Once again, the overflowing thread must spill over into a new vessel. Speak amongst yourselves as you are accustomed, but you might want to also weigh in another issue.
The comment threads are getting a bit fractious in general, and I keep hearing calls to ban so-and-so, throw whoever into the dungeon, crucify J. Random Idjit. I'm a little reluctant to use my vast powers so cavalierly, but I am considering whether I need to hold another Survivor: Pharyngula event just so everyone can blow off a little steam. Slaughtering a scapegoat always helps, doesn't it?
Of course, I just get to play the Pontius Pilate role.
So…leave your thoughts in this thread. Do you oppose the idea, for any reason? I'm not committed to it. If you've got some infuriating nincompoop in mind, leave a name here, and a reason why they deserve the mighty banhammer.
And perhaps most importantly, who gets to play Biggus Dickus in the proceedings?
(Hmmmm. 10,256 entries with 999,446 comments. The mileage will probably tick over today.)
I vote no on another round.
Not really needed. It seems like they're mostly drive-bys. They hit one thread, but they never spread to the site at large. Banning them seems like a waste when they're already gone anyway.
Well, we have a couple of annoying gits out there, sure - but I really don't think we need another round. I find the best way to deal with a troll is to dispassionately counter them on their own idocy and then demand that they have nothing to say until they satisfy your concerns. It works wonders for me!
Not really enough quality trolling for a Survivor round, but SlantedScience is an annoying git who tried repeatedly to derail a thread about rape with his abortion drivel. I don't have a count of how many times he's tried to derail other threads, but I sense from the reactions of others that it's been quite a few.
I'd just as soon not silence anyone that I disagree with. What would we do for entertainment then? Besides, I don't think anyone currently rises to the level of idiocy and persistent trollery necessary for a ban. In fact, how about bringing some of the oldies but goodies back, just to remind everyone?
Good point, Mattir. Forgot about him.
I'd vote for another Survivor challenge if one of the candidates is sandiseattle.
He/she/it really seems to believe that people get axed by disagreeing with everything and not because they're usually repetitious gits.
At any rate, this made my day and this seems to be the place to share:
Original ---> Parody (NSFW).
Dogs get bored with no chew toys. The start ripping up the carpets and chewing on the furniture.
Just sayin'.
Yah, I don't know that we need another round. Banning should be handled as on-condition maintenance, rather than coming at set service intervals. (Can you tell I work in the jet engine biz?)
Also, here's what I was writing when the portcullis came rattlin' down on me:
Hrrmmph! This pisses me off. "Public indecency" is arguable — I don't think anyone has the right to inflict their nudity on unwilling bystanders in public spaces, but I also think a no harm; no foul policy should apply, and it's not clear to me that any actual bystanders were harmed in the making of these photographs — but the notion that "disrespect for a religious site" should be a crime offends me. This isn't desecration, mind you, or vandalism; it's simply behavior in a public space (hence "public indecency") that happens to have a religious significance.
Grumble, grumble, grumble....
Nay.
daveau:
I'm with you. I'd rather only silence people who are boring and repetitive. It's like pressing snooze on the alarm clock multiple times - eventually you just get up and turn the damned thing off.
Bill Dauphin, OM:
As a matter of fact, yes. But that's because I am a quality consultant that spent a couple of years with some Friends of the General.
@Bill Dauphin:
Are the photos at least tasteful?
Welease Wodewick!
daveau:
Uh, no thanks. I would rather not see KC or Guardian of the Poll come back again. Or one of those slimeballs that used to steal nicks. ::shudder::
Onward with the million-post push!
I just wish the good folks over at Panda's Thumb would wake up some day soon and ban John Kwok. He's such an insufferable bore, and quite a vicious little bully when taunted. It IS rather enjoyable to tweak him though, for the wholly predictable response. It almost makes me want to poe him.
Mike, is Kwok still name-dropping?
Nope. Yours is the Power and the KingdomBlog and the Glory'Pod for ever and ever.
48297
Bill Dauphin (From the previous monasticization of the thread (not that I'm saying any of us would qualify as monks, but it's an amusing word)):
I outed myself? But I really am straight. Now fifteen different right wing whacko 'think tanks' (all with 'freedom' or 'family' in the title) will go after me tooth and tong.
And I have no problem with public nudity. Never have. Of course, given my current body, others may object.
------------
Regarding the dungeonization of particular commenteers, meh. There have been some who have been such incredible pests, ones who have posted inanity after insanity on a thread (or more) to the point that ad nauseum is no longer a metaphor, that banning may be appropriate. I'm thinking, specifically, of Graeme Bird (or what ever the hell the asshat called himself). To me, merely being a disagreeable asshole, or being a religiobot Christianist, is not a valid reason.
On my blog (which I have been neglecting because of serious computer problems at home (thank you, once again, McAfee)), the only thing that has gotten people banned was cut and paste stupidity on, like, 30 or so posts.
Then again, religiobot creationist asshats can, in limited doses, be amusing and useful. Useful just like the blocks of wood that (((Girl))) gives to her rats.
I'll never understand how Life of Brian is supposed to be the best Monty Python film.
Killfile works for me. Besides we've only got three real candidates:
● Slanted Scientist likes to derail threads with his anti-abortionism and hatred of women.
● Irksome Infidel Accommodationist is trying to prove a negative but pretends he's not.
● Some libertarian whose handle I forget is proselytizing his sociopathic fantasies.
Arguing with these characters keeps our claws sharp and our coats sniny.
@iambilly:
Oh shoot, I forgot about those ramifications. Goddamit now I'm going to have right-wing religious nutbags trying to pray me straight.
Would that be ABQ? He's the only one I've got a problem with. Otherwise, just as long as PZ keeps Mabus caged out, and cleans up Piltdown's vomit I've got no one to immediately ban. (PZ is the janitor of his own blog. lol)
Does the pope shit in a funny hat?
I like the power residing in PZ, as long as he doesn't mind if we occasionally alert him to repetitive egregious behavior. All the blog owner's discretion on how to do it, really. Perhaps by internet poll. ;)
Slanted Science calling rape victims "Swamps of Womanhood" deserves worse than banning the prick.
As a photographer this really pisses me off.
'Tis Himself, OM:
Meh. He's small beans compared to most. He tends to shut up when you point out that he's an idiot - at least, for a little bit.
If he's repetitive with it, then sure. Otherwise, just your standard, irrational idiot.
Yeah, I forget, too. I mostly lurk around here and only remember the names of the people I want to read more of, so I can't help you. But do you really want to remember that joker?
Rawr!
While I enjoyed the last version of Survivor, I vote no this time around. I would prefer a no holds barred WWE cage match where the ring is filled with primordial mud. First one to crawl out of the muck and ooze wins. Then we can crown the winner Mr/Ms Evolved of 2010.
Graham Chapman was sober.
Now that I think about it there's two libertarians, Al B. Looney and mfd(three digit number). Neither of them are in the African Genesis or Scott from Oregon league.
Time to draw a little Muhammad.
Or at least show what others have drawn.
I'll add a couple to 'Tis' list:
Coumardain, a racist and angry liberturd. I don't recall any posts from him in the last few weeks. Hopefully he has faded into the bandwidth.
Robocop, a pathetically inept apologist for religion.
I'm not calling for a round of Survivor Pharyngula, but SS is working hard on changing my mind.
+1
Where did I, in my orthodox-libertarian heyday, fit into this hierarchy? :-)
I don't think we need another round of Survivor, but I'd like SlantedScience out of here. He/She/It was intolerable in the Creepiest Christian thread and continues to derail threads with the same argument over and over.
Kevin:
A man secure in himself generally is flattered.
I vote no on the Survivor: Pharyngula. I didn't care for it the first time, and don't even see many "candidates" this time.
Genuine trolls are easy to spot, and PZ quickly gets rid of them without feeling any personal need to call for a vote. What's left are not 'trolls' -- defined as: people coming in to a forum and pretending to hold outrageous views just to disrupt the flow of discussion and cause a ruckus. Instead, you have sincere people who want to make a point on topic, and persuade others that they've got a surprisingly good case. They usually don't, but exploring and explaining where and why they are in error is useful. To both sides, and to onlookers.
As it is, there are often at least 2 or 3 subtopics coming off of any one of PZ's posts anyway. I think the regulars on Pharyngula -- and people who are used to the internet in general -- are perfectly capable of skipping over any discussion they consider "boring" or "annoying." PZ does not have to step in to save anyone who reads his blog from being forced to respond to someone who is saying something wrong -- or even wrong in a frustrating way. That would end up being his full-time occupation, maybe even worse than dealing with spam. He's not a net nanny for SIWOTI Syndrome.
It's up to us to learn how to deal with being frustrated. If we are going to debate with/argue with/deal with creationism, theism, and woo, I think we need all the practice we can get.
Slanted Science and Quirky are annoying, but I don't think there are enough regular trolls around at the moment to make for a good game of survivor.
Walton:
Don't get me wrong - you're annoyingly self-assured in many cases, and I think you should actually learn what politics is like in the US before talking about it, but I merely disagree with you. You don't fit in that hierarchy from my perspective.
I think I should get the banhammer. I am guilty of at least seven of the High Crimes and Misdemeanours...although not on this blog as such. In other news, I agree with those who are saying that troll maintenance should be continual rather than sporadic; no need for grandiose events, especially since trolls seem a bit thin on the ground right now.
SlantedScience said some pretty horribly offensive things on the thread about rape. Given the nature of the topic, and the fact that he doesn't seem to be stupid, I can only conclude that he was posting with the deliberate intention of hurting people.
I just can't figure him out at all. He doesn't appear to be motivated by any particular religious or political ideology. He just seems to enjoy being insulting and offensive, and posting on topics in which he knows his posts will get a strong emotional reaction from people.
It isn't. That would be Monty Python and the Holy Grail, closely followed by The Meaning of Life (if only for "Every Sperm is Sacred"). Life of Brian is third.
Caine:
I have known several that were, as a matter of fact. One of them even got himself drunk so I could have sex with him. Naturally, I declined, drove him home, and left him alone in his bed (fully clothed, thank you), but it was rather touching in a semi-macho way. God, was he ever hot, though. And his smile every time I said that melted all the boys and girls around him, too.
Walton #34
You were towards the bottom. You were never in full frothing rant mode like SfO or GWIAS. You could occasionally be annoying but most of the time you were just eager. Plus you did make a reasonable argument every so once in a while.
yup, you're most likely correct about this. I've seem to notice that when people dislike someone, they will perceive their negative traits more strongly, while perceiving their positive traits more strongly when they like someone.
I kinda trained myself to sometimes be able to look at people "objectively", and it still sometimes surprises me how many nice people have really weird and kinda ugly facial features.
doesn't have to be motivated by politics or religion. when you're empathy deficient, you can't see women as fully human because you never were one; otoh, you were a fetus once, so they are human (especially the more human they start looking). see how that works?
@deriamis:
I would be glad to find a good-looking guy or girl who's interested in a slightly effeminate, mojo-less guy.
@My 46:
*facepalm* Did not mean to post that quite yet...
In addendum, I cannot even remember what I was going to say cause now I'm super-embarrassed.
deriamis:
I'm married to one. :D
Aaaaaahhh... but who will make the millionth comment?
Ban Antiochus Epimanes! There can be only one Seleucid King!
AE: JK. There can be two Seleucid Kings.
Hmmm. I think that in this context there are perhaps different senses of the word "empathy".
I'm "empathy-deficient" in the sense that I find it hard to understand how other people are feeling. I sometimes offend or annoy people by accident, both online and in real life, because I tend to be bad at picking up signals about other people's emotions, and don't find it easy to imagine how they're feeling. And so I often say stupid or hurtful things without meaning to. This is really an inborn characteristic; I suppose it's a side-effect of my narcissism. On the internet I try to get around it by thinking very carefully about the things I post, but even so, it's gone wrong in the past.
But on another level I'm not empathy-deficient, because when I think of someone else suffering, and it actually registers properly in my mind, I have a very strong emotional reaction. I'm often a bit clueless about what other people's lives are like, having lived a sheltered and privileged life; but when I'm confronted with it directly - as with reading some of the personal experiences people have shared on Pharyngula - it often has a strong emotional effect on me (and sometimes profoundly changes my outlook). And I really do care about other people and often worry about whether I've hurt or offended them with anything I've said.
SlantedScience seems to be lacking in empathy in the second sense, not the first. He knows he's hurting people; he just doesn't really care. He doesn't seem to think their feelings matter.
deriamis,
I envy you. I've been trying to get a hot muscled grad student to notice me at the gym for a while. (There are other hot guys there, but he's the only I'm sure is gay.)
I agree with this. And I agree that banning should be more a PZ dictated from on high thing than a Survivor thing. Not enough interesting Trolls to want to squash.
Also, what *does* happen at the millionth comment?!
Goddammit, get rid of SlantedScience. He is horrible. He's not open to discussion. He came into the thread and took a shit on the rug in the middle of the floor.
And what do we have here, people saying it's his human right to shit, so we shouldn't kick him out of the room? Spare me.
A lifetime supply of bacon, I hope.
I don't think anyone's saying that. :-/
Personally, I would have no problem with banning him. As I said above, he seems to have deliberately chosen to post something offensive and hurtful on a thread about rape, and personally insulted rape victims, for no apparent reason. I can only assume that he enjoys hurting people.
But it is his right. Likewise, it's our right to give him hell for his shit taking. From the first day, SS came in with the intent of pissing people off. He/she/it/they need(s) a banhammer to the bum and then some.
I'd vote to ban SlantedScience purely because of his behavior on the recent rape thread. There were lots of new posters relating horrifying experiences that in some cases they had never discussed before, and he referred to this as "dredging the swamps of womanhood" in an effort to oppose his particular views on abortion. He was deliberately trying to hurt vulnerable people. I and a bunch of the regular posters are perfectly capable of ignoring him, but I felt incredibly protective of some of the first-time posters.
Idiocy I can handle and even enjoy (the baiting of LeeLeeOne got me hooked on the Pharyngula comment threads), but deliberate vicious cruelty should involve the banhammer and all those unsavory revenge fantasies shared on that thread. In lieu of the banhammer, I'm willing to devote my first pair of TortureShorts to the treatment of SlantedScience's difficulties.
Can someone tell me how to do the spiffy trademark thingy? (Yes, I know this ls a lazy request.)
I was wrong to say that PZ was promoting Nazism. Lars Vilks' racism is not Nazism. I spoke hurtfully to PZ, without cause, and I am sorry for that.
I'm posting this here on the off-chance that someone will quote me to attack PZ further; I want it known that I retract my accusation.
There are different ways, but I use [sup]TM[/sup]. (obviously replacing the square-brackets with pointed brackets)
I've been thinking about names lately. I'm wondering if someone becomes an atheist, and has a name who's meaning is something religious, should that person change their name? Thoughts?
No he was hurt and angry. People weren't listening to him and insisted on talking about themselves. Not only that people were acting like their stories were more interesting that his ideas!
Horrors.
He got uspet that he couldn't compete because even his chopping up babies hyperbole pales in the face of some of our real actual lives.
So he wanted us to shut up so we could see how smart he was. Really smart! LOOK AT ME MOMMY LOOK AT MEEEEEEE!
Furthermore no one cared to talk about what he wanted to.
He was angry at all those mean selfish women and men for not paying attention to him. And being a woman is something he can't do so he lashed out at the "swamps" because if he could just get rid of that then maybe people would pay attention to him and see how really smart and challenging he's being.
