studies that have looked at this find that most parents drive their children to school because it’s actually more convenient, and because fewer families than in past decades live within safe walking distance of schools. Lambert introduces the phenomenon, but doesn’t really explain it. Can parents be burdened by a task that saves them time or stress?*


He offers other examples, such as salad bars where one confects one’s own lunch; but this belies the rapid rise of fast-casual restaurants like Chop’t or Chipotle, where serried rows of minimum-wage workers deliver bespoke meals on demand. He mourns the supposedly thinning ranks of “floor walkers” who once attended to big box store customers’ every need, but one wonders if he has set foot in an Apple store, where the cordial-suspicious salespeople must be batted away like gnats.


Emancipation from toil hasn’t happened, but we also aren't as overwhelmed as Lambert and his ilk would have us believe. Casually humblebragging about how busy we are has become a conversational banality akin to talking about the weather, but our collective obsession with time pressure is part of a cycle of credulity: popular press accounts about widespread busyness lead more people to report that they’re busy, which creates further media coverage of the same. In truth, we’re not as busy as we think, and warnings of off-kilter work-life experience often elide larger political contexts — the public policies, cultural norms and technologies that determine individuals’ control over their own time.



There are certainly people“who will testify that life is flying them by. But, demographically, they seem to be outnumbered,” says John P. Robinson. Robinson, who has studied American temporal experience for decades as the director of the Americans’ Use of Time Project at the University of Maryland, focuses on 24-hour time diary data, which is compiled yearly in the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ American Time Use Survey (ATUS) and includes participants from across the socioeconomic spectrum recording specific activities in real time. According to the ATUS, Americans above the age of 15 spent just as many average hours per day on leisure and sports in 2014 as they did in 2004, and in each year in between. The same is also true for average hours spent working on workdays. And other researchers looking back even further, to 1965, have found that we generally work less and have more leisure time than previous generations.


Robinson points to a slight uptick in sleep and television time and says that you simply “can’t look at the ATUS data and find support for the idea that we're becoming a more frantic society.” In a 2012 paper for Social Indicators Research he wrote that, “Counter to the popular societal consensus on an increasingly time-pressured society ... reports of feelings of being ‘always rushed’ declined by 6-9 points from those reported in 2004 … both among employed and unemployed respondents.”*


These are averages, so certain groups can tug on the larger trend lines, while others may be missed altogether. Depending on the state of the economy, an uptick in leisure might be driven to a larger degree by unemployment; and the sampling probably barely accounts for the vanishingly small one percent that controls more than a third of total wealth. The ATUS also doesn’t factor in “other activities done simultaneously.” That means it misses multitasking, which can amplify the feeling of being frazzled; but it also means it leaves out leisure activities conducted during work hours. A yearly Salary.com survey found that, “Workers are wasting more time than ever in 2014,” with just under two-thirds of respondents admitting to spending 30 minutes to an hour on non-work activities every day (much of it on Facebook).



Emancipation from toil hasn’t happened, but we also aren't as overwhelmed as many would have us believe.



 


Beyond quantifying the relative volumes of work and leisure, social scientists also analyze the quality of time spent, rendering a measure of subjective quality of life in addition to objective temporal expenditure. Toward this end, in 2010 the ATUS began soliciting 24-hour time diary records of respondents’ feelings about specific activities that fill their days.


One finding seems to indicate widespread boredom. In a study Robinson published in the journal Psychology in 2014, he found below-average enjoyment ratings for the two central-most activities in American leisure and productive life: television and one’s day job, respectively. TV viewing, he notes, “consumes almost half of peoples’ free time,” yet has the same enjoyment score as email and commuting, and it clocks in only slightly above the enjoyment rating people give their job.




This is a startling possibility; if further studies bear it out, it will help explain our predilection to feel harried. If people aren’t even enjoying the “life” side of the work-life divide, then it’s predictable that they’ll think they’re busier than they are.*


Some people have more command over their free time than others. Looking at the period between 1965 and 2003, researchers for the Institute of the Study of Labor found that as leisure time for less-educated people has increased, its quality has diminished. This is especially true for women in dual-income households who while doing less housework than in decades past still contribute more than their male counterparts. To explain this, the authors point to increased “leisure fragmentation … the extent to which leisure events are interrupted by other activities,” and speculate that higher educated and wealthier individuals are better equipped to “time their leisure so as to make it less fragmented, and to coordinate it with others’ leisure, even if in exchange for a lower quantity of leisure.”


