Am-Dram 2.0

I don’t recall school plays being quite like this.

Also, open thread.

Comments

[David]

I mean, come on. Someone deserves an ‘A’.

[BlokeInBrum]

That was cool. Kudos to those who thought of it and pulled it off, though maybe they should have done one about (illegal) aliens!
I'm just going to leave a link here for other readers;

https://www.crcpress.com/Gender-and-Drone-Warfare-A-Hauntological-Perspective/Clark/p/book/9781138580275

I stumbled upon it accidentally and thought it a joke, until of course a quick google trawl revealed a rich vein of academic research in the field.

The West is truly screwed..

[TimT]

That video though. Classic rendition of 'he's right behind you!' pantomime-style acting.

[David]

Classic rendition of ‘he’s right behind you!’ pantomime-style acting.

Yes, but with face-huggers.

[David]

“Children under 7 must be accompanied by an adult.”

[Damian]

Matt Taibbi:

There was never real gray area here. Either Trump is a compromised foreign agent, or he isn’t. If he isn’t, news outlets once again swallowed a massive disinformation campaign, only this error is many orders of magnitude more stupid than any in the recent past, WMD included. Honest reporters like ABC’s Terry Moran understand: Mueller coming back empty-handed on collusion means a “reckoning for the media.”

Of course, there won’t be such a reckoning. (There never is). But there should be. We broke every written and unwritten rule in pursuit of this story, starting with the prohibition on reporting things we can’t confirm.

[Jonathan]

Should we let him back in, of course. You're not an Islamophobe are you?

via Orwell & Goode

[JuliaM]

It was better than 'Prometheus'....

[David]

It was better than ‘Prometheus’....

[ Slides large, elaborate cocktail to Julia. ]

On the house.

[Watcher In The Dark]

It was better than Prometheus

To be honest, Bugs Bunny in 'Mad As A Mars Hare' was better than Prometheus.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3pzldj

[Ten]

Either Trump is a compromised foreign agent, or he isn’t. If he isn’t, news outlets once again swallowed a massive disinformation campaign, only this error is many orders of magnitude more stupid than any in the recent past, WMD included.

Silly American press; duped again, the darlings. What's a top newsroom to do.

http://thefederalist.com/2019/03/21/soros-funded-pr-shop-constructing-media-echo-chamber-push-impeachment/

We broke every written and unwritten rule in pursuit of this story, starting with the prohibition on reporting things we can’t confirm.

Which is it, Matt? The 4th Estate is a thriving bastion of naturally discordant free voices or it's a functional component of a colossal public disinformation campaign to impeach the people's elected choice?

The Press were wholly complicit. The evidence is all over the landscape.

Cue up the transparent begging-off, which as you say accounts for not a thing. Were there accountability, in the immortal words of one of the left's top saints, half of DC would be going down with her.

Report that, journalist.

[WTP]

Never saw Promethius, for which I understand I should be thankful, but it definitely is much, much better than yet another rendition of Our Town.

[Daniel Ream]

this error is many orders of magnitude more stupid than any in the recent past, WMD included.

You mean the error of claiming there were no WMDs in Iraq, despite it being part of the Congressional record that the invasion forces found and neutralized over 500 chemical munitions warheads? And that there's ample satellite intel showing the program being trucked out to Syria on the eve of the invasion? That error?

The media self-immolated their credibility decades ago, but nobody actually cares. Nobody actually cares about this epic self-own either. The Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is strong.

[Darleen]

Honest reporters like ABC’s Terry Moran understand: Mueller coming back empty-handed on collusion means a “reckoning for the media.”

I haven't seen this much emoting over "nothing" since Geraldo and Al Capone's Vault.

[WTP]

Daniel,

Yes, the attempts to whitewash the severity of this by comparing it to Iraq and WMDs is grating to say the least. Especially as even a 2015 article in the NYT references WMDs purchased by the CIA in Iraq during the occupation...
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/world/cia-is-said-to-have-bought-and-destroyed-iraqi-chemical-weapons.html

What’s cute is how “no WMDs in Iraq” dovetails nicely with denying veterans’ claims. It’s a win-win, see?

[Darleen]

Very cool school play! Hats off the students & adults with the creativity for costumes and sets out of nothing. I went to high school long before these movies were out, or social media. But we did tweak a play so playfully we got onto the front page of the entertainment section of the Los Angeles Times and sold out all performances by 10 am that morning.

Heady stuff.

