Cancer Posted January 2, 2019 Report Share Posted January 2, 2019 Japan is leaving the International Whaling Commission and will (openly) resume commercial whaling in July. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Liaden Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 I suppose we can at least give them credit for finally being honest about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 Yeah, well, those Whale Wars idiots from a few years ago did a good job of making the whalers look better with their cheap shenanigans. And I loath saying that about the whalers. Duke Bushido 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Liaden Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 I see too many people trying to absolve themselves of guilt for the bad they do, by claiming someone else does worse. I'm not saying that's what you're doing, Badger. But nothing radical environmentalists did justifies Japan conducting decades of commercial whaling in violation of international agreements their own government signed. Their excuse of "scientific research" was so transparent as to be almost pornographic. I guess by openly acknowledging their intentions, Japan has moved one rung up the ethics ladder from the bottom. pinecone, Christopher and Cygnia 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 1 hour ago, Lord Liaden said: I see too many people trying to absolve themselves of guilt for the bad they do, by claiming someone else does worse. I'm not saying that's what you're doing, Badger. But nothing radical environmentalists did justifies Japan conducting decades of commercial whaling in violation of international agreements their own government signed. Their excuse of "scientific research" was so transparent as to be almost pornographic. I guess by openly acknowledging their intentions, Japan has moved one rung up the ethics ladder from the bottom. Yeah, we agree, I by no means am absolving anyone of guilt. I tend to have a bone to pick with radicals who engage in pseudo-terrorism, using "saving the environment" as a blanket justification is all. (the whaling issue reminded me of those fools is all) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 It must be noted that the Rainbow Warrior was bombed by the French secret service with loss of life by orders of French President Francois Mitterand, though not for the anti-whaling activities but for anti-nuclear testing activities. The only (human) loss of life was performed by a government, not "terrorists". This gets political quickly, though. Duke Bushido 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cygnia Posted January 5, 2019 Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 Comcast Voice-Remote Rejects "Dick Van Dyke" Search: "I Cannot Handle That Type of Language" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Posted January 5, 2019 Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 6 hours ago, Cygnia said: Comcast Voice-Remote Rejects "Dick Van Dyke" Search: "I Cannot Handle That Type of Language" "Ah, my old Nemesis - Context" - unknown Voice Recognition Programmer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hermit Posted January 5, 2019 Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 https://www.npr.org/2019/01/05/682314361/freed-from-copyright-these-classic-works-are-yours-to-adapt About time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 5, 2019 Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 15 hours ago, Cygnia said: Comcast Voice-Remote Rejects "Dick Van Dyke" Search: "I Cannot Handle That Type of Language" 9 hours ago, Christopher said: "Ah, my old Nemesis - Context" - unknown Voice Recognition Programmer. A version of the Scunthorpe Problem, though I first encountered the issue when trying to mention Toppenish in a discussion of the Lower Yakima Valley in a travel forum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted January 5, 2019 Author Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 14 hours ago, Christopher said: "Ah, my old Nemesis - Context" - unknown Voice Recognition Programmer. Quote Matilda Wormwood: It's not trash, daddy. It's lovely. Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Harry Wormwood: Moby WHAT? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duke Bushido Posted January 5, 2019 Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 On 1/3/2019 at 1:45 AM, Cancer said: This gets political quickly, though. Not if you leave the "" off of the word "terrorists" in the given context. Sorry; I appologize. Let me state this: It has been my personal--admittedly-limited, at least outside the one I ran for a couple of decades--experience with bulletin board style forums that putting a term or phrase that refers to a particular person, group, or activity inside of quotation marks is akin to the of-recent-years highly-derogatory 'air quoutes' used in a conversational setting. Essentially, it has become more-often-than-not an intentional trigger, akin to the "prove me wrong" sign some guy did that ended up getting memed into oblivion. In this case, those who champion the Rainbow guys see it as you replacing their name with the word terrorists, and that you used them to draw attention to the fact that you have done so. This isn't the only problem, though; such a trigger produces fire from both ends of the barrel: Those who are seriously opposed to the Rainbow guys (forgive me; I'm using a phone right now, and thus I cannot simply scroll up to read the actual name the group used without automatically posting this not-yet-finished reply) will see the quotations as an unveiled sarcastic dig specifically at those who oppose the Rainbow guys, and then make the short jump to the idea that you, if not one of them (and therefore evil in their eyes), are at least a vehement supporter of their activities. Crap on a crutch! I should have opened with the explanation first; it would make the opening comment more obvious as a suggestion than an insinuation. I deeply appologize to you and anyone following along. Again, I can't scroll up to fix it without posting it. :(. At any rate, I would--as a concerned acquaintance, and not just a busy-body, mind you-- suggest that if you are truly wanting to make a non-adbersarial comment, or at least hoping that a comment won't lead to political fallout, that in the future, consider leaving the quotation marks off of labels or socio-political trigger words. Again: no hostilities: I just appreciated the stated avoidance of a degrading the conversation enough that I wanted to share something that has worked really well for me for several years. Above all else, though: have fun. Duke Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger Posted January 5, 2019 Report Share Posted January 5, 2019 Well, I referred to them as being pseudo-terrorists, which it fits in my mind to their activity. They might not seem to get people killed (or not usually) but their actions are aggressive to say the least, but most definitely could potentially could get someone killed. Not to mention their tactics are quite unethical. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unclevlad Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 There's nothing wrong with porn filtering in principle. Even with an adult monitoring, it's not that hard to have an accident happen. There's plenty of stuff you don't want a kid to see. The problem is, of course, getting the sensitivity right. "Dick van dyke" actually nails not one but two terms when they're that close together, so it's not that surprising. Me, I'm more worried about blocking access to proper sex and health education by overzealous filtering. That used to be a major problem; dunno if it still is. And parental monitoring has an issue when the kid is too embarassed to talk about it with his parents. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duke Bushido Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 6 hours ago, Badger said: Well, I referred to them as being pseudo-terrorists, which it fits in my mind to their activity. They might not seem to get people killed (or not usually) but their actions are aggressive to say the least, but most definitely could potentially could get someone killed. Not to mention their tactics are quite unethical. I don't disagree with you. In fact, I find you're lack of open quote- label-close quote structure to be far less adversarial in terms of making a statement. All I was stating in my reply was essentially "since you don't want an argument, consider not including argumentative structure in your comments as a means of helping you maintain peace." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 Yeah, usually when I use them, my intent is a YMMV type of thing (well maybe not always if I look case by case, probably, but in general) That, or how I am trying to best describe things when I lack a more accurate term. For what all that might be worth to those involved. (really, I only mentioned it because it caused merely self-reflection on my intentions throughout time on using them, than the latest topic in particular really-I know sometimes I abuse the use of "" and also ( ) for that matter ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 I admit I put "terrorist" in quotes [and the use of quotes in this sentence is in the actual quotation sense] because while I think of Greenpeace as confrontational in the extreme, they have never been in the biz of killing people for the generation of terror. While there's lots of confrontational political action groups, those that don't use indiscriminate killing (or attempts at it, or believable threats of it) as a premeditated tool fail to qualify for the label of terrorist as I understand the definition of that word. Where to draw that line is open to discussion, of course. Had the term a**hole group been used instead, I would have immediately agreed with it. Real terrorists, by that strict definition above, I'm ok with the hunt-down-and-extirpate means of dealing with them. I insist on that rigorous definition though, because it's really easy, and way too common on all sides these days, to apply that tag to lots of groups the speaker doesn't agree with, independent of the actual actions carried out by the groups. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 9 hours ago, Badger said: Well, I referred to them as being pseudo-terrorists, which it fits in my mind to their activity. They might not seem to get people killed (or not usually) but their actions are aggressive to say the least, but most definitely could potentially could get someone killed. Not to mention their tactics are quite unethical. My definition of Terrorism is: "Application of Violence or threat of Application of violence to archieve a Political goal". I have no idea wich Greenpeace action could conform to that requirement. But I know plente of cases where it does apply, includingf 9/11 and the origin of the word in France. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoloOfEarth Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 4 hours ago, Christopher said: My definition of Terrorism is: "Application of Violence or threat of Application of violence to archieve a Political goal". So, basically, every government in the world. Duke Bushido 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
death tribble Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 Obituary for Major Geoffrey Langlands. A teacher who stayed on in India and Pakistan at the behest of a local leader to teach. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-46757125 Michael Hopcroft and tkdguy 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ranxerox Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 15 hours ago, Badger said: Well, I referred to them as being pseudo-terrorists, which it fits in my mind to their activity. They might not seem to get people killed (or not usually) but their actions are aggressive to say the least, but most definitely could potentially could get someone killed. Not to mention their tactics are quite unethical. So, how do you feel about the term pseudo-rapist to describe cat-callers or pseudo-murderers to describe people who sell guns? Because I know people on the left who would be totally down with those terminologies. Using the pseudo- at the front or -like at the back of some really heinous word such as terrorist, rapist, murderer or pedophile is a tactic of demonization. It is saying that this group that you dislike is almost that other horrible group. The idea being that we should punish our newly labeled pseudo-terrorist/pseudo-murderers/pseudo-rapist almost like we punish actual terrorist, murders and rapist despite their not having terrorized murdered or raped. When activist use this tactic they are trying to be inflammatory. When government this tactic they are usually getting ready to do some sort of crack down. Both groups are trying to bend or break the truth in order to achieve an end. What I am saying is Greenpeace either is a terrorist organization or they are not. If they are not, then it is inappropriate to try to paint them as being almost terrorist because the word terrorist is much to loaded to use in that fashion. Cygnia, Bazza, Duke Bushido and 2 others 3 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Starlord Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 So when I was young I had heard of the word 'suede' because of the Elvis song Blue Suede Shoes. Then one day I was reading a D&D supplement or module or some such and came across a really cool new monster: the Pseudo-Dragon. For some reason, I decided they were pronounced 'Swaydo-Dragons' and referred to them as such until I was laughed out of a D&D session a few months later. I have to catch myself calling them 'Swaydo-Dragons' to this day. Thanks for letting me get that out, please continue. L. Marcus, Duke Bushido, Christopher and 2 others 3 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 Roll your own Suede Dragon monsters and you could still get the last laugh.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 They certainly chafe a lot less than the scaly kind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 6, 2019 Report Share Posted January 6, 2019 Hmm, garment dragons, a whole new regime. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts