Don’t Like: The New York Post’s Decision To Post Erin Andrews Spy Video Pictures and Including A Distasteful Cartoon As Well

(note: this is not page with the picture… I’m not going to do that)

Ragging on a rag like The New York Post (eh, get it?) seems like a waste of time. It’s a nonsense paper, with a nonsense agenda, designed to make money, and it does. Fine.

I’m also not here to get political. That would be pointless. Dismissing a sensationalist paper for it’s politics completely misses the point as they are inherently designed to piss people off or go the extra step out of bounds on a given angle (politically speaking of course). Does it potentially have a negative effect? Sure. Do I like that so many people read it? No. It’s just doesn’t make sense to rail against this because it’s an inherent reality of the mud slinging business. And most of their gossip rag stuff is completely trashy, but appropriately trashy in the larger sense. In other words it’s exactly the kind of nonsense you’d expect to find in any magazine like that.

So then The Post went along the other day and ran a story on page 1 referencing the now unfolding and infamous Erin Andrews story. If you have not heard, the ESPN sideline reporter was recently filmed with a peephole camera as she was changing in her hotel room. It is a significant offense. Highly illegal. And rotten to the core. Honestly, I did not find that it happened that surprising. Erin Andrews has a vehement, vocal, and often juvenile fan base, stemming from the fact that she is an attractive, capable woman and is a member of the sports world, particularly college sports. That lends itself to a certain kind of attention. She is also a decent sideline reporter (my qualms are more with actually sideline reporting and not her performance itself). The problem with having this kind of celebrity-like admiration is that she also a sideline reporter and NOT a giant celebrity with security and protection and all the like. Honestly, I’ve worried for her safety in a variety of situations.  Sure, she seems tough and no nonsense and all that good stuff; she’s probably perfectly capable of taking care of her self… but still. I worried about, I dunno, something like this.

Most of the major papers have and simply abstained from referencing the story all together… but The Post? They ran an article about her outrage… including a screenshot from the video (a barely censored one).

This is absolutely deplorable.

More than than that it is actually illegal. They are posting a pic which was from an illegally shot video. Admittedly, I do not know the finer points of the law concerning this issue, but I know that that kind of act is illegal and grounds for legal action. The Post have since taken it down on the website version of their paper. But probably more because people are pissed (even within their regular readers). This sentiment is also not to imply that I, or some of the people who complained, are some kind of prude or believe that sexuality has no place in modern media. Who can’t understand why a lot of people would want to see a naked video of someone famous? Particularly an attractive famous person.  It’s just that I recognize the inherent difference of a video obtained through such incredibly dishonest and violating means. Not helping matters is that some people are confusing the release of this video with the “release” of some other famous celebrity videos; they don’t understand what the big deal or difference is and why this video can’t legally be posted.

There isn’t even a comparison. Those videos were released with pre-made deals and financial compensation. It was planned. This video was not.

Which leads to something else The Post happened to do in that edition of the paper. They printed this cartoon.

There are three possible meanings you can take from this cartoon. The first is that modern corporate/celebrity culture uses sex and personal stuff to sell sell sell. Which would be valid. But that would be giving a lot of credit. See the problem is those 5 blatant ESPN signs, which means the second possible meaning and perhaps most obvious is that ESPN planned or wanted this video to come out. Or is somehow glad. Which is malicious and implies they are a morally bankrupt organization… which I find to be anything but the case for the company. It also completely discounts the fact they’ve been running around like crazy suing websites and LEGITIMATELY trying to shut it down. If anything ESPN has been the one major sports coverage unit that has really, and truly tried to abstain from sexualizing sports. They consider themselves a family network. They really do and seperates themselves from Fox Sports, which has no qualms about doing so (the great irony of this being that Fox sports is 1000 times more likely to have the kind of behavior/viewpoint shown in this cartoon). The third meaning, and most offensive, is that Erin Andrews was in on it. Which if that is the intent, is probably the most heinous, sexist, cynical, violating tone I can think of for a situation like this.

