Salon.com > All Salon http://www.salon.com Sun, 26 May 2013 01:38:09 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 The best of Tumblr porn http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/#comments Sun, 26 May 2013 00:30:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307253 Earlier this week, in light of worries that Yahoo's purchase of Tumblr would mean an end to porn on the micro-blogging platform, I reviewed its most popular adult blogs. I slogged through hours of explicit material -- all for you. But then, the sophisticated porn-oisseurs among you were like: Who needs this plebe porn? Show us the best!

Alright, I hear you. But there is only so much of the Internet -- even the pornographic Tumblr Internet -- that one woman can cover, so I called in some expert help from porn stars, journalists and sexperts. The result is a wildly eclectic bunch of blogs featuring everything from porn superstar Stoya to the indifferent cats of amateur porn. There is something in here for everyone -- even if you don't consider yourself a pornophile.

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Art or Porn: You Decide

Because of its "unique twist," sexpert Emily Morse (she of Bravo TV fame) suggests this Tumblr. "You get to look at beautifully composed photographs that can also be considered pornographic," says Morse. "The photographs titillate and tell a story. It's up to you to decide whether you're enjoying porn or art."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/feed/ 1 From global warming to fluoride: Why do people deny science? http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/from_global_warming_to_fluoride_why_do_people_deny_science/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/from_global_warming_to_fluoride_why_do_people_deny_science/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 20:30:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13306964 The potent combination of our powerful intelligence with our massive reality denial has led to a dangerous world. Less obvious, but in the long term more dangerous, are threats resulting directly or indirectly from technological developments that have permitted us to increase our numbers well beyond the carrying capacity of the natural world. More efficient agriculture and the invention of artificial fertilizers permitted humans to produce food sufficient to support numbers that would be unthinkable for other animals of our physical size. Public health measures, vaccinations, antibiotics, and other medical advances also permitted population numbers to explode. The world is overpopulated already and is becoming more so at an alarming rate. And although we pay lip service to the resulting problems, we do relatively little to address their root causes. Indeed, some religions continue to promote the unrestrained propagation of their flocks. Planet Earth is sick, with a bad case of "infection by humans." In fact, as far as the other species on the planet are concerned, we humans are like the rapaciously invasive conglomerate of aliens called the Borg in the classic TV series "Star Trek" — a race that indiscriminately assimilates and takes over anything and everything it encounters. The motto of the Borg is "Resistance is futile." And indeed, for all other species on Planet Earth, resistance is futile when faced with humans! The exceptions, of course, are the microbes that infect us (such as tuberculosis, HIV, and malaria), which are also spreading just fine, thank you. As explained by environmental activist Paul Gilding in "The Great Disruption": "We have now reached a moment where four words—the earth is full—will define our times. This is not a philosophical statement; this is just science based in physics, chemistry and biology ... To keep operating at our current level, we need 50 percent more Earth than we’ve got."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/from_global_warming_to_fluoride_why_do_people_deny_science/feed/ 64 What does it really feel like to fall out of a building? http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/what_does_it_really_feel_like_to_fall_out_of_a_building/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/what_does_it_really_feel_like_to_fall_out_of_a_building/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 19:35:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13306846 When BBC reporter Alan Johnston was held captive in Palestinian-controlled Gaza, he had plenty of time to fill but no accurate method of measuring it. With no wristwatch, no books, or pen and paper, his only means of guessing how much time had passed was by studying the lines of light visible through the shutters and the shadow that moved slowly across the walls as he willed each day away. The five Islamic calls to prayer also allowed him to work out the rough time of day, but he soon lost track of the date. "I made a mark on the door in the traditional clichéd prisoner way, but for a while I was worried about what the guard might do if he saw these marks on the door of his flat. He was going through quite bad moods at the time, so I started making etching lines on the edge of my toothbrush instead, but it was still quite easy to become uncertain about the date, and soon I was adrift from time."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/what_does_it_really_feel_like_to_fall_out_of_a_building/feed/ 3 How Dan Savage lost it http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/how_dan_savage_lost_it/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/how_dan_savage_lost_it/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 19:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307374 Even in childhood, Dan Savage was learning how to negotiate the straight and gay worlds. He was born in Chicago in 1964, so his earliest memories coincide with the birth of gay liberation. Gay life in the big cities was about to pass from being secretive to being flamboyant. As if sniffing the change in the air, Savage accepted his homosexuality early, at least by 1970s standards. “I was 12, maybe 13,” he tells me when I visit him in Seattle. “Both of my brothers wanted to be in Boy Scouts and run riot and run around and beat shit up, and I wanted to sit home with my mom and bake. At four.”

