Jake

Idle Thumbs 176: The Classic Alien Form

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One of the things I loved as a Canadian kid in elementary was going to a fairly nearby maple tree forest for field trips every year. Maple syrup on snow is super delicious! Other than that I don't care about it.

Great cast, it was cool to have Anita on the show!

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Your posts aren't really making it seem any less weird to me, unfortunately.

 

Knowing what you know about China, weird would be if China didn't censure media into their country.  That's why Homefront and Crysis used North Korea as enemies instead of the Chinese.  Battlefield 4 uses China as the enemy and as such is banned in China.

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Dear Danielle, how awful is it that the queue reorganization after the introduction of Fastpass has ruined the ability of today's youths to be able to engage in knowledgeable arguments about the left vs right sides of Space Mountain?

Also yes I have also had the same "oh we're going on vacation!" "ooh, where are we going?!" "Disney!!" "....oh. again? well, that'll be fun. I guess." conversation with my parents.  (Joke's on me, I guess, since I've been back there like 6 times on my own.)

 

Also this whole discussion prompted me to go try to track down my Walt Disney World Forever CDs, so thanks for that.  (In the late 90s they had these kiosks where you could pick a bunch of park music (including like incidental background music, stuff that hadn't been released on any CDs and would likely never be) and burn your own CD which was super great as a kid who had been there Too Many times. Unfortunately they didn't have everything, some of the track names were relatively vague, and they'd cap you off at 10 tracks.  I remember one of mine, I picked a track titled "Walt Disney World Railroad" which was like 15 minutes long (gotta max out that CD space!!) and was all excited to have the full spiel for the railroad, but when I got home and put it in my CD player it was just 15 minutes of NOW BOARDING calls from every single station in the park. :nodance: )

 

Everything about this post is amazing.

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I'm still listening to the podcast as I type this and it's super awesome to hear Anita and the Thumbs crew geeking out on Disney and Harry Potter, if you guys are big Disney or other amusement park nerds, you might want to watch "Some Jerk With A Camera", who more or less reviews amusement rides and episodes of show that take place in amusement parks.

 

I know they've talked before about games that use many Sony motion controller, but my jaw dropped when I heard a game with TWENTY FIVE of them exists. That's probably around 1000$ worth of them unless they are cheaper in the US. 

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Okay, having listened, three things:

  • I used to think it was this great piece of surreal serendipity that Danielle came out to her mother at Disney World, but now I'm apparently finding out that Danielle's family was just always at Disney World, so it was as likely to happen there as at the kitchen table.
  • I wish the podcast had had more time to go into the problems of corporations as conservators and of preservation for profit. All three options (re-release it as is, release it bowlderized, or refuse to release it) seem intriguingly imperfect to me and I'm not really sure what my own opinion is, besides my "historian" opinion that is always, "Oh jeez, don't get rid of anything, you never know when you might need it again."
  • If anyone actually knows what Farscape episodes from the first season can be skipped while preserving the series narrative, let me know, because it's my third time through the show with a friend and I'm still at a loss for which they could be. I made it through myself way back in 2008 by watching the show with the laptop on my lap while playing Mass Effect on the TV for the nth time, which most people can't really manage. If you were wondering, they synergized pretty well, if only because Crichton is a great antidote for Shepard and his/her ilk.

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I wish the podcast had had more time to go into the problems of corporations as conservators and of preservation for profit. All three options (re-release it as is, release it bowlderized, or refuse to release it) seem intriguingly imperfect to me and I'm not really sure what my own opinion is, besides my "historian" opinion that is always, "Oh jeez, don't get rid of anything, you never know when you might need it again."

 

My issue with discarding works based on contemporary moral standards is that we would necessarily have to discard valuable pieces that played an important role in their respectives arts by virtue of their moral sensibilities of the time. Postcolonial works like Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness come to mind as examples of works that would be struck as does pretty much every work of H.P. Lovecraft.

 

I have friends who love Breakfast at Tiffany's and consider it an important work in the development of the modern American aesthetic for romantic comedy across all mediums. It's a film that won two Academy Awards, was nominated for five, was inducted into the Library of Congress' permanent collection in the National Film Registry and produced one of the most memorable themes in history of film. It also was nominated for AFI's 100 most important American films of the past century. It also happens to be incredibly racist.

 

You could say that we should only strike those works which are clearly racist and have no importance, but who exactly should make that decision? Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been accused of being overtly racist many times over the years even though it's a satirical work that was lauded not only as one of the most important works of American literature, but also an exceptionally anti-racist work especially considering the time in which it was published. Critics and authors were still disputing whether or not Huckleberry Finn was racist or not for quite literally a century.

 

Like it or not, there are many works of great cultural importance that are incredibly sexist, racist, and otherwise morally offensive today. There are undoubtedly many works that we wouldn't bat an eye at right now, which will become offensive in the future. It might seem crass and objectionable to allow corporations and what not to profit on what we consider morally objectionable, but if we start censoring works, how would we identify what is important and what is not?

