Simply the best
Now here’s something I know isn’t being ripped out of context! It’s Steve, one of Ace’s super-awesome readers (thanks to Al_in_Arabia for the tip):
What I say next will surely identify me as the geek I am, but here goes anyway: as a Lord of the Rings fan of longstanding (I first read the trilogy in the late fifties, when it was fjirst published in America), I can’t help but compare our present situation to the gathering storm in the Two Towers: the forces of darkness on the move, massing for war, America is Gondor, holding the line, and that Western Europe is the Shire, populated by clueless Hobbits who have no idea that just beyond their borders the armies of the Dark Lord are massing.
Did I say that I am a geek?
Y’know, I never would have guessed otherwise.
Further down in the thread, we find this (my emphasis):
TO quote a doggerel from my childhood:
“Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb-bomb-Iran!”Geez, that was in 1980-81. Those fuckers in Tehran are WAY overdue for the rain of explosive death they deserve. They feel like they can play in the majors, eh? Fine, bomb their leaders, bomb their Revolutionary Guard, bomb their gas stores and their oil refineries, bomb their ports, bomb their motorboat fleet, bomb their nuke plants and army bases. Bomb everything, and then play “God of Thunder” and “We Will Rock You” so loud it makes their ears bleed. It won’t solve all the world’s problems, but by Beelzebub it will diminish some of them.
The Great Satan rocks like AC/DC.
Hey Steve, kudos to another long-standing Tolkien fan. Sometimes I feel the USA isn’t Gondor, we are Rohan. Our leader is a prematurely senile fart who used to be a badass, the young warriors are out in the cold, and policy direction is in the hands of a spineless craven traitor who sold out for the promise of gold and a trophy wife. But still, we ride out to hunt the Orcs, with steel in our hands, fire in our eyes, and a song in our hearts.
What is wrong with these people? Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
Damn internets got broked again. Let’s just fixed that:
But still, we ride out to hunt the Orcs type, with steel cheetos our dicks in our hands, fire piss in our eyespants, and a song in our hearts.
All better. That was a bad one.
Hmmm, the preview SHOWED strkeouts! You’ll have to imagine them.
But still, we type, with our dicks in our hands, piss in our pants, and a song in our hearts.
Some people call it a God Complex; where there is no self doubt and a complete denial of the death and suffereing of others.
What disturbs me is not so much that they are geeks. I’m probably as geeky, at least. What distubs me is that they have apparently not read Lord of the Rings very deeply, if they think it gives support for the kind of ultra-millitaristic policies they favor.
What is wrong with these people? Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
It’s called white supremacy which is why tolkien is a favorite of theirs.
Our leader is a prematurely senile fart who used to be a badass, the young warriors are out in the cold, and policy direction is in the hands of a spineless craven traitor who sold out for the promise of gold and a trophy wife.
Rove has a trophy wife? Stuffed and mounted on a plaque over the fireplace?
But still, we ride out to hunt the Orcs, with steel in our hands, fire in our eyes, and a song in our hearts.
What javaphil said, with knobs on.
What is wrong with these people? Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
Yes: “wankers”.
Under the spreading wingnut tree
The village wanker stands….
Is this sort of stupidity actually common in the US? Surely we are talking fringe elements, left to care for themselves in the community becasue the crisis in health care means there’s no room in the asylum? On my last trip to the states (Colorado last September) everyone I met seemed perfectly sane, and very keen to discuss the Middle East in a pretty rational and well-informed manner.
They are of course both wrong – We are Mordor.
I think the Onion did pretty good on this one:
They’re Chee-toâ„¢ chompin’ losers in Mom’s basement (hey, that’s original) who are doubtless dissatisfied w/ their lot in life, escape to the fantasies of Star Wars/Trek, LotR, etc, vid-games & what not, giving them a completely dualistic take on the world they’re trying to avoid. Along comes 11 September 2001 & the only way thay can wrap their minds around the concept that not every other human on the planet thinks Murka is the bestest ever is to paint them as “evil,” & deal with the Other as if it were a simple video game or fantasy epic.
I didn’t read LotR until the mid-sixties, I can only imagine super-awesome Steve must have a few yrs. on me, and he’s still wallowing in it? Yow.
