Falling, Falling, Falling

Just say NO to self pity and stupidity.

Er… too early in the morn to think.

BTW, I tried to click on the link and all I get is a login page.

Actually, I’m all in favor of making it exclusive and password protected. It means that it will not see the ‘tubes light of day. Way to defeat your own purpose Team Sarah.

As for D&D, I played it for a while till I had a falling out with my Dungeon Master (who turned out to be a two faced knob) and was kicked out of the group. Did hurt the ego for a while as I was not happy about being rejected by fellow social “outcasts.”

Libruls! Can’t live with ’em. Can’t shoot ’em. Unless…

D Master: Is that some kind of bondage thingy?

@Benedick:
Sadly no. He was usually the guy who owned all the D&D stuff and the dice, the pretty pretty dice.

I’m waving a huge GEEK flag here folks.

It was all about teh Magic when I was part of the black Trenchcoat Mafia of freaks at my high school — sadly, Columbine happened and we were all put under the watchful eye of the campus cops (and one gal actually got spat upon). First inklings of the increasing fascism that we were to experience in this country in the years ahead.

The dude who spat upon the girl later was a local chair for the Caligutard/Dark Lord campaign. Figures. The young woman is now doing very well and is far, far away from Macon, Ga.

@rptrcub: This is the big plus of having gone to school before teh War on Terra. Nowadays everything is so serious. When I was at school some malcontent mailed a bomb to one of our masters which exploded in the PO when an unsuspecting clerk stamped the package. The school grounds were patrolled for a year and the headmaster was on TV. This was before the toilets were dynamited and the quad flooded with sewage. Happy days.

@rptrcub:
As if being the “freak” or “geek” wasn’t bad enough.

As for the spitter. Seems like his destiny was in his spittle, eh?

@Benedick: Bomb threats were a reliable way to get out of a test one was unprepared for, in my day, or even just to get a smoke break. All fun and games. Nowadays they have this alarming “lockdown” thing. My stepdaughter’s high school made the studentts memorize an elaborately retarded system of color-coded alerts, yellow means un-armed intruder, red means armed intruder, there was some code to indicate whether the intruder was a known known or an unknown known, just sheer dumbfuckery. Why is there such a thing as an EdD? And the pompous fucks call themselves “Doctor.” It is my intention, if I ever meet my son’s principle, to tell him how much I admire him for leaving medicine to go into education.

Everyone needs drama, don’t they? Oh, to imagine oneself part of something important and to be doing your part in a valiant battle against the forces of evil. The funny thing is that the libtards on DU often strike excatly the same tone as the palintards.

Are Palintards the new Paultards?

It would be fun to start a war with the Palintards, we would not be lowering ourselves to their level, because we would be doing it ironically, for amusement.

@rptrcub: Now you know that the Columbine boys were inspired by a forgotten movie starring the young Leo DeCaprio, called “The Basketball Diaries,” in one part of which a trench-coated DeCaprio shoots up his high school (the movie is based on the autobiography of young heroin-addict and proto-punker Jim Carroll). The strange silence of the media about this seems to me evidence of some kind of conspiracy to protect the media whenever the media plays a part or bears some fault for bad news. The same thing happened with that college football movie called “The Program,” it featured a scene with a game of chicken in it in which the football players would demonstrate their courage by laying down on the centerline of a highway at night and letting cars pass on either side of them. I recall that within a week, dozens of young noodleheads with defective genes for intelligence had been weeded out of the gene pool while emulating this scene, which was then removed from the movie and the matter was never spoken of again.

@Prommie: If you have the Calvin & Hobbes collection, as I do, you can see that Calvin enjoys many fantasies of blowing up his school, having his classmates eaten by dinosaurs etc.

@Dodgerblue: No, Dodger, the notebooks and diaries of the columbine killers all explicitly mention The Basketball Diaries, just as every statement Bin Laden makes says that 9-11 was retaliation for US support for Isreal, and apparently, these are just two of the many things which may not be publicly acknowledged in our society. We have lots of elephants in our living room, a whole herd. Nobody wants to acknowledge the Hippo.

Nojo, do I detect just a wee bit of jealousy that Stinque was not cited somewhere in those 15 pages as part of the Liberal Conspirators?

