BlackRock Inc on Wednesday said investors elected all of its director nominees and approved its executive pay at

Barbiemania is unstoppable. Merch is flying, people won't stop playing the soundtrack, and the Greta Gerwig film has been a huge box office hit. But now it has gone one step further and transcended pop culture to worm its way into the political realm - having influenced anti-Tory protesters, who have cast MPs as characters in the hit film and put posters of them around London bus stops and tubes. The posters show big name ministers and MPs Suella Braverman, Rishi Sunak, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Robert Jenrick, Lee Anderson and Priti Patel, Kemi Badenoch, Liz Truss, Boris Johnson, Michael Gove and Dominic Raab and doesn't cast them in a favourable light. Instead, they show quotes from the politicians or short bios about their failures accompanied with the hashtag "#ThisBarbieIsAC*nt". Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Liz Truss's poster, for instance, claims she is "as useful as a condom". It adds: "Liz Truss holds the record for the shortest time served as PM. She crashed the economy trying to make her pals richer. While we're struggling to buy food and pay our bills, she's making tens and thousands as a public speaker. "#thelettucewoulddoabetterjob". Another poster calls another former PM, Johnson a "f**king eejit". Pictures of the bus posters were uploaded to Twitter by the campaign group Lesbians and Gays Support the Migrants. The group, who posted the images on Twitter on the same day that Barbie was released in cinemas, wrote: “This week not only marks the cinematic event of the summer, but the Illegal Immigration Bill also passed a few days ago and it looks as though someone has been doing some alternative promo.” They added: “This government’s treatment of migrants and asylum seekers is an outrage that violates human rights and fails to protect those fleeing from persecution and conflict. It will make life even more dangerous for people on the move.” As for the tube posters, they wrote: "We may not all be barbie girls, but we do live in this Tory world. The UK government targets and scapegoats asylum seekers, migrants and trans people, and fabricates fear to distract us all from their farcical failure to serve the people." They referenced Sunak's commitment to expand North Sea drilling today, which is controversial because of climate change, adding: "While Shell announces annual profits almost 10X their last, around one in five (20 percent) of our population live in poverty. Now just this morning the Tories have issued 100 new oil and gas licences. Make it make sense. "We’re being rinsed, financially and politically, now and for generations to come. No mojo dojo case house vibes please, we’ve had Kenough". But it looks like the poster campaign might be short-lived. When the bus stop posters appeared, Transport for London (TfL) spokeswoman told the Evening Standard: “These offensive adverts are not authorised by TfL or our advertising partner JCDecaux. “We have instructed our contractors to remove any of these posters found on our network immediately.” Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

A Canadian public relations manager for a Chinese-founded development bank has announced his resignation in a statement that accused it of being dominated by “Communist Party hacks” and said Canada’s interests weren’t served by being a member

Egyptian luxury brands are harnessing traditional craftsmanship from jewellery design to carpet weaving to bring the country's ancient cultural...

Controversial figure Andrew Tate and Adin Ross clashed over LGBTQ+ issues during a livestream, turning it into a heated debate on gender

The Rolling Stones celebrated the release of their first collection of new original songs in 18 years with a club gig in Manhattan Thursday before a few hundred invited guests

TAIPEI Taiwan's exports dropped for the 12th consecutive month in August but less sharply than expected, and may

If Quordle is a little too challenging today, you've come to the right place for

By Carolina Mandl and Chris Prentice NEW YORK The U.S. securities regulator on Wednesday was set to finalize

Bruce Willis' family revealed his dementia diagnosis in February 2023

The Rugby World Cup will take place against the backdrop of a concussion lawsuit that has similarities to one settled by the NFL in 2013 at a likely cost of more than $1 billion

Just days after Sam Altman was fired as OpenAI’s CEO, the board might be considering bringing him back, according to reports. Anonymous sources told both the Wall Street Journal and New York Times that the board is considering walking back on its dramatic firing of Mr Altman. Both outlets reported that Microsoft, a prominent investor in the company, was leading the charge to reinstate Mr Altman. The company announced the leadership change on Friday. “Mr. Altman’s departure follows a deliberative review process by the board, which concluded that he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities,” the company wrote. “The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI.” While publicly citing communication issues, behind closed doors, the board and Mr Altman appeared to diverge when it came to OpenAI’s future. Mr Altman was hoping to push development more aggressively than the board, CNN reported. Greg Brockman, the president and cofounder of OpenAI who was asked to leave the board, wrote on X that the operation to upend the leadership happened quickly. Mr Altman was asked to join a video call with the board at noon on Friday and was immediately fired. Mr Brockman was not a part of the video meeting, he said. Twenty minutes later, Mr Brockman was told that he could stay in his role, but was being removed from the board, he wrote. “We too are still trying to figure out exactly what happened,” Mr Brockman wrote. He later announced he was quitting “based on today’s news.” Following his exit, Mr Altman wrote on X: “i loved my time at openai. it was transformative for me personally, and hopefully the world a little bit. most of all i loved working with such talented people. will have more to say about what’s next later.” The Times also reported that Mr Altman and Mr Brockman have plans to launch a new startup in the wake of his ouster and are speaking to investors. Those plans have not been made public. Read More OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman ousted as CEO ChatGPT Plus stops signups after major update ChatGPT creator mocks Elon Musk in brutal tweet