Sun 10 Dec 2006
This week:
* Australia: beautiful one day, on fire the next.
* Beautiful languages and nauseating languages.
* Personalised number plates.
* Push-up underwear.
* William Shatner speaking Esperanto.
* Cooking with Jana.
Sun 10 Dec 2006
This week:
* Australia: beautiful one day, on fire the next.
* Beautiful languages and nauseating languages.
* Personalised number plates.
* Push-up underwear.
* William Shatner speaking Esperanto.
* Cooking with Jana.
December 10th, 2006 at 1:58 pm
Here’s the trailer for the Incubus:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_Spyt7bjFk
December 10th, 2006 at 4:21 pm
Speaking of Borat, I don’t know of any American backlash to the movie. (In my opinion, he’s just a pale imitation of Tom Green.) But my brother recently attended a panel discussion of Kazakhs at the university where he’s studying. He said they were not at all amused by the film, and he quoted one of them as saying that it “should be forbidden”.
December 10th, 2006 at 6:31 pm
With all due respect, the Kazakhs Tvindy refers to are showing the brand of no-free-speech-unless-we-agree BS ideology that threatens free speech in the US. It’s trite, to be sure, but if they don’t like it, criticize all you want, don’t encourage others to see it, but don’t inflict your values on others’ choices. “Should be forbidden” is what a dictator would say, and it invalidates the public’s ability to form their own opinions. What are we, sheep who believe whatever we see on TV or in movies I don’t think so. With freedom comes responsibility (an oft-ignored aspect), discomfort, even sacrifice and death protecting that freedom. If I had a white-supremist group in my community, and they wanted to broadcast their hateful rubbish on the local cable TV system, that *is* their right. There’s no law against being un-PC, racist, or stupid, at least in theory here in the US. My responsibility as a citizen is to ignore their message, regardless of how offensive it is, and give them the space to express their opinions. And the same goes for others who find my opinions offensive.
Maybe I should listen to this week’s show first! But this is one of my hot buttons, namely free speech, adult responsibility, and tolerance in the face of offensive ideas. My belief that, for instance, homosexuals deserve the same rights to marriage, and anything else I am entitled to as a heterosexual, certainly offends many people, as I have experienced. Still, it is a core belief, and I can see no other way to feel. I don’t understand those who feel it cheapens marriage to let “those people” have it, too. Having been divorced once, I learned that love and committment make a marriage (or not), regardless of biology. Those who are offended are free to tune me out, go vote their consciences, and speak their own minds, even if I find their assertions offensive and small-minded. The alternative, tip-toeing around everyone else’s values, real or imagined, defeats the purpose of a democratic society, and is only comforting to those who prefer imaginary consensus over reasoned debate. No thanks!
-V
PS> What I’ve seen of Borat isn’t funny to me. I don’t get the humor. Some folks like the pushing-the-envelope stuff; I sometimes do, especially when it questions Politically Correct BS (like what words or thoughts you can and cannot say, regardless of context). Borat’s kind of international put-down humor seems mean-spirited. Things are tense enough in the world without it. The Borat character was on the Jon Stewart show a little while ago, was anti-Semitic, and didn’t believe Jon was Jewish because he didn’t have horns (like the devil). Sasha Cohen WhatsHisName is Jewish too, but it still didn’t go over very well. OK, I get it, it’s a hyperbolic putdown of people who really feel Jews are the devil. Still not funny. Sorry.
PPS> Yes, I had a few martinis tonight, and I am a bit buzzed. What do you think, is this interesting discourse, or should I pipe down after a few drinks? A letter grade will be deducted for respondents who what me to clam up just because they disagree!
December 11th, 2006 at 7:31 am
Whoah, Vibeeen — drunk and argumentative! I generally agree with what you say, and think Australia is too prone to silencing offensive views, which just pushes them underground and protects them from debate or disagreement.
That said, there are shades of grey. For example, what if your white supremacists were broadcasting misinformation? Say they used their show to claim that members of a local immigrant family were rapists or terrorist and gave out their address, leading to members of that family being physically attacked? Even with a less extreme example, I think it’s a valid complaint if one group is circulating lies or vilification which could be expected to encourage hatred and prejudice.
December 11th, 2006 at 12:54 pm
Hey!
I wasn’t looking for a plug (but thanks). I just wanted to let you know that I like your show. I’ll be sure to send in something more intresting next time.
The city of Barrie is in Ontario Canada (100km north of Toronto)
Cheers
December 11th, 2006 at 1:44 pm
Zan,
The white supremists can air their opinions and values on TV. They may even lie, knowingly or not, and claim some scientific research backing up their claims of racial superiority. That’s all fine–all groups have their first principles That May Not Be Questioned, however much they may need to be.
But your second paragraph describes criminal behavior, namely slander, harassment, criminal threatening, maybe invasion of privacy and incitement to commit a crime.