Savage’s mother was a homemaker, and his father, a Chicago-Irish cop, patrolled the rough Area 6, which in the 1960s was the gayborhood before gayborhoods were trendy and chic and Starbucked. The elder Savage was not a mean guy nor a particularly bigoted one, but he believed the worst about gay life. “All he saw of gay life was squalid,” Savage says. Yet while neither of Savage’s parents had positive feelings about gay life — almost no parents did back then — they did not evince the kind of homophobia that drives a son deep into the closet.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/how_dan_savage_lost_it/feed/ 15 Diet soda rots your teeth “like meth and cocaine” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/diet_soda_rots_your_teeth_like_meth_and_cocaine_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/diet_soda_rots_your_teeth_like_meth_and_cocaine_partner/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308559 the fix
Turn that smile upside down, Diet Coke addicts! A new study claims that a diet soda habit can rot your teeth just as badly as using meth or cocaine. "You look at it side-to-side with 'meth mouth' or 'coke mouth,' it is startling to see the intensity and extent of damage more or less the same," says Dr. Mohamed Bassiouny, a professor of restorative dentistry at the Temple University School of Dentistry in Philadelphia. In the findings of the study, published in the journal General Dentistry, a woman in her 30s who drank two liters of soda a day for three to five years had the same dental damage as a 29-year-old meth user and a 51-year-old crack cocaine user. "None of the teeth affected by erosion were salvageable," says Bassiouny, and all three study participants needed all of their teeth extracted. The woman said she consumed extreme amounts of diet soda because she was concerned about weight gain, and also because she associated regular sodas with tooth decay. But Bassiouny says that sugar-free soda is just as damaging to teeth as regular soda "if they are consumed in the same frequency, the same amount and the same duration.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/diet_soda_rots_your_teeth_like_meth_and_cocaine_partner/feed/ 17 Is the Environmental Defense Fund ruining environmentalism? http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/is_the_environmental_defense_fund_ruining_environmentalism_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/is_the_environmental_defense_fund_ruining_environmentalism_partner/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 17:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308509 Pacific Standard The battle over hydraulic fracking of oil and natural gas has pitted land owners against each other. It has also created divides between neighboring states such as Pennsylvania, Ohio and New York. And now, after the Environmental Defense Fund joined a coalition of nonprofits and oil companies called the Center for Sustainable Shale Development, fracking is also splitting the environmental community.

The Center for Shale Development advocates that oil and gas companies voluntarily adopt 15 performance standards. These cover wastewater disposal, fracking fluids, air pollution standards for drill engines, limits on gas flaring in the fields and more. But this week, 68 grassroots groups protested the Environmental Defense Fund’s move, arguing the big environmental advocacy organization had allowed itself to be “co-opted by industry interests,” and that it was engaged in “greenwashing.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/is_the_environmental_defense_fund_ruining_environmentalism_partner/feed/ 3 Nancy Jo Sales on L.A. celeb robbers: “The Bling Ring kids were depressed” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/nancy_jo_sales_on_l_a_celeb_robbers_the_bling_ring_kids_were_depressed/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/nancy_jo_sales_on_l_a_celeb_robbers_the_bling_ring_kids_were_depressed/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 16:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308056 One of the summer's most anticipated films not about superheroes or space voyagers is Sofia Coppola's "The Bling Ring," the story of a group of young people who begin robbing the homes of celebrities. Among the victims of the fame-obsessed cabal: Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, "O.C." star Rachel Bilson and "Hills" personality Audrina Patridge, all of whom had clothes or jewelry stolen. It's the ultimate story for the TMZ age -- and it's all based on a true story.

