June 17, 2003

On blogfeuds and comment trolls

I am going to let a guy have the last word -- the indespensable Jim Treacher. His new MT-ized blog hadn't even been up a week before he got to taste of the vinegary wine of Innernut Luv... and as a consequence he has come out with the hands-down Best Line Ever:

And to the bored dipshits out there who didn't think things were miserable enough already and tried to start even more fights between people, do your little victory dance. Be sure not to forget the move at the end where you go fuck yourself so hard that it affects the Earth's orbit around the sun.

Okay, that's two lines. So sue me.

Oh yeah -- and read his review of Attack of the Clones. I haven't seen this thing yet. However, a friend of mine gave me a video tape of Left Behind. So should I watch Kirk Cameron laying down some fierce Bible shizzat on Satan or George Lucas's Interstellar Wankathon? Decisions, decisions...

Posted by Andrea Harris at June 17, 2003 12:55 PM
Comments

Oh dear Lord don't watch a frame of "Left Behind" unless you're a couple sheets to the wind, or are planning to come up with audience participation gags, ala "Rocky Horror Picture Show", for others to do. It's in that zone of being very bad but not bad enough that it turns back around into being good. It's just bad.

"Clones" is simply "not bad" and worth a couple hours if you have them to spare.

Posted by: Yahmdallah at June 17, 2003 at 01:10 PM

I was wondering what the level of badness of the film was. Worth-MST3K-izing-bad, or just-tape over-it-bad? Well, maybe I'll just give it to my ex-boyfriend, the arbiter of all that is bad in the movie world. We'll see how many Manos: the Hands of Fate points he gives it...

Posted by: Andrea Harris at June 17, 2003 at 01:36 PM

Do. Not. Watch. Attack of the Clones. If you get the urge, just take a meat tenderizer and beat yourself with it for about a minute. Same overall effect--huge timesaver.

Posted by: Tracey at June 17, 2003 at 02:35 PM

Watch it once - you can fast forward through the banal love scenes (if you don't, I'd advise an empty stomach), but it's worth it just to see the bitchin' light saber fight between Yoda and wasshisface.

Posted by: Emily at June 17, 2003 at 02:42 PM

"And to the bored dipshits out there who didn't think things were miserable enough already and tried to start even more fights between people, do your little victory dance. Be sure not to forget the move at the end where you go fuck yourself so hard that it affects the Earth's orbit around the sun."


I understand, and have succumbed myself, to being the troll, baiting the troll, feeding the troll... Yes, THEY started it, with their invasion of our ancestral homelands, no THEY started it with their war to push our sanctioned homeland into the sea, not THEY started it with the territories they occupied after the war no THEY started it with their suicide bombs. And only THEY can stop it.


It is easy to be nasty. It is a hell of a lot easier to generate a heap of foul invective than to generate a rational argument.


It is even easier to be nasty in response because THEY started it.


The cited quote is nasty, and so encourages the same. Doesn't matter who started it. Doesn't matter if it was provoked or you feel it was justified. Doesn't matter if you disagree so violently with the politics of whoever that you feel a repugnant response is called for. The incredible hypocrisy, the displays of self-righteousness that attend these feuds is almost as repugnant as the actual nastiness of the comments.


I can control only one aspect of this collective medium and that is my own behavior. Anyone who can't do the same I have no time for discussion with.

Posted by: Thee Nanojath at June 17, 2003 at 03:28 PM

Admit it, Andrea...you signed up for the Lecture-A-Day service, didn't you? Dammit, I was so going to get you that for Christmas!

Posted by: Sekimori at June 17, 2003 at 03:47 PM

Will I get flamed if I post "me too" like a braindead AOLer? Oh who cares, I used to be on AOL so: Nanojath, "me too". :^)

And while we are on the subject of Star Wars, I fully recommend the latest novel, "Shatterpoint" by Matthew Stover. It goes into what the real enemy of humankind is - not Dooku's Separatists, not even the Sith lords (i.e. not whoever is bugging you today) but the darkness that lies outside civilisation.

Darkness is entropy, and entropy is the state of nature. Civilisation is unnatural and takes hard work to keep aloft. The state of war is the rule of the jungle, and like the jungle is very easy to enter, and very hard to escape.

To keep the darkness at bay takes a Jedi state of mind, a conscious will not to sink to the level of one's enemies.

Not to say a Jedi must never fight - they serve civilisation, not "peace".

The Force be with us all -

Posted by: David Ross at June 17, 2003 at 06:31 PM

It's easy to say one is going to control one's own behavior, but apparently controlling one's actual pie-hole is a tougher job.

Posted by: McGehee at June 17, 2003 at 06:32 PM

1. On Treacher: Yup.
2. On Clones I saw it in the theatre, you know, so I could see if the big screen treatment were somehow worth the $8.50. I don't remember much of the movie, which says quite a bit, but I do remember physically wincing in embarrasment and wishing I could change the channel whenever Pre-Darth and that chick from The Professional opened their mouths. What the f**k was Lucas thinking?
3. On Left Behind Having spent my entire life so far being one of the many people evangelical Christians believe would be better off dead, I've never been in a hurry to watch Kirk Cameron's flick. Heck, I don't even like that we share a name.

Posted by: Cameron at June 17, 2003 at 06:34 PM

To Thee Nanojath: cold compresses and a nice cup of chamomile tea will make all those bad dreams go away.

Posted by: Andrea Harris at June 17, 2003 at 10:46 PM