Duh, because it's cheaper and easier...

Are we going to talk about the posters for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival this year? Huh? Wait, where are you going? Ok, ok, but I mean:

I want to be clear here: I hold the AI itself completely blameless.
You can only do what the humans tell you you can do. For now...

Or, go from here as the case may be.

For those unfamiliar, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, is huge. They do ten plays a season, people come from all over the world. According to wikipedia, there are something like four-hundred thousand attendees every year, and the budget is thirty-two million dollars. Of money. My point is, it's a big deal. I've never been, but money, time, work, you know. And I would like to go someday, but something about this year's posters clanged with me. Here, look at this one on the right. You see it, right? It's not just me? It's got that AI-y-ness, I don't even know how to articulate it.

Ok Krzysztof, you're off the hook.
Get back to sculpting bronze beardos
and being unpronounceable.

There's just that certain unnerving, je ne sais quoi am I looking at, about it. The artist's name is Krzysztof Bednarski. I looked them up and there a few people with that name. The first was a Polish photographer who is, you know, a photographer. Then there was a sculptor who used to design theatre posters. At first I thought this was him, but it kind of sounds like he hasn't done posters since the eighties. But the third guy--assuming he's a person and not a company--feels like the most likely candidate. On his site, he describes himself as "a multidisciplinary freelance creative director and collaborator, specializing in branding, visual identities, and motion design. [Who] crafts visual solutions for corporate and cultural projects." Which is 100% the kind of gibberish a person who would have no qualms about Chat GPT-ing up some art and calling it a day, would say. And while that's unfair of me to say, I don't think it's incorrect.

Above: something off-
putting and weirdly lit.

What's weird--other than the art, that is--is that Bednarski--again, assuming a person here--appears to be fully capable of not just AI-ing nonsense. In fact, he did so for OSF back in 2023 according to his website, and it was pretty good. Not everyone's cuppa, I'm sure, but way more interesting than the slapdash and smeary poster series this time around. So why did they, the Festival that is, even use this? Was it like a deadline thing and they had to go with whatever visual solution their freelance multidisciplinary brand crafter turned in? Or did they cheap out from the get-go and tell Bednarski "eh, just prompt us up something off-putting, and weirdly lit."

"Because this is cheaper and easier?"

-someone who's technically wrong

Which, I mean, anyone can do that, so why hire a Bednarski at all? Theatre is constantly in competition with other forms of entertainment. Forms of entertainment that are cheaper and easier, but people are choosing to drive or fly to Ashland to see actual humans perform plays written by actual humans. To sit in person, in a room with other actual humans, and to be gouged at the gift shop by actual humans. Why in the world would the Festival not insist on art by an actual human illustrator?

I don't know, this whole thing makes no sense to me. Just like Prince Hal's torso in the Henry IV image. Seriously, do yourself a favor and don't look too closely at it. Or at all.

You looked, didn't you? Heedless of my warning, you looked
and now you can't unsee it. You brought this upon yourself.

 

Not so fast!

The good news is, the tortoise is alive and well. I just want to be upfront about that. The bad news is, there's a new low. 

Above: Jonathan the tortoise who, as of this writing, is alive.

"For the last time, I never said anything
against trans people, Diane, not once."

-Jesus, kinda over it

New low? Maybe I should rephrase. We do, after all, live in a world where being a sex crime enthusiast isn't a bar to high office, and where we can't ban conversion therapy because that would impinge on some therapist's right to tell trans kids that Jesus is mad at them. Which he's not. He told me himself. What, don't believe me? Prove it. Boom. And yes, I'm going to be salty about that for a while. Anyway, my point is that there are some real shitheels out there, and I think they need to be called out even if their crime is trying to scam people with a dead tortoise and not say, bombing Iran. And once again, to be clear, the tortoise isn't actually dead.

Yeah, the "Trail of Tears" guy. Hey, Jonathan
has lived through the two worst presidents... 

What tortoise? Great question, glad you asked. Jonathan is a one hundred and ninety-four year old Seychelles giant tortoise living on Saint Helena island. Yes, one hundred and ninety four years of age old, can you believe it? He's a contemporary of both Brahms and Chappell Roen. He was hatched during the Jackson administration. He's the oldest living land animal according to my exhaustive research of his wikipedia page, so you can imagine the reaction around the world when his veterinarian, Joe Hollins, announced his death on X, and then asked for crypto donations--which, yeah, see where this is going? 

Above: Jonathan with today's headlines,
which I guess means he's ok? I'm not sure
how to tell an alive tortoise from a dead one.

According to the Guardian, upon learning of the alleged death of the island's oldest living inhabitant, the Governor of St. Helena--yeah, the actual governor--went outside to check. Evidently Jonathan lives at the Governor's house, or maybe the island is really small, either way, he found the animal alive, and even took a proof of life photo this morning just to quell any remaining rumors. But what about the vet's twitter post? Welp, turns out that wasn't him. That was just some rando posing as the vet to ring sympathy money out of tortoise lovers and that's why there's an extra warm spot in hell just for them.

Seriously, explain to me why it
exists except for doing crimes. 

And look, if this wasn't such a shitty, manipulative, cynical scam, you'd almost have to admire the dirtbag. Like, who would have thought to fake the death of an ancient tortoise in order to make a quick, uh, crypto buck? The hutzpah! It sounds like it should have been a perfect crime. Who could have foreseen the island's governor being in strolling distance of Jonathan? I don't know if they netting any crypto, although if they did, I suppose there's nothing to be done. It is, after all, crime money. 

