Friday Ephemera

Freshly baked, you see. || Don’t blame me for suddenly punching you in the face. || Bad, a cover version. || Today’s word is inadvisable. || A lively neighbourhood. || Scenes of niche dexterity. || Think happy thoughts, comrade. || A challenging restoration. || Yes, there will be a test on Friday. || Spend your money on “feminist studies.” || It needs to be set on fire, she says. || It seems that only some men are allowed to dress up as women. || Underside. || Whee. (h/t, STG) || Caution, variable gravity. || Lomanstraat, Amsterdam. || Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland. || Erratic steel, rather hot. || “They took a look at my crotch and said ‘Wow, that’s amazing!’” || And finally, have you mastered your demon pronouns?

Comments

[NTSOG]

TikTok tucking?

I could solve his problem easily: I've just come back from the paddock where I 'marked' a bull calf born in the last 24 hours. It's best to get the little blighters early before they learn to run and resist. The process includes driving an electronic ear tag through the right ear which probably wouldn't bother many of the weirdos seen in their self-promoting clips as they seem to have piercings all over their bodies including where the sun doesn't shine. However for little bulls the process includes squeezing their balls up into the scrotum and applying a tight elastrator ring [also used on lambs] at the base so, fairly quickly, the sac falls off with the nuts. It doesn't seem to bother the soon-to-be ex-bulls so it may be no local anaesthetic would be required for this TikTok tucker. I'm sure the rubber elastrator ring would stretch enough to include his totally tucked 'wedding tackle'. Then he would not need to TikTok tuck.

[Princess Cutekitten]

Is there some law that says honestly believing you’re the opposite sex means you have to act like a freakish parody of that sex?

[pst314]

Is there some law that says honestly believing you’re the opposite sex means you have to act like a freakish parody of that sex?

Likely that both malfunctions are caused by the same wiring defect.

[pst314]

Don’t blame me for suddenly punching you in the face.

Yes. Don't blame him. Just dispassionately and without malice give him a beatdown he will never forget.

[Uma Thurmond's Feet]

like a freakish parody of that sex?

While reserving the right to coldcock anyone who says something you don't like. You know, like women do.

[Uma Thurmond's Feet]

It seems that only some men are allowed to dress up as women.

At the bottom of the page there was a vote: Do you find the Upton rugby players' fundraiser offensive?

1158 votes, 11 percent yes, 89 percent no.

[Princess Cutekitten]

I forwarded the Euphonium Guys to several people and my uncle wrote back to say that one day in Hong Kong, he and my aunt were pushing my cousin along in his stroller and along came Michael Jackson with a couple of big, unsmiling guys. Jackson smiled and waggled his fingers at my cousin. So my cousin was lucky—he met Michael Jackson for free—and unlucky—he’ll never remember it—with the same event at the same time.

[Daniel Ream]

honestly believing you’re the opposite sex means you have to act like a freakish parody of that sex?

Self-destructive coping mechanisms tend to be flamboyant, yes.

[Darleen]

San Francisco Mayor Breed got a bit peeved the other day saying that the Walgreen closings had nothing to do with shoplifting. Now Target is throwing in the towel.

“This store loses $25,000 a day to shoplifting,” an SFPD officer told the Globe in lengthy, taped interviews conducted this week. “That’s $25,000 that walks out the door on average between 9 and 6 every day.”

(The Globe is redacting the officers’ names because of critical remarks made about Mayor London Breed and District Attorney Chesa Boudin that could potentially endanger their jobs.)

“This store does between $80,000 to $120,000 in sales every day. And they lose 25 of it [meaning $25,000]. Even if they’re making 25% profit, the stealing takes that down to zero.”

[Nikw211]

Now Target is throwing in the towel.

Good.

[Ricard Cranium]

@NTSOG, there is an alternative method via so-called "bloodless castrators" (AKA https://myvetsupplies.com/product/bloodless-castrator).

However, if the crushing bits have a slight gap, you might end up with a demi-steer. One testicle functional, the other not.

[Nikw211]

Bad, a cover version.

Good

[Pete]

Today’s word is inadvisable.

#MaximumRussian

[JuliaM]

Waking up over here to the surprising news that Alec Baldwin shot a woman dead and critically injured his film director.

