City council member cites Urban Dictionary in an official statement criticizing BLM

Oh, Selah. It’s been a long time, but it’s clear that not much has changed. My husband grew up in Selah, a rural town of 8,000 people scattered outside of Yakima, Washington. There was one black kid in his entire high school, who ended up leaving because they were so ostracized by the other kids.…

Annie Reneau

Jun 18, 2020

Array – Photo credit: Photo by Gabe Pierce on Unsplash

Oh, Selah. It’s been a long time, but it’s clear that not much has changed.

My husband grew up in Selah, a rural town of 8,000 people scattered outside of Yakima, Washington. There was one black kid in his entire high school, who ended up leaving because they were so ostracized by the other kids. My husband was once called “white n-word” for standing up for a Mexican kid whose family were migrant workers in town. That was more than 20 years ago, but it’s helpful background for this story to make sense.

There are people with diverse viewpoints even in the smallest of towns, of course, and Selah is no exception. According to the Yakima-Herald, a Black Lives Matter rally took place in the town over the weekend, attended by more than 150 people.

One attendee was a Yakima city council member, who encountered Selah city administrator, Don Wayan, at the rally. Wayman apparently made a comment equating BLM with communism, and allegedly implied that there would be no trouble at the rally because of the high percentage of Selah citizens having concealed carry permits. Reports of his statements prompted letters to the city and an official statement that Selah city council member Kevin Wickenhagen felt compelled to write in response.

You can read the whole statement here, and it’s…well, it’s a doozy. But I’ve pulled some highlights to address. (Please note, I’m copying the passages exactly as they are written, so any grammatical errors—because there are some—are not my mistyping.)

After thanking people for expressing themselves to the city, Wickenhagen wrote that he had “done some research” on Black Lives Matter, then wrote:

“It is my belief that some people participating in the march and supporting the march are without an understanding of the underlying principles of the Black Lives Matter movement.”

Well that’s not condescending or anything. What, pray tell, does he think people think they’re supporting? We’ll get to that momentarily.

“First, though, I’d like to address the accusation that Mr. Wayman was intending to intimidate the BLM protestors by mentioning many people in Selah have carry conceal permits. Everyone needs to understand, the rumors of violent outbreaks in rural areas and suburbs were quite prevalent leading up to the march. One doesn’t have to look very far West to see what happens when people with unhealthy motives use a peaceful march as camouflage to instigate violence and vandalism. Selah police and Mr. Wayman would have been remis in their duty to protect the citizens and businesses had they not prepared for such a possibility.”

Umm, I hate to break it to you, but the ANTIFA boogeymen that alt-right social feeds were foaming at the mouth about were never, ever, ever going to show up in “rural areas and suburbs,” and especially not in Selah. Anyone in Selah who thought that was actually a possibility needs to get out of Selah more often. Good gracious.

And we’re not even to the good part yet. Here we go:

“Regarding Mr. Wayman’s statement about BLM being based on Neo-Marxism. Frankly, I had to do some research on Neo-Marxism. Explaining Neo-Marxism isn’t an easy philosophy to explain, but I found this online in the Urban Dictionary when comparing Marxism to neo-Marxism. “Instead of the dichotomy being between wealthy and poor (ie Marxism), it is between successful and unsuccessful demographics. Neo-Marxists divide all demographics (white, black, asian, male, female, gay, straight, etc) and place them in a hierarchy of oppression as determined by how successful that demographic is.” Using that statement as a basis, and reviewing BLM’s own website, BLM policies fall well into Neo-Marxist philosophy. Whether or not being called a neo-Marxist is seen as a negative would all depend on your point of view.”

Hoo boy. Urban Dictionary?! Really??

For those who are uninitiated, Urban Dictionary is a crowdsourced site for slang definitions, a large percentage of which are joke definitions. Seriously. Anyone can post a definition there. I could go on Urban Dictionary right now, type in “Selah” and write “hick town that wouldn’t recognize a Marxist if Karl Marx himself slapped it in the face” and it would be put in as an entry.

I mean, look:

teargaslighting – https://t.co/6ZAroGDNPh pic.twitter.com/0JJXxAQGlg— Urban Dictionary (@urbandictionary) June 8, 2020

I just Googled “Neo-Marxism” and had to jump over several perfectly legitimate pages like Encyclopedia Britannica, Science Direct, and the Oxford dictionary before I got to the Urban Dictionary entry (and if you know anything about Neo-Marxist philosophy, it’s easy to see that the Urban Dictionary definition is purposefully inflammatory).

And I’m not even getting into what else Urban Dictionary is commonly used for. Citing Urban Dictionary in an official statement is laughable and embarrassing, but unfortunately not surprising, all things considered.

“As to Mr. Wayman’s opinion of the march sounding like Communist Indoctrination. BLM has a plan they call ‘A Vision for Black Lives: Policy Demands for Black Power, Freedom and Justice,’. In that plan there are 6 core demands. The 4th core demand is, and I quote, ‘Economic justice for all and a reconstruction of the economy to ensure our communities have collective ownership, not merely access.’ That is a basic principle of communism. And again, if that is a negative or positive would all depend on your point of view.”

Wait, is this 2020 or 1920? Did we just skip back a hundred years to the first Red Scare? Are we really still doing the whole “commies” thing? Do you really not understand why the Black community might want “collective ownership, not merely access” in our country’s economy (which has been owned/run/dominated by wealthy white people for, like, ever—most of the time at the direct expense of Black people)?