[David]

[ Drapes VIP rope around Darleen’s table. ]

[Ted S., Catskill Mtns., NY, USA]

We broke every written and unwritten rule in pursuit of this story, starting with the prohibition on reporting things we can’t confirm.

Taibbi couldn't confirm Jackie Coakley's story, but published it anyway.

[Pogonip]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-6838293/Grammar-quiz-1980s-difficult-people-answer-HALF-questions-correctly.html

If this elementary spelling and grammar quiz, supposedly from the ‘80’s, really did defeat half the quiz-takers, the English language and its speakers are in big trouble.

[Darleen]

Well, there it is. The wailing and rending of garments that started Friday will now be dialed to 11.

[Pogonip]

He is still guilty of being Donald Trump and of taking Hillary’s turn away from her. Each of these charges will require yet more very expensive investigations.

[David]

If this elementary spelling and grammar quiz, supposedly from the ‘80’s, really did defeat half the quiz-takers, the English language and its speakers are in big trouble.

It reminded me of the prep lessons for A-levels at school, in which we’d be faced with a sample exam paper from previous years. Whenever the paper in question was more than three or four years old, half the class would groan, without fail, every time. Because they knew that an exam from, say, eight or nine years earlier would be noticeably harder than a contemporary one.

That was in the ‘80s.

[Darleen]

If this elementary spelling and grammar quiz, supposedly from the ‘80’s, really did defeat half the quiz-takers, the English language and its speakers are in big trouble.

I got two wrong ... for the life of me, I overthink the who/whom bit and consistently trip myself up.

[Pogonip]

Darleen, for who/whom recast the sentence with he/him. ‘He” is who, ‘him’ is ‘whom.’

Who/whom kissed her? Well, you can’t say ‘Him kissed her,’ you have to say ‘He kissed her,’ so it’s ‘who.’

[David]

I’ll just leave this here.

Via Julia.

[TimT]

What gets me about those videos from the play are the audience reactions. Gasps, screams.... that's peak theatre, that is. Arts council funded national theatre troupes can go for years without ever experiencing reactions like that. Top work.

[Darleen]

thanks, Pogo!

[WTP]

So this (software thus not really a real) engineer got 16/20. Though I protest the whole effected/affected thing is BS. Also, though not covered on the test, wtf with speech and speak/speaker being spelled like that is complete BS and thus a disqualifier for the entire grammer nazi establishment’s supposed credentials. Y’all have had a century or more to fix thar BS and yet it persists.

Also, as dear old Dad used to say, “I don’t know how to spell engineer, but I are one”.

[WTP]

And yes, I put the f’n period OUTSIDE the quotation mark because that’s where it f’n belongs. So unless you want to argue for using TWO f’n periods, deal with it. Though after much consideration, I can go either way on the Oxford comma thing. Depending on context. I’m rather open minded that way.

[WTP]

Oh, also... I may have missed a memo or had this wrong in the first place but didn't the past tense of plead use to be plead, like with read (reeeed) and read (red)? Why does pleaded look wrong to me? Again, I don't know how to spell engineer...

[TimT]

Oh, also... I may have missed a memo or had this wrong in the first place but didn't the past tense of plead use to be plead, like with read (reeeed) and read (red)?

Interesting question. I looked the verb up: it entered English through French. Normally when verbs have internal vowel modifications ('read/reed', present tense, 'read/red' past tense), I'd say that would indicate Germanic/Anglo-Saxon origins of the verb. German dictionaries have the verb 'plädieren', 'to plead' - it's a borrowing from their French neighbours - but they have no such vowel modification in past tense.

However, Etymology Online *does* list 'pled' as 'past tense and past participle of plead'! It seems to me that this may be a regional variation, containing the vowel modification in past tense because for some speakers it sounded *right*; conforming to the way some other English words change for present tense/past tense, and so on.

Etym Online also lists 'pleaded' as a word. Wiktionary seems to point to a split roughly along Anglo-Scots lines: English say past tense 'pleaded', Scots say past-tense 'plead'. America seems to have split the difference and inherited *both* forms of the past-tense verb!

So, sometimes pleaded, sometimes plead.... Have I leaded you up the garden path? ;)

[Alex]

WTP, the past tense of “plead” used to be “pled,” like lead/led.

As for the period outside the quotation marks - why? It belongs to the sentence, no? Same way as if you quote a question:

“Why does pleaded look wrong to me?” you asked.
vs.
You say that you “don’t know how to spell engineer”? Why not?

