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Lilia Tarawa
Lilia Tarawa is a New Zealand speaker, author, entrepreneur, and influencer. Tarawa grew up in the Gloriavale Christian Community on New Zealand's West Coast, but left the community with her parents and siblings in 2009. In 2017 Tarawa published her bestselling book ''Daughter of Gloriavale'' and gave the viral TEDx talk: ''I grew up in a cult. It was heaven – and hell.'' Biography For the first 18 years of her life, Tarawa lived in the Gloriavale Christian Community. Tarawa said she felt "brainwashed" but struggled with the restrictions placed on her. At 16 years old, Lilia made a vow to her grandfather Neville Cooper during a commitment ceremony, promising she would submit to men, look after the home and remain "meek", "modest" and "pure". She renounced adultery, divorce, birth control, and abortion. Tarawa also vowed to marry whichever man the community's leaders chose and clean, cook, and sew for the community of around 500 people. Tarawa vowed to disown and condemn anyon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gloriavale Christian Community
The Gloriavale Christian Community (also known as the Cooperites) is a small and isolated community located at Haupiri on the West Coast of the South Island in New Zealand. It has an estimated population of over 600. It has operated on a property owned by a registered charity since 2008. History The group was founded in 1969 by Neville Cooper (aka "Hopeful Christian"), an Australian-born preacher who was invited to New Zealand, having earlier (as a member of the Voice of Deliverance Evangelist Mission) survived a near fatal 1965 plane crash in south-east Queensland. Cooper founded what became known as the Springbank Christian Community near Christchurch, moving to a larger property on the West Coast of New Zealand between 1991 and 1995 when the community grew too large for its existing home. This new settlement, located in the Haupiri Valley was named "Gloriavale", and established the existing Gloriavale Christian Community, roughly inland from Greymouth. Public apology O ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rihanna
Robyn Rihanna Fenty ( ; born February 20, 1988) is a Barbadian singer, actress, and businesswoman. Born in Saint Michael and raised in Bridgetown, Barbados, Rihanna auditioned for American record producer Evan Rogers who invited her to the United States to record demo tapes. After signing with Def Jam in 2005, she soon gained recognition with the release of her first two studio albums, ''Music of the Sun'' (2005) and '' A Girl Like Me'' (2006), both of which were influenced by Caribbean music and peaked within the top ten of the US ''Billboard'' 200 chart. Rihanna's third album, ''Good Girl Gone Bad'' (2007), incorporated elements of dance-pop and established her status as a sex symbol in the music industry. The chart-topping single "Umbrella" earned Rihanna her first Grammy Award and catapulted her to global stardom. She continued to mix pop, dance, and R&B genres on her next studio albums, ''Rated R'' (2009), '' Loud'' (2010), ''Talk That Talk'' (2011), and ''Unapolog ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beyoncé
Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter ( ; born September 4, 1981) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Beyoncé's boundary-pushing artistry and vocals have made her the most influential female musician of the 21st century, according to ''NPR''. Her success has led to her becoming a cultural icon and earning her the nickname "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Queen Bey". Beyoncé performed in various singing and dancing competitions as a child. She rose to fame in the late 1990s as a member of the R&B girl group Destiny's Child, one of the List of best-selling girl groups, best-selling girl groups of all time. Their hiatus saw the release of her debut album ''Dangerously in Love'' (2003), which featured the US Billboard Hot 100, ''Billboard'' Hot 100 number-one singles "Crazy in Love" and "Baby Boy (Beyoncé song), Baby Boy". Following the 2006 disbanding of Destiny's Child, Beyoncé released her second solo album, ''B'Day (Beyoncé album), B'Day'', which contained s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taylor Swift
Taylor Alison Swift (born December 13, 1989) is an American singer-songwriter. Her discography spans multiple genres, and her vivid songwriting—often inspired by her personal life—has received critical praise and wide media coverage. Born in West Reading, Pennsylvania, Swift moved to Nashville at age 14 to become a country artist. She signed a songwriting deal with Sony/ATV Music Publishing in 2004 and a recording contract with Big Machine Records in 2005. Her 2006 self-titled debut album made her the first female country singer to write or co-write a U.S. platinum-certified album entirely. Swift's next albums, '' Fearless'' (2008) and '' Speak Now'' (2010), explored country pop. The former's " Love Story" and "You Belong with Me" were the first country songs to top the U.S. pop and all-genre airplay charts, respectively. She experimented with rock and electronic styles on ''Red'' (2012), which featured her first ''Billboard'' Hot 100 number-one song, "We Are Neve ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
50 Cent
Curtis James Jackson III (born July 6, 1975), known professionally as 50 Cent, is an American rapper, actor, and businessman. Born in the South Jamaica neighborhood of Queens, Jackson began pursuing a musical career in 2000, when he produced ''Power of the Dollar'' for Columbia Records; however, days before the planned release, he was shot, and the album was never released. In 2002, after 50 Cent released the mixtape ''Guess Who's Back?'' he was discovered by Eminem and signed to Shady Records, under the aegis of Dr. Dre's Aftermath Entertainment and Interscope Records. His first major-label album ''Get Rich or Die Tryin''' (2003), was a huge commercial success. The album spawned the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 number one singles "In da Club" and " 21 Questions", and was certified 9× Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). That same year, he founded G-Unit Records, signing his G-Unit associates Young Buck, Lloyd Banks and Tony Yayo; prior to becoming the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tony Robbins