He's pretty transparent. From the time he came here posting about all of us being fat wanna-be scientist virgins.
™
This site has that and more.
Let me join in the choir of people who love Rachel Maddow (dr). I'm very very impressed with this discussion with Rand Paul (dr), she's just had (via Dan Savage).
I think Paul jr. was discussed here recently, but I fear I tuned out. Let me say up front that I don't know him, but I rather like him in that interview. Well-spoken and intelligent, but I'm not much of a judge of character.
We've had this discussion before - recently over the anti-gay UK B&B, but I would be much obliged if you'd remind me why he's wrong? Why are private businesses not allowed to discriminate? I'm afraid I find myself agreeing that anyone has the right to be a fucktard and the government shouldn't really get involved in that. Likewise I can't find the fault in his argument that banning segregation implies that one cannot in turn ban weapons from private property.
I think I'd like to know his opinion on pharmacists refusing to fill prescriptions for birthcontrol. After all one cannot be a pharmacist without a government licence, so in that case refusal to do one's job is certainly institutionalised bigotry.
OT: ThinkGeek.com has Bacon soap. Just don't eat it as it IS soap after all.
Can a comment in this thread really be Off Topic?
That may be the dumbest question I've heard all week and I deal with our sales-force on a daily basis.
Gyeong Hwa Pak:
^This. He/She/It showed up in the endless thread and announced the intention to troll. Ever since, it's only argued the same thing over and over in regard to abortion.
Haven't you ever read The Nine Billion Names of God by Arthur C Clarke?
Spoiler: "overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out."
If some one wants to change their name for any reasons it's their right to do it.
Personally, I think that's a pretty stupid reason.
It's hard to get so worked up about something you actually don't care about. I can't imagine if my name was Mark or something that I'd feel a need to purge it.
Kind of like prying off the S,T,A,M,and P keys from your keyboard because you don't collect STAMPS.
sandiseattle:
You are the village idiot, your specialty being stupid questions.
I really don't have a problem with anyone, much, other than the cretin SS... I don't relish another warmed-over, shark-jumping Survivor (it was funny the first time).
I just wanted it out there that certain trolls are worse than others. Some actually make good toys for constructive debate in which the rest of us get to hone and refine our arguments, and they even sometimes provide interesting piquancy to the standard scientific/atheist bean soup. I have to admit that in the absence of the usual misguided blowhard, every similar chat room or blog I've been in has regressed into an endless round of cats, talking dirty, politics, cooking, and dating. :)
I'm not arguing we have to get rid of SS because he's stupid or even hateful. I'm arguing that he's not only not contributing to anything positive, he's dragging the whole thing down into a very negative direction. He's feeding off others' pain, whether that is his stated intention or not. Drive a stake through the heart of that nonsense already.
Damnit, Daveau! Why didn't I think of that one. Good story, too.
@KOPD Mmm Bacon
@sandiseattle I think people should change their name if it makes them uncomfortable, but all names have origins and ideas attached to them, you have the option of declaring it your name and that it doesn't mean anything besides that. Like, my name is Ashley and I am willing to accept that this means people will compare me to Bruce Campbell and Ashley Wilkes from Gone with the Wind, and I'm willing to declare that I am not, in fact, a dude.
You Australians are a constant source of amusing BBC ninja tidbits.
@sandiseattle:
I don't see why not, but I don't see it as a big deal. What one's name means doesn't necessarily relate to who they are. Kevin means 'handsome' or 'gentle'...
Huh, so I guess my name really does represent who I am *hehe*
Mattir:
I felt the same way. It was hard enough for a lot of women to speak up, SStroll's crap was not helping. That thread turned into a place where women could talk and receive support.
I agree with my stunt double, that is just silly. Names are just names. I am no one's advisor, but my name is derived from a word for an advisor. Should I change my name?
I've never liked my name. I mean my real names.
I just... don't like them.
But I never got around to changing them and now they're just sorta... there.
Sure. Like, what if my name was Christian Pope and I became atheist. I would totally change it to Satan Babyeater. Or, if my name was, like, Mohammed Jewboy and I became atheist. I would change it to Ithink Yourgodisbullshit. Like that.
Thanks for askin'
Awww. That's cute!
Mine is a poetic name for Ireland. What's weird is that my mom's family has only a few Irish ancestors on her fathers side. No more than the German and French ancestors. Most of that family, going the furthest back, was English anyway.
But she named me after Ireland. Mostly because my cousin bought a dog and gave the dog the same name my mother had chosen for me.
Then no one in my family liked my name anyway and I was raised under another name. One my mom jotted down while she was strung out in post-op watching The Bionic Woman.
And thus I got my name.
And immediately I hated it. Stupid name.
I'd rather be named Dennis.
Ashley @ 74: I think perhaps Ashley is one of those androgynous names that have bbecome less so over time. I had a swim coach - a guy - named Kim and I know Shirley and Marion were both guy names at one point. My own name is one that can be applied to both sexes as well.
I only really like my initials, particularly the middle one. It allows me to introduce myself as such:
Person: What's the F stand for?
Me: I'm Ashley Fucking Miller!
Ooookay, then...
Somewhat juvenile jokes about Al Capp's fictional 'Lower Slobbovia' enjoyed a brief vogue, somewhere way back in my distant youth. I'm assuming this was some sort of weird reprise owing to I know not what pop culture forces, since this must have been around the time of Capp's death, well after Li'l Abner was much of a going concern...
Anyway, for a time, I just sorta assumed Alabama was another such fictional place invented solely to make jokes about. This pair of videos (the parody was which again?) has made me again think I was probably right about that in the first place.
LMFAO!!!!
Yes, F is the best middle initial!
Iono. I think you're more of a Gwyneth.
Kevin:
Too late, buddy. The cat's out of the bag now, so to speak!
@Gyeyong Hwa Pak: I was also in the US Navy at the time, so there was plenty of very yummy young men who had no love for clothing running around. Some of them were ahem...very sexually permissive. So, lucky? No. I had to deal with being in the military for that. I was just enjoying the ahem...perks of the job.
Caine:
And some men, as few as there were. Still, reducing it as he did to "dredging the swamp of womanhood" and completely ignoring the direction the thread was taking was hurtful to me, too, if only because he completely dismissed the personal stories people were telling as just so much touchy-feely crap. Even when I deliberately offend someone I think is taking something far too seriously, you can bet that it won't be while they are pouring his or her heart out.
I vote for the summary banning of SS; he adds nothing to the discussions and his constant attempts at derailing serious conversations are annoying. His misogynistic comments in the rape thread went way past the bounds of civility. They might have been tolerable had he added anything of value to the discussion, but he didn't and doesn't.
Might I suggest, oh Pharyngulites, that a policy of "ignore the trolls" be instituted? They want attention, even negative attention - the latter gives them a certain sense of power: 'Oh, look, I can get people riled up and angry.' Back in my youth, my meatworld clade had a policy of refusing to acknowledge in-person trolls; we'd start reciting the Dead Parrot skit. If one gives them no attention, they usually go away in search of greener pastures, as it were.
I vote no on Survivor, yes on giving SS the axe.
My name is religious. That is, my Jewish name is. I have one. It's "Sarah," which as practically everyone knows who's ever been to Sunday School, means "princess." Given that my father named me that because I was, in fact, the eldest born in the lineage of some petty Hungarian princeling, I don't see any particular reason to change it. My regular, birth-certificate name was never attractive to me on its own and I de facto changed it when a good oppportunity presented itself.
Kevin (@12):
Since I'm at work, I didn't go looking for the actual photographs. From the article, it seems as if the photographer is a serious — if boundary-pushing — artist, rather than some raincoat-wearing pornographer. Not that it matters, though: I assume if you do nude photography (of any sort) anywhere other than in a private studio, dealing with whatever the local law might say about public nudity is a Cost of Doing Business®; it's the idea of enhanced charges owing merely to the pearl-clutching sensibilities of the sainted deceased that has my panties in a bunch!
Well, I'll be honest that a a large part of why I enjoy coming to the Pharyngula arena is the opportunity to smash trolls, though I haven't been able to do much of it recently.
I hate my name in all kinds of ways. My first name is a rare spelling of a name I don't like anyway, spelled in a way that confuses 30% of people that see it so that they have no idea how to pronounce it. So I go by my middle name, which is a short version of a more common longer name so people always assume I call myself that as short for the longer name, but I don't. It's not short for anything. It just is. Going by one's middle name is a pain, though, as everybody assumes you go by your first. Then there's my initials. My fracking initials spell my first name. They also happen to be the same as a very commonly used acronym on the Internet, so I always pause when people use that one, thinking for some reason that they are talking to me when I should know better.
At least on the webs I get to choose my own name. Though I didn't choose so wisely, as there's this thing called the "King of Pop Discussion" site about MJ.
™ is more æsthetic.
Ol'Greg:
I don't like mine, especially as I got them for a stupid reason - I wasn't born a male. Apparently, names for a girl were never discussed.
My real name is Virginia. I never use it, I haven't legally changed it but I have a legal DBA. Most of the people who know me have no idea that the name I go by isn't my legal name.
@badgersdaughter
I always loved the name Sarah -- because of the Labyrinth. Maybe that means David Bowie crushes on you.
Never really thought about if I like my name or not.
I was named after my grandfather so I like that and my last name isn't a super common and is definitely Irish in Origin so there's that.
All in all. I don't mind it.
HOWEVER
My first name is one that has about 4 different shortened versions of it and I fucking hate it when someone takes the liberty of thinking they can call me those shortened versions when I've specifically told them my name is the long version.
I vote no on Survivor: Pharyngula. Something about it didn't sit well with me the last time, and I avoided reading or commenting on those threads.
Hell, I've never even watched one of the shows.
Deriamis:
Yes. I'm sorry I left you and WhoCares out, I was thinking of you both after SStroll's assholism.
Haha, Ashley, if David Bowie crushed on me, my best friend would go berserk. Nobody, I say nobody can crush harder on David Bowie than my friend, without actually turning into a creepy stalker. :)
Reverand (I'd call you Rev, but is that one of the shortened versions? or do you mean your meatname?):
I feel for you. I've gone through life as Billy, Willy, Bill, Will, Loki (my sister was big on Norse Mythology for a while and thought I was an immature version of Satan) and Bilbo. No one has ever asked me what I want to be called.
I'm partial to Ogvorbis.
Yeah.
That would work.
[signed]
iamogvorbis
Kishin Shinoyama for me falls into the category of art I would call art but art I find boring.
I don't really know what tasteful/not tasteful means.
Some very prominent high art is very distasteful.
I would consider his photographs slightly less interesting because they are not very challenging to me.
That being said it's no damned reason to censor him and I guess this has more to do with the idea of a cemetery as a place of reverence.
Hehe, obviously they were challenging to SOME ONE! OMG naked girls!
You see, I don't get the positive or the negative parts of that.
His photos are mostly female nudes. Conservative IMO. Sweet actually. Very safe, unless you think nudity itself is unsafe.
For something more unsettling and Japanese try Nobuyoshi Araki.
Now... the irony meters go off.
I guess maybe he's more acceptable because he uses sets so much? As opposed to the gonzo style.
nice
I finally caught up with SlantedScience's sneering, unholy awfulness, and my only opinion in that area is that he should be put in a missile and shot into the sun.
Caine:
I was sure it wasn't intentional. No worries from me.
Anyway, about names, I've always sorta liked mine. My first name means "Little King" in Irish (as in, one of the many city-state kings), and I share my middle name with the identity of a biblical troublemaker - or an Egyptian god, depending on how you look at it. My last name is just a bunch of funny-sounding gobbeldygook my grandfather invented when he came to the US, so it seems rather incongruous at first, but it is a very, very exclusive name right now.
@deriamis:
Yes yes, I just didn't want to sound desperate. It's more the latter half of my unwilling statement that I'm more embarrassed about.
I give up. I tried to guess what KOPD's first name is, but I couldn't come up with anything that "WTF" would be an alternate spelling of.
(ducks)
The only thing I can think of that fits most of the criteria is a Hindu name that means "beloved" and that's not too awful, but I still bet I'm wrong.
'Tis Himself mentioned Scott from Oregon. Shudder. I don't miss him a bit.
No on any new survivor round.
Nonsense. One can require a shirt and shoes in a restaurant, one can require that all children have an adult accompanying them, one can remove a drunk from a bar. "No guns allowed" falls into that category. FTM, the government, as the health department, building and safety, ABC, can require a business to meet certain licencing standards.
Segregation is different - it applies to specific groups, usually non-white, for no other reason than bigotry, and for something they cannot change. It relegates people to a lesser status. It is inherently evil and unfair; it damages society as a whole. And do understand that those businesses that refused to serve black people [or brown or red or gold or gay] feel perfectly entitled to the fruits of the labours of those persons, to the services their taxes provide: interstate highways, fire and police departments. They can't have it both ways; if they want the privilege of discriminating against a part of society, they cannot be entitled to the benefits society grants.
@badgersdaughter
I imagine my 6 year old self probably would have given your friend a run for their money.
Random, when I was in high school, my best friend and I wrote a series of sketches starring David Bowie and Alan Rickman as themselves. We thought that they would make a hilariously uptight buddy team.
AR: What's an Iman?
DB: She's a fan, you remember those don't you?
AR: That was harsh, David Bowie.
Harsh, David Bowie being my favorite thing to say when someone is being a dick.
KOPD, you should write those little mensa questions.
I have a guess for what your name is now.
haha...
I won't post it though just in case I'm right :P
*heresy to follow*
I hate the idea of Survivor, actually. It's just so...Howard Stern-ish. It's a hobo fight. Gross.
While I'm voicing an opinion, some of these trolls would just go away if they were ignored. It is hard to resist the smell of stupid in the water, but come on. When everyone simultaneously jumps on one obvious jackass/idiot/clownshoe/insert-epithet-here, it kind of clogs up the thread. Sometimes, the insults are still being hurled one-hundred comments after the last insert-epithet-here comment.
*cringes and retreats*
I vote 'no' on a new Survivor. I'm generally only for banning in extreme cases. I also don't think there's enough trolls to merit another Survivor. We can easily deal with the ones we got now on an individual basis.
I've heard that North Americans tend to think The Holy Grail is the best Monty Python movie while Brits prefer The Life of Brian. From my completely anecdotal experience it seems more or less accurate.
For a libertarian you were quite reasonable (not that that's saying much :p).
If that were my first name I would not be going by my middle name. :-)
I like my name OK... and as serendipity would have it, it is the name shared by the star of the clip PZ used for this iteration of the endless thread (Brian).
Although, considering how simple and common a name it is, I am always amazed at how often it is mis-spelled in correspondences I receive.
It also doesn't lend itself to nicknames all that well... growing up I had a cousin with the same first and last name, he was 4 months older and I was taller, but I was referred to as "little Brian" till I was 21. At one point when I was about 15 my aunt was giving me a hard time and called to me "hey, little Brian", to which I immediately replied "yes, slutty Nancy?"
I was grounded for a week. It was totally worth it.
What's that Brain?
@Celtic_Evo:
Kevin is usually nicknamed into 'Kev' or 'Kevie.' Though I think the funniest was 'Big Kev' when I was in college. For some reason, all the guys in my dorm called me 'Big Kev.' And it was funny because, like I explained above, I'm somewhat effeminate, I'm 6'0 (so tall, but not super-tall), and I'm a skinny kid. And these were BIG guys, footballers and track runners - 6'2, 6'3, could probably easily bench press me.
