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Sign Language Interpreter Reveals What the Fake Interpreter Was Signing

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As the mystery surrounding the Mandela memorial's "fake" sign language interpreter deepens, at least one question has finally been answered: What the hell Thamsanqa Jantjie was actually signing.

Though he was no doubt signing nonsense, it turns out Jantjie was signing actual words.

To interpret the fake interpreter's fake interpretations for real, Jimmy Kimmel invited his show's resident sign language interpreter to read Jantjie's signs.

Suffice it to say, it sounds like a hearing impaired version of telephone.

For what it's worth, Jantjie seems to believe his interpretations are coherent.

"I think that I’ve been a champion of sign language," he told a local radio station yesterday. "I’ve interpreted at many big events...if I was interpreting wrong why should it become an issue now?"

[H/T: Laughing Squid]

Beyoncé's Just Like Everyone Else, But Much Better

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Beyoncé's Just Like Everyone Else, But Much Better

When Beyoncé walks, she tells us, she walks with a vengeance. When she enters the room, she commands every eyeball and ear her way. And what an entrance it was, the release of her surprise fifth album, the consistently dazzling BEYONCÉ, which landed on iTunes without previous announcement last night.

Not just an album—a "visual album," with often enjoyable clips to accompany every song (and a bonus, the above-quoted "Grown Woman"). Beyoncé exists to overwhelm us with perfectly executed, extraordinary work ethic and here she did it in a once-in-a-lifetime spectacle. It was a lightning bolt of art: Here is all of this new music. Here are all of these new visuals. Here they are, ready for you whenever you want to binge. People could Orange Is the New Black that shit and take their time, or take part in the pop-culture event that spontaneously broke out on Twitter.

These kinds of surprises are so rare, especially in the age of leaks, when we've already gotten tired of albums by their official release date. It would be a stretch to call this a "gift," as many pop artists love to do when discussing their work (Mariah Carey specifically), but what Beyoncé and her team engineered is about as close to a gift as something that you paid for can be.

How can Beyoncé possibly top herself next time? Create a new scale? Freeze time? Create a new form of currency from music ("Beycoin") and furnish us with billionaires? The reason we cannot possibly answer this is we are not Beyoncé.

This kind of release perfectly suits BEYONCÉ, because it assumes that enough people care about Beyoncé to overcome the complete lack of promotion leading up to it (in fact, last we heard, Bey had scrapped what she'd recorded and we should expect something next year). It's arrogant, the assumption that you can show up, say Now hear this, and that people will without any preparation. It's beyond arrogant: I'm fucking awesome and you're going to drop what you're doing and go to bed late because you're going to want to hear what I have to say. It's also spot on.

BEYONCÉ is an album about being desired. Its singer repeatedly asserts her beauty, her flawlessness, the sweetness of her genitalia, her prowess, her booty, in exactly the way she delivered her new work: Here are these things; I know you want them. She often delivers this in the form of raps, like "Partition," a minimal playground chant that finds Beyoncé aggressively submissive ("Driver roll up the partition please / I don't need you to see Beyoncé on her knees") and with cum on her dress ("He Monica Lewinsky'd on my gown"). The video dissolves from her eating breakfast. It's a fantasy, it's outrageous, it's aggressive—but there's also something striking about watching one of the planet's most desired women engage with the desire to be desired. This is Beyoncé's version of a Kanye rant. It hits you with multiple ideas that are just as likely to sound like bullshit as they are entirely true.

We watched Beyoncé wrestle with expressing her humanity earlier this year in her HBO documentary Life Is But a Dream, which was stilted and tight-lipped so that it seemed more like what she thought a documentary about her life should look like, rather than what her life actually looked like. BEYONCÉ isn't Blue, but there is expressive progress there. It doesn't get deeper than "Pretty Hurts," an adult contemporary ballad a la "If I Were a Boy" with a hook so caked in sugary synth sounds that is sounds frosted. Here we have one of the most admired women on the planet, one of the few who can say without exaggeration that she has helped set the standard, moaning, "Pretty hurts / Shine the light on whatever's worse / Perfection is the disease of a nation… Tryna fix something / But you can't fix what you can't see / It's the soul that needs the surgery."

