The Elephant In The Living Room
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The Elephant In The Living Room
The expression “the elephant in the room” (or "the elephant in the living room") is a metaphorical idiom in English for an important or enormous topic, question, or controversial issue that is obvious or that everyone knows about but no one mentions or wants to discuss because it makes at least some of them uncomfortable and is personally, socially, or politically embarrassing, controversial, inflammatory, or dangerous. It is based on the idea/thought that something as conspicuous as an elephant can appear to be overlooked in codified social interactions and that the sociology/psychology of repression also operates on the macro scale. Various languages around the world have words that describe similar concepts. Origins In 1814, Ivan Krylov (17691844), poet and fabulist, wrote a fable entitled "The Inquisitive Man", which tells of a man who goes to a museum and notices all sorts of tiny things, but fails to notice an elephant. The phrase became proverbial. Fyodor Dostoev ...
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Metaphor
A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide (or obscure) clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are often compared with other types of figurative language, such as antithesis, hyperbole, metonymy, and simile. One of the most commonly cited examples of a metaphor in English literature comes from the "All the world's a stage" monologue from '' As You Like It'': All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances And one man in his time plays many parts, His Acts being seven ages. At first, the infant... :—William Shakespeare, '' As You Like It'', 2/7 This quotation expresses a metaphor because the world is not literally a stage, and most humans are not literally actors and actresses playing roles. By asserting that the world is a stage, Shakespeare uses points of comparison between the world an ...
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Billy Rose
Billy Rose (born William Samuel Rosenberg; September 6, 1899 – February 10, 1966) was an American impresario, theatrical showman and lyricist. For years both before and after World War II, Billy Rose was a major force in entertainment, with shows such as ''Billy Rose's Crazy Quilt'' (1931), ''Jumbo'' (1935), '' Billy Rose's Aquacade'' (1937), and ''Carmen Jones'' (1943). As a lyricist, he is credited with many songs, notably "Don't Bring Lulu" (1925), "Tonight You Belong To Me" (1926), "Me and My Shadow" (1927), "More Than You Know" (1929), "Without a Song" (1929), " It Happened in Monterrey" (1930) and "It's Only a Paper Moon" (1933). Despite his accomplishments, Rose may be best known today as the husband of famed comedian and singer Fanny Brice (1891–1951). Life and work Rose was born to a Jewish family in New York City, United States. He attended Public School 44, where he was the 50-yard dash champion. While in high school, Billy studied shorthand under John Robert G ...
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Gus Van Sant
Gus Green Van Sant Jr. (born July 24, 1952) is an American film director, producer, photographer, and musician. He has earned acclaim as both an independent and mainstream filmmaker. His films typically deal with themes of marginalized subcultures, in particular homosexuality. Van Sant is considered one of the most prominent auteurs of the New Queer Cinema movement. His early career was devoted to directing television commercials in the Pacific Northwest. He made his feature-length cinematic directorial debut with ''Mala Noche'' (1985). His second feature, ''Drugstore Cowboy'' (1989), was highly acclaimed, and earned him screenwriting awards from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and New York Film Critics Circle and the award for Best Director from the National Society of Film Critics. His next film, ''My Own Private Idaho'' (1991), was similarly praised, as was the black comedy ''To Die For'' (1995), the drama ''Good Will Hunting'' (1997), and the biographical film ''Mil ...
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Elephant (1989 Film)
''Elephant'' is a 1989 British short film directed by Alan Clarke and produced by Danny Boyle. The film is set in Northern Ireland during the Troubles and its title comes from Bernard MacLaverty's description of the conflict as " the elephant in our living room" — a reference to the collective denial of the underlying social problems of Northern Ireland. Produced by BBC Northern Ireland, it first screened on BBC2 in 1989. The film was first conceived by Boyle, who was working as a producer for BBC Northern Ireland at the time. The film, which contains very little dialogue, depicts eighteen murders and is partly based on actual events drawn from police reports at the time. It is shot with 16mm film with much of it filmed using a steadicam and features a series of tracking shots, a technique the director used regularly. The grainy 16mm film, together with the lack of dialogue, plot, narrative and music give the film a cold, observational documentary feel. Nothing is learnt abou ...
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Alan Clarke
Alan John Clarke (28 October 1935 – 24 July 1990) was an English television and film director, producer and writer. Life and career Clarke was born in Wallasey, Wirral, England. Most of Clarke's output was for television rather than cinema, including work for the famous play strands ''The Wednesday Play'' and ''Play for Today''. His subject matter tended towards social realism, with deprived or oppressed communities as a frequent setting. As Dave Rolinson's book details, between 1962 and 1966 Clarke directed several plays at The Questors Theatre in Ealing, London. Between 1967 and 1969 he directed various ITV (network), ITV productions including plays by Alun Owen (''Shelter'', ''George's Room'', ''Stella'', ''Thief'', ''Gareth''), Edna O'Brien (''Which of These Two Ladies Is He Married To?'' and ''Nothing's Ever Over'') and Roy Minton (''The Gentleman Caller'', ''Goodnight Albert'', ''Stand By Your Screen''). He also worked on the series ''The Informer (TV series), The Info ...
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Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a prominent role in the history and development of Western civilization.O'Collins, p. v (preface). The church consists of 24 ''sui iuris'' churches, including the Latin Church and 23 Eastern Catholic Churches, which comprise almost 3,500 dioceses and eparchies located around the world. The pope, who is the bishop of Rome, is the chief pastor of the church. The bishopric of Rome, known as the Holy See, is the central governing authority of the church. The administrative body of the Holy See, the Roman Curia, has its principal offices in Vatican City, a small enclave of the Italian city of Rome, of which the pope is head of state. The core beliefs of Catholicism are found in the Nicene Creed. The Catholic Church teaches that it is th ...
