title: Non-renewable resource

text: Issues entirely separate from the question of the sustainability of nuclear fuel, relate to the use of nuclear fuel and the high-level radioactive waste the nuclear industry generates that if not properly contained, is highly hazardous to people and wildlife. The United Nations (UNSCEAR) estimated in 2008 that average annual human radiation exposure includes 0.01 millisievert (mSv) from the legacy of past atmospheric nuclear testing plus the Chernobyl disaster and the nuclear fuel cycle, along with 2.0 mSv from natural radioisotopes and 0.4 mSv from cosmic rays; all exposures vary by location. natural uranium in some inefficient reactor nuclear fuel cycles, becomes part of the nuclear waste "once through" stream, and in a similar manner to the scenario were this uranium remained naturally in the ground, this uranium emits various forms of radiation in a decay chain that has a half-life of about 4.5 billion years, the storage of this unused uranium and the accompanying fission reaction products have raised public concerns about risks of leaks and containment, however the knowledge gained from studying the Natural nuclear fission reactor in Oklo Gabon, has informed geologists on the proven processes that kept the waste from this 2 billion year old natural nuclear reactor that operated for hundreds of thousands of years.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: Land surface can be considered both renewable and non-renewable resource depending on the scope of comparison. Land can be reused but new land cannot be created on demand so from economic perspective it's a fixed resource with perfectly inelastic supply.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: Natural resources, known as renewable resources, are replaced by natural processes and forces persistent in the natural environment. There are intermittent and reoccurring renewables, and recyclable materials, which are utilized during a cycle across a certain amount of time, and can be harnessed for any number of cycles.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: The production of goods and services by manufacturing products in economic systems creates many types of waste during production and after the consumer has made use of it. The material is then either incinerated, buried in a landfill or recycled for reuse. Recycling turns materials of value that would otherwise become waste into valuable resources again.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: In the natural environment water, forests, plants and animals are all renewable resources, as long as they are adequately monitored, protected and conserved. Sustainable agriculture is the cultivation of plant and animal materials in a manner that preserves plant and animal ecosystems and that can improve soil health and soil fertility over the long term. The overfishing of the oceans is one example of where an industry practice or method can threaten an ecosystem, endanger species and possibly even determine whether or not a fishery is sustainable for use by humans. An unregulated industry practice or method can lead to a complete resource depletion.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: The renewable energy from the sun, wind, wave, biomass and geothermal energies are based on renewable resources. Renewable resources such as the movement of water (hydropower, tidal power and wave power), wind and radiant energy from geothermal heat (used for geothermal power) and solar energy (used for solar power) are practically infinite and cannot be depleted, unlike their non-renewable counterparts, which are likely to run out if not used sparingly.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: The potential wave energy on coastlines can provide 1/5 of world demand. Hydroelectric power can supply 1/3 of our total energy global needs. Geothermal energy can provide 1.5 more times the energy we need. There is enough wind to power the planet 30 times over, wind power could power all of humanity's needs alone. Solar currently supplies only 0.1% of our world energy needs, but there is enough out there to power humanity's needs 4,000 times over, the entire global projected energy demand by 2050.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: Renewable energy and energy efficiency are no longer niche sectors that are promoted only by governments and environmentalists. The increasing levels of investment and that more of the capital is from conventional financial actors, both suggest that sustainable energy has become mainstream and the future of energy production, as non-renewable resources decline. This is reinforced by climate change concerns, nuclear dangers and accumulating radioactive waste, high oil prices, peak oil and increasing government support for renewable energy. These factors are commercializing renewable energy, enlarging the market and growing demand, the adoption of new products to replace obsolete technology and the conversion of existing infrastructure to a renewable standard.


title: Non-renewable resource

text: In economics, a non-renewable resource is defined as goods, where greater consumption today implies less consumption tomorrow. David Ricardo in his early works analysed the pricing of exhaustible resources, where he argued that the price of a mineral resource should increase over time. He argued that the spot price is always determined by the mine with the highest cost of extraction, and mine owners with lower extraction costs benefit from a differential rent. The first model is defined by Hotelling's rule, which is a 1931 economic model of non-renewable resource management by Harold Hotelling. It shows that efficient exploitation of a nonrenewable and nonaugmentable resource would, under otherwise stable conditions, lead to a depletion of the resource. The rule states that this would lead to a net price or "Hotelling rent" for it that rose annually at a rate equal to the rate of interest, reflecting the increasing scarcity of the resources. The Hartwick's rule provides an important result about the sustainability of welfare in an economy that uses non-renewable source.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas Montenegro is a character from Ubisoft's "Far Cry" video game franchise. He appears as an early game antagonist in the 2012 title "Far Cry 3", and was extensively featured in promotional material for the game. Vaas is depicted as a capricious and mentally unstable character who antagonizes "Far Cry 3" main character Jason Brody, and also serves as his dark psychological mirror. Vaas is later revealed to be a drug-addicted wayward member of the local community of the Rook Islands, the setting of "Far Cry 3", who betrayed his people and aligned himself with the crime boss Hoyt Volker. Outside of "Far Cry 3", Vaas' appearances include a live-action web series prequel called "The Far Cry Experience", the virtual reality title "Far Cry VR", and as the player character in "Vaas: Insanity", a downloadable content (DLC) expansion for the 2021 title, "Far Cry 6".


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Conceived and designed by Ubisoft's development team as a villainous character who is comparable in stature to "Star Wars" Darth Vader, Vaas is portrayed in all relevant media by Canadian actor Michael Mando. Mando decided to improvise for his audition and did not follow the developers' script, but they were so impressed by his performance that the character they had in mind was redesigned to match Mando's physicality. The game's story was eventually altered from the developers' initial intentions to accommodate a more frenetic, sociopathic villain in response to Mando's performance. The creative team worked in tandem with Mando to flesh out Vaas' characterization.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas has been well received by the video game community and is often ranked on many lists of the best video game villains due to his depiction as an unhinged criminal. Mando's critically acclaimed performance was considered by many critics to be instrumental to the character's predominantly positive reception, and would influence the portrayal of villainous characters in subsequent sequels.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: The lead writer of "Far Cry 3", Jeffrey Yohalem, is credited as Vaas Montenegro's creator. For "Far Cry 3", Yohalem took inspiration from public discourse about whether video games are good for the player's mental health, and about the concept of "gamification" in society as a whole. Yohalem wanted Vaas to represent a cautionary tale about what could potentially happen to a player character who find themselves caught up in their most indulgent, violent impulses; when interviewed by IGN about his thought process behind Vaas, Yohalem explained that video game developers always talk about 30-second loops, where there is a line of thought within the video game industry that players should be put into a situation where what they are doing every 30 seconds is so satisfying that they never want to stop. Yohalem wanted to examine "what made games tick", and then examined the player's involvement in them and whether these experiences are enjoyable for the player, or whether they find themselves confronted by an "uncomfortable development" with archetype represented by Vaas, a pirate who seems to be "on the knife edge between sanity and mental collapse". Yohalem opined that Vaas' monologue about the definition of insanity is in accord with the philosophies behind "Far Cry 3" design, as it "perfectly encapsulates" the dark side of the concept of a gameplay loop which the writing team attempted to deconstruct.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas is not part of the developer's original vision for one of "Far Cry 3" major villains. He was meant to be a bald and muscular man named Bull, who looked similar to "a 300-pound, six-foot-tall bullmastiff dog". A second iteration of the character was named Pyro and featured a heavily mutilated body. Michael Mando's audition and subsequent hiring prompted Ubisoft staff to alter their original plans for the character to accommodate Mando's likeness and mannerisms. Bull's physical fierceness transformed into Vaas' emotive and volatile personality, though such features were later downplayed as Mando's portrayal of Vaas enabled his personality to be expressed through subtle mannerisms to achieve the effect of a charming but menacing villain. Initially the character was called Lupo but the name Vaas was picked once the graphic design was altered to incorporate Mando's appearance. This was done primarily because the developers faced difficulties matching Mando's facial musculature to the model.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Producer Dan Hay compared Vaas to Darth Vader, in which his presence is often short and brief, yet when he appears, he catches attention and galvanizes players' memories. Hay described Vaas as a character that was "very much in your face", which helped cement Jason's early status as a "victim". Yohalem added that Vaas's implied death at the game's midpoint was inspired by the novel "To the Lighthouse", in which the protagonist died midway through the story and the rest of the plot explores her absence.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Yohalem recalled that Vaas was a "lightning rod" with an "incredible gravity", and that the character become the subject of obsession with video game fandom before "Far Cry 3" was even released. Yohalem concluded the critical and popular acclaim in response to Mando's performance as Vaas was a "lightning in a bottle" moment Ubisoft experienced for the first time with the character, and observed that the series would go on to explore the different possibilities of a dark central performance. Ubisoft staff originally considered creating a direct sequel to "Far Cry 3" and entertained the idea of resurrecting Vaas, but abandoned it to commit to a standalone sequel with "Far Cry 4".