The thing is, Beyoncé exists to be perfect. It's why that doc seemed so stuffy, and it's why she doesn't say a whole lot when she isn't singing. But while those lyrics may seem hypocritical coming from her, I think this song has the same ambivalent affect of Kanye West's "New Slaves," which calls out different kinds of racism West has felt as he's ascended classes, and bemoans a slavishness to brands while participating in it.

West fights back by attempting to build his own brand, to aggressively overcome those who would stifle or dismiss him (lately, this largely amounts to complaining). Beyoncé, on BEYONCÉ, calls out the game, but also attempts to build herself up within it through intimacy and unity. What goes without saying with West and Beyoncé is that they can achieve in their chosen fields because they think they're special enough to do so. So while, yes, one could make an argument about the unsightliness of arrogance, it works. And there's such a fine line between the confidence necessary to do anything worthwhile and the arrogance that some people may find distasteful that you often must risk the latter to achieve the former.

So Beyoncé exists to desire and be desired ("I know if I'm haunting you, you must be haunting me," she says in the closest flirtation she's come to making a straightforward house track, "Haunted"). She casually drops in the word "beautiful" to describe hers and her object of desire's bodies (Jay Z here, he guests on a verse) in the synth fantasia with a hook you'll want to spend your life with, "Drunk in Love." She never sounds happier than in "Rocket," a horny slow jam approximating D'Angelo approximating Prince (co-produced with Timbaland and Jerome Harmon). "Goddamn it, I'm comfortable in my skin / And you're comfortable in my skin / Ya look so comfortable in my skin skin skin," she sings at the climax, in the apotheosis of love and self-satisfaction.

It's fascinating peaking into the mind of a leader, when she's engaged with describing her perpetual public challenge of simultaneously finding worth within and asserting herself from without. "***Flawless" is a call to pride ("We flawless, ladies tell 'em I woke up like this") and feminism. It features Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie reciting something she wrote about society's reduced expectations for women—expectations Beyoncé must have stopped listening to years and years ago to be where she is today. She's leading by example—she requests that her listeners "bow down" in the song's first verse.

Beyoncé seems to believe that depth is an ideal, though like in Life Is But a Dream, she won't allow you to get much lower than just under the skin. "No I'm not the girl you thought you knew and thought you wanted / Underneath the pretty face is something complicated / I come with a sign of trouble / But I know that's why you're staying," she sings alongside what sounds like the keyboard that played the Doogie Howser, M.D., theme song in "No Angel." In the gorgeous sounding but melodically inert Frank Ocean duet, "Superpower," human voices, crisp high hats, tympanis and atmospheric strings elegantly support her observation, "When I'm standing in this mirror after all these years, what I'm viewing's a little different from what your eyes show ya / I guess I didn't see myself before ya." The woman has room to grow. She has flaws. She "probably won't make no money off this, oh well." She even says at one point, "I'm just jealous / I'm just human / Don't judge me."

I'm not sure which is the bigger fantasy here: Beyoncé not being judged or Beyoncé being "just human," but BEYONCÉ makes them both feel this close to believable.

[Image via Getty]

Buzzfeed CEO Jonah Peretti just unveiled the prize for meeting the company's traffic goal: every emp

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Buzzfeed CEO Jonah Peretti just unveiled the prize for meeting the company's traffic goal: every employee was gifted with a drawing of a cat by his friend, "post-conceptual" artist Cory Arcangel. The previous traffic prize was an iPad mini.

Company's Public Shaming of Ranting Customer Results in Flood of Orders

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Company's Public Shaming of Ranting Customer Results in Flood of Orders

When customers unfairly rant about poor service on Facebook, most companies just turn the other cheek. But one Washington business decided to respond in full to one irate client's accusations — and was rewarded with a hefty return on investment.