And when will these wankers realize we’re not threatened by nation-states w/ borders, territory, uniformed, organized militaries, etc.? We’re dealing w/ loosely organized cells that are jiu-jitsuing our military against us, because we’re too crude to deal w/ them effectively. Subtlety is too much for them to understand, they think they’re knights on white stallions come to save the day & get some princess action after it’s all over. Double plus lame.
P. S.: The elf (is that what he’s supposed to be?) on the right in the picture looks like Joe (“What dead body in my district office? Oh, her? She had a heart condition or something.”) Scarborough of MSNBC (Mighty Sorry, No Body Cares).
[…] No! catches this skidmark in the comments at some righty wanker blog: Sometimes I feel the USA isn’t Gondor, we are Rohan. […]
You know, there IS something to that whole “we are Rohan” schtick. When I read the Two Towers, I always pictured Wormtongue as looking like Dick Cheney.
Or is he Gollum?
“What is wrong with these people? Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?”
I’m not a shrink but I believe the term is “douche-clownery.” Wait; wait, I may have diagnosed incorrectly. Please see the affliction known as “ass-helmet-itis.”
What is wrong with these people? Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
Microscopic penises.
Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
I believe it’s called “virginity.”
God, that’s so fuckin’ metal. It’s awesome squared if you have Iron Maiden’s “Run For The Hills” stuck in your head when you start reading it, and then Robert Plant cries out “Strider!” when you finish.
These guys are so not metal. These guys are Dr. Rockso, the Rock and Roll Clown. “I do cocaine!”
Okay, in what sort of bearded Spock evil universe is Laura Bush a trophy wife?
See, this is the kind of thing that always strikes me about the particular sort of wingnuts S, N! watches.
They’re geeks. They listened to Firesign Theatre, read National Lampoon and Lord of the Rings, watched Monty Python, did all of that stuff.
And meanwhile, and I wager plenty of the Sadly, Not regulars are the same, I was in the same kind of nerdsphere throughout my formative years.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
Idiotic metaphoritis?
You gotta figure, though, that somewhere in the Middle East are a bunch of geek fanboys of some Islamic legend that stands in for Lord of The Rings, dressing up in stupid costumes and kvelling about how their favorite story serves as a metaphor for the brave Muslim soldiers-of-legend fighting against the slavering hordes of the West. Small world.
Dangerously Unaware Manichean Belligerent and Stupid Syndrome?
DUMBASS, for short.
We grew up and realized that real people matter a hell of a lot more than fictional ones.
i’m putting the sentence back in that steve (o) forgot,
“and we, these few men who type at our keyboards as the world goes ever further to shit, we are all gollums. every single one of us. i remember when last year our precioussssssssssss was bush, but now we await another one true wankering. now, i am off to slay the dragon, aka mom, who tells me that she doesn’t like the sound of my typing! aaargh!!! i’m 60!!!!! why do i live at home?”
Let’s rock and roll, Muslamonazicommunists! I’ve got a pocket full of quarters, a 2L bottle of Shasta, and my all-Rush mix tape. Oh yeah.
… with the space he invades he gets by on you…
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
Girlfriends?
Patkin is right (at least in my own case), I was just as geeky, played D&D, read LOTR cover to cover a couple of times. The difference is 98% understood that we weren’t reading history or “reliving” great battles.
The thing about these comments that always raises my blood pressure several hundred points is the whole (Senator Ted’s note to self – I must one day learn how the tubes make block quotes):
“But still, we ride out to hunt the Orcs, with steel in our hands, fire in our eyes…”
You wanna ride out and hunt “the Orcs”? Then march your sorry skin-bag down to your nearest Army recruiting office and sign up. They’ve got all sorts of “Orcs” for you to hunt, and they’ll even provide the cold “steel” for you. I won’t hold my breath…
Hmmmm. Quiet. I’m trying to decide which one of these wingnuts’ skulls I’m going to use for a hash-pipe once that societal breakdown they’re always cheering for actually happens…
Is there some kind of clinical diagnosis for stuff like this?
Iranian Derangement Syndrome?
“Fine, bomb their leaders…”
If I follow this correctly, first we fine them, and then we bomb them?
Why not just bomb them and be done with it?
Well, but where’s the profit in that, FS? Gotta keep your eye on the bottom line.
