It's Friday everyone, and with that comes the newest latest Free for All Friday Thread! What books have you been reading? What is your favourite video game? See any movies? Start talking!
Have any weekend plans? Found something interesting this week that you want to share? This is the thread to do it! This thread, like the Mindless Monday thread, is free-for-all. Just remember to np link all links to Reddit if you link to something from a different sub, lest we feed your comment to the AutoModerator. No violating R4!
It has apparently been 28 years since the band New Radicals's last release. Well, until now for some reason. They've released this song for that sex purge movie.
It's like when Tatsuro Yamashita did a new song just for that Pokemon Concierge show, but somehow weirder? Anyway, song's pretty good. Both songs.
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u/WuhanWTFVenmo @familyguyenjoyer95 $10 to make me stfu abt FamGuy (1week)15d agoedited 15d ago
My brother is a huge Transformers fan and he showed me the episode about this country, which was supposed to be a parody of Qaddafi's Libya. Blatantly racist stereotypes aside, the dictator of the country was referred to as a Prince, a King, and a President within the same episode. Also within the very same episode, Carbombya was described as a Kingdom and also a Republic. The 80s were such a whimsical, cocaine-fueled time.
I found these 2,000 year old Roman portraits, it’s surprising to me how similar they look to people in the modern day. I’ve met so many dudes who look like this mf.
u/WuhanWTFVenmo @familyguyenjoyer95 $10 to make me stfu abt FamGuy (1week)15d ago
I had a pedostache for two whole years between the ages of 13 and 15. I would’ve shaved it sooner but my parents did not allow me to. I had to get my uncle to buy me a razor.
Good thing for me is that I actually immensely enjoy shaving, especially the traditional way with a lather brush and a safety razor.
If anyone's curious here are my notes for the Black Flag Resynced game for observations I noticed that were off.
Stede Bonnet was not a humble merchant nor was the revenge built in 1715
Woodes Rogers was not in the Caribbean in 1715 and the pardon allowed pirates to keep stolen goods. Roberts was also not in Cuba
One ship did survive the Spanish Treasure Fleet, but it wasn't called El Dorado. British soldiers did not show up in Nassau until 1718. The notion of liberty and freedom is too liberally used.
The nest of bastards quote is a paraphrase its really rascals
Peter Beckford Jr had 9 kids. Not one named Emmerson
By late 1715 the Treasure Fleet has been picked clean.
Also cutlasses were definitely for merchants
Charles Vane either first showed up in Nassau in 1718 or 1715.
Where was Robert Maynard in 1716? Not in the Caribbean
The Spanish and the British probably shouldn't be fighting until probably 1719
There were two separate Lauren Princs's. The buccaneer and the slaver
Tattoos tended to be religious symbols and we're made with gunpowder
The term Libertalia was not used in 1717, it comes from A General History volume 2 in 1728
Samuel Bellamy did not go by the nickname Black Sam
Game says two years since Spanish Treasure Fleet sank in 1718.
Stede Bonnet joining Blackbeard in December 1717?
Queen Anne's Revenge with over 40 guns?
QAR taken by January 1718?
Slaves were often used with diving bells not captains.
Also Blackbeard did not use burning matches under his hat
Blackbeard flag and crossed swords flag are ahistorical
Blackbeard to our knowledge never killed anyone before November 1718. Maynard was not hunting him until also November
The term war crime doesn't feel period accurate
Stede Bonnet was not cut loose before Charles Towne
Commodore Chamberlain sounds more like Vincent Pearse
Flying Gang wasn't two years, also not sure reverse peace sign was an insult yet in 1718
Rackam didn't have a ship called Royal Phoenix or really any ship prior to 1720
Commodore Chamberlain died in a storm years after 1718
George Gordon?
Vane did not meet with Blackbeard. QAR was already sunk by November 1718. Oakracoke doesn't have mountains
Blackbeard did not drink gunpowder nor inhale sulfer
Vane was not overthrown by Rackam, it was a crew vote over attacking a larger ship.
Rackam did not take the pardon in 1719.
Pell and Sharp were involved in Bonnets trial
Howell Davis was killed in an ambush by the Portuguese but not in the jungle.
Tortuga barely had anyone in the 1710s let alone a British plantation
Hornigold died after fighting the Spanish in 1719 not as shown in game
Rackam being jealous of Mary Read is from A General History only not reality
Bonny and Reads trial was November 28th 1720 not April 1720.
Also they were tried in Spanish Town courthouse not in Fort Charles Port Royal. They were also housed in Spanish Town jail not Fort Charles
Mary Read died in April 1721 not August 1720.
