Michael Offutt's Blog, page 56

Today I'm thinking about exploitation and I'm wondering why there is so much of it in the world today.

As I've gotten more aware of how the world works, I've noticed that a lot of life seems to be comprised of people who are looking for others to do unpaid work for them or to just flat out support their lifestyle of fun and play. It's a fascinating thing to observe, and I don't really have strong feelings about it either negative or positive. It just is, and I'm aware of it. Now, I'm not going to call this "unpaid work" by the term "slavery," but some resemblances to the images that particular term conjures into the mind do exist.

For example, I know people who are hyper-sexual and long for a devoted partner who will go to work 40-hours a week to pay for all the bills they rack up going on lunch dates, seeing doctors for various things, playing board games, and entertaining multiple guys and gals in that oh so special way (glamorized somewhat under the term "polyamory.") I know people who take on partners and then down the road, expect these partners to pick up more and more of the slack of caring for disabled individuals. And I know disabled individuals who really want a partner for doing all of the domestic chores and then some free sex here and there. I know people who "borrow money" with no intention to pay it back (another way to manipulate someone into doing something for them for free).

I know of organizations who couch unpaid work as evangelical volunteerism, or that use a religious calling as a thinly disguised way to make someone do a lot of unpaid duties. I know unpaid interns working for corporations. I know some former prisoners who tell me stories of work they were forced to endure while behind bars, which was essentially "unpaid." I know people who always have "their hand out," and it's because they want someone else to do the work they don't want to do (for free). I know people who feign helplessness to try and get free work out of someone else. And I know people who use emotional blackmail to enlist volunteers for lots of work (caregiving for an elderly parent comes to mind).

Becoming aware of this "fact" of living in the 21st century has become essential to my well-being and self care. I've actually found it "empowering," because I've learned that there is a never-ending pit of need out there, and that saying "Yes" to everything is dangerous to a person's health. If you do, you risk spending the rest of your days doing unpaid work for someone else, which can lead to bitterness, rage, and resentment (and other issues). And believe me, there is a never-ending supply of people who want you to work for them for free. Some will even be so ungrateful that they will criticize the work you've done for them for free.

And I wonder, sometimes, how many people out there are unaware of this fact. The curious thing about "facts" is that they are true no matter whether or not you believe them. This is a hard concept for some people to swallow, especially in this day and age of "fake news." I wonder how many people end up in marriages that, after several years of honeymoon, break apart because one spouse realizes that they are being worked to death. I wonder how many people understand that they are being "exploited" by an organization or a person. I wonder how many parents exploit their children for free labor.  And I also wonder how many people are honestly wanting to be exploited, because their self-esteem is so damaged that they long for a good exploitation with exultations of "Yes! Yes! Exploit me more!" I find the whole thing just fascinating to think about.

I have been careful in the past few years to avoid any opportunities where I feel someone or something might try to exploit me. And I must say, it's had a souring effect on my disposition regarding this particular word. People do a lot of things in the name of "love" whether or not they are actually feeling that emotion at all. Sometimes, maybe all it takes is someone mouthing "I love you" and there is no meaning behind it.

"Love" in my book is supposed to be Shakespearean. It's when two people who have great passion and respect for one another, come together and become greater than they are apart. But what I've been witness to are people who are afraid of living alone just taking anyone to cause the pain of aging to go away, or people see another person as a meal ticket and think "why not?" Or people who choose a partner because it allows them to climb higher in whatever social circle in which they reside.  It all seems to fly in the face of my heart, which is that of a true romantic. I suppose I should add to the stack of "the people I know" a nice helping of psychopaths. Yes, I know a few people who I think are psychopaths, and by the very definition of that word, they could not possibly know what love is. Yet...these people end up in marriages...and they say, "I love you" to their partner with as much emotion as a fish. "Whatever," I think to myself. "You do you" and all that, right? But it does leave me wondering why this happens.

