I realise this is my third post in a row on the ongoing American shit-storm. I'm also aware that this is currently at the discussion phase, and in media terms that word can include anything down to the level of "one guy said this and wasn't immediately cast to the pavement by an outraged mob".
Still, it sounds like the discussion went further than that on this occasion. And even if it didn't go very far, and even if this never comes close to becoming enacted, the very fact it's even on the radar scares the absolute crap out of me: in order to save money, Topeka City Council is considering striking the ban on domestic abuse from the city code, so as not to have to pay the costs associated with prosecuting offenders.
It's wouldn't be a complete free-for-all out there, from what I can tell, since the laws regarding more serious levels of violence will remain in place. Obviously, though, that's horribly cold comfort for anyone being effectively told "Don't worry, we'll only tolerate your spouse beating you up to a point".
The United States of America, ladies and gentlemen. Tens of thousands of deaths a year due to lack of health care, thirteen million children below the poverty line, and coming soon: a strictly positive value for the number of times your other half will be allowed to punch you in the face.
(h/t Balloon Juice)
Update: By a vote of 7 to 3, the City Council repealed the local law that makes domestic violence a crime.
Tuesday, 11 October 2011
The Cain Scrutiny
I am getting heartily sick of Herman Cain AKA Mr "Let's simultaneous decimate the federal budget and increase tax rates on the poor by a factor of nine". Zandar does a fine job of dismembering his "racism is dead" bullshit here. [1] Zandar, as I understand it, is black, so I'll let him or her dissect the degree to which Cain's nonsense is especially surprising and aggravating coming from a black man.
I will note however that one does not need any personal experience of the pain of racism to realise that Cain claiming that his rise to wealth and power is proof that the playing field is level is ludicrous. It's exactly as logical as Frodo returning to the Shire and announcing any hobbit who can't make the trip to Mount Doom is a feeble-minded, unmotivated pussy, because he's done it, Sam's done it, and all those raspy, scraping Nazgul don't seem to have any trouble with it either.
Newsflash, Mr Baggins: you didn't get there on positivity alone. As Zandar notes, we don't know whether Gandalf the Grey represents affirmative action in this metaphor, or just an astonishingly impressive run of good luck, but either way, that dude was there, keeping the Balrog off your back whilst you gritted your teeth and applied yourself. To turn round and announce the moral of your story is that you have proved the uselessness of wizards doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Cain's loyal coterie of defenders can piss off as well, while we're at it. Every time someone argues the Republicans can't be racist because Lincoln freed the slaves (Pierce eviscerates one such fool here), it makes me wish Honest Abe had left a seven course banquet sealed up somewhere in the Whitehouse, just so we could feed its dust and bones to these idiotic fuckers and demand they claim it's still the hautest of haute cuisine. You might as well cite Friedrich Ebert as proof that Hitler was a fan of political compromise and coalition building to ensure peace.
[1] Is there any more perfect encapsulation of Republican thought than "Now I've passed beyond the need for something, it's high time that it was removed?" See also the wretched husk of humanity men call George "No global warming since 1991" Will.
I will note however that one does not need any personal experience of the pain of racism to realise that Cain claiming that his rise to wealth and power is proof that the playing field is level is ludicrous. It's exactly as logical as Frodo returning to the Shire and announcing any hobbit who can't make the trip to Mount Doom is a feeble-minded, unmotivated pussy, because he's done it, Sam's done it, and all those raspy, scraping Nazgul don't seem to have any trouble with it either.
Newsflash, Mr Baggins: you didn't get there on positivity alone. As Zandar notes, we don't know whether Gandalf the Grey represents affirmative action in this metaphor, or just an astonishingly impressive run of good luck, but either way, that dude was there, keeping the Balrog off your back whilst you gritted your teeth and applied yourself. To turn round and announce the moral of your story is that you have proved the uselessness of wizards doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Cain's loyal coterie of defenders can piss off as well, while we're at it. Every time someone argues the Republicans can't be racist because Lincoln freed the slaves (Pierce eviscerates one such fool here), it makes me wish Honest Abe had left a seven course banquet sealed up somewhere in the Whitehouse, just so we could feed its dust and bones to these idiotic fuckers and demand they claim it's still the hautest of haute cuisine. You might as well cite Friedrich Ebert as proof that Hitler was a fan of political compromise and coalition building to ensure peace.
