Police arrested 71 people protesting the acquittal of Officer Michael Brelo in Cleveland on Saturday, the New York Times reports. At a news conference, Chief Calvin D. Williams said they were mostly arrested on charges of aggravated rioting and obstruction of justice.

Further demonstrations are expected through Memorial Day weekend, protesting the acquittal of Officer Brelo in the shooting deaths of Timothy Russell, 43, and Malissa Williams, 30. Russell and Williams reportedly led officers on a 22-mile car chase on November 29, 2012, over the course of which 137 rounds were fired at their car.

Brelo alone fired 49 shots, and the chase concluded when he jumped on the hood of Russell’s car to fire 15. Some of those rounds were lethal. Officer Brelo is on unpaid leave, the Times reports, awaiting the results of an internal review paused during his trial.

Three people were arrested on Saturday after one threw a sign through the window of a restaurant. A patron was injured. Two of the three were arrested after interfering with the arrest of the first, Williams said.

Williams said the demonstrations began peacefully and turned aggressive as the night went on. “We only moved in to make arrests when things got violent and protesters refused to disperse,” he said. “We want people to understand, we’re going to help you in this process, but if things turn violent in this situation we will take action.”

“We continue to encourage peaceful protest and demonstration,” Cleveland mayor Frank Jackson said. “However, we will not tolerate demonstrations that cross the line.”

This characterization was disputed on Twitter.

Protests were entirely peaceful until drunken suburbanites started fights with protestors. https://t.co/KEXYmDmYyR

May 24, 2015

But...but there were no riots... https://t.co/ASybS0hX8S

May 24, 2015

So far, 72 officers have been suspended without pay as a result of the 2012 incident, the Times reports. One supervisor was fired, two more were demoted, and administrative charges against three officers were dismissed. Also, however:

Nine of the police officers disciplined for their roles in the shooting have filed a federal lawsuit against the city for racial discrimination. The officers—eight whites and one Hispanic—claim that they were disciplined more harshly because they were not black.

The city settled a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the families of Russell and Williams last year for $3 million.

Photo credit: AP Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

A 21-year-old woman is in “serious condition” at Moscow’s Sklifosovsky Institute after posing for a selfie with a handgun on Thursday and accidentally firing the weapon into her temple, The Independent reports.

According to Russian authorities, the 9mm pistol is believed to have been left at the woman’s workplace by a security guard. From AFP:

Police are investigating how the woman, who was an office worker, got hold of the gun, a city police spokesman told RIA Novosti.

The security guard had left the gun at work two weeks earlier before going on holiday, the police spokesman said.

A police source told state news agency RIA that the owner of the gun could face up to 6 months in prison for negligent storage of firearms resulting in “grave consequences.”

[Image via Shutterstock]

The UK’s poop-powered bus is officially one fast son-of-a-bitch. As reported Friday by Ars Technica, the bus recently hit a top speed of 76.8 miles per hour at the Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire—a record for a regular service bus.

“It was an impressive sight as it swept by on the track,” chief engineer John Bickerton told the BBC. “It sounded like a Vulcan bomber.”

The “Bus Hound” (name inspired by the British Bloodhound supersonic car) runs on biomethane produced by the anaerobic digestion of cow poo in a bioreactor. The methane is compressed, liquified and stored in a series of tanks fixed to the inside of the bus’s roof. Naturally, the bus is painted black and white to look like a Friesian cow.

Now, those of us who have any familiarity with the Speed movies have clearly seen faster buses. Even outside the realm of 90s action-flicks, to be recognized as a Guinness World Record, the bus would have to reach speeds of above 150 miles per hour, according to the BBC. But compared to its oil-eating counterparts, which typically max out around 56 miles per hour, the poo-bus isn’t looking too shabby. Despite sounding like the end of days.

The next step, of course, will be to race the Bus Hound against the UK’s human poop-powered bus, and learn once and for all whose shit packs more punch.

[Ars Technica]

Follow Maddie on Twitter or contact her at maddie.stone@gizmodo.com

An officer with the Housing Authority of New Orleans was found shot to death in his patrol vehicle at around 7 a.m. Sunday morning, NOLA.com reports. According to police, the car still had its lights on and was in drive, apparently having come to stop after hitting a curb.

It wasn’t immediately clear when or why the 45-year-old officer was killed while patrolling an unpopulated block of under-construction public housing.

“What we know right now is that he was fatally wounded, and it is just a sad day,” NOPD Superintendent Michael Harrison told WWLTV. “We are all very touched by it and our thoughts and prayers are with the chief, his family and the officers of the housing authority.”

HANO police chief Robert Anderson told reporters that this is the first on-duty death in his department’s four-year history.

[Image via WWLTV]

In an interview Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter said that the Iraqi military lacked the “will to fight” the resurgent Islamic State, demonstrated by the loss of Ramadi to militant forces last week.

“What apparently happened is the Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight,” Carter said. “They were not outnumbered; in fact, they vastly outnumbered the opposing force. That says to me, and I think to most of us, that we have an issue with the will of the Iraqis to fight ISIL and defend themselves.”

Hakim al-Zamili, head of the Iraqi parliament’s defense and security committee and member of what the Associated Press describes as a “deeply anti-American” Shiite faction, told the AP that Carter’s comments were “unrealistic and baseless.” “The Iraqi army and police did have the will to fight IS group in Ramadi, but these forces lack good equipment, weapons and aerial support,” he said.

The Iraqis left behind a large amount of U.S.-supplied equipment. “The ISF was not driven out of Ramadi,” Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey said last week. “They drove out of Ramadi.”

“If there comes a time when we have to change the kinds of support we give, we will make that recommendation,” Carter said on Sunday. “But what happened in Ramadi was a failure of the Iraqi forces to fight, and so our efforts now are devoted to providing their ground forces with the equipment, the training, and encouraging their will to fight so that our campaign enabling them can be successful—both in defeating ISIL and keeping ISIL defeated in a sustained way.”