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: To achieve their goal of creating nuanced characters, Ubisoft's development team made extensive use of performance and motion capture, so that actors could convey more-complicated emotions on-screen. According to Anne Gibeault, associate producer for cinematics in the Montreal studio, a character's face and hands convey the most essential part of the animation process. Yohalem emphasized that the eyes are the most essential facial feature as they get noticed first, and that makes a character more emotionally resonant, and that in turn players could connect with the characters through eye contact. To perform his role as Vaas, Mando's gestures and facial expressions were translated into animation through carbon-fiber helmets, with cameras mounted about two feet from their faces to record every squint, frown or smile. Yohalem noted that actors have to “create a style between the exaggerated movements of the theatrical and the minimalism of film” for a motion capture performance.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Mando became involved with the "Far Cry" series in July 2010 when he auditioned for a role then known as "Mr.X". Although he was provided with a script, he decided to improvise in pursuit of creative freedom. During his audition, Mando thought it would be interesting if he were to have his back face the camera, and pretended that he was eating. When Mando started turning around to face the camera, he began licking his fingers until he reached his middle finger, where he then made crude gesture and continued licking his middle finger. Mando was aware that he was taking a creative risk, and that his improvisation may not be met with approval from Ubisoft staff who were responsible for assessing his performance; instead, the animation director of "Far Cry 3" was intrigued by Mando's creative decision for audition and asked the casting director to instruct Mando to do it again and take it even further.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Although Mando was hired following the audition, the creative team had insisted on the villain of "Far Cry 3" being presented as a physically imposing figure. The concept did not match Mando's more slender frame. Mando had already undergone rehearsals and some footage of his performances were filmed by the time Ubisoft made the short-lived decision to discard the character he had come up with, as it was incompatible with the visual character that the creative team had in mind. Mando recalled that Ubisoft later retracted their decision largely due to the impression he had made during the audition, and brought him back into the project at the last minute. Ubisoft decided to accommodate Mando by altering the character they had planned for to match his actual appearance instead.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Reflecting on his role as Vaas, a character Mando calls his "spirit animal", he described him as "liberating", with an "innocent heart" who so happened to have "gone so far off the deep end". Mandos considers himself to be one of the character's creators as he had a lot of involvement in developing Vaas' personality, mannerisms, and motivations with the creative team. Mando recalled that he performed Vaas' monologue to a tennis ball as a stand-in for the player's perspective during filming. Although Mando did not understand why it would turn out to become a compelling scene for many, he suggested that there may be a "truly profound existentialism" with that moment underneath the simplicity of the actual scene. According to Mando, their goal was not to deliberately create a character who appeals to audiences and is insane for the sake for it, but rather a personality who is looking for truth in that moment and who happens to be crazy.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: "Far Cry 3" opens with montage footage of player character Jason Brody holidaying in the Rook Islands region with his brothers and associates. The footage is captured on a video camera seized by Vaas, who has kidnapped the group and intends to sell them into slavery. After intercepting Jason's escape attempt and murdering his brother Grant, he allows Jason the opportunity to flee from his compound. Jason aligns himself with the local resistance forces known as the Rakyat, who oppose Vaas' pirate group in an armed struggle. Vaas' backstory is gradually revealed with the progression of "Far Cry 3" narrative: prior to the game's events, he became addicted to drugs introduced to Rook Island by the South African crime boss, Hoyt Volker, who made Vaas his right-hand man and leader of the pirate faction terrorizing the Rook Islands. Vaas and his men assist Volker with his criminal activities such as cannabis cultivation and human trafficking, while inflicting death and destruction on the Rakyat, Vaas' former compatriots who are led by his estranged sister Citra Talugmai.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: During one incident, Jason attempts to rescue his girlfriend Liza Snow from a pirate compound and is caught in a trap set up by Vaas, but manages to escape with her through a combination of luck and sheer grit. In a later skirmish, Jason is caught in another trap set up by Vaas, who ties him to a rock and delivers a monologue about the definition of insanity before sending him plunging into a pool of water. Jason survives the ordeal, and later arrives at Vaas' island base to exact revenge. Vaas meets his apparent death by Jason's hand while the latter experiences a hallucination following their confrontation.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: The post-credits scene of "Far Cry 6" features one of the main characters, Juan, talking to an unnamed smuggler voiced by Michael Mando. The character is strongly implied to be Vaas, who somehow survived the events of "Far Cry 3".


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas makes his first appearance as a playable character in a post-launch expansion titled "Vaas: Insanity", released on November 16, 2021. "Insanity" begins at the climax of Jason Brody's final confrontation with Vaas, in which the latter is seemingly stabbed to death. Vaas wakes up in a hallucination, and is guided by the voice of his sister, Citra Talugmai, to reconstruct her Silver Dragon Blade to win her approval as she claims that it is the only way he can escape his mind. Vaas journeys through his mind, revisiting past memories of his life while gathering the pieces of the blade as well as fighting apparitions of Citra, Jason, and the Rakyat warriors. When Vaas succeeds in rebuilding the blade and hands it to Citra, she breaks it again and demands him to keep fighting for her as she sends waves of enemies after him. After a brief struggle and realizing Citra's negative influence throughout his life, Vaas finally rejects her pleas to stay with her and escapes the hallucination. An older Vaas is then shown sitting at a beach on a deserted island as he talks to himself using a tennis ball that resembles Jason.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: A four-part live action webseries named "The Far Cry Experience", which stars Mando as Vaas, was released to promote "Far Cry 3". Set a few days before the events of "Far Cry 3", Vaas captures and tortures to death fictionalized versions of Christopher Mintz-Plasse and his camera-man who were engaged by Ubisoft as a part of a survival challenge in the "real" Rook Islands that inspired "Far Cry 3". Upon his realization that Mintz-Plasse has died from the torture, Vaas learns about the arrival of Jason and his friends in the region from one of his men, and leaves to "welcome" them.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas appears in "Far Cry VR", a 2020 virtual reality title where up to eight players can play cooperatively. The premise of the game is that the player characters find themselves marooned by Vaas and have to escape the Rook Islands by shooting their way out.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas is featured in a 2021 tie-in comic series called "Far Cry: Rite of Passage" published by Dark Horse Comics, which sees "Far Cry 6" villain Antón Castillo recounting cautionary tales to his son Diego, one of which involve an account of Vaas' childhood years and the retelling of his eventual "downfall". Vaas's childhood is also explored in the 2021 manga one-shot "Happy Vaas Day" published by "Jump".


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: "Guinness Book of Records" described Vaas Montenegro as the poster character of "Far Cry 3". The character's initial public introduction was by way of a promotional trailer for E3 2011 in which he makes his monologue about definition of insanity before tossing the player character over a cliff. To promote "Far Cry 3" at 2012's PAX Prime, attendees were given the opportunity to get a haircut to style their hair like Vaas' mohawk. Ubisoft released a limited edition run of lithographic print art of Vaas by artist Ben Oliver for customers who preordered either "Assassin's Creed III" and "Far Cry 3" from the GAME concessions stand at the Eurogamer Expo. European players could also purchase the "Insane Edition" which includes all pre-order bonuses and all other forms of launch downloadable content (DLC), along with a Vaas bobblehead and a survival skill manual for usage in real situations of danger. A six-inch PVC figurine of Vaas by Syco Collectibles was released in October 2012. In August 2020, Ubisoft released a line of Chibi figurines called "Ubisoft Heroes", with Vaas available as one of the selections.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas Montenegro was met with critical acclaim following the game's release. Vaas was awarded Best New Character by "Giant Bomb" for their 2012 Game of the Year Awards, and by the 4th Canadian Videogame Awards held in April 2013. His definition of insanity monologue was named Best Gaming Moment at the 2013 Golden Joystick Awards. Vaas was a nominee for Best Character Design at the 4th Inside Gaming Awards in 2012.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: For his portrayal of Vaas, Michael Mando received nominations for Best Overall Acting from the 2013 New York Videogame Critics Circle Awards; Lead Performance in a Drama from the National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers Awards; and Outstanding Character Performance from the 16th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards. Mando's reprisal of his role as Vaas for "Far Cry 6: Vaas - Insanity" earned him a nomination for the Great White Way Award for Best Acting in a Game at the New York Game Awards 2022.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Vaas became a viral sensation the moment he was first featured in the E3 2011 trailer for "Far Cry 3". Vaas' popularity has led to the character becoming the subject of fan labor activities. A noteworthy "Grand Theft Auto IV" fan mod reskins player character Niko Bellic with a high-quality, bump-mapped texture that recreates Vaas' character model from "Far Cry 3". Ron Whitaker from "The Escapist" observed that Vaas, "a loud, vivid character that people enjoyed", had caught on with video game fandom as a popular choice for cosplay activities by the mid-2010s. Mando wrote in a 2020 Reddit post that he still receives recognition by appreciative fans in public.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: In retrospect, Dale Driver from "IGN" noted that his "elaborate, violent monologue about the definition of insanity" was an unforgettable debut and became an instant fan favorite. Fascinated by the fact that Vaas was almost cut from "Far Cry 3" entirely, Driver argued that Vaas' serendipitous creation changed the course of the "Far Cry" series as it provided the series with "an iron-forged identity that influences everything from design to marketing". Tim Edwards from "PCGamesN" called Vaas one of the video games industry's "most interesting collaborations", and lauded Mando's portrayal of the character as the most believable virtual performance since the debut of Alyx Vance in "Half-Life 2" which he highly enjoyed. Shaun Prescott from "PC Gamer" considered Vaas to be the "Far Cry" series' best and most fondly remembered villain in spite of his scary nature. Imogen Donovan from "Videogamer.com" called Vaas an iconic video game villain, and his “flamboyant, intelligent and completely insane” legacy haunts the "Far Cry" video game series "like an unfriendly ghost".


