Environmental activism plays a vital role in raising awareness of environmental degradation and halting environmentally destructive activities, which is expected to contribute to safeguarding the Earth’s system against climate and biodiversity loss crises. Although the passion and commitment of environmental activists should be acknowledged, several groups of environmental activists are embracing the radical environmentalist movement. They support using illegal actions to achieve their primary goal of environmental protection. The actions perpetrated by radical environmentalist groups are not impulsive but rather part (...) of a deliberately planned and organized following a long-term strategy. (shrink)

Tainted political symbols ought to be confronted, removed, or at least recontextualized. Despite the best efforts to achieve this, however, official actions on tainted symbols often fail to take place. In such cases, I argue that political vandalism—the unauthorized defacement, destruction, or removal of political symbols—may be morally permissible or even obligatory. This is when, and insofar as, political vandalism serves as fitting counter-speech that undermines the authority of tainted symbols in ways that match their publicity, refuses to (...) let them speak in our name, and challenges the derogatory messages expressed through a mechanism I call derogatory pedestalling: the glorification or honoring of certain individuals or ideologies that can only make sense when members of a targeted group are taken to be inferior. (shrink)

Environmental activism is crucial for raising public awareness and support toward addressing the climate crisis. However, using climate change mitigation as the cause for blockage, vandalism, and harassment activities might be counterproductive and risk causing negative repercussions and declining public support. The paper describes a dataset of metadata of 89 blockage, vandalism, and harassment events happening in recent years. The dataset comprises three main categories: 1) Events, 2) Activists, and 3) Consequences. For researchers interested in environmental activism, climate (...) change, and sustainability, the dataset is helpful in studying the effectiveness and appropriateness of strategies to raise public awareness and support. For researchers in the field of security studies and green criminology, the dataset offers resources to study features and impacts of blockage, vandalism, and harassment events. The Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) analytics was employed to validate the dataset. Consequently, the estimated result aligns with the Mindsponge Theory’s theoretical reasoning. (shrink)

In order to fight massive vandalism the English- language Wikipedia has developed a system of surveillance which is carried out by humans and bots, supported by various tools. Central to the selection of edits for inspection is the process of using filters or profiles. Can this profiling be justified? On the basis of a careful reading of Frederick Schauer’s books about rules in general (1991) and profiling in particular (2003) I arrive at several conclusions. The effectiveness, efficiency, and risk-aversion (...) of edit selection all greatly increase as a result. The argument for increasing predictability suggests making all details of profiling manifestly public. Also, a wider distribution of the more sophisticated anti-vandalism tools seems indicated. As to the specific dimensions used in profiling, several critical remarks are developed. When patrollers use ‘assisted edit- ing’ tools, severe ‘overuse’ of several features (anonymity, warned before) is a definite possibility, undermining profile efficacy. The easy remedy suggested is to render all of them invisible on the interfaces as displayed to patrollers. Finally, concerning not only assisted editing tools but tools against vandalism generally, it is argued that the anonymity feature is a sensitive category: anons have been in dispute for a long time (while being more prone to vandalism). Targeting them as a special category violates the social contract upon which Wikipedia is based. The feature is therefore a candidate for mandatory ‘underuse’: it should be banned from all anti-vandalism filters and profiling algorithms, and no longer be visible as a special edit trait. (shrink)

Several contemporary scholars have embraced the aesthetic resources in the Black Radical Tradition for the purpose of revitalizing the democratic project. Ironically, however, many drawn to the radical potential of fugitive escape are concerned about flight or exodus from the democratic project itself resulting in a defense of politics that constricts the possible benefits of fugitive aesthetics for democratic life. This article draws on the work of Alain Locke, a key figure of the Harlem Renaissance, to suggest another way in (...) which we might follow Black fugitive aesthetics. Through an engagement with Locke, I theorize the notion of a fugitive bearing associated with a set of sensibilities that we might cultivate in order to approach the task of democratic transformation as a “reverent vandalism.” This article also challenges dismissive readings of Locke’s aestheticism by closely reexamining his commitment to expressive autonomy in connection with his theory of democracy. His “New Negro” avant-garde, like the fugitive, remains tethered to political life even while seeking a freedom that is unavailable within the strictures of the standing normative order. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In recent years, progressive activists around the world have fought to remove ‘problematic’ commemorations – typically, monuments commemorating and honoring individuals responsible for injustice, or even unjust events. Many of these problematic commemorations are vandalized before they are eventually removed. In this essay, I consider how the vandalism of problematic commemoration can transform the public honoring of a target, to a public repudiation or humiliation of that target. I discuss four obstacles to realizing the transformative potential of (...) class='Hi'>vandalism, and how they may be mitigated or overcome. (shrink)

