The question: Why?

Attention Upper Eastsiders, as they say, the Gossip Girl reboot airs its first episode on July 8th, and photos of the new "it" group of NYC have been plastered on billboards for weeks, watching over the city with judgment for weeks.

The trailer dropped on June 10th and anticipation is ramping up for the new series. The original iteration was based on the bestselling novels by Cecily von Ziegesar and captured audience attention from 2007 to 2012 with its gripping tales of the glamorous, dramatic lives of New York's Upper East Side teens. Starring Blake Lively, Leighton Meester, Penn Badgley, Chace Crawford, and Ed Westwick, the cultish teen drama has earned itself a place in the cultural canon that obviously, almost a decade later, begged a reboot.

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Music Features

The Inevitable Demise of ICED EARTH

The band has officially disbanded as a result of John Schaffer's extremist antics, but a look back shows that the warning signs were in plain view all along.

Jon Schaffer

Will Ireland/Future/Shutterstock

Jon Schaffer, the sole remaining original member of ICED EARTH, had been the glue that held the band together for the last 37 years.

As the band's main guitarist, songwriter, and producer, he crafted all of the group's biggest hits, including "Watching Over Me" and "I Died for You," and was even cited at one moment as being one of North America's great metal guitarists. He was also the one member that stuck it out with the group through countless line-up and name changes, and at one point he even built his own studio and office space to make recording sessions with the band more comfortable and relaxed.

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Culture Feature

Only White Liberals Are Surprised by Trump's Acquittal

The American justice system has never been about right and wrong — it's about white supremacy.

Donald Trump

By Evan El-Amin / Shuttertsock

Here's the thing about the American justice system: It's startlingly predictable.

Not because it's good and fair and always right, but because the opposite is true. In America, American interests prevail over anything else. And since this country is steeped in racism, sexism, classism, and capitalism, why are people so surprised that Donald J Trump was acquitted in his second impeachment trial? Isn't that America doing what America does?

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January 20th was a hopeful day for many Americans.

After four years of worrying that the President was going to start a nuclear war via Twitter, it feels good to finally have an adult in the Oval Office. That being said, after Trump, yesterday's the inaugural proceedings were almost jarringly cohesive.

There were no rambling, senseless speeches given by a reality star turned oligarch, the performances were wholesome and uplifting, and the whole event was clearly attempting to emphasize American unity above all else. While this was all admirable, it kind of felt like someone insisting that they're a good driver after careening their Subaru off a cliff. If the Trump administration proved anything, its that America is not united, it is not tidy and wholesome, and it is most certainly not a place where "everyone can just love each other."

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Culture Feature

4 Ways This Inauguration Will Be Different From Any Other

An unprecedented inauguration for unprecedented times.

After a mob attacked the Capitol on January 6th and over 400,000 U.S. deaths as a result of the pandemic, this year's inauguration is going to look a little different.

Crowds will be small or nonexistent, events will be moved online, and security will be tougher than ever. It will be a day of historic firsts, both good and bad.Some things will change, but the important things will stay the same. The Vice President and President will take the oath of office, and it will be the same oath it always is: An oath to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

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Donald Trump

By Evan El-Amin // Shutterstock

It seems fitting that the Trump administration would go out with a bang. It also seems fitting that the bang would be unbridled white supremacy and blatant racism.

After the white supremacist insurrection at the Capitol, tensions have been high in anticipation of the January 20th Inauguration, with the whole country waiting on edge to see what how the transfer of power will go.

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