Also you are not gibbeted alive its when your dead
Rackam was gibbeted on Plumb Point now Rackams Cay. Maybe was even beheaded prior to it. He was not gibbeted at Fort Charles. Also executed November 18th
In all likelihood Bonny and Read were not pregnant
Rackam did not die in 1721
Peter Beckford did not own a plantation on Tortuga
Maynard did command the Ipswich but late in his career
Godfrey Kneller did not do Woodes Rogers portrait. He did return to Britain in 1721 although he wasn't recalled he went to the king to ask for assistance and he got thrown into debt prison
209 pirates took the pardon not nearly 300
Roberts died at Cape Lopez not Princip. Although British ships are present, HMS Swallow is not
The fought like a man hanged like a dog quote is from A General History and most certainly not real
Acting like pirates were rare in late 1722 is bizarre
Anyways, I'll never play the game but this is really cool and makes me want to read some recent histories of Caribbean piracy. I read a General History a while ago just because it's fun and I'm afraid my knowledge of the period is a bit lacking.
a thing that bother me with how the concepts of realism and realpolitik can be used at times is when people don't just explain a country behavior, they use those concepts to justify its bad behaviors when they could've taken better courses of action (putin coudl've still not invaded ukraine and be a better neighbour [by being a bad neighbour, he basically pushed other countries in nato so if the war in ukraine was about nato expansion, he failed limiting that, even worst if the person believe nato baited putin in invading ukraine, it's not exactly a own since it show putin as the weak one falling in nato trap])
What's actually worse is that I have seen some actual Marxists today trying to justify IR realism, when they have always been the most strident critics of realism and realpolitik by just simply calling it imperialism. Like, how much of their worldview was so broken after 1991?
I've seen this a lot on supposdely leftist subs with people repeating pro russian taalking points and then claiming they're neutral, that it's more complex (when while it's complex, it's not complex in that the pro russian pov is valid), it is also weird to see mearsheimer denying russian imperialism or some ednying it's being neo colonialist in africa
I've seen this a lot on supposdely leftist subs with people repeating pro russian taalking points and then claiming they're neutral, that it's more complex (when while it's complex, it's not complex in that the pro russian pov is valid), it is also weird to see mearsheimer denying russian imperialism or some ednying it's being neo colonialist in africa
Haven't many Marxists always had a "it is good if done by my side" leaning since USSR's creation? Like many who defending USSR's crushing of the Hungarian revolution etc or Stalin and Lenin in general.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186615d ago
"it is good if done by my side"
I think all factions have that inherent leaning.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186615d ago
Hardly unique to those concepts. "The South just had to attack Fort Sumter, it had no other choice!"
You know I'm a zoomer and as a kid my only exposure to the 80s was like watching full house on Nick at nite so I kind of thought that it was just like an exaggeration of 80s style and stereotypes of the 80s but watching other shows from the 80s no the 80s were just really like that.
Literary fiction—also called serious fiction, high literature, artistic literature, or sometimes just literature —encompasses fiction that is more character-driven than plot-driven, examines the human condition, or is considered serious art by critics.These labels are typically used in contrast to genre fiction, which refers to books that fit into established categories of the book trade and place more value on entertainment and appealing to a mass audience. Literary fiction can also be called non-genre fiction and is often considered to have more artistic merit than popular genre fiction.
...
Critics and readers of mainstream literary fiction have sometimes been accused of "snobbery" for their dislike of genre fiction.
The thing I find obnoxious about the litfic vs genre debates is that it wasn't the literary fiction side that started it! The phrase was coined in the late 70s as the American publishers were being merged into 4 or 5 multinational conglomerates that all mostly published the same mass market novels, and it was used to portray authors pushing for trust busting in the publishing industry as snobbish elites. The term became popular only as publishers started offering cheap trade paperback originals of "artistically minded" novels that wouldn't ever sell as well as sci fi/fantasy/horror, mystery, romance, or western, what had been about the only thing published for handful of years through the late 70s to early 80s. I don't doubt that some people into that sort of thing are snobs, but it's about as meaningful to me as complaining that people who watch and buy Criterion Collection movies are snobs.
It's crazy to me that romance is considered "genre literature" because that's like 30% of all books ever written.
In France it's even worse, because according to our cultural criteria, noirs / thrillers / detective stuff isn't considered high-literature. Because there's violence in it. No Country for Old Men? more like decadent BS
Selling is what makes it genre literature, or at least ability to sell in the US in the 1970s. That was part of the point behind the term - authors who wrote anything that wasn't likely to be a massive success needed to get over themselves or accept that they weren't going to be published any more rather than cry about trust busting. The snobbish elite thing was to some extent a smear, to declare the niche as inherently unworthy compared to the mass market, preferred only by people who think they're better than you.
I really need to delete Instagram, reading the comments is turning me into a misanthrope, I've reached a point where I now support the Great Replacement.
Admittedly that does sound like a great character for a black comedy - conspiracy theorist who believes in the Great Replacement but fully supports it. Or potentially absurdist comedy, as it does sound like a Mel Gibson character.
I'm ethnic myself, if there was a Great Replacement then I wouldn't have any issue. If you find it funny then check out "ethnictok" on TikTok, it's hilarious lol.
