LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – If you tend to believe that the cast members of TLC reality series “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” are less than totally evolved, rejoice; this story might just confirm your suspicions.
“Crazy” Tony Lindsey – the cousin of “Honey Boo Boo”‘s titular star Alana Thompson” – was arrested in Georgia earlier this week following a goofy, but dangerous, stunt involving a gorilla suit, TMZ reports.
A police report says that Lindsey was among a group of men arrested for reckless behavior after one of them, dressed in a gorilla suit, prepared to jump into a lane along Highway 20 at approximately 11 p.m. Unfortunately for the band of wrongheaded pranksters, Deputy Joe Rozier happened to be driving by as he was about to take the leap from the side of the road.
“I observed a white male dressed in a gorilla suit acting as if he was going to jump into my lane of travel. I swerved into the left lane to avoid an accident with the person,” Rozier said in a police report.
Rozier took pursuit, and “observed several white males run up the embankment and into the woods,” the report notes. After threatening to release his police dog, he heard a voice yell back, “You don’t have to do that, we’re coming back.”
A group of five adults and two minors emerged – but with no gorilla suit. After a while, however, they admitted to hiding the suit in the woods.
It’s not known if Lindsey was the one in gorilla suit, or if the stunt will be incorporated into an upcoming episode of “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.”
A spokesperson for the show has not yet responded to TheWrap’s request for comment.
Early one morning I caught sight of Morpheus, silhouetted against a pink African dawn. Her long, sloping neck was stretched out as she loped away from me, disappearing over a hill. I followed her to a nearby plain and was met with the unmistakable sound of a group of hyenas squabbling over a carcass. Morpheus entered the fray, first lunging at a smaller male on her right. A moment later, she looked up briefly, her nose and mouth covered in blood, then turned and snapped at a hyena feeding nearby.I’m intimately acquainted with Morpheus and these other hyenas because they have been studied for more than twenty years by various members of the lab where I did my Ph.D. research; I’ve staked these hyenas out at dens for hours on end and followed them as they raced across open plains. From watching these animals, we’ve learned about hyenas’ social system, their physiology, and the conservation challenges they face.But to me, it’s the aggression that is the most fascinating thing about hyenas. It’s rule-based and constrained by specific social norms, but at the same time, it’s incredibly primal and ruthless. Studying aggression has helped us understand what makes hyenas tick, offering us a glimpse into the evolutionary pressures that have made them one of the most unusual and misunderstood species in the animal kingdom.Formidable femalesFor more than 1000 years, people believed that hyenas were hermaphrodites, since female hyenas have long, fully-erectile pseudopenises that mimic male genitalia. Seeing a hyena play the role of mom while sporting what looks like a penis would bewilder even an astute naturalist. Not only do female hyenas look like males, they are also the more aggressive and socially dominant sex, exhibiting aggression more than three times more often than male hyenas do.For many animals, too much aggression is detrimental, at least in terms of reproductive success; in baboons, aggressive females have reduced fertility and increased rates of miscarriage , and in western bluebirds, overly-aggressive males tend to fledge fewer offspring than other males. But in these species, males are generally more aggressive than females; how is aggressiveness related to fitness in a species where females are the more aggressive sex?Life in the clanHyenas live in huge social groups called clans that are structured by a “linear dominance hierarchy.” That’s the scientific way of saying that in these societies, a high-ranking individual is dominant to every lower-ranking animal in the clan: Morpheus is dominant to Scrabble, who is dominant to Hendrix, and so on. For hyenas, social rank isn’t just a title or a badge of honor. Rank determines access to food, so a high-ranking hyena like Morpheus can drive a lower-ranking hyena off a kill at any time, no matter who hunted or scavenged the meat.Social rank also plays an important role in aggressive behavior among hyenas, since dominance determines who can exhibit aggression toward whom. Aggression is nearly always directed down the hierarchy, toward lower-ranking hyenas (and if a hyena disregards this rule, it’s not taken lightly by other clan members). This means that the highest-ranking hyenas have a lot of opportunities for aggression – they can attack nearly any other hyena in the clan – whereas lower-ranking hyenas have far fewer possible targets. Aggression can occur over food, in defense of cubs, or to reprimand a pesky suitor.But unlike many species, aggression doesn’t dictate social rank among hyenas; instead, social rank is inherited. Hyenas are stuck with their lot in life, unable to move up the hierarchy. So does all this aggression actually benefit hyenas, and if so, how?The implications of