Will Shetterly's Blog, page 121

A note for any article about comics and censorship

The Surprising Origin Story of Wonder Woman | Arts & Culture | Smithsonian: "in March 1942, the National Organization for Decent Literature put Sensation Comics on its blacklist of “Publications Disapproved for Youth” for one reason: “Wonder Woman is not sufficiently dressed.”"

Dr. Carl Hart's Ted Talk on Drugs, Poverty, and Crime

Secret of the Incas

Just sawSecret of the Incas, the main inspiration for the Indiana Jones movies. I liked it more than I should've, given the erratic script, but I had fun mapping the characters on Casablancaand imagining the 1940s black-and-white version:

Humphrey Bogart as the lead.
Ingrid Bergman as the romantic sidekick.
Peter Lorre as the commie diplomat.
The main antagonist could've been played by

My question at io9 about the effect of popular entertainment on behavior

InThe Secret Twist In the Bobo Doll Experiments That Turned Kids Mean, Esther Inglis-Arkell concluded,"We can all admit that what kids (and adults) read and consume probably does have some influence on their behavior."

I replied, "We can admit that's the argument of every censor. But it assumes we are nothing more than the product of what we read and consume. If this is true, slash fanfic

On civility, disobedience, and yo mama

I left this as a comment at Corey Robin'sThe Reason I Don’t Believe in Civility is That I Do Believe in Civility:

Civility is not bourgeois. Working class people of all hues know the meaning of "Didn't your mama teach you any manners?" Bourgeois civility expects obeisance, but simple civility expects equality, and equals don't treat anyone as inferiors, which is the essence of incivility.

When

Respect everyone, post #3: Kadampa Buddhism

"Do not contemplate your own good qualities, but contemplate the good qualities of others, and respect everyone as a servant would." —Atisha, Kadampa Buddhism

Related: Respect everyone

the "respect" quote of the day is by Anthony Bourdain

Our Minnesota State Fair trips—mostly, seed art!

Emma and I only made two trips to the State Fair this year. I brought along my old iPod and took a few pictures, which I rarely do because my general philosophy is that you can experience an event or record it. And okay, if experiencing recording something is your idea of fun, fine, but it ain't mine. So most of our State Fair experience is not recorded here.



Emma does like to take pictures

All I care to say about Anita Sarkeesian, the tl;dr

The tl;dr: Everyone should be treated with respect, but the social justice community has a Munchausen syndrome problem, so we should always question their claims, especially when those claims add to their fame and their bank account.

The longer version is here:All I care to say about Anita Sarkeesian

ETA: I italicized the first part of the first sentence for people who read too quickly. As for

Russia, what's better, what's worse—a note by Rachel Rubin

In a message (shared with permission) Rachel Rubin wrote,

I am writing this in Moscow, and thinking about our conversation about Russia's before/after. I have been asking everyone old enough to remember to tell me one thing that is better, and one thing that is worse. It's actually been really painful, if fascinating--all the senior citizens with pensions gone, etc. One street artist (incredibly

Socialist Bible: What does "the poor will always be with you" mean?

Capitalist Christians love to cite Matthew 26:11: "For ye have the poor always with you; but me ye have not always." The saying references an older saying that capitalist Jews like, Deuteronomy, 15:11: "For the poor shall never cease out of the land: therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land."

So long as there