All of these findings point to a vast diversity in the American experience of work and leisure, which largely depends on one’s wealth, education, job security and employment status. Ultimately, there is no simple explanation for the modern time pressure paradox because for many people it doesn’t exist. For others, it surely does, but it manifests in different ways and for very different reasons. The American Psychological Association’s annual “Stress in America” report helps to limn these categories, while bolstering Robinson’s own assessment. In the latest release this past February, it found that, “Overall, Americans seem to be doing fairly well — average stress levels are trending downward,” with predictable exceptions: “… parents, younger generations and those living in lower-income households … [who] report higher levels of stress than Americans overall.”


Nick Hanauer and David Rolf, in a recent essay in Democracy Journal, describe a woman they call Zoe who is one of those exceptions. Zoe juggles low-wage part-time jobs and moonlights in the “gig economy” as an Uber X driver but still struggles to keep up financially. She feels busy — indeed, stressed to the point of despair — in a fundamentally different way than a sales executive in Manhattan who must rush every day to pick up his children from private daycare while also keeping up on his Twitter feed. As Hanauer and Rolf warn, “a nation full of Zoes is a nation full of people who simply do not have the time or energy to help their children with their homework, to be good neighbors, or to participate in the civic life of their communities.” 



Zoe’s situation is a far cry from the 15-hour workweek Keynes predicted, but it isn’t a mystery. As Hanauer and Rolf note, her situation has obvious policy dimensions and could be improved by public programs, such as social safety nets and initiatives that create opportunities for further education and skills training, and stronger corporate and labor market regulation. Reversing her plight, and that of millions like her, is a matter of democratic will, not means. Popular busyness theses usually acknowledge this political reality but prefer to associate themselves with the “lifestyle” publishing genre. They avoid politics in search of some larger, elusive truth to succor the navel-gazing curiosity of the higher-income professional class they’re targeting — people with economic security who say they feel overwhelmed all the same.


Busyness proselytizers suggest that Thorstein Veblen’s fin de siècle theory of “conspicuous consumption,” whereby the moneyed class establishes its status through ostentatious spending, has reversed itself: that prestige now derives from public displays of personal industriousness, not empty extravagance. Meanwhile, as Staffan Linder pointed out in 1970, when wealthy people pursue leisure and consumptive activities, they must expend their valuable time in addition to their money, resulting in a tyranny of choice that can add more angst than pleasure. And as today’s critics argue, our devices assail our attention and hold our leisure time hostage such that technological innovation meant to empower us imprisons us instead.


Some theorists have begun to push back on that last, most common postulation. “The stereotype that everyone has busy lives,” writes Judy Wajcman in “Pressed for Time,” belies the fact that teenagers manically texting back and forth never seem to complain about the data deluge. Attributing our exaggerated sense of time pressure to technology is, as Wajcman told a London School of Economics audience last year, a form of determinism that pardons our politics and culture, the “prerogatives and parameters we as a society set.” When we ascribe acceleration in our pace of life to the technologies we use, we abnegate our own roles in engaging with those technologies. 


For example, a common complaint is that mobile phones have allowed work life to colonize the home. But this excuses the companies and individuals who make the conscious decision to exploit the accessibility phones provide. Meanwhile, as Wajcman found in her own study on the intermingling of domestic and work life, most mobile phone use at work is for domestic purposes, such as coordinating child care or leisure activities. In this way, phones are used to actually save time and alleviate stress. Technology’s effect on our sense of temporal experience, it seems, is more complex and dialectical than the Jeremiahs of an overwhelming pace of life are willing to allow.


Industrial society has always grappled with these conundrums. As Wajcman points out, “A sense of acceleration has … accompanied the path of Western modernity since its origins”; and technology has always “played a key role” while also always running into a wall. Oscar Wilde acknowledged this in “The Soul of Man Under Socialism,” in 1891, when he observed that, “Up to the present, man has been, to a certain extent, the slave of machinery, and there is something tragic in the fact that as soon as man had invented a machine to do his work he began to starve.” Wilde, neglecting to mention that plenty of people starved before the Industrial Revolution, nevertheless envisioned a world that had overcome the paradox of progress — a world where all undesirable work “should be done by a machine,” where “The State is to be a voluntary association” and where the individual “is to make what is beautiful.”