My first name is Biblical, but means "devotee of [an Egyptian goddess]". Few people pronounce it correctly on first sight [or hearing]. I go by a shortened version. OTOH, I was nearly named after my late great-aunt Borghild. Imagine the Borg jokes...
My son has several names: his first, his original Korean name, a middle, my last, his father's last. When, at age 5, he asked me what he could do with so many names, I told him he could pick and choose which name he liked. 'OK', says he, 'I'll be MacGuyver.'
Brain is an awesome nickname for Brian.
I'm calling you Brain now.
In my head.
@Rev BDC:
Are you pondering what I'm pondering, Pinky?
iambilly (@101):
Heh. For all of my adult life, pretty much everyone I've known has called me Bill; when I ran for Town Council, I changed my voter registration from William to Bill, so I'd appear on the ballot the same way people know me. But when I was a little boy, I was Billy... to everyone except my (paternal) grandmother, who insisted on calling me William, if not (humiliatingly) Sweet William. Of course, just about the time I decided I was grown-up enough to be Bill, she started finally calling me Billy, and did so for the rest of her life! <sigh>
Ol'Greg (@102):
Thanks for the comments on Kishin Shinoyama. As I said, I was unfamiliar with the work; I only saw the news story. My comment about Shinoyama being "boundary-pushing" came from the article's suggestion that he was at the lead in challenging Japan's mores (laws?) regarding pubic hair in nude photography... but there again, this one article is my only source. When I'm on a computer under my personal control, I'll have to google up his work (and Araki's) to take a look.
Rev BDC (@wayupthread):
Do you shoot nudes in public places? I'd be interested in any war stories you have about the trials and tribulations involved.
Kay, work is over, so I'm goin' home. Gotta return something to a store and go get some groceries.
Will log in at home. See you.
Ol'Greg,
If you manage to guess my first and middle names, you can email me at my Gmail account. The address is firstname.middlename at gmail dot com. Very creative, I know. :-)
Hooray - this thread has turned into the internet petition on the banhammer for SlantedScience. Now all our problems will be solved. Perhaps I should make several more avatars so as to Pharyngulate this poll...
Bill:
Lots of derivations of 'Beloved Helmet' out there. When I first found out the origins of my first name, I just thought it strange. Then when I discovered sex, I got my face slapped. (((Wife))) likes the name though.
Ogvorbis
I get that too:
"Do you go by Tony?"
"Yeah, that's why I introduced myself as 'Anthony'. You introduced yourself as Robert; mind if I call you Fuckingmoron for short?
It doesn't bother me as much as it once did, as people who shorten my name are generally doing so to be friendly.
I remember wishing I had a less 'ethnic' surname when I was young, though.
I work with a number of immigrants from China, many of whom adopted 'Western' names when they came to Canada. The father of one such coworker immigrated here as well and was dismayed to learn she was 'denying' her Chinese heritage, so she asked everyone to use her Chinese name instead. Three or four others soon followed suit. Unfortunately, many of the anglophones I work with have a difficult time pronouncing Mandarin names, and so in any given meeting one will hear five different terrible pronunciations of the same name. (I tried to get everyone to start calling me 'Framboiseobyrnewiczbergensteinington' in a similar fashion, but no dice.)
This idea that one keeps the same name for life seems to be limited to North America and perhaps Europe, it seems.
No, uh, not yet.
But I do shoot portraits (with very conspicuous lighting setups etc..) in public places (including the middle of the street) and typically I don't get hassled too bad as long as you stay out of traffic and behave politely. Mostly I gather crowds wondering what is going on and who the famous person being photographed is (I've never photographed anyone famous).
However, the cops always want to be real nosy about what the hell you are doing. And don't let them catch you photographing any land marks.
My favorite is the cop telling me I can't take a photo of a building viewable from a public street.
Kevin:
When I was a kid, I got stuck with Ginger, as my grandmother (also Virginia) was called Ginny. I couldn't wait to get away from my name.
Be mindful that some of us are in the advance stages of SIWOTI. Such a policy would have us foaming on the ground.
Then who would I swear at?
Neither my first or middle name shorten well.
I was very close to changing my name to Mathilda.
I actually like Gwyneth, Sili. But I don't like Gwyneth Paltrow much. I'd hate for people to think I was trying to be like her.
If I did Mathilda I'd go by Matty or Mat.
I also liked Agnes.
My last name is the Anglicization of the Hispanization of a Chinese surname.
Bingo! Thanks.
I rather keep my name. It's the Anglicization of a Cambodian nickname that I can't use while in Cambodia. And my surname is the most common one in Korea and is a pronunciation of the word 金.
You can't abbreviate my name really, since it's a single syllable. So some people decide they want to lengthen it.
Wait, wasn't this whole topic kicked off by somebody's dumb question?
Rev. BDC, I'm lucky, I don't get too hassled here in ND, there aren't that many cops around. This gets discussed a lot on Moblog though, as the situation can be pretty touchy in the UK. Check out http://photographernotaterrorist.org/
No to Survivor, but definitely ditch SlantedScience.
I always hated my name -- I am so not a Heather -- so changed it after my parents died (didn't want to hurt their feelings while they were alive).
Unfortunately, we Aussies not only have good ninjas (yay, ninjas!), but apparently also now have evil weapon-stockpiling cultists as well:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/05/20/2905252.htm?site=news
Brownian (@126):
When my lovely bride and I were teaching in Korea, many of the students took Western "names" for use at school (and most of the rest went by "Mr/Ms <FamilyName>"; apparently calling someone by their given name is considered an intimacy not easily granted to foreigners/strangers... even highly respected ones like teachers)... but often they were words that we don't usually think of as names (e.g., Giant) or surnames of famous Americans (esp. presidents: I had several Kennedys, and, oddly enough, one Nixon).
All this talk of names and naming inevitably makes me think of this.
Rev BDC (@127):
Yeah, or worse yet, public modes of transportation. We almost got thrown off the T in Boston for taking pictures of the kids inside a subway car... nevermind that all you could see in the pictures (other than the kids) was a tiny bit of generic subway car interior.
Last weekend, when I was in the DC area for the TARC rocketry contest, I had to pick up a friend/fellow volunteer at Dulles Airport. Having just seen the Saarinen exhibit at Yale, I couldn't resist taking a lot of pictures of the terminal. I spent the whole time expecting a TSA tap on the shoulder, but nobody hassled me. It probably helped that I was so obviously a clueless tourist with a crappy little point-and-shoot digital; serious gear would've probably attracted more attention.
That happens to me all the time. And as I said, it's my middle name I go by. That led to an interesting situation once with a police officer I knew asking me as he filled out paperwork "Okay, [incorrectly lengthened version of middle name, writing down as my first name], what's your middle name?" To which I replied "you're going to need another sheet."
Please don't ignore them completely, I'm pretty new around here but I've found that the threads in which I learn the most are the ones where the regulars are keeping their claws sharp!
I think first names tend to be kept but surnames get changed quite often. A few years ago when I was much skinnier and blonder I was known in my office as 'Barbie'. I kind of liked the name and as we were allowed to use pseudonyms when dealing with the public I asked my boss if I could use it. She wasn't keen and decided that as I had a middle name I could use that instead. A few weeks later I was going through the process of changing my surname for long and convoluted family reasons, had a lightbulb moment and proceeded back to the office waving my deed poll around and demanding to use my new middle name. I still have the namebadges they made for me somewhere........
Ley, Lee, Young, Louis, Louie, Sy, Dy, Ong, or Wong?
I had my name changed when I was 22 to the name of my favorite D&D character, Borgarhal Rantipole, a pretty advanced conjurer. My friends usually call me Borg or Hal, or just sometimes Rantipole. Beats the hell out of my birth name, Nad Chislerr. What were the 'rents (Camus and Jainy Chislerr) thinking? Nad? FFS.
KOPD...is your name really Lol?
Daughter Spawn's name means "God has answered," leading Mr. M & I to wonder what, exactly, the question was. We think it may have been "Which name in the girl section of "What To Name Your Jewish Baby" contains the name of my pentacostal great-grandmother?" The IPU certainly does work in mysterious ways...
Maybe it's because I've had a long and illustrious career involving a lot of freelance RA work for researchers in health-related fields (including a stint as a spirometry tech for someone's Master's thesis), or maybe it's because I smoke, but my mind always wants to resolve KOPD as an acronym for "Kronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease".
Which would be a wicked sweet name for a punk/funk band that performed a lot of songs about reefer.
I frequently describe my first name as "the Anglicisation of the Hebraic corruption of the original Egyptian".
The original Chinese surname was this. The final product is left as an exercise for the reader.
I have always had Issues with my real given names, first and middle. I have mostly come to terms with them and embrace them, but not when I'm in a bad mood.
As for the Monty Python, I have a story. Perhaps I have already shared it. When I was a teenaged fundamentalist, I had a youth pastor who was fairly young and desperate to be "hip". We had a get-together that was movie day, and he decided that we all needed to be introduced to Monty Python. Only problem was that he couldn't quite remember exactly which movie was which, and what each one was about. So he rented, of course, Life of Brian. Picture 8 13-16 year-olds, all at their Baptist youth pastor's house, watching the scathing commentary on religion that is Life of Brian, said youth pastor getting more and more disturbed as he realized what the movie was really about.
And then there was the male nude scene.
I like my name. Both of them (where I come from, we don't usually have middle names). The problem is there are both rare, even in my country, and almost unpronounceable in most other countries. People keep saying it wrong, and it's going to get worse when I move to the US soon. I'm already thinking how can I short it so people could say it - It maybe better for me to introduce myself in the short version, and not let people murder the original name.
Oh, and Mattir @143 - Eliana? I kinda like this name, actualy.
My thought when I first saw KOPD was "Knock Out Police Department".
Yes, my first name is biblical. It doesn't matter to me, though. I do, however, insist on my full first name, except for close friends, and even they can only shorten it to "Ben". "Benny" will earn you my contempt (except for my dad; I seem to be incapable of breaking him of the habit), and calling me "Benji" is a shooting offense.
(PS: Yes, the name you see above is my real name.)
Liang -> Leong -> León -> Leonard -> Lennard?
Carlie: Some female FFN too.
Um. Not that I noticed or anything. HEard it from a friend.
Borgerhal
'm wondering if someone becomes an atheist, and has a name who's meaning is something religious, should that person change their name? Thoughts?
My thought is that you need to dredge up something that resembles a brain so that you can form your own stupid thoughts rather than panhandling for them.
My second thought is that you need to fuck off, you passive aggressive wanna be tyrant shitstain.
Jesus fucking Krispy Kritter, I hate it when people say something stupid, and then simper: Thoughts? Or, worse still: Discuss. They remind me of the repressed dom leaders of do-nothing bullshit high school clubs like Future Homemakers of America.
As a former employee of the health care industry, I totally understand that. In actually it stands for "Killer of Peaceful Dreams". Don't ask me what that's supposed to mean, it just kinda came to me one day while my mind was in "word salad mode."
Um, close. It's the right length and has one of those letters in it.
Dear Unbelievers
I treasure my first name, because it is the last thing Mama Batzrubble gave me before life ebbed from her body.
To cut a long story short. On the way out the front door to take herself to the maternity hospital because her labor had started, Mama Butzrubble slipped on ice and cracked her skull open on the erect penis of a lewd garden gnome (a family fetish handed down for generations).
Papa Batzrubble (who was two years later executed as a serial killer of fat nuns) arrived home from disposing of a particularly plump Bride of Christ named Sister Seraphim Butter. He found Mama dying in the ice and carted her to hospital where I was delivered by Caesarian section (hence my middle name). Shortly after my birth Mama floated to the surface of her coma to speak to the weeping Papa Batzrubble. "Call the boy Smok—eee" she said, and then she died.
Of course, you will all realise at once that she wanted me to be named "SMOK" which is Polish for Dragon, and that the "eee" was simply her dying exhalation. But Papa Batzrubble was never the brightest bulb in the family chandelier (and, in fairness, he was also distracted by the twin facts of Mama Batzrubble's awful death and Sister Seraphim Butter's rosary beads, which he still had tightly knotted around his scrotum) and so the stupid arse named me "SMOGGY", which in polish means 'pig-placenta'.
I often think of changing my name, but then I ask myself "What would Jesus Fucking Christ do?"
Smoggy Section Batzrubble
Ex-Missionary to the Atheists
You mean like Paul Zachary (from Zechariah; "Yah(weh) remember(s)")?
I think the most subversive thing that an atheist with a name like "Jesus" (or "Christian" or "Christine" or whatever) can do is keep the name. Names are not destiny; names are never destiny.
When I read Logicomix recently, I was interested to note that the lead authors' names were "Apostolos" and "Christos". Greek society may have a pool of names that hark back to a time of great piety and devoutness, but the authors themselves seemed pretty secular in their sympathetic portrayal of the atheist Bertrand Russell.
BTW, can you (Americans and other) know the religion of people (or their parent's religion, more likely), by their names? Can you say, for example, oh, that's your name so you must be Mormon, or whatever?
In my country (Israel), one can know more-or-less not only if, but *how* religious one's parents are by his or het name. The ultra-orthodox have a completely different set of names, but there are differences even between the secular and the mildely-religious.
Okay. We'll cover a few Dead Kennedys tunes and go with the acronym, like SNFU, and leave it up to the audience to decipher. I'll start composing multiple and misleading answers to the inevitable "What does the name stand for?" question for the interviews with SPIN, Rolling Stone, and NME.
Thread Dreail!
Just heard that the Independence Mall area, Independence National Historical Park, Philadelphia, has been evacuated because of a balloon cylinder device filled with white powder. (((Wife))) says the TV news reports it has tested positive as being biological (big deal, if it has carbon, it has a good chance of showing up as biological, right?).
And in other news, Rush Limbaugh, Rudy Giuliani, Glenn Beck, and other right wing asshats are down on their knees praying that it is (a) a real terrorist attack and (b) that it was not placed there by an angry white guy. Or if (b) is true, that (a) is false.
John, Kenn, Joel, Kole, Dane, Dann, Diep, Kanh, Kong, Kieu, Phan, Pham, Olie?
KOPD, first and middle: lol wut? :D
Sure, but I already knew exactly what that looked like in person.
Gyeong,
I wish to remain anonymous but I will say you're very close.
*cough* Trotsky *cough*
LMAO!
I could only imagine. My fundie sister walked out when we were watching the extremely tame History of the World, Part I.
Says a man who's obviously never considered changing his name to "Max Power".
XD
Given the rules of how Life Often Sucks, I'm going to guess that Kevin's comment @46 is the millionth, and will be emblazoned in 48-point font on the front of the home page tomorrow with its own post. :)
Bill - I would only have been annoyed about the photo if the model were posing on a tombstone belonging to my family and we hadn't been asked first.
I guess now would be a good time to admit that my real real name is Art Vandelay... but I perform under the name Buck Naked.
;^)
TTFN....
Okay, okay, I won't pry. On the subject of morphing Chinese Surname I here that in the Philippines Shī has morphed into Schultz.
Only my mother calls me that.
Sometimes, especially if the person in question is a 19-year-old boy named "Elder".
Oh, give ol' Leon a break. Musta been hell in the '80s. Or fun.
Okay, okay, I won't pry. On the subject of morphing Chinese Surname I here that in the Philippines Shī has morphed into Schultz.