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: On multiple occasions, numerous sources have chosen Vaas as one of the best video game characters, particularly in his role as a villain. In 2016, "Glixel" staff named Vaas the 49th most iconic video game character of the 21st century, and the character's monologue about the definition of insanity his most emblematic moment. "GamesRadar" staff described Vaas as the most wonderfully unhinged character of the seventh generation of video game consoles. Vaas is ranked 45th place in "IGN"s list of Top 100 Villains from film, television, video games, and comics. Vaas placed 7th on a 2018 list of the best villains in video games published by "GamesRadar", with staff noting that he has become the "poster boy" for the "Far Cry" franchise despite only appearing in its third mainline entry at the time of publication. Brendan Lowry from "Windows Central" identified Vaas' legacy as one of the best game villains in Xbox history to be derived from his "unparalleled unpredictability". "Red Bull" called Vaas one of the scariest video game villains of all time due to his palpable presence and unpredictability, and that he is responsible for making villains the major selling point of the "Far Cry" franchise going forward. Other sources that rank Vaas in their lists of top video game villains include "Game Informer", "Techradar", and the official blog of Middle East Games Con.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Not all reception for the character has been positive. The depiction of Vaas' mental illness was noted by the 2017 publication "100 Greatest Video Game Characters" to be a merely "easy-to-use label" for malevolent behavior. Dr. Kelli Dunlap from "Games Foundation" concurred that Vaas' characterization evokes a problematic stereotype and compared him to Heath Ledger's version of the Joker as well as "Final Fantasy VI" Kefka, all of whom in her view lacked depth in terms of character development and their motivations are entirely defined by their psychotic tendencies. "WePlay" staff considered Vaas to be a "hackneyed" character and excluded him in their 2019 list of the best antagonists from video game history.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: A popular fan theory about "Far Cry 6" was that Diego Castillo, the son of Antón Castillo, is in fact a young Vaas. The speculation behind the theory was fueled by Mando's tease of his return to the series via a Reddit post, Diego having a similarly placed scar as Vaas in his live-action appearance, and the observation that both characters wear a red top. The fan theory was debunked in 2021 with the announcement of "Rite of Passage", which unambiguously differentiates Diego from Vaas as two distinct characters, as well as a direct confirmation from "Far Cry 6" narrative director Navid Khavari in a statement published by "TheGamer" in May 2021.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Although Vaas and Citra are presented as members of the Rakyat (a word that means "the people" in Indonesian and Malay) tribe on the fictional Rook Islands, there has been some confusion over the depiction of his intended cultural identity. Christopher B. Patterson, professor at the University of British Columbia, perceived an inexplicable discrepancy in Mando's portrayal of Vaas. Patterson observed that while Vaas is presumably native to the Asia-Pacific region, most likely Malay in his view, the accent that Mando uses is Hispanic. The usage of slang terms such as "white boy" and "hermano" is something the character is alone in among the Rakyat population. Charlie Stewart of "Game Rant" also remarked on the characters accent and noted that while the Rook Islands are based largely on Indonesia Vaas way of talking implies that he grew up speaking Latin American Spanish in difference from his sister who sounds the same as the rest of the native population. He states that this has been regarded as a bit of a mystery among players and that it is the reason for the many fan theories speculating that Vaas must have spent time outside of the islands in his youth, including theories assuming that Vaas was actually Diego from "Far Cry 6", with people trying to explain Vaas background to understand his irregular manner of speaking. Karina Tapia of Digital Trends named Vaas as an example of a Latino character in video game's sporting an exaggerated accent and speaking spanglish.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Johnny Galvatron interpreted the character as a foreign invader and not as a member of the Rakyat tribe, while Edward Ross took Vaas to be Indonesian in his book "Gamish: A Graphic History of Gaming". Angga Prawadika Aji, a lecturer at the Airlangga University in Indonesia opined that the skin color of the pirate group led by Vaas implied their identity to be native Rooks Islanders. Leo Stevenson of "Power Up!" described Vaas as "decidedly not white" and cited "Far Cry 3" as an example of a piece of media where the hero is white and people of color are relegated to supporting roles or villains.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: When defending the game against allegations of promoting a white savior narrative, Yohalem stated that the foreign player character Jason Brody was not originally intended by Citra to be the one to be part of the tribe's ritual, instead Vaas was, but he simply refused to participate. "Kotaku" Kirk Hamilton argued that the game would have been better and its white savior narrative from its first half would have become ironic if Vaas had turned out to be the one who underwent the ritual. Maurice Pogue of "Geeks Under Grace" felt similarly, wishing "Vaas or a character of a similar background emerged the hero" with Vaas being the only indigenous male given a name, and stated that the "majority of the people populating the island are Austronesian". Pogue also observes that Vaas criticises Jason Brody's attempt to integrate into Rakyat culture (an example Pogue believes of the "mighty whitey" trope). Speaking of Vaas role on the islands Pogue felt that he is treated by Hoyt as "yet another expendable native" by his superior who doesn't seem worried for his operations once Vaas is killed. He adds that the game would have been superior if Vaas had returned to his birthrigth as a Rakyat warrior or Citra had succeed in her revolt without Jason's help, but as it is the game falls into a poor white savior narrative.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: In the DLC "Vaas: Insanity" asserts his native identity when one of Hoyt's men inform him and three of his pirates that Hoyt wants them to expand the operation by "clearing" the land of the indigenous population, Vaas reacts negatively to this information and asks his men where they're from, all three of them asserts that they're born on the Island, Vaas then asks for one of their guns and shoots the informant, saying "Hermano. We are the natives." He then declares that the next day they will go to war with Hoyt.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: Ross remarked that Vaas is depicted as both scarred and mentally ill. Georgia Hinterleitner states that while "Far Cry 3" has several mad antagonists, Vaas is the most prominent of them and that while he himself claims to be mainly interested in his kidnapping victims for the monetary aspect "it becomes almost immediately clear that his criminal activities double as a convenient outlet for his deeply warped personality". She adds that his madness manifests in his propensity for lengthy (which she calls "at times barely coherent") monologues, his tendency to lapse into intractable fits of anger at minor provocations, and the pleasure he finds in the sadistic games he plays with Jason, such as letting him flee in order to hunt him for sport. She interprets Vaas's as sparing Jason several times solely to have "conversations" with him that are both unprompted and thoroughly one-sided, these being "partly mocking, partly sincere". Hinterleitner compares Vaas to Kefka Palazzo in "Final Fantasy VI" as both their instability are based on very old and common ideas of mental illness which esablishes a direct link between madness, evil and violence. She does however note that they differ in that while Kefka's madness is tied directly to the plot of the game Vaas's primarily serves to provoke visceral emotions and reactions in the audience, something which she believes is enhanced by each game's gameplay, interactions with Vaas emphasizes the players feelings of vulnerability due to the lack of distance from Vaas through the use of the first-person perspective, whose limited field of vision causes a sense of intimacy to the threat in front of them. She elaborates that Vaas's quick mood swings let neither Jason nor players have time to anticipate or brace themselves against whatever whim Vaas indulges in next. In his article "First Person Mental Illness" Bernhard Runzheimer cites Vaas as an example of a villain exhibiting sociopathy and sadism. Cecilia Rodéhn has argued that Vaas's racial depiction is tied to the depiction of his madness, characterising him as loud, erratic, sadistic, and violent, similar to how black men have been depicted in games. Charlie Stewart of "Game Rant" expressed when comparing Vaas to Joseph Seed that Vaas's rejection of his sisters attempts to convince him that he is a "chosen one sent to lead his people" as well as his acceptance of his own sadism and megalomania makes him a far more honest character than Seed. Stewart notes that Vaas never attempts to justify his actions.


title: Vaas Montenegro

text: In his review of "Far Cry 3" for "Entertainment Weekly" John Young characterized Vaas as a gonzo alpha male. This sentiment is mirrored by the game's cinematics director Robert Darryl Purdy who described Vaas as an "alpha male", a dominant individual who exploits the bad situation in a land, has no bounds and no one to stop him. Purdy states "he's into human trafficking, he's into drugs, prostitution, everything" and summarises that Vaas stands for the aggressive side of the island in the game. None the less he does note that Vaas still has moments where he is "soft" due to his mood swings. In her book "Gaming Masculinity: Trolls, Fake Geeks, and the Gendered Battle for Online Culture" Megan Condis comments on Vaas questinging Jason and his friends manhoods and making rape threats, with Vaas saying things like "I am the one with the [fucking] dick" and "You're my bitch", she interprets this as the game making literal the rhetoric of rape as shorthand for in-game dominance that exists in online culture by making the power dynamic explicit in the narrative, with rape being a real threat Jason faces. Super Players Online Gamebase's Svend Joscelyne also noted Vaas's emasculation of Jason in the situation and observed that the moment serves to make Jason relatable due to imersive nature of the first person point of view in the game, stating that Jason was an "unrelatable jock before". Contemporary historian Andreas Enderlin-Mahr of the Institut für Neuere Geschichte und Zeitgeschichte cites Vaas as a character who exhibits a plethora of "traits that unequivocally and thoroughly constitute toxic masculinity", with violence, torture and abuse being the result of his own personal beliefs that lay in the core of his personality.


title: Marilyn Diptych

text: The Marilyn Diptych (1962) is a silkscreen painting by American pop artist Andy Warhol depicting Marilyn Monroe. The monumental work is one of the artist's most noted of the movie star.


title: Marilyn Diptych

text: The painting consists of 50 images. Each image of the actress is taken from the single publicity photograph from the film "Niagara" (1953). The underlying publicity photograph that Warhol used as a basis for his many paintings and prints of Marilyn, and the "Marilyn Diptych", was owned and distributed by her movie studio. "Marilyn Diptych" was completed just weeks after Marilyn Monroe's death in August 1962.


title: Marilyn Diptych

text: Silk-screening was the technique used to create this painting. The twenty-five images on the left are painted in color, the right side is black and white.


title: Marilyn Diptych

text: It has been suggested that the relation between the left side of the canvas and the right side of the canvas is evocative of the relation between the celebrity's life and death. The work has received praise from writers such as American academic and cultural critic Camille Paglia, who wrote in 2012's "Glittering Images" lauding how it shows the "multiplicity of meanings" in Monroe's life and legacy.


title: Marilyn Diptych

text: In a December 2, 2004 article in "The Guardian", the painting was named the third most influential piece of modern art in a survey of 500 artists, critics, and others. The artwork was also ranked ninth in the past 1,000 years by Kathleen Davenport, Director, Rice University Art Gallery, Houston.


