I've just had probably the most charming birthday ever. Besides getting my DVD box-set of THE PRISONER, the chef whipped up a cake with none other than the Incredible Hulk on the top, made out of bright green marzipan with the trademark scowl on it's features. Even the bottom of the pants had the sufficient tears and rips. Wonderful timing, considering 2003 is to be the 'Year of the Hulk' (Ang Lee's movie). But there was one mistake, one capital mistake the chef had made that tore apart the very fabric of the space time continuum.
The pants weren't purple.
Horror of horrors...
ROB: Thank you for that passage. Uh...I didn't even know I was part of a 'crowd' here. Now I'm really worried.
BERMANATOR: In cases like this, P.A., the best I could suggest is removing yourself from western civilization utterly, but I don't know too many people who enjoy that scenario.
If it's any comfort, reincarnation is a wonderful concept and something you might want to look into - that we all achieve different forms of existence resulting from whatever deeds we committed previously.
For example, the fellows who continued to take photos of Princess Di as she lay slowly dying in her car will probably become short-lived maggots in some random housefly's brood buried within a cocker spaniel's excrement.
To the Washu/Chris crowd...
In my early teens I was at the peak of my comics-collecting. In my New York binges I pursued Marvel back issues relentlessly; especially Fantastic Four. Some issues I found from over a decade earlier cost me $25-$50.
I was pawing through a box of those last night and pulled out an old Thor. It was issue #193, co-featuring the Silver Surfer. I leafed through the pages. It was part II in a three-issue saga about Loki stealing the Odin ring, taking Asgard and finally creating the demon, Durok the Demolisher, to wreak havoc on Earth with the intent of destroying Thor. When the Surfer comes to Thor's aid he is left to handle Durok on his own; in the course of the battle he is briefly taken out. Gerry Conway wrote a really nice passage for this scene, which goes on for two pages (beautifully drawn by John and Sal Buscema):
SO DO THE NOBLE FALL...
FOR THEY ARE EVER CAUGHT IN A TRAP OF THEIR OWN MAKING...
A TRAP..WALLED BY DUTY..AND LOCKED BY REALITY.
'GAINST THE GREATER FORCE THEY MUST FALL..
...FOR, AGAINST THAT FORCE THEY FIGHT..
BECAUSE OF DUTY...BECAUSE OF OBLIGATION.
AND WHEN THE NOBLE FALL..THE BASE REMAIN.
THE BASE...WHOSE ONLY PURPOSE IS THE CORRUPTION OF WHAT THE NOBLE DID PROTECT...
WHOSE ONLY PURPOSE IS...TO DESTROY.
TO DESTROY..
...AND DESTROY
...AND DESTROY
THE NOBLE: WHO, EVEN WHEN FALLEN, RETAIN A VESTIGE OF STRENGTH.
...FOR, THEIRS IS A STRENGTH BORN OF THINGS OTHER THAN MERE FORCE. THEIRS IS A STENGTH SUPREME...
THEIRS IS THE STRENGTH...
...TO RESTORE.
The panel-to-panel transition worked really well. Good piece of craftsmanship.
Just thought I'd share that.
Alex,
I have to say it...I cannot hide the need to say it...I'm utterly, genuinely sorry to read that about your son. I do hope a brighter future awaits you and your spouse.
I personally believe that everything in nature has soul.
What is soul, anyway? I know I got it; people tell me all the time.
One thing I know: you can't teach it.
I think animals have soul. Dogs and cats (the animals with which I'm most familiar) certainly have personalities. They understand things you say and very definitely have feelings.
Still, I don't mind eating animals. Guess I sold my soul for bacon, man! :)
But is "having soul" the same thing as "having A soul?"
Hmmmm.......(she ponders and ponders...).
(PS: thanks for keeping the debate around here both vigorous and civil. That is sooooo unusual when topics like this crop up in other places. I'm done with the debate myself, but I'm enjoying reading your continued thoughts. Thanks for being candid and reasonable).
Cindy, with all due respect, your question, however well-meant it may be in this case, is essentially just an attempt to get people's feet onto the old slippery slope. It's an attempt to set rules, essentially. It's also indicative of a gap in your knowledge. Roe v. Wade did not give women complete authority to frivilously end a pregnancy in the third trimester. In the third trimester, the Supreme Court adjudged, the state does have some interest.
But in effect, it's just another version of the question, "If it's a human being one second after it leaves the womb, why isn't it a human being one second before?" It amounts to special pleading for the anti-choice definitions, pure and simple.
I generally stay out of abortion debates, because, since my son died and we had to abort two unviable fetuses, I'm a hard-ass on the issue. My wife and I make the decision, and we don't give a rat's hairy behind for other people's opinions on our decisions. But I have observed certain ploys that come up, over and over, on both sides. Sorry Cindy, but your question is the leading edge to such a ploy, even though I'm sure you meant it sincerely. A pro-choicer who picks it up and treats it seriously is in for a long, fruitless argument.
--Alex
XANADU,
I'm glad you're back... delighted.
:)
My statement you refered to was candid-- I was posting under the influence of Peg and Cookie.
I understand the degree of courage that Peg had to muster when posting about her Christian faith here. I respect her adherence to her beliefs and I don't think anyone could challenge her sincerity. Since I am a Christian too I knew that my post would not put me in a good light with Peg, whom I consider to be a friend. Still, I felt compelled to share my own experience-- not to condone abortion or expose my inability to stick with the ship no matter whom it ended up drowning, but to show that even with resolve and conviction mitigating circumstances can put extreme english even on a long and passionately held belief.
I do agree, abortion is a horrible thing. I don't think we'll ever be on the same page as those who are pro-abortion on demand, but I think both sides could make a few common sense concessions that might move us toward the middle.
Outlawing all abortion probably isn't going to happen but...
QUESTION TO THE PRO-CHOICE AMONG US:
I think most pro-choice advocates would agree that a full term baby that is 8 months or 9 months that is perfectly healthy and posing no danger to it's mother should not be legally killed.
To accomodate a woman's right to choose, she could have the baby removed... but she should not have the right to demand the death of a healthy child that could live on his own without her.
Any of y'all disagree with that statement?
Cindy
Little Washu: My thinking on souls comes from the attempts to reconcile science and spiritualism. I'd like to believe that I have a soul/spirit, but I am also devoted to the facts of biology and evolution. So logically, if humans have souls, and we are animals, shouldn't other animals have souls too? I can't buy the idea that only we have souls, no other animals do. That just doesn't work for me.
The belief that animals have souls has led me down some twisting paths. I am now a vegan, and that is hard. Also, it's hard to find good shoes (I buy my leather ones used; that's my compromise). Yet inevitably, I must hurt animals b/c it's embedded in our culture-- my car's tires are vulcanized with animal fat, etc. So on some level I am always a little bit morally compromised. What's a soul to do?
Bermanator
BERMANTOR: Do animals have souls? Well, can 'consciousness' be directly connected to 'soul'? I believe there's degrees of sentience in lifeforms. Dogs and dolphins are two such examples, and might qualify as having souls of their own if such an argument is true.
Jon,
You're absolutely right: Isaac Newton...one of the greatest minds in history...was a Theologist. It IS important to keep a couple of things in mind about that:
1) He lived in a time without the technological resources to understand what was going on around us. Everyone was raised to believe Man was the center of the universe and no tools yet existed to even frustrate that notion.
2) Newton grew up on the Bible; when you grow up on something it's pretty much with you for the rest of your life - particularly in those primitive times. Indeed, throughout his life Newton had a childlike faith and lived like a conscientious Puritan.
The ironies about Newton left me thinking of him for a long time being to physics what Jefferson was to the subject of slavery...
He was a man who'd developed two kinds of calculus to solve the problem of celestial motion. Before the age of 28 he'd singled-handedly destroyed the medieval concept of the world as a structure moved by the invisible but ever-present hand of God. There was no longer a place in the cosmos, it seemed, for the providential involvement of a supreme being in the affairs of Man. All this delivered, ironically, by a man who would commit the rest of his life to Theology. The course of his studies itself was a closed circle as he'd been raised on and fascinated by, from what I remember reading, the book of Daniel; his work in astronomy and celestial mechanics all grew out of his consuming interest in the book of Daniel! After his stunning but brief work in mechanics he would return full circle to his beginnings. He would proceed in an effort to PROVE the existence of a deity - one of the results being a dictionary of prophetic symbols that was to demonstrate the physical and religious occurrences attached to prophetic verse - using approaches similar to those used in the Principia. To the extent of PROVING anything he failed.
David: Actually, I just thought the positing about "successful marriage" was intended as a bit of tongue in cheek humor, which got a chuckle from me, and a tart "men are pigs" comment from the wife.
Rick & Xan, re the conception of evil: I've often considered the notion of a person's actions being labelled 'evil' a description that is more likely something conferred upon the person's behaviour by others, rather than something inherent.
A short time ago, TVO, our education channel aired a documentary of edited testimony from the trial of Adolf Eichmann, and I was left with the impression of how this man seemed wholly comfortable in being able to carry the airs of a bureaucrat, thinking himself perfectly justified in carrying out the duties of his office. Within his eyes he felt he was performing necessary logistics of his society's professed aims, timetabling trains to ferry Jewry to work and concentration camps throughout Nazi controlled Germany and Poland, without the slightest realization of of the fact of sending millions of innocents to their deaths. In the same breath, Eichmann and many others considering Jews themselves to be 'evil', to have been the cause of all the failures of Germany to ascend as a nation, and as a result to be brutally dealt with.
BOS
Peg: That's lousy. It's nice to see someone handle it so well, but that doesn't modify the lousiness.
Religion stuff: Well, Isaac Newton was a devout Christian, and my unimpeded areligious brain ain't beating him in the brains department anytime soon, unless my singing deodorant idea really, really flies. I'm not a religious person, and I probably agree with more of Rob's points than anyone else's -- but Reason (as opposed to reason) elevated to the level of dogma is as pernicious as any religious creed. And as soon as Stephen Hawking (in _A Brief History of My Unread Bestseller_) starts into the schtick about a universe without any need for a God because it never started in the first place, based on one model, Stephen Hawking is blowing just as much smoke out of his ass as anyone with yet another piece of the true cross or yet another psychic hotline to sell.
And that's why my god is Crom.
Cheers, Jon
No questions, Rob. Just the theory that either you were molested by snake-handling Baptists at a very young age or you failed your Dianetics entry quiz and the Sc*entologists didn't want you.
L.
{insert snapping clams here}
"Move on and quit jumping down people's throats when they state their beliefs on this board."
1) Nearly always, when anyone summarizes his or her opinion, it is a "vast generalization".
2) I'll assume you raced through my posts with the cursory glance I give Bush's comments in the news. So, you probably missed some crucial points I was trying to make. And I happen to think they were good ones. If there's a CONCEPT I really have to take issue with, I have to summarize the REASONS I take issue with it. Inevitably, my gripes about human nature tend to surface like boils. These are tangents of my OWN beliefs, which I state from the gut, worded in the way I feel I need to word them. It is my own feeling that religion could be among our undoings. It is...a "belief" of mine...which I am stating here on the board just like everyone else.
3) I had to make clear to Peg what I meant about "reasoning" with people of faith, particularly when a social issue is argued in a religious context. I really had no desire to get into the matter of blind faith again. That's why I said, "believe as you will...".
4) I WAS about to move on till you brought me back to this. Now, unless you need anything else from me I'm ready to move on.
Any further clarifications needed?
BOS asked:
> "(and many people seem to regard "successful marriage"
> in those terms)": Am I to infer from this that I am to be
> seen as some species ignoring extinction, clutching in
> futility to what you perceive as a cultural anachronism?
Ehhhmmm ... it sounds as if there's a very good question in there somewhere, but I'm afraid I just can't parse it. Could you rephrase, please?
Ahh, I think you are asking me whether I consider marriage an "evolutionary anachronism." Of course not. I'm a happily married man, myself. I was merely suggesting there may be other ways to adjudge a marriage successful than either stability or longevity. I've observed some marriages that achieve one or both which I would nevertheless call rotten. And I don't automatically regard a separation or divorce as a failure.
Peg: If you label as a life or baby whatever results from the union of spermatozoan and egg, then Mother Nature or God or whomever kills babies all the time. Hundreds of them. Thousands of them. Maybe even more than humans abort by mechanical and chemical means, I don't know.
If you can acknowledge that and then object to our "playing God" by choosing when and whom to abort, my response is that we "play God" all the time in other arenas. I don't regard this one as terribly different.
Rob,
At the risk of incurring your proselytizing yet again--and usually I ignore your vast generalizations--I must point out that the following statement is patently false, or, at the very least, cannot be proven one way or the other:
"There are brilliant people who are also religious, or they are at least believers. It is, nevertheless, an impeding mind-set."
An impeding mind-set for what? For not believing that there is no God? Look: Peg believes. Cindy believes. And maybe a few others that haven't said anything, but you've written quite a bit on how believers are misinformed and even mentioned the word "zealot" to describe those that posted or would post in response to your own brand of dogmatic statements.
Like I said, I normally wouldn't jump into the middle of this, but for someone who can speak so intelligently you seem to have your own impeding mind-set when it comes to people stating their beliefs and your sense of outrage at their beliefs.
Live and let live. Especially on this board where I've seen, with a few exceptions, intelligent people arguing and debating in a civil manner. You are on record as being a non-believer. Move on and quit jumping down people's throats when they state their beliefs on this board.
(Ok, that last statement is probably out of line, but I'm keeping it in there, consequences be damned. Rob, I know you'll respond because you're Rob, but I've said my piece.)
Xanadu:
Good to see the rumours of your demise were greatly exaggerated. Welcome back.
Byebye, BOS
A bit, as Mel puts on her face. Out to dance, and eat.
Peg: Good god, mother-in-law and then a burglary. What's next next for you, a plague of locusts? In all seriousness, I hope you and husband get through this, and a little insurance softens the blow, at least for the property loss. I know the sense of invasion will take a bit longer.
Bermanator: Animals and a soul? Hmmm, that's one for a bit of consideration. The notion of a soul's existence in man brings debate; the extension of the concept to our fellow species is an interesting premise.
Now, the beasts of the field and the birds of the air do have intelligence, albeit less in comparison to ours, along with other comparatives of self and socialization that match up to human in behaviour patterns. But they do appear to lack the concept of abstract conception, in terms of self-awareness, language, religion, the lot. (I've yet to see beavers enter a church of their making) Perhaps that's where the thinking of a soul for animals breaks down, but more in the fact that the soul seems to be a creation of us as abstract conceptualists. We are the only species that professes its possible existence, and that would seem to be a solid argument against the soul's being at all.
This is one to play with for awhile, and sadly I'm just about out the door. Wouldn't mind picking it up later.
BOS
Peg,
First I was going to include this in my last precis. Then I decided not to and just give my own position on things in my own way. Now I changed my mind again.
Thus, on the matter of "being able to reason with one so extreme", well...let me put it this way: A Creationist, as an example, will discard the lessons from the Scopes Trial or what we're learning in the labs; that person's faith, in his/her mind, is the unalterable reality. Whether there's contrary evidence or not. No facts, no geometrically perfect arguments will change that person's mind about it. Strictly in this sense I just wouldn't be able to "reason" with this person. That's simply the way it is with most people who hold to a faith. That's what I meant. It's my experience. One I'm not playing semantics with. I remember vividly Sagan, in his last days, trying in vain to lay out logical fact-driven arguments about our place in the universe with a religious audience; it seemed like Joseph Priestley trying to explain the molecular structure of grass blades to grazing bovine. And do NOT mistake that crack as equating YOU with bovine; I am challenging a mind-set. There are brilliant people who are also religious, or they are at least believers. It is, nevertheless, an impeding mind-set.
Also, I understand you were trying to point out man's responsibility in his "God-given dominion"; I sat back to spin out a long spiel why the "dominion" concept itself has been a destructive one. I also sought to say little has been "GIVEN" to us; we TOOK it all...generally at the expense of others or the earth itself.
Typo slipped by me:
I mean "perceived", not "percieved".
In the evolutionary chain the highest creature of one class is directly contingent upon the lowest creature of the order above. Scientists only recently found the evidence to conclude our earliest ancestors used up their resources swiftly as voracious predators, driving mammals into extinction and turning fertile earth into barren plains. We were a species of waste and rapacity from the outset and that beginning reaches down to this day in the Enrons and WorldCons all around us; we are certainly not denied our heritage. Organisms evolve through the mechanism of competition and the survival of the more viable forms. Ever abused, such a conception was irresistible and its flavor of economic laissez-faire in the 19th century provided the blank check I spoke of earlier. We’re still carrying that check around in our vest pockets.
Even as I type this I’m hearing a report on the radio about a revival of whale-killing - not because we need it, with today’s technology - but because it still generates great capital. In spite of the lessons of history, in spite of the wealth of wisdom we have to tap from we are truly one with our primordial ancestors: we haven’t changed a bit.
Whoever Jesus really was - historical records from those days and those accounts don’t exist and Western religions blindly thrive on the myth-figure shaped by Constantine, no questions asked - his legacy is but a parable, nothing more. Every century sees the belated "Second Coming" and nothing ever materializes. Yet, how comforting it is to know there will always be a second coming. No: there are no Gods; there are no messiahs. We are an animal at the top of the hierarchy always ready to move in on what it wants while using its power of ideas to relinquish itself of guilt and responsibility. No great beings were there to "give" us any "dominion". We TOOK it and NAMED it our dominion; it was in our genes...not because of some supreme being granting them to us but because of the way we interact with environment, adapting to it by MAKING it adaptable. This may seal our heriditary fate if we can't find a way to deal with it.
How I wish we could remove the blindfolds of faith and confront our own nature directly. We might then rely less on rationalization to defend our acts. Here is a historical fact about faith, one which I know will be discarded by the zealots here, an example of how it’s used as a tool to control: the process of degeneration, the idea that the species can change from a more complex to simpler form makes extinction a possibility. It means those forms that cannot adapt as environment changes eventually disappear. Survival of the fittest. In the 17th and 18th centuries theological doctrines rejected the concept, along with the idea that species could become extinct. The species must have remained fixed and constant from the Creation. Any evolution, degeneration or extinction would detract from the perfection of the world. What the Lord creates must be perfect. It followed that fossils could not have been the remains of extinct animals. This law freed man to do as he pleased: he could interact with and exploit the earth and all the lower orders, and what he percieved as the lower order (remember this was White European, the "highest" racial order), free of concern about waste. A grand provision for economic and political power. This is the kind of blank check religion typically offers; never mind pursuing the facts if we can live with a clear conscience.
Out of convenience we are constrained by how we perceive things not by the need to know.
Just to say,I posted my thanks to all on the other board. And I think it's time to move on in subject matter. We've been level headed so far, and I don't want to raise pulses and tempers further. Back to lurking for a while....
Rob,
I find your statement
"People embracing world views this extreme cannot be reasoned with; logic, history and empirical evidence hold no weight"
to be generalizing, inaccurate, and personally offensive. Just because someone believes in a supreme being (while you do not) does not strip them of all intellectual capacity or the ability to learn. They may not come to the same conclusions as you or agree with you. I am not certain if you are being sarcastic or extreme or just ill-written with this statement; an effort to be more temperate in future would be appreciated.
In regards to imposing belief structures - many laws that appear to be attempts at legislating morality or beliefs are not such, but instead seek to impose societal structure; examples might include murder or stealing (which in some belief structures and societies *are* acceptable under various circumstances; this is an example of values or morals with which many folks happen to agree).
To put this in context of the abortion debate, I ask - if someone was being murdered against their will, and you could try and prevent it, would you? That is the quandry in which many pro-life proponents find themselves. (The same is probably true of vegans regarding animals, to consider a different viewpoint; it makes the blood splattering of fur far more understandable.) One might not seek to impose prayer in school, or to force everyone to keep the sabbath, or to legislate any number of other ideologies of a personal belief structure. Politics and belief should generally, I'm sure you will agree, be kept separate. (An aside - to me Christianity is all about personal relationships and salvation, not about seeking to run governments and countries. From a biblical standpoint, Christians are called to follow the laws of man unless they conflict with the laws of God.)
However, in this case you would allow what you consider to be murder (and hence for many Christians, against God's law) to be not only legal, but funded with your personal tax dollars. It's not about belief or morality or principles to those who are pro-life proponents -it's about sanctioned death. This is why it is so emotional.
Heather: Thanks – I appreciate your comment on the other board, though you may need to review the chapter on personal sacrifice again.
Peg: Thank you, I recognize that you were explicating the logic behind religious thinking in these matter, not proselytizing – and though I am not religious and we disagree 'til 26 weeks, I respect your personal POV.
Rob: I'm curious, doesn't the very nature of society mean that sometimes our personal "right" to behave as we desire or to pursue our personal interests regardless of consequence is limited by a consensus view of what is legal, ethical or moral? Is that not society "imposing" a consensus "worldview" or "value system" on individuals? It seems to me that the logical outcome of a world were everyone is entitled to do whatever the hell they personally desire is a shortcut to anarchy, and that is not a position I can support.
Cindiana: Wow, your personal experience, and your willingness to share leaves me in awe. It does illuminate the slippery nature of "abstract philosophical position"vs. "rubber-meets-the-road reality".
P.A., David Loftus, BOS, Lynn, et al involved in "dominion": Point the first – it's a religious perspective, and since man wrote the book, of course we get top billing. Point the second – we ARE the dominant species of the planet at this moment. We're not very good at it, but until we Uplift the dolphins and apes, we're it. Consider it a divine plan, freak of evolution, whatever – we are it – we get to use the resources, we get to fill up the space with what we want, we get to eat the other life on the planet. Are we very good at it? Not very. Will we get better? Maybe. Will anything care in a million years? Not likely. Should we take this as a license to do and act without regard for the other lives that share this exceedingly small and fragile little globe? Of course not, but I am very species centric – we've won this round of evolution, we get to decide. I don't need the rationalization of "soul" to defend it.
Rick: Again, regarding my post on the other board – I have never claimed an ability to read minds or discern motivation, nor do I particularly need to. I have said, more than once, that I reserve the right to judge other people's actions, as they can judge mine. If one acts in an evil fashion, you are evil. What is evil? Well, much of my list of six is a good starting point – as well as the lists of everyone else. I made no claim that I was the ultimate arbiter of men's souls. Nor do I feel any need to weigh the potential of redemption in my ordering. As this was a hypothetical exercise, no one need fear my rampaging moralism or value system. But after much thought and debate with myself – this is the list and the order in which I placed them – if I were presented with a situation that pits one thing against another, this is the way the cards will fall. For me. Alone.
Looking back over my post on the other board, perhaps I was not clear stating that my hierarchy was direct riff on Harlan's initial query – If we consider a situation that only involves reward, my six are as good a list as any, but when that same situation involves threat – the pitting of one thing against another – this is the way and specific value list with which _I_ will resolve the conflict.
Your mileage may very.
Thanks for the considerate responses. However, just to ensure you didn't misunderstand, my post did *not* claim...
- Animals are incapable of thought or emotion. As for a soul I am not certain either way.
- That being granted dominance meant it should be used as an excuse, nor that we have managed our dominion well.
My post did say that we should be expected to be responsible, and it was meant to imply that we have not been very successful and are suffering those consequences. I could not imagine Jesus being pleased with all that we have done to the earth and it's inhabitants. We know more now than did some of our predecessors, and so should be even more driven to limit our negative impact.
In response to some of the messages about abortion, I agree that it can be difficult to face the consequences of pregnancies. I think the fundamental difference of opinion is twofold.
I believe all people can have some value in some way, even if we personally cannot know or understand or imagine it. Therefore abortion is prejudging that no matter what happens, their life (and maybe suffering) would have been useless, irredeemable, and of no value to themselves or others; that there would be no possibilty whatsover of overcoming their situation. I simply am incapable of believing that of an unborn child. In fact, I do not believe myself fully capable of that kind of judgement of anyone - at best I can judge their acts, perhaps, for which there may be deserved consequences. (I also don't believe in the death penalty, at least I'm consistent.)
Secondly, I believe that a baby is a human being (a separate life, not just another part of my body) as soon as it is conceived. Therefore to have an abortion is murder, at a very early stage in life. The baby hasn't consented, it has been killed on the basis of someone else's will. On that premise, it becomes in for a penny, in for a pound - just when is it okay to murder someone and when isn't it. I believe that unless it is to save the life of the mother it isn't. I do not condone the use of violence to prevent abortion, but do support peaceful protest and education. Legislation is an imperfect solution; if people do not believe it is murder than they cannot share the same view. It is much harder to comprehend abortion as murder than it is to see someone shot in the street as such.
I realize not everyone will agree with either of these points. I am not trying to convince you by my arguments, nor militant about changing the world (though influence would be acceptable). I merely attempt to make it clear why we might disagree.
Scot: Windows XP has a function that allowss you to run programs 'as if' they're running in an earlier version of Windows (that you choose). It's a fairly easy process that I can't walk you through because the XP is on my parents' computer, not mine, but rummaging around in the Help index should get you through it quickly.
This is all contingent on IHNMAIMS being compatible with an earlier Windows, mind you. If it isn't, ignore my advice.
Jon
The main problem with Lynn's comment is the reference to "copyright notices." They have not been required in the US since March 31, 1988.
The other problem is that it may be entirely unnecessary for Matthew to prove prior conception; there is a very high probability that there's something in the potential defendant's files that would point to the source. But this is more a litigation issue than a copyright issue.
Sorry about the double post. I don't know what happened there...
Lynn & David: I have read When Elephants Weep. I found it incredibly moving and it contributed to my decision to go vegan. It is highly anecdotal in nature, but that's OK. Most of my proof that animals have thoughts and feelings comes from anecdotes about my cats anyway.
BOS: I know we are animals. I think you may be mincing words here, b/c I agree with you. My point was that we are animals who evolved from other, different animals, so why are we the only ones who have a soul? It seems absurd to me that, althought we merely refined our progenitors' qualities (a big cerebrum, an upright gait, and fine motor skills w/opposable thumb), we somehow obtained a soul out of nowhere. The other developments existed in earlier animals (and in animals extant today), so why not the soul too? The idea that only humans have a soul suggests that either the soul is a freak mutation and would have to serve some adaptive purpose, or that animals must have them as well. If we want to be logical about this, of course.
Yes, my phrasing was inexact, but we're pretty much on the same page, aren't we? I'm not being arrogant; I'm saying, if we're all animals and have a hell of a lot more in common with other mammals than differences, why should we be so special? Or, rather, why aren't we ALL equally special and ensouled, as we are all miracles of a sort.
And we're just a flash in the pan compared to the saurians. It's hard to imagine Homo sapiens sapientus being around 300 million years.
Bermanator
Lynn & David: I have read When Elephants Weep. I found it incredibly moving and it contributed to my decision to go vegan. It is highly anecdotal in nature, but that's OK. Most of my proof that animals have thoughts and feelings comes from anecdotes about my cats anyway.
BOS: I know we are animals. I think you may be mincing words here, b/c I agree with you. My point was that we are animals who evolved from other, different animals, so why are we the only ones who have a soul? It seems absurd to me that, althought we merely refined our progenitors' qualities (a big cerebrum, an upright gait, and fine motor skills w/opposable thumb), we somehow obtained a soul out of nowhere. The other developments existed in earlier animals (and in animals extant today), so why not the soul too? The idea that only humans have a soul suggests that either the soul is a freak mutation and would have to serve some adaptive purpose, or that animals must have them as well. If we want to be logical about this, of course.
Yes, my phrasing was inexact, but we're pretty much on the same page, aren't we? I'm not being arrogant; I'm saying, if we're all animals and have a hell of a lot more in common with other mammals than differences, why should we be so special? Or, rather, why aren't we ALL equally special and ensouled, as we are all miracles of a sort.
And we're just a flash in the pan compared to the saurians. It's hard to imagine Homo sapiens sapientus being around 300 million years.
Bermanato
David:
"If one measures "dominance" in terms of longevity and stability (and many people seem to regard "successful marriage" in those terms), then Saurians WERE the dominant species in the history of the planet."
Quite right, but that doesn't preclude the possibility that saurians, without the climatic change brought on by the asteroid at the end of the Cretaceous Period, could've generated a species capable of evolving into creatures capable of cogent abstract thinking.
"(and many people seem to regard "successful marriage" in those terms)": Am I to infer from this that I am to be seen as some species ignoring extinction, clutching in futility to what you perceive as a cultural anachronism?
Lynn, re the Sponge: your comment makes me consider more seriously the line from "Stripes" by John Larroquette where he wishes he could be a loofah...
Yes, I know the loofah is a vegetable, geez, Mel, I'm trying to make a joke here...
BOS
Um, computer question here: Can someone -- anyone -- tell me how to get my copy of "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" to work in Windows XP? Or would it be easier to hunt down an older computer and install it on that? Any advice would be muchly welcome; please email me and we'll go from there, if go we can. Thanks!
LYNN: So, in other words, the sponge is the Strom Thurmond of the animal kingdom?
And just mail the poor bastard his pizza menu, already. Those dinner combinations can be a BITCH to negotiate...
Harlan...
Are there certain kinds (or maybe, ways) of writing that you've outgrown doing? I don't mean good versus bad writing.
I think you KNOW what I mean.
H
Oh, and Marshall Blonsky was the guy who did the King interview.
Oh, and LYNN:
Yes, I have much admiration for the sponge too.
Clever little fucker.
Dave, you are the king of the left-handed compliment. I submit to you that this is one subject where an entirely scientific point of view will be lacking. Having lived with animals my entire life (my mother should have been a vet), and having no small amount of experience with warm-blooded animal behavior (mostly pack, some flock, limited herd), I can honestly tell you, for every emotion in the human spectrum, there is an analogous counterpart in animals. I think the biggest misconception that humanity has of itself, is that somehow they've become exempt from the rest of the spectrum (the ugly animalistic tendencies) merely because we have language and can think abstractly about things like emotion and sentience. The real research begins when we stop watching the animals to see how they're like us, and start watching ourselves to see how we're like the animals.
L.
PS. Peg, I cast no aspersions on your religious beliefs. I only seek to weight 2,000 years of enlightenment against 10 million years of evolution.
DAVID'S QUOTE:
"In these terms, humans are not dominant at all. We're an evolutionary aberration ... a short-lived if virulent disease, a planetary virus."
Why? Why have we evolved into the one species that does actual harm to the planet? Where did we begin to go wrong? (Coincidentally, I'm turning off my AC as I'm writing this. Ahem.)
It might be simply the tried-and-true catchphrase of 'too smart for our own good'. I mean, how did we get to so easily fuse unbelievable ingenuity with mind-blowing idiocy?
The dinosaurs really died for one reason and one reason only: they were big, and they were dumb. They had a LOT more time than us to get smarter, and they blew it. As for the human race, we're not big, but we can still be dumb.
We don't need an asteroid.
Y'know, on the evolutionary scale, the one creature I have the most respect for is the sponge. I mean, over millions of years, this animal has had every possible chance to evolve and at every opportunity has just said, ".... Nah."
L.
BOS chided PAB thus:
> Remember, if it wasn't for Chicxulub, the Saurians
> may well have become the dominant species, and we might
> never have come into being.
If one measures "dominance" in terms of longevity and stability (and many people seem to regard "successful marriage" in those terms), then Saurians WERE the dominant species in the history of the planet. (Sharks and cockroaches have 'em beat in longevity, for example, but not in adaptation and flexibility -- saurians spread through ALL habitats.)
In these terms, humans are not dominant at all. We're an evolutionary aberration ... a short-lived if virulent disease, a planetary virus.
I second Lynn's recommendation of _When Elephants Weep_. Not the most scholarly or well-written book, and one of the coauthors, the infamous Jeffrey Moussaief Masson, is a bit of a loon (not on this topic, but elsewhere in his tumultuous life), but there are some fascinating stories in it ... not only about our longtime buddies the primates and elephants, but such startling creatures as the devilish octopus.
A similarly fascinating if weakly written tome is _The Parrot's Lament, and Other True Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity_ by Eugene Linden (see my mixed review on Amazon).
Cindy: Thanks for your wonderful, thoughtful story. A little honesty about the complexity of life and its critical issues goes a long way. I once interviewed a pediatrician who performed abortions in a small town (the text is on my Web site), and he said a number of folks who gave him grief about it, picketed his offices and such, quietly changed their tune when their teenage daughters got pregnant.
I don't appreciate the galoot (Todd, was it?) who smeared pro-choicers as folks who regard abortion as "contraception." I don't know anyone who treats it that lightly. If you can't make a coherent and plausible case for the opposition, then you haven't grasped the issue yet.
Peg: We never had dominion over the earth and all its creatures, and we never will. Thinking we did has got us in a mess o' trouble and will ultimately destroy not only our species, I think, but most of the rest of life on the planet as we know it. Helluva shame, not to mention an insult to whatever Creator one might wish to posit.
I see Frank shot his mouth off once again, this time about genealogy. Spoken like a fellow who didn't/doesn't get along with his folks, I'll bet. Of course people can go nuts about it, like anything else, but looking into one's roots can -- as someone else noted -- introduce you to dozens of interesting relatives you never knew existed. In recent years I've found lots of my wife's, and a few of my own (and I was already aware of and in regular touch with more than a hundred) -- not only across this continent, but possibly overseas. Lovely people, most of them.
I also suspect that if more people knew how many thieves, drunks, prostitutes, and just plain losers lurked in their own family tree, they might have a bit more perspective on their amour-propre and the frailties of others.
PA & Peg~ I highly suggest a book called "When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives Of Animals".
Most people know about Koko the gorilla, she of kitten named Ball and the cute fingerpaintings. Most don't know about the male gorilla named Michael who entered the program at the same time as Koko, and I was stunned, absolutely stunned to hear Michael recount the memories he has of his orphaning at the hands of poachers. He doesn't have as rich a vocabulary as Koko, but you can see the memory in his face as clearly as I could see a painful memory in each and every face in this room. When the keepers asked Michael if he remembers his family, after a long silence he slowly replied, "Men came. Much screaming. Much red. Michael alone."
I know why Dian Fossey gave her life for them.
L.
CEP~ If there was inaccurate advice offered, it seems I was the one who offered it. I'd be eternally grateful if you'd correct my misunderstandings about the copyrights of cyber-publications.
Sincerely,
Lynn
cavalaxis-at-digitalcarrion-dot-com
PS. Jim Davis ~ I'm *workin'* on it, *workin'* on it. L.
P.A.:
"After all, we evolved from animals."
Simply put, wrong. We are animals, and will always be a species. Part of this world, not owners of it. I've always felt that that arrogance, as much as those who believe that some being placed us here, is one of the ways we justify any spurious claim of being appointed caretakers, or that we are appointed the dominant species hereabouts. We were simply lucky enough to win the evolution sweepstakes.
Remember, if it wasn't for Chicxulub, the Saurians may well have become the dominant species, and we might never have come into being.
BOS
Peg, re: animals-- I really enjoyed reading your posts, as always. Like Rob, I'm troubled by the idea that everything on the Earth is under our dominion. Seems we've done a lousy job.
I've never been quite sure if there's such a thing as a "soul" or life beyond the physical. I'd very much like to believe there is. If so, why would humans have souls and animals not? After all, we evolved from animals. We are not so special in having dominion over the Earth-- the dinosaurs had it for 300 million years. We should be so lucky. So, if humans have souls, why not animals? I know the Bible says not, but is this logical? They seem to have feelings, and some even have thoughts. Apparently chimps have the mentality of a human 4 year old, and dolphins and elephants seem just as complex as humans in many ways, and certainly more respect for the planet than we do. Why did God give us dominion and not them?
Bermanator
The brief is on the way to the Ninth Circuit in San Fiasco. So now... we wait. Until the Tuesday after Labor Day, on which day AOL will find out how much of its lunch has already been eaten when it sees the amicus briefs. Plural. (Have fun, Belinda. You'll only have three weeks to respond.)
I intend to ask Harlan for permission to post the briefs we've filed, AFTER all of the briefing is complete. That will be early to mid October. Now, they won't make much sense to y'all (I'm not sure they make much sense to ME, and this is the [number in excess of 2^5] appellate brief I've done). "Legal brief" is even less accurate than "honest politician," and even less common--14,000 words plus various other required parts will put even a college student to sleep, before considerating the mandatory stilted style. But these 100-page documents might make good hamster bedding if you're desperate.
As an aside, Matthew Davis should contact me by e-mail (go to the website, authorslawyer dot com, and look at the navigation bar). I'm afraid some inaccurate advice was offered on his copyright problem.
Peg,
"God gave humans dominion over the earth and all the creatures and creation in it."
Had you not included this classic reductio ad absurdum - a blank check used incessantly by Man as an excuse to raze the earth, use up his resources and destroy without conscience - I'd have not bothered responding to your post. Any comment on the question of some supreme being would be a redundancy here; one I've wearied of. My views on the topic have fattened the archives. So, I needn't press on about it. People embracing world views this extreme cannot be reasoned with; logic, history and empirical evidence hold no weight. The rapture and self-assurance beliefs bring to us - their consoling removal of all quagmires - come first in the human hierarchy of needs. Any alternative that might threaten that condition will be ruled out. Thus, there's no way I can talk to you on the matter.
I will, however, express this point: a quaint notion like "God-given dominions" thoroughly alarms me. It virtually crosses the boundaries of personal belief and becomes a dictum. It is the inability to distinguish between what is man-made and what might be the paradoxical creation of an imaginary (therefore also man-made) being. However recondite the concept, it is part of a world view that compels people to vote in laws that mandate morality: I am, in essence, to live by YOUR beliefs; I am to think and act according to YOUR injunction; even the content of school books must follow YOUR guidelines. You see, I resent that. I don't seek to attack one's world view until one seeks to impose it on ME. And that is precisely what YOU are doing when you take away pro-choice rights. Embrace your beliefs as you will; impose them on others and opposition will always be there to greet you at the clinic door.
Please bear in mind this is not an attack upon you; it is an attack upon a concept (our "dominion") - a vile one at that. I use the personal and possessive pronouns here as a substitute to mean ALL those who seek to impose their beliefs on others.
Well, being both a father and a libertarian, I'll excuse myself from the discussion re: parenting and abortion.
1) I am a father and damn proud of it.
2) As a libertarian, I firmly believe that a person's body is their own property, and, with the exception of engagement in crime, no other person or organization has any right to enforce their viewpoint, or take subsequent actions upon that right. Choice is my perogative, and I feel my right to choose is dependent upon how well I defend the right of others to do same.
With that, I leave those who wish to continue the thread. I'll be over in the corner, listening to my Elvis and Buddy Holly records.
BOS
Peg,
You know I am with you as a Christian and as such, you know how I feel about abortion. BUT almost seven years ago I was faced with having to walk the walk and it made me softer with regard to those who have been in similar positions.
I was pregnant with my final surprise when a routine ultrasound at 16 weeks took my legs right out from under me on the abortion issue. My doctor called me into his office and told me that there seemed to be a problem with the baby. He said the skull of my developing infant was bowed out in the front and flat in the back and he was afraid that it could mean that the baby had not only a misshapen skull but horrific brain abnormalities.
He suggested that I go to San Antonio for an amniocentesis at once to determine what we should do. I told him it did not matter what the result of the test would be-- I woud never terminate my pregnancy. He said he respected that and he gave me a hug. He said that he would still like me to have the test so he could know how best to handle my pregnancy.
Okay, I can handle this. God sent this baby to me and I understood that for whatever reason I would accept it with an open heart.
Then I was knocked for one more loop.
My husband, who married me when I was a struggling single mother of four and who adored not only me but my babies as well broke down and cried when I told him.
This is a Texas man, a fifth generation rancher and 15 year veteran cop who could handle ANYTHING. He doesn't cry. He never hesitated taking on me and my pack. He took the added noise, responsibilities and expense that came along with his choice to go from single childless man to father of four then five... now one more brick had been placed on his back.
He cried.
He never tried to change my mind.. never argued with me about it. After the fact he told me later that all he could think of was how he would be able to feed, cloth and care for the others with the expense of a child who would probably never have enough of a mind to even be aware of the world around him.
I drove myself to San Antone for the test, I needed to be alone to think. On the long drive I considered what I should do if the worst were to be confirmed by the test. I had to think about what it would mean to the others and to my husband... not just me.
Isn't this a HORRIBLE confession! All my life I had been a firm believer in the sanctity of human life... not even condoning the use of IUDs because of their mechanism to prevent implantation of a human embryo. Now a whole new twist had presented itself.
What I decided was that if the test confirmed my worst fear that I would have the doctor do a c-section. It would be bad.... God how bad it would be, but I would have him wrap the baby in a blanket and hand it to me and I would comfort it until it died.
No D&C , no saline, no partial birth abortion. Deliver it the way you'd deliver any of my babies and treat it with the respect and kindness that deserved as a human being... even if it was deformed and lacked the ability to comprehend anything at all.
In the end God pulled me off the hook. The old physician who was from Israel and had a beautiful accent hooked me up to his state of the art ultrasound machine. He said,
" I see nothing wrong with this baby." He did the amnio and for ten days I waited for the results clinging like the drowning to what he had said.
The lab called and said the baby was genetically perfect and did I want to know what it was? It was a girl... my Paris.
Now I am more careful about what I pronounce to be true and right. The gray area has divided the black and white. I still loathe abortion and wish there were no more of them. I can see that maybe a compromise could be in order in some situations. Once it has a nervous system, a brain and a beating heart; I think the baby should be given a chance to live. Even if it's an outside chance. I don't think they should be killed with a pair of scissors or burned with salt or cut to pieces.
I am pro-life in the way that I regard the unborn... but the militance has gone from me replaced by a resolve to let God be the Judge, I'm not qualified and hypocrisy tastes really bad.
Cindy
Lynn, sometimes I even annoy myself...............
-TODD
Another thought on abortion:
I just wanted to add that I think the decision to terminate a pregnancy on the grounds that the child "is better off dead" is not necessarily as short-sighted and presumptious as has been described. My personal belief is that there are some social situations so horrific that a child has no place there. I'm certainly no expert in these matters, but my observations have been that there are some situations where a baby is going to die through the actions of the parents--the only choice is whether it happens before or after it can feel the pain of the violence and neglect and abuse.
In an ideal world, as has been stated numerous times before, no child has to die. In this world, babies are battered until they are brain-dead, kept alive by machines until all the examinations picking up evidence of abuse are completed. Given a choice between having people abort their pregnancy or having to see more babies with small circular burns on their bodies, from where the parents stubbed their cigarettes out on them, I vote for abortion everytime.
Pam and I watched a show tonight on hot dogs, featuring the world-famous PINK'S dogs.
Yes, they may be the worst food in the universe outside of drinking lard right from the microwave but DAMN this show made me want to go out and grab a Nittany Lion Primal Scream with mustard.
http://www.wqed.org/tv/natl/hotdogs/
And for Pink's direct: http://www.net101.com/rocknroll/pink.html
Todd, I never said I hated you. I said sometimes you annoy the living shit out of me. There's a distinct difference. Hell, my mother annoys the living shit out of me, and I love her very, very much. I have all kinds of people in my life that annoy me (SUCH AS PEOPLE WHO WANT THEIR PIZZA MENU MAILED TO THEM) but I cherish every moment I spend with them. Okay, I won't go so far as to say I cherish every moment I spend with you, Todd, but I still read your posts, mostly because you're sane and intelligent. And not everyone here can make that claim.
So there, just for the record, I don't hate you.
L.
Peg, your posting on not having children is beautiful. Though a gal, you speak my words exactly....and the words of my wife! We made the same decision, and yes, we also agreed that any child of ours would remain our child if it happened: but fortunately, unlike many folks who desire to abort their pregnancies, we had the brains to make sure we didn't have the child!
I didn't really read your follow-up post because the debate has gone from powerful when I first started getting involved in abortion discussions (20 years ago) to just too goddamn boring to go through it again. No one side will convince another side they are right. And, surprise surprise, no one party will change the ways of the world as they sit today......remember how Reagan was going to have wimmen back in those illegal Mexican hangar closets? If any one President was going to shoot the abortion world all to hell it was him!!! Ooops, guess not. It is not going to be made illegal, so folks can relax about that.