He's not a net nanny for SIWOTI Syndrome.
frankly, I'm tired of seeing this bit of oversimplistic, near denialistic, response!
most people here never call for someone to be banned unless there is a damn good reason.
it's hardly fucking SIWOTI involved, and to suggest such means you are calling the rest of us who do occasionally call for bans unthoughtful.
I say the people saying this haven't been paying much attention to our trolls of late.
I don't call for the bannation of Slimyslacker because I disagree with him, I call for it because he contributes NOTHING to any thread but derailment and nausea.
seriously, someone who said what he said in the rape thread deserves more than not being allowed to post here again!
Harrumph I say, HARRUMPH!
So, are you in jet engines or latex?
Mormons often have odd names, frequently a combination of syllables from two other names [parents, grandparents]. There's a website that discusses/lists them.
BTW, if you move to Utah, you'll become part of the goyim. Anyone not Mormon = gentile.
Damn you, Smoggy. You got me. I giggled loudly at the signature.
Aztec Camera - Somewhere In My Heart
(...there is a star that shines for you...)
too frickin' catchy to not share
Better Mormon name website: here
Jeffrey is actually a nickname for my real name - Doofus.
As someone said above, Rev I think, I dislike having people shorten my name. I use the whole thing and prefer people to do the same.
Only time I thought of changing the name was to change to the English spelling.
Being from the deep south, I have known many men named Lynn, Shirley, Beverly, Ashely, etc. Not as common as it once was, but still found, often as middle names.
DoofusD
Ha Sili!
You thought it was going to be something silly like "Caesar" didn't ya?
In an astonishing once-in-a-decade turn of events, I actually agree completely with Ichthyic.
I'm normally opposed to banning anyone. But what SlantedScience said on the other thread was both pointless and deliberately hurtful. Deliberately insulting victims of rape, for no apparent reason other than to draw attention to himself, is not merely insensitive: it's vicious and cruel.
Several people on that thread were describing deeply horrifying and traumatic personal experiences, and showing a lot of strength and courage in talking about what happened to them. The very least that the rest of us can do is try to provide them with a supportive and caring online environment, as far as we can do so. When this is happening, and some asshole decides to troll the thread and launch a vicious attack on the victims for no comprehensible reason, banning him is IMO a perfectly appropriate response.
Like Ol'Greg says, SlantedScience really seems to be here just to seek attention. I think banning him would be perfectly appropriate.
Under the heading of unfortunate names, I went to school with a girl named Jenny Mae.
It gets worse.
Her name was Jenny Mae Faulk.
No, not kidding.
ObPratchett:
I hate my real name. It's Augustus Buttmunch-Pickelheimer (or Pickelheimer-Buttmunch, I can never keep that straight). So naturally I go by the name of Joseph Pudlerowski (Joseph is short for Joseph) 8-þ.
Seriously, my real first, middle and last names are quite unremarkable. My first name is Michael. Most people call me Mike, but I actually prefer Michael.
iambilly @181
That's nothing. There's a Noo Zillund netball player named Jenny-May Coffin (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenny-May_Coffin)
For those of you who are fortunate enough to be unfamiliar with it, netball is the world's most tedious game, only made bearable by laughing at the NZ netball team's copious weeping every time they get thrashed by Australia.
Dear brother tis,
What a shame your name isn't "Picklemunching-Butthammer"
@JeffreyD #178:
None named "Sue"?
I worked for a guy named Shannon once. I liked him a lot. When I found out I was going to be on "Shannon's" project I didn't expect him to be a he.
When my manager introduced me to him I actually stood there for a second looking for Shannon before my boss cordially said, "Let me introduce you two..." and I realized the obvious.
Shannon was a guy.
Oh. Ok.
lol
I've always hated my first and middle names; it always suggested someone's supercilious maiden aunt. For years I went by a diminutive, but unfortunately, the health insurance (when I had health insurance) insisted on my full, legal name. For years I kept my real name secret, and threatened with death anyone who used my it at me, and now it's out there. *grumble*
On the Intarweebs, I just use my SCA name.
Would announcing that I am praying for PZ and all the poor, mis-guided atheist participants of this blog get me banned?
I was told that doing this was the probably the most annoying and offensive remark, mainly because it's a bit condescending.
But it sounds like slantedscience managed to offend me just reading what other people reported. I suppose I should actually go and read it for myself. One thing I've learned from experience is it's often foolish to declare I'm opposed to something based on opinions instead of actually reviewing it for myself.
OTOH,I still refuse to watch "Schindler's List" because everything I've seen on the subject of the Holocaust gets me very upset and morose.
Sorry, I missed "survivor.pharyngula."
Did I derail the thread? ;)
We have another winner in the assclam stakes over in the Creepiest Christian thread:
Jeffpayne:
I don't have this problem, because my real name is, of course, Oliver St. John Mollusc, thought by many to be this year's outstanding twit.
Though for political purposes I go by the name of Tarquin Fim-Tim-Lim-Bim-Wim-Lim Bus-stop F'tang F'tang Olé Biscuit-Barrel.
(Yeah, I know I've posted these before, but they never get old...)
OK, I see the direction things are going: no new Survivor game this weekend. I get it, too, that I'm supposed to be both the janitor here and the executioner.
I'll keep an eye on SlantedScience. He might feel my wrath soon if he doesn't clean up his act.
As for names: I don't like mine. I didn't even know my name was "Paul" until I got sent off to Kindergarten with this strange new appellation pinned to my shirt; my whole extended family called me "PZ" until I started going to school, and then they told me that that was my baby name and my big kid name was Paul. Which was OK, if a bit distressing, until I looked it up in a baby name book and discovered that Paul Zachary was biblical, and meant "little one whom god remembers".
Ewww. Ick.
It was made worse by the fact that my maternal grandfather was also called Paul, and every time we were in their company (which was frequent), I became "Little Paul". Slapping a young boy with the diminutive and persisting with it through adolescence was not good for my self-esteem.
A friend of mine has two close friends named Shannon, one of either gender. When speaking to or about them she uses "Boyshannon" and "Girlshannon" without a trace of guilt.
As for me, I've had nephews and nieces since I was eight, and for much of that time in large gatherings my family would use the confusing construction "Uncle Ant".
('Ant' being short for 'Anthony', in case that wasn't clear from my post #126).
"Mormons often have odd names, frequently a combination of syllables from two other names [parents, grandparents]. There's a website that discusses/lists them."
I went to college with a fellow named Romney, which pretty much speaks for itself. His sister was named Reionda, one of those strange syllable-mishmashes of which Mormons are fond. They had a brother whose name escapes me, but it also started with R, also indicative of Mormosity, but by no means definitive.
Meanwhile, my real last name is commonly mispronounced as a barnyard animal, so y'all got nothing on me.
Which is why you're now taking out your issues by forming a many-tentacled cult mob to assault theists and accommodationists?
OH HAI I HAVE ANOTHER STORY.
So this one time I was at the massage therapy place in town, waiting on my mom to get done with her massage I got her for her birthday. This college-age frat/sorority couple came in (they had letter shirts, I wasn't assuming) and the guy was so proud of himself because he had booked his girlfriend a massage for her birthday or something and she was so happy about it and so proud of her caring and sensitive boyfriend, and he was strutting around like he was all the shit for being so sensitive and awesome and getting her such a great gift and scheduling it for her and everything (at this place you had to schedule for specific masseurs, which will be important in a moment). So the desk person had them sit to wait, and he was beaming smugly and she was all squeeing and then this gorgeous guy came out from the back room, walked up to her to shake her hand, and said in this deep sultry voice:"Hi, I'm Shannon, your masseuse." She glowed about three times brighter and skipped off with Shannon as her boyfriend got the biggest stunned deer-in-the-headlights look I've ever seen. It was easy to reconstruct that the desk person had offered him a session with "Shannon" for the booking, and this wasn't a version of Shannon he had in mind.
He kept that look on his face for a very long time.
My actual real name (#191 notwithstanding) is really, really boring. And since my first name is shared with at least one other regular commenter here, it would get confusing if I were to use it.
"Walton" is admittedly a dull, stodgy pseudonym (I've been using it since my Wikipedia days); but then, I guess I'm quite a dull, stodgy person.
In other news, I made an awesome lime cheesecake this afternoon! (Thank you to Josh for the advice. I did indeed use lime zest as well as the juice, and it turned out very well.)
I know of a couple that used syllables from each of their names to make their kids names. Problem is that neither have names with many syllables or a lot of vowels. The names are abysmal! I mean truly horrid.
Imaging merging two names like Kevin and Trish this way.
Their kids have names like Kish and Trevin. Not kidding. Sad things.
(altered of course for the interwebs)
Interesting thread tonight. Never knew so many people took names seriously. Makes sense once I think of it.
Decided my past need not be discussed further on this site, so will not. :^}
Time to wrap myself in the arms of Morpheus.
Ciao y'all
DoofusD
No opinion on bannination – lately I've mostly stayed out of the threads that the annoying people frequent. (Though comment 63 is very amusing!)
Also, today is not blockuqote day, today is blcokquote day.
That I can imagine. I just didn't think all of you were literally in love with Maddow. :-)
And I don't have time to watch any more videos of her :-)
(Well, actually, I don't have time for Pharyngula either, but... whatever.)
<sigh>
Ha! =8-)
You scooped me. <snarl>
Win!
Over here, we feed the trolls till they explode.
How... inappropriate :-D
Isn't it "wants helmet"? The opposite of Wilfred, "wants peace"?
Definitely Europe – but then the tricks come. My first name is pronounced differently by the same people depending on which language they happen to be speaking at the moment. In fact, it was deliberately chosen for being international*.
* Within the Western and sufficiently Westernized world. Wouldn't work in China, of course.
PZ -
Zachary (or Zacharia) does mean "God remmember", but where did the "little one" come from?
And re the Shanon story - in my country, many names are given to both boys and girls, which can cause confusion. There's also quite a few couples where the husband and the wife have the same name.
I've grown so used to you as Walton that I can only imagine if I met you in person I'd have trouble not calling you Walton!
lol
My aunt and uncle did that. For their racehorses. One was named Jukema, for instance...after the first two letters of each of my cousins' names.It was OK for a horse.
I like my 'nym because it refers to my two favorite plant-based products.
(Yes, that means I love my IPA. 'N stuff)
Lilith - here in the UK, you can sometimes spot Catholics by their names - they tend to use Saint's names, but most of these are common enough not to be a good sign. Bernadette is a pretty sure indicator of someone from a Catholic background.
Otherwise, names are an indicator of ethnic/national origin, and so indirectly religion. There's little to tell for the "indigenous" population.
I'm OK with my meatspace name, but it feels very odd being called in online. I'm currently doing an online course where real names are used, and it feels very wierd not being called Jefrir, which I've gone by for about 7 years now, since I was a teenager.
My real first name is Haley, and I really like it. I usually have to spell it for people, since too many idiots have perverted it by spelling it Hayley, Hailey, Hailee, Haylee, and many other permutations, but overall its uncommon enough that in combination with my mildly unusual Eastern European last name I get to have Haley.lastname at gmail dot com all to myself.
My mom named me after Halley's comet, which she thought was Haley's comet and pronounced "Hay-lee" instead of "Hal-lee". It was also chosen specifically to avoid being nicknamed, because my mom had an easily nicknamed name and hated it. I dare you all to find a nickname for Haley.
(I vote for the banhammer for SS-idiot)
Haley - what a beautiful name with a beautiful story! I love names that have meaning
OT, but what do people think about this: "A Professor at Louisiana State Is Flunked Because of Her Grades"?
In case you can't access the article behind the paywall, Ms. Dominique Homberger (dunno why she's not referred to in the article as 'Dr.') is a biology professor who was relieved of teaching an intro bio course for bio non-majors because her student's test scores were so low.
While it seems the university jerked her around in a most unprofessional manner, her exam questions seem absolutely ludicrous:
I say they're ludicrous not because they're particularly difficult in terms of content, but because they're so unwieldy they're unlikely to differentiate between a student who knows almost all of the material and one who knows almost none if either of them gets the slightest bit frazzled. (I say this as someone who could often score better on poorly-written exams graded on a curve than my understanding of the content would warrant because I love writing exams and don't easily get frazzled. As a slacker, a three-hour exam was always a preferable means to a grade than a 15-page paper that might take all night to write.)
I had an instructor that wrote similar questions with up to five true-or-false statements to evaluate, but at least he used some sort of right-minus wrong scoring methodology so a student who flubbed one component of a given question would still score better than one who flubbed four or five.)
But I've never had to actually construct an exam or a course syllabus, so I might be way out to lunch here.
David:
Highly inappropriate. :D :D :D
Those questions don't address the concepts very well: the students who will do best on them are those that focus on brute force rote-memorization.
The pre-meds probably like her.
Haley:
Lee. That was easy. ;D
Is that why you're so big now? /fattist
The trouble is: you're too efficient. You ought to let a few of them sneak through for a while. Build up their confidence, like. Yeah, that's the ticket. Let us toy with them a bit. When we have a few worthies, then it will be time to play Survivor.
I was thinking Hay, but that works.
I had also always known the name "Sasha" as a girl's name, and thus was surprised to meet a coworker named Sacha fellow from the Republic of Georgia. Is the feminization of that name an American thing?
Also, Vivian. I didn't learn that fellows could have this name until like last year. Although I guess they often go by "Viv"?
Okay, I'm back.
You ever go to the store with an idea for dinner - gather all the ingredients, get home and realize it's currently 6, and it'll be 7 by the time dinner is done...
Stupid... time.
I'm sure you're not the only one... I imagine this will be distinctly disconcerting if we ever have a Pharyngula meetup. :-)
Hal.
It's really not so easy with Erin though. You get... Rin? Er? Ri? E? In?
They call me ho. they call me Stacey. they call me her. they call me Jane. That's not my name...
Oh now you've done it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8AH7yYQpro
@Ol'Greg:
I call my sister 'Ern'
That sort of thing is only okay when talking about a couple, like Brangelina, Bennifer or Filliam H. Muffman.
I've met up with people I've known on the net for a long time, and they've always called me Caine. It's just easier, and I've been using it for over a decade.
Particularly since we use names like that for shipping. I'm not into Ben10 myself, but I think Bevin=Ben+Kevin is popular. Likewise Harry Potter (which I'm not into, either) has Snupin, Snarry, Drarry, Harmony (cheating) and so on. Though I think HD is more commonly used than Drarry. And don't get me started on the differences between NarySasu and SasuNaru.
::waves KaRe flag::
Personally my favourite was always Meaning of Life, with Life of Brian in a distant last position. I saw it only two years ago, and it had been built up to me as the best one of their films and something that was religiously controversial.
My experience of it failed to deliver on either count.
My name is unisex, and is related to religion. Ancient Roman religion, that is. I still don't like it very much, and it was long attached with nickname.
Strange God Before Me:
"I'm posting this here on the off-chance that someone will quote me to attack PZ further; I want it known that I retract my accusation."
I thought it was just a reductio ad absurdum, when I read it, to be honest. It was still a poor choice of demonstration for an otherwise good argument, in my opinion.
I love this name.
Vyvyan has to be the best spelling though :P
'Round herrrr that wudn't be to differnt soundin'
People say my name it sounds like Airn.
Oh,, we're having one. But someone decided he was too fancy for the rest of us.
I wish I could go too :(:(:(:(
If I ever meet some of you in person, I'll give you something else to call me. "KOPD" gets a little cumbersome in conversation. :-\
I suppose it's not as bad as this.