Once again… this is absolutely deplorable.

Yes the cartoon probably falls under free speech and probably has the legal standards to run… but then I have the right under free speech to say this probably should never have seen publication and if I ran a paper it wouldn’t… ever.

This sounds like I’m getting all high and mighty and holier than thou… I know… I’m sorry. True, should I expect anything less from society? Is this really THAT big a deal? I’m not sure. But sometimes I get tired of being cynical. I get tired of just ignoring shitty behavior just because humans are inclined to be shitty sometimes. But every once and awhile it’s okay to call a duck a duck. Their actions are egregious. It deserves to be called out.

In response to the whole affair, ESPN has blacklisted any Post reporters from their coverage and removed their access to any ESPN broadcast. This will have an immediate effect on their coverage and will hopefully hurt them financially.

But for Erin Andrews, in a perfect world, she would sue for posting the picture and defamation of character for the cartoon. She has a legit claim with the picture, but the cartoon claim would be thrown out under free speech. And since the post is part of the News Corp empire the history of two mega corporations suing each other tells us that it would be so bogged down in various stalls and litigation as to be a complete waste of time.

So in the end, ESPN made the right call.

For me, the whole thing has no effect, really.

I will continue to never read The Post.

Like: Overblown Opening Day/Week Baseball “Stories”

OH MY GOD! CC SABATHIA SUCKS! NEW YORK HAS WASTED 190 MILLION! TEXIERA CAN’T HANDLE THE PRESSURE! THE RED SOX ARE BETTER THAN THE RAYS THEY BEAT THEM 5-3! ELLSBURY CAN’T HIT ANYMORE!

Saying opening day results are prone to hyperbole is like saying I am using a simile right now.

Really,we shouldn’t we be better than this? But hyperbole sells papers and I even seen legit people at least addressing the issue of “well, you want to get off to a good start.” For the fans, yeah sure, whatever. But statistically speaking CC Sabathia has had many awful starts to his seasons. Last year especially and then he got it going on. Texiera is also another notoriously slow starter and yet no one seems to pay attention to these trends.

The fact of the matter is whatever seeming deduction that has come out of the last two days will be supplanted by another one once the week is out. And then another one by the end of the month. Trends will layer themselves and start to define a larger context. That’s baseball. It’s a law of averages, not the recent singular moment. Every guy goes 0-5. Every guy puts together a decent streak. The singular stuff only seems to matter in the post-season.  There’s about 160 games left so let’s wait and see how everyone shapes up.

Just started watching the Red Sox game now. Lester strikes out ANOTHER! CY YOUNG HERE HE COMES!

Don’t Like: This Asshat’s Logic on “Why Athiests’ Arguments Do Not Work”

First off he never really addresses atheist’s arguments and just makes hilarious statements and conclusions instead. But first, a qualifier!

1) I am somewhat at odds with logic. It’s is an incredibly useful tool of construction/deconstruction and often provides the crux of philosophical theory. But logic itself is not, and has never been, the definitive system for “answers,” philosophical or otherwise. The basic scientific principal of “correlation does not mean cause” prevents it so, and yet most logic depends on that being true. While it may seem that “science” as we know it was invented in the 17th-18th century, really the basic tenants have always been routed in the pillars of observation and appropriation. There’s a timelessness to those qualities, just as their is a timelessness to logic, but they are interdependent on one another and have always been. More so, in the age of increasing scientific propriety, observation, data collection, and technology, we have a legitimate ability to gain actual substantial answers to long theoretical questions and problems. With that, logic has become the currency of the intellectual disaffected and the occasional dead weight of lunacy.(1)

Enter this asshat.

There’s a lot of general stupidity out there with which I have absolutely no problem. I generally like to single out the most amusing or most outrageous in some kind of personal way. So like those, this guy is special (assuming he’s serious. Which I think is true. More on that later). But this seems to think he is the god of logic. But so often the problem with logic is that YOU define the variables and if you define them wrong you can go of an logic bender that leads you to a stunningly crap-tastic conclusion. So let’s go on a journey.