The surprising thing being it appears to have been totally accidental. Can happen to anyone, eh, Alec?

https://twitter.com/Undoomed/status/1451388968352817156

[Joan]

Don’t blame me for suddenly punching you in the face.

Toxic masculinity.

[David]

Morning, all.

While reserving the right to coldcock anyone who says something you don’t like. You know, like women do.

Well, if you’ve arrived at transgenderism via childhood abuse or molestation, which seems to be one of the more common paths, then you may well have certain issues - a reservoir of anger. Whether that anger is directed at an appropriate target, or displaced elsewhere, perhaps habitually, doesn’t appear to matter too much. And hence, I suppose, much of transgender TikTok.

[svh]

It needs to be set on fire, she says.

Bet the 'non binary' kid is a boy.

[David]

Toxic masculinity.

[ Slides free straw along bar to Joan. ]

[NTSOG]

@ RC: "bloodless castrators". I've heard of them, but never used them. Whatever method is used one has to be careful not to leave a 'nut' in place and end up with a bull not a steer. Years ago and early in my farming career I did miss a couple of nuts - it was mid-winter, damned cold and my hands were frozen - and I left two little bulls with a single undescended 'nut'. They were a nuisance until sent to market.

[David]

Bet the ‘non binary’ kid is actually a boy.

Well, we can only guess.

Though there is a pattern of some woke mothers, often single mothers, rushing to assume that there must be something worrying or aberrant about their male child, as if they should be entirely interchangeable with girls, and then treating the boy in ways one might call overly controlling, or simply abusive.

And as a side note, madam’s chosen tone and menu of facial expressions - the self-satisfied facial theatre - says more, I think, than the lady realises. I’d say it’s telling us quite a bit about her.

[David]

Meanwhile, in the happy-clappy world of Antifa.

[WTP]

I think David posted some ephemera here a few weeks back about how movies use silent items, like soft billiard balls and such because it interferes with dialogue sound and they mostly add sound in later for such things. This is the third such incident that I know of of a weapon firing blanks, or what were supposed to be blanks. Granted, over 40 years or so, but still why the need for such dangerous props? I've often wondered about people with actual combat experience who became movie actors, what it would be like to have that experience and then be in a movie where someone points a gun at you and fires. Gotta be more than a bit unsettling.

[PiperPaul]

The two people shot were crew members and not actors. Why was the weapon pointed towards them in the first place?

[pst314]

This is the third such incident that I know of of a weapon firing blanks...

Even blanks can be deadly: I seem to recall people being killed when a blank was fired at close range. So I wonder if, in this case, the blanks were defective or if the weapon was mishandled.

The two people shot were crew members and not actors. Why was the weapon pointed towards them in the first place?

Sounds like Alec Baldwin mishandled the weapon. Maybe he forgot the cardinal rule to keep your finger off the trigger until you are ready to fire. And the other cardinal rule to never carelessly point a gun at someone you do not intend to shoot.

The 72 Hour Rule applies, of course: Important facts may not yet have been published.

[asiaseen]

A good friend of mine at school only had one ball. He went on the become a bishop.

Just saying

[asiaseen]

Doh! to not the

[pst314]

...and then treating the boy in ways one might call overly controlling, or simply abusive.

From that link:

"Jody Allard, a single mother and doctrinaire feminist...humiliates her own teenage sons in a national newspaper... And at no point does Ms Allard consider the possibility that this is something that sane and loving parents do not do."

Side note: There is a tendency among writers to write about people they know, from journalists writing columns about their adorable daughters to novelists using family and friends as characters in stories. Even the most kindly depictions may be embarrassing and humiliating to people who would like their personal lives to be known only to those they choose as intimate friends, and to be confident that their privacy is secure--and some novelists can be quite callous in the intimate details they reveal. Ex-lovers and ex-spouses get much of the abuse, but anyone may be a target.

Jody Allard writes that one of her sons is now suicidal and is seeing a psychiatrist. It sounds like she picked a psychiatrist who is also a radical feminist:

"As we drove home, my son told me that he hates that psychiatrist. She is too blunt and harsh, he said.
. . .
I am a good enough mother. I know that because my son’s psychiatrist told me so last week, as she explained bell curves and Skinner’s theories, and said that suicidal thoughts are normal."