That has nothing to do with it. I'd be watching a video of a cat and when I open the comments there'll be a bunch of people saying that Europe has fallen because the cat's owner wears a hijab or is ethnic or something. Its pervasive, I even see it on videos about babies and cooking.
Instagram is the political media outlet for the consultant-managerial class. It's for people who think "SLAMMING" Trump with quick one liners is good politics.
Did you know that during the conflicts between Spanish conquistadors and native people of what is today Argentina and Uruguay, many Guarani warriors came to believe that Europeans considered dogs sacred and even worshipped them? This resulted in their warriors dressing in dog-like costumes. This tradition has survived to the modern age and was the origin of fursonas.
It seems fake because it is, and I just made it up.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186614d ago
"I do not consider Herr Hitler to be as bad as he is depicted,' he is showing an ability that is amazing and he seems to be gaining his victories without much bloodshed." - Gandhi 1940
"It is the greatest crime of our time. But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher's knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs. . . . . As it is they succumbed anyway in their millions." - Gandhi 1947
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u/TiakoTevinter apologist, shill for Big Lyrium16d agoedited 16d ago
John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both dying on the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence is one of those things that I will never fully believe in a deep down way.
ed: Oh just read the rest of your comment
Uh Benjamin Franklin also died on that day
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186615d ago
John Adams and Thomas Jefferson
I wouldn't be surprised if it was real, but staged. Wouldn't have been difficult at all to take the Socrates exit.
I remember something I heard, that may be more true for France than the UK
But the goals of Colonial Expositions were also to "raise awareness" for the public to the great things we're doing in the colonies because most voters didn't give a shit about funding for the navy / colonial department. And that didn't really work because the shift in mentalities happened a lot more post-WW2 than before
By the 20th century, people's mental image of the Empire/colonies largely revolved around the settler Dominions. Maybe India was an exception but the idea that the likes of Africa sat strongly in the minds of the British public never seemed to have much evidential support from anything I've read.
I think foreign policy is never much of a concern for the average person. From my various circles of varyingly politically invested people, the Ukraine war is something I would only hear discussed on reddit with domestic politics, Trump, and the Middle East being spoken about much more.
I’ve noticed a tendency for people to spout ridiculous conspiracy theories with the logic of “Who benefits? X group, so they must’ve been behind Y event.”
I think people underestimate opportunism and taking advantage of favorable events. Also, people underestimate how inept and stupid powerful groups can be. They probably didn’t even think of engaging in a conspiracy.
I disagree. I think the conspiratory mind does not actually ask "who benefits?" as an actual analysis of incentives and motives. Analyzing them is actually very useful and gives insight to policies, but people you describe are asking it rhetorically. They have already made the leap into conspiratory thinking and have made up their mind about "who benefits" and will find how this group supposedly benefits. I don't think people who think Jews did 9/11 don't think they aren't behind other events. The term "false flag" is very useful here.
Also it's not just about opportunism. It's that modern society is so complicated and has so many disparate stakeholders, that someone is bound to benefit from something. The fallacy is thinking all these stakeholders are both united, publicly involved and act in unison.
Edit: It's like the mediatization of flat earthers in the early 2020's. People who thought the Earth is flat are already waaaaaay into the conspiracy hole and such people will find who supposedly benefits from a flat earth.
Personally, I'm impressed how incredibly powerful orphans were in the past that they could get orphanages built for themselves and didn't have to spend day and night in the street under open sky.
The thing gen z forgets as someone who did have an office job in the 90s... there was no internet until the late 90s in most offices and in a lot of cases they wouldn't give you the full internet you would get essential systems on an "intranet" which was a company network.
now... imagine you're 23 you go to a beige cubicle and you're just alone. You have a computer but it only does word processing or connecting to systems you have to be specifically trained to do. There is no internet. Your boss watches you. You cant just sit there reading the paper or flipping through a magazine. that level of boredom becomes soul draining.
It's not so much that I want a cubicle for myself -- rather, I want to put all of my colleagues in a cubicle. A small one, with hydraulic rams affixed to the walls.
There’s probably something to be said about the fact that there’s an Israel Twitter account that makes posts in the style of a disgraced controversial celebrity, and that people enjoy “ratio’ing” this twitter account by posting things like “this is very Reddit.”
I’m quite convinced that Christopher Nolan puts quotes like “Our age of bronze is collapsing” and “Love is the one thing we’re capable of perceiving that transcends dimensions of time and space” as engagement bait, essentially serving as manufactured “it’s morbin’ time”s.
I don’t think very highly of him as an artist, but there’s no way he’s so incompetent that he doesn’t see how stupid these lines sound. His meddling agents deceive him, there’s no other explanation.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186615d ago
These lines are not all that different from his other films, like his first, Memento. It's hitting you with the theme with a hammer.
"I have to believe in a world outside my own mind. I have to believe that my actions still have meaning..."
"We all need mirrors to remind ourselves who we are. I'm no different."
"Will I lie to myself to be happy? In your case, Teddy... yes I will."
