Insert Coin For Dancing Monkey
With domain renewal looming, along with other behind-the-scenes overheads, now seems a good time to remind patrons that this rickety barge is kept afloat by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to help it remain buoyant a while longer, and remain ad-free, there are three buttons below the fold with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted.
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Oh yes. The buttons:
“Russia may be implicated in Hamas attacks”
Wow it’s taken four days for the lame-stream establishment shills to figure out a way of blaming Russia. Given that all they do is propaganda, it’s surprising how bad they are at it!
That.
Again, a signature of our times.
Grown man is terrified.
Apparently, if a Home Secretary dares to articulate some belated concern with the avalanche of illegal migrants, and notes some of the ploys used by them to milk the British taxpayer, then this means that gay middle-aged pop-singers must either live in terror or flee the country.
“It’s just terrifying,” says Will.
Given the continuity of dysfunction, it doesn’t seem vain at all.
“It’s just terrifying,” says Will.
If there is one thing “migrants” from Africa and “Asia” are known for it it the rich and diverse population of LSMFT types.
OTOH, and TBF, if he lives somewhere where these “migrants”, famed for their tolerance of LCTDC3 ilk, are being located, he might have reason to be scared.
On the bright side, even though he changed his hat, looks like we found Waldo.
I thought of that when I first heard of the attacks. It’s not ‘blaming Russia’ to note that this is a different tack than that usually taken by Hamas & their masters in Iran and, given recent rapprochement between Russian, China, and Iran, a joint planning exercise seems highly plausible.
Nor would it surprise me to find out the U.S. government had information that it conveniently didn’t get around to sharing with Israel.
Not hearing much that convinces me of either.
No, indeed. Still, it’s interesting how these fading celebrities know which noises to make in order to retain a toe-hold in the public consciousness.
Meanwhile, at the Labour Party Conference.
A fascination with glitter seems a hallmark of the puerile.
Related.
Come, let us give more power to the glitter-throwing loon. He and his ilk should be in charge of as much as possible.
Apparently a “People’s House” is one of those Citizen’s Assembly things, so beloved of the Woke set, which are a marvellous way of selecting a herd of unrepresentative thickos to be lectured by approved ideologues into making fatuous progressive recommendations to our other slightly more democratic institutions.
I imagine glitter-boy fancies himself for the post of chief House Haranguer.
In pop-culture news, the new iteration of Frasier seems like a terrible idea. I did enjoy the 90s series, most of it, but I saw the trailer for the new thing and didn’t once come close to laughing.
They’re shaking the corpse and hoping coins fall out of the pockets.
That seems an accurate description of much modern “entertainment”.
Though this is a fun take.
The original had some great moments, lots of them, but it did rather outlive its welcome. There were, what, eleven seasons? So many of the best gags hinged on Niles’ preoccupation with Daphne, and her obliviousness to his interest. Once they became an item, then married, the show lost much of its mojo.
Knowing when to stop is an under-appreciated British talent in the writing of comedy series.
Aelfheld, given the presence of Iranian sympathizers and/or agents at high levels in the U.S. Government, it would surprise me if the U.S. Had NOT deliberately withheld or distorted relevant intelligence.
Isn’t Fawlty Towers, which people often cite as a comedy that knew when to stop, supposed to be coming back? Again, nothing about that bodes well.
See also Absolutely Fabulous, which turned into slop with remarkable speed, then kept on dragging its zombie carcass into the TV schedules. The thing would rise up and twitch, in TV ‘specials’ and an unloved feature film, despite the jokes having run out in season two, decades earlier.
Mark Steyn
Pretty much the same relation to the people as a “People’s Republic”.
Meanwhile in Pennsylvania, “We are obliged to respect free speech, but if you want to protest this “hurtful” and “offensive” bigot we support you because everything we don’t believe in is hate speech, and oh, BTW, we are cancelling the speaker so your feels aren’t hurt.”
Only slightly paraphrased.
Things I am getting weary of: “I stand with___________” (fill in the blank).
Dollars to doughnuts, they don’t mean the children in Kfar Aza.