‘Terraforming’ is hypothetical climatic and geo-physical engineering of other planets on a grand scale, with the aim of turning the so-called ‘barren’ planets in our (or for that matter another) solar system into habitable earth-like eco-systems. Although terraforming sounds like an idea from science fiction (where it indeed has appeared), it has been seriously proposed as a future project for the human race. With such a technology we could colonise the solar system and perhaps eventually others, moulding them in an (...) image of our own making. In this chapter I consider the ethics of terraforming through the lens of an ‘agent-based’ virtue ethics. I argue that advocacy of - and any attempt at - terraforming is likely to demonstrate two significant character flaws in agents: an insensitivity to beauty; and, hubris, an excessive pride or faith in our own abilities in the course of transcending the proper limits of human activities. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 20 (2000) 239-240 [Access article in PDF] News and Views Korean Temple Burnings and Vandalism: The Response of the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies Harry L. WellsHumboldt State UniversityOver the course of the last decade a fairly large number of Buddhist temples in South Korea have been destroyed or damaged by fire by misguided Christian fundamentalists. More recently, Buddhist statues have been identified as idols, and attacked (...) and decapitated in the name of Jesus. Arrests are hard to effect, as the arsonists and vandals work by stealth of night. In 1998, the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies announced its support for our Buddhist brothers and sisters and our disgust at such violent misuse of the name of Jesus. At the 1998 Board meeting, an ad hoc committee was set up to explore and develop strategies which would further address the situation. Below are some actions which have occurred during 1999. A Letter from Our President: The following letter of protest was sent on the Society's behalf on January 25, 1999 to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Korea and other governmental officials plus Korean church leaders and organizations. A second letter was sent to the U.S. State Department and the headquarters of various church bodies in the U.S. as well as the National Council of Churches. The Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies wishes to register its deepest sadness and most profound protest regarding the numerous acts of arson and malicious destruction done to Buddhist temples by misinformed and intolerant fundamentalist Christian groups throughout the Republic of South Korea. Professor Frank Tedesco of Sejong University first drew the attention of the Society to these incidents in an article he published in 1997 in Buddhist-Christian Studies, the journal of the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies. More recently, two more Buddhist temples have been burned by fundamentalist Christians, seven hundred Buddhist images have been decapitated, and the Roman Catholic Cathedral was also burned because it contained images. All members of the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies, both Christian and Buddhist, are embarrassed that such acts have been done in the name of [End Page 239] Jesus Christ, a name that demands that all persons should live in justice and peace, not sectarian stupidity and religious fanaticism. The small, but vocal, number of fundamentalist Christians in Korea who defend such actions as blows against pagan idolatry are simply wrong. Their actions are contrary to the core of Christian teaching and practice, which is that all persons are to be treated with love, justice, and respect. There is no excuse for intra-religious violence in Buddhist or Christian teaching and practice. Accordingly, the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies not only deplores fundamentalist Christian attacks against Korean Buddhist temples, images, and persons, we ask that the government of Korea actively seek out all groups and persons engaged in violent actions against our Buddhist brothers and sisters and bring them to justice according to the laws of the Republic of Korea. May the peace at the heart of the Christian tradition and the heart of the Buddha's Dharma heal the minds of the violent so that all human beings may one day live as brothers and sisters in accord and dialogue. Paul O. Ingram, President A Section on the International Association for Religious Freedom Website Robert Traer, General Secretary of the International Association for Religious Freedom, graciously agreed to allow the Society to post a section on their website about the Buddhist-Christian tensions in Korea. His hope reflects the hope of our Society, that incidents of vandalism will cease and dialogue efforts increase. This page presently includes the summary account written by a SBCS member, Dr. Frank Tedesco, photos, and an introductory statement by our Society. Visit the site! A Call for Monetary Contributions The Society initiated a contributions drive to collect funds to send to Korea as a symbolic gesture of support of our Buddhist brothers and sisters whose temples and images have been attacked by extremist Christian vandals... (shrink)

English - language Wikipedia is constantly being plagued by vandalistic contributions on a massive scale. In order to fight them its volunteer contributors deploy an array of software tools and autonomous bots. After an analysis of their functioning and the ‘ coactivity ’ in use between humans and bots, this research ‘ discloses ’ the moral issues that emerge from the combined patrolling by humans and bots. Administrators provide the stronger tools only to trusted users, thereby creating a new hierarchical (...) layer. Further, surveillance exhibits several troubling features : questionable profiling practices, the use of the controversial measure of reputation, ‘ oversurveillance ’ where quantity trumps quality, and a prospective loss of the required moral skills whenever bots take over from humans. The most troubling aspect, though, is that Wikipedia has become a Janus - faced institution. One face is the basic platform of MediaWiki software, transparent to all. Its other face is the anti - vandalism system, which, in contrast, is opaque to the average user, in particular as a result of the algorithms and neural networks in use. Finally it is argued that this secrecy impedes a much needed discussion to unfold ; a discussion that should focus on a ‘ rebalancing ’ of the anti - vandalism system and the development of more ethical information practices towards contributors. (shrink)

Environmental activism is expected to improve society’s well-being and environmental sustainability. Nevertheless, some inappropriate ways of activism, like road blockage, art vandalism, assaults, etc., have been recently conducted and risked causing adverse repercussions, including violence escalation. The current study aims to explore which types of environmental activism are more likely to escalate violence between activists, affected citizens, and police. Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) analytics was employed to analyze a dataset of 89 blockage, vandalism, and harassment cases in 13 (...) countries in this exploratory study. We discovered that rallies and demonstrations, marches, event disruption, and art vandalism were less likely to escalate violence between protestors, other citizens, and the police. In contrast, road blockades and assaults are more likely to lead to violence escalation. Apart from those, sabotage was found to have an ambiguous relationship with the violence escalation. Based on these results, we suggest that climate activists should be more selective in adopting activism approaches to raise public awareness and support and avoid using tactics that might be counterproductive and reduce public backing, such as road blockage and assaults. Despite the negative impact of art vandalism on violence escalation, we also discussed why art vandalism should not be used since it can curb the effectiveness of artivism, showing misuse of artworks (e.g., paintings, music, films) for environmental activism. (shrink)

Many virtual communities that rely on user-generated content (such as social news sites, citizen journals, and encyclopedias in particular) offer unrestricted and immediate ‘write access’ to every contributor. It is argued that these communities do not just assume that the trust granted by that policy is well-placed; they have developed extensive mechanisms that underpin the trust involved (‘backgrounding’). These target contributors (stipulating legal terms of use and developing etiquette, both underscored by sanctions) as well as the contents contributed by them (...) (patrolling for illegal and/or vandalist content, variously performed by humans and bots; voting schemes). Backgrounding trust is argued to be important since it facilitates the avoidance of bureaucratic measures that may easily cause unrest among community members and chase them away. (shrink)

Open-content communities that focus on co-creation without requirements for entry have to face the issue of institutional trust in contributors. This research investigates the various ways in which these communities manage this issue. It is shown that communities of open-source software—continue to—rely mainly on hierarchy (reserving write-access for higher echelons), which substitutes (the need for) trust. Encyclopedic communities, though, largely avoid this solution. In the particular case of Wikipedia, which is confronted with persistent vandalism, another arrangement has been pioneered (...) instead. Trust (i.e. full write-access) is ‘backgrounded’ by means of a permanent mobilization of Wikipedians to monitor incoming edits. Computational approaches have been developed for the purpose, yielding both sophisticated monitoring tools that are used by human patrollers, and bots that operate autonomously. Measures of reputation are also under investigation within Wikipedia; their incorporation in monitoring efforts, as an indicator of the trustworthiness of editors, is envisaged. These collective monitoring efforts are interpreted as focusing on avoiding possible damage being inflicted on Wikipedian spaces, thereby being allowed to keep the discretionary powers of editing intact for all users. Further, the essential differences between backgrounding and substituting trust are elaborated. Finally it is argued that the Wikipedian monitoring of new edits, especially by its heavy reliance on computational tools, raises a number of moral questions that need to be answered urgently. (shrink)