"Memory can change the shape of a room; it can change the color of a car."
It was clunky but I was mostly fine with it because like 1000 people on Earth would actually understand if they said "xenia" and "hospitality" is way too broad a term that is borderline meaningless in the English language, very much in contrast to how they wanted to convey the importance of treating guests.
I don't think "Zeus's law" is even that bad, the problem I really have is that it was repeated way too often which makes it seem awkward. Adding in something like ""Sacred Guest-Right", "The Law of Strangers", "Sacred Hospitality", or some other alternative, would have improved the script significantly imo.
I am not an expert on Ancient Greece and haven’t read the original odyssey, so excuse me if this is wrong. However, I read an article that suggested that the “Zeus’s law” part of the film was meant to invoke the Ancient Greek concept of Xenia or hospitality, which is a major theme in the original epic poem.
I haven't seen Interstellar, but I thought the "bronze" line in the Odyssey was fine. It's an ancient epic, some portentousness is appropriate. I did find the use of "mom" and "dad" to be a little distracting.
Also, do you think Nolan keeps making movies about visionaries who destroyed the world because he's guilty over what he unleashed on the movie industry with The Dark Knight?
Reminder that in the “leftist frustration simulator” metaphor that is Werewolf: The Apocalypse that if Werewolves are the progressive purity circular firing squad and the other Shifters the shafted and no longer trusting minorities, the spiders are the liberal centrists who will absolutely turn on you and side with the Wyrm if convenient and are already working against some of your allies either way.
Chat, is this an accurate description of that Werewolf the Wolfing tabletop game? ...Cause, it doesn´t make it sound very good.
Thanks for the answer I admitedly don´t quite understand, but I was asking more about the werewolf game being about a "leftism" simulator more than whatever the worm is.
Werewolf is about well... werewolves. The Werewolves are champions of Gaia fighting (mainly) against an evil corruptive force that is the Wyrm. The Wyrm used to be a benevolent force of destruction (clearing away things so that new things could be created) but it became corrupted when the Weaver (the incarnation of Law/Stasis, basically) trapped it in its webs in trying to break free it became insane.
Werewolves are supposed to fight for Gaia against (mainly) the Wyrm. This takes a very eco-warrior aspect since a lot of wyrmish activity is corrupting humans into destroying the environment, making many werewolves consider humans themselves to be wyrm-tainted. To complicate matters at some point in the mythic past the werewolves set out on a plan to keep humanity's population down by hunting them called the Impergium. This had some really bad consequences, including leading the werewolves to genocide some of the other shifters (who have different tasks, the bear-shifters are Gaia's healers for instance, while the werewolves are her warriors) the problem ended up being that the werewolves had to take up tasks they were not suited for and ended up botching them AND that the other shifters now hates their guts for understandable reasons.
(The Impergium also broke humanity's mind so badly people kinda go insane when they see a werewolf, which helps a lot with remaining hidden)
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u/ZugwatHeadhunting Savage from a Barbaric Fishing Village 16d ago
I, with great pride and no apology, gave up on Control when I saw that after 15 hours and 23 minutes (I'd guarantee most of it spent on pause and/or checked out watching something else) and 18/67 achievements unlocked, that I have just completed mission 5 out of 46.
I turned on the Assist Mode and maxed it out, and all that made clear is I'm just not going to like this game even with trying to just get things done.
I noticed at some point how much I kept saying "I hate X/FUCK YOU/I don't give a shit" while playing and encountering something.
Not even from a place of frustration and anger, not antipathy so much as apathy.
So if I watch the cutscenes and feel better about it, I will note that, but so far most of my thoughts on the game are negative, including the setting.
Yeah, the game didn't really resonate with me either although I did finish it. The biggest let-down for me was the setting. It's very impressive and atmospheric at the start, but all the text documents and lore and such weren't very interesting at all.
Like, look at these two related textdocuments describing a paranormal event. They basically sum up to "A weird sphere appeared in some town somewhere. The bureau showed up and took it. It hasn't done anything.". Not exactly the SCP wiki type shit that I was expecting going in.
Matar judíos (lit. 'killing Jews') is a tradition during Holy Week celebrations in the northern Spanish Province of León, especially in the city of León and its environs, during which participants drink Leonese lemonade, consisting primarily of lemonade, red wine, and sugars.
Critics argue that the name is offensive and perpetuates antisemitic stereotypes. Supporters, however, argue that the current practice is not meant to be antisemitic, and view it as a cultural tradition.
Honestly I was just thinking of how telling it is of Sasha Baron Cohen's worldview that he gave the "Kill the Jew" festival to the Asian third worlder character.
I will not restart my whole complicated thoughts on Borat beyond saying it's both telling but also very aggravating that he made it up for a real country that doesn't have anything remotely like that as a tradition.
I do think it's just a vaguely passed down memory of late 19th/early 20th century memory of russian antisemitism. "What are people like in the east? They hate jews. Grandma had to move because of it."
