It's Made From Animal:

*The information that follows is from PETA's website.*
The following product is made from animal:
"Aminosuccinate Acid.
(See Aspartic Acid.)
Aspartic Acid. Aminosuccinate Acid.
Can be animal or plant source (e.g., molasses). Sometimes synthesized for commercial purposes.

Buy Stuff From This Company:

According to PETA, this is an animal-friendly company. "Those marked with a dot (·) meet the Corporate Standard of Compassion for Animals (CSCA). Those marked with an asterisk (*) manufacture strictly vegan products:

"*Ahimsa Natural Care, 1250 Reid St., Suite 13A, Richmond Hill, ON L4B 1G3 Canada; 888-424-4672; ahimsa@interlog.com"

Organization of Interest

As you know, the IPS is dedicated to bringing attention to charitable organizations everywhere.
This Month's:

Amnesty International USA
322 Eighth Ave
New York, NY 10001
212-807-8400
http://www.amnesty_usa.org

I think most of you are familiar with Amnesty Intl. They fight against violations of human rights the world over. They're like PETA for people.

Whad up wid dat?!:

Uh, yeah. I was gonna put an article here, but the Tibet one is so long and so you know, I know how it is to look at a bunch of words so I figure one long article that nobody will read is enough for this month.

Update on Tibet:

Information is taken directly from the ICT website, which you should visit, if possible (http://www.savetibet.org).

"Tibetan Tragedy"
Time Magazine
Asia Now

JULY 17, 2000 VOL. 156 NO. 2

As time and tyranny tear into the cultural fabric and spiritual soul of an ancient land, believers hope a new leader-in-exile can complete the Dalai Lama's mission
By ANTHONY SPAETH

The world's image of Tibet-a land of breathtaking beauty, intriguing spirituality and intractable political travails-is really based on two Tibets. One is a vast landmass under the control, and a very tight one, of the People's Republic of China. The other is a widely scattered diaspora of Tibetans who rejected Chinese rule with their feet. The center of that displaced tribe is the Indian mountain town of Dharamsala, where a virtual Tibet has arisen. Maroon-robed monks with shaven heads climb steep lanes for audiences with the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled God-King, who has lived there since his escape from China in 1959. Prayer flags fly high atop houses and monasteries: Tibetan tradition says blessings float down from the flags on the mountain breezes.

Few blessings have been showered on the people of either Tibet for the past 50 years. Within China, Tibetans are jailed for nationalist utterings, forbidden to display photos of the Dalai Lama and faced with the very extinction of their culture. The exiles don't have it easy either: they have waited for four decades for the miracle that would send them home with some guaranteed freedoms. Hope is running out-and time, too. The Dalai Lama is generally viewed as the only person capable of striking a decent deal for his people with China. Last week he turned 65. Should he die, many Tibetans feel their cause will perish with him.

But late last year, an intriguing bridge between the two Tibets was spanned. A 14-year-old monk climbed out of his bedroom window in Tsurphu Monastery, 80 km north of Lhasa, and, by foot and by car, made his way surreptitiously to Nepal and then to Dharamsala. His name is Ugyen Trinley Dorge, but his title is Karmapa, the highest lama in the Kagyupa sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Like the Dalai Lama, the Karmapa is an incarnate: he is the 17th incarnation of a wise soul. Now 15, he is barely out of childhood, although strikingly tall and authoritative in voice. China seems stumped: it officially recognized his authority in the past and has yet to denounce him for his escape. Within Tibet, it remains legal to display the Karmapa's pictures. Since January, they have sold like hotcakes.

Spiritually the Karmapa is not the Dalai Lama's successor. (His is a different sect entirely.) But for Tibetans despondent over the impasse, the boy represents new hope that the struggle can continue, and possibly be resolved. Though the Karmapa was once considered a helpless captive of China, his daring escape made him a hero overnight. For now, at least, the Dalai Lama insists he's not a successor. "Not in that way," he told Time. But he concedes that the Karmapa will be an important leader. "I have told him-and I have said this publicly-that my generation is growing old, and the time has come to prepare the next generation of spiritual leaders."