Patkin, while I’m inclined to agree with sohei, my working theory in explaining this stupidity is this: They have never been able to see the difference between fiction and reality. It’s not just that they picture themselves as Orc hunters, or Rambo, or Jack Bauer or whatever. They seriously believe that the world operates or should operate the same way that it does for a fictional setting.
This of course is stupid, since any fictional setting works not because it is a model of how the world should or does operate but because the author wants it to.
This of course is stupid, since any fictional setting works not because it is a model of how the world should or does operate but because the author wants it to.
Which, come to think of it, explains a fair bit about the mentality of religious fundamentalists of various stripes.
Hell, I still play D&D.
I am also George Lucas’ bitch. I hate the last trilogy *so much,* and yet part of me finds it *so awesome* at the same time.
I … have issues.
But these guys have Issues, with a capital I.
My love/hate relationship with Star Wars hurts no one but myself. I don’t even make my wife sit through it.
These guys are out to wipe out the Sith, and they are paranoid enough to see Sith everywhere.
“P. S.: The elf (is that what he’s supposed to be?) on the right in the picture looks like Joe (â€?What dead body in my district office? Oh, her? She had a heart condition or something.â€?) Scarborough of MSNBC (Mighty Sorry, No Body Cares).”
I’m afraid that I am blocking that picture from my memory. LARPers are too much for me, man.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
I think it has to do with what people get out of the genre. Fantasy and Science Fiction simultaneously deal with escapism and interpretation. We can change the rules of the world, we can make the fight between Good and Evil a supernatural affair, we can change the technology in fantastic ways. But to be an engaging story, it requires people who act in believable and relatable ways to these situations.
Thus while we see the cosmic struggle of Good Versus Evil as the escapist element, the wingnuts saw it as interpretive of the world around us. We play a game to enjoy the goals set for us, or explore a role that places us outside or usual experience. Wingnuts want to be the bad-ass, whether the Hero or the Villain: Feared by their foes, worshipped by their allies, and utterly invincible on the battlefield.
Yes there is a name for it…
“a condition characterized by lack of empathy or conscience, and poor impulse control or manipulative behaviors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy
This of course is stupid, since any fictional setting works not because it is a model of how the world should or does operate but because the author wants it to.
Ah, but the wingnuts think they are the Authors of History, remember?
I think it would go a little something like this:
The aide said that guys like me were ”in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who ”believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ”That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. ”We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
Replace “just study what we do” with “try to clean up our mess after we have stolen the silver, shit in the bed, molested the kids and burned down the house,” and that’s about right, I suppose.
Let’s read that again:
when we act, we create our own reality
These people are clinically insane. So when there groupies start gibbering about steel and Rohan, how surprising is that?
Yes, and as the reality that they are not becomes more and more unavoidable they retreat into a fantasy world of elves and dwarves and massive new bombing campaigns. That’s what we’re seeing here.
“So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?”
I don’t know about you (but I suspect the story is similar for many of us), but I moved out of my parents’ house when I was 18, went to college, transfered to an NYC school, graduated, worked a lot of hours, travelled for work and pleasure, had relationships with women, read a lot, went to law school, graduated, got a job, work a lot, travel, go out to bars and eateries, read, enjoy warm sunny days, eat lunch in the park or in various public plazas, meet people, have a relationship with a woman – i.e. *gained adult life-experience*.
These dweebs haven’t. For fuck’s sake they actually think we face Orcs in the world, and fancy themselves as Aragorn. Orcs! Aragorn!
But still, we ride out to hunt the Orcs, with steel in our hands, fire in our eyes, and a song in our hearts.
Yeah, right. Dude, you ain’t hunting shit. You’re making an ass of yourself on a third-rate wingnut blog. If you ever had to fight anything other than with a set of 20-sided dice, you’d have piss in your pants, not “fire in your eyes.” No, the real fighting is for someone else to do, someone from a lower economic bracket than you, someone who had no choice but to join the fucking army. Don’t you worry, they’ll go fight the orcs for you. You just sit there and keep cheerleading like a real patriot.
In MMORPG terms (think World of Warcraft), these are the dudes who buy high-level characters from Chiinese gold-farmers who have leveled them up, and then swagger around, acting like they’re big swinging dicks when they obviously know nothing about the game or how it’s played.
In psychiatric terms, I believe that the appropriate diagnosis would be “fuckwit.”
