Friday Ephemeraren’t
I know, I know. I’m leaving you to fend for yourselves again. But after nearly a decade of Fridays, I’m sure you know what to do in the comments. To get things rolling, here’s one of these, and one of those, and some of that. Plus, a Morgan Freeman flashback circa 1971, Brad Bird on animation, and because I know you so well, a searchable historical compendium of coarse and vulgar English.
Indeed, why not teach the work of a Saintly Person of Color instead?
For instance, let’s take a look at the Arabized Berber and noted marginalized indigenous brown body of color Ibn Khaldun, to whom some would attribute the “invention” of sociology as a discipline.
Here is what our enlightened indigenous non-white scholar had to say about black Africans…
“Therefore, the Negro nations are, as a rule, submissive to slavery, because (Negroes) have little that is (essentially) human and possess attributes that are quite similar to those of dumb animals.”
https://books.google.com/books?id=FlNZ5wmo5LAC&pg=PA117
And here is what he had to say about the Muslim Arab conquest of Iran…
“But when the Persians came under the rule of the Arabs and were subjugated, they lasted only a short while and were wiped out as if they had never been. One should not think that this was the result of some persecution of aggression perpetrated against them. The rule of Islam is known for its justice. Such (disintegration) is in human nature. It happens when people lose control of their own affairs and become the instrument of someone else.”
https://books.google.com/books?id=FlNZ5wmo5LAC&pg=PA117
And here is what our esteemed beacon of moral enlightenment had to say about the Bedouin…
“Places that succumb to the Bedouins are quickly ruined[.] The reason for this is that the Bedouins are a savage nation, fully accustomed to savagery and the things that cause. Savagery has become their character and nature.”
https://books.google.com/books?id=FlNZ5wmo5LAC&pg=PA118
See, if only we taught more people of color instead of morally bankrupt dead white males, we could decolonize our curriculum of bigotry and bias and the vile scourge of colonialist whiteness once and for all! Like, literally!
Do I remember correctly that one Jessica Valenti has been mentioned here before?
It seems she wrote a book, and the book wot she wrote has been reviewed, or rather, thoroughly fisked by Robert Stacey McCain. A bit of a read, but worth it I think:
https://medium.com/the-patriarch-tree/lessons-of-a-sex-object-4b57f666dec5#.j3w0p6p3b
Do I remember correctly that one Jessica Valenti has been mentioned here before?
Yes, several times, though never kindly.
Soccer is a perfectly good English word; it’s only in the last couple of decades when some sort of linguistic snobbery has started deprecating it
I think there was a streak of anti-Americanism in the mix.
Very often, if someone referred to it as soccer, they would be told that only the Americans call it soccer.
There might also be a follow-on sentence about the stupidity of Americans etc and how the Americans call their national baseball championship the World Series etc
Ah, David, yes indeed. The good Mr McCain fillets her in a style I think would impress even you.
James, one hears that all the time still, even though
– Soccer was a UK term deriving from “Association Football”
– The “World” Series is named after the “World” newspaper which was the original sponsor
as anyone who cares to investigate knows.
But yeah, of course Americans are the stupid ones…
Regarding “One Weird Trick” for destroying First World nations, here’s another:
Hipsters demonstrating an inability to comprehend logic or reality, #3,453,986,589,574 . . .
Apparently someone intends to make a movie of Starship Troopers, which so far has yet to be done.
There is a cinematographic hairball of Verhoeven’s Bugs In Space!!! where anyone with any knowledge of the book agrees that the book and Verhoeven’s hangover are unrelated.
Apparently as part of this, A) The new project is to be called a “reboot” in the vain hope of giving Verhoeven any credibility, and B) hipsters are claiming offense.
From yesterday’s NYT, fact-free feminist twaddle. Seven hundred odd words that would be howled out of the place if they were applied to any group other than white men. And without a hint of irony.
Really? He did? Where do I go to get it, the DMV?