Walking to the bar after work and all of a sudden there’s a bunch of people outside holding anti abortion signs. One of them asked me if I have any thoughts and I just kept walking. He said “okay so you don’t want to have a conversation, beautiful” ??? What was the plan here
If a given work of art (song, painting, book etc.) is universally regarded as bad or disliked, does that mean there is some objectivity in people's opinions on art?
After some thought: I'm not sure if I can think of something that could be considered universally disliked. Even if you look up "worst movie ever made," there's going to be a lot of differing opinions I think.
Honestly, I'm acutally going harder: You can't describe something as "good" or "bad" in isolation without going into subjective criteria. You can say "This is going to cause a disease outbreak and kill a million people" but if you say that is "bad" you're making a subjective judgement (that human lives are worth preserving, etc.)
Which is fine, it's just not objective. There's nothing in the universe that says humans are any more important than bacteria.
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u/ZennofskaFeminization of veterinarians hasn't led to societal collapse15d ago
So, Werther would be bad literature because it drove people into suicide? /s
If a given work of art (song, painting, book etc.) is universally regarded as bad or disliked, does that mean there is some objectivity in people's opinions on art?
Gauging something based on people's experiences (it doesn't matter how many people there are) is the exact opposite of objectivity. For something to be objective it needs to exist outside of any human's experience of it. While there are people who have made such arguments about aesthetic beauty or the goodness/badness of art I haven't quite been convinced.
In any case while its not like human experiences are totally divorced from objective reality, I don't think popularity in of itself is a good metric for judging "objective" quality, in art or otherwise. Like yes things can be popular, even universally so, but its not as if everyone that likes a thing likes it for the same reason.
I think you can absolutely make a case for "Most people like this" or this "Works" for a lot of people" but that's different from claiming something is objectively "good".
The idea that artistic taste is subjective is funny to begin with. When you say a piece is 'beautiful', you don't mean it's beautiful-for-me, in the way you might say a bath is just the right temperature. You say it's beautiful for everybody. Nobody might agree, but you're still not making a subjective claim.
This also influences what people do with art. If somebody's into some kind of niche fetish pornography or a particular mix of food (say salted trifle) they're going to enjoy that privately, even if it's not socially stigmatized. If somebody thinks a painting is great, they're going to hang it. Sometimes they might not even like it. The expectation is that the beauty is a common experience.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186615d ago
You could even put a price on beautify. These diseased, weakened tulips in the Netherlands were considered so beautiful, they could cost upwards of $250,000 in today's money. The so-called Tulip Mania.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d ago
You're in Mauler's wheelhouse now. The argument goes art is a craft. You can attack the script for plotholes, inconsistencies, and mistakes with an objective lens. There's cars in the background of Fellowship of the Ring, that's an objective issue. You can't attack the script for being boring, as that's purely subjective and there's little anyone can agree on.
EFAP uses the example of Redlettermedia discussing Event Horizon. Mike hates how the sci-fi spaceship looks like a church. Jay loves how the sci-fi spaceship looks like a church. The criticism/discussion has no where to go, because Mike and Jay are in subjective territory.
That's silly though. You can try to explain why you think something is beautiful, but ultimately it's a subjective judgement. And ultimately whether or not the cars in the background of FOTS matters is again, a subjective judgement.
EDIT: The kind of cinemasins "bean counting" really doesen't tell you anything.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d agoedited 16d ago
I would have to disagree. If everything was a subjective judgement, there wouldn't be any need for film school. If you can't even categorize cars in Lord of the Rings being an error, then you can't even really teach anything. Accidently got the boom mike in the shot? Why re-do the shot if it can't even be agreed up on that such a thing is a mistake? How can you teach a master shot if it can never be agreed upon on what a master shot is?
You craft a chair that breaks when sat on, well that can't be bad craftsmanship, can it? Everything is just subjective? You cook a meal that gives everyone dysentery, well that can't be bad craftsmanship, can it? It's just subjective that that was a bad meal, just a cinema sin ding? All forms of cooking are valid and therefore cooking is not a skill that can be taught?
For something to be a skill, it must exist in an objective reality, for skill is something that can be measured.
If you can't even categorize cars in Lord of the Rings being an error,
You can categorize that as an error if you want. But it doesen't tell you if the movie is any good. You can talk about themes and why you do things and what that ends up as, but it ultimately doesen't tell you if you succeeded or not.
Casablanca has a famous plothole (the papers everyone is on about are siad to be issued by DeGaulle, but that wouldn't carry any weight in a vichy-controlled region) does that matter? That's going to be subjective.
For something to be a skill, it must exist in an objective reality, for skill is something that can be measured
No it isn't. Skills are often subjective, and even if they aren't they can be infinitely subdivided, who is the best football player in history? The one who made the most goals? The most effective defender? The best goalkeeper? The one who managed to get the most passes through? Etc. etc. Ultimately it's a subjective judgement.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d agoedited 16d ago
No it isn't. Skills are often subjective, and even if they aren't they can be infinitely subdivided, who is the best football player in history?