Sounds like there’s still a few kinks to work out in the beta Klingon-to-Elvish online dictionary.
You can all scoff, but – dude – “young warriors are still out in the cold”…playing…paintball…
The new plan for victory in the Middle East looks like this:
1. Bomb Iran
2. ???????
3. Victory!
They don’t seem to understand the concept of blowback. Bombing Iran will just solve everything according to these asshats. They don’t understand that by upping the ante and expanding the violence, we’re playing right into Teh Terrorists’ hands.
What was the rationale behind 9/11? The perps of 9/11 wanted to do a few things: scare the bejeesus out of America. Check. Bleed the American economy. Check. Lure us into an asymmetrical war. Check. Now we’ve been in the asymmetrical war for several years, and it is tearing the country apart, breaking our military and sending us to the poor house. The solution? Bomb Iran. What could go wrong?
and that Western Europe is the Shire
He’s right there. When Rohan is defeated, Gondor surrounded and Gandalf out of ideas, someone will have to save all our asses in the end…
Fine, bomb their leaders, bomb their Revolutionary Guard, bomb their gas stores and their oil refineries, bomb their ports, bomb their motorboat fleet, bomb their nuke plants and army bases. Bomb everything…
Um, just one small question. How would this NOT be terrorism? I mean, they’re still all kinds of pissed over 9/11, right? That’s the root of their hatred for muslims. So essentially blowing up some buildings in the middle of a big city was a contemptible, unacceptable act of terrorism. So their response is to – wait for it – Blow up a bunch of buildings in the middle of a bunch of cities. Niiice….
mikey
They simply have a craving for that over-romanticized fictional portrayal of being strong and powerful.. which they obviously lake in their pathetic little lives.
Frodo has failed. Bush has the Ring.
Um, just one small question. How would this NOT be terrorism?
It’s only terrorism if “they” do it. And we (the US) get to determine who they are.
they have apparently not read Lord of the Rings very deeply, if they think it gives support for the kind of ultra-millitaristic policies they favor.
word.
It’s even funnier if you look at a map of Middle Earth–and a map of Earth.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
We understood what we were reading; they didn’t?
The idea of Tolkien, who lost most of his childhood friends to real life war, supporting an atrocity like the Iraq War is risable . . .
arabs don’t count as people in the wingnut video game. Iranians are arabs in the game too
Part of it is a tribalism issue, too: They self-identify as “Americans” and tie their identity and self-worth to the idealized Glory and Righteousness of the good ol’ US of Apple Pie and Mom and July 4th fireworks. They make the US perfect so they can be perfect, too. Just like sports fans can get rabidly protective of their chosen team, because they invest their entire self-esteem in it.
It’s almost like they an adolescent crush on the country, and anything the country does is sooooooooo cool, even if that’s beating up on the smaller kids for fun. And they can’t understand why the smaller don’t love America the way they do.
(I’m reminded of some guys in high school who teased me incessantly, and then wanted me to let them cheat off my midterm. When I told them to piss off, they assumed I was a goody-two-shoes who would never break the rules. It just never occurred to them that maybe, just maybe, I resented them for being such assholes to me and maybe, just maybe, being a bastard to someone is a piss-poor way to get them to do you a favor.)
Those of us who continued living past high school realized that
— no person or group or government is perfect
— your actions have directly-traceable consequences
— if you make a mistake, you’d damn well better fix it as soon as you can
— other people get to have emotions, opinions, and points of view, too, and sometimes these conflict with yours
— and the world doesn’t revolve around you, your tribe, your posse, whatever. It just revolves.
So yeah, it’s bascially that they never got past adolescence.
What a childish asshat he is.
“Um, just one small question. How would this NOT be terrorism? I mean, they’re still all kinds of pissed over 9/11, right? That’s the root of their hatred for muslims. So essentially blowing up some buildings in the middle of a big city was a contemptible, unacceptable act of terrorism. So their response is to – wait for it – Blow up a bunch of buildings in the middle of a bunch of cities. Niiice….
mikey”
No problem. The “moral equivalence” “argument” will clear up that glaring inconsistency.
Hey Brad, is there enough room left on yall’s Ace of Spades banner for a Hobbit?