Fact free generalization, followed by a link to Vox, the young adult webzine that apparently is unclear on the concept of race, or correct attribution.
BTW, For you men out there who are curious about how awful you are, , the is on the beat.
And a last split second guess before the actual numbers get chewed over for the next several years . . .
“Fact free generalization, followed by a link to Vox, the young adult webzine…”
That reminded me of this quote from a link posted here recently:
from a link posted here recently
See today’s ‘elsewhere’ post, item one.
Off topic question…am considering going to see a movie Tueday night so I can dodge all this election BS. Problem is I got so tired of PC crap showing up in films that I stopped paying attention to them unless it was Batman or Spider-Man or possibly a reality based war pic. Ironically, aside from BM and SM (and The Phantom*) I’m not much of a comic book fan. But I see this Dr. Strange is playing. I know nothing of him at all except that he was mentioned here recently. Can anyone recommend it within the context of what I just related?
*For the Ghost Who Walks
Can anyone recommend it within the context of what I just related?
Um. Short answer; zero politics.
Longer answer: Given Stuff I already knew of, and with noted recent reading(1), my definite reaction is that the writers/producers seem to have insisted on making the paranormal Stuff immensely more complicated than they needed to . . . And, other than noting of having such a reaction, barring some relative obscurity that I wasn’t picking up on, yeah, no politics.
—You state having little knowledge of the story, and there is the bit of having Tilda Swinton as The Ancient One, where yes I agree that such is silly as hell regardless of having to maneuver around the Chinese Communists, where that in and of itself somewhat has absolutely zero affect on the storytelling alone . . . . At absolute worst, you’ll be telling yourself Yes, that is Thomas Jefferson dressed in a formal Kyoto court kimono, with zero explanation of how or why such clothing would turn up in late 1700s America, and Oh, Whatever, I’m just gonna watch the damn movie . . .
(1) . . . and by this point, quite recommended reading, that . . . See, also, a rather interesting article I ran across that discusses the concepts as a general overview, and that is how and why my reaction of making things much more complicated than needed . . .
Can anyone recommend it within the context of what I just related?
As Hal said, the story doesn’t have any obvious politics to gripe about so it should work as an election night palate cleanser. And once things kick into gear it rolls along briskly and with a generous helping of spectacle and some visual comedy. I actually think Tilda Swinton was an excellent casting choice and at times her performance is quite compelling.
Piper Paul
Your quote would be true in a country without free access to starting their own media, or in the short term.
In the US if a market is open then people move in. Fox did very quickly. Fox is popular and profitable, but not popular enough to suggest that there is room for many more similar.
Also, not that long ago the print media was, if anything, rather conservative. How, since it was more popular back then, did it get dragged left? Either there’s some vast conspiracy or it has followed the market, not vice versa.
One of the most pathetic paths Marxism went down was “false consciousness”. The fanciful idea people were naturally Leftists, only the organs of capitalism tricked them. Nowadays it is the alt-Right that does it — believing that only a kidnapped media prevents people from seeing what is true. It’s still a pathetic delusion.
“Coarse and vulgar English”…
Ahh…..so that’s what “fuck a brisket” means…..
I’m enlightened.
I actually think Tilda Swinton was an excellent casting choice and at times her performance is quite compelling.
A followup thought that actually would have rather even simplified things for the production: Have Strange get directed to a somewhat obscure bit of Manhattan—or even just something claimed to be upstate New York—and drop a line in of Oh, yes, we Used To Be in North Of India, but some number of years ago we moved to New York—and let movie watchers and others draw their own conclusions—and as part of the move from one continent to another, I Have Changed My Form . . . .
—It would indeed be rather an additional shift in the back story, but would rather underline We’re sorcerers, we just Do this.
We’re sorcerers, we just Do this.
Heh. Yes, the ‘Westerner visits The Mysterious East in search of salvation’ shtick is a tad creaky and antiquated – though less creaky and antiquated than in the original comics. But I suppose it adds some scenery to play with and heightens the ‘fish out of water’ aspect, and the subsequent gags about Wi-Fi, Beyoncé, etc.
I actually think Tilda Swinton was an excellent casting choice and at times her performance is quite compelling.
Oh David, you don’t know just how wrong you are.
In flipping both race and gender to cast Swinton as a character who in the original comics is a Tibetan-born man, Marvel admirably went out of the box to correct one aspect of underrepresentation in its cinematic universe, but did so at the expense of another. Like its fellow Marvel franchise Iron Fist, it is steeped in cultural appropriation and centers around what Graeme previously noted as the “white man finds enlightenment in Asia” trope.
Of course, the real reason that Hollywood couldn’t have a Tibetan played by an actual Tibetan was to avoid pissing off the Chinese. Let’s not mention that though eh?
Oh David, you don’t know just how wrong you are.
Heh. If experience has taught me anything, it’s that trying to appease pretentious clowns who earnestly use the term “cultural appropriation” is both futile and likely to backfire. These people want to disapprove, and be seen disapproving. It’s what they do, it’s how maintain their status among other pretentious clowns. Are we expected to believe that if the Mandarin had been depicted as an East Asian psychopath and terrorist, and if the Ancient One was still a geriatric Tibetan man, there wouldn’t have been just as much tutting, possibly more? Exactly what combination of ethnicities, gender, geography and roles, villainous and heroic, would meet with their approval?
Hmm…..
Cumchugger…..
Well I very never…..
“Anal astronaut”…..
Abo’s handbag, an Australian term for boxed wine.
I denounce myself.
Thanks for the all of the input. Not a big fan of sorcery and such but I think I’ll give it a whirl. Don’t see much else out there. Just to give you a hint of my illness, as it were, I was considering Hacksaw Ridge but the tv ads I keep seeing repeat some line about “others will be taking lives but I will be saving them”. While I truly admire the brave men who go out on the battlefield focused not on the enemy and thus less regard for their own lives and more for the wounded, knowing that they are easy targets for enemy combatants, that line has a ring of arrogant moral superiority to it that makes me highly suspicious.
Not a big fan of sorcery and such but I think I’ll give it a whirl.
I left happy and feeling entertained. And some of the effects design and compositing is quite remarkable.
Don’t see much else out there.
There’s always the old-school approach to ignoring current events. Read a book. I’m currently reading _Kon-Tiki_ by Thor Heyerdahl, and enjoying it immensely, especially the non-PC parts, mild though they are (he mentions race, and describes people by it! Horrors!:-).
If you want something of a more current, and less academic, flavor, the Monster Hunter International books by Larry Correia are good and fun. And of course there’s Adelsverein by one of the regulars hereabouts.
the Monster Hunter International books by Larry Correia are good and fun.
They really are.
Kon Tiki! One of my childhood favorites. I wonder if I still have my Dad’s copy?
My favorite bit is when the crew is forming, Heyerdahl congratulates Bengt Danielsson because it takes special courage to be the sole Swede in a crew of Norwegians.
(this remark led me to study the history of Scandinavia, particularly the issue of WW-2 German transit across Sweden into Norway.)
There’s always the old-school approach to ignoring current events. Read a book.
Oh trust me, I’ve read more than my share of books. To the point that I really don’t enjoy them much any more aside from history, which itself is not much more than fiction. And I’m spending most of my days buried in software tech manuals and such so getting rather restless anyway. Plus I’m only trying to burn 4 hours not 4 days. Besides, the idea is to get out of the house. I’d go shoot some pool or something but the bars are full of TV’s now. No plays/theater on Tuesday nights to speak of. I figured I haven’t been to the movies since that last space flick with that Matthew McConaughey or whatevs guy was in. Which itself was rather meh. But thanks to all for the movie tips.