TV review: Black Mirror: Bandersnatch (no spoilers)

I watched this show yesterday and have to agree with Kevin Fallon that it was a gimmicky disappointment, not up to the level of earlier episodes of Black Mirror that I found thought-provoking even if somewhat dark. Set in 1984, the main conceit of this latest offering is that it has a ‘choose your own story’ interactive structure where at various points you, the viewer, are asked to make a choice between two options that the chief protagonist Stefan is confronted with as he designs a ‘choose your own adventure’ computer game based on a ‘choose your own adventure’ book. You can already see the interweaving of multiple layers of reality.
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Abominable treatment of detained migrant children

The news that yet another Guatemalan child has died has once again focused attention on the utterly cruel treatment that is meted out to the child migrants who are in the custody of the Customs and Border Protection agency. Felipe González Morales, the UN’s special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, had already called for a full investigation of the first child’s death.
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Please, please don’t let it be of Donald Trump

According to a court filing, special counsel Robert Mueller is said to have obtained a ‘nude selfie’ during the course of his investigations into possible Russian interference in US elections. No one knows who is in the selfie but I don’t think that the nation can survive the collective psychological trauma if the photo is released and we find out that it is of Donald Trump.

I think that this is one of those situations when invoking national security to keep such a selfie secret would be justified.

Bernie Sanders and women and people of color

One of the most common criticisms of Bernie Sanders by liberals and even by some people on the left is that his supporters are predominantly white and male (derisively referred to as ‘Bernie bros’) and that is because Sanders is locked into a white privilege mode and has not addressed issues of importance to women and people of color. This view is promoted by the Democratic party establishment and its media supporters, who backed Clinton during the last campaign and are backing Joe Biden now. It is true that Hillary Clinton seemed to have more support from women and people of color during the campaign for the 2016 nomination but the reasons for why that was so are not clear. Katie Halper writes that the current media narrative that Sanders lacks support fro those groups is false and deserves to be countered.
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Esteemed scientists and famous cultural figures who died this year

This time of year brings an endless supply of best/worst lists most of which I ignore. The ones that I read are those of people who have died because often news of such people’s passing was lost in the noise when it happened. One such list that I read are those of actors but this one of scientists who died is also noteworthy, the most famous of whom was Stephen Hawking.

Another is this list of writers, musicians, and actors who died.