First off, there is his claim that Atheists don’t believe in god, because they can’t see god. He compares this to the fact that we can’t see air, but we know it’s there.  Sigh.  The obvious problem is that we can see air. You use a thing called a “microscope” (well a powerful version of one) or other scientific instruments with which we can look at and analyze the molecules that make up this “air” thing you speak of.  Even better, he then uses the comparative example of “not being able to see your own brain, yet it exists.” Well tell you what, I’ll go grab my dad’s Vietnam era machete and give a good slice across your forehead, grab a piece of your brain and show it to you before you die. Because you’re sitting and talking to a camera, yes, even you have a brain (of course this implies your sliced brain would still have visual functioning capability). See we have TANGIBLE ways of actually seeing these invisible examples you speak of. The atheist argument is dependent on the fact we currently have NO TANGIBLE ways of seeing god. (2)

The next part is equally awesome. Saying that proposition of God’s existence inherently begins as a 50/50 chance is a total falsehood.  Just because there are two possible answers, does not mean there is an equal chance of those answers being correct. It’s like saying there’s a fifty/five chance I’ll be hit by a falling lime green Boeing jet today. The odds are actually dependent on, you know, the probability of said event occurring, not the number of a possible outcomes. It is one of the most basic pillars of logic and one of the first things you learn on the subject: An either/or result does not facilitate either/or logic.

Which then brings him to the “51%” thing where he goes from his already incorrect 50/50 probility of god existing to the the long-pause-inclusive “but. there. is. evidence!… of him, existing!” deduction is high comedy. Needless to say said evidence isn’t presented and instead we’re just treated “we exist” followed by a statement which implies 100% of god existing by saying “And if he didn’t exist there would be nothing.” Just awesome. It becomes evident he has no idea where he is in his logistical timeline and is pretty much winging. Then sequeways with a sort of nice equivalent of saying science can’t prove anything “because it’s logic.” Which is oh so failsafe.

The also also best part comes right after that with “the four most evil people in history of human history” (nice repeat) were atheists… followed by the hilarious DOUBLE eyebrow raise (a kind of awesome you get me? you GET me? ATHEISTS ARE EVIL, eh?). Followed by the prefect double hand open of obviousness.

Just Killer.

The also also also best part is his other videos are even more hilarious, offensive, and culturally charged (the one on sex hurting the vagina being okay in particular), but this one highlights his logistical failures much more acutely.

Psychologically speaking, his arguments are oddly solipsistic. He is taking special care to deny almost any other singular influence on his opinions. Most like to reference and support, his logic is instead a wholly insular enterprise. It is an increasingly common behavior on the internet and something I find to be a result of 1) a disconnected society and 2) bad learning habits. But that’s all conjecture. The dude is funny to watch.

There’s a lot of belief that this guy is playing a character and these segments are a joke. Who knows? The problem is that it doesn’t pass my gut test. I look at him and it reads real even if his statements are ludicrious (a good deal of Christians seem to be just as offended by his nonsense giving them a bad name). He’s just too good the personality type. He’s simply too good at playing the self assured, withdrawn, intellectual type who is probably a libertarian, thinks no one is as smart as he is, and dismays that society does not live up to his standards. Which makes me sad… I’m going to hope he really is playing a character.

It should be said there scientific arguments/theories for god’s existence (the big bang, etc) that are at least somewhat interesting. It’s all deeply theoretical and miles away from having scientific legitimacy, but it’s still interesting and enjoy reading about it. And no, I’m not talking about intelligent design. Any scientific theory that is built on “we haven’t figured this shit out yet, so it must be god” is about as faulty in logic/science/basic life skills as you can get.

For those  questioning my motives, as everyone tends to do, I really don’t have a stake in the answer. I might believe in God, but I lean sort of atheist. I’m not sure. I just know that I care about the methods we use to come up with “answers”, because often the methods inform the answers themselves.

