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Allan Keyes Presents A Trio Of Asshattery

1 Jul

 

July 1, 2013

keyes

Ever ask yourself “What if classic sculptures were dressed as hipsters? What would it look like?”  OF COURSE YOU HAVEN’T. That’s because you’re normal. But some asshat with WAYYYYYYYY too much time on his hands did:

http://todayilearned.co.uk/2013/06/13/classical-sculptures-dressed-as-hipsters-look-contemporary-and-totally-badass/

….. there’s nothing I can say. I’m kind of dumbfounded here. On one hand, I gotta give props for the execution. On the other hand, I’d happily blow up the Parthenon to stop it if there was ever a glint of a chance this would be something that could happen in real life. I. HATE. HIPSTERS.

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In other news, you remember the Berenstain Bears right? Those boring Jewish bears that were the stars of scores of utterly banal and forgettable children’s books and stories? Did you ever think to yourself “You know, I kinda think that the Berenstain Bears reinforce negative stereotypes and serve to the dominant patriarchy. Is that crazy talk??”  Evidently not slugger:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/06/06/childrens-media-use-cuddly-animals-to-reinforce-racist-and-socially-dominant-norms-researcher-says/

It’s some egghead researcher’s opinions that children’s stories and cartoons serve as evil vessels to do things like “reproduces and confirms racist, colonial, consumerist, heteronormative, and patriarchal norms”

THE STUPID…..IT BURNS. IT BURNS! IT’S A F**KING CHILDREN’S BOOK!  I never read it as Horton Rapes a Who or Thomas the Tank Engine of Empire Expanding Destruction.  What really galls me is not so much that these living blood clots actually continue to get a paycheck, but that they actually continue to live. I mean really.

MR. BTR SAYS: Let us examine an academic quote from that  article: “Most animals portrayed in children’s books, songs and on clothing send a bad message, according to academics Nora Timmerman and Julia Ostertag: That animals only exist for human use, that humans are better than animals, that animals don’t have their own stories to tell, that it’s fine to “demean” them by cooing over their cuteness.”

1-  Humans ARE better than animals. Sorry, maybe that’s my human-centric bias showing, but I think I’d rather take a human being with me to a Rangers game than a wildebeest. You can’t high-five a wildebeest after a hat trick.

2-  Animals don’t have their own stories to tell? Maybe yes, maybe no, but you know what they don’t have? Vocal chords capable of forming words or speech centers in their brains in order to tell them.

3-  We demean animals by cooing over their cuteness? I’ve never heard one complain (see point 2) but more to the point, there are a lot of lonely teenagers staying home with their parents on prom night who’d love to be demeaned that way.

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Why do I torture myself by actually looking at these effing stupid things? Besides trolling for content that is.  Well, now that I’ve fully established myself as a masochist, lets bring the full awfulness home:

Japan- the land where they sell used schoolgirl panties in vending machines, and anime of otherworldly monsters and robots doing unspeakable things to teen girls dressed in sailor suits. Is there ANYTHING there that would surprise you?

Well yes, yes there is. Thank you for asking:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/shortcuts/2013/jun/14/eyeball-licking-fetish-japanese-teenagers-sick

Yes. EYEBALL LICKING is a new fetish thing now. Where was this when we were kids? I mean, who wouldn’t have given their left and possibly right nuts to see Voltron crack out a giant robeast, kneel down, and lick his eyeball? I know I would’ve!!!

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The Saturday Comics: Pizzazz

29 Jun

June 29, 2013

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I remember this magazine, and especially the comic book ads for this magazine, but I was just a little too young to appreciate it. I saw it on the stands but I am not sure if I ever bought it. A Marvel Comics magazine, it featured articles on comics, Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica, as well as all kinds of pop culture and music. Pizzazz only ran 16 issues, from October 1977 to January 1979, so I was just 7 or 8 when this hit the stands, a few years too young to really be interested. And too bad, since I would have loved the cover featuring Superman, The Movie. (The caption from Superman on the cover reads: “I consider it the greatest honor of my long career to be on the cover of a Marvel magazine.” DC and Marvel are fierce competitors, then and now.)

Stan Lee never looked this good in his life.

Stan Lee never looked this good in his life.

Here is the Wikipedia entry, which is decidedly short on pizazz:

Recurring features included a comic about Amy Carter’s life as the President’s daughter, a serialized Star Wars comic, and a one-page comic by Harvey Kurtzman (typically a “Hey Look!” piece done for the Marvel predecessor Timely Comics in the 1940s) on the last page. Regular columns included the reader dream-analyzing “Dream Dimensions” and the advice column “Dear Wendy.” Once the magazine was established, a regular feature was a full-page illustration of some crowded scene in which the names of readers who had written letters to the magazine were hidden. The covers showed either photos of popular celebrities, or photo-realistic drawings of celebrities and/or Marvel superheroes. Shaun Cassidy was featured on six covers, The Hulk appeared on five covers, Spider-Man on four, and Peter Frampton on three.

Topics mentioned in the magazine included (but weren’t limited to):

  • The original Star Wars movie
  • Grease
  • Meat Loaf
  • The movie Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
  • Battlestar Galactica
  • Superman: The Movie

The early installments of the serialized Star Wars comic featured in Pizzazz have the distinction of being the first original (i.e., not directly adapted from the films) Star Wars material to appear in print form, preceding the 1978 novel Splinter of the Mind’s Eye by several months, as well as the introduction of original stories in Marvel’s own monthly Star Wars title.

Six Shaun Cassidy covers? SWOON! (And one Meat Loaf. One sweaty bloated Meat Loaf cover.)

I now leave you with a gallery of all sixteen covers of a magazine which, had I been a little older, I would have been all over. Click on the thumbnails to enlarge.