title: Marilyn Diptych

text: Warhol is regarded as an artist known for the appropriation of images and he often made use of publicity photographs and publicly available photographs and motifs not owned by him, which often brought him into conflict with the owners of the source material. An example of this is Warhol's Marilyn series including the "Marilyn Diptych", which resulted in a settlement with the owner of the Marilyn Monroe publicity photograph which he used as the source material for the paintings. Warhol and his estate have settled many copyright disputes including with regard to his famous flowers paintings and paintings of Jackie Kennedy, as discussed in detail in "Andy The Appropriator: The Copyright Battles You Won't Hear About at The Whitney's Warhol Exhibit" from "The Columbia Journal of Law & the Arts": "Although some of Warhol’s work was commissioned by individuals or companies, much of it was appropriated from other artists, photographers, and brands. Two of his most famous pieces, "Marilyn Diptych" and the collection of Campbell’s soup cans, are examples of his habit of appropriation. For the "Marilyn" series, Warhol took a promotional photograph of Marilyn Monroe and transferred it onto silkscreen print using different colors. He did not own the promotional photograph that he used and he did not have permission to use it. The resulting work was transformative enough that a strong fair use argument could be made today, but Warhol’s appropriation is undeniable. Similarly, Warhol used the Campbell’s Soup logo without permission from the company for dozens of silkscreen prints. Eventually, Campbell’s Soup tacitly approved of his use because of the free marketing they were receiving, but Warhol’s use of their logo without initial permission was still appropriation."


title: Our Friend

text: Our Friend is a 2019 American biographical drama film directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite and written by Brad Ingelsby, based on Matthew Teague's 2015 "Esquire" article "The Friend: Love Is Not a Big Enough Word". It stars Jason Segel, Dakota Johnson, and Casey Affleck.


title: Our Friend

text: The film had its world premiere under its original title The Friend at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival on September 6, 2019, and was released on January 22, 2021, by Gravitas Ventures. It was a box-office bomb, only grossing $714,255 on a $10 million budget.


title: Our Friend

text: In the winter of 2013, Matt and Nicole Teague prepare to tell their daughters, Molly and Evie, that Nicole's ovarian cancer is terminal. Outside, their best friend Dane Faucheux keeps the children company.


title: Our Friend

text: In a flashback to 2000, Matt, a journalist, and Nicole, a theater performer, live in New Orleans. She introduces Matt to Dane, a friend from college working as a camera operator who dreams of becoming a stand-up comic. The three become close over the years. In 2008, Matt and Nicole reside in Fairhope with their daughters. Matt works as a war correspondent and spends months overseas, putting a strain on the family. Meanwhile, Dane remains in New Orleans working dead-end jobs. On Thanksgiving, Dane, unhappy with his life, decides to backpack at the Grand Canyon without telling anyone where he is going. Another backpacker recognizes his potential suicidal behavior and offers support. Her gesture of kindness, plus an unexpected voicemail from the Teague family, renews Dane's will to live. In 2010, Matt discovers that Nicole had an affair. With Dane's help, they reconcile their relationship. Dane returns home where he works as a manager at a sporting goods store and begins dating a woman named Kat.


title: Our Friend

text: In September 2012, Nicole receives her diagnosis and begins to undergo chemotherapy. Recognizing their need for help, Dane offers to stay with them for a few weeks. However, as Nicole's condition worsens, Dane decides to remain with them, taking on many household duties. Kat struggles to understand Dane's loyalty to the Teague family after weeks turn into months, and they break up. On Christmas, Nicole ruptures her abdomen, and Dane is left to watch over the girls. Following her surgery, the doctor reveals to Matt that Nicole's cancer has spread and gives her approximately six months to live. Nicole decides that she does not want to tell their daughters until her quality of life declines significantly.


title: Our Friend

text: Nicole prepares a bucket list which Matt and Dane help her accomplish; such as sitting as Grand Marshal of the Mardi Gras parade, swimming in a historic fountain with all of her friends, and writing letters to her daughters for future life events. As 2013 closes and Nicole becomes sicker, they decide to tell their daughters and Dane listens on in sorrow as the girls cry.


title: Our Friend

text: By the summer of 2014, Nicole becomes increasingly irritable, hallucinates, and experiences pain. Realizing that Matt is overwhelmed, Dane takes him hiking. Upon their return, Matt realizes that they are no longer equipped to care for Nicole so he calls a hospice nurse, Faith Pruett. Nicole's friends and family visit with her one last time. One night, Faith alerts them of Nicole's slowing heart rate, and they take her to the beach to watch one final sunrise. Returning home, Nicole dies with Matt and Dane at her side.


title: Our Friend

text: Following Nicole's funeral, Dane confines himself to his room and grieves alone. Matt writes an article called "The Friend", which he gives to Dane. Dane finally decides to go home after putting his life on hold to live with the Teague family for over fourteen months. Matt embraces Dane, expressing that simply saying "Thank you" isn't enough. In the epilogue, it is revealed that Matt's article won an award in "Esquire" magazine and that he and his daughters remain in Fairhope. Dane remains close to the Teague family and marries in 2019.


title: Our Friend

text: In January 2019, it was announced Casey Affleck, Dakota Johnson, Jason Segel and Jake Owen had been cast in the drama film "The Friend", with Gabriela Cowperthwaite directing from a screenplay by Brad Ingelsby, based upon an "Esquire" article by Matthew Teague. Gwendoline Christie and Cherry Jones were among additional casting announced in February.


title: Our Friend

text: The film had its world premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival on September 6, 2019. It also was screened at AFI Fest on November 16, 2019. In January 2020, Roadside Attractions and Gravitas Ventures acquired distribution rights to the film. It was retitled "Our Friend", and released on January 22, 2021.


title: Our Friend

text: Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that of critics gave the film a positive review, with an average rating of . The site's critics consensus reads: ""Our Friend"s occasionally frustrating approach to dramatizing its fact-based story is often offset by a trio of starring performances led by a never-better Jason Segel." Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 57 out of 100, based on 20 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".


title: Our Friend

text: Ella Kemp from "The Playlist" praised the performances stating: "The Friend is successfully anchored by its three leading players... The sensitivity of these performances, particularly from Affleck and Segel, offers a reckoning on sincere friendship and the limits of devotion that remains with the viewer, long after the days of waiting and the years of pain have finally come to an end."


title: Our Friend

text: Katey Rich of "Vanity Fair" said: "It succeeds by sticking closely to the important specifics ... It's a small-scale human story, precious few of which make it to film these days. It's also, if you're in the market for that kind of thing, an extremely effective tearjerker." Conversely, Peter Debruge of "Variety" wrote: "So much of the unpleasantness has been scrubbed from the picture, until what remains is precisely the kind of dishonest, sanitized no-help-to-anyone TV-movie version of death that inspired Teague to set the record straight in the first place."


title: Medjugorje

text: Medjugorje (, ) is a town located in southwestern Bosnia and Herzegovina, about southwest of Mostar and east of the border with Croatia. The town is part of the Čitluk municipality and geographically part of Herzegovina. Since 1981, it has become a popular site of Catholic pilgrimage due to Our Lady of Međugorje, a purported series of apparitions of Mary, mother of Jesus, to six local children that are supposedly still happening to this day.


title: Medjugorje

text: The name "Međugorje" literally means "between mountains". At an altitude of above sea level it has a mild Mediterranean climate. The town consists of an ethnically homogeneous Croat population of 2,306. The Roman Catholic parish includes four neighbouring villages: Bijakovići, Vionica, Miletina and Šurmanci. Since 2019, pilgrimages to Medjugorje have been authorized by the Vatican.


title: Medjugorje

text: To the east of Međugorje in the Neretva valley, the Serbian Orthodox Žitomislić Monastery has stood since 1566. Gravestones erected in the Middle Ages have remained to this day in the Catholic cemetery "Groblje Srebrenica" in the hamlet of Miletina as well as in the hamlet of Vionica. In the area of the cemetery in Miletina, structures from the Roman era stood, whose ruins have not yet been fully excavated.


title: Medjugorje

text: Part of the Ottoman Empire until 1878, it became part of Austria-Hungary (War of 1878, Annexion 1908). In 1882 the railway line between Mostar and the Adriatic coast of Dalmatia was built, with a station in the hamlet of Šurmanci, through which the village gained access to the railway network.


title: Medjugorje

text: The Catholic parish of "Sveti Jakov" ("Saint James") was erected in 1892 by the Bishop of Mostar Paškal Buconjić. The twelve-metre tall crucifix on the mountain called "Križevac" (Cross Mountain), completing the parish's Stations of the Cross "(križni put)", was completed in 1934.


title: Medjugorje

text: During World War II, the Franciscans of Bosnia and Herzegovina played a leading role in the slaughter and forced conversions of Serbs. Some Franciscan monks directly participated in the atrocities. On 6 August 1941, 600 Serb women and children were taken to the head of a quarry near the Franciscan monastery in Medjugorje and killed by being pushed over the precipice and thrown into a pit.


title: Medjugorje

text: 66 Catholic friars of the Franciscan order were killed by the communists, mostly at the end of the war, including 30 at Siroki Brijeg near Medjugorje for their perceived involvement with the Croatian fascist Ustaše.


title: Medjugorje

text: This was the place where, some 40 years after these atrocities took place and exactly 10 years before the Bosnian War broke out, residents began reporting apparitions in Medjugorje, which called for prayer, conversion, fasting, penance and peace.


title: Medjugorje

text: Since 1981, when six local children said they had seen visions of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Medjugorje has become an unapproved destination of Catholic pilgrimage.


title: Medjugorje

text: ""Our Lady of Medjugorje"" is the title given to the apparition by those who believe that Mary, mother of Jesus, has been appearing from 24 June 1981 until today to six children, now adults, in Međugorje (then part of communist Yugoslavia). "Most Blessed Virgin Mary", "Queen of Peace" and "Mother of God" are words the apparition has allegedly introduced herself with.


title: Medjugorje

text: The Peace Rosary, also known as the Peace Chaplet of Medjugorje or Workers Chaplet, is recommended for regular prayer by Our Lady of Medjugorje: "There are many Christians who no longer believe because they are not praying. Therefore, start praying daily, at least seven times, Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory be to the Father, and I believe in God". Thus the Chaplet of Medjugorje consists of 1 + 7 x 3 beads, with a cross or medal. (The Chaplet later became a basis for a prayer for the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, known as the Chaplet in Honour of the Holy Spirit and translated into many languages.)