In Wilde’s imagined future private property had been abolished. He knew that his vision, and that of socialists generally, was utopian, but he embraced it as such. For him, “Progress is the realization of Utopias.” More importantly, he knew that the goal of an equitable leisure society was a political project more than a technological one. He was prescient in this regard. Just a few decades later, the Bolsheviks’ frustrated attempt to appropriate capitalist technologies and systems of production for their own socialist purposes demonstrated, in practice, the perils of trusting technocratic means to achieve political ends.* Irrespective of material innovation, change in how individuals think about society, its defining institutions and their place in it, must precede change in society itself. There is no hack to accelerate the process.



Busyness treatises succor the navel-gazing curiosity of the higher-income professional class they’re targeting...



 


A deeper awareness of what drives social and political change does not encumber today’s exponents of technological innovation, who trust American capitalism’s dynamism to more than make up for its damages.


Perhaps a rethink is in order. Nicholas Agar’s “The Sceptical Optimist,” published this month, exposes the folly of what he calls “radical optimism” and any claim that “accelerating technological progress can significantly enhance well-being.” According to Agar, there is a psychological process endemic to how technological innovation affects human society and its individual members’ feelings about their quality of life. It’s a process Sisyphus would know all too well. What if, in our supposed race against time, technology’s role is essentially moot?


As Agar explains, a phenomenon known as hedonic adaptation leads us to quickly grow accustomed to new technologies, thus discounting what marginal pleasure or utility they initially provide. When you purchase the new Apple Watch you may feel happier for a week, a month, maybe longer, but eventually that feeling subsides; your sense of subjective well-being in fact returns more or less to the “hedonic baseline” it was at when your wrists were unadorned (fortunately, the same thing happens following negative events in our lives: we tend to bounce back).


And as Agar points out, this process operates at a generational level as well. Through what he calls hedonic normalization, a society’s sense of revolution after a major new technology appears stops with the generation born immediately thereafter. Young people raised with the new technology take it for granted just as we take air conditioning and washing machines for granted today. Consider that, thanks to the fruits of modernity, most of us live longer and more comfortably than a patrician under the Antonine Dynasty or a bourgeoisie in 19th Century France. And yet there is no reason to think that Roman or that Frenchman is any more or less happy than someone of similar socioeconomic standing in the 21st Century United States.


Material advancement as Agar describes it — with its baked-in tendency to disappoint — has a clear dark side. For society at large, it can divert focus and resources from other goals, including “enhancing social justice, equalizing educational opportunities, reducing unemployment, and many more.” And for individuals, it may help explain why we say we feel ever busier even when we aren’t. We as a culture make increasingly ambitious promises to ourselves that beleaguer our psyches and erode our hopes when things don’t pan out as expected.


Asked about this, Agar wrote back that, because of hedonic adaptation,



“We end up with some of the downsides of new technologies (e.g. finding ourselves helpless and clueless when they don’t work properly) but few of the expected upsides. This could be a special problem when a new convenience technology displaces activities from which we derive robust enjoyment. I’m thinking of activities like cooking. We feel that we don’t have time to cook an evening meal — along comes a cool labor saving gadget. Hedonic adaptation swiftly erodes any enjoyment associated with using it, but it’s too late (we’re too busy) to reinstate cooking with all of its time-consuming chopping, heating, and stirring.”



This is a variation of that age-old question: Is it better to have cooked and lost, or to have never cooked at all? 



Since Keynes, and Wilde before him, Western life has seen broad economic, political, social and material transformations. But when we reach each new Utopia we’re neither closer nor further from a true life of leisure. Rather than offload work, we choose equilibrium, absorbing our gains so as to take on more. This tendency toward speed, efficiency and convenience is imbued into almost every policy decision and every invention. Agar and Wajcman recommend that we start going about it another way. We shouldn’t shun developments that enhance our sense of well-being, as Lambert often does in his hunt for shadow work, but we also shouldn’t prioritize material progress over hardscrabble politics. Only the latter can ensure social justice, economic security and “temporal sovereignty” for all.