Addendum

1- This statement however does ignore the problems created by conflicting data and the mass amounts of misinformation.

2- There are some interesting theories, which I address a bit at the end above.

Like: The Geek Heirarchy

Warning. Do not try to read this. Click on link below.

THE GEEK HEIRARCHY CLICK HERE FOR BIG VERSION YOU CAN ACTUALLY READ

What is the most wonderful thing about the Geek heirarchy? It’s unflagging accuracy. There isn’t a single thing I can find wrong with it in the way of discourse. It’s a wonderful achievement in the annals of fanboy and geek semantics. It also belittles your potential interests! Either way. Just great stuff.

It’s also completely hilarious.

Props go to K. for alerting me to this many moons ago.

and remember, we’re official: www.stuffilikeandstuffidontlike.com YAY!

Hate With The Passion Of A Thousand Suns: That For Some Reason I’m Too Dim To Figure Out My Favorite Website No Longer Can Be Displayed At My Work

I fury knows no bounds. I am seething rage.

Look. I don’t abuse my internet privleges at work. I check emails. It check out favorite sites (the onion, espn, etc) when I take breaks.

My particular favorite site is a movie site called www.chud.com.  It stands for Cinematic Happenings Under Development and is a reference to the old (awesome) horror movie.

And for some reason. It’s not fucking working anymore. On any server.

Granted the site is so filled with ads and nonsense I’m sure that my updated browsers think it’s an attack site of some sort. And it’s not “blocked by websense” which I inadvertently get sometimes when I click emailed blind(er) links. But this is just uncalled for. It’s a movie/video game website with a bit of snark, intelligence, and similar test.

In the words of Belle and Sebastian, “Fuck this shit.”

remember, we’re official! http://www.stuffilikeandstuffidontlike.com/

Like: Flow Charts, and Flow Chart Humor

Flow Charts are awesome. And Hilarious. For some reason I couldn’t find all my favorite ones, but here are ones that at least explain what I’m talking about. Not hilarious, but you get it. My all time favorite is the Geek Heirarchy, but that will be saved for a later post. Here is a hyper involved one: driving-test

Not hilarious, but you get it. My all time favorite is the Geek Heirarchy, but that will be saved for a later post.

Here is a hyper involved one:

Don’t Like: How The Office Sucks This Season

The Office totally sucks this season.

A lot of people say this type of thing about a show at some point and often their reasons aren’t wholly sound. They are often unfounded, unexplained, and instead based on some weird vague feeling they have. This is understandable, but here, I will attempt to explain just why The Office has sucked this season.

The show started off in its early seasons with an excellent format (and proven in the UK). Michael was the ridiculous jerk with an air of being pathetic. Dwight was too just in a more survivalist bent. Jim/Pam had the emotional resonance. Then at the start of season 4, in an effort to keep from getting stale Jim/Pam got together and the emotional conflicts transferred over to Michael and (better yet) Dwight.  It was all done rather well too. Michael’s relationship deteriorated hilariously with Jan, followed by the arrival of Holly and their unspoken perfectly suited love. Dwight’s relationship with Angela came to a crashing halt and as a result, there we were wholly empathizing with a broken-hearted Dwight (even at his most bullish times, the sign of great writing). Meanwhile, Jim and Pam were the constants; together and happy and immediately ready to play off others at a moments notice. Jim and Dwight had this nice little building arc where they were acting like (fighting) brothers. Pam was becoming more confident. To top it off the entire season finale was one of the best episodes of the show(1) that set up so many great dynamics for the season to come. It was great.

Then came this season. It was full of constant false starts, pre-mature endings, misleading development, backtracking, erroneous details, and over the top behavior (even by office standards).