Can a 15-year-old boy upset, for better or worse, a standoff that is half a century old? Perhaps so, considering the treatment he is receiving in India. The Dalai Lama's government-in-exile has housed the Karmapa in an empty religious-studies center in Dharamsala, where he lives with a few helpers, a sister who preceded him into exile-and more than 30 guards. He doesn't get out often, and every trip has to be planned well in advance. His sect has a vibrant monastery nearby and a headquarters in the Indian state of Sikkim, but the boy's public life has been restricted to daily audiences open to the devout and the curious, including many Western tourists. His aides say his day is dull even by the standards of a Buddhist monk and that he is lonelier in exile than he was in China. He has made the passage that is familiar to all of those who have moved between the two Tibets, from the unfree homeland to the limbo of exile.

There is no easy solution to the Tibetan impasse. The arguments between the conflicting sides have barely budged in four decades, as if Tibet were some enigmatic Buddhist riddle that must be played out eternally. But times have changed. Just look at the thaws around the region. Beijing now manages a highly autonomous Hong Kong with a surprisingly light hand. Taiwan's new President Chen Shui-bian has invited his communist counterparts across the strait for a summit. North Korea's Kim Jong Il, head of another of the last communist holdouts, turned on the charm last month and suddenly a Korean rapprochement seems possible. Is there hope for Tibet?

If Tibetan culture is to survive, time is of the essence. Beijing has flooded Tibet with Chinese settlers-Tibetans may now be a minority in their major cities-and cracked down on political activity, religious training and the teaching of the Tibetan language. "Tibetan culture has at least one more generation in it inside Tibet," says Ron Schwartz, a sociology professor at Memorial University of Newfoundland and author of a book on the anti-Chinese riots of 1987 and 1988. "Beyond that it would be difficult to say." In other words, a political miracle may be the only hope that there will be a Tibet for anyone to go home to.

Tibet, particularly in its cities, is a bubbling mix of modernization, intimidation and a rapid influx of ugliness. Old neighborhoods are being demolished. Brothels with Chinese sex workers flourish. Signs posted at monasteries instruct the clergy to denounce the Dalai Lama. Tibetan study courses at Lhasa University have been largely dropped-the few that remain are for students from abroad. Young Tibetans are becoming frivolous, parents complain, with the overnight import of consumerism. Portraits of the Dalai Lama have to be hidden from neighborhood spies.

In the other Tibet, life in exile is hardly paradise. The religious education in India is fine-some monks come for training at the Sera Monastic University in the southern part of the country and return afterward to Tibet. But Dharamsala was meant to be a temporary refuge, and the wait has gone on too long. The old now doubt that they will ever achieve their dream of going home, and their progeny show more interest in motorbikes and migration to the West. Tashi Choezum, a 58-year-old refugee in Bylakuppe, a Tibetan settlement in southern India, says she put her nine children through school so "they would fight for Tibet." But most now live abroad-one more loose thread in a fraying community.

The past few weeks have been good for the Dalai Lama and, if you watched TV, splendid for the Tibetan cause. His Holiness had his sixth meeting with Bill Clinton, sandwiched between talks with U.S. congressional leaders and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. He spent time impressing backers on the West Coast. Late last week, the World Bank got caught up in the fray. It couldn't decide whether to lend China the funds to pay for the transfer of thousands of farmers onto fertile land in Qinghai province. Tibetan organizations abroad criticized the project as part of Beijing's plan to colonize areas populated by Tibetans. When it looked as if the World Bank might cancel the loan or impose new restrictions, China angrily said it didn't want the money and withdrew its request.

To Beijing, however, such conflicts are mostly sideshows. China has possession of Tibet-with its tourist potential, mineral wealth and position as a buffer against India-and that, to paraphrase the old bromide, is nine-tenths of the battle. Tibetan groups proclaimed the collapse of the loan as a major victory. But the resettlement is still likely to take place, and without the outside world's financing and supervision. Politically, the communists don't need to dangle in front of Tibetans the "one country, two systems" formula that helped win Britain's agreement to return Hong Kong in 1997. Tibet has been in China's grasp since the People's Liberation Army invaded in 1950. Tibet's two waves of nationalistic uprising-a major one in 1959, and a pair of riots in Lhasa in the 1980s-make Beijing nervous,
particularly with revered leaders like the Dalai Lama and the Karmapa overseas.