Yakima-based Liberty Bottleworks — "The ONLY American made metal bottle in the marketplace" — gets its share of negative feedback, but when one customer unjustly accused it — in ALL CAPS — of being bad at its job, Liberty Bottleworks co-founder and COO Ryan Clark was moved to respond:

Company's Public Shaming of Ranting Customer Results in Flood of Orders

A screenshot of the reasoned and patient (since removed) reply made the rounds online this week, prompting a veritable deluge of new orders to replace the one they'd lost.

Yesterday morning, the company posted a thank you note on its Facebook page, advising its untold number of new customers that, due to the volume of orders received since the post, they may experience longer than normal wait times.

I see what you did there, Universe.

[H/T: AdWeek via 22Words, photo via Facebook]

Dozens of journalists have been arrested in Egypt since 2011.

China Has Landed on The Moon

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China Has Landed on The Moon

A spacecraft launched by China has landed on the moon, the first "soft landing" a man-made object has made on the moon since 1976.

Only the United States and Soviet Union have landed objects on the moon previously. The Chang'e 3 lander is carrying a rover which will explore the lunar surface for the next three months. While the United States has turned most of its attention away from the Moon and towards Mars, China has focused on our satellite, aiming to land a human on the lunar surface by 2030.

The landing, which was broadcast on Chinese television, happened at 9:14 p.m. local time. The rover will explore the Bay of Rainbows, where it will conduct studies on the geology of the unexplored part of the moon. The probe and its rover are expected to photograph each other later this weekend, to prove the success of the mission.

New Yorkers beware: The writhing mass of douche that is SantaCon is happening right now.

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New Yorkers beware: The writhing mass of douche that is SantaCon is happening right now. Don't engage with them. Don't approach them. And whatever you do, don't sit on their laps.


Never Let A Cop In Your House: The Will Graves Story

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Never Let A Cop In Your House: The Will Graves Story

This story is so stupid, I feel bad making you read it, but it's a teachable moment. Former North Carolina guard, Will Graves, was cited last week for misdemeanor charges when cops searched his home and found eight marijuana seeds, three (!) blunts and two burnt blunts, all helpfully scare-quoted in most write ups because maybe your alcoholic granddad doesn't know that blunts and seeds are something the kids are "doing" these days. A nothing story became Breaking News From The Breaking News Center because Will Graves consented to a search of his home.

That's right! Will Graves wasn't doing anything illegal and the police had no right to enter his house, but that didn't stop them from asking. They'll always ask because you might actually say "yes." It may seem weird to say "no" to a cop, but you absolutely can and should if they've got no other right to be on your property. Graves was renting the home from his former coach, Roy Williams, but the principle applies all the same. That is his house and you need his permission to enter without a warrant or probable cause.

So, what the hell were the cops doing there in the first place?

A meter reader with the utility company called police after assessing the house that was thought to be vacant but suspected somebody was living at the residence.

Come oooonnnnnnn. This is the worst, Will Graves. I feel bad for you because this is just a shit situation. Some nosy electric company worker drops the dime on you and then all of a sudden cops are at your door—questioning whether you have a right to be in a home you are paying for because a fucking meter reader wasn't sure—and asking if they could look around. He probably felt like he had to let them in, to prove he's not squatting in the house, which is bullshit. But cops know that's how people will react, it's why they ask.

Graves then allowed police to enter and since they had his consent, and therefore a legal right to be in the home, anything they observed was fair game. Which is how they found the pot.

So, here's the deal: if some snoopy meter reader calls the cops because he or she isn't up to date on whether a property is being rented, it is your right to tell the cops who come by to check it out to either show you a warrant or get fucked. Otherwise you might be forced to release a ridiculous statement expressing remorse for getting cited for possession of three blunts in your own fucking home. Dude wasn't even arrested and we've got reports of a "Drug bust" involving former UNC player Will Graves. That's how crazy drugs make the people who don't use them.