 

 

The teens are also the subject of a new book by Nancy Jo Sales titled "The Bling Ring: How a Gang of Fame-Obsessed Teens Ripped Off Hollywood and Shocked the World." Sales reported on the so-called Bling Ring in a 2010 Vanity Fair piece, which focused in particular on Alexis Neiers, a beautiful and troubled teen whose arrest coincided with the taping of a reality show on E! called "Pretty Wild." (Neiers, who has protested her innocence, pleaded guilty -- and was in the jail cell next to Lindsay Lohan's.)

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/nancy_jo_sales_on_l_a_celeb_robbers_the_bling_ring_kids_were_depressed/feed/ 2 “Arrested Development,” hurry up and get here so you can stop being so annoying http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/%e2%80%9carrested_development%e2%80%9d_hurry_up_and_get_here_so_you_can_stop_being_so_annoying/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/%e2%80%9carrested_development%e2%80%9d_hurry_up_and_get_here_so_you_can_stop_being_so_annoying/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 16:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308126 As you have likely heard many, many times over, "Arrested Development" returns this Sunday on Netflix with 15 brand-new episodes dropped smack dab in the middle of Memorial Day weekend. In the months leading up to this monumental cultural brouhaha, there has been a deluge of “Arrested Development” ephemera. You can read about how “Arrested Development” creator Mitch Hurwitz wants you to watch the show (not all at once), watch Tobias Fünke's amazing sizzle reel, pour over Netflix’s posters and trailers, get “Arrested Development” emojis, enjoy more than one painstaking chart of every single call-back on the show, read a primer on the existing episodes, and many, many more supporting materials.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/%e2%80%9carrested_development%e2%80%9d_hurry_up_and_get_here_so_you_can_stop_being_so_annoying/feed/ 10 Top 5 investigative videos of the week: “Winning” Afghanistan http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/top_5_investigative_videos_of_the_week_winning_afghanistan_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/top_5_investigative_videos_of_the_week_winning_afghanistan_partner/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 15:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308337 The I Files A few things I learned from this week’s stories:

• The Sopranos are alive and well in Afghanistan.
• The California Legislature is a surprisingly lucrative cash cow.
• Never mess with the Mossad.

For more insights like these, please take a moment to subscribe to The I Files, the informative, sometimes fun, and totally free one-stop news source.

We promise it’s all perfectly legal.

“This Is What Winning Looks Like,” Vice

“Try doing that day in and day out -- working with child molesters, working with people who are robbing people, murdering them. It wears on you after awhile.”

So says Maj. Bill Steuber, a Marine serving on a forward operating base in southern Afghanistan. He’s referring not to enemy soldiers, but to U.S.-trained Afghan security officers who will take over once the Americans withdraw at the end of next year.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/top_5_investigative_videos_of_the_week_winning_afghanistan_partner/feed/ 2 Will U.S. amphibians become endangered species? http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/are_amphibians_going_extinct_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/are_amphibians_going_extinct_partner/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 15:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308571 Scientific American A new study finds that frogs, toads, salamanders and other amphibians in the U.S. are dying off so quickly that they could disappear from half of their habitats in the next 20 years. For some of the more endangered species, they could lose half of their habitats in as little as six years. The nine-year study, published on May 22 in PLoS One by scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), examined population trends for 48 species at 34 sites across the country.