Within Tibet, Beijing has responded to the threat by launching one of the oddest and most extensive efforts at social engineering the world has seen. China says it wants to bring development and modernity to a historically backward land, and by some measures it has. Office and apartment blocks with blue tinted windows, ubiquitous throughout modernizing China, have sprouted around Lhasa, the spiritual cradle of Tibet. Discos and karaoke bars throb in the shadow of the Potala Palace, the Dalai Lama's former seat of power. Nearby is the new Lhasa Department Store, a sumptuous oasis in which wide-eyed monks experience their first, nervous escalator rides. Tibet's gdp rose 9.1% last year, according to official figures, which also show that the per-capita income of farmers and herdsmen jumped 7.9%. And Beijing insists that Tibetan traditions are being respected. It recently released a 29-page document extolling preservation efforts and detailing the sums spent: $36 million yearly to keep monasteries going, more than $6.6 million on repairs of the Potala Palace. Talk of an attempt to extinguish Tibetan culture, the report says, is "prattle."

Swamping Tibetan culture is probably a better description. In the so-called Tibetan Autonomous Region, ethnic Tibetans now number 6 million, or only 44% of the population, according to the Dalai Lama's government-in-exile. China disputes those figures, but its own census data is from 1990, before the most recent waves of Han Chinese immigrants. At the Sera Monastery outside Lhasa, novice monks still debate one another on Buddhist doctrine, a traditional training. But they do so at set times so that busloads of tourists, including many ethnic Chinese, can watch. On top of that are the police-state methods, highly evolved and ultra-vigilant, of smothering nationalism. Neighborhood spy networks operate as they did during the Cultural Revolution; there are political detainees and recurring reports of torture of prisoners.

China's hope, surely, is that economic development will take the steam out of Tibetan nationalism-and to a certain extent this is happening. Religion is fading as the central element of identity within Tibet, which has led to the appearance of what some foreign analysts call "secular" Tibetans. These are the urban folk who hang out at places like the Princess Bhrikuti Dancehall, a couple of blocks from the Potala Palace. On any given night the place is packed with businessmen, officials, Generation X-ers-all Tibetan, none Chinese. They have cut deals with their consciences to thrive in the neocolonial business atmosphere.

Nonetheless there is a hint of subversion in the air. Princess Bhrikuti, for whom the bar was named, was a wife of the Tibetan warrior king who introduced Buddhism to the Tibetan court. This is a jab: Chinese propaganda frequently mentions Songtsen's other wife, an ethnic Chinese princess, as evidence of the strong links between the two lands. On stage, a man belts out a song about two cranes, one that died and the other that flew away. That's an allegory: one crane is the Dalai Lama, the other the late Panchen Lama, his No. 2, who passed away in 1989. The conversation is very much about modern Tibet, and a visitor is reminded that China's spin regarding development should be received skeptically. According to the United Nations, the average local life expectancy is 60 years, compared with 75 in Shanghai. Tibet's grain output tripled from 1952 to 1980-but has barely budged since. The U.N. Development Program's human development index ranks life in Tibet on par with that in Zimbabwe or Equatorial Guinea. The us-and-them feeling is pervasive at the Princess Bhrikuti, a bit like Prague during the cold war. But whether the complaints are jovial or bitter, they are always very discreet.

There are bars in Dharamsala, too, thousands of kilometers from Tibet but close to the headquarters of the Dalai Lama and the large, empty structure that is the Karmapa's new home. In those watering holes, the talk is hot-headed. "I want to go blow up a few bridges," says one young Tibetan, who has a college degree, loves mtv and has never seen his homeland. "The Chinese don't care because we don't do anything about it." It's a common refrain. Some young exiles, after a few beers, wonder aloud why Tibetans can't be as brutal as the separatist Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka. But come daylight, most of their energies are directed toward more practical affairs, like getting visas for the U.S. There are 120,000 Tibetans in India: the majority were born there. "Two generations have been brought up in exile," says Tsten Norbu, president of the Tibetan Youth Congress, an exile group. "They don't have a sense of belonging to Tibet."

