Rob's Blog

I’m reading a travelogue about a Will Ferguson’s trip hitchhiking through Japan. These bits tickled me:

“Do you have a gun?” the youngest asked, and his older brother, Toshiya, immediately chimed in, “Yes, did you ever shoot anybody?”

“No”, I said. “Only evil Americans shoot people. In Ka-Na-Da everyone lives in peace and harmony.”

It sure is great being a Canadian. You get to share the material benefits of living next door to the United States, yet at the same time you get to act smug and haughty and morally superior. You just can’t beat that kind of irresponsibility.

Quite. And this:

“Wild plates?”

“Not plates, monkeys.”

“Ah, yes,” I said. “That would make more sense.”

The words for plate (sara) and monkey (saru) sound similar in Japanese, and for some reason I can never keep them straight. Another combination that gives me trouble is “human” (ningen) and “carrot” (ninjin) which once caused a lot of puzzled looks during a speech I gave in Tokyo on the merits of internationalization, when I passionately that “I am a carrot. You are a carrot. We are all carrots. As long as we remember our common carrotness, we will be fine.”

On another occasion, I scared a little girl by telling her that my favourite nighttime snack was raw humans and dip.

I also enjoyed the way Ferguson, on observing the behaviour of monkeys that a Japanese professor had previously explained to him exhibited similar social patterns to Japanese society, “…made an important social observation of my own: Monkeys are miserable little bastards. They spent their time biting, screaming, and picking on each other.”

While I’m on the subject: Don’t learn Japanese.

Here is an example of Neal Stephenson’s writing style that illustrates why I find him so entertaining. It’s taken from Quicksilver, which is a 17th century historical romp scattered with such characters as Newton and Charles II. Here the fictional Jack Shaftoe has signed up to do battle with the Turks who are besieging Vienna, and since they have routed, is doing a spot of looting. A Polish warlord gives him a horse to look after, using him as, “a sort of flesh and blood hitching-post. Jack’s job was to stand still holding these reins until the Winged Hussar came back — all day if need be” when, “the strangest thing Jack had ever seen, certainly one for the book of Revelations: two-legged, feathered, therefore, arguably, a bird” ran past, chased by, “a small mob of infantrymen”.

The bird had gone by very fast, easily out-loping the scrambling, miserably shod pursuers. They’d never catch it. On the other hand, Jack was holding the reins of a horse, and (he began to notice) a magnificent horse it was, with a saddle the likes he’d never seen, decorated in golden thread.

It probably had not even occurred to that Winged Hussar that Jack would know how to ride. In his part of the world, a serf could no more ride on horseback than he could speak Latin or dance a minuet. And disobeying the command of an armed lord was even less likely than riding around on a horse.

But Jack was not Polish scum of the earth, barefoot and chained to the ground, or even French scum of the earth, in wooden clogs and in thrall to the priest and tax-farmer, but English scum of the earth in good boots, equipped with certain God-given rights that were (as rumor had it) written down in a Charter somewhere, and armed with a loaded gun. He mounted the horse like a lord, spun it round smartly, reached back and slapped it on the ass, and he was off. In a few moments he had ridden through the knot of men who were hoping to catch the giant bird. Their only hope had been that their prey would forget that it was being chased, and stop running. Jack had no intention of letting that happen and so he jabbed his boot-heels into his mount’s sides and lit out after the bird in a way that was calculated to make it run like hell. Which it did, and Jack gallopped after it, far outdistancing his competition. But the bird was outstandingly swift. As it ran, its wings splayed this way and that like an acrobat’s balancing-pole. Seiing into those wings from behind, Jack was reminded of decorations he’d seen in the hats of fine French gentlemen, and their mistresses, during military parades: those were the plumes of the, what’s it called the, the … the ostrich.

The reason for this merry chase was plain now: the ostrich, if caught, could be plucked, and its plumes taken to markets where fine things from exotic lands were sold, and exchanged for silver.

