I don’t know about other people, but when Google introduced the dropdown-suggestion-box-thing, I lamented the loss of my previous searches showing, but this sadness quickly subsided and turned to excitement. I couldn’t stop entering all sorts of searches to see the shit that people Google. And as I mentioned two posts ago, a lot of them are stupid, many are hilarious, and some even hilariously stupid in the vein of Yahoo! Answers.
Try it for yourself. I’ll leave you with these.
try to point out what makes her so typical
Apart from being stylistically horrendous, (the book’s opening words are “Renowned curator”, as if it’s a newspaper article) Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, much like Zeitgeist, has people convinced everywhere that they have deconstructed religion by reading a fiction novel.
Now let’s think of what people parrot from the movie:
- “The First Council of Nicaea was the Catholic Church removing picking and choosing books of the Bible because they didn’t like them”
A lot of these people are convinced that, first of all, the Council just removed books the didn’t like. This is untrue. The council was called to distinguish between canonical books of the Bible, and Joe Schmoe’s of the time wrote more books because they liked the stories of Jesus so much, or for whatever reason. Those are non-canonical books.
Some of our tin foil hatters think they are geniuses with access to “secret” or “lost” Bible books. Like in that movie Stigmata, where the the priest in the Vatican tells the main character to stop reading the forbidden and secret Gospel of thomas, lol. Let’s see if a non-negligible number of people think this:
Ok, no big deal. We’ve known about these books for almost as long as Christianity has been around, we just knew they were non-canonical. So it’s a common misconception, right? No big deal. But surely nobody thinks they are… secret.
Hmm. Let’s try forbidden.
So anyway, if you take anything about such a ubiquitous organization from a fictional book, you are stupid. Dan Brown is just like those Zeitgeist and Loose Change tards, except he is sowing the seeds of stupidity unintentionally.
Mark Hamill is dead at age 57. Apparently he died in a car accident. It was near his home in Malibu, California, and he was the passenger in the vehichle. The car was hit broadside into another car, and the driver was Hamill’s son, Hayden Christensen. Christensen is currently in critical condition.
Good night, sweet prince.
The internet is a wonderful place for those holding polar opposite opinions any issue to clash in flame wars until their faces get red and glasses get steamy. The supergenre of “Metal” is certainly not an exception to this. From garbage like Linkin Park and Slipknot, to prehistoric Motorhead, raw Pig Destroyer and trendy Bring Me the Horizon, the rights to use the title of “metal” are hotly contested among it’s fractured following.
Once I was in the metal purist camp, and part of me still is. What is a “metal purist” you say? Well maybe I just coined the term, but a metal purist is one who hates all “untrue” genres that unrightfully use the holy name of metal. How can they claim some metal is “pure” and others are not?
For the sake of brevity, I will focus on Black Metal. What is Black Metal’s essence? It is the heroic melodies of the pre-Christian European peoples sent forward through time and distorted from its violent trip. It rejects capitalism and socialism in favor of something more organic. Black Metal distills metal philosophy and it is pure, just like the basic nationalist ethics of it would demand. The sound of a younger world ring true throughout any black metal album, and it is even evident in the names of bands, such as Primordial and Ancient. Black Metal celebrates nature, and not just nature in the PETA sort of way. It celebrates the natural order, the organic nations of the North, and the individual uninhibited in all his romantic glory. There is something to be said about how ineffable and incomprehensible Black Metal philosophy is to the average modern person is.
Black Metal eschews the populism, egalitarianism and ultimately the “dumbing down” that liberal democracy has brought to the world. Modern bureaucracy spawns from this, and the consequence is inevitable: we are all treated as being of the same general form, thus “equal,” and thus equally fit to serve in an industrial society and be subject to as near a mechanical process as possible. When this conflict between normative bureaucracy and the old order first hit Europe, the result was two world wars in rapid sequence. It is the most foundational schism of our time, and while we may not praise the old order as it was at the time, we might praise its ancestors: the ancients, or the classic civilizations of Greece, Rome and Scandinavia.
But as the popularity of this underground genre increase, the artistic quality seemed to decrease in an inversely proportionate relationship. Thus came about a wave of bands making Satanic music and purporting to “hate everyone equality” and “want death for all humanity,” without realizing they’d been played like a rental fiddle. The emulators did not have the musical subtlety of the original, and thus started making music that resembled punk rock with the trappings of black metal. They abandoned all of black metal philosophy except for it’s shallow, superficial shell that could fool the public. The very same public that it’s inherent and essential elitism was meant to ward off.
So, with Black Metal as our paragon of metal purity, where does this leave the metal? From anus.com:
“In roughly 1996, this decline became evident, and consequently metal fragmented once again. The dichotomy between mainstream and underground widened, and then closed, as mainstream bands began adopting the same techniques as underground, and fans looking into the underground found product that was not musically distinct from the mainstream pop as classic death and black metal had been. This vast failure of spirit, and collapse of metal culture, gave rise to nu-metal and similar genres in the mainstream. To understand why this music was formulated as it was, we must backtrack a slight bit….