@Prommie: The media were too busy blaming Marilyn Manson to latch onto anything else. But that’s sort of beside the point. What really bothered me about the immediate aftermath of the shootings, though, is that, and this might have been mentioned in “Bowling for Columbine,” a local resident placed fifteen crosses in a field near the school, thirteen for the victims and two for the shooters, and due to the outrage over anyone having actually acknowledged that the killers died, too, which, if you happen to believe in salvation, makes sense, the crosses were removed. There truly was a concerted effort to quash any attempt at understanding what was wrong with the kids. That they wore black clothing and listened to industrial music was sufficient explanation for most folks.

@Prommie: I wasn’t suggesting that the Calvin strips actually influenced the Columbine shooters — only that the feelings of outsiderness and desire for vengeance are not unusual among school-age kids. I was not Mr. Popularity in high school by any means (I was in the Math Club, for example), but even I recognized that there were some kids so weird that no one wanted anything to do with them.

@Prommie: I blame the media for Sport. Also War. Also David Spade.

The creator of “YA for Obama” checks in…

I suppose what makes this funnier is that my site was mainly for kids, under 18s. I guess a few of them went over to see what Team Sarah was about, and talked about their experiences on the forum. The response? Some Team Sarahs came over the fence one night and started screaming obscenities at my kids — who often hung out in the chat room, where they had made good friends, and liked to talk about Doctor Who and books. Fully grown adults (with awesome usernames like “smarterthanu”) called them baby killers, socialists, bigots… They are some upstanding people, making 14 year old girls cry.

So I banned them. And they went back to their site with a CAUSE! They had been wronged! Then they REALLY came.

Reminds me of the dude who lectured me one Halloween when I was trick-or-treating for UNICEF: “Don’t you know they support kids in communist countries?” I was in third grade.

Sorry to have suggested you might have been serious. I have come to think that the media have greater capacity to influence the suggestible than the media like to admit, and therefore the media avoid stories which display this influence. And I think film is the most powerful medium. The lower orders are addicted to movies, they eagerly consume the vilest swill; what else accounts for Adam Sandler being the biggest box-office guarantee in Hollywood?

Thankfully, after its heyday in the 80s and 90s, there seems to be a lull in the real numbing violence in movies, lately, fewer of the murderous Shwartzenegger shoot-em-ups. But for a while it was kinda icky.

But I see the influence mostly in areas other than violence. My generation took Animal House as an instruction manual, for example, and suddenly toga parties, binge-drinking, and road trips were ubiquitous. My college days were a 5 year exercise in trying to live that movie. These days, from what I hear from kids, the easy availability of porn seems to have altered sexual behavior. Its not that we didn’t do everything they do now, its just that it was a Big Deal back then, some of the things I hear them speak of so casually nowadays. I live in New Jersey, in a town dominated by Italian Americans, and you would be amazed how many of them take their cues from The Godfather, and according to accounts, even real mafiosi have adopted cues on how to behave from The Godfather. And remember the Annie Hall look? Literally millions of women went out and deliberately adopted a clothing style designed to make them seem awkward, neurotic, and clueless.

@Prommie: “…fewer of the murderous Shwartzenegger shoot-em-ups.”

Fewer bad movies because Schwarzenegger is busy shooting up the state government here.

Oh my god, I’ve been doing that for weeks all by myself. And here I am, part of a conspiracy for the first time.

Awesome. When are the meetings? What should I wear?

@Prommie:

Dude, have you been over to that site? I’ve been posting little snippets of Hitler’s speeches for weeks there under the name “Amanda Humphreys”. Nobody noticed except for the few members that wanted to buddy me. It is impossible to mock these people, they mock themselves.

Hey, Nojo! I clicked on the link in post to YA for Obama and got a rude message: “Uh-oh! . . . invalidSlug in controller blog . . .” All right, which of us is the invalid Slug? And who do they think they are, anyway?

@lynnlightfoot: Well, it was working last night…

I’ll guess that Maureen (nice YA lady who wrote me this morning) yanked the post or something, since it was also linked from RedState.

Here, enjoy the Google cache. Not up to date, but you’ll get the idea.

@nojo: Thanks for that late-afternoon treat. My fave post?

MY KEYBOARD IS SOAKED WITH TEARS

Which I think says it all.