In communities of user-generated content, systems for the management of content and/or their contributors are usually accepted without much protest. Not so, however, in the case of Wikipedia, in which the proposal to introduce a system of review for new edits (in order to counter vandalism) led to heated discussions. This debate is analysed, and arguments of both supporters and opponents (of English, German and French tongue) are extracted from Wikipedian archives. In order to better understand this division of (...) the minds, an analogy is drawn with theories of bureaucracy as developed for real-life organizations. From these it transpires that bureaucratic rules may be perceived as springing from either a control logic or an enabling logic. In Wikipedia, then, both perceptions were at work, depending on the underlying views of participants. Wikipedians either rejected the proposed scheme (because it is antithetical to their conception of Wikipedia as a community) or endorsed it (because it is consonant with their conception of Wikipedia as an organization with clearly defined boundaries). Are other open-content communities susceptible to the same kind of ‘essential contestation’? (shrink)

Is graffiti writing creative activism? In this paper, I challenge commonly held beliefs that graffiti writing is politically inert. On the contrary, I argue that graffiti writing is an example of creative activism. Rather than being a narcissistic form of vandalism, primarily directed at increasing one’s fame in front of an esoteric group, that is, fellow writers, writing is a form of everyday resistance allowing its practitioners to challenge authoritarian power. In questioning dominant hierarchies, graffiti is a powerful tool (...) to help correct a specific instance of spatial injustice: the unequal distribution of access to urban surfaces for self-expression in the city, where corporations and political elites hold an unjustified monopoly over visual communication. (shrink)

In the current American iconoclash, certain monuments are subject to vandalism and municipal removal from their pedestals. Phrases such as “the erasure of history” and “damnatio memoriae” point to concerns that iconoclasm is an attempt to censor history or even remove certain individuals from public memory altogether. Because these phrases beckon the past, this wave of iconoclasm calls for a close examination of previous image-breaking to establish motives. Drawing first from art history, we analyze Byzantine iconoclasm and anxieties over (...) the nature of icons’ power, before contextualizing these findings within image destruction from the Paleolithic to the present day. Each comparison is suggestive of an enduring aesthetic principle: that what appears inanimate is not always inert. Next, drawing from cultural anthropology, we argue that principles of sympathetic magic are at the heart of contemporary iconoclasms, but not in the way media outlets often suggest. Instead, the fear of history’s erasure betrays a deeply rooted equivalence between the representation and the represented. In perceiving their fates as shared, sympathetic magic is seen to persist in the way humans create, interpret, and desecrate images. We conclude with the speculative realist proposition that iconoclasm can produce new, original artworks, which carries implications for the autonomy of art and its distribution between artist and artwork. (shrink)

What should we do about “tainted” public commemorations? Recent events have highlighted the urgency of reaching a consensus on this question. However, existing discussions appear to be dominated by two naïve opposing views – to remove or preserve them. My aims in this essay are two-fold. First, I argue that the two views are not naïve, but undergirded by concerns with securing self-respect and with the character of our engagement with the past. Second, I offer a qualified defence of vandalising (...) tainted commemorations. The defence comprises two parts. I consider two prominent suggestions – to install counter-commemorations and to add contextualising plaques – and argue that they are typically beset with difficulties. I then argue that in some circumstances, constrained vandalism is a response to tainted commemorations which effectively adjudicates the demands of the two opposing views. (shrink)

The complex structure of the tragic aspects of globalization has been accounted for in extant literature. What remains unclear is how deglobalization, isolationism and all the radically disruptive movements and politics in-between will shape transnational corporations’ organizational practices. The purpose of this study is to interrogate and problematize the implications of anarchic ‘globalisolationism’ vis-à-vis the atlas of insurrection and the TNCs’ global responsibility towards human-centric management practices. We situate our analysis in the heavily politicized and contested discursive space of emergent (...) global geopolitical and environmental tensions and the global quest to reclaim dignity, freedoms, right to resources and decisions—stakeownership. ‘Globalisolationism’ is conceptualized as a radically non-compromising coexistence of globalization and isolationism by design, aided by new information technologies, reactivated mass consciousness and slack political resources. It is characterized by the radical pursuit of new deals within the global geopolitical and economic order; renegotiation of existing deals for resource appropriation and democratic space for the marginalized; the collapse of the old political order via auto-implosion as a beneficial constraint; and the defence of the status quo in global resource and environmental governance due to ‘translocal’ insurrection. Therefore, the paper suggests how TNCs’ current modus operandi could be transformed into responsible human/environment-centric organisational practices to accommodate emerging sociopolitical and environmental challenges. It further highlights the implications for novel game-changing policies and political action by ‘subaltern’ societies and their metamorphosis from victims of planetary vandalism to stakeowners with sovereignty over their resources. (shrink)

To the person unfamiliar with the wide variety of street art, the term “street artist” conjures a young man furtively sneaking around a decaying city block at night, spray paint in hand, defacing concrete structures, ears pricked for police sirens. The possibility of the ethical criticism of street art on such a conception seems hardly worth the time. This has to be an easy question. Street art is vandalism; vandalism is causing the intentional damage or destruction of someone (...) else’s property; causing destruction or damage is wrong. The only remaining question is which of two coarse-grained models of ethical criticism we choose. The ethicist model holds that a work of art that exhibits ethically bad properties is a work that is thereby aesthetically flawed. That is, the work is flawed as a work of art just because of its ethical flaws. Bad ethics make art worse than it otherwise would have been, although it may be aesthetically successful otherwise. The autonomist model, by contrast, holds that the ethical properties of a work of art have no bearing at all on its aesthetic success. One might suppose, therefore, that on either model, a criticism of street art would be relatively easy to undertake. In defacing public property, some street art exhibits and endorses ethically bad attitudes. On the ethicist model, such a work is thereby pro tanto aesthetically flawed because in the process of creating such works, they violate ethical norms concerning the use of public spaces; on the autonomous model, any ethical criticism of the aesthetics of street art would need to be set aside entirely in favor of criticism that focused purely on the aesthetic properties of street art. I will argue in this paper that neither the ethicist nor the autonomist model adequately captures the moral landscape of street art. Street art may indeed be criticized productively on aesthetic grounds for the destruction it does to public spaces, but the existing models of ethical criticism overlook the complex ethical landscape of street art that results from its use of public spaces. In the interplay of various forms of street art we can see the emergence of an ethical criticism of art that is accomplished by the material properties of related artwork, and consists in the creation of a dialogue over the proper use of contested public spaces. (shrink)