I noticed, while preparing this post, that Stephenson writes very economically. It was impossible to edit this quote in any way, and this was the shortest quote from this bit of the story than made sense on its own (and even then I had to introduce the setting). Stephenson makes every word, sentence and paragraph count. There is no filler here. He brings to life a battle scene in a way that dry, historical battle writing never does with its “siezing” of land and “capturing” of cities. He is aware of the importance of the development of freedom and rights that many today take for granted. And he fills his books with characters who make a living by being aware of markets and economics in general. So not only is the setting interesting, he takes interest in, and writes about, the things about it that I am interested in.

This evening I finally got around to watching the DVD I bought several months ago, Michael Moore Hates America. It was fascinating, and often moving, in particular the part in which a National Guardsman vehemently objects to Moore’s use of his injury to make points about the War in Iraq with which he does not agree.

In addition to examining Moore’s dishonesties, such as the edited Charlton Heston speech and the getting-the-gun-from-the-bank incident, the film is very introspective about the nature of documentary making and debate. After interviewing David Horowitz, Michael Wilson becomes concerned at the shrillness of the debate between left and right, with both sides often claiming that the other is evil. An interviewee says,

If we take all the shrillness out of the debate, everyone’s going to be talking like John Kerry. I mean, isn’t that shrillness one of the colours that makes the whole sport so enjoyable? [Here he launches into a sporting analogy to illustrate his point that I was too lazy to transcribe.]

What’s really funny is: I don’t think Michael Moore really does anything to help his side. I don’t think anybody that isn’t predisposed to believe in Michael Moore is going to come out of a Michael Moore film going, “you know, I never looked at it that way.”

The difference is that Michael Moore Hates America is so self-evidently honest, even to the extent of debating and agonising over its own level of honesty right there on the screen, that it will change the minds of people pre-disposed to believe in Michael Moore.

The high point for me was when another interviewee optimistically implied that everything was okay, because:

And I can guarantee you that if there was a right wing version of Farenheit 911, you know, the same reaction would be happening: “You gotta see this movie, it’s telling the truth!” [...] Since we’re seeing so many alternate ideas out there, whether it be on Fox News or CNN, and that we’re not just being served up The Truth by Walter Cronkite, it’s basically forcing us to engage; to actually think a little and not allow for people to just hand us what the truth is. And so it may actually bode well for our future that a freak like Michael Moore can, you know, he may become an unlikely American hero for instigating change.

This is very close to something I’ve often said, but never quite got around to applying to Michael Moore: Because there is bias and opinion in everything that’s ever said or written, we should apply critical thinking to everything. By being so obviously biased, Michael Moore makes that point rather well.

Related links: Two previous Michael Moore related articles: One; two.

I’m coming round to the opinion that Wife Swap (mentioned here before) is actually very good television. Having just watched an episode on ABC, I can say that the Americans have executed it with finesse.

In this episode a sun-gazing, raw-food eating, vegan PETA campaigner from Arizona swaps homes with a wife from Arizona whose family hunts and eats game. In one classic scene the husband of the hunting family comes home to find that the vegan hasn’t cooked any dinner because she “forgot” to take the meat out of the freezer. He grabs his rifle, goes outside and shoots a rabbit, which he then butchers and presents for cooking.

To her credit, the vegan doesn’t make a fuss and is not judgemental about their hunting lifestyle. She just bursts into tears every time she thinks about the poor little animals happily running around with their friends and family when they are cruelly shot.

The hunter gets it right when he points out that the vegan is taking the weight of the world on her shoulders. She has a kind of substitute catholic guilt complex and is always stressed and upset, despite all the yoga and sun-gazing. She agrees with him, saying that there needs to be a balance, and it can’t be good for people or animals who think about things too much.

Much is made of attempts by the hunter’s wife to get the veggie family to eat meat. Despite the fact that the daughter has been a vegetarian since she was three and therefore probably didn’t have much real choice in the matter, it’s clear that she is now a committed vegetarian and these efforts were doomed to failure.

Both sides of the hunting family were cajoled into going handing out leaflets for PETA, with similar success. Perhaps someone should point out to the vegans that PETA kills animals…

Ultimately, though, both families learnt something from each other. The vegan dad is now spending more time with his daughter, and the hunting family… well I’m not sure they really did learn anything. They should have picked up some parenting tips (letting your hyperactive ten-year-old son eat a pound of sugar at breakfast is a bad idea) but it’s not clear that they made any changes. The vegans, meanwhile, are now eating cooked food and talking to each other more.