After coalition forces reclaimed Tikrit in March, many analysts believed ISIS was in decline. This has turned out not to be the case.

“I thought they had lost the capability to do what they just did,” Jessica Lewis McFate of the Institute for the Study of War, a D.C. research organization that has advocated for a more bellicose posture from the United States towards ISIS, told the New York Times. “The tide of the war really looked like it had shifted away from ISIS’s terms.”

“Ramadi was a bigger loss for us,” McFate said, “than Tikrit was a loss to ISIS.”

Photo credit: AP Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

I would like to wish everyone, including all haters and losers (of which, sadly, there are many) a truly happy and enjoyable Memorial Day!

May 24, 2015

[h/t Mediaite]

Actress and comedian Anne Meara, who came to fame in the 1960s as half of the comedy duo Stiller and Meara, has died, NBC News reports. She was 85.

Alongside husband and fellow Second City graduate Jerry Stiller, Meara was a staple of variety programs like The Ed Sullivan Show and The Merv Griffin Show. The duo would continue to work together throughout their 61-year marriage, and later, with their son, Ben Stiller, all three appearing in 2001’s Zoolander.

According to a statement released to the Associated Press by her family today, Meara passed away on Saturday from unspecified causes.

“Anne’s memory lives on in the hearts of daughter Amy, son Ben, her grandchildren, her extended family and friends, and the millions she entertained as an actress, writer and comedienne,” read the statement.

[Image via Getty Images]

Gator mad. Truck approach gator. Gator see truck. Gator bite truck. Truck owner mad.

[h/t Digg]

Before this week, when reality star and conservative political activist Joshua Duggar admitted to molesting several underage girls, including his own sisters, what most people knew about the Duggar family could be counted on two fingers: They have 19—19!—kids, and they’re extremely religious Christians.

But the Duggars are different than your standard evangelical Christians—they’re followers of a particularly scary fundamentalist sect known as the Quiverfull movement, which adheres to a deeply patriarchal and highly authoritarian set of beliefs about gender and culture. What does that mean, exactly? Here’s your guide to the Quiverfull movement and some of its heavy hitters.

The Quiverfull Movement

“Quiverfull” is very new. Newer than Scientology, in fact. Starting in the 1980s, its ideas have mostly spread through homeschooling and networking with other similarly minded Christians—which is why the cult-like movement has taken root as social media and internet access has exploded in the past three decades. That, and the fact that they’re literally multiplying, should make you at least a little bit afraid.

On the surface, Quiverfull follows your typical radical evangelical principles—every word of the Bible is taken literally, traditional gender roles and “family values” are emphasized, and the secular world is alternately scorned and feared. But followers of Quiverfull take one key tenet and let it shape the rest of their beliefs: Birth control is evil. They want to have as many children as possible, in order to build a pint-sized fundamentalist Christian army. The Quiverfull movement takes its name from this verse from Psalm 127 (KJV):

Lo, children are a heritage of the LORD:
and the fruit of the womb is his reward.
As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man;
so are children of the youth.
Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them:
they shall not be ashamed,
but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

Each child is an arrow in their quiver, and they’re going to try to shoot it right at you.

Ultimately the scariest aspect of Quiverfull is that it’s not just one specific Christian denomination or church: Quiverfull families are all over America, in churches everywhere. That’s why it’s nearly impossible to tell how quickly their numbers are rising. They tend to congregate in fundamentalist evangelical churches, but Quiverfull families could really be found in any traditionalist Protestant denomination. It’s their mission to push more and more people toward their rigid and reactionary view of Christianity, and to eventually outnumber anyone who disagrees.

See, the “having a lot of kids” aspect of the Quiverfull movement is just the tip of the iceberg. Catholics, Mormons, and certain groups of conservative Jews also believe in having a lot of kids and not taking birth control. Duggars, along with the rest of the Quiverfull movement, turn having kids into a political statement. They want to out-reproduce Muslims, and see the quantity of children they put out into the world as a maternal mission statement.

Struggling with infertility issues? Sorry about your “empty quiver,” but according to the Quiverfull faithful, God doesn’t believe in fertility treatments, and your barrenness is probably the result of your sinful heart. Only the woman is at fault for any problems reproducing. Men are, of course, blameless. Would giving birth be a dangerous health issue for you? They’ll encourage you to get pregnant anyway—because dying in childbirth is a virtuous death by which you can become a martyr.

If it seems like the evangelical right isn’t progressing forward along with the rest of the world, it’s probably because—along with the right-wing values of the Tea Party—these patriarchal and oppressive ideas have wormed their way into the mainstream evangelical churches. It’s not only the Duggars; the Duggars are just the most famous example.

And here’s what they—the reality-television family idolized by Christian fundamentalists—believe.

Women must obey the orders of men, in all cases

Aren’t all religious Christians anti-feminist? No, not at all. But Quiverfullers are. And while ultra-conservative views on childbearing have long been present in many religions, Quiverfull’s anti-feminism traces itself back to a woman—a self-described former feminist—who brought the movement to the forefront three decades ago.

In 1985, a writer named Mary Pride published a book called The Way Home: Beyond Feminism, Back to Reality, which detailed her journey away from the second-wave feminism of the ‘70s and into what she perceived was a woman’s Biblical place in the home, and the commandment to fill the house with as many of her husband’s children as possible.

Pride insisted that no woman could possibly find true happiness without submitting to her vision of Christianity: Relinquish control of your womb to God, and exist only to please your husband, give birth, feed everyone, and educate your children in the home—almost certainly without having received any formal higher education yourself.