If we ever want to reach a workless society — or at least one where we work less — it won’t do to rely on dispassionate historical or technological forces to bring it about. Instead, we’ll have to get it for ourselves.


___________________________________________________________


Stuart Whatley (@StuartWhatley) is Executive Blog Editor at the Huffington Post.


Top illustration by Jason St. Angelo (@jaysaintNY).

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These #PopeDogs Are Sinfully Adorable

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Humans aren't the only ones completely psyched about Pope Francis' visit to the U.S.


That's right, these pooches are really amped up about the pope's trip, as well. The paw-ntiff fans are showing their excitement by donning their best Francis-inspired outfits for the occasion. Their humans have been sharing pictures on social media using the hashtag #PopeDog and holy bananas are they adorable. 



A photo posted by Winston (@winsterrier) on



All kinds of dogs from bulldogs to Pomeranians showed their excitement for the pope, looking mighty squee-worthy in their costumes.


We're feeling pretty darn #blessed to be able to witness such cuteness. 



A photo posted by @chm128 on



Check out more #PopeDogs below:



A photo posted by @busterpher on








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Without Skull, Experts Can't Say If Bones Belong To Mona Lisa Model

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Researchers testing bone fragments thought to be from the body of a woman who some contend was the model for the Mona Lisa said Thursday that their findings were inconclusive.


Experts analyzed the remains found at a Florence church grave, but said that without a skull, it is difficult to determine if the findings are those of the model for Leonardo da Vinci's famous portrait, painted sometime between 1503 and 1517 in Italy.  


"Our biggest problem has been the fact that the fragments were very fragmented, very deteriorated," said Giorgio Gruppioni, head of the forensic anthropology laboratory at Bologna University. That complicated the task of determining the sex and age at death as well as DNA analysis, he said. 


Art historians differ on the model's identity. Even if bone testing had determined that the remains were that of Lisa Gherardini, the wife of rich silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo, it wouldn't have answered the intriguing question of who posed for Leonardo.



Researchers told reporters in Florence that carbon-14 testing of one of the fragments indicated the remains were compatible with the period. Gherardini died at age 63 in 1542, and the researchers said historical documents indicate she was buried in a Florence convent.


The pursuit for the identity of the model for the painting is not without its critics.


"I can’t think of any scientific reason to pour so much money and effort into finding the skeleton of a woman who posed for a (famous, admittedly) painting," bioarchaeologist Kristina Killgrove wrote in Forbes.


Nevertheless, head researcher Silvano Vinceti insists that "the odds that the bones belong to her are very high."


In 2013, NBC News reported that Vinceti intended to develop a virtual reconstruction of Lisa Gherardini's face for comparison with the Leonardo interpretation.


The Associated Press contributed to this report.


Also on HuffPost:



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Dad Explains Why He Lets His Daughter Paint His Nails In Sweet Video

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Six-year-old Sadie Bond has been painting her dad Nathan's nails ever since she was a toddler. 


In a sweet video from Upworthy, Nathan gives viewers a glimpse into his nail-painting process and talks about the special way he bonds with his daughter. "When I walk around with them, I look at my nails that she's painted," the dad says. "I think about her, and that's really nice. That's like a way of taking her around with me."


Though Nathan says people sometimes stare and little kids ask questions about his nails, he uses that as an opportunity to spread an important message about gender stereotypes. When children say "That's for girls," the dad simply responds, "No it's not."


"There's no boy color or girl color," adds Sadie in the video.


For Nathan, who lost his wife Elisa to cancer last year, wearing his daughter's nail polish on his fingers and toes is about more than aesthetics. "As a single dad, raising a really strong confident woman is super important for me," he says. "And making sure she's got great role models, but also being a great role model is a primary goal."


If this video is any indication, he's already achieved that goal.


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A White Artist Wrote ‘Black Lives Matter’ 2,000 Times. But His Mural Almost Said ‘All Lives Matter.’

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Artist Renda Writer wrote “Black Lives Matter” about 2,000 times last week on a wall in Detroit, the white text in his handwriting appearing both tiny, streaming over the black background, and huge, shouting its message to anyone who walks by.