The researchers found that on average amphibian populations were shrinking a surprising 3.7 percent per year. “Even though these declines seem small on the surface, they are not,” lead author Michael Adams, a USGS ecologist, said in a prepared release. “Small numbers build up to dramatic declines with time. We knew there was a big problem with amphibians, but these numbers are both surprising and of significant concern.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/are_amphibians_going_extinct_partner/feed/ 12 Must-do’s: What we like this week http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/must_dos_what_we_like_this_week_12/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/must_dos_what_we_like_this_week_12/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 14:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307329 BOOKS

New Yorker writer George Packer's “The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America" is a journalistic marvel, examining 35 years worth of history to reveal the slow transformation of American institutions. Laura Miller writes:

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/must_dos_what_we_like_this_week_12/feed/ 0 Josh Ritter makes his “Blood on the Tracks” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/josh_ritter_makes_his_blood_on_the_tracks/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/josh_ritter_makes_his_blood_on_the_tracks/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 13:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307117

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/josh_ritter_makes_his_blood_on_the_tracks/feed/ 1 I don’t hate millennials anymore! http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/i_dont_hate_millennials_anymore/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/i_dont_hate_millennials_anymore/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 13:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307168 Like many of my colleagues in the American academy, each fall I consult the Mindset List for entering college freshmen produced annually by Beloit College of Wisconsin. Designed to identify “the experiences and event horizons of students and . . . not meant to reflect on their preparatory education,” the list is marked by a frequent use of “always” and “never,” reminding us that many cultural and experiential commonplaces for those writing syllabi are foreign, inscrutable, and sometimes ancient history to the syllabi’s intended audience. On the list for the class of 2013, three facts controverting my own early experience catch the eye: one demographic, one geographic, and one pedagogic. First, in these students’ lifetime, “Smokers have never been promoted as an economic force that deserves respect.” The Marlboro Man never galloped across their television screens, nor will they recall Virginia Slims’ women’s-lib-hijacking “You’ve come a long way, baby!” advertising campaign. On the geographic front, the Soviet Union never appeared on their map, and thus “Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Latvia, Georgia, Lithuania, and Estonia have always been independent nations.” No Cold War–era living in the shadow of the bomb, no anxiety of "The Day After" variety for these students; they have lived instead with the horrifying shadow of 9/11 falling over half of their lives.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/i_dont_hate_millennials_anymore/feed/ 109 Illinois’ fracking and coal rush is a national crisis http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/illinoiss_fracking_and_coal_rush_is_a_national_crisis_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/illinoiss_fracking_and_coal_rush_is_a_national_crisis_partner/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 13:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308595 AlterNetWhat happens in Illinois doesn't stay in Illinois -- especially when you're dealing with the national ramifications of a combined fracking and coal mining rush unparalleled in recent memory.

As a sit-in movement continues at the office of Gov. Pat Quinn in Springfield, Ill., besieged southern Illinois residents who have been left out of backroom legislative negotiations over a controversial and admittedly flawed regulatory fracking bill are calling on the nation to contact Gov. Quinn and Lt. Gov. Lisa Madigan to "put a moratorium on drilling to investigate its full climate and health impacts."

Residents are also asking for concerned supporters to call members of Illinois' legislature to vote against a bill that health expert Sandra Steingraber has denounced as unscientific and unsafe.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/illinoiss_fracking_and_coal_rush_is_a_national_crisis_partner/feed/ 29 Jester clowns Westboro Baptist Church http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/jester_clowns_westboro_baptist_church_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/jester_clowns_westboro_baptist_church_partner/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 12:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307786 International Business Times
Hackers gonna hack, and this time the deserving target is the Westboro Baptist Church.

The notorious Christian fundamentalist group, never one to miss a chance to offend everyone on earth, decided that "God hates Oklahoma," and in the wake of the massive EF5 tornado that killed 24 people in the city of Moore, Okla., on Monday, the Westboro folks set up a website called just that.