I did enjoy the 90s series
It had excellent writing and a lot of dry wit, but I recall the writers saying that the formula was explicitly “Frasier’s pomposity gets him into an embarassing situation, and then we watch him twist for 22 minutes”. Alongside Cheers, Wings, and Friends[1], 1990s NBC sitcoms were generally about watching the characters humiliate themselves in as degrading a fashion as possible. It was all a bit much for me.
Once they became an item, then married, the show lost much of its mojo
The tragically underappreciated 1998 Cupid blatantly lampshaded this in the second episode, painstakingly explaining to the audience that if the will-they-or-won’t-they ever gets resolved there’s no longer a show so please shut up about it.
On that note, I tried the first season of Moonlighting to see if it holds up (it does); it’s kind of charming to see a weedy, hyperkinetic Bruce Willis – with hair – playing what is effectively the 1980’s Shawn Spencer.
I would like to be the first to congratulate Canadian atrocity Robxn Hood on being the first series in history to score 1.0/10 on the review site IMDB.
Which I honestly didn’t know was actually possible.
Where did you stream it from? Wife and I thought about streaming it a while back but ran into some excuse to the effect that it could/would never be available due to the licensing issues with the wide range of music used.
could/would never be available due to the licensing issues
This is almost certainly true. There’s a ton of Canadian children’s television from the 1970s and 1980s that can’t even be released on DVD because the original contracts didn’t even conceive of home videotape, much less DVD. In order for Smallville to be released on disc, The WB had to re-record the backing music tracks to remove all the up-and-coming Warner Music artists they used the show to boost – and whose braodcast contracts had long since expired. Ironically, they had to do it all again when they released Smallville on streaming, for the same reason.
As for the source – I found the episodes on a completely abandoned Spanish treasure galleon, drifting in the trade lanes. Hazard to navigation, it was, and ’twas only right and proper we heave to and tow her out of harm’s way after assuring there were no crew aboard requiring assistance.
Where did you stream it from?
According to these guys, is on Hulu.
It does look stunningly bad. From the reviews:
What strikes me about so many glaringly woke productions is not just the incompetence of the writing – the often shockingly low standard – but the fact that we’re expected to find appealing and affirming such tiresome, narcissistic, morally awful characters. Characters who are presumably some idealised self-insert of the writers.
This phenomenon is also quite striking in several recent Marvel and DC offerings – say, Batwoman and Ironheart – in which the supposed hero or heroine is charmless, entitled, or just grating and repellent. And this isn’t some attempt at clever-clever spin. It’s the kind of psychology with which we’re supposed to identify. As, one assumes, the writers do.
It does rather give away the basic problem of the woke demographic. The practised victimhood and the rote pieties about “social justice” are just unconvincing camouflage for fundamentally obnoxious people.
The bits of Frasier that I remember fondly tend to be the Niles-Daphne situations, which grew from small, comical details – a momentary expression, a lost earring – to full-on gothic-mansion-on-stormy-night operatic farce.
“Doctor Crane, your glockenspiel has sprung to life!”
The weirdest thing is that, for all his prickly pride at the turd he extruded, “Director X” could hardly have been more demeaning of the racial demographic represented if he actually were a Wyte Supremacist.
And speaking of the unspanked.
Quite. In a way, bad woke drama – which is to say, woke drama – does offer some insight into the psychology of its writers. And by extension, the wider progressive demographic.
As is now the custom, the director has been busy blaming “racists” for the audience reaction to his hilariously tin-eared and shoddy work. Apparently, these “racists” – by which he means pretty much the entire audience – is “angry that it was a black woman playing Robyn Hood.” You see, it’s all about “hate.” Not the fact that the series is itself racially obnoxious and just staggeringly bad.
And so, a question comes to mind. What kind of person would publicly denounce his audience as racist in order to deflect responsibility for his own obvious incompetence?
While clearly expecting to get away with it.
Only slightly paraphrased.
The inevitable intellectual pablum: “Well, of course we support Free Speech. But. You know, we’re Fascists. So you’re banned.”
The kind of person whose mother maintained a condom jar for her promiscuous, immoral, self-centred, violent, degenerate, irresponsible, criminal, fatherless offspring?
Ker-ching!
Bless you, sir. Should a neighbour have some large appliance delivered, may the surrounding area not be left covered in polystyrene snow.
