Declan Finn's Blog, page 130

Within Temptation - And We Run

I don't know the rapper, but obviously, I'm on a Within Temptation kick.



And you know what? I like it. Even the production values on the video look pretty good.

Nerd News roundup, Star Wars, Daredevil, Ants, Batman, and Puppies

Enough Sad Puppies for this minute. Well, at least the depressing parts.



Peter David has commented on the Hugos, and said, "Eh. Whatever."



You saw J. Michael Straczynski's comment the other day, which boiled down to "Either put up or shut up, Hugos."



Now, for a little but of awesome.





First....



I've finished watching Daredevil. It is still awesome. Vincent D'Onofrio, when he's sane, can do whatever acting gig he wants. His Wilson Fisk was sympathetic and terrifying. Carlie Cox was suave and funny as Matt Murdock.  And Foggy Nelson nearly stole the series -- which is a toss-up between Foggy and Murdock's priest for who stole the most screen time.



And even though they didn't have the standard "after the credits" tag, they had one mid-season tag (the episode called simply "Stick"), hinting at a grander story arc here, probably involving the magical/ninja/Yakuza known as the Hand. It will be interesting to see what else pops up over the next three series Marvel has planned.



For the record, the best exchange? "You took Spanish in college just to get near that Greek Chick.  Whatever happened with her anyway?"   "Oh, it didn't go well."



I see this being very interesting in the long run. Though if there's another Daredevil series, they may or may not do Elektra, assuming that the Jennifer Garner role didn't blow it.



Did anything else happen this week?



Oh yeah, CUE THE MUSIC.  Star Wars has returned!







The force is strong with this family.  It looks very badass, from the crashed Star Destroyer in the desert to the tense (but not over the top) action and special effects. The X-Wings look like standard dogfighting photography.  And, if I'm reading their implications right, they're going to follow up on Leia as having the force.



The graphics look great. The production values and costumes look great. And is anyone else going to complain about grizzled Han Solo?



But I'm with the Novel Ninja, I want my Grand Admiral Thrawn (or Timothy Zahn's, depending)



Then we have: Even MORE Star Wars. For the record, this is a video game. Ignoring the people (who move a little awkwardly), I have problems telling this apart from live action.




Congratulations, we no longer need actors. Especially if they're directed by George Lucas.











NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA  BATMAN!

.... Versus Superman.







My reaction is very "eh."



First of all, there are waaaayyy too many people kneeing before Superman....



And, seriously, they didn't keep the line KNEEL BEFORE ZOD in Man of Steel, but they're having people kneel before Superman?  Really?  I know that people comment that DC heroes look like god, but this is a little heavy handed. Very heavy handed, really.



Enter Batfleck. I'll give them points for the costume straight out of Frank Miller's The Dark knight Returns, meets Iron Man, but aside from that ... also, if they were going to skip the idea of Batman changing his voice, couldn't they have gotten the voice of The Animated Series Batman to do it? Just asking.



Sigh. I'm not impressed just yet.



Also, did you note who's doing the voiceover once the soundbites stop?  I believe that's Jeremy Irons. As Alfred.  Yes. Really. He's going to be the most terrifying Alfred ever.



I like the Batwing and the batmobile, though. And I liked Henry Caville last time, so worst case scenario, I'm hopeful he can save it.



And I finished watching the netflix Daredevil this week. Batfleck is not on my good side right now.



Oh, and of course, Marvel can't go a week without topping everyone else.



Enter: Ant Man.







I like it. It's quirky, there's definitely a Guardians of the Galaxy feel here. From from the comic deflation, to the the epic nature of one-on-one fighting to the goofiness of using Thomas the train engine as a weapon.



You know what? It just looks fun.

Within Temptation - Stand My Ground

A little "symphonic rock" for you all this Friday..



Have a good weekend, all.