[Jerryskids]

Is there some law that says honestly believing you’re the opposite sex means you have to act like a freakish parody of that sex?

No, but it's a natural consequence of saying you feel like you're the opposite sex when your actual sex means you can't possibly know what it feels like to be the opposite sex. If you're a man who likes wearing dresses and make-up and high heels, you can't say you feel like a woman since you have no idea what it feels like to be a woman. You're just a guy who enjoys acting like a woman. I like wearing wool sweaters but I don't go around saying I feel like a sheep.

[sk60]

Meanwhile, in the happy-clappy world of Antifa.

When you're a useful idiot who's no longer useful.

[David]

When you’re a useful idiot who’s no longer useful.

Well, quite. And once again, far-left posturing translates as predation. This non-reciprocal approach, a kind of lunatic entitlement, does seem to crop up an awful lot. Why, it’s almost as if there were a pattern.

Also, pro tip: Don’t hang out with sociopaths.

[pst314]

...you can't say you feel like a woman since you have no idea what it feels like to be a woman.

I'm afraid that even some "conservatives" buy into the lie that trans people really are whatever sex gender they say they are. The pretense is that the brain abnormality that makes a man think he is a woman means that he really does have a woman's brain. It may take a long time to eradicate this and other lies from our culture.

[pst314]

Liberalism is not just insanity. It is criminal insanity.: "A man who has a history of attacking passers-by and transit workers stabbed a 66-year-old man five times... But he is only charged with one count of misdemeanor battery, even though...the victim wanted to pursue felony charges."

[David]

Too far? Perhaps a touch.

Via Holborn.

[pst314]

Too far? Perhaps a touch.

One of more depressing aspects of growing up was realizing just how many ways there are to be really stupid, and just how many stupid people there are.

[One Smart Fellow]

There is a genuine chance that anyone attacking me for “misgendering” them will have my thumbs driven into their eye sockets. Don’t blame ME, my thumbs, like an AR-15, have a wheel of their own.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Meanwhile, an individual describes difficulties in ADL.

[One Smart Fellow]

WILL of their own. My iPhone, like my thumbs, has a will if its own. Another theory being the text to speech is typing on the fly by ESL students in the Peoples’ Republic. :)

[pst314]

my thumbs, like an AR-15, have a wheel of their own.

A wheellock AR-15!

[WTP]

Also regarding movies...does anyone know if movie people are required to go through the sometimes unnecessarily long and often unnecessarily dull safety training that people in regular jobs do? I have had safety training for fuels that I never came within 100 yards of, tools that I would not be using but were in the same shop area as I was, etc. Just yesterday trying to find information on mounting a router (woodworking) I ran across a long safety instruction form for some university engineering class.

[pst314]

My iPhone, like my thumbs, has a will if its own.

"If you have enjoyed the experience of this drink, why not share it with your friends? Share and enjoy!" "Happy Service!"

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Journalists, is there anything they don't know?

[ccscientist]

Princess cutekitten nails it: why indeed do they have to act like a freakish parody of women? There is no way trans "know" what it feels like to be a woman. Men have complained forever that they cannot grasp what the women in their life are thinking or why they say certain things. Women themselves have little ability to explain why they are in a funky mood or doing some irrational thing like buying another pair of shoes. None of the women I have ever known dress and act like these trans "women". Perhaps they go overboard because they know they are not convincing in their act?

[David]

an individual describes difficulties in ADL.

It occurs to me that if you’re so obese that you can’t find clothing sufficiently vast, and can’t use even a disabled toilet without a farce ensuing, then… well, maybe you shouldn’t have allowed yourself to become so monstrously fat.

The problem, I’d suggest, is not size of the toilet.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Transwoman has an opinion and a job interview.

[WTP]

Now Target is throwing in the towel.

Well I won't be crying for them. They've enabled and even encouraged this problem. For years now. Bastards the lot of them.

[pst314]

Journalists, is there anything they don't know?

Remember when some journalist referred to an African athlete as as African American African?

Headline: "Fiscal conservatives promise to put budget back in the African American"

[Daniel Ream]

This is the third such incident that I know of of a weapon firing blanks

I'm familiar with the Brandon Lee and Jon-Erik Hexum shootings. What's on your list?

why the need for such dangerous props?