aggressionAggressiveness, it turns out, varies drastically among hyenas; some hyenas tend to threaten – or outright attack – group members more frequently than others do. There is more than a five-fold difference in the aggression rates of the least aggressive and the most aggressive females, even after controlling for social rank and the number of opportunities for aggression.This type of consistent variation in behavior, called “animal personality,” is being found in several traits, such as sociability, boldness, and docility, across many species. And aggressiveness, like other personality traits, can have major implications for fitness. However, for hyenas, aggression doesn’t affect fitness by improving a hyena’s own survival; aggressive females don’t live longer or survive at higher rates than others that attack less often.Instead, the benefits of aggressiveness are seen later down the line, in the survival of offspring. Female hyenas that are particularly aggressive over food successfully rear a larger proportion of their cubs to adulthood than do females that aggress less often over food. But interestingly, the benefits of aggressiveness depend on social rank. For high-ranking hyenas, aggressiveness doesn’t matter much in terms of reproductive success; the offspring of dominant females do well no matter how aggressive their mom is. However, for hyenas low on the totem pole, aggression plays an important role in reproductive success, greatly improving their offspring’s odds of surviving until adulthood. But how?Competition and reputationsIt all comes down to acquiring resources for your offspring. High-ranking hyenas already have prime access to food, so being super-aggressive at a kill or carcass isn’t a huge advantage. However, for hyenas low on the totem pole, being able to secure a little extra food for a cub could mean the difference between its survival and starvation.When cubs begin eating meat at around 4 months of age, they start visiting kills with their moms. But as these cubs attempt to eat, they are often harassed by older hyenas and chased off the carcass. Additionally, these young hyenas have another disadvantage when it comes to feeding: their skulls haven’t finished developing yet. Although being able to crush bone is a big benefit for hyenas evolutionarily, it’s a huge morphological handicap for cubs. It takes up to 35 months for a hyena’s skull to develop the integrity and strength to crack bone, so until about three years of age, young hyenas feed more slowly and less efficiently than adults. Combine this physical disadvantage with the incredible feeding competition seen at kills, and cubs – especially low-ranking ones – often don’t get much to eat during these communal feeding situations.Here’s where a mom’s aggressiveness comes in: we found that the cubs of aggressive females are tolerated better, and are able to feed longer, at these kills than the cubs of less aggressive females are. By being super-aggressive, moms secure extra feeding time and valuable calories for their cubs during this particularly handicapped period in their lives. Although we don’t completely understand the process yet, aggressive females appear to develop a type of “mean girl” reputation within the clan that gives their offspring a boost early in life. This effect is incredibly strong and persists even when the mom isn’t present at the kill, allowing cubs to benefit from their mom’s aggressiveness even in her absence. This increased access to resources benefits low-ranking hyenas disproportionately, since they generally have very limited access to food.A combination of behavioral, morphological, and ecological research has helped us begin to understand why these highly aggressive and masculinized females have been favored evolutionarily. But even after 20 years of intensive research, there’s so much more to learn; we still aren’t sure what the functions and implications of male aggression are, and it’s possible that there are consequences of aggression in females that we haven’t yet discovered.Morpheus and her clanmates are still being observed, and you can follow the trials, tribulations, and musings of the researchers studying these hyenas out in the field at the Mara Hyena Project blog.
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — A report by the Brookings Institution shows Brazil‘s 13 largest metropolitan areas are the country’s economic engines, concentrating more than half of national GDP and driving their states forward.
The study by the think-tank’s Metropolitan Policy Program was issued Friday during an international conference in Sao Paulo. The Institution analyzed for the first time economic and demographic data about Brazil’s 13 most significant cities. A quick glance shows that with 33 percent of the population, they account for 56 percent of national GDP. They also concentrate half of the country’s college graduates, and are responsible for at least 45 percent of their states’ GDP.
These metro areas also have prominence globally: they’re responsible for one-third of Brazil’s exports.
DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — In an open letter Thursday to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the president of the African Union urged the U.N. to take immediate military action in northern Mali, which was seized by al-Qaida-linked rebels earlier this year.
