I’m shocked at your lack of imagination, sir.
~Shooter Out
I think you mean the opposite thing. :oops:
I think calling Smokey and the Bandit a racist piece of crap is really unfair to a funny, classic movie. I watched it a couple of years back when I was doing Mutants and Masterminds write-ups for some movie and TV characters (here if anyone is interested.) So, I’m not speaking from nostalgia remembered from a movie I saw as a kid.
I didn’t get the same feeling in any way other than the fact that some of the characters were racists (especially Jackie Gleason), but even those were portrayed in a negative light. We realized they were bigoted idiots. If you have specific instances that make it seem like racism was a good thing in this movie, I’d have to re-watch and see what you’re referring to because I just don’t remember it.
Smokey and the Bandit racist? The god damn Germans got nothing to do with it!
Have to suggest you guys stay away from console talk. Even Juan was off about the price of XBL - was $50 now $60 a year through official channels, though there are deals where it might still be $40 - and hearing the old tirade about the PS3 being ridiculously expensive actually made my skin crawl.
I’ve been directly dealing with the current “Console War” since Youtube videos of Sony going bankrupt over a $700 game console and Xbox 360 owners looking for help with red ring of death in game forums were offensively attacked by other Xbox 360 owners, so it really and honesty doesn’t sit well to hear my favorite non-gaming podcasts bring up the PS3 for what was likely the first time ever only to condemn it. If only because you guys have repeatedly said not to condemn things you know little of, yet admit you know nothing of the PS3.
Yes, I’m one of “Those Idiots” who bought a $700 PS3. Was looking at it less as a game console, more a $300 cheaper at the time Blu-ray player much like the PS2 is a DVD player which also plays games. Really wasn’t expecting the reaction I got from some like I’d just been conned out of a cow for a small bag of beans. Of course I’m not liking what’s going on with PSN, but I’m keeping myself informed.
But from you guys I just heard some misinformation. That’s cost you.
Godmars,
I would say welcome to the forum, but I see you joined three years ago. Welcome back I suppose is in order.
I want to clarify your point as I understood what was said on the cast to be different. The point of the segment wasn’t to talk about the general cost of consoles but the recent newstory about the hacker intrusion of the PS3 network. The only cost discussion (as I recall) was the cost of membership, PS3 being free and XBox live being ~$50. I will freely admit I may be mixing this conversation with a recent Nerdist podcast and other articles I have read, but I am pretty sure the focus of the conversation wasn’t a console war / pricing discussion, but bringing people up to speed on the details of the PS3 hacker attack.
Do you agree?
Totally agree. By the way, when I quotee your post it looks like you put an image in there but it’s not showing up?
Yeah, Man Men is good quality TV. I’m kinda puzzled at Chuck using words like satire or fantasy (?) to describe Mad Men.
Chuck, I don’t know where you got that idea.
It’s a period piece show and meant to reflect what times were REALLY back then. And people who have worked in New York’s Madison Ave in the days of the explosion of the advertising industry say, “Oh yeah, it was exactly like that.” People worked till noon when to lunch and drank, came back to the office and drank the rest of the afternoon. Guys screwed their secretaries. Women more mostly secretaries or housewives.
It’s not a pretty picture, but it’s authentic.
I understand that people have different tastes in TV, but there’s been real exciting innovation happening in recent years with the idea of the show with the despicable main character.
Weeds and Mad Men and Caprica (Caprica also another layer of interesting because it had no one main protagonist). are ones I’ve been a fan of. Others I haven’t seen are Sopranos and Breaking Bad. And there’s other examples. Even BSG treaded that line.
I totally respect that that sort of show isn’t to people’s tastes.
But here’s a question to those we don’t like such shows:
I’m curious to understand what’s the reason. Do you just like not having a protagonist? Are the shows too complex?
Are you offended by them? Do you fear that people think you endorse those character’s lifestyles? Do you not do the weird stuff? I don’t get it. Please explain.
I understand what you mean - though I don’t think that there was malice behind the comments they were making about the PS3. (Full disclosure: my household of 2 people have a PS2, PS3 and Wii but most of our gaming happens on our PCs). Given that a number of us do use the services that have been compromised, it’s definitely relevant to the GWC community. You can never repeat enough cautions about being aware of your online and financial security. Nevertheless I can understand your feelings, since our Crew isn’t familiar with the systems we use (and honestly, Juan’s comments focused on security), and when we comment on things we’re not familiar with, people who are familiar with them might want to grind their teeth. Totally unrelated to gaming consoles, for example, when people start talking about my areas of expertise, I tend to get very nitpicky and sometimes a bit testy about errors or misconceptions. It’s just very human of us.