I explained why I couldn't come to Copenhagen, as much as I would love to. :-(
Next meetup, though, as long as it's within reasonable travel distance, I will be there.
Late to the party but:
@ Haley:
Emex?
Expanation:
Haley
Hal 9000
9000
MX (9000 in roman numerals)
MX
Emex
It's a stretch, but anyone who called you that would at least be interesting to talk to.
My names, on the other hand, mean Man Horse-lover.
I don't think my parents bothered to look it up, but they just might have a twisted sense of humor, as my younger sister's name means Defender of Man.
Regarding banning SS:
Why does this pop into my brain?
To the tune of 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer':
Bang, bang PZ's banning hammer
came down upon his head.
Bang, bang PZ's banning hammer
Made sure the troll is dead.
OK -- probably a warped sense of humor.
Just be glad your name isn't Shit Fun Chew.
Ack!
Nobody sings anymore should have been italicized. My bad.
I think I though Evelyn Waugh was female for a while.
I certainly laboured under the misapprehension that Cecil Bødker was male.
(Of course, I also though Ethan Siegel was gay.)
My own family name is unusual even by Danish standards (though it's actually been a good while since I've seen it misspelt - yay for databases, I guess), but it's easily adulterated to make fun of a nerd, so even on a student evaluation I ended up as Brainbog once - I should prolly be grateful they didn't know who I was ...
KOPD
I'd say it: kohp-dy
That's pretty damning praise in my books, PZ.
You're all welcome to crash at my pad if we hold it in Edmonton. My roommate even tossed out my crappy couches and purchased her own which are much more comfortable. And we've got a firepit in the backyard, and another of my housemates just bought a 60,000 BTU barbeque, and across the street is a school field should anyone want to have a scratch game of Calvinball, and I can probably get us a deal on Jäger and pints at the local pub. Oh, do come; it'll be ever so much fun.
Speaking of Maxwell's Silver Hammer, I just YouTubed it... as disturbing as the original song is, this cartoon version makes it even freakier.
Oooh I'm there if it's in Canada. That is not hard to get to from here.
That's a reasonable distance Walton, right?
lol
from the bio test:
d. Giantism and dwarfism is [sic] common among all domesticated mammals.
NOT gonna say it...
Are you gonna show him the bleachers as well?
A night or two ago I dreamt I had at least two middle names. Now that was a weird experience. (I haven't got any.)
"Might" and "fight"...
Gold? Jīn in Mandarin?
...Wow.
Please explain.
Sociolinguistic question: you include Kindergarten in the term "school"?
(Anyway, I think I'd have been seriously traumatized by being told I didn't actually know my name. WTF.)
Waiting on?
I sense the emphatic dative coming back to the English language.
Question for you: if I said "I washed the hands on me" to mean "I washed my hands", would that be understandable? (Weird, sure, but would it be understandable?)
ROTFL!
Latin paulus.
X-)
Many Turkish names are gender-neutral. The German constitution court finds that so baffling that it has reached a verdict according to which all German citizens with such names must take an unambiguous middle name or something.
When I was in the Navy the ship I was in had two men with the same rank and name: MM2 Robert Gonzalez. One was nuclear trained and the other was a non-nuke Auxiliaryman, so they were usually referred to as "Nuke Gonzo" and "A Gang Gonzo."
Sounds awesome. Though flights to Edmonton are not cheap. :-(
A report out of Fermi Lab on why matter predominates over antimatter.
Jenny Mae (may) Faulk (sounds a bit like fuck)
You get.
Jenny may fuck.
Wow guess open threads are the exception. Multiple appearances by our host even.
So since I started the line of thought:
Sandi is my middle name but it is what I go by, my first name being an honorific really (a title but partt of my legal name.) Some of my family does still call me by my (now not so hated as before) childhood nickname. I know "Sandi" is a diminutive of Alexander: helper of man.
I gather the basic consensus here seems to be that a name is just a name and what it means has no affect on a person.
Great discussion, had fun.
6-7? How long does it take to wash three apples and lick peanut butter off the back of a spoon?
(I've been a bachelor wa-a-a-a-ay too long now. Honestly, I used to cook real honest-to-goodness meals for the ex, not that she ever seemed all that appreciative...)
Should this not be masseur?
(Though gender distinctions in these types of nouns is largely falling out of use in English. Lawyers used to describe the administrator of a deceased person's estate as an "administratrix" if she was female, for instance, but this is rarely seen any more. And "hero" now seems to be used for both men and women; "heroine" is rarely used in spoken English any more, presumably because of the similarity with the drug.)
Yes, hence K-12.
Speaking of verbal idiosyncrasies, the Rand Paul interview I posted shows him to be the most emphatic is-is speaker I've ever heard.
I was planning on making delicious baked penne. But with having to bake it and cook a homemade tomato sauce... it'll be an hour.
Ugh.
I'm really picky about food... hence learning to cook was a good move. I made a simple pasta dish this evening with Quorn mince, penne pasta, garlic, basil, rosemary and passata. This was followed up with some of the lime cheesecake I prepared earlier.
(The pasta dish wasn't perfect; I overdid the herbs slightly, and didn't chop the garlic finely enough, so the flavours weren't evenly distributed and there were a few oversized chunks of garlic. But I'm steadily improving, and have become quite a good cook in a short space of time.)
Walton:
Quorn! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Use real meat!
Woah... weird coincidence... Kevin and I seem to have posted #250 and #251 at the same time and seem to be describing exactly the same kind of meal. :-/
Oh if only I was admin. I would so put that on my business card.
SlantedScience FTW.
Seriously, about the "swamps of womanhood" comment. Re-reading it, I can absolutely see what a shitty little lowlife I seemed. Terribly.
But please understand this: I was completely ignoring the rape part of Myers's post, going instead after the abortion aspect. As I read the comments, any which seemed on first glance to be related to rape, I skipped.
Abortion is a subject I have strong opinions on, and those opinions seem to be counterpoint to many of yours. So what? Either debate me or ignore me. This is a fairly controversial blog, which wilfully attempts to offend many people. I really can't see how, when someone comes on here and posts an opinion which differs from any reader's that reader has a right to rear up onto their hindlegs and start snorting about trolling and something called a 'banhammer'.
I assume you're all adults, so just grow up, turn your bullshit detectors on, and if yours alarms when I'm around then just ignore me.
Again, apologies for not couching the swamps thing in a better-explained context.
PS: I am happily married to a real, actual ladyperson.
Celtic_Evolution:
Yes. You two seem to be very in sync lately.
*blinks*
hmmmmmmmm
I can't. I cook with friends who are vegetarians.
And Quorn mince isn't that bad, if you cook it with passata and plenty of herbs and spices to give it some flavour. (Quorn faux-chicken fillets and the like, on the other hand, tend to be dry and boring.)
SlantedScience FTW.
I want to take my thumb, squash you with it, and smear you out of existence.
@Walton:
Freaky... though you actually made your dinner, and I'm probably just gonna have a sandwich with some sliced sweet vidalia.
Walton:
Okay, I admit that my lack patience for people and their stupid, fucking food issues has made me a little sensitive on the "substitute foods" issue.
Vegetarians don't bug me nearly as much as the no wheat/no dairy/ etc. crowd, however.
Oh, not necessarily. Clearly a name can cause an affect (or even an effect), as noted by those who really dislike their names for one reason or another, and wish to change them. And perhaps vice-versa.
As I think Terry Pratchett meant to imply, it depends on the name, and on the person.
I was once in a bookstore searching for Waugh - a helpful sales assistant directed me to the romance novel section, assuring me that "she" was a well known romance novelist.
On unfortunate names and blunders:
I once knew a woman whose maiden name was "Maybee". She married a man named "Faithful". There were embarrassing moments when her whole name was called aloud.
One of my former bosses could not grasp that the decedent in a probate was female. Why? Her name was "Jesus", which was not uncommon in her culture.
And if your last name is "Weiss", don't name your daughter "Penelope". Please.
So are many serial killers. Why mention this?
It's so funny!
You have no idea what you did even. Pathetic. Truly. It wasn't the place or time to demand a bunch of rape victims STFU and listen to your ideas about what they should do with their bodies.
Your wife is married to an ass.
I sometimes think the blog needs additional trolls if only to see the reponses of Patricia OM and Janine, Vile About Something OM and others including the highly esteemed (in my book) Mrs. Tilton.
That and the Rev BDC has neglected to post about bacon for some time. Is he on a diet or has he converted to a religion that forbids pork or has he just been taking his true love (bacon) for granted?
SlantedScience,
Taking you at your word, maybe you weren't being deliberately cruel and offensive. But if this is so, then you're insensitive, callous, and utterly clueless about other people's feelings.
Seriously. If you had bothered to read the thread properly, you would know that people shared some very personal, very painful things. You decided to barge into the conversation and belittle them by making a stupid comment, which you now seem to realise was offensive.
The only reasonable and decent thing you can do right now is apologise personally and unreservedly to Caine, Ol'Greg, JustALurker, and the other people who you insulted and whose painful, traumatic experiences you dismissed with a wave of the hand.
Which was all of the important stuff. Seriously, you admit that you were ignoring the main conversation entirely and think that will help you seem less of a boor? It's the internet. It's written down. It's ok if it takes you awhile to read through it before you comment; it will wait. I belong to some message boards that have reading rules like requiring commenters to read at least the most recent 15 pages of the thread before posting (works out to about 100 comments), and people get banned if they obviously blunder in without having done so because that's fucking rude. The endless thread is for bumbling in, not main posts.
Strike me from that list. I don't like apologies much and have no use for one.
SS can be as much of a dick as he wants to. I'm not married to him, after all. And if he annoys me enough I'll just block him.
If he can't handle being called out for being a dick because he thinks we're being "judgy" then he can KHSWALR.
SS posted crap.
Comment by SlantedScience blocked. [unkill] [show comment]
PZ Myers @ 192:
Well, I have plenty of food issues myself. I won't eat banana or anything that tastes of banana, for instance. Many fresh fruits - apples and pears in particular - also make me gag. And I really don't like mashed potato or many other things with a squishy, mushy texture. Not to mention baked beans, which are also revolting.
Like I said, I'm very picky. This is why I now enjoy cooking my own meals, so I can put in the ingredients I actually like.
Where you don't acknowledge the woman and her rights.
As if we care about your inane and unthought out opinions. Dunning Kruger at work.
You and your stoopidity will never be ignored. You don't debate, you try to preach. You are not an expert on anything and should listen to our cogent opinions. If you were smart...
The comes from how you do it. You aren't god. You don't dictate. You should never presume you are right and we are wrong, otherwise it isn't a debate. You debate if you are capable. So far, that ability is in doubt.
We are, you aren't. If you are an adult, lose the superior attitude.
Poor woman. Give her our condolences.
Damn, not another generation of that shit....
?
That sounds like a cartoon character overdoing it when lying about his made up wife.
Ol' Greg: "a bunch of rape victims".
Wow. Way to go with the empathy, OG.
If you take the time to think about my words, you'll see that the thread was also about abortion.
It is not up for discussion whether rape is right or wrong; that is not a question a sane person would consider.
Abortion has two equally arguable sides to it, and I was trying to engage the readers in a discussion - aside to and separate from the other one - about its position in society.
I think that it is an abhorrent practice which I hope the 21stC will wave goodbye to. You may not agree. If you don't then please come up with a constructive argument instead of shouting "Troll! Troll!" like a farmer in a fairy tale.
PS You're correct: my wife is indeed married to an ass. But we have a fairly well worked out arrangement that lets me see her on weekends and public holidays. Truth be told, Gregory is a pretty nice donkey, who has held down a well-paid job for several years now, so I'm happy with the arrangement.
She has my condolences.
Gluten allergies?
Lactose intolerance?
I will eat anything but I hate mealy apples, pears, peaches (I hate them so much I even hate the smell!), raw tomato, and like you baked beans. Hmmm... and I'm pretty lactose intolerant but I eat lots of dairy anyway. I just suffer or take those pills. A lot of times I get away with it.
I'm not really that fond of chicken. I don't do pork. Not for religious reasons, I just don't like it.
Doesn't everyone have *some* food preferences?
That being said I'm kind of old school. Since my life isn't on the line I'd eat whatever my friends had made and try not to show any lack of appreciation.
Freudian slip: naming my donkey 'Gregory' wzs, honestly, not a snipe at ol'greg. Guess it was just in my head at the time.
LOL!
Fail.
Walton:
I appreciate the sentiment, Walton, but I don't want an apology from SStroll. I wouldn't let that slimy, sleazy, limp-brained lowlife kiss my ass.
Gyeong Hwa Pak:
And the mere suggestion of it is starting to give me twitches... Urk!
MrFire:
This is the never-ending thread. What's yer point?
iambilly:
Really? They were praying? That's not what it looked like to me...
What a dipshit.
Walton:
Which is a good thing!
Everyone has their weird likes and dislikes when it comes to food* and I've got no problem with that.
My feelings on this are kind of hard to explain, but I get really pissed off when 1) people don't eat "staple" foods and 2) when I offer to bring them a dish, they ask for something that by definition contains those foods they don't eat. (For reference see my quiche rant in the previous thread.) These are people that do not have food allergies, mind you. Just crazy self-imposed food restrictions.
It's all the rage for middle-class white people in their late 20's and early 30's to think and behave like this and it drives me up the fucking wall. To me, it just smacks of that self-entitlement mindset that so many of my peers have.
*For me, raw tomatoes and olives.
Not interested in SlantedScience's ladyperson activities.
There are a lot of topics to discuss, and the posters I respect most comment on many different topics, not on the same on over and over and over and over and... I know and am friends with numerous people who disagree with my stance about the ethics of abortion. The ones I respect work decrease abortions by establishing social programs to support actual women and children. They're the ones who have the most impact and, strangely enough, tend to be the ones least likely to bring abortion into every random conversation.
Plus it takes a special kind of insensitive religio-control freak to skip all the posts having to do with the trauma of rape and then insist that women who were raped or who will DIE if they continue a pregnancy may not terminate their pregnancies. (See the pulmonary hypertension case in Arizona and the 9-year-old Brazilian kid pregnant with twins by her mom's boyfriend for examples). Nice job with the compassion for other living humans there, SS.
@SlantedScience: Dude, really, you aren't making the best case for yourself right now. If that's your plan, knock yourself out, but you're even starting to irritate me, and not in the SIWOTI Syndrome kind of way. You still have not addressed those points I put to you over in the rape thread; if you have no intention of doing so, then you are wrong, you know it, and you should just shut the fuck up.
One of my best friends is seriously into woo - and she has a doctor who is also wooish. He's determined that she's allergic to dairy and gluten, without benefit of actual testing. Oh, and the "allergies" manifest themselves in all parts of her body, which means every ache and pain is attributed to them. I'm waiting for the next thing he removes from her diet...
Me, I'm genuinely -and seriously - allergic to shellfish, having gone into anaphylactic shock the first time I was fed lobster. Same with penicillin. The Biophysicist carries the epinephrine with him at all times.
No it doesn't. It has force pregnancy versus freedom of choice. The sides aren't equal, and in any thinking person the woman's choice wins every time. Simply the known factor versus the potential. Known wins every time.
We did, but you never acknowledged anything but what you wanted to hear. Which you didn't hear. You don't make the decision on the cogency of our arguments, we do. You lost big time. No evidence, just inane repetition of your idiocy. Which we have seen for years, and don't accept. You aren't an expert, and your opinion is meaningless to us. Always keep that in mind.