 

As late as the 1960s, a bit shy of half century after Lovecraft's most productive years, critics were still maintaining that Lovecraft was just a pulp hack and that his works were of little literary worth. Today, almost a century after his first work was published, Lovecraft is largely considered one of the most influential authors of horror. Who would have been the curator and conservator for Lovecraft other than publishers and other commercial entities when his works were considered inconsequential? Who would have protected his so called pulp stories when they ceased to be socially acceptable? More importantly, if these morally offensive works were not available, what impact would it have on succeeding generations? Many authors, directors, and animators credit works that would be considered offensive today as their greatest influences, including contemporary artists such as Joyce Carol Oates and Hayao Miyazaki.

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Knowing what you know about China, weird would be if China didn't censure media into their country.  That's why Homefront and Crysis used North Korea as enemies instead of the Chinese.  Battlefield 4 uses China as the enemy and as such is banned in China.

 

I don't know, that sounds like a weird shitty practice to me.

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I appreciate that Danielle is in the same boat as me: we both have an incredible ability to learn and memorize extensive information, but only about the dumbest shit. My brain is like Wikipedia, if it were made entirely of pages like List of films featuring powered exoskeletons.

 

Also, just a weird and interesting note about racism in old cartoons: Osamu Tezuka, creator of Astro Boy among others, learned his style of cartooning from early American cartoons by Disney, Fleischer, etc. Along with the more famous trademarks like giving his characters huge eyes, he also inadvertently mimicked those cartoons' habit of giving their minority characters offensive, racist designs; seemingly because he just didn't know better. His work had a distinctly anti-racist theme, so he would have these horrible racist caricatures often be the most well-rounded and sympathetic characters in the narrative.

A good portion of his books that have been translated into English have an introductory disclaimer along the lines of the

mentioned in the episode.

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Man, I didn't consider Lovecraft when that discussion was going on. I've definitely watched a bunch of offensive portrayals in cartoons, and they don't really bother me at all. I dunno what it is about them, but they seem toothless in a way. Uh, this is excluding Song of the South, which I either haven't seen or don't remember. Lovecraft on the other hand, hit me really hard when I attempted to read it. I'm not really a stranger to reading older fiction and coming across racist thought processes and language (because that's most older fiction). However, I often come across those works from an academic standpoint, and they're framed with that stuff in mind. However, on the internet, the discussions of Lovecraft's work and derivative work that I was engaged in was completely separated from that aspect. All I heard about his work was a deep respect for his take on horror using these powerful creatures whose indifference towards man is so potent as to be malicious while the people discovering them struggle with their minds in trying to comprehend them. So, I was crushed when I attempted to read my first Lovecraft in a little anthology from the library, to find that it's also couched in this deeply racist and hateful viewpoint. I still haven't read any of his stuff.

 

I was already thinking it's valuable to show works that are from a time when extremely offensive portrayals were more widely accepted, so that we have a good sense of history, but bringing up Lovecraft just intensifies that desire. I still enjoy Lovecraft-derivative works and love those his horror concepts, but I think being able to separate that from other sensibilities in his work to the point that you can enjoy and espouse it without ever engaging in it is extremely disingenuous.

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If the goal is to mature the critical ability of the society at large, but with the caveat of existing inside of late capitalism, then the Warner Brothers solution of preserving and distributing media from a gross past with the "hey, this is from an ideologically fucked up era, so keep that in mind" preamble is probably as good as we're going to get. I'd prefer the full archives be free and available online under public commons, but whatever, the fight for open access to historical materials is the concern of the public, not the businesses that hold the rights.

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What a cool idea to invite Anita. I respect her a lot.

 

I know talking over each other is Idle Thumbs style, and it works when everyone is doing it while still respecting each other. I think that especially before the break Anita had problems with that. There were two or three points at which I would have appreciated her not being interrupted. Perhaps I am the only one who had this impression... in any case, it got better in the second half.

 

It would be great to have her back, perhaps at a time when the internet has calmed down a little bit. I can't escape context when listening to her. It made me add a lot of layers that I wish weren't there. It would be great to hear more from Anita the cool person who is a feminist instead of Anita Sarkeesian the Feminist at the Center of an Internet Battle.

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What a cool idea to invite Anita. I respect her a lot.

 

I know talking over each other is Idle Thumbs style, and it works when everyone is doing it while still respecting each other. I think that especially before the break Anita had problems with that. There were two or three points at which I would have appreciated her not being interrupted. Perhaps I am the only one who had this impression... in any case, it got better in the second half.

 

It would be great to have her back, perhaps at a time when the internet has calmed down a little bit. I can't escape context when listening to her. It made me add a lot of layers that I wish weren't there. It would be great to hear more from Anita the cool person who is a feminist instead of Anita Sarkeesian the Feminist at the Center of an Internet Battle.

 

I know exactly what you mean.  I love the back and forth, excited interruption style that the Thumbs have but that can make it tricky for someone who's not used to that flow.  Its no one's fault; its just an unfortunate mix of timing and circumstance that we view it in this way.  I certainly don't think anyone was intentionally trying to cut Anita off from sharing her thoughts but it did seem a little reminiscent of current internet style debates.

