The Mad Professah Lectures

As expected, Novak Djokovic of Serbia defeated Kevin Anderson of South Africa in the 2018 Wimbledon final 6-2 6-2 7-6(3) to win his 4th Wimbledon title and 13th career major title.  This year the semifinals outshone the finals on the men's side where all 4 competitors were over 30 years old. 31-year-old Djokovic outlasted and outplayed 32-year old Rafael Nadal to win 10-8 in the fifth set. Kevin Anderson survived an extended 6 1/2 hours on court with John Isner to win 26-24 in the fifth. That might have explained the South African's slow start in the final although he made the 3rd set competitive and had 7(!) opportunities to break serve in that set, all of which were saved by his opponent, including 5 of these which were also set points.

Djokovic's win means that he is now 4th on the all-time major men's singles list, behind Roger Federer (20), Rafael Nadal (17) and  Pete Sampras (14). This is his 4th Wimbledon out of 5 finals: 2016 (l. Murray), 2015 (d. Federer), 2014 (d. Federer) and 2011 (d. Nadal). In fact, for the last 16 years all Wimbledon Men's singles titles have been won by one of the big 4: Federer (8), Djokovic (4), Murray (2) and Nadal (2). He will return to the Top 10 on the men's tour and since he has zero points to defend for the rest of the year he has a very good chance to end the year at #1.

Kyle Sellars has appeared as Eye Candy before (February 1, 2016). He's a dancer and fitness model in South Africa. He has an excellent Instagram page (@pt_kyle94). The pictures in this post were taken from there, so there is more where they came from (usually in color but I liked this set of black-and-white shots).

Enjoy!

Zakhele Mbhele made history yesterday on May 22, Harvey Milk Day, when he was sworn in as the first elected openly gay, Member of Parliament in South Africa. Mbhele, 29, is believed to be the first openly gay elected Member of Parliament anywhere in Africa!

The Washington Post reports:

Today, Zakhele Mbhele, a member of the opposition Democratic Alliance, was sworn in to the South African National Assembly. He is the 203rd openly gay member of parliament worldwide  since Coos Huijsen became the first, in the Netherlands, in 1976. The symbolism is made more vivid by the fact that Mbhele is the first openly gay black African to be elected on a continent where laws designed to invalidate gay people have destroyed countless lives.  

There is an unsettling polarity in the state of gay rights around the world today. The march toward gay rights in much of the developed world has sped up to a dizzying pace. More and more countries have introduced same-sex marriage and other equality laws. Today, well over 700 million people live in places where gay marriage is legal; over 120 million of those are in the United States.

You can congratulate Mbhele yourself via his Twitter account yourself. Hopefully, he will only be the first of many out LGBT politicians on the African continent.

Hat/tip to GLAAD Link

Nelson Mandela, the world's most famous (and, arguably, most successful) political prisoner, has died in South Africa at the age of 95.

The New York Times has published Mandela's obituary:

Nelson Mandela, who led the emancipation ofSouth Africa from white minority rule and served as his country’s first black president, becoming an international emblem of dignity and forbearance, died Thursday night. He was 95. 

[...] 

Mr. Mandela’s quest for freedom took him from the court of tribal royalty to the liberation underground to a prison rock quarry to the presidential suite of Africa’s richest country. And then, when his first term of office was up, unlike so many of the successful revolutionaries he regarded as kindred spirits, he declined a second term and cheerfully handed over power to an elected successor, the country still gnawed by crime, poverty, corruption and disease but a democracy, respected in the world and remarkably at peace. 

The question most often asked about Mr. Mandela was how, after whites had systematically humiliated his people, tortured and murdered many of his friends, and cast him into prison for 27 years, he could be so evidently free of spite. 

The government he formed when he finally won the chance was an improbable fusion of races and beliefs, including many of his former oppressors. When he became president, he invited one of his white wardens to the inauguration. Mr. Mandela overcame a personal mistrust bordering on loathing to share both power and a Nobel Peace Prize with the white president who preceded him, F. W. de Klerk.

There will be a state funeral on Sunday December 15. President Obama is expected to attend.

Today is World AIDS Day 2013. TheBody.com has created an interesting infographic excerpted above which informs readers about the current facts about AIDS/HIV in the world.

While I was in Los Angeles for my wedding anniversary last week The Other Half and I saw the movie Elysium, the follow-up film from Neill Blomkamp, who directed District 9. Elysium was one of my most highly anticipated films of summer 2013 because I was so charmed by Blomkamp's debut work.

However, his second film is not as well-received by critics (66% favorable) or audiences (70% favorable) as his first (critics 90%, audiences 79%). This is unfortunate, because Blomkamp is working with a bigger budget and bigger stars (Oscar winners Jodie Foster and Matt Damon). The star from District 9, Sharlto Copley also appears in Elysium, as one of the key bad guys in the piece. Copley is a quirky actor, and his casting as Kruger is one of the weak aspects of the film. He simply does not convey the sense of menace as one would expect in a summer blockbuster villain; he's more like the weird, homeless guy in the subway you want to avoid not because you're afraid of him, but because you're just grossed out or uncertain about the guy's boundaries.

