Yeesh, I go away for a few hours and come back to how many new pages?
Yeah, perhaps it's because my brain is fried from studying but I don't even know where to begin catching up.
Although before I forget in a video game forum thread talking about female characters in literature I can't imagine how no one brought up poor, faithful to a fault: Sarah Kerrigan. Especially given when she dates to, she's rather well written, she wasn't even really fan service, but rather unbelievably competent. We also never know why her commander Arcturus screws his best Lieutenant over royally.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBR3doYRick Her only offense was faith in him.... To the extent she needs "rescued," it's only because Arcturus screwed her over beyond all belief and reason, and she trusted the bastard.... I find it especially easy to relate to her.
Evolution and why Humanity Fails at it: Yeah, look, while evolution is true, we suck at it, understanding it, and applying it. I say again, people are bastards. This has lead to Eugenics, genocide, "social darwinism" ( aka: "I'm justified in screwing you over"). We take "only the strongest will survive," to absurdity in order to "justify" our basest impulses. Ask men to achieve anything, love, hate, perversion, revenge, the murder of an entire continent, anything at all except respecting themselves and others and they will do so. Evolutionary theories provide a way to paint ourselves and our failings as "natural" and we love it for that. Just as we loved killing "in the name of God(s)...." (What's even sadder is that multiculturalism is guilty of this too, but in reverse)
Like most of psychology, biology and other evolutionary views, it also really doesn't address the human condition in ways it really should.... According to this incomplete theory, I am a dead end who cannot influence the gene pool as I will never pass on my own genes. In its haste to achieve superiority at all costs, Evolutionary Theories tried to separate "nature and nurture:" this is a fallacy. While I will never procreate, I most certainly can influence the gene pool, by helping children. My helping them both shapes those who will reproduce and increases their chances of doing so.... It doesn't involve a single shred of passing my DNA down either.
Foresight is only as far as you can peer into the past. Unfortunately one of science's greatest strengths is also one of its greatest flaws, it only looks forward and never back. If it did, it might have kept from making some of its greatest mistakes.
From Siquo
On that "right in the kisser" stuff, it's funny because she doesn't care. His "right in the kisser" isn't funny, the fact that he's posing as a badass and she just looks at him with that "oh you poor deluded man"-look, that bravado-that-covers-impotence, that's what makes it funny. It's quite a feminist show, that way. She's obviously the one who ultimately decides what happens, while he is desperately grasping on to old macho values.
Actually no. This is the single furthest thing from a feminist show, ever. It was meant to be literal, not dramatic irony, or satire, or mockery. "The Honeymooners" really wasn't as sexist as it appears even, it was worse. She actually NEVER decided what happened in any form. He did and it almost always ended badly. Her role was to be the devoted wife "for better or worse" and do whatever she could with what her husband gave her. It was unthinkable for her to sincerely expect to challenge him. O sure, she could whine, because "clearly" women just do that and never shut up and isn't it funny when they do? You can't look at this through the eyes of someone in 2011. This was made in the 1950s and it was literal.
How are they contributing to a culture where the butts of your joke are victimized?
Is somebody you're speaking to likely to be offended?
Are you making the joke to express actual contempt for the subject, or are you just doing it as a means of small talk?
Don't care, Don't know and Neither. I'm kind of oblivious to society and the group around me.
Meh, we're not going to get anywhere like this. I could say this is negligent or reckless of you, but really where would that get us?
"Transgirl gets beaten in a McDonald's "
I normally just lurk, but I had to say something when I saw this.
Only one person stepped in, and it was an older woman. Seriously?
No one in the -ENTIRE FUCKING RESTAURANT- felt that someone being beaten merited intervention of some kind?
Amazing. Simply amazing. In the worst possible sense, obviously.
I would love to discuss some of the other things presented in the thread, but I'm not exactly the most eloquent of persons.
I would like to say 'Thank You' to Vector for starting the thread to begin with: Lot of interesting subjects being covered, and an interesting read in general.
Yeah, this is how people are unfortunately. Even if they didn't want to get directly involved, they could've called the police or something. It wasn't just that they sat back and watched her get the shit kicked out of her, it was that they didn't even do anything afterwords. It was the old woman (the only one who tried to help) who called the police. No one else did... ever....
More later today.... It's 2 AM and I'm tired.