title: Medjugorje

text: The visionary Marija Lunetti (Pavlović) claims to receive messages from the Virgin Mary on the twenty-fifth of every month, while Mirjana Soldo (Dragičević) reports receiving messages on the second of the month.


title: Medjugorje

text: The messages attributed to Our Lady of Medjugorje have a strong following among Catholics worldwide. Medjugorje has become one of the most popular pilgrimage sites for Catholics in the world and has turned into Europe's third most important apparition site, where each year more than 1 million people visit. It has been estimated that 30 million pilgrims have come to Međugorje since the reputed apparitions began in 1981. Many have reported visual phenomena including the sun spinning in the sky or changing colour and figures such as hearts and crosses around the sun. Some visitors have suffered eye damage while seeking to experience such phenomena. Jesuit Father Robert Faricy has written about his own experience of such phenomena, saying, "Yet I have seen rosaries which have changed colour, and I have looked directly at the sun in Medjugorje and have seen it seem to spin and turn different colours. It would be easier to report that it is just hysteria except that I would then have to accuse myself of being hysterical, which I was not and am not."


title: Medjugorje

text: On August 21, 1996, Vatican Press Office spokesman Joaquín Navarro-Valls declared that Catholics may still travel on pilgrimage to Medjugorje and that priests may accompany them. Navarro-Valls declared: "You cannot say people cannot go there until it has been proven false. This has not been said, so anyone can go if they want."


title: Medjugorje

text: A Vatican commission to study the Međugorje question was set up by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010; headed by Cardinal Camillo Ruini, it was reported on 18 January 2014 to have completed its work, to be communicated to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Pope Francis commented on the report as ""very, very good"" on 13 May 2017 when speaking to journalists. According to Italian media, the Ruini report divided the investigation into three main parts: the early apparitions from 24 June 1981 to 3 July 1981, the acclaimed apparitions thereafter, and the pastoral situation. The commission's findings were positive towards recognizing the supernatural nature of the first appearances, and rejected the hypothesis of a demonic origin of the apparitions. But it could not reach a finding on the reported subsequent apparitions, despite a majority of the commission recognizing the spiritual benefits that Medjugorje had brought to pilgrims, including Pope Francis who remarked: ""The third, the core of the Ruini report, the spiritual fact, the pastoral fact. People go there and convert. People who encounter God, change their lives…but this…there is no magic wand there. And this spiritual and pastoral fact can’t be ignored.""


title: Medjugorje

text: On 11 February 2017, Pope Francis appointed Archbishop Henryk Hoser, S.A.C., the Bishop of Praga (Warsaw), as Special Envoy of the Holy See to Medjugorje. By the end of 2017, Hoser had announced that the Vatican's position was in favor of organizing pilgrimages. “Today, dioceses and other institutions can organize official pilgrimages. It’s no longer a problem,” explained Archbishop Hoser. “Pope Francis [even] recently asked an Albanian cardinal to give his blessing to the faithful at Medjugorje." “I am full of admiration for the work the Franciscans are doing there,” the Polish archbishop reported. “With a relatively small team—there are only a dozen of them—they do a huge job of welcoming pilgrims. Every summer they organize a youth festival. This year, there were 50,000 young people from around the world, with more than 700 priests.”


title: Medjugorje

text: He also cited the large number of confessions, adding, “There is a massive number of confessions. They have about 50 confessionals, which are not enough.” “This is a phenomenon. And what confirms the authenticity of the place is the large number of charitable institutions that exist around the sanctuary. And another aspect as well: the great effort that is being made at the level of Christian formation. Each year, they organize conferences at different levels, for various audiences,” exemplifying priests, doctors, parents, young people and couples. “The decree of the former episcopal conference of what used to be Yugoslavia, which, before the Balkan war, advised against pilgrimages in Medjugorje organized by bishops, is no longer relevant,” he said.


title: Medjugorje

text: On 24 June 1981, reports began of Marian apparitions on Crnica hill in the Bijakovići hamlet, and shortly thereafter confrontations with Yugoslav state authorities began. Pilgrims were forbidden from coming. Pilgrims' donations were seized by the police and access to what was called the "Apparition Hill" was largely blocked.


title: Medjugorje

text: In October 1981, Father Jozo Zovko, then the parish priest of the town, was sentenced to three and a half years imprisonment with forced labor for allegedly participating in a nationalistic plot. After Amnesty International, among others, appealed for his release and a judicial appeal was made, the sentence was reduced in the Yugoslav Federal Court in Belgrade to one and a half years, and the priest was released from prison in 1983.


title: Medjugorje

text: In the last years before the breakup of Yugoslavia, travel of pilgrims was no longer hindered by the state.


title: Medjugorje

text: During the Bosnian War, Medjugorje remained in the hands of the Croatian Defence Council and in 1993 became part of the Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia. By the Dayton Agreement in 1995, Medjugorje was incorporated into the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, populated mostly by Bosniaks and Croats. It lies within the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton, one of ten autonomous regions established so that no ethnic group could dominate the Federation.


title: Medjugorje

text: On 2 April 1995, at the high point of conflict within the local diocese, Bishop Ratko Perić was kidnapped by Croat militiamen, beaten, and taken to a chapel run by one of the Franciscans associated with Međugorje, where he was held hostage for ten hours. At the initiative of the mayor of Mostar, he was freed without bloodshed, with the help of the United Nations Protection Force.


title: Medjugorje

text: The Dutch professor of anthropology at the Free University, Amsterdam, Mart Bax, wrote in several publications that there had been mass killings due to a vendetta between clans during the beginning of the Bosnian War in 1991 and 1992. After much investigative research by journalists in several newspapers and comments from other scholars it appears unlikely that these mass killings ever occurred.


title: Medjugorje

text: After the Bosnian War ended, peace came to the area and UN peace troops were stationed in western Herzegovina. Efforts by a politician, Ante Jelavić, to create a Croatian entity were unsuccessful, and Međugorje remained part of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.


title: Medjugorje

text: The town and its environs boomed economically after the war. Over a thousand hotel and hostel beds are available for pilgrims to the town. With approximately one million visitors annually, the municipality of Medjugorje has the most overnight stays in Bosnia-Herzegovina.


title: Medjugorje

text: The Mostar International Airport, located approximately to the northeast and which was closed in 1991, reopened for civil aviation in 1998 and has made air travel to region easier since then. The road network was expanded after the Bosnian War. In addition the hamlet of Šurmanci in the lower Neretva valley has a train station on the route from Ploče to Sarajevo.


title: Medjugorje

text: On 6 April 2001, demonstrations occurred in the region, with some violence, after the NATO-led Stabilisation Force had closed and searched the local branches of the "Hercegovačka banka" ("Herzegovina Bank"), through which a large part of the currency transactions in Herzegovina, including international donations intended for Međugorje, were carried out, on suspicion of white-collar crime. The Franciscan Province responsible for the parish was a shareholder of the bank.


title: Medjugorje

text: On 11 February 2017, Pope Francis named Archbishop Hoser from Poland his special envoy to Međugorje, tasked with assessing its pastoral needs. A couple of months later Hoser finished his work and returned home.


title: Medjugorje

text: On 31 May 2018, Pope Francis named Hoser as special apostolic visitor to Međugorje, for "an undefined period and "at nutum Sanctae Sedis"" (at the disposal of the Holy See). The aim of this mission is "ensuring a stable and continuous accompaniment to the parish community of Medjugorje and to the faithful who go there as pilgrims, and whose needs require particular attention."


title: Medjugorje

text: On 12 May 2019, the Vatican officially authorized pilgrimage to Medjugorje. The first Vatican sanctioned pilgrimage then took place for five days from 2-6 August 2019. During the pilgrimage, approximately 60,000 young Catholics from 97 countries took part in the celebration of a youth festival. Fourteen archbishops and bishops and about 700 Catholic priests joined the festivities as well.


title: Boyar

text: A boyar or bolyar was a member of the highest rank of the feudal nobility in many Eastern European states, including Kievan Rus', Bulgaria, Russia, Wallachia and Moldavia, and later Romania, Lithuania and among Baltic Germans. Boyars were second only to the ruling princes (in Bulgaria, tsars) from the 10th century to the 17th century. The rank has lived on as a surname in Russia, Finland, Lithuania and Latvia where it is spelled "Pajari" or "Bajārs/-e".


title: Boyar

text: The title Boila is predecessor or old form of the title Bolyar (the Bulgarian word for Boyar). Boila was a title worn by some of the Bulgar aristocrats (mostly of regional governors and noble warriors) in the First Bulgarian Empire (681–1018). The plural form of boila ("noble"), "bolyare" is attested in Bulgar inscriptions and rendered as "boilades" or "boliades" in the Greek of Byzantine documents. Multiple different derivation theories of the word have been suggested by scholars and linguists, such as it having possible roots from old Turkic: "bai" ("noble, rich"; "cf." "bay")plus Turkic "är" ("man, men"), proto-Slavic "boj" (fight, battle) or romanian "boi" (oxen, cattle) to "Boier" (owner of cattle).The title entered Old Russian as "быля" ("bylya", attested solely in "The Tale of Igor's Campaign").


title: Boyar

text: The oldest Slavic form of "boyar"—"bolyarin", pl. "bolyari" (, )—dates from the 10th century, and it is found in Bulgaria, also popular as old Bulgar title "boila", which denoted a high aristocratic status among the Bulgars. It was probably built from "bol"- meaning "many" and "yarin, yarki"-meanng "bright, enlightened". In support of this hypothesis is the 10th-century diplomatic protocol of the Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII, where the Bulgarian nobles are called "boliades", while the 9th-century Bulgar sources call them "boila".


title: Boyar

text: A member of the nobility during the First Bulgarian Empire was called a "boila", while in the Second Bulgarian Empire, the corresponding title became "bolyar" or "bolyarin". "Bolyar", as well as its predecessor, "boila", was a hereditary title. The Bulgarian bolyars were divided into "veliki" ("great") and "malki" ("minor").