Photo credit: Getty

Drug bust at home owned by UNC coach Roy Williams [ABC]

Former UNC player cited for drugs at Williams-owned home [WRAL]

​Inside My Shopping Cart: Food, Culture and Geographic Yearning

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​Inside My Shopping Cart: Food, Culture and Geographic Yearning

I am in the kitchen of the house I grew up in, holding a head of cabbage stable on the cutting board with both hands, while my mother thrusts a cleaver into it, slicing it in half. The leaves are densely packed in a squiggle of translucent white and green. She hands the knife to me, instructing me to cut the cabbage into thin shreds. When my slices are too coarse, she thwaps the back of my hand with a wet soup spoon and tells me to cut them finer.

We are making goi ga, which is a Vietnamese chicken and cabbage salad. Most of it is just work: chopping and dicing, gathering herbs from the garden, where they grow in big ceramic pots along the driveway, pulling apart the steamed meat by hand. Have you ever cooked a whole chicken before? You can get at least two dishes out of it. The salad and then a soup that you make by boiling the bones. It’s simple kitchen things, but some of it requires finesse. When you make the dressing, if it’s too salty or spicy, you add coconut soda. “Normally, coconut juice,” my mother says, “but this is how we do things in America.”

I would be lying if I said that food is all there is of culture, but it is the thing that is the easiest to explain, the thing that is most physical and visceral. Is finding home just a matter of having the right hot peppers burn your tongue? The first weekend I moved into the brick house with the green porch on Howe Street, I went grocery shopping and stumbled into a tiny Chinese market about a mile down Whalley. I don’t know if I could tell you what it’s called, now. It had just opened, but already smelled familiar. It’s an open secret that all Asian-American grocery stores contain tiny, hidden portals to each other, as well as your childhood. No matter where you go, you will find the snacks you ate after school when you were eight years old; the plastic stool you used to sit and take baths on when you were a toddler; the pastel clothespins that your extended family use to hang-dry their shirts.

I wandered in, wanting to fill up my empty corner of the pantry. One thing no one tells you when are nineteen and preparing to move into a new house for the first time is that you will need to stock your kitchen with all the spices and pastes and implements that you were so fortunate to be born into, the silver spoon of the first-generation American youth. The spice drawers in the kitchen of the house I grew up in have a thin film of chili and curry powder on the bottom; that’s how lucky I was to be born.

Downstairs, the market was cool and smelled stale. Mangoes were ripening, stacked in huge flats; I picked one up in my hands, hefting its weight, smelling the goldening skin. There were bins of tea, dried fruit and fish and squid, impassive glass jars of pickled vegetables. There were two shelves devoted entirely to chili sauces, and it was there that I found the plastic jar of hot garlic chili paste that I only know—as I only know so many things—by its Vietnamese name. I bought it immediately, along with a hand of ginger. Ginger is good for taking care of yourself or sick friends, if you put it in tea.

When I got home—by home, I mean the house in New Haven, Connecticut, which has white walls that still emanate the clean brightness of fresh paint, and a kitchen so narrow that only two people can comfortably cook in it at once—I unscrewed the little plastic jar with its green cap, and peeled back the safety lid. I dipped my pinky in the red paste, feeling a little ashamed but mostly anxious to make sure I’d found the right thing. It was, so I ate it every morning on my eggs for the rest of the semester.

To make the dressing for goi ga, you take water, a little rice vinegar, a little fish sauce, that red chili garlic paste, and coconut soda, the kind that comes in a shiny emerald pop-top can, and then mix them in a blue ceramic bowl until your mother approves. Alternatively, you mix it yourself, put the entire salad together, actually, with the chicken and cabbage nestled under the chopped Thai basil and the mint and the lime juice and drizzle the dressing over it and turn it over and over with two forks and present it at dinner, a gleaming, white and green and oily-peppered offering. The dregs of salty shreds of cabbage left in the bottom of the big china bowl are the only sign you did it right, but it’s enough.