Yeah, I’m far more of a listener than a poster but one thing I am hearing after a bunch of basic online security advice are a ton of inaccuracies and a lot of out of date rhetoric which for some reason still poisons gaming forums. Literally makes it impossible to voice an honest opinion or raise a concern about anything.
Though giving that part another listen Juan did mention that $40 was a sales price - sorry Juan.
Thing is that the PS3 has had other news about it, and yet this is the first time I think its ever really been mentioned. Granted its important but still there wasn’t the least positive thing presented unless it was about the Xbox. I’m just now listening to the cast but I’m pretty sure that by the time you guys were recording more information was available.
image was just the Madmen logo. No biggie.
The shows you mentioned are all awesome. Nancy Botwin is one of my favorite female characters to come out of television in nearly 10 years. Brian Cranston’s work on Breaking Bad is stunning. The Sopranos … fuhgeddaboudit.
The characters in Madmen are truly flawed, but there in lie the stories. There are consequences for these flaws it just takes several episodes ( or seasons in the case of Don Draper) for Karma to fuel up the chainsaw.
I’m watching BSG again on instant view. I’ll look for the darkness you speak of. I imagine it is there. Let’s face it, Lady Macbeth was always more interesting than her husband 
cheers
First off, since I’m about to wall-of-text (yes I’ve made it a verb): you all know I love GWC. So.
I just have to say that when you guys started trying to argue (maybe? it was a bit confusing) that racism is somehow worse than sexism because they mean it, and sexism is just part of the culture? Lost me there, big time. That’s like saying one kind of oppression is worse than another because… of what? The worthiness of the oppressed group? The intentions of the people saying things? Just because people don’t mean things to be racist, sexist, or any other -ist, doesn’t mean that they aren’t. Those are the kind of ideas that allow people to argue that the US is now post-racial and post-feminist, both terms that events of the past few years (for example the whole birther ridiculousness and the obvious and organized attack on women’s health by some members of Congress) have proven to be false. By perpetuating the idea that one set of attitudes is somehow more acceptable than the other we’re perpetuating systems of oppression in such a way as to avoid people embracing their intersectional identities. If you’re interested in what some have termed the “Oppression Olympics” (though it’s a term that some people reject, arguing that by reducing these issues to the comparison of a sporting event we trivialize them), the Geek Feminism wiki has an interesting write-up.
Audra, you aren’t a buzzkill! You’re right! (I may have spoken back to my computer saying, Listen to Audra! while I was listening to the podcast…) In order to make a more just society, we have to recognize and own what’s wrong with it in order to have any sort of meaningful change. Stick to your metaphorical guns! It’s part of why, even though it sometimes feels fruitless and can be emotionally draining, when someone tells a joke in which the humor depends on the marginalization of a group of people, or uses a slur, etc., I call them out on it (you should see me in WoW…). In a world where I have to explain to people on a regular basis why the experience of wiping on a video game boss and real life sexual assault really have no point for comparison; that using “gay” as an insult perpetuates homophobia and a culture of hate; that referring to all people who look vaguely Hispanic as “illegals” is a rhetorical move to negate the basic personhood of immigrants (not to mention invoking racist fears of non-white America), well, arguing that a sexist movie is less bad than a racist movie because - they didn’t mean it! it’s part of the culture! - simply normalizes, trivializes, and appropriates the experiences of people who suffer simply because of who they are. It’s problematic (link specifically about language use).
In terms of enjoyment of art that engages with various -isms. In my mind, nostalgia doesn’t trump offense. Sure, it sucks to realize that something that you really enjoyed (or remember enjoying) reflects toxic ideas that you don’t want anything to do with. The key part is to recognize those ideas for what they are. If that has an effect on your enjoyment of the piece of art, well, that’s a deeply personal decision. For example - I didn’t grow up reading most of the sci-fi classics because I couldn’t stand them. I found the sexism and patronizing tone of a lot of it anathema, and quickly found other genre writers (often people writing at the same time as the Big Names!) that were more to my tastes, both in style and in content. I didn’t read Starship Troopers, for example, until it was a Book Club selection. As I said at the time, what bothered me wasn’t just Heinlein’s sexism, but the way in which is was expressed. My reaction to that is to have absolutely no interest in his work, because as a woman I find it alienating to be excluded from even an imagined future.