Michael – rather than have a nice slow burn and build-up Michael just decides he doesn’t want anything to do with Jan’s baby (she disappears) and then pretty much gets  Holly immediately (and they start doing it). There really isn’t much to the relationship. Worse, like three episodes later, Holly is transferred to Nashua because the relationship was undeclared and rather than have any kind of leniency in this, it’s just thrown at it so quickly. It’s like she had to go to do some other show.  It rendered everything completely meaningless. Since that moment Michael has been languishing without purpose or interest. In the last two-part episode we are finally promised a reunion, only to be hit with another false start. She’s not there and only a crappy device leaves things up in the air. It was a waste of time.

Toby – after leaving the show, Toby shows up like 4 episodes later. The moment of his return was pretty amusing, but again, the whole arc is rendered pointless.

Ryan – Ryan comes back for a few episodes. It is also pointless(2).

Dwight/Angela/Andy – so Dwight and Angela start doing it pretty much at the start of the season. we go from empathizing with Dwight to pretty much recognizing him and Angela as be straight up dicks. only Andy remains interesting. What’s more is the cheating just goes on for half a season with nothing brewing. It’s static and Andy just comes off as pathetic.

Jim/Pam – this is the real offender. In an effort to have some kind of plot for them(3), week after week they are thrown into some kind of episodic complication: Them being apart. Her being at school. Her parents divorce. Jim secretly spending all their money on a house. The list goes on and on. And while they could use this to build and texture their relationship, every single episode ends with a “Nope! They’re perfect together!” moment that almost serves to undermine the very drama they attempted to create(4). It’s wholly inane. People liked Jim and Pam because they identified with their longing. Now, who identifies with two people being perfect for each other. Forgive the personalizing, but I’ve found the love of my life and never do we have the “oh well, we’re perfect for each other!” resolution to our problems. That’s because it’s not a relate-able phenomenon. That’s not how human beings work. It’s a how a bunch of writers approach a situation where they don’t want to mess up their two main characters, they don’t want to overly dramatize it, and they don’t want to do anything brave  It’s a complete and total freaking cop out. Their drama is nothing but red herrings.

Jim – I’ve kind of been saying this for awhile, but this season confirms it: Jim is secretly a dick. Why does he behave the way he does and make the choices he does? He’s a paper salesmen in Scranton and he has a completely ‘holier than thou’ attitude towards everyone in the office. He’s thinking he’s just responding to people’s ridiculousness, but instead he’s just mean. Seriously, watch this season’s episodes again with that perspective. It’s amazing.  His asides are not so much “is this really happening?” and more “can you believe these assholes?” It’s really weird. The best way to legitimize this claim I’m making is to look at the UK Office and just how incredibly Tim used the same kind of character. Tim was a loser and recognized it. He hated his position in life and it just so happened that Dawn was there to brighten up his days (he basically articulates this exact phrase at some point). Sure Tim made fun of Gareth constantly and found David ridiculous. But in some ways he recognized he was one of them. He lived with his parents. He wasn’t particularly handsome or charming. He was just a funny guy. Meanwhile, Jim always had friends and seemed somewhat popular. He was kind of a cool kid. Or at least that’s how he reacts to. Why is Jim there if he dislikes it so? What is preventing him and Pam from going off somewhere else (5). Okay I’m running on too long and I realize a lot of this seems circumstantial. I just want more people to look at Jim with this perspective.

Angela – Yeah I get it. She likes the attention of men fighting over her. The problem is she’s just stone cold biyotch about it all, whereas when she was with Dwight before she was just a straight laced priss who had a secret adventurous side (re: human).

Kevin – even the Kevin being retarded plot line was far too short. they could have got more out of that. and then once it was over there was nothing. he harbored no ill will toward holly.

Michael’s Boss – has show up a lot more this season, but he’s mostly been a heavy and they haven’t gone anywhere with the conflict. Plus he made it seem like dwight should be fired and then nothing happened. Once again. Just weird.