Okay, one more paragraph to highlight:

“I have endeavored to pattern my view on race based on the words of Martin Luther King Jr. who dreamed his children wouldn’t be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. But that attitude no longer seems to fit in with current political climate. We are told we must end racism, but the very group that calls for it, calls special attention to it. We are told we must see everyone the same, but ‘all lives matter’ is insensitive. The same groups that calls for the end of racism request special resources for minority programs. It is a time where stating you’re not racist is immediately called into question and no amount of evidence seems to change minds, based on you’re the race of the person saying it.”

Aw, come on. It’s like a full Bingo card of white, willful mischaracterization of race issues. Selective MLK quote? Check. Believing that talking about racism perpetuates racism? Check. All Lives Matter? Check. Affirmative Action is racist? Check. Grammatically jumbled “I’m not racist” complaint? Check.

Selah, I know you have some progressive-minded people there. But if this is what your leadership is saying in official public statements, you haven’t come as far as I would have hoped since my husband’s childhood.

And while it’s easy to laugh at the ridiculousness of citing the Urban Dictionary, the Marxist/communist fearmongering, and the long-outdated double spaces between sentences, there are towns with leadership like this all over the U.S. That’s frankly a little terrifying.

The world is moving on, folks. Even in small towns. Time to catch up.

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Youth-led party for community engagement, MEDEA, Tanzania Captured by James Roh for Pura

Culture, Education, Empowered Women, Equality, Family, Identity, Modern Families

The next generation of female leaders has arrived. Here’s how they’re making sure they (and every girl) get a chance to learn.

Malala Fund and their local partners, with support from Pura, help girls find their voice. The result: greater access to education and a better world.

Sarah Watts

3/8/2026

Music, community and joy drive real change

In a small village in Pwani, a district on Tanzania’s coast, a massive dance party is coming to a close. For the past two hours, locals have paraded through the village streets, singing and beating ngombe drums; now, in a large clearing, a woman named Sheilla motions for everyone to sit facing a large projector screen. A film premiere is about to begin.

It’s an unusual way to kick off a film about gender bias, inequality, early marriage, and other barriers that prevent girls from accessing education in Tanzania. But in Pwani and beyond, local organizations supported by Malala Fund and funded by Pura are finding creative, culturally relevant ways like this one to capture people’s interest.

The film ends and Sheilla, the Communications and Partnership Lead for Media for Development and Advocacy (MEDEA), stands in front of the crowd once again, asking the audience to reflect: What did you think about the film? How did it relate to your own experience? What can we learn?

Sheilla explains that, once the community sees the film, “It brings out conversations within themselves, reflective conversations.” The resonance and immediate action create a ripple effect of change.

MEDEA Screening Audience in Tanzania. Captured by James Roh for Pura

Across Tanzania, gender-based violence often forces adolescent girls out of the classroom. This and other barriers — including child marriage, poverty, conflict, and discrimination — prevent girls from completing their education around the world.

Sheilla and her team are using film and radio programs to address the challenges girls face in their communities. MEDEA’s ultimate goal is to affirm education as a fundamental right for everyone, and to ensure that every member of a community understands how girls’ education contributes to a stronger whole and how to be an ally for their sisters, daughters, granddaughters, friends, nieces, and girlfriends.

Sheilla’s story is one of many that inspired Heart on Fire, a new fragrance from the Pura x Malala Fund Collection that blends the warm, earthy spices of Tanzania with a playful, joyful twist. Here’s how Pura is using scent as a tool to connect the world and inspire action.

A partnership focused on local impact, on a global mission

Pura, a fragrance company that recognizes education as both freedom and a human right, has partnered with Malala Fund since 2022. In order to defend every girl’s right to access and complete 12 years of education, Malala Fund partners with local organizations in countries where the educational barriers are the greatest. They invest in locally-led solutions because they know that those who are closest to the problems are best equipped to solve and build durable solutions, like MEDEA, which works with communities to challenge discrimination against girls and change beliefs about their education.

But local initiatives can thrive and scale more powerfully with global support, which is why Pura is using their own superpower, the power of scent, to connect people around the world with the women and girls in these local communities.

The Pura x Malala Fund Collection incorporates ingredients naturally found in Tanzania, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Brazil: countries where Malala Fund operates to address systemic education barriers. Eight percent of net revenue from the Pura x Malala Fund Collection will be donated to Malala Fund directly, but beyond financial support, the Collection is also a love letter to each unique community, blending notes like lemon, jasmine, cedarwood, and clove to transport people, ignite their senses, and help them draw inspiration and hope from the global movement for girls’ education. Through scent, people can connect to the courage, joy, and tenacity of girls and local leaders, all while uniting in a shared commitment to education: the belief that supporting girls’ rights in one community benefits all of us, everywhere.

You’ve already met Sheilla. Now see how Naiara and Mama Habiba are building unique solutions to ensure every girl can learn freely and dare to dream.

Naiara Leite is reimagining what’s possible in Brazil

Julia with Odara in Brazil. Captured by Luisa Dorr for Pura

In Brazil, where pear trees and coconut plantations cover the Northeastern Coast, girls like ten-year-old Julia experience a different kind of educational barrier than girls in Tanzania. Too often, racial discrimination contributes to high dropout rates among Black, quilombola and Indigenous girls in the country.