The question naturally arises: Is public art inherently violent, or is it a provocation to violence? Is violence built into the monument in its very conception? Or is violence simply an accident that befalls some monuments, a matter of the fortunes of history? The historical record suggests that if violence is simply an accident that happens to public art, it is one that is always waiting to happen. The principal media and materials of public art are stone and metal sculpture (...) not so much by choice as by necessity. “A public sculpture,” says Lawrence Alloway, “should be invulnerable or inaccessible. It should have the material strength to resist attack or be easily cleanable, but it also needs a formal structure that is not wrecked by alterations.”12 The violence that surrounds public art is more, however, than simply the ever-present possibility of an accident—the natural disaster or random act of vandalism. Much of the world’s public art—memorials, monuments, triumphal arches, obelisks, columns, and statues—has a rather direct reference to violence in the form of war or conquest. From Ozymandias to Caesar to Napoleon to Hitler, public art has served as a kind of monumentalizing of violence, and never more powerfully than when it presents the conqueror as a man of peace, imposing a Napoleonic code or a pax Romana on the world. Public sculpture that is too frank or explicit about this monumentalizing of violence, whether the Assyrian palace reliefs of the ninth century b.c., or Morris’s bomb sculpture proposal of 1981, is likely to offend the sensibilities of a public committed to the repression of its own complicity in violence.13 The very notion of public art as we receive it is inseparable from what Jürgen Habermas has called “the liberal model of the public sphere,” a dimension distinct from the economic, the private, and the political. This ideal realm provides the space in which disinterested citizens may contemplate a transparent emblem of their own inclusiveness and solidarity, and deliberate on the general good, free of coercion, violence, or private interests.14 12. Lawrence Alloway, “The Public Sculpture Problem,” Studio International 184 : 124.13. See Leo Bersani and Ulysse Dutoit, “The Forms of Violence,” October, no. 8 : 17-29, for an important critique of the “narrativization” of violence in Western art and an examination of the alternative suggested by the Assyrian palace reliefs.14. Habermas first introduced this concept in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society, trans. Thomas Burger and Frederick Lawrence . First published in 1962, it has since become the focus of an extensive literature. See also Habermas’s short encyclopedia article, “The Public Sphere,” trans. Sara Lennox and Frank Lennox, New German Critique 1 : 49-55, and the introduction to it by Peter Hohendahl in the same issue, pp. 45-48. I owe much to the guidance of Miriam Hansen and Lauren Berlant on this complex and crucial topic. W. J. T. Mitchell, editor of Critical Inquiry, is Gaylord Donnelly Distinguished Service Professor of English and art at the University of Chicago. His recent book is Iconology: Image, Text, Ideology. (shrink)

North American archaeologists have long defined their ethical responsibilities in terms of a commitment to scientific goals and an opposition to looting, vandalism, the commercial trade in antiquities, and other activities that threaten archaeological resources. In recent years, the clarity of these commitments has been eroded from two directions: professional archaeologists find commercial entanglements increasingly unavoidable, and a number of nonarchaeological interest groups object that they are not served by scientific exploitation of the record. I offer an analysis of (...) issues having to do with the identity of archaeology that underlie this debate and outline one strategy of response now emerging. (shrink)

Conscientious disobedients often face the demand to differentiate themselves from criminals whose law-breaking actions are not undergirded by conscientious convictions. In public and philosophical discourse, conscientious disobedients are often criticised on the basis that their actions render them no different from criminals. I provide a qualified defence of disobedients in this essay. I argue that the differentiation demand can be satisfied even by disobedients who engage in what are typically regarded as radical acts of disobedience. In practical terms, this means (...) that even disobedients who engage in actions such as arson, looting, rioting, vandalism or vigilantism can also successfully differentiate themselves from criminals. (shrink)

This article analyses the multimodal representations of public space in Chilean broadcast news reports on the figure of the hooded rioter and its alleged connections with the student movement. We seek to identify how space is constructed as a legitimation strategy in relation to the actors involved and the actions taking place across four different news broadcast pieces in the light of Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis and Systemic Functional Linguistics. Results show that the multimodal representations of space are crucial to (...) identify and functionalize hooded rioters as belonging to the student movement. Actions are dependent on the spaces in which actors operate, restricting the occupation of certain spaces to specific actors. Thus, transgressive protest actions are to be contained to educational spaces and represented as naturalized vandalism, ignoring the students’/demonstrators’ motivations to recuperate/vindicate the public space. (shrink)

Islam in the Ukrainian territory has more than a thousand years of history. However, after the extermination of the Islamic world on Ukrainian lands by means of Stalin's vandalism, in particular the deportation of the Crimean Tatar people who professed Islam to Central Asia, the destruction of mosques and madrasas, the repression of the clergy of Islam, we have mentioned this religion mostly or in recent times. related to Muslims abroad.

Let’s look at Wikipedia itself, which is misunderstood constantly as “self-organizing and selfcorrecting.” In fact there is a strict hierarchy of levels of editorship. Also, “high-quality articles tend to experience entropic degradation … as various Wiki-workers … tinker with them” (423). Most Wiki-work is Sisyphean fight against constant vandalism, and most articles never converge on any stable form.

