Althouse |
- "Pepe [Le Pew] was set to appear in a black-and-white Casablanca-like Rick’s Cafe sequence. Pepe, playing a bartender, starts hitting on a woman at the bar..."
- "This guy was known for loving the job so much that he literally skipped to work... I remember thinking, ‘He had a crush on our job...'"
- "Some days I loathed myself for loathing my time on the couch when others didn’t have the option. Some days I loathed myself for liking it."
- The NYT had multiple reporters doing minute-by-minute commentary on Oprah's 2-hour interview with Meghan and Harry.
- "Mitt Romney didn't do it. John McCain didn't do it. There's something about Trump. There's a dark side and there's some magic there."
- MacKenzie Scott — the unfathomably rich ex-wife of Jeff Bezos — has married again. The new husband is a high school science teacher .
- Sunrise.
- "I am not belittling my client... but my client was wearing horns. He had tattoos around his nipples. He wasn’t leading anywhere. He was a follower."
- "Black children suffer disproportionately from 'zero tolerance' disciplinary policies under which they are suspended and expelled...."
- Is there someone in your life who is annoying you with the conversational tic "Do you know what?"
- "Democrats have bollixed up every sexual harassment scandal I’ve covered."
- Why isn't there a vibrant anti-pornography movement within the present-day cancel culture?
- At the Waning Crescent Café...
- "Biden stimulus showers money on Americans, sharply cutting poverty in defining move of presidency."
| Posted: 08 Mar 2021 09:29 AM PST "He begins kissing her arm, which she pulls back, then slamming Pepe into the chair next to hers. She then pours her drink on Pepe, and slaps him hard, sending him spinning in a stool, which is then stopped by LeBron James' hand. James and Bugs Bunny are looking for Lola, and Pepe knows her whereabouts. Pepe then tells the guys that Penelope cat has filed a restraining order against him. James makes a remark in the script that Pepe can't grab other Tunes without their consent...." From "Pepe Le Pew Won't Be Appearing In Warner Bros' 'Space Jam' Sequel" (Deadline Hollywood). The actress, Greice Santo, is unhappy to have her big scene cut: "Even though Pepe is a cartoon character, if anyone was going to slap a sexual harasser like him, Greice wished it would be her. Now... she doesn't have that power to influence the world through younger generations who'll be watching Space Jam 2, to let younger girls and younger boys know that Pepe's behavior is unacceptable." If I remember the old cartoons correctly, the other cartoon characters always let Pepe know his behavior was unacceptable... though I think that was mainly because they were cats and he was a skunk. I don't know if that read as racism — Was the problem that he was a different species? — or were we to think their objection was simply that he smelled bad — which really was, I think, an insult intentionally directed at the French.As for this new movie, maybe instruction about sexual harassment didn't fit the mood of whatever the story was or maybe LeBron James doesn't have the acting chops to pull off a sincere warning against sexual misdeeds. From the Wikipedia article on Pepe Le Pew, under the subheading "Reputation":
If you're interested in reading that Amber E. George essay, it's in "The Intersectionality of Critical Animal, Disability, and Environmental Studies: Toward Eco-ability, Justice, and Liberation." That will cost you $73 even just to download it in Kindle! As for Charles Blow, the Le Pew bit is just a line in his column about the Dr. Seuss problem: "Six Seuss Books Bore a Bias/Racism must be exorcised from culture, including, or maybe especially, from children's culture." Racism must be exorcised from culture, including, or maybe especially, from children's culture. Teaching a child to hate or be ashamed of themselves is a sin against their innocence and a weight against their possibilities.Exorcised?! I think the word he was looking for the word "excised." Or are we possessed by an evil spirit that can be driven out by performing some ritual? If you're talking about editing things out of the culture — which is what is really going on — the word is"excised."  |