“In the logic of Brazilian society, Black people don’t need to study,” says Naiara Leite, Executive Coordinator of Odara, a women-led organization and Malala Fund partner. Bahia, the state where Odara is based, was once one of the largest slave-receiving territories in the Americas, and because of that history, deeply-ingrained, anti-Black prejudice is still widespread. “Our role and the image constructed around us is one of manual labor,” Naiara says.

But education can change that. In 2020, with assistance from a Malala Fund grant, Odara launched its first initiative for improving school completion rates among Black, quilombola, and Indigenous girls: “Ayomidê Odara”. The young girls mentored under the program, including Julia, are known as the Ayomidês. And like the Pura x Malala Fund Collection’s Brazil: Breath of Courage scent, the Ayomidês are fierce, determined, and bursting with energy.

Ayomidês with Odara in Brazil. Captured by Luisa Dorr for Pura

Ayomidês take part in weekly educational sessions where they explore subjects like education and ethnic-racial relations. The girls are encouraged to find their own voices by producing Instagram lives, social media videos, and by participating in public panels. Already, the Ayomidês are rewriting the narrative on what’s possible for Afro-Brazilian girls to achieve. One of the earliest Ayomidês, a young woman named Debora, is now a communications intern. Another former Ayomidê, Francine, works at UNICEF, helping train the next generation of adolescent leaders. And Julia has already set her sights on becoming a math teacher or a model.

“These are generations of Black women who did not have access to a school,” Naiara says. “These are generations of Black women robbed daily of their dreams. And we’re telling them that they could be the generation in their family to write a new story.”

Mama Habiba is reframing the conversation in Nigeria

Centre for Girls' Education, Nigeria. Captured by James Roh for Pura

In Mama Habiba’s home country of Nigeria, the scents of starfruit, ylang ylang and pineapple, all incorporated into the Pura x Malala Collection’s “Nigeria: Hope for Tomorrow,” can be found throughout the vibrant markets. Like these native scents, Mama Habiba says that the Nigerian girls are also bright and passionate, but too often they are forced to leave school long before their potential fully blooms.

“Some of these schools are very far, and there is an issue of quality, too,” Mama Habiba says. “Most parents find out when their children are in school, the girls are not learning. So why allow them to continue?”

When girls drop out of secondary school, marriage is often the alternative. In Nigeria, one in three girls is married before the age of 18. When this happens, girls are unable to fulfill their potential, and their families and communities lose out on the social, health and economic benefits.

Completing secondary school delays marriage, and according to UNESCO, educated girls become women who raise healthier children, lift their families out of poverty and contribute to more peaceful, resilient communities.

Centre for Girls’ Education, Nigeria. Captured by James Roh for Pura

To encourage young girls to stay in school, the Centre for Girls’ Education, a nonprofit in Nigeria founded by Mama Habiba and supported by Malala Fund and Pura, has pioneered an initiative that’s similar to the Ayomidê workshops in Brazil: safe spaces. Here, girls meet regularly to learn literacy, numeracy, and other issues like reproductive health. These safe spaces also provide an opportunity for the girls to role-play and learn to advocate for themselves, develop their self-image, and practice conversations with others about their values, education being one of them. In safe spaces, Mama Habiba says, girls start to understand “who she is, and that she is a girl who has value. She has the right to negotiate with her parents on what she really feels or wants.”

“When girls are educated, they can unlock so many opportunities,” Mama Habiba says. “It will help the economy of the country. It will boost so many opportunities for the country. If they are given the opportunity, I think the sky is not the limit. It is the starting point for every girl.”

From parades, film screenings to safe spaces and educational programs, girls and local leaders are working hard to strengthen the quality, safety and accessibility of education and overcome systemic challenges. They are encouraging courageous behavior and reminding us all that education is freedom.

Experience the Pura x Malala Fund Collection here, and connect with the stories of real girls leading change across the globe.

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Photos of a man and woman from the 1800s – Photo credit: Public Domain

Culture, Pop Culture

Why didn’t people smile in old-timey photographs? Smiling meant something different back then.

Our perceptions of smiling have changed dramatically since the 1800s.

Annie Reneau

Upworthy Staff

3/24/2026

If you’ve ever perused photographs from the 19th and early 20th century, you’ve likely noticed how serious everyone looked. If there’s a hint of a smile at all, it’s oh-so-slight. But more often than not, our ancestors looked like they were sitting for a sepia-toned mug shot or being held for ransom or something. Why didn’t people smile in photographs? Was life just so hard back then that nobody smiled? Were dour, sour expressions just the norm?

Most often, people’s serious faces in old photographs are blamed on the long exposure time of early cameras, and that’s true. Taking a photo was not an instant event like it is now; people had to sit still for many minutes in the 1800s to have their photo taken.

Ever try holding a smile for only one full minute? It’s surprisingly difficult and very quickly becomes unnatural. A smile is a quick reaction, not a constant state of expression. Even people we think of as “smiley” aren’t toting around full-toothed smiles for minutes on end. When you had to be still for several minutes to get your photo taken, there was just no way you were going to hold a smile for that long.

But there are other reasons besides long exposure times that people didn’t smile in early photographs.