From the moment a Duggar in possession of a vagina is born or married into the family, she falls under the control of Christian Patriarchy. The wife is forever under the authority of her husband, and a daughter is completely subservient to her father until the day he finds a suitable husband to take up the role. The women of Quiverfull are never supposed to disobey their male authority figure, ever, even if it’s something they find immoral. Because they think God would rather you kill a guy because your husband says so than to disobey the orders of a man.

Women aren’t supposed to work outside the home, and if the father can’t find anyone for his daughter to court and marry, they have to live at home to take care of the other children. (Sorry, Jana Duggar.) College? What’s that? There’s no room for individuality for men or women when you’re immediately dictated into a role based on the kind of genitals you have.

Image: Josh Duggar with Sen. Ted Cruz (R - TX)

Premarital sex is sinful, and women are temptresses—who must also be sexually available to their husbands

One line of argument you might hear is that Josh Duggar didn’t know it was wrong to molest girls or that he didn’t know what he was doing. He comes from a culture in which women are forbidden from showing their shoulders in case it causes their brothers to stumble, where they aren’t allowed to dance or front hug their own siblings—so how would he not know it’s wrong to fondle their breasts and genitals?

Don’t let anyone tell you this. The Quiverfull fundamentalist Christians are obsessed with sex. It’s the ultimate sin: They’re always thinking about it, and they’re always categorizing what’s wrong and what’s right.

This isn’t a particularly arduous task because the list of what’s right is pretty short: Heterosexual, vaginal sex between a biological male and a biological female is the only permitted kind of sex, and it can occur only in the bonds of holy matrimony with the intent of procreation. That’s pretty much it.

And women are obligated to give it up to their husband whenever and wherever they want it. Michelle Duggar herself relegated this advice to her daughters Jessa and Jill, on Today.

“In your marriage there will be times you’re going to be very exhausted. Your hubby comes home after a hard day’s work, you get the baby to bed, and he is going to be looking forward to that time with you. Be available. Anyone can fix him lunch, but only one person can meet that physical need of love that he has, and you always need to be available when he calls.”

Modesty and purity are of the utmost importance for a young lady until she gets married—and then she’s expected to turn into an on-demand sex slave robot. That’s definitely what Jesus wanted out of his followers.

As it turns out, this kind of obsessive regulation doesn’t lead to healthy attitudes toward sex, and this isn’t the first time that someone from the Quiverfull movement has gotten himself involved with sex-related accusations. In 2014, a group of women claimed they were sexually harassed by Bill Gothard, creator of the Institute in Basic Life Principles, an organization which provided Duggars with their homeschool curriculum. Gothard denied the allegations but was still forced to resign. His curriculum, however, remains the cornerstone for many Quiverfull homeschool educations and includes advice for victims of sexual assault that lays the blame on them, rather than on perpetrators.

Image: Josh Duggar with Gov. Scott Walker (R - WI)

Parents control their children’s lives

The Duggars, like most Quiverfull families, aren’t allowed to do anything fun, ever. With all the chores, and children, they probably don’t have time, but even if they did, their extracurricular activities would be completely controlled. The kids can’t listen to any music that makes you want to dance, even terrible Christian rock, so it’s pretty much just hymns and classical music. They can only read approved Christian books. Their internet access is strictly controlled, and the television is a thing TLC pays them to be on, but not a thing that they actually watch. (In 2009, EOnline estimated that they make at least $25,000 - $40,000 an episode, not counting additional television appearances on other networks.)

And if you’re one of the lucky Duggar children who has a phone, but doesn’t live outside the home yet, you have to copy your parents on every text you send. Lame, mom and dad! Plus, all the fashion choices you make are going to be dictated by them too. For the girls, that means your clothes are constantly policed for modesty (plus no jeans, and no short hair); for the boys, dad shirts and 1950s haircuts for the rest of your life.

Forget about alcohol, going to the beach, hanging out with anyone who isn’t part of your specific belief set, or Halloween. All of that can cause you to sin. So when the Duggars take communion, they partake in a literally watered-down version of Jesus’ sacred Last Supper: grape juice and a thin styrofoam wafer.

Image: Josh Duggar with former governor of Florida Jeb Bush

Families must be self-sufficient—no schools and no government assistance, no matter how many kids

Being able to support yourself is a good thing. But like everything, Quiverfullers take it to the extreme. All children are homeschooled, so they won’t be influenced by the big, scary world of heathens, and Quiverfullers are told to live debt-free and without government assistance—you wouldn’t want the secular government interfering in your personal life, would you?

And while the Duggars can easily afford their children, that’s simply not true for all Quiverfull families. Former Quiverfull adherent Cheryl Lindsey Seelhoff said in a 2009 interview with Newsweek:

“The Quiverfull movement holds up as examples families like the Duggars, the Doug Phillips family, the Michael Faris family—all men of means. But for every family like this, there are ten or fifty or one hundred Quiverfull families living in what most would consider to be poverty. Quiverfull families are one-income families and believe the father should be the provider and the mother should be caring for hearth and home.”

This kind of cut off, patriarchal, self-sufficient culture makes it hard for people to report sex abuse in their communities: The outside world is seen as being inherently untrustworthy, and the families try to handle as many problems as possible in the home without relying on external institutions. Even after repeated instances of abuse, Josh Duggar was never formally charged or turned into the authorities. He got a “stern lecture” from a state trooper who happened to be a family friend, and also happened to be a pervert who was later arrested on child pornography charges himself. And it’s rumored that neither Josh nor the victims received any therapy from licensed professionals.