Glad I'm not the only one that had to go through that. Although in my case it was my father with the same name. People alternated between "Little Paul" and using my first and middle names in rapid sequence, which most people mistook for "Pauline". It of course didn't help that I was generally the shortest kid in any group, either.
Stupid common name.
They're also bizarrely specialized and detailed for an introductory biology course.
Jadehawk will likely be very grateful that I'm not in the habit of calling people by name at all unless I really can't avoid it. (Hey, I don't need to remind them, they know them already!) Google knows her meatspace name, I know her meatspace name, but it... doesn't catch on...
Hail!
<crawling under table just in time>
No; it's the most common nickname for both... how to transcribe them... Alyeksandr (male) and Alyeksandra (female).
It's more or less universal for Russian nicknames to look grammatically feminine ( = ending in -a) and be declined accordingly. Similar things go on in related languages... this goes so far that, in Polish, Paula can be short for Paulina (I've met one).
You could simply modernize it, to Éire, but that isn't any easier to pronounce unless you actually know Irish Gaelic or... wait for it... Russian.
Or Defender Against Men?
I have no trouble pronouncing it as a single syllable, [kɔpd̥], but that would be rather far from the English sound system (first of all, if you aspirate the P, it doesn't work), and it would make the D difficult to hear.
<convulsing on the floor, laughing>
(Well, I'm too tired to actually do that, or to laugh much at all, but you get the point.)
Jägermeister? X-)
(Trying not to remember the song Zehn kleine Jägermeister. Not... not... not... argh... well, the song itself counts as funny, but I had the misfortune of watching the disturbing video someone has made to it.)
Look, I've read some more from the infamous swamps thread, and I have to say this: if I were you, I would assume that I am the offspring of Adolf Hitler and the Ebola virus.
It's always hard to see the big picture when one's focus is on a small part of it, but I reckon that I really should have seen the word "rape" in the thread and just left the hell alone.
Please understand this: it's only my bad luck that both of the thread's two foci were on issues which primarily (though not only, in either case) affect women. When I used the rude and thoughtless turn of phrase in one, I completely failed to realize that it would come across as referring to the other.
Because, as stated, I was ignoring the rape posts and thus did not even realize that people were posting such personal things.
Truly sorry for the hurt this caused. Hope that all will believe that I had no idea such a discussion was also going on there.
Mmm, sweet vidalia onion is pretty good - very tasty on sandwich.
@121
Oh, dear. You accidentally knocked the seal off some of the memories I've repressed, having been raised by a Very Strange Person (my Mom used to "alarm clock" us in the morning by singing silly songs she learned in elementary school at the top of her voice).
This has stuck in my head for years. Many, many, many years. Can't remember who wrote it and this is only the first stanza, but the fact that I can remember it at all is HER fault.
Father calls me William,
Mother calls me Will,
Sister calls me Willy,
But the fellers call me Bill.
Most of the time, the whole year 'round
There ain't no flies on me,
'Cept just before Christmas,
When I'm good as I can be.
*(I'm so sorry you had to suffer through that)
Owlmirror and Ol'Greg:
I'm not talking about likes or dislikes or food allergies. Those I totally get. I, for some unknown reason, know a lot of people who are just really restrictive in their diets.
I doubt it would bother me so much if they asked me to bring dishes that didn't have to be modified to the point where they are unrecognizable. If I have to suffer though one more "mockolate" cake, I'm gonna smack someone.
Time for slanted science and his crocodile tears to go bye-bye. He started out his posts by accusing us of being teen-aged homosexual basement dwelling trolls. He hasn't really improved his attitude since, except when it looked like he might be toast via the banhammer. He only seems to want to be a thorn in our side. I suggest he be shown the door, with a swift kick to the posterior to speed him along.
Like I said, SS, if you were someone who (a) read the threads and (b) posted interesting comments about issues besides abortion, I'd view you as someone I disagreed with but respected. You've got a lot of catching up to do - I haven't ever seen you an any thread that does not involve abortion. Hence the banhammer requests.
I'd be amenable to letting SS have a sort of probationary period, but if all the posts are about abortion and get inserted into fairly random threads, WHAMMM.
Even a tiny amount of gluten cause me great pain for several days. I'm most firmly in the no-wheat crowd. How does that bug you?
Sasha is actually originally a male name - it's a Russian diminutive of Alexandr. English-speaking countries seem to have a strong tendency to convert names from male to female, especially ones ending in an -a, and to be far more adventurous for girl's names.
To be fair, I think he described us as all being virgins (specifically, thirty-five-year-old overweight, scientist virgins), but didn't say anything either way about sexual orientation that I can recall. :-/
Walton:
I've had what you Brits consider "baked beans," and holy shitfuck they are disgusting.
Walton's right. SS's comment was filled with douchebaggery, but nothing about sexual orientation. He did however later say anyone grading lab reports or teaching wasn't a real scientist.
Seriously SS, can you see why people here are angry at you?
echidna:
I don't think I'm explaining myself very well. It's the people that needlessly restrict their diets and expect others to mock something up for them that get on my nerves. Food allergies and food intolerances have got to be really shitty and I wouldn't rant against someone who honestly needs to be mindful of what they eat. It's those who buy into the "food woo" that are at the core of my rant.
It's also been my experience that people with food allergies don't make ridiculous requests when you offer to cook for them.
I'm truly sorry if I offended, it's not my intention at all.
Hey... I just realized something. I'm reading Ouran High School Host Club for a completely different reason than I told myself when I first watched the show. Cause the guys are cute and I read girly manga because I like it.
Hint: It's bad no matter which one you were referring to.
I sort of like having all the dietary-restricted people around, no matter their reason for doing so; it makes it more of a normal thing that I ask please no nuts because it could kill my son. The more people who have restrictions, the more people think to ask about restrictions before they bring particular dishes, and the more they pay attention to what goes in them, so the better things are for us because it's not just us policing the food of the world, if that makes any sense. I don't have to worry as much if I forget to mention it when we accept a dinner invitation, because the host is likely to ask whether we have any food issues if I forget to bring it up.
(This is different than turning up one's nose at a dinner when preferences haven't been expressed ahead of time and are just preferences; protocol then demands that one at least push the food around the plate, eat slightly more of the side dishes, and keep one's own mouth shut about it.)
I'm late to the game but here's my two cents worth:
Fuck no. I get a lot of mileage out of my name and wouldn't change it for the world, least of all to avoid offending the sensibilities of some fundie whack job.
My real, given first name is isaac (I only capitalize it when I sign checks or documents), and I don't care which fundie might not like it.
And I didn't "become" an atheist, I was born that way and I've never seen any reason to change.
It really seems to discombobulate certain types of fundies who, when they meet me say "Ah, a good, biblical christian name." Then I tell them I'm not a christian and let the fun ensue.
I also recently became an ordained minister in the Universal Life Church* just for the fun of being an atheist minister named isaac.
*You may have heard of the ULC--there are no rites, no sacred texts, no rituals or beliefs. You just fill out a form online, submit it, and voila! you are an ordained minister, with the authority to perform weddings. Not like I'd ever have any interest in doing that.
Some people who have also done it include all four of the Beatles, Mae West, Doris Day, Hunter Thompson, Jimmy Stewart, Paul Newman, Johnny Carson, and Bill Gibbons, the ZZ Top guitarist. And lots of others.
SlantedScience:
Glad you've read more of what you were already supposed to have done long ago. But no, I don't consider you any of those things. See, my opinions are honest ones, generally. I simply despise your intellectually flaccid sophistry and your boringly repetitive statements that completely ignore any responses to them. I'm glad you're progressing in your education here, though. Maybe within a month, if you don't bore Our Lord and Master to tears first, you might become aware of how stupid you seem right about now.
Not that I am holding my breath, mind you.
That's exactly your problem. It's all about you and how right you are, no matter whether the conversation has anything to do with what you're thinking. You're like the little chihuahua yipping at our ankles.
Is this because you are incapable of reading a thread before posting? Or is it that you are incapable of understanding the responses after you do? It's not like you didn't post the same shit over and over again while people were tearing your head off, after all. You are the worst kind of idiot - the kind that doesn't seem to understand why people don't like him, and then blames everyone else for the problem.
I ask again: when are you going to address those points I put to you in the other thread? I am waiting for your reasoned response. As in, shut the fuck up and get out until you have one.
SlantedScience #273
Ol'Greg was being too nice to you. Let me put her sentiments another way: Fuck off!
By the time you barged into the thread, it was on rape. You were the only one interested in discussing abortion.
Only you didn't try to discuss it, you were preaching at everyone else. There's the further point we've discussed abortion many times on this blog. Usually the topic comes up when some asshole like you shows up, denounces everyone as "baby killers," and generally makes themselves disagreeable. Just like you did.
You barged into a discussion about rape. You called rape victims "Swamps of Womanhood." You were an asshole who insulted people talking about a very painful topic. And you're surprised you were called a troll? I won't call you a troll. Motherfucking pig of a shiteating asswipe would be more appropriate.
I won't tell you to fuck off and die. The Colgate Twins' lackeys would get too excited if I did. Instead I'll invite you to fuck off and become seriously ill.
I don't think you're wrong to not like fake apologies.
The only "apology" -- or rather, notpology -- made was for "not couching the swamps thing in a better-explained context."
Yeah....
He's so sorry for expressing his misogyny poorly.
otrame:
The Very Strange Person in my life was my dad, who used to do the same thing to us by warbling off very bad versions of "My Darlin' Clementine", "Wolverton Mountain", and "Rye Whiskey", among others. What made it particularly annoying was the discovery that he was in a church choir when he was a boy and actually had a wonderful singing voice.
Reminds me of Assumpta from Ballykissangel. And we all know how THAT turned out.
Woo Hoo I nailed it.
@ SlantedScience, still digging:
Oooh, poor you! So, that fixation of yours about the eeevilz of abortion just caused you to neglect that the creepiness of the article was precisely because of the way it framed the issue of rape? Impressive filtering of inconvenient content, here!
SlantedScience:
Surprise! Lots of people around here would agree with you that abortions are generally a bad thing, such as myself. However, I recognize that it's only an ideal. I would never force a woman to carry a child if she did not want to, and I would never judge her for making the choice to terminate her pregnancy. Of course, I might encourage her to give the child up for adoption, if she were willing to carry it to term - but considering the fact that the adoption system here in the US and just about anywhere else you go is seriously fucked up, that's not a much better option.
No, your problem is that it's a moral absolute for you that women should never have abortions. Fine, go run with that. Just don't expect to convince us here without evidence, especially if you're preaching it on a thread that has nothing whatsoever to do with the topic!
Aw. That stretches it.
Of course. I hope it was deliberate. :-)
Why?
Instead of mashed potatoes, how about actual purée, you know, made from flakes bought at a supermarket? Fully homogeneous (unless you don't stir it enough while cooking it).
:-) <hug> Sanity is coming to England :-)
:-) :-) :-)
It's a both male and female nickname, see comment 288.
Me:
To be clear, I am talking about elective abortions outside the context of forced pregnancies. I'm sorry if my lack of clarity caused offense.
Patricia08 #309
Do you know what tomorrow's winning lottery numbers are?
Ugh. No. Still yuk.
Walton:
Is this specifically with mashed potatoes, or does it cover other things like mashed butternut squash or mashed yams? I can understand the mashed potatoes thing - they can be bland and gummy if not done right. I have to make them myself in order to like them.
The hummingbirds arrived this morning and are already having territory fights over the great magic flower. I love having lived in the same place long enough to know when various critters will return or hatch or bloom.
Wow. Way to go with the empathy, OG.
*goes out to kitchen to scrub smear stain off thumb with pure bleach*
No, your problem is that it's a moral absolute for you that women should never have abortions. Fine, go run with that.
frankly, there are plenty that will run with that here, that aren't as grossly offensive as this shithead.
IOW, we already have plenty of amusing anti-abortion trolls without encouraging this one to stay.
Ichthyic:
No, I meant it in the literal sense of "run away". I think I've made fairly clear already that I would like SlantedScience to leave. Quickly. And without concern for what part of the door hits him in the ass on the way out.
I go by Sasha, actually, courtesy of a Russian language professor who decided it would be cute to give everyone Russian names that sounded like their birth names. (My birth name, as I mentioned, is not actually Sarah, either; it's a ridiculous Hungarian diminutive of it, as if my parents intended me to go through life continually being mistaken for a five-year-old. Bluh.) Ironically, my father's name is Sandor, which is Alexander in English, so I can't see why he got all damn bent out of shape when he found out what all my friends called me in school. I told him I thought it was cool that I could name myself after him, and he full-on pouted and said that was what my last name was for. Ergh, Hungarian men and their fucking attitude problems.
Oh, well.
SlantedScience, I accept your apology. Now, I hope you understand, but I would feel better without seeing your hapless attempts to pull yourself out of the social cesspool you created. Please leave.
No, I meant it in the literal sense of "run away".
ah.
David, as far as "waiting on" is concerned, I am a Texan and I use the phrase as Texans do, to substitute for "waiting for," which I also use because I'm not a native Texan and I understand the difference between informal and formal register. I wouldn't use it in business correspondence, naturally, unlike my e-mail correspondents in Louisiana, who will sometimes write in Cajun patois, and in Aberdeen, who half the time use Scots, once they realize I actually like it.
I always thought of "waiting on" as being like "paying for," which can also in certain circumstances become "paying on." Consider these sentences and some of their subtle differences:
- I was waiting for my mother to finish her shopping. (formal)
- I was waiting on Mom to finish and get out of the store. (informal)
- I was waiting on hold for the telephone salesperson. (different here; the "on" is sort of part of a phrase "on hold" and sort of not.)
- I was paying for dinner when I realized I only had one check left in my checkbook. (one-off payment; I would never say "paying on")
- I was paying on my car note when I realized I only had one more payment left. (an installment plan; I would never say "paying for" and I would rarely just say "paying;" "paying off" would only apply to making the last payment)
- I was paying my housekeeper when I realized I only had one more thing for her to do. (I would not say "paying for" or "paying on" at all in this case).
I can't offhand, think of any other phrases where "--ing on" works like "--ing for"
SlantedScience:
You really ought to consider getting yourself up to speed on more than the small part of the issue that you are obsessed with. You need to bring more to the table than your purely kneejerk, emotional response.
You have so far really lived up to the saying that those who know the least know it the loudest.
Thinking about the weird use of "on" in Texas vernacular:
"Yeah, my four-year-old and I went on down to the animal shelter, and he was lookin' on all them dogs, and then he was down on that floor huggin' on one them puppies there, and I figured we'd better take it on home with us."
I actually meant to write "waiting for", but I have used "waiting on" in the same way that badgersdaughter just mentioned. Usually "waiting on" comes into play for me when I'm getting impatient for someone else: "I am going to be late because I am waiting on you! Hurry up!"
badgersdaughter, weird. I've lived my whole sad little life in Texas and I wouldn't use waiting on.
Not a criticism, just interesting to me.
Biggus Dickus...Dickus Butkus?
Ol-Greg, I never used it myself until I moved down here. I caught myself using it one day and started thinking about why.