I wonder why there is so much exploitation in the world. I also wonder why people fall victim to it every day. I do know that things are changing. Cheap labor is drying up, and I think that's a good thing. But I expect there to be a tipping point...that there will be violent pushback from the modern day "slave owners" who suddenly will be in danger of paupering themselves to get the help they need. There will be lazy people everywhere who suddenly will need to do the work themselves because they no longer have someone to boss around for free. Organizations may need to cut their bottom line to start paying unpaid workers or risk being destroyed. I honestly can't wait to see this happen, and I hope it happens within my lifetime. I love to witness a good wake-up call as much as anyone, and I can't wait until the "entitled" in our society come face to face with the fact that they may have to scrub their own toilet.

The Second Trailer for Netflix's Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance is beautiful.

I saw this on my feed yesterday, so I'm putting it below for any who haven't watched it. I'm really looking forward to it, but I'm also reminded of how bland the Gelflings actually are. It's weird to see the eighties strip-mined and repackaged so fervently, what with Stranger Things, My Little Pony, Strawberry Shortcake, Indiana Jones, Ghost Busters, and the Dark Crystal all making comebacks. Was it really that great of a decade for people to want to revisit? Nostalgia is a weird thing. Maybe it was the last decade where a lot of people felt truly safe and insulated from "the other," which is why all of this stuff is coming back into fashion. It also feels like Netflix dropped a boatload of money on this project.

It makes sense given that Disney, Universal, and Warner may be yanking back their licenses in favor of their own streaming services. Netflix needs to do something or it will become a barren wasteland. They need a library of original content, or they probably won't survive. That being said...this next offering looks good.

If you are looking for a different kind of superhero movie I highly recommend checking out The Boys on Amazon.

I'm about four episodes into Amazon's The Boys, and the first words that come to mind when thinking about this show are, "It's just too real." It is worth watching, and it's an open critique on how modern capitalism begets modern "crapitalism," and ruins just about everything it touches. Capitalism does have a proven means to drive success and invention. But it's also a mean, cruel, and unforgiving system, and its "cruelty" seems amplified when you have super-powered beings living among regular mortals on this planet we call Earth.

The premise is at first deceptively simple: these super-powered beings are not interested in being tyrants or gods. Rather, they are heavily invested in society. Just like the Kardashians or other kinds of famous people, they don't want to rule. They want to be a part of the "elite" members of society, the .01 percent, the people who are admired and looked up to as beautiful, strong, just, and wonderful. The people that us normals out here fantasize about sexually and emotionally and think, "Oh those people have got it so good. I want to be just like them." The "supes" of The Boys are "social media influencers" to the nth degree, and there's a profound narcissism about it all...the need to be willingly worshiped. And that's the noose that capitalism has around all of the super-heroed beings I've met so far in the series. And why do I say it's a noose? Simple: the lust for fame and fortune.

Corporations in The Boys drive the narrative, and in particular one called Vought. Vought's ultimate goal is to have superhumans adpoted as the primary form of national defense in the United States, which would allow them to gain a monopoly on defense contracts, given their dominance of the superhuman industry. In the show, the character we deal most with is played by Elizabeth Shue (it's nice to see her again as I enjoyed the works she did earlier in her career). She's an unlikeable corporate shill pumping breast milk in her office to feed her child, and treating all of the superheroes as the property of the corporation. Vought controls public appearances, team-ups, and stages battles. Everything boils down to making money for shareholders.

Where the show gets interesting is in how the superheroes adapt to the trauma of being corporate shills (slaves to greed and fame). Because they want the fame and fortune and exposure that Vought promises, they are willing to compromise on every single one of their virtues in order to obtain it. Women who become part of the seven are expected to service the men who are already there in sexual ways, and they must put up with an invisible man watching them use the bathroom while he jerks off. If they don't, they'll be kicked off the very precious team (which is the equivalent of The Justice League of America).