They aren't dangerous if handled properly. In the Brandon Lee shooting, the prop master who was responsible for the safe firing of the prop firearms had left for the day and the director decided to go overtime and shoot the scene without him. Jon-Erik Hexum didn't understand how blanks work, put the gun to his temple, and pulled the trigger.

Having worked in both very dangerous engineering sites and the film/TV industry, I can say that the latter is not filled with terribly bright or responsible people.

crew members and not actors. Why was the weapon pointed towards them in the first place

Because they weren't actors. With some isolated exceptions, when you see an actor firing a gun on screen the scene is always blocked so that the gun isn't actually pointing at anyone in the scene. The problem is that when there are bright lights shining in an actor's eyes he can't always see whether the gun is pointing at someone off set in the dark.

movie people are required to go through the sometimes unnecessarily long and often unnecessarily dull safety training

I wasn't but that was twenty years ago before the explosion of elfin saffey.

I am a good enough mother. I know that because my son’s psychiatrist told me so last week

Remind me who's paying the psychiatrist?

The pretense is that the brain abnormality that makes a man think he is a woman means that he really does have a woman's brain

Not a single scrap of actual science-based evidence for this, of course. The most likely explanation for the superficially similar brain scans is that both women and people with PTSD tend to have more active amygdala.

Men have complained forever that they cannot grasp what the women in their life are thinking

Don't try to understand women, Bud. Women understand women, and they hate each other.

(Women buy shoes because men evolved to be hunters and women evolved to be gatherers in the neolithic steppes. Having more luxury goods is a sign of status within the herd. Buying expensive shoes is a way of satisfying the instinct to collect valuable things. Plus, shoes are largely insensitive to weight gain.)

[PiperPaul]

when there are bright lights shining in an actor's eyes he can't always see whether the gun is pointing at someone off set in the dark.

Ooh, good answer. But I thought blanks were just a cartridge sealed with wax or similar material (Hexum dying mostly from the blast pressure, not a projectile - I thought). I'd think that crew members would be at least 10' away on set and this projectile apparently went through one person and into another. Sounds like a real bullet.

[pst314]

Will Smith is paying attention.

[anon a mouse]

"to TikTok tuck"

How much tik could a tiktok tuck
if a tiktoc could
tuck tik?

*heads for exit*

[pst314]

[ searches occult library for a spell to ward off punsters ]

[Darleen]

None of the women I have ever known dress and act like these trans "women". Perhaps they go overboard because they know they are not convincing in their act?

It's a fetish and they are trying to create the cartoon woman in themselves they want without the messiness of investing in a relationship with another individual. It's not much different than the guy who wants to marry his blowup doll.

[Dr. Chaotica]

Remember when some journalist referred to an African athlete as as African American African?

The most ridiculous example of this that I have seen was in the novelization of a Babylon 5 TV-movie. An Earth Alliance military officer (played by Tony Todd in the movie) was described as "African American," but it was never established that he was from either America or Africa. Hell, he might not even have been from Earth, since the Earth Alliance includes colonies on Mars, Orion 7, and Proxima 3. But the author felt compelled to use that phrase, because any other way referring to Tony Todd's race can get you canceled.

[Dr. Chaotica]

Hexum dying mostly from the blast pressure, not a projectile - I thought

That's more or less right. I've seen some accounts stating that a piece of paper wadding was propelled into his head, and others implying that there was no projectile as such. It doesn't really matter. The important fact is that he chose to detonate a chemical explosive against the side of his head. The end result was that Hexum's skull was fractured and bone fragments were driven into his brain, which killed him.

Would you tape a firecracker to the side of your head and light the fuse? If you answered "no," then you shouldn't press a blank pistol to the same spot and pull the trigger. It's pretty much the same thing.

[pst314]

The most ridiculous example of this that I have seen was in the novelization of a Babylon 5 TV-movie.

Do you happen to know which novel? I'm wondering if I'll recognize the author's name.

[pst314]

It's a fetish

People used to know that a fetish is something they should indulge in private, not flaunt in people's faces, much less demand that others participate.

[pst314]

This is the third such incident that I know of of a weapon firing blanks...

According to this update, it was a live round.