Look at the response I just got from someone at Dispatches:
He's not wrong. Yeah... I'm not much of a conservative or a libertarian, any more. I don't know quite what I am. My ideas have become internally inconsistent and largely incompatible with one another; at this rate, I'll start having regular political arguments with myself. :-/
@SlantedScience
I don't accept your apology because it's obviously your continued pattern of behavior to totally ignore the comments that don't suit your small minded attempts at yelling about abortion. If you actually cared about talking about abortion in a reasonable way, you'd have responded to the many posts that were over there about abortion rather than just saying "no one's responded to my terribly clever point" which had been responded to a half dozen times.
Furthermore, as I said in the other thread, you can't separate the issue of rape from forced pregnancy (aka no abortions). They are both stealing the woman's body without permission, causing it harm and potentially death. A woman can enjoy sex or pregnancy willingly taking on the risks, but to have a woman unwillingly forced to do either is the exact same abhorrent act.
And to say that a woman doesn't have the right to control her own body to a bunch of women, myself included, who had been raped, molested, and/or assaulted is a shithead move.
My ideas have become internally inconsistent and largely incompatible with one another
I'd say that's part of growing up.
don't fret it.
oh, and be patient, don't try to force consistency, let it happen at its own pace.
could take years.
sorry.
Okay.
In a related vein: Ichthyic, I've been meaning to apologise to you about what I said to you the other day on the Dylan Evans thread. It was a massive overreaction on my part, and I'm sorry.
From way earlier, still catching up. (One reason I didn't post for so long is that I would read things, think of something to say, and then find out NOONE was talking about it any more.)
When I was little my family called me Patty. When I got my first "real" job I decided I didn't want my boss calling me Patty and, since I never cared for Pat, started introducing myself as Patricia. I found that I would have to correct people at first since they frequently shortened it to Pat. One group I was in just wouldn't learn. I got tired of repeating that I preferred Patrica and so I started finishing it for them. And this is the only group and the only time in my life I have been called Tricia.
Ichthyic is busy being the millionth poster!
I've been meaning to apologise to you about what I said to you the other day on the Dylan Evans thread. It was a massive overreaction on my part, and I'm sorry.
I'm a big boy, it don't bother me none.
no, I haven't got a hug for you.
:P
All these posts about names...
...strangely enough, at home I am called Usagichan (comes from a (long since abandoned) meat free diet and a Japanese wife (and the intrinsic kawaii value of all things lagomorphic)). Its a habit that has been passed down the generation(only one as yet) and I am Usagi-papa to my daughter. I know I'm in real trouble when my actual name gets used.
Perhaps that's why the screen names here seem so much more real than 'real' names.
As for the despicable SlantedScience, insensitive, inattentive and insipid - he went over the edge for me in the Creepiest Christian thread, and should PZ provide a cozy cell for him in the dungeon I won't shed any tears.
Man I always get in on this stuff late.
Even though PZ has already put the kibosh on the whole survivor thing, I'm gonna put in my two cents anyway.
I'm not especially down with the whole survivor idea. But then, I'm also one of those guys who never puts anyone on ignore or bans them (when I have such powers) or anything like that really. I'm a big boy, I can just not read what they have to say if it irritates me. Whatever. Maybe I'm just too easy going or something. That having been said, SlantedScience really, really, REALLY pissed me off in the rape thread. I wouldn't complain if he disappeared. :P
Regarding names:
KillJoy obviously not my real name. It was my tag when I was young and stupid and spray painted things on walls. Heh. My real name is James. And please dont call me 'Jim' or 'Jimmy' or 'Jimbo'. James will do perfectly well thank you. XD
KJ
Killjoy
Like "Killjoy was here?"
*Cackles at Isaac*
Naw, I was a little more creative than THAT. ;)
KJ
I'm worried about a friend's mental state.
Caveat: He lives 7000 miles away.
Walton:
You're maturing Walton, growing into the man you are destined to be. Shedding the liberal, hetero, skeptic idealogies of your youth you are waking up to the real world only the outlook of a conservative gay zealot, of an as yet undefined cult/religeon, can succeed in.
*ducks and sprints for cover*
Walton:
The horror! Yeah, that's normal. It's a sign of maturity, m'dear Walton. You might as well get used to it now.
A (probably regional) speech peculiarity that I've only heard from my husband and one other guy who was also raised in the same part of western Oklahoma: "take and". "Take and go into your Help screen." "Take and put your costs into Volume A." Anybody else familiar with this word choice?
KillJoy:
Eh? I thought that was an awfullt creative subversion of a well-known joke, myself. Maybe you should have thought of it! :-p
This comment is valued at $10; you now owe me $10 for reading it.
Killjoy
cicely:
Yeah, you here it down in the gulf coastal part of Texas sometimes.
One particularly interesting regional speech peculiarity for me is the Northeastern US English variant that produces "used to could" as a shortening of "used to be able to". I can always tell when someone is from the Northeast, regardless of accent, when I hear that.
Katharine:
Do you know of friends or family, yours or his/hers, in that area, or that you might compare notes with?
ChrisTOTG:
And you owe me $20 for my standard response fee. I usually waive it for freely available blogs such as this one, but while we're charghing each other...
Interesting. I've lived in the northeast my entire life and I've never heard that.
Is it a New England thing?
LOL, that's great. I remember going through similar realizations.
Listening costs $50.00
Cicely:
Yes, I've heard that, from one set of great-grandparents. It was a Missouri (pronounced Missourah) thing though. The other big one was "oncest" rather than "once".
OurDeadSelves:
Yes, rural New England. We hear it a lot in rural Texas, too - it was a favorite Bushism from long before the general American people even knew what one was. Chances are, if you don't hear it with a heavy Texas twang, they are from rural New England.
This comment is valued at $10; you now owe me $10 for reading it.
No problem, I'll pay up promptly. Just post your bank account information including all relevant passwords so I can make the electronic transfer.
Me:
Hm. I looked this up myself and people insist that it's a strictly Southwest vulgarism. I find that interesting because the areas here in Texas (with which it is most associated) are to a large degree filled with New England transplant families. Maybe I'm wrong, but I have used this rule successfully - maybe it was a fluke?
Caine, Fleur du Mal:
That's interesting. I'm living in MO now, and have been for, uh, something like 20 years, and haven't heard it in what you might call general use. What part of Missourah were your great-greats from?
Come to think of it, the quirk in question can best be generalised as "Take and (verb)", where almost any verb will do.
Hosting fees are $10 per comment. I also get 20% of all fees paid on this site.
Cicely:
Jamestown.
Well, my real given name is James, but I go my Jamie because, while I don't really like it, it's more 'me' than James is. About the only good thing about it is that, combined with my surname, makes my initials JW, which allows me to make the 'I'm not Joss Whedon - but I've got the same initials' (bad) joke.
Heck, if I decided to change my name I have no idea what I'd change it to. Well, other than maybe 'Rock Kickass'...
Funnily enough, had I been a girl my parents were going to name me Elizette. You can't begin to imagine how glad I was that that didn't happen; that name just makes my skin crawl.
Oh, and as for people with bad names: I was at school with a girl whose name was Sue-May Seamen (yes, it was pronounced with the unstressed second e, the same as semen) and I think the alliteration made it funnier; if her name had been, say, Jennifer, I don't think it would have been quite as hilarious-sounding.
Then I was at Uni with a girl named Dawn Lai - known for ever after as 'Morning Fuck'.
More central Missouri, then.
Wowbagger:
Elizette is pretty bad. At least your parents considered the fact that they might have a girl. That didn't happen with mine. Apparently, my mother was convinced I would be a boy. I was supposed to be Robert Joseph. They were so surprised (in fairness, I was 2 months early) I was a girl, my father suggested naming me after his mother, who was Mildred. My mother blurted out, no!, uh, we have to name her after my mother.
So, this is how it went:
Great-Grandmother (maternal): Alice Ann
Grandmother (maternal): Virginia May
Mother: Alice Ann
Me: Virginia Alice
Not a lot of thought. Or creativity.
I once knew a guy who decided to adopt the nickname of "Rock." He wrote someone a note and signed it "Rock." Unfortunately his handwriting was poor and the signature looked like "Pork." He was called "Pork" for years.
Cicely:
I suppose, I was through there once, when I was eight years old. :D I was born in Southgate, California.
My poor older sister has suffered through being called "Pork" (or, when Mom's feeling sassy "Porker") her entire life.
She's 35 now.
My husband and I absolutely refused to name any of our kids after relatives.
I knew a brother and sister in high school whose names were Rocky and Sandy. Their surname was Surface.
When I came home from school and told my dad, he thought for a moment and replied, "I remember going to school with their dad, and I'm honestly not surprised."
'Tis Himself wrote:
Brilliant!
Before I moved to my current location I'd spent five years being called Tintin because someone had noticed my resemblance to said Belgian comic-book character and commented on it and it stuck - to the point where I'm sure there are quite a few people who have no idea what my real name is.
Moving to another city was weird because I had to get used to people calling me by my real name again.
However, I seem attract nicknames; I've had literally dozens over the years. Recently with one group of friends it went from Jamie to Jimbo to Jimboner to just Boner. But I find that one hilarious so I've done my best to encourage it...
Actually the guy wasn't overweight or even slightly chubby. The story just shows you can't give yourself a nickname, it's bestowed by others.
Nothing like having parents so tone-deaf (or with a seriously malevolent sense of humor) as to saddle you with the initials are "BS."
@370
Grammar fail. (Falls on sword).
We have 4 kids number 3 was a girl and I picked the name Hailey, the wife decided on the spelling. Literally, as she was being born we could hear it hailing outside.
Our youngest, Jackson, was named after my nickname when I was younger - Jack. He has his Maternal grandfather's name for his middle name and of course his Paternal grandfather's, and mine coincidentally, last name. Quote a nice fit I thought.
Katrina:
I am ever so thankful that one of the conversations my mother had with my grandmother was about the horrible names of two children she new named Rocky and Penny, surname Pyles. It made my mother very aware of bad names.
This is peurile but no one ever accused me of being mature so I'll admit it.
My last secretary was a stuck up, in-your-face christian arsehole would say stuff like "there''s no need for THAT language" if anyone as much as let fly with a "bloody" or a "damn". Anyhow our files at work are tagged in large letters with the first 3 letters of the client's surname preceeded with their first initial ie John Smith would be tagged SMIJ etc etc.
On her second to last day I invented a client called Theresa Cunningham and asked her to make up the file for me. The other normal ( not the christian weird one) solicitor was in on it so we hung out near her desk for ages waiting for the reaction. When the penny finally dropped the look on her face was priceless and we had a hard time keeping straight faces when she brought the file to me in case she twigged that it was a prank.
To clarify I wasn't CALLING her that, it's just the first four letter word I thought of that could be easily extrapolated from a genuine sounding name.
Bride of Shrek, there's nothing quite as satisfactory as getting a Pearl Clutcher&trade good.
Like Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne and Peter Parker I have two first names. That, along with my science nerditude, almost guarantees some physics experiment will one day turn me into a superhero. I'm still deciding whether do the whole costume and cape thing or just let it all hang out like Dr. Manhattan.
Anyway, a surprisingly large number of people have thought my surname was my given name.
@374 Priceless!
Jeez I'm an idiot. That should be FOLLOWED by their first initial, not preceeded.
Bride of Shrek, OM:
That's rather like the "See you next Tuesday" line some people give, just to see if others put it together. I've always liked that one - it's funny to me when people try to be overly polite with their insults.
Feynmaniac:
This is the best option. Jus'sayin.
Years ago when MAJeff got his OM and became MAJeffOM I suggested he put he put "The Great" in front of it to sound like the world's most awesome wizard.
Modesty probably prevented him from doing so but I still like to think of him that way in my head.
Feynmaniac:
ADRIAN! ::whoosh::I AM VERY DISAPPOINTED IN YOU, ADRIAN! ::whoosh::
I guess, as long as my archnemesises don't include Mr. Freeze.
Qwerty - Why thank you darlin! I'll move your paddle up four places when the spanking couch comes back.
Ignore the trolls...HA! I like mine raw, wrigglin', and religious.
Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)
-W. Whitman, Song of Myself
Internal inconsistency is the reason I rarely comment on issues of ethics or morality.
Feynmaniac:
Or Poison Ivy. Yeech...
Feynmaniac:
Pfft, Dr. Manhattan could trounce that sucker with a glance. You could be Dr. Manhattan like in more than, uh, attire and besides, you have that Chimerical Toad thing going. I think you'd be invincible enough to risk hangin' out.
Feynmaniac, Super Chimerical Toad:
By the way, I was going to say that the having two (or three) first names was explained to me as being the standard WASP name. If you could swap the position of any of the names and it sounded okay, WASP.
Besides being Chimerical, everyone knows Toads have magical tongues...
Come on Bride, shashay in with a slutty remark!
Well, I guess I'll just have to wait and see what my powers are. Although....
...if this is true shrinkage may not be an issue.
Patricia:
Oh, Patricia... How very ignorant and slutty of you!
Oh. Right.
I was calling myself 'Wowbagger, Grumpy Minimalist' at one point, but that's when signing in wasn't such a clusterfuck of irritation - I don't want to screw things up so I can't comment...
Feynmaniac, Chimerical Toad:
Oh yes, Toads have magical tongues. This could also be a weapon, a la D'Argo:
Well that settles it, my next husband is going to be a toad.
Bride of Toad - weeelll, my next husband is Naughty. *smirk*
Well, if I'm going to be stealing stuff from Farscape I always did find Scorpius' cooling suit (which pretty much looks like something an S&M samurai would wear) inexplicably sexy.
/waaaayTMI
Did I just enter a fairy tale?
I hardly make a good princess. Perhaps I am the foul mouthed step sister.
Feynmaniac:
Erm. Yeah. So, ah, about that great big oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico...
Feynmaniac, yes, the suit was sexy. So, Super Chimerical Toad could just wear the suit, nothing else and you'd have the Magical Tongue&trade (which of course can be used as a weapon as well). Mrrreooow.
http://wallpapers.free-review.net/wallpapers/36/Farscape_Scorpius.jpg
I always did find Scorpius' cooling suit (which pretty much looks like something an S&M samurai would wear) inexplicably sexy.
is it made of felt?
Regarding names,
I never really understood the strong dislike some people seem to develop for their given names. As somebody once said, A rose is a rose whatever you end up calling it. I have a close friend whose given names means "The Son of God". But when I think of that name, god does not figure anywhere in my mind. What comes to my mind is a computer geek with the most amazing vocabulary of swear words I have ever heard and a lazy bastard who does not come out with his old friends unless his wife is out of town. The name is irrelevant. The person is all that matters.
The only problem I have with my own name is that my first name which I normally use is so common that its almost impossible to get it as a handle on any website. I have to use my last name which I rarely use in real life.
Regarding the male/female confusion,
I once had a roommate whose name was Shahin, which is a male name. With a little change on where you put the stress while pronouncing it, it could be made to sound like Shaheen which is supposed to be a female name. We had a lot of fun with that one making him squirm.
As for religious identities from names,
Where I come from given the full name you would be able to tell the religion, how religious or traditional the family is, which part of the country they are from, approximate decade of birth and a whole lot of other things.
Caine:
And thus has the Never-Ending Thread been turned into the latest example of geek porn. Damn you, Rule 34! Damn yoooouuuuu!
Er, did someone talk about tongues?
Do bad things, to good people…with science!
Bah! Warm fuzzy nice nice! What good is science if no one gets hurt?
deriamus - You catch on real quick.
That will cost you 50 ducats from your bar tab. I am not very ignorant. Or of course you could choose to be laced up tighter... and no, the use of a toad is not in your future. ;)
Of all turns The Thread has taken this one must be the strangest. I'm not sure whether to be proud or ashamed of myself.