[1] Is there any more perfect encapsulation of Republican thought than "Now I've passed beyond the need for something, it's high time that it was removed?" See also the wretched husk of humanity men call George "No global warming since 1991" Will.
Monday, 10 October 2011
Choose Your Targets Wisely
I've been following the Occupy Wall Street/"We are the 99%" protests for a little while now, and I think I understand the situation. For a while there, I was baffled as to why the Tea Party was covered in so much more detail during it's early stages than OWS has been.
I think I've got it, though. Becoming disgusted at watching the banks almost destroy the world before demanding public money and demanding President Obama be held accountable = grass-roots movement of real Americans. Becoming disgusted at watching the banks almost destroy the world before demanding public money and demanding the banks be held accountable = bunch of unwashed hippies with no clear agenda.
Does that about cover it?
(Also, I'm not sure this guy is really following a winning strategy here. Others with a greater knowledge of the period than I might have a different reading, but I'm struggling to see what King could be referring to other than the Civil Rights Act. I can't see how "Last time we let this happen, them Negroes got themselves equality under the law" is going to be much of a rallying call to action. Or at least, not any action in the direction he's hoping for).
I think I've got it, though. Becoming disgusted at watching the banks almost destroy the world before demanding public money and demanding President Obama be held accountable = grass-roots movement of real Americans. Becoming disgusted at watching the banks almost destroy the world before demanding public money and demanding the banks be held accountable = bunch of unwashed hippies with no clear agenda.
Does that about cover it?
(Also, I'm not sure this guy is really following a winning strategy here. Others with a greater knowledge of the period than I might have a different reading, but I'm struggling to see what King could be referring to other than the Civil Rights Act. I can't see how "Last time we let this happen, them Negroes got themselves equality under the law" is going to be much of a rallying call to action. Or at least, not any action in the direction he's hoping for).
Sunday, 9 October 2011
By Any Other Name
The Other Half and I watched The Descent: Part 2 earlier (SPOILERS FOLLOW). To review it as quickly as possible:
First third: pretty good, and successfully evokes the combination of the vast wilderness of the Appalachians with the claustrophobic terror of the cave system used to such great effect in the first film (and once again, the caves themselves are at least as dangerous an enemy as the crawlers).
Second third: fairly boring. Part of the problem with horror sequels is the difficult tight-rope that always has to be walked. You can't stick too closely to the last film, or the scares will be lessened by simple familiarity. On the other hand, it's far too easy to overcompensate for this and end up chucking in too much new stuff that doesn't sit well with what's gone before, or even helps to undermine it (Tremors 2 parodies this problem by having its giant subterranean worms turn out to be incubation chambers for voracious heat-seeking velociraptor-beetles, or something). TDP2 sticks very much to the first of these options, which really means you're just watching the exact same film again with less interesting characters.
Final third: this actually does something new, by forcing the survivors to start thinking about what - and who - will need to be sacrificed in order to ensure at least someone escapes. There's a scene in which one character is forced to chop off another's hand with an ice axe (a somewhat unergonomic utensil with which to perform the task, to say the least) which is both hideously difficult to watch and probably the most grimly realistic idea in the whole film (why she actually needed to do the cutting is another story).
Plus, Juno is back, which is awesome because a) Natalie Mendoza is astonishingly pretty (even covered in grime and crawler blood) and b) she uses her gymnastic skills in the fight against evil. It also gives Sarah and Juno some closure, which the first film wasn't exactly crying out for, I suppose, but at least lets us know at exactly which point Sarah went mad (so far as I can tell, she escaped from the caves and only her tremendously serendipitous finding of the car wasn't actually real).
Having said all that, the film does have one major problem. It's not the director's fault, or the screen-writers', or any of the actors' (always good to see Gavan O'Herlihy in action, whether he's fighting crawlers, the French, or the Nockmaar army that destroyed Galadoorn).
No. The person to blame is Diablo Cody, because thanks to her, all I could think of whilst watching the last half hour of the film was this:
You win this round, Cody...
First third: pretty good, and successfully evokes the combination of the vast wilderness of the Appalachians with the claustrophobic terror of the cave system used to such great effect in the first film (and once again, the caves themselves are at least as dangerous an enemy as the crawlers).