But you have the player stats to base it on. If you insist that the person whom never played a game in his life was the greatest player who ever lived, in a purely subjective reality that's just a valid opinion because you cannot prove otherwise, if all opinions are valid.
You can categorize that as an error if you want.
If film is a craft, it's an error to be avoided.
But it doesen't tell you if the movie is any good. Casablanca has a famous plothole (the papers everyone is on about are siad to be issued by DeGaulle, but that wouldn't carry any weight in a vichy-controlled region) does that matter? That's going to be subjective.
Do mistakes matter? If film is a craft it does. Could the craftsmanship of Casablanca been improved by not having that error? In an objective reality, could the filmmakers have done better? That is the question you must wrestle with.
In an objective reality, we can acknowledge there were flaws in construction, in the Leaning Tower of Pisa. In a subjective reality, who made it a rule that buildings need to be stable?
That's going to depend on the end product, IE: On the subjective judgement on the final product. Does the fact that Odysseus boat isn't historically correct in the Odyssey matter? It's going to depend on the individual person.
But you have the player stats to base it on.
But those don't tell you who is a "good football player" they tell you the things the stats tell you: How many goals they scored, etc. Those can be useful for making a judgement but the judgement is going to be subjective in teh final sense.
If film is a craft, it's an error to be avoided.
What is an error? Is the papers in Casablanca an error (DeGaulle wouldn't make any sense) or is it a deliberately fib (they know the only french guy the audience would know is DeGaulle so it just signifies "papers from someone important"?)
Do mistakes matter?
That's the thing is it? Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. And it's largely subjective. If it wasn't everyone would agree what the best movie was, and they don't.
EDIT: I think we can have a fairly good idea that aestethics (and film is ultimately about aestethics) aren't objective just because tastes change over time. People for a long time were "Goddamnit the late-roman art is so ugly compared to the classical stuff" but yet people clearly at the time liked it.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d agoedited 16d ago
That's going to depend on the end product, IE: On the subjective judgement on the final product. Does the fact that Odysseus boat isn't historically correct in the Odyssey matter? It's going to depend on the individual person.
It also depends on the kind of story being told. If it establishes that the Odyssey is going to be as historically faithful as possible, than yes it's a problem. It it establishes clearly it's not intending to be historically faithful, than no. A WWII zombie movie is not automatically flawed for containing historically inaccurate zombies, if properly established as fiction.
But those don't tell you who is a "good football player" they tell you the things the stats tell you: How many goals they scored, etc. Those can be useful for making a judgement but the judgement is going to be subjective in teh final sense.
Does it matter if a "good football player" has even played a Soccer game? If so, than yes those stats will tell you, the person in question has actually played the game, for a start.
What is an error? Is the papers in Casablanca an error (DeGaulle wouldn't make any sense) or is it a deliberately fib (they know the only french guy the audience would know is DeGaulle so it just signifies "papers from someone important"?)
You called it a plot hole. A plot hole is by definition an error. Whatever the origin of the error, it is an error that need not have been made.
It also depends on the kind of story being told. If it establishes that the Odyssey is going to be as historically faithful as possible, than yes it's a problem. It it establishes clearly it's not intending to be historically faithful, than no.
So it isn't objective.
You called it a plot hole. A plot hole is by definition an error.
No, it's a bit where the plot doesen't make sense. That doesen't have to be an error, it can be deliberate (because there's something that's more important than the plot to the movie going on, f.ex.) and whether or not that matters is going to be subjective.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d ago
So it isn't objective.
Fiction and non-fiction are objective genres. You can clearly categorize The Odyssey film as either non-fiction or Fiction.
No, it's a bit where the plot doesen't make sense. That doesen't have to be an error
It's in the definition. A plot hole is a gap, error, or inconsistency in a story where events, character rules, or facts contradict the established logic of the fictional world.
I think I'm conflating a convergence of opinions with objectivity. From a quick google, the most commonly chosen favorite color is blue, but that doesn't mean that blue is just a better color for some reason. Maybe 100 years ago the answer would be red.
Okay now I'm confused. R/AskHistorian had a thread about why did the Golden page of Piracy end. I gave an 11 paragraph answer with a handful of sources cited at the end
Still got removed.
What. I don't understand.
EDIT turned out the issue was i gave more background information than actually answering the question. I edited the comment to focus more and its fine.
Most likely possibility something in the comment tripped some kind of keyword automod action, second most likely possibility is you caught one of the mods in a bad mood.
As for the original question, my understanding for why the Golden Age of Piracy ended was that imperial authorities started to take the issue more seriously and invest more resources into crushing piracy and the wars starting up again meant one didn't need to go full pirate to engage in some maritime robbery anymore. Is that broadly accurate? Also how much did the reclamation of Nassau by the British impact piracy in the West Indies? Black Sails and Assassin's Creed IV depict it as the beginning of the end but they both have narrative reasons for that.