This alienation poses perhaps the biggest risk to Tibetans' hopes of regaining meaningful autonomy in their homeland. Many young exiles have no patience for the Dalai Lama's "middle path" of peaceful negotiation, and life in India doesn't offer many opportunities either. Politics is a controlled affair: much of the government-in-exile is run by the Dalai Lama's relatives. Religious leaders spend a lot of their time traveling to the West to gather sympathetic cash for their sect or monasteries. Even the Dalai Lama is worried. "Some monks," he said in a recent speech, "are becoming businessmen, selling dharma [divine law] for more dollars." The result is an exile community fast losing coherence.

Standing above it all, still larger than life, is the Dalai Lama. Tibetans and their supporters have invested enormous hopes in his ability to somehow make things right. But some within the exile community fear that Tibetans will follow his nonviolent injunctions until he expires-taking with him the entire Tibetan cause. That, they reason, is what Beijing is banking on. With only token pressure from the West, China has little cause to do otherwise. "Short of radical political change, I don't see the iron laws of empire relaxed even among the most pro-Western Chinese leaders," says Graham Hutchings, China watcher at Oxford Analytica, a London-based international consultant group. "The game is moving rapidly China's way." For Tibetans, it looks like only a miracle could turn the situation around.

A kind of miracle occurs every time a top Tibetan lama dies. His soul is reborn, and his followers, using premonitions and traditional divination techniques, seek out the new incarnation. Beijing has gotten involved in the last two major searches-for the Panchen Lama and the current Karmapa-creating much consternation. To prevent that happening after his own demise, the Dalai Lama has said he will be reborn outside of China's borders-so that Beijing can't control his successor's upbringing and training. For a people whose fate is in the hands of an elderly holy man and a teenage monk, that plan has actually brought some hope-but it is of the faint, fatalistic kind so familiar to the people of both Tibets.

What a Show:

The following episode of a t.v. show is worth taping:

I think and I think and I think and the only show I can think of is that episode of Conan that was rerunned the other night with Mira Sorvino, Jack Black, and Elliot Smith. That was one funny show. Jack Black, of Tenacious D and High Fidelity fame, showed his audition tape for the sidekick position on Conan and, well, if you've ever seen the guy you know it was funny. So yeah, that was a good episode. I think I did in fact tape it the first time it aired if anyone wants to see it. Yep, summers are boring at the IPS but eh, who cares really?

Where's That From?

Last month's quote was from "Jerry," Seinfeld. First one to guess the source of this month's line wins a prize!

"Pull your pants down. Check your ass. What do you find?"

It's Poetry Daddy O!:

It's poetry time baby--pronounced a la Conan O'Brien, babeh. So sit back and enjoy some solid vibes. *Sound of fingers snapping*

"Luster"

Silver stage
Purple dream
Rusty blue
I always think of you
All wrapped in neon gleam
All wrapped inside of me

--Sally

Petty Pectin Trivia:

Kurt Cobain was supposed to write the soundtrack for Grosse Pointe Blank.

Hmm, that's strange...:

This was donated by Shadow so like, you know, like I always say, you can offer up stuff for any article folks.

"Courtesy of Tom Llewellyn of WA, used with permission

Can you imagine working at the following company? It has a little over 500 employees with the following statistics:
*29 have been accused of spousal abuse
*7 have been arrested for fraud
*19 have been accused of writing bad checks
*117 have bankrupted at least two businesses
*3 have been arrested for assault
*71 cannot get a credit card due to bad credit
*14 have been arrested on drug-related charges
*8 have been arrested for shoplifting
*21 are current defendants in lawsuits
*In 1998 alone, 84 were stopped for drunk driving
Can you guess which organization this is? Give up?