Another example: I grew up watching Holiday Inn every year at Christmastime. I loved the songs, and it inspired me to imagine what my grandmother’s life might have been like in the 30s and 40s. However, learning about the representation of black people in literature and film and the “mammy” archetype made the movie difficult to enjoy in the same way; Bing Crosby’s (whose children accuse him of abuse) character is helped around the property he buys by a large and content black woman and her two small children. (Hello, Mammy.) There’s a musical number to celebrate Abraham Lincoln’s birthday that is performed in blackface. Today, I find that horrifying but, being from 1942, it’s also a product of its time. It certainly brought to life for me the kinds of racial attitudes that were prevalent in the United States my grandparents lived in. I can’t enjoy the film the same way I did as I child; I shouldn’t, because I no longer am a child.
In lighter thoughts:
Kirk in Firefly would be hilarious. I would laugh every time his shirt ripped (oh wait, I already do that ;))
Flying movies. I think the only “flying” movie I’d be nostalgic for would be Flight of the Navigator, but I haven’t seen it since I was small. I also loved Space Camp. However, I think they are a different kind of flying movie - they’re in space! It all goes to what we’re interested in, in the end - I still don’t pay much attention to military tech stuff, because I don’t really care about it. Sure, some GWCers geek out about that stuff on Twitter (and I’m sure in other venues as well), but we all have things we’re more geeky about than others. It’s not one of mine.
And speaking of things that have been ruined, vis a vis Topgun the movie… Tom Cruise. blech.
It’s worth mentioning that I haven’t seen either Smokey and the Bandit or Cannonball Run, so my part of the discussion was limited to my reactions and assumptions.
Also, my initial reaction of “wait – you don’t mean to say that racism is worse than sexism?” is a valid question (see Casilda’s explanation above) – BUT I do want to clarify that none of the Crue endorses sexism or racism or the idea that one is somehow more tolerable. I hope my initial prickly reaction isn’t taken out of context. Once we discussed it, it became clear that the guys were trying to say that one movie seemed oblivious of its own misogyny, while the other seemed more insidious and deliberate about its racial material.
While all three of us may sometimes be unclear about our thoughts (it is, after all, not scripted discussion) or change our minds over time, or be misunderstood by others – what matters is the Crue agrees on the basic values of human decency. We engage in debates over such issues and will inevitably press some buttons (either each other’s or other GWCers’). But when it comes down to the truth, the actual, complex reality is that we each see the world through different lenses, but we share the same basic values of human dignity. This commonality is essential to our group’s makeup, and our different interpretations are essential to the critical questions and concepts we address in the cast.
The dick and fart jokes are just a bonus.
heh heh–you said “bone-us” 
Operator – I got in your siggy!
BAD ASS!!!
fraggle dance a la 'Talos
I’m in ur siggy, killin ur doodz.
Eddie just kills ya:D
Going to watch Wild Target tonight and yeah like a lot of PS3 owners (bought solely as a heavily subsidised Blu-ray player) I’ve been watching my credit card activity:shifty:
I think you’ll have a good time with that one sir. Rupert Grint is awesome in it.
The main focus of the news item was to make sure that affected users knew about the security breach, and how to protect their information. When it comes down to it, I’m a huge tech and security nerd, and (I hope) the analysis was presented from that perspective.
No worries - the way I look at, there’s a deal on the service at least once a year, and that’s enough to get my membership renewed until the next year’s discount comes along.
Although I personally don’t own a PS3, I was following the story and did want to make sure our listeners that do were adequately informed – basic online security advice isn’t always the most intuitive thing to everyone, and it couldn’t hurt to let people know what to expect. As for the compilation of news, it was the information that I was able to find as of Friday.
Regarding any PS3 news (or other geekery news) that we’ve missed, send us an email or voicemail and let us know! The hivemind makes us go!
It’s ironic that no love was shown to Mad Men in this nostalgia arc…
//youtu.be/DHUUyx0d7qw&feature=related
Anyway, I can’t agree with you on the sexism bit with Mad Men. Yes, there is sexism but it is an accurate reflection of the time period that ends up presenting some of the richest, complex, and well defined female characters on television. Can you not watch Roots because it depicts a bunch of racists?
Anyway, I haven’t seen Smokey and the Bandit in years, and the show never really was one of my favorites. However, just for my edification are we sure that the racism isn’t presented with a hint of irony? For example, Blazing Saddles is full of racists characters and offensive stereotypes, but they are presented to disarm and ridicule such sentiments.