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On the hunt for Disney’s utopia- Fake snow and cotton candy in the town that Disney built
“Come hungry, leave happy”. McDonald’s monstrous neon sign shows off its morbidly obese grin along the U.S. Highway 192 and the Florida peach sunset can only fight for attention with a red lobster-shaped car parked in front of it. An army of endless cheap motels, discount shopping towers and the finest selection of fast-food chains…
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Romani camplife- Dispatch from the citizens of nowhere
Casilino 900 is not mentioned on any must- see lists in glossy Italian travel guides but is competing for the glare of the international media with the most spectacular of Rome’s tourist attractions. Tucked away on the outskirts of the ‘city of love’, hundreds of families from the largest and most marginalised ethnic minority in…
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Charleston and Red Bull- It’s a Christmas party!
Ass grabbing, photocopying genitals, lampshade on heads, gravy- covered beer guts, flashing ties and illuminated reindeer earrings- those are well- known signs of Christmas as thousands of offices around the country get their Christmas parties into full swing. I got invited to Red Bull’s staff Christmas bash in Shoreditch this weekend- only to find those…
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Savage TV: The great journey and the irresistible ’Other’
Norwegian Broadcasting Association sent three Norwegian families to live with indigenous peoples for three weeks and ended up offering a reality show suspiciously similar to the human zoos of old colonial exhibitions. Popularised TV anthropology is a risky sport, especially when 19th century ideas of human beings in their “natural” state reach primetime TV. Every…
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Save a punter: The latest in Norway’s prostitution debate
Since the Norwegian government decided that buying sex will be illegal for Norwegians anywhere on Mother Earth from 1 January 2009, a potlatch debate featuring ‘experts’, moralists, misogynists and misandrists have filled the national and regional papers. Being made redundant in January is not a rosy start to the New Year. It would have made…