Image: Josh Duggar with Sen. Rand Paul (R - KY)

Who’s Who in the Quiverfull Movement

Obviously the Duggars are the most notorious Quiverfull family out there. But they’re hardly the only recognizable reactionaries. Here are a handful of the movement’s leading lights:

Bill Gothard, the previously mentioned former director of the Institute in Basic Life Principles, has ties to Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, and former Georgia governor Sonny Perdue. In the 1980s, Bill’s brother Steve Gothard was forced to resign from IBLP after his extramarital affairs with several secretaries cam to light. In 2014, more than 30 women who worked as administrative assistants at the IBLP as teens accused Bill Gothard of having sexually harassed them or acted inappropriately; some said he fondled or kissed them. Gothard, who has never married, released a statement saying “I have never kissed a girl nor have I touched a girl immorally or with sexual intent.” Recovering Grace, a site for former Gothard followers, has several long and fascinating articles about the now disgraced minister.

Doug Phillips, son of Howard Phillips (leader of the U.S. Constitution Party), served as director of Vision Forum Ministries, one of the many Quiverfull-affiliated ultra-conservative evangelical organizations that helps produce anti-science, pro-Biblical patriarchy “educational” materials. Phillips was a close friend of the Duggars and fundamentalist actor Kirk Cameron—but was forced to step down from his position in late 2013, saying he had a “lengthy, inappropriate relationship with a woman”; the following April, that woman, a 29-year-old named Lourdes Torres-Manteufel who had worked as a nanny for Phillips’ children, sued Phillips for manipulating her and using her as a “personal sex slave.”

Nancy Campbell runs the ministry “Above Rubies” and is author of the book Be Fruitful and Multiply. Her ministry’s magazine has a circulation of over 160,000 to 100 countries, and she regularly holds international tours to give women’s conferences for churches. Her beat? Shaming Christian women into procreating by telling them they’re going against God’s will if they don’t, and encouraging couples who have had vasectomies and tubal ligation procedures to have them reversed.

The Human Toll of Quiverfull

It’s easy to laugh at the retrograde and irrational ideas of the Quiverfull adherents, but as Josh Duggar, Bill Gothard, and Doug Phillips have shown, the movement’s anti-feminism and authoritarianism can very easily elide, excuse, and hide abusive behavior.

Before the Duggars, the most famous Quiverfull parents might have been Rusty and Andrea Yates. Rusty encouraged his wife to continue having more children, regardless of the fact that a doctor had strongly advised against it: Andrea was experiencing mental breakdowns, suicide attempts, and hospitalizations caused by postpartum psychosis during previous births. After her husband left her alone despite a doctor’s orders to never leave her unsupervised, Andrea Yates drowned all five of her children.

So given that Quiverfull presents a real danger to the women and children forced into it by abusive husbands and fathers, what happens to those who leave? People who exit the movement are often shunned by their families, with limited or no communication after they escape. Maybe their parents “forgive” them, but they don’t ever welcome them back with open arms, just as they are.

In January of 2015, Radar Online reported that that Evelyn Ruark, Michelle’s older sister who happens to be a lesbian, was broke and filing for bankruptcy. Due to her “lifestyle choice” of having a longtime female partner, the Duggars were unwilling to dip into their reported $3.5 million in order to help. Interesting, considering what 1 John 3:17 (ESV) says about that:

But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?

However, Michelle was happy to record a transphobic robo-call to play in the ears of the Fayetteville, Arkansas public to inform them about the dire effects of an anti-discrimination ordinance that was being considered by the Fayetteville City Council. She warned the public that putting “men” in ladies’ and girls’ restrooms would permit them to come in contact with sexual predators. Oh, the irony! Much to her delight, the measure was repealed in late 2014 after originally being passed earlier in the year.

So while Christians strike up a call to forgive Josh Duggar for molesting five underaged girls, that doesn’t mean his actions should be excused, or the family used as an example of holy redemption while the stories of the survivors aren’t even mentioned. It’s more unforgiving of the victims he sexually assaulted to let this pass without consequence. Redemption and forgiveness aren’t a justification to continue failing the casualties of this culture who are made to feel like it’s their fault for “tempting” their abusers in the first place. An attack on Josh Duggar is not an attack on all of Christianity: it’s an attack on the fundamentalist sects that continue to condone or even help to create this behavior in the first place.

Contact the author at jcm_the_writer@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @notreallyjcm.

A body pulled out of the Hudson River on Saturday has been identified as that of Vincent Viafore, the New York Times reports. Prosecutors allege that Viafore, who drowned after his kayak capsized on April 19, was killed by his fiancée Angelika Graswald.

The body, which was discovered north of the United States Military Academy at West Point—not far from where the couple launched their kayaks—has been transferred to the Orange County morgue for an autopsy. According to the Times, police say forensic evidence from the body will be crucial in their investigation.

Graswald was arrested on April 29 and charged with second-degree murder.

At a bail hearing earlier this month, investigators claimed that Graswald—the beneficiary of two life insurance policies worth $250,000 that Viafore had taken out—had admitting to tampering with her fiancé’s kayak and that she had said it “felt good knowing he was going to die.”

Graswald’s attorney has said his client’s statements were coerced.

Image via Facebook. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Happy Memorial Day. For some reason, instead of having fun outside with your friends, you are alone in front of your computer, reading a blog post. Maybe you didn’t get the day off work, or maybe you’re hung over. That’s OK. You can celebrate the Memorial Days of 1983, 1986, 1988, and 1992—all thanks to YouTube’s bountiful archives of perfect, vintage, unwatched home video.

YouTube is rich with this sort of stuff. Just type “XYZ occasion” plus “XYZ year” into the search bar and you’re granted access to someone else’s fuzzy and erratically edited memories of amusement park visits, beach trips, and otherwise insignificant days spent at home. Memorial day was as popular occasion as any for breaking out the old home video camera.

Because YouTube is as useful for sharing videos among a small circle of friends as it is for launching a viral hit, it’s likely that many of the below clips were never intended for pubic consumption. But there they are, waiting for you. Enjoy.

1983 Old City Philadelphia Memorial Day Block Party

This quintessentially ‘80s and quintessentially Philly clip plays like a bizarro version of the classic documentary Heavy Metal Parking Lot. A man in a shark-shaped hat DJs and MCs, dancers in roller skates get down, and an enthusiastic and shirtless guy asks questions of the crowd, often about music. When shirtless guy pits punk rock against heavy metal—which he derisively terms “hamburger music”—one passionate Van Halen fan strikes back about The Clash: “They don’t even know what the hell they’re playing! They play two goddamned notes, and that’s all they know. They have no talent!”

Tom Newbold video of Memorial Day Party 1992 (In Three Parts)

Kids on Power Wheels, dads drinking Michelob, a five-alarm bonfire. A bassist with a mullet in a ponytail leads a band called The 18th Emergency through a spirited cover of “Dear Prudence.” Welcome to summer. Welcome to 1992. Welcome to America.

Memorial Day 1986

“Bob, let’s go cruising, buddy.” “We don’t have parties in Chicago. It’s just one big party.” “This is Americana. This is the land of the free. On this Memorial Day weekend, let’s all remember not to be a memory, OK?”

Midnight - Backyard Party Memorial Day 1988

After the show, it’s the after party. Midnight has pipes to make Geddy Lee blush.

Memorial Day 1988 Dave in Pool

As Midnight was wailing away on Memorial Day 1988, somewhere else in America, Dave was getting thrown in the pool.

Contact the author at andy@gawker.com.

What are the Faith of the Seven’s rules about sex? Did Stannis really hire mercenaries? Does Tyrion meet you-know-who in the books?

As we’ve done with every episode so far this season, we’ve put together a list of scenes, references, and characters that deserve a special comment or mention. There’s no way we got all the good stuff (and we might be wrong on some of the things we’ve left below)—so please help expand our appendix.

“It’s dragonglass. It’s what I used to kill the White Walker.”

Dragonglass—called obsidian by the no-fun maester brigade—is the only substance known to harm or kill the supernatural beings known on the show as White Walkers. Widely used for daggers and arrowheads by the Children of the Forest, the original inhabitants of Westeros, dragonglass was supplanted as the material of choice by sturdier steel sometime during or after the arrival of the First Men, but because of its magical properties it was still highly valued, and for the first few centuries after the defeat of the White Walkers thousands of years ago, Children of the Forest gave a yearly gift of obsidian daggers to the Night’s Watch.

It’s unclear where anyone gets obsidian in Westeros, but since obsidian occurs in areas of current or former heavy rhyolitic volcanic activity, knowing where the dragonglass deposits are would help expand the growing body of knowledge of Westerosi geology.

“That laugh...Egg! Egg laughed like that. One of the first things I remember.” “His little brother, Aegon...He became king.”

Aemon’s younger brother Aegon V Targaryen was the fifteenth King of the Seven Kingdoms, son of Maekar I, father of Aerys II, and (in the show) grandfather of Danaerys. He is the main character of George R.R. Martin’s “Dunk and Egg” series of Song and Ice and Fire prequels; in the novels, he’s Danaerys’ great-grandfather (the show eliminates King Jaehaerys II, the Mad King Aerys’ father in the books).

Aegon—called Egg by his family and friends—was the fourth son of his father King Maekar, directly behind Aemon in the line of succession. Because he was not expected to inherit the throne lived a fairly quiet life, squiring for the hedge knight Ser Duncan the Tall and marrying Lady Betha of House Blackwood, but his Aegon’s two oldest brothers, the cruel Aerion and the drunk Daeron, both died young, leaving no suitable heirs, and Aemon, the next in line, had become a maester and renounced his claim. (Aemon was nonetheless offered the throne and, wanting to avoid being used against his brother, joined the Night’s Watch instead.) Aegon, the only surviving claimant, was crowned at age 33. He died in a fire nearly 30 years later while attempting to hatch a dragon from an egg.

“At the wall, a dozen lord commanders came and went during his service.”

Besides Jon Snow, we know Maester Aemon served under a lord commander named Qorgyle, under whose command Mance Rayder eventually deserted the Night’s Watch, and Brynden Rivers, Aemon’s great-uncle and the bastard son of Aemon’s great-grandfather, Aegon IV the Unworthy. Rivers, a one-eyed archer known as Bloodraven, came to the Night’s Watch at the same time as Aemon and quickly became its lord commander. he disappeared while out ranging some 50 years ago.

“He’s hired thousands of foreign sellswords to bolster his army.”

This is the first we’ve heard that Stannis has hired mercenaries—let alone thousands of them—and if we didn’t get confirmation from dialogue between Stannis and Davos later I would have assumed that it was just a rumor. In fact, during Stannis’s charge at the end of the last season, we see only around 4,000 men—exactly as many as Stannis tells the Iron Bank he still has a few episodes prior...

“The Stormcrows rode off last night.” “500 men. Sellswords...loyal to nothing but gold.”

...But there you have it. The Stormcrows are an Essosi sellsword army (in the books, Daario is a Stormcrow, not a Second Son). And if there are (or were) only 500 Stormcrows, and Ramsay is right that Stannis has “thousands,” he’s probably hired others—most likely the Golden Company, the famous band of mercenaries recommended to him by Davos last season. The only question is: When did he hire them? His trip to the Iron Bank last season resulted only in a provisional loan—not enough to hire two (or more) entire companies of sellswords. Even if we assume the bank opened up a larger line of credit after his victory at Castle Black, was he really able to muster “thousands” more mercenaries from across the Narrow Sea, especially during inclement weather?

“I retreated from King’s Landing, Ser Davos. If I retreat again, I become the King Who Ran.”

Stannis, remember, attacked King’s Landing in the second season, nearly managing to take it before the sudden arrival of a joint Lannister-Tyrell army that managed to repel his forces.

“I have shown you the power of king’s blood. The usuper Robb Stark. The usuper Joffrey Baratheon.”

It’s easy to stake a claim to deaths that happen thousands of miles away, but to the best of our knowledge Melisandre only has direct responsibility for the death of Stannis’s brothe Renly, whom she used a blood magic shadow creature to assassinate. Robb was killed thanks to a plot between the Freys, Lannisters, and Boltons; Joffrey thanks to a plot between Olenna Tyrell and Petyr Baelish.

“Even in White Harbor, I’d want a kiss.”

White Harbor is a port at the mouth of the White Knife river, south of Winterfell and near the Neck swamps that separate the north from the south. It’s the north’s largest city

“A Westerosi knight from an ancient house, trained in sword and lance. He fought beside the stag king Robert on the far side of the Narrow Sea. He was first through the breach during the siege at Pyke, slaughtering 50 men with his flaming sword. He killed the great Khal Drogo in single combat. Betrayed by his woman, he sold himself into slavery to repay his debts.”

This is...actually mostly true! House Mormont is an ancient house; Jorah fought for (and with) King Robert; he was among the first through the breach at the siege of Pyke, when Robert put down the Greyjoy Rebellion. He does not have a flaming sword, however—that’s the red priest turned outlaw Thoros of Myr—and he did not kill Khal Drogo—just his bloodrider Qotho.

“By their holy text, the Seven-Pointed Star.”

The Seven-Pointed Star is the main religious text of the Faith of the Seven. It’s divided into seven books—one for each of the seven “gods” of the faith. No one seems to know who wrote it, or how old it is, but it features Hugor of the Hill, the semi-legendary first king of the Andals (the warriors who invaded Westeros several thousand years ago, importing their religion), and so appears to be as much a ethno-cultural creation myth as a specific holy writ.

“Then you’ll remember the passages concerning buggery and perjury. Your grandchildren will be punished in the same manner as anyone who breaks the sacred laws.”

I don’t remember these! In fact, in the books it’s not clear that the Faith of the Seven is particularly concerned with homosexuality at all (though it is generally anti-sex, and certainly anti-incest.

“Why is it happening at all?”

Because the producers needed to do something with Jaime and Bronn but didn’t want to build a whole siege-at-Riverrun set.

“Brothers, oh brothers, my days here are done”

“My dagger was coated with a special ointment from Asshai. They call it the Long Farewell. It takes time to work. But if a single drop makes contact with the skin? Death.”

Asshai is a major port city in the far east of Essos, located at the foot of the Shadow Mountains. Because it’s so far from Westeros, not much is known about it in the Seven Kingdoms, but it has a reputation for dark sorcery and the open practice of magic. It’s also Melisandre’s hometown!

“But, if you do happen to triumph here, you will fight at the Great Pit of Daznak itself, it front of the queen.”

The Great Pit of Daznak is Meereen’s premiere venue for fighting—a large, centrally located coliseum that can fit thousands of spectators in a descending class-based seating arrangement, with the richest closest to the action and the poorest the furthest away.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, your grace. My name is Tyrion Lannister.”

Well, this represents a significant acceleration. By the end of book five, Tyrion is outside Meereen but still has not met Danaerys, who (as in the show) is embroiled in what is almost certainly the most boring and useless plot in the series.

“Well, she and her brother are both being held under fair suspicion. A trial will be held for each of them to determine if they are guilty of any acts that might constitute a violation of the tenets of the faith.” “Who will stand judge?” “Seven septons, as it was in all trials before the Targaryens.”

One, it seems like Cersei should recognize she’s in a bad place when she—the power behind the throne—is asking some other guy how the trial of her enemy will work.

Two, the High Sparrow isn’t exactly correct. Aerys I was happy to let his conquered kingdoms continue pursuing justice in whatever manner they’d been doing before he arrived. The particular ruling he’s referring to, which blocked septons from adjuticating trials, was put into place by the fourth King of the Seven Kingdoms, Jaehaerys I, some half-century after the Targaryen conquest. But more importantly, it was never true that “all trials” were presided over by clergy—certainly not in the north, which never converted to the Faith of the Seven, and certainly not in the case of trials by combat.

“Did you know this chapel is one of the oldest structures in King’s Landing?...Baelor built his sept around it. But men worshipped here long before him. Who carved this altar? Do you know...? No one does. There’s no name on it, or anywhere else in the chapel. The people who built this place didn’t inflict their vanity on those who came after them, the way Baelor did with that great gilded monstrosity up there. Their faith was clean.”

The altar that the High Sparrow is so obsessed with was likely built by the fishermen who lived in that area of the Blackwater Bay prior to the Targaryen conquest. It would have been located on an otherwise unoccupied hill (now called Visenya’s Hill), which would have made it an inconvenient but fitting place for worship.

But “oldest” is relative: King’s Landing (strangely for such a perfect location along a river and in a large bay) is among the newest cities in Westeros, and most of it is less than 300 years old. The Great Sept of Baelor, where Cersei and the High Sparrow are, is barely 100 years old; the largest and most important place of worship in Westeros, the sept was begun by Baelor the Blessed, the most pious of the Targaryen kings and reputedly among the craziest, and not finished until well after his death.

Contact the author at max@gawker.com.

According to a New York Times profile, multi-platform Millennial-baiters Fusion Media’s big-money backers at Disney put pressure on the fledgling outfit to back off its (initially quite aggressive!) reporting on the contents of last year’s Sony hack.

After Fusion—a joint venture between Disney and Univision—began publishing stories drawing on stolen documents, Disney put Fusion “on notice that it would not take kindly to coverage that might dent its standing with consumers,” the Times reports. It is always heartening to hear about talented people being paid exorbitant sums to do something other than what they’ve proven themselves to be good at doing.

The Times piece raises more questions than it answers, which is fine, of course, and seems mostly attributable to the fact that Fusion Media doesn’t itself seem to know what it is trying to be. (Who does?)

Recently-appointed editor-in-chief Alexis Madrigal described Fusion as “a cable and digital network that is championing a more diverse and inclusive America.” Simple enough! And yet:

Several current and former Fusion employees mentioned a masculine and raucous office culture inside the organization.

Last year, when the company instituted what it described as a routine training program on appropriate sexual behavior, some employees took it as a reaction to widespread rumors of office liaisons. David Ford, a spokesman for Fusion, said that, just like other corporations, it conducted “respect in the workplace training as part of our overall compliance program.”

Also, strangely, at least one line has been deleted entirely from the Times piece, referring to a clique surrounding the company’s CEO, Isaac Lee:

There are also a coterie of well-regarded reporters and editors that some inside the organization have nicknamed F.O.I.L., or Friends of Isaac Lee, according to current and former members of the staff.

Lee told the Times that no one at the company gets preferential treatment. “I have nothing to worry about,” he said. “I know exactly what I am doing.”

Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Last week, Josh Duggar confirmed reports that, as a teenager, he molested several underage girls, including his sisters. “I am extremely sorry,” he said in a statement. Sure seems like it.

H/T Fishwrapper. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

In April, the FCC blocked a bid by Comcast, the largest cable provider in the United States, to acquire Time Warner Cable for $45 billion. Now, Bloomberg News reports that Charter Communications, the fourth-largest cable operator, is nearing a deal to buy TWC for around $55 billion.

Memorial Day marks the start of the serious grilling season, and there’s no better weekend to bolster your grill-master game. Luckily, honing your outdoor culinary skills is a lot more simple than it seems, given the right tools, a little preparation, and a few tips on technique.

This post was originally published on May 23, 2008.

Get the Right Tools

• Lump charcoal or briquettes?: This is one of those endless, both-sides-are-right-and-wrong debates (kind of like Mac vs. PC), but there is some fairly common ground. As The Virtual Weber Bullet puts it:

  The general consensus is that lump tends to burn hotter than briquettes, but not as long or as consistently. Some lack of consistency is to be expected, given that the content and piece size varies within an individual bag and between bags.

  Personally, I recommend briquettes for anyone just starting out with their grill, as lump can be finicky in lighting. Of course, you can save yourself a lot of effort and frustration by investing in a chimney starter, which you can also use for flash-cooking.
• Choosing a gas grill: Ignore the BTUs and heat for the most part—unless you really need to cook a whole bird or roast this weekend, most grills have got your steaks and burgers covered. Consumer Reports’ blog recommends bringing a magnet with you to gauge the quality of steel used to contain the heat. If the magnet sticks, it’s likely a cheaper grade that will rust more easily. Feel free to give a test model a few shoves and shakes, as an unstable grill is a recipe for serious problems. The Wirecutter has some good recommendations to get you started.
• Multi-use utensils: The three-tool grilling sets you see at big-box stores have all you’ll need for basic grill work, with long-handled versions of a spatula, tongs, and a carving-type poker. A long-handle brush would be your next purchase, and then a grilling basket and skewers when you start branching out. Make sure your tools feel heavy and firm in your hands, as clumsy handling creates the kind of BBQ stories you don’t want repeated.

For more grilling gear, our gadget-crazed brother site Gizmodo runs down 10 awesome grills you can buy for the ultimate Memorial Day barbecue.

Get Ready

• Clean that grill: If there’s black crust on the grill bars, you need to get it off to ensure no-stick cooking and easy food flipping. You can use a grill brush or an onion if it’s being particularly stubborn. The video above shows you how to do a deeper clean, and if you’ve neglected your grill for years, it may need a bit of repair, which you can do yourself.
• Make your own sauce: Most of the pre-bottled sauces you see on grocery shelves are over-sweetened, and none match the taste of homemade. Making your own isn’t that difficult, either. Use one of BBQ Recipe Secret’s three sauce bases as a starting point, and build your own flavor ideas into them. It’ll give you something to talk about while you’re waiting for the ribs to finish. You can even give bottled sauce a boost with a few household ingredients, if you don’t want to start from scratch.

Hone Your Technique

• Use your grill’s “zones”: Not everything goes right over the fire. Different types of meat (and vegetables) will work best on different parts of the grill depending on how much heat they need. Check out this infographic to see where everything goes.
• Use a cheat sheet: Experience is the best indicator for knowing the precise moment to yank your food off the rack, but Real Simple offers a super-helpful cheat sheet you can print and bring to this culinary test. Here’s a sample that covers the basics of red meat and sausages:
  While you’re at it, don’t forget about the palm test for determining the doneness of a steak.
• BBQ chicken: As my fellow editor Adam can attest, eHow’s technique for grilling whole or partial chicken results in some juicy bird. The basics: Oil the grill, cook the chicken uncovered slightly off the heat center, and, for Pete’s sake, don’t put your sauce on until the last few minutes.
  
• Perfect burgers: Our commenters don’t necessarily agree on cooking great burgers, but they do have some common wisdom to share. Use meat that’s as close to room temperature as possible for even cooking. Don’t press them on the grill, unless you like your meat dry. And the best “secret” to great burgers is buying good meat, preferably ground by a butcher while you watch. And if you want them to cook evenly, a shallow indentation in the middle can help avoid the hockey puck look.
• Seriously salt your steak: Got filet mignon dreams for the weekend, but only a Quarter-Pounder budget? Buy a cheap cut of “choice” meat, then salt, salt, salt the heck out of that thing—for only one hour before grilling, and then pat it dry. By doing so, your salt is breaking in your meat and loosening some of its protein strands, making it hold flavor better and cut like the steakhouse commercials of your dreams. You can also freeze it for 30 minutes for that perfect seared crust.
• Hot dogs with maximum toppage: Spiral-cut your hot dogs to ensure it cooks perfectly straight, with more surface area for that nice grill flavor and plenty of room for all your favorite toppings. You might even consider marinating them for a boost of flavor that goes beyond the ho-hum hot dogs everyone’s used to.
• Let it rest: You’ll be eager to slice open your tender steak or succulent chicken, but you’ll lose a lot of juicy flavor if you do so. As the food techies at Cook’s Illustrated point out, cutting into your food right off the grill releases a significant amount of juice, which would be re-absorbed for better succulence if you let it sit a few minutes.

