@Derek Pegritz: I think you and corpore-metal had better breakdance fight over this one.
I'm startled by the cynicism in this post, Annalee. As rhmoon noted below, it's not like space travel was somehow a wide-open option for everyone before privatization. Right now only billionaires get to travel into space. If SpaceX and Virgin Galactic succeed, within the next decade space will be opened up to the upper-upper-middle class ($200,000 a trip?).
I'm not saying it's going to be perfect, I'm just baffled by your tone. We all knew it was either going to be a flag or a logo emblazoned on the side of a spaceship, why is one worse than the other?
I'm not saying it's going to be perfect, I'm just baffled by your tone. We all knew it was either going to be a flag or a logo emblazoned on the side of a spaceship, why is one worse than the other?
Two points:
1. I'm a dude and NYC goofed up my drivers license, so it says "Sex: F." I managed to get discounts by asserting that I was female, despite all evidence to the contrary. No one demanded to see genitalia.
2. The "Ladies Night makes economic sense and brings in men" argument doesn't hold water. I think bars should be allowed to have Ladies Night and have no problem with it, but on the right of the bar to do what it wants and invite who it wants. My issue is that if a bar held a "White Ladies Night" or a "Gay men's night" people might get rather upset.
Why is Ladies Night an acceptable economic incentive, but other forms of incentive would not be?
1. I'm a dude and NYC goofed up my drivers license, so it says "Sex: F." I managed to get discounts by asserting that I was female, despite all evidence to the contrary. No one demanded to see genitalia.
2. The "Ladies Night makes economic sense and brings in men" argument doesn't hold water. I think bars should be allowed to have Ladies Night and have no problem with it, but on the right of the bar to do what it wants and invite who it wants. My issue is that if a bar held a "White Ladies Night" or a "Gay men's night" people might get rather upset.
Why is Ladies Night an acceptable economic incentive, but other forms of incentive would not be?
Two questions:
1. For the ladies who've experienced low libidos on hormonal BC, would you take a libido enhancer if it was available/safe/cheap?
2. If a male Pill ever comes out and turns out to lower libido, will that be seen as negative as it is for women to have low libido?
Can we please give Effen some credit for at least being funnier than FCUK?
@Unquoth The Raven: Silverlake. LA requires more armor than Pike's Place.
Kenneth Branagh was upset he couldn't be Thor, so he made sure Thor looked like him. So. Damn. Excited.
@BearDownCBears: *golf clap* Way to resurrect that meme.
What I want to see is some sort of meta-movie where all of Kurt Russel's amazing characters are blended into one super anti-hero. McCready + Plissken + Soldier + Jack Burton + Stuntman Mike + O'Neil + Wyatt Earp + Cash = yes please.
@JinxyMcDeath: The crazy part is that the Van Gogh/Dutch cartoons were months/years old when the whole controversy first erupted.
It isn't the violation itself, but the radical clerics/imams who fan the flames. No one in the Muslim community really notices but a few loons who whip their followers into a froth.
The bigger question: can Mohammad still use the power of fire from within his bear costume?
Mohammad is shown all the time...in syndication.
Utility and violence have never been more perfectly intertwined.
Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends has a time machine and aliens and there are often dragons in the Fractured Fairy Tales. Count it.
BSG survived the writer's strike as did Lost. The problem is that the networks want an easy solution, but stupid sci-fi doesn't fly. The nerds don't like it and the plebes don't get it, so no one is happy. Mediocre crime dramas work, mediocre sci-fi does not.
Brendan Fraser is gonna be piiiiiissed.
@JilliefromChile: I'm not minimizing the feelings of men who were unwillingly circumcised, I'm contrasting them to women who were unwillingly circumcised or forced to carry a pregnancy to term. The latter are the more significant issues of bodily autonomy.
FGM is destructive whether it is done with a scalpel or shard of glass. There is no arguable benefit to the practice.
@librisdraconis: Agreed. Scars do exist and the circumcision operation can go wrong, causing significant, permanent damage. The option to be circumcised is the preferred situation.
My comment's original intent was to acknowledge that circumcision is indeed a matter of bodily autonomy, but one of significantly less importance than those affecting women, like FGM and abortion.
@slowpoke.r: The word is "cut." As a person with tattoos and a heaping helping of piercings, I too speak from experience. The foreskin is cut off the penis surgically. My skin was tattooed and pierced by needles.
We wouldn't say a person is mutilated when he or she has his or her appendix taken out. We would say that person had surgery.
Mutilate and maim carry connotative meanings of damage, violence, and disfigurement. I do not believe circumcision meets those conditions.
@JilliefromChile: I never claimed to be, nor do I cite my friend as proof of my case. My point is that abortion, hell, even female circumcision, is an issue of bodily autonomy orders of magnitude more serious than male circumcision in every way.
Like I said, I would have preferred the option.
@morninggloria: All I could picture is Alan Rickman in Dogma. "Angels are ill equipped."