Writer, a white painter and poet from Miami, was commissioned by Detroit’s N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art to create the mural. He worked on the piece for about 80 hours and finished earlier this week.


Gallery owner George N’Namdi said he wanted to spark dialogue and pay homage to the Black Lives Matter movement, which formed in response to police shootings of young black men and addresses racial inequality more broadly. But initially, he and the artist discussed incorporating the phrase "Lives Matter" or "All Lives Matter."


Though the obvious meaning of "all lives matter" doesn’t contradict the assertion that black lives matter, some say changing the focus to "all lives" undermines the BLM movement and ignores its message that society doesn’t value black and white lives equally.


"All Lives Matter" has been used to criticize the movement’s tactics, appearing in Twitter fights, political speeches and more destructive scenarios. In July, a mural in Ottawa, Canada dedicated to a black woman who died in police custody was defaced, with the words “All Lives Matter” spray painted over her face. A Maryland church’s Black Lives Matter sign was vandalized twice this summer, with someone cutting out the first word. 


“‘All Lives Matter’ really is a way of co-opting the Black Lives Matter movement,” N’Namdi told The Huffington Post. N’Namdi, who is black, ultimately decided that if Renda Writer included the words “All Lives Matter,” it would take away from the mural’s message.  



“It really dawned on me, we're talking about a movement here, we’re not talking about just a slogan,” N'Namdi continued. “We’re talking about something we’re trying to change, and once you start diluting the movement and making it ‘All Lives Matter’ … What issue is ‘All Lives Matter’ confronting? None.” 


Though Writer and N’Namdi both said they’ve heard mostly positive responses to the new Detroit mural, the artist attempted to squelch any potential “All Lives Matter” backlash when he shared photos of the mural on Facebook. 


“I realize that All Lives Matter. I agree that All Lives Matter,” he wrote. “But simply put, that is not the topic of this mural.” 



In his other work, Writer scrawls original aphorisms thousands of times, like, “Love is a risk. Do it anyway.” He told HuffPost most of his work is about “love and positivity” and that while the new mural may bring some controversy, he sees it in the same vein.


“I think 'Black Lives Matter’ is a message of love,” he said. “This particular race needs a little more attention, a little more love.”



Also on HuffPost:


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These Instagram Accounts Are Documenting The Refugee Crisis

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As thousands of refugees and migrants have made their way to Europe in search of safety and better lives, photographers have gone to incredible lengths to document the harrowing journey across the continent.


Many photojournalists and reporters have shared images daily, making sure the world gets a first-hand look at the struggles involved.  


Below is a selection of some of the most powerful accounts to follow and track the refugee crisis on Instagram. 


David Maurice Smith is a documentary photographer based in Sydney. 





Zalmai, was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, and left the country during the Soviet invasion in 1980. He relocated to Lausanne, Switzerland. 



A photo posted by ZALMAÏ (@zalmai) on




A photo posted by ZALMAÏ (@zalmai) on




A video posted by ZALMAÏ (@zalmai) on



 


Freelance photographer Somi Riahi is based in Iran. 



A photo posted by somi riahi (@somiriahi) on




A photo posted by somi riahi (@somiriahi) on




A photo posted by somi riahi (@somiriahi) on



Marko Drobnjakovic is a freelance photographer based out of Belgrade, Serbia. 





Muhammed Muheisen is a chief photographer for Associated Press.






Panos Pictures, a photo agency based in London, has created a feed dedicated to documenting the refugee crisis. 





Ivor Prickett is a photographer working in Greece for UNHCR. 





Liz Sly is the Beirut bureau chief for The Washington Post.



A photo posted by Liz Sly (@lizslywp) on




A photo posted by Liz Sly (@lizslywp) on




A photo posted by Liz Sly (@lizslywp) on



Alexander Marquardt is an ABC News foreign correspondent based in Beirut. 





(H/T Instagram/Outcast Agency)

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You Never Thought You Needed A Mobile Private Island... Until Now

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Why visit a private island when you could design your own... and drive it anywhere you want?


The Migaloo Kokomo Ailand is taking yachting -- and luxury in general -- to a borderline ridiculous new level, with a mobile private island design that rivals even the most elite of tropical beach clubs. 