And folks who think I'm praying for this because of my strong Conservative views can put away their political-philosophical blinders. I am pro-abortion. I would want that choice, even though I know we would not have it done if the baby was going to be as healthy as could be expected upon birth. Of course, I am also pro-death to fucking morons in the world who are so goddamn stupid that they list abortion as one of a handful of effective birth-control devices. Ooops, more expensive and painful than a goddamn condomn or pill....that's o.k., rip 'er out!
See, there is always that political hypocrisy.....pro-death sentence and pro-life. Anti-death sentence and allow the choice to abort. I ain't a hypocrit.....abort and kill those I loathe. That's me.
No wonder Lynn hates me ::grin::
-TODD
Happy Birthday greetings to Ray Bradbury!
From one who survived "Boot Camp" at Great Lakes IL to one of my favorite Authors!
John
I realize these views will not go over well with most folks here. Up to this point, like Bern, I have been terribly impressed with the level of clear headed debate on this topic (and others) along with the absence of name calling and war cries. I hope that this post will be received in similar manner.
Some prolifers are vegans, some do try to save whales and boycott animal testing, what have you. However, I can offer some insight to the biblical perspective of believing abortion is murder but pork chops are not. It's human life that is considered sacred, not animal. Animal sacrifices were common, as was livestock and the consumption of meat. God gave humans dominion over the earth and all the creatures and creation in it. (I believe that God wishes we would be [more] responsible with that creation, and that we also have to live with the consequences of the choices of our dominion). All things in it were created to serve the good of man in some way. (It's clear we have not discovered all those yet, and that many have chosen to exploit uses of earthly objects or creatures which do not benefit man in the long ruin). So, being pro-life in the abortion debate and being carnivorous is not a contradiction from a biblical perspective.
As you might expect, I am pro-life. I believe this not only from a religious standpoint, but that medical science can genetically prove a human being is such at the earliest stages of development and so abortion is murder regardless of whether it is viable outside the womb. I can understand the choice to abort to protect a mother (similar in a way to murder in self defense) but feel it is equally valid to personally choose to sacrifice yourself for that other life. I can comprehend why those with different beliefs might not be of the same opinion, but that does not stop it from being murder in my eyes, and makes me wish I could somehow ensure my tax dollars did not go toward federal funding of this tragic practice. While the right to choose may be democratic, to me abortion in most circumstances represents a cold and inhumane act that proves we are still capable of savagery.
This is the age old question of when is it acceptable to take another life? If it is not legal to kill another person then abortion should likewise not be legal; to save a life could be mitigating circumstances (such as when a policeman shoots a suspect who is going to kill someone else). To believe that a baby is better off dead, regardless of why, is amazingly presumptious and shortsighted. To believe a human being does not have a right to live just because it might be sick, or because it was fathered by a horrendous human being, or because it may have to live in poverty with assistance from the state, sells short the capacity of a human being to overcome circumstance, disability, and tragedy to live a meaningful live and touch the lives of others in a positive way. We show more respect of life to death row prisoners and animals; how can anyone assume an unborn child is beyond redemption? I believe the use of abortion to avoid responsibility for the consequences of your actions is even more reprehensible.
The world is not perfect. If abortions were to stop, there would be a burden, a cost. Someone might have to give up their education. The state would have to support. There could be suffering, and crime. But if we allow ourselves to kill a life because of the cost, we are in danger of losing our own humanity.
Been away for a week, my word are you folks prolific! Still letting some things sink in but I've a couple of initial offerings...here's the first.
PA Berman: As someone who does not have kids nor any desires/plans for them (*snip snip* all done), I am happy with my decision. I chose to not have children because I do not like children or their company. I do not go *ooooh* or *ahhhhh* or giggle at the site of young cuteness. I do not get warm gooey fuzzies when somehow a child develops an affection for me. We tell our nieces and nephews that I am "mean aunt Peggy"; heck, I think I was not found of children even when I was one! Many people cannot fathom this, and will inevitably explain that it would be different if it were my own. I don't hate children, and can even relate to them when needed; I just don't want to be around them for the most part.
I also believe children can invariably sense when they are not wanted and so I would not voluntarily place a child in that situation. My husband and I both agreed we did not want children before the marriage. In the event of the unexpected, we agreed we would keep a child because we felt we would be decent parents and did not want to abandon a child we created, and we both believe abortion is murder. The better half has since become more tolerant of youngsters; he now thinks he might have enjoyed some aspects of parenthood but still does not regret our choice.
I do not feel particularly well placed to judge parents in the subtleties of child rearing but there are times when it seems obvious the struggle is not going well. I cannot help but question the methods of a parent who feels the need to be abusive (mentally, physically, emotionally, whatever) in order to raise their child. At the other end of the spectrum, discipline has it's place in parenting, and I think many parents today are afraid or disapprove of using that parenting tool. Note that I do not equate a proper spanking with abuse, and honestly believe that some children require strong tactics.
Venk: Pulling one's children around? Christ, we fear taking ours anywhere, knowing how fast they can disappear.
Jim Davis: I'm one for "Devil In Disquise", "Return to Sender", and "Heartbreak Hotel"...
BOS, who, after completing exhaustive biological and genetic testing, can now confirm Mojo Nixon's assertion that Michael J. Fox has no Elvis in him...
Of course, the kidnapping, forced confinement and illegal exhumation charges levied by the Canadian actor and the estate of the King of Rock and Roll are still pending.
Alex, the born-again EC artist wasn't Jack Davis, who continued to work for Gaines for decades. It was Graham Ingels, who signed his work "Ghastly. Gaines still sent him checks. Dunno if he cashed'em.
Allow me to tell you how my day went...
FUUUUUUUCK!!!
...thank you for listening.
Anyone who's going to Dragon*Con this year, they have the schedule up at www.dragoncon.org.
Jim,
When putting peaches in the fridge, store them in Ziploc or somesuch bags, and only after they're ripe. Peaches area high-humidity fruit, and refrigerators tend to strip humidity from food. Same goes for apricots, pears, nectarines, mangoes, kiwis, plums and melons.
Regards,
Joseph
And I've always had a soft spot for "(Marie's the Name of) His Latest Flame". Does that make me officially Uncool?
DARYL: Thank YOU. There's a lot more I wanted to write vis-a-vis the whole race issue, but you summed it up beautifully, so there's no need.
While we're kinda on the subject, here's a good article about Elvis's supposed racism: http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/living/0802/12elvisracist.html
I never believed he said what was attributed to him, myself. Did he have some of the prejudices that any white southern man growing up in the 50's would've had? Sure. But this was also a man with an intense feeling for rhythm and blues, and it would've been a mind-boggling act of cognitive dissonance to love the music while hating its creators. Personally, I like some of Elvis's stuff; the early Sun singles and his late 60's "comeback" recordings are genuinely great. Is it accurate to say, as John Lennon did, that "before Elvis, there was nothing"? Absolutely not. But his talent WAS tremendous, no matter how horribly he squandered it later in his career.
SOME OF MY PET PEEVES:
You know when you buy some peaches in the supermarket, and they look and feel firm and ripe with beautiful amber-and-red swirls on the skin, and you're really looking forward to feeding off them for the next few days, and you put them in the fridge, and they suddenly metamorphose into this sodden mulch, so when you grab one and bite into it, it tastes like a mouthful of wet toilet paper, and you stand there sputtering and spitting, wondering if you're the butt of some cosmic joke?
I HATE that.
The use of "impact" as a verb.
Women who look perfectly fine, but panic and get plastic surgery that transforms them into grotesque cat-women-slash-space-aliens after seeing ONE frown line in the mirror.
Driving in traffic and never, EVER hearing jazz or classical music blare from other people's car stereos. (As opposed to hip-hop, rap-metal, and classic rock.)
Todd~ You annoy the living shit out of me anyway. ::grin:: So don't worry, you're covered.
Seriously, I'm at home from work today because it seems every bit of stress in my body has chosen to reside in the left side of my neck. It had been giving fits yesterday and this morning about 4am, I woke up in tears because I couldn't move without pain shooting up into my skull. So I can't drive, and I know I can't sit in front of the computer all day. And I'm pretty sure it all boils down to one project manager's fault. (I'm double allocated. Again. When will these people learn 100% is the LIMIT of time I can give. I have a life outside my cube! And this line of conversation is making my neck tense up again... Owie.)
Soma is our friend.... Soma is our friend....
L.
Project Managers:
As one (by job description, not title) I have to agree with Lynn; we're irritating on general principle. We can be pains in the ass. This is usually because we operate in a universe that removes anyone's self-importance or status when it comes to managing projects. Where I'm concerned, it's like a big game of Tetris with time and machines. The projects keep coming and you gotta twist and turn them to fit available slots. Now imagine some rabid dingo calls and asks that his project, snug at the bottom of the pile needs to be moved because Lieutenant Suck-Up of Tyco Industries needs to catch an earlier flight to his convention in Pigsknuckle. That's why most people dislike project managers. It makes us dispassionate, with that glazed, distant expression that eventually thickens into something like a Greek theatre mask by the time they use the phrase "This is more important than you realize!" While it is understandable that things need to be done, some things can't.
Peeves:
The Consumer Culture. The assumption that anything should be available at any time in a pretty package for a reasonable price. This extends from bread and milk to color copies to happiness, love, reparations, whatever. While it's great to WANT, it isn't someone's god-given right to have all material needs granted.
The Service Culture. The indutry that feeds this selfish, slothy and spoiled class of people by competing for their short attention spans and access to their credit cards. While I'd like to send out a big "fuck you" to Miss Cleo and her ilk, at least people are spending their money on her and not holding up the line at Kay-Bee Toys returning a toy they bought last Christmas without a receipt.
People who truck their kids around like they're some court-ordered boulder chained to their leg.
People who attach amplifiers to their exhaust so their new Honda Civic (with the racing stripes and ridiculous spoiler) can sound like the '72 Mustang owned by the jackass who thinks not having a muffler makes his ride sound "tuff".
The media implying that child abductions and murders are suddenly episdemic in nature when they are just focusing on that same annual statistic ignored year after year by the four-minute picture press.
Developers who believe that the best use of undeveloped land is a mall or more housing.
I'm sure there are more, but I've got about sixty pop-up windows to close and get to work.
Get this one... Paris, my six year old came home from her first day at Kindergarten. I asked her if she missed me... she got this funny look on her face and said that she cried and cried for me. This was odd because I had never had one cry for me before on the first day of school. She said that she was crying so hard that she started screaming and they could hear her in the 8th grade. She said the principal had to be called, and he told her to go sit in the corner and " think happy thoughts." She said after she sat there for an hour he let her get out of the chair in the corner but then she began to cry again so he sent her back to " think more happy thoughts." she said 10 times she was sent back to the corner.
I asked her if the principal had been nice to her and she said yes.. except when he made her go to the corner. I said, " Which principal was it?" She replied that it was the one with the
" gray hair."
I left the room for a minute and came back.. she was watching Sponge Bob.. and I said, " He made you sit in the corner-- really?
She said, " Noooooo-- I was just joking."
I said, " About all of it?"
She said, " Uh huh! But I did get some tears in my eyes."
She wanted me to think she missed me. LOL! I doubt if she gave me a second thought! I'm with my kids so much that by the time they go off to school they are ready to be on their own.
Funny kid.
:)
Cindy
Brian, EC went further than that. Once Bradbury got that check from them, they made adapting his stories a regular thing--and used his name on their covers. Worked out well for both sides. But William Gaines was a strange duck, ultimately ethical, even if he had to be prodded occasionally. He continued to make payments to the artists on those EC stories for reprints and adaptations, even though they were not "entitled" to any under the original employment agreements. How many people doing reprints of '50s material could say the same?
I recall, too, that one of the artists --Jack Davis, I believe-- was very unhappy with the checks, because he'd become a born-again Christian, and was embarassed by his early horror work.
--Alex
Lynn, the comic company that Bradbury got payment from was none other than the famous "Entertaining Comics," publishers of _Tales from the Crypt_, _The haunt of Fear_, _Weird Science_, and much more.
They also did a space-travel story titled "Upheaval" which, while not credited to a certain fantasist, is _uncannily similar_ to one of his stories...
Well, as one of those dreaded creatures; an MBA (that's right; one of the sources of what's wrong with the world is me) with a minor in labour relations obviously my degree has come in handy for my choice of vocation.
Still, the degree didn't come into service for a few years, during which I tossed garbage, drove truck, backhoe, and bulldozer (got to admit, the ability to study helped me to get the tickets I needed to operate heavy equipment faster than some) to do my share in keeping lights on and bills paid. Many of my co-workers ribbed me about the sheepskin, to which I gently responded "Make sure you keep my phone number".
That suggestion worked out rather nicely for a couple of them who had sense enough to listen.
BOS
John Pickett,
I love your list.
:)
Cindy
Lynn Sez: "And project managers. Nothing in specific about project managers, just project managers in general annoy the living shit out of me."
Uh, well, ummmmmmm, I'll keep as far away from you as I can, Lynn.
-TODD
LYNN: Glad to see someone else mentioning psycho and Ann Coulter in the same breath. First time I saw her -- back before the Presidential elections, when I watched CNN, MSNBC, etc., on a daily basis -- I thought, "Hey, she's kinda cute...in an anorexic way, of course." Then she started talking. "Fuck me!" I thought (not literally, of course). It was one of those lessons that we males ocassionally need: reminding us that even psychos can come wrapped in fairly attractive packages. (God, or whoever is in charge, help us and our secondary brains).
--DTS
P.S. HEATHER: though I haven't read her work, I do know a former newspaper editor ("Dallas Morning News") who highly recommends Catherine Coulter's novels.
John,
You work at a bus station, too? I only work at the local one on weekends. My favorite is when it's my fault the bus left without them. It's my fault they arrived at 8:59 and didn't make it when the bus left at 9.
A brother in buses,
Bill
Pet Peeves
Stupid people questions I get at work
Here are a few examples
"My sister is coming in on a bus. Do you know when she will arrive?"
Of course the caller has no idea
A. when she left
B. Where she is coming from
C. Oh she did'nt say when she was coming exactly other then she'd be here today maybe.
My bus was due in at 2:30PM is it here yet?
A look at my watch shows it's now just 1:45PM
I need to know if the 2:30PM bus to Jacksonville,Fl. is on time today as I plan to catch it next week.
I've never been to Tampa Fl. before can you give me the address to the station there? Ok I give them the address their next question amazed even me.
"Where in Tampa is that near to?"
Of course the most popular question I get is
"Do you have any buses running to New York today?
Yes we have 4 buses a day to New York.
Do they go anywhere else?
Other Pet Peeves
Email telling me I can get larger breasts naturally (Being a single guy living alone this is VERY important info to know!)
People who jumped on the "patriotic american" bandwagon after 9/11
My pet peeve is wet bread.
Darryl,
YOU are lovely. You made me think. Tomorrow I will respond after I have steeped on it a bit.
Yours in Admiration,
Cindy
Chuck~ That's just it. I have a degree and I know what it's like to come home smelling like shit after a day of making pittance wage. On the other hand, my husband has the kind of natural leadership qualities that would have made him a general in a previous life, but because he has no college degree, most managers look at him as the "Guy Who Lifts Heavy Stuff." And he is struggling right now to get past that.
Makes me want to go postal on a group of VP's that are so dense as to not see what a talented resource they have, more likely because they're used to harvesting his ideas and taking credit for themselves (one of my other pet peeves, you noticed).
Darryl, one of my other pet peeves is men in auto parts stores that can't seem to understand that a) yes I have tits and b) yes I do know what I'm talking about when I want a part. My bleeding edge breaking point is men that assume anything about me because I'm female. And project managers. Nothing in specific about project managers, just project managers in general annoy the living shit out of me.
L.
Matthew~ Yeah, you should be pissed. The crux of the matter lies in whether or not you had a copyright notice on your web publication, and whether you can date a copy of the material to a date prior to the publication of the book.
Listening to the inestimable Mr. Bradbury speak at ComicCon, he told a story about how a comic book company had taken his stories whole cloth and adapted them to the graphic form. His reaction was to send them a very nice letter congratulating them on their success and then note, very gently, that they must have been too busy to send him a check for his work. He got a check two weeks later. Personally, I think they'd laugh at you for that approach. Then again, they might not.
L.
Oh, yeah. One day, I was driving behind a guy in a pickup that had a bumper sticker that read, "Forget World Peace, Visualize Using Your Turn Signal". He then made a left turn without signalling. Maybe the sticker was put there by the previous owner.
I saw a T-shirt that read: "Don't let your mind wander. It's too small to be out by itself."
Darryl,
You write some powerful stuff, mister.
Chuck
As a sometimes very occasional poster here I was hoping somebody might have some idea as to whether I have any recourse to the problem below.
I run a website about an sf author - bibliographies, essays, reviews, and general comment about him and his works. One of his early books has just been republished by iBooks (the people who published "Troublemakers". I was looking at a copy of this book while I was in Barnes and Nobles across from the NY Public Library and was astonished to see that about 400 words of mine had been ripped from off my website and reprinted verbatim on the inside front page "about the author" section. Is this legal? Am I justified in being not flattered and instead really very pissed off?
2001: a Harlan Odyssey. I read once that Harlan actually did change his mind about the movie after he saw it again years later. Turns out, the first time he saw the movie, it was the original cut, which Kubrick himself didn't like. Kubrick apparently realized what it was about 2001 he didn't like and re-cut the thing. It's amazing what a little nip and a tuck can do for a movie. I'd LOVE to see what Welles' version of MAGINIFICENT AMBERSONS would have been like.
Lynn,
I have known and read about people who weren't able to go to college, who ended up better read that people who graduated from Hah-vud. Dick Cavett wrote about how he was awed by Groucho Marx's broad and deep knowlege of literature and history, even though Groucho never went to college. You sound purty durn smart to me, Mrs. Nice Lady.
Pet Peeves. How to count them? I almost collide with them when driving to work. People whose level of basic competence is so low, they can't be trusted to tie their own shoes without accidentally hanging themselves, yet the state gives them a licence to drive a vehicle. How does that happen? A guy can't make himself breakfast without accidentally getting his butt caught in a toaster, but he can drive a honkin' big pickup truck.
One Major Pet Peeve: Spammers. Internet advertising can be effective, but not when you send 3,000 copies of the same ad to everybody on the net. The spam is getting less and less effective, I think about 0.0025 per cent now, so they send MORE AND MORE AND MORE.
One more peeve: Evil fuckers like Strom Thurmond live to be 1,000 years old, but Gilda Radner, who only was a sweet, great lady who made people laugh and made her hubby immensly happy, dies in her prime.
Goddamnit. Who IS running the show here?
Say, Frank. Although I disagree with your opinion on geneology, I think the whole of your rant sounded a little like George Carlin. Way to go.
Chuck
PS: Spammers. Hate 'em.
"Geneology--who the fuck cares where you came from, it is more important that you are here now."
Genealogy isn't all about living in the past. It can also help you find relatives in the present, who you may not know you have.
Other pet peeves:
People who wait to make a left turn, from the right-hand side of the lane
People who refuse to merge
(insert a bunch of other traffic irritants here)
People who post a question to a message board, that a two-minute web search could have answered. I'll be the first to admit that the internet is not an all-knowing oracle, but it's a good place to start. And if you've posted the question, then you obviously have access, so why not USE it, you twit? But you're too friggin' lazy to look it up yourdamnself, so you foist it onto everyone else on the board, you miserable piece of...
*pause, deep breath*
So yeah, stupid drivers. Can't stand em.
Mitch
Darryl -
Well, well put and thank you.
Lynn, re anti-intellectualism: Interesting question. I don't get the real bright lights; they go into the AP classes. When I do get a really sharp one, often they are given respect for being smart, and kids seem a bit envious. The worst they get is the perception that they're stuck up, which maybe they are. I recommend them for AP and hope it helps them.
Maybe it's just my whitebread, middle class school, but they seem to want to get good grades. When I was a kid, I never told anyone my grades b/c they were good, and I was enough of a geek already. Now, they shout out their grades with great pride. Seems odd to me, but I'm glad they're proud of themselves.
I've also had several students tell me they admired me for my brains. They think it's cool that I have Hamlet memorized. This all makes me hopeful. I don't know about you, but when I was in public school, the words "dexter" and "brainiac" were common epithets. I tried to hide it under a barrel.
It's not so much the kids who taunt the intellect, it's older people. My brother, for instance, loves to retort to any political debate we have with, "Well, your problem is you're all colleged out. You don't live in the real world." As if being informed makes you out of touch-- huh? I've also noticed that people seem to dislike intelligent politicians. Look at the fate of Jimmy Carter to see that. Dubya seems to coast along on his "just a good old boy" image when really, he's an upper crust blue blood to the core.
Anyway, that's my rant for the day.
Bermanator
First, and most important, much thanks Darryl, for the insight of times both past and present in the POV or race. Sobering, and a bit frustrating.
Many know the feelings I have for the three little souls I've woven into my own, and how I'm far stronger for their presence and life within mine. To think, at one time I'd resolved never to be a father, fearing to be a repetion of the self-hating sub-human who sired me. That's one self-misconception I am dammed happy to admit to, and proud to have proved wrong.
...Of course, ask again when they begin dating and driving, and then ask how I feel.
Peeves:
Small: People who talk in a theatre.
Large: The ones who walk past those who are homeless on our streets, and self-righteously sneer "Get a Job", not considering for a moment the numerous terrible things which can drive a person to such desperation, each circumstance being entirely beyond the affected person's fault.
...And, it's a small turn of fate that could place any of us there in their place.
BOS
Jim Hess~ Pull your head out of your ass. http://www.catherinecoulter.com/ is the writer Heather was speaking of, not the Right Wing Psycho Ann Coulter.
And you wonder why Harlan gets cranky... jeez.
L.
Sitting in a left-hand turn lane and again realizing that the oncoming line of monster trucks/SUVs/4x4's renders me unable to see the oncoming cars for about 100 or so metres back.
Seeing someone use a baby carriage as a portable crosswalk.
SUV ads that tout the naturalness and nature-lovingness of the vehicles they promote.
Ads with squeaky voiced pubescent girls in tight and/or revealing clothing (apparently, Humbert Humbert got a job on Madison Ave.).
Roadwork. I don't hate it; I'd just like a new approach that caused smaller, more manageable chunks of road to be inactive at one time.
Alex Krislov: I have to ask. Reading a book in the Dog Pound because you got stuck at a game you didn't want to be at, or reading a book during one of an NFL game's long downtimes? I'm amazed you didn't end up in a sports highlight reel, anyway.
Jon
Heather: The name is ANN Coulter. And people wonder why Harlan is cranky. I know you may not think of Ms. Coulter, owing much to her politics, but, pleaseeeeee get the writer's name right. If nothing else.
Until next time. . .
Pet Peeves: Noam Chomsky.
Just kidding, Frank, just kidding! Put down those typing fingers, they're loaded.
Number one pet peeve: People who take some things you say so goddamn seriously that you have to fucking smile wide and yell "It's a joke, sheesh!" and still want to punch their lights out when their befuddled look remains frozen on their face.
Kinda goes for some things that are typed on boards like this as well. It's harder to get that sarcasm or slight jiggly jibe over the 'net as it is, but when some things are totally blown out of proportion it gets even harder not to jab your own eyes out.
-TODD
I just loves going after my buddy Frank, who sez that one of his pet peeves is: "Geneology--who the fuck cares where you came from....." then goes on to tell people to effectively live in the here and the now.
But, Frankie, you make this statement immediately after taking another shot at reparation and/or apologies.
Ahem, like you said, let's live in the here and the now (or however you put it....I'm too lazy to page back).
-TODD
Peeve:
People who don't resaearch things properly, leading them to believe in such coackamany as pseudoscience and non peer-reviewed scientific papers.
Re: Children
I was a typical guy, thinking that someday I’d have a relationship and kids, but in an amorphous, ethereal, “someday” way. When I got married and we had one, then two children, life changed. That’s what is known as understatement.
As I’ve said on this board before, nothing can prepare one for the introduction of a child into life. It’s the hardest, most wonderful thing I’ve ever encountered. I’ve often described it as being part of the world’s largest club – you know about it, but until you’re a member, there are no words to describe membership, no rules, no instructions. I love it. YMMV.
Cookie and Cindiana, you both sound like wonderful mothers to me. Cookie’s being a little too hard on herself (which is a positive thing where childrearing is concerned). I don’t think you have to worry too much about your kids, they have love – 80% of what they need to survive in the world if you ask me. Cindiana, I have had the same reaction when our first went into kindergarten, our second will start on Wednesday.
Rich, my “father is really proud” moment came when my first son was about 10 months old. He started understanding English, and my wife was holding him. She asked “Where’s your daddy?” as she had a thousand times before. This time, he pointed to me. It was his first time doing something like that. I could barely speak, tears ran down my cheeks. I felt like I could conquer the world.
I’ve always admired people who decide they don’t want children of their own. Recognizing that is also a wonderful thing, as there is little worse than an unwanted child. I have plenty of friends who have decided to remain childless, they enjoy ours, then go home. More power to you. Had I not met my wonderful wife, I might be with you.
Pet peeves:
People who think they’re cool because of what they’re wearing instead of who they are.
People with more money than brains.
People who drive the hugest, most polluting SUV’s on the planet, and never take them off road.
Hollywood’s definition of sexy, ‘cause they tend to discard women just when they are achieving it.
Most politicians.
Knee-jerk reactions, especially politically. Left or right.
People who think they can pigeonhole you because of the job you do (props to Lynn).
People who act like the world is out to screw them, so they’re going to do the screwing first.
Loud people (and I’m one!)
Pet peeves?
People who have seen POKEMON and SAILOR MOON and automatically presume all anime is exactly the same.
Okay, time for my ritual Busting on Frank. Today's episode, his desire for a written apology for slavery.
It'd be nice, but it's sort of an empty gesture. It wouldn't have much effect on current politics. I think that the sacrifice of half a million soldiers should be more of a monument than a simple apology. This doesn't mean I'd prefer reparations to an apology; I think an apology is just empty, reparations a bad idea, and I'd prefer to see the effort go into building a better society. (Okay, so I didn't "bust" so much as offer a counteropinion...)
Okay, pet peeves. Loud, concussive music played at top volume. Bad arguments. Belief in paranormal bullshit. Cheap sentiment. Vindictiveness towards the less fortunate. Most religions. Snobbery passing itself off as elitism. Self-righteous modern art.
To Lynn, re her peeve of people who are touchy about hugs: I'm afraid I'm one of those people, Lynn. And there's good reason for it; some of us weren't exactly well-liked when we were young, so invading someone else's space feels risky, and having one's space invaded makes us _very_ defensive and suspicious. It'd be nice to not feel this way-- but it'd be nice to not have hay fever, too.
Take note: the Feds are talking of going after "file-sharing" instead of leaving it in the civil courts. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2121102,00.html
Pet Peeves: People who sit at traffic stops and wait until the green light before signaling a left turn. Plastic jewel-boxes for CDs, instead of the nifty cardboard gatefolds (which cost more). Restaurants who blast commercial radio stations or loud music at patrons. Movie previews that reveal the whole damn story in miniature. Politicians who shove their religious beliefs on the rest of us. Urban renewal as practiced in my city, where beautiful or historic architecture is plowed over for parking lots, sports stadiums and national chains. The myth of the liberal media. The dominance of sports in society.
Alex~
YES! Add to my list people that say stupid things like, "Wow, that's a twenty dollar word" or "Oh, SAT word, huh?" Using the word "enigmatic" or "rhapsodic" in a sentence should not cause the conversation to come to a screeching halt. Folks, it's not as if you can stop and look it up in the middle of a meeting. You don't know what it means, make a mental note to look it up later and MOVE THE FUCK ON.
A close friend and I have been having this ongoing discussion about the anti-intellectual climate in our culture. I think we've pretty much boiled it down to one conclusion: People equate intellectual with "elitist" when such is not always the case, and people who are intellectual tend to be of the ilk that believe being an intellectual somehow makes them "elite," and thus they treat everyone around them like mouth breathers. Believe me, I hate mouth breathers just as much as anyone, but just because you can discuss the origins of socialist political theory in the Middle Ages, doesn't mean you're worth anymore salt than the guy who washes your car. Being intellectual makes you a richer person, not a better one. Being anti-intellectual makes a person's own insecurities all the more apparent.
Bermanator, do you see this in your classes? Is it still the same way it was when I was in school, the smart kids segregated and to some extent, persecuted?
L.
People who play their music *really* loud without any regard for their neighbors or other people in traffic.
People who talk on cellphones while driving (which has been proven to have the same rate of accidents as drunk driving).
People who take credit for a subordinate's hard work.
People who assume that because you have a service job, you have no brain, and thus are not fit to discuss literature, politics, religion or any other "highbrow" subject. Also, people who assume that because you have no degree, you obviously couldn't get into college, and therefore might as well have a service job.
People who think that having an education somehow precludes them from getting dirty, as in changing a tire or digging a stuck car out of the mud.
People who treat their animals (and children) as if they were things, not living creatures.
People with no sense of humor.
People who are touchy about giving and receiving hugs. (I respect that, it just bugs me. Seems like you're hiding something.)
People who are oblivious to their surroundings.
Hypocrites & Liars
Small, repetitive noises.
L.
Pet peeves? Hmm.
People who resent literacy. Quote from a book, just a schlubb book, not, lawdhelpus, a classic, just an ordinary printed during the last 40 years book, and you're a "snob" parading your esoteric learning. Hey, go be semi-literate, but don't wear it as a goddamn badge of honor.
For that matter, don't ever try to read a book while sitting in the Cleveland "dog pound," the bleachers at the football game. The regulars are genuinely offended by the sight. One beer-swilling tank-top with a belly the size of a Franklin stove yelled at me, "Go to a library if you wanna do that!"
Drivers who think you're obliged to turn right on red, even if you don't want to.
People who condemn a whole musical form because they didn't like the three examples of it they've heard. Rock is childish, country is for hicks, opera is for snobs, jazz is dead, rap is obscene, etc. Listen to twenty or thirty sides and _then_ give me an opinion. Otherwise, shut the hell up and listen.
Oh, and my daughters' pet peeve: having a set of parents who tend to break into song so much, the kids think they're living n a musical (g).
--Alex
Frank: Some pet peeves right off the top of my head--
People who don't signal for turns, esp. when you could have proceeded but were waiting for them to go straight.
Tailgaters.
People who don't spay or neuter their pets and then don't take care of their pets' offspring.
People who are chronically late but refuse to wear a watch
People who never apologize even when they know they're wrong
People on Usenet who bottom post and put all the previous thread's message above their reply
People who forward chain letters and hoaxes via e-mail
The sound of a chainsaw
People who flick their cigarette butts all over the place, esp. on my front lawn and porch area
People who don't vote
People who think their car is so hot that they take up 2 spaces in the parking lot
That's just for starters.
Bermanator
Re: my desire to be a failure as a parent, David Loftus snarked:
"It shouldn't be. It should be refreshing. The obsession with not failing, with "being a good parent" (however one interprets that) is what makes for so many bad ones."
I beg to differ, sir. I don't think it's a burning desire to be a good parent that makes for so many bad ones. I think that many people have children b/c it's the thing to do, like having and SUV or a dog. I think if more folks thought seriously about what it means to be a parent before they conceived a child, asked themselves if they *really* could handle it, and consciously behaved in a way that they felt would be successful, there would be fewer bad parents.
I'm not sure what point you were trying to make by saying that striving to be a good parent dooms one to failure. Thinking too much is never a good thing, of course, but thinking to little isn't much of a virtue to tout. I don't care what other people would think of my parenting skills; I do care that my kids feel well-raised, fairly treated, and can look back on their childhoods fondly.
If that's "moaning," then so be it.
Bermanator
COOKIE: Thanks you're a dish...or should that be a dessert?
--DTS
Okay, you bookmobeeles..I ask this again. Do you know anything about this Catherine Coulter? I realize New York Times bestseller is no great indicator of talent these days--if you're in vogue, you're in vogue. But I'm curious what you think of her style. Only seen the one book (cassette, that is) and I still stand by my movie-of-the-week comment about the storyline I read but..I dunno. I thought the story was kinda nifty. And I have no idea why..but I wish I knew this guy she ends up marrying. No extreme--far as I can tell--amounts of 'romance' in this piece. I guess it just reminds of what James Bond MIGHT have been like if he wasn't so damn formal..
or summat. Will figure it out whether you feedback or not. Just found this kinda interesting.
H
Darryl, you said a mouthful my friend. That is my idea of reparations as well; at least a goddamned apology signed by the entire Senate and congress.
----------
Ok, new topic: Favorite pet peeves.
Geneology--who the fuck cares where you came from, it is more important that you are here now. Self esteem doesn't come from the knowledge that you were descended from the damn Mayflower. People have a fetish about their family tree that I do not understand. I don't care to know if I come from a line of either murderers or saints; I just know that life is more important in the now.
Cell phones going off at the movies: New law; we have a cell phone shoved up the owner's ass if it goes off.
Christian rock: Rock music is the Devils music, let's leave it that way. Bands like, Creed are out to destroy rock,not save it.
Liberals who want censorship: This is an oxymoron. Liberals have a history, and being PC is not an option. Civil liberties are the hallmark of Liberal thought, so it is sad to see certain feminists and other lefties trying to censor pornography or rap music or whatever makes them offended. Love what you love and turn the damn channel when you are offended. First amendment is not a loophole.
People who are easily offended by swearing: Fuck em.
Nostalgia junkies who think that their time was better or more noble than now. Face it folks, the old days sucked.
Knee-jerk Noam Chomsky critics: These are people who learn of the man's work from second hand knowledge and pontificate about what they do not understand. Either respect the man or don't but don't lie about his ideas.
Born again patriots: 9/11 brought these yabo's out of hiding. Waving a flag does not make you American, believing in freedom does.
Europe bashers: Americans are good at this stuff as well. We only put down these countries because we know they have better health care and more freedom of the press; not to mention better food and drink. Well, not England.
People who talk about how awful the rich are, but live like kings themselves: Walk the talk.
Oh yeah...Daryl reminds me of something.
Met this woman. Beautiful. I'm talking beautiful--a tall, outdoorsy, natural...beauty. Young woman, about 23. She trained me at a McJob recently. Left for a new job, so I only had contact with her over a two day period.
We talked. I'm not saying the conversation STARTED when I mentioned she was pretty and had she ever considered modelling?--yeah, THAT pretty--but this anecdote of hers blew me away.
I spoil the story by telling you, outright, she's part Aboriginal. Up here, that means Indian. Tribes. Got it? She's part Scottish and part Aboriginal. She mentioned this and the first thing out of my mouth was, "You don't LOOK it." (Silly, we humans.) Anyway, what she related, that blew me away was this:
She used to go into clubs with her friends as a teen. One time, she went into this club that was mainly Aboriginal based--they were the dominant culture, is what I mean.
Now..imagine this: BECAUSE she didn't look Aboriginal, she got hassled by the inhabitants. I'm talking threatening. I'm talking someone wouldn't think twice to walk up to you and knife you cos you 'weren't one of us.' A rowdy bunch of people, okay?
On this one occasion, she goes into this bar, gets this kind of snubbing...
and then..mentions to someone that she's part Aboriginal.
And all is forgiven. They immediately start treating her like a bud. Like one of them. The same people, who not five minutes earlier, would have been willing to club her in a back alley.
Discrimination. It's fucked as far as _I_ can see. Imagine that. Being the same looking person and faced with those two extreme options.
Perhaps that's an old story ta some of ya, but it simply blew me away. Boy...
Darryl's wonderful note reminds me of the single best argument against reparations for slavery. If they're ever granted, then white dopes'll have a field day saying, "How can you complain about crime, police brutality, and black poverty? We've just paid up for slavery, so anything else is probably yer own dam' fault."
David Loftus mentioned the bit about cahs handouts being part of reparations. I just don't expect that to happen: rather, figures like Randall Robinson are asking that funds be applied to somehow rectify the matter-- say, endowing chairs to research slavery, funding museums, commissioning statues and public plaques, etc. Of course, the people who'd administrate these funds'd find themselves with a decent income for a long while. Very little of that cash'll wind up in the hands of, say, a family of sixth-generation Arkansas sharecroppers.
Let me know what you think of this guy's brand of humor:
http://www.reynoldsunwrapped.com/
As usual, Darryl has shown himself to be smarter than the rest of us since he only posts infrequently and, because of that, has yet to post with something that can even remotely (if at all) be conceived as being disagreeable.
Reparations: No.
And the points Darryl make are interesting in that no amount of reparations will address the issues he brings up. It's a societal and cultural issue and this issue will only be addressed as generations are replaced; generations that judge a person by who they are instead of what they look like.
And it's not just the overt racism of calling someone a nigger. It's asking a black guy you know what he thinks of OJ getting off as though his opinion somehow counts more than anyone else's. Or, what he thinks about how accurate "Good Times" is, even though he doesn't live in Chicago or was brought up in an upper-middle class neighborhood. Or, listening to the news and hearing about the "urban dwellers" which always seems to me to be a euphemism for "predominantly black neighborhood". It's subtle and harder to pick up on, but it's racism still the same.
Switching train tracks, now:
I never said I hate my parents. Correction: I never said I hated my father as silence was always best in his turbulent presence. Don't recall if I ever said it to my mother, but I kinda doubt it. I've never been one, even as a child, to utter absolutes of hate or love. My wife was the first person I ever said "I love you" to (and that includes trying to get into women's pants; I was an asshole at times, but I never said the words just to get laid). I said it to my mother as she lay dying of cancer in the hospital, but not really sure to this day (and she died ten months ago) if there was any actual emotion behind the words. I've never said those words to my father.
Which is why, every morning, I tell Mackenzie I love her. I don't know if she can understand me or not, but I damn well know it was never said to me by my parents and it couldn't hurt her. Based on my experiences growing up, I'm trying to do the opposite of how I was raised.
Is it inevitable that a child will tell his or her parents that he or she hates them? Don't know, but I personally don't think anything is invevitable. But, then again, I'm a pessimistic optimist, so what do I know?
Back in de-lurk mode:
Reparations: As a black man, I have a couple of thoughts on this issue. Personally, I don’t know that I’d take the money, even if it were offered. While my family (and myself) have been personally and constantly wronged by the aftermath of slavery, I don’t know that reparations would be fair. I could tell you the stories (my father lost both parents when he was 8 (couldn’t afford medical care), the youngest of 12 children, soon after, he had to stop the awful “separate but equal” school he was attending in order to help his family, chopped cotton, cut sugar cane, etc.) but it would be a long story. His mother was full-blooded Native American (whose trials and tribulations would make a compelling story, too). I would not want dollars. I’d settle for an apology, and a chance. I want a chance to fuck up, and have people say that everyone makes mistakes, rather than “What did you expect.” I don’t want you to treat me differently, but I do want a chance to take the job, do a good job, and to be judged on the job I do, rather than the color of my skin. I don’t want special privileges, I just want an equal opportunity. When I lived in the south, I can’t tell you how many times I was blatantly told that I didn’t get the job because I was black. In those words. This was in and before 1983. I can’t tell you how many times I was told that I should be white, because I was thought to be smart, and spoke traditional English. I know that there have been other groups who have been discriminated against, but to equate white immigrants’ issues with slavery is misguided at best. In one or two generations, nearly every white immigrant family is assimilated into larger society. In my personal experience, that simply isn’t true with blacks. (Thanks to Jim Davis for initially raising that point).
Have we come a long way? Certainly. Do we have a long way to go? Most certainly. There are men being dragged behind cars in Texas, and synagogues being burned in California. Certain human beings have always looked to differences, rather than similarities, to give themselves an ego boost. I had a Korean acquaintance tell me the other day that her parents were “light-skinned Korean, not dark-skinned.” That type of thinking is so foreign to me that I could simply stare, slack-jawed, and shake my head in wonder.
I have never been one to blame all bad experiences on racism. If someone spits on you while shouting the “N” word, when you are jogging and someone throws a bottle at your head while shouting the “N” word, when you can’t trace your ancestry beyond 1870, because your ancestors were counted in the census without names in most cases, and without last names in all cases (yeah, I know about Roots, free blacks and all that, but the vast majority of us can’t), when your _father_, not some nameless, faceless slave but your _father_ can’t be anything but a laborer, because he’s black/native american and has a strong back, I think racism is validly claimed. You talk to me about the trials and tribulations of immigrants. My family has been in the US for at least 5 generations (all that we can trace) and we’re still being treated badly. Not because we’re stupid or lazy, but because our ancestors had an abundance of melanin in their skin. That’s generally not true of the second or third generation white immigrant families. I keep hearing about this “colorblind society,” (from both whites and conservative blacks – like Ward Connerly) I have only experienced it intermittently.
Reparations? I’d settle for being able to drive a nice car without police suspicion, to browse through a store without being followed by security, to walk down a street without having people lock their car doors while I wait to cross at the light.
DTS: That song is "Sometimes I'm Happy" by Vincent Youmans and Irving Caesar.
P.S. I NEVER told my parents I hated them.
But I understand this is not the norm.
COOKIE: The lyrics you quoted below -- "Sometimes I love you, sometimes I hate you...But when I hate it's because I love you" -- do your what the song's title is? Thanks.
--DTS
PAB moaned:
> Someone posted the quote re: parenting, "It's
> not a question of whether you'll fail, but
> how you'll fail." I find that enormously
> depressing and discouraging
It shouldn't be. It should be refreshing. The obsession with not failing, with "being a good parent" (however one interprets that) is what makes for so many bad ones. Like so many other activities that matter in life, if you give up caring so much about doing it right (or the worse flip side, avoiding making any mistakes), you'll relieve a lot of stress in advance and likely do a much better job.
> --I'm not fond of failure, esp. not in the most
> important job I'll ever have.
True, but who's going to define success or failure for you? Nobody, except maybe your kids themselves, and you don't have much control over how they turn out or what they'll think of you. Too many people judge their success or failure as parents by how OTHER people -- some of them parents themselves, some of them not -- judge them, and that's a mug's game.
"Signs" is neither skiffy nor sci-fi. I thought it was fine. But of the recent pickin's, I liked "The Road to Perdition" better.
Some of the recent discussion of reparations for African-Americans seems to presume cash handouts will be involved. I heard an advocate talk about reparative programs, rather than money to any one party or another. I think Cookie's points about the society we have inherited are much more to the point than the red herrings about whether one's ancestors were slaveowners, slaves, or "clean" immigrants, or whether one's family earned their living with the sweat of their brow, which I think are all pretty much red herrings. I'm not in favor of reparations; I just don't know, and I think there's an interesting case to be made. (Note: My mother was one of those Japanese-Americans who received reparations for the years she spent in the internment camps as a young girl.)
Yeah, I've told my parents I hated them. I actually decked my Dad once. My kids tell me that all the time. I make 'em clean their room or do the dishes(which they think shouldn't be done by kids) and they complain, moan, and tell us they hate us. Give 'em time out for whacking a sibling or for generally getting out of control and they scream, "I HATE YOU!" But buy 'em a candy bar or take 'em to the waterpark and it's all, "I love you, mommy."
So, yeah the "h" word is in common parlance here. It is balanced by the "l" word. Like the song says, "Sometimes I love you, sometimes I hate you. But when I hate you, it's 'cause I love you....". :)
Rich: Is it inevitable that all kids at some point will tell their parents that they hate them? I wonder about that. I know I told my mother I hated her, and in the moment I said it, I meant it with all my heart. But the thought of being the recipient of said comment breaks my heart in advance.
Someone posted the quote re: parenting, "It's not a question of whether you'll fail, but how you'll fail." I find that enormously depressing and discouraging--I'm not fond of failure, esp. not in the most important job I'll ever have.
Parents out there--have you kids said the H word to you? If so, how did you handle it? If not, how do you avoid it, or can't you? For everyone: ever tell a parent you hated him/her?
Bermanator
Rob, Brian, everybody, my point on Harlan's review of 2001 was not to say the film is bad. I didn't agree with Harlan when the review appeared, and I still like the film today. But he was dead on in his remarks on how people were trying to impose meanings on the film. To quote:
---I realize I am sick to tears of having to point out to phony and pretentious avant-garde types that all the significance they've dumped on this film simply ain't nowhow, nowhichway, in no manner, present.--
And while I have more respect for the folks on this board than he did for those of whom he spoke, I feel pretty much the same way about the rationales for the wretched writing in "Signs."
--alex
Happy Launchday (one day late) to Voyager 1, still going strong 25 years later.
Signs? My current favourite is "Construction zone ends. Thank you!" The backs of some highway signs on the TransCanada east of Quebec read "You're going the wrong way." For some reason, that's funny. Not as funny as crop circles, but pretty close.
Cheers, Jon
rich: "It could've been zombies. Could've been rats."
Or vampires, or werewolves, or demons, or ghosts, or elves...
RE: 2001
You see, this is why I always get a little cranky when someone asks me two seconds after the credits roll, "So what did you think?" I can't tell anybody what I think because the movie's still sinking in and I have no idea yet what to make of it. I still ponder just what all the fuss over CASABLANCA was about, while I worship ERASERHEAD as the ultimate example of an artist utilizing film to it's greatest advantage to create a disturbing experience. These final judgements happened over a VERY long period of time.
For one reason or another, Kubrick's never had much of an impact on me. I can't say exactly why...there's a distinct stainless steel feel to his films which probably turns me off. THE SHINING is the sole exception, mainly because I just enjoy seeing Jack Nicholson go looney tunes. Love that soundtrack, too.
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
Alex K.,
I've steeled my wife for the day when Mackenzie tells us she hates us. Hopefully, we'll do ok for the first few years of her life so that as she passes through her adolescence and back to sanity she'll love us once again.
And SIGNS is...aw, forget it. Agree to disagree on that one.
Cindiana,
Beautiful.
Venkman,
Make sure the frame doesn't clash with the color of the wall. And goat fucks are indeed a local activity (this is North Carolina, after all). You get in the small booth and shut the door, put your quarter in the slot, and as the curtain scrolls across the small window to the view of the dais beyond the booth, there before you are the goats of a lifetime. Yes, Jesse Helms and Elizabeth Dole. Combined age of 3000 and going at it like little puppies on your leg. Lotta fluids and dentures being spilled and a defribillator on standby. My eyes are still bleeding.
Brian and all,
"Harlan called it kubrick's Folly, compared it to Erich von Daniken's bullshit, and at one point, said that they'd only added the Dawn of man and "Beyond the Infinite" sequences as an afterthought because the middle portion was so awful. This latter point, Harlan claimed, he'd heard from Clarke himself. (This doesn't jibe with the accounts of the film's production that I'd read, including those Clarke set to paper, so Lord knows where that argument came from.)"
One would think I'd have something more substantive to offer after a hiatus; then again perhaps no one would:
Briefly, that bit about Clarke is essentially bullshit. At least on the matter of how he felt about the film...in its FINAL form; in countless interviews, including one last year on PBS, he expressed exuberance about the movie as a work of art and his pride in being associated with it. I have him on tape saying so and in a magazine too.
Though I've never read Harlan's review of 2001 - and given the clues in your comments it's one of his few I prefer not to (I know Harlan admires Kubrick highly - though, I admit, he's not fond of ALL his movies...as I sure as hell am to different degrees. Reminds me a bit about how Harlan and Bradbury are at odds about 'Close Encounters'...which I came to like less myself after a number of viewings; and those two guys love each other, so who gives a shit; both men are often dead on and sometimes they miss the target). Yet, 2001, like most of Kubrick's stuff, became a classic 10 years after being reviled (Kubrick movies weren't alone: 'Bonnie and Clyde' with Beatty took the same course; it was panned upon its initial release, according to Ebert. Now it's an acknowledged classic. Same with 'Godfather II'). Many times Siskel and Ebert discussed this pattern that followed Kubrick throughout his career. Critics of the day, by-and-large, despised 2001; critics today, by-and-large, adore it. Occasionally, Harlan admitted feeling different about a certain film upon subsequent viewings. Perhaps that is the case with 2001. I have no idea, of course. (If he chooses to comment on it, I'm not going to hassle him about it either way; he hasn't time for bullshit quibbling. But no matter what films I might disagree with him about the wonderful peaks in his OWN work more than make up for it. AND...his film recommendations are generally excellent). But certainly speaking for myself, I think it's a fucking masterpiece - having seen it perhaps 30 times or so - an opinion shared by Clarke, Ebert and the late Gene Siskel. Besides Harlan (supposedly), the only celebrities (minor or major) I recall unable to handle 2001 were Kale and Rock Hudson (the latter according to Ebert).
...and now for something completely, absolutely and inexplicably different:
I'm planning to read the HE Hornbook; I was fascinated by Harlan's run-in with a mobster. I was recalling Sinatra too.
The other night I read an article about some of the facts released by the FBI on Sinatra. I always knew he had mob connections. But I didn't think he "made use" of those connections. I thought they were "just buddies", which, alone, drew contempt. But Frankie was frankly a REAL fucker. This thug named Moretti got him singing engagements in the late 40's when his career nearly went sub-zero. I'd previously supposed his ties began there. But, in fact, his tie with mobsters reached back to his early childhood (even worse than Kennedy's). His uncle (brother of Sinatra's mother), it seems, was a driver for a gang of armed robbers and was convicted of murder in 1921. So, in the course of his life Sinatra not only hung out with some of the most ruthless mobsters, inluding Lucky Luciano, but used their "influence" when he thought appropriate: the eye-popper for me was this incident in the 60's involving comedian Jackie Mason. Sinatra had a relationship with another powerful mobster named Giancana. On several occasions people who'd angered Sinatra received threatening phone calls saying that Giancana would teach 'em a lesson. Mason at this time had a stage act in which he'd made jokes about Sinatra's marriage to Mia Farrow. The comic received phone calls threatening his life, but he refused to change his routine. Six days later three bullets were fired through the door of his hotel room in Vegas. The Sheriff’s Department investigated, but dropped the case because it said there was "no motive for the shooting". Mason stopped making his jokes about Mia Farrow, but went on making cracks about Sinatra in his show. A few weeks later, at an appearance in Miami, Mason quipped something like, "I don’t know who tried to shoot me but after the shots all I heard was someone singing: Doobie, doobie, do." Mason received four death threats that week with warnings that he should stop talking about Sinatra. Finally, when he was sitting in his car a dude wearing brass knuckles pulled him out and smashed his face. His nose and cheekbone were broken. "We warned you to stop making those jokes about Sinatra in your act", the assailant told him before taking off. Mason dropped the jokes about Sinatra from his act.
In 'The Godfather' there's a singer based on Sinatra. I didn't realize it was so accurate.
This sort of thing always makes me feel...how should I put it?...Morally naive. I tend to "boycott" certain people who sink in ways I cannot reconcile. Sinatra, Reagan and John Wayne were always examples. Yet, I have to consider some of the oddest bedfellows in history I came to accept. Perhaps I was simply raised on the myths that allowed me to accept them. The most obvious instance would be the Kennedys - who'd been very close friends in the 40's with a rogues gallery that included McCarthy and Nixon, not to mention Joseph P's mob pals from prohibition days. Should it matter to me, I wonder, when seemingly principled people hang out with 'Murder Incorporated'? Hey, how should I feel about Mia Farrow for marrying a mob-loving roue? Would John Frankenheimer have starred Sinatra in his masterpiece, 'Manchurian Candidate', had he known about the man's ties? The film is SO good (and, I'm afraid, so is Sinatra) I have to discard all my prejudices whenever I view it. I'm not sure where that leaves me; but long before I'm through casting a near-McCarthyesque judgement on everyone I'm confronted with an equivocal landscape of blurred boundary lines extending to the horizon. Finding your way across that landscape is what life is about.
I guess it's time for me to watch John Wayne movies now; then I'll start my Ronald Reagan collection.
Forgot the HTML ban--the last line of that conversation should be:
Mike {holds out wallet} "You want some reparations, brother?"
A quick recap of a conversation I had at work with Mike and Connie:
Now, Connie is sepia-toned; Mike is of a dark mocha hue.
Mike: "Alex, who's your department head?"
Alex: "Terry."
M: "Amd Terry is ..."
A: "Oh; she's cool."
M: "No, no; that's not what I meant."
Connie: "He's right, Mike; Terry IS cool."
M: " No--what color is Terry?"
A: "Oh; she's black."
M: "Uh-huh. And how many department heads have you been under?"
A: "Uh, three."
M: "And how many were black?"
A: "Two ..."
M: "Okay, now we're getting somewhere. How many managers have you had here?"
A: "Three--oh, and one other, on a unit I was detailed to."
C: "Only four? Well, you haven't been here that long."
M: "Okay--And how many of THEM are black?"
A: "Two."
M: "All right--two black, and two white."
A: "No; ONE white; Felix is Cuban/Mexican."
M: "Good point. Now. When did your people come over?"
A: "Well, on the one side, we got to Baltimore in the 1870s; the other side came over around 1912--I told you about the Titanic thing, right?"
M: "Right; right."
C: "WHAT Titanic thing?"
M: "He'll tell you later. So, let's look at one more thing. I'm GS 9, step seven [that's a governmental pay grade]--Connie, what're you?"
C: "GS 10, step three."
M: "And Alex?"
A: "Just got my GS 8 this week."
M: "You want some reparations, brother?"
(And on a newsgroup I frequent, a poster--a black poster--solicited for antireparations slogans she could take to the recent march. The winner was, "We will not be bought--again.")
Cindy, Bermanator, et whoever: See? I just don't get all gooshy and worried about my kids like that. I just don't and I feel like I ought to feel guilty for it. I got a little sentimental when the first son went to kindergarten (I took pix and all that) but mostly I just can't wait until they graduate from high school and get out.
And they *will* get out. No children of voting age at home.
To Alex, rte harlan's review of _2001_. I'd always wanted to ask Harlan about that review. Granted, it's kind of a trivial matter, but the subject came up on the Kubrick board, and Harlan's position on _2001_ is, well, hard to figure out.
The review you mentioned, written when the film came out, is pretty darned scornful. Harlan called it kubrick's Folly, compared it to Erich von Daniken's bullshit, and at one point, said that they'd only added the Dawn of man and "Beyond the Infinite" sequences as an afterthought because the middle portion was so awful. This latter point, Harlan claimed, he'd heard from Clarke himself. (This doesn't jibe with the accounts of the film's production that I'd read, including those Clarke set to paper, so Lord knows where that argument came from.)
I figure, Harlan went in like a lot of people did in 1968, expecting a straightforward SF film with decent production values-- perhaps along the lines of _Forbidden Planet_ or _Destination Moon_. Instead, what Kubrick delivered was a new myth for the age of space travel, the story of an entire _species_ told from a vantage point previously occupied by Olaf Stapleton. There were threads of cold irony throughout; the final frontier was now just another _airport_, equipped with a Howard Johnson's and a Hilton. The intrepid scientist is just another grant-funded bureaucrat, charged with managig politics than science. They got a film that confounded every expectation they had of how a film should tell a story-- almost no dialogue, no real "plot" except that revealed near the very end, and a climax that attempted to depict something truly unimaginable. Not only was this something new under the sun, it wasn't even _under_ the sun, per se.
And I also suspect that a _lot_ of idiots and poseurs were hailing it for all the wrong reasons, so who'd want to give those pre-New Age dopes the benefit of the doubt?
Granted, it wasn't an easy film to evaluate when it first came out. I recall that younger SF and fantasy writers tended to like it, while the old guard tended to dislike it intensely; Ray Bradbury and Lester Del Rey, for example, were nastily dismissive of _2001_. Can't hold it against the genre, though. Mainstream film critics were just as divided, and it's fun to read the re-reviews where the critic who'd disparaged the film suddenly realized what they were seeing. And it was a season of films that were self-consciously experimental, artistic, disaffected and trippy, so _2001_ had to work against a lot of set notions of what a film, and a science fiction film, ought to be.
Cindy: The human race may not have my admiration, but you do. Your kids are lucky you're their mom. Thanks for being so wonderful.
Your friend,
Bermanator
Rich -
"Jesus H. Christ. I tell you. I've been to two World Fairs and a goat fuck and it doesn't get any better than when your daughter smiles at you. A little person that you helped create. Smiling. At you."
I'm going to frame that quote. What, by the way is a goat fuck? Is this a local activity and what does one pay for admission to such a spectacle?
If all of the passionate, articulate, insightful people who really cared about mankind quit having babies... where would that leave us?
Trust me on this.. stupid people are having babies. A LOT of stupid people are having a LOT of babies.
People like you, Bermanator, OWE it to society to pass those wonderful genetics on down to the next generation. What if YOUR child was able to bring nations peacefully to the table of compromise... what if YOUR child had the gift it will take to solve the cancer problem for always? What if your child was a kind and decent human being who cared enough about the world to question what would happen to a child of hers or his in the future?
Seems to me the answer is as close as your handiest mirror. Look at yourself Bermanator-- I've seen who you are and I can tell you this, any child of yours would be blessed to have you for a parent.
Hey Rich,
You're great. Shall we nail this lid down for Bermanator?
Here is a picture of my Paris-- I took it myself.
http://photos.yahoo.com/bc/rip_stix/vwp?.dir=/My+Photos&.src=ph&.dnm=Paris+in+the+Springtime.jpg&.view=t&.done=http%3a//photos.yahoo.com/bc/rip_stix/lst%3f%26.dir=/My%2bPhotos%26.src=ph%26.view=t
HEATHER, check out more about Dan Simmons and his work at:
(www.dansimmons.net) or maybe it's (www.dansimmons.com). He even has works in progress posted, info about an upcoming writers workshop, etc., etc.
Informationally, the man
Cindiana: I'm sure I'd love my kids with a bottomless passion... however, I can barely justify my own existence from day to day, so I'm not sure if I can justify making more of me. The human race does not have my admiration. I'm not sure I want to be a part of it in a lasting way, you know?
We shall see...
Bermanator
Rich, ain't kids grand? Of course, you understand your daughter will eventually become a teenager. That's when your karma balances again.
On "Signs," at this point, I'll simply say that you might want to read Harlan's review of "2001: A Space Odyssey." It's in "Harlan Ellison's Watching." . (Besides, everyone should read that book anyway. One of HE's best.)
Frank: Farrakhan is indeed an effective public speaker. So was Hitler. I think the two have a lot in common.
--Alex
And speaking of kids...
I never would've thought that I would spend almost all my waking moments in trying to get my 6 month old daughter to smile and giggle at me. Adults sneer and giggle at me, but it just ain't the same.
I'm tapping on the back window of the car, Mackenzie in her car seat facing the back window, and tapping on the window trying to get her attention and then she looks up...recognizes me...and smiles.
Jesus H. Christ. I tell you. I've been to two World Fairs and a goat fuck and it doesn't get any better than when your daughter smiles at you. A little person that you helped create. Smiling. At you.
Seriously, there's no greater feeling in the world than instant happiness from my daughter when she sees me. I told my wife, in a moment of pure honesty and emotion, that I thought I loved my daughter more than her. It was a slip of the tongue and there was no thinking involved, it was almost a reflex the way it came out. And my wife said she understood. Now I don't know who to love more, but it's pretty close.
Alex Krislov,
Yeah, we're using the terms in the same manner and like I said, SIGNS ain't science fiction.
"It's not for adults who appreciate science fiction." You're right. The same way SLEEPER ain't for adults who appreciate science fiction.
SIGNS isn't even close to being science fiction. Just 'cause it's got aliens in it doesn't mean it's science fiction or "skiffy". Look: All the information we have on the aliens comes from newscasts and aren't really explained. Who said the crop circles were for navigation? The same book that said to put aluminum foil on your head? For all we know the crop circles could've said, "Hey, low humidity, set down here." or, "Next rest stop, twenty light years." The aliens aren't explained because they don't really matter. They're not integral to the story other than to get the family alone and spray the kid with some fucked up type of Binaca. It could've been zombies. Could've been rats. Could've been crazed Avon ladies, but Shyamalan chose to use aliens. It just don't matter.
The forest for the trees, my man. Forest for the trees.
BERMANATOR,
HAVE KIDS... HAVE LOTS OF KIDS.
Today I ended a twenty year hitch staying at home with my babies.
The last one flew from the nest to Kindergarten. Paris wanted to ride the bus with her brothers... so I let her.
Later, I slipped up to the window of her classroom to see that she was okay. There she was stacking big blocks higher than her hands could almost reach. She had a smile on her face and a little boy at the foot of her tower who marvelled at her handiwork. She was fine.
I turned to go and got the biggest knot in my throat. I was hoping that I would not meet anyone coming in as I was leaving, with the tears already spilling down the sides of my face.
This love that I have for my children defies logic and time and reason. I cried when each of them went off to Kindergarten and I mourned when they left for college. It's a sad, sweet, precious experience that I wouldn't have missed for all the world.
The feeling of sadness at not having her right with me sun up to sun down also rings a more solemn note-- perhaps due to our recent discussion. My daughter is gone for a happy reason and will come home on the bus after school. When I think of the Jewish mothers whose little ones were taken from them and of the fate of those mothers and their babies.. I literally ache.
Motherhood is a two edged sword, Bermanator. You will love in a way that compares to nothing you have known. It's cranking up the volume as high as it will go on the most intense love you have ever felt and putting your ear directly against the speaker.
With that degree and depth of emotion comes a vulnerability that is unspeakably terrible.
Cindy
My stance on reparations, as Alex's, is one of neutrality. I hear of the exploitation of slavery and think also of Japanese internment; the exploitation of Asian, Jewish, Italian, Greek, Spanish, German and Russian immigrant workers in North America's history; the theft of culture, land and life from native North Americans; the plight of women; on and on the litany of crimes goes...with most of us able to claim ancestry with those effected.
Starting to think that mayhaps we should all sue, and then all collect.
BOS
Dan Simmons?
--perk--
Yep. He has a new book out now. Another in the Joe Kurtz series. And I am off to listen to and watch and, oh, I don't know, maybe even talk wif Da Man come the 29th of this month.
Heather, the book you mentioned is "Darwin's Blade".
Anyway, wanna see just how small this here universe is? Last year abouts this time Dan Simmons, whom unca Harlan 'discovered' (just like me, except I was under the rock instead of sunning myself on it), was doing a reading and signing for the first Joe Kurtz book. Of course I went, because, well good entertainment is so hard to find.
I get to the bookstore to see Mr. Simmons and I go to sit down and can't help but notice the back of the head almost directly in front of me looks somehow known. The guy turns around at a point and, well, geez, wouldn't you know it? A former college professor of mine.
Who, incidentially, wrote the original screenplay for "The Grifters", from Martin Scorsese (sp?).
Now. Dan Simmons has reported Leonardo DeCaprio is interested in making one of his books into a film.
With assistance from the aforementioned Scorsese.
Wild, huh? How the whole universe just fits so neat and tidy-like.
'Scuse me, now. Off to make a deadline for a film review.
Until next time. . .
Cindy, Todd must be handled with oven gloves at all times.
Just saw the DVD-restored version of "Lost Horizon." Wow, what a difference! I used to have an old VHS tape of it, that I had gotten at a library discard sale, and parts of it were so shakey and dark that you could barely figure out what was going on. This version looks great and the commentary about the restored/omitted scenes and alternate ending are great.
Big thumbs up if you haven't seen it restored.
"...Here's my hope that we all find our Shangri-La."
Rich, I wonder if perhaps we're using the term "sci-fi" or "skiffy" in the same manner. A skiffy flick is _not_ science fiction. It's skiffy--and skiffy is for kids. It's not for adults who appreciate science fiction. That is to say, a story like Blish's "A Case of Conscience," which is a story about faith, is also excellent science fiction. A novel such as "The Sparrow" is a story about faith, and also damn fine science fiction. A story like "Signs," which is a story about faith, is also insultingly bad science fiction, which is to say: skiffy.
Frank, the last time I interviewed bell hooks, she still insisted on lower-case letters. Has this changed? I've always rather enjoyed the affectation. andy offutt also employed the device.
Cindy, Todd, Frank: I've stayed out of the reparations debate precisely because I, unlike everyone else here, cannot claim to have had no ancestors in the issue. I had ancestors who fought on both sides of the Recent Unpleasantness Between the States. I'll own to some guilt feelings over this. I always suspect myself of some irrationality on the issue as a result. So I stay out. Have at it.
--alex
Dear Todd,
Thank you for what you said about my post on reparation.
You are a treasure,
Cindy
I thought this Courtland Milloy essay on reparations was quite interesting. It apparently appeared in the Sunday Washington Post, but I read it in the Syracuse Post Standard today.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31362-2002Aug17.html
Thoughts?
This article made me think that perhaps part of any reparations should be used specifically to study and educate people about slavery and its legacy throughout history. I think we're blind if we don't think the legacy of American Slavery lives in some way today. Even though there are no living slaves, I'll bet there are grandchildren of slaves (greats or great-greats). Yes, many groups have enslaved others throughout history. Who knows? My Irish ancestors may have been slaves to the Romans. But American slavery is not ancient history. I don't think it's something black folk should---or even could---just "get over."
I think another portion of any reparation payment should go to the United Nations to be used for the eradication of slavery in all its forms worldwide.
But then again, WHADDA I KNOW???? Dammit! I'm a jazz-singer not a diplomat, Jim! (been watching too much original Trek lately...). :)
Frank, I luvs ya! On what has turned out to be a very nerve-wracking day, you gave me my one true laugh of the past 24 hours with your summary of SIGNS.
No milk came out my nose, though, because I hate milk.
-TODD
Brian, I was trying to see how "down" you are.
You forgot, Eric Foner and Manning Marable and Bell Hooks and The Black Radical Congress and Salim Muwakkil and...
------
Todd, I know what Signs is about. It is about a vengeful God and his hapless subjects who refuse to bow down to His hammer, so God sends dumb aliens to kill their children. This is the kind of faith Hitler would of envied.
Heather,
Two books of Stephen King interviews were published by Warner Books in the late 1980s early 1990s. BARE BONES and FEAST OF FEAR, noth edited by Tim Underwood and Chuck Miller. It's strange because I've been rereading them lately. There's also a sight I found last week, here's the place: http://scarletking.20m.com/#53.
Take care,
Bill
Bermanator and Joseph:
This thread puts me to mind of two things:
My wife gave me a birthday card a couple of years ago, with Old Man Death on the front; the shroud, scythe and the skeletal hands holding up a cake adorned with candles, brilliantly lighting a pink frosting "Happy Birthday". The message inside the card:
"You can run, but you cannot hide..."
The second being my darling littlest loinfruit, all of four, being unable to fathom Daddy's age.
As for age and discrimination of people's tastes, I tend not to be so fast to deride those younger than me. In our neck of the woods, record shops (now there's a quaint phrase) are quite few and far between, leaving many of the adolescent crowd to rely on the fogies hereabouts who have collections of music for supplies of tunes. Myself, Mel and a number of our friends have gotten a rather large reputation for being an ad hoc virtual library of music for the kids; our tastes tend to run the gamut, excepting country music (find and listen to "The Drunken Driver" by Ferlin Husky for an explanation). Consequently, when a whippersnapper comes to us looking for something to listen to, we'll draw them back to earlier artists, many times getting the kids to realize that old doesn't necessarily mean bad. The results come through our local radio station, where it's not uncommon to hear Zappa following a song by Nickleback, and "Live at Leeds" being a featured album on Friday, having beaten out the latest Marilyn Manson opus in a listener's vote.
Another ray of hope: Danny, after reading "Troublemakers", is going to recommend "Never Send To Know For Whom The Lettuce Wilts", and "Repent, Harlequin!..." for her English class to study this year, alongside "The City of Gold and Lead".
(Sob) Sometimes I just feel so proud...(Sniffle)
BOS
I appreciate everyone's debate of the reparations. One thing I observe in discussions (not just here, but elsewhere) is that people invariably shoot back stuff like "Well, my family never owned slaves," or "My ancestors came here and struggled for everything they had," or "I didn't own slaves and I work for peace now," or whatever. First of all, like (Mr. Davis, I think?) said, white priveledge makes it considerably easier for caucasians to assimilate and then work out their own destinies. Also, African slaves did not CHOOSE to emigrate here. That's a pretty major difference from how many of your ancestors and mine got here. My people were (and some of them remain) dirt poor, but at least they (being white) had the advantage of their skin color. What they choose to do is up to them and their own ingenuity and effort without being hindered by racism. Classism, yes---but that's another issue.
Second, this isn't about you, me, your family, my family, or individual African-Americans or their families. This is about recognizing an institutional debt long unpaid and largely unappreciated. If the government *is* eventually called on to pony up, the taxes of ALL Americans including African-Americans will provide the funding. So it's not as simple as black people wanting to "take" something from whites. Again, I think it's more about official recognition of our slave heritage than it is about actual payback.
That said, I still don't believe it's an issue that will be resolved satisfactorily. Even if reparations are paid in some form, racism still exists and might possibly become worse.
I just plain don't know.
"Out with the old, in with the new."
For more on this concept, read Terry Bisson's The Pick-Up Artist.
Trust me, it's a hoot (look up some reviews and synopsis' on the web and you'll see what I mean).
-TODD
JIM, BERMANATOR: Speaking as a teenager (why else do you think I'd be dumb enough to name myself after a character from a goofy anime show?) the 'out with the old, in with the new' motto is more in practice now than ever. This would all be well and good, if the modern perception of 'old' wasn't getting so hazy (as P.A. pointed out).
Oddly enough, an overall poor comedy called HIGH SCHOOL HIGH still had a scene which was a hilarious send-up of today's youth. The new teacher at a hard-ass, ghetto high school introduces the concept of 'books' to his class:
"Now this...is a BOOK. You open it...like THIS."
(in awe) "Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh....."
_________________________________________________________________
Meanwhile, I just received THE ESSENTIAL THOR from Amazon.com. Thor effortlessly projects power and majesty, but his talent to give good false explanations is just nonexistant. For example, the evil Dr. Zaxton goes on a psychotic rampage until Thor thwarts his plans, replacing him with a 'good' clone of Zaxton. Not wanting to tarnish the good doctor's name, Thor explains to Jane Foster: "He...uh...snapped out of it."
I would've loved to have seen Thor as Charles Manson's defense attorney at a parole board. "He...uh...snapped out of it."
"Oh. Okay."
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
BERMANATOR: The problem with modern youth culture is that it's so damned accelerated. What happened yesterday is old news, what happened last year is ancient history, and what happened more than twenty years ago is postively mythological in conception. ("LO, THERE WERE GIANTS IN THE EARTH IN THOSE DAYS. AND THEIR NAMES WERE...THE FLYING BURRITO BROTHERS.")
The music industry is mostly to blame for this, of course. They're so obsessed with the bottom line these days that they can't be bothered with nuturing bands. If someone's debut CD doesn't go at LEAST gold, then they're dropped to the curb. It's a crying shame--how many great bands of yesteryear could have survived in such an environment?
Thanks, Jos, Alex J.
Don't worry, I'm not balkanizing..or whatever that was. Ya gotta understand. I stopped reading fiction devoutly a while back. Read other kinds of books. Lots to catch up on. Thanks for the names you've mentioned. I'll see what I can find.
Got a job. Got a few jobs, actually. Will let you know where I end up. Not that it matters. This is what I do.
Checking out Dan Simmons. I like his tone. He has a "Hardcase" (I think it was) hard boiled detective character out there in the bookstores. I read the excerpt from the forthcoming book (at the back of this one.) Another story of the same character, called Kurtz, I think. Throwing the Three Stooges out the back of a moving vehicle. Looks interesting. Read a bit of another non-sf, non-horror book of his..Or started it. (I'm skimming a lot these days.) About an accident expert. Simmons is bloody good. Just my view.
Read a Stephen King interview in book last night. Damn. Last thing I read, I canna remember the author. He seemed to do a lot of social commentary. Didn't finish it. Will check his name when I get back there.
I liked King's observation on a certain sort of 'American.' There's the "Have a Nice day" AND "Make my Day" type. Happy indifferents who are quick to be violent. Never thot of if that way. Makes sense.
Question: Can you suggest more places for King commentary? I have "Art of Darkness." But that's not really KING talking. This interview inferred King has written other books of commentary--besides "Danse Macabre" which I've read. And, "On writing," of course.
Read some 'feminist' writers. I've never bothered with this stuff--just been living it. Some of it makes sense. Some worries me. Fueling an imaginary fire? That sorta thing.
Got some interesting views on some stuff though. The movie "Star Wars" appearing just after we Americans lost the war. To a bunch of Madame Butterfly 'women'. (Even the French couldn't beat them. But hey, the French ain't manly men anyway. Whoa! *laugh*) Then we start cranking out action films. Like "Star Wars." Didn't win that war in Vietnam. (I need to read more about this. Don't jump on this comment. I simply thought it a cool connection. She might be right.) But we proceeded to win, on film. "Rambo". Sylvester Stallone. "Die Hard". Shit like that.
Read some stuff on war and guys and rape. (Linda Grant, I think is was. "DeSexing the Millenium" I THINK it was. Will confirm this. Was chain-reading a few books last night.) The casualness. The OH SO casualness. My Lai wasn't so odd a situation, she suggested. Things of that nature were/are everywhere. That sorta thot. Creeped me out. VERY much. A bit scary. More on that later--maybe a book. Heh. Reading the backstory to REAL stories is interesting. Interesting to get other people's voices on what happened. (True or no, it's still interesting.)
PA Berman,
If I can advance my own theory (no, no, Joseph never has any of those!), the obsessive reading of liner notes and lyrics wound down when they were compressed into those godawful 6-point type CD booklets. CD format also killed off the art of album covers. Rarely anymore do we see anything with the brilliance of the covers for So, or Dark Side of the Moon, or Kind of Blue, or the surrealistic splendor of Roger Dean's covers for Yes.
Regards,
Joseph
BOS: You gotta understand, to teenagers, 38 is like, ancient. When I tell them I'm 30, they always say, "No WAY!" Like they think I should have a walker or something. I remember when I was that age, anything after high school was this uncharted territory. It is to laugh.
The really sad thing is, most of these kids who claim to be rock fans would love The Who's music if they gave it a chance. They all enjoy Pink Floyd when I play it for them. I think rock music today (such as it is) is geared more towards singles (downloadable off of Morpheus) than albums and bands. How this happened I don't know, b/c when I was a kid, the obsessive poring over liner notes and album covers was part of the fun. Things change...
Bermanator
Though I generally agree with everyone's comments re the hardships of their immigrant ancestors, I hope that no one is claiming that whites didn't accrue SOME privilege on account of their skin. Because even if you were Irish, Jewish, Russian or whathaveyou, you could still assimilate into Anglo society. On the other hand, if you were black, well, then you were pretty much screwed no matter WHAT you did. In some respects, that's true even today.
Though this country has made a lot of progress, there's still a long way to go before we achieve a truly color-blind society. How could it be otherwise? The USA, for all intents and purposes, WAS South Africa just a scant forty years ago. To think that all that institutionalized hatred has disappeared is a fantasy, pure and simple. (Or impure and complicated, as the case may be.) If the Modern American Buffet was so damned grand, I doubt ANYONE would be asking Uncle Sam to pick up the check.
(Yeah, I know: No one was claiming otherwise. Some things just Need To Be Said, is all.)
As for the odious lie that Jews controlled the Slave trade...hey, we were too busy poisoning wells and chopping Goyim children into matzo to worry about such picayune concerns. Seriously, isn't taking the rap for the murder of the Son of God ENOUGH for some of you folks?
ON SIGNS: I didn't like this movie--I LOVED it. Loveditloveditloveditloveditlovedit. It scared me, it moved me, it gave me practically the ONLY goddamned thing to be happy about in the month of August (thus far). The religious overtones didn't bother me a whit, because I never felt that M. Night was proselytizing me--he simply chose to focus on one individual's personal response to an alien invasion. Maybe I'm deluding myself, but the message of the film wasn't You Must Believe In God, Or You Will Live A Meaningless Existence Festooned With Lime-Green Alien Monsters. It was simply that you must have faith in SOMETHING, be it God, Human Reason, or the idea that tomorrow, in some ineffable way, will be better than today. Who really has a beef with that?
Was it flawed? Sure. As others have noted, the aliens were your standard humanoid-looking, easily-killed-by-a-major-component-of-our-planet cardboard villians. But they were used effectively, nonetheless, and none of the cheesier elements disturbed the flow of the movie. (The final scene in the living room scared me so damned much, I though I was going to shit zirconium.) And Shyamalan should NEVER, EVER act. A Hitchcock-type cameo is fine, but actually attempting to deliver lines was too much for the poor fellow. If anyone else had given such a lame reading, he would have been fired on the spot. (Is this an example of fame clouding someone's judgement?)
What can I say? The damned movie WORKED for me, and I can hardly wait to see it again. For those people who have avoided it because of the negative critical comments: Just go to the thing, already. You will be pleasantly surprised. (Unless you're not. Hey, you accept someone's opinion on the Internet as gospel, you takes your chances...)
Alex,
Why do I get the feeling you've been reading Transmetropolitan, with the Mercury remark? Anyhoo, you make a good point - we just have to be careful not to harm any ecology we find out there (though if Venus has a life-supporting ecology it's going to be one of the weirdest imaginable).
Regards,
Joseph
Alex Krislov and anyone else who thinks this,
I have issues with SIGNS, but let's be clear about one thing and one thing only: SIGNS is not, I say again, not a "skiffy flick". It's a lot of things, but science fiction ain't one of them. In this regard, Todd is perfectly correct. Yes, I am as shocked as you are, but he is correct this time.
To belabor the point: SIGNS has science fiction elements, but it is not a science fiction film. ALIEN has science fiction elements, but it is not a science fiction film. JERRY MAGUIRE has comedic elements in it, but it is not a comedy. VANILLA SKY has comedic elements and plays like a suspense film, but it is a science fiction film. Just because a film uses certain aspects of genre to get its point across does not make that film part of that particular genre.
HEATHER: I don't much know that I like the idea of literary Balkanization, be it when someone suddenly discovers Latin American authors and has to read them all, or when someone looks to members of a given a writers' group or of a reagion region, as in the Minneapolis mafia in sf/f--or, to get back to the point, when someone says, "I want to read more [female or male] authors." Granted, there's a lot of good to be found in each of the above examples, but I find it fun to just branch out and find stuff which is new and different.
Having said that, here are a few recommendations: Mary Gentle is adept at both sf and fantasy, and won the British Fantasy Award last year or the year before for her THE BOOK OF ASH (available here in America as four separate paperbacks. Whether she's making it up or working with established armament, the woman knows her weaponry, being as she is a skilled fighter in several historical forms.
Ah, hell. In the interest of not clogging the board, let me just throw names at you: Lois McMaster Bujold. Pamela Dean. Brenda Clough. Emma Bull. Patricia Wrede. Dorothy J. Heydt. Alma Hromic.
I'm staying in the realms of science fiction and fantasy, because if I branch out, I really WILL clog the board.
(A note: All but of the above names are regular contributors to the rec.arts.sf.composition newsgroup; you may want to check it out. I DO recommend that you especially try to find books by Alma Hromic, even though most of her stuff is published out of New Zealand and Australia--she's one hell of a writer of both fiction AND nonfic, and is also one of ny very best friends in the world, so ...)
COOKIE: My ancestorsd inherited nothing, I'm afraid. My ancestors came from pogrom-ridden places which once they called home like Kaunas (Kovno). Vilna (Vilnius). Desye (Odessa). Once here, whether alone or aided by relatives who had themselves only come over shortly before, they built. Worked. Scrimped. Saved. Suffered. Succeeded. Slaves did not build the ghettoes.
Not that I'm a proponent of the Horatio Alger approach as the only way for everyone, but that is what my landsmen had to do to make better possibilities for their children. To infer that whatever meager success my forebears had was contingent on a previous slave-based economy is a fallacious argument.
(And somewhat insulting, but I know you didn't mean that.)
America WAS built on slavery. As was the British Empire. As was the Roman Empire. As was Pharonic Egypt. And a lot more of the great societies of the world I haven't mentioned.
America was built on slavery. But it has built its way--foundering and failing at times, yes--out of that hole.
JOSEPH: Though I'm no Dysonite, believing the solar system our fiefdoim to do with as we please, I can't see anything wrong with, say, covering Mercury with solar panels and beaming the energy back to Earth and the orbiting stations we may put up. Stripmining Venus (though a gas giant would give a better harvest) is a bit much, I agree--but where do we draw the line between workable resources and that which should be left sacred and inviolate?
Todd, if you like SIGNS, that's fine with me. I like some bad movies, too. Where you and I differ is your declaration that disliking SIGNS' stupidity in its depiction of aliens is the mark of a nerd.
Sorry, but SIGNS is a skiffy flick. It's a bad skiffy flick, one that has science-fictional elements so childish as to distract the viewer from any meritorious aspects of the film. That's precisely why I dislike it. You think we should all overlook that, which is fine--until you start accusing us of complaining that it isn't INDEPENDENCE DAY. That's an unfair accusation, Todd. The problem with the film is that its own stupidities mire its good intentions in muck. That's my point. Okay?
You needn't agree, but kindly stop accusing anyone who doesn't love the film of being upset that it's not a skiffy flick. The problem is that that is precisely what it is.
By the way, I like Frank, too. I think a lot of us do, even though we rarely agree with him. Hi, Frank, how ya, doin?
--alex
Another point regarding reparations. I'd like to think that both Britain and the United States deserve some credit for having eliminated slavery within their own demains, as well as for trying to stop it elsewhere. When African chieftains would have been happy to continue to sell their people for quick profits, the abolition movement in Britain managed to convince the Crown to reject the practice. Britain began policing the seas for the slave trade, and even before th Civil War, the American coast guard was vigilant (tho not always effective) at trying to stop ships delivering their ghastly cargo. I strongly recommend reading Hugh Thomas' _The Slave Trade_ before replying to this.
Yes, much of the West participated in the slave trade, but it was the West that decided what an evil practice it was.
To Frank: I don't know _why_ you'd ask me if I know if any black intellectuals on the left. Especially since I'd already cited the estimable Adolph Reed, Jr. several times in this discussion. But if you'd like, I'll toss out the names of Henry Louis Gates and Cornel West (whom I've met). Randall Robinson might be considered on "the left," but this reparations scheme strikes me as a kind of brokerage politics that has a degree of authoritarianism at its core. So, why do you ask such a question?
Oh, and happened to be running through channels and sawe Harlan on a special titled "Voyage to the Milky Way," about the future of serious human space travel. He had some good comments of trying to beat the exploiters out there before they start stripmining Venus.
Frank,
Cornel West, Michael Eric Dyson, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison - how's that for a good start on black left-leaning intellectuals? Just in case you were starting a list...
Joseph
Like I said, Alex, "You may not like what it is saying or attempting to say about faith and belief etc. Fine." I suppose what I should have really said was "You may not like HOW it says what it is attempting to say".....in other words, you may not like the damn movie and that's fine. I liked it. Who cares? There is no single movie in the world that everyone will like, and when I give thumb's up or down to a movie I am simply giving my preference: I am not trying to convert anyone. I am not trying to be snotty about someone's liking the movie or not, I am just trying to be snotty about one thing:
The movie ain't about the aliens. It ain't about the crop circles.
Now you, and many others, feel that this is true and still the movie sucks. That's good. That's fine.....but you know that the movie ain't about the aliens/circles. You just don't like it anyway and feel that the stupidity of the aliens ruined it for you anyway. Fine. Good for you and anyone else who does not like this movie.
But I respect Frank and I feel Frank is a compadre of mine on this board regardless of our political beliefs.....and Frank is a smart man and I just wanted to toss out to him that this is how I feel about anyone who concentrates so heavily on the aliens.
That's all. You find that snotty, that's fine. Hey, I enjoyed INDEPENDENCE DAY in the theaters the one time I saw it....I had a rollicking good time that night, but I know that the movie is a piece of shit. But THAT movie is a movie where you can pick apart the logic of the aliens....because THAT movie is about the aliens.
I am far from being a movie snoot. I cry like a baby everytime I see FIELD OF DREAMS....and I've seen it 6 or 7 times. THAT is far from a movie snoot as I could ever come.
-TODD
Todd, we've been through this before. SIGNS is an excellent example of nerdly thinking. By making the aliens incredibly stupid, it presents an "example" of a stupid movie that commits the additional sin of thinking it's smarter than its audience. It isn't. It's infinitely dumber. A film can focus on an element other than the aliens without making them so ridiculous that the stupidity of their conception draws attention to itself. SIGNS simply lacks an intelligent concept; in the end, it's so lacking in imagination and intelligence, it becomes a slick version of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD.
And taking note of that stupidity does not make one a fan of INDEPENDENCE DAY. But it's amusingly snotty of you to pretend one must chose between two bad films. No thanks, Todd. There are plenty of intelligent films, SF, fantasy and mainstream alike, to choose from. Lord knows there are more intelligent films about faith.
--Alex
Frank, SIGNS is not about the aliens. It is not about the logic of the invasion and the logic of how they do what they do and the logic of how they go down. SIGNS is not about the aliens at all. It is not INDEPENDENCE DAY.
Now, you may not care for the movie as it is, that's your choice. You may not like what it is saying or attempting to say about faith and belief etc. Fine.
But it ain't about the aliens.
Those on the 'net who insist on listing of logical fault of the alien invasion are the type of people who give Science Fiction the name Sci-Fi.....they's too busy drowning in their little community of nerd-dom to come up for air.
-TODD
CEP - I wouldn't start choosing the fabric for the inside of the pine box just yet. I myself are amongst those who saw the Loon at work, albeit in his final tour with the Who, long past his prime. I was one of those at the first of the myriad final concerts, held at Maple Leaf Gardens on December 17, 1982. I haven't passed the into the land of the ancient, being only 38.
Remember, you're supposed to die before you get old. Bonne Chance demain.
BOS
Random thoughts: I keep hearing how "this country was built on the backs of slaves". I seem to recall the vast majority picking cotton down south. The southern economy was not in any way a rival to the industrial north-not until the auto plants and other giants of industry moved to warmer climes in the last 25 years. You have to also consider that a great number of those uprooted or sold by their own people in Africa also ended up in Cuba chopping sugar cane. Many also ended up in South America. Brother Farrakhan and his Islamic hoards also seem to think Jews were largely responsible for the slave trade, though slavery like so many other things transcends racial boundaries and is more rooted in debt, lawbreakers and other misfits. All societies, even the fun loving native Americans have had people whom they have cast aside as undesirables or put to work doing menial tasks, often bartering them out for goods. This is not new and did not start on this continent as some would have you believe. Civil rights was a positive step. Affirmitive action and any concept of reparations has only and will only divide us more.
CEP: I *have* street cred-- Ozzy Osbourne is The Man. I knew him before he was Dan Quayle's favorite TV dad, in the days when he bit the heads of bats, strangled his wife, and passed out drunk. Sad to say, these kids have no idea who Keith Moon is. I think you're way cool to have seen him, but they would think you were an old dude living in the past. ::sigh::
Cookie: My grandparents didn't speak English when they came here and no one cut them a break. They worked their asses off, as do I. I do understand what you mean about white privilege, and the fact is, white people take it for granted and usually take umbrage and fiercely deny it when it's pointed out. But it does exist, and color still forms a barrier between people and obstructs social mobility. Would that it were not so, but reparations will only widen the gulf, IMO.
Bermanator
Oh fuckit, I've already opened my big trap once today, so let's go for a double header...
ON REPARATIONS:
In all honesty, part of me is VERY sympathetic to the idea. We can say over and over again that money is no solution to past injustices, but to many people that argument rings hollow. In the society we live in, money is the alpha and omega, and government and big corporations spray it around like it's silly string. CEOs run companies into the ground, and are rewarded with massive severance packages; military programs are earmarked billions of dollars, even if they've been proven to be seriously flawed in conception; celebrities who do little more than read cue cards and ask asinine questions (Connie Chung, anybody?) pull down salaries WAY in excess of their actual worth. So is it really so outrageous to suggest that the government pony up for an immoral policy that it supported wholeheartedly 150+ years ago? Especially when the government recently awarded reparations to families of the Japanese-Americans interred in World War II?