The most powerful superhero (with abilities clearly inspired by Superman) is an unscrupulous white man who feels deeply unappreciated for his contributions, but who ultimately is not ready to rock the boat too much at Vought. However, his incredible dissatisfaction with himself and the years of compromising his own morals for the corporation (which includes killing people who threaten to expose the superheroes for using dangerous performance-enhancing drugs) has made him treat all of his co-worker superheroes like utter crap. Homelander's become a nasty grandiose narcissist who has by episode 4 clearly lost every bit of humanity that he once possessed.

If you are looking for some non-traditional superhero fare, I would recommend checking The Boys out on Amazon streaming. As I said before, it's worth your time, and it validates a lot of what I think happens in our society once we embrace the evils of unfettered capitalism and allow corporations to rule our lives.

I know way too many older men who never grew up and it weirds me out more than anything.

Our society has lots of people in it, and more and more I realize how many older men I interact with just have old bodies. Their inside self never seemed to move beyond their teenage years. I've been editing a book written by a disabled man in his fifties this week. One of the things he proudly speaks about in his book regards an activity I'd call a temper tantrum (he thinks he's making other people...namely minimum wage workers...aware that stores need to accommodate disabled people).

First, a little background: the guy's in a wheelchair. If he goes to a store to shop, and the racks are too close together for his chair to comfortably navigate the aisle, he rips all of the clothes down going through the aisle (on purpose) until a store clerk calls him on it. Then he professes ignorance and says, "It must have been my chair. I'm sooo sorry." But it's an empty apology. He was throwing a tantrum because he didn't get what he wanted.

Other grown men I know are not in equal marriages. They say things like, "I need to be home by this and this time, or I'll get in trouble." I want to say, "Oh will you get a spanking? You naughty fify-two year old, shame on you." I know what they mean. A better response would be, "I told my wife I'd be home at a certain time. If I'm not home at that time, it's disrespectful. I respect my partner, so I'm going to leave." See how the blame shifts from the wife to themselves? I'd much rather hear that, but I don't.

When I told my friend, Meg, about these observations she wasn't surprised. She has a lot of experience with men, and she says that a lot of them get married thinking that their wife will be a replacement for their mother. She says it's gross and disgusting. I wish I could have put up an argument to counter her point. But seeing what I've been observing around here in Utah, I think Meg is 100% on the mark. But I don't understand why. Why are so many grown men wanting to act like infants?

It makes me wonder, are some of the mass shootings happening in our country a result of men throwing a temper tantrum? What the hell? Are we now awash in millions of men who are essentially fat unkempt children at the age of 45? I can't help but think that this is at least one factor that is unraveling the threads of what holds us all together. How can we even be on the same page of anything if what we're dealing with are minds that never left the teen years. Have you ever seen a class of screaming children? Multiply that by 150 million and give them all the ability to vote and you just might see the crazy that we're seeing today.

I know I'm an adult. I feel like an adult. I approach things like an adult. And I just want to say...I'm really disappointed with how my adulthood turned out so far. I thought I'd see a lot more parallels with myself to others who are my own age. The world has a lot of problems, folks, and they are adult-sized problems and not kid-sized ones. At first glance, we'd have the numbers to tackle these problems. But half of these adults are children, so they can't face them. It's mind-boggling. I live in a society that is populated by Peter Pans. I find myself (too often) wondering why so many men never escaped Neverland and chose to remain there forever. 

The latest edition of Microsoft Word that comes with the subscription-based Office 365 has a powerful artificial intelligence to improve your writing.