Over my last winter break, my brother and I went to a grocery store on 82nd, deep southeast Portland, to buy snacks. It’s something we do together; we’ve grown closer since I moved out. He dragged me over to the soft drinks section and put a bottle of Calpis in my hands. “It tastes just like the stuff we used to have,” he said. There was a yogurt drink­—I hate never knowing the names of things, but I’m used to it by now—and it tasted sort of orangey, and came in boxes that you poked open with a straw. We bought it and he was right: it was the same thing, just in different packaging. Proust had madeleines; I have lychee gummy candy and yogurt drinks and rice crackers with tiny specks of white sugar crystallized on their puffed tops.

It feels like cheating, to write about culture by writing about food. But how else do I explain that it wasn’t until I left my mother’s kitchen that I learned I was always struggling to remember names? How do I explain the trawling, the sifting, the smelling, trying to decide: was this it? Is this it? I’ve spent hours in these tiny grocery stores, running heavy-bellied grains of rice through my hands.

When I told my mother I was writing this piece, she said, “You had better not write any more bad things about me.”

I said to her, “I can’t help it, I write about you so much.

We are so similar it hurts. When I was still in high school, I saw a picture of her when she was sixteen. She looked just like me, only prettier, her skin clear and bright.

A few weeks after my conversation with my mother, I got a care package from home. “Open it soon, they’ll rot,” she told me; calling me on the phone I am never without in case someone I love is sick. I cut open the box and found a dozen persimmons, nestled in paper towels. They glowed warm orange in the heat of the lamp of my kitchen, not so shiny and new anymore, with a thin film of spice dust building up in the cupboards, and I was heartsick for a moment, I missed home so much.

Not that I know where home is anymore, not that I don’t think both coasts and countries have a claim on my component parts, not that I can hardly remember the last time I picked persimmons off the tree in my family’s back yard, their skins shone over with a sudden frost. It would have been late October and I must have been seventeen. That batch was too bitter to eat raw; we made jam with cups and cups of sugar, trying to sweet the tannins in the fruit. Not that I don’t still linger in grocery stores, trailing my hands over fruit that’s marketed as lush and exotic, the things I grew up eating recontextualized and strange on this chilly New England rocky soil, not that I am only writing about food because I don’t know any other way to say the things that I am feeling.

On my street in New Haven, there’s a crabapple tree. I guess it’s the next best thing to the persimmon tree I grew up next to; the pears and plums I picked and carried around in my shirt. It flowers in the spring and snows pink petals all over the sidewalk; by July, there’s hard green fruit in the trees. In September, you can pick them. They’re yellow and red by then, blushing like you wouldn’t believe how sour they can be. I stole a basket of them off the tree with my best friend, soon after I moved in. We tried to make a salad of them: grated carrots and sliced avocado and chickpeas, topped with these halved crisp stone-less cherries. No matter how hard we tried, nothing would sweeten them. And though I kept taking bites, each one made my mouth pucker, rosy as a kiss.

Larissa Pham is an artist and writer interested in intimacy, new narratives, and the ways in which our lives intersect with modern media. She is a regular contributor at Full Stop Magazine and has been previously published in The Rumpus, Salon, Nerve, and The Ellipses Project. She currently splits her time between Portland, OR, and New Haven, CT. You can find her on twitter at @lrsphm.

[Photo: ValeStock / Shutterstock.com]

Burned: Michigan Man Fired After Helping Put Out Fire

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Burned: Michigan Man Fired After Helping Put Out Fire

A Michigan man was fired last month after he left his position greeting customers at the entrance to a store and rushed with a fire extinguisher to put out a car fire in the parking lot.

David Bowers, 62, was fired by the Meijer store in Gaylord, Michigan, after helping a distressed customer.