Recover from a Rain-Out

All that planning, cleaning, and purchasing, and Mother Nature calls an audible on your perfect grill day? You’re not finished yet. As the New York Times’ food guru and cookbook author Mark Bittman points out, your oven broiler can sub in for your grill with a little prep-work, with results almost as satisfying. Brown your meat in the pan, roast or braise it slowly, then use the broiler to give it that grill-like finish. Check out his oven-based pork ribs or brisket recipes if you need convincing.

Document Your Success

When you’ve put all this effort into creating a great fire-cooked feast, you’ll want more than just compliments to remember it by. Break out your camera (or pass it off to a trusted friend) and try the following tips to take some great grilling shots:

• Tell a story: A BBQ-friendly shooter named Nika notes that a lot of grilled food might look good to the human eye, but smoky crusts and perfect charring can look like unappealing dark nothingness without good framing. Try to capture moments of “drama,” such as when the meat’s being pulled, or focus on the tools used to make the meal to get shots you’ll remember.
• Get in close: At the same time, Flickr user Another Pint Please..., also known as Mike and who shot the steak picture you saw at the top of this post, recommends being brave and getting up-close and personal with your heat source—while being safe with your lens, of course. You’ll have time to take wider-angle shots when the cooking’s done, but those sudden flare-ups and perfect glistening angles only happen once.

Happy Memorial Day, and enjoy the barbecue!

Photos by Mike, Rick, Robert S. Donovan, and Christopher Aloi.

At least 13 people were killed when a tornado struck the Mexican border city of Ciudad Acuna on Monday, NBC News reports. The tornado, which flipped cars, destroyed homes, and ripped an infant—still missing—from its mother’s arms. At least 230 people were injured.

“It hit an area of about seven blocks,” Victor Zamora, interior secretary of the northern state of Coahuila said. The neighborhood was “devastated.”

The tornado is part of the same weather system that tore through Texas and Oklahoma this weekend. At least three people were killed in those states, the Guardian reports, and 12 are still missing.http://thevane.gawker.com/it-wont-stop-r...

“It’s unprecedented in our history,” Johnson County emergency management coordinator Jamie Moore told the Dallas Morning News. “People who lived here their entire lives can’t remember a spring like this.”

Photo credit: AP Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

“The problem became immediately clear to the scientists: This turtle’s penis was mangled.”

Fighter jets scrambled on Monday to escort Air France Flight 22, an Airbus A-330 out of Charles De Gaulle Airport, to John F. Kennedy Airport, after anonymous threats were made against the flight.

Someone who did not identify himself called the Maryland State Police Fusion Center around 6:45 a.m. Monday morning using from an untraceable number and spoke of a “chemical weapons threat” aboard the flight, ABC 7 reports.

The flight was searched after it landed. In a statement, the FBI said no weapons were found:

Out of an abundance of caution, Air France flight number 22 was escorted to John F. Kennedy airport by U.S. Air Force fighter jets following a phone threat. The plane has landed and has deboarded. There were no incidents or hazards reported on board the flight by either the passengers or its crew. The plane has been cleared.

According to the Guardian, another plane, owned by Saudi Arabian Airlines, was also searched at the airport after a similar threat was made against that flight. The FBI believes the same caller was behind both threats.

Kent Powell, a spokesman for American Airlines, told the Associated Press that a third threat had been made against a flight on that airline flying from Birmingham, England. That threat was later determined not to have been credible.

Photo credit: Shutterstock. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Earlier this month, a coroner determined that B.B. King’s death was caused by a series of mini-strokes. Now the late bluesman’s kids say his cause of death was tied to something much more nefarious—poison.

King’s health began deteriorating over the last year and he reportedly entered a home hospice two weeks before his May 15 death. Both King’s physician and the Las Vegas coroner who examined his body attributed his death— multi-infarct dementia caused by a series of small strokes—to his type 2 diabetes.

At the time, the AP reported that the doctors believed King’s “strokes resulted from reduced blood flow as a consequence of chronic diabetes — or unhealthy fluctuations in blood sugar levels.”

Now, the AP reports, at least two of King’s daughters say that they believe King’s business manager, LaVerne Toney, poisoned King to death. But Toney—a longtime employee who was reportedly the last person to see King alive—has been at legal odds with his kids for some time now.

B.B. King’s daughters didn’t see him at all during the last 2 weeks of his life — and are now just hoping they can be involved in planning his memorial.

Patty King tells TMZ ... she and her sister Karen Williams spoke to B.B.’s manager Laverne Toney on Thursday morning, and she had agreed to let them see B.B. on Saturday at noon. But Patty says Toney called her at 9:40 PM to say her father had died peacefully in his sleep

As TMZ first reported ... Patty and her sister Karen had been at odds with Toney for months — accusing her of elder abuse and stealing from King. Their claims were shot down in court last week.

A coroner tells the AP an autopsy was performed this weekend and should be completed sometime over the next eight weeks. And a Las Vegas police spokesperson tells the outlet that homicide detectives are still investigating the case.

King’s family is also accusing Toney—who still has power of attorney over King’s estate—of misappropriating millions of dollars, lying, and exerting undue influence over her late client.

Image via AP. Contact the author at gabrielle@gawker.com.