- Being There (1979) -- adaptation of a novella, starring Peter Sellers and Shirley MacLaine
- Black and Tan (1929) -- (youtube video) a recording of Duke Ellington and His Orchestra
- Dracula (1931) (Spanish language version) -- Spanish adaptation of Dracula, using the same costumes as sets as the Bela Lugosi film, but starring Carlos Villarías
- Dream of a Rarebit Fiend (1906) -- (youtube video) live action short adaptation of Dream of a Rarebit Fiend comic
- Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer (1974) -- documentary on photographer Eadweard Muybridge
- Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze (1894) -- youtube video
- A Fool There Was (1915) -- a silent film drama with "controversial" "risque" intertile cards like "Kiss me, my fool!" starring Theda Bara
- Ghostbusters (1984)
- Hail the Conquering Hero (1944) -- satire with Preston Sturges screenplay nominated for 1945 Academy Award
- Humoresque (1920) -- film noir starring Joan Crawford and John Garfield
- Imitation of Life (1959) -- romantic drama starring Lana Turner
- The Inner World of Aphasia (1968) -- youtube video, educational film about patients with aphasia (inability to speak caused by brain trauma) and the medical staff treating them
- John Henry and the Inky-Poo (1946) -- a George Pal Puppetoon
- L.A. Confidential (1997)
- The Mark of Zorro (1920) -- silent film starring Douglas Fairbanks
- The Old Mill (1937) -- a Walt Disney Silly Symphony
- Our Daily Bread (1934) -- aka Hell's Crossroads, sequel to The Crowd (1928)
- Portrait of Jason (1976) -- documentary on gay African-American hustler and cabaret performed Jason Holliday
- Seconds (1966) -- scifi movie starring Rock Hudson
- The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
- Sink or Swim (1990) -- experimental film containing 26 short stories featuring the same father/daughter characters
- The Story of Menstruation (1946) -- a Disney produced educational film commissioned by the maker of Kotex (I think I need to see this)
- Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One (1968) -- an experimental, metatextual cinema verite docudrama by William Greaves
- Top Gun (1986)
- Winchester '73 (1950) -- Western starring Jimmy Stewart
Tuesday, December 29, 2015
The No ClickBait, Annotated List of National Film Registry Archive Additions, 2015
Thursday, December 17, 2015
I Hereby Issue a Fatwa on Gullibility
Apparently, the far right is outraged today because ISIS ordered a fatwa on people with Down's Syndrome-- and equally outraged that there's no outrage from the left.
So I looked for news about it.
A single blog site in the Middle East claims that ISIS issued a fatwa authorizing the murder of disabled children in Syria and Mosul, issued by several sharia judges. It further claims that this was an "oral fatwa" from a single Saudi judge, implying that there would be no record of it. The judge is named and the fatwa is attributed to a panel of judges.
That the facts are reported inconsistently, of course, means squat, even though it's reported inconsistently within a single paragraph.
The claims are repeated with details to make it seem more believable, like saying about the source "It has been called 'one of most accurate chronicles of life under Islamic State rule.'" By whom? Who can say? The author clearly can't because he doesn't. Maybe he's the one who said it. (He also didn't put his name on that article, which was attributed to "staff" with an update by "editor," who is totally mad that "the leftist socialists" aren't outraged by this.)
And some articles quoted the *commenters* from other articles on the same topic, all of whom believed the claim despite a complete lack of corroborating reports, some of whom claimed that ISIS is "worse than the Nazis," (when we have a Presidential candidate in the US saying that we should put American citizens of the wrong religion into concentration camps, which is not Nazi at all, obviously). I particularly like this detail: "The information indicate(sic) that most of the children born with Down's Syndrome are those of foreign fighters who married Iraqi, Syrian and Asian women."
So we're not talking about just any babies with Down's Syndrome, because most babies in the Middle East with Down's Syndrome are the children of (probably US) soldiers. Obviously. You see, we might not care if the babies were 100% Middle Eastern or if they were born out of wedlock, so obviously, a bunch of US soldiers got married there, had disabled kids, and left their wives and kids in Iraq to be murdered by ISIS. As one is wont to do. 'MURICA!
Sadly, it took searching the name of the judge to find the snopes article that did the same work that I did but while giving clicks to sites like Briebart. *cringe* I went through 3 pages of news reports looking for a reputable source and another 2 on a different search to get to snopes.