The Writers – This is just complaining specifically about one episode. The characters in The Office always have a certain degree of selfish meanness (Michael/Dwight specifically), heck it’s part of the brand. I’ve tolerated it cause it was sometimes funny and because it never went over the line. There was an episode this year that went over the line. That was the episode where Michael and Dwight investigate another paper company to try and steal all their clients. Sure there was a kind commentary on the Darwinistic nature of businesses, but seriously? First they construct the nicest people you’ve ever met in your life just to have them gutted by Michael and Dwight? It’s wholly manipulative and worse it wasn’t that funny. It was conniving. It was actively mean. It drove me nuts… I realize all this makes it seem I dislike mean comedy. Nothing could be further from the truth. Seinfeld is one of my favorite shows and I like Sunny and Eastbound and Down and all the shows of that ilk. It’s just those were shows built on people doing unlikable things for comedic effect. The Office is built on empathy… so this basically means the show kicks itself in the nuts sometimes by having characters do really Seinfeldian stuff.  Look at how the Office UK handled a lot of David Brent’s behavior. It was less actively mean and more “I’m so awesome and trying to have a laugh” and he just fails.

This season has been nothing more than long list of bad decisions. Sure there’s been funny parts and little moments that have worked, but the entire season has been so disjointed…  lacking focus… somewhat annoying… crappy… not as good.

What’s worked and why they should focus on that:

Jim/Pam -only one episode worked this season and that’s when Jim and Pam had the little war over whether or not they should get a new copier or new chairs. It was perfect. Their conflict/interaction was playful, light, and more importantly real. It’s EXACTLY what they should be doing. We know they’re great together so you don’t need to keep reminding us. Just show how they deal with little relationship stuff by being funny. Not with miraculous Deus Ex Machina revelations at the end of heavy conflict building.

Michael – I feel like this one is already blown. They should have done the slow burn w/ holly, but instead it’s crapped. I say don’t bring her back till the endgame of the show and just let Michael be amusing within office contexts. (like the chair/copier episode).

Andy/Oscar – on the business trip Andy and Oscar had this great little bonding episode. And it was done in the perfect way where they stay true to their characters and we just find ways that they get along (6). Since then, nothing has come of it. Just another false start. They should revisit this kind of thing. Even if it’s just tonally.

Dwight/Angela/Andy – something has to happen here. I have no idea what. But they just have to re-empathize Dwight. Outright make Angela more apologetic (it’s necessary at this point) and then de-patheticize Andy. You don’t have to redifine these charcters, you just have to tone down their extremes and help get them to a kind of stasis.

To the writers of the office… in conclusion, do better.

Endnotes:

1- including the greatest line of the series, when Holly (thinking kevin is retarded) proceeds to help him count out change for the vending machine. As she helps Kevin sort out the coins in his hand she and points to one and clarifies for him “…that’s a button.” I nearly shit my pants.

2- I’m not saying that there has to even be a super-logical point to it. There should be a comidic point to it. And Ryan was used for very little laughs other than getting Kelly out of her relationship. Which, again, went nowhere.

3- Which we establish from the season before, is not wholly necessary. They’re good constants.

4- key word being attempted.

5- besides being on the show. Which writers should never work themselves into.

6- the perfect example is during Pam’s art show in season 3. No one likes her art. She’s seriously sad. Michael shows up and is his usual officing loving self and loves her drawing of the office. Pam is genuinely touched. it was a great moment that was totally in sync with their characters. The ensuing “chunky” line was a perfect example of how to alleviate the emotion too with some humor.

Don’t Like: “Freaxxx” By Brokencyde

Just wow.

This monstrosity has been floating around the blogosphere lately and perhaps for good reason. I wasn’t going to say anything at first. Most of the commentary has been along the lines of “sign of the apocolypse” and “fall of western civilization… but over the last 24 hours I’ve become a little bit obsessed.

See this isn’t just your usually stupidity. This is special.

Strangely, the questions begin with the haircuts. How does someone get that haircut who isn’t a Japanese teen five years ago? They aren’t even fallout-boy-at-least-definable-by-physics-bad. What possesses someone to be that incredibly outrageous with their hair? It’s amazing. Who likes that?