Yayi Boni, the president of Benin who is also head of the African Union, said any reticence on the part of the U.N. will be interpreted as a sign of weakness by the terrorists now operating in Mali. The AU is waiting for the U.N. to sign off on a military plan to take back the occupied territory, and the Security Council is expected to discuss it in coming days.
In a report to the Security Council late Wednesday, Ban said the AU plan “needs to be developed further” because fundamental questions on how the force will be led, trained and equipped. Ban acknowledged that with each day, al-Qaida-linked fighters were becoming further entrenched in northern Mali, but he cautioned that a botched military operation could result in human rights abuses.
The sprawling African nation of Mali, once an example of a stable democracy, fell apart in March following a coup by junior officers. In the uncertainty that ensued, rebels including at least three groups with ties to al-Qaida, grabbed control of the nation’s distant north. The Islamists now control an area the size of France or Texas, an enormous triangle of land that includes borders with Mauritania, Algeria and Niger.
Two weeks ago, the African Union asked the U.N. to endorse a military intervention to free northern Mali, calling for 3,300 African soldiers to be deployed for one year. A U.S.-based counterterrorism official who saw the military plan said it was “amateurish” and had “huge, gaping holes.” The official insisted on anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the matter.
Boni, in his letter, said Africa was counting on the U.N. to take decisive action.
“I need to tell you with how much impatience the African continent is awaiting a strong message from the international community regarding the resolution of the crisis in Mali. … What we need to avoid is the impression that we are lacking in resolve in the face of these determined terrorists,” he said.
The most feared group in northern Mali is al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, al-Qaida’s North African branch, which is holding at least seven French hostages, including a 61-year-old man kidnapped last week.
On Thursday, SITE Intelligence published a transcript of a recently released interview with AQIM leader, Abu Musab Abdul Wadud, in which he urges Malians to reject any foreign intervention in their country. He warned French President Francois Hollande that he was “digging the graves” of the French hostages by pushing for an intervention.
Also on Thursday, Islamists meted out the latest Shariah punishment in northern city of Timbuktu. Six young men and women were each given 100 lashes for having talked to each other on city streets, witnesses said.
___
Associated Press writer Virgile Ahissou in Cotonou, Benin and Baba Ahmed in Bamako, Mali contributed to this report.
NEW YORK (AP) — A new survey finds that digital video recorders are now in more than half of all U.S. homes that subscribe to cable or satellite TV services.
Leichtman Research Group‘s survey of 1,300 households found that 52 percent of the ones that have pay-TV service also have a DVR. That translates to about 45 percent of all households and is up from 13.5 percent of all households surveyed five years ago by another firm, Nielsen.
The first DVRs came out in 1999, from TiVo Inc. and ReplayTV. Later, they were built into cable set-top boxes. The latest trend is “whole-home” DVRs that can distribute recorded shows to several sets.
Even with the spread of DVRs, live TV rules. Nielsen found last year that DVRs accounted for 8 percent of TV watching.
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Athens is seeing an alarming increase in new HIV infections, particularly among intravenous drug users, health officials warned Friday, as Greece struggles through a protracted financial crisis in which funding for health care and drug treatment programs has been slashed.
While there were about 10-14 new HIV infections per year among Athens drug users from 2008 to 2010, that number shot up to 206 new cases last year and 487 new cases by October this year — a 15-fold and 35-fold increase respectively, officials said.
“There is no doubt we have a big and rapidly developing epidemic in Athens,” said Angelos Hatzakis, an epidemiology and preventive medicine professor at Athens University.
A total of 1,049 new cases of HIV infection were recorded in Greece in the first 10 months of this year, including the 487 drug users. Of the others, 256 were homosexual men, while 108 caught the virus through heterosexual intercourse, the figures showed.
“One of the reasons is the financial crisis,” said Marc Sprenger, director of the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control. “There are more people who are vulnerable, marginalized” and who use drugs.
They turn to cheaper drugs and turn to injecting instead of smoking in order to get the same high from a smaller quantity, officials said.
“We are very concerned,” Sprenger said. “What we see now is this increase, and if you don’t really pay attention to this, it will become in the future a really huge burden.”