Middle- and upper-middle-class students continue to outpace those from less privileged backgrounds. Most attempts to redress this inequality focus on the issue of access to financial resources, but as _Producing Success_ makes clear, the problem goes beyond mere economics. In this eye-opening study, Peter Demerath examines a typical suburban American high school to explain how some students get ahead. Demerath undertook four years of research at a Midwestern high school to examine the mercilessly competitive culture that drives students to advance. (...) _Producing Success_ reveals the many ways the community’s ideology of achievement plays out: students hone their work ethics and employ various strategies to succeed, from negotiating with teachers to cheating; parents relentlessly push their children while manipulating school policies to help them get ahead; and administrators aid high performers in myriad ways, even naming over forty students “valedictorians.” Yet, as Demerath shows, this unswerving commitment to individual advancement takes its toll, leading to student stress and fatigue, incivility and vandalism, and the alienation of the less successful. Insightful and candid, _Producing Success_ is an often troubling account of the educationally and morally questionable results of the American culture of success. (shrink)

In the summer of 1985 my children, Laura and Aurélien, then seven and five, knelt before a Barbie doll standing at the foot of a Ken doll on an imaginary cross. I remember vividly the scene because I took a picture of it. We were vacationing in Ticino and visiting the local churches, so I assumed that this play imitated the iconography to which they were being exposed. After reading Moshenska's Iconoclasm as Child's Play, however—whose cover shows “Josh McBig,” a (...) bearded version of Ken with outstretched arms and severed legs, photographed by the Jackson sisters as part of their “Doll Games” project—I have to wonder: was there not in this play an element of parody or blasphemy, of iconoclasm even, prompted perhaps by my working at the time on contemporary “vandalism”? Or, on the contrary, was there an element of devotion, of faith produced by mimicking the ritual? I am now faced with the conundrum of “the adult's imagination of the child's imagination,” to borrow a phrase (from Michael Taussig) that resonates through Moshenska's strange and fascinating book.Sometime in the 1530s, in Redcliffe Cross in Bristol, in the west of England, a preacher named Roger Edgeworth denounced what he regarded as a current upsurge of impiety and singled out as evidence that “many Images” taken from the dissolved monasteries “haue bene caryed abrod, and gyuen to children to playe wyth all,” so that when their parents ask them what it is that they are playing with, they make them laugh by answering: “I haue here myne ydoll.” “Ydoll” is a portmanteau word—as Lewis Carroll would have said—combining “doll” and “idol,” and Moshenska finds “scattered but definite evidence... that holy things were made into playthings with sufficient frequency for it to be considered an established and recognized part of iconoclastic practice in the early modern period.” He analyzes a few other examples, but Edgeworth's sermon supplies him with the primal scene of his book: he admits to “having been seduced by this passage..., caught up in its folds, brought back to it time and again,” so that Iconoclasm as Child's Play bears some structural resemblance to Henry James's novella The Turn of the Screw. Consistently—and at times obtrusively—self-reflective, it also wonders whether its approach can be regarded as “a kind of iconoclasm” or is intended “as a form of play”—lusus serius, naturally.Iconoclasm as Child's Play explores with great ingenuity the complex relationships between the Christian rite, iconoclasm, and child's play: a Byzantine empress enables her icons to survive the Quarrel of Images by calling them her “dolls”; Protestants trivialize the Roman Catholic ritual by comparing it to “trifles” and the “mere playing of children”; in The Praise of Folly, Erasmus embraces the “foolishness” of Christianity, centered on the figure of a broken body that renders attacks against its images and iconoclastic theory itself—as Bruno Latour has shown—deeply equivocal. A further turn of the screw takes place in the missionary and mercantile context of Malacca, where the Dutch settlers impute childishness both to the Portuguese Jesuits who preceded them and to the local religions. The notions of “fetish” and “fetishism,” as Moshenska shows, charge their targets with a misattribution to objects of agency, responsibility, and desires.The object of Moshenska's inquiry, which he claims less convincingly to include “art-things,” is “polysemic and polychronic,” and a leitmotif of the interpretations he proposes is the instability of the status and meaning of what is interpreted, be it a thing, an action, or a word. Among the many epistemic virtues he attributes to iconoclasm as child's play is the questioning of “the sharp... divisions between modern and premodern” implied by historical narratives such as Max Weber's account of the Reformation as the “expulsion of play” and “disenchantment” of the world. A long meditation on the temporality of play concludes by pointing out the “toy potential of all things” and referring to James Gibson's notion of “affordance.” Indeed, child's play, whatever adults want to do with it, often consists in multiplying and inventing affordances, and it is capable of turning not only “idols” into “dolls,” but also “dolls” into “idols.”. (shrink)

The Wiki represents a legitimate form of literature that requires a deep rethinking of how texts are produced and consumed. In order to understand and evaluate the Wiki, Barthes' distinction between Text and Work, and the critique of authorship found in the writings of both Barthes and Foucault are employed. The Wiki is a genre of literature, which like Barthes' concept of the Text, is without identifiable authorship, and its production is directly related to semantic conventions governing the text as (...) a system of signs. The authority of the Wiki is a function of its survival in an agonistic environment that extends from outright vandalism to reasoned discourse. Barthes concept of play, the pleasure of the text, the role of the reader, and Foucault's analysis of the hermeneutic function of authorship provide a theoretical basis for critiquing new forms of digital literature, which, like the Wiki, are disseminated across computer networks. (shrink)

I apply an agent-based virtue ethics to issues in environmental philosophy regarding our treatment of complex inorganic systems. I consider the ethics of terraforming: hypothetical planetary engineering on a vast scale which is aimed at producing habitable environments on otherwise “hostile” planets. I argue that the undertaking of such a project demonstrates at least two serious defects of moral character: an aesthetic insensitivity and the sin of hubris. Trying to change whole planets to suit our ends is arrogant vandalism. (...) I maintain that these descriptions of character are coherent and important ethical concepts. Finally, I demonstrate how the arguments developed in opposition to terraforming, a somewhat farfetched example, can be used in cases closer to home to provide arguments against our use of recombinantDNA technologies and against the construction of tourist developments in wilderness areas. (shrink)

Many have argued that certain statues or monuments are objectionable, and thus ought to be removed. Even if their arguments are compelling, a major obstacle is the apparent historical value of those commemorations. Preservation in some form seems to be the best way to respect the value of commemorations as connections to the past or opportunities to learn important historical lessons. Against this, I argue that we have exaggerated the historical value of objectionable commemorations. Sometimes commemorations connect to biased or (...) distorted versions of history, if not mere myths. We can also learn historical lessons through what I call repudiatory honouring: the honouring of certain victims or resistors that can only make sense if the oppressor(s) or target(s) of resistance are deemed unjust, where no part of the original objectionable commemorations is preserved. This type of commemorative practice can even help to overcome some of the obstacles objectionable commemorations pose against properly connecting to the past. (shrink)