| Posted: 08 Mar 2021 09:34 AM PST "'... and he couldn't not talk about it the way you talk about somebody you have a crush on'... I was like, 'Maybe this is fine, but it isn't fun.'" Said Liz Glazer, from "A Law Professor Switches to Stand-Up Comedy/Taking an improv class on a whim led to a career in comedy for this onetime law professor" (Wall Street Journal). The skipping-to-work guy was a partner in the law firm where she worked before she took up a job as a law professor, but the concept — wanting to really love your job — carried over to law professing, which she left for stand-up comedy. She'd received tenure, but then her school was making buy-out offers, and she snapped it up. She had been doing stand-up performances for a year at that point, and I guess she knew that was her real love. Do you love your work and if so, does that mean you are in love with your work? There's a difference! Have you ever let go of a successful line of work because you weren't in love with it? Would you? Would you trust that this other thing that you feel you're in love with would really turn out all right? To put it that way makes the problem sound analogous to being married, without any serious problems, but falling in love with someone else. When that happens, do you think well, hell, I want the magic? No, no... despite the "in love" business, work isn't like marriage. You don't swear lifetime faithfulness to your job, and your job doesn't have a consciousness capable of suffering. You can be untrue to your job. You're just being true to yourself. There's no moral question, only a question of how much to risk your own happiness. The thing you did for love might fail. It might turn out not to feel like so much fun after you've made yourself dependent on it. And you had tenure!! Maybe this is fine, but it isn't fun.  |
| Posted: 08 Mar 2021 04:43 AM PST "But I was so tired.... But as the months wore on I realized this wasn't rest anymore. It was becoming my lifestyle. And it wasn't making me feel better — I felt deeply, unsettlingly worse.... 'Can you have rigor mortis while still alive,' I typed into Google.... There are two kinds of fatigue.... One is when your mind and body are truly tired. The other is when that system tricks you into feeling tired because you are in a rut. When you're tired, you need rest. But if you're in a rut, you need to nudge yourself into action.... That's why so many of us feel like we hit a pandemic wall — the fatigue we faced last spring, the natural reaction to shock and terror, has been replaced by inertia.... Pandemic ennui appears to be reorienting the economy overall, as we channel our angst into massage guns and candles and Fitbits. But the price of fitness is sneakers...." From "Why I Stopped Running During the Pandemic (and How I Started Again)/Waiting to feel better wasn't working. I had to act" by Lindsay Crouse (NYT).  |
| Posted: 08 Mar 2021 04:33 AM PST Weird that they gave that such prominence. Here's how all that stuff is processed into something to read this morning: "A Raw Look Behind Palace Doors as Meghan and Harry Meet With Oprah: Highlights/In a two-hour interview with Oprah Winfrey, Meghan Markle made dramatic disclosures, including that there were 'concerns and conversations about how dark' her son's skin might be." Excerpt:
Did Oprah ask them if they watch "The Crown"? I bet they do.  |
| Posted: 08 Mar 2021 04:17 AM PST "What I'm tryin' to do is just harness the magic. To me, Donald Trump is sort of a cross between Jesse Helms, Ronald Reagan and P.T. Barnum. It's just this bigger than life deal. He could make the Republican Party something that nobody else I know can make it. He can make it bigger. He can make it stronger. He can make it more diverse. And he also could destroy it." Said Lindsey Graham, quoted in "Graham deals with Trump 'dark side' to 'harness the magic'" (Axios).  |
| Posted: 08 Mar 2021 04:06 AM PST The news of the marriage came out after he signed onto her "giving page," pledging to give away most of his money in his lifetime.
Who would you marry if you were a woman who not only had absolutely no use for extra money but only for a partner — companion — to help or stand by while you give your massive money away? At WaPo, which is owned by MacKenzie Scott's ex-husband, the article has this in the comments: MacKenzie Scott married a teacher. Just when I didn't think your star could rise any higher.... Please, both of you, show us how it's done. And, I say this with heartfelt gratitude: thank you for your service-minded contributions. (Bezos? You, not so much.) Somebody else steps on the sentimentality:
 |
| Posted: 07 Mar 2021 09:29 AM PST
Talk about anything you like.  |
| Posted: 07 Mar 2021 08:39 AM PST Said Albert Watkins, the lawyer for Jacob Chansley (AKA "The QAnon Shaman"), quoted in "U.S. judge scolds 'QAnon Shaman' for appearing on '60 Minutes Plus' without permission" (WaPo). As for the controversy over appearing on TV: During a detention hearing Friday, Judge Royce C. Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia questioned whether Jacob Chansley appeared in the interview that aired Thursday without the required clearance from the U.S. Marshals Service, the detention facility or the judge. The judge also questioned whether Chansley's attorney, Albert Watkins, was deceitful in skirting proper authorization to appear on the show.... Watkins said he did make "independent arrangements" with "60 Minutes Plus" but denied conducting "subterfuge." He said he assumed his client would be allowed to be captured on camera from his office. What is the government interest in suppressing communication by persons charged with crimes? I can understand why someone's lawyer might advise him not to give public interviews, but why is there a requirement of "clearance from the U.S. Marshals Service, the detention facility or the judge" — and what is the extent of the clearance? Is it just about giving interviewers access to a detention facility? If it's nothing more than that, then the lawyer's assumption was correct. If it is more than that... why is it more than that?  |
| Posted: 07 Mar 2021 08:19 AM PST "Black boys are three times as likely to be suspended as White boys.... I'm not proud of my actions. But if White people want to help the push for racial equity in education, they need to own their role in perpetuating racist practices. I was not equipped for my job when I first entered my 10th-12th grade classroom at one of the poorest high schools in Memphis.... My students resented me for being so severe; I learned that they complained about me to their other teachers. Once, my overuse of discipline elicited a revolt: After I'd sent an 11th-grader to the principal's office for talking over me repeatedly, the rest of the class put their heads face down on their desks, tossed their pencils to the floor and refused to carry on with the lesson in solidarity with their classmate.... A few months into my first year of teaching, Black Lives Matter came to dominate the news cycle.... I wished I had learned my lesson sooner.... Many other White educators have told me similar stories from their classrooms. We unintentionally perpetuated a broken system we had set out to dismantle.... The fate of far too many American children is still in the hands of inexperienced White educators who know no better than to uphold a system that lets people slip through the cracks. 'Zero tolerance' disciplinary policies must be dismantled, and schools must rebuild such policies to be explicitly anti-racist. Meanwhile, for the rest of my life, I'll dream of the look on my students' faces right before they were expelled. They all wore the same recognition of deep-set injustice, the dawning realization that their futures were being taken from them before they even had a chance to graduate from high school." From "I was a well-meaning White teacher. But my harsh discipline harmed Black kids" by Liz Posner (WaPo). The most up-voted comment says: "She was not a teacher. A 'Teach for America'-er. Didn't train to be a teacher. Didn't plan to be a teacher. Planned always to be a writer. Decided to swoop in and save the poor underprivileged children. For two whole years. And, uh, write about it. Not using them at all...." Posner's own webpage supports that factual assertion: "Liz is a lifelong writer, editor and advocate for social justice. She writes frequently about feminism, education, and justice issues for various publications. While working as a high school Spanish instructor with Teach for America in Memphis, Tennessee, she wrote a novel about low-income students and teachers. As a a writer and editor, she is dedicated to amplifying the voices of marginalized people everywhere.... Liz has known she was destined for a writing career since the 5th grade...." |
| Is there someone in your life who is annoying you with the conversational tic "Do you know what?" Posted: 07 Mar 2021 08:58 AM PST This hilarious man has hit upon the solution:
ADDED: I assumed this was a husband and wife, but I see from this CNN article that it's a father and daughter: "She sings. He interrupts. Together they've become a TikTok sensation." ALSO: They have lots of YouTube videos — here. The father — knows as The Real Indian Dad — appears in a filtered animated form. NO: I was right the first time! The man is the husband. If you read to the end of the CNN article, that's revealed. He's a dad because they have children. I'm glad to see that my intuition about a marital vibe was accurate. She's attracted to him — as he makes fun of her in a way that contains his love.  |
| "Democrats have bollixed up every sexual harassment scandal I’ve covered." Posted: 07 Mar 2021 06:46 AM PST "Joe Biden truncated the Hill-Thomas hearings in the name of comity. The Clintons had henchmen smear Lewinsky. Democrats vainly hammered Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh on sexual misconduct, hoping to stop judges they opposed on ideological grounds. Now, some Democrats are feeling regret over forcing out Al Franken, and for all those statements by prominent Democrats about how we must start with the presumption that women are telling the truth — an absurd standard.... 'Probably enough Democrats feel it no longer makes sense to hold your own side to serious ethical standards if Republicans won't, so it's possible to tough out things like this,' Ron Brownstein, a senior editor of The Atlantic, told me. 'I wouldn't look at this as evidence that #MeToo is losing momentum; it's more the sense that a red-blue cold war is gaining momentum. I think there's less and less willingness to unilaterally punish your own side. Why take your own piece off the board if they won't?'" Writes Maureen Dowd in "Cuomo Discovers #MeToo Means #HimToo/Democrats agonize over the fate of a falling star" (NYT). I kept the Brownstein quote in my excerpt not because I think he's sharp and getting it right. I kept it because it is such ripe bullshit, and I thought you might enjoy a laugh. He wouldn't look at this as evidence that #MeToo is losing momentum? Well, I sure as hell would.  |
| Why isn't there a vibrant anti-pornography movement within the present-day cancel culture? Posted: 07 Mar 2021 06:14 AM PST I wondered. I remember the big anti-pornography movement of the 1980s — and how it was squelched — and I thought it is due for a comeback. We're censoring Dr. Seuss books for minor racial improprieties, but the monumental misogyny problems of pornography are ignored. So I looked to see if there were signs of a resurgence of the anti-pornography movement, and I found this (from a few days ago, at Vox): "This week in TikTok: The problem with the 'Cancel Porn' movement/On TikTok, it's impossible to have a nuanced discussion about sex work." Apparently, there's enough of a new movement that Vox needs to instruct us about what's wrong with it. If there's a resurgence there's also a squelching of the resurgence, off and running. Notice that Vox's problem with it is structured as feminism — helping sex workers? — but that's how the squelching of the 1980s movement worked too. It was packaged as feminism. What's different now: There's TikTok, and the activists are teenagers reaching teenagers. Here's #cancelporn if you want to educate yourself about how this movement is taking off. ADDED: Here's a Reddit discussion from January: "I'm very worried about the #cancelporn movement on TikTok." The worry expressed is that it will be used "to shame sex workers and generally safe ways of sex work." Someone there says: "I wouldn't worry too much, the porn industry is one of the largest in the world and there's no chance in hell that a bunch of TikTok cringe artists are going to have any sort of actual impact." That roughly corresponds to something I was thinking. You can't pressure porn businesses if they are nothing but porn. It's not like demanding some publishing company take out a book here and there or movie company cancel some of its productions. If the questionable material is only a part of a business, there is leverage to pressure the business. So the "Cancel Porn" movement will need a different strategy. What I would expect to see is young people, especially women, staunchly disapproving of people who consume porn and declining to be in a relationship with a porn user. Boycott the users. AND: From the Vox article (which is written by a woman, Rebecca Jennings):
SWERFs! That's a new one to me, but it's obviously like TERFs. The "RF" stands for "radical feminist," and these acronyms are used to demonize feminists who go radical in a way that's deemed wrong. The "E" stands for "exclusionary," though, ironically, the acronym is all about excluding a type of person — a radical feminist who doesn't want to consider transgender women to be women (TERF) or a radical feminist who's critical of sex work (SWERF).  |
| At the Waning Crescent Café... Posted: 06 Mar 2021 05:29 PM PST  ... you can talk all night. |
| "Biden stimulus showers money on Americans, sharply cutting poverty in defining move of presidency." Posted: 06 Mar 2021 05:28 PM PST |
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