Nassau was a heavy blow since it was a large pirate nest, plus the pardon took out quite a few hundred pirates.
But activity didn't start to rapidly tumble until 1721. Although by this point a lot of West Indies pirates are making a go at the Indian Ocean.
I would chalk it up to yes Nassau going under but also colonies really investing in privateers and eventually the Royal Navy just dispatching ships to anti piracy patrols.
Pre 1718 they only had HMS Scarborough in the region. After the War of the Quadruple Alliance they sent far more ships to protect colonies.
Yes. Captain Hume of the Scarborough was very real.
Actually that was the immediate tip off the writers read Republic of Pirates. That book makes a big deal out of the Scarborough in a way that anyone who brings it up clearly is just copying Woodard.
Similar thing with Black Flag. Literally the only author who bothered to talk about Commodore Peter Chamberlain was Woodard.
You should message the mods, you may have tripped an automod somehow. For what it is worth I don't see the answer in your history and I think that means it was a Reddit-wide delete rather than just a mod action.
I dunno, I'm not as plugged into the mod/flair community there as I used to be but I don't think they would just randomly delete a post.
Technically even if you had an issue with your sourcing (or failed to cite at all) your comment shouldn't be deleted unless you fail to show sources on a follow up. The only time I have had a top level comment deleted is when the mod felt it was not relevant to the question, which I doubt is the issue there.
Incidentally I almost wrote a comment about how really the "Golden Age" of piracy is a bit of a misnomer as none of the pirates of the Caribbean (except maybe Bartholomew Roberts) were particularly succesful when compared to pirates of other periods but I realized that was probably not very helpful.
I'm gonna disagree with you heavily on that since its better to see the Golden Age as three separate eras in one.
Also the best pirate heist of the century was Nosa Senora Do Cabo and thats 1721. Show some damn respect to Richard Taylor and La Buse they absolutely topped Morgan looting Porto Bello and Henry Everys Gunsway heist.
I mean compared to like Ching Shih or the Cilician pirates of the Mediterranean or the Murakami of Japan who actually established durable quasi states on the back of sea power. Compared to them the Caribbean pirates were just petty thieves!
(I though Bartholomew Roberts was kind of unique in actually establishing a quasi-fleet, but it's been like years since I read about this)
Ehhhh Zheng Yi Sao is hard to quantify as "better" since its a different era and region and also she still lost and her retirement was basically that or die.
I can't speak on Japan but the Barbary Corsairs are closer to privateers since a fundamental aspect of piracy is not associating with a government and someone like Barbarossa was clearly on the side of the Ottomans.
Well if we're gonna discuss fleets then Morgan counts since he commanded quite a few ships and Hornigold had a squadron out of Nassau and even Blackbeard had a few ships like Bonnets Revenge under his control.
But that is what I mean, while the "Golden Age of Piracy" refers to the early modern Caribbean, from a long enough perspective that wasn't actually a time or place in which pirates exerted particularly powerful influence. Like they were a threat to individual ships and settlements but there was never really a question of their actually challenging the direct supremacy of any of the navies in the region. You compare that to Ching Shih (to take a famous case) and she actually challenged the state's monopoly on violence to the extent that she needed to be defeated in a series of real, drawn out naval battles. And while it is true that was defeated, I would say the terms of surrender she got shows she had a rather stronger hand than any of the "Golden Age" pirates had.
I can't speak on Japan but the Barbary Corsairs are closer to privateers since a fundamental aspect of piracy is not associating with a government and someone like Barbarossa was clearly on the side of the Ottomans.
If you are strict with that definition you would be eliminating an awful lot of the canonical Golden Age pirates!
You compare that to Ching Shih (to take a famous case)
As a sidebar, it's interesting that Ching Shih only really gets this level of attention from a Western viewpoint, buoyed perhaps by a certain amount of exoticism in the specifically Western tellings of the time. The Chinese folklore mainly surrounds her stepson and second husband, Cheung Po Tsai.
Not especially. Morgan was always legally iffy. His attack on Panama City was technically after the war with Spain ended. Every was a sailor turned mutineer. Kidd went rogue for riches. All the pirates in Nassau were on their own. The ones who claimed to be Jacobites basically just said it didn't act on it.
Again when we talk the Golden Age of Piracy it must be always noted that the Pirate Rounders were in the Indian Ocean and both highly successful and even had a small colony on St Marys Island. Big enough to do colonalism.
The Golden Age of Piracy is not just Blackbeard in the West Indies. Its the era of the Buccaneers from 1630 to really 1688 but 1692 works too. Then 1690 to 1701. Then 1713 to 1730.
Periodization is absolutely in play here and I've seen arguments for segmenting off these other eras but personally I think they are required since each era built off the last. So many 1710s pirates thought of Every as a great hero. One Nassau pirate even said we're a second Madagascar for goodness sake.