It wasn’t quite the bloodbath I was hoping for, but it was interesting to see how well people with such different lifestyles and opinions can get along.

I’ve just watched the first episode of Firefly and already I’m hooked.

It’s essentially a western in space, which sounds like a wierd idea until you think about it: Space being the new frontier, it’s just like the Old West. It’s sparsely populated, and everyone is just trying to make a living however they can. Josh Whedon‘s execution of the idea is supremely cool. Most of the people in the world of Firefly, apart from the government types, are hard-edged business people. They don’t take any nonsense and they drive a hard bargain.

The captain of the Firefly class ship Serenity, played by Nathan Fillion is the epitome of this. He’s practically a hero from an Ayn Rand novel. When the doctor taken on board as a passenger tells the captain his moving sob story, the captain is only interested in what the doctor can do for him, since he’s caused a lot of trouble “for me and mine.” He knows when to walk away from a deal that’s too much trouble, avoiding a fight he can’t win, and when to use force to protect himself and his crew. And he says cool stuff like, “the purpose of government is to get in a man’s way” and, “you don’t know me son, so let me explain this to you once. If I ever kill you, you’ll be awake. You’ll be facing me, and you’ll be armed.”

If I have one criticism of what I’ve seen so far, it’s that the guns are drawn a little too often. The real old west was a lot more peaceful than the movies make out because for the most part guns were merely a threat rarely used. But this failing is forgivable in a TV show that needs to be action packed and exciting. And it’s so hard to repress a cowboy whoop when, during a tense hostage scene in which the bad guy cop has his gun to a girl’s head, Captain Reynolds comes running up, sees what’s happening and shoots the bad guy in the face without missing a beat! Yeehah! There’s no soul searching and “what have we done?” nonsense, they just chuck him out of the back of the ship and continue about their day, having done what needed to be done.

The rest of the characters are interesting and diverse. These include the ambassador, a euphemism for the woman who helps smooth the ship’s passage into certain ports by providing her, uh, services to the local men. There’s the always amusing, you-wouldn’t-want-to-get-on-the-wrong-side-of-him security man (“you don’t pay me to talk pretty, Captain” — and he doesn’t). And to soften the mood there’s Kaylee the mechanic who is far too sweet and innocent to be on such a spaceship, although I have a feeling she is yet to show her true mettle.

Top it off with a wonderful bluegrass soundtrack; the way some of the technology, like the space ship looks so rugged and creaky and yet there are glimpses of slick technology like smart paper; the fact that for once there’s no sound in space; and the diverse locations from space to futuristic cities to cattle-ranch outposts, and you’ve got a corker of a show. It’s looking like the best new sci-fi in a very long time.

Which makes it such a shame that Fox saw fit to cancel it. Maybe it was too sophisticated but I think sometimes these studios underestimate their audience. The fact I heard about it first on the usenet newsgroup alt.fan.elite suggests it could have been marketed better. (“Hello! Target demographic over here! Hello?”) There is hope, though, in the form of a movie version called Serenity, which will hopefully be hugely successful and spawn endless spin-offs and sequels.

So what are you waiting for? Go and buy the series and make sure you see the movie when it comes out.

I’ve been watching Fox News in my hotel room this evening. I’ve heard all kinds of terrible things about how biased Fox News is and how this explains why Americans are so ignorant because they all watch Fox News. Fox definitely presents a more right wing point of view in its editorial. I think this is a healthy reaction to an otherwise mostly left wing media, but what about accusations that Fox News is not fair and balanced?

The news bulletins themselves are just like any other. They present the news, that’s it. They may be selective in what news stories they present and the emphasis each story is given, but I couldn’t spot any obvious signs of this in one evening.