Mona Lisa – Photo credit: Public domain

The non-smiling precedent had already been set by centuries of painted portraits

The long exposure times for early photos may have contributed to serious facial expressions, but so did the painted portraits that came before them. Look at all of the portraits of famous people throughout history prior to cameras. Sitting to be painted took hours, so smiling was out of the question. Other than the smallest of lip curls like the Mona Lisa, people didn’t smile for painted portraits, so why would people suddenly think it normal to flash their pearly whites (which were not at all pearly white back then) for a photographed one? It simply wasn’t how it was done.

A smirk? Sometimes. A full-on smile? Practically never.

Algerian immigrant to the United States. Photographed on Ellis Island. Photo credit: Augustus F. Sherman via William Williams/Wikimedia Commons

Smiling usually indicated that you were a fool or a drunkard

Our perceptions of smiling have changed dramatically since the 1800s. In explaining why smiling was considered taboo in portraits and early photos, art historian Nicholas Jeeves wrote in Public Domain Review:

“Smiling also has a large number of discrete cultural and historical significances, few of them in line with our modern perceptions of it being a physical signal of warmth, enjoyment, or indeed of happiness. By the 17th century in Europe it was a well-established fact that the only people who smiled broadly, in life and in art, were the poor, the lewd, the drunk, the innocent, and the entertainment […] Showing the teeth was for the upper classes a more-or-less formal breach of etiquette.”

"Malle Babbe" by Frans Hals – Photo credit: Frans Hals via Public domain

In other words, to the Western sensibility, smiling was seen as undignified. If a painter did put a smile on the subject of a portrait, it was a notable departure from the norm, a deliberate stylistic choice that conveyed something about the artist or the subject.

Smiling simply didn’t work well in old portraits

Even the artists who attempted it had less-than-ideal results. It turns out that smiling is such a lively, fleeting expression that the artistically static nature of painted portraits didn’t lend itself well to showcasing it. Paintings that did have subjects smiling made them look weird or disturbing or drunk. Simply put, painting a genuine, natural smile didn’t work well in portraits of old.

As a result, the perception that smiling was an indication of lewdness or impropriety stuck for quite a while, even after Kodak created snapshot cameras that didn’t have the long exposure time problem. Even happy occasions had people nary a hint of joy in the photographs that documented them.

Another reason why people didn’t smile in old photos is that dental hygiene wasn’t the same as it is today, and people may have been self-conscious about their teeth. “People had lousy teeth, if they had teeth at all, which militated against opening your mouth in social settings,” Angus Trumble, the director of the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, Australia, and author of A Brief History of the Smile, said, according to Time.

Even wedding party photos didn’t appear to be joyful occasions. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

Then along came movies, which may have changed the whole picture

So how did we end up coming around to grinning ear to ear for photos? Interestingly enough, it may have been the advent of motion pictures that pushed us towards smiling being the norm.

Photos could have captured people’s natural smiles earlier—we had the technology for taking instant photos—but culturally, smiling wasn’t widely favored for photos until the 1920s. One theory about that timing is that the explosion of movies enabled us to see emotions of all kinds playing out on screen, documenting the fleeting expressions that portraits had failed to capture. Culturally, it became normalized to capture, display and see all kinds of emotions on people’s faces. As we got more used to that, photo portraits began portraying people in a range of expression rather than trying to create a neutral image of a person’s face.

Changing our own perceptions of old photo portraits to view them as neutral rather than grumpy or serious can help us remember that people back then were not a bunch of sourpusses, but people who experienced as wide a range of emotion as we do, including joy and mirth. Unfortunately, we just rarely get to see them in that state before the 1920s.

This article originally appeared last year.

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A Black woman (left) and packages on a stoop (right). – Photo credit: Canva

Culture, Wholesome

‘You better than that’: Door camera shows woman stopping package thief with tough love

She turned a tense moment into an unforgettable display of empathy.

Heather Wake

3/24/2026

In a moment when most people might respond with anger and discipline, one Philadelphia woman chose instead to lead with compassion.

On March 6, Bernadette Williams noticed a stranger across the street near a neighbor’s porch. As seen on Williams’ doorbell camera, a woman with a partial face covering appeared to reach for a delivered package. It was the kind of scene that immediately raises alarm, and Williams responded without hesitation.

‘What are you doing? Put that back! Put that back!’

The woman quickly dropped the package. For a brief moment, the situation hung in the balance. It could have turned into a confrontation, a threat, or a call to the police. But then Williams made a choice that shifted the entire tone of the encounter.

“I said, ‘She’s in trouble. How can I make a bad situation better?’ You have to be a part of the solution,” she later told WPVI.

Rather than continuing to call out the woman, Williams began speaking to her in a completely different way. As her voice softened, her message changed from warning to encouragement.

“You better than that. Get some help. I love you. God loves you,” she told the woman.

Then came the offer that has stayed with so many people who have heard the story. Reaching into her pocket, Williams told the stranger, “I’ll give you some money. Here’s $7, here’s $7.” It was all she had, and she gave it up willingly.

Close-up of hands offering money. Photo credit: Canva

The exchange was brief, but its impact was clear

As WPVI reported, the woman apologized and thanked her before leaving. Williams said she could see something had shifted in her expression.

“Her eyes of ‘I’m sorry.’ That was in her heart, and that’s what I read. I hope that she will be fine, and I have faith that she will be fine.”

For Williams, the decision was not about ignoring wrongdoing, but about recognizing what might be underneath it. Instead of seeing a thief, she saw someone who might be struggling.

“She started realizing ‘I am somebody,’” Williams said. “She started realizing that ‘There is somebody out here that cares.’”

A close-up of eyes. Photo credit: Canva

That perspective comes from years of living in the same neighborhood and feeling connected to the people in it. Williams believes that communities are shaped by how people choose to respond to one another, especially in difficult moments.

“We are a part of this community, and we can make our community better,” she told WPVI.

The big takeaway

There’s a common assumption that accountability must come with harshness. This story shows that it doesn’t always have to. The would-be thief is held accountable while maintaining everyone’s dignity, making a different choice in the future far more likely.

While it’s impossible to know what happens next for the woman in the video, what remains is the example Williams set by actively choosing humanity when most would not.

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Ethan Hawke gets philosophical about art and creativity. – Photo credit: Elena Ternovaja/Wikimedia Commons

Culture, Pop Culture

Ethan Hawke beautifully explains why AI art can’t replace imperfect human creativity

This energy is what AI can’t replicate.

Annie Reneau

3/24/2026

As AI plays an increasing role in our world, questions about its appropriate use abound. There’s no doubt that technology has the potential to improve our lives dramatically. But the way we choose to use it can also impact us in ways we may not fully appreciate.

For instance, how might AI impact our relationship with human creativity? Ethan Hawke was asked about the idea that “AI is the future of art,” and how he would argue that human creativity matters. People are loving his thoughts.

View this post on Instagram

Ethan Hawke on AI art versus reality

“Nature is reality,” he said. “And when you get away from reality, you get lost. Human creativity is nature manifest in us. It is happening in us.”

Then he gave an example of why AI art will never be able to replicate a piece of art created by a human.

“AI could make an amazing portrait of the Sundance Film Festival, and it’ll be incredible,” he said. “Or my 14-year-old could color her impression of it. And the thing about my 14-year-old’s is it’s not perfect. It’s hers. It’s unique to a moment in time and a place. And it’s inimitable because it’s coming from her, and she is beautiful. And it’s not the painting; it’s the energy behind the painting.”

“We are celebrating people, not AI. Animation is more than a prompt, it’s an art form that needs to be protected.”

Amazing message from Will Arnett at the Oscars pic.twitter.com/hbwr85sv7g
— vids that go hard (@vidsthatgohard) March 16, 2026

“What makes a poem great is not this collection of words,” he continued. “It’s the energy behind the poem. Dance can be…you see people who can barely dance, and you can cry at the joy happening with the music. Because they’re alive right now and they won’t be forever. And when we start making things being about perfection, you’re just belittling the experience of life. You’re just totally ceding your humanity.”

Hawke concluded, “It makes me sad, but it also makes me excited, because I don’t want to do that. I’m not going to do that.”

So many people resonated with his response in the comments:

“This is so beautiful and so true ~ everything he says is so profound and I’m here for this thinking…. we’ve become a weird world of social media perfection.”

“I love how he got 🥲 talking about the imperfections created by hand from his daughter. What a beautiful way of describing creativity.”

“Can he just write a philosophy book already? We all know we’d read it.”

“@ethanhawke always saying what the world needs to hear. Thank you sir! Thank you for defending the magic of NATURE and defending the MAGIC of humanity. More of this ENERGY and CONSCIOUSNESS ❤️❤️❤️.”

“This feels less like an anti-AI take and more like a pro-human one.”

AI isn’t going anywhere, time to choose the role it plays in society

That last comment hits the nail on the head. Whether you love it, hate it, or aren’t sure how to feel about it, AI is here. The conversations we have about it, and how we consciously choose to engage with it, matter. There’s a lot to consider on that front, ethically, educationally, environmentally, and more.

But one thing those considerations are forcing us to do is to examine the value of human creativity. Not the dollar amounts we can assign to it, but the inherent value of the energy behind an artist’s unique expression. Generative AI will never be able to replace human creativity, no matter how “perfectly” it may replicate it. The real beauty of art is the singularity of the human spirit and the unique energy an artist brings to it.

As Hawke said, we can choose not to cede our humanity in the age of AI—and we can be excited about that choice because the beauty of human creativity is absolutely worth celebrating.

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Internet sleuths are trying to help a woman find the sender of a mysterious, coded Valentine from 1993. – Photo credit: @sarah_snop13/Threads

Culture, Wholesome

Eagle-eyed sleuths might be close to finding the sender of this puzzling 33-year-old Valentine

Promising theories abound.

Evan Porter

3/23/2026

No one can resist a good mystery, least of all when love is involved. One woman recently captivated puzzle enthusiasts when she posted a juicy brainteaser in the form of a mysterious Valentine’s card she received in 1993.

In a viral post on Threads, Sarah Snop explained how she received the card on Valentine’s Day more than 30 years ago. The card was, to say the least, extremely bizarre.

The card was a blank-inside design from the German company GRUSS GmbH. That’s strange in and of itself, since Snop was living in the United Kingdom at the time. Inside, one side of the card featured a hand-drawn ace of hearts, with the central heart marked by a peculiar arrow.