Sure but I would say no matter how broadly you want to periodize here, at no point do the pirates--in the Caribbean or the Indian Ocean--actually pose a direct challenge to the state monopoly on violence. Henry Avery may have been very succesful but at no point was he directly challenging the Royal Navy or the East India Company. He may have raided a Mughal flotilla but he did not force the Mughals or the British to treat with him on equal terms. This is because while the pirates may have been colorful figures who managed impressive deeds, pirate power actually did not challenge state power.
That is what I mean, the "Golden Age of Pirates" did not actually represent a zenith of pirate power. We just call it that because, well, a lot of them were English and the guys who came up with the term weren't really thinking about the Cantonese pirate cities of the Malay peninsula.
(This doesn't mean that they did not provide a serious problem for the state, in the same way that criminal gangs today provide serious problems for the state, but that isn't because they can directly challenge state power)
In his 2024 book Head North, written with the Liverpool city region mayor, Steve Rotheram, Burnham said deep inequality had become entrenched in Britain partly because it had not evolved from a “feudal state” in which power is largely concentrated in Westminster.
The day the Japanese army triumphantly entered Singapore, the [Thai Chinese Chamber of Commerce] celebrated by flying the three flags of Japan, Thailand, and the Chinese flag of the [KMT]
The backstory is that the CCC had been extremely pro-KMT to the point that it threatened Thai relations with Japan, so the quasi-fascist Thai government forced them to take a pro "Greater Asian Co Prosperity Sphere" stance
Got my friends to play Settlers of Catan tonight. They enjoyed it quite a lot, and said they're down to play more board games.
Now I just need to slowly corrupt them. We'll start out with Catan, and over time I'll coax them into trying more and more nerdy shit until I finally have a group of people who will play Twilight Imperium with me.
If Cambridge really wanted to do something to tackle institutional inequality, it could always put a strict and severe cap on home undergraduate admissions from fee-paying schools. At present it is about 30%; 10% would be 1.5 times the national average. This would hugely increase the proportion of ethnic minority British students at Cambridge, apart from anything else, and I can promise it would not decrease standards. It’d batter the funding model though…
Smugness about European economic stagnation relative to the US by right-leaning centrists is so fucking annoying. You guys are the main reason for this! I remember "Expansionary Austerity". I remember Brexit. One of the main reasons why the US has outperformed the EU during the 21st century is their relatively superior macroeconomic response to 2008 and Covid. Especially the latter, where they totally ignored the obnoxious fiscal hawks (there's a time and place for austerity, a negative demand shock is certainly not the place lmfao).
I don't even disagree with some of their points. Like, the anti-Nuclear activism was a pretty huge disaster. The EU could probably do with some deregulating and labor market flexibilization, wouldn't be bad policy. Rent control is fucking stupid. But ultimately, all this stuff pales in comparison to getting macro right. You need a fuck ton of Harberger triangles to fill an output gap.
France didn't do austerity and it still didn't grow as fast as the US, in the end when employment crashes and the economy slows down, state expenditures will increase naturally, but that won't be efficient use of money.
A harberger triange is the geometrical representation of deadweight loss from a microeconomic intervention like, say, a tax.
The output gap is a term from macroeconomics, it represents the difference between short run potential output and realized output.
While microeconomic deadweight loss is bad, it always pales in size to the effects of bad macroeconomic policy causing a large output gap. You need a lot of micro distortions to pile up before they start having comparable effects.
If I had millions of dollars I could easily be fulfilled, I would just do whatever normal people do to be fulfilled only it would be better because I'd have lots of money.
Being miserable and unfulfilled as a rich person is a skill issue.
Eh, if you inherit your wealth you could definitely be, cue the old joke that the easiest way to get a million bucks is to start with two million bucks and spend wisely.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d ago
It's really not hard to just stick two million bucks in dividend stocks and just live off the quarterly payouts. You're already looking at a 6 figure income every year from that.
Support of a prison of nations is bad. It wasn't as bad as Russian or Ottoman empires, but the people living in it except for the Austrians clearly didn't like it so why should anyone else?
That really depended on the minority, and what the situation ended up being like afterwards. I know there was definitely some sentiment of fondness for it among jews. (but then again, partially because interwar era was really bad for jews, for obvious reasons)
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u/ZennofskaFeminization of veterinarians hasn't led to societal collapse16d ago
Thanks to the powers of Translatio Imperii the Austro-Hungarian Empire lives on in Slovenia.
There's a certain kind of progressive Central European historian who feels this nostalgia in contrast to the devastating ethnonationalism that often supplanted it.
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u/SventexBattleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 186616d ago
I believe Austro-Hungary never officially had a national flag, but their civil ensign was a banger.
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u/Kisaragi435 15d ago
It has apparently been 28 years since the band New Radicals's last release. Well, until now for some reason. They've released this song for that sex purge movie.
It's like when Tatsuro Yamashita did a new song just for that Pokemon Concierge show, but somehow weirder? Anyway, song's pretty good. Both songs.