I watched two programmes. Your World discussed various current affairs such as the US pension reforms and the effects of increased life expectancy, pharmeceutical regulation and the fate of US car manufacturers. What struck me was that most of the interviews were with CEOs of companies and business people. In other words, people who actually earn a living, rather than the usual rabble of politicians and activists I’m used to seeing interviewed on the BBC. I found this quite refreshing, especially on seeing one interviewee, James Glassman of Tech Central Station describe himself as a dyed in the wool libertarian. You could argue that the choice of interviewees was unbalanced, but for me in the UK, it was a rare chance to get firsthand the viewpoints of people largely unrepresented on TV interview shows. And the interviewer, Neil Cavuto, was polite but asked all the pertinent questions. He read out a charming editorial on the plight of a New York doorman in the snow.

The second show was Hannity & Colmes. At first I was slightly shocked by Hannity. He is clearly a Republican, perfectly towing the party line. His interview style is bizarre: he is very aggressive and constanly interrupts. But he’s balanced by Colmes, who takes the liberal side and is far more capable of coherent argument than Hannity. When discussing Jeb Bush’s plans to use public money to fund a Catholic abortion advice hotline, Hannity interviews the pro-choice campaigner and Colmes interviews the anti-abortion campaigner. All sides get their points across. It seemed fair and balanced to me.

As I type this another interviewer who has just been giving a hard time to a guy representing ACLU, who are suing Donald Rumsfeld for allegedly authorising torture, is saying, “I’m going to give you the last word. Thirty seconds, uninterrupted, to say whatever you want to say.”

One thing that counts against Fox News, though, is that all the female anchors have really big hair. There’s definitely something suspicious going there.

A couple of other things: I’ve noticed a few interviewees using the word ‘victocrat’. This refers to someone with a victim mentality, and presumably is a slur on Democrats. “Don’t be a victocrat,” is the advice of one interviewee on Your World. “If you work hard, surprise surprise, you’ll be successful.” And from what I’ve seen tonight, I’ll be surprised if Michael Jackson is found guilty. There seem to be too many problems with the prosecution’s case.

When I first saw the trailer for Team America, I thought it looked likely to be very funny, but I had reservations about it. After all almost everyone, especially if they’re from Hollywood, is spouting the same boring one dimensional anti-American opinions. The last thing I wanted was to sit through an hour and a half of George Bush jokes.

But the film was made by the people behind South Park, a show with a keen sense of morals that presents sensible political views. And I remember somewhere seeing, hearing or reading an interview with either Matt Stone or Trey Parker who said that they were making fun of everyone and not taking sides. Then I saw a transcript of a rather excellent monologue from the film. I decided I must go and see for myself.

I was glad I did. For one thing, the film is laugh-out-loud wet-your-pants funny from start to finish. The puppetry is extremely clever and used to hilarious effect. The jokes against Team America are in good humour — yes, they manage to unnecessarily drive through market stalls during car chases and accidentally blow up the Eiffel Tower and wonder why the French aren’t grateful that they killed the terrorists, but they’re portrayed as the well meaning, if bumbling, good guys.

The terrorists, meanwhile, are portrayed as pure evil, while the Film Actors’ Guild, representing the American left, nuanced Europeans, and Hollywood actors who read newspapers and then repeat what they read on TV to sound intelligent, are the targets for the most cutting satire. They start out with half baked notions — corporations are evil because they make money; we can work it out if we just talk to the terrorists; “er…Global Warming!” — and end up as the film’s real baddies. Michael Moore is a suicide bomber.

That monologue turns out to be the main message of the film:

We’re reckless arrogant stupid dicks. And the Film Actors Guild are pussies. And Kim Jong Il is an asshole. Pussies don’t like dicks because pussies get fucked by dicks, but dicks also fuck assholes. Assholes who just wanna shit on everything. Pussies may think that they can deal with assholes their way, but the only thing that can fuck an asshole is a dick, with some balls. The problem with dicks is that sometimes they fuck too much, or fuck when it isn’t appropriate, and it takes a pussy to show ‘em that. But sometimes pussies get so full of shit that they become assholes themselves. Because pussies are only an inch and a half away from assholes. I don’t know much in this crazy crazy world. But I do know that if you don’t let us fuck this asshole, we’re gonna have our dicks and our pussies all covered in shit.

Go and see this film, then consider whether you’d rather be a dick or a pussy.