Maybe all of the judges on that panel have the same name. Maybe the judges reproduce asexually, like protozoa, and now there's like 6 identical judges on the panel, all of whom have the same name. Maybe the judge is a protozoa.
People really need to learn that "how can anyone do something so terrible?" might be a question that we ask ourselves, but it's not a rhetorical question. Look it up. There's a good chance that if you asked that question, it didn't actually happen.
Is the claim true? Who knows? But if there were really 38 confirmed killings of disabled children under 3 months old, don't you think that that would be reported by a reputable news agency or at least by multiple local websites?
"The liberal media" didn't report on it because it's even too unreliable even for CNN to use in their fearmongering campaign, something that isn't the case when "an unnamed law enforcement source" repeats a rumor started by "an unnamed Facebook executive," in which case IT'S TOTALLY TRUE OMG. (Aside: where's a blink tag when you need one?)
Even if the FBI disagrees.
Oh, and that image of Sarah Palin? That's from her Facebook page. In case anyone's forgotten, she has a child with Down's Syndrome, which is why it's not ok to use "retarded" as a slur. But it's totally ok to use "lame" as a slur, as in "Lamestream Media," even though it has the same history and use as "retarded." Slurs against the physically disabled are totes ok.
In case you missed the point, "the leftist socialists" aren't outraged because we prefer that our media report facts and there are none to back this up. If it's true, it's appalling, but there's nothing to indicate that it's true.
So I looked for news about it.
That the facts are reported inconsistently, of course, means squat, even though it's reported inconsistently within a single paragraph.
The claims are repeated with details to make it seem more believable, like saying about the source "It has been called 'one of most accurate chronicles of life under Islamic State rule.'" By whom? Who can say? The author clearly can't because he doesn't. Maybe he's the one who said it. (He also didn't put his name on that article, which was attributed to "staff" with an update by "editor," who is totally mad that "the leftist socialists" aren't outraged by this.)
And some articles quoted the *commenters* from other articles on the same topic, all of whom believed the claim despite a complete lack of corroborating reports, some of whom claimed that ISIS is "worse than the Nazis," (when we have a Presidential candidate in the US saying that we should put American citizens of the wrong religion into concentration camps, which is not Nazi at all, obviously). I particularly like this detail: "The information indicate(sic) that most of the children born with Down's Syndrome are those of foreign fighters who married Iraqi, Syrian and Asian women."
So we're not talking about just any babies with Down's Syndrome, because most babies in the Middle East with Down's Syndrome are the children of (probably US) soldiers. Obviously. You see, we might not care if the babies were 100% Middle Eastern or if they were born out of wedlock, so obviously, a bunch of US soldiers got married there, had disabled kids, and left their wives and kids in Iraq to be murdered by ISIS. As one is wont to do. 'MURICA!Sadly, it took searching the name of the judge to find the snopes article that did the same work that I did but while giving clicks to sites like Briebart. *cringe* I went through 3 pages of news reports looking for a reputable source and another 2 on a different search to get to snopes.
 |
| He's pretty! |
People really need to learn that "how can anyone do something so terrible?" might be a question that we ask ourselves, but it's not a rhetorical question. Look it up. There's a good chance that if you asked that question, it didn't actually happen.
Is the claim true? Who knows? But if there were really 38 confirmed killings of disabled children under 3 months old, don't you think that that would be reported by a reputable news agency or at least by multiple local websites?
"The liberal media" didn't report on it because it's even too unreliable even for CNN to use in their fearmongering campaign, something that isn't the case when "an unnamed law enforcement source" repeats a rumor started by "an unnamed Facebook executive," in which case IT'S TOTALLY TRUE OMG. (Aside: where's a blink tag when you need one?)
Even if the FBI disagrees.
In case you missed the point, "the leftist socialists" aren't outraged because we prefer that our media report facts and there are none to back this up. If it's true, it's appalling, but there's nothing to indicate that it's true.
Saturday, December 5, 2015
Things That Only Readers of "Things That Only [Some People] Understand" Lists Understand
- Half of these are pretty universal. Why would people think that only 90's kids/Tiger Fans/LSU fans engage in underage drinking/tailgate/can't find a parking spot? Does this person live in an actual cave? Do they have electricity? Are they aware that the Internet exists?
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