At a whopping 383 feet long (don't worry; you can customize the length to your liking), Kokomo Ailand features a penthouse hundreds of feet above sea level, a glass-bottom jacuzzi and a jungle deck with waterfall pool and lush hanging gardens. Barbecue on your beach deck complete with a pool, swim-up bar, outdoor movie theater and elevator down to a secret beach club. Stroll on the garden deck, or hit the gym and beauty salon on the spa deck.


The island also features laser shows, a helipad, a dance floor, a "shark feeding elevator" and a private underwater dining saloon.


What. is. going. ON?!



The Migaloo Kokomo Ailand is available for order through Migaloo Submarines, which also makes custom-designed submarines and yachts.


Pricing is determined largely by the customer's desires, said Christian Gumpold, Migaloo's managing director. He says Kokomo is better than a regular island because you can design it yourself. 


"Living on and with the sea will be a future mega trend," Gumpold told The Huffington Post. "The island can be a first step to adapt to this new way of living."


And we're so onboard. But until we can afford an entire island shebang, maybe we'll start with a submarine because why not.




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Your Favorite Celebrities’ Personality Types, In One Helpful Chart

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Are you more of an Albert Einstein or an Angelina Jolie?


Luckily for anyone who has ever wanted to identify their public-figure spirit animal, the good people at Visualy broke down some of the most well-known celebrities' personality types, each one classified on the 16 Meyers-Briggs categories. The results are based on quotes and behaviors each person has exhibited over their careers.


You can tell a lot about a person by their character profile -- and celebrities and public figures are no exception (Stars! They're just like us!). While the science of personality types is slightly dubious, there is some research that suggests that certain behaviors may be neurologically wired. In other words, Kanye West can't help but be an ISFJ anymore than you can.


Check out the famous personality types in the infographic below. You may be more like your favorite icon than you thought.



Famous Personality Types

From Visually.


 


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Broadway Actor's Emotional Facebook Post Defends Mom Of Child With Autism

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A Broadway actor is getting praise for something unusual: Coming to the defense of a disruptive audience member.


During a recent performance of "The King And I," a child with autism started yelling during a quiet moment in the show. 


Actor Kelvin Moon Loh, who is part of the ensemble, wrote on Facebook that some audience members rallied against the child and his mother. Loh said he heard murmurs along the lines of "why would you bring a child like that to the theater?"


It might seem that Loh would wonder the same thing, especially in light of incidents earlier this summer where performers such as Patti LuPone confiscated the phone of a theatergoer who was texting during her show.


However, in a Facebook post that currently has more than 9,000 shares and 25,000 likes, Loh explains that his concern is for the child and his mother, who was trying to calm her son, not his own performance.


"I wanted to scream and stop the show and say- "EVERYONE RELAX. SHE IS TRYING. CAN YOU NOT SEE THAT SHE IS TRYING???!!!!" I will gladly do the entire performance over again. Refund any ticket because-For her to bring her child to the theater is brave. You don't know what her life is like."


 



I am angry and sad. Just got off stage from today's matinee and yes, something happened. Someone brought their...

Posted by Kelvin Moon Loh on Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Loh told Broadway World that he hopes his post "will bring awareness of parents who have children with special needs and the fact that they have the same right to enjoy theater as we get to enjoy it every single day without thought."


 Broadway tickets are expensive, but Loh told the website that going to live theater means being aware that life doesn't stop just because you're seeing a play.


"I understand it's expensive but you have to have compassion for this mother who came to the theater and was wanting the exact same experience as you," Loh told Broadway World. "She wanted to have a wonderful, beautiful experience at the theater. This was an occurrence that she could not have anticipated, and because she couldn't anticipate it, how can we as people who love the theater as well, condemn somebody for that? So that's where my heart is at."


Loh's compassion is getting praise from blogger Jennifer Bittner, mother of a child with autism.


"We don’t willingly put our child in a situation that will overwhelm them or cause a disturbance, but sometimes things happen. And when it does what we need most is compassion from strangers, not judgment," she wrote on BlogHer.com.


In recent months, several Broadway plays have started holding special performances for people with autism, according to Playbill.com.


 



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Watch These Dancers Tell A Breakup Story In A Way Words Can't Convey

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Few breakups are cut and dry: When you're deeply invested in a relationship, there's bound to be some push and pull, with one or both of you clinging to the life you've built together as a couple. 