title: Boyar

text: Presently in Bulgaria, the word "bolyari" is used as a nickname for the inhabitants of Veliko Tarnovo—once the capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire.


title: Boyar

text: In medieval Serbia, the rank of the boyars () was equivalent to the rank of the baron; meaning "free warrior" (or "free man" in general), it was the first rank after the non-free peasants or serfs. The etymology of the term comes from the word "battle" (); the boyars of Serbia were literally "men for the battle" or the warrior class, in contrast to the peasants; they could own land but were obliged to defend it and fight for the king. With the rule of the Ottoman Empire after 1450, the Ottoman as well as the Austro-Hungarian terms exchanged the Serbian one. Today, it is an archaic term representing the aristocracy ().


title: Boyar

text: From the 9th to 13th century, boyars wielded considerable power through their military support of the Rus's princes. Power and prestige of many of them, however, soon came to depend almost completely on service to the state, family history of service and, to a lesser extent, land ownership. Boyars of Kievan Rus were visually very similar to knights, but after the Mongol invasion, their cultural links were mostly lost.


title: Boyar

text: The boyars occupied the highest state offices and, through a council (duma), advised the grand duke. They received extensive grants of land and, as members of the Boyars' Duma, were the major legislators of Kievan Rus'.


title: Boyar

text: After the Mongol invasion in the 13th century, the boyars from western and southern parts of Kievan Rus' (modern Belarus and Ukraine) were incorporated into Lithuanian and Polish nobility (szlachta) and they were completely polonised and catholicised. In the 16th and 17th centuries, many of those Rus boyars who failed to get the status of a nobleman actively participated in the formation of the Cossack army, based in the south of modern day territory of Eastern Ukraine and Western Russia.


title: Boyar

text: Boyars in Novgorod and Pskov formed a sort of republic, where the power of princes (knyaz) was strongly limited until the conquest by Moscow. Boyars kept their influence in the Russian principalities of Vladimir, Tver and Moscow. Only after the centralization of power by Moscow was the power of the boyars diminished.


title: Boyar

text: During the 14th and 15th centuries, the boyars of Moscow had considerable influence that continued from the Muscovy period. However, starting with the reign of Ivan III, the boyars were starting to lose that influence to the authoritative tsars in Muscovy. Because of Ivan III's expansionist policies, administrative changes were needed in order to ease the burden of governing Muscovy. Small principalities knew their loyal subjects by name, but after the consolidation of territories under Ivan, familial loyalty and friendship with the boyar's subjects turned those same subjects into administrative lists. The face of provincial rule disappeared.


title: Boyar

text: Boyar membership, until the 16th century, did not necessarily require one to be Russian, or even Orthodox, as historians note that many boyars came from places like Lithuania or the Nogais, and some remained Muslims for a generation after the Mongols were ousted. What is interesting about the boyars is their implied duties. Because boyars were not constitutionally instituted, much of their powers and duties came from agreements signed between princes. Agreements, such as one between Ivan III and Mikhail Borisovich in 1484 showed how allegiances needed to be earned and secured, rather than implied and enforced.


title: Boyar

text: Instead of the grand prince personally overseeing his lands, he had to rely on his captains and close advisors to oversee day-to-day operations. Instead of the great voice the boyars had previously in their advisory roles, they now had less bargaining power and mobility. They answered questions posed by the grand prince, and Ivan III even made sure to get their approval on special events, such as his marriage to Zoe Paleologa, or the attack on Novgorod. This was to ensure the boyars and their military power remained loyal to the tsar. The grand duke also made sure that peasants could not leave the princes' lands, or from one place to another, in the mid-1400s, effectively establishing serfdom. The boyars gained rewards and gifts as well. Some boyars were sent to regions as governors, and could “feed off” the locals in this way. Still, by the end of the 15th century, boyar membership had declined, and merit rather than family background decided who became a boyar. When Ivan IV became the tsar, more radical changes were implemented to limit boyar influence.


title: Boyar

text: Ivan IV became the grand prince of all Muscovy in 1533 at the age of three, but various boyar factions tried to compete for control of the regency. When Ivan IV came to power in 1547, much more of the boyars' independent political power became obsolete. The independence and autonomy experienced by the princes of the regions in Muscovy was abolished under Ivan IV by the end of the sixteenth century, making them "the prince's sons", or just simple boyars serving the Grand Prince. Ivan IV divided Muscovy into two parts in 1565, and in the private part, the terror began. The boyars attempted to band together and resist, but instead of constitutionally establishing their role in government, Ivan IV ruthlessly crushed the boyar opposition with the use of the oprichnina terror purges. Land grants were also given to subjects that provided military service, and soon this type of land grant became the more common compared to inherited land among the boyars. Ivan IV consolidated his power, centralized royal power, and made every effort possible to curb the influence of the princes.


title: Boyar

text: After Ivan IV, a time of troubles began when his son Fedor died without an heir, ending the Rurik dynasty. The boyar Boris Godunov tried to proclaim himself tsar, but several boyar factions refused to recognize him. The chaos continued after the first False Dmitriy gained the throne, and civil war erupted. When the Romanovs took over, the seventeenth century became one filled with administrative reform. A comprehensive legal code was introduced, and a merging of the boyars into the elite bureaucracy was beginning to form.


title: Boyar

text: By the end of the Time of Troubles, the boyars had lost nearly all independent power. Instead of going to Moscow to gain more power, the boyars felt defeated, and felt compelled to go to Moscow to maintain a united and strong Russia. Second, the boyars lost their independent principalities, where they maintained all their power, and instead governed districts and regions under the grand prince of the time. Boyars also lost their advisory influence over the grand prince with tools such as the duma, and instead the grand prince no longer felt compelled to listen to the demands of the boyars. Finally, the tsar no longer feared losing their military support, and unification of Muscovy became paramount in importance. With Peter the Great, the final nail in the coffin happened for the boyar's power, and they would never recover from his administrative reforms.


title: Boyar

text: Peter the Great, who took power in 1697, took it upon himself to westernize Russia, and catch it up with the modern world. After the revolt of the streltsy regiments in 1698, Peter the Great returned to Russia, forcing government officials and those that were financially able to have clean shaven faces and wear Western clothing. Peter also reformed the judicial system, and created a senate with members appointed by him, replacing the old council of boyars that originally advised the tsar. This move he made was one of many that dismantled the powers and status the boyars previously possessed. Peter was driving out the conservative and religious faction of the boyars out of the courts, and instead using both foreign and Russian officials to fill the administrative system. Several boyars, as well as other nobility, spoke out against these reforms, including historian Mikhail Shcherbatov, who stated that the reforms Peter made helped destroy Russian tradition, and created people that tried to "worm their way up, by flattering and humoring the monarch and the grandees in every way." Still, the reforms continued, as by this point, the tsar possessed too much power, and Russia became an absolute monarchy more and more with each ruler.


title: Boyar

text: Being part of Ruthenia (also known as Kievan Rus), the Galician nobility originally were called boyars. With the annexation of Galicia by the Kingdom of Poland as the result of the Galicia-Volhynia wars, local boyars were equated since 1430 in rights along with Polish nobility (szlachta). A great number of boyars fled to the lands of Great Duchy of Lithuania in Volhynia and Podolia.


title: Boyar

text: In the Carpathian regions inhabited by present day Romanians, the boyar () class emerged from the chiefs (named ("leader") or ("judge") in the areas north of the Danube, and south of the river) of rural communities in the early Middle Ages, who made their judicial and administrative attributions hereditary and gradually expanded them upon other communities. They were "approved" by the Ottoman Empire, which had suzerainty over the area. After the appearance of more advanced political structures in the area, their privileged status had to be confirmed by the central power, which used this prerogative to include in the boyar class individuals that distinguished themselves in the military or civilian functions they performed (by allocating them lands from the princely domains).


title: Boyar

text: Historian Djuvara explained the hypotheses concerning the origin of the Romanians, such as advancing the theory that the vast majority of the nobility in the medieval states that made up the territory of modern-day Romania was of Cuman origin and not Romanian: "Romanians were called the black Cumans".


title: Boyar

text: The Romanian social hierarchy was composed of boyar, ("turkish: mazul"), ("yeoman, freedman") and ("serf, slave"<nowiki>}}. Being a boyar implied three things: being a land-owner, having serfs, and having a military and/or administrative function. A boyar could have a state function and/or a court function. These functions were called </nowiki> or . Only the prince had the power to assign a boierie. Landowners with serfs but no function were categorized as but were still considered to be of noble origin (, literally "of boyar bone"). Small landowners who possessed a domain without distinction () were called , while the serfs (indentured servants) were called .


title: Boyar

text: Although functions could only be accorded by the prince and were not hereditary, land possession was hereditary. The prince could give land to somebody but could not take it from its possessor except for serious reasons such as treason. Therefore, there were two kinds of boyars: those whose families, as chiefs of the ancient rural communities, had held land before the formation of the feudal states, such that the prince merely confirmed their preexisting status as landowners; and those who acquired their domain from a princely donation or who had inherited it from an ancestor who acquired it through such a donation ("cf." the distinction between "Uradel" and "Briefadel" in the Holy Roman Empire and in its feudal successor regimes). During the Phanariot régime, there were also boyars who had no land at all, but only a function. This way, the number of boyars could be increased, by selling functions to those who could afford them.


title: Boyar

text: The close alliance between the boyar condition and the military-administrative functions led to a confusion, aggravated by the Phanariots: these functions began to be considered as noble titles, like in the Occident. In fact, this was not at all the case. Traditionally, the boyars were organized in three states: boyars of the first, second, and third states. For example, there was a first or a grand postelnic, a second postelnic, and a third postelnic, each one with his different obligations and rights. The difference of condition was visible even in the vestimentation or physical aspect. Only the boyars of the first state had the right, for example, to grow a beard, the rest being entitled only to a mustache. Within the class of the boyars of the first state, there was the subclass of the "grand boyars". Those were great landowners who also had some very high functions, such as the function of great vornic. Above those grand boyars was only the prince.


title: Boyar

text: Usually a prince was a boyar before his election or appointment as prince, but this was not an absolute condition. Initially, only princely descendants could be elected princes. During the Phanariot epoch, however, any man could be a prince if appointed by the sultan (and rich enough to buy this appointment from the grand vizier). During the Ottoman suzerainty, and especially during the Phanariot régime, the title of Prince became an administrative function within the imperial Ottoman hierarchy, and thus the ultimate form of boyardness. The title of Prince of Wallachia or Moldavia was equivalent in dignity to that of a Pasha with two horse-tails.


title: Boyar

text: Norwegian composer Johan Halvorsen wrote a march entitled "Bojarenes inntogsmarsj" ("Entry March of the Boyars"), known in Norway as the signal tune for the radio programme "Ønskekonserten". Edvard Grieg arranged it for solo piano. August Strindberg requests that this piece be played during his play "The Dance of Death, Part One".