[WTP]

Have I leaded you up the garden path?

Leaded/lead/led/zeppelin. You bastard.

[WTP]

Alex, my gripe is does the punctuation belong to the quote or to the sentence as a whole? It's convenience, I'll grant you that. But it parses out of context. What is the correct punctuation for the following, granted awkward, sentences...

Did Mary say , "Lorem ipsum. Where's the beef?"
Did Mary say, "Lorem ipsum. There's the beef"?

Why shouldn't the punctuation that belongs with the quote stay inside the quote? Yes, a ."? looks awkward to us but isn't that just a factor of what we have grown used to, thus why is it incorrect while actually, syntactically parsing clearer? And yet the awkward speech/speak thing persists.

And on top of all that, let me once again remind y'all that literally no longer literally means literally.

[WTP]

Because typesetters, I'm guessing. Grammar should derive from a clear context of communication, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony...wait a minute...

[Hal]

English is the product of a Norman warrior trying to make a date with an Anglo-saxon bar-maid, and as such is no more legitimate than any of the other products of that conversation.

---H. Beam Piper, Fuzzy Sapiens.

The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.

---James Nicoll

Capital letters: the difference between helping your Uncle Jack off a horse and helping your uncle jack off a horse.

and,

Attention toilet only for disabled elderly pregnant children

[lotocoti]

and,

It's as dry as a nun's nasty.

[David]

Morning, all.

Via Obnoxio.

[WTP]

Yes. Because my insomnia isn't giving me enough trouble as it is.

[David]

Yes. Because my insomnia isn’t giving me enough trouble as it is.

You’re checking the opening times of the nearest chic salon, aren’t you?

You’re among friends. We won’t judge.

[WTP]

And here I was expecting No refunds. Credit note only.

My world just doesn't make sense anymore. The punctuation thing, literally, he-hives, inconsistencies in business practices. Is it any wonder that I can't sleep?

[David]

Struggling with unfamiliar pronunciation is racist, apparently. Please update your files and lifestyles accordingly.

[WTP]

You're killing me here. Literally.

[David]

You’re killing me here. Literally.

Listening to the interview, the vanity and neuroticism are hard to miss. And the ladies appear oblivious to how they seem.

And these attitudes, these teetering vanities, are encouraged and cultivated.

It’s interesting how the grievances of the recreationally indignant – these self-regarding young women who wear victimhood like jewellery - almost always read as an assertion of class status. As if a modestly-paid coffee-shop worker, with whom they interact for a few seconds, should somehow automatically divine the unobvious pronunciation of an unfamiliar name, and then remember it, forever, despite interacting with hundreds of people every day, and having lives and priorities of their own.

We’ve been here before, of course.

[WTP]

You know the thing where fortune cookies are more fun by adding the phrase "...in bed" at the end? I think SJW pronouncements make perfect sense by adding "in my head" at the end. e.g "White people are all racist...in my head".

[David]

I think that one deserves a post of its own.

[pst314]

WTP, the past tense of “plead” used to be “pled,”

When I was very young, highly combustible materials were labeled "inflammable" but were changed to "flammable" some time in the sixties because reporters claimed that "inflammable" was confusing and led too many people to think these materials were not flammable. (Or was it shyster lawyers, defending obviously guilty fools, who kept pushing that claim? I cannot remember. Regardless, "inflammable" had worked for generations, but somehow became a problem in the sixties. Go figure.)

[WTP]

"inflammable" was confusing and led too many people to think these materials were not flammable.

Oh, don't get me started onthe misuse of "infamous". Or wtf in- is the way it is.

[Baceseras]

The inflammable-to-flammable switchover had a legitimate purpose: the word was printed on the rear of fuel trucks and had to be understood unhesitatingly as a warning, by drivers whose attention might be divided.

Of course, adding the word "warning" to "inflammable" ought to have worked just as well. But they did what they did. Istanbul not Constantinople. Why'd they change it, I can't say - people just liked it better that way.

[pst314]

people just liked it better that way.

So we should blame the Muslims? /deadpan facial expression

[jabrwok]

So we should blame the Muslims?

It's nobody's business but the Turks.

[Hal]

Heh . . .

. . . Istanbul not Constantinople. . .

First, a couple of niggling details. Istanbul IS Constantinople; the name hasn’t changed. ‘Istanbul’ is just the Turkish pronunciation of the old Greek popular name for the city, ‘Stamboul.’ (The Turkish language does not like words to start with two consonants.)