Second third: fairly boring. Part of the problem with horror sequels is the difficult tight-rope that always has to be walked. You can't stick too closely to the last film, or the scares will be lessened by simple familiarity. On the other hand, it's far too easy to overcompensate for this and end up chucking in too much new stuff that doesn't sit well with what's gone before, or even helps to undermine it (Tremors 2 parodies this problem by having its giant subterranean worms turn out to be incubation chambers for voracious heat-seeking velociraptor-beetles, or something). TDP2 sticks very much to the first of these options, which really means you're just watching the exact same film again with less interesting characters.
Final third: this actually does something new, by forcing the survivors to start thinking about what - and who - will need to be sacrificed in order to ensure at least someone escapes. There's a scene in which one character is forced to chop off another's hand with an ice axe (a somewhat unergonomic utensil with which to perform the task, to say the least) which is both hideously difficult to watch and probably the most grimly realistic idea in the whole film (why she actually needed to do the cutting is another story).
Plus, Juno is back, which is awesome because a) Natalie Mendoza is astonishingly pretty (even covered in grime and crawler blood) and b) she uses her gymnastic skills in the fight against evil. It also gives Sarah and Juno some closure, which the first film wasn't exactly crying out for, I suppose, but at least lets us know at exactly which point Sarah went mad (so far as I can tell, she escaped from the caves and only her tremendously serendipitous finding of the car wasn't actually real).
Having said all that, the film does have one major problem. It's not the director's fault, or the screen-writers', or any of the actors' (always good to see Gavan O'Herlihy in action, whether he's fighting crawlers, the French, or the Nockmaar army that destroyed Galadoorn).
No. The person to blame is Diablo Cody, because thanks to her, all I could think of whilst watching the last half hour of the film was this:
You win this round, Cody...
Wednesday, 5 October 2011
Careless Words
I've held off on posting about this article by Brooks, mainly because the excerpts of it I'd read were so horrific I got too angry to type. I promised myself I'd calm down, read the piece in full, and then comment.
I'm glad I did, because it isn't as bad as I'd thought. Not quite, anyway, in that it's merely contradictory and ill-considered, rather than desperately offensive.
Still, though, I have to wonder what is it Brooks is ingesting to make hm seem lucid despite his total amnesia about what he's written just a few sentences earlier.
Brooks writes that the US is currently in the grip of an "empathy craze", where you can't move in a bookstore without stubbing your toe on a book on the subject that presumably is expecting you to apologise to it. Brooks thinks this is proof that people over-value empathy. I'd be more inclined to think that it's an obvious reaction to a country in which people deride the president for saying judges are better when they can understand the experiences of other people, and in which one entire political party has concluded that lowering unemployment or funding disaster relief for those hit by hurricanes are things only pussies would want.
Let's assume for the sake of argument that Brook is right, though. What's his point? That empathy alone isn't going to get you anywhere.
Thanks for that, Davey boy. Really fucking insightful. You know what I've seen recently? An awful lot of cook-books. You know what didn't go through my mind? "Don't these people realise they'll need an oven as well?"
The crux of Brooks "argument" is that unconsidered, spontaneous empathy might not be as much use as a firm moral code, and that the world would be a better place if we could just respect each others core beliefs (man, if only there were a word to describe understanding other people's convictions are as important to them as ours are to us, huh?). He "demonstrates" this in several ways, but the two that stand out are a) that Nazi prison guards sometimes wept when machine-gunning prisoners, but that didn't stop them, and b) it turns out that happiness/good fortune actually makes one more likely to be charitable than empathy, under certain conditions.
The degree of cognitive dissidence to include these arguments in a piece based on stressing the importance of a moral code is truly staggering. To take the second example first, any first year student of any course requiring any logic whatsoever would be able to point out that "A is better than B because B doesn't do so well as C" is a fallacy of the most egregious and embarrassing kind. It can't possibly matter that people are more likely to give money to tramps if they've found it on the street than just because their empathic, unless you also prove that whatever moral rules you live your life by clear the hurdle empathy fell at.
Moving on to the Nazi example first (I can't believe I even have to type that sentence), either the prison guards were obeying orders for fear of being imprisoned or executed (in which case it's not proof of anything), or they did it because their moral code told them obeying orders was more important than their personal feelings.
The fact that Nazi soldiers massacred civilians despite finding it abhorrent isn't proof that empathy isn't sufficient, it's that a moral code divorced from empathy can lead to murderous, even genocidal outcomes. Whether the guards felt empathy for their prisoners is irrelevant, what matters is that Adolf Hitler, who moulded the moral code on which Germany under the Nazis was based, clearly didn't.