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto is a cartoon character created by The Walt Disney Company. He is a yellow-orange color, medium-sized, short-haired dog with black ears. Unlike most Disney characters, Pluto is not anthropomorphic beyond some characteristics such as facial expression. He is Mickey's pet. Officially a mixed-breed dog, he made his debut as a bloodhound in the Mickey Mouse cartoon "The Chain Gang". Together with Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, and Goofy, Pluto is one of the "Sensational Six"—the biggest stars in the Disney universe. Though all six are non-human animals, Pluto alone is not dressed as a human.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto debuted in animated cartoons and appeared in 24 "Mickey Mouse" films before receiving his own series in 1937. All together Pluto appeared in 89 short films between 1930 and 1953. Several of these were nominated for an Academy Award, including "The Pointer" (1939), "Squatter's Rights" (1946), "Pluto's Blue Note" (1947), and "Mickey and the Seal" (1948). One of his films, "Lend a Paw" (1941), won the award in 1942. Because Pluto does not speak, his films generally rely on physical humor. This made Pluto a pioneering figure in character animation, by expressing personality through animation rather than dialogue.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Like all of Pluto's co-stars, the dog has appeared extensively in comics over the years, first making an appearance in 1931. He returned to theatrical animation in 1990 with "The Prince and the Pauper" and has also appeared in several direct-to-video films. Pluto also appears in the television series "Mickey Mouse Works" (1999–2000), "House of Mouse" (2001–2003), "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" (2006–2016), and the new Mickey Mouse shorts (2013–2019) along with its successor, "The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse" (2020–present).


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: In 1998, Disney's copyright on Pluto, set to expire in 2003, was extended by the passage of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act. Disney, along with other studios, lobbied for passage of the act to preserve their copyrights on characters such as Pluto for 20 additional years.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto first appeared as a nameless bloodhound tracking the escaped convict Mickey in the film "The Chain Gang," which released on August 6, 1930. On October 23 of that same year, "The Picnic" was released. Pluto was Minnie's dog and was named Rover. "The Moose Hunt", which came out on May 3, 1931, Pluto appeared as Mickey's pet, and was given the name "Pluto".


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Several months had passed between the naming of what was then classified as the ninth planet, Pluto, on May 1, 1930, and the attachment of that name to the dog character. Disney animator Ben Sharpsteen said "We thought the name [Rover] was too common, so we had to look for something else. ... We changed it to Pluto the Pup ... but I don't honestly remember why." Some Disney animators reportedly believed that Walt Disney chose the name to capitalize on the sensation of the newly named planet.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto was initially a minor character until 1934 when Disney animator Norm Ferguson gave the dog a key role in the cartoon "Playful Pluto". Pluto becomes entangled with a sticky piece of flypaper, and Ferguson expanded the sequence significantly. The segment became a classic, demonstrating how Disney artists can take a simple circumstance and build humor through a character.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Unlike Mickey's other animal friends, such as Goofy (who is also a dog), Pluto is a relatively normal animal, with few anthropomorphic traits apart from his facial expressions. Pluto usually does not speak in English, walk upright, or wear clothing. A significant departure from this was his speaking role in "The Moose Hunt" (1931), which was produced before Pluto's characterization had been clearly defined. As Pluto made more appearances, it became common that he would mostly speak in barks and grunts like most dogs. Other ways of communicating Pluto's thoughts occur through his facial expressions, and sometimes through the use of a shoulder angel/devil who speak directly to Pluto. ("Mickey's Elephant", "Lend a Paw").


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto is generally a cheerful and adventurous dog, although he can be given to sheer panic when confronted with something unknown. Common themes in Pluto's stories involve him becoming jealous of Mickey getting another pet ("Mickey's Elephant", "Lend a Paw", "Mickey and the Seal"), Pluto accidentally and unwittingly swallowing something and panicking when he realizes it ("Playful Pluto", "Donald and Pluto"), Pluto getting entangled with something inanimate like a piece of flypaper ("Beach Picnic", "Playful Pluto"), or Pluto being pestered by a smaller animal ("Private Pluto", "Squatter's Rights"). In many of his appearances with Mickey, Pluto will get himself into trouble and cause Mickey to get angry at him. Mickey, however, often cheers up quickly; often telling Pluto "Aw, I can't be mad at ya."


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto sometimes appears with other regular animal characters. His friends include Fifi the Peke, Dinah the Dachshund, and Ronnie the St. Bernard Puppy. Other animals he is less friendly with include Salty the Seal, Butch the Bulldog, Figaro the Kitten, Chip 'n Dale, Peg Leg Pete, Spike the Bee, Bent-Tail the Coyote, Milton the cat and other characters. In Disney's 1937 animated short "Pluto's Quin-Puplets", Pluto has a son who is simply referred to as "Pluto Junior." In the 1946 animated short "Pluto's Kid Brother", Pluto has a younger brother named K.B.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto first and most often appears in the "Mickey Mouse" series of cartoons. On rare occasions, he is paired with Donald Duck ("Donald and Pluto", "Beach Picnic", "Window Cleaners", "The Eyes Have It", "Donald's Dog Laundry", & "Put Put Troubles").


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: The first cartoons to feature Pluto as a solo star were two "Silly Symphony" shorts, "Just Dogs" (1932) and "Mother Pluto" (1936). In 1937, Pluto appeared in "Pluto's Quin-Puplets" which was the first installment of his own film series, then headlined "Pluto the Pup". However, they were not produced on a regular basis until 1940, by which time the name of the series was shortened to "Pluto".


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: His first comics appearance was in the "Mickey Mouse" comic strip in July 1931, two months after the release of "The Moose Hunt". In 1938, Pluto headlined in the "Silly Symphony" Sunday comic strip, in an adaptation of his "Silly Symphony" short, "Mother Pluto". Pluto was later featured in several sequences of the "Silly Symphony" strip in 1939 and 1940.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: "Pluto Saves the Ship", a comic book published in 1942, was one of the first Disney comics prepared for publication outside newspaper strips. However, not counting a few cereal giveaway mini-comics in 1947 and 1951, he did not have his own comics title until 1952.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: In 1936, Pluto was featured in the picture book "Mickey Mouse and Pluto the Pup" by Whitman Publishing.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto ran his own neighborhood in Disney's Toontown Online until its closedown. It was called the Brrrgh and it was always snowing there except during Halloween. During April Toons Week, a weekly event that was very silly, Pluto switched playgrounds with Minnie (all other characters did this as well), and he actually talked in Minnie's Melodyland.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto has also appeared in the television series "Mickey Mouse Works" (1999–2000), "Disney's House of Mouse" (2001–2003), "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" (2006–2016), the new Mickey Mouse shorts (2013–2019), Mickey & the Roadster Racers (2017–present), The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse (2020-present) and "Mickey Mouse Funhouse" (2021-present). Curiously enough, however, Pluto was the only standard Disney character not included when the whole gang was reunited for the 1983 featurette "Mickey's Christmas Carol", although he did return in "The Prince and the Pauper" (1990) and "Runaway Brain" (1995). He also had a cameo at the ending of "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" (1988). In 1996, he made a cameo in the "Quack Pack" episode "The Really Mighty Ducks".


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: The following is a list of short films starring Pluto in the "Pluto the Pup" and "Pluto" series. It is not a complete filmography for Pluto as he has also appeared extensively in "Mickey Mouse" or "Donald Duck" films. Although some of such cartoons are labeled as Mickey cartoons, they are actually officially placed under Pluto's filmography.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: Pluto also appears in "Disney Golf" for the PS2. In the event that the player's golf ball goes out of bounds or hits a water hazard, Pluto will come and look for your golf ball.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: In the "Kingdom Hearts" video game series, Pluto is still Mickey's pet and acts as somewhat of a messenger, assisting in his master's plans. For most of "Kingdom Hearts II", Pluto stays by Kairi's side (even when she has been kidnapped), as he has apparently taken a liking to her. Strangely, throughout the series, Pluto appears and disappears at random moments.


title: Pluto (Disney)

text: In the various Disney theme park resorts around the world, Pluto is a meetable character just like many of his film co-stars. Pluto, however, uncharacteristically walks on two legs in this capacity out of necessity. Adults and children are able to meet, play with, and get autographs and pictures with Pluto and his friends at all Disney parks. Shirts, hats, toys and other various types of merchandise featuring Pluto are available.


title: United States of Europe

text: The United States of Europe (USE), the European State, the European Federation and Federal Europe, is the hypothetical scenario of the European integration leading to formation of a sovereign superstate (similar to the United States of America), organised as a federation of the member countries of the European Union (EU), as contemplated by political scientists, politicians, geographers, historians, futurologists and fiction writers. At present, while the EU is not a federation, various academic observers regard it as having some of the characteristics of a federal system.


title: United States of Europe

text: Various versions of the concept have developed over the centuries, many of which are mutually incompatible (inclusion or exclusion of the United Kingdom, secular or religious union, etc.). Such proposals include those from Bohemian King George of Poděbrady in 1464; Duc de Sully of France in the seventeenth century; and the plan of William Penn, the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania, for the establishment of a "European Dyet, Parliament or Estates". George Washington also allegedly voiced support for a "United States of Europe", although the authenticity of this statement has been questioned.