Attack of the Puppies

UPDATE: Tom Smith, who's work has appeared on this blog before, has created a new ditty just to hate on Sad Puppies.  He did it with the help of ... David Gerrold. I'm getting a pattern here.  In case he tries to shove it down the memory hole, just click on the picture to the left and feel free to peruse it until your heart's content.



For obvious reasons, he is no longer going to be posted on my site. None of his work will exist here anymore. For him to back this sort of hate is beyond the pale. And I'm sick of it.













Sad Puppies has made me, well, sad.



Actually, no, they haven't, but people I have liked and enjoyed have severely disappointed me.



If you read the last post, you know what "Sad Puppies" is. If you haven't, you may be a little lost.



David Gerrold, for those of you who don't know, started out as a kid who slipped a script over the transom, and started his career. His script created Tribbles -- yes, of Star Trek. Since then, Gerrold has been one of the Names in SF.



Then he went full racist psycho on author and Puppy supporter Brad Torgersen, going into full hysterical name calling.



It's been a bit of a theme.



I don't like throwing names around, but a lot (ok, two, but two seem to be more than enough) of the anti-Puppy crowd is evil. Not wrong, not incorrect, not misguided, not even deluded. They. Are. Evil. Full stop.



"Now now, Declan, aren't you exaggerating?"



Lemme give you a fer-instance, shall I?



Brad Torgersen went out and posted a photo of his family on his blog. He wanted to show that, yes, he's a real person, with a real family. He supports Sad Puppies, and that doesn't make him evil, damnit. He's not some sort of monster from the black lagoon waiting to eat the children of lesser writers (Scalzi, I'm looking at you, you schlub).  Sad Puppies are people too.



Then someone went and called his wife a human shield. Because she's black.



...



...



...



You're expecting another meltdown, aren't you?  You're expecting me to rage and rant and go completely psycho.





Before that happens, please note, I don't really know Torgersen outside of the FANifesto idea. I'd like to know him, but I'm too busy just trying to keep up with everything from Cedar and Sarah and Larry and Matt and Larry, and Larry and damn, Correia posts a lot.  But, alas, I can't keep up, and Brad has been one of those people I can't even follow on Facebook because I have no time.



But this?  That thing above?  No.  You don't do that.  That is vile and hateful and spiteful, and what sort of person EVEN THINKS LIKE THAT?



This. Is. Evil. Period.




Let's break this down a bit.  Forget the racial component for right now, okay? Let's forget it. Hard to do, but forget it. SHE'S HIS WIFE. Isn't the first rule of civilization don't touch the family?



Going after family is what you do if you're in the mafia, or in drug cartels. That's what you do when you are a vengeful, spiteful little s*(t ... or you're in a culture where your enemy's children will grow up to murder you in your sleep.



Either way, NORMAL PEOPLE DON'T DO THIS.



I'm still trying to wrap my brain around this. Seriously, people, what has happened that justifies this? And death threats to Larry Correia? Slandering authors, whole groups of fandom, whole chunks of people who just want to see their authors, who they enjoy, get a freaking award?



How do you anti-Puppies justify this? The best I've heard is "VOX DDDAAAAYYYY, HE IS EEEEVVVIILLLL" and Vox Day isn't even WITH Sad Puppies, so try again.



Seriously, though.  Do I want Jim Butcher to get a Hugo? Sure. I also want Timothy Zahn, John Ringo and David Weber to at least be nominated.  Hell, how about Peter David? David should be a good candidate, at least for bringing us the best Star Trek novels ever. I also want a Marvel film to get best picture at the Oscars and Joss Whedon to get a TV show without station overlords killing it.



But I'm not going to call people at home or send them emails threatening their life. I'm not going to personally attack them unless they attack me and mine first.



As an aside: John Scalzi, you are a douchebag, really.









But, guys, I'm not going to go out and start a campaign of harassment and death threats over it, like the anti-Puppy people have. Seriously, John Scalzi goes on his blog ranting and raving about how we "can't let these people win! They disagree with us!  Voters, cancel the Hugos by voting 'no award' on your ballot! That will surely fix them! Muahahahaha."



As J. Michael Straczynski posted on his Facebook page: there have been voting blocks going on around the Hugos forever, Sad Puppies are only open and public about it, if you think this year's Hugos are illegitimate, cancel them, if not, then shut the hell up. Full stop.



You know, the Puppies have a point to make, and they're making it. I gotta ask: what exactly are the anti-Puppy trying to do that justifies expending this much energy? Don't they have better things to do?



When Sad Puppies started, it was to prove that the Hugos have become the property of a small clique around WorldCon. That clique said No! This represents ALL of SF. Correia and Co. said "You want to lay money on that?"



After three years of Sad Puppies, that clique at WorldCon is squealing like a stuck pig that "It's ours! Ours I say! Precious! Dirty, nasty Hobbitses." They've cried uncle. They have admitted to what Correia said all along.



Guess what? The avalanche has already started. It is too late for the pebbles to vote.



And now, the anti-Puppies want to wage a war over all of this. Possibly with real bullets.  Where do they get the energy? I know cliques can be schmucks, but come now, what the hell?



This started out over an award, people.  Calm the hell down, pop your meds, and take a breath.



But go after someone's family? I hope someone takes a baseball bat to your knees and works their way up. This is repulsive.



I also "enjoy" how Torgersen's wife is a human shield, but his daughter? What is she? Not black enough to be a "human shield"? Because that's the only answer I can come up with. You want racism, I think I've found some.



I'd say that the anti-Puppies should just calm down and vote for their own damn favorites next year, but that's the point, isn't it? Cliques don't work like that. Cliques have to have their thing their way, and now that the pretense is gone, the anti-Puppies are grasping for traction, because Heaven forbid that, one year, just one year, someone other than "one of their own" win the awards.



Normal awards shows, like the Oscars, just give awards to the deserving later on.  Nicole Kidman didn't win for Moulin Rouge, since the Oscars just had to give it to Halle Berry because ... Monsters Ball had a good sex scene? I don't know. But the next year, Kidman won it for The Hours. The Oscars didn't really want to give an award to The Dark Knight, but they gave one to Heath Ledger, since they really wanted to give it to him for Brokeback Mountain, because gay cowboy, and they wouldn't get another shot.



To the anti-Puppies, we all know you're going to try to do the same exact thing next year, because that's how it works. And if the Hugos change the rules to exclude the Puppies, the Puppies win. If they destroy the Hugos rather than let it go to the Puppies, Vox Day wins.



When people like Scalzi threaten to burn down something they claim to love because they love it so much they can't see it violated by outsiders, that's not love. That's Medea murdering her own children. That's insanity.



But the anti-Puppies seem to hate the outsiders more than they love the Hugos.

Within Temptation: Sinead

I changed my music lineup.



Brunettes and guns. I'm good.

Daredevil Has Arrived

So, miraculously, that didn't suck.



The first of the Marvel NetFlix tv shows has debuted ... oh, the whole season has dropped on Netflix like an atomic bomb ... and I've seen the first three episodes of Daredevil.



What did I think?  I think it's borderline artistic, and in this case, I'm thinking that's a good thing.



If you saw the Affleck version, you know the story, though the NetFlix version is very understated -- Matt Murdock "sees" by using his senses. Instead of the CGI "vision" in the Affleck version, all that Matt Murdock has to go on are sounds, and smells he talks about.



The storytelling is smart. It doesn't hit you over the head with anything, just emphasizes some points a little, and that's about it. The origin story is littered with little, Arrow-like flashbacks used to great effect.



In fact, there's nothing really over-the-top, and even the stunts are relatively low-key in comparison, though there is more straight-forward martial arts (real moves from real, identifiable martial arts, including capoeira, some Krav Maga weapon disarms, and some boxing styles).  While not being over the top, wi-fu (wire-fu), there are serious, serious stuntmen involved in this, some of them from the Taken franchise. And they are all having fun.



It's also nice to have a show on the streets of my home town that are back-end streets that look like places that I can identify.  That doesn't happen. Ever. But it does today.




The pilot, Into the Ring, is about Karen Page, a secretary at a financial firm that's handling money for the post-Avengers rebuilding of  New York City.  She finds some iffy money practices, and finds herself framed for murder. There is a nice bit of detective work going on, nice fight work, and sets up the next episode with the kidnapping of a boy by evil Russian white slavers.



With the second episode, it takes place right after that, with the camera angle pointing straight down into a dumpster, with Daredevil's body lying in it.  The kidnapped boy was a trap, and he's had the heck beaten out of him. Instead of wasting time with a fight at the opening, we see the aftermath, and it works. Most of that episode is just Daredevil talking with someone who saved his life, with Karen Page and Foggy Nelson getting plastered together on a night out on the town.  There is exactly one fight scene in the entire episode. It works.



A word on the actors. They have a Ben Uric who is a refugee from Chicago Hope, back in the 90s. I'm not sure where they're going with him yet, but I'm okay with it ... even if his boss looks more like the comic character than the actor they have. And, yes, Foggy Nelson, Murdock's partner, is in the series. He's got a strange look, he's obviously not Jon Favreau of the movie, though they're both doing basically the same (good) job.



There are moments in these episodes that are very well executed.  The first episode -- heck, all the episodes -- has Arrow-like flashbacks that break up the action nicely, without resorting to fake-outs of "oh no, the hero might be beaten."  Yeah, no, we know that Daredevil isn't going to be beaten to death in an alley in the first episode, so the flashbacks draw out the tension.



The moments of art occur more frequently as the episodes go on. In the second episode, Cut Man, there is a fight scene in a hallway. The interesting part is that the camera never leaves the hallway, even when the fight does. The director just tracks the camera back and forth through the hall.  It's surprisingly well done, leaving a lot to the imagination.



Episode 3, Rabbit in a Snowstorm,  has several moments. Including a bit where Matt Murdock tracks someone because he has a Cartier watch, and just follows the ticking. In fact, it's almost a musical leitmotif, the way it's handled.  Darth Vader has the Imperial March, the Kingpin's right hand man has a ticking watch.  It was also a nice touch to put together the ticking watch with the speeding heartbeat of a juror on a fixed jury.



During a closing argument to a jury, the camera shoots Murdock from several different, interesting angles, going from the back, the side at a high angle, and sweeping around to the front.



And then, at long last, at the end of the episode, we have the reveal of Kingpin ... and his first appearance is almost like shooting Murdock before the jury, using some of the same angles.



This Kingpin wears all black -- shirt, tie and jacket. It's a nice inversion of the all-white ensemble that the comics use.But then again, I have this feeling that both Fisk and Murdock will be modifying their costumes as time goes on.



Vincent D'Onofrio's Wilson Fisk at first comes off as a little sad. When asked "How does this piece of art make you feel?" He answer was only "It makes me feel alone."  Huh. Interesting.



The short version is, I'll take this over Agents of SHIELD any day of the week, and twice on Fridays. It is well written, brilliantly directed, and if it stays this good, I will get the DVD set.



In short, this was awesome.

Music blog: A Stirling Return

I was going through the music playlist of the blog (just hit "music" and watch the fun start), and I noticed a few things.



One, I haven't really done a music-for-music's sake in a long, long while. The biggest blog of music I've run into was in December, over three months ago.



Also, I haven't posted any Lindsey Stirling for over a year.



Time to fix that, I think.



Also, the last few blogs were kinda heavy.  We need some light.



This one is called Child of Light....







Master of Tides ....



Do I know why it sounds like an Irish Jig while she's dressed up in colonial-era garb? No. Just listen to the music.







And this is Child of Light with lyrics: Shatter Me.  Turn up the volume on this one.









I have no idea what Senbonzakura is from, but it's listed as a cover.  It's pretty. I'll take it.

Cry Havoc! And Let Slip the Puppies of War!

UPDATE: Due to the backlash, the EW HACK behind the piece has deleted her Twitter account.  The Puppies ate her twitter.



ALSO:  Larry has posted on his Facebook Page.  Brad Torgersen has posted on his blog.





If you have never heard of the Sad Puppies Save the Children Campaign, you're about to.

If you've ever wondered why I don't talk politics on the blog, brace for impact.

Sad Puppies has been about bringing balance to the Force, or at least the Hugo awards for Science Fiction and Fantasy.  See, a few years ago, the great and powerful Larry Correia dismissed the Hugo Awards as being nothing more than a popularity contest for World Con.  Once upon a time, it might have awarded good SF&F, but it has now gone to politically-based "literature" over good reads.



How so?  Well, look at the Hugos a little, okay?



If you don't believe that the Hugo awards have become a problem over the years, let's take a look at the progression of the award. The first best novel winners started with Fritz Leiber, Alfred Bester (who wrote the most influential telepath novel ever), Robert Heinlein, Phillip K. Dick (author of the book Blade Runner was based on ), and Walter Miller (Canticle for Leibowitz). Bester and Miller influenced the 1990s tv show Babylon 5. Heinlein's book Starship Troopers was made into ... a really, really bad movie.





These are award winners from the first ten years, whose competition included Theodore Sturgeon and Kurt Vonnegut.


Now? Let's put it this way. Baen books is one of the biggest publishers in science fiction today. Their top lists of bestsellers include John Ringo, David Weber, Timothy Zahn, Elizabeth Moon, and even Correia. In the last 25 years, books from Baen have been nominated 8 times for a Hugo, and it's mostly been Lois McMaster Bujold, or Elizabeth Moon, with Correia getting one nomination last year.





Ringo has pumped out nearly 40 books in the 15 years he's been writing, almost every one a bestseller, but he can't get a nomination? 




David Weber has been writing for at least 20, if not 25, and his books have been compared to Star Wars meets Horatio Hornblower, but not one lousy nod? Timothy Zahn is responsible for resurrecting the entire Star Wars Franchise in the early 90s with his Heir to the Empire trilogy, but has never been suggested for a Hugo in 25 years! What. The. F&*(!



The nominees lately? People who are friends with the former President of the SFWA, John Scalzi, A race-baiter named Jemisin. Someone named Mira Grant four times in five years (still hasn't won). George RR Martin (never won). Waaayyy back in 2009, they had Gaiman, Cory Doctorow, Neal Stephenson ... and John Scalzi, but that's at least a lineup of I've heard of.



Oh, but the entire Wheel of Time saga was nominated for best book last year. It lost to someone named Ann Leckie, for a debut novel called Ancillary Justice, with a great big blurb on the front cover ... from John Scalzi. See how that works? 




JK Rowling managed a nomination and a single win, and she's made more money than the population of the UK.




Terry Pratchett wrote dozens of books over the span of forever, and he never got a single nomination.




Remember, Science Fiction Writers of America have been undergoing a full-on, Stalin-level purge lately. Heck, even former members of the SFWA have come out against their lock-step, utterly insane behavior -- writers such as Sarah Hoyt. Even current members are protesting some of the more deranged moves -- people like Harlan Ellison, David Gerrold, Mercedes Lackey, Barry N. Malzberg, Jack McDevitt, Larry Niven, Mike Resnick, Harry Turtledove, and Gene Wolfe. And let's face it, when Harlan Ellison is calling you a schmuck because you're too far left, you're probably a schmuck. You know the SFWA has gone too far when even the New Statesman thinks' you're a leftist schmuck.



This is about as bad as the Oscars, where only the prestigious and elite of Hollywood's most pretentious can even be bothered getting a nomination. Only this time the clique is smaller, and even more vicious. High school-level vicious. And it's time someone stood up to these schmucks.



Cry havoc, and let slip the puppies of war! Commence ... the saddening!




When Larry Correia pointed this out, he was told "No!!!!! Hugo represents AALLLLL fandom!!!!"



Larry said: "Here, let me show you."



Since then, the Sad Puppy Crew has, for three years now, put together their own slate -- voted upon by their fans, who then use that slate to pick nominees.  They're basically running their own Hugo Awards.



And, since Correia started this to make a point, he has refused his own nomination from the Hugos themselves (he leaves himself on the Puppy Slate, however, since, well, he doesn't get an award from that).



Since this began, the Sad Puppy people have undergone accusations of being evil white men! Blah blah blah.  It's what makes "racists" of of Beale / Vox (though he's Native American), or Larry Correia (who's Portuguese). It makes misogynists out of Sarah Hoyt (from Portugal) or Cedar Sandarson ... and no, they are NOT transgender, they were born women, and remain women.



This was "fine," with me.  Really. I've put up with name calling my entire life, and so have they.We're all really used to it.  Really used to it.



Heck, when John Scalzi went on his page and roared about campaigning to "No Award" the Hugos over Sad Puppies. And he's literally claiming that "we shouldn't allow those who don't like us to campaign so blatantly."  Uh huh, "They don't agree with us!!!! WWWWAAAAHHHHH."



Oh, get over yourself, Johnny. I now rename you Bella Swan, because you are just that tedious.



And then, Entertainment Weekly came out with it's article, and a headline "Hugo Award Nominations Fall Victim to Misogynistic and Racist Voting."  They have since changed the title.



....



You're expecting me to go nuclear, aren't you?  I'm far, far beyond that right now.



Suffice it to say that this lying little douchebag has now kicked up such a s***storm, she's going to think she was born in fecal matter.



Let us ignore that the new Hugo slate includes women and Hispanics. Let us ignore that one of the nominees, Jim Butcher, is as politically neutral as they come, and he's not a member of Sad Puppies. Let us, instead, focus on how many of them are lawyers. Let us focus on how much EW has slandered a whole cross section of fandom.



Right now, I want to hit someone with a brick.



Oh, and get this correction.

CORRECTION: After misinterpreting reports in other news publications, EW published an unfair and inaccurate depiction of the Sad Puppies voting slate, which does, in fact, include many women and writers of color. As Sad Puppies’ Brad Torgerson explained to EW, the slate includes both women and non-caucasian writers, including Rajnar Vajra, Larry Correia, Annie Bellet, Kary English, Toni Weisskopf, Ann Sowards, Megan Gray, Sheila Gilbert, Jennifer Brozek, Cedar Sanderson, and Amanda Green.

What does that mean?  That means that the author, one Isabella Biedenharn, didn't talk to anyone on the Puppy side.  Seriously. Congratulations, EW, you've just shown crappy journalism at its finest. Talk to people on only one side of an issue, do no research of your own, and ignore everyone else.



[Slow clap.]  Nice.  Very retarded of you.



However, I can't seem to top the epic, epic tweets of Larry Correia to Biedenharn on Twitter.

You went to press with a bunch of asinine, obvious lies, and you're happy to include my side AFTER YOU LIED? @isabella324

— Larry Correia (@monsterhunter45) April 6, 2015

We put 10 talented, deserving women on our slates, plus homosexuals, minorities, didn't matter, only cared about the quality. @isabella324

— Larry Correia (@monsterhunter45) April 6, 2015

How dare you lie about these people? I'm used to it, but you should be ashamed of yourself. Have you no integrity? @isabella324

— Larry Correia (@monsterhunter45) April 6, 2015

Obviously not, Larry.  She has no decency at all.



And, yes, it keeps going. But I have to do my own work, now.



You can see other people comment on this.  Tom Knighton (twice). Amanda Green -- twice. Cedar Sanderson has a fan reaction at her blog. Otherwhere.  Matt isn't up and running yet on EW, but this is close enough. Sarah and Larry don't have posts up yet on EW, but when I do, expect an update on this blog. The closest I've found is that Sarah has expressed surprised at being a white mormon male "with a great rack."  Really.





Are these people my friends? Larry retweeted two of my links ... and then my sales shot up.  Sarah and Cedar let me guest post on their blogs. I'm friendly with some of them. In some cases, I barely know them.  In some cases, I don't like or dislike them. But, as Tom said, they're family.



You f**k with my family, and I will end you.



So, to EW, John Scalzi, and anyone and everyone who has indulged in this evil, vile campaign of lies and slander, I tell you now, you are done. Forget being dead to me. I'm nobody.  But I, and Sad Puppies, and Fandom, will see your careers buried under so much debris that you will swear that you were born in a block of concrete.



You @$$hats have f***ed with the WRONG PEOPLE,



Let's start with EW, because they have yet to sufficiently hurt over this.



For the world of Scalzi? He's working on alienating his own fans.  I will merely sit back and watch him suffer and die from his own lack of talent.



I'll be hatching evil plots as the day goes on.  But right now, I want to watch their entire house of cards burn down, with them in it.  I don't want them to die, because that's too quick. I want them to suffer through every last, agonizing moment as everything they've built, and everything they've accomplished on the backs of others, die.  Death is too easy for such evil as this.  There's a reason for Hell. And this is it.



Christ said to forgive your enemies. This isn't about that. Forgiveness isn't a factor. Not even revenge. This is about stopping them. And they must be stopped.



So, until next time, UNLEASH THE PUPPIES!!!

Daredevil: the GOOD trailers

Don't get me wrong, I liked the original Daredevil trailer, but these actually make the entire storyline look interesting.



It also shows us Karen Page, who was a long-term character in Daredevil, on-again, off-again girlfriend of Matt Murdock's (one of about five hundred, from what I can tell), before she was murdered by Kevin Smith during his brief run (though if she's back from the dead again, I wouldn't be that surprised).



In other Daredevil news, apparently they'll be going to swap out this black costume in the trailers with the classic red costume (not the early yellow one, thank God).

Stupid Writing Cliches, the revenge: Political cliches

I seem to be going after a lot of cliches lately. First there was the Christian cliches from a few weeks ago, now this.




ILLEGALS.




Want to give this alien a work permit?

This pisses me off because I'm a New Yorker, and I know how the world works on this. At least in New York City.



The usual cliche is "Oh, illegals can't come forward on crimes because they might be deported!"



WRONG! When pigs fly. When this is pulled on tv, you know it's crap.



For the past 15 years, New York has been an "asylum" state for any and all undocumented / illegal immigrants. Deportation doesn't happen. Period.



If you want to make the argument "They don't trust cops in their countries, because it's all corrupt where they're from,"  fine. You can make that argument. It's even a valid argument.



But to suggest that anyone is sending any illegal back anywhere? That's just a joke in most of the country, since the federal government has to ship them back home, and they haven't even thought about it in six years.



But this especially rings false in New York -- which is where you usually see the cliche anyway.  Hell, we can't even ship back criminals who enter the country illegally. Some of them make Al Pacino's Scarface look like a documentary. (I prefer Paul Muni, myself)



Also, the good, pure and virtuous illegal? Don't believe it. In the last year, tens of thousands of the undocumented immigrants are members of gangs, like MS-13, who traffic in drugs and people. These are not nice people.



Now, if you want to give me a story of the men and women who come to America, put in the time, energy and effort to become legal citizens? That's a story I will happily read, and happily wallow in. Because that's a story worth reading. And one that's far, far more believable.




GAYS


I covered this a little bit in the first cliche post, but there are a few other things to cover.



Take, for example, the trite concept that "Oh, gay partners don't have visitation rights in hospitals!  Oh, gay partners can't receive life insurance!"



Are you writers stupid? What idiot believes this crap? You know what the solution to all of that is?  It's called paperwork. Sign a healthcare proxy, ya moron! And on the insurance form? "I want X person to be the beneficiary of my insurance payout." Done. Period. Stop being a moron.



Seriously, have these writers never seen an insurance form? A legal form of any sort?





Also, the prevalence of homosexuals in media is getting annoying. Heck, DC comics is going a little bit nuts over it -- Batwoman, longtime cop Leslie Thompkins, Renee Montoya (formerly the Question), probably Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, Alan Scott -- are all gay, with the exception of Harley Quinn, who's "just" bi. And these are the ones I know off the top of my head.



Homosexuals are, maybe, 1%-2% of the world's population. I'm sorry, but there are so few human beings on the planet who end up as superheroes, or villains, and so few homosexuals, the overlap has got to be small. Going by these numbers, DC comics must have about 300-600 name heroes and villains on their active roster, otherwise, they are seriously over-represented.



Don't even try to justify it by calling it all deviant behavior, because ... no. Just no.



Heck, The Walking Dead just brought on a gay couple.  That's nice ... except there are maybe a few hundred people left on the planet (that have been shown) and a gay couple happens to be two of them?



Excuse me, but let's go back to the Venn diagram.  98%-99% of the planet is straight. Again, homosexuals are, maybe, 1%-2% of the world's population. In The Walking Dead, 99.99% of the planet have been eaten or become zombies, and somehow, they're still 1%-2% of the world's population.  My credulity has just been strained to the breaking point. My suspension of disbelief has broken.



And for the record ... Indiana.  Indiana passed the same law that's either de facto or de jurie in THIRTY OTHER STATES, in fact, in Illinois, OBAMA PASSED IT, I think the entire conversation is Bullcrap.  Seriously.  A state that has NO, NONE, ZERO incidents of anti-LGBT bigotry is now going to become rampant because of a law that's already in over half the country?  How f-ing stupid do you have to be to figure that?




MILITIAS


This was something that was popular in the 90s, and had some bleed-in to the 21st century. Basically, the world was at a point where Islamic terrorists had been done, and who cared? It was really an excuse for writers to have cardboard villains they didn't need to explain. They were anti-gummint, and dangit, that was all that mattered!



In short, this was BS.  The "evil Christian militia" was big in the 90s after Waco, Ruby Ridge, and Oklahoma City, and it was a meme that everyone drummed into the heads of the public for nearly a decade. None of these people were ... anything that the public had been told, really.  The Branch Davidians of Waco was a cult, and the siege of their compound was a screwup according to every Hostage Rescue Team on the planet. Ruby Ridge was just bizarre.  Oklahoma City was lead by a pot-smoking atheist douchebag.



Sadly, there's a bit of a resurgence of this idiocy lately.  John Land had these types kicking around his last few novels. There've been a few bad movies and murder mysteries around this sort of thing.  Heck, Castle had the whole "evil White veterans were framing innocent Muslims for a terrorist attack."



Really?  Really?  No. Just no. Period. End sentence. It doesn't work anymore, people. Heck, watching most of the 90s stupidity is almost painful, so one can argue that it never worked.





AND IT DIDN'T WORK WITH CAPTAIN

AMERICA IN CIVIL WAR, EITHER!

And now, you've got some villains who are obviously evil because they're caricatures of conservatives. Ooohh, they're RACIST! And Christian! And Tea Partyers! And against illegal immigration! And they like guns!



In short: evil white men. Again. Sigh.



Heck, if you go by the premise that the Tea Party is for smallest government, I could technically count. If you've been tagging along with me for five years now, and you assume that this makes me evil, yeesh, have you got problems.



Oh, and for the record, I never again want to see the evvviillll military trying to overthrow the government. It barely worked in Seven Days in May , and that was only because of Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster.



The closest American fighting men and women come to overthrowing a government is by running for President. You're talking about a military that hasn't ever had a mutiny, that I recall, and there are fiction writers out there who want us to believe that they'd overthrow the entire government?  No. This is a concept that needs to be put down like the mindless rabid animal that it is.