Posts by Danielle
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All right, how about changing 'in a broader sense' to 'in a practical if not literal sense' or 'in a societal if not legal sense' or some phrase like that? Will that satisfy the conditions of the semantics-off? :)
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LBJ's Great Society/War on Poverty acts were also, in a broader sense, civil rights laws: food stamps, Medicare, Medicaid, help with higher education costs... it wasn't as though he treated civil rights as an afterthought. Dude seemed seriously committed to allowing poor and disadvantaged people (who often happened to be African-American) a fair shot. (I think this goes all the way back to his work for the Rural Electrification Administration, right?)
(I'm not a huge expert on presidential politics though.)
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if america was still the 50's america of smiling geeks and rescuing puppies
That's a misconception. The US in the 1950s was actually quite an anxious place, simmering with paranoia, violence and discontent. The US has also been invading places it wants something from since before it was even a country: manifest destiny. 'Same as it ever was. Same as it ever was.' </derail, sorry>
Anyway, I strenuously disagree with your assertion that music piracy is 'all part of the bigger picture' of accepting wrongdoing, up to and including warmongering. 'Downloading mp3s' isn't going to overlap with the 'killing people' section of my ethical Venn diagram at any point. Ever.
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its not a comparison
Yes, it is. You're saying that societies are more or less ethical than other societies (problematic in itself), and drawing an equivalence between starting an unjust war and music piracy, by saying that they're part of some sort of continuum. I call bullshit. Sorry.
under the piracy model I should be able to sneak out the door without leaving a tip and hold my head up high, right?
I suppose the point is that you can, in fact, choose not to tip. But most people don't stiff a waitress, because then she starves and she's really pissed off with you. Then again, waitressing is a service, and you go into a restaurant expecting to pay for service. Is music a service? Hrm. I don't really know how apt that comparison is either, but at least it's not totally nuts.
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ie its ok to invade someones country if there are a lot of people doing it.
That is an utterly ridiculous comparison.
I remember... objecting to... the american system of tipping wait staff in restaurants.
I think it's a dumb system too, but I hope you tipped. They don't get a living wage otherwise.
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... as bad as the sight of Natalie Portman naked in The Darjeeling Limited ...
Good lord, man - speak for yourself! 8-)
Belatedly: I was cool with seeing her naked, but I kind of wanted to kick Wes Anderson's ass for making her character into an imitation Jean Seberg. We've all seen A Bout de Souffle, Wes...
(The film itself was better than the short. But I am an Anderson fangirl. He could do that 'slo-mo shot with a 60s pop song playing' thing in every single film until the year 2525 and I'd still love it.)
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I love how 'concerned' Republicans are about Obama's foreign policy experience. You see, seven years ago George W. had, uh, been to Mexico for a visit and governed Texas, so he was clearly the ultimate Citizen of the World. No one on the Democratic side this go-round could possibly match him! Feh.
Incidentally, James, the implication you made in your last post with the scrotum/vagina remark - that Clinton is not appropriately feminine and you do not consider her hot enough to be a sexual object? - well, that's reeeeeeeally sexist. Awesome.
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Hugely impressive.
And bleak. Whew. As I was watching it I thought 'this is so wonderfully grim that I'm actually exhilarated by it!' It was a weird feeling.
If you eat duck for Christmas, you don't have to worry about it drying out. You *do* have to worry about all the duck fat clogging your arteries, though.
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Merry Chrimble, as the four lads from Liverpool used to say on their fanclub records. I became reacquainted with brandy cream today and I've decided to put it on everything from now on. Even salad.
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Huh. Everyone's sensing spirits and energy and shit, and I'm wandering, apparently obliviously, through the world without noticing a damn thing out of the ordinary. I feel so boring. I wonder if the spirits are smacking themselves on their foreheads when they see me coming? 'Oh, here's Obtuse Dumbass again! No use trying to get through to *her*.'