Synova

 Have you noticed what I've noticed? It's not really something new.  I started to notice way back in 2015-ish that protests seemed to be deliberately non-persuasive.  Note that this is well before Trump, possibly all the way back to the beginning of Obama's terms or farther.  And I'll admit that I've only noticed this as a left-wing phenomenon, possibly because I don't need to be persuaded of what my opinions already are.  (And right-wing arguments that I find stupid mostly elicit a rolling of my eyes.) I had a long conversation once with someone about the very poorly conceived practice of blocking freeways.  My argument was that anyone stuck on the freeway would be motivated negatively toward whatever the blockage was supposed to be about, and that furthermore, nothing about a freeway even began to indicate what cause the blockers were intending to highlight.  In fact, if I don't say here what the cause was, in future years no one will be able to figure it

Remember this: When we began with Covid 19 we were generally told that the goal was to slow the spread, to "flatten the curve", in order to dribble out covid cases in bits and drabs to reduce the burden on hospitals and staff. Everyone was still going to eventually get it, just not all at once. Think about when that message shifted. Think about when the rhetoric changed to "defeat" or "end" Covid 19. No flu or covid virus, not one of them, that has made the jump from animals to humans has ever been defeated. Not a single one has truly come to an end. They mutate. They become less prevalent. They all still exist and are still passed between people. Flatten the Curve. That made sense. Let us take away all of your freedom, emotionally and psychologically abuse your children, disregard those with mental difficulty, isolate the elderly and let them die alone because, BECAUSE, if you allow these utterly HORRIFIC things... we can DEFEAT Covid 19. Utter, au

Time to talk about Strong Female Characters again. I actually saw that shortened to SFC. Time to talk about SFC's again. Why? Because there is a blow-up about a remake of a kid's cartoon and everyone is on about "Teela and the Masters of the Universe" and a couple of people have pointed out an element of the story that does seem rather odd as it's described: Does anyone care about spoilers? Prince Adam dies. According to what people are saying, Teela's "take away" on this is the need to berate his parents, fresh in their grief at the loss of their only child, that no one told her that he was He Man. She has a tantrum and leaves. She stays mad. She resists the call to be a hero when the universe is going to be destroyed. Later she treats Prince Adam badly. Or so I'm hearing. Tell me I've heard wrong. But the charge that her response when finding out that she'd been kept in the dark is self-absorbed, that tracks with the current tre

 Call me Mary Sue. Writers have all heard of a Mary Sue.  In truth, these days even non-writers have probably heard of a Mary Sue. In short, a Mary Sue is a character who doesn't have to try very hard.  She is talented and loved by all without having paid her dues.  Mary Sue might be an orphan, but she's secretly a princess.  She's unusual and beautiful. She seems to inspire love and loyalty for no reason. She never faces the possibility of failure when it comes to the stakes of the story. And it's a fine line. One of my favorite novels, Perilous Waif by E. William Brown, seems to be a deliberate send up of the idea of a Mary Sue, complete with the violet eyes, the orphan condition, the inexplicable love and loyalty, and the secret princess. Everything. And yet, the character works because she makes mistakes that have weight and you know that she may fail at the stakes of the story at any point.  So the definition of a Mary Sue is not just being overpowered or uncritica

 This was fun and interesting.  Thinking with Mike Episode 13 A woman of STEAM Julie Pascal

  Maybe we should talk about what cancel culture isn't. It's not a boycott.  It's not deciding to no longer go to a business. It's not giving a bad review for bad service. It generally involves two things. First, the offense is a matter of opinion. Second, secondary or even tertiary targets are threatened. Cancellation does not need to be successful, and often with very famous and wealthy people it is not successful. But it serves as a warning to vulnerable people who are not in a position to weather that kind of attack. The goal is terroristic in that it's about forcing social behavior in people who are not currently the subject of the attack. The message is always, this could happen to you. And the tactic invariably includes seeking out vulnerable people to threaten in order to put pressure on businesses or on the target of the attack. So it works like this: JK Rowling is invulnerable. But they can try, right? So what they do is they find out who works for the pub