It is August 7th, and the first Wednesday of the month. So it's time for an all new installment of the Insecure Writer's Support Group. If this is your first visit to my blog, or if this is the first time you have heard of this blogfest, then you'll want to check it out HERE. As for my particular post, I'm not answering the question this month. Rather, I want to tell you about the shocking experience I had in using Microsoft Office 365 and specifically, Microsoft Word, which is one of the programs you get with that subscription package.
I had been asked to proofread and edit a small novella a co-worker wrote about his experiences as a disabled person, and yes, I'm getting a small amount of monetary compensation for my efforts. I'd previously used Office 365 rather lightly, doing some fun writing here and there, but nothing that I felt was worth a thorough edit as it was not going to be seen by a lot of eyes. My co-worker wants to publish their document on kindle, and I said I'd help them do that as I'm familiar with the process. After I got the document formatted to kindle specifications, I ran it through the checker that comes with Office 365, and I was absolutely floored by what happened.
The program caught just about everything. It checked for proper grammar, inserted commas and semicolons exactly where they were needed, changed "your" to "you're" exactly where it was needed, took out extra punctuation, replaced two and three word combos with more effective words that meant the same thing, and on and on. In total, it made over three-hundred changes in a matter of minutes, and I agreed and loved all of them. I have NEVER seen a program do this before. I was floored. And since then, I've done some research, and this is what my research turned up regarding this phenomenon (and believe me, folks, it is impressive):
The latest version of Microsoft Word now comes with an Artificial Intelligence (A.I.). From what I understand, this has permanently replaced the Spelling & Grammar pane that was featured in earlier versions of Word (think 2016). The A.I. taps natural language processing and machine learning to deliver intelligent, contextually aware suggestions that improve a document's readability. Some of the things I witnessed were 1) making phrases more concise, clear, and inclusive, 2) offering synonym and alternate phrasings, and 3) providing justifications and explanations (such as why "then" should be used in place of "than" in a specific context.
Anyway, I was so excited by this that I wanted to write about it so that all you insecure writers out there (just like me) can know about this. I honestly feel that Microsoft Office 365 is definitely worth the money, and that it is a HUGE upgrade over any other word processor I have seen to date. It can actually make you a better writer, by providing you with a powerful artificial intelligence ready to edit all of your words, and it's at your beck and call 24-hours a day.

I'll be back on August 7th for the Insecure Writer's Support Group

I'm taking next week off to take care of some things. I hope it's not too hot where you are at, but if it is, I hope that you have air conditioning. One of the things I plan to do is see Hobbs and Shaw. That sounds like just what the doctor ordered to kick off August. I just love Idris Elba screaming, "I'm black Superman!" That's going straight into the box marked "memorable lines from movies."

Stay cool, friends and see you for the August 7th Insecure Writer's Support Group post.

What I learned about violent video games recently made me never want to play them again.

A fatality effect that is included with Mortal Kombat 11 (you can do this to someone you defeat). Probably like you, I've enjoyed a video game here and there. But just this week, I learned that video game programmers are forced to work in pressure-cooker type situations, and that the content of violent video games is actually giving computer programmers PTSD. Examples of these types of games are Mortal Kombat and Grand Theft Auto.

In a nutshell, what is happening is that there's a team of programmers that are assigned a certain section of a video game to complete. Sometimes it's only a sequence only a few seconds long that just requires a lot of detail. If the sequences are gory, then the programmer spends a huge amount of time examining gory images and making sure that things look authentic. The article I read on Kotaku indicated that in one office, it was pretty typical to see programmers watching videos of real life hangings, people getting killed, and cows being torn apart or cut up online so that they could get blood effects and death just right. Conversations around the water coolers talk about how blood splatters, how it lands, and how meat should look if its decayed, ripped open, etc.

I never realized that this was a thing...that people are actually being forced to watch stuff like this in order to make a living wage in this country (and other countries). One programmer talked about how he had nightmares so bad from staring at bloody images of real life people that were murdered (and posted around his desk for reference material) that it gave him severe nightmares. He said that he avoided going to sleep and took drugs to stay awake. Those that weren't effected like this had grown desensitized to violent imagery and talked about it like sociopaths. Is any of this good for society?

Knowing all of this, I don't think I can ever play a video game like Mortal Kombat ever again. It's not right, despite the fact that its fun to do. That's the problem I think: the things that consumers in the United States find fun or convenient are usually made possible because someone we can't see is made to suffer. I wonder how long this trend can be sustained, and what its long-term effects are going to be on society at large.