Janine - Of course you aren't a good princess. You are a Queen of foul mouthed abuse.
Patricia, about the only member of royalty that I do not want to string up is you.
Waiting for Walton to save the day.
Feynmaniac:
Oh, be proud. How often does one get to discuss the potential properties of a Chimerical Toad Superhero? Besides, just think of the material this will give PZ when it comes to finding a vid for the next incarnation of the endless thread - the possibilities are endless...
Patricia:
::pats pockets::Oh, damn. Hang on, I'll be right back. I know where I can get some money. I just need to grab my ...ah... costume from my room first.
What? I bought it from the Farscape wardrobe sale! You'd be surprised (or not) what some guys are into. Do you know what a Champagne Popper is? I do, and it was hot.
Feynmaniac - Hell's bells brother, sit up and croak! It isn't every man that get's accused of having a magical tongue.
...And that's my last slutty remark for the night. (PZ is going to warn me one of these days.)
Cobolt@ 372, you spelled your daughter's name wrong.
Egad, man! What's the point?
Looks like a toad superhero can be powerful....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91Dyav1qHt0
I'll just have to watch out for lightening.
THE EVIL MIDNIGHT BOMBER WHO BOMBS AT MIDNIGHT!
I like my first name, but i always found it didn't go at all with my last name. For a while, I considered adopting my mom's last name, but alliterations in names are teh suck. so instead I married an American with a nice last name.
also, I hate my middle name with burning passion, because it's an old spinster name (works better in Polish; also, judging from Ol' Greg's list, she might like it. She can have it if she wants, I'm not using it :-p )
it's something you get used to after a while. There's a whole bunch of people who call me Jade in person; I'm sure some of them even think that's my real name.
As a matter of fact, I find it far more jarring when people from the internet start using my meatspace name suddenly. It just does not feel right.
they should be glad germany is not a emmigration destination for Americans. Poor bureaucrats would fucking lose it over the American naming traditions (or complete lack thereof)
I like vegetarian food. but I will absolutely never understand the need to ruin it with fake-meat :-/
I gather this was an attempt at appologizing. I gather it expectedly failed to rise above idiotic. whatevs.
:-)
I have those all the time. How else do you arrive at a sensible, defensible conclusion, if you don't argue with yourself? It's not like other people are always available to bounce ideas off of.
On names bestowed by oneself and others...
My meatspace first name is 'Beverly'. I went by that for years and years and thought nothing of it, until I got a job that required talking to strangers on the phone dozens of times a day. No one could ever get my name right. After I'd say my name, I was called, variously, Barbara, Emily, Bertha and Dimity. I decided that my whole, 3-syllable name was just too much for callers to take in, so started using 'Bev', which all my co-workers called me anyway.
Now the most frequent response to hearing me say my name is 'Thanks, Ben'.
Whuh?
Oh, and when I made my debut on the planet, it was during a well-known solstice holiday. Helpful family friends wanted to commemorate my arrival day and suggested to my folks that I should be named 'Holly' or 'Star' or, for all I know, 'Prancer' or 'Elf'.
Considering those shudderingly-awful options - and that my birth surname actually rhymes with 'holly', I'm glad enough to suffer with the name I got.
As far as I can tell and remember, the only good thing my deeply catholic grandmother ever did for me was to prevent my parents from calling me "Boris", for which I will be eternally grateful.
My kid's first name is pretty normal, but middle name is Luis, after the portuguese soccer player Luis Figo, who ex used to lust after.
I've decided that whole concept is flawed, and I'm not trying it again, too expensive and painful.If I want to be in pain, I can go out in Frankston on a Friday night.
Tired from a long day at work; only just caught up.
I remember, back when I still read New Scientist, they had a section on nominative determinism for quite a while. Quite a few amusing examples were shown.
--
PS John
David M, do you have a reference for the thing about the German constitutional court and Turkish names? I find nothing online and it smells a bit of urban myth :) -but that could be wishful thinking on my part.
Hello everyone,
OT but I need some help please!
Does anyone have the link to the petition against the popes visit to the UK?
I tried a few weeks back but apparently there was an election or something going on (???), so they blocked it for a while.
And as a result I've lost it, and I can't find the bloody thing. I was sure I'd emailed it to myself so I wouldn't forget... Such a muppet. It's turning into one of those days, already applied a mug of tea to my lap this morning...
Thank you, and hope you all have a lovely weekend by the way!
Walton,
Just to add my own twopenneth. I must say that your journey has been one of the most compelling features of this site for a long time now. The contrast between that old imposter who first used the name Walton, and that the current incumbent is incredible. You are very nearly the perfect model for the spirit of this site, as somebody who was willing to take the very brave step of re-evaluating their preconceptions against the evidence, and allowing themselves to admit - publically - that they were wrong.
@Walton: having political arguments with myself is how I pass the time commuting to and from work; Radio 4 gives me "This Morning" and "PM" as grist to the mill.
I'm pleased to say that I usually win the arguments. Although recently I did have to spend some time shouting "That's not what a vote of no confidence is, you morons" at the radio, which was unproductive but cathartic.
2 seconds of googling was required to find it :
NSS website stating the petition is now closed
I did say I was probably being dense... As it turns out, very much so.
I thought there was another one though. Never mind. I'll check back for when it opens up again.
Thank you Rorschach :-)
Well there is one other one linked from that site, this one, but with change of administration it seems to be in limbo a bit.
Marriage? Or toads? I can't say I've ever tried either... :-/
Toads, definitely sticking with toads from now on. Not cut out for marriage.
Toads might hurt or burn or sting or be foul and yucky and smelly and toxic when you touch them, but marriage if done with the wrong person is like dying inside a little, day by day, and you can't just wash the dying off...:-) That's not mentioning the financial pain of course.
Oh, I think I might sound melodramatic, better stop, I think I've made my point..:D
No, no, I'm the princess. (Naturally, that and five dollars will buy you a cup of coffee these days.)
Walton, I'm going through that libertarian and personal transition thing too, just with far less bravery than you.
As far as toads and marriage are concerned, the old gag about princesses kissing them to turn them into handsome princes just doesn't work, take it from me. They have to be princes first.
Or nice single atheist women.
I guess there's always football.Or knitting.
Jadehawk wrote:
Oh, when I was a vegetarian, I was great at that. I never became vegetarian because I hated meat, after all. I once made a chickenless chicken soup for my grandmother that had her poking around under the noodles and carrots and leeks to see what I did with the meat, before concluding that I must have ground it up and put it in the lasagna (no, Grandma, that's TVP). Ruining fake meat is astoundingly easy to do, and since most vegetarians are unwilling to taste meat every now and then as a reference, it's nearly always done badly.
Meat eaters do it, too. My mother tried, when I was a teenager, to use ground turkey as a ground beef substitute. (She was actually a passable cook except when she experimented.) The next time it was my turn to cook, I made a turkey loaf with turkey seasonings and celery, with a layer of meat, then a layer of stuffing, then another layer of meat, and I served it in slices with turkey gravy. It was turkey. Mom didn't use it as a substitute again after that.
Following on from the 'Rape isn't that bad' thread, I just found this on the Grauniad website.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/may/20/women-against-rape-anonym…
Not entirely sure what to make of it, and I absolutely disagree with what she says about womens dress in the linked article.
Whilst I can fully comprehend that for a man to be wrongly accused of rape would be earth-shatteringly awful, I don't think this should be a priority.
Surely the low conviction rates would be a better place to start???!!!
Cleggatron I am very very disappointed in you...
Given the discussion on the other thread, I'm very, very wary of disagreeing about this, but I feel I have to.
I think it's generally unjust that at the moment, someone accused of any serious crime has his or her name dragged through the mud by the media before he or she has even been convicted. This is particularly true where he or she is accused of an offence that is particularly horrific, like murder, rape or child molestation. If the person is innocent and is acquitted at trial, then he or she has already had his or her life and reputation ruined by the media. I'm in favour of extending anonymity by court order to all defendants accused of serious or high-profile crimes, unless and until they have been convicted. Juvenile defendants accused of any crime are already routinely granted anonymity by court order; I don't understand why we shouldn't extend the same right to adults, at least until they have been convicted.
Look at Teresa McKenzie, a teacher falsely accused of having sex with a 15-year-old special-needs pupil. She turned out to be innocent and was acquitted by the Crown Court; but her name had already been dragged through the mud by the tabloid press, and it is unlikely that she will work in teaching again. That, I think, is unfair.
I would add to #435, though, that I don't know why they're granting such anonymity exclusively for rape defendants and not for those accused of other serious crimes.
Re: Names:
Ugh, I totally forgot this yesterday! I used to go to Community College with a guy named Lucas Magnum. Yes, that was his real name. By the end of the semester, I went up to him and told him "You have the most awesome name I have ever heard." To which he replied, "I know."
Ahem - regularly scheduled comment:
I got a Shareholder's Report from WalMart recently (I own stock because I used to work there, might as well keep it for when WalMart rules the world.) They had that little shareholder's voting thing in the back, and it really makes me sick of the people who run the company.
Their first item on the agenda - which they recommended a 'No' vote for:
Non-discrimination policy for gender identity.
The other policy items were things related to letting the shareholders know where WalMart is getting / putting its money. All of which the company asked for a 'No' vote.
It's not surprising how transparent they are, but read it with a 'Yes' vote and it comes out to this:
Allow discrimination against people with gender identity disorders.
Let WalMart hide where it gets its money from and which political candidates and organizations we give money to.
but...
but...
*dejected*
As another addendum at #435, it should go without saying that the new government should be putting a lot more money into counselling and crisis centres for victims of rape. It's beyond awful that some rape crisis centres are being forced to close due to lack of funding. Of all the services that should not in any circumstances be cut back, this has to be one of them.
Of names.
I have heard of a family, surname Head, who named their son Richard.
My story is a little more complicated. Being of Hungarian descent, and due to a family tradition where all the children are given an Hungarian name (so we don't forget where we came from *), one of my names is Tipo.
At school, when we were asked for our full names, the children were much amused at the child with the name teapot. Children being what they are, the name stuck as a nickname.
The cosmic part came from when I was a teenager. The group of lads I used to drink with decided to create a punk band. Having just come across Russels teapot argument (in a bar of all places), I was therefore torn between calling myself Fred Phlegm or Cosmic Teapot as a stage name. Fortunately for the world of music, the band never performed, as I was the only one with an instrument, and I could only play two chords. But we did have fun trying to convince girls that Cosmic Teapot was my real name.
* Quite difficult for me, having an Hungarian surname too.
badgersdaughter (comment 323*), thanks for your examples. Most of them sound a lot like the things described here (as dativus (in)commodi, dativus ethicus and dativus auctoris), here (last bullet point), and here, though one ("paying on a note") doesn't.
* This is going to be another of those less-than-two-day subthreads.
Interesting.
Oh, there are exceptions. My sister did manage to give herself one.
It's not used outside the family, though.
So he's literally the son of a Jack! :-D
LOL!
You've watched The Incredibles, I hope? No cape.
What's up with Tuesdays? Is it "get lost, and don't come back too soon"?
I probably couldn't find it easily, but I've read a lot (in German) about German and Austrian name laws and their consequences, about crazy names that were allowed by generous bureaucrats (there are seriously whacked-out Germans out there... and I've been told about an Austrian couple who wanted to call their son "Batman"), and about similarly crazy names that were not allowed to appear on a birth certificate.
To me it doesn't smell of urban myth at all, BTW. The concept of a gender-neutral first name is completely alien to the German... <handwave> language.
OK, is Rorschach implying that he is unable to find nice single atheist women? Bwuh?
Hey, Rory, I've heard there's a place on this thing called the Internet where a lot of intelligent, sensible, passionate, top-shelf single atheist ladies hang out. It's a blog called Pharyngula. Maybe you've heard of it. ;)
Whatinhell I gotta do, get T-shirts made?
Heh.
My ex swears he was in the Army in Britain with a chap who had the surname Partz. And yes, he was a Private.
Sven
Sorry darl, forgot about our already arranged betrothal. *sigh*, well ok, I'll get married just this one last time. When we get divorced though I'm keeping the surname because the very first thing I'm going to do, post-nuptials is change my first name to Venus.
I don't know, but I think in the case of rapists they need to make a special case then that allows police to contact other potential victims of the same person.
This is just another layer of protection for rapists. Making it clear that women and children who are raped are the criminals who need to prove they have a right to prosecute before things move on.
It's a BRILLIANT way to make the number of rape cases go down. Just like that!
Must be all those false accusations.
What's that song by the Dicks?
Rurrrr... am I allowed to think married men I work in the same building with are tasty??
Yes but don't let them catch taking pictures of their rears with your phone
/needle off the record noise
Hey, why is everyone looking at me?
(sigh) What we have to do in the interests of linguistics.
David, it's partly phonetic. I've actually seen it written as "C U Next Tuesday," if that helps.
@Rev BDC:
There's a certain... difference in a man's derriere that comes to light when they're wearing somewhat tight jeans as opposed to custom-tailored pants.
My original surname (I hate the term "maiden name!") is Polish, and it's not a particularly common one among Polish-Americans. When I got married, I took my husband's German surname and started using my former surname as a middle name. I doubt very much that anyone on the planet shares my full name!
Oddly, I probably self-identify more as Italian-American than anything else. My maternal grandparents were Italian immigrants to the U.S., I had a lot more contact as a kid with my mother's relatives than with my father's, I heard more Italian than Polish spoken in my presence, and of course Mom did the cooking. (Although the in-laws concurred that she made the best chruschiki of anyone in the family! Don't ask me, though. I can't stand the things.)
Casual Friday at the office today?
@Rev BDC:
Yep. And I work with Federal Agents... so he's rather well-built.
Uh, "Batman" wasn't allowed.
Wikipedia turns out to be impossible to search, and the website of the German ministry of the interior is even worse. All I can offer is this forum post in German quoting a German constitution court verdict from December 2008 that I didn't know about. The verdict allows names that are already gender-neutral in the cultures they come from, without requiring a second name that is unambiguous, though it still forbids using gendered names for the wrong gender, with the traditional exception of Maria as a middle name for boys with extremely Catholic parents. (Lots of famous examples from at least 50 years ago exist – extremely Catholic people have become very rare.)
The next post gives a very incomplete list of names that were not allowed by German registrars. It also mentions that a couple was allowed to name their daughter Pepsi-Carola <headdesk>, though Pepsi-Cola did not get through.
In hight school there was a girl that worked at one of the movie theatres in town whose name was, and this is completely honest,
Aquanetta. Yes like the hair spray.
I also went to school with a girl named Dorkus.
And it was a family name. I'm sure there is some historical or religious significance to it, but I bet she got a fair amount of flak over it in grade school.
Block quote fails. Apostrophe fails.
Good fucking morning.
@Rev BDC:
Dorcas is how it's usually spelled. The name Tabitha is another form of that same name.
Actually, you're correct that was how she spelled it.
Dorcas = Tabitha?
wtf?
Dorcas. It's from the bible. I have a family member who was named Dorcas Ham.
Holy shit that's an awful name.
teh google knows all, tells all:
It's biblical. Acts 9:36.
Dorcas = Greek
Tabitha = Aramaic
Both mean 'gazelle'
No, if someone is found guilty of rape the anonymity will be lifted. Until then they are innocent, just as with every other crime.
ouch
so I'm lazy, just you try and take my bacon away