@Benedick: haha! Little Miss All Caps also posted:
THEY WILL KILL BABIES IN THE LINEN CLOSET

No, dear. We’re OUT of the closet. We will perform abortions at the foot of the Confederate Monument.

@nojo: PeggyNooner got banned very early on in the TeamSarah project, but Nabisco lurks on. YAY for YA Obama.

@nabisco:

Why didn’t you tell me you were conspiring? We coulda traded snippets from The Protocols of the Elders of Zion with the word “Homosexuals” replacing the word “Jews”, then posted it here when the Palintards joined the thread with enthusiasm. Hilarity for all.

Nobody tells me anything anymore :( ….

TJ: anyone want to play investigative journalist? Google scientology, medication, and epilepsy and read all the stuff about the “church” ordering epileptics to stop taking their seizure medication and them dying and stuff. And its all old stuff, its not stuff thrown up there post-Travolta. Really creeeeepy.

@Benedick: @Mistress Cynica: The tears shorted out the caps lock key.

Mistress Cynica: Some things never go out of style. Like, for instance, ALL CAPS. Makes me nostalgic and shit.

Prommie: Well, Scientology is no less creepy than, say, Christian Scientists in this respect. What makes Scientology creepy is Tom Cruise and associated assorted nuts. Eyes on the ball here, Prom.

@chicago bureau: AT LEAST YOU CAN DO IT WITHOUT EMBEDDING CODE, UNLIKE BOLD AND ITALIC.

@Prommie: @chicago bureau: That particular strain of Scientology creepiness goes back to the 1980s. Best to wait until Tom Cruise and Will Smith stage a Battle of the Gods for control.

@Prommie: I don’t know much about the whole thing, but wouldn’t even they make some sort of distinction between physiological and psychological conditions?

@mellbell: Oh, no no no no no.

There is no distinction between the physiological and psychological. Illness is a matter of Bad Thetans you have yet to expunge from your soul. Please, step down the hall, second room to the left, and we’ll hook you up to a geiger counter.

@nojo: Perhaps neurological is a better word. Not that it probably changes matters. But my takeaway had always been that they disavow medical care for psychological conditions, particularly the use of pharmaceuticals, but take a, well, normal approach to other aspects of modern medicine.

nojo / mellbell: Actually, I have a better idea for curing illnesses. There are these things called “alcoholic beverages.” You drink them, and they make you feel good. Beer is particularly helpful, as burping loudly is a great release of nervous energy. And it makes you feel good.

Excuse me.

[running to bar a little bit early today]

@mellbell: I think you’re right. What they do is attract disturbed people, catalog their disturbances, then use that catalog against folks who even think of leaving. (The supposed story about Travolta is that he admitted to liking dudes, and now he’s stuck.)

It’s a very nasty business, no doubt there. In fact, I expect a lawsuit by the end of the day.

The assholes at TeamSarah.org tossed me after one post casting the Talibunny as the white power Joan of Arc, the Prophet Sarah, She who survived the flames of persecution that consumed the pretender Joan. No fucking sense of humor. I can’t wait to see if these fuckwits trot out the subtly subversive and discrediting comments of FlyingChainSaw as proof of a vast marxist conspiracy to pain the Talibunny as a neonazi.

@FlyingChainSaw:

There really is no justice on that side, FCS, is there? And no capacity to understand art either….

@FlyingChainSaw: @Tommmcatt Yet Again: I keep thinking they’re going to run out of steam, but they just keep on giving. So much more fun than bitter PUMAs.

@nojo: Guys, I say we just confess and admit to the charges and call a press conference admitting yes, we were working to the overthrow of America and establishment of a marxist dystopia by zooing out a failed stand-up comic who is known for her imitations of Ellie Mae Klampett. @Tommmcatt Yet Again: No, shit. Humorless fucks. I figured it didn’t matter taking the chance with art since

@FlyingChainSaw:
@nojo:
Careful. There’s bound to be at least one Scientologists-4-Sarah on that list.

Woot! I can finally Stinque from work again!

@IanJ: I haven’t even been to work in like ten days it seems. Sick, holidays, sick.

Damn, I hope I still have a job. The ‘berry seems to think so.