This is where Brooks argument completely collapses. He assumes a priori that a moral code is important, and empathy "a sideshow", without stopping to think for a second that maybe empathy's real use is in shaping moral codes to begin with [1]. Brooks suggests we think of people we admire, and then note that what drives them is liable to be a moral/religious conviction rather than empathy, but the people I admire - take Martin Luther King, Jr., for example - based their convictions on the simple truth that empathy is the bedrock of human society. Remind me again, who was it who said "Love thy neighbour as thyself?", again?
Which brings me back to Brooks initial reason for writing the article - the sudden explosion of "empathy" books in America. In response, I'd point out two things. First:: I will bet all the money in my pockets that books on Christianity outweigh those on secular empathy by a considerable degree. Second: the vast majority of American citizens are religious, which means the moral codes that Brooks is so fixated on have already permeated US society. We don't need more people to have codes, we need more people to act on those codes in a consistent, thoughtful way. Every one of the major religions in the United States is quite clear on the idea that being nice to people is good, and suffering is something we should take steps to avoid. The fact that some people don't do this in a sufficiently cool-headed way for David Brooks (a man whose moral code, let's not forget, puts politicians being nice to each other above attempts to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans without health insurance) is almost indescribably less concerning a problem than those who claim to belong to a religion demands empathy, but who demand the children of immigrants be deported, Iranian citizens be killed so as to teach their leaders a lesson, homosexuals are booed for daring to want to serve their country, young women die of cervical diseases for which vaccines are freely available, etc., etc., et-fucking-c.
It's like Brooks has seen people drinking tonic water in bars, and lambasted them for not realising how great a drink gin and tonic is, all whilst pretending not to notice that his friends have gotten themselves completely wasted on Bombay Sapphire, and killed a stripper. Actually, it's worse - it's like Brooks has deliberately launched into his "just because it cures malaria doesn't mean you can order it on the rocks!" tirade specifically to give his buddies time to dump Candi's corpse into the Potomac.
Which, of course, makes David Brooks the real sideshow. The fact that this is rhetorically satisfying is cold comfort to say the least.
[1] This is what Davey does almost every time, of course. Hell, we should call this the Brooks-Douthat Inversion. Every time Republicans in Congress or high-profile positions in "grassroots" organisations say something thoroughly abhorrent, Brooks and/or Douthat will crap out a colum arguing that the exact opposite position might be pretty bad as well. If Bush had nuked San Francisco, Brooks would have pointed out that hating radiation might lead to a loss of business for banana farmers.
I'm glad I did, because it isn't as bad as I'd thought. Not quite, anyway, in that it's merely contradictory and ill-considered, rather than desperately offensive.
Still, though, I have to wonder what is it Brooks is ingesting to make hm seem lucid despite his total amnesia about what he's written just a few sentences earlier.
Brooks writes that the US is currently in the grip of an "empathy craze", where you can't move in a bookstore without stubbing your toe on a book on the subject that presumably is expecting you to apologise to it. Brooks thinks this is proof that people over-value empathy. I'd be more inclined to think that it's an obvious reaction to a country in which people deride the president for saying judges are better when they can understand the experiences of other people, and in which one entire political party has concluded that lowering unemployment or funding disaster relief for those hit by hurricanes are things only pussies would want.
Let's assume for the sake of argument that Brook is right, though. What's his point? That empathy alone isn't going to get you anywhere.
Thanks for that, Davey boy. Really fucking insightful. You know what I've seen recently? An awful lot of cook-books. You know what didn't go through my mind? "Don't these people realise they'll need an oven as well?"
The crux of Brooks "argument" is that unconsidered, spontaneous empathy might not be as much use as a firm moral code, and that the world would be a better place if we could just respect each others core beliefs (man, if only there were a word to describe understanding other people's convictions are as important to them as ours are to us, huh?). He "demonstrates" this in several ways, but the two that stand out are a) that Nazi prison guards sometimes wept when machine-gunning prisoners, but that didn't stop them, and b) it turns out that happiness/good fortune actually makes one more likely to be charitable than empathy, under certain conditions.
