Early Experiments In Teleportation

Can we do the whole thread in *pirate voice*?
If it would make you happy, I suppose so, yes.

I thought you meant Tumbler.

Somewhat related, Heather Mac Donald on sinking standards and pretentious victimhood:

The ethnic-studies victim narrative is fiction. Far from being shut down by its racist institutional hosts, the field is growing. Even [Columbia literature professor, Frances] Negrón-Muntaner grudgingly concedes that radical scholars “may be incorporated and even rewarded.” Are they ever! Professors in “Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies” earned almost $12,000 more than the average professor in 2017–18, reported Campus Reform, drawing on data from the College and University Professional Association of Human Resources. If you were so benighted as to teach Math, Biology, or the Physical Sciences, you earned $15,000 less on average than your counterparts in ethnic studies. This is not a salary pattern consistent with a field under siege.

As it’s Ms Mac Donald, there’s plenty more to chew on.

The Guardian bemoans the fate of the word “woke”.

Like “politically correct” before it, the word “woke” has come to connote the opposite of what it means…today we are more likely to see it being used as a stick with which to beat people who aspire to such values, often wielded by those who don’t recognise how un-woke they are, or are proud of the fact.

They say that as if it is a bad thing…

They say that as if it is a bad thing…
“We just wanted free hits, forever.”

Diversity Mach Frei Is Our Strength, except when it isn’t.

“Go back to Iowa, you go back to Ohio*. New York City belongs to the people that were here and made New York City what it is,” Adams told the crowd gathered at the House of Justice on Monday…”I’m a New Yorker. I protected this city. I have a right to put my voice in how this city should run,” Adams said…Shortly after the event, Adams took to Twitter to double down, criticizing “new arrivals” for not making an effort to be a part of well-established communities.

Maybe they should build a wall.
*”What do think of Flushing, NY ?” “Great Idea”

They really thought tweeting this rubbish would make them look good
I suppose that at some point it becomes a reflex, a compulsion. An ideological tic.

Shortly after the event, Adams took to Twitter to double down, criticizing “new arrivals” for not making an effort to be a part of well-established communities.

Good thing he’s not a Canadian hockey commentator; he’d lose his job for that

Yet so dominant have the minority-opinion pushers become that many people are persuaded that it would not just be career-damaging but socially fatal to say anything to the contrary.
It’s worrisome enough that there are so many who believe that speaking the truth would be socially fatal; what really scares me is how many believe it should.
And the closing of that Grauniad article should win a prize for self-unawareness: “The language has been successfully co-opted – but as long as the underlying injustices remain, new words will emerge to describe them.” I mean, even if I’m willing to concede that the Right has co-opted “woke” and corrupted its meaning, do you really think the author wants to pull out the blackboard and tally up how many words each side has rendered meaningless?

While researching English music halls of the 1920s, I came across the word “Jap.”
Oh ho, raycist!
Well, no. Turns out Japanese acrobats were wildly popular at the time, and so whenever wanted to refer to one of those acts, they used “Jap” instead of “Japanese.”
Sort of like how we use “Brits” instead of “Britains.” If we could shorten “Americans”, we would.
Because we’re linguistically lazy, not raycist.

Well, Mr. Muldoon, my understanding is that “Yank” is an offensive stereotype (meaning ‘a youthful hoodlum’) in Japan… but only if it’s applied to someone who’s Japanese… but then again, most of my understanding of Japanese culture is based on Anime, so I could be oh so very wrong…

I made a joke at lunch today that made my boss nervous. He was eating black beans and rice and I referred to them as ‘Abe Lincoln beans’. He looked kinda puzzled. I said, “You know, frejos negros”. He still looked puzzled for a second and then a little nervous laughter.

Sort of like how we use “Brits” instead of “Britains.”
We’re Britons, actually, but no hard feelings.

“Our betters”
Mesh shirt alert.

Oooooh, UFO. Gerry Anderson’s best work.

“We’re Britons, actually, but no hard feelings.”
Do Britons find “Brits” offensive? Or is it on a level with “Yanks”?

“With groovy title music”
My phone’s ringtone.

I owned a toy SHADO mobile and an Interceptor. With its one big plastic missile
Heh. I was the only kid I knew who watched that show. Kinda annoyed my friends by trying to get them to watch it so we’d have something to discuss besides McHale’s Navy, which came in EXTREMELY snowy at our house on UHF channel 33 out of Miami.
But the ONE missile thing used to fascinate me. Of course I knew it was all imaginary/fantasy/whatever so I used to puzzle on why, with an imaginary technology of launching planes from under water, huge base on the moon, etc. etc. etc., they would be limited to just ONE torpedo or whatever. Seemed like the pilots were being sent on what was effectively suicide missions since the aliens seemed able to reload that green laser thingy at will. But hey, at least the pilots got to go down that (presumably) big long slide before facing near certain death.
And yes, the mesh clothing. Which I thought significantly differentiated it from most sci-fi clothing/uniforms. People talk about the great “predictions” in sci-fi that became realities. Like video/mobile phones, computers you can hold in your hand, etc. Yet tunics never really happened. Which, don’t get me wrong, qualifies as a good thing. Didn’t see mesh clothing becoming a gay thing though. Meh, the 70’s.

I’m now mentally humming the bloody theme tune.
And I’m picturing/remembering Lt. Ellis getting dressed. If I don’t get this damn SQL three table join working by lunch, I’m blaming you lot. And Gerry Anderson. Of course he’s now passed on…so…

Terry Jones
1942-2020

However, for all your fashion needs to bash the fash and other assorted Nazis like taxi drivers, Ian Miles Cheong notes a sale in progress.
Not swanky enough ? A mere 3,590 metric dollars will get you this anarchy leather jacket that pairs nicely with 540 metric dollar anarchy karate socks.
Oh sweet irony. The capitalism of anarchy writ large.

… the preferred term being ‘African American’ even when applied to people who aren’t even American…
I remember hearing a supposedly professional, and doubtless highly remunerated, newsreader describe Nelson Mandela as ‘the African-American South African leader’.

…anthropologists had three main categories for the human race, Caucasoid, Negroid, and Mongoloid.
That’s what I was taught, and how I still think of things. Amerindians were regarded as an offshoot of Mongoloids. And the Australian Aubergines were called Australoid but not considered a major group. Of course, this still left some anomalies / unclassifiables, such as the Bushmen and Hottentots of southern Africa (sometimes called Capoids) and the Ainu of Japan.
I expect to be tracked down and severely recalibrated for using outdated terminology. Please remember me as fondly as you can.

Australian Aubergines…
Eggplants ? Now you are in real trouble…

Yeah, it’s also recently become associated with the male-ist part of the male anatomy.
I’ve seen it used thusly as an emoji. Its association with a gentleman’s appendage is not immediately apparent to me, but then I am positively vestal.