Still unanswered: Why he was pointing the gun at a member of the crew?

Given Baldwin's history of highly erratic behvior, I suspect he was "goofing" around.

[David]

much less demand that others participate.

For instance.

[Darleen]

According to this update, it was a live round.

Considering that contemporary "journalists" have as much real knowledge of firearms as a dog does of algebra, it was "live" with a blank load (which has gun powder to produce kick and muzzzle flash) but no movie set is going to include actual bullets.

[pst314]

Considering that contemporary "journalists" have as much real knowledge of firearms as a dog does of algebra...

But "live round" was the language used by the union in its email, so I am more inclined to believe it.

Still, one must ask why there were any live rounds on the set.

[pst314]

Now Target is throwing in the towel.

This is how "food deserts" are created.

Liberals: "They make a desert, and call it equity."

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Still, one must ask why there were any live rounds on the set.

Well, duh.

[WTP]

As I've read somewhere recently, Brandon Lee did have a .44 slug pulled out of him. He also was insistent that his father was killed by some asian mafia/gang alluding to the possibility he was onto something there. And yes, Hexum was the other other one.

Most of my (somewhat excessive) safety training goes back more than 30 years to some degree to the space program. While they did have reason to be hyper vigilant, I never understood how my understanding of hypergolic fuel safety was going to help me if God forbid there was an accident during my possibly 30-60 minute visit once or twice a year to a control room to conduct a technical discussion on software installation and monitoring processes.

As for the tranny thing, if we believe the history books women have convincingly pulled off pretending to be men for their entire lives. As stated, if these tranny men actually felt like they were women I doubt they would come across so ridiculously. Dustin Hoffman was far more convincing in Tootsie or even Robin Williams as Mrs. Doubtfire. In her single days my mother went our to California to visit a cousin and she told about some drag show (she had kept the program and I stumbled across it) they saw in San Francisco where she said she could not tell that the drag queens were men. IIRC, the men in the program did not look especially feminine to me but she said it was in the way they behaved. That said... I have seen videos, David posted one, of earnest sounding individuals who are embarrassed by the current out-there trannies, but these people seem more like asexual to me than feminine. Another thing I find odd about how much discussion there has been on this is how the subject of hermaphroditism almost never comes up.

[Darleen]

Cosplay in support of being "Your authentic self".

Dear.lord.

[Uma Thurmond's Feet]

Worst aged tweet: "I wonder how it feels to wrongfully kill someone ..."

[pst314]

Worst aged tweet

I wonder if anyone has kept a list of Alec Baldwin's gaffes. Would be a long list.

[Darleen]

One must ask why there were any live rounds on the set.

As I said, a blank is a live round but without the bullet. There aren't going to be actual bullets on a film set.

When a rear-end car accident happens, the driver of the rear-ending car is assigned responsibility. The person holding any firearm is likewise responsible for anything that happens downrange of the muzzle.

Unless some material fact comes out that completely changes the scenario, Baldwin is 100% responsible for pointing the gun at the directors AND pulling the trigger. Horrible, tragic - someone's daughter and mom is gone forever and another person injured - but that's why basic firearms safety rules must be followed.

As you pointed out earlier, Will Smith refused to allow a "prop" gun muzzle to be waved in his face, even inadvertently.

[NTSOG]

As a young school military cadet in 1964 I and the other lads were taken out to the middle of the football oval during parade where the Officer in Charge loaded a .303 SMLE rifle with a blank round. He placed a small and empty jam tin over the muzzle, aimed skywards and fired the rifle. We were suitably impressed as the can flew high, but even more impressed when he showed us the hole in the bottom of the tin as a result of a so-called harmless blank round. Lesson learned.

[Baceseras]

Societally Disempowered forms of Neurodivergence -- the very phrase I was looking for

[Megaera]

Earliest reports of the Baldwin shooting, having been written by the brain-dead for the brain-dead, were actually laughable (if it weren't for the subject matter), insisting that a "prop gun" "misfired" ... the level of incomprehension is staggering. Guns in stage productions tend to be "props", in the sense that they are lightweight imitations of the real thing, incapable of firing projectiles; they create a visual effect, and post-performance are dumped in a box with the rest of the properties to await the next show. As for movie firearms, whether you call them props or not, they are generally actual weapons, capable of firing whatever round you load in them.