I love the trailer for Star Trek Picard that debuted at San Diego Comic Con.

San Diego Comic Con had a bunch of surprises for me that I didn't anticipate. I guess I haven't been paying attention to entertainment as closely as I might have thought I was. One of the things that was a huge and pleasant surprise was all the Star Trek news that came out of Hall H. In particular, I loved the two minute plus sized trailer for Picard, which is slated to come out in 2020. I had previously thought it was due out in the fall, and I probably just misread that at the time. Still, 2020 isn't far away, and it's starting to look like 2019 will be the last time I can cancel my CBS All Access subscription for a few months to wait for Discovery to return. It's gonna be Star Trek all the time. Eh...there could be worse things, right? :))

In the trailer, which I'll link below, Picard has a dog, and we see some very familiar faces: namely Jeri Ryan reprising her role as 7 of 9 and Brent Spiner coming back as Commander Data. For the record, Data looks really odd (probably a combination of de-aging C.G.I. and other things--for one his cheeks are too fat for an android that doesn't age), but these things aside it's nice to see Data again. The trailer is filmed expertly. It instantly makes me want to know more, which is what a trailer is supposed to do.

At the same time though, it looks to be a much slower paced yet very thought-invoking exploration of the years following the last Next Generation movie, which are filled with tons of events like the destruction of the Romulan homeworld. If you are a fan of J.J. Abrams, you know that event in particular led to alternate timeline Trek where we have Chris Pine playing Captain Kirk three times (probably the only three times that will happen, sadly). However, Chris Pine does do television stuff...he was in a Black Dahlia mini-series filmed by the director of Wonder Woman. So there's always a chance that CBS All Access could approach Pine and say, "Hey...how would you like to play Captain Kirk and do a few seasons of television for us?" Just saying...that would be exceptionally cool.

But the trailer also seems to be infused with a bit of Blade-Runner noir-esque sprinkles. In particular the scene of the woman walking by the storefronts, and it's raining like hell outside. That scene strikes of Blade Runner, and I'm wondering where else we're going to get that kind of thing. I like it a lot. The atmosphere instantly draws you in, and gets the imagination firing on all cylinders.

If you haven't seen the trailer yet, I highly recommend you indulge yourself. Let me know what you think in the comments.

A Warhammer 40K television series has finally been greenlit by Games Workshop and it may be the perfect doorway for us non-players to begin exploration of their universe.

Warhammer 40K is finally getting a television series. I've never played the game, but I've been in and out of game stores pretty much all of my life, and I've had friends who have collected some really large armies, painted them to gorgeousness, and fielded them against foes sitting across from them at conventions amidst startlingly cool tabletop terrain. I was always content to be just that: a spectator. I never really wanted to play. It looked too involved, too time-consuming, and honestly too heavy to carry around from place to place. And then there was (of course) the problematic issue of storing it all once I did start collecting. So nope, I never started. But that doesn't mean I wasn't a fan.

I played a couple of the video games through the years, and I found them pretty intoxicating. Warhammer 40K takes place in a distant future where humanity is ruled by an emperor who is pretty much a god (made so through some kind of dark science) and he is served by armies of genetically enhanced humans called space marines. These guys are immensely powerful, and their power armor is extremely impressive. They go to war against all kinds of enemies. The most intriguing of these enemies (to me) were things that resembled alien xenomorphs (I think they were called tyranids) and the followers of dark gods like Slanesh and Khorne. In the Warhammer universe, these entities are very real, and they have destroyed entire worlds by remaking them into versions of nightmares Clive Barker must have on occasion (he's the creator of Hellraiser).