Writing to the young emperor Nero, Seneca elaborates a sophisticated distinction between compassion and mercy for use in forensic contexts, agreeing with earlier Stoics that compassion is a vice, but adding that there is a virtue called mercy or 'clemency.' This Stoic repudiation of compassion has won the attention of Nussbaum, who argues that it was motivated by a respect for persons as dignified agents, and was of a piece with the Stoics' cosmopolitanism. This chapter engages Nussbaum's presentation of the (...) Stoics, examining Seneca’s On Clemency and Epictetus' use of the term prohairesis, showing that while there is some truth in her characterization, it needs to be qualified in important ways. It also analyzes Augustine's engagement with Seneca's On Clemency in the City of God 9.5, and in his letters concerning punishment for vandalism, theft, and human trafficking. It argues that Augustine has a nuanced mercy ethic that is deeply informed by Seneca's position, but that he intentionally improves upon it. (shrink)

Rock art - paintings, and pecked or engraved images on rocks, whether in caves, shelters, or in the open-air - exists in all but a couple of countries of the world [Bahn, 1998], It spans a period from at least 35,000 years ago to historic times, comprises many millions of images from hundreds of thousands of sites, and thus constitutes the vast majority of the world's art, and art history. It is a phenomenon that has seen a huge upsurge of (...) interest in the last few decades, with not only numerous publications and conferences, but also a proliferation of calendars, T-shirts, mugs, jewellery, and garments bearing rock art images. Many people who are famous for other things have worked on or published rock art - for example, scholars such as Mary Leakey or authors like Joy Adamson or Erle Stanley Gardner. Rock art studies have always been the domain of the “amateur” as well as the “professional”, and amateurs remain of huge importance in this field. Indeed, most of the principal rock art organisations, along with their journals, were created by, are run by, and consist largely of amateur enthusiasts who include some of the world's foremost specialists. The growing popularity of the art brings an ever-increasing risk of pollution, damage, and vandalism, as well as outright thefts of wall or cave images. The rock art associations are dedicated to the discovery, recording, and conservation of rock art, and play a major role in striving to teach schoolchildren and adults alike about the incalculable importance of this irreplaceable, universal heritage and about the need to respect and protect it. (shrink)

From 1982 through 2016, Korean media outlets have reported over 120 instances of vandalism, arson and harassment targeting Buddhist temples and facilities in South Korea. An extension of on-going tensions between South Korea’s Buddhist and Evangelical Protestant communities, this one-sided wave of violence and harassment has caused the destruction of numerous temple buildings and priceless historical artifacts, millions of USD in damages, and one death. This article surveys these incidents of anti-Buddhist vandalism, arson, and harassment, analyzing their general (...) characteristics and summarizing major instances of each, before examining the frequency of these incidents within the wider chronology of recent Evangelical-Buddhist tensions. It then examines the responses from South Korea’s Buddhist and Evangelical communities and various government agencies, as well as the effects of these responses, before investigating the relationship between these incidents and the mainstream Evangelical doctrines of religious exclusivism, dominionism and spiritual warfare. The article closes with a discussion of the need for further research into these incidents and the wider Evangelical-Buddhist tensions surveyed herein as well as the relevance of such research to inter-religious conflicts outside Korea. (shrink)

periphery looks at you with hate. This phrase in red neon struck the visitors of Landscapes, an exhibition by Domenico Antonio Mancini in the Lia Rumma Gallery in Naples, in 2019. It was not addressed to the public but to the nineteenth-century pictorial views relocated in the last room of the exhibition, as if repainted by the immaterial vandalism of the colored light. The exhibition’s theme was the visibility of contemporary suburban environments, now accessible through Google street view visualizations. (...) Mancini’s non-representational Landscapes are Google addresses, not aesthetically appreciable but pragmatically challenging: the visitor must type on a touch screen to access to the outskirts of Naples, Palermo, Catania, Rome and Milan. The words at the end of the exhibition almost literally replicated a black graffiti drawn on Palazzo Missori in Milan. Are these relocation and remediation just about artification? What happens when, browsing Google street view, I take a close look at that graffiti recalling the political protests during the streets the 1960s? The deictic transitability in space and time of the hypermediated image can activate a fortuitous narrative and an open interpretation by looking back on the present as if it were past. Even a digital landscape is a moral landscape like that of public art for Danto, with a «internal beauty» whose meaning is not already embodied in architectural and artistic media but accessible and shareable through our portable devices. (shrink)

If man has no nature - if our intellect and understanding are products of our own activities - do we possess a key to self-modification? Are we free to re-make mankind? Sartre champions the romantic idea that we can - by sheer determination - begin afresh. Oakeshott is struck by the vandalism of such a project - he seeks to defend political culture from degradation by meddling academics. The Radical and Conservative understanding of social order and the human self (...) are compared in this in-depth analysis of two contrasting philosophies. (shrink)

periphery looks at you with hate. This phrase in red neon struck the visitors of Landscapes, an exhibition by Domenico Antonio Mancini in the Lia Rumma Gallery in Naples, in 2019. It was not addressed to the public but to the nineteenth-century pictorial views relocated in the last room of the exhibition, as if repainted by the immaterial vandalism of the colored light. The exhibition’s theme was the visibility of contemporary suburban environments, now accessible through Google street view visualizations. (...) Mancini’s non-representational Landscapes are Google addresses, not aesthetically appreciable but pragmatically challenging: the visitor must type on a touch screen to access to the outskirts of Naples, Palermo, Catania, Rome and Milan. The words at the end of the exhibition almost literally replicated a black graffiti drawn on Palazzo Missori in Milan. Are these relocation and remediation just about artification? What happens when, browsing Google street view, I take a close look at that graffiti recalling the political protests during the streets the 1960s? The deictic transitability in space and time of the hypermediated image can activate a fortuitous narrative and an open interpretation by looking back on the present as if it were past. Even a digital landscape is a moral landscape like that of public art for Danto, with a «internal beauty» whose meaning is not already embodied in architectural and artistic media but accessible and shareable through our portable devices. (shrink)

Throughout the history ofthe U.S. national park system, park advocates and managers have changed both acquisition priorities and internal management policies. The park movement began with the establishment of large, spectacular natural areas, primarily in the West. As the movement developed there was more emphasis on the biological, on recreation, and on parks near population centers. GraduaIly, scenic wonders and uniqueness have become less necessary to designation and the types of sites eligible have diversified. Early managers treated the parks as (...) relatively unchanging, threatenedby little other than human vandalism. Initially managers removed “bad” animals, such as wolves, and suppressed disturbances, such as fire. Modem management values processes as weIl as objects and recognizes change and disturbance as integral to park maintanence. A conversion to an ecosystem mode of management does not answer all questions concerning values, however, and may present some disadvantages, such as a tendency to treat nature as aseries of functions and energy equations, thus weakening aesthetic values. (shrink)