I mean, could you imagine how much better the world would be if we took all the money, resources, and manpower we're wasting on a pointless war, racist immigration enforcement, and that preposterous ballroom/secret military base, and spent in on going after scammers?

"What am I doing? Why, I'm buying something called bit coin to send to
the Tulsa Police Department to bail out a grandson I wasn't aware I had."

-Someone's grandparent, right now

somewhere. Like this moment

Heartless? Hey, we all agree on something!

"Oh, was I not suppose to say that?"

-the deranged clown 35%

of the country still worships

I guess what we're all saying is that no one, literally no one was waiting for the Senate Republicans to chime in on International Transgender Day of Visibility. We know very well what they think about--wait, that's not fair. Sorry, I'm being unfair. Here I am, suggesting that Republicans don't care about trans people and that's misleading and simply not the case. They do care about trans people. At least insofar as they can keep beating the drum of "woke Democrats want to trans your kids" in order to con rubes into voting for seven dollar per gallon gas and secret military bunkers under the East Wing.

Case in point, yesterday, when the Democratic Party's X account posted--yeah, I don't know why they have an X account either--anyway, when they posted in support of trans rights, the National Republican Senatorial Committee replied:

"Wow, sick burn, brah."

-literally no one

Apologies to strawberry vape fans, but
comedy loves specificity. Also, maybe quit?

Yeah, whatever manosphere-addled, young Republican intern they put in charge of their social media account set down their strawberry vape long enough tap out "No" followed by a heart. I would read this as "no heart," an astonishingly frank, and self-aware thing for a conservative to say. So obviously that's not it. Instead, what they meant is "we disagree with everything you just said." Everything the Democrats said being "we acknowledge that you, trans people that is, exist, and are facing a daily struggle just to exist in the world." 

Whoa, whoa, that's a serious allegation.
You'd better have evidence to--oh, right.

No to all that, is what the NRSC is saying here. No. No to trans and non-binary people existing. Which, great. Super. The GOP looked at the unrelenting shitstorm of torment and vitriol visited upon a small and extremely vulnerable minority in America, and said, "how can we make their lives juuuuuust a little bit worse, while at the same time distract from the child sex trafficking our party's leader is allegedly guilty of?" Any ideas? The answer? A shitty comment on the burnt out husk of what used to be Twitter.  

The only silver lining here is that, despite the NRSC's dumb social media post, America's 2.8 million trans and 1.2 million or so non-binary people do indeed continue to exist. Something which, if there's any justice in the world, we may someday not be able to say of the GOP.

This November, just remember which party brought back internment camps, started a war,
sent armed goons into American cities, deported citizens, threatened our allies, and shielded (and in
many cases are themselves) sex offenders. Assuming that is, we actually get to vote ever again.

Today in justifiable gatekeeping:

I don't want to gatekeep or anything, but Stephen Miller is not a Star Trek fan. Ok, fine, I guess I do want to gatekeep. But hear me out: complaining about how woke the latest entry in the long running series of series about a moneyless, secular humanist utopia of space hippies is is evidence that he's not really a fan of Star Trek and possibly has never seen it before. It's been woke since the 1960's when painting Frank Gorshin half black and half white was considered subtle social commentary.

Star Trek in 1969: Racism is dumb and wrong.
The entire GOP platform in 2026: Racism is great, keep it up!

I mean, this has to be
unconstitutional too, right?

Miller, for those unfamiliar, is the White House Deputy Chief of Staff. He's probably most famous for both his policy of ejecting brown people from the United States without a hearing and for that time he went on TV sporting an artificial hairline he'd inexpertly sharpied onto his head. He recently took time off from Grima Wormtongue-ing into the remarkably un-scarred ear of the current President, to voice his opinion of the new Star Trek Starfleet Academy show, or at least a clip of it posted on a Twitter account called End Wokeness. Miller pronounced it "Tragic" and helpfully suggested that Paramount reconcile with William Shatner, so that he can salvage this disaster. I mean, ladies? In space?

Above: a scene from Starfleet Academy,
seen here passing the Bechdel test. 

At least, I assume that's what his beef is. Or maybe it's that one of the actors is British? Doesn't matter, he's the figurative (and possibly literal) devil. For William Shatner's part, the ninety-four year old star of Priceline.com ads trolled him right back suggesting that Miller's issue was that Holly Hunter wore glasses in the scene, because what else could it be? Anyway, he added that he's standing by to assume total control. Like it's an island in the North Atlantic.

Which, Uh-oh, does Miller know that Shatner is Canadian? Yikes, better not tell him.

Oh, right, he's white. Guess he's safe from Stephen Miller then, amiright?

Pictured: Jean-Luc Picard, noted captain
seen here not wearing fake spray-on
hair, and thinking woke thoughts. 

In any case, I felt the need to come out of my semi-retirement both to rag on Stephen Miller for having an opinion about how to fix Star Trek, and to say that I quite enjoyed the first couple of episodes of the new series. Did I ever think I'd be interested in a show that's at least fifty percent teen drama? Absolutely not, but I'm super into it and can't wait for the next episode. And do you know what? Make it more woke. Just, pour it on. Nothing gives me greater joy than to see right-wing shitheels whining about how they don't feel seen. Particularly when it's about media that stands in direct challenge to their worldview.