Look, moonbats, the U.S. is the superpower of the world. The idea that we should discard our use of force because it’s too scary is the kind of Defeatocrat cowardice that Tolkien would have despised. I mean, if Tolkien were that disturbed by an unrivaled power then Frodo would have taken his super-powerful ring and, like, thrown it away or something. U.S.A!!!! U.S.A!!!
But still, we ride out to hunt the Orcs, with steel in our hands, fire in our eyes, and a song in our hearts.
a song in our fucking hearts.
fucking hell. this is the kind of bullshit we have to put up with? no wonder everyone turns to apathy. if you don’t care, then you can’t be driven insane by their absolute stupidity.
Where the ent-wives at?
And these comments are comedy gold. I confess that I borrow from sites such as these for my online comic Taking Stock. I do try to give credit where credit is due.
The problem with these guys is obvious.
It’s a lack of quality Legolas-Gimli slash.
You know, there IS something to that whole “we are Rohan� schtick. When I read the Two Towers, I always pictured Wormtongue as looking like Dick Cheney. Or is he Gollum?
Wormtongue is the Bad Roger Ailes. Gollum (I hope and pray) is Karl Rove. If we and the world are lucky, he’ll be screaming my preeeecious!!!! all the way to his (padded) cell in the Hague.
And meanwhile, and I wager plenty of the Sadly, Not regulars are the same, I was in the same kind of nerdsphere throughout my formative years.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
“We have a sense of humor” has always been my own shorthand. My husband, who has more patience for those among our longterm acquaintances who’ve never moved past the happy college days when we were the only three dozen gnerds who knew that the Tolkien Fellowship didn’t involve numismatists, has a complicated and multifaceted explanation concerning social empathy and the ability, not strongly correlated to IQ, for an individual to step outside his limited personal experience and thereby benefit from others’ perspectives. But for daily use, I find that testing new acquaintances for a working sense of humor helps me avoid wasting time trying to bond with people whose inability to move beyond “Us good, Them bad, Hulk smash, hurhurhur” will only irritate both parties to the conversation.
Various combos of the following personality disorder traits (none of which are very amenable to therapy):
paranoid
narcissistic
anti-social
schizoid
Key component of all of them is the incapacity for insight or empathy.
I say hold em down and make em watch Clerks II:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0sc-gS9AqM
These guys are like what Elias is going to be when he grows up; Pillow Pans and all.
I am always amused that these neo-Fascists seem to admire the song “We Will Rock You� so much. I want to yell “have you ever listened to the lyrics?� It about Fascism and it’s mocking you and it.
Buddy you’re a boy make a big noise
Playing in the street gonna be a big man some day
You got mud on your face
You big disgrace
Kicking your can all over the place
We will we will rock you
We will we will rock you
Buddy you’re a young man hard man
Shouting in the street gonna take on the world some day
You got blood on your face
You big disgrace
Waving your banner all over the place
We will we will rock you
We will we will rock you
It’s all about the seductive power of obedience. Think of that when you see entire stadiums full of people stomping their feet and clapping their hands in unison like joyous Brownshirts at Nuremberg; amply demonstrating Queen’s point.
OMG that elf! Phil Hartman wasn’t killed!
“They’re geeks. They listened to Firesign Theatre, read National Lampoon and Lord of the Rings, watched Monty Python, did all of that stuff.
And meanwhile, and I wager plenty of the Sadly, Not regulars are the same, I was in the same kind of nerdsphere throughout my formative years.So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?”
Punk Rock, LSD and the Golden Rule did it for me.
a complicated and multifaceted explanation concerning social empathy and the ability, not strongly correlated to IQ, for an individual to step outside his limited personal experience
Anne:
Yes. And thank you for pointing out how little ‘IQ’, as it is commonly understood, has to do with it.
Sometimes we progressives/leftists pride ourselves on our intelligence and talk about how stupid the right wing is. I believe that when we do this we are fooling ourselves about the real issue.
I believe that the difference between us and the hard right is more our attitude toward Authoritarianism, than a matter of IQ, education, or “hipness”.
I believe that the difference between us and the hard right is more our attitude toward Authoritarianism, than a matter of IQ, education, or “hipness�.
Which is the thing I was asking, really.
I’m a self-identifying communist, a convert Reform Jew, a definitive power geek, who may or may not be a mild case of an avoidant or schizoid personality.
But I’m over here, reading Sadly, No! and trying my best to be a progressive leftist.