Then there is, you know, the actual music. I mean, what? Apparently they have combined screamo and crunk. And appear to have done so by yelling intermittently at periods of their crunk song. For no apparent reason. Also the stunning acne. I imagine this is preventative to stardom, but what the hell do I know. I just know it illicits a gutteral response of “yick”. Then there’s the name “brokencyde” a weird mashup of a bunch of other band names that somehow make more active or relative sense than this one. It’s a kinda desperate name at that. I imagine some bad late 70’s high school band naming themselves “Led Sabbath” and that seems akin to this. But this is all the surface-y stuff. It’s like not liking frida because she has a unibrow. Actually it’s not like that all. You might not be able to judge a book by its cover, but in this case it would have been really, really helpful.

Obviously, the music sucks. Not even enjoyable on some ironic level. It’s harsh and loopy and not in a pleasing way. The lyrics spare no subtext like mongol hordes spared no village. It’s audacious in some ways really. “Let’s fuck on the dance floor! Right now!” is the effective gist. Sure, it’s juvenile to a fault, but the members of this seem so inandated with their own awesomeness and not in a “our subculture actually values this” kind of way that allows me to put a lot of rap video’s excesses off the hook. There’s nothing “awesome” really happening. The range rover, the benz, the pathetic red plastic cups, the tiny party of 7 girls obviously conned into this somehow. It’s all  longing to be something it terribly isn’t.

But the truly amazing part comes at around 1:50 where there is a sudden, dramatic 180 switch and the boys proceed to yell “LIAR!” at the girls and pantomime choking a Jamie-Lynn Spears lookalike. The juvenile behavior at this point reaches absurdity. Little are they aware, but the action profiles the insane, deeply rooted problem of young boys trying to “get chicks”. They espouse their sexual prowess (in reality, obviously lacking) and regard women as nothing more than vacant fuck puppets (that’s the nicest way I could put it), but their fragility is SOOOOOOOO transparent that they scream LIAR! WHORE! at a moments notice. You hurt their feelings you see!

It’s all so wonderfully poetic. They completely emasculate their own amazing bullshit.

And look. I’m not someone who gets up on a soap box and bitches about every little indignation (well. actually that’s exactly do in this blog. but not in real life… or… um LOOK OVER THERE! [runs away]). Most of the time you watch a bad late 90s rap video and kinda laugh it off. There’s kind of an aloof charm, or slickness to that stuff and a lot of other music videos in general that make it all at least OK.

“Freaxxx” is fallout and effect of all that I guess; a couple of lame ass tards’s interpretation of the baser ends of pop-culture, complete with the more transparent evidence of about 14 different aspects of arrested maturation and development.  They are WELL within date-rapist territory. In short, these fuckers have problems… and I’m guessing they’re not alone.

My friend Ken had some nice input too after I sent it to him: “Way to loop and lip-synch to your own emo scream while filming against a backdrop of a McMansion development.  I like how the lead “vocalist” is the only one who appears to be having a good time.  The actively-disinterested blonde dancer is perhaps my favorite element of the video.  The strained novelty of the dancing pig-suit gentleman is another excellent touch. It is really and truly a tragedy that the Midwest has been dragged kicking and screaming into popular culture by the internet.”

Don’t Like: That Amazon.com had the GALL to recommend a Full-Screen version of a movie to me

Do you even know me Amazon.com?

You’re usually so good, if not prolific and accurate, with your emails. You reminded me when the new season of How I Met Your Mother went on sale. You offer me 50 percent off my favorite awful movies that I have no business buying and usually do. I got my mom that scarf that one time.

But then you ONLY recommend a full-screen edition of movie? I always filter our full-screen editions. I have no time for the stupid BS of Full-screen editions. “Know what would be great? If we took this beautiful movie and cut out half the shit on screen. That’ll be awesome and I’m sure it won’t effect the integrity of what’s on screen, nor the work of hundreds of people that went into the parts that are missing[watches]. Why are two people talking but I only see their hands and a big space between them?”