It's the 535 members of your United States Congress. The same group that perpetually cranks out hundreds upon hundreds of new laws designed to keep the rest of us in line."

Song of the Month:

"Curtain Calls," Too Far to Care, Old 97's. Okay, so like, a few of you will know the significance of this song for me, and the others won't and you'll just have to suffer. Either way, this is like, a really good song and I heard it on the radio the other night at the strangest time and they never play it and then it was cool and so I've been digging on this song. And like, if I could have two songs for this month, the other would be "Melt Show" off the same record. I know I'm being super cryptic in describing why these are the Songs of the Month as far as most of you are concerned, but the only people who really care about my reasons know anyway and like, basically it all goes back to last month and how I was talking about how coincidences rule and stuff and so anyway, yeah, get the album if you don't have it.

Blocking the Wall:

Visit Blocking the Wall Online: http://www.dhak.net/btwonline

THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (1991)*****
(Yes folks, that's right, Shadow actually does like the occasional movie.)
Directed by Jonathan Demme
Starring Jodie Foster (rock!) and Anthony Hopkins (rock!)

Has anyone else noticed that Jonathan Demme hasn't, as of yet, lived up to all that potential? I mean, sure, he did Philadelphia, but come ON, does anyone else see the visual flair this dude has?! Demme, come out, please. Do more thrillers. That said, let's move on.

This is in the Private Collection for many reasons. Number one, any movie that thrills the hell out of me gets that immediate distinction, because it's a tough thing to do. Number two, the impeccable source material. Thomas Harris. *raises fist solemnly* Rock on. Number three, Anothony Hopkins and Jodie Foster. Together. Producing performances that, singularly, are quality, but which combine to produce some of the most blistering chemistry I've ever witnessed. Electricity doesn't just flow through the interplay of these characters, it fuckin' short-circuits. There is one moment in particular I simply must point out, but I'll get to that a little later.

A really good title is hard to come by. I didn't watch The Silence of the Lambs until 1995, at a friend's birthday party, and until that point I was befuddled by the title. Granted, I was little more than a glorified child at the time (which, in most respects, I still am), but it's not every movie poster that makes you stop, look, and go "Silence of the--what the hell?!" You want to see it, just to know how the title fits. Demme's brilliant little flick satisfies on all fronts, and everything comes beautifully full circle.

Editing is hell-for-leather, and the film moves along so quickly that you have no time to predict what will happen next. The downfall of most suspense movies being the amount of time you are kept in suspense, of course. From breathless scene to breathless scene, it's all the gritty bombast of Scorsese combined with the elegant subtlety of Kubrick. At that, it must be noted that everything here is about subtlety. It you haven't seen The Silence of the Lambs--watch it. If you've seen it--watch it again. Those who just watched it the first time--do the same. You'll catch things you never saw, and the understatement of everything, from setpieces to dialogue, especially to acting, deserves a second look.

Oh, yes, the acting. Classy performances always renew my faith in the film industry, even when the characters have the potential to be as over-the-top as your average Gary Oldman turn (hey now--don't get me started on how much I love Gary, but come on). Like a southern baptism, The Silence of the Lambs is a story completely immersed in its characters. And, most hair-raising of all, these characters are palpably human, a protagonist you identify with and an antagonist....well....when you rear back at any point during the movie and find yourself in Clarice Starling's shoes, knowing you shouldn't trust Hannibal Lecter but unable to turn away...that's when the creepiness sets in.

In an all-out backlit-and-mounted-open-to-the-public-exhibit of the subtlety of Jonathan Demme's direction, the film's most haunting moment is also one of its quickest. About three million things happen all at once, and in the amount of time it takes to register it, they've already turned the page. Starling breaks the rules, a connection is made, and the expertly framed shot of Lecter's finger touching hers coarses lightning through the film, minutes before a pivotal escape. It's moments like that which reinforce my desire to make films, and by george if I didn't have the most indulgent willies for the rest of the night.