Greece has been hammered by a financial crisis since late 2009 that has left the country facing a sixth year of a deep recession and with a quarter of the workforce unemployed. The country relies on international rescue loans from other European countries that also use the euro and the International Monetary Fund to stay solvent.
But in return, the Greek government has imposed several rounds of spending cuts and tax hikes. Charities dealing with drug users and HIV sufferers have also struggled to find funds during the crisis.
Energy Secretary Ed Davey says the Bill will transform the energy landscape
Energy minister Ed Davey has unveiled the government’s much-trailed Energy Bill, setting out the roadmap for the UK’s switch to “a low-carbon economy”.
Energy firms can increase the “green” levy from £3bn to £7.6bn a year by 2020, potentially increasing household bills by £100.
But big, energy-intensive companies could be exempt from the extra costs of the switch to renewable energy.
There are also proposals for financial incentives to reduce energy demand.
The “transformation” will cost the UK £110bn over ten years, Mr Davey said.
He told MPs: “Britain’s energy sector is embarking on a period of exceptional renewal and expansion.
“The scale of the investment required is huge, representing close to half the UK’s total infrastructure investment pipeline.”
The government’s plan formed the “biggest transformation of Britain’s electricity market since privatisation,” he said.
Measures proposed in the Bill and consultations include:
Household energy bills to rise £100 on average by 2020
“Green” levy charged by energy firms to rise from £3bn to £7.6bn
Switch to clean energy to cost £110bn over ten years
Bill aims to encourage investment in low-carbon power production
Energy-intensive companies may be exempt from additional charges
Possible financial incentives to reduce energy consumption
Mr Davey said government policy was “designed specifically to reduce consumer bills”, arguing that without a move to renewable energy, bills would be higher because of a reliance on expensive and volatile gas prices.
Continue reading the main story
The government has unveiled plans to exempt some of Britain’s biggest industries from charges for clean electricity.
The Energy Bill confirms that households will be expected to pay about £100 a year on average to get more power from nuclear and renewables.
But it looks as though energy intensive firms won’t have to pay the extra charges. It’s feared that if their energy bills rise too high, they’ll move manufacturing jobs abroad.
The move may prove controversial with consumer groups.
The Bill confirms that households would provide £7.6bn of subsidy to nuclear and renewables by 2020 to keep the lights on and to meet targets on reducing emissions of greenhouse gases.
The government says the investment will shield the UK from volatile gas prices and force down costs in the long run.
But ministers have also announced that some of biggest industrial polluters in the UK – like steel and cement – may not be asked to pay extra. These global firms threaten to take their jobs elsewhere if power bills rise.
The government has recognised that if you are trying to cut global emissions of carbon, it’s futile driving away firms to pollute somewhere else. But many households may wonder why they’re being forced to pay extra whilst big firms are not.
Follow Roger on Twitter @rogerharrabin
The Energy Bill aims to move the UK’s energy production from a dependence on fossil fuels to a more diverse mix of energy sources, such as wind, nuclear and biomass.
This is to fill the energy gap from closing a number of coal and nuclear power stations over the next two decades, and to meet the government’s carbon dioxide emissions targets.
By allowing energy companies to charge more, the government hopes they will have the confidence to invest the huge sums of money that are needed to build renewable energy infrastructure such as windfarms.
But the opposition said that investment in renewable energy had fallen under the coalition.
“The reason that’s happened is because of the uncertainty the government has created – that’s why firms have put investment on hold, or scrapped it altogether,” said shadow energy and climate change secretary Caroline Flint.
She added that the absence of a carbon cap for the energy sector for 2030 further undermined investment in renewables.
Exemptions
But in a consultation paper published alongside the Bill, Mr Davey said energy-intensive industries, such as steel and cement producers, would be exempt from additional costs arising from measures to encourage investment in new low-carbon production.
“Decarbonisation should not mean deindustrialisation”, Mr Davey said.
“The transition to the low carbon economy will depend on products made by energy intensive industries – a wind turbine for example needing steel, cement and high-tech textiles.
“This exemption will ensure the UK retains the industrial capacity to support a low carbon economy.”
Without the exemption, the government fears big companies would cut jobs and relocate abroad.
Reducing demand
The government proposals to reduce electricity demand include financial incentives for consumers and businesses alike.