Having said that, there was a famous case in the states a while ago where a pro-life extremist had created a web site with pictures, names, and in some cases addresses (home and/or work) and phone numbers of doctors who performed abortions. As each doctor was killed by a walking oxymoron (a pro-life murderer), the site would add a red ‘X’ over the picture of the victim. The site stayed up for a long time, and while I think it was finally ruled to be illegal because of the implied threats, I can’t swear my memory is working right.
Similar to the intention of preserving justice by letting criminals go free rather than imprison an innocent, I believe in tolerating out-there opinions in order to be free to express my own. Unfortunately, many people behave as if Freedom From Being Offended is a right guaranteed by the US constitution, and the usual response to offensive speech is to suggest a new law is needed to eliminate the offense, just as the Kazakh students suggested to forbid Borat’s film. Call me crazy, but that’s one price of the freedom–one is compelled to tolerate offensive things. And give others the benefit of the doubt that they won’t see some kooky quasi-Kazakh spoof (in a comedy) and think it must be really what Kazakhs are like.
OK, I’m banning myself from the soapbox for a while. Plus, I think I’m preaching to the converted here. You all seem like reasonable, intelligent people.
On a completely different topic, I’ve been drafting an email about couples porn for a month now. Ever hear of the “Femme” product line? We got a few DVDs, and they’re pretty good! Enough sex so the movie doesn’t rely too much on the plot, and vice versa. Imagine dramatic tension in a porn! Good stuff. More to… uh… follow.
-V
December 11th, 2006 at 11:01 pm
I have actually seen Shatner’s Esperanto masterpiece Incubus in its entirety. Worship me! The Esperanto had a hell of a lot of Spanish in it, I thought. But, yeah, very Romance language-based.
Damn if I can remember the plot of the movie though or much of what happened. I remember some scenes on a beach and that’s about it.
I think either the SciFi channel or TNT aired it about a decade ago late one evening.
It was a wonderful opportunity to hear Shatner speak haltingly and emphatically in another language.
—-
What was that last ingredient? Kofa?
December 12th, 2006 at 10:19 pm
“With all due respect, the Kazakhs Tvindy refers to are showing the brand of no-free-speech-unless-we-agree BS ideology that threatens free speech in the US.”
Well, I think you should cut them a bit of slack. After all, they’re not American and weren’t exactly raised in a country that embraces free speech like we pretend to.
December 13th, 2006 at 3:40 am
When I was at college we had some people from Kurdistan there, whose relatives suffered under Saddam Hussain. There was a support demonstration by the student body inevitably entitled “Let the Kurds have their way”.
December 13th, 2006 at 4:30 am
Re: which Spanish is more sexy, New World or Old World?
With apologies to any Spanish people, I was just about to trot out the story I have been told all my life, namely “Old World Spanish has a lisp because one of their Kings lisped. Everyone at his court copied him so he wouldn’t feel bad, and then it caught on. New World Spanish people regard Old World Spanish people as being mildly retarded because of all the affected lisping.”
However, I thought I would just dig out more detail such as the name of the King and I find none of it is true!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceceo - see “the Castillian Lisp”
My story may now be reduced to urban legend, but I’m still with the (now imaginary) New World Spanish viewpoint on this one: mildly retarded, rather than sexy. Italian and French are far more sexy sounding to my ear.
December 13th, 2006 at 7:27 am
It’s the Old World/New World thing which always confused me. I understood that there is no lisp in New World Spanish (I remember in stories by Argentinian author Jorge Luis Borges, characters are always referring to the ‘Spanish lisp’ of European visitors), but we had a friend who lived in Latin America for some time, and asserted very strongly upon returning that there was no real difference between European and American Spanish pronunciation.
After reading the wikipedia entry, I’m only more confused. ‘Ceceo’ means ‘lisp’, and is ‘not unlike a lisp’, but isn’t actually a lisp, while the ‘Castillian lisp’ is something different?
I don’t think it’s the lisp I find sexy, although mildly retarded sounds a bit harsh. Still, if I heard someone talking like that in English I’m sure I’d have a strong compulsion to punch them as hard as I could.
December 13th, 2006 at 8:32 pm
I minored in Spanish but never did master the distinction between ceceo and seseo. Also, the lisping only occurs with some s’s but not others. Personally, I think your friend is nutters. Both Spanish and Portuguese are spoken much more clearly in the New World than by the Europeans, who tend to mumble and turn most of their vowels into É™’s. The indigenous and African populations in the Americas refused to submit to the practice of mumbling and forced the colonists and their descendants to speak clearly.
December 14th, 2006 at 11:38 pm
I am not sure why someone from America would say they did not know what Krackel chocolate was. Hersey’s - the big American Chocolate producer makes a bar called Krackel from almost their inception. The Krackel bar is the equivalent of Nestle’s Crunch Bar.
I am not sure of their availability in full size bars but at the moment they are still produced in bags of mini sizes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krackel
cheers