Inside the card. Photo credit: sarah_snop13/Threads

The other side featured a cryptic, nonsensical, and likely encoded note:

“Dear Sarah I wish you quite a few unsloppy kiss es to the space where your head is. i hope that you enjoy to-day and to-morrow, and don’t forget to eat the broccoli on the shorts. (And dear V-alentines day two) … Bestwisheslovefromgetwellsoonyours.”

A strange and mysterious message. Photo credit: sarah_snop13/Threads

Other strange words and scratchings appeared around the edges of the card, and the copyright information on the back was scratched out, except for the word “HAPPY.”

What could it all mean?

“I kept it all these years because I have never figured out who sent it to me,” Snop wrote in the post. “It intrigued me as I always felt it was in some form of code that I just couldn’t crack.”

For all these years, she’s had no leads or clues. Snop told Upworthy the card must have come from someone at her college, as it was secretly slipped into her bag while she was on campus. Other than that, she didn’t recognize the handwriting or any references to inside jokes with her friends.

And no one ever came forward to claim responsibility.

The challenge

Not to worry—hundreds of amateur Internet puzzlers were more than eager to take on the challenge.

More than 400 users chimed in with observations and attempts to solve the puzzle, taking a multitude of approaches.

Some fed images of the card into AI chatbots like ChatGPT to spot patterns. ChatGPT “identified” an elaborate cipher in the note—a coded message that uses a key, or secret instructions, to encrypt and decrypt information.

“The line ‘Unsloppy kisses to the space where your head is’” was the “key clue,” it said. The AI tool was eventually able to extract a scrambled message from the note, which, when unscrambled, read: “Hi Sarah, I hope you enjoy today and tomorrow. Don’t forget I adore you.”

Adorable, but it doesn’t do much to identify the secret admirer. And for such an elaborate cipher, the hidden message isn’t all that fascinating—hardly worth going to such great lengths to conceal.

Another user chimed in with a much more interesting theory:

“Ok. FAITHFULL could be a columnar cipher key: after writing the letters in a grid under it, if you reorder the columns alphabetically according to the letters in the keyword then reading down the correct vertical column after reordering reveals the hidden name DAVID, and the rest of the letters form LOVE FROM DAVID. Does that make any sense?”

Others took a more human approach, looking for clues in the card, the drawing, and the handwriting itself.

“From the writing, the level of thought that went into it, neatness, I’d be pretty sure this is from a girl,” one user wrote.

Some speculated that, since the card was from Germany, the sender must have been as well, which might help explain the odd phrasing.

A few others didn’t have any codebreaking skills to contribute, but still got a kick out of the mystery.

“So much to unpack… the spacing and arrangement of the letters, the arrow next to the heart, the all one word ‘bestwishes…’, the bordered words, Faithfull … this is zodiac level,” one user marveled.

“Get the swifties on this STAT!!” someone else joked.

Sadly, Snop had to break the news to everyone following the post that she didn’t recall knowing anyone named David or Faith, or anyone who had spent significant time in Germany. For now, at least, the card remains a mystery—but a few dedicated cryptographers are still on the case, with plenty of new leads to pursue.

A fascinating tradition

Secret admirers and coded love letters are a fascinating tradition that dates back hundreds of years.

The Victorian era was a time of elaborate flirtation. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

The Marginalian‘s Maria Popova writes of a gentleman in the 1850s courting a woman with an overprotective father. Knowing his letters would be read first, he brilliantly encoded them to avoid arousing suspicion. Secretly, they contained messages expressing his longing for the daughter:

“The young bachelor cleverly engineered his language so that the letter could be read two ways — line by line, as the unsuspecting father would, which renders the text a contemptuous disavowal of romance, or by skipping over all even-numbered lines and reading only the odds, which transmogrifies the message into a passionate declaration of love.”

In the Victorian era, the placement of a postage stamp on a letter could reveal the sender’s secret intentions. Edwardian Promenade‘s Evangeline Holland writes:

“They say that when a stamp is inverted on the right hand upper corner it means the person written to is to write no more. If the stamp be placed on the left hand upper corner and inverted, then the writer declares his affection for the receiver of the letter. When the stamp is in the centre at the top, it signifies an affirmative answer to a question, or the question, as the case may be; and when it is at the bottom, or opposite this, it is a negative.”

Even Julius Caesar is said to have written secret love notes to his mistress, which she kept concealed in a wooden chest.

When you combine encoded messages with a secret admirer, the titillation is irresistible. Snop’s old Valentine may be a forgotten and slightly strange piece of paper tucked among her belongings, but to the rest of us, it’s a fascinating, multilayered puzzle we can’t help trying to solve.

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Jenny's number can now help cancer patients. – Photo credit: TutoneJJ/YouTube & Canva

Culture, Pop Culture

Pop music’s most famous phone number now connects callers to a cancer support helpline

Tommy Tutone’s frontman said he hopes it makes people smile.

Erik Barnes

3/23/2026

Since the 1980s, one particular phone number has earwormed its way into pop culture’s collective memory. That number? 867-5309 (which you probably just sang in your head). Today, however, that memorable number doesn’t belong to Jenny anymore. Thanks to Tommy Tutone’s frontman, dialing it now connects cancer patients to a support group.