In fiction, Warhammer 40K is kind of inaccessible. There are stories and novels, but it's hard to find a recommended reading order or even a place to start as they are all different. I think Games Workshop has done a tremendous job in managing their intellectual property. However, I think the screws are so tight on a lot of their stuff that it has made it hard for someone like me to really explore their universe without playing the actual game (which may be their intention as the game is what makes them money). And they usually concentrate around a particular character, which you may not understand if you haven't played the game, so there's that too. But maybe with this new TV series, there's a break in the ice that's forming.

A tv series will need to appeal to more than just the fan base (although the fan base is extremely important in any endeavor). So they'll need to explain in detail about Earth, the Emperor, the roles of the Space Marines, and the enemies of the Space Marines. They'll need to give us bits of information over time regarding how the universe works, the threats the good guys are facing off against, and whether or not there are even good guys to work for (kind of like in Game of Thrones). This has got me excited, because from what I've seen, the universe of the Space Marines has always been extremely intriguing, but very daunting, to explore.

Anyway, I guess we'll all see where it goes.

Here are the three panels I'm excited to read about from San Diego Comic Con this week.

I probably won't ever go to San Diego Comic Con. I don't like crowds, and from what I've heard, SDCC takes the cake as far as that goes. However, this doesn't mean my "Google Fu" isn't top notch. I play a good game when it comes to following up on things that interest me. So in case you are one of those people that likes to know what I'm interested in hearing about this week from the many panels at SDCC, I'm posting about the three I'd attend if I were there.

The Expanse. It seems like forever since season 3 ended with all of the ring gates opening up, revealing entrances to 1300 individual systems spanning an entire galaxy (and each one with either something interesting or a habitable world to explore). I saw on social media last week that season 4 has now been all wrapped up and post-film production (and editing) has begun. People who follow the industry closely believe season 4 will hit Amazon Prime sometime in September or October, and I'm super excited. In the meantime, I want to read what the panel at SDCC dares to reveal! There is most certainly going to be a trailer, and I hope that the authors who are known collectively as James S.A. Corey reveal the title to the sequel of their book, Tiamat's Wrath. I simply must know where all of this is headed. Breadcrumbs are much appreciated. The panel takes place on Saturday, July 20th, from 1:00 to 1:50 in the Indigo Ballroom at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront.

The Witcher: A Netflix Original Series. Henry Cavill is Superman no more! Now his new role is to play the lead in The Witcher (called Geralt of Rivia). My friend James played the video game, and he really loved it. And Cavill's makeup job in The Witcher has got people buzzing that he looks a lot like Legolas did in The Lord of the Rings movies. I do plan on reading The Witcher books, which are a series of short stories and novels written by Andrzej Sapkowski going back to the 1990's when fantasy was just starting to explode on the market. The saga consists of the following books: Blood of Elves, Time of Contempt, Baptism of Fire, The Tower of the Swallow, and The Lady of the Lake. The panel takes place on Friday, July 19th, from 2:15 to 3:15 p.m. in Hall H (good luck to anyone trying to get access to Hall H).

Terminator: Dark Fate. I've seen every Terminator movie. I've only really loved Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Both of those movies were directed by James Cameron. But this doesn't mean that I'm not a sucker for everything Terminator. I kind of like the universe, because I kind of like apocalyptic tales. There's a lot of interesting things that could come out of this movie, like answers to the questions: 1) Did Judgment Day never happen? 2) Will Judgment Day still happen? 3) Why is Sarah looking for vengeance if she won in Terminator 2? That Terminator as a franchise has moved beyond the fears that my entire generation had of World War 3 has probably never occurred to studio execs. Which means that (from my point of view) the thing is doomed to tank at the box office. However, what do I know? I mean...the fears of the new generation are all centered around climate change. However, this doesn't mean Terminator won't get my money yet again. There's something fun about watching these machines take on people in action-packed sequences that makes me want to watch with my butt glued to the chair. And I like that Arnold and Linda Hamilton are back (we haven't seen her in a long time!) It'll be interesting to see how Linda's character has grown through the years. The panel for this movie takes place on Thursday, July 18th, from 11 a.m. to noon in Hall H.