Hey, they even end this on a cheap joke and it works! --Shadow Omega

Stuff That Rules:

One of my favorite things in all the world to do is just sit there and talk to people. I mean, like, sure I like to party or whatever, but times when I actually have something to do are few and far between and what I really value is sitting around with a friend or two and just talking about everything and nothing for a period of time. The past two weekends have been Friend Days of the World and though I've been depressed the rest of the time, the time spent with my three best friends just talking about, well, everything and nothing, have been so cool. I mean, it reminds you why you value them so much. It reminds you what drew you to them in the first place. It reminds you why you never want to fall out of touch with them. So anyway, I guess the thing that rules this month is spending time with the important people in your life. Alright the Full House moment is over. Everybody go back to pickin' your asses!

Dude/Chick of the Month:

Dude: Quentin Tarantino. Uh, he's cool and good and funny and brilliant and he needs to quit jacking off and make me a damn movie! And I know that I'm not the only one who gets excited when I hear the words, "I'll bring it right back."

Chick: Mira Sorvino. I can't remember if she's already had this award or not, but either way, I thought it would be fitting to have them both up here because of their history and the fact that she was also in the tv show that everyone should see this month. Olga's like, her ideal woman and stuff, as in, if Mira Sorvino could look like anyone in the world, she'd wanna look like Olga. I'm sure that doesn't surprise anyone though. And she also wants to have the distinction of having slept with Quentin Tarantino like Sally has. Poor Mira.

Whoriscopes:

Cancer (6/21-7/22) - The hotel has invisible furniture and the lobby is lonely and dry; even so, you should dispose of your pin cushion and your last twenty cigarettes.
Famous Crabs - Tobey Maguire (6/27/ 75), Juliette Lewis (6/21/73), Courtney Love (7/9/64), Gilda Radner (6/28/46), Lena Horne (6/30/17), & John D. Rockefeller (7/8/1839)

Leo (7/23-8/22) - Perhaps the hardest decision you'll make this month is between sugar cookies and chocolate covered strawberries, but you'll go with the strawberries and freeze the cookies.

Virgo (8/23-9/22) - You may as well be drinking a malt in the sun or pouring red pepper on your ulcer; this month lay off your stomach as well as your boggled mind.

Libra (9/23-10/22) - Recognizable recognition does wonders for your hateful little turtle's raunchy disposition; display a bit and watch the respect roll in.

Scorpio (10/23-11/21) - Don't allow yourself to get so tainted by your environment; stand outside of situations and make it your decision to look in on the sappy happenings. Maybe you'll find you're quite the individualist.

Sagittarius (11/22-12/21) - The unknown substance clogging your drain is a peach; plunge it out and make peach pie.

Capricorn (12/22-1/19) - Your recently uncovered treasure barely pays for the millions of Sweet Tarts you require, but your rainy day money pays off wonderfully.

Aquarius (1/20-2/18) - Your dumb ghetto ghost is searching the streets for crumbs, let him know there's plenty of succulent fruit in the sewer.

Pisces (2/19-3/20) - My god, the sabotage is rusty; if you must throw grenades, throw them in the ice cream not the cake.

Aries (3/21-4/19) - Maybe you haven't noticed the apple is rotten but your teeth are breaking in your clenched hand anyway; it's not very kinky but it's pretty wild.

Taurus (4/20-5/20) - Try to remember that you will need plenty of lubricant and pest control products for your midsummer garage sale.

Gemini (5/21-6/20) - That dirty little battle you fight with your third eye is making the second one sick; give up and collaborate.

Contacting The IPS:

email:

SPing319@excite.com
ScarletLoser@excite.com

Congrats!

Congratulations to Scott, who has officially become The IPS Gay Male Slut! Wear your crown with pride dude; wear your crown with pride.

Notes From the Editor

Know somebody worthy of joining the IPS? Let us know and we'll set them up with an application.

Song stuck in your head that deserves the Song of the Month title? Send it in. Avid about a worthy cause? Tell us about it. Your suggestions may not appear immediately because I write these so far in advance, but I promise I'll use it sooner or later. This is your newsletter so let me know what you wanna see in it and I shall do my best to please you. So it is written; so shall it be.

And Happy Birthday to Shadow and Sally! Good work on being born this month and stuff!

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