In a gorgeous, new contemporary dance interpretation of James Bay's "Let It Go," dancers Chaz Buzan and Courtney Schwartz perfectly capture that experience. The routine was choreographed by Talia Favia, who's best known for her work on the reality show “So You Think You Can Dance."


In an interview with The Huffington Post, Favia said she pulled on her personal breakup history to interpret the song.


"I wanted to show people all the emotions you feel when you're about to end something that was once very special: sadness, anger, confusion, doubt and finally, relief," she said.


The fact that Buzan, a principal lead dancer for Madonna, is also Favia's boyfriend added another complicated, emotional layer to the whole experience.


"There were moments where I was thinking, 'What if I were to lose him? What if this were to happen to us?'" she said. "I definitely pulled from that a lot during the creation process," she said. 


Watch the heartwrenching video -- which was released by YouTube dance network DanceOn and directed by Tim Milgram -- above. 


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Mom Challenges Disturbing Costume Trend In Open Letter To Party City

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When mom Lin Kramer visited Party City's website to look for a Halloween costume for her 3-year-old daughter, she was very disappointed by what she found.


The "Toddler Costumes" section revealed a discrepancy between the offerings designated for boys and those for girls -- particularly in the category of career-related costumes. While there was a wide selection of empowering costumes marketed for boys, girls were left with sexualized and diminutive versions of these costumes and significantly fewer career-based options.


Unwilling to simply shop in the "boys" section or silently taking her business elsewhere, Kramer wrote an open letter to Party City.




"Please, Party City, open up your view of the world and redesign your marketing scheme to let kids be kids, without imposing on them antiquated views of gender roles," Kramer wrote in her letter, which she posted on her personal Facebook page and Party City's page on Sept. 14.


In her letter, the mom breaks down some of the differences between the "girl" and "boy" versions of certain costumes -- from the way they're labeled ("precious pirate" versus "rascal pirate") to the online descriptions ("cute cop" and "sassy and sweet" versus "realistic scaled-down police shirt" and "this protector of the peace has it all under control!") to the outfit designs themselves.


"When you look around at the police officers in your city or neighborhood, the uniforms they wear are probably substantially similar to the costumes you have elected to offer for boys," Kramer says. "However, the same cannot be said of the costume you market to girls. Generally speaking, real life uniformed female police officers do not wear short skirts and low cut shirts, but instead wear exactly the same slacks and shirts as their male counterparts."


She continues:



"While Halloween costumes are undoubtedly about 'make-believe,' it is unfathomable that toddler girls and boys who might be interested in dressing up as police officers are seeking to imagine themselves in the incongruent way your business apparently imagines them. Toddler girls are not imagining and hoping that they will grow up to become a "sexy cop" -- which is clearly what your girl costume suggests; rather, young girls, just as young boys, see and admire their family members and neighbors offering service to their communities and delight in the idea of doing the same. I am absolutely appalled that your business reinterprets girls' innocent and well-intentioned dreams into this costume."




Kramer also points out that of the 53 costume options recommended for boys, 16 relate to occupations, whereas only three of the 45 recommended girl costumes are career-related. Still, the mom adds, it may have been generous to include "cowgirl" in the three given that "she is clearly not appropriately dressed to be employed on any sort of working ranch." 


Toward the end of the letter, Kramer suggests that Party City simply include the toddler costumes  from the boys section in the girls section as well. She also emphasizes her mission of inclusiveness.


"While there is absolutely nothing wrong with little girls who enjoy and want to dress up this Halloween as a 'Light Up Twinkler Witch,' or a 'Doo Wop Darling,' or an 'Enchanted Stars Princess,' there is also absolutely nothing wrong with little girls who might wish to give the 'UPS Driver' costume or the 'Ride in Train' costume a try!" she says.


Shortly after Kramer posted her letter to the company's Facebook page, she received a response from Party City, she told The Huffington Post. The comment stated, "Hi Lin, thank you for reaching out to us. We appreciate the insight and will consider your feedback for the future. Thank you."



Feeling that Party City's Facebook response left something to be desired, Kramer shared her letter with a local current events group she's involved with online, but after other members requested a link to her post on Party City's page, the mom saw that her letter had been deleted. Kramer says she posted her letter on the page again and found that within 20 minutes, that post had been deleted as well. She then discovered she had been blocked from commenting, sharing and writing posts on the Party City Facebook page.