…What remains of the nu-metal and black hardcore movements is the knowledge that once again, popularity took over, and bands instead of leading began to follow the desires their audience had in common, which tend to be of a lowest common denominator (perhaps a parallel to democracy is appropriate here; leaders in democracy do not lead, but read opinion polls and act out what they perceive as the simplest expression of the desire of their electorates). Ultimately, this was fatal to the metal movement as it existed, but the terminal decay started before, when the ideas germaine to the creation of these unique styles of music were expressed but the crowd still wanted more product (CDs, tshirts, DVDs, cigarette lighters). It remains enigmatic how such dissident genres can be so easily taken over, but perhaps the truth is that sheep can wear wolves’ clothing as well, and that because something is labelled as being dissident does not mean it understands the thought process behind reaching that state enough to express something relevant to it. Much as Christianity invaded pagan culture from within, and soon subverted it and turned its people against themselves, popularity – whether commercial or of the trend-underground type – invaded metal and divided it permanently.”
So why is Black Metal elitist by nature? Because it doesn’t want to change the world, it rejects it and refuses to let it in. Because it is the romantic sounds of our collective mythology that that world has abandoned.
On any internet forum you can see some guy with a Stewie Griffin avatar thinking he is the funniest, most edgy motherfucker on the planet. Even in real life you see people wearing family guy shirts. These people are easy to classify, too; I’ve noticed that both groups are never actually funny people, and they are compensating by showing us that they like a “funny” TV show. Now, the show itself is constructed for these people, and the nature of the show’s reliance on cutaway jokes makes it ideal for people looking funny by easily quoting those context-less joke. So the lazy, plotless writing and undeveloped characters gets the show a niche audience, win-win!
Talk to these average Family Guy fans and you’ll usually hear that what they like best about the show is that it refers to things they saw when they were growing up, and they’re just tickled to find that someone else remembers it, but that’s lazy comedy writing: there’s no perspective on the stuff Family Guy is referencing, no actual joke beyond the reference itself. A golden rule of bad comedy is that if people recognize the reference, they’ll laugh even if the joke’s not funny. Family Guy goes beyond that; it doesn’t even try to have a joke half the time – it just assumes that making a pop culture reference is inherently funny. The cutaways themselves aren’t even related to the plot. The topic is something like, say, Peter stole the mayor’s clothes. Then Stewie might say, “this is almost as bad as the time I went to Tarzan’s house for dinner”. What? And then afterwards, the ‘plot’ has to be rebooted and the audience reminded what the episode is about.
Going back to undeveloped characters, this show’s characters have completely inconsistent personalities. I am not even talking about between seasons, I am talking about episodes, and even scenes. If you watch more than a couple episodes, this is painfully evident. Peter is supposed to be the archetypical father unaware of his own stupidity, but if some vapid joke calls for it, he is suddenly supposed to be the reasonable and intelligent sounding. Lois is the worst offender. She is supposed to be Peter’s foil, who retains realistic reactions to situations. This is 70% of the time. Other times the writers decide for Lois to be inexplicably just as stupid or cartoony as Peter, such as the episode where she dresses like Mystique to seduce the Jewish kid that likes meg. So in this regard, it’s like the writing staff hasn’t even been to middle school to understand the concept of characterization. They entire cast is just a vessel for interchangeable joke after joke.
An annoying thing about Family Guy is that it presents itself as “cutting-edge” but is actually gutless. Its “offensive” jokes are neatly calculated to make sure they don’t actually risk offending their fanbase; instead they make jokes that would be offensive to the kinds of people who don’t watch the show – sexual prudes, for example. Any genuinely cutting-edge comedy will risk offending people who watch it; but how is a penis joke supposed to offend the average college student? The answer is, it’s not supposed to offend anybody who watches the show; it’s supposed to give college kids a smug sense of superiority in believing that someone else might theoretically be offended by that penis joke.
This goes hand in hand with the trendy liberalism that McFarlane tries to hammer into the fanbase. Oh, and they are putting Limbaugh on the show in a desperate attempt to make headlines and pretend to look at things from the other side. As if some blustering buffoon of an entertainer actually represents thinking non-liberals, but that’s an issue of media strawmen. Apparently the episode is that Brian the dog, MacFarlane’s liberal mouthpiece in the show, decides that since Obama was elected, leftists have nothing to complain about. LOL WUT?
Now, even I will admit that Family Guy is occasionally funny. But the thing is, it is never, EVER during one of those mind-numbing cutaway jokes.
Whenever I hear about that boring issue of prayer in schools, some dumbass always invokes “separation of church and state”. This idea is overused and abused by people who just plain have a vendetta against religion. All ‘Separation of Church and State’ means is that the government cannot establish a state religion, like the Church of England, in the USA. It doesn’t mean you can’t pray or do religious things in public places. So if you don’t like religion and don’t like public prayer, fine, try to get more laws telling people what they can and can’t do. But don’t pretend you have a precedent of the Founding Fathers.