@nojo: They make these distrubed recruits sign a sort of living will-care directive, stating that its a matter of their religious beliefs that they desire no psychological care, and the totally unenforceable agreement even tries to make them immune to involuntary commitment, so that their relatives cannot use incompetence proceedings to try to free them from the cult. Its a bad evil thing, and Germany is the only country treating them the way they deserve.

@nojo: They are almost as amusing as Paultards, but somehow, creepier, there is an even deeper level of strangeness.

@Promnight:
Deeper levels of strangeness like the deep end of a pool as compared to the Marianas Trench.

@Promnight: Well, they’re in a cult founded by a really crappy sci-fi author, and sure all religion is irrational but holy crap, the stuff they spout is batshit. What makes them evil is the amount of money they scrape from their followers and the awful ends they turn that money towards.

@drinkyclown: Scientology: the Medellin Cartel meets Heavens Gate.

@drinkyclown: Oh, and their use of terrorist bombings and endless litigation against critics, thats a black mark too.

I find them fascinating because I am so completely fascinated by religious sects as a sociological phenomenon. Specifically, I am fascinated by one huge question: are the founders of a new religion usually sincere believers in their developing dogmas, or are they knowing fraudsters? Did the first christians honestly believe Jesus rose from the dead? They lived in a pre-scientific, superstitious age when magic, spells, and the working of the gods were truly believed in by most, I am open to the idea that they were sincere.

Now look at Mormonism, its only 180 years old near as I can recall, the same age christianity was when the gospels were accepted and codified into the canon. But it does seem clear that Joseph Smith was either insane or a conscious, knowing fraud. Just read the book of Mormon, just on literary criticism alone it reads like a half-educated dude’s effort to make up stuff and make it sound biblical, lots of archaic turns of phrase juxtaposed with anachronistic 19th century American phrases. To me its as obvious as the JonBenet ransome letter written by her mother.

Now take Scientology. Here we have published reports of the founder, speaking with his fellow science fiction writers, who were generally ill-paid toilers, saying that “the way to make real money is to found a religion.” And then he did. And its absurd and obviously pure hokum and the reports from former high-ranking defecters from the cult indicate that at the highest levels its power elite know its a fraud.

This is fascinating, the comparisons. Haile Sellassie, another fascinating one.

@Promnight: I think the gospels were sincere, Paul seems like the asshole in that scenario, he was obviously a man with many, many axes to grind. And hey, the bible has some great literature! The book of mormon is just the right combination of hokey and bizarre to be thoroughly entertaining (like a chick tract)! Dianetics is unreadable dreck, much like duder’s regular non-culty fiction. Haile Selassie seems like an awesome guy, but I still just equate rastafarians with dreds and tons of weed.

@chicago bureau: When I was a child, any upper respiratory infection/flu-like illness was treated with bourbon mixed with sugar (’cause, you know, bourbon isn’t sweet enough). It may not have cured us, put it did let us — and everyone else — sleep. And we all lived.

Paul has a twisted personality that jumps off the page, more than any author I have ever read. People who are deeply sceptical of all biblical writings as some deliberate fiction by a scheming group of conspiricists, are aghast that the obvious personality present in Paul’s letters, to me, proves them absolutely genuine works by a real person. I think most people cannot cast of the social baggage surrounding the idea that its “The Bible” and simply cannot read it as objectively and carefully as they would read, Shakespeare, for example. When I have read the gospels, the obvious shifts in writing style and just contextual appropriateness, have made it as obvious as hell to me when there is a real eyewitness account transcribed in good faith, and an obvious editorial insertion that was obviously added later in an attempt to add veracity by linking the story in question back to some Old Testament prophecy about the Messiah.

No such switches in tone in the Book of Mormon, pure bullshit all the way through, just like ElRon.

@Promnight: I was raised by atheists/agnostics and never went to church as a kid unless I went there with a friend. I never read a passage of the Bible until my freshman year of college in a “Western Civilization” class where I was the object freakshow because I read the Bible the same way I’d read Voltaire or Shakespeare or Kafka. I was critiquing the flow of the plot, the writing style, etc., and my professor and classmates would stare at me like I landed from Mars. My wise working class grandfather told me when I was a kid that I shouldn’t read the bible until I was 25 because there was too much murder and sex in it.

I read it pointing out where the points of view changed, much like you.