Tommy Heath, the lead singer of Tommy Tutone, teamed up with the Cancer Support Community to secure the number for its free support helpline. In an exclusive interview with People, Heath shared how cancer has affected him as he’s gotten older, noting that he is dealing with “minor” skin cancer himself.

“I have some family members who are struggling with cancer,” he told People. “I’m out on tour with a lot of bands and suddenly somebody’s not there.”

The song’s prank-filled past

The song “867-5309/Jenny” reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1982. However, its catchy, memorable chorus led to a wave of stories beyond music. It also sparked years of prank calls, with people asking for “Jenny” whenever they dialed the number—both during the song’s heyday in the 1980s and decades later.

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The Cancer Support Community’s hotline provides expert support from trained specialists who offer personal guidance, information, and a listening ear for cancer patients. Having such a recognizable phone number helps ensure people know exactly which number to dial for help. After learning this, Heath stepped in, wanting to give back after getting so much from the number that made him famous.

“I need to give back to the community, the people who have supported me all these years,” he told People. “I’m going to do what I can…I’d be happy if this was an enduring legacy, and made people smile and give them hope.”

Now, when someone dials the number using the 272 area code (or “CSC,” for “Cancer Support Community”), it connects them to a professional who can help people with cancer.

At 78, Heath is still going strong, performing live. And yes, he still happily plays and sings “867-5309/Jenny” for the crowds that support him.

If you need additional or specialized support in your battle against cancer, visiting the American Cancer Society’s website can help. Searching for and connecting with professionals there can provide patients with additional resources, including in-person, local support.

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A band plays in the produce section of Fiesta Fresh Market. – Photo credit: Fiesta Fresh Market/YouTube

Culture, Identity

Grocery store’s produce section concerts give indie musicians a live venue. People want more.

“We need this right now in the world…Real humans doing real human things.”

Erik Barnes

3/23/2026

On the outside, Fiesta Fresh Market looks like just another neighborhood grocery store in New Castle, Delaware. Inside the produce section, however, customers can listen to local bands perform their latest songs live and in person. These “Mercadito Sessions” have since evolved from a simple community offering into a full-fledged live music event.

While grocery stores and live music don’t typically mix, at Fiesta Fresh Market, it’s part of the family. The Aguilar Garcia family, who run the store, have music in their roots—especially co-owner José Luis Aguilar Garcia, who works in the music industry.

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In the hope of helping Mexican American bands gain more exposure, José and his family offered their produce section as a space for Latin musicians to perform for customers. They were inspired by National Public Radio’s “Tiny Desk Concerts,” which feature artists performing live in a confined space.

These produce section mini-concerts, dubbed “The Mercadito Sessions,” initially puzzled customers. Over time, however, shoppers came to welcome and enjoy the live music, with some even visiting just for the performances. Then, posts on the store’s social media featuring the bands began to go viral.

“The idea is to highlight independent artists from the area,” José told CBS Philadelphia. “Because it’s getting more attention online, people are excited. They’ll ask when we’re doing the next one.”

Commenters on the store’s Instagram celebrated the market’s concert concept:

“This is so cool. Not everyone wants to go to bars and/or have to stay up late to hear live music. I love this so much.”

“Honestly this is the absolute coolest thing ever.”

“Amazing music scenes going on everywhere, love the magic being shared.”

“We need this right now in the world…Real humans doing real human things.”

“Such an innovative and creative idea! 🥹💫”

@fiestafreshmarket
Just put the bananas in the bag bro @erre6ixx
♬ original sound – Fiesta Fresh Market

While the Mercadito Sessions showcase Mexican regional music, they are open to any genre. As the series gained attention online, many bands reached out to Fiesta Fresh Market to get booked. Several acts have come to perform and record as customers pick out fresh fruits and vegetables.

Concerts for the community, by the community

Musicians and customers alike say these concerts provide a sense of community among Latin Americans living in Delaware. They not only celebrate their culture, but also showcase it to others in New Castle.

“It gives us a platform to portray who we really are,” musician Jesús Beltran Méndez told CBS Philadelphia. “There’s a lot of misconceptions about who we are. There are bad people. There are good people. We are just human.”

@fiestafreshmarket
@Los K-Bros “Ya No Me Llames” (Unreleased) live desde Fiesta Fresh Market
♬ original sound – Fiesta Fresh Market

Demand for the music has grown so much that the grocery store is now hosting and promoting a full-fledged concert event. What was once a place to buy groceries has become a spotlight for the community—all by offering a small space in an aisle.

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Men wearing hats speak in the 1930s. – Photo credit: Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales/Wikimedia Commons

Culture, Generations

A ‘gentleman’ reveals 4 reasons why men suddenly stopped wearing fancy hats in the ’60s

Men and women once went out wearing hats, and then suddenly, they disappeared.

Tod Perry

3/23/2026

One of the most striking things about real-life footage of Americans from the advent of the camera until around 1970 is that nearly all men, and many women, are wearing hats. In footage from the 1940s, for example, men boarding the subway to go to work are almost always seen in fedoras, trilbys, or homburgs. Earlier clips show them in bowlers and top hats.

It’s as if, before TV turned color, Americans were a nation of conformists who all dressed the same way. So how did men across the Western world go from wearing hats every day for decades to suddenly going bareheaded? Preston Schlueter of the Gentleman’s Gazette outlines four reasons in a YouTube video with more than 2 million views.

