Author: marc (Page 49 of 60)

I was digging around the blogosphere toady when I came across this from Shakesville:

Scottish stereotypes have shown up as sidekicks, comic relief characters, Magical Celts, and noble domestics at least as far back as Scotty on Star Trek (who wasn’t even played by a Scot).

…

Like its cohorts, Brave is doing something very cynical in its appropriation of Scottish culture for the backdrop of this film: It’s using the most identifiably tribal white culture to side-step charges of racism while playing the same goddamn exploitative game of hilarious caricatures and noble savages.

Scottish people, with their clans and tartans and ubiquitous red hair, have become the go-to group for makers of pop culture who want all the fun of racial stereotyping without the charges of racism.

I understand that the author, Ms. McEwan, doesn’t care for the Scottish stereotypes sometimes portrayed in movies. While I find it very odd that she would complain about this one in that she hasn’t seen the movie, I sympathize that she is bothered by the horrible stereotypes. No one wants to be accused of vague or mundane quirks. It is exactly like blood libel. I just wish the Scottish could be treated like normal people instead of drunks. Like the Irish, the Mexicans, or the Native Americans. I can thing of something interesting, though. Despite the fact that my European ancestors were living in what is now the U.S. (Florida) a few decades before Jamestown existed, the shade of Ms. McEwan’s skin would make her a much more suitable dining companion for the “better” people of world than me.

While we’re on the topic, white men are often portrayed as idiots like Homer Simpson. And the obscenely wealthy are caricatured as being cruel or even soulless every time they shut down a factory to hire slave labor in Asia. Come to think of it, impoverished African immigrant lesbian Jews with AIDS have an unfair advantage over everyone, especially wealthy white heterosexual Protestant men with surnames originating in the British Isles.

The word “ginger” may be composed of the same letters as another racial epithet, but it is far, far more offensive.

In this world of insane partisanship, can’t we all just agree that anyone who is against HPV vaccination is a terrible human being?

South Carolina’s House of Representatives recently voted in support Governor Nikki Haley in her veto of a bill intended to provide information on and access to a free vaccine that prevents a sexually transmitted, cancer-causing virus. You see, preventing cancer-causing infections will only encourage those filthy, filthy sluts.

Technically, of course, a gal could contract HPV despite having been pure as the driven snow at her wedding if her beau had been not quite so pure. But then we can say that she should have known better than to hook up with a guy who may have had intercourse at some point in his past. Certainly that rarely happens. And HPV is probably a very rare infection. Also, while we’re thumping our Christian bibles, we should recall that accusations of adultery merit a good stoning.

I’m not a lawyer, but the gist of the various lawyers I have heard blog on this is that the Roberts view describing this as a tax is not a particularly compelling argument. Many individuals seem to feel that Roberts has caught on to the consensus view that the Citizens United ruling was the worst ruling in a century and a half. Some suggest he feared that attaching his name to another terrible ruling would push him over the line from being a simple party hack to being a the worst partisan in the history of the post Civil War Supreme Court.

Personally, I think that voting the way we all know he wanted to vote would not even be particularly bad for him. His court has shown to be radical in the extreme, and one not-particularly-over-the-top ruling does nothing to change that. Don’t get me wrong, I am mildly pleased that he voted correctly. Only for the fact that an asshole-laden Congress cannot surreptitiously negate recently passed laws using the Judicial Branch. But the floodgates of legal bribe money have been irreversibly opened. I don’t think there is enough time left in Roberts’ tenure to undo that damage. Especially since that dirty money will pour into convincing the idiot public that any attempt to stem the flow is downright communism.

Something that bothers me about the current sociopolitical situation:

It would be so much easier if right wing loons were simply bad people. Unfortunately, that is usually not the case. Most of these people (at least the ones I know) are sane and decent human beings. They do, however, fall far too easily for the sort of tripe bought into by religious extremists in the Middle East and other such places. They are victimized by the rich and powerful. They are then informed by agents of the rich and powerful that their situation is caused by a third party. For much of the Middle East, this third party is the decadent West of the Jews and Christians. Put simply, wildly disparate wealth distribution is not due to the rich consolidating wealth and power. Rather, it is due to believers of the wrong magic friends. Somehow. Similarly, an American middle class bereft of opportunity is due to lazy minorities and overpaid union workers, rather than a tiny fraction of the population absorbing all of the benefits of our society’s largess while offering no remuneration.

In reality, I was a registered Republican most of my adult life. It was because I did (and, for that matter, do) adhere to many of the stated principles thereof. I disdain those unwilling to actively seek self-improvement and I feel that society should reward those who have striven the hardest for achievement. The Republican ideal is far from the reality, however. Much better people than I have managed to wallow in mediocrity while those several generations removed from genuine achievement wallow in the luxury afforded them by the modern version of primogeniture.

If you believe that the Democrats (who, admittedly, are lousy at their job) are the villains here, you are not paying attention.

It is for that reason and no other that I call you not bad, but lazy.

I have been hearing about this for some time, but only as a mention or headline. I knew it had something to do with guns somehow ending up in Mexico. Today I saw the Rachel Maddow explanation. Amazing. I really have difficulty believing that a literally raving lunatic was responsible for the most unintelligible crackpot conspiracy theory I have heard in my decade or so of looking at crackpot conspiracy theories. Alex Jones would probably consider this guy a crank. According to Maddow, prior to the stupidly named “Fast and Furious” operation, Michael Vanderbough’s claim to fame was inciting some halfwits to vandalize Democratic Party buildings. The guy is exactly the sort of person I recognize as a Limbaugh-addled kook. It amazes me that people like this are taken seriously by anyone but mental health professionals.