"When the guy came in and said his dashboard was on fire I grabbed the fire extinguisher and I followed him outside and sure enough his dashboard was on fire," Bowers told WPBN in Michigan.

Bowers helped put out the fire, but was dismissed by the company for not following policy.

"The safety of our customers and team members is a top priority at Meijer. We have a very specific protocol in place for our team members to follow when emergencies occur and we can't allow any deviation from the policy that could put our customers or team members at risk," Meijer told WPBN.

The customer who Bowers helped is baffled: "I thought that was what we were supposed to do, you know you have somebody that is in need, don't you help them, but I guess not."

Bowers has been unable to find a new position since his dismissal.

How much classified information did Edward Snowden take with him when he left the country?

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How much classified information did Edward Snowden take with him when he left the country? We don't even know.

Have You Seen King Bozo?

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Have You Seen King Bozo?

Has anyone seen one of these giftcards around New York City? This Tumblr, run by someone called King Bozo, documents cards given to people in coffee shops, subway trains, and book stores around the city. The cards end up being strangely funny, strangely pretty, or just strange.

Have You Seen King Bozo?

Have You Seen King Bozo?

If you've met King Bozo — what does he look like? Is he truly a king? Bozo? Both?

Have You Seen King Bozo?

Not to be outdone by China, Iran claims it has sent a second monkey into space.

Japan Executes Prisoners Without Letting Them Know When They'll Die

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Japan Executes Prisoners Without Letting Them Know When They'll Die

Japan executes its death row inmates only hours after the prisoner has been informed that they are about to be hanged, Danielle Wiener-Bronner over at The Atlantic writes.

The family of the prisoners are not informed of the execution until after it's already happened, and the inmates are only told they will be hanged hours before they are. In contrast to the lengthy waits and last-minute reprieves that is common in the U.S. justice system, Japan uses a "secret execution" program that keeps the date secret from the prisoners until only hours before they are hung.

The Guardian reports that "in a report published in 2008, Amnesty [International] said inmates in Japan were being driven insane and exposed to 'cruel, inhuman and degrading' punishment."

The prisoners spend years on death row being slowly driven insane that today might be the day they die.

[Shutterstock]


American And Chinese Warships Engage In Bizarre Game Of Chicken

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American And Chinese Warships Engage In Bizarre Game Of Chicken

As China goes around claiming vast swaths of territory based on controversial claims, more and more confrontations are going to occur in the waters of Asia. A fairly serious one occurred just a few weeks ago, when a Chinese naval ship decided to turn in its tracks right in front of the USS Cowpens.

Details are still murky over exactly what happened, but like everything involving international relations we have to start way back to provide some context over what's happening. As China's national ambitions have grown, so have its territorial claims.

While a lot of noise has been made about China's new air defense identification zone over islands administered by Japan, China has also quietly been staking a claim to virtually the entire South China Sea, which, weirdly enough, isn't actually very close to China. It's smack dab in the middle of the Philippines and Vietnam, and it's bordered to the south by countries like Indonesia and Malaysia. Naturally all of these countries claim some sort of rights to the South China Sea, then, but China has decided unilaterally based on some ancient maps that the South China Sea now belongs to China, thankyouverymuch, along with all of the natural resources that potentially lie below it. The New York Times actually did a fantastic job explaining the whole situation, and it's well worth a read if you have like nine hours or so.

The other piece of the puzzle leading up to this whole little shindig is the Chinese aircraft carrier Liaoning. The Liaoning started out in life as a not entirely-completed Soviet aircraft carrier, but the Soviet Union collapsed and it just sort of sat there, parked on Ukraine's coast. Ukraine didn't really want or need an aircraft carrier, so they tried to get rid of it for years while it the carrier rusted.

In 1998, the carrier was sold to a random Chinese company called Chong Lot Travel Agency for about $20 million. Chong Lot claimed they were going to turn the aircraft carrier into a hotel and casino, because that makes a lot of sense, and the fact that their chairman was a former career officer with the People's Liberation Army of China was totally not a factor, don't look over here guys.