"Incensed at the censorship of a perfectly civil consumer concern, many members of this small internet group began sharing the letter from my page," Kramer told HuffPost, adding that she shared her story with Women You Should Know, which led the letter to gain more traction. Within 24 hours of that article's publication, the mom regained the ability to interact with Party City's Facebook page.


Kramer is pleased that her story is reaching a wider audience. "I hope, by reading my letter, others will be encouraged to pause and critically think about what they are seeing -- and accepting -- from retailers," she said. "When there is a difference between a 'girls' item and a 'boys' item, I hope that people will think critically and ask whether there really needs to be, or should be, a difference between the two items."


A Party City spokesperson issued the following statement to The Huffington Post in response to Kramer's story:



Party City values customer feedback and appreciates our customers taking the time to share their opinion with us. Nothing we carry is meant to be offensive and we supply Halloween costumes suitable for all styles, tastes, and budgets.


We expect parents to be as involved in their children's costume selections as they are in selecting their everyday wardrobe, and we encourage parents to shop with their children. We supply the types of products that our customers, and specifically parents, demand, and the Girls Cop Costume mentioned by Ms. Lin Kramer is one of our most popular costumes.


We understand this is a sensitive issue. Party City is always evaluating how to make shopping in our stores and online a fun, welcoming experience and her feedback has been shared with the costume manufacturers and leadership teams at Party City. If Ms. Lin Kramer would like to speak directly with a Party City team member, she's welcome to contact us and we hope to connect with her soon.



The mom told HuffPost that she also hopes that Party City and other businesses will be more willing to foster open dialogue about these issues. 


As for Kramer's daughter, the toddler has recently taken an interested in Mary Poppins, so her parents are acquiring materials to make a DIY costume of the classic Disney character. 


As a mom, Kramer says, she felt impelled to share the letter for her daughter's sake. "For me, it's important to speak out because I want to be able to honestly tell my daughter when she's older that I tried my very best to make this world a better place for her."


H/T Women You Should Know


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Leah Remini Tells All In New Memoir About Scientology

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Actress Leah Remini announced this week that she will soon release a memoir about her 30 years as a member of the Church of Scientology. The book will be "bold, brash, and bravely confessional," according to publisher Ballantine Books. Troublemaker: Surviving Hollywood and Scientology is set to arrive on Nov. 3.


Remini, who is best known her starring role on the long-running sitcom "King of Queens," became a Scientologist as a child, but publicly left the Church in 2013 because she didn't want her 9-year-old daughter, Sofia, to become indoctrinated in its precepts.


She revealed her plan to write a tell-all about her time in the Church soon after her departure, but details were scarce until this week. Now, thanks to Remini's Twitter account, we even have a cover:





A number of books released in recent years -- most notably Lawrence Wright's Going Clear, which was adapted into an Emmy-winning HBO documentary -- have thrown open the doors of the famously secretive Church of Scientology. One of the central figures in "Going Clear" was "Million Dollar Baby" screenwriter Paul Haggis, and the book describes the lengths to which the Church will go to keep its most famous members -- especially Tom Cruise -- in the fold. But Troublemaker will be the first book to reveal the perspective of one of Scientology's many celebrity members in their own words. 


There's no telling what she'll say, though there's certainly a good chance that much of it will paint the Church in a negative light. Remini has been a rather outspoken critic of Scientology over the past two years. At one point, she even filed a missing persons report for Shelly Miscavige, wife of David Miscavige, the head of the Church of Scientology, which the LAPD called "unfounded."


The Church, for its part, sent The Huffington Post a statement slamming Remini's book and behavior over the past couple years as a "pathetic quest to get publicity and seem relevant."


"Ms. Remini needs to move on with life and stop obsessively blaming others for her problems, be it her former religion or those she has worked with professionally," Scientology spokesperson Karin Pouw said. 


 The Church has a history of responding aggressively to criticism of its practices. Just this week, two movie theaters near the Scientology headquarters in Clearwater, Florida, canceled plans to show the film"Going Clear," allegedly as a result of pressure mounted against them by the Church. 


 


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