Anthony Jay Robbins (né Mahavoric, born February 29, 1960) is an American author, coach, speaker, and philanthropist. He is known for his infomercials, seminars, and self-help books including the books ''Unlimited Power'' and ''Awaken the Giant Within''. Early life Robbins was born Anthony J. Mahavoric in North Hollywood, California, on February 29, 1960. Robbins is the eldest of three children, and his parents divorced when he was seven. He is of Croatian heritage from both sides of his family. His mother then remarried several times, including a marriage with Jim Robbins, a former semi-professional baseball player who legally adopted Anthony when he was 12. Robbins attended Glendora High School. During high school, Robbins grew ten inches in a year, a growth spurt later attributed to a pituitary tumor. He has said his home life was "chaotic" and "abusive". When he was 17 years old, he left home and never returned. Robbins later worked as a janitor, and did not attend coll ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jessica Bird
Jessica Rowley Pell Bird Blakemore is an American novelist. Under her maiden name, Jessica Bird, she writes contemporary romance novels, and as J.R. Ward, she writes paranormal romance. She is a three-time winner of the Romance Writers of America RITA Award, once as Bird for Best Short Contemporary Romance for ''From the First'' and twice as Ward for Best Paranormal Romance for ''Lover Revealed'' and ''Dearest Ivie'', and her books have been on ''The New York Times'' Best Seller list. Biography Born Jessica Rowley Pell Bird in Massachusetts, United States, she is the daughter of W. Gillette Bird Jr. and Maxine F. Bird. She began writing as a child, penning her thoughts in diaries as well as inventing short stories. The summer before she went to college she wrote her first book, a romance novel. After that, she wrote regularly, but for herself. Bird attended Smith College where she double majored in history and art history, concentrating on the medieval period. She then recei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sam Harris
Samuel Benjamin Harris (born April 9, 1967) is an American philosopher, neuroscientist, author, and podcast host. His work touches on a range of topics, including rationality, religion, ethics, free will, neuroscience, meditation, psychedelics, philosophy of mind, politics, terrorism, and artificial intelligence. Harris came to prominence for his criticism of religion, and Islam in particular, and is known as one of the "Four Horsemen" of New Atheism, along with Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett. Harris's first book, ''The End of Faith'' (2004), won the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction and remained on ''The New York Times'' Best Seller list for 33 weeks. Harris has since written six additional books: ''Letter to a Christian Nation'' in 2006, '' The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values'' in 2010, the long-form essay ''Lying'' in 2011, the short book ''Free Will'' in 2012, '' Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Rel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An atheist, he is well known for his criticism of creationism and intelligent design. Dawkins first came to prominence with his 1976 book ''The Selfish Gene'', which popularised the gene-centred view of evolution and introduced the term '' meme''. With his book ''The Extended Phenotype'' (1982), he introduced into evolutionary biology the influential concept that the phenotypic effects of a gene are not necessarily limited to an organism's body, but can stretch far into the environment, for example, when a beaver builds a dam. His 2004 The Ancestor's Tale set out to make understanding evolution simple for the general public, by tracing common ancestors back from humans to the origins of life. Over time, numerous religious people challenged th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Agnosticism
Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either the belief that God exists or the belief that God does not exist." The English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley coined the word ''agnostic'' in 1869, and said "It simply means that a man shall not say he knows or believes that which he has no scientific grounds for professing to know or believe." Earlier thinkers, however, had written works that promoted agnostic points of view, such as Sanjaya Belatthaputta, a 5th-century BCE Indian philosopher who expressed agnosticism about any afterlife;Bhaskar (1972). and Protagoras, a 5th-century BCE Greek philosopher who expressed agnosticism about the existence of "the gods". Defining agnosticism Being a scientist, above all else, Huxley presented agnos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Māori People
The Māori (, ) are the indigenous Polynesian people of mainland New Zealand (). Māori originated with settlers from East Polynesia, who arrived in New Zealand in several waves of canoe voyages between roughly 1320 and 1350. Over several centuries in isolation, these settlers developed their own distinctive culture, whose language, mythology, crafts, and performing arts evolved independently from those of other eastern Polynesian cultures. Some early Māori moved to the Chatham Islands, where their descendants became New Zealand's other indigenous Polynesian ethnic group, the Moriori. Initial contact between Māori and Europeans, starting in the 18th century, ranged from beneficial trade to lethal violence; Māori actively adopted many technologies from the newcomers. With the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, the two cultures coexisted for a generation. Rising tensions over disputed land sales led to conflict in the 1860s, and massive land confiscations, to which ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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