title: United States of Europe

text: Felix Markham notes how during a conversation on St. Helena, Napoleon Bonaparte remarked: "Europe thus divided into nationalities freely formed and free internally, peace between States would have become easier: the United States of Europe would become a possibility". "United States of Europe" was also the name of the concept presented by Wojciech Jastrzębowski in "About eternal peace between the nations", published 31 May 1831. The project consisted of 77 articles. The envisioned United States of Europe was to be an international organisation rather than a superstate. Giuseppe Mazzini, an early advocate of a "United States of Europe" regarded European unification as a logical continuation of the unification of Italy. Mazzini created the Young Europe movement.


title: United States of Europe

text: The term "United States of Europe" () was used by Victor Hugo, including during a speech at the International Peace Congress held in Paris in 1849. Hugo favoured the creation of "a supreme, sovereign senate, which will be to Europe what parliament is to England" and said: "A day will come when all nations on our continent will form a European brotherhood ... A day will come when we shall see ... the United States of America and the United States of Europe face to face, reaching out for each other across the seas". During his exile from France, Hugo planted a tree in the grounds of his residence on the Island of Guernsey and was noted in saying that when this tree matured the United States of Europe would have come into being. This tree to this day is still growing in the gardens of Maison de Hauteville, St. Peter Port, Guernsey.


title: United States of Europe

text: In 1867, Giuseppe Garibaldi and John Stuart Mill joined Victor Hugo at the first congress of the League of Peace and Freedom in Geneva. Here the anarchist Mikhail Bakunin stated: "That in order to achieve the triumph of liberty, justice and peace in the international relations of Europe, and to render civil war impossible among the various peoples who make up the European family, only a single course lies open: to constitute the United States of Europe". The French National Assembly also called for a United States of Europe on 1 March 1871.


title: United States of Europe

text: Before the communist revolution in Russia, Leon Trotsky foresaw a "Federated Republic of Europe — the United States of Europe", created by the proletariat. Following the First World War, some thinkers and visionaries again began to float the idea of a politically unified Europe. A Pan-European movement gained some momentum from the 1920s with the creation of the Paneuropean Union, based on Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi's 1923 manifesto "Paneuropa", which presented the idea of a unified European State. This movement, led by Coudenhove-Kalergi and subsequently by Otto von Habsburg, is the oldest European unification movement.In 1923, the Austrian Count Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi founded the Pan-Europa Movement and hosted the First Paneuropean Congress, held in Vienna in 1926. The aim was for a Europe based on the principles of liberalism, Christianity and social responsibility.


title: United States of Europe

text: His ideas influenced Aristide Briand, French Prime Minister, who gave on 8 September 1929 a speech before the Assembly of the League of Nations in which he proposed the idea of a federation of European nations based on solidarity and in the pursuit of economic prosperity and political and social co-operation. At the League's request, Briand presented in 1930 his "Memorandum on the Organization of a Regime of European Federal Union" for the Government of France. In 1931, French politician Édouard Herriot and British civil servant Arthur Salter both penned books titled "The United States of Europe".


title: United States of Europe

text: After the First World War, Winston Churchill had seen continental Europe as a source of threats and sought to avoid the United Kingdom's involvement in European conflicts. On 15 February 1930, Churchill commented in the American journal "The Saturday Evening Post" that a "European Union" was possible between continental states, but without the United Kingdom's involvement:


title: United States of Europe

text: During the 1930s, Churchill was influenced by and became an advocate of the ideas of Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi and his Paneuropean Union, though Churchill did not advocate the United Kingdom's membership of such a union. (Churchill revisited the idea in 1946).


title: United States of Europe

text: During the World War II victories of Nazi Germany in 1940, Wilhelm II stated that "the hand of God is creating a new world & working miracles. ... We are becoming the United States of Europe under German leadership, a united European Continent".


title: United States of Europe

text: In 1941, the Italian anti-fascists Altiero Spinelli and Ernesto Rossi finished writing the Ventotene Manifesto, encouraging a federation of European states.


title: United States of Europe

text: The European Confederation () was a proposed political institution of European unity, which was to be part of a wider restructuring (). Proposed by German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop in March 1943, the concept was rejected by Reichsführer Adolf Hitler.


title: United States of Europe

text: Churchill used the term "United States of Europe" in a speech delivered on 19 September 1946 at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. In this speech given after the end of the Second World War, Churchill concluded:


title: United States of Europe

text: While Churchill advocated a united Europe, he saw Britain and its Commonwealth, along with the United States of America, and Soviet Russia as "the friends and sponsors of the new Europe", separate to a United States of Europe led by France and Germany.


title: United States of Europe

text: As early as 21 October 1942, in a minute to his Foreign Secretary, Prime Minister Churchill had written, "I look forward to a United States of Europe in which the barriers between the nations will be greatly minimised and unrestricted travel will be possible".


title: United States of Europe

text: Churchill's was a more cautious approach ("the unionist position") to European integration than was the continental approach that was known as "the federalist position". The Federalists advocated full integration with a constitution, while the Unionist United Europe Movement advocated a consultative body; the Federalists prevailed at the Congress of Europe. The primary accomplishment of the Congress of Europe was the European Court of Human Rights, which predates the European Union.


title: United States of Europe

text: The Union Movement was a British party founded by Oswald Mosley after the dissolution of his British Union of Fascists. Mosley first presented his idea of "Europe a Nation" in his book "The Alternative" in 1947.


title: United States of Europe

text: He argued that the traditional vision of nationalism that had been followed by the various shades of pre-war fascism had been too narrow in scope and that the post-war era required a new paradigm in which Europe would come together as a single state. In October 1948 when Mosley called for elections to a European Assembly as the first step towards his vision. "Nation Europa" was a German magazine inspired by Mosley's ideas, founded in 1951 by former SS commander Arthur Ehrhardt and Herbert Boehme with the support of Carl-Ehrenfried Carlberg.


title: United States of Europe

text: By the 1950s and 1960s, Europe saw the emergence of two different projects, the European Free Trade Association and the much more political European Economic Community.


title: United States of Europe

text: Individuals such as the former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer have said (in 2000) that he believes that the EU must in the end become a single federation, with its political leader chosen by direct elections among all of its citizens. However, claims that the then-proposed Treaty of Nice aimed to create a "European superstate" were rejected by former United Kingdom European Commissioner Chris Patten and by many member-state governments. (, the post "President of the European Union" does not exist, nor are there any plans that it should do so.)


title: United States of Europe

text: The member states of the European Union do have many common policies within the EU and on behalf of the EU that are sometimes suggestive of a single state. It has a common executive (the European Commission), a single High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, a common European Security and Defence Policy, a supreme court (European Court of Justicebut only in matters of European Union law) and an intergovernmental research organisation (the EIROforum with members like CERN). The euro is often referred to as the "single European currency", which has been officially adopted by nineteen EU countries while three other member countries of the European Union have linked their currencies to the euro in ERM II. Then non-EU member states of Andorra, Monaco, San Marino, and Vatican City concluded monetary agreements with the EU on the usage of the euro. The non-EU member states of Kosovo and Montenegro adopted the euro unilaterally.


title: United States of Europe

text: Several pan-European institutions exist separate from the EU. The European Space Agency counts almost all EU member states in its membership, but it is independent of the EU and its membership includes nations that are not EU members, notably Switzerland, Norway and as a result of Brexit, the United Kingdom. The European Court of Human Rights (not to be confused with the European Court of Justice) is also independent of the EU. It is an element of the Council of Europe, which like ESA counts EU members and non-members alike in its membership.


title: United States of Europe

text: At present, the European Union is a free association of sovereign states (a de facto, but not de jure, confederation) designed to further their shared aims. Other than the vague aim of "ever closer union" in the Solemn Declaration on European Union, the EU (meaning its member governments) has no current policy to form a federal union. However, in the past Jean Monnet, a person associated with the EU and its predecessor the European Economic Community, did make such proposals. A wide range of other terms are in use to describe the possible future political structure of Europe as a whole and/or the EU. Some of them, such as "United Europe", are used often and in such varied contexts, but they have no definite constitutional status.


title: United States of Europe

text: In the United States of America, the concept enters serious discussions of whether a unified Europe is feasible and what impact increased European unity would have on the United States of America's relative political and economic power. Glyn Morgan, a Harvard University associate professor of government and social studies, uses it unapologetically in the title of his book "The Idea of a European Superstate: Public Justification and European Integration." While Morgan's text focuses on the security implications of a unified Europe, a number of other recent texts focus on the economic implications of such an entity. Important recent texts here include T. R. Reid's "The United States of Europe" and Jeremy Rifkin's "The European Dream." Neither the "National Review" nor the "Chronicle of Higher Education" doubt the appropriateness of the term in their reviews.


title: United States of Europe

text: Various federalist organisations have been created over time supporting the idea of a federal Europe. These include the Union of European Federalists, the European Movement International, the (former) European Federalist Party, Stand Up For Europe and Volt Europa.


title: United States of Europe

text: The Union of European Federalists (UEF) is a European non-governmental organisation campaigning for a Federal Europe. It consists of 20 constituent organisations and it has been active at the European, national and local levels for more than 50 years. A young branch called the Young European Federalists also exists in 30 countries of Europe.


title: United States of Europe

text: The European Movement International is a lobbying association that coordinates the efforts of associations and national councils with the goal of promoting European integration, and disseminating information about it.


title: United States of Europe

text: The European Federalist Party was a pro-European, pan-European and federalist political party from 2011 to 2016 which advocated further integration of the European Union.


title: United States of Europe

text: As the successor movement of the European Federalist Party, Stand Up For Europe is a pan-European NGO that advocates the foundation of a European Federation. Contrary to movements like the UEF or the former EFP, Stand Up for Europe does not command any national levels anymore, but only consists of regional city teams and the European level.