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Pedro Rubiano Sáenz
Pedro Rubiano Sáenz (born September 13, 1932) is a cardinal and Roman Catholic Archbishop Emeritus of Bogotá in the Roman Catholic Church. Early life and ordination Born in Cartago, Colombia, Rubiano Sáenz studied at the seminary in Popayán before his being ordained as a priest on 8 July 1956. He did pastoral ministry 1956–1971. Pastor and founder of the parishes of "San Pedro Claver" and of "Nuestra Señora de la Providencia". He served as treasurer and pastoral vicar of the archdiocese of Cali and vice-rector of the Major School "Santiago di Cali". Bishop and Archbishop In 1971, he was named Bishop of Cúcuta. He was consecrated only fifteen years after his ordination to the priesthood and just within the canonical limit, on 11 July 1972 in Cali, by Archbishop Angelo Palmas, nuncio to Colombia. He was appointed Coadjutor Archbishop of Cali in 1983 and was transferred to the metropolitan and primatial see of Bogotá, 27 December 1994. From 1990 to 1996, he chaired the ...
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Cali Cartel
The Cali Cartel ( es, Cartel de Cali) was a drug cartel based in southern Colombia, around the city of Cali and the Valle del Cauca. Its founders were the brothers Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela and Miguel Rodríguez Orejuela. They broke away from Pablo Escobar and his Medellín associates in 1987, when Hélmer "Pacho" Herrera joined what became a four-man executive board that ran the cartel. At the height of the Cali Cartel's reign from 1993-1996, they were cited as having control of over 91% of the world's cocaine market and were said to be directly responsible for the growth of the cocaine market in Europe, controlling 90% of the market there as well. By the mid-1990s, the leader of the Cali Cartel's international drug trafficking Miguel Rodríguez was a $7 billion a year criminal enterprise. Foundation The Cali Cartel was formed by the Rodriguez Orejuela brothers and Santacruz, all coming from what is described as a higher social background than most other traffickers of t ...
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Ernesto Samper
Ernesto Samper Pizano (born 3 August 1950) is a Colombian politician. Samper is a member of the influential Samper family. He served as the President of Colombia from 1994 to 1998, representing the Liberal Party. From 2014 to 2017 he served as the Secretary General of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR). He was involved in the 8000 process scandal, which takes its name from the folio number assigned to it by the chief prosecutor's office. The prosecutor charged that money from the Cali Cartel was funneled into Samper's presidential campaign to gain his success in what would have been a very close race after he failed to win by a majority during the first round (Colombia has 2 rounds of elections, unless the first round yields a majority winner). The Colombian Chamber of Representatives acquitted Samper by a vote of 111 to 43, concluding the process. Genealogy Samper is related to several other Colombians of note. One of his great great grandfathers, Teodoro Valenzue ...
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8000 Process
8 (eight) is the natural number following 7 and preceding 9. In mathematics 8 is: * a composite number, its proper divisors being , , and . It is twice 4 or four times 2. * a power of two, being 2 (two cubed), and is the first number of the form , being an integer greater than 1. * the first number which is neither prime nor semiprime. * the base of the octal number system, which is mostly used with computers. In octal, one digit represents three bits. In modern computers, a byte is a grouping of eight bits, also called an octet. * a Fibonacci number, being plus . The next Fibonacci number is . 8 is the only positive Fibonacci number, aside from 1, that is a perfect cube. * the only nonzero perfect power that is one less than another perfect power, by Mihăilescu's Theorem. * the order of the smallest non-abelian group all of whose subgroups are normal. * the dimension of the octonions and is the highest possible dimension of a normed division algebra. * the first number ...
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Seeing Pink Elephants
"Seeing pink elephants" is a euphemism for hallucinations caused by delirium tremens or alcoholic hallucinosis, especially the former. The term dates back to at least the early 20th century, emerging from earlier idioms about seeing snakes and other creatures. An alcoholic character in Jack London's 1913 novel ''John Barleycorn (novel), John Barleycorn'' is said to hallucinate "blue mice and pink elephants". Another notable instance of the appearance of pink elephants in popular culture is the "Pink Elephants on Parade" section of the 1941 Walt Disney animated film ''Dumbo''. Pink elephants actually exist in nature. Although they are extremely rare, albino elephants can appear to be pink as well as white. History of the euphemism For many decades before "pink elephant" became the standard drunken hallucination, people were known to "see snakes" or "see snakes in their boots." Beginning in about 1889, and throughout the 1890s, writers made increasingly elaborate modifications to t ...
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Taboo
A taboo or tabu is a social group's ban, prohibition, or avoidance of something (usually an utterance or behavior) based on the group's sense that it is excessively repulsive, sacred, or allowed only for certain persons.''Encyclopædia Britannica Online''.Taboo. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Retrieved 21 Mar. 2012 Such prohibitions are present in virtually all societies. Taboos may be prohibited explicitly, for example within a legal system or religion, or implicitly, for example by social norms or conventions followed by a particular culture or organization. Taboos are often meant to protect the individual, but there are other reasons for their development. An ecological or medical background is apparent in many, including some that are seen as religious or spiritual in origin. Taboos can help use a resource more efficiently, but when applied to only a subsection of the community they can also serve to suppress said subsection of the community. A taboo acknowledged by a ...
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