Actualmente, la reflexión sobre la imagen se centra mayoritariamente sobre su masiva presencia y su interminable reproducción. En este trabajo nos centraremos, a la inversa, en cómo las imágenes se destruyen masiva y sistemáticamente. Si el examen interdisciplinar es una prerrogativa fundamental en los estudios visuales, el volumen Striking Images, Iconoclasms Past and Present (Ashgate 2013), compilado por excelentes históricos y arqueólogos, ofrece a los filósofos un modelo importante de colaboración a la hora de pensar qué son las imágenes. El (...) propósito de este trabajo es presentar y discutir brevemente algunos aspectos originales de estos ensayos, enfatizando la importancia de los distintos modos y motivos por los que nuestros antepasados no solo han creado, sino también han destruido imágenes. Distinguiendo la iconoclasia del simple vandalismo, podemos descubrir una ambigüedad fundamental según la cual quien intenta preservar las imágenes, acaba con destruirlas y quien aparece como destros antepasados no solo han tructor, logra fertilizar nuevas concepciones y significados para su propia tradición figurativa. Quizás esta ambigüedad no sea algo que las imágenes sufren desde fuera, sino que sea algo connatural a la imagen misma. Y si es así, quien hoy estudia la vida de las imágenes, quizás podría encontrar un acceso privilegiado en esa a través una lógica paradójica que destaca como las imágenes mueren. PALABRAS CLAVESICONOCLASIA, ICONOFÍLIA, FILOSOFÍA Y TEORÍA DE LAS IMÁGENES, ESTUDIOS VISUALES.ABSTRACTContemporary thought on images focuses mostly on their massive presence and their endless reproduction. On the contrary, in this paper, I will focus on how images have been massively and systematically destroyed. If the interdisciplinary exam is a fundamental prerogative in visual studies, the volume Striking Images, Iconoclasms Past and Present (Ashgate 2013), compiled by excellent historians and archaeologists, could offer to philosophers an important frame of teamwork in thinking what the images are. The purpose of this paper is to present and discuss briefly some original aspects of these essays, by emphasizing the importance of means and reasons through which our ancestors have not only created, but also destroyed images. Once distinguished iconoclasm and mere vandalism, we could discover a fundamental ambiguity whereby any person who tries to preserve the images, finishes with wrecking them; while on the contrary somebody who appears as a destroyer, succeeds to fertilize new concepts and meanings for his/her own figurative tradition. Perhaps this ambiguity is not something that image suffers extrinsically, but something inherent to the image itself. And if it is so, he/she who wants to study the life of images, could perhaps find a privileged access to it, through a paradoxical logic that explains, instead, how images die.KEYWORDSICONOCLASM, ICONOPHILIA, PHILOSOPHY AND THEORY OF IMAGES, VISUAL STUDIES. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Burma’s Healthcare Under Fire: My Experience as an Exiled Medical ProfessionalP. P. KyawI used to work as a medical doctor in a less developed state than many big cities in Burma1 that experienced prolonged civil wars and current similar atrocities decades before the urban areas of the country experienced them. Before everything started, I was responsible for the medical management of the most vulnerable communities and had been struggling (...) with pandemic-related medical activities. Those were the happiest years of my life. I was with one of the best international organizations, where every effort I made was directly delivered to the patients with no unnecessary paperwork. The system was efficient, my colleagues were supportive, and I had a good work-life balance. I supported my family and whoever needed temporary financial support, played music weekly, met good friends who I hung out with every weekend, and [End Page 164] found hobbies like gardening and crocheting. I was content and happy. I even postponed my plans to get registered as a doctor in the Western world.Before moving to this beautiful ethnic state in 2019, I previously worked as a government medical doctor in Yangon, the capital. As much as I loved working in those civilian hospitals, I could not support myself with a monthly pay of $100-$150 USD. It was a hard decision to leave the service because it meant I could not pursue the medical specialty that I had always longed for and had to leave like-minded supportive colleagues. In Myanmar, unless you are a civil servant, you cannot pursue further clinical specialties. However, after leaving the government’s service to work in humanitarian medical assistance in hard-to-reach areas of Burma, I learned that life is still beautiful outside my comfort zone, until February 2021 when the coup began. Democratically elected members of the country’s ruling party were overthrown by the military, which then bestowed power in a military junta.I expected the election prior to the coup in November 2020 to be an uphill battle for Burma, but nothing more. I was still in denial when I first heard the news from one of the town’s NGO staff. The person had to travel on a motorbike to inform everyone that the junta had staged the coup. No telephone or internet was working at that time. My colleagues and I cried in our office, saying, “We are so young, and the future is still ahead. I don’t think this is going to last long. Maybe it will be over in a few days or, at most, a few weeks.” Once the peaceful protests started nationwide, my friends and I provided medical cover for the protesters, initially for minor medical problems such as low sugar, low blood pressure, injuries from accidental minor slips and falls, etc. Never in my life had I imagined that I would be taking care of bullet wounds and people injured by live rounds. While learning about gunshot wounds in forensic medicine, I thought, “Oh, this is not going to be very useful because Burma is not America, and I am not going there.” Then suddenly, it became too real and more useful than I would’ve liked it to be.I always think back to one especially bloody day when many people in the town were shot with live rounds. We assisted many patients. Usually, we would go around with the protest groups until they were over in the late afternoon. The protesters were always peaceful. There were no riots, no harmful acts, or vandalism. Only when the protesters were cruelly dispersed with tear gas, high-pressure pumps, rubber bullets, and live rounds (to the head) did they decide to defend themselves while still making their voices heard. The only defenses people had to counteract the live rounds were things like metal covers, firecrackers, and slingshots.One afternoon in March 2021, my team and I took an early break for lunch—unaware that some people would lose their lives that afternoon. We followed the local protests through Facebook Live while having lunch and started to hear firecracker sounds. A few seconds later, we knew... (shrink)