Also, and I just LOVE bringing this up, there's an undeniable racial angle to all of this. For many African-Americans, the arguments against reparations just sound like the same old excuses not to give black folks what's theirs. (What's that saying? Justice means "just us"?) Slaves toiled for generations to help build this country, and were paid...nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zip. Zapada. Why shouldn't descendants of these slaves get a piece of what should have rightfully gone to their ancestors? Again, to argue otherwise reeks of a double standard--after all, monetary awards in court cases are given out all the time to living descendants.
BUT...as much as I understand the reasoning behind the reparations movement, there is the potential for so much havoc and resentment if it succeeds that a victory may well leave the black community in worse straits than before. How do we determine who gets the money? Are descendants of freemen out of luck? What about families of mixed race? What about the desecendants of Irish immigrants and Asian railworkers and Native Americans and all the other oppressed groups? Hell, what about all the WHITE indentured servents, who lived lives as hellish and devoid of hope as any African slave? What about the Civil War dead? Do THEIR families get a break from reparations payments? What about the African chiefdoms who supplied the slaves to begin with? What about all the countries besides the US who participated in the slave trade? What about the modern countries, many of them in Africa and the Middle East, who engage in slavery today? And what about the inevitable tsunami of resentment by the majority of non-slave desendants (read: white folks) in the United States, which may result in racial violence the likes of which we haven't seen since the LAST turn of the century?
Reparations would have been a WONDERFUL idea a hundred years ago. Hey, if you could lick all those problems above, I'd even be willing to chip in. But now? Too amorphous an idea, too fraught with peril, and too late to help those who needed it the most.
Gee, so lil' Caucosoid me comes out against reparations. How DARING. (Next week: I tell you all why pizza, cute little puppy dogs, and the music of the Beatles are all Good Things...)
FRANK: Take it from me, Harlan is like the Shadow. He's got informants everywhere. Harlan see's all and knows all...from the goings on here in Webderland to the darkness that lurks in your little heart.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
-Informationally, the man
Wasn't the money we gave the 9/11 families reparations? And some of those families were already rich.
Brian, do you know of any other black intellectuals on the left? Thanks.
--------------
Do you all think Harlan left us for good?
You know, if reparations focused on civil rights violations and were held at the State level, the organization would be more successful. Look at lawsuits against the tobacco companies. Imagine the ARM going to, say, Texas and demanding several billion for slavery as well as recent racial attrocities. THAT would be entertaining.
But going to the Union - the body that liberated slaves in the south - for MORE than the blood of its citizens? No. More men died in the Union than owned slaves. I'd say we've paid.
As for living in a world built on the backs of slaves: Nah. This country was built on the backs of millions of hard-working people of all races. The rich get richer and the poor get fucked and that's as true today as it was then. Slaves contributed to the selfish needs of the slave owners and contributed to the southern economy as PART OF its work force. There were a lot of poor white folks treated as bad if not worse as laborers.
Coal miners, railroad workers, trailblazers, millworkers...all of whom built this country without the same care for safety or fair wages as we have today...are you telling me THEIR heirs have a case for reparations, too? Certainly they weren't free to up and leave the company store or the sweatshop. Should the rich, evil companies that, eventually brought us liquid soap, frosted flakes, the automobile and chewing gum accountable for exploiting their workers under deadly conditions with no compensation for health or retirement?
Slavery = Evil, but that evil is dead. We, as the United States, killed it. We sent many a son to die for the cause. We apologized for slavery. The government has paid its debt. I think ARM should take it to the states of the Confederacy and try to make a case. At least their attempts would be entertaining and, like the tobacco cases, based on local impact, not empty rhetoric.
Got this off of usenet. The criticisms of the plot holes in Signs are dead on:
"1. Aliens so dumb that they need crop circles to navigate. They can
cross the universe but not navigate without making huge crop circles
thst draw attention to them. They also leave their lights on at night
so everyone can see them.
2. Aliens so dumb they don't know water will kill them! And if they do
they make no effort to protect against it!
3. Mel Gibsons character contacts no one about the alien in the
pantry. I bet the CIA would love to catch a live one!!!
4. The aliens focus on a farm house with 4 occupants. A large waste of
resources.
5. GOD kills (Nice GOD) Gibsons wife so she will leave the message
with Mel so he will save his family from the aliens. GOD also makes
the little girl love water glasses and the little boy have Asthma
(Nice GOD) so the poison gas won't kill him. Couldn't GOD just make it
rain really hard and kill off of them before they invade the house???
STUPID!!! Not even counting all of the people who the aliens killed.
Didn't GOD care about them?"
Lynn,
That's why I like you - you can take one the lamer bands ever and quote them effectively.
Jim,
Chessmaster 7000? Man, that's making me feel old - I remember the original of that.
Regards,
Joseph
[rant]
Inherited? I don't know about you, but I didn't *inherit* anything. My father was raised in a reconditioned chicken coop in South Texas. He worked for a living. He worked so hard, he insisted that I do the same, even though he paid for my college. Education appreciation in my family was digging ditches and shovelling shit until my palms were blistered and bleeding. What the fuck is wrong with *working* for your "inheritance", eh? Instead of just expecting someone to cough up their own hard earned dough so you can continue to do nothing.
Sorry, I just loathe and despise people that want something for nothing, and that's just exactly what "reparations" sound like to me. It's in quotes because the root of the word is "to repair", and giving someone money because their ancestors were slaves doesn't *repair* anything. All it does is coddle people into believing that if you whine loud enough, someone will pay you to shut up.
"Complain about the future and blame it on the past, I'd like to find your inner child and kick its little ass, Get Over It." ~The Eagles
L.
[/rant]
This rant has been brought to by the good folks at Cube Farms Unlimited, bettering your world by lowering your expectations.
Jim: I'll keep that in mind when I read your response. Chances are, though, I wouldn't take much offense anyway. I think at heart that I really _am_ a nice guy, but I'm continually angry that a lot of people don't even approach my standard.
Cookie: Okay, so recent immigrants came to a country that had slavery in its past. Great. And if those immigrants came here with little more than the clothes on their backs, barely knowing the language, facing hatred, mob rule, discrimination, and worse, would that make you reconsider your smarmy and empty-headed comment?
To CEP: Good luck with the brief. Won't ask which ethnic group you hail from, tho. There's just so many downtrodden to _choose_ from.
To Frank, re Robinson's making strong moral points: I can't agree, because so much of Robinson's case rests on a mug's game.
There is no end to the comparative-suffering game, because one can always find some aspect of one crime that makes it worse than another. ("Slavery was worse because these people were torn from their homes and treated like animals!" "No, the Holocaust was worse because people were treated like vermin!" "No, the wars against the Indians were worse because they wiped out whole cultures!" etc., etc.,)
And there really is no act, no dollar amount, no public statement that could _possibly_ make up for many historical evils. It just can't be done-- even if we're talking about a single murder of a human being. So the call for reparations can be made _endlessly_. It may be morality's equivalent to the non-falsifiable proposition in science.
....and a good typist knows how to properly place on paper or screen the thoughts that are coming out of his confused head.
I is not one of them good typists.
-TODD
Frankie Bubbie, "No matter what you might think of Farrakhan, you cannot deny that he is one of the best public speakers around. I find strange entertainment in his speeches, that seem to go on endlessly."
If his speeches go on endlessly, how can he be one of the best public speeches. A good speaker knows how to condense his thoughts.
-TODD
Where does one stop with Reparations? Human beings have been enslaving, oppressing, crushing, killing, raping and abusing each other since we crawled out of the cesspool. It just doesn't make sense, except for any living ex-slaves. Too late for that, I believe.
*sigh*
BRIAN: I've had a bad month, so if my response to your post in the Pavilion was a little harsh, that wasn't my intent. To tell the truth, this is why I hardly post anymore: I'm in such a poor mood these days, I don't know HOW I'll come off. Again, I wasn't trying to put you down, and maybe I should just stick to my Chessmaster 7000.
Even if your ancestors didn't own slaves or came here yesterday, they still inherited a country which was built on the backs of those slaves. Just a thought....
Just taking a break for a moment in the middle of the end of Harlan's appellate brief (goes out tomorrow)...
(1) Reparations: Yeah. Stick to me to pay for them (that money has to come from somewhere). I didn't have ANY ancestors in the New World until after WWI. Not to mention that the minority of which I'm a member has been at least as downtrodden as any based merely on the melanin content of one's skin...
(2) PA Berman: You have no street cred. ;-) I saw Keith Moon drumming for The Who in concert. Twice. I saw U2 on their first US tour, in the college chapel. I faced piles of trials with Miles (now, sadly, on CD only).
You young whippersnappers... (Hey, I'm a lot older than I look, even without averaging in the apparent age of my back. Running from bullets on active duty kept me looking young.)
No matter what you might think of Farrakhan, you cannot deny that he is one of the best public speakers around. I find strange entertainment in his speeches, that seem to go on endlessly.
I saw Randall Robinson on C-Span, I mean the guy has brains up the yin yang. Morally, he makes good points, but I do agree that reparations have very little chance of being mainstreamed any time soon.
------
Good to see Chuck D. Moderating on Elvis. You really cannot deny the man's power. Elvis had one of the greatest singing voices ever.
Heather,
While I can't answer as to whether the professional field of science fiction is more or less welcoming to women than it once was, I think we can all agree that it at least has the perception of being so. There are for more female writers published than there once were, many of them of a high level of talent that I'm horribly gratified to see on the shelves (just offhand, I can think of Kage Baker, Connie Willis and Octavia Butler). It certainly isn't easy (of course, that applies for any author trying to be published), but the numbers are a lot different than they were even ten-twenty years ago.
As for the non-professional side, I think anyone who's been a fan for the past few decades will agree that there are a lot more women reading science fiction and participating in the fan community than there once were. Go to, say, Dragon*Con and you'll see a lot of female fans - and I'm not talking women dragged their by boyfriends and significant others. I think part of has to do with there being a lot more fiction that is marketed toward them and characters that they can identify with.
Sorry, Heather, no hard data. Just my perceptions.
Regards.
Joseph
I'm looking at the issue of woman writers. Kinda hard not to; I keep bumping into it on different levels. I realize an issue such as this borders on feminism (and I also realize there aren't many women's voices on this forum which I've always wondered about but no matter), but I can't do much about that; it's what's out there. Any suggestions on authors to look at? I've tried Kate Wilheim and Joanna Russ, for example. Some others you would not know. Read a book (sorry, LISTENED to a book) by Catherine Coulter (There's a movie of the week quality to this story that I just can't put my finger on.); looked at the background of Diane Gabaldon and her historical, character filled novels..those are a few examples. Got more? Any direction you want to take this is fine. I'm just starting with this.
Question: Is it true Norman Mailer believes you needs "balls" to write? Someone quoted him as suggesting that you could only write well if you were a man. Let me know.
Question: J.K. Rowling is a success as a children's writer. Will she be able to become a mainstream or adult books writer, if she wishes, or has she screwed herself?
Reading a book by Dale Spender. She talks about issues to do with being a "woman" writer (Funny, it never occurs to me to call myself that. Hmm..woman...writer..yah.) It's a little unsettling. Read about Tolstoy's wife. Not impressed.
Is science fiction, as a genre, any more welcoming to women who write than it was, say, ten years ago?
Questions, questions. Just looking for viewpoints here. I have a pretty good idea what's out there, in the world. Been living in it for quite some time.
Anyone see "Last Orders"? Good movie. Excellent character studies. Excellent story.
BoScott, that post of yours way back on the other forum about who you are and how you live your life was good. A person doesn't have to be an artist to live creatively. I liked that. Thanks.
How'd the parachute work out?
Chuck:
Actually, the time before boarding the plane and the plane ride itself was the point where I wholly questioned my sanity, the terror being enough to make me vomit (something I'd never done before), and trying to cover it by telling the others in a moment of bullshit bravado I was going to be the first out. I didn't get any arguments from the others, including a married couple who do this regularily. It did offer a chance to question whether they'd tried to be members of the "Free-fall Club", but I thought better of it. Besides, I can't see the circumstance of being distracted to the point where one would pursue coitus with all else that's going on. I did get out first, to my complete astonishment; taking two jogging steps, then jumping out into a entirely different world.
Funny, but a week afterward and I'm still having a bit of tingle when I recall the dive and the moment that comes easiest is the first instance after leaving the aircraft. I guess it was the sense of complete strangeness to me, the sudden force of the wind alongside the feeling of being completely out of my conventional element, almost as if I was placed within someone else and had gotten to ride in their psyche.
There was a strange combination of terror and euphoria at work, a sensation I actually enjoyed during free-fall, and it seemed to have the effect of distorting time and giving me a sense of weightlessness. The sense of aloneness, of existence being nothing else but my person and that place within that moment was all-consuming; I felt both tiny before the size of the world, and large in feeling it was mine and mine alone. For the first few seconds, I had to resist the near total fear impulse to pull the cord, so I could enjoy the ride. I connected up with four of the other divers, making a small circle; even tried a couple backflips. Gods, it was truly a scary fun, well beyond a rollercoaster.
Back on the ground, none of us could talk at a reasonable volume; the endorphins and adrenals are pumping out at the point where they were in complete in control. It was an hour before I could speak to Mel without shouting.
Would I do it again? Yes, but in a while, I want to ride off this sensation for a bit. It wouldn't feel the same though; that first image of the blue against the multi-hued green emptiness that became the totality of my existence is going to hang around for quite some time.
Mel won't try it though, and I asked her why she didn't have any problem with me trying to dive. She said she did have a problem with my doing it, but that was resolved by the phone call to our insurance sompany, assuring her that my life policy's premiums were paid in full.
No family sentiment in the style of "It's A Wonderful Life" around our house, nossirreeee.
BOS
CINDY: Hurriedly scanned past posts before getting to work, so I didn't get to read ALL of them, but I'm in agreement with you (and a majority I would assume): Fuck Farrakhan. Like other extremists -- Jerry Falwell comes to mind -- his comments should never be taken seriously. In fact, the only reason anyone should consider such men a serious threat, is because there are enough dumb Americans willing to believe what they say and provide them with the financial werewithal to gain a substantial "voice" (via private networks, organizations, etc) in our society. And even though "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation," enough of them are willing to gather like a mindless herd and follow the trail of shit left behind when an egotistical, self-centered bull starts bellowing loudly in a convincing manner (regardless of how much his shit stinks).
--DTS
cookie,
You is one swell gal, you know that? Not only did you start a superb topic for discussion, which I would say has been handled well so far, but you awoke long-dormant memories of many nights spent at the drive-in.
From sneaking peeks at THE MUSIC MAN, as me and my sister were both supposed to be asleep during the second feature (yeah, right), to watching my cousin dangle the grey patty on the bun of his warmed-over hamburger, exclaiming "It lives again!" right in front of the counter lady. Ah, the concession stand food. Playing on the swingset under the screen while the first feature was running, and we could play outside in our pajamas!
And those armor-plated, US Army surplus speakers (at least that's how they looked). We never accidentally drove away with one still hanging in the window. I'd remember that.
Thanks, cookie!
Chuck
Bag-O-Scott,
Nice to see your chute opened. Also nice to know the plane landed okay. So, now that you've had this experience, would you do it again? Was it a rush? Was it something you've wanted to do for a long time?
Was there a moment where you thought:
"WHAT
THE
FUCK
AM
I
DOO
O
O
O
O
O
I
I
I
N
N
N
NNNNGGGG?!!!"
Me, I have a problem with heights. It's not as bad as it used to be, but there is no way I'd ever go bungee jumping, for example. On the other hand, I just might jump out of a plane someday. Preferably with a parachute.
Chuck
Well, saw _Ghosts of Mars._ Holy Moley, that was indeed bad. Also saw _Wet Hot American Summer_, which was surprisingly funny, as parodies of eighties youth movies go. Much funnier than _American Pie_ and their ilk, anyway. And a talking can of vegetables...will wonders never cease.
Jon
Comic Book Artists:
Hmm, Venkman. Besides web forums and other internet-based places where artists might show up, a couple of other suggestions:
Any fine arts college programs around you? I've certainly met a lot of people who were interested in comics and comics artistry by bumming around fine arts people, including Richard Comely's son (yes, Richard Comely, the creator of Captain Canuck, for you canuckleheads out there). An ad in a campus newspaper might help as well.
Comic book conventions. How many artists shop themselves and their portfolios at conventions?
Good luck,
Jon
Point taken, Cindy. But I would like to add one small correction. Don't blame Farrakhan for this particular debacle of black politics.
Blame Randall Robinson, an otherwise intelligent man whose book _The Debt_ was the first mainstream discussion of slavery reparations. Prior to Robinson, the idea was pretty much confined to marginal groups, and perhaps mentions on occasion by the Nation of Islam, and nobody gave the scheme much credit. But, once Robinson made his case, it was suddenly taken _seriously_. I think Adolph Reed's arguments were right on target, especially given Robinson's interesting focus on both statues, commemoratives, and the prospect of a massive fund to be administrated by, wel;l, people like Randall Robinson
By the way, gang, this ARM bunch seems to be a bunch of British idiots. I say, let's stick to bashing on our _own_ homegrown idiots for the time beind.
Also, I'd like to say that if the U.S. is going to have to pay reparations for slavery that ended a hundred years ago, it should happen only if the slavery that _currently exists_, in the Sudan for example, was eradicated first. Otherwise, the reparations cause demonstrates that it's not about justice or human dignity, but a craven desire for an imagined payoff.
BRIAN, BRIAN,
It really isn't about " my people" in this case. To be quite frank; I'm a shiksa from the word goyem.
I think Farrakhan is out of touch with reality here. His case would be in the stagnant cold case files if the reparation issue was even attempted. Those who suffered greater atrocities, those who suffered more recently all would come ahead of his list.
Farrakhan's point is moot...as they used to say on Saturday Night Live.
In my estimation the museum you mentioned is the equivalent of presenting a thimble for use in baling out the Titanic. A nation does not make up for acts such as this by memorializing. We can't make amends.. it is done and beyond our control... which is precisely my point.
We cannot undo what those horrible excuses for humanity did 60 years ago or 160 years ago... no matter how badly we would wish to, no matter how badly we feel about it.
Cindy
Alex K: I got to keep my street credentials up to date, man. Do you know what a cache I have just by telling kids that I saw Ozzy Osbourne on tour with Anthrax in 1988? And Metallica before they became short-haired rehabbed sell-outs?
I genuinely like and am interested in what my students think is important and worthwhile. I rarely agree with them, but I want to have an *informed* opinion when I criticize or differ from them. Then they can at least respect my opinion knowing that I've taken the time to respect theirs. And when I need to make a pop culture reference or analogy, I can be accurate instead of sounding like an obsolete fossil.
Hip hop and music as collage is the way of the future. The guitar has been done, innovated, and the new thing is the synthesizer. Aside from the interesting stuff being done by rappers, guys like Beck, Moby, The Chemical Brothers, etc. and probably a lot of others I don't know about, they're where it's going. I don't have to stop growing just because I'm getting older. That feels like death to me.
Not to get all heavy on you,
Bermanator
Several comments re the reparations. First of all, Cindy, there have been substantial payments made by Germany to Holocaust survivors and to the state of Israel over the years; I'd recommend Norman Finkelstein's book _The Holocaust Industry_ for a quick survey on this.
As far as making reparations to the survivors or descendants of the people on the _St. Louis_, someone could say that a lot has been _done_ alreday. Consider that the U.S. hosts one of the largest Holocaust museums in the world, and has supported Israel with several billion dollars over the past few decades. I dunno if you'd count these as a proper amount, but I can think of other groups of people that probably deserve as much.
The rotten part about reparations arguments is that finding some equivalent "dollar value" for unquantifiable suffering is, well, a mug's game. You just can't calculate that in any objective way. Imagine proposing some dollar amount to be paid to Japanese-Americans who were interned in camps by the United States. Sure, it might sound OK. And you might work out what a decent settlement ought to be for those families who were harmed by the Tuskeegee Syphilis Study. But try _comparing_ the two; if one group gets more than the other, then how do you justify that difference?
This is one reason why I can't really side with Cindy's comments about the _St. Louis_. Once you make an argument like "You think your people have suffered? What about _mine_?", then you've simply adopted the same ridiculous tribal resentments that make the reparations argument so repulzive, and pretty much given up arguing on the basis of real ethical standards or justice. (And considering how well Jews as a whole have done in the United States, asking for reparations is more than a little crass.)
As for slavery reparations... well, the U.S. sould have made them by the turn of the 20th century. There's just no decent way of doing it now. But, if one wants the U.S. to pay some _moral_ price... well, half a million dead was more than enough.
Hey folks,
I had a breakthrough this weekend. I went to visit some local guys barking their own comic books at the mall, signing pictures, selling books, doing sketches, pressing flesh and being all professional book-publishing types and it hit me:
Make the script into a graphic novel.
What's "The Script" you ask? Well, insert "pet project" instead. I've been tinkering with it over two years. It'll never be made into a movie, but I think it would make a great graphic novel.
Now here's the question I have: Anyone know a comic artist looking for a good story? I know that's like asking "Anyone know where my true love is?" I realize it's a broad question, but I'm looking more for information more than a partner by the question.
I think what I'm going to do is combine my screenplay and rewrites with print shop skills and just make the damn thing myself...pay to publish it, market it, you know the drill. Terms are negotiable. I'm looking for "The Ultimates" style realism with a knack for noir imagery - Adam Hughes' run on "Ghost" mixed with a little bit of "Sandman Mytsery Theater" atmosphere.
There. THAT should narrow it down.
I'd be a schmoe if I didn't bark their wares to you. A bunch of great guys they are. Give them a look.
http://www.angleentertainment.com/ New guys with a lot of promise.
http://www.renpress.com Home of "Amelia Rules!" a really fun, witty book.
Hope y'all are well.
Cookie,
You're just like other moms, but you're honest about it. All parents are crazy to their kids once they turn 13. :)
On Reparations:
If African Chiefs has "suffered enough" then the great-grandchildren of the relatively small number of slave owners have, too. How much did the Civil War cost the United States in 2002 dollars. Any reparations paid should have this deducted along with the dollar amount of citizens who lost property or life in the War to Liberate Slaves. Just to be a smartass, if that number happens to exceed the reparation demand, ARM can write the Federal Government a check. Screw the Wrath of Farrakhan.
Hi, all. Thanks for your comments on my post. Somebody asked about what my husband thought about the abortion and unwanted pregnancies: he's a saint. He was right there with and for me and we made our decisions together. I feel fortunate that at least we were in it together. I feel more fortunate that we REMAIN so.
And it's funny how things go, but last night I actually DID have one of those priceless moments of sharing something with the kids that delighted me when I was one: We went to the drive-in movies. Saw Spy Kids 2 and Austin Powers 3 under the stars. It was great. It happened on the spur of the moment. I got back from a gig and was reading the paper and realized that for us, that was a pretty decent line up. We had a half an hour to prepare (drive in's an hour away) so we made our own popcorn and took a jug of Kool-Aid. The roadtrip was a good way to cool down after a hot, muggy day. My kids just LOVED watching a movie outdoors. Quite frankly, I prefer it to the theatre: you can get up and move around without bothering folks, you can bring your own munchies, and you can control the volume at which you listen (I really dislike how loud movies are in most theatres. Often it hurts my ears).
Anyway, my kids were immensely happy and thought I was the coolest for suggesting it. So I guess that no matter how I may feel about it, like you all very kindly pointed out, I'm probably NOT the worst momma even if I'm not the best.
I'm also enjoying reading everyone's comments about reparations. Thanks for the continuing insight. Like I said, I think it's a grand idea in theory, but in reality, it isn't practical. I think a case could be made that many of our ancestors suffered institutional injustices. And yeah, the Native Americans probably got worse than anyone.
Alright: I've been on a bandwagon singing Dixie for about two days now. I am physically and mentally fried so I'm signing off and going back into lurk mode.
Again: THANKS TO *ALL* OF YOU!!!!
In case any might care, I am alive and (subject to discernment by friends and family) well, and got out of the plane. Tremendous terror and fun, all in a glorious free fall: something that, once done, never feels exactly the same again.
Rick: Good one on the weight loss.
Writing: Something I'll do once the kids have decided that they cannot tolerate myself and wife for one moment longer and flee the nest screaming. Look for something reminiscent of Kerouac, with a bit of De Sade mixed in.
Have precious little opinion on reparations and apology for slavery, except to ask: Why isn't Britain, and the companies of the United Kingdom who underwrote the majority of the slave trade the primary defendants in any civil action? They were, after all, colonial masters of North America when the slave trade was at its height.
Have fun all.
BOS
JIM:
"Ultimately, people must follow their true natures, though at times they may resist and even act in ways that seem to violate them."
You see, that was what I was kind of asking; is there such a thing as 'true nature'? Are we unable to condemn a man or woman, no matter how loathsome and callous he/she becomes, just because of the possibility we could easily turn into the exact same kind of cockroach?
I didn't notice any 'basic decency' unveiled in Van Heflin's character at the film's climax. A hint of shame, maybe - the only hint we ever see - but otherwise there wasn't much to indicate he had actually learned anything.
Speaking of which, did you notice how Hunter seemed to briefly become a monkey, with his simian posture, just before he hurled that rock at Cooper? Deliberate or not? Hmmmmmm.
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
XANADU: I disagree; I don't think it's a money grab.
No; I think it's a POWER grab. Look at who leads the charge: Farrakhan, et al.
I don't think they truly believe that the fight is one which can be won--I think it's a chance to get themselves into the public eye and be able to later say, "We fought for what is ours, but the white devils (Yeah!) said, 'No.' Are we going to take 'No' for an answer again?"
It's a tack which allows Farrakhan et alia to claim the status of victims' advocate.
Cindy, huzzah to you! Bravo!!! I fear that there will now be a bunch of 'comparative trauma' postings that will attempt to put you in your place, so before they come let me just say I give you the big fat thumb's up on your posting.
In reality, I'd rather not give reparations to anyone for just such a reason that this debate angers me......once you give to one group, another will come a'knockin' with hands held out.
Regardless, I bow down to you in honor.
-TODD
Louis Farrakhan TAXES my patience, he really does.
NO, I don't feel we owe reparation to anyone who is the descendant of a slave.
We DO owe reparation to the families of the black men victimized in the Tuskegee Syphillis study. We can identify those families and they should be paid, although no amount of money could put a DINT in making things right under such deplorable circumstances.
To pay money to people for the sins of their fathers over six generations ago is ludicrous.
Farrakhan has never been a slave-- so he's demanding money for something that didn't happen to him.. not to his father or his grandfather.
If you want to give money to victims give it to the Jews who survived the death camps or lost members of their families because the United States turned a blind eye to their plight.
Some of those victims are STILL HERE! Those whose suffering was beyond imagination, who endured the cruelest fate of any. You want to talk about a group of people who have been sinned against; let's ponder what happened to the Jews because of us.
In 1939, there was a bill in Congress to allow 20,000 refugees, Jewish CHILDREN from Germany to come to the United States. The bill died in committee, even though those participating in the discussions KNEW what was going on over there.
YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT REPARATIONS?
Again, in 1939, 936 Jewish men women and little children managed to leave Nazi Germany on the S.S. St. Louis. They made it all the way to the shores of America-- close enough to see the lights of Miami from the ship. They were sent back to the Nazis! 600 of them DIED in the death camps BECAUSE THE UNITED STATES WOULD NOT ALLOW THEM TO DISEMBARK... KNOWING WHAT FATE THEY HAD AWAITING THEM IF THEY WERE RETURNED TO GERMANY.
YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT REPARATIONS?
FUCK FARRAKHAN. Nothing of this magnitude ever happened to him or any of those seeking reparations.
The blood of these Jewish victims is on our hands-- if there is money to be paid to those we have sinned against, then let it be given to the families of these who have suffered the greatest pain of all.
What happened to the slaves over a hundred and thirty years ago was unspeakable and sad beyond belief, but what happened to the Jews dwarfs even the suffering of the slaves.
Cindy
I don't like it - it smacks of a blatant money grab, and since it's specifically targeted only at those societies with deep pockets, it immediately belies the idea that it's about "the principle".
From: http://www.arm.arc.co.uk/FAQs.html - "Q) But African chiefs and other people such as Arabs were also involved in the slave trade what about them?
A) Africans of all classes have been persecuted and have suffered enough. It is not the policy of ARM to pursue African chiefs. The Arab question is another issue entirely It is the policy of ARM that Arabs should not be pursued in the first instance but to concentrate on the main oppressors."
Face it. MLK is dead - and I fear his dream has died, as well.
It is clear we are not one people. We stand before a divide of perception that has widened geometrically, even as the reality of the situation has narrowed. There is less "institutional racism" today than there was 40 years ago. There is greater opportunity and support for blacks to achieve than ever before. The war to eliminate all vestiges of racism is not over, but the battles are being won, and the tide has turned. This cannot be argued, these are facts.
It is also plain that great injustices have been perpetrated on blacks throughout history. There is no question, no doubt - the cost of which is staggering to contemplate. But the black leadership is clearly ignoring the issue that blacks were and are not alone in suffering staggering injustice as a people, that blacks are not alone in bearing the burden of hardship and hatred around the world, that riches and prosperity have been created through the under/unrewarded work of an underclass in nearly every society that has ever existed. They are shaping a "black" mindset of unequaled and continuing victimhood, portraying the events and occurrences of African history as unique among the world and, frankly, I think it is this narrow mindset that has done more to damage black progress than all the other ills of society since the 60's. And as long as this mindset states that assimilating into American culture, adopting mainstream values and working to change your individual circumstance is "selling out", or "going Uncle Tom", and is seen as somehow betraying "black culture" - there will be no change in the situation.
As more blacks line up behind this skewed perception of injustice - as the language becomes more and more militant, more righteous, more hardened around the principle of "victimhood", so will the resentment of "white society" rise and coalesce in opposition. Conservatives will decry yet another "redistribution of wealth", liberals will resent paying for a principle they never supported and have actively opposed, poor white trash will wonder why they have to pay on behalf of a system that grinds them down every bit as relentlessly and immigrants will wonder why they have to pay at all.
Ambitious blacks have always reached the very highest levels of achievement in this country, even during the height of the Slave Era. Surely it can't be as hard as that now, even for an average black in the inner cities. Is it strictly the fault of our changed and changing society that the circumstances of black life in the US are stagnant or perhaps even regressing, or can at least some of (and, in my opinion, a growing percentage of) the blame be laid upon this corrosive mindset?
We, the US and the world, will pay reparations - do not doubt it - and I predict, whatever the amount, it will be considered insufficient by the black leadership, who will ask for more - and it will be this combination of greed and unenlightened self-interest that will generate a significant resentment in those who are targeted - so much so, that we will face the specter of race war in our lifetimes. It doesn't take Seldon's Psychohistory to see it.
In parting, remember that three hundred and twenty thousand white Union soldiers died during the Civil War, another thirty-eight thousand black Union soldiers died - free men who died to set US blacks free. As far as reparations go, that makes for a very high price paid already.
ALL --
I didn't mean to imply you didn't care about the floodings, I was just bemoaning the general lack of reporting on CNN. Which, apparently, changed that very day. That'll teach me to not go check that additional time.
RE SAMPLING --
If you have a look at the Top Sampling Bands list, you'll find out that industrial bands sample so much more than rap bands it's not even funny. Ice Cube, at #14, is the first rapper, preceded by at least 10 industrial bands. There's also a list of Most Sampled items, which is similarly interesting.
Check it out at http://www.sloth.org/samples/
Jim, shoot, you're right. I did confuse Public Enemy with Two Live Crew. Mea culpa. However, I'm afraid I don't buy Chuck D's comments on Elvis. His "iconic image?" If he knew better all along, those comments on his "iconic image" were a deliberate lie. If he simply learned better, he should have said so. His explanation reeks of decade-later rationalization.
And, yes, I'm aware of the Supreme Court ruling on Orbison and "Pretty Woman." Poor reasoning, at best.
P.A.: We're supposed to sound like old men. What's the fun of having music that annoys old farts if the old farts come out on the dance floor and waltz to it? Come on, get over here to the hooting gallery and give the kids a break!
--Alex
Just a note to let Harlan Ellison fans know that he has listed on Ebay a personal item. Up for bid is his complete 35 cover set of the 35th anniversary Star Trek TV Guides. He has offered personalize them for the winning bidder. Ebay #2131844138. Thanks, Vince
thttp://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2131844138&rd=1o
PA Berman,
I do remember that scene (getting slightly off topic) in Pulp Fiction. What's hilarious is that you mention the question to people and pretty much everyone does have an opinion one way or another. Me, I'm a Beatles man - specicifically, the Revolver period.
Regards,
Joseph
I knew I forgot something (I feel like a one-legged participant in an ass-kicking contest)...
LITTLE WASHU: You mentioned Gary Cooper's rather grim performance in THEY CAME TO CORDURA. If I'm correct, Cooper was dying of cancer at the time, so it's amazing he acted in any capacity AT ALL. As for what the film was trying to say about heroism, I believe it showed how people have certain moral "baselines" that are revealed in times of stress. Ultimately, people must follow their true natures, though at times they may resist and even act in ways that seem to violate them. Van Heflin may have been a murderer and a potential rapist, but he couldn't deny his basic decency in the end. Conversely, Tab Hunter showed himself to be a spineless bastard, despite his earlier boy scout image.
But, as always, I Could Be Wrong.
BERMANATOR: What you said.
COOKIE: I wanted to send this via e-mail, but seeing how you never post an address...
You don't write here very often, but every time you do, your humor, earthiness and uncommon good sense just knock me out. Your earlier post about your personal experiences regarding abortion and parenthood was magnificent. Too many times, these subjects reduce even the most level-headed among us to self-aggrandizement and hollow posturing. Not you, my lady. Thank you.
Oh, and I think your kids will turn out okay. Well, maybe they'll knock over the odd liquor store or two, but they'll never lack for funny anecdotes to tell about their mother.
Please hang up and dial again. The number you have reached is no longer in service. Two three nine seven. Please hang up and dial again. The number you have reached is no longer in service.
1 part Stolichnaya Cinnamon
3 parts Barenjaeger
2 parts Das Comet or vanilla rum
2 parts Maker's Mark
a dash of ground cloves
a dash of cinnamon
Serve chilled. Whatever you do, do NOT drink through a straw.
12 of 26, an unlimited person living in a limited world
ALEX K: Are you sure you're thinking of the right person? Two Live Crew was the hip-hop group that sampled Roy Orbison without authorization--the Supreme Court later ruled that their parody of "Oh, Pretty Woman" was protected by the law. Public Enemy has never used an Orbison song as the basis for any of their raps, to my knowledge.
As for that infamous line from "Fight The Power," here are Chuck D's comments from the April 2002 issue of Mojo magazine:
"When I wrote "Fight The Power" I wasn't blasting Elvis per se, but I was blasting his iconic image. How can you say Elvis is 'The King' when Little Richard and all these other guys put it down before him? Tons of cats influenced him but his skin could be accepted. But musically I think the Sun recordings were the rawest elements of what made him blast off into rock'n'roll...there's some real good Elvis stuff. I think Elvis was a bad-ass white boy who definitely was no joke."
Sounds right on to me.
HEY P.A.,
Just dropped by again (after my impromptu rap and a quick shower) before signing off for the night. Me judge anyone? Naahh! (Actually, I just find it annoying that kids -- black, white, brown or purple -- think it hip to talk as if they were grammatical idiots; I enjoy it when guys like Will Smith point out that it's okay to talk the patios if you learn to speak correctly first; many would-be cool types never do; I once had to go out to the edge of my yard [underneath the three huge pine trees in front of our house] where some idiot had parked his car and turned the music up so loud it was vibrating the walls...I pounded on his window, and told him to turn it down...in a somewhat contrite manner, he said, "Oh, my bad, my bad"...and being the disgruntled curmudgeon, I responded with, "No! You loud! Now turn it down...he did as requested and drove off, but I don't think he caught the humor or sarcasm...ah, well).
(How was that for an extra long aside?)
-- DTS
Joseph et al, I'm not saying I agree with Chuck D about Elvis... just quoting the man. I can't personally comment about Elvis as I truly have no opinion about him. There's a scene in Pulp Fiction that was cut out, where Mia asks Vincent if he's an Elvis man or a Beatles man-- not that you can't like both, but no one likes them the same. I have found this to be true, and, well, I'm a Beatles man. Elvis has never interested me.
As for hip hop sampling being intellectual theft: first of all, I don't think it's fair to tar all hip hop artists with that brush. The Beastie Boys sample (and give elaborate credit to their sampled artists in the liner notes) but also play their own instruments. Second, do you consider collage an art form? It's taking others' images and rearranging them into a new piece of art. I do collage, I don't pay anyone royalties, and I don't consider myself a thief. If a musician gets permission and gives credit where credit is due, he's not a thief.
Also, and this is a friendly jibe, you guys sound like old men. Of course people naturally gravitate towards the music of their youth, and scorn the music of those who come after. Don't you think the prior generation scoffed like hell at rock and roll? You guys don't have to like it, but when you dismiss hip hop out of hand, you're turning into an old fuddy duddy. He who is not busy being born is busy dying, after all.
And DTS, I'm not a big fan of the white boy hip hop culture either. The Eminem fashion trend is pretty sorry IMO, but I know that my long heavy-metal hair (complete with bangs), black leather jacket and overabundance of silver jewelry in high school made my parents and their peers roll their eyes and gag. Look at it this way: they're kids. This is what they like. When they're old and full of wisdom like us, they'll look back at their high school yearbook pictures and laugh at themselves. Just try not to be too harsh when you judge them.
Bermanator
P.A. BERMAN:
Hypocriscy/lyrical medocrity/It's all the same damn thing to me.
And Mathers is just a black man wannabe.
Come to think of it/What up with this shit?
Dumb upperclass white kids tryin to act hip/by talkin street jive and broken English like "wit."
(As in, take me "wit" you).
Oy/If I hear one more white boy tryin' to be an M&M/I'm gonna have to slap some sense into him.
'Cause the cold hard facts be this: even when black men talk that jive patois/they all sound like ill-educated idjits.
(and, unfortunately, many of them are -- don't get angry, 'cause you know it's true).
Word.
--DTS
Cindiana.
Thank you for turning me on to Edith Piaf. I just ran across a few 78s in my dad's collection and a CD. Wow. Like Ute Lemper but better. Autumn Leaves give Strange Fruit a run for best creepy blues love song ever. :)
Venk
Sigh. Here's the bit that was supposed to be quoted from "Amazing Africana."
---Presley freely acknowledged his debt to Crudup, and once said in an interview, "Down in Tupelo, Mississippi, I used to hear old Arthur Crudup bang his box the way I do now, and I said if I ever get to the place where I could feel all old Arthur felt, I'd be a music man like nobody ever saw." ----
I'm not a fan of much modern music. With the exception of Tom Waits, there's little on the college charts I'm likely to buy. Despite that, I feel it's good for young people to have music I'm unlikely to like. What the hell--we had our music, which was supposed to upset our parents. It didn't work on mine, but that's besdies the point.
However, one thing hasn't changed: the number of young artists who make dumb, pompous remarks about old artists. Those who did it in the sixties deserved no respect, and those who do it today deserve none now.
The notion that Elvis was, "a straight-out racist, the sucka was simple and plain" isn't defensible. Most of that is the result of urban myths. Elvis was no paragon, but there's no particular basis for calling him a racist. Right there, I have to decide whether Chuck D is a casual hypocrite or an ignorant creep. Either way, I'm a lot less impressed with him than with Elvis. The latter was honest in expressing his debt to black artists. Even "Jet" magazine recognized that the man was not a racist. As "Amazing Africana" notes,
>
I'm also offended by "sampling." Paying royalties doesn't cover that. Intellectual theft is theft. It's not just illegal, it's unethical. If you're going to "sample" someone else's work, you have an obligation not just to pay, but to CREDIT. And you shouldn't be doing it without prior permission. That's what copyright--and ethics--are all about. The notion of "sampling" without permission is no better than any other version of "information just wants to be free."
In other words, they're no different than the theives who have driven Harlan into a lawsuit against AOL. You can come up with all sorts of excuses for what they do, but theft is theft, and an artist who justifies stealing from other artists is beneath contempt.
And Chuck D isn't just a sampler. He fought a long lawsuit for the right to rip off Roy Orbison without permission. That says a lot about him. Any complaints he makes about musical theft ring hollow in my ears.
--alex
Otherwise, hey, I've nothing against modern music.
Bermanator,
Actually, I was referring to Chuck D's comments on last night's Nightline special on Elvis. Just so you don't think that I can't quote properly, compadre.
Regards,
Joseph
Damn, I go away for one day and you guys blow me away when I come back. Where to start?
Cookie: Jesus, woman, thanks for the amazing commentary on parenting. Your honesty floored me and I'm grateful to you for sharing it. I'm sure you are the best mother you can be, and that's all you can ask of yourself.
I worry about the same things that you express: I have become a solitary creature and I'm getting less and less flexible as I get older. I am afraid I wouldn't be able to keep from resenting a kid. I think ideally I should have had kids at 23 or 24, when I was more malleable. But I have this nagging feeling that I want to have a kid but I can never say that NOW is the time. I wonder if I ever will.
Re: reparations to descendents of slaves-- When the German government sends me reparations for gassing my great grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins at Auschwitz, then we can talk. Everyone's been wronged in some heinous way, it seems, some more recently than others. I don't think money will ease the pain much and will likely make people hate each other anew.
Frank: I couldn't agree MORE about modern music. It's oddly refreshing, this agreeing with you. Anyway, yes, kids enjoy rap music because it's THEIRS. Their peers are making it, reflecting their sensibilities, and isn't that the way it's always been? Any adult who wants to understand kids should at least try to listen to their music with an open mind. I make it my business to borrow my student's CDs and lend them mine. I gotta stay hip, doncha know.
DTS: When you wondered earlier why more people don't feel guilty about the killing of cows, pigs, and wolves, to you I say-- that's exactly why I'm vegan. Life is life, and it's not for me to say whose is worth the most, so I try my hardest not to kill anything unless it wants to kill me. This is well nigh impossible, but I try.
And you're kinda off base about rap music. It is more than limericks over a drum machine and samples. As Frank stated, Eminem is quite a skilled lyricist. I also recommend The Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy, etc. As a student of the word, I find these bands inspired and well worth the effort.
And I think Chuck D's words re Elvis on Fear of a Black Planet were, "Elvis was a hero to most but he never meant shit to me. A straight-out racist, the sucka was simple and plain--yeah fuck him AND John Wayne." He doesn't say anything about the musical offenses that he feels Elvis committed.
I don't see how sampling makes Chuck D a hypocrite-- when a band samples, they pay royalties or they get sued. I think of rap as a collage, whereas rock and roll is painting in oils. Both are valid art forms.
Bermanator
Hey guys~
It looks like Harlan's trying to raise some money again.
Check it out.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2131844138
From his personal collection, no less.
L.
JOSEPH: I think rappers who "dis" Elvis are not only hypocrites -- after all, for _real_ artistic theft all they have to is look at "sampling" -- but they're just envious 'cause (and I say this admitting that I actually like some of it), musically speaking, rapping will never be anything more than over glorified limericks backed up by repetitious bass and drum beats. No matter what the self-appointed critics say, rapping does not require more than a fingernail worth of talent (timing maybe; talent no). Think I'll go dig out some Elvis CDs and rock out for a while.
Thankyouverymuch,
DTS
Frank,
Dhuck D isn't Elvis' greatest fan; he's still ticked that Evlis got so much credit at the time for things that Chuck Berry and Little Richard were doing as well. I'm more on the side of Chris Isaak, who flat-out said that he's been stelaing for years, just like every other artist. You dip into a common well, and sometimes you come up with the same thing.
Regards,
Joseph
Reparations for slavery is such an obviously muddle-headed and unproductive cause that I can't work up even slight sympathy for it. I can't even see a decent reason to restrict it to those who are clearly descendants of slaves; the whole scheme strikes me as a fruitless quest for a doubtful goal, and one which can only create resentmant and separatism.