American And Chinese Warships Engage In Bizarre Game Of Chicken

In 2001 it was towed to China, where nothing seemed to happen for a while.

Then in 2005 the carrier moved to a drydock in Dalian, where it was covered in red primer, which is normal if you're going to be converting a hulk into a casino, I suppose, and China attempted to negotiate an order for 50 Su-33 naval fighter jets, which is most definitely not normal if you're building a casino. I dunno, I stayed in the Luxor this one time, didn't see any Russian fighter jets, but that's just me.

The old Soviet aircraft carrier was soon re-named the Liaoning, and China was all "what hotel and casino?" and everyone else was just like "sigh, China, SIGH."

Of course old rusted-out Soviet hulks take a bit of time to make new again, so it's taken until now for the Liaoning to go on its first training runs. And where did China decide to send it on one of its very first training missions?

You guessed it: the South China Sea.

You can also probably guess where this is going.

On December 5th, the Liaoning was being escorted by a few other ships in the South China sea conducting maneuvers, all the while being shadowed and observed by the US Navy cruiser USS Cowpens. It's all fairly standard procedure for most navies, and, let's be honest, the Cowpens may have been toeing the line between observation and outright spying.

Either way, the Chinese seemed to have gotten pretty pissed about it. A Chinese amphibious transport dock (likely a Type 071) broke off from the rest of the group, crossed in front of the Cowpens, and came to a dead halt.

Despite warnings from the American ship, the Chinese ship refused to budge, and the Cowpens came within 500 yards of colliding with the other boat after the Captain ordered an all-stop. If you're not familiar with big ships, that's really pants-wettingly close.

And it was all very deliberate, according to CNN:

"The Chinese knew what they were doing," a second U.S. military official said.

During the encounter, bridge-to-bridge radio communications were maintained between the American and Chinese commanders.

"Communications were professional," the second official said.

Eventually the strange staredown ended without further incident, but it's important to note that Vice President Joe Biden went to China last week, and he probably didn't just talk about puppies.

But hey, while we're on the topic of CNN, why don't we ask whether or not you think this is a good thing, or a bad thing?

Don't leave your opinion in the comments below, because it doesn't really matter and holy crap this is such a complex issue why does anybody ever even ask that???

Photos credit US Navy

A dad filmed 25 years of Christmas mornings.

[A makeshift memorial with crosses for the victims of the Sandy Hook massacre stands outside a home

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[A makeshift memorial with crosses for the victims of the Sandy Hook massacre stands outside a home in Newtown, Conn.. Photo by Robert F. Bukaty via AP]

Pope Francis: Not a Marxist, but he knows a bunch "who are good people."

Kim Jong-un Lets Aunt Live After Executing Uncle

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Kim Jong-un Lets Aunt Live After Executing Uncle

Kim Jong-un has let his aunt remain a top official in North Korea, even after he executed her husband, Jang Song-thaek, on Friday. Jang Song-thaek was a mentor to Kim Jong-un and second-in-command of the security-minded nation.

Mr. Jang, Kim's uncle, was executed on Thursday after the government reported he had attempted to overthrow it, marking the beginning of a purge of many of the nation's leader. Many had wondered whether Kim Kyong-hee, Kim Jong-un's aunt, who had been sixth-in-command before the execution of her husband, was "purged" as well, or even executed alongside her husband. But on Friday, her name appeared on a list of attendees for a state funeral for a former party secretary.

Kim Kyong-hee might have been spared because she is the only sister of the North Korean leader's father, Kim Jong-il. She has often been the solitary female face among the many men who make up North Korea's leadership.

In an editorial on Sunday, the main North Korean paper ran an editorial stating that a true revolutionary was "one who has no qualms about pointing his gun barrel at anyone who dare challenge the leader's authority, no matter who he is, even if he is a blood kin of the leader."

In other news, Dennis Rodman will coach the North Korean basketball team.

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