The site's contents -- surely nothing more than a string of hateful remarks and hurtful insinuations -- are no longer visible to visitors. They've been replaced by just two pages that flip the script on Westboro (we refuse to link to their offensively named homepage), which likes to allege that just about everything tragic that happens in America comes as a result of an evolving list of alleged "sins."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/jester_clowns_westboro_baptist_church_partner/feed/ 29 GOP: Party of crybabies http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/grand_old_party_of_crybabies/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/grand_old_party_of_crybabies/#comments Sat, 25 May 2013 11:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308290 It’s time to call out a major Republican theme of how politics should be practiced in a democracy: the supposed right to be free from criticism. It may sell wonderfully inside the conservative closed-information loop, but it’s a nasty idea that sorts exceptionally badly with democratic politics.

In case you’re unfamiliar, the right to be free from criticism is the core idea behind what used to be complaints about “political correctness” and which have now morphed into the conviction that some accusations are too terrible to be made. See, for example, former Heritage immigration expert (or is that race-and-intelligence obsessive?) Jason Richwine. As he told conservative reporter Byron York:

The accusation of racism is one of the worst things that anyone can call you in public life … Once that word is out there, it's very difficult to recover from it, even when it is completely untrue.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/25/grand_old_party_of_crybabies/feed/ 100 What’s 2013′s “Gone Girl”? Here are this summer’s best reads http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/whats_2013s_gone_girl_here_are_this_summers_best_reads/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/whats_2013s_gone_girl_here_are_this_summers_best_reads/#comments Fri, 24 May 2013 23:30:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13306792 Step away from that Dan Brown novel! Better yet, don't let summer's distractions lead you to consider picking it up in the first place. Take our advice now and you won't find yourself scanning the shelves of dispiriting airport bookshops and beach-town drugstores before settling on yet another routine thriller. Contrary to what some mega-selling authors seem to believe, not every page turner has to be packed with ham-fisted clichés, wooden characters, pointlessly frenetic action and cheesy dialogue. Somewhere between Brown's "Inferno" and "War and Peace" lies the sweet spot where literary quality mingles freely with crackerjack storytelling.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/whats_2013s_gone_girl_here_are_this_summers_best_reads/feed/ 9 Title Post Title http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/title_post_title/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/title_post_title/#comments Fri, 24 May 2013 23:25:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308592 Blah Blah Blah

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/title_post_title/feed/ 2 Twitter talks back: Obama’s missed salute http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/twitter_talks_back_obamas_missed_salute/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/twitter_talks_back_obamas_missed_salute/#comments Fri, 24 May 2013 21:51:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308308 Boarding his helicopter today, President Obama gave a rather lackluster salute to the attending Marine. The President then realized his mistake or was made aware of it and returned to shake the Marine's hand.

A few Twitter users took this as an invitation to share their opinion:

[embedtweet id="337953875556450304"]
[embedtweet id="337995871977349121"]
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[embedtweet id="338047021091004418"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/twitter_talks_back_obamas_missed_salute/feed/ 111 Fox executive behind “Does Someone Have to Go?” leaving the network http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/fox_executive_behind_does_someone_have_to_go_leaving_the_network/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/fox_executive_behind_does_someone_have_to_go_leaving_the_network/#comments Fri, 24 May 2013 20:55:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308379 Evidently, he was the one who had to go.

Mike Darnell, Fox's president of alternative entertainment, is leaving the network, Fox said via press release.

Darnell was the executive responsible for reality series like "American Idol" and "The X Factor" -- as well as the series that debuted last night, "Does Someone Have to Go?," which asks office workers to decide which of their colleagues should be fired. Writing for Salon, Willa Paskin called it "a vile show," noting, "Obviously, someone does have to go, but it really should be all the cameras."

Aside from the two singing-themed reality series -- one of which has cratered in the ratings, the other of which has never caught on despite perpetual reinvention -- Darnell's résumé is full of the sort of provocative specials and series Fox was known for in its wilder early years: “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?” “Man vs. Beast,” “World’s Scariest Police Chases,” "The Swan," “When Animals Attack!,” et al.

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