Also, I’ll leave this lulzy gem here for your viewing pleasure
One-hundred years ago, the word “Liberal” has a meaning truer to the word that it does today. It meant a free market liberal, one who believes in liberal, loose laws when it comes to the market. Today it means quite the opposite, referring to socialist-progressives, at least in the United States. Like words describing political factions can change associations, the meaningfulness of stances and issues themselves can be overtaken by word politics. The whole ideas of “left” and “right” were originally, and still are, in economic terms. Right-wing indicates a classical liberal, who support deregulated economies, and leftwing indicates those in favor of regulated or command economies. The problem today is the vernacular usage of this left-right spectrum. Right wing is used to describe Nazis, authoritarian, Darwinian socialists who had a command economy and despised transcendent spirituality. How is this right-wing as we see it in the dichotomy of our time? History itself breaks the left-right mold set before us.
Where does this leave us today?
We have issues that are artificially associated with one another. The “right-wing” stance on multiple issues doesn’t make any sense. How does being pro-death penalty and anti-abortion make sense? How does being anti-death penalty and pro-abortion make sense? Does being Christian have anything to do with being a capitalist? Or being a socialist? How does being a secularist make you more for a regulated economy or an environmentalist?
We need to overcome these ridiculous associations that the constructs “right wing issue” and “left wing issue” create if we want to start getting to anything in the political world. The Media in all of its glory will continue to perpetuate this retardation until it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. All we see is that Christians are total environment-hating capitalists on TV, and socialists are pro-abortion fanatics that want everyone to be able to marry anything. The worst part is, everyone buys it. Our views are being channeled into two narrow frames of though. “Well, I am a democrat and I support socialized medicine and welfare, and the guys on TV that also support those things say abortion should stay legal, so I guess I do too.” Of course, it’s always far more subtle than this. What can you do? Look at every issue without party politics or left-right bullshit.
To anyone that actually understands the concepts of ‘economy’ and ‘freedom’, it’s fairly evident that socialism is a system that sacrifices freedom to gain equality. The terms left wing and right wing, despite their misuse today, simply mean less economic freedom vs more economic freedom.
I’m not sure if it’s MTV, wipespread misunderstanding, youthful ignorance or a combination, but for some reason, every trendy, starbucks-drinking pseudo-intellectual is convinced that socialism is some sort of rebellious, anti-authority philosophy. Apparently they don’t know much about it, since socialism involves extending government power more and more into the personal lives of individuals. Now, what I am not saying is that the philosophy of socialism itself is for complete idiots; it’s a legitimate viewpoint, albeit one that doesn’t value liberty and individuality very highly. I am saying that many of it’s adherents try to spin it so it’s some super-freedom loving, inherently American philosophy. That’s what I have a problem with.
Let me create a character: we will call him shadowrenegade666. He is having an IM conversation with his acquaintance, ReasonableHuman11.
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Shadowrenegade666: I can’t fucking stand these capitalist politicians trying to tell us all what to do, the government is fucking dumb.
ReasonableHuman11: wait, what? you know capitalism just means that the economy is not controlled by the government, right?
SR: yah, that’s what they want you to think.
RH: …
SR: I’m a socialist, the federal government probably has me blacklisted and shit, cuz im against authority and all that
RH: You know socialism involves giving the federal government more power and extending their control of our personal lives
SR: corporations do that, Im for freedom and equality.
RH: First of all, how do corporations control our personal lives? You aren’t required in any way to buy any company’s product or work for any company you don’t want to. Secondly, are you aware that the words ‘freedom’ and equality have two different meanings?
SR: … ur dumb.
This is the worst show I have ever seen, and when I hear people say anything about it, I am lost in thought trying to think how anyone in the world finds it watchable. I think Tim or Eric must have incriminating photographs of a married higher-up fucking his secretary, because I don’t know how else the show hasn’t been canceled.
Now, I am not an Adult Swim hater, the network has a lot of funny shows. Metalocalypse, Venture Brothers is hilarious, but Tim and Eric is just… monotonous. Not only monotonous, but a little embarrassing because of how hard it tries. It’s two friends making stupid faces in front of a green screen. As for the cringey Tim and Eric, I’ve really tried to give them a chance, but with the exception of one John C. Reilly sketch, I’ve yet to have so much as an involuntary giggle over anything that’s ever appeared on one of Tim & Eric’s programs. I’ve tried to watch it from the angle of satire against the volume of low budget public access stuff out there. I’ve tried to understand it as just being intentionally so stupid as to be funny. But it still doesn’t make me laugh. I liken it to roadside boiled peanuts in the south- an “acquired” taste, as they say, and in the case of television I have no intention of drowning myself in unfunny crap and wasting my time for the sake of acquiring the “taste” of this show. Watching it just makes life less funny, if I wanted to see pasty white boys flail around and be “experimental” I’d start buying art students LSD.