Since Baldwin's movie was a Western I assume the firearm was a revolver, requiring a trigger pull for each fire, so there is no such thing as a "misfire", whatever the press might think that involved. Even if the gun had an abnormally light trigger pull (doubtful), you still have to put your finger on the trigger and pull, with intent, in order to discharge the weapon.

If later reports are to be believed (???) somehow a live cartridge, not a blank, was loaded into the weapon which Baldwin then pointed and fired. If the assumption is supposed to be that the rest of the rounds were blanks, this couldn't have happened without intent: blanks cannot be mistaken for a fireable load because blanks do not have an actual bullet to fire -- they have some kind of wadding sealed in place over a powder load so that a trigger pull produces a bang and a muzzle flash sort of like the real thing. Point is, they don't look anything like an actual cartridge which has a metal projectile sitting on top of the powder--even a reporter or an actor would find it difficult to mistake the one for the other. I have no explanation for the disaster, just a conclusion that someone had to have been massively culpable because mere negligence wouldn't account for this.

[pst314]

laughable...insisting that a "prop gun" "misfired"

I took "misfired" to be standard Press Release doubletalk, in the same vein as "mistakes were made": "We haven't figured out what to say, so in the meantime we'll say nothing."

[WTP]

I know nothing of firearms on a movie set, nor anything about blank rounds but in context of discussion here...in order to have the see-rounds-in-the-revolver authenticity, possibly...possibly could there be blank rounds with very thin paper or thin wax shaped and colored to look like a real bullet? Wouldn't need to be real looking enough when out of the revolver but just enough for head-on camera shots perhaps?

[Megaera]

And, in the meantime, we'll blame it on the gun. Which "misfired". In the earliest reports, misfired TWICE.

[pst314]

One of the reports says that Baldwin only fired one shot, but the round went through the woman who died and then hit the second victim who lived.

72 hour rule: I doubt we'll see the facts solidly nailed down before Monday evening.

[Darleen]

Megaera ...

A source close to union said Local 44 does not know what projectile was in the gun and clarified that “live” is an industry term that refers to a gun being loaded with some material such as a blank ready for filming.

IOW no bullet, but it looks like Baldwin's production have been cutting corners.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

If the assumption is supposed to be that the rest of the rounds were blanks, this couldn't have happened without intent...

As linked above, a blue check with a tin foil hat wants an investigation because he thinks a Trump supporter might have put real round into the weapon "...to punish Alec Baldwin for his Trump parodies..."

...even a reporter or an actor would find it difficult to mistake the one for the other.

Never underestimate their stupidity.

[pst314]

Is the Biden Administration now an episode of Beavis and Butt-Head?

[Darleen]

Wouldn't need to be real looking enough when out of the revolver but just enough for head-on camera shots perhaps?

Since films are not shot sequentially, close ups so you can see "down the barrel" are not done at the same time as the more distant action shots. So in the close ups the gun is loaded with a fake dummy bullet but no powder charge.

[Baceseras]

see-the-rounds-in-the-revolver authenticity

Most movies don't need that level of fool-the-eye authenticity, and if the director chose to try for such in this case, the close-up of real (or real-looking) bullets would be an insert shot, filmed separately, and smoothly edited into scene of actor handling a "best-practices" safe gun.

72 hour rule

Quite right. Very sad news, all I can do now is wholeheartedly affirm what is said so well here.

[pst314]

Some basic firearms education for stupid journalists. From here.

[Megaera]

WTP: With a revolver, the cylinder, which has to rotate, must be longer than the rounds loaded into it, otherwise it couldn't move at all. There really isn't a way to see loaded rounds once the cylinder is swung into place, so the only time you could get sort of what you're talking about is if they were to film someone actually loading rounds into an opened cylinder. Once they're in all you can see is the base of the cartridge with the primer, and if the cylinder is closed all you can see, even with extreme closeup, is a small segment of the edge of the brass.