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It's funny to me how these perceptions work. I think this isn't the first time Idle Thumbs have gotten criticized for talking over a guest. The Crate & Crowbar podcast has the opposite problem where every time they have a guest on people in the forums get upset over the perception that the guest is stepping all over the hosts' lines.

For my part I'll take either over that awkward Skype pause.

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Cool cool. Danielle is so ill.

 

I think when faced with these equally imperfect choices I favor "not sanitizing." Even the "free youtube" version isn't really free, they're getting that advertising money, and you've shifted the value to google as the host.

 

It's easy to recognize older, agreed upon problems and say "they shouldn't be selling this" but we can do the same, almost equally for modern works. TV & Film, broadly, is still thoroughly racist, it's just that our understanding of racist attitudes have shifted from the most obvious "shucking and jiving" to representation and opportunity. 

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Your posts aren't really making it seem any less weird to me, unfortunately.

 

Pretty much the more you learn about the Chinese government, the weirder you feel about ever traveling there or buying things from there. The fact that a government with that level of oppressive power exists in the 21st century is sickening. I'm now excited when things I buy are made in Vietnam.

 

Edit: I was also very much enjoyed how much Anita fit into the podcast. It was like she has always been on it. More guest hosts!

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I totally understand people's immediate reactions with respect to talking over people, especially when it has resonance with other parts of Anita's online life. But speaking as an Idle Thumbs host, I have never felt very comfortable with the episodes where we have a guest on and then treat that person Like A Guest, being deferential with speech patterns and so on. It just feels like a different podcast to me, not like ours. We should only have guests on who we like and enjoy as friends, who will understand that we aren't trying to silence them, we're all just letting ourselves get excited, and they have the same right.

 

Obviously if they've never been on Thumbs before this can be an adjustment. In this case I would put forth Danielle. When she was on the podcast, before she was a permanent host, we got these exact same reactions from people who felt uncomfortable about the implications of a woman coming on Idle Thumbs and then getting talked over. But as it turned out, she fit in great--so well in fact that she is now on the show all the time. I'm not saying this to foreshadow Anita becoming a host; she has her own web series already, obviously, and it's way bigger than ours. I'm just saying that, to me, it only makes sense that we treat every guest the same as we treat each other.

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Chris:

 

I totally understand people's immediate reactions with respect to talking over people, especially when it has resonance with other parts of Anita's online life. But speaking as an Idle Thumbs host, I have never felt very comfortable with the episodes where we have a guest on and then treat that person Like A Guest, being deferential with speech patterns and so on. It just feels like a different podcast to me, not like ours. We should only have guests on who we like and enjoy as friends, who will understand that we aren't trying to silence them, we're all just letting ourselves get excited, and they have the same right.

 

Obviously if they've never been on Thumbs before this can be an adjustment. In this case I would put forth Danielle. When she was on the podcast, before she was a permanent host, we got these exact same reactions from people who felt uncomfortable about the implications of a woman coming on Idle Thumbs and then getting talked over. But as it turned out, she fit in great--so well in fact that she is now on the show all the time. I'm not saying this to foreshadow Anita becoming a host; she has her own web series already, obviously, and it's way bigger than ours. I'm just saying that, to me, it only makes sense that we treat every guest the same as we treat each other.

 

 

I agree that it takes time for a guest to get used to the pacing, and Anita did towards the end.

 

However, I don't think the alternative is to treat people Like A Guest. The alternative is to sense and adjust to a person's mode of communication, to sense that a person is being interrupted often while she never interrupted anyone so far. This can happen naturally if one pays a little attention.

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I totally understand people's immediate reactions with respect to talking over people, especially when it has resonance with other parts of Anita's online life. But speaking as an Idle Thumbs host, I have never felt very comfortable with the episodes where we have a guest on and then treat that person Like A Guest, being deferential with speech patterns and so on. It just feels like a different podcast to me, not like ours. We should only have guests on who we like and enjoy as friends, who will understand that we aren't trying to silence them, we're all just letting ourselves get excited, and they have the same right.

 

Obviously if they've never been on Thumbs before this can be an adjustment. In this case I would put forth Danielle. When she was on the podcast, before she was a permanent host, we got these exact same reactions from people who felt uncomfortable about the implications of a woman coming on Idle Thumbs and then getting talked over. But as it turned out, she fit in great--so well in fact that she is now on the show all the time. I'm not saying this to foreshadow Anita becoming a host; she has her own web series already, obviously, and it's way bigger than ours. I'm just saying that, to me, it only makes sense that we treat every guest the same as we treat each other.

 

Oh yeah, I completely agree.  I didn't mean to suggest that guests should receive special treatment or anything like that.  I guess I'm projecting my own issues and frustrations onto the podcast which is really my problem and not yours so sorry about that.  In the end, I think the take away should be that having Anita on was great and it should happen again soon.

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It was Jaaaaaake why does everyone think we are the saaaaaaame....

All white dudes sound the same to me.

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All white dudes sound the same to me.

 

I was actually embarrassed for a lot of the podcast because, having not been used to hearing Anita talk except in a presentational mode, she just sounded like a less ebullient Danielle to me. I had it figured out by the end, but I was miserable there for a bit.

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