Four reasons why men stopped wearing hats

1. Climate control

“One of the biggest reasons for the loss of hat-wearing is likely that we now have better control over our indoor climate than we used to,” Schlueter says. “This is also why men can now go in and out of doors wearing sometimes fewer than two layers of clothing, and why things like gloves and scarves aren’t as popular as they used to be.”

2. Social class

“Social class was an incredibly important aspect of Western society, and people were absolutely expected to know their place,” Schlueter says. “But, after the horrors of war brought every social class just a bit closer, we began to focus more on the individual, rather than on the class in which they resided. As a result, then, the practice of wearing clothing and, particularly, hats to signify yourself as part of a distinct group has become largely extinct.”

A man and woman wearing hats at the turn of the century. Photo credit: Adományozó/Wikimedia Commons

3. Highways and cars

Back in the day, when transportation consisted of subway cars, trolley cars, horse-drawn buggies, or horseback travel, there was plenty of headroom, even for someone wearing a top hat. However, with the advent of the automobile, headroom in vehicles changed drastically.

“Look up at the ceiling in your own car. How much headroom do you have there? The answer is probably not much, perhaps even for a relatively soft or short hat style,” Schlueter says. “Simply put, modern cars aren’t built to accommodate the hat styles of old.”

Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart in The Big Sleep. Photo credit: Warner Bros./Wikimedia Commons

4. The Internet

“In the last decade and a half or so, hats like the fedora and trilby have gained an increasingly negative reputation thanks to Internet memes from websites like 4chan, Reddit, and Tumblr,” Schlueter says. “Indeed, for some younger members of our audience, when we mention fedoras, they might first think of the infamous ‘tips fedora’ meme. Because there are now thousands of these easily spreadable memes all over the Internet, the fedora, in recent years, took on a decidedly less-than-cool reputation.”

Hats are due for a comeback

In the end, there are many reasons people stopped wearing fancy hats every day. It appears to be a confluence of historical events, technological progress, and social pressures that influenced this major shift in fashion. But that doesn’t mean the era of the hat is gone forever. If one thing is certain, what goes out of fashion is always bound to come back.

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Comedian Jack Shep as Princess Diana in a "Saturday Night Live UK" sketch. – Photo credit: Sky TV/YouTube

Culture, Pop Culture

Comedian Jack Shep steals new ‘SNL UK’ scene with impeccable Princess Diana impression

Audiences are already begging for him to do it again.

Heather Wake

3/23/2026

Saturday Night Live UK debuted over the weekend on Sky TV (and Peacock in America), and already, one performer is a fan favorite. In a skit titled “David Attenborough’s Last Supper,” the famed naturalist, played by George Fouracres, invites several of “history’s greatest Britons,” who have been resurrected thanks to his brother Richard Attenborough’s “Jurassic Park technology.”

Naturally, the sketch featured a slew of impressive celebrity impersonations, from Freddie Mercury to Winston Churchill to Agatha Christie. But even in a sea of notable performances, it was comedian Jack Shep’s Princess Diana who really stole the show.

Watch:

While Shep’s Diana does speak here and there—thanking Attenborough for the invitation and reassuring Freddie Mercury that if a menu item “has an asterisk next to its name, then it comes with free rice”—most of the laugh-out-loud moments come from her coy, flirtatious glances at the camera while others are speaking. The People’s Princess has, after all, long been a queer icon. But this takes things to a whole new level.

Reactions

One leisurely scroll through the YouTube comments makes it clear that Shep was a fan favorite. Many are eager for Diana to become an SNL UK staple.

@gaytimes
Saturday Night Live UK premiered last night and we can’t stop thinking about Jack Shep’s impersonation of gay icon Princess Diana! The British version of the long-running US sketch show debuted with host Tina Fey and musical guest Wet Leg. ‘The Last Supper with David Attenborough’ saw a dinner party featuring a number of resurrected British icons, including Princess Di, Freddie Mercury and Elizabeth I 👏 #snl #princessdiana #diana #tinafey #saturdaynightlive
♬ original sound – GAY TIMES

“The way he was eyeing the camera was hilarious.”

“I hope that Diana becomes a regular that randomly pops up in episodes to steal the show as she/he does here.”

“Princess Di was to die for.”

“I loved Princess Di but that Jack Shep impression was the funniest thing I’ve seen in ages.”

“Hope she’s a recurring visitor…”

“The Diana impression is an instant classic. Absolutely spot on.”

“The star of this show is definitely the person that played Princess Diana.”

Perhaps this comment says it best:

“Princess Di was uniquely special in real life and this actor does do her memory justice even though it’s a silly comedy skit. I feel she might have had a good laugh about the whole thing and it’s not disrespectful at all.”

Though Shep undoubtedly helped win favor among viewers, the overall reaction to an across-the-pond version of SNL has been mixed.

Some things, like host Tina Fey’s opening monologue and the edgier “Weekend Update” segment, have been mostly well-received.

However, some critics have lambasted the show as a “tepid cosplay” of its American predecessor, arguing that it copies the format without adding a unique touch. Still, even those critics seem to agree that certain elements need time to develop before the show can be fully assessed.

One promising sign is that, much like SNL in the U.S., SNL UK can give relatively unknown comedians like Shep a chance to share their gifts with the world. That certainly seems like a win-win for everyone.

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