As to the blanks, well, anything is possible, but such a thing would be so fraught with potential disaster I can't imagine anyone doing it without malign intent. A fireable round comprises a brass casing which has a primer embedded in its base, and holds the powder load to drive the projectile, with the projectile itself sitting on and in the top of the casing. A blank, which is specifically designed NOT to be confused with a real round, is the brass casing, with primer and a significantly reduced powder load kept in place by some sort of wadding which is sealed over at the top of the casing. So, a proper blank should have nothing sticking up beyond the rim of the casing and thus can't be confused with an actual projectile-loaded round. As others have pointed out, lack of a bullet doesn't mean that blanks are in any way safe -- you're still firing a gun, but what comes out (at high velocity) is the wadding material and burning powder, not a lead bullet. The late Jon Hexum, not understanding this, put a gun loaded with blanks to his head and pulled the trigger; he died several days later, having sustained severe brain damage from the force of the wadding driven into his skull even by a reduced powder load.

So, at close range even a proper blank is dangerous. That said, the operative words are "at close range." I find it difficult to believe that some wadding, from any distance at all, actually did a through and through on one human body and then penetrated another at some distance behind the first. An actual projectile, yes -- wadding, no.

There are also other perceptions involved. Powder charges are measured in grains, so the reduced charge for a blank might not be noticeably different from the charge for a fireable round, but what WOULD be noticeable is the weight of the finished cartridge vs the blank -- lead makes a pretty perceptible difference.

I haven't mentioned wadcutters, because they haven't come up in any discussion or report so far, and I don't want to get off in the weeds on this. Just trying to respond to your question.

[Darleen]

I find it difficult to believe that some wadding, from any distance at all, actually did a through and through on one human body and then penetrated another at some distance behind the first.

There are several things we do no know - how close was Baldwin to these two, and how close were they to each other? If this went through her to hit the director, what part of her body? From news reports, the director was hit in the shoulder which would seem to indicate that the woman was hit high, through the neck maybe? It would certainly explain the fatality, too.

Speculation aside, I don't care whether it was a "hot" gun or not, whether it was loaded with blanks, bullets or unicorn farts. Baldwin had no business pointing it AT people and then pulling the trigger. Violation of the most basic of gun safety rules.

[Dr. Chaotica]

Do you happen to know which novel? I'm wondering if I'll recognize the author's name.

It's the novelization of A Call to Arms by Robert Sheckley. Published in 1999, so it's one of the last books he wrote before he died in 2005.

[pst314]

It's the novelization of A Call to Arms by Robert Sheckley.

Robert Sheckley, my goodness! A very fine writer with a long distinguished career. I wonder if "African American" was forced on him by the publisher/editor.

[Dr. Chaotica]

I wonder if "African American" was forced on him by the publisher/editor.

I don't know. But I was surprised to see him writing a novelization of someone else's screenplay. I guess he needed the money.

[David]

I am a good enough mother. I know that because my son’s psychiatrist told me… that suicidal thoughts are normal.

Revisiting that thread was quite an eye-opener. It’s not every day you see a mother prioritise a paranoid ideology, a license for spite, over her own children. Children she accuses of lacking empathy, while herself demonstrating precisely that quality, and to a degree it would be hard to overstate. And who then manages to construe any demurral or logical correction, any plea for reflection, as a validation of her own deranged and sadistic behaviour.

[JuliaM]

Well...

"Alec Baldwin was handed a loaded weapon by an assistant director who indicated it was safe to use in the moments before the actor fatally shot a cinematographer, court records released on Friday show.

The assistant director did not know the prop gun was loaded with live rounds, according to a search warrant filed in a Santa Fe court."

It just gets worse and worse. Why would you assure someone something was safe if you didn't personally know it was safe?

[Stephanie Richer]

I once did some set photography on the set of a low budget indie film. In one scene, actors playing Union soldiers were walking through an antebellum mansion at night, requiring them to carry lit torches. Everyone on set was schooled vociferously on safety measures that were to be in place when the torches were lit, including the stern admonition that when the director yelled, "Cut!" NO ONE was to move from where they were standing until the prop crew removed the torches from the actors' hands AND brought them outside the building AND extinguished them. And by no one I mean NO ONE - it did not matter whether you were an actor, the AD, grip, just someone standing by and watching. Furthermore, the torches were only lit by the prop crew and handed by them to the actors. And yes, this was a SAG film.