Heh. Funny you mention that. Vague reference to a certain Robert Redford movie that was recently available? I rarely watch 21st century movies as I find the stupidity intolerable and, well, disturbing. Wife saw great reviews (a dead giveaway for stupid movies) recently for some 2013 thing by him about an old man in a sailboat adrift in the Indian Ocean because he hit a shipping container. I’m no sailor but I have spent considerable time in powered boats on the ocean fishing on a few bad days. OMG that was painful to watch.
Thanks. Will have to look for it when we get home.
Thanks for the entertaining (and thought-provoking) reads, Mr Thompson.
I made a contribution to your Blog Preservation Fund.
Too kind, but nice to hear.
Bless you, sir. May your towels always match.
It is getting tedious, that thing that never happens happened again and again.
And it will doubtless continue happening, with ever greater boldness, until those same progressive ladies, the ones smiling and applauding, and who make this farce possible, stop pretending.
You don’t say.
“What’s he being arrested for?”
“Disorderly conduct right now.”
“All right. What’s that mean?”
American higher education leaves something to be desired.
Judging by the tone, and the company, I’m guessing the question is disingenuous and voiced to express belligerence, not curiosity.
It’s who they are. It’s what they do.
rom-coms: one of the reasons I can’t watch them anymore is that the entire premise is so off. You have a guy, wooing a girl who often is already engaged (Sabrina, sleepless in Seattle, Titanic) and if he succeeds that means she is shallow and unfaithful. The guy is often a dork with no job but shows his intense love so that is forgiven. But nothing is ever shown about the girl that is in the least redeeming, besides being pretty. Can she cook? Does she help people? Does she want kids? Does she read? We don’t know.
On another note, those supporting Palestine conveniently call it a “rebellion” and a “freedom” movement. But Israel would be happy to leave them alone and even give them work visas if only they would stop shooting. This is NOT about freedom or “occupation” but is a religious war. Hamas and the others want the extinction of the jews. They want the end of Israel. The rockets being shot for the last x years have been intended to kill civilians. The current atrocities make it clear that genocide is the goal.
Oh, quite.
Still stunningly stupid though.
If you think of them as dumb little balls of malice, whose only ingenuity is in matters of spite, you won’t go far wrong.
Those supporting Palestine have been known to indulge in all sorts of mendacity.
That.
Those supporting Palestine have been known to indulge in all sorts of mendacity.
“It is an open air prison“, with
water parks(oops, Hamas destroyed that one), malls, fancy restaurants, nice beaches, a resort, traffic jams, and all the other things you find in a veritable gulag.But nothing is ever shown about the girl that is in the least redeeming, besides being pretty
What’s the primary audience demographic for rom-coms?
There are rare exceptions. The Julia Roberts vehicle My Best Friend’s Wedding completely deconstructs the trope, and the sitcom Happy Endings focuses on the poor bastard left at the altar immediately after one of these insulting pander-fests fades to credits.
[ Opens Daniel’s file, adds suspicious knowledge of rom-coms. ]
It reminded me of that time in 2018, when Franklin revealed his detailed knowledge of the life and films of Jason Statham.
I wasn’t quite sure how to process it.
*ping*
Ping!
Bless you, sirs. May five minutes with the pumice prove more than sufficient.
Thanks to all who’ve chipped in so far, or subscribed, or done shopping via the Amazon links, including all those much too shy to say hello. It’s much appreciated and is what keeps this place here.
I give you The Los Angeles Times.
A little over the top, but this guy gets it.
To pass the time, some reheated items:
Trust Me, I’m A Witchdoctor.
The thrill of prehistoric healthcare.
Only Doing It For The Betterment Of Us All.
Come, dip a toe in the world of “queer studies.”
Don’t Oppress My People With Your Public Libraries.
The history of ideas, as seen through the welding goggles of wokeness.
Those Aboriginal Telescopes.
On tongue-bathing the primitive.
Something About The Tone.
Urban Studies lecturer bemoans litter inequality, homes nicer than his own.
Have You Tried Less Tiresome Music?
On the word you mustn’t say but must love hearing.