Shadow energy secretary Caroline Flint says the bill will see consumers will facing higher prices
For example, firms could be paid for each kilowatt-hour they save as a result of taking energy-reduction measures, such as low-energy lighting.
Householders and businesses could be given discounts and incentives to replace old equipment with more energy-efficient versions.
The government believes a 10% reduction in electricity demand could save £4bn by 2030.
But research by management consultancy McKinsey suggests there is the potential to reduce demand by as much as 26%, equivalent to 92 terawatt-hours, or the electricity generated by nine power stations in one year.
Audrey Gallacher, director of energy at Consumer Focus, said: “The government’s commitment to reduce energy demand through incentives for consumers and businesses is welcome.
“But it will come at a cost – which again will be passed onto customers.”
Citing a palpable “aesthetic experience” in classic games while eschewing others, the Museum of Modern Art announced Thursday that it has assembled a new collection of video games. The museum’s initial collection includes 14 classics like Pac-Man and Tetris, but also more recent additions to the canon like Passage and Canabalt. The museum has a “wish list” of about 40 total games, which include Pong, The Legend of Zelda, and Minecraft. The games will be exhibited starting in March 2013, but the selections aren’t necessarily what you’d expect.
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Video games are art. That’s a fact (which has some notable dissenters) that’s even been determined by the Supreme Court in a a case decided in 2011. And games have been embraced by art institutions before. In an exhibition this year, the Smithsonian American Art Museum explored The Art of Video Games. But in a blog post today, Paola Antonelli, senior curator in MoMA‘s department of design, explained that the museum’s intention is not as simple as evaluating the artistic value of certain video games. They want to look at games from a design perspective: “Our criteria, therefore, emphasize not only the visual quality and aesthetic experience of each game, but also the many other aspects—from the elegance of the code to the design of the player’s behavior—that pertain to interaction design.”
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Because the museum is looking for specific design traits, Antonielli explained that MoMA has not acquired, and is not looking for, some games that might seem like “no-brainers to video game historian.”
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Here are some images of the games MoMA has acquired, via the museum:
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Tetris
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MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Russian court ruled on Thursday that video footage of the Pussy Riot punk group protesting against President Vladimir Putin in a church was “extremist” and should be removed from websites.
The demonstration last February offended many Russian Orthodox Christians. But Putin has been criticized by U.S. and European leaders over what they saw as disproportionate jail sentences imposed on three Pussy Riot members. Their trial was also seen by Putin’s critics as part of a clampdown on dissent.
The Moscow court said it had based its ruling on conclusions by a panel of experts who studied the video, showing band members in colorful mini-skirts and ski masks dancing in front of the altar of Moscow’s main Russian Orthodox cathedral.
Judge Marina Musimovich said the footage “has elements of extremism; in particular there are words and actions which humiliate various social groups based on their religion”. She said it also had calls for mutiny and “mass disorder”.
The verdict said that free distribution of the video could ignite racial and religious hatred.
The court’s ruling applies to other videos released by the band, including a performance in Moscow’s Red Square, where calls for mass disorder could be heard. Such calls were not made inside the church.
The websites are now likely to be included in a state register and could be blocked if the banned content is not removed.
The Russian communications regulator Roskomnadzor said that once the court decision takes effect it will monitor how it is implemented.
Three members of Pussy Riot convicted in August of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred for their “punk prayer”, which the Russian Orthodox Church has cast as part of a concerted attack on the church and the faithful.
The women said the protest, in which they burst into Christ the Saviour Cathedral and called on the Virgin Mary to rid Russia of Putin, was not motivated by hatred and was meant to mock the church leadership’s support for the longtime leader.
Band members Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina are serving two-year jail sentences over the protest last February. A third member, Yekaterina Samutsevich, walked free last month when her sentence was suspended on appeal.
“To me this is a clear attribute of censorship – censorship of art and censorship of culture, of the protest culture which is very important for any country, let alone for Russia,” Samutsevich told reporters outside court.
“Now of course the fact that they will be blocking all Pussy Riot videos as I understand, all photos – this is horrible. Naturally, I will lodge an appeal and I will try to do it today,” she added.
Putin, a former KGB officer who has cultivated close ties with the Orthodox church over 13 years in power, has rebuffed Western criticism about the prison terms meted out.
(Additional reporting Valery Stepchenkov; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