So, reading this morning in the WSJ that an assistant director was the one who picked up the firearm from a nearby trolley that had several guns on it, handed it to Baldwin, and allegedly yelled, "Cold gun!" I thought, "Y'know . . . I don't think that was meant to be his/her job . . ." Where was the set armorer, whom the WSJ identifies as 24-year-old Hannah Gutierrez Reed.

And Baldwin's reaction, according to sources, at the time of the killing was to repeatedly say, "Why was I handed a hot gun?"

[John Lewis]

Should we now place “misfiring” guns in the same category as sentient vehicles mounting pavements and mowing down innocent pedestrians to the obvious chagrin of the peace-loving Norwegians behind the wheel?

[pst314]

But I was surprised to see him writing a novelization of someone else's screenplay. I guess he needed the money.

Many well known sf and fantasy writers have done novelizations to pay the bills: James Blish and Theodore Sturgeon, even Thomas M. Disch. Popular writers can earn a good living, but for many it can be a marginal living. Sigh.

[pst314]

Where was the set armorer, whom the WSJ identifies as 24-year-old Hannah Gutierrez Reed.

I have read one report that, due to union disputes, there were many inexperienced non-union crew.

But, once again, the 72 Hour Rule applies and everything we read may turn out to be entirely or partially wrong.

[pst314]

Revisiting that thread was quite an eye-opener.

The insanities and dysfunctions explored here are so multifaceted that you would have to write a hundred times more words than you do to cover everything.

It’s not every day you see a mother prioritise a paranoid ideology...

And do it in print. Repeatedly. Think about all the editors who welcome her poison.

And even without the paranoid ideology, I sometimes wonder about all the editors who see nothing wrong with their contributors writing about the intimate lives of their children (and spouses, and siblings, and so on), never telling the them that it would be better to do so anonymously.

Did you notice that she also writes about an autistic daughter? A google search will find that and other items she has written for the Washington Post.

"Never marry a writer". And always have the good sense to not be the child of a writer.

[pst314]

And always have the good sense to not be the child of a writer.

An intentional reference to Gilbert and Sullivan's sailor who, to his great credit, had the good sense to be born an Englishman.

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

Should we now place “misfiring” guns in the same category as sentient vehicles mounting pavements

This is actually the sort of language that was used here in the States when policemen fired their guns in controversial cases: "The officer's gun discharged" or the like, as though the gun fired itself.

I remember a pre-BLM case local to me when a school cop negligently fired his gun in the school hallway and the local news story used that language, so in the comments I remarked that the gun was released on its own recognizance, going on to point out how nobody other than the cop could have fired the gun or that would have been the story, meaning that either the cop fired the gun or it fired itself. Some people got the message, but there were still comments wondering why everybody was criticizing a "good" cop.

[pst314]

"The officer's gun discharged" or the like, as though the gun fired itself.

Theodore Dalrymple cites the felons who say "the knife went in" rather than "I stabbed him".

"prop gun" "misfired"

It's only a matter of time before a rapist says "my penis misfired".

[PiperPaul]

Why would you assure someone something was safe if you didn't personally know it was safe?

For some reason, the idea of advocating for "gender reassignment" procedures/surgeries in not-yet-adults popped into my mind when I read that...

Even if the gun had an abnormally light trigger pull

The historical period represented in the film takes place right around the time that double-action revolvers were introduced so it makes me wonder if the firearm was a single-action.

Daniel's theory upstream make a lot of sense: "With some isolated exceptions, when you see an actor firing a gun on screen the scene is always blocked so that the gun isn't actually pointing at anyone in the scene. The problem is that when there are bright lights shining in an actor's eyes he can't always see whether the gun is pointing at someone off set in the dark."

[Horace Dunn]

Meanwhile, in the happy-clappy world of Antifa.

Now that's what I call social justice.

[pst314]

It's only a matter of time before a rapist says "my penis misfired".

The Ace of Spades blog used to parody politicians' lies with variations on this:
"A very heterogenous and diverse set of data sources proves that I cannot be blamed for what eventuated in your mouth."
or:
"Nobody Is Angrier Than I Am about what happened in Your Mouth." --Barack Obama
Sometimes hilariously convoluted and euphemistic.

[David]

what happened in Your Mouth

Album title.

Just sayin’.

[pst314]

So when are you getting the band back together, David?