The single best argument against it, by the way, comes from Adolph Reed in _The Progressive_, and a link to the full text is below.
http://www.progressive.org/reed1200.htm
I've probably quoted this here before, and it frosts me that I can't give proper credit to the family psychologist who said it (nobody famous -- just a specialist who visited town here 11 years ago, and his comment in a newspaper interview stuck with me):
"The question is not whether you are going to succeed or fail as a parent, it's how you're going to fail."
Just get that through your head, relax, and do it.
"You're right, I've never considered legal action. The reason is one of
principle. I'm opposed to the use of libel laws and other such devices to
restrict freedom of speech. Many people know that, and therefore feel
quite free to lie, slander, invent "quotes," etc., at will.
Libel laws are a very dangerous device. One can see how dangerous by
looking at what happens in countries where the laws are horrendous, as in
England, which at least has a formal commitment to freedom of speech,
unlike some other Western democracies."
--Noam Chomsky
Joseph, is Chuck D still dissing Elvis?
I've been dipping into Peter Golenbock's _Dynasty_ (about the Yankees of the 50s and 60s) again lately. Not exactly poetic, but useful -- especially when you're wondering about how much of _61_ happened. Robert Creamer's _Babe_ is a fine biography -- not too speculative or too judgmental.
Cheers, Jon
COOKIE:
I actually think the one race that's in even more dire need of 'reparations' are the Native Americans. You don't have to look too far to a common reservation to realize there's a lot of open sores America as a nation still refuses to attend to.
Nevertheless, they've done pretty damn well for themselves, without the Big Bad Government's help.
THEY CAME TO CORDURA:
All right, I've delayed it long enough, now I'm going to get it off my chest. It was a great experience, what I like to call a 'flawed masterpiece'...my very favourite type of film. David Lynch's DUNE and Terry Gilliam's BRAZIL fall under this category. The cast was uniformly fantastic all around, the direction was bang-on, and the final scene on the railroad was bloodcurdling. Never since THE LAST LAUGH have I seen a more visceral depiction of human cowardice and cruelty. Van Heflin does the 'loathsome thug' gig very well.
But Gary Cooper as Thorn...his performance wouldn't have irritated me if it didn't seem to be the exact same character from HIGH NOON. This might have been fine in itself, but...THE GUY NEVER SMILES. Never. Never ever. It's like he has one of those cartoon black clouds right above his head. This began to bug me after a while. In the end, though, his character really IS poignant and has a lot of impact.
Now, the question that immediately popped into my head after the film was...are these men beyond our judgement? Do we have no right to judge these people, no matter how vile and treacherous they become? Even more terrifying, could WE become just like them in similar circumstances? Somehow this whole topic enrages me beyond description.
So what do we have here? Is there such a thing as an inherently 'good' (or bad) man? Or are we just heroes and villians at different stages of our lives?
Either way, it's a mind-blowing debate. Harlan, thank you.
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
Since the inner-city was created by white elites, it makes sense that they pay reparations for the damage and the blight. When I say "elites" I mean corporations that largely started the industrial revolution with the profits from cotten that was harvested by free labor. So, I believe these elites should be the ones who build up the black community, not the common white tax payer. I don't mind paying my share, but the elites should carry the most weight, since they are the ones who caused the genocide in the first place.
------
Lynn, Harlan is gonna fry ya for liking Manson. He he.
-----
We need to stop complaining about why kids today listen to crap. Schools gut music programs for more sports, or internet computers so why are we not surprised the kids are tone deaf? Classical and jazz elites never present their art forms as vital or progressing. Jazz elitists like, Wynton Marsales complain about rock styles in jazz, not taking into account that jazz has to progress or it gets stale. Classical radio plays the same boring stuff, and avoids cutting edge pieces. I have never heard Morricone or Verese on classical radio. Then, they act surprised the kids would rather listen to rap. Classical and jazz also present themselves as the art forms of the rich and snobish. This is what is killing these art forms. Kids will never learn the beauty of certain kinds of music, if they feel that the culture is being forced down their throats. And how do you convince youth that classical and jazz is great when these elites denegrate youth music? Respect has to go both ways. Art has to be alive to be appreciated. These kids see museum music as square and boring. We need to do a better job telling them the other story. The story about how alive this music is. We must take it off of it's pedestal for that to happen.
Alex Jay: Living Colour's 1988 album (_Vivid_, I think -- my cassette tape died long ago) is supposed to be re-released with, I assume, extras sometime in the next few months. I think they've also reunited for a tour and a new album, but I'd wait and see how far that goes.
Cheers, Jon
Alex,
T'was an interesting Nightline special on lasty night with various contemporary musicians and their perceptions of Elvis and his legacy, and Vernon Reid (of Living Colour) was one of them. Interestingly diverse group, too: Chris Isaak, Joan Jett (who freaked me out a little with her extremely short blond hair), Chuck D from Public Enemy, Kid Rock (who told a hilarious story about trying to get into Graceland afer a couple of martinis) and some others whose names escape me. Had a lot of good early performances too, which is always nice; I love those early tapes of Jailhouse Rock where the animalism of the song comes through.
Regards,
Joseph
COOKIE: Alex Jay is absolutely right: and the fact that you realize you're not perfect, that you aren't cut out to be a mom, but still accept the responsibility is more than half of the partents (not just single moms, mind you) do for their children. And you summed up parenting quite nicely, thank you. It is a soul-searching adventure, isn't it? As for the Elvis question, I was seventeen, living in "the body of christ" (Corpus Christi, TX) and working at supermarket to pay my way through college when I heard the news on a radio. Even though he'd become a white-jump-suited, grotequesly bloated parody of himself, it was still a bummer to hear about it. Felt crummy for the rest of that day.
-- DTS
COOKIE: Darlin', far be it from me to tell you you're not special--I'd be lying--but ...
That's just what good parenting IS. Trying to do your best despite the ravages of the day-to-day and the need to follow your own dreams.
Having said that, I have to poop on your other points. Watever cultural watershed his emergence on the scene may have been, I really can't stand Elvis. His first few records for Sun were a not-bad mix of country blues (no comma) and rockabilly, but his subsequent collapse into the hype pretty much epitomizes the self-important and bloated (and no; I'm not talking about the later Elvis so much) side of this country I despise.
(Was listening to "Elvis is Dead" by the much-missed rock group Living Colour earlier today and was surprised at how sympathetic the song actually is toward Presley, where it could have been far more acerbic. Comes from having Little Richard guest on it, I guess.
And slavery reparations is a bad idea. It was a damned GOOD idea back when Andrew Johnson vetoed it and the slaves were only barely freed, but as for now? It'd be a nightmare. You may bring up Holocaust reparations and reparations to Japanese-American internees, but THOSE were given to firsthand victims. How do you determine what's fair? Who gets it? If a forty-year-old man gets it, do his twenty-year-old-son and HIS newborn get it? How is the line drawn? What geneological records need be presented? What about coolies and Scots-Irish indentured servants? Does it matter when your ancestors were freed, be it by benificent masters or the Emancipation Proclamation (which, you'll note, only freed the slaves in the Confederacy)?
Far, far too many questions to raise. We should have just given them the forty acres and a mule back in the 1860s. It'd be an interesting America today if we had; a different socioeconomic makeup. But now it's juat way too damned late.
JOSEPH: Why indeed, when there's so much current stupidity to go around?
Re:
Slave reparations. Hmm. I think reparations should go to surviving victims or their children. Japanese Americans that were put into camps during WW2, for example. The slave reparation issue smacks of blaming the current generation for what happened in the 18th and 19th century. That's just too distant. I COULD get behind reparations to those who lost relatives or property to the depredations of the KKK when lynching and murder was considered good clean family fun. That would make more sense.
Perhaps part of my position comes from the fact that one of my ancestors was killed by one of his slaves. I'm sure the bastard had it coming, and I hope his killer got away with it. It's just that what my ancestor did is inconceivable to me, and I don't want to be lumped with that cracker sumbitch. I think the reparations issue would do that. Reparations are for the people who were actually wronged, not their distant descendants. The same goes for blame.
My blindfold is on. You may fire when ready.
Chuck
Gunther,
Actually, I DO care about the flooding that's going on in Europe right now. Maybe it's because here in this part of the US, we're having the opposite problem - drought and fire. During the worst part of the season, the air was so full of smoke it became dusk in the afternoon and the sun turned red. The water that comes out of the faucet in my home smells funny - mouldy. Rivers are stagnant. At least my apartment building is in no danger of burning down.
To see the opposite, to see water come up to and engulf houses, is just as bad. Whether by fire or water, someone losing their home just plain sucks. Glad you and yours are on high ground, and I hope the flood season is over soon.
Chuck
cookie -
I was eating Count Chocula and drinking OJ when I heard about Elvis. Summer wasn't over and I didn't care at the time. It was time to watch cartoons and hit the pool. I was 7.
If it doesn't put you out, what was your husband's take on the whole experience? What did he say about the abortion and how did he take the other pregnancies?
Reparations? Yes. IF. A citizen can prove that he or she is the heir of a slave AND it only effects citizens who can be proven descendants of slave owners(the cost of which is deducted from the reparations fund) and from those who did not make reparations to their slaves or set them free prior to the mandate, did NOT serve in the Union Army (or be a family member of a Union Veteran or US military since 1861), lose more than the fair reparation tax in damages in battle or seizure from Union forces following the war. Also, those who are to be assessed this tax can declare deductions if they can provide proof of family members who worked for civil rights in the generations following the end of slavery, participated in Affirmative Action programs with their company or organization, or has family ties to former slaves. AND it it must be in 1860 valued currency...that is to say the exact amount the court would have given the slave at the time of emancipation, FROM the convicted heir of a slaveholder and divided among all certified descendants of slaves who did not move to Union "Free" states after 1865.
At the same time, I ask that my people be given, in 2002 dollars, the real estate value of all lands taken from them by white Americans in violation of treaties signed in good faith. While we're at it, the French and Russians should get what THEY deserved when we snowed them for that real estate. Japanese and Chinese for their forced relocation and servitude respectively.
Oh, and as an Algonquin, I want some damn Amish family to build me a house on the three acres my family owned before the French and British torched it. Why, cause the Amish are white and they deserve to share in the reparations, too.
Oh....you were SERIOUS? Sorry.
The simple answer is No.
ALEX JAY BERMAN,
What you said on abortion was amazing. The sentiments you expressed appear to be flawless to me. I could not agree more.
Well said!
Cindy
Cookie,
Thank you for being so honest and don't be so hard on yourself. You must be a good mom or your kids wouldn't be so cool.
NOBODY is June Cleaver and some people have been wired to tune out more effectively than others. Some of the best moms I know had a rough time of it when their kids were little and still underfoot. They found their stride when those of us who could rock with the little ones lost our minds and our cools when the teenagers started wanting to go off with (horrors) other teenagers.
You'll be fine. TRUST me on this. They will grow up and go off and it will all happen so quickly that you will wonder at the fleeting fraction of a moment that they were with you.
There is a trick to dealing with their fighting and yelling and general cacaphony. You imagine how the house would sound if for some reason they were gone and you wouldn't hear it ever again.
Don't worry about them grating on your nerves at this time in their lives-- it won't last long. Don't think you're not a good mom just because you can't handle it sometimes.
One day one of my best friends called me on the phone in tears and said, " Oh my God, I'm so horrible! I spanked David in anger!"
I said, " Are you kidding? That's the ONLY way I ever spank any of mine!"
I am so laid back that it takes REAL motivation to make me crank on one. Like somebody in mortal peril AND getting the smart mouth simultaneously.
Cookie, you're bright and kind and cerebral. You're also tuned in enough to your own shortcomings (real or perceived) to see room for improvement. You love those boys and that's the big thing. They know it... THAT is the other big thing.
You need to be able to identify what is necessary to get yourself through this phase. Tell people who ask you to bake cookies for the school bake sale, what I tell 'em.
" No but thanks for asking."
When it comes to dinner, buy a pizza. If the house is a mess, don't worry about it. You can clean it when they go to college.
>
This is the way to let go of perfection and relax. It's sort of like being in a bad car wreck-- if you are relaxed you'll stand a better chance of surviving.
:)
Not that parenthood is like a wreck, Bermanator.
In the meantime, Cookie. You're a sweet girl and I have no doubts about your skills as a mother. I suspect that you have the bar set a mite too high for this time in your life.
your friend, and the mother of legion,
Cindy
Cookie,
I'll vote for repartations when I get my check from the Court of St. James for the systematic murder of my ancestors in Ireland. Oh, wait; why should I blame the current assholes for their ancestors' stupidity?
Regards,
Joseph
Washu: I don't like Marilyn Manson's music, but I sure as hell appreciate him as an artist. I wish I had the guts to be so far out there on the fringe.
The view from where he stands must be mind-shatteringly terrifying and beautiful at the same time.
L.
My husband pointed out that I really didn't argue anything in my abortion topic post. I pointed out to him that he was correct. The arguments go out the window when you actually stand in those particular shoes (or stirrups as the case may be).
I would like to point out to you in my "change of topic" that the question of reparations to descendants of slaves is "divisive" rather than "decisive" (though, indeed it may end up, after much time and debate, a decisive issue in the direction this country takes...).
You'll forgive me for posting after drinking beer and listening to jazz, I hope. I can't be nearly as formal and erudite as I wish when winding down from a truly happy "happy hour.":)
On abortion: I've had one and as much as I appreciate the intellectual back-and-forth (and used to engage in it---on both sides as my religion and my intellect fought with each other), it is, like parenthood, one of those things that unless you've ACTUALLY been through, you will only be speculating.
Humans is such contradictory peoples.When I had my abortion (shortly before my husband and I were married) it was an excruciating decision, especially for somebody who was raised very conservatively and at some level wanted to be a "good girl."
We have every good intention of taking the right precautions. I couldn't take the pill and within the first year of marriage to my husband, I was pregnant. I didn't want the child, really, but I couldn't go through another abortion because everybody's cryin "Murderer!"---even the liberals.
So we had him, but he changed our lives significantly. That was cool. There was just one of him. He could easily be packed up and taken 'round to hear jazz and hang out all night long.
Then, one sultry hot humid day, my mother in law came to take care of our then 1.5 year old son. Mom and Dad went out into the hills to take a natural dip in one of the out-of-the-way gorges and Nature overtook us. It was the best sex of my life.The best. I was actually shocked that I was pregnant though intellectually, I shouldn't have been. I remember falling against a wall by the bathroom and literally RAILING at God. The little answer said, "Hey, man, I didn't fuck ya."
At this point, I was regularly attending church (though I had joined the Episcopalians because they were so much more relaxed than the Fundies) and felt constrained to have the child.
It was really fuckin' rough and remains to be so. Sometimes, I think the aborted child had the best fate. I'm NOT a perfect parent. I try, but I don't try so hard. I really should NOT have been a momma. But, hey! Here I am.
I do my best and am married to an incredible man. But I'll admit it: I really do not enjoy motherhood. It gets in my way. I love my kids and I do stuff with and for them, but they are not my reason for existence. Poor them, but I'm not violent or unfit enough for them to be handed off to the State.
My kids are well-aware that they have a crazy mother. They also know that I think they're wonderful people despite the fact that I wish they had a better mom than me. And I do think they're cool kids. They're both inquisitive, smart, energetic little boys. They just drive me to my limit at times. Honey, one kid's one thing, but you really earn your stripes when you have two or more. Then they fight and argue with each other. I love 'em, but really, they drive me to the brink. I have stuff of my own to do and they get in the way.
Not their fault, and like I said, I do my best. One of my sons said that having a crazy mom is cool because it never gets boring. One of my colleagues was complimenting me on my "fantastic mothering." I told her, "I don't know about 'fantastic mothering' but one thing's for sure: they'll have stories to tell."
Anyway, I'm just ranting. It ain't all peaches and roses even if you're an educated, well-intentioned, smart person. Shit happens. You do your best.
My parents weren't the best either, and I used to really hold it against them. Eventually I got to the point where I realized that even if they weren't the best, the DID their best. That's all you can do.
Here's another thing: some of you are getting all dewey-eyed about how you'll share your own childhood pleasures with your children. While that happens and is indeed an indescribable pleasure, in reality your children will teach YOU more than you teach them. What I mean is this: your children reflect you and the world around them in their own individual way. You will be shocked and even perturbed to realize that your children have their own unique minds and viewpoints. Like I said, I have a really hard time being a mother. I don't really like it. At the same time, my kids have really made ME grow and they've said and done things that have just FLOORED me with their individuality.
Children are little people. They're tougher than we give 'em credit for sometimes.
OKAY. We've done the abortion topic. Let's discuss something REALLY painful and decisive: Reparations to the descendants of American Slaves.
I personally think it's a great idea, however, I also don't think it would solve the problem of racism in American society (might make it worse, actually). And while it is a justifiable thing to do, it will be difficult to figure out just HOW to do it.
Any thoughts about that issue? I think it could become very important in this century.
Bon weekend!
(PS: Where were you when Elvis died? I was in my parents' car just north of Millinocket, Maine on the way home from Canada. I was 11. It didn't affect me much, but my parents seemed perturbed....).
Frank, I know you just say those things to egg me on....but you can't, because I feel your love for me through my Cablevision Internet Connection. You can't hide it.....you love me more than you've ever loved another man. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
I'm pretty sure that no matter my politics and philosophy and my opinion on anything that crosses the board, no one here has ever sensed me standing for greed and domineering socialization of the masses. Maybe I'm wrong.
Hugs and Kisses, your friend, Todd
LYNN: There's something about Marilyn Manson that I can't quite put my finger on, but he strikes me as a VERY interesting person. Screeching, satanic music, quiet, soft-spoken guy. I definitely WON'T be buying one of his CD's anytime soon, but...he has the kind of personality that says, "I do this kind of thing, and if you're not into it, that's okay-dokey."
Or maybe I'm just being naive.
Todd, Michael Moore is an activist. He stands for something; unlike Conservatives who stand for greed and domineering socialization of the masses.
Lynn, I know, my animal magnetism is getting to you.
Yes, both Manson and Moore are smart as whips, but I never said they were intellectuals.
Joseph, Michael Moore is a very sweet and moral dude, with a sense of humor that shines in dark places. While Ann Coulter is a bitter, evil and silly woman. Her venom couln't curdle kool aid. She is an empty vessel, with an equally empty head. Maybe she could be of use as a blow up doll for some hard up college nerd; who knows. At least then she would serve a purpose; as a writer and thinker she is neither. Michael at least has the right ideas, and remember, his film won at Cannes. He must have some talent.
I wish Liberals would stop laying claim to Michael Moore, I love the guy. He's a riot!
In the end, Michael is an entertainer....not a politician. That's how a staunch Conservative like me can proudly lay claim to loving him since Roger And Me was an unknown quantity.
-TODD
Heather-
Re: Your Request
Absolutely OK. Look forward to seeing how it progresses. Glad to have been of service.
Honestly, I typed Frank between 'think' and 'meant'. Or at least my fingers thought they did. This mental block I have must be really strong...
L.
Joseph~ I think meant Marilyn Manson is a lot smarter than people give him credit for. I could be wrong.
L.
Frank,
I don't think anyone has ever claimed that Michael Moore isn't smart (not that you did); it's just for us liberals, he's starting to become the equivalant of Anne Coulter for conservatives - the embarassing relative that you don't want to be stuck next to at Thanksgiving. Of course, Moore is still light years ahead of Coulter and her pack of hyperbolic lies.
Alex,
Thanks for the update on Mr. David.
Regards,
Joseph
Michael Moore has a new documentary coming out soon. It is called, Bowling For Columbine, and it received a prize at Cannes. The doc is a serio-comic look at gun culture and why the Columbine shootings happened. Classic MM. The interview with Maralyn Manson is great. Smart guy. A lot smarter than some give him credit for.
-----
Everybody should give Eminem a second chance. His new video and song, Keep It In The Closet is a step up maturity wise. Great music in that song as well. Smartly controversial, instead of just hateful.
TODD: I much agree. I like SHOELESS JOE a lot (as it is quite superior to the movie, even though the movie is a beautiful piece of hoke), but I.B.C. IS the better book.
XANADU: I like your idea a bit, despite the tweaking it needs. Marriage IS a good thing--in fact, long-term mating is an evolutionary product, seeing as how it helps ensure better child-rearing, and thus a better chance for the child to live healthily, and thus a better chance of the species' continuation (as is the concept of face-to-face sexual coupling). Granted, it'll run into hassles from both the conservative ("But you're taking a LIFE!") and liberal ("But if she doesn't want it, you're penalizing her unduly and making her into a brood mare!") sides. In this, I'm on the liberal side; something has to be given to the married woman who does not want the child but is forced to bring it to term. But, as I say, with tweaking, it might prove a lot more acceptable.
JOSEPH: Mr. David is fine; the site just needs repairing. He still posts with regularity to the alt.fan.peter-david newsgroup.
Heather,
Phyllis Reynolds Naylor is especially renowned in children's literature for her fabulous "Shiloh." Damn fine writer, who never talks down to her audience (Lois Lowry and Louis Sachar have the same characteristic).
Regards,
Joseph
Still dipping into genres. Came across a recent book by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor. A young adult writer. Heard of her? Got any views on what she does and how she does it? She's been around a while. A year older than Harlan. I read one of her "Alice" books. Interesting style. I gotta admit I enjoyed the Alice book. A girl as the main character. Funny too. Naylor got her degree in psychology. Was the 'middle' child. Hmm. Do I see a pattern here?
She's not a beginner, in case you've never heard of her. She's written over 115 books, about 2,000 stories and articles and had 10, 337 rejection slips from publishers. Heh.
Say, does anyone know what's up with peterdavid.net? It's been down for a while and I was just getting a little worried about Mr. David.
Regards,
Joseph
XANADU: Guess what?I don't feel like Willem Dafoe in PLATOON anymore.
Good to see you again.
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
Forrester...
I'm sorting through some of my story marbles. Remember your addition on that SF piece? Would it be okay if I continue with it? If I do something REAL world with it (which I doubt. Let's be real.) I'll stick your name on it as well, for your contribution.
What say you? Let me know. (If yer out there. Otherwise, I'll go dig you up and email you private-like. Thanks.)
H, just cleanin'
Greetings and Salutations one and all,
Yes, I return. I was just passing through for what I thought would be a quick read, and I was immediately hooked by the quality of the debate – bravo to all involved – and I felt compelled to break from my sabbatical to add comments that I think need be stated and have only been marginally addressed or not at all, 'til now.
First point – that Venkman made, and several others peripherally addressed. When does the zygote/fetus/baby gain full human status/rights? Right now, the law in most states grants such status at birth. I cannot help but think this is too late in the game. The other side of the debate usually pegs it at conception – a date I feel is far too early. (This is really a separate question from the hoary "When does life begin?" - because most people simply don't understand that "life" didn't "begin" during our geological epoch, let alone at conception. It has continued in an unbroken chain from the first stirrings some 2 billion years ago. (If you are strongly religious, substitute "6000" for "2 billion" in the previous sentence, my point is still valid.) Each gamete is "alive" before conception, they just don't live very long, nor can they develop into a human being by themselves.) As Alex Jay stated in response to lonegungirl as I sat composing this, I propose the medically supportable idea that such rights should be granted at approximately 26 weeks – commonly known as the third trimester. Prior to this, the fetus will simply not survive outside the womb despite all the significant medical technology and support available. It is at this point I feel the baby's right to live trumps all but the most severe threats to the life of the mother, and I cannot support abortion on demand after this timeframe.
Now we come to the most interesting area – the rights of the mothers and fathers. Current law states we each have complete autonomy over our own bodies and their use/abuse therein. This, by definition, grants the woman sole power over the pregnancy (until the third trimester, when the baby's rights should take over). (Sorry Venk, but it's a matter of biology – they gots the equipment, they gets to decide.) I completely support that.
Actually, I take that back, I mostly support it – and I finally get to the purpose of this long post. There is one place where I stray from the pure philosophy – one place where I feel the father's desires are of equal weight with the mother's and my personal bias will always side with the party that desires life.
And that place is within the bonds of marriage. Marriage is a voluntary social/economic contract that binds two otherwise independent/autonomous individuals into a combined unit which obligates them to each other socially, economically, biologically and so forth. It is a reasonable statement of expectation that the husband's progeny will arrive via his wife's biology. This is not slavery, nor an unreasonable imposition, nor an immoral obligation – each gender brings something to the table and the female's most significant asset in this particular arena is her biology. The male's most significant asset used to be his unencumbered ability to support and protect the female especially during the later stages of pregnancy, when her physical abilities are sharply degraded – this asset is much diminished in our modern world, but it remains an asset nonetheless.
In blunt terms, I think a husband should be able to say: "Hey, you can't kill my child!", and I believe the wife is obligated to honor that – despite any rancor that might otherwise exist between them. (Of course, this is an idealized version – criminal conduct on either side should significantly reduce or eliminate their "rights" in all matters.)
**********
My proposal, in quick summary:
A) They both want the child – he legally obligates himself to at least the child and, ideally, the mother too, and they continue with their married/unmarried lives as before.
B) She wants it, he doesn't –
Not Married:
1) He voluntarily obligates himself to the child (and perhaps the mother). Sole or joint custody as needed/desired.
2) He walks away, no obligation incurred. He signs away all parental rights and she gets sole custody.
Married:
3) He is automatically obligated to both the child and the mother whether or not the marriage continues – she gets sole physical custody if not.
C) He wants it, she doesn't –
Not Married:
1) It goes bye, bye (before the third trimester), and they go their separate ways.
Married:
2) She carries to term, signs away her parental rights and obligations. He gets sole physical custody and they go their separate ways.
3) She carries to term and voluntarily obligates herself to the child. The marriage continues or not – he gets sole physical custody if not.
D) Neither he nor she want it – It goes bye-bye (before the third trimester) and they continue with their lives separately or not, as they wish.
**********
As you can see, my proposal is heavily weighted in favor of marriage. In my never-to-be-humble opinion, Marriage is a Good Thing.
Several of the proposed options are morally bankrupt, in my opinion, but they should be available as legal choices. (For the record, they are the ones where either parent walks away from their obligations to their child)
Overall, I think this strikes as reasonable a balance between everyone's "rights" and their obligations as is possible in our world. It addresses the male need to have some say in the continued existence of what is, after all, his child too. But it preserves to fundamental right of the woman to control her own body. (In 6 of the 8 options available, the woman's wish is followed – and the other two are enforcing a contractual obligation she voluntarily accepted)
Whew.
And as I re-lurk and continue my sabbatical, I have to say thank you, again. You guys have made me think; reminded me, repeatedly, of why I like this place so much; and to the horror of those who dislike my positions on various topics, I can now safely say I will return, at least periodically.
Have a good one,
Bern
I'd like to ask a bit of advice from all the writers here-- and Harlan, if you're lurking, I'd really appreciate your experience on this.
As many of you remember, I've vented here about a local political issue that's given me a small asteroid of grief. I've started writing up the Story of How It All Went Down, not with an eye to publishing it professionally, but for eventual publication on my website. I'm not even trying to write it with any terrific sense of style; I just want to assemble the last few months into a narrative so others can hear my end of the story. Obviously, there are going to be points where my accounts may rub people in a bad way. I can deal with that.
It's just that one particular event, where a couple of the guys from the opposition, decided to level a few threats at me, gives me a bit of trouble. When I get around to writing it down, I want to name names. But, it's pretty certain that these guys might object to my account, and agree between themselves about the "true" story. And there's always the prospect that they might enforce the lie with the law.
Any suggestions on how I should proceed? I'd rather tell what heppened, simply and directly. And while the truth is the best defense, it may not stand against a lie supported by a larger number.
I make it a habit to read at least two nonfiction baseball books a year as the season approaches. My favorites are: ME AND DIMAGGIO by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, GOOD ENOUGH TO DREAM by Roger Kahn, THE ERA by Roger Kahn, NINE INNINGS by Daniel Okrent. I have tons more I can list, but I love these 4!
As far as fiction goes, though SHOELESS JOE is certainly a great Kinsella novel (and fuck you all, I LOVE LOVE LOVE Field Of Dreams....makes me sob like a big friggin baby everytime), Kinsella's best novel is the superb THE IOWA BASEBALL CONFEDERACY. Goddamn, I love that book!
-TODD
DTS wrote: "So how come all those people who believe in the sanctity of life aren't turning vegan and trying to save more whales, etc?"
Simple, she quips in as sarcastic a tone as she can muster. They don't have a soul.
Venk~ You rock, my friend. You should start collecting your views about fatherhood into a book of essays, so that other guys can learn from your most commendable attitude. When they make me Empress of the Universe, it would be required reading.
L.
Alex Jay -
"Is it so hard to be "Alpha Male" of the house without (perhaps for now) being "Father"?"
I think Alpha Male is the only way you can go with kids who already have an active father in their lives. Their mom makes the rules on how they conduct their lives and behave (bedtime, cleanup, homework, manners). I make the house rules (no eating here, no playing with my action figures or HeroClix without permission) and I add discipline when I watch them without her. Both kids are coping with the effects of a divorce. So I try to be there, as I am, maintain my house and - when it comes time to "rule" - use a harsh tone and/or material pleasures as bargaining tools. "Who drew on the carpet with a Sharpie? Okay, that means the Barbie Hotel disappears for a view days. (insert lecture about respecting property)." My role with them is to provide safety, comfort, friendship and love, but to administer it on their terms, lest I risk them fearing I'm there to intrude on the existing system rather than add to it. Sometimes, like with that Sharpie image of Nyarlathotep on the living room carpet, I get a bit miffed and become this dark-stare grumbling ogre they recoil from. A little fear of the Alpha Male is good, too, sometimes.
Bermanator -
Thanks. Sleep a year for me, eh?
CINDY: Thanks for the kind words...been really busy of late, and some new software I installed even helped me loose a lot of old email, etc. (Oy). Well, I read the page you referred me to, and it comes down to this: who do you trust? My experience with the NRLC and groups of their ilk (that is, groups with more than one agenda), is that they tend to slant the "news" and any stories they use or cobble up to support their beliefs. (By the way, Cindy, this isn't an attack on you; I once had a grrreat relationship with a woman who was the daughter of missionary; she was fundamentalist christian, I am an atheist; alas, long term relations just weren't in the cards; we were both too set in our ways and beliefs to ever really change down deep inside).
Speaking of beliefs, why is it that when a female human being chooses to abort the fetus growing in her body, so many (usually) religious people scream about destroying a life, yet they have no problems with humans that butcher cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens, etc for sustenance? How come those same crowds aren't protesting when ranchers shoot wolves (animals killed for doing what comes natural to them when hungry) or so many other species we wipe out in the name of progress, human development or cruelty (mountain gorillas)? I ask, because, at the time most abortions are performed, the human fetus is no more complex than those animals mentioned above. All of the complexity, the possibility of greatness, etc., come later in the developmental stages. But in those early fetal stages, humans are not much more than tadpoles with potential. (And I know someone who believes in the afterlife will say they're saving a soul created at conception, but that's faith-based -- stick with verifiable facts). So how come all those people who believe in the sanctity of life aren't turning vegan and trying to save more whales, etc?
Just wondering,
DTS
Forrester,
I am indeed familiar with "Slouching." Highly interesting read about minor-league baseball.
Alex,
"The Natural" is a wonderful novel. As a movie, it's cloying palp. Huge waste of Glenn Close, otherwise known as Our Virgin Mary of the Stands (for the unfortunate fact that she has almost nothing to do in the movie, combined with that radioactive glow that cinematographers think make women of a certain age look better, when they just need their natural beauty). Oh, how I could go into the mistakes the movie makes! From the bleeding of his stomach through his skin at the final bat to the over-the-top exploding of the light bulbs, it grates on every fiber of my being. Malamud deserved better treatment.
On the other hand, if someone wants to do a Twilight Zone of Malamud's "The Magic Barrel," I wouldn't object.
Oh, and I'll take a look for "The Cubs Reader." I have plenty of relatives who are Cubs fans who would appreciate such a gift.
Regards,
Joseph
Baseball fans: are any of you familiar with this book?
"Slouching Toward Fargo - A Two Year Saga of Sinners and St. Paul Saints at the Bottom of the Bush Leagues with Bill Murray, Darryl Strawberry, Dakota Sadie and Me" by Neal Karlen
Venk-- You're a cool guy, you know that? Thanks for your eloquent response about children. I'm still undecided and as there isn't much chance of it happening to me any time soon, I think I'll sleep on it for about 5 more years.
Bermanator
JOSEPH: Yup--and the followup, THE FALL OF THE ROMAN UMPIRE, is fun, too. (That might be the third book, rather than the second; I'm not sure.)
If you liked Johnstone's style, you ought to love Bill "Spaceman" Lee's THE WRONG STUFF.
(Oh; and I should have added in my earlier post a bit of anticipation: "Yes; I believe that FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME is even a better book than THE NATURAL, the movies made of the two notwithstanding."
Damnit. Malamud gets Redford; Shaara gets frikkin' Costner.)
And though I know you're a Sox man, you still might want to take a look at THE CUBS READER--or maybe just give it to Long-Suffering Cubs Fan Ray Carlson (Ray--you still out there?): It's got an amazing roster of writerly talent, including a rather good excerpted bit from a play cowritten by, among many others, Joe Mantegna and Dennis Franz called BLEACHER BUMS.
Alex,
Thanks for the recommendation. For non-fiction, I'll also toss in Halberstam's "Summer of '49" and Jay Johnstone's first hilarious memoir, "Temporary Insanity" (written by Rick Talley). Come to think of it, toss in Ron Luciano & David Fisher's "The Umpire Strikes Back."
Regards,
Joseph
LONEGUNGIRL: Here's what I believe. At the instant that the fetus is sufficiently advanced that it can be viable--that is, it can live outside the mother's womb--the stork's underpaid and underpublicized assistant, the tern, swoops down and gifts it with what, for lack of a better term, we shall call "the soul." At which point, abortion should no longer be considered unless the mother's life is endangered.
It was interesting today (last night? The night shift and insomnia make for a circle-jerk circadian.) at work; I was chatting with a born-again coworker, and the Florida law about birth mothers who are unsure of their child's paternity having to place the newspaper ad revealing their sexual history. I stated my position, that is, that I am strongly pro-choice, but that I dearly wish that no abortions were performed; that somehow, the need for them could be eradicated, however Pollyannish such a wish is. And that that is why the Florida law infuriated me; aside from the unnecessary humiliation resulting, the law would cause the number of abortions in Florida to spike unnecessarily. My coworker nodded.
Said, "I can respect your belief."
Score one for harmony and tolerance.
P.A.B.: My wish to have children is quite shallow: I love kids. And quite egotistical: I think I would be an excellent parent.
VENKMAN: Serious question: Is it so hard to be "Alpha Male" of the house without (perhaps for now) being "Father"? I say this, having very little experience in this, having only a few months when I dated a woman with an adorable, extremelyly intelligent, and very lovable two-year-old daughter (truth be told, I miss playing with her a lot more than dating her mom). Never had a problem with telling the child what to do, gently but firmly and, often as not, funnily. I expect it's different with older children, though ...
BASEBALL FANS: I sigh.
I have spoken at interminable, mind-numbing length here and in other fora of my love for the sport. And this dovetails quite nicely with my love for the printed word; I have baseball books galore on my shelves. Be it nonfiction or fiction, if it deals with bat, ball, and glove, I have either read it or intend to. Right now, in fact, I'm reading the very good BROOKLYN'S DODGERS by Carl Prince, a former chair of the History Department at NYU.
Well, I've just read the best novel about baseball I've ever read--perhaps the best one ever written. The author won one Pulitzer for another book, and I feel could have won one for this as well. I swear, I was so engrossed in this examination of a player's mind that, on smoke breaks and lunch breaks and stolen moments at work, I was actually cheering out loud while reading.
And they made a fucking Kevin Costner movie out of it. Damn the world.
Yes; I'm speaking of Michael Shaara's last book, FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME.
If you love baseball, READ IT. It will be a couple hours VERY well spent.
If you don't love baseball, READ IT, and you just may afterward.
(Kevin frikkin' Costner ... damn it.)
(For the record: My picks for best nonfiction baseball books are, in no particular order, THE BOYS OF SUMMER, by Roger Kahn; SUMMER OF '41, by Robert Craemer; Bouton's BALL FOUR, and whichever Roger Angell book is closest to me at the time.)
Gunther,
Hell, the floods have been front-page in the Chicago Tribune all week. Jut so you don't think everyone over here is ignoring the refugee crisis in the Europe.
And I just checked CNN.com and it's front page there as well. Seems to me they're covering it fairly well. Here's a summary of the damage in the tragedy so far:
http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/08/15/floods.effects/index.html
Prague, Dresden, Salzburg...sheesh. Good to hear that you're doing okay, Gunther.
Regards,
Joseph
But... but... but...
XXX didn't save Prague! It's flooded to hell and back!
In case you care, or didn't even hear of this as CNN seemed to think the wedding of Lisa Marie Presley and Nicholas Cage so much more important, I and everyone I know wasn't directly affected by the floods (except at work, where our sysadmins had to move servers upstairs, and you can look at some pictures at http://fourcoffees.com/stuff/flood/ if you're thus inclined).
End of heads-up, back to lurk mode.
Frank,
Why, he's at www.berkebreathed.com, of course!
(Yes, I know you were being facetious)
Cindy,
The procedure? I find it disturbing. The legislation? I find sloppy and unnecessary. Just my personal opinion - abortion should be regulated as any other medical procedure, not legislated out of the reach of any person who might actually need it, as it is in Missouri.
Regards,
Joseph
Cindiana -
Lady, you're like my personal cheerleader. Thanks. Keep in mind that the guy on the other side of the Internet is not as verbose or articulate in person (read: often barely verbal). Stand up is about as far from my agenda as going back to dumping barrels of chicken grease at the local amusement park.
lonegungirl -
You hit on the fundamental base of the debate. It's that dark dungeon of moral and medical indecision which folks like us won't escape any time soon. We define single cell organisms as "life" but have no problem squahing multi-celled life forms like bugs, and enjoy hunting mammals for meat or sport. It's no wonder to me that the exact point of HUMAN life taking the place of cells in a womb is subject to great debate.
Bermanator -
I've just inherited 2 stepchildren and it's difficult. I had the experience of dealing with a man who is an excellent stepfather to my own son, so I hope I learned enough to work through it. The hardest thing is knowing the boundaries and accepting the responsibility of raising someone else's kids in the spirit of their father while maintaining the household I keep my own way. Stepfathers have a challenge of loyalties. So far it seems that Pam's kids are testing me to see how far they can push me before I leave "Pam's fiance" mode and enter "Lord of the Manor" where I tell them to quiet down, clean up and go to bed or "there will be consequences." It's fun and an adventure. :) The reasons you give for having a child or children: The most REWARDING and WONDERFUL parts of being a dad. You touched on the greatest joys of my life. When my son and I watched "Lord of the Rings" and I saw the look on his face... all that stuff is like CRACK, I swear. It's the kind of stuff that lets you go to bed at night happy even if the rest of your life is crumbling. And you're absolutely right about sharing experiences: You know that feeling you get when you know you touched one of your students - like you KNOW you got through and THEY know it, too? Triple that feeling with your own kids when that happens. You never expect it. I know the first wasn't expected. My second child is a whole new adventure. It's a different mother, a different age and under different circumstances. But it's just as much fun.
Jon, thanks for reminding me about that Prague montage and Jesus, in trying to forget about this movie as quickly as possible I forgot about the moments that made me laugh out loud, disturbing the Xtreme Game bulky gorilla in the row ahead of me who was obviously enjoying the movie immensely.
Those scenes immediately gave me Armageddon flashbacks, until I realized that these were so much funnier.
YeeGawds.
-TODD
Todd: I can't believe you didn't enjoy the greatest film ever made about an extreme sports-playing secret agent who saves the world from Prague-dwelling Anarchist Russians whose doomsday device looks like the big brother of the gun the Atom People had in that 50's Superman movie. And you know, during that 'will XXX save Prague?' montage of lovers kissing, children frolicking, etc., the movie makes it very clear that XXX saves Jesus, too. Where _was_ this guy at the crucifixion?
Jon
Joseph,
Setting terminology aside, focusing on the doctor's own description of the procedure; when you look at the legislation endorsing the ban what is your take?
Cindy
Where the hell is Berke Breathed? Lol.
Cindy,
My apologies for misinterpreting your comments from before. I read both pages which you reference, and quite frankly I'm sticking with the Planned Parenthood page. Since it's the one based on actual scientific evidence and compassion for both mother and fetus, as opposed to the NRLC page, which seems to use as references generalistic newspaper reports of political discussions (which by their very nature are going to be full of idealogically twisted phrases and non-scientific use of medical terminology) and the most distasteful passages that the authors could find from "Abortion Practice." A mite bite too biased of writing for me to trust it that much.
Regards,
Joseph
Regards,
Joseph
Joseph,
No no no! I'm sorry! That's MY solution! I am the one that said they should " Get the baby out." That IS the proper medical response to those symptoms. My point is that they don't need to KILL the baby to save the mother.. only to get it out of her body.
The list came from the Planned Parenthood website on a fact sheet on Abortion After The First Trimester.
Go here to read what planned parenthood puts out on the issue ...
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/library/facts/abotaft1st_010600.html
Lynn posted it.
To be completely up on the matter though you should go to this link as well and read what came before Congress.
http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/pba/test.html
The two have conflicting information-- you be the judge of which is most accurate. Then come back if you would and tell us what you think.
:)
Cindy
Actually a practical post for Lynn and Rick who head up the KICK movement...
I am working on training for a new sign shop that creates magnets, vehicle signs, indoor/outdoor banners, coroplast and metal signs. I need to design stuff for training. How about KICK stickers and magnets? Anything in that vein you guys think would help get the word out?
Let me know.
J
Joseph,
No no no! I'm sorry! That's MY solution! I am the one that said they should " Get the baby out." That IS the proper medical response to those symptoms. My point is that they don't need to KILL the baby to save the mother.. only to get it out of her body.
:)
Cindy
Cindy,
I refer to your post of Wednesday, August 14 2002 23:27:15, where you posted a "list" that claimed Planned Parenthood's solution for everything up to depression was "GET THE BABY OUT," which I quite fairly took to be a euphemism for abortion. That seems to me to be a gross mis-characterization of one of the leading sources of reproductive consulting in the United States for lower-income women in the United States and worldwide.
Regards,
Joseph
Y'all are the greatest people. Do you know how RARE it is to find people on both sides of an issue as volatile as abortion that can swap ideas, concerns and opinions without rancor or venom?
Lynn,
You're a darlin' of a girl and your points are well taken. You don't approve of barbarity either but you worry about the trapped women. That is a valid concern. Your point about the guns is accurate as well.
I think you're grand, Lynn. I really do.
:)
Cindy
VENK, AHHHHH VENK,
Standup-- did you ever try stand up? I love to read your posts. You never cease to make me laugh or think-- usually it's both simultaneously.
DTS,
My friend who sends the most beautiful roses I have ever EVER seen let ALONE had on my table. How are you? I've missed you!
Now, let's see what we have here...
You wrote;" From what I've read, competent physicians perform partial birth abortions only when a mother's life is in danger and there's no other way to save her. "
When you have a moment please go to this link and read what the doctors who perform them have said--
http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/pba/test.html
Drop about halfway down the document to the bold print reading;
" NCAP's Ron Fitzsimmons Blows the Whistle"
That will sum things up.
your Texas buddy,
Cindy
>
Mine darlink Joseph,
:)
You wrote;
"Cindy,
I have to object to your horrible mischaracterization of Planned Parenthood, a fine organization that exists to make sure that all women have access to correct medical information about their fertility without having to go to an abortion clinic or their family doctor, both of which are going to have their own prejudices. Hell, PP ain't perfect - but they're a sight better than most of the strident wackos on both sides of the abortion debate."
I will grant you that both sides are an embarrassment most of the time. They get so pissed off during debates on television that veins stick out on throats and foreheads. They act like third graders seeing who can be the loudest and most obnoxious.
But I can't find where I mischaracterized Planned Parenthood. Can you tell me what I wrote because I sincerely can't find anything objectionable.
:)
yer pal,
Cindy
Venk's post was deeply moving for me, and it got me thinking (and yes, trying to divert the subject off of abortion). I don't have children, though I spend my working days teaching other people's, and I genuinely like being around kids of any age. However, I have of late been in an agony of indecision about the possibility of having children of my own.
The reasons I would have one: I would love to know someone intimately from they day he is born, to show him the world from my eyes, and it see it from his. I want to have a child of mine to talk to when I'm old; I want to hear what he thinks about my favorite books, movies, about his loves and fears, etc. I want to see my genes go on to the next generation.
Then I feel very selfish. First of all, the world is overpopulated. Some days I worry that the human race is going to drive itself into extinction; on my worst days, I hope this will happen. I live alone and spend some of my best time alone. Would I be able to share my time with a baby and not become resentful or claustrophobic? What about the kid's other parent? There are so many kids in the world who need a loving home who don't have one. Shouldn't I adopt? Would that be the truly moral choice? And how the hell am I going to afford to put a kid through college on a teacher's salary?
I don't expect anyone to give me any answers. I don't even want any. I just want to know what you guys think b/c you are a bunch of incredibly reflective people. Those of you who have kids: did you have to learn how to rise to the occasion, or were you ready when you did it? How do you know you're ready? For those who don't have their own kids, who have stepkids or adopted kids: how is that working? Is it very difficult to make a kid not of your body feel accepted in your family? For those with no kids: are you glad you didn't have them? In general: do you think most people raise their kids well? Why or why not?
Thanks,
Bermanator
On Abortion:
I have no good answers for this. My personal viewpoint is completely pro-choice but the differences in opinion I tend to see seem to boil down to the following questions: At what point do you consider the fetus an independent being, with rights of its own? Do you consider that there are some lives that babies lead that are worse than death?
I have never heard nor seen what you're defining as a "partial-term" abortion, but I have seen third-term abortions they really bear no resemblance to what's been described here. I'd have to think that partial-term abortions are fairly rare, if still performed, but I'm not an expert.
Frank,
Personally, I'd go with "The City" by Derf (http://www.derfcity.com/), but Tom Tomorrow is pretty high up there.
Regards,
Joseph
For the best comic artist and wit in the country, go to, http://www.thismodernworld.com Tom Tomorrow is one great American.
Lynn -
The thing is, we're not going to solve it. I respect you and your point of view. I enjoy discussing it, but I leave it to the zealots with sandwich signs and bullhorns to get pissy and testy with each other on the street. The louder they speak, the less they say and the less anyone else hears. That's not US for fucking fuckle fuck sake. :)
I DO see your point. Forcing a woman to do something with her own body is wrong. Where the fog rolls in HERE is that there's another life to consider beyond the mother's. What would you say if the petition to halt an abortion obligates the father to take full physical and legal custody of the child while giving the mother the option to waive all responsibility? Sure, the father could skip the country. I consider that a small percentage compared to the number of fathers who would take to raising their children. I could be wrong about that assumption, though.
Our difference of opinion, I think, is where the burden of relief is placed. You're advocating relief for the mother. I'm advocating relief for the baby, first, and the parents second. I know more than a half dozen men who I consider abusive or who have crossed that line and been punished for it. I don't want those kinds of people raising children in the first place, but I can't make the distinction and I cannot tell a GOOD father that he cannot see or bring to light his offspring because OF those scumbags who treat their "loved-ones" as meatbags and slaves. Life offers a chance to break those patterns and make changes. Yes, it's not my usual, cynical mode, but when it comes to children you HAVE to be hopeful and provide them with every opportunity to thrive, even if the world they are destined to enter is potentially cold and abusive.
Having a son who is now seven, going through a hellish split with his mother, fighting to remain an active father in his life and make amends with his mom over the years, I can tell you that I DIDN'T want any of this life 7 years ago. Sitting in my ex's car the day we found out she was pregnant it was like I was going to prison in a wheelchair. It was overwhelming and shameful at very least. I didn't want to grow up so fast, change my life, change diapers, get up six times a night, pick a daycare, volunteer on a midget sports team, wait endlessly in the hospital ER when his temp crested 104, hear how bad a father I was for being half an hour late picking him up, watching him with his stepfather and feeling that clawing at the heart... all that stuff. I didn't WANT to have to learn to be a parent WITH someone else, and then to have to learn it alone...well, let me tell you...it puts strain on a selfish 20-something kid.
It was hard for my ex, too. But from the beginning her position was that because she and I decided to have sex and our actions resulted in this, we had a greater responsibility to IT than to ourselves. I'll be honest, at the time, I didn't want "it" and I hoped that she'd be cold and rational and want to not carry "it" but that moment passed and all that badness and all that suffering and setback...all the financial and emotional drain was worth it.
Most people without children, and I'm not saying YOU, just don't know the full picture of what it's like to be given the responsibility of life, told that there is something greater than the Self and it's time to pass along who you are to he or she that will tell your stories into the next generation. It wasn't the path I set out on, but I've learned more about life by being a father than if I had been a Masters-degree touting humanities prof at some community college or any of five career paths I had mapped for myself.
And I wouldn't change it. I wouldn't go back in time to change it and I don't regret the sacrifices. That's my universe. Ours crossover in places and I respect the points where they don't. We're cool. Cindiana is cool. The world is cool in places and, in others, it is fucked up beyond the imagining of it. But we're here, above the curve and just sharing the ideas. :)
(On a lighter note, I had to tell her father - an ex-state trooper close to seven feet high and four-foot wide Catholic with a big gun collection...lucky for me he is one of the greatest men I've ever met.)
Lynn,
Here's another term for prisons, from a fine novel by Edward Bunker: "Animal Factory." Made into a pretty damn good movie with Willem Dafoe, Edward Furlong and Danny Trejo. Incidentaly, Bunker (who did some writing for the classic "Runaway Train" and who played Mr. Blue in "Reservoir Dogs") knows prison from having served time for bank robbery. Bet he and Danny Trejo (who served time with Bunker at San Quentin) must have been shaking theirs head at "we're getting paid to be in prison?"
It's a weirdly small world, isn't it?
Regards,
Joseph
http://us.news2.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/cx/uc/20020804/bz/bz020804l.gif
Warning: Do not drink coffee & read this comic at the same time. Put your soft drink down and then click.
L.
Venk~ Read here: http://slate.msn.com/?id=2069132
L.
Venk~ First of all, thank you for keeping this light. This subject often gets too hot and heavy too quickly and then the name calling starts and it gets ugly quick. So thanks for that.
As to the evil that dad's do, again I was theorizing about the possible outcome of letting someone who has rights decide what another body does. Pardon me if the idea of a woman being forced to carry a child she doesn't want to term is as unpalatable to me as forced slavery. In my heart, it feels like a rape that goes on for nine months. There is such a thing as marital rape, and of all the fucked up and abusive relationships I've seen (women with black eyes and broken jaws protesting how much "He loves me!"), there is the possibility that this could happen. Just picture in your mind the controlling husband whose wife finally wakes up and realizes she's carrying the child of a monster in her belly, only to have the father-monster press his legal rights in a court of law. Then, including all possible outcomes, the child is born against her will, the father leaves the country (goes back to Iran, for instance), and leaves the mother with a child she doesn't want. Sure, adoption, okay. But the whole idea just makes my skin crawl.
In the end, the decision whether or not a ten week old embryo is a life, has a soul, etc, shouldn't be up to the State or the Church or the Doctors. It should be up to the woman whose body said embryo resides in. I share with you the revulsion and disgust at women who use abortion as birth control. To look at it in a larger picture, we can't feed all the mouths we got here now. There are plenty of unwanted children with a host of neuroses walking around. The problem with the ethics of abortion is just one tiny piece of a greater, even more fucked up problem.
Again, I'm ethically opposed to the idea of killing a child that might have a happy healthy life. But I'm even more ethically opposed to the concept of forced pregnancy. That little voice in my head screams that it's only a few steps away from being forced to have a microchip implanted by the government, or human organ farms, formerly known as high security prisons. Can you see where I'm coming from at least?
L.
"I'm kinda peeved at you because you keep responding to my devil's advocate questions as if the only type of father who would object to the mother of his child having an abortion is the saintly well-intentioned one."
I'm not saying they're saintly. I'm just saying the rights of fathers who want to protect their children should be protected. The criteria should be simple. 1. Are you the father? 2. Do you wish to assume full custody of this child? 3. Will continuing this pregnancy place the life of the mother or child at risk? Of course, 3 is vague. If a father wants to claim full custody (or partial custody with grandparents) then the child and the father should be protected. In some cases (not ALL) the mother needs to be uncomfortable for nine months and then give up all rights to the life after birth. If the father doesn't want to assume full custody, financial responsibility to bring the child to term, or if the pregnancy puts mom and/or baby at risk, there's no contest.
How do we settle it, I dunno. But you can't universally discount the rights of a dad any more than I can universally force you to carry or terminate.
Now to the devil's advocate side. (turns around, rubs temples and takes a breath, turns back around looking like Vincent Price)
Hello, my dear. Now that your body has the Seed of Dr. Xero growing in its womb, allow me to explain my evil and dastardly plan (pause for a stirring and booming "bwahahahahahahahaha" accompanied by thunderclap). Our night of passion was but a means to introduce my mutant offspring to the world. I could have used a cow, but some Texan woman stole that idea (shakes fist at sky) DAMN YOU CINDIANA JONES!!!(gathers self) I will force you to carry my little monster - I call him "Hubert" - and then, the GLORIOUS part of my plan will emerge. Once born, he will become one of my legion of bridge trolls to rise up at passersby and extort their gold and valuables. He will have a rich, textured life in my charge. And YOU! You will become a waitress in a cocktail bar, perhaps to be found by some efem British manager type in a thin pleather tie who will exploit you for your beauty and harmonizing abilities. Why do I do this, you ask? Well, my dear, because (ahem) I. Am. EVIL! Bwahahahahahaha...
Seriously, with any situation, you'll have people who are corrupt, stupid, evil, abusive, domineering, selfish and vile. I don't deny that. In the example you just gave, the end result is a viable child with a future. Does he go live with Lionel Luthor in the big mansion while mom is forced out into the cold world without so much as a limo driver? That's one of those case-by-case deals. If a woman doesn't want the child, she should be able to give up all rights at birth, be able to walk away from it and allow the father to raise the child. If she cannot do that, how can she terminate? (WARNING: Entering Moral Fog Area! Turn on Headlights and Reduce Speed!) Is it because a 10 week old baby is a collection of cells and not a living human being? We're both advocating responsibility for one's actions here. Give me an example from your experience of a father who manipulated a pregnancy for his own selfish ends so I can better understand what you mean.
"...they'd realize that the simpler and far more effective way to handle the situation is to EDUCATE people, and not just about sex! (::GASP::) Put a higher priority on teaching personal responsibility , self-respect and self-worth, and a lot of these problems decrease significantly."
This is very true. People need to think and learn. But even educated intelligent Joes like myself end up spending the afternoon with the wife's OB/GYN because the precautions didn't work. In terms of the basic fundamental rule, I think the general public has it down. The operations manual to the human body didn't describe sex as the human means of hedonistic pleasure. That's just the side effect and incentive for the species to engage in it's primary function: To Extend and Expand the Species. You engage in sex, you risk performing the function for which it exists. But we could put up a billboard "SEX = BABIES. WANT ONE? NO? THEN WRAP IT, SNIP IT, PUT IT IN THE JELLY, or KEEP IT OUT OF THE HOT ZONE, BRAINIAC!"
But if, through misuse, non-use, or sheer force of will, something happens and the hot five minutes in the operahouse coat room results in a Junior, I firmly believe that MOM and DAD's life is changed. It may be difficult for this culture to accept but the MINUTE you concieve, your life is subordinate to the life you create. We talk about it, write stories about it, make a big deal about only God has the power over life and death, but it comes down to two people, a bottle of stoli and a dance that's a little too close and goes on a little too long.
That's what makes this subject fun. You're absolutely right. As a woman, I respect your right to make a decision. How I feel about your choice is my right, but because I am an observer in your life I have no say. If I am the father, then I maintain right to be involved in the decisions of that like. Kinda like Elton John and Bernie Taupin. Sure, Elton gets to belt them out and wear the funky clothes, but without Taupin, the songs just wouldn't be written. Do we ignore his contribution because Elton's the one on the chat shows and doing the shows?
Okay, I know that was a stretch. Just keeping it light, is all.
Seriously, what have you seen - examples - of the evil that dads do?
Cindy~ Sweety, baby, honey chile, you know I never claimed that such a thing should be acceptable. I'm just concerned that the chicken littles in Congress will use it as a foot in the door to challenge Roe v Wade. Let's not make a mountain out of a molehill. I also don't think that people should be allowed to have heat seeking missiles, but living in Los Angeles County, I've seen the rights of legal, educated gun owners erode away to almost nothing. It started with an assault weapons ban and has gradually expanded to included such idiocies as "projectile weapons". Y'know, airsoft guns? Sling shots? Cross bows? It's gotten so bad that police officers don't train to the best of their ability because their lawyers don't want them to come across as hired killers in courts. And these are the guys that are *allowed* to carry guns!
It's a matter of spin, and the problem with spin is that it can get out of control before the populace knows what's happening.
Venk~ I'm kinda peeved at you because you keep responding to my devil's advocate questions as if the only type of father who would object to the mother of his child having an abortion is the saintly well-intentioned one. I've spent some time volunteering in a women's shelter in one of the richest towns in this country (Santa Barbara, CA) and believe me, the ones who have the dough to push such a case are not always as well-intentioned as you'd like to believe. And again, while I could never have an abortion, I couldn't, in good conscience, make that decision for someone else. And if people would stop concentrating on the most inflammatory part of the problem (how to deal with the consequences of your actions), they'd realize that the simpler and far more effective way to handle the situation is to EDUCATE people, and not just about sex! (::GASP::) Put a higher priority on teaching personal responsibility , self-respect and self-worth, and a lot of these problems decrease significantly.
But the simplest answer is never interesting enough for the ten second sound bite, so we continue to argue over issues that get the highest ratings instead of focusing on actually solving the problems.
L.
CINDY: From what I've read, competent physicians perform partial birth abortions only when a mother's life is in danger and there's no other way to save her. The idea that it's commonplace is one of those myths floated out into the ill-educated gestalt by rightwing nuts who think religion should should be legislated -- and that abortions should not be allowed at all ('course, the people screaming loudest against the abortion of an unwanted fetus are those who are unwilling to take care of the resulting child should it be put up for abortion).
Out here, DTS
"Charlie" (hey, you can't have that name, it's taken ;-) ) points out that in Florida there is a CLE requirement on ethics. I hate to say this, but that makes my point.
ETHICS IS NOT A MOVING TARGET. CLE shouldn't be necessary. And it's useless; anyone who has ever attended a CLE session on ethics can testify that it was one of three things:
* Lessons in how to skirt ambiguous rules;
* Monotonic repetition of rules we were supposed to learn in law school; and/or
* Lessons in how to outright evade the rules.
The only ethics system we should need is the officer's code: Thou shalt not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate others who do; if it looks like a conflict of interest, it is; and this is a profession whose primary reward is not riches, but the satisfaction of doing a job well that nobody else can do. That's not going to happen anytime soon, and if it does some experts (most of whom need the remediation more than most) will argue over the boundaries of lying, cheating, and stealing.
There's a basic attitude problem: that ethics is a win-lose situation. A good ethics system is win-win: self-confidence, public confidence, and accurate results.
Cindy,
I have to object to your horrible mischaracterization of Planned Parenthood, a fine organization that exists to make sure that all women have access to correct medical information about their fertility without having to go to an abortion clinic or their family doctor, both of which are going to have their own prejudices. Hell, PP ain't perfect - but they're a sight better than most of the strident wackos on both sides of the abortion debate.
Regards,
Joseph
VENK!
You never cease to delight and fill me with awe!!
" Til the pod bay doors are closed and the seed spreader is snoring or strolling away."
" Sorry, Steve, I like to think of you as a really, really good friend."
THIS IS PRICELESS!!!!!!!!!!!!! CLASSIC VENKMAN MATERIAL.
You're the man... you ARE....the man.
Lynn,
I gotta go with Venk on this. In fairness, and in the case of two consenting adults, the man SHOULD have a say so when the mom is not awash with maternal instinct. If she chooses to participate in the conception then she's in for the penny and the pound. It's only nine months and you knew when you did it that this is the way that babies are made. The nine months is NOTHING compared to the effort involved in night feedings, diaperings, late night sick bed vigils...potty training, early childhood, adolescence and forGET about the trials of raising teenagers... a man who wants a plate of this and is willing and happy to have it is a beautiful and rare thing and he should NOT BE DENIED.
I can answer this one from personal experience. You see I HAVE been pregnant...seven times. I lost one but of the other six I have raised three.. two are still in college, one is a freshman in high school one is in the third grade and the little girl is going into Kindergarten on the 20th. TRUST ME-- swollen ankles puffy fingers and six caesareans aside the first nine months WAS the easy part.
The time to say thanks but no thanks is PRIOR to conception.
What Venkman said about the pod bay doors firmly closed and all--jeeze you HAVE to admit that is some dazzling phraseology there.
As for the planned parenthood stuff-- hmm let's address the items as we go...
The Planned Parenthood list goes;
Medical indications may lead to abortion after 12 weeks. Discovery of serious fetal anomalies, such as severe genetic disorders, or conditions in which the woman's health is threatened or aggravated by continuing her pregnancy include
malignant hypertension, including preeclampsia
CURE-- GET THE BABY OUT.
out-of-control diabetes
GET THE BABY OUT..
heart failure
UHMMMM GET THE BABY OUT...
severe depression
Get the baby the HELL out.
suicidal tendencies
GET THE BABY OUT and put the mom in a psyche ward.
serious renal disease
Get the BABY OUT.
certain types of infections
UHMMMMMMM Get the baby OUT.
Now, shall we consider what the goverment said about Partial Birth Abortion when they came to a consensus regarding the practise and voted to BAN it?
***********************************************
The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act (HR 1122)
as Passed by the U.S. House of Representatives
ON MARCH 20, 1997
Sec. 1531. Partial-birth abortions prohibited.
(a) Any physician who, in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce, knowingly performs a partial-birth abortion and thereby kills a human fetus shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both. This paragraph shall not apply to a partial-birth abortion that is necessary to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, illness, or injury: Provided, That no other medical procedure would suffice for that purpose. This paragraph shall become effective one day after enactment.
(b) (1) As used in this section, the term 'partial-birth abortion' means an abortion in which the person performing the abortion partially vaginally delivers a living fetus before killing the fetus and completing the delivery.
Ron Fitzsimmons of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers puts the annual number of partial birth abortions at around 5,000.
If you want to be fair go to this link and read it.
http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/pba/test.html
Skim over the political bullshit but go to the information provided on the actual medical procedure that is partial birth abortion. Look under the heading " Dr. Martin Haskell Starts the Debate". THEN continue to the testimony before congress of Brenda Pratt Shafer, a registered nurse from Dayton who assisted Dr. Haskell in three partial birth abortions.
Then come back here and tell me that we can't agree on this one count.
This outrage should be banned. Politics aside it isn't about pro-choice or pro-life it's about a horror that we are allowing to continue because we choose to bury our heads in the sand while muttering a mantra of a woman's "right to choose".
As I wrote earlier our world is not perfect and there are things that we will never agree on...but after reading this information I believe that you will see why a majority of Democrats and Republicans voted to ban it.
Cindy
Sorry about the multipost...eep.
"Venkman~ I'm a couple pages into it and I had to set it aside because it was freaking me out, in a completely good way."
Great. And I use my handle for the lead freak. What an impression I must be making.
"What if it is an abusive and controlling relationship that the woman has finally gotten out of. What if the father "wants" the baby purely to control and demean the mother?"
Again, the law doesn't exist to protect the father. Speaking as a man whose seen the drama you describe unfold, I can tell you there are checks and balances that exist in family court to deal with it. Aborting the innocent child to deal with a domestic issue or sever ties with an abusive man is not the best case scenario. Most states favor the mother in matters of custody. They also demand strict observation and social work involving cases of alleged abuse. I have a hard time imagining a man who would force a woman to carry a child during a split. Usually all they want to do is cut bait and forget it all happened. Under family law, the father will be the one most closely watched and impacted by this.
But it comes back to the reason. If a woman wants to terminate because of the father, than the issue seems to me to be one between the mother and father, not if the baby should live or die.
"Would the courts have any recourse if the father did not fully engage his responsibilities?"
Yes. Few fathers would go through the expensive court process of protecting the life of his child, be involved in the process and then suddenly abandon it. As for the consequences, there are already many for deadbeat fathers (and mothers) Even if a father can't stand his family, he is obligated to pay support, involve himself in visitation, or he can opt out altogether. If you neglect your child, there are laws governing this. But again, I can't see a man forcing a woman to go through 9 months, be with her, see the changes, discover his own child and then say "HA HA! Tricked ya! I'm off to Vegas, sucker!"
"What if the father bailed the day after the birth?"
He is a fool and subject to paternity laws.
Hey, the weird thing, Lynn, is that I cover this in the script. How do you protect a child from a heritage of sadistic fathers? Hmmmm... you tell me how well I handle it.
"Being pregnant isn't a social disease and it isn't something to be cured. Speak to any woman who has had an abortion and the consequences (both to her life before and after the pregnancy was terminated) are readily apparent."
I hope you didn't misunderstand my previous posts because I agree with you here completely. It is a HORROR to live with the memory of a miscarriage and a conscious decision to abort must be indescribably hellish.
"Having a kid isn't a lifestyle choice. It isn't akin to deciding whether or not to get a tattoo. It's taking responsibility for another human being..."
Absolutely. My issue is allowing those who believe it IS a lifestyle choice to terminate. But a lifestyle choice is a wide, broad, vague standard. "I'm too young to be a mom" or "I won't be able to finish college" or "They'll never hire a single mother" or "Oh they'll be so ashamed of me" are not good enough, at least to me, to terminate.
"It isn't your womb and even though you shared in the conception, until you can carry that baby for nine months, you have no say in the outcome."
The problem I have with that is: It's your womb, but my baby. If I'm Congressman Dickface from Colorado, I should stay the hell out of it, but if I'm someone who cherishes the life he's created, I should have a say in what happens to that life.
"And if a man shares the emotional consequences of a terminated pregnancy, then maybe he should be a little more discriminating where he spreads his seed."
Well that, too, goes both ways. If a woman doesn't want the burden of that little memorial ghost, she should say goodnight early, pass on the third glass of wine and keep vertical until the pod bay door is firmly closed and the seed bearer is snoring or strolling home. Of course there is always the classic "Sorry, Steve, but I'd like to think of you as a really, really good friend."
An aside, I love this:
"I will be a friend and be there to help in any way I can, but believe me, he ain't gettin' no sympathy in the bargain."
The definition of a true friend.
Washu,
I'd be terrified by "Simone," except that it is written and directed by Andrew Niccol, who has already done two of the smarter movies about the consequences of technology in the past ten years: "The Truman Show" and "Gattaca." Makes me feel much more interested in the movie right there.
Regards,
Joseph
Cindy: I am not really very knowledgeable about abortion laws. I was under the impression that late term abortions weren't legal; there is a point in the pregnancy where it is too late to terminate via a legal medical procedure. I don't think there are too many people who are in favor of third trimester abortions, are there?
Abortion is just one of those issues, like the Middle East, where my wisdom fails and I can't manage to find a position that is entirely tenable. I'm going to try really hard not to say too much more about it.
Bermanator
Venkman~ I'm a couple pages into it and I had to set it aside because it was freaking me out, in a completely good way. But I need to get it in hardcopy and read it before I go to bed, preferably after having eaten a messy pastrami sandwich. That way I can fully experience the nightmares it will induce. ::hehehe::
You also spoke of the impact of an active father. You are absolutely right. Let me give you another scenario. What if it is an abusive and controlling relationship that the woman has finally gotten out of. What if the father "wants" the baby purely to control and demean the mother? Would the courts have any recourse if the father did not fully engage his responsibilities? What if the father bailed the day after the birth? What then? Being pregnant isn't a social disease and it isn't something to be cured. Speak to any woman who has had an abortion and the consequences (both to her life before and after the pregnancy was terminated) are readily apparent. Having a kid isn't a lifestyle choice. It isn't akin to deciding whether or not to get a tattoo. It's taking responsibility for another human being, and I don't care what your reasons. It isn't your womb and even though you shared in the conception, until you can carry that baby for nine months, you have no say in the outcome.
And if a man shares the emotional consequences of a terminated pregnancy, then maybe he should be a little more discriminating where he spreads his seed. (I should relate, I have a male friend who I fully expect to get AIDS or Hepatitis C or get some psycho bitch pregnant. He's an intelligent guy, but somewhere along the line, someone told him his entire self-esteem revolves around his ability to screw anything that moves. And when the consequences come, I will be a friend and be there to help in any way I can, but believe me, he ain't gettin' no sympathy in the bargain. The most frustrating thing is, he can hear that train coming, and yet, he does nothing but stand on the tracks, whistlin' Dixie. :::GRRRRR::: Okay, I'm gonna go hit something now.)
L.
Okay, with the understanding that I'm speaking as someone who hasn't seen the movie yet, but...does anyone else here find the concept of SIMONE (digital actors flawlessly replacing flesh & blood actors) absolutely terrifying? Is it even more terrifying that it's supposed to be a COMEDY?
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
Lynn,
Did you have a chance to look over the script, yet? No rush or anything. I know you're busy.
Venk
Lynn,
Did you have a chance to look over the script, yet? No rush or anything. I know you're busy.
Venk
Jon, you wrote, "Saw _XXX._ Was pleasantly surprised -- better than the last ten or so Bond films, Vin Diesel is an engaging hypermuscular fella, and the world-destruction plan is hilarious."
OK, OK, I know you were taking the movie as a bit of a goof, but Jon, this movie is HORRIBLE. UGH UGH UGH. It makes Attack Of The Clones look like Citizen Kane. I would take any repugnant Roger Moore Bond movie, yes, even A View To A Kill, over XXX, or Triple X, or 30 or whatever you call this movie ANY DAY.
The action was nil.....just a lot of noise and explosions and CGI 'stunts', and the dialogue was absolute shit. There was nothing clever about this movie: shoddy editing, lame action, noise noise noise, and not a single giggle from the lead (were we supposed to slap our knees because two guys were named Ivan?). I know that there are a lot of fluff films in the summer that are good for some noisy action, but this film does not make it. Horrible. To say this is better than ANY Bond film, even the worst Bond films, is an insult: that's just a load of malarkey and you seem to be falling for the marketing hype of this being a spy for the 'current generation.'.
Yeeks, I hated this movie. Loathed it. Only sat through the whole thing because I was meeting some friends for dinner nearby afterward and, hey, I'm unemployed and don't have much better to do than see movies that the wife refuses to see with me.
There is nothing to this piece of shit......I expected some cool action, and I just got a bunch of bad cutting from some doofus' bald head to a long distance shot of a real stuntman to CGI shit. And while I'm ranting, which I don't do that much over bad movies....live and let live.....what's this shit with his name? Xander, but friends call me X. Thus, I put THREE X's on the back of my gorilla skull. But please, don't get confused and call me Triple X or anything, I'm X. See? X. See the three X's? Just call me X.
And as for those insulting my beloved Bond films (been living and breathing them ever since I was 5....yes, even the Moore era), there is nothing wrong with the last 5 Bonds (since Old Man Roger departed). The Living Daylights is a terrific Bond movie with one of the great Bond fights (and stunts) as they struggle in the open cargo plane. License To Kill was, ok, a bit lame, but Goldeneye is one of the better Bond movies of the 19 (soon 20). I put this up there against any Bond movie, though the trio of Goldfinger, Thunderball and You Only Live Twice can really not be topped. Goldeneye is aces and actually brings in some good screenwriting into the mix.....the last to Brosnans were o.k., but they can kick XXX's ass anytime.
And now that I've totally taken away everyone's mind from the horrors of abortion debating and Alzheimer's for a few moments, I now return your screen to your regular programming.
-TODD
(XXX, grumble grumble grumble. Compare to Bond? grumble grumble grumble. whattaworld! whattaworld!
"...then what about the woman who wants to keep the child and the father doesn't want...the ultimate responsibility. How would you handle that situation? Does the father get to say she can't keep the baby then?"
No, if law is enacted, then it needs to protect the child's rights over any convenience to the parents. You are absolutely right and, as I mentioned, it is the mother's final decision. However, the darkest path in this forest is where the mother doesn't want the child and the father does. What if the mother decides, as many have, that she doesn't want to share her life with the father and wants to terminate the pregnancy. What if the father wants to raise and care for the child himself. It's his son or daughter. Should he have no rights at all? Clearly there can be no law to for or enforce an abortion, but there can be one to protect it should the circumstance warrant it.
"I believe that the woman is 100% responsible, from birth control all the way through to birth. It's her body, it's her decision. And while I personally could never have an abortion, I could never live with the idea of someone being forced against their will to carry a child to full term."
Why? It's any one of many potential consequences of sex. You know going into it (no pun intended) that one of the results could be, despite your best efforts, pregnancy. I don't understand the idea of protecting children outside the womb, but treating them as parasites while still gestating. I'm not saying that's YOUR point of view, Lynn, I'm just saying that's common thought on the subject. Again, it's case by case. If a rapist or Uncle Wacko wants a victim to keep a child, there's less gray in the fog, but I can't live with the idea that a man could lose his child because someone doesn't "feel like' having a baby.
Being the father of a child means being there through the mood swings, through the swollen feet, through all the tests, pokes, exams, kicks, contractions, back and belly massages, baby yoga and the hours upon hours spent in stores picking out all the cute theme stuff to put around the room. Women have 100% of the physical responsibility, but you cannot underestimate the impact of an active father on the child during pregnancy.
"We don't live in a perfect world. ... we will never find a solution to this problem that is universally acceptable."
Yep. That's why we have pleasant conversations like these to stir it up.
"PS. Personally, ...I think it makes a lot more sense to take the bullets out of the gun than it does to wear a bullet proof vest. But I digress..."
Yep...six months from now...SNIP SNIP I hear that.
BERMAN(ATOR): Actually, I believe I read somewhere (some time ago) that mosquitoes don't bite certain people because of the way body smells (that's not knock on your hygiene) -- something about the phermorones or some such explanation. So while you might have immunity from mosquito bites, I'm not sure you'll be much help in the prevention dept. where others are concerned.
Informationally...
Venkman~
The example you cite (father's rights) is a double-edged sword. If fifty percent of the responsibility of the child is the father's (in a perfect world, it would be), then what about the woman who wants to keep the child and the father doesn't want to pay child support, doesn't want progeny turning up looking for handouts when he wins the lottery, doesn't want the ultimate responsibility. How would you handle that situation? Does the father get to say she can't keep the baby then?
I believe that the woman is 100% responsible, from birth control all the way through to birth. It's her body, it's her decision. And while I personally could never have an abortion, I could never live with the idea of someone being forced against their will to carry a child to full term.
In a perfect world, men & women take responsibility for their actions. They plan to have children. Those children are wanted, healthy and loved. We don't live in a perfect world. So we make do with the solutions we have. And until an embryo can be extracted from an unwilling mother and implanted into a willing one, we will never find a solution to this problem that is universally acceptable.
L.
PS. Personally, I think that the law should be a bit more consistent regarding a woman's control of her own body. Surrogacy is legal, but prostitution is not. So technically, a woman can rent out all but the last six inches or so of her reproductive system. And the culture of birth control is also seriously flawed. I think it makes a lot more sense to take the bullets out of the gun than it does to wear a bullet proof vest. But I digress...
I have no problem with someone being personally against abortion; my problem is when that person uses their personal moral beliefs to change the law. As long as they give woman a personal choice to do with their bodies what they want then I am fine with any moral point of contention.
Cindy,
Baby's doing fine at the moment. Still has the sniffles, but otherwise ok. Thanks for asking.
And I must say that I'm generally surprised at the debate concerning abortion on this board. No one has called anyone any names, yet. Amazing. Other than Frank's usual baiting concerning Chazz and his Alzheimer's, the posting of comments/opinions has been quite civil. By the way, Heston doesn't deserve this crippling disease. He's no Jesse Helms (who is recovering, bless his wicked heart).
One last thing about the abortion topic and then I leave it alone. When a pro-lifer argues with a pro-choicer, invariably the pro-lifer will always retort, "What if your mother had an abortion?" I always reply back, "What if Hitler's mother had an abortion?"
CEP says:"at least one third of the "lawyers" in this country should be permanently barred from practicing law, and that half or more of the remainder needs serious remediation in ethics, competence, or both". I can tell you in Florida, all Florida attorneys are required to do about 30 continuing education credits and 5 credits of ethics every 3 years. Over a super majority of the attorneys with whom I have dealt with over 13 years are both ethical and competent. I can count on 3 fingers the number of attorneys over a 13 year period who were either incompetent or unethical. I see more of a problem with people who are practicing law without a license. I'm talking about neighbors/friends "helping" others with their legal problems. That, to me, is a more serious problem.
Lynn -
"And the decision to terminate a pregnancy should remain the choice of the person who's life is at stake (and I don't just mean medically)."
Two issues with that. The decision works both ways. I believe the father of the child should have as much to say about it as the mother. Sure the mother carries the child to term, but the father has a crucial role in the following 18 years and then throughout its life. It complicates things, yes. But if my child's life comes down to a decision by its mother to keep or kill it. Parenting, ideally, is a partnership from conception unto death. Again, it works both ways. There are lots of guys who want the power to terminate a pregnancy for their own convenience and who can walk away from it and the relationship without the scars the mother has to carry for life. However, there are many men who have fought to prevent the termination of a pregnancy.
An interesting case here:
http://www.cnn.com/2002/LAW/08/05/abortion.lawsuit.ap/index.html
I believe this one ended in the mother suffering a miscarriage.
Yes, I know there are medical issues to discuss that complicate the issue. Case-by-case, I maintain for the rights of all parties to be protected.
If financial, emotional, spiritual well-being is in jeopardy because of an unexpected pregnancy, I don't think its cause to terminate a pregnancy. I'm not saying that should be the law of the land, but I have a serious problem with abortion as a means of protecting a lifestyle.
Stories of women who have decided to abort have a common theme. The ghosts follow them through life and appear throughout various stages of life beside the living children who would be the age of the child terminated. Often the child has a face and a distinct identity. The decision is hard in any case and results in depression, withdrawl, anxiety, hypertension, neurosis, among other things. This may sound cruel, but I guess if someone decides her life is too important to change for the sake of the child they've conceived, a little ghost is not too horrible a thing to endure.
Ultimately, it is the mother's choice to do with herself as she sees fit. I understand that. It's what makes this issue very difficult.
BERMANATOR, re MOSQUITOES: Believe it or not, that might be something you should try to look into. Natural immunity against mosquito bites isn't unheard of, and with the west nile craze going on, who knows...
FRANK: Speaking as someone whose own grandfather has passed away from alzheimer's, wishing such a hideous, humiliating condition on ANYONE should not be taken lightly. I'm not trying to talk down to you, just...don't be so eager to throw away THAT kind of degradation on a silly dope like Heston.
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
As per usual, both Brian and Todd are wrong. The important part about Clinton's economy was that real wages continued to go down. The gap between the poor and rich widened, and corporate monopolies were at their peak under Clinton. Clear Channel America is the construct of Clinton centrist policy and Brian should know this. The Corporate scandals are the fault of Clinton as well; especially since Wall Street were one of Clinton and Gore's biggest supporters. Read some Edward S. Herman Brian. You need a refresher course in economics.
Todd, Bush is continuing along the Clinton line. So he is to blame as well. Todd, back to the books.
-----
Well, Mr. gun nut NRA stooge, Charlton Heston has alzheimers. It may sound mean, but it couldn't happen to a nicer guy. I do believe in spiritual punishment, and Heston's karma is in need of a washing. Rock on.
The debate over "partial birth abortion" (a term not recognized in the medical community) is calculated to inflame. Statistics claimed in the opposition camp are wildly speculative, as the CDC and the medical community deem the procedure so rare, they don't even keep statistics on it.
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/library/facts/abotaft1st_010600.html
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00015648.htm
Cindy, regardless of what you or I think about the moral consequences of such an act, I think Mr. Petitt's point of view is accurate. In a perfect world, children wouldn't get pregnant. In a perfect world, every baby would be born healthy into a loving home. Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world. And the decision to terminate a pregnancy should remain the choice of the person who's life is at stake (and I don't just mean medically).
L.
PA BERMAN!
We aren't going to rid society of abortion, that is clear. What we should do, however, is to stop late term abortions.
Period.
If the issue is to free up a woman's body from the burden of an unwanted child.. fine... do so, but don't deliberately kill the child right before you remove it from the woman's body so it will be dead before it draws a breath. That is wrong.
We have laws against mistreating human corpses and yet a physician can legally insert scissors in the back of a baby's head and suck it's brain out seconds before the child would have been born healthy and at full term or weak but viable.
It isn't a rare occurance.
They say," Oh but they MUST be performed to save the mother's life." I say, " Tell me how?" If the woman shouldn't be pregnant do a section and get the baby out-- but don't stick scissors in the head of a healthy normal baby and claim it had to be killed the moment before it is delivered to save the mothers life. It is the removal and not the death of the baby that is required.If anybody knows of any reason why I am wrong.. please say so because I would like to hear it. I can't fathom how anyone could abide this sort of barbarity.
How can some people who rail at the mistreatment of animals neither see nor condemn the horror that is partial birth abortion?
I would think that all of us, pro-choice and pro-life, could at least agree on this issue.
I don't think Clinton was the monster that some of us on the right believed him to be.
He shouldn't have lied to us-- that was not honorable, but he is just a man and we have all had glitches in judgement. I don't care about Monica Lewinsky, a human being married to a ball buster like Hillary would probably experience the need to see himself reflected in the eyes of someone with a fleck of worshipful admiration from time to time.
But the one thing that Clinton did that I cannot reconcile myself to was to veto the partial birth abortion bill. That was unconscionable.
Until we all stop being so terrified of each other we will be subjected to absurd and unthinkable things like assault weapons in the possession of civilians and brutally murdered babies only moments from birth.
Cindy
On a more positive note:
For anyone who is planning on attending the World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose over the Labor Day weekend, I'll be a panelist on:
* Introduction to Intellectual Property
* Legal Issues for Authors
* Avoiding Literary Scams (moderator)
* "Having a Fan Website Means Never Having to Say 'I'm Sorry, Your Honor'" (legal issues for fan websites)
* The DMCA and Fandom
* Publishing contracts
and a couple of others. I really, really, REALLY would like to see some Webderlanders at the DMCA panel (Sunday at 10am, unfortunately), as the panel is stacked with EFF people (one of whom is an "information wants to be free" type). I'll need someone to help me wipe the expected banana cream pie off my suit. I wish that last sentence was hyperbole, but given recent history it's not.
A few random comments:
The real problem with the abortion debate is that it confuses a fundamentally religious question (when does life begin?) with a fundamentally cultural question (when is it right to take a human life?). The problem is not with abortion per se, no matter how those questions are answered; the problem is with the separation of church and state that is betrayed no matter how the question is answered. So long as the procedure is medically safe, the state should not be involved. Period. Religious authorities can bring all the "moral pressure" to bear that they wish, on either side; it's just not a question for law.
Handguns don't meet the proscription of the Militia Clause, as they are essentially useless weapons in the context of a militia. Whether the state _should_ regulate them is a different question; this answers only the question of whether the state _can_ regulate them under the Second Amendment. The irony, of course, is that it is weapons with a strictly military use that, aside from anything that the Second Amendment says, cry out most for regulation, restriction, licensing, or some kind of effective control. Just remember: guns don't kill people; gun nuts do, either by pulling the trigger or putting them in the hands of those who should not be trusted with a penknife.
All I have to say about the Hon. Priscilla Owens is that I know of at least two lawyers who won cases based on her opinions who have privately said that they should have lost, but carried on what they believed to be a losing case at their clients' directions. That's quite a bit different from saying "I lost, but I should have won." Bluntly, given the way the legal system operates in the Fifth Circuit (Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi), I could not in good conscience approve of much of anything down there. And yes, I have had cases there, and have seen the "good ol' boy" system in action in the federal courts--which are better off than the state courts. (OTOH, I also believe that at least one third of the "lawyers" in this country should be permanently barred from practicing law, and that half or more of the remainder needs serious remediation in ethics, competence, or both. And that electing judges is unconstitutional, because that's not "a republican form of government.")
And on a more serious note, a little treatise re: the abortion debate. I've thought about this a lot because I simultaneously hold two contradictory views: 1) that abortion is murder and 2) that a woman must have the right to choose to have an abortion. Here's my effort to reconcile those views:
While the choice to have an abortion should, in an ideal world, be solely a moral decision, in the real world, most often it is an economic decision. This is precisely why it must remain legal in spite of the huge moral issue: because morality is a luxury when you can't feed yourself, when becoming a parent would destroy your life, when you are unable to maintain your livelihood, or are in an abusive situation (self abuse or abuse by another).
If this society developed an easy to use, cheap, and highly effective birth control; if all single and/or poor mothers had access to affordable and adequate natal and post-natal health care; if they didn't have to worry about losing their jobs when they have to take inordinate amounts of time off for due to the pregnancy; and if childcare wasn't exorbitantly expensive and sometimes dangerous, I think there would be a lot fewer abortions. As it stands, having a baby is an expensive and often trying process for a woman with no support. I am in no position to judge a woman who decides that she cannot do it because I can't put my money where my mouth is and help her out with her numerous expenses, then take that baby off her hands. Not to mention that even if I could do that, I definitely can't take away her physical or emotional suffering through said pregnancy either.
I have never met a woman who has had an abortion who was happy about her choice. Some deeply regretted it, some were sure it was the only sane choice at the time, but it's a "devil and the deep blue sea" choice at best. If abortion became illegal in the US, wealthy women would still be able to get them, undoubtedly, while poor and middle class women would either have kids they don't want (and I've seen firsthand how awful that is), or will undergo dangerous illegal abortions. Sadly, abortion is a necessary evil as the world stands now. I feel compassion towards women who feel they must make that choice and wouldn't take that choice from them.
Bermanator
re: mosquito bites-- I have never had one in my life. Honestly. Everyone around me is bitten and gets those awful red lumps, but I get nothing and never have.
Anyone else have this weird immunity? I wonder if it's that they are not biting me or that I am not having a reaction to the bite. Because if for some reason they aren't biting me, I could patent this, no? Perhaps I should do an experiment and find out.
Bermanator
Rich,
How is the baby?
There is nothing more unsettling than having a sick little one. All night, checking the face, the arms and legs making certain the fever doesn't edge too high. So much relief when the Tylenol kicks in and things cool down. Does anyone know why a sick baby's fever always spikes at night?
In any case, Rich thank you for clarifying what I wrote-- YES, I put "hand gun" school graduate. My fingers tend to fly faster than my brain these days and I'm apt to spell phonetically, transpose letters or put spaces where they don't belong.
Sorry y'all!
:)
Cindy
Washu~
Here in Los Angeles, we don't really have a problem with mosquitoes. Too much sun makes the skin leathery and impenetrable, not to mention blood that has more silicon than nutrients in it. And all that sun tan lotion makes a pretty good repellent as well. Although, they will stop you at the border and harass you with questions like: "Are you carrying any old tires filled with stagnant water today?" and rumors have it, they're racially profiling Creoles & people with really bad acne.
L.
Amidst all the gun-talk, something about mosquitos...
Bermuda has probably the most all-out, knuckle-down mosquito prevention organization on this side of the planet, so I have the arrogance to believe I'm safe from the west nile virus that everyone's been going berserk about lately.
But how about the rest of you? Taking precautions? Wearing repellent outdoors? Getting rid of any stagnant water? I ask this out of concern that'll hopefully pass when this virus burns itself out.
LW (Benjamin A.A. Winfield)
Steve:
Thanks for the info. Unfortunately, I placed my order yesterday. But I will pass the wite to some of my colleagues here at work. It's amazing how people are not aware about this whole DVD by region nonsense. Their eyes really grow wide when I tell them. So as I spread the word among my firends, they will all want more info. So your advice is helpful.
Alejandro
Alejandro,
Before buying a code free dvd player I would recommend that you take a look at www.area450.com, where you'll find loads of useful information on the subject.
Steve J.
Todd,
C'mon; that's like claiming it's horrible to be king because the peasants complain about taxes. Next you'll be telling me that Steinbrenner crys himself to sleep every night on his 200-count Egyptian cotten sheets.
Regards,
Joseph
P.S. Not that Georgie boy does this - I'm just thinking of an old episode of "The Simpsons":
Ranier Wolfcastle: The film is just me standing in front of a brick wall for an hour and a half. It cost $80 million.
Jay Sherman: How do you sleep at night?
Ranier Wolfcastle: On top of a pile of money, with lots of beautiful ladies.
Jay Sherman: Just asking.
Joseph, you don't think being a Yankee fan has adverse aspects? Think about it.....think about how any mention of my team on this board brings out all the passionate anger toward their modern history: the same as any of my Conservative views.
It ain't adverse to be constantly ducking the enamel chips from all of the teeth-gnashing that goes on around my team? I beg to differ. Some of that enamel gets in the eyes, and it stings, man.
-TODD
Guns:
Sure you can have them. As long as they are kept in a safe location; say, a local armory or shooting range where you can use them for target practice or check them out during hunting season (assuming it is season, you have a valid hunting license to show the clerk, etc). Wow - reasonable controls on deadly weapons. What a concept.
Todd,
You kid, right? You're actually trying to claim that being a Yankees fan has adverse aspects? It is to laugh.
Alejandro and Todd,
Even better Sosa column is Rick Morrisey's from yesterday's Tribune, entitled "Keep talkin', Sammy, then start walkin'":
http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/cs-020811morrissey.column?coll=cs%2Dcubs%2Dheadlines
Regards,
Joseph
"...and ANOTHER THING..."
Some people want to ban handguns and keep assault rifles. Some want the opposite. What's the difference? They're both designed to kill. Of course, you can do more damage with a modified GLOK than with a .22 pistol, so I lean more toward a ban on anything manufactured for the private sector with its main purpose being to kill other people. If I go hunting, I take a hunting rifle. I don't take a German commando assault weapon with armor piercing rounds and a laser sight. Do I want the military marching through town with them? No. Do I want cops armed with them? Under certain circumstances, sure, you can hand them out. I support having firepower when storming the local crack house. HOWEVER, I also support research in the field of body armor and non-leathal, fun and humiliating weapons like Spider Jerusalem's bowel disruptor.
But a ban ain't gonna happen. Depending on who you believe there are upwards of 100 million weapons out there and, if you buy the NRA's take, they are all stockpiled and ready to rise up against an attack by external or internal threats to liberty. Of course, they are more likely hanging out in the closet waiting for something like the Bumpus hounds to get into the garden again or if that Shomper kid brings the daughter home an hour late again with hickeys on her neck. But there are exceptions to every rule. How about regulations? Should the government know who has what at any given time? No one NEEDS an assault rifle, but then no one NEEDS pro wrestling or Beef Jerky or Raspberry Twist Kool-Aid or rolled plastic candy that pulls off wax paper in the shape of a moose.
There are exceptions to every rule.
Some notes before I go to bed (working nights is FUN!)
Sorry, I'm a little angry. This is a vent. Beware.
Abortion: Like Rich, I am pro-choice politically. I have my view of abortion as something that needs to be addressed case-by-case. I've met too many people who demand that government stay out of their lives, yet demand the government ban abortion. The government cannot administer justice by universally allowing or banning anything. In a country of 288 million souls, you cannot do that. There are too many exceptions. I've experienced (indirectly) what it's like to bring a child to term knowing there is a high risk and seeing it die outside the womb shortly after birth. I know of mothers who carelessly disregard all the warnings and continue to abuse their bodies and, in turn, their baby's with drugs. Do you force the incompetent abuser to abort in order to spare the child the crippling effects, or do you sit and watch as the baby develops post partem respiratory and heart diseases that often lead to infant death? Or do you force the mother to cease doing things to herself that are entirely legal on behalf of the baby's well being? Can we physically restrain a human being for doing harm to a life no yet recognized by the government?
Personally, I find abortion-on-demand evil and horrifying. That some people would kill their child so they may continue to live as they wish is, as Mother Theresa once said, "a poverty" of the human soul. Beyond that is a wide, ugly gray area that I choose not to debate here. When does life begin? The government gives a certificate and a ss# and insurance coverage begins at birth. If the government and church believes otherwise, then there must be a recognized movement to turn back that clock to whatever part of the gestation period is where they feel human life (in whatever definition you want) begins. Conception? Formation of human features? When the baby can support itself outside the womb prior to natural birth? It's a big, ugly philosophical and moral debate. All I know personally is it is entirely wrong when young Mary goes to the clinic to sweep away what she "caught" from the prom because she desperately needs to finish school and have a life. At the same time when Mary chooses a crack pipe or a bottle of vodka over the well being of her baby... like I said, there are exceptions to every rule. You make a choice, you live with the consequences.
Death Penalty: There are choices you make in life that have dire consequences. Again, it comes back to how much power we give our government. Quite frankly, I would rather have some toxic juice shot into my body than spend 75 years in a maximum security prison. That's just me.
There are evil fucking monsters out there who just need to be put down. Who are they? Again, that's subjective. While some reserve the deepest circle of Hell for the corporate scumbags who lose millions dollars in Other People's Money, I reserve it for the child rapists and spouse murderers, the "passion killers," the ones who make the choice to destroy the lives of others. Bonus points if they get off on it. Should ANYONE get 50,000 volts in the groin or have DranO poured down his throat? Sometimes I wonder. Some days you can make a strong case for castration. When you hear about some 45 year old postal worker who thought it a good idea to abduct a 4 year old and use her as a sex toy before dumping her in the woods, It's hard NOT to want to tie the fucker down and slowly roll over him with a 10-ton pavement scraper.
But seems like there are still a few bugs in the system. Do I trust the government to make up the rules for us? Not really. With those clowns, its a matter of making universal generalities that please people on a very basic, visceral level. Most of what politicians do is talk and talk a lot in small, quick colorful words. Then they have people explain to them what it all means and how it impacts their job security. They vote accordingly. Of course, this is marginally better than mob violence against crime as I would hate to have torch-bearing librarians storming my house for overdue library books or the Klan stringing me up because I dated a black woman for a year in high school. People, in general, are subject to fits of brutal stupidity. At least politicians are on tape for their bouts and know not to act like morons if they can avoid it. When they do, they, too, deal with the consequences.
So I guess my point here, if there can be one, is this: Why do we look to government to tell us what is morally right and wrong and insist that they provide equal rights and justice for all when all this stuff comes from the church? Why don't we look for these answers there and apply them to our daily lives? Sure, many of us do, but we can't ask Congress to tell us or enforce one brand of it on the country. It's a legislative body, not a congregation. Morality isn't going to come from the idiots in Washington. You choose your life and your path by accepting (or denying) a faith that teaches or guides you through your moral and spiritual growth. Insisting that Washington follow that is like asking Christians to accept Muhammad as the one-true prophet and deliverer of man to paradise.
There will still be jealous husbands with shotguns, 10 year olds who toss 8 year olds off the roof, loner psychopaths with nothing to lose, office workers who pee in the coffee pot, and anything else the evening news can find or Dick Wolf can dream up. We just have to deal with it episode by episode.
Now, off to bed...I feel better. Didn't accomplish anything, but at least the fiance won't have to hear it, now. Thanks.
One of the more comical aspects of politics is how conservatives and liberals reverse their positions when supporting Their Guy benefits from such a switch. We saw this in liberals when Republican Presidents became poster boys for deficit spending. Suddenly Democrats started noticing the deficits, while Republicans poo-poohed them. Now we're seeing a new switch: Republicans who claim that Presidents have little or no effect on the economy.
Balderdash.
When Reagan ran against Carter, the GOP watchphrase was Reagan's own remark that Carter was "the man in charge" and so had to take responsibility for the budget, even though his own balanced budget proposal hadn't gotten support in the Congress. Most amusingly, in retrospect, was this remark of Reagan's:
"Mr. Carter is acting as if he hsn't been in charge for the past three and a half years; as if someone else was responsible for the largest deficit in American History."
Reagan's claim was that all economic ills, from inflation to high interest rates to low savings totals, resulted from deficit spending. Of course, that was before he racked up whopping new highs in deficits, deficits that made Carter's look picayune. And now his fans tell us:
1) Reagan's actions resulted in an eight-year economic boom that started years _after_ he left office, and
2) Presidents don't have much effect on the economy.
Huh? Which is is? Well, that depends on who is President. When there are good effects, Presidents (Republican only) can have a good effect on the economy. When there are bad effects, Presidents (Democratic only) can have a bad effect on the economy. When a Republican is in office, the guiding principal is, "It's not his fault, it's the other guy's, and besides, Presidents are irrelevant.
For a good look at how a President can have salutory effects on the economy, check out Woodward's book on Greenspan. He makes no bones about it: much of the economic boom of the Clinton era resulted from Clinton agreeing to give up a number of his favored programs in order to lower the deficit and, finally, bring the budget into balance. That's why we got those low interest rates, folks. And that's where the economic boom came from.
--Alex
Thanks, Cindy, for bucking the Webderland system and laying out your ideas and feelings knowing full well you'd probably get pushback on most of what you said. You and Todd keep this place from becoming a quagmire of attaboys and "my ain't we correct all the time" forum (seriously, that was not meant as a slight to anyone left or right; I guess I shoulda just said, all viewpoints welcome and left it at that, but...).
This is going to be quick since I am currently watching a sick child at home and still trying to do (some) work that keeps the roof over our head...
Actually, Cindy never said high school students should have access to guns. She said, "every sane, law abiding, HAND GUN SCHOOL graduate" (emphasis mine) should have access to a gun. Vast difference. Just wanted to clarify that.
I do appreciate the comments that were posted and, just to get it out of the way, I would oppose the nomination of Priscill Owen. However, what struck me as I was reading about her was the very real "attack" of some of the publications that indicated her right-wing leanings were dead wrong and she was using her ideology as a way of interpreting the law in her own image, so to speak. My real question is, why is that worse than a left-wing proponent doing the same?
Don't misunderstand me, I am far more left than right, though I don't know that those terms really have any meaning anymore since I try to look at things in a common sense type of way as opposed to any political or ideological way. I think we spend way too much time labeling ourselves left or right when all of us that are not politicians are actually somewhere in between.
My own opinion on why right-wing ideologs are not good for us is that they, more than liberals or left-wing ideologs, have a tendency to want to impart their own values on others and seem to think their values/cultures are the correct ones. Especially those that are politicians or are in positions of power. Left-wing folks have a tendency to interpret the law as a way of trying to do good for everyone as opposed to just doing well for an individual and, I think, try not to say one culture is better than another. (I'm making some generalized statements here, something I try to avoid, but it was a generalized question with no right or wrong answer, but the essay does count as one-third of your final grade. Cindy and Todd give lie to those generalized statements as I've seen nothing in their posts to indicate that they are trying to convert anyone to their way of thinking.)
Anyway, just a thought and I do appreciate everyone's comments. By the way (and that sick, beautiful baby finally fell asleep so maybe I can catch up on what I missed last night), my own opinions:
Guns: Get rid of all handguns. Illegal to buy, sell, or make. This won't happen, so the next thing would be to continue the waiting period for background checks and to LICENSE everyone that owns a handgun. Licensing would be more stringent than getting a driver's license.
Abortion: Pro-choice all the way, baby. But (and this is what endears me to the pro-choice folks in my family), abortion is murder, plain and simple. But, I'm still pro-choice. And those pro-lifers that are against abortion EXCEPT in cases of incest or rape are hypocrites. I'll let this one be for the moment and come back to it if anyone wants to know my reasoning behind this.
Death Penalty: Agin' it as it stands right now. However, I've got no problems with doing away with the unremorseful killers of the world. My problem is that we don't do enough to ensure adequate defense for those that might get the chair.
Ok, enough of this soapbox. Use this as ammunition against me if I ever go crazy and decide to run for public office. (I won't mention the period when I got out of the Army and was involved in guns, moonshine, and drugs. I'll wait for someone to dig that stuff up; mighty difficult though since most of those folks that could implicate me are now dead---natural causes, by the way). Gonna check on the baby, finish watching "Brush With Greatness" from the Simpsons Season 2 DVD, pretend to do some actual work, and then grab a half-hour snooze.
That is all.
TODD: I'm sorry; I just don't buy it. There's simply no investment in being a Yanks fan. The short periods of adversity the team HAS had--most notably the late Sixties--are but blips in an ever-climbing bull market. Plus, those blips, you'll recall, caused team ownership to go out and damned near buy a new team wholesale each time.
Mind me, now; I am a student of the game, as well as of its history, and there's a lot of history to be had in white and black pinstripes: Miller Huggins building and managing the most dominant team of its time; Murderers Row; that amazing team in '41, showcasing the best of what was almost certainly the best season of baseball overall ever played; the hard-drinking and hard-hitting team with Mantle, Berra, Maris, et alia; Mel Allen; Billy Martin; all of that.
But damn, there sure is a lot about the Bronx Bombers to HATE: the institution of the blackmailing of a city's fans to put in luxury boxes, seat licenses, and whatnot; the air of superiority which Yanks fans have, with little of the perserverance of REAL fans who suffer and sigh with a team as well as cheer; the constant loafing to be seen on Yankees teams for decades who seem content on coasting when they feel they're too important to be bothered (see: Roger Maris, Bernie Williams, Reggie Jackson, Darryl Strawberry, Roger Clemens, and a lot of other Yank superstars who didn't work to always give their all); the team-wide drug problems and scandals which rival the Dallas Cowboys'; and then there's Steinbrenner.
Doesn't it seem wrong to you that Pete Rose is banned from the sport for allegations of gambling whose proof has never been revealed, while the marquee team of the country is owned by a man who served prison time for federal crimes in the early Seventies?
Oh--and to blame the country's economic downturn on September 11th is a callous sham, and I'm surprised that you buy it. The economy started on that "natural downturn" about three or four months before Clinton left office, right about the time that Bush emerged as a tentative front-runner. Now, I don't think that that is anything more than coincidence. But what IS The Shrub Administration's fault is the SUDDEN downturn the country's economy took just a few months after it got into power.
(If the downturn was so natural, why did the administration think it so desperate a situation--in APRIL AND MAY, mind!--that it called for the revival of a gambit not used since the Ford Administration; a gambit which did not work then and has not worked now, to rebate taxes? And can you honestly believe that the tax cut "we" received was NOT inordinately slanted toward the wealthy and corporations?)
Industry safeguards were deregulated, slash-and-burn corporate directors rewarded with tax benefits, corporations were allowed to make government policy, and the faire got WAY too damned laissez, as proven by the sudden turnaround made by the right AFTER September 11th, when all at once, politicians who had for years vociferously the subsequent Enron/WorldCom/Arthur Andersen/Adelphia/et cetera scandals and the sudden rush to incorporate outside the United States to avoid paying taxes.
But we must forget all that now, because Bush, Cheney, and all their pals are foursquare AGAINST corporate shenanigans: Yes; they've leaned a valuable lesson from Harken, Halliburton, Enron, Sneezy, Sleepy, and Dopey:
(don't get caught)
CINDY: You know that many "sane, law-abiding high school graduates"?
Saw _XXX._ Was pleasantly surprised -- better than the last ten or so Bond films, Vin Diesel is an engaging hypermuscular fella, and the world-destruction plan is hilarious. How the f**k is this 80 mph hoversub supposed to make its way from the Danube to the Atlantic to threaten Washington again? Well, it's no dumber than about a thousand other action movie things I've put up with. Plus I think Flash Gordon designed the hoversub thingie. Hoo ha. At least I laughed every minute or so.
Death penalty: Install a death penalty for egregious corporate, banking and environmental crime, and I might listen. Wipe out the life savings of more than 1000 people through gross incompetence or unbounded profiteering, get stoned to death by those same people. Sounds good to me. Ditto for those who enact corporate policies or pass bills allowing major acts of pollution or other environmental desecrations affecting human or other life on a mass scale. Oh, and deal with everyone responsible for puppy and kitten mills, corporate box farms, whaling and the _Survivor_ series.
Also, wankers who've committed gross acts in the private and public sector who are defended with statements that begin with some variation of "But he's a decent person -- he loves his family/his dog/his local charity" should be pummelled by anyone who want to pick up a whiffle bat.
Yours in sympathy with the terrible private pain of whatever misunderstood, downtrodden corporate executive or politician who got stuck with the accounting books accidentally up his or her heinie today,
Jon
Brian sez: "....during (Clinton's) Presidency interest rates dropped to their lowest point in decades. Homeownership increased, investment continued, the econmy boomed, and there were signs that the inequalities created by Reagan and Bush were going to be alleviated. Then, Bush gets elected-- and now we're worse off."
Brian, I know you are smart. I've been reading you for over a year now.....so I know that your posting must just be a weak 'liberal moment.' What is a 'liberal moment'? It's a moment where very smart people actually spout typical bullshit because the encroaching elections make them very nervous.
Neither Clinton, nor his programs, lowered interest rates. Nor did they increase home ownership, continue investment and boom the economy. Clinton's good deed was his deficit work. That was his money-deed. The economy is powered by a lot more than a President, and it is injured by a lot more than a President. Clinton beat Bush I because dumb people believe Bush was responsible for a downturn in the economy. Democrats are now trying to push the current economy problems (which ain't as bad as Wall Street numbers would make you think) on Bush II because dumb people might fall for that malarkey all over again.
Funny, but I could have sworn that one of the big downturn issues this past 11 months had a little something to do with a little date named September 11th. The Wall Street numbers had been going through a natural downturn (hey, it can't ALWAYS go up)when we were hit by an event that sent shockwaves through many industries and the resolve of many investors. That natural downturn became a plummet.....and we have been struggling to get our Wall Street heads above water since then. A small downturn of probably a year's length has become a slightly larger downturn over a longer period.
It ain't George's economy that is down, and it ain't Bubba's economy that was up......it was the ebb and flow of business. And no matter how much people want to believe otherwise, as far as Bull and Bear markets go, It Ain't The President, Stupid.
-TODD
Okay, I need a break, so I'll do Cindy's topic list my way.
Giving a typical high school graduate access to guns is sort of like giving Beavis and Butthead a nice jar of anthrax spores. The fact that many high schoolers DO obtain guns, with disastrous results in many cases, should also be considered.
I am pro-choice. I regard an abortion as a medical procedure that is a woman's right. I don't see why even pro-choicers have to be all apologetic-- wishing there were fewer abortions, for example. Given the sins of their opponents, apologies are the last things us pro-choicers should be offering.
Sort of in agreement with taxing sales rather than personal income... but I'd still tax estates, stock profits, incomes above a certain point, large-scale bank transactions, etc. Someone's gotta pay for the schools and fire departments, and we should start with the rich.
DNA doesn't prove things decisively. The death penalty gives the state the power to decide who lives and dies, and it deforms the culture by making a fetish of human sacrifice. Anyone who cares about liberty would deny that right to the state.
Differential punishment for crimes is a longstanding part of jurisprudence. A lesser punishment for an "attempted" crime doesn't seem unreasonable.
Agreement on NAFTA, somewhat-- it's an international contract that favors the rich and powerful, will keep Third World nations in ruin and servitude, and force U.S. wages down in the long run.
Priscilla Owen carries the same taint as most of the right wing. She should not be appointed to an office higher than dogcatcher.
NOW isn't radical _enough_.
Other observations:
Republicans have demonstrated that they are utterly and completely incapable of running the economy. Nixon took a booming economy, took us off the Bretton Woods system, and plunged us into the inlfation spirals of the 1970s. His Phase-1, Phase II plan made the situation worse, and all Ford could think of to counter the trend was distribute sily "Whip Inflation Now" buttons. Jimmy Carter, facing double-digit inflation, hired Paul Volcker to run the Fed: Volcker's tough-love remedies eventually worked, but by that time, Carter had been replaced with Reagan. Who, within three years, turned the World's Leading Creditor Nation into the World's leading _Debtor_ nation. Bush continued the trend, maintaining massive federal deficits while economic disparies grew worse and worse, and squandering the ones-in-a-lifetime possibility of a "peace dividend." Clinton, for all his substantial faults, managed to reduce the federal deficit, and during his Presidency interest rates dropped to their lowest point in decades. Homeownership increased, investment continued, the econmy boomed, and there were signs that the inequalities created by Reagan and Bush were going to be alleviated. Then, Bush gets elected-- and now we're worse off.
Long lecture, short lesson: Republicans Are Not Fit to Run the Economy.
Todd:
Speaking of owners who do not invest in their teams, you must and I mean MUST read Jay Mariotti's column in today's Chicago Sun Times. It's all about how Sammy this time really means to leave the Cubs and how the Trib doesn't even want to pay maintenance to upgrade the team's plane thus forcing Sammy to hire a private jet that would carry him and four other players to last weekend's game in Colorado. By Crikey, it's a beaut of a column yonder at www.suntimes.com
Alejandro
Rich,
As you all know I list more to the right than the left.
I like the idea of every sane, law abiding, hand gun school graduate owning at LEAST one gun.
I would prefer there be no more abortions but the world is not perfect. To find middle ground I feel that abortions if they must be-- should be limited to the time frame during which an embryo looks more like a tadpole than a baby.
Sterilization and birth control should be free.
The government should not be in our business-- unless it is in a sales transaction. We should all pay a 10 percent flat Federal sales tax. Those who do not live extravagantly would not be penalized for their thrift. Those whose income is derived from less than legal sources would pay taxes on what they spend. Every prostitute, drug dealer and Enron exec. would pay as they go according to their spending. Those among us who are
enterprising and filled with initiative would be punished neither for their brilliance nor their hard work. Every bum would pay taxes on his six pack or Mad Dog 2020 purchase.
I believe that the only sure cure for recidivism is the death penalty... but I also believe that when it is imposed guilt should be a certainty. With DNA we can now prove things conclusively.
In the eyes of the law attempted murder should be the same as murder. Bungling a murder should not warrant a lesser punishment. Hack off somebody's arms and leave her for dead and we will put you down like a rabid dog so you can't do it again.
I despise NAFTA with "a blue flame of loathing", as Harlan would say. I HATE it... did I say that? It has taken the legs out from under the Ag. industry and put countless families out of a decent living while huge industries make a royal killing off the sweat of the third world poor.
Pricilla Owen seems to pose no real threat if you look at her voting record. She is a " team player" as we say down here. She is more likely to follow than lead or get out of the way. She'll vote with the pack, or so we could surmise from her track history.
The only source I could find for the Enron tax debacle that NOW alleges is the NOW article and frankly I think it's an embarrassing group that is so militant and out of control that I wouldn't put a great deal of stock in anything they write unless they back it up with sources. I didn't see any mentioned. If you can find some for me I'd be curious to take a look though. Meantime, if it's true then she should be kicked off the bench and out of the bar association. If she took Enron's contributions... I don't care much about that , she'd be a damned fool not to have.. they were giving it to everyone. Rewarding Enron contributions with favors is another horse.
Thank you Rich, for asking. What is your take on her?
:)
Cindy
Ahhh, c'mon Joseph, just say the word and I will teach you the joys of being a Yankee fan in a world of crybabies. I can bring you into the fold, coddle you and make you warm and turn your mind into the right direction so that even you will be able to see that you can love the game of baseball and love the Yankees as well.
Sure, it's hard these days.....since 1995.....but it's a lifelong thing. When you are able to spit back that you have survived the lean years of the late-60's early-70's, as well as the entire 80's and half the 90's; when you are able to defend your men and their uniform and their jealousy-inducing payroll (because THEIR millionaire owner spends his money while other millionaire owners don't, thus creating all these sudden, ahem, 'small markets' in Chicago and L.A. and S.F. and Southern Florida and why even that tiny little market on the other side of town in Queens.....).
Come into the light, Joseph. Experience a championship before you meet your maker. If I ever get my ass out to Phoenix this year, I'll even sell you my condo at a discount rate!
-TODD
HARLAN: Congrats on the nomination. Here's hoping.
JOSEPH: Yeah, I was momentarily worried of the same thing. But while I always take EVERYTHING from AICN with a grain of salt, Harry strikes me as a person who would never deliberately rip someone off.
Speaking of which, did Harlan ever publish his review of LORD OF THE RINGS? I would really like to check that out, if it exists.
Alejandro,
Nope - a slight slip of the digits on teh Autofill of my web browser. I'm actually located at Racine and Barry now in Lakeview, only five blocks from my previous location.
And I'm still a White Sox fan, thankyouverymuch. *sob*
Regards,
Joseph
Joseph:
I could not help but notice that you are writing from New York. What gives? Did you move out on us? Are you now becoming a Mets-man? Or even worse, a Yankees fan?
The horror, the horror.
Alejandro
Infoman~ I know you mentioned this on Friday, but I thought I'd paste up the link anyway.
http://www.locusmag.com/2002/News/News08Log2.html
Yeah, Harlan!
L.
Alejandro,
Any code-free DVD players in teh city have probably only had the software modified, making them suspect to later updates. In order to get around the MPAA's violation of the fair-use portion of copyright law, your best best is to buy from Code Free DVD:
http://www.codefreedvd.com/
Fairly reasonable prices ($299-399 for Sonys, for example), and they do the chip modification to remove the Region Lock. Shipping is about $95 for 1-2 day UPS or DHL delivery.
Regards,
Joseph
Joseph:
My pleasure, my friend. I too was impressed by their quick and professional service. They ran my move to Andersonville last year like it was a military campaign. And considering that they had to carry more than 90 boxes full of books, CDs, videos, clothes, dishes and other assorted objects plus my furniture up three flights of stairs…hell, IT WAS A MILITARY CAMPAIGN!!!!
And now that I am planning on buying a DVD, ten more boxes will be added to that count.
Okay Chicago Webderlanders, the time has come for me to ask for your assistance and guidance. I want to buy an all-zones DVD machine. It irks me that every time I go to Spain I cannot buy a single tape or DVD of films that will never reach these shores because of all this zoning nonsense. So, where oh where can I buy in this fine city an all-zone DVD?
Alejandro
rich,
What is much more troubling about Priscilla Owens is that she can apparently be bought and sold:
http://www.now.org/issues/legislat/nominees/owens.html
Note the last item, about her dealings with Enron, and tell me that doesn't stink to high heaven. And then there's her ties to the Federalist Society, one of the New Speak "cute and cuddly" right-wing groups. That one's far less disturbing.
Regards,
Joseph
Washu,
Thanks for the link to the interesting article over at AICN. I thought for a second he was ripping off portion's of Ebert's well-written feature on Sound & Sight from yesterday, but I see had a point of his own and he was careful to link to Ebert's feature at the end.
Alejandro,
Much thanks, my friend, for the Golan's recommendation. They moved out furniture this morning, and could not have been more proefessional or hard working. Great moving company.
Regards,
Joseph
Cindy,
If I may be so bold as to ask: What's your opinion on Priscilla Owen's nomination to the US Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit?
I've been reading that there are those that oppose her nomination because she is a "right-wing activist committed to remaking the law according to her own ideology."
Just wondering what you thought of this and also wondering (for everyone else) why being a "right-wing activist committed to remaking the law according to her own ideology" is worse than a "left-wing activist" doing the same?
Say whatever you want about AIN'T IT COOL NEWS, every so often there comes along an article...well, check it out, if any of you want to. It's really damn good, and mirrors some of my own feelings about the state of cinema in general right now:
http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=12978
RICK: Weight is a terrifying thing and just kind of creeps up on you, like Freddy Krueger. As for myself, summer's had it's toll on me and I can't wait till I'm racing between courses and arranging treadmill appointments in the gym back in college. Good fortune and good karma in your efforts.
RICK: I'm also with you on the physical stuff--after being both scrawny and potbellied all my life (a tubechest is not a beautiful thing), I've lost about twenty pounds since April and have put on a goodly bit of muscle, so I LOOK like I've maybe lost five pounds. It's a change, but at 160 lbs., I have more energy and my arms and chest are now so that I don't feel embarassed to wear t-shirts which have sunk in the wash. Keep it up, and the other problems will look a lot more likely to fall into place.
Rick: I'm doing the physical change dance myself. Lost just over thirty pounds in four months, with another thirty-five or so to go. No beer, no ice-cream, lots of veggies, whole grains, lean meats and a half-hour per day on the stairclimber or elliptical cross-trainer. Adding weight-training this week. I'm over forty and a metabolism shift has made all of this much more difficult than it used to be. I've been a yo-yo with body fat, and my advice to thirtysomethings is whip yourself into shape before the big four-oh, and maintain.
Scattered congratulations and thoughts:
Chuck: Can't add anything that hasn't already been well said by others, so keep us informed and remember: You are not alone.
Rick: Good for you. And if we continue to give you heartache, pull the plug and don't sweat it.
Lynn: Another Good for you. Congratulations. May it be the first of many.
RICK!
Good for you on your new project... the physical remodeling can be a BITCH pup, but it sounds like you have it whipped. Everything is going to turn out amazingly well for you. It HAS to, you see, because you have done so much for so many of us.
You are overdue for a string of wonderful things and clearly you are doing your part to make them come about.
Now for you, a prayer from this heretical Lutheran that your life will soon be filled with those who would break their backs to help you make your wishes reality... just as you have done for others.
I won't forget what you did for me.
:)
truly yer pal,
Cindy
CHUCK!
LOL!!! WOMANSCH!
Excellent news on the kid... he is reportedly going to recover completely. The ability of the body to bounce back from something like this is astounding. What a relief!
:)
Cindy
Oh, and CHUCK:
"Maybe it's a good thing her bike is totaled."
Probably...but don't tell her that...
RE: Pizzas
Never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever EVER order pizzas in Bermuda. An average 14-inch costs $18.50.
Weekend viewing: RETURN TO OZ and SHANE. Eerie to see Fairuza Balk as Dorothy knowing she'll grow up to be the hellcat seen in THE WATERBOY. SHANE suffered from hideous brightness problems due to the quality of the tape, but the movie itself was pure Western legend.
Of course, this whole pizza thing comes down to "how do we up the per-transaction revenue a buck?" Pick-up pizza has always been cheaper from Dominos, so this "delivery fee" is bullshit. If they need to up the price, they can add a quarter to their add-on products; soda, breadsticks, wings. Eliminating free delivery in some markets is a way of getting free advertising from CNN. If it wasn't, they'd utilize their internal marketing/training department to aggressively upsell at the franchise level.
But enough about 'zza. More spiritual matters await you here:
http://www.beliefnet.com/features/quiz/index.html
$1.00 to deliver a Dominos pizza!!! Shoot they don't even take IOU's!
Hungry Howies cajun crust Pizza with Ham & 3 cheese for $6.98 free delivery too! I live on their pizzas!
John
Oh the humanity! The end of an era!
http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/08/10/pizza.delivery.ap/index.html
Thank God I hate the shit. Even Pizza Hut pizzalikeflavoredfood is miles better than Domino's sickly sweet sauced shit.
-TODD
Carey,
You are correct, my friend. Sorry about the mixup between Mssrs Palminteri and Mantegna.
Regards,
Joseph
It's Chazz Palminteri in the Vanilla Coke ads
From the acknowledgments of "Vitals" by Greg Bear; http://star.tau.ac.il/~inon/baccyber0.html
Some very interesting/scary stuff there. To quote Bear, "The notion of a distributed bacterial network-a bacterial mind, if you will-is far from fantasy."
ALL: THE AMERICAN FANTASY TRADITION ed. by Brian Thomsen is due out in October from Tor (ISBN:0-765-30152-0). It's a 688 page anthology featuring work by folks like Washington Irving, H.P. Lovecraft, Shirley Jackson, Ray Bradbury, Manley Wade Wellman, Avram Davidson, Charles Beaumont, Richard Matheson, L. Frank Baum, Theodore Sturgeon, Bradley Denton, Gene Wolfe and...Harlan Ellison (two stories by him, in fact). And lots of other great writers.
--DTS
Chuck,
You're welcome, and a mensch is applicable to males and females, as it literally means "human being." The broader meaning, of course, can be put in the words of the Prophet Micah: "He hath shown thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord re quire of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" (Micah 6:8)
Jon,
Hmmm...Vanilla Coke to me tastes like a delicious Coke and Vanilla Stolichnaya without the vodka. Good taste without the alcohol - not bad. And frankly, worth exisiting just for Joe Mantegna's performance in the commercials.
Regards,
Joseph
Lynn,
Congratulations, anyway. I'll get through this, don't worry about that. I talked to my dad, and a good friend, and that helped, too. Sometimes you just have to decompress, especially when the information won't even trickle in. There is just one thing. Your accomplishment is worth celebrating, and I want you to whoop it up, young lady. Don't let me rain on your fireworks. Carpe Diem, as they say.
So there.
Thanks to Alex Jay (nice essay, too) and Venk, Joseph, Michael, Jon, Cindy and Washu. Good vibes are being felt here. Youse is a great buncha peoples.
Little Washu, I'm glad your sister is going to be okay. Maybe it's a good thing her bike is totaled. Now she can walk or take something with four wheels to get around.
Venk, Glad to know the nipper-in-the-making is doing okay, as well as your spouse. I hope for all three of you that the rest of the pregnancy goes smoothly
Cindy, 14 year olds vs. 18 year olds. There are some people I can't abide, and slope-headed tough-guy coaches are at the top of the list. I hope that bastard is fired and unemployeble, so he has to collect aluminum cans to buy food. That was not just neglect, but out-and-out cruelty. I hope the kid pulls through this.
Say, what is a female mensch, anyway? A womansch? Anyway, we got more than a few here.
Chuck
Chuck~ My heart goes out to you and your family. Sometimes it seems the weight of the world is too much for the more fragile among us. It does not mean that we are not strong, merely that we are human. And it sounds like your sister is very lucky to have such a loving family around her in her time of need.
To all~ Thank you so much for your kind words. After hearing what Chuck is going through, my good fortune pales in comparison. I felt like utter shit yesterday for complaining that my project manager had blown me off for the fourth time. Turns out he was at home because his wife lost her baby at the beginning of the second trimester. Puts everything in perspective. Projects will wait. Real life takes precedence.
L.
Little Washu,
May your sister never have another motorcycle accident. She's a lucky girl. So many don't walk away.
Yesterday a kid on my 14 year old son Beau's football team took a hard hit to the head. He was disoriented and the coaches told him to " shake it off". He was lined up again for another drill and then they had him run with the other boys a number of wind sprints. He kept complaining that his head hurt and finally, unable to run anymore another boy helped him back to the locker room where the coaches applied ice to his head. He lay down on the floor in a pile of towels and later when the coaches asked him to sit up he could no longer communicate and Beau said he was moving his legs involuntarily.
Finally the ambulance was summoned and they loaded the boy up. He was airlifted out about 30 minutes later and they say that he had not regained consciousness as of late last night.
They had the 14 year olds doing blocking drills with 18 year olds.
The Mr. Pibb/Pineapple Soda/Moxie Thread:
Here are a few products from my youth I started to think about because of the thread. Warning: Some Canadian Content Ahead.
Popeye Cigarettes: You exhaled into them and, the first time anyway, a cloud of powdered sugar replicated smoke. They just weren't the same when they became Popeye Candy Sticks (wink, wink). Although I can't recall an incarnation of Popeye that actually smoked cigarettes...the irony of having the Popeye trademark affixed to faux-cigarettes and spinach doesn't escape me, either.
Chocolate cigars and cigarettes: Especially the chocolate cigarettes that came in packages with pictures of famous world historical landmarks like the Eiffel Tower and the Parthenon.
The Pop Shoppe: Where you could mix and match refillable glass bottles of cola, cherry cola, black cherry cola, lime rickey, carbonated fruit punch, pineapple soda, and others. The lime rickey had a colour that can really only be described as 'kryptonite-radiation green.'
Beer bottle stubbies: Back in the day when all Canadian beer came in identically shaped brown bottles that looked like the offspring of a one-drink thermos and an artillery shell. The excitement that accompanied the arrival of the first 'tall' bottles is probably difficult to comprehend for a non-Canadian.
Hostess fruit-flavoured potato chips: Flavours such as orange and grape made their appearance and disappearance over about a six-week span in the 1970s. I don't think test-marketing had been invented at the time.
The Arcane Sanctuary of Regional and Niche-market Brand Pops/Sodas: Fanta, Wink (still alive and kicking, thank the good dude), Tahiti Treat, Brio, Fresca (which seems to respawn every few years)...ah, what a list. The cranberry ginger ale Canada Dry puts out is pretty damn tasty, too, although it may have been discontinued again.
Yes, I did try Vanilla Coke. It tastes oddly like rye-and-coke, but without that sweet, sweet rye in it. What's the point?
Cheers, Jon
CHUCK -
It is our great love that gives us pain. The greater our love of others, the greater pain we all must endure. This may be why we like to disregard, ignore or even kill rather than endure the suffering of our loved ones. When she pulls through and all is better, I hope you both will share happier moments together to make up for it all. :) I lift a Yuengling to both of you.
LYNN -
Congratulations! Whenever a "barbarian" leaps the gates into Rome, it is a good day for civilization. I lift a Yuengling to your success.
WYATT -
Damn great job on the weight loss! If you can master it, you can master anything. I lift a Yuengling in lieu of weights in your honor.
EVERYBODY ELSE -
To anyone who says Webderland just jumps on the slow and weak of the herd, I offer a Perry County raspberry and refer you to the love-sharing going on, esp. for Chuck here. I'd lift one for you all, but I'm feeling a little light-headed already.
In great news, our trip to the ER this week revealed nothing serious, our baby is doing very well and just kicked me in the head this morning in utero. After a nap, it's time for groceries and continuing the search for a new crib.
Be well!
Venk
CHUCK!
I'm really glad that your sister is okay.. I will say a prayer that she continues to be.
You are a great guy, do you know that?
:)
your friend,
Cindy
LYNN!
HOW SUBLIME! I am THRILLED on your behalf. Such a great life you're going to have.. first an adorable husband now this foretaste of things to come.
Congratulations sister webderlander! You are a jewel.
:)
Cindy
Chuck: I'm sorry to hear about your sister's problems. About all I can offer is the lovely line from _A River Runs Through It_ (both book and film) about the fact that it's possible to love completely without complete understanding.
Take care, Jon
CHUCK: I can only offer my sympathies in the most honest way possible in that, coincidentally, my own sister was caught in a motorcycle accident just yesterday. One of her legs was badly scraped but otherwise all she (and my family) suffered were blown nerves. Oh yes, and the motorcycle was wiped out too. But frankly, who cares right now?
I wish you and your sister good luck, Chuck.
CHUCK: Alex is right. Sometimes all you can do is to be there for the ones you love...and somehow that never feels like it's enough. Here's hoping that Julie gets the help she needs.
But whenever YOU need a little help dealing, Chuck, well, I've found that this is a good place to find it. Our thoughts and best wishes are with you, brother.
Michael
Chuck,
I'm glad to hear your sister is being cared for.
Alex K.,
I'm not in the book busines - just a collector and user. Also, from looking around, I discovered that I would not be able to pay you fair price on the Encyclopedia anyway. Seems to run around $1000 on the used market. But hell, if you run across anything interesting when you get to the English section, let's do chat. What I'm always especially interested in, and this pertains to the Hebrew-Aramaic-Yiddish sections, is anything about Judaism in Ireland.
Lynn,
Congratulations on the publication! As for Catholic presses, you'd be surprised. Some Catholic Universities have fine presses that publish all sorts of works. To take a moderate example, Loyola U of Chicago has Loyola Press, which is motsly Catholic-oriented books; they also have an imprint, Wild Onion Books, which publishes books about Chicago (the city name supposedly comes from an Illinois Nation word for "wild onion").
Regards,
Joseph
P.S. In trying to find something else at University of Chicago Press, I found they now have a very cool ongoing FAQ for the Chicago Manual of Style (sue me - I prefer it):
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/cmosfaq/
CHUCK: Never apologize for feeling; for caring. It's the feelers and the carers who remake the world in warmth, rather than in fire.
It's a terrible thing to care, to love so much, I know. But it's a beautiful thing to have someone who cares like that for you. It's a beautiful warm wonderful thing to open your hand and know that someone dear is opening his heart and putting it there for you to hang onto or use as a crutch in the bad times.
But there's a flip side, Chuck, and its a hard hurting one: SOMETIMES, YOU JUST CAN'T HELP. Not in the way you want. As a sufferer of clinical depression yourself, you will likely remember the times when nothing got through your wall of pain and ennui. There are no magic wands to wave and make it all a'right; no magic spells or potions to put the world back spinning on its correct and stable axis. Electroshock hookups, pills, therapy--these things are placeholders to HELP the healing, not to MAKE a healing.
All you can do right now--and I know it hurts, damnit, and I wish that you and the millions of you's and me's who hold this hurt in their hearts could find a way for it to all be made well--is hold out your hand; hold out your heart, and wait for her to take it. And that may take a good long while. Sometimes, it just doesn't take. But we must make the gesture, nonetheless. As soon as you can, as soon as she can, give her a visit or a call and just let her know that the love is there.
And there's another burden you may have to take on, and that's the burden of being the crutch for the OTHERS affected by this. The supportive husband: His pain and his guilt is now working overtime. Let him know that he is NOT culpable for this; let him know that he is appreciated. Others in your family may need your bolstering, as well, and if you can, give it.
Of course, I haven't forgotten the $64,000 Margot Kidder question: "But who's got YOU?" Yeah. Well. That's a tough one. The hell of it is, for all the electron support people like us who barely know you can give, for all that your friends can do for you, it's oftentimes the case that the only one holding YOU up will be YOU. And you have to acknowledge your pain and accept it, either in the company of others who care for you, or alone with tears your only company, or both. But you have to fight past it.
I'm no guru, Chuck; I'm just another guy who cares and who recognizes the symptoms in others. I've talked, begged, cajoled, screamed at, and otherwise walked--what? five or six?--suicidal people out of the land where a slit pair of wrists or a pharmaceutical oblivion beckon. And no; it doesn't get any easier. I haven't lost one yet, but I'm sure that one day, I will. And I will blame myself for a time, despite all that I have just said. But I will realize, in the end, that I did all I could, and that that was all I COULD do.
Be strong, Chuck; that's all I ask of you right now. For your sister, for your family. But mostr of all, please be strong for YOURSELF.
Ahhh, soft drinks, a subject I can really get into. Mr. Pibb, Tahitian Treat - it may as well be named red syrup, Orange Crush (the old kind, before they "improved" it), coca-cola in a 6 1/2 ounce bottle. Yum. But the absolute best, and hardest to find, is Schwegmann's Big Shot Pineapple Soda. Only sold at the New Orleans supermarket chain. I miss that soda.
Just bought the Lord of the Rings DVD. Can't wait to show it to my 8 year old. In a couple or three years, that is.
Congratulations on being published, Lynn. I don't drink, but I'll hoist a RC cola to you.
Okay, I'm not so freaked now. Wherever Julie is, she's being taken care of. I just wish it would stop.
Chuck
Okay, amusement aside, for the moment. Lynn's posting lifted my spirits momentarily (thanks, Lynn) but I've got to unload or explode. My sister is in the hospital. Again. This is the one who tried to off herself five times. She has a supportive husband and I think she feels able to get help before she does something drastic. But this is the second hospitalization in a month. God. Damn. I'm getting scared, here. What the hell is going on, here? Why is this neat lady falling apart? Why are the wheels coming off when things seem to be going okay? I know the nuts and bolts. I have clinical depression. I take a little pill every morning to keep the brain in balance. But, what the hell is going on with Julie? Nothing seems to help. She even had electro therapy. That seemed to help for a while.
I am just shaken. No one is home to answer my questions, such as: Is Julie okay? How bad is she? Where is she hospitalized? I had to get a phone message from my mother in the state of Washington to find out it happened. I am once again out of the loop.
I just want to know two things: Is Julie okay? And, why the hell is this happening?
While I was typing this, my dad logged on and we had an online chat. Julie is okay. That's all I know. Got to log off. Thanks for reading. Write to y'all later.
Chuck
Lynn,
Oh, the irony.
Chuck
Okay, so here's the skinny. The story that got published is "Corázon" (which some of you have read). The publication is the Mount Saint Mary's literary journal, MT. VOICES. It's 74 pages, with 6 poets & 7 prose authors, and it sells for a grand sum of $1 a piece. The selection process was anonymous (so the fact that my friend's roommate is the editor has nothing to do with the fact that they liked my story enough to include it).
NONETHELESS... Published is published. And I'm off to the pub to lift a pint in celebration. Join me in spirit if you so desire, because I have to say, me getting up the gumption to submit is due in large part to your support. You. Webderlanders.
Go buy a mug.
L.
PS. And someone, please, share with me the irony that a private Catholic school publication has just published a pagan author.
Joseph, I wasn't kidding about my grandfather's library--it really is all Hebrew, Yiddish and Aramaic. The Encyclopedia Judaica is too young--and too English-- for it. It was first published in 1972, the very year old Rabbi Krislov passed away. My father's library, on the other hand, includes number of books of interest to collecters, and I will be going through that to establish values and sell most of it, to disburse the funds among my siblings. Do I recall correctly that you're in the book business? We might both benefit from a talk, if so. But first I have to get grandpa's library organized and shipped to a yeshiva. That duty fulfilled, I'll be able to concentrate on the fun part.
Additionally, I'm now looking into selling off a large chunk of my own collection. It's nice to have the complete "Terry and the Pirates," but I find I've no longer any interest in reading it. I've begun to realize, at 50, that I'm never going to read some of this stuff again. My goal is to shrink my personal library down to 2500 books. Surely, that won't be too painful.
No, folks, I'm not selling any of my Ellisonia. Not even the cheap paperback original of Rockabilly. Not yet.
--Alex
By the by: Just bought myself a DVD of Stevie Ray Vaughan's performances on Austin City Limits in '83 and '89. No special features, no doodads, no behind-the-scenes stuff. Just Stevie and Double Trouble and the music.
I'm in heaven.
(Speaking of guitars--anyone interested in music, in art, or in physics should go to http://www.chrysalisguitars.com ... you really should. This thing they have invented is a work of music, a work of art, and a work of science--and I WANT one! Now if I can just scrape up the $4K ...)
ALEX KRISLOV: Camann--it was the best I could do on short notice and no sleep, with a friend snoring in the living room (where all my books, my boooks, my booooksss, MY books; my pretty-pretties, love them, yes yesss ...
Ahem.
Where all my books are.).
DTS: No. I haven't sold the book. But now I have a new printer cartridge and can start submitting again!
Heather,
Look here:
http://www.hawthornebooks.com/books/2002.html
And look at the list of authors for the book. He's under "E." (nudge, nudge, wink, wink)
Joseph
Dats funny...I went to the "Terrorits" website. Didn't SEE any mention of Harlan, being IN the book. Seems kinda odd, ta ME. Have some guy like that in a book, and I see no mention of it on a website. I could be wrong..but..
Happy weekends, folks.
H
For a minute there, I thought she had typed "Terrotits." I thought it was an essay on the most recent airport security check story where a woman was forced to drink her own breast milk to satisfy the IQ King Security Force.
-TODD
Rhonda,
Oh, I don't know; "Terrorits" somehow sounds like a wonderful Newspeak way of putting it...
Joseph
Jeez! See why we hire proof readers?!
For those of you interested in purhasing a copy of WEST COAST WRTIERS APPROACH GROUND ZERO, which includes "Terrorits," by Harlan Ellison, go to our website: www.hawthornebooks.com, and buy a copy! They will be here the week of August 12th.
Sincerely, Rhonda Hughes, Publisher
Congrats, Lynn! Great going. Hope there are many more such successes in store for you.
Hugs,
Lorin
Lynn -- Oh, no, it's a Plymouth Fury. Puritan, very restrained.
Jon
DTS,
Huh. That's one of the most weirdly apt descriptions of someone I've ever read.
Regards,
Joseph
Hey! I read an article last week (can't remember where) in which the writer (whose name I've shamefully forgotten) described Vin Diesel as a cross between Elmer Fudd and the Hulk. Didn't pay it much mind until I ran across a photo of the guy (his face is everywhere this week), and damned if the writer wasn't dead-on with that description. That's good writing, damnit. (This superfluous nonsequitur was brought to you by the makers of Charmin, squeezably soft).
-- DTS
ALL: "THE ESSENTIAL ELLISON: A 50-Year Retrospective" is in the running for a World Fantasy Award.
Informationally yours, the man.
ALEX JAY BERMAN: Thanks for the enlightenment regarding Hebrews and Satan. (the new issue of "Newsweek" has some interesting stuff regarding Heaven). By the way: Have you sold that book yet? (Or am I way out of the loop?).
-DTS
When is that book with the Harlan essay coming out? You know, the 911 essay.
Lynn,
Congratulations on being published! What story is it?
On Alex Jay's Satan and yetzer harah explanation:
That's close to what I have believed, which is: I have met the Devil and he is us.
Chuck
Lynn...Congrats on the published piece. Keep it up.
Heather
Alex,
The phrase is from three of the four Gospels (not John):
Matthew 16:23.
But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.
Mark 8:33.
But when he had turned about and looked on his disciples, he rebuked Peter, saying, Get thee behind me, Satan: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but the things that be of men.
Luke 4:8.
And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
By the way, if your grandfather happened to have an Encyclopedia Judaica, I'd be interested in making an offer.
Regards,
Joseph
Saw that Neil Gaiman has up at KidsReads.com a summer reading list, with an interesting book called "The American Fantasy Traidition."
http://www.kidsreads.com/features/2002-gaiman.asp
Harlan, which story of yours did they choose?
Regards,
Joseph
Mainly the Jews see Satan as a manifestation of mans primal nature while Christians (fundamentalist one's, to be exact.) may see satan as an actual being that guides the forces of evil in the world. The Jews have a better understanding of enlightened belief. Not counting, Ariel Sharon, the war criminal of course.
Jon~ Re: Fury on your desk.
Thanks, I just snorted coffee all over myself. ::grin:: I got this image of a monumentally pissed off little creature trapped in a snowglobe.
L.
I like the German theologian who posited evil as the shadow cast by God at the moment of the first light -- in part because Grant Morrison either paid homage to the concept or came up with it independently in the "Decreator" arc in _Doom Patrol._
Cheers, Jon
Alex Jay: marvelous, succinct overview of Satan in your message. Saves me the trouble of composing a less brilliant reply of my own. Cindy: What he said. And the Willy Wonka comparison was terrific, too. I'll keep that page on file.
It's funny this came up now. For six months, since my father died, I've been trying to place my grandfather's library of antique Judaica with a Yeshiva. Today, finally, something is beginning to firm up. Of course, this means I must take the benches out of the van, drive to another county where my father used to live, and lovingly package up shelves and shelves of 100-year-old books in Hebrew, Yiddish and Aramaic. But at least it'll be off my mind. Then I can deal with his English language library, from the signed Arthur Conan Doyle on down. If that turns out to be half as hard, maybe I'll just hide them in my attic, and leave the problem for my kids to deal with some decades hence.
Nasty temptation, that. What's the Christian phrase? "Get thee behind me?"
--Alex
And I almost forgot. I got a call yesterday letting me know a short story of mine was published in the Mount Saint Mary's literary journal "Mt. Voices". Sure, no check, but it puts a significant dent in my major New Year's resolution.
I'll let you know when I get my copy of the mag if it looks any good.
L.
(who is still very pleased to have been published)
They both wear red and feed the capitalist consumer machine.
I don't think there's any coincidence. I think Old Nick (correction duly noted) needed a seasonal job to balance out all that good will.
L.
I've been recently corrected. He "disembowels" children. Big world of difference.
---Peter
And Peter wins for the obscure Anya reference of the day. High-five me, my man!
Lynn: that's actually just Old Nick. Saint Nick is that Jolly fat man who flies on a sleigh pulled by reindeer, climbs down chimineys, and (if you believe the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer) eats children.
Hmm. Satan = Old Nick, Santa = Saint Nick
Coincidence? Maybe not.
---Peter
Interestingly, Blog of a Bookslut (at bookslut.com) has a link to a verybinteresting article on the problems with translating the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures:
http://www.literarytranslation.com/2/2_2.html
CINDY: Gabriel Byrne was decent, I suppose. END OF DAYS...what a strange, sad, goofy movie.
ALEX: Satan's role in Judaism certainly seems far more mysterious and less overblown than his Christian counterpart. Great post...I might read into this myself sometime.
re: THEY CAME TO CORDURA. I was unable to catch it on Turner Classics, rented it instead. I'm still having conflicting views on this film, and I'll post about them soon after I've stabilized a little bit.
Todd,
Thank you for that link. It was most efidying...and amusing! If only all religion classes were that clear in their metaphors.
Regards,
Joseph
Outlawed Satan? Somewhere Old St. Nick is boozin' it up and just laughing his ass off at that proposition.
Alex~ Thank you for that explanation. I love learning stuff like that.
Personally, I like the notion of Satan/Shaitan/Set as the Adversary. The dark side without which the light would not exist. But I'm a dualist, so take that with a grain of salt if you would. I'd never heard of the yetzer harah before, but it makes a heck of a lot more sense to me than the fundamentalist cry 'The Devil Made Me Do It'. At least at the bare minimum, it demands that people take responsibility for their own weaknesses.
And if you look at the whole subject from the point of view of the story teller, well... it's pretty obvious why Old Scratch is so interesting. Interesting villains always make for better stories. (Better stories make for more listeners. More listeners, more converts, more money for your coffers, yadda yadda.)
::Tumblers click, roll, fall.::
Makes growing up Methodist a lot bigger influence on my life now than I would previously care to admit.
L.
Alex: Actually, that informed me, too. Of course, I used to be United Church, and they outlawed Satan about 15 years ago.
Cheers, Jon
CINDY: Satan plays a very miniscule part in Judaism. In fact, he is a minor plot point; nothing more.
In the Book of Job, he appears briefly in the first chapter, and no more. A little background (Bear in mind that my Hebrew Bible is in the other room, as is one of my best friends, sleeping, so this may not be all that exhaustive.):
"Satan" is Hevbrew for "Adversary," and that's just what he is in Job: A sounding board for the Lord, nothing more. He's there to provide God with a conversation partner, and acts as--you'll pardon the expression--devil's advocate. He is a "son of the Lord," by the by. Among many, it would seem. Whether this means he is an angel or not is up for interpretatiion.
In this role as conversational mirror, Satan asks God if Job, "a perfect and an upright man," full of integritry despite his prosperity, would curse God's name if calamity befell him.
Now I have to explain a little about the Old Testament. Many of the stories are doubled; that is, told twice--the Creation being the most prominent. There is a demarcation between authors in the Hebrew that is not present in the English--one account invariably spells out God's name YHVH (spoken as "Adonai" when read, so as not to take God's name in vain), while the other refers to God as "Elohim"--that is, "Our Lord." Two accounts, often with very different viewpoints, pop up all over the Old Testament.
In the first account In Job 1, Satan merely places an earworm in God's mind; in the second account, to be found in Job 2, he's a little more active, but barely so: It is Satan, in this telling, who smites Job with head-to-foot boils. Still, he leaves after the beginning of each account, and is not heard from again. Whether the perils and disaters which befall Job after this are natural or are God's doing is, again, open to interpretation.
Now. Satan pops up in a few other Old Testament books as someone or something which turns people to the bad. In First Chronicles 21, "1 And Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel."
In Zechariah 3, He or it appears as part of Zechariah's vision: "And he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan 1 standing at his right hand to resist him.
2 And the LORD said unto Satan, The LORD rebuke thee, O Satan; even the LORD that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?"
Lastly, In Psalms 109, in part of a psalm of David asking that his enemies be condemned: "6 Set thou a wicked man over him: and let Satan stand at his right hand."
Now, these last three also need some explanation: In the first two--and possibly the third--examples, "Satan" seems to be shorthand for what in Judaism is called the "yetzer harah;" the "evil impulse." It is this which comes over people to harden their hearts and turn them--even only momentarily--to the bad. The third may be different, in that David is singing a song of destruction of his adversaries--and, after all, "Satan" means "adversary", so it may just be a case of "Evil to he who thinks evil."
The above four examples are it for Satan in the Old Testament. Though there are more examples in The Talmud, the collected writings and oral knowledge of Judaism which goes beyond the Bible, Satan is also either the yetzer harah, or a personification or omen of same. Sorry; I'm unable at this time to look up the gematria (numerical analysis of words which puts a mystical bent on Judaism; part of the Cabala) of the word Satan.
The Yetzer harah is indicative of a HUGE difference between Judaism and (many) forms of Christianity. The evil impulse is an indication that, in Judaism, PEOPLE are responsible for their own wrongdoings, and that there are really no outside forces MAKING you bad, or which MAKE bad things happen. Though not all sects of Christianity espouse this, it seems that, far too often, the Devil is used as scapegoat, as justification for the world's evil, and as an evasion of one'sown responsibility. I don't say that this is dogma; it's just how *I* see it.
All that longwinded explanation help?
Mr. Pibb, and Moxie?
We'll all be drinking free Bubble-Up, and eating rainbow stew...
How's that for a Merle Haggard reference: Going out to ol' Frank Church...
"When they find out how to burn water,
and the gasoline car is gone
When an airplane flies without any fuel,
and the sunlight heats our homes..."
Just lettin' ya knows I likes ya, Frankie baby!
Tahiti Treat, or Fanta, or Knee-Hi anyone?
Actually, I'm partial to Vernor's, Wink, and ripping off A&W Root Beer mugs from the restaurants, after downing the brew says BOS
Holy shit.
Todd sends a hyperlink that compares Satan to a character in a kids' story explained as the Gene Wilder movie and I suddenly understand Satan as the nature of celestial evil and a TOOL of God as opposed to his own independent agent.
It's either an epiphany or my fourth Heineken.
Thanks, Todd
Todd, you DEVIL,
It makes such sense! What a fascinating website. I bookmarked it, and intend to return frequently. So much to think about, so much to question.
Thanks, Todd,
:)
Cindy
Cindy, for your edification, or just for the fun of the forced symbolism:
http://www.beingjewish.com/basics/satan.html
-TODD
Alex!
Please tell me how Satan differs in Judaism than in Christianity. I am fascinated.
:)
Cindy
My pick for sexiest portrayal of Satan would be Gabriel Byrne in that Armani overcoat in End Of Days.
Good GOD.
Cindy
Alex,
A damper. Well...you know...you might be right. Stardom he was, indeed, denied...and being a guy of enormous talent he certainly deserved more popularity. Considering the damage typecasting had done to other actors I just felt Walston "got off easy". At least he enjoyed constant work, diverse roles and some formidable credits.
I STILL rather like MFM.
NONSEQUITUR: Risking the wrath of Frank (and all others who think Springsteen is bogus 'cause he doesn't really represent the working man -- but hey, does ANYONE [including Merle Haggard] who passes the six figure line salary-wise have any real connection the working man blues anymore? Having lived on the other side of that line for a long time [and having done a lot of blue collar labor], I'd say, no -- the best any successful musician can do is try to imagine what it is like to work paycheck to paycheck, etc., etc). WHere was I? Oh, yeah: As a die-hard fan of Springsteen, I can safely say that it took two listenings for me to warm up to his new album, "The Rising." Yeah there are about five "filler" songs included seemingly for feel-good, tap-your-toes purposes. But they're probably needed when one considers the grim subjects of the other songs: Urban decay ("My City of Ruins"), death ("Empty Sky"), fundamentalist terrorism and its consequences ("Paradise"), death and what possibly awaits afterward ("The Rising") the often fatal consequences of heroism ("Into the Fire"), mourning the loss of a loved one ("Missing"), etc., etc. Grim stuff. But the lyrics in songs like "Empty Sky" ("On the plains of Jordan/I cut my bow from the wood/Of this tree of evil/Of this tree of good/I want a kiss from your lips/I want an eye for an eye/I woke up this morning to the empty sky), and the dynamite arrangements (in songs like "Empty Sky" "Worlds Apart" "The Fuse" "My City of Ruins") make this Springsteens best work since the "Tunnel of Love" album or "Streets of Philadelphia". If you guys haven't bought a copy, you should pick one up tomorrow. "The Rising" is a four star album.
Informationally, the man
Brian,
On reflection, I think you're right. It's a tribute to the power of Kubrick's re-imagining of the book that I was convinced I _had_ read it in the original. Admittedly, it's been a while; I pulled out my copy and realized, lo and behold, it's a first edition--which I bought for a buck, ninety-eight after it had been remaindered, when King was still little known. The picture of King on the inside flap is priceless--he's dressed in a remarkably ugly jacket, and looks like a cheap game-show host.
Rob, yeah, Walston was in "The Player," but _everybody_ was in "The Player." Half of Hollywood is in the opening shot, if I remember the film properly. After "Damn Yankees" and "South Pacific," Walston was en route to real stardom. I think "My Favorite Martian" nipped that in the bud. I enjoyed spotting him many times afterward (remember his newsstand character in "Johnny Dangerously?"), but he rarely had a lead role after that. He should have been ubiquitous. One man's opinion.
--Alex
Alex,
Ray Walston's credits after his MY FAVORITE MARTIAN days include Altman's THE PLAYER and POPEYE (many of the director's die-hards like the latter very much), FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER ('79 or '80), OF MICE AND MEN, FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH and PAINT YOUR WAGON (with Clint Eastwood and Lee Marvin). I don't think his tv role did substantial damage to his career. I spotted him in countless shows over the years playing a broad range of characters. He managed, effectively, to avoid the stigma of typecasting. As for MFM itself, though the series was AT TIMES silly, for the period - given the standard for comedy in them days - it was a relatively intelligent show, now and then threaded with interesting themes (yeah, I taped a couple off cable a year ago, including a good one about the embarrassing effects solar flares have on Walston; some I erased, some I was compelled to keep: he and Bixby were REALLY good together). I admit its high points were sporadic; but it did have its charm and the dialogue was often clever. I think it was superior to many comedies of its time.
Alex, I think you're mistaken about the "All work and no play" scene. There's no such scene in the book.
On the other hand, probably the most disconcerning portrayal of the prince of darkness is in THE LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST, right at the end, when Satan disguises himself as a - no, that'd be ruining it.
My favorite Satan is Ray Walston, in "Damn Yankees." Not the least bit frightening, but lots of fun. In retrospect, I wish he'd never taken that role in "My Favorite Martian." I can't help suspecting it typecast him to the extent that he wasn't considered for many film roles afterward. His best work appears in films and television before that silly Bill Bixby vehicle. People see him and say, "Oooh, it's Uncle Martin!" Blah.
After him, my favorite Satan is in a comic, not a film: Steve Englehart's version of Satan in "Dr. Strange," way back in the seventies.
But overall, I've never been able to take Satan seriously. So I rarely find him frightening as a figure in films, books or comics. Maybe you need the religious background; Satan isn't the figure in Judaism that he is in Christianity.
BTW, Brian, the "All work and no play" scene is in the original novel version of "The Shining," but it has nowhere near the same impact Kubrick draws from it. Two different media, with two different effects from the same scene. It's really rather instructive.
My favorite movie Satans would have to be Peter Cook in "Bedazzled," Earl Pastko in "Highway 61," and De Niro in "Angel Heart." It's true that "Mr. Frost" is underrated and Jeff Goldblum is great in it. Another great Satan is John Glover on Fox's short-lived "Brimstone," a great performance on an underrated show.
Frank,
Not to mention that DeNiro (in "Angel Heart"), by many people's opinion, was doing a wickedly funny imitation of Martin Scorcese. Me? I'm on the fence about it - but it sure does work if that was the intention.
Jon,
Mr. PiBB is a Coca-Cola product, basically a cherry and other flavors, that was introduced in 1972 to go up against Dr. Pepper. It's a real cult drink, and is sadly being supplanted by junk called "PiBB Xtra." For an interesting history, here's The Ultimate PiBB Site:
http://www.misterpibb.com/history.htm
Regards,
Joseph
Jon - I'd have to root around and dig it out, but as I recall, Exorcist III was ordered recut in at least one instance by the studio, mainly because the original cut didn't include an exorcism (in keeping with the original source material, Blatty's sequel novel "Legion"). And once you know that, you can see how diced in the whole exorcism sequence truly is. So it's possible other edits or changes may have been mandated from on high (so to speak) that contribute to the unevenness of the finished product.
The ultimate Devil in the movies was Robert DeNiro in, Angel Heart. Or at least this was a good campy Devil. Dig those long fingernails.
OK, Moxie's some sort of chocolate soda, I think, but what is Mr. Pibb?
Yes, I am from the land of Maple-flavoured ice cream and Green Giant Frozen Fiddleheads,
Jon
RICH: regarding "The Prophecy": Satan (in the first one) was played by Viggo Mortensen ("G.I Jane," "Lord of the Rings," etc).
cookie,
Oh, sure; you can get Moxie shipped to your door, but just TRY and get Mr. Pibb shipped. *sob*
Joseph
Hi, theah, folks. I just returned from the great State O'Maine. I'll catch up on my lurking in the next few days. I just wanted to say hi. I'm also curious to know: Does anyone here drink Moxie?? I'm a stone Moxie junkie. Just bought a case. Wanna go on a Moxie bender??? :)
Ah, Crowley; a demon who jams cell-phone reception in downtown London for an hour and feels frustrated when the less cosmopolitan demons don't appreciate how much evil & bad feelings this will spread. God, I can't wait to see what Terry Gilliam does with that novel.
Regards,
Joseph
Well, if you're going to go to print, then please don't forget Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman's GOOD OMENS. With the demon Crowley, who "did not so much fall, as vaguely saunter downward."
L.
Re: Satan or the Devil or That Goat-Legged Fellow
Ok, not really in regards to the devil, but I always thought Christopher Walken as Gabriel in the neat, but flawed, "Prophecy" (not the one with the bear that's covered in ketchup; the one about the war in heaven and the angels) was always pretty cool. (I don't even remember who played Satan in that movie.)
Jon,
RE: Darkseid
"Hey, four temporal lobes! Let's see what happends when I mess around with them a bit."
Strangely, I always remember (in "Rock of Ages") the expression on Aquaman's face when Wally West explains how they're going to go back in time - basically by accelerating them to light speed and other gooldeygook that sounds dangerous as hell. Aquaman, already strapped in, looks up with a wonderfully startled expression and says "We're going to do what?"
Regards,
Joseph
Devils...the school teacher in the _X-Files_ ep. about the Satanic cult town was nice; "Nice working with you." The coffeeshop demons in the Millennium episode by Darin Morgan (possibly the only writer in the X-Files/Millennium axis who might conceivably have made a good writer for Unknown in the 1940s) are very good, as was Frank Black's line to one of them ("You must be so lonely").
Thumb up to the Walter Huston shout-out. The devil in _Highway 61_ is very funny, menacing and ultimately pathetic. Brad Dourif's scenes as some form of ultimate evil in _Exorcist III_ are striking and eccentric. The devil in the original Don Ameche _Heaven Can Wait_ is funny but pretty much loveable and non-menacing. Please, no _Little Nicky_ mentions! But there's always Peter Cook in _Bedazzled_ -- although god's laughter at the end is the real menacing part of the movie. Robert deNiro in _Angelheart_ is awfully good, although the makeup effects sort of whack you in the head (hey, his fingernails keep growing!).
The devil always seems to work better in print and comics, at least by my lights -- James Blish's Miltonic and pissed-off speechifying Satan at the end of _The Day After Judgment_, Milton and Dante's Satans (natch), the peripatetic Satan of the Book of Job, Gaiman's tired and retired Lucifer on the beach, Niven and Pournelle's Satan in their _Inferno_, the truly creepy Satan in Stephen King's "The Man in Black" (possibly incorrect title -- the story with the kid going fishing in the Maine woods and the image of the dog licking the tears from the dead mother's face).
And while he's simply Satanic and not Satan, Darkseid (and Darkseid's effects) in Grant Morrison's _JLA_ "Rock of Ages" arc really sum up the character and how threatening he can be within the DC Universe. Thank heaven for the Atom and Green Arrow.
Cheers, Jon
JON: Hulk am sorry. Jon is not son of a bitch.
LYNN: Walter Huston's performance as Mr. Scratch in THE DEVIL AND DANIEL WEBSTER. Unsurpassable.
BRIAN: Believe it or not, the idea of Doctor Who's gender-bending dates all the way back to when Tom Baker was leaving the program. With producer John-Nathan Turner, he came up with the scheme to screw with the minds of the press. You've got to admire that.
JON: I think far more disturbing childhood demons can be found in our little action figures.
A 12-inch Hulk?! AAAAAAAAAAUGH! YOU SONOVABITCH!!!! HULK HATE PUNY STINKING LUNCH BOX!!!! AAAAAAAUGH!!!!
Lynn,
RE: Devil
Personally, I prefer Nicholson in "The Witches of Eastwick." The movie is fairly pedestrian to me, but it uses Nicholson's annoying mannerisms to wonderful effect.
Though there was also a "Drew Carey Show" episode where Grant Shaud played The Devil (literally - he had a driver's license and everything) as a smarmy jerk ("Shouldn't you have horns?" "You have one bad hair day in the fifteenth century and it all goes to hell from there...")
Ray,
Great line about football vs. baseball. I'll remember it when football starts at the end of October (and the Bears are at 7-1).
Regards,
Joseph
Jon~ Again your comments bring to mind other images. I think the best version of Lucifer I've seen on screen was Al Pacino in THE DEVIL'S ADVOCATE. And Keanu wasn't too shabby in this film either. I have to say, I really enjoyed the writing in this movie, and I'm not usually a fan of Pacino's (I'm a deNiro girl myself).
I've been told that my film life will be utterly inadequate until I see Jeff Goldblum in MR. FROST. You guys have any other favorite film portrayals of the Devil Himself?
L.
Joseph,
Amen brother, THE BLACK SWAN is most excellent.
Football vs. Baseball?
This wonderful line by Steve Rushin in the latest Sports Illustrated:
"Football has returned, as it does every August, to knock the books from baseball's arms, steal its lunch money and leave the sport suspended in obscurity- hanging by its Hanes, from a hook in a locker."
Well, there's always William Peter Blatty's directorial effort on _Exorcist III._ Uneven, seemingly recut by TPTB (Nicol Williamson's character ends up without any development at all, and I don't think that was planned), featuring a love-it-or-hate-it performance by George C. Scott (I love it -- when facing Satan, extreme emoting is fine by me), featuring cameos that really shouldn't be (Fabio and Patrick Ewing as angels?)...it's a tremendously flawed film that delivers more smarts and scares than almost any horror film I can think of from the 1990s. The dialogue's often tremendously quirky (a nervous doctor explains why he has all those back issues of the NY Times in his office; Scott delivers a lecture on the meaning of Macbeth; Scott discourses on the carp in his bathtub); one of the shock scenes is cribbed from a scene in Psycho (it works); there are some truly creepy images; and it's got terrific acting by Brad Dourif, Jason Miller and Ed Flanders (Williamson doesn't get enough lines to really act much). It also appears to be homaging Raoul Walsh and Jack Benny's _The Horn Blows at Midnight_ during the heaven sequence. That's some damn interesting film-making.
Cheers, Jon
Okay, I'll add _Se7en_ to my list of horror films that scared me-- mainly because it managed to be as emotionally upsetting as _The Fly_ in some scenes. When the victim of "Sloth" fluttered up from his bed. The slobbering, self-loathing confession of the guy in the brothel, and what John Doe made him do.
And then there's that amazing, horror-of-the-brain scene in _The Shining_-- when Wendy realizes what Jack's been writing all those months. There's nothing in King's book that matches _that_ scene.
There's a nice moment in Wes Craven's _Swamp Thing_, a film I'm not keen on generally. It's at a dinnerparty when the Louis Jourdan character announces that he's put his mutation serum into someone's drink. One of his henchmen starts to froth and gibber-- and instead of turning into a gigantic fearsome monster, he emerges as a misshapen dwarf. There's a horror to that scene that Craven's pedestrian skill can't kill.
As the man said in the article, "All bets are off."
http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/auspac/08/07/australia.lightspeed/index.html
Alex Jay -
Doctor Who "Curse of Fatal Death"
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000050ZF6/qid%3D1028804417/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-0314587-9897777
BRIAN: I've heard of this Comic Relief parody. Any chance you might know where I could get a hold of a copy?
Mmm ... Julie Sawalha. Mmmm ... Helena Bonham Carter.
Ahem.
ALL: I usually approach the idea of weblogs, or "blogs" with a healthy degree of mislike.
But this is a good'un.
Robin Pen, Mad Australian Film Critic, and author of THE SECRET LIFE OF RIUBBER-SUITED MONSTERS (*) has just launched a blog of film criticism at http://www/sf.org.au/pootmootoo/ and, I think you'll want to, as Joe Bob says, check it out.
Here's what he has to say about it:
"Here we are at the Temple of the Rubber-Suit Monster, within the clouds atop Mt Pootmootoo, hidden somewhere in the sea of suburbia. This is a journal of speculative, fantastic and science fiction film commentary by Robin Pen."
Trust me; it's good stuff.
(*)This book is probably my favorite book of film criticism ever, even scoring slightly above Harlan's WATCHING. Where else can you get WAITING FOR GODOT parodies, Brechtian analysis, the idea of Godzilla as Zen sensei, the definition of what an "Ewok" is in any given film, and a monochromatic Lauren Bacall
(Mmm ... Lauren Bacall) as a guide? If you can get it, do; DO.
SCARY FLICKS: I should put a caveat here: Though I LIKE scary movies, I'm almost never scared by them. Even when I give in to immersion in the plot, I just can't drum up any actual fear. Which is odd, because I can be easily moved to tears by movies--most baseball movies'll do it, actually.
But the two movies which HAVE thrown a fright into me were the Kubrick SHINING and IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS.
LYNN; CAREY: I too must admit to a childhood scare or two: It was an episode of THE ELECTRIC COMPANY. In a skit, a bunh of people were in an inflatable boat and it went over a waterfall, with what I thought had to be a wet doom all that awaited our hapless friends. I was two and a half. Scared the living shit out of me.
And a couple years after that, there was one FANTASY ISLAND episode that just chilled me.
Doctor Who as a woman? It's been done, actually.
The British charity _Comic Relief_ did a Doctor Who parody segment a few years back. It was on the web for a while, but when they decided to sell tapes of the parody for added charity revenue, they pulled it.
Titled "The Curse of the Fatal Death," it boasted _Rowan Atkinson_ as the Doctor, doing it closer to Jon Pertwee than anyone else, and Julie Sawahala as his assistant. Lots of gags regarding reused sets, gravel quarries, and the Master, played by Jonathan Pryce (great cast, eh? Gets better) being flushed through millions of miles of sewage. The Doctor admits to growing weary of saving the Universe, and decides that he wants to settle down and marry his assistant.
There folows a flurry of regenerations, where the Doctor is played by Hugh Grant, then Richard E. Grant, then Jim Broadbent, and finally Joanna Lumley. The marriage with Sawahala off, she and the Master realize a mutual attraction.
Hmm. _Scaramouche_ with Stewart Granger and Janet Leigh can cheer me up. It's the Tyrone Power Zorro that Frank Miller has Bruce Wayne seeing with his parents the night they're killed, isn't it? Saw it on TVO a long time ago; I'll have to catch it again.
Oh, and Little Washu -- my 12-inch Hulk from the 1970's laughs at your puny lunch box. He also laughs at me for not keeping him in the package, but at least he's still got all his limbs, accessories, and avoided the magnifying glass burn trauma of Steve Austin and the head and body swapping tricks I played with Captain Kirk and Spiderman. Bill Shatner's head on a Spider-man body -- now that's scary.
Cheers, Jon
Robert Mitchum in CAPE FEAR
Davis and Crawford in WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?
Jessica Lange in FRANCIS
and Jeff Goldblum as Satan in MR. FROST which I feel is underated if not piss yourself scary.
My 2 cents - Barney
Joseph,
Thank YOU for that release info on ALLEY (which really does suck; maybe it'll appear on cable sometime) AND bringing up THE BLACK SWAN, which I've never seen. I'll check out the latter because I'm a fan too. And I'm with you guys about Power being the definitive ZORRO as well. This side of George Hamilton he played Zorro's alter-ego more of a fairy than any actor in history ("My bath is tepid"). The movie was directed by Rouben Mamoulian, who'd filmed the finest and most stylized version of JEKYLL AND HYDE ever, with Fredric March. Interestingly, THE MARK OF ZORRO made me a genuine Basil Rathbone fan; not only was he among the best psychotic villains ever but he was a real-life fencer. Back then he was like the Chuck Norris of swordsmen: he knew exactly what he was doing. The climactic stand-off between Rathbone and Power is one of my favorite scenes in all moviedom.
Oh, well, while we're at it...
I cast my vote for Helena Bonham Carter as the new Doctor. She's got just the right weirdness and kookiness about her to pull off a female Doctor.
Joseph -
I appreciate The Sixth Sense on different levels. It addressed the question often asked about ghosts and the dead; why don't we see everyone who died? And if you could see those left behind in their worst moments, how horrible would that be? Put a sweet kid in that position and, MAN, I felt for him. To go to school in a charnel house...wow, that is sucking beyond the telling of it.
I felt for the mom, too. There are so many things that can get under the skin of a kid - things that we can't understand as adults as well as the many things children just can't articulate to us. We know they hurt, but we just can't communicate well enough to help. It's miserable, especially when you're dealing with fears and anxieties that manifest themselves as monsters and ghosts and nightmares that leave them screaming and weeping in bed.
So Tyrone Power follows up playing Somerset Maugham's Larry Darrell with playing a carny geek. As the man says, "Yes, my friend, you are bold...but are you also DARING?"
Doctor Who as a woman, huh? You know, 40 years in and after McGann's run, I would just assume let it go. The two men who could save it and make it work have passed on. If the Doctor were written by Neil Gaiman and put into serial form as it has been (not movie-of-the-week American style) it might have a chance. SO LONG AS the Doctor is reinvented as not to be a parody of himself or a copy of Tom Baker. A woman would be fine. The doctor, itself, is not as important as someone with a mastery of British storytelling and fantasy handling the story.
Oh, and Eric Roberts as the Master? What a slap in the face.
JON: Didn't you know? The Doctor's going to regenerate into a WOMAN next.
Really. Seriously.
Rob,
Thanks for the "Abandon Ship" recommendation. I've always been a huge fan of Power (as Ray said, he is Zorro - no question; his madcap grin as the playboy fop is beautiful to see, especially as it transmutes to the determined Zorro). As for "Alley," it appears to have never been released on video in the United States. You can get bootlegs on eBay and at conventions, but I won't stoop that far. It's tempting, though, since the owner of the rights obviously isn't doing much with the movie.
Oh, and a personal favorite of Power movies? Why, "The Black Swan," of course! Seas Ablaze...with black villainy, with fiery romance, with breathless deeds of daring...in the roaring era of Love, Gold and Adventure! And Maureen O'Hara!
Sometime, look through Power's filmography. It's kind of amusing to see the various ethnic groups he played; Mexican, Spanish, Irish, etc. Not as many as Henry Silva, but it's impressive nonetheless.
Regards,
Joseph
Ray and Joseph,
I have ALWAYS wanted to look at NIGHTMARE ALLEY; Power plays a circus geek chomping off chicken heads. I believe he considered this his first REAL piece of acting. I read he was proudest of the role. To my chagrin I just haven't been able to find it (to rent). SOME time I will.
Another film I often recommend which showcases his abilities is ABANDON SHIP! ('57), made in Britain and originally titled SOULS AT SEA (they stupidly changed it to 'AS' for the U.S. release). There's nothing remarkable about the directing; it's all about the acting and the script. Evoking the Titanic disaster it's about what happens to people in the last extremity of survival. A luxury ocean liner hits an old derelict mine and goes down in minutes - before a distress signal can be transmitted (the radio had been destroyed by the explosion). Nearly all aboard perish. Twenty-seven survivors of the wreck cling to a tiny lifeboat designed to hold only nine (it was a captain's shoreboat, not a lifeboat). Power is an executive officer who is put in command by the dying captain and advised to exercise the survival-of-the-fittest rule or ALL aboard would die. As they float through shark-infested waters and treacherous weather, the survivors' rations quickly diminish and tensions run high. A storm finally begins to rise and it is when Power must decide which of the passengers (the weak, the injured and the dying) will go over the side. His character transformation is really fascinating to watch.
CHECK IT OUT! Lloyd Nolan, who plays the mortally wounded fellow-officer advising Power of what he must do, starred a decade later in Harlan's OUTER LIMITS episode, SOLDIER; a VERY good actor.
Oh, by the way...Tyrone Power...THE greatest Zorro.
Oh, thanks a lot, Ray. Recommend a movie with my fave Tyrone Powers that is completely unavailable. Darn me.
One Scary Movie:
NIGHTMARE ALLEY starring Tyrone Power.
Scary movies:
A Clockwork Orange (even if it isn't as scary as the book) at the level "what are they really doing to identity?"
Reversal of Fortune; Jeremy Irons as Klaus von Bulow is one of the most subtly menacing "I'm not sure if he's really a villain" characters around.
Lynn: Didn't that disembodied hand end up reconstituting its owner as a female rock-thing when it had previously been a male rock-thing? Ah, Dr. Who -- a gender and sexuality workshop cunningly disguised as a science fiction serial.
The big plant thing Dr. Who episode was pretty scary too, although I found out later how much of an homage it was to _Quatermass._
TTFN, Jon
I know probably everyone else but me noticed this last year, but I happened to see that Victor Wong passed away last September 12th. Sad to see - he was always one of my favorite character actors, especially because he could take some stereotypical wise old man role and give it a twist that made you think you were in on a private joke against the writer and director. He really did have a fascinating career, what with being one of San Francisco's first Asian-American TV reporters. I found a fascinating look at Wong's life from last October in the Sacramento News & Review:
http://www.newsreview.com/issues/sacto/2001-10-18/cover.asp
Regards,
Joseph
Ok, as usual I'm a day late and a dollar short, but after re-reading "The 3 Faces of Fear" last night, I got to thinking about "Signs" again.
READ NO FURTHER IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE MOVIE OR COULD GIVE A RAT'S ASS WHAT I THINK
I agree, for the most part, about Todd's analysis of "Signs". I didn't get the impression that God sent the aliens, but I did understand the use of them for the film. I also agree with everyone that liked the film and disagree with those that didn't.
However...
1) The aliens couldn't get through a door (as mentioned by someone earlier), and
2) Mel's family was alone.
Ok, ok, I understand the need to have Mel's family separated and shacking up in the house as opposed to say, calling the lady with the gun to get her ass over there or holing up with others. Shyamalan needed to have the family alone. The movie (as others pointed out) is not about an alien invasion, but, like "The Exorcist", was about a man's lack of faith. Given that framework, I'm willing to let the aliens be, for the most part, unexplained. I have no problems with water being in Middle East. I have no problems with moisture in the atmosphere (maybe it wasn't humid and that's why they were waiting so long). I have no problems with them harvesting humans, getting their quota and taking off. I have no problem with no explanation for the aliens because that doesn't matter. It's not what the movie is about.
However...
Just as Ellison pointed out some issues he had with "Repulsion" (see? and you thought I was just going to mention the essay for no reason), I must point out the issues I had with "Signs" that kept it, for me, from becoming almost a perfect movie. The aliens being able to travel a few miles in space and having the ability to "cloak" themselves, but unable to get through a door. No one in Mel's family even sought out others to hole up with. No scenes of them talking on the phone with anyone. No scenes of anyone checking up on them. Despite what was touted as the end of the world, did anyone come to seek out Father Mel. I would've thought there woulda been a rush to go to his house in much the same was as what was presented in the pharmacy scene. But, no. Nothing, not even in an off-hand manner were these issues addressed.
So those two things bothered me when I saw the film last Sunday, but it was a needling thing, a minor annoyance. Not that I didn't enjoy the movie, I enjoyed the movie immensely. And it wasn't the contrivance of the pre-destination thing, as that was the point of the movie. But, those two things kinda stuck with me and it wasn't until I read Ellison's essay did it come together as to why those two inconsistencies bothered me.
So, not a perfect film, but one I would recommend, and much the same as Ellison mentioned Polanski, I do look forward to Shyamalan's next film.
And that's all she wrote.
Jon~ Your comments about Mulder strapped to the bed reminded me of the scene from Seven, the one representing Sloth? Where they found the guy and he was still alive? Yeah, okay -- let's just sign up for therapy right here, right now.
::shudder::
Oh, and if you really want to tap into that memory line, the episode of Doctor Who, with Tom Baker, and that alien hand that could crawl around by itself, and eventually got someone to take it into the heart of the nuclear reactor so the whole alien could regenerate. That one gunmetal grey appendage, dragging itself around by its finger tips, is a recurring image in my nightmares to this day.
L.
TODD: I'll certainly be the first to admit the script was weak as hell in many spots (a genetically altered spider escapes from it's cage and all the guide says is "Oh." HIT THE RED ALERT BUTTON, YOU IDIOT!!!!) but Sam Raimi's heartfelt direction and wonderful performances by the cast all around made the script easily forgivable.
Most terrifying films? THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM with Vincent Price unnerved me for a long time; TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE worked in the 'assault-on-the-senses' category. THE EVIL DEAD was both a real scare and a breath of fresh air, as for once it featured a MALE protaginist who got all the crap. ERASERHEAD was an eerie experience that haunted me for days afterwards. And the 'dead baby' nightmare sequence in TRAINSPOTTING royally FREAKED-ME-OUT.
Scary stuff:
Let's see. The giant Freudian/Lovecraft tentacle monster in the Space:1999 episode "the Dragon's lair" gave me nightmares as a child, even though it could be killed with an ax. Y'know, that was generally a lousy show, but it did horror well from time to time.
The big bloodsucking mobile Stonehenge-like rocks in a Doctor Who arc also freaked me out as a child.
As to more adult pleasures..._Manhunter_ has its moments, probably because Tom Noonan and "In a Gadda-da-Vida" are inherently terrifying when used together in a film. Speaking of Tom Noonan, there's something really unnerving about a couple of sections in _Robocop 2_ involving, well, Robocop 2...it's a movie with about 30 good minutes, which isn't actually that bad, although I wish TNN would stop showing it every ten minutes.
The _Millennium_ episode "Somehow Satan Got Behind Me" (that's not quite it -- the one with the four demons in the coffee shop) is both funny and, at points, actually horrifying. As to _X-Files_ episodes, the ep. with the giant bug telemarketer works as both comedy and horror, and the scene with Mulder shackled to the bed waiting for the bug to arrive is terrific. I also liked the episode "Grotesque", with its sculptures and Mulder's fears of going buggy himself.
_Event Horizon_, though...I laughed and laughed. It's like _Solaris_ meets, well, crap.
Cheers, Jon
Audition is damned unnerving (if I ever hear a woman say "Kiri, kiri, kiri" I'll run away like a little girl). Santa Sangre is also very creepy. I've also got to agree with The Haunting, The Vanishing, Jaws, Halloween, They Came from Within, and many others.
Let's not forget that episode of G.I. Joe in which Cobra needs a secret codeword from Shipwreck so they take him out on an island, Truman Show-style, into this constructed town, and make him think he's married with a kid and retired from G.I. Joe. Then all of his friends start melting. That scared the shit out of me when I was eight.
Fave scary (and by scary, I mean they make me feel genuinely frightened, as opposed to thrilled) movies: Duel, Jaws, Wait Until Dark, Night of the Living Dead, Trekkies, (the mostly idiotic yet strangely effective) Prince of Darkness, Night of the Hunter, They Came from Within, The Brood, Rabid, Poltergeist (the skeletons in the yard kept me out of swimming pools from the age of 9 to about 15; and the boy-eating tree! kee-rist! my life as a nature-hating recluse explained!), the George Miller (i.e. Nightmare at 30,000 feet) segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie, Seconds, and I could go on and on. Brrrr ...
Oooooohhh! Those are very scary movies!
Here are Count Floyd's favorites:
Alien, Rosemary's Baby, Carnival of Souls, Sixth Sense.
Alien: I left permanent fingernail marks in th