A cursory reading of Thomas Aquinas’s work can give the impression he condones a despotic or exploitative relationship between humans and the environment. Many philosophers and theologians have sought to dispel this impression and draw out a more robust Thomistic environmental ethic. In this paper, I support this endeavor by describing how, in Thomas’s work, the environment is God’s artistic property and how this notion qualifies our use of the environment. Next, I consider two concepts related to artistic property: (...) class='Hi'>vandalism and showcasing. I explore these concepts as they relate to the environment and find they give us reasons not to deface or destroy creatures and to look to creation for guidance in problem-solving. (shrink)

In previous decades, numerous involvements of adolescents in deviant behavior have been increasing, and previous researchers examined different variables that may influence these phenomena. This study was designed to look for the possible predictors of deviant behavior, as well as its association with family satisfaction and personality traits. The study was conducted on 1500 participants ages 12–19 years old from selected schools in Nueva Ecija. The researchers used the Deviant Behavior Variety Scale by Sanches et al.. It consists of 19 (...) items of a variety of deviant action such as thefts, drug and alcohol consumption, verbal and physical aggression, possession of weapons, vandalism, truancy, lies and defiance of authority, and selling drugs among adolescents. Out of 1500 samples, 1227 met the criteria for the deviant behavior scale. Descriptive and Inferential statistics such as Mean, sd, frequency, percentage, Regression analysis, Pearson-correlation, and Mann Whitney U test were used to analyze this study. The research found that there are differences in levels of deviant behavior among sexes. Results showed that female participants have higher tendency to engage in minor infractions of deviant acts, while males had a higher rate of participation in severe infractions of deviant acts. Moreover, there is a negative/inverse association between family satisfaction and deviant behavior. This implies that respondents who participate more in deviant behaviors are found to be less satisfied with their family life, while respondents who participate less in deviant behavior are more satisfied in their family life. Lastly, the current study found that personality trait-agreeableness is found to be the best predictor of deviant behavior among adolescents. (shrink)

Comparing people to trees is a customary and common practice in Jewish tradition. The current article examines the roots and the development of the image of people as trees in Jewish sources, from biblical times to recent generations, as related to the prohibition against destroying fruit trees. The similarity between humans and trees in the Jewish religion and culture was firstly suggested in biblical literature as a conceptual-symbolic element. However, since the Amoraic period, this similarity was transformed to a resemblance (...) bearing mystical and Halakhic implications. Various sources in rabbinical literature describe trees as humans that may be spoken to or yelled at to produce fruit. Cutting down a tree was perceived by the rabbis of the Talmud not only as an unethical act or vandalism, but also as a hazard: the death of the tree corresponds to the death of the person who resembles it. All societies, cultures and religions have a system of values and practices that are aimed at shaping people, society and the environment according to a certain worldview.Contribution: The discussion in this article on the relationship between religion-culture and nature indicates how the Jewish religion shaped believers’ attitude to the world of flora over the generations by transforming the man-tree comparison into one with binding and even threatening practical religious meaning. (shrink)

Introduction. The article examines the role of youth culture (in particular, counterculture and subculture) in reformatting the modern sociocultural space. As long ago asin the 1970s. the researchers pointed out that young people, showing their active position, change the realities of the socio-cultural space in which their parents lived. The research is based on the materials of the graffiti and street art subculture, as an informal artistic practice. The graffiti subculture emerged among African American teenagers in the 1970s in New (...) York City. The first label that this subculture has been endowed with by society and city authorities is vandalism. However, in the late 1970s early 1980s graffiti is involved in the sphere of the art world institutions activities (private galleries) and becomes in demand among collectors. Street art emerges under its influence. The aim of the study is to reveal due to what characteristics of the socio-cultural space the transition from deviation (vandal practice) to the asserting norm became possible. Methods. The methodological basis of the research is the theory of generations by K. Mannheim and his concept of «fresh contact», which indicates the rethinking of the previously assimilated sociocultural experience by the subjects of culture. Another methodological basis is the concept of rhizome, introduced into scientific circulation by the philosophers J. Deleuze and F. Guattari. Scientific novelty of the research. It is shown how the rhizomatic principle of organizing culture is realized during the transition of youth practice from the space of deviant, in accordance with social norms, actions into the institutionalized space of the art world. Results. Using the example of the metamorphosis that the youth subculture of graffiti underwent in the late 20th — early 21st centuries, the author shows how the boundaries between norm and deviation are shifting in modern society. Conclusions. The rhizom principle, clearly manifested in the organization of the space of postmodern culture, allows graffiti and street art to make the above transition. The fall of the great narrative in the art world leads to the loosening of hierarchies and creates an opportunity for the integration of once marginal phenomena into the space of official art. K. Mannheim’s concept of «fresh contact» is effective in the study of postmodern culture. (shrink)

At Pech Merle in 1952, André Breton provoked a controversial incident by damaging a Palaeolithic wall painting that he suspected to be a fake. This episode provides an insight into the contested status of prehistoric sites in post-war France and the theoretical and ideological implications of their cultural mobilization. Such sites allowed for a disavowal of wartime trauma and supported the reaffirmation of French national identity and its civilizing mission by locating the birthplace of human culture on French soil. Yet (...) their extreme age also threw into relief the relative fragility of the recently invented nation-state. Breton's vandalism cast doubt on the models of cultural progress and pre-eminence that sought to instrumentalize prehistoric art but failed to appreciate the subversiveness of its ‘deep’ history. Ironically, however, Breton's scepticism ultimately enhanced the subversive dimension of archaeology by allowing it to demonstrate the authenticity and age of cave art. (shrink)

Conventional wisdom has it that street protests are typically driven by rage due to grievances perceived to inflict on a group. This emotive atmosphere can shape protest methods to be vandalistic to the point where armed attacks against targeted opponents are justified. This paper suggests that rage-influenced struggle can be counterproductive as it obstructs a movement from building a coalition board enough to challenge the ruling elites it opposes. This paper argues that carnivalization of protests can prevent this setback in (...) two directions. First, it potentially transforms protesters’ collective emotion from rage to cheerfulness. This effect may lessen a possibility where protesters project violent revenge on those thought to represent the ruling elites. Second, while helping protesters to address sources of their grievances, carnivalesque protests create a “friendly” image that may convince a public audience outside the movement to support its cause. In assessing a political process of carnivalesque protests, this paper bases its analysis on an account of protest actions by Thailand’s Red Sunday group emerging after the 2010 crackdown. (shrink)