*pays off bar tab*
Bless you, sir. May you notice that you’ve gotten better at something.
The unspanked, part… oh, I dunno. I lost count some time ago.
Someone no one ever hear of says, “America does not deserve me.”
Another of the hopelessly oppressed in AmiriKKKa…
Sounds like colonization to me.
Today’s word is hiveminder.
Today’s word is hiveminder.
Well as long as the “well educated” in gender and queer studies say it is evil, it must be so.
Related, “What do you mean they are killing our guys? Yeah, that thing we signed yesterday, nevermind“.
It’s interesting to see just how little of what passes for activism involves autonomous mental activity. The above example, one of so many, seems more a matter of social-status calculation: “Which things, of which I know next to nothing, should I be seen to oppose, quite vehemently, and thus be considered fashionable?”
“Did you do your Israel/Palestine post yet?“
Chappie is quite proud of his ignorance:
It’s a righteous ignorance, you see.
[ Laughs at forthcoming Ephemera item, denounces self. ]
He doesn’t need to know anything about the book he’s protesting. Someone told him it was written by a witch.
Currently in a discussion with a high school friend of friends regarding the 6 billion. He is quite proud that he doesn’t know what the word ‘fungible’ means. He refuses to look it up and keeps asking me to tell him the definition. Idiots.
What I have observed upon being put in contact with a lot of not very bright people from back in the day, surfer dudes, party dudes, jocks, the kind of people who were at one time entertaining but not very smart, is that at some point, likely in the last 10 years or so, someone woke them, sold them on a leftist brand of stupid that would propel them to the front of acceptable society. Likely acceptable leftist society.
Heh. Well, quite.
If anyone is curious as to what said book is actually about, here’s an interview with its editors, in several parts.
I’m still not clear on why someone who hasn’t read the book, even in part, and who seemingly knows nothing much about it, would bother to turn up on a cold night and want to participate in a protest against the book’s existence. A protest at which event attendees, largely women, were screamed at and physically obstructed by students and assorted activists, including Dr Jonny Dennis, who were laying on the ground and, apparently, grabbing at the attendees’ legs.
I mean, it doesn’t strike me as an obvious, or obviously worthwhile, use of one’s time. Unless, of course, laying on cold concrete and grabbing at random women’s legs is a thing one enjoys doing.
The words “The Piglet Files” bubble up into my conciseness; that, however, was funny.
“That is one small step for a man, one giant leap for Potemkinwomen“
Someone no one ever hear of says, “America does not deserve me.”
Pretty much a requirement when you’re half as smart.
Also, just wait for the first sign of trouble and these Blaxiteers will be screaming for an airlift back to safety.
Also, long overdue sorry to you Muldoon. Was going through some stuff at the time.
I agree with her. But for reasons quite different from hers.
Steve,
Thanks, but not needed, I should have recognized something was wrong and just backed off whatever the hell the conflict was I was probably adding 110 leaded to, but then it wouldn’t be a proper blog without the occasional argument about something inconsequential in the long run…
That.
P.S. Tip jar hit.
The indignation does seem to be recreational, a kind of role-play, and more about social positioning than any supposed danger posed by two middle-aged ladies.
See also this farcical example.
Again, the ignorance on display, from would-be intellectuals, regarding the object of their ire, is quite something. Apparently, five minutes of Googling was too much to ask of students at an upscale university where annual tuition is $60,000. And these are the preening creatures who call themselves “thought leaders.”
Bless you, sir. May you always have bin liners.
What the hell does he think he’s doing? It’s like watching a toddler’s tantrum.
Absolutely. It’s the psychology of The Unspanked.
And so, Dr Jonny Dennis, our righteous man, publicly boasts of protesting against books whose contents are unknown to him, and spends his evenings behaving like a spoiled infant and physically harassing random women, and thrusting his crotch at them. All in the name of his own righteousness. Because trying to make random women, some of whom are elderly, trip and fall over is what “social justice” is all about.
I mean, you say it out loud and it sounds unhinged. Yet here we are. Again.
A belated ping. Thanks for doing what you do.
Bless you, sir. When short of inspiration for a quick but tasty dinner, may you remember those bags of rather good chicken stew stashed in the freezer.
#TrueStory