There are other problems with the film as well. While it's great to see Jodie Foster working in films (especially after her infamous Golden Globes speech this year where she said she was quitting the business), her Delacourt is a corrupt, elitist bureaucrat with ice in her veins who is willing to do "whatever it takes" to defend her society's morally bankrupt way of life. But, the film doesn't do a good job of really exploring or explaining Delacourt's motives. Is it just a lust for power? One would hope that there is a more complex motive for Delacourt's action than the typical desire for control. Plus, what going on with her accent? (It sounds vaguely European mixed with South African). Copley's Kruger also sounds South African, which is not surprising to those of us who recognize him from District 9, but there's no explanation why a violent and unhinged mercenary has a South African accent.

I must say that generally the use of language is one of the strongest aspects of the film. Damon's blonde, blue-eyed Max is shown speaking fluent Spanish in his orphaned, youthful past and in his squalid, hellish present. This Spanish in a sea of brown bodies and faces is juxtaposed with Delacourt's smooth French in the well-manicured, very civilized (read: White and upper-class) on Elysium. Elysium, as we know from the trailers, and very early on in the movie, is a floating habitat that the select super-rich have created and retreated to, leaving a desperate and destitute Earth to the multitudinous, teeming hordes. The use of language as a proxy for class is deployed skillfully and quickly illustrates the bifurcated nature of life in the future that we the audience are going to be experiencing in Elysium.

The central tension in Elysium is whether our main character, Max (Damon) is going to be able to figure out a way to Get Up There (to Elysium) in order to have a chance of getting access to near-miraculous machines which can fix basically any health problem. The plot to get him up there ends up with Max having information uploaded into his brain that could potentially completely change the balance of power between Earth and Elysium. The fact that there are millions (if noy billions) of people on Earth who do not have access to basic necessities of life (food, water, shelter, health) while a coddled few have access to all these in addition to miraculous health care is a clear commentary on current political debates going on in America and elsewhere. However, as Alyssa Rosenberg cogently argues, the sharp political wit that was so present in District 9 doesn't make much sense in Elysium and ultimately disappoints viewers who were excited by the visionary nature of that film.

I don't want to reveal too much of the plot twists except to say that all though the action doesn't always make sense (Blomkamp apparently has a tenuous grasp on the Newtonian laws of motion and other aspects of physics which can be distracting) it is always compelling. A friend of mine who saw Elysium at a preview described it as "a cross between Jason Bourne meets Terminator 150 years in the future."

Title: Elysium.
Director: Neill Blomkamp.
Running Time: 1 hour, 49 minutes.
MPAA Rating: Rated R for strong bloody violence and language throughout.
Release Date: August 9, 2013.
Viewing Date: August 9, 2013.

Writing: B-.
Acting: C+.
Visuals: B+.
Impact: A-.

Overall Grade: B (3.0/4.0).

Retired Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu has joined the recently announced campaign by the United Nations to fight homophobia called Free & Equal. The BBC has an interview with the South Aftican Nobel Peace Prizewinner denouncing religious-based homophobia which is today's Queer Quote.

"I would refuse to go to a homophobic heaven. No, I would say sorry, I mean I would much rather go to the other place." 

"I would not worship a God who is homophobic and that is how deeply I feel about this."

Bishop Desmond Tutu is one of my heroes!

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God

Nelson Mandela turns 95 years old today! He was the first Black president of South Africa after that country's system of apartheid was dismantled. He is a hero to millions of people around the world. Recently, he has been in poor health and is currently n the hospital. Many people did not expect him to reach this milestone of his 95th birthday, so today is a great day!

With the passage of marriage equality in Uruguay, the above graphic is floating around the Interwebs. It is very soon to be out of date, because in addition to the imminent case of France, Great Britain will almost certainly enact marriage equality by the end of the year.

France is poised to join the list of countries in which same-sex marriage is legal by 2013, and in light of the debate which is about to start in that country when the marriage bill is introduced in Parliament in October, the news service France24 has published an interactive map demonstrating the countries around the world which allow full marriage equality or civil unions.

hat/tip to Joe.My.God

As I had previously blogged about, the Scandinavian country of Denmark has been planning on joining the rest of the region in enacting marriage equality this summer. On Thursday, the Danish Parliament passed a bill to allow marriages by same-sex couples by a vote of 85 to 24 in the 111 member body called the Folketing.

According to Pink News:

Excellent news! As I blogged about last October, the Government of Denmark has announced that it will be enacting marriage equality in the near future, and today comes word that the date will be June 15th, 2012.

At her weekly press conference, Tuesday, Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt said the government is putting the finishing touches to a bill that will come into force on June 15th, allowing homosexuals and lesbians to walk down the aisle in the church of their choice – if they can find a priest who’s willing to conduct the ceremony.

“It will always be up to the individual priest as to whether he or she is prepared to bless gay couples but this legislation provides homosexuals with the same rights as heterosexuals,” said the PM.

Way back in 1989, Denmark was the very first country in the world to have state-sponsored recognition of same-sex couples when they enacted registered partnerships, which was essentially what we would now call civil unions or comprehensive domestic partnerships. Now, there are well over a half-dozen countries which have full marriage equality, led by the Netherlands in 2000 and followed by Canada, Argentina, South Africa, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Sweden and Norway.

Denmark is a European country of 5.5 million people, about the size of Minnesota or Wisconsin. When Maryland and Washington defend their marriage equality laws at the ballot box later this year, even more people (5.8 million and 6.8 million, respectively) will gain access to marriage equality.

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God

Also posted at SentientMeat.Net

This Argyroderma startled me the other day. I hadn't noticed the bud forming until it I saw its shocking purple petals fully unfurled and sticking straight up.
You'll have to take my word that this flower is a purple of such intensity and depth that I've rarely seen a color to rival it. Cameras have a hard time capturing intense magenta and deep purple; my camera is no exception. In real life the petals are a much darker, deeper purple—rather than the hot magenta in this photo. You almost begin to doubt your own eyesight... as if someone has fiddled with the color knobs of the world.
Argyroderma is native to the quartz fields of the Knersvlakte north of Vanrhynsdorp in southern Namaqualand, in South Africa's Northern Cape. All known species in Argyroderma are from this same region.

Like all its relatives known by the monickers "Split Rock" or "Living Stone", Argyroderma is a mesemb—a member of the ice plant family Aizoaceae, formerly Mesembryanthemaceae. Try saying that 3 times fast. I have yet another geeky confession: sometimes I walk around the house repeating this family name to myself: mess-emm-bree-ann-them-AY-see-ee. If I had to explain myself, I guess I'm practicing so that I don't stumble if I have to say it in public. Try it again yourself: meh-semm-bree-ann-theh-MAY-see-ee.

This particular plant was sold to me as Argyroderma 'Purple'. I'm guessing it's cultivated from Argyroderma delaetii, a solitary species which in Nature can have white, yellow, purple, or occasionally even red flowers—in the same population.

Argyroderma delaetii at CactusArt.Biz 

Court, Doreen. (Third Edition, 2010). Succulent Flora of Southern Africa. Cape Town, South Africa: Struik Publishers. ISBN-10: 1770075879. ISBN-13: 978-1770075870.

Joe.My.God links to this interesting map about the state of the law towards homosexuality throughout Africa, provided by ILGA.

Interestingly, friend of MadProfessah.com, Rod McCollum is currently in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for an international AIDS conference and is posting some amazing first person reports of his trip on his blog, Rod 2.0. Check it out!

While we were on a ridiculously long hike in Table Mountain National Park in Cape Town, the other half and I ran into these amazing specimens of King Protea a.k.a. Protea Cynaroides, the National Flower of South Africa. When fully open the flowers are between 6-8 inches in circumference. Truly astounding to behold.

South Africa has thousands of species of flora and fauna which are found nowhere else in the world. In fact, Table Mountain National Park has more biodiversity than the entire continent of North America!

Hi... Just a quick post to let my readers know that I have arrived safely in Cape Town, South Africa. I'm on vacation until March 28th, visiting the country (Cape Town, Johannesburg and Pretoria).u

Above (I think) I have posted two shots I took of sunrise this morning (Tuesday March 15, 2011) from the roof of the place I am staying, in the "Gay Village" section of Cape Town called, De Waterkant. South Africa is currently 9 hours ahead of Pacific Daylight Time (6 Hours Ahead of Eastern Daylight Time).

They don't offer unlimited internet usage here, so blogging will be light!

more...

I'm on vacation in South Africa from March 11th through March 28th. I'm flying from LAX (Los Angeles) to LHR (London Heathrow) to CPT (Cape Town) and then after 9 days up to JNB (Johannesburg) where we'll spend 5 days and then back to Los Angeles via London again. 22,526 miles on the Star Alliance (United and South Africa Airways). It's basically a day and a half of travel time in each direction, with 14 days spent on the ground.

I will have internet access, but blogging will be much lighter than usual, with some favorites (such as Monday's Eye Candy and Thursday's Reviews and Celebrity Friday programmed to post automatically).

Today is the final of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Spain will be playing the Netherlands. Holland is undefeated in this year's tournament, while Spain has been one of the top 2 ranked teams in the world for the last three years (the other, Brazil was vanquished by the Dutch team in the quarterfinals).

Caster Semenya is back in the news because the International Association of Athletics Federations has finally resolved her case and decided that the gender non-conforming (and rumored intersexed) athletic track star can compete in women's events in the future.