So what switches were pressed, which levers were pulled, that stuck me over here while people who, as near as I can tell, were nurtured in the same nerdsphere became those lunatics? What issue did I get instructed in that they didn’t, that made them such psychotic authoritarians while I’m (probably) not?
It’s a personal question that I’ve been wrestling with since at least 2001 when I got a good look at these people and saw but for the grace of God go I.
Lovable Rogue Phil M. sez:
“Punk Rock, LSD and the Golden Rule did it for me.”
Yeah, I was thnking musical taste might make a diff. (Also not sure LotR should be lumped in w/ NatLamp, Firesign & Python, you know, funny/satire vs. non-ironic no real humour epic.) For me it was the Mothers of Invention, which lead me to jazz, Stravinsky, Beefheart &tc. & of course punk (which I’d been waiting for since The Seeds broke up) while the wingnuts stuck w/ pedestrian, commercial metal drivel like AC/DC, Queen, Dead Zeppelin & so on.
Plus they’re all wired for authoritarian sheepery. Fuck ’em.
M. Bouffant:
I brought up those other three because of some Goldstein bullshit about conservative ‘humor’ harkening back to the irreverent humor of olden day.
Basically, saying that the conservatives took that mantle because they’ll call a dead man a racial slur when he’s safely in the ground and act all smug like we’re the ones without a sense of humor anymore.
So I just had it in my head as evidence that “conservatives must’ve come from the same stock, so what the fuck went wrong with them?”
So what switches were pressed, which levers were pulled, that stuck me over here while people who, as near as I can tell, were nurtured in the same nerdsphere became those lunatics? What issue did I get instructed in that they didn’t, that made them such psychotic authoritarians while I’m (probably) not?
I see what you mean Patkin. Yes it is a very vexing, and interesting, question. But not an easy one by any means. I also have certain issues. I have been somewhat schizoid and antisocial at times. So then, why do I think I may be a socialist?
I can’t answer these questions. I think it can be useful to see clearly what it’s not about. It’s not about how smart or educated you are. Or how hip or cool you are. Or even how sane you are.
Have you looked at Dave Neiwert’s blog, http://dneiwert.blogspot.com ? There’s some good material on the psychology of authoritarianism there, written by Sara Robinson, her ‘Cracks in the Wall’ and ‘Tunnels and Bridges’ series.
In my case, it was punk rock, LSD and a Winona Ryder-look-alike goth girl named Donna
Plus they’re all wired for authoritarian sheepery. Fuck ‘em.
M.:
You don’t like them. Well, neither do I. But I don’t think that all of them are incurable authoritarian followers, either.
I’m not saying to bite your tongue and pretend you like them or like the horrible things they say and believe. I’m saying that they are still more than sheep or robots.
And meanwhile, and I wager plenty of the Sadly, Not regulars are the same, I was in the same kind of nerdsphere throughout my formative years.So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?�
Sorry. Didn’t get to go down that road. They plucked me off the beach, cut off my hair and sent me to fight for my life against the North Vietnamese Army.
I’m sorry, you want me to WHAT?
I like music, girls and drugs. I like to surf, and hang out, beer is nice too.
Now you put me in this fucking crazy place with people trying to kill me?
I have to learn a whole new set of rules about the way the world works. That rule set includes killing anyone who disagrees with me.
Then you send me back to the 24 hour px.
And when I fucked up, a little bit, you put me in jail.
Nerds? Lord of the Rings? Dungeons and Stupid? No. I do not have that experience. I cannot understand. I do not relate. And yet, we share a political position that says peace, prosperity and individual liberty have value, and those who would take away those things are our enemies.
Just don’t assume we have a common experience. We have common GOALS….
mikey
Also a very important point Mikey.
I think Patkin’s essential question had to do with how people, given quite similar upbringings, come to very different belief systems.
And, yes sometimes it works the other way and people with very different life experiences find themselves with the same goals.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
Elementary, my dear Patkin!
We moonbats read National Lampoon’s classic parody “Bored of the Rings”; those silly wingnuts completely failed to do so.
Extremely clear on that, mikey. Our goals being in common is the most important issue, not where we’ve been. And I didn’t mean to suggest everyone at Sadly, No! went through, or even understands my own particular experience.
It’s just particularly weird for me as a reader to