Blackballing

Blackballing is a rejection in a traditional form of secret ballot, where a white ball or ballot constitutes a vote in support and a black ball signifies opposition. This system is typically used where a club's rules provide that one or two objections, rather than an at-least-50% share of votes, are sufficient to defeat a proposition. Since the seventeenth century, these rules have commonly applied to elections to membership of many gentlemen's clubs and similar institutions such as Freemasonry and fraternities.

A large supply of black and white balls is provided for voters. Each voter audibly casts a single ball into the ballot box under cover of the box, or of a combination of a cloth and the box itself, so that observers can see who votes but not how they are voting. When all voting is complete, the box is opened and the balls displayed: all present can immediately see the result, without any means of knowing which members are objecting.

Overview

The principle of such election rules in a club is that it is self-perpetuating to preserve the current ethos (and exclusivity) of the club, by ensuring that candidates are congenial to (almost) all the existing members; i.e., new members are elected by unanimous or near-unanimous agreement of voting members. A difference of opinions could be divisive, so that an election must be taken secretly as well as correctly.

Blackballed (film)

Blackballed: The Bobby Dukes Story is a 2004 film by Brant Sersen in his directorial debut, written by Brian Steinberg and Brant Sersen. It is an improvisational comedy set in the world of paintball. It stars Rob Corddry, Paul Scheer, Dannah Feinglass, Rob Riggle, Rob Huebel, Ed Helms (in his film debut), Curtis Gwinn, Seth Morris, and DJ Hazard.

Plot

Paintball's first superstar, Bobby Dukes, led his team, the River Rats, to an unprecedented three consecutive victories at The Hudson Valley National Paintball Classic. On May 28, 1993, the River Rats were competing for their fourth "Classic" victory when disaster struck. Bobby, attempting one of his signature moves, was shot. Desperate to stay in the game, Dukes intentionally wiped the paint from his jersey, thus committing paintball's most heinous crime. A zealous referee spotted the wipe and ejected Bobby from the game. The three-time champ was embarrassed, went to Venezuela, and left the game for 10 years while being the laughingstock of the paintball community. Deemed a cheater, disgraced and humiliated, Bobby disappeared. Ten years later an older and wiser Dukes returns to reclaim his title and erase the memory of his tainted past. He enters the 2003 Classic but finds no self-respecting paintball player will be caught dead on his team. On the verge of giving up hope, Bobby joins forces with the most unlikely of allies... the referee that caught him cheating. Now, the two improbable partners must recruit a team of paintball misfits and take back the Hudson Valley Paintball Classic taking place at Liberty Paintball in Patterson, New York.

Boon

Boon may refer to:

Places

People

Surname

Boon (TV series)

Boon is a British television crime drama starring Michael Elphick, David Daker, and later Neil Morrissey. It was created by Jim Hill and Bill Stair and filmed by Central Television for ITV. It revolved around the life of an ex-fireman called Ken Boon.

Premise

Ken Boon (Elphick) and Harry Crawford (Daker) were both old-fashioned 'smokeys' (firemen) in the West Midlands Fire Service. In episode 1 Crawford takes early retirement and moves to Spain to open a bar, leaving Ken behind. In the same opening episode, Ken attends a house fire where a child is trapped upstairs. Realising he must act quickly he goes into the house without breathing apparatus, rescues the child but is severely injured by inhaling toxic smoke. He attempts to prove he can still make it but he is declared unfit for duty after collapsing during a practice-simulation because his lungs have been permanently damaged, and he is forced to retire from working in Fire Service.

He started a market garden called 'The Ponderosa' in a village about ten miles outside of Birmingham but found that it wasn't working out. As he struggled to pay bills and keep afloat, he was surprised when a visitor arrived at the garden; Harry had returned from Spain to Birmingham, after his wife Alison had left him for a young hairdresser. Harry had acquired a hotel in Birmingham and offered a 'port in a storm' for Ken.

Boon (novel)

Boon is a 1915 work of literary satire by H. G. Wells. It purports, however, to be by the fictional character Reginald Bliss, and for some time after publication Wells denied authorship. Boon is best known for its part in Wells's debate on the nature of literature with Henry James, who is caricatured in the book. But in Boon Wells also mocks himself, calling into question and ridiculing a notion he held dear—that of humanity's collective consciousness.

Summary

Boon opens with an introduction by Wells, calling it "an indiscreet, ill-advised book." Wells pretends to repudiate any public identification with the work: "Bliss is Bliss and Wells is Wells. And Bliss can write all sorts of things that Wells could not do."

As he was to do in The Research Magnificent, Wells creates a literary character (Reginald Bliss) who is making a book out of the literary remains of an author who has recently died (George Boon, a popular author of books and plays). Bliss attributes Boon's death to depression on account of the war. Bliss expresses disappointment that among Boon's papers (kept in "barrels in the attic") he has found "nothing but fragments" and "a curious abundance of queer little drawings," many of which are reproduced'.