God.

It’s like they never read this: http://www.theonion.com/content/node/30231

So just forget it amazon.com… we had something special. And you ruined it.

And for your information, I HATED the Sex and the City movie.

Endnotes:

1.The TV show was really good though

2. “Gall” has the best webster’s definition ever: “brazen boldness coupled with impudent assurance and insolence”

Don’t Like: Metacritic

So here’s what metacritic is if you don’t know: It’s a website that takes reviews (including ones that don’t give any kind of “rating”) and finds the average scores of those ratings and positive/negative sentiments to give the most average and fair score to that film/album/dvd/show/what have you.

Sounds perfectly fair, right?

Except the system has a lot of problems. I don’t know how they put it all together but many of the results are… suspect. I think it may have to do with how each medium approaches its criticism but let’s get specific.

The chief offender is easily, easily, easily music.

Here’s the top 16 for 2008:

1	What Does It All Mean? 1983-2006 Retrospective by Steinski		2008	90
2	London Zoo by The Bug		2008	90
3	Fed by Plush		2008	89
4	For Emma, Forever Ago by Bon Iver		2008	89
5	Dear Science, by TV On The Radio		2008	88
6	Fleet Foxes by Fleet Foxes		2008	87
7	Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!! by Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds		2008	87
8	Robyn by Robyn		2008	86
9	Hercules And Love Affair by Hercules And Love Affair		2008	86
10	Fortress by Protest The Hero		2008	86
11	Rook by Shearwater		2008	85
12	Life…The Best Game In Town by Harvey Milk		2008	85
13	Third by Portishead		2008	85
14	Stay Positive by The Hold Steady		2008	85
15	Laulu Laakson Kukista by Paavoharju		2008	85
16	Harps And Angels by Randy Newman		2008	85

Now I like music. A lot. I like a lot of weird shit. I went to metafilter to specifically see if there was anything I didn’t know about which was pretty good. I do this about every 6 months or so. And this time I was like “that’s it, I’ve had it.” The top twelve on this list are pure balls. Seriously I in depth listened to all of them and there wasn’t anything good. The only things I kind of liked were stuff after that and things I already had like Portishead, The Hold Steady. Look, music is ultra super subjective. Moreso than the other mainstream artforms. It just is. And trying to critically rate it all just doesn’t work in the metacritic system. Look across the board,  everything gets the “green light” rating of being good. Unlike the other mediums where getting something in the green is rare. Plus it tends to overskew bad metal bands that get big love from metal magazines. Don’t get me wrong, I likes me some metals but damn Protest the Hero sucks. Bah, it makes me too angry.

Their movie scores are much less offensive, but often your favorite movie can get lost in the shuffle. Strongly mixed critical reactions are often a symbol of brave filmmaking. My favorite film so far this year “Towelhead” rated a 57. Why? Because I imagine it was so hard/uncomfortable for some critics to watch. And that becomes a huge detriment for this intensely brave and well-made movie which is tackling societal taboos and the mixed messages we send young girls. Show me a “universally adored” movie and I’ll show you a Titanic. Yeah, you go back and watch that piece of poop recently? God that was bad.

Oddly enough there is one form of media where metacritic system excels.

Video games?!?!?! Yup. Their culminations of reviews are surprisingly spot on. Universal adortation of video game is easily possible because gamers are such a specific audience. Everyone who goes to a movie doesn’t understand mise en scene. But everyone who plays video games frequently gets the subtleties of game play. So metacritic works so well for my gaming purchases purpose. Just fantastic stuff.

*shit, sorry all. I like TV on the Radio a lot. I should have mentioned that but forgot. I stand by the rest.

**double shit, I like Nick Cave and the bad seeds too.

***i more though the bug, plush, robyn, hercules and the love affair, protest the hero, and shearwater really, really, REALLY sucked.