The degree of cognitive dissidence to include these arguments in a piece based on stressing the importance of a moral code is truly staggering. To take the second example first, any first year student of any course requiring any logic whatsoever would be able to point out that "A is better than B because B doesn't do so well as C" is a fallacy of the most egregious and embarrassing kind. It can't possibly matter that people are more likely to give money to tramps if they've found it on the street than just because their empathic, unless you also prove that whatever moral rules you live your life by clear the hurdle empathy fell at.
Moving on to the Nazi example first (I can't believe I even have to type that sentence), either the prison guards were obeying orders for fear of being imprisoned or executed (in which case it's not proof of anything), or they did it because their moral code told them obeying orders was more important than their personal feelings.
The fact that Nazi soldiers massacred civilians despite finding it abhorrent isn't proof that empathy isn't sufficient, it's that a moral code divorced from empathy can lead to murderous, even genocidal outcomes. Whether the guards felt empathy for their prisoners is irrelevant, what matters is that Adolf Hitler, who moulded the moral code on which Germany under the Nazis was based, clearly didn't.
This is where Brooks argument completely collapses. He assumes a priori that a moral code is important, and empathy "a sideshow", without stopping to think for a second that maybe empathy's real use is in shaping moral codes to begin with [1]. Brooks suggests we think of people we admire, and then note that what drives them is liable to be a moral/religious conviction rather than empathy, but the people I admire - take Martin Luther King, Jr., for example - based their convictions on the simple truth that empathy is the bedrock of human society. Remind me again, who was it who said "Love thy neighbour as thyself?", again?
Which brings me back to Brooks initial reason for writing the article - the sudden explosion of "empathy" books in America. In response, I'd point out two things. First:: I will bet all the money in my pockets that books on Christianity outweigh those on secular empathy by a considerable degree. Second: the vast majority of American citizens are religious, which means the moral codes that Brooks is so fixated on have already permeated US society. We don't need more people to have codes, we need more people to act on those codes in a consistent, thoughtful way. Every one of the major religions in the United States is quite clear on the idea that being nice to people is good, and suffering is something we should take steps to avoid. The fact that some people don't do this in a sufficiently cool-headed way for David Brooks (a man whose moral code, let's not forget, puts politicians being nice to each other above attempts to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans without health insurance) is almost indescribably less concerning a problem than those who claim to belong to a religion demands empathy, but who demand the children of immigrants be deported, Iranian citizens be killed so as to teach their leaders a lesson, homosexuals are booed for daring to want to serve their country, young women die of cervical diseases for which vaccines are freely available, etc., etc., et-fucking-c.
It's like Brooks has seen people drinking tonic water in bars, and lambasted them for not realising how great a drink gin and tonic is, all whilst pretending not to notice that his friends have gotten themselves completely wasted on Bombay Sapphire, and killed a stripper. Actually, it's worse - it's like Brooks has deliberately launched into his "just because it cures malaria doesn't mean you can order it on the rocks!" tirade specifically to give his buddies time to dump Candi's corpse into the Potomac.
Which, of course, makes David Brooks the real sideshow. The fact that this is rhetorically satisfying is cold comfort to say the least.
[1] This is what Davey does almost every time, of course. Hell, we should call this the Brooks-Douthat Inversion. Every time Republicans in Congress or high-profile positions in "grassroots" organisations say something thoroughly abhorrent, Brooks and/or Douthat will crap out a colum arguing that the exact opposite position might be pretty bad as well. If Bush had nuked San Francisco, Brooks would have pointed out that hating radiation might lead to a loss of business for banana farmers.
Tuesday, 4 October 2011
The Perfect Score
Excellent! My most popular Lucifer post just reached 666 views since it was first published.
No-one is to view it again! Here, have a link to it to ensure you know exactly which article must never again be seen by human eyes!
Update: Goddamnit, you guys!
Update 2: Seriously; stop that! What the hell, people?
No-one is to view it again! Here, have a link to it to ensure you know exactly which article must never again be seen by human eyes!
Update: Goddamnit, you guys!
Update 2: Seriously; stop that! What the hell, people?
Monday, 3 October 2011
Satire With Bite
For the last couple of days I've been trying to figure out what exactly I thought of Teeth. It's difficult to go into any detail without discussing large chunks of the film, and since the five year rule still applies (though only for three more months), I'll stick my thoughts after the jump.
The gentlemen in the audience should consider themselves warned, however - grown men have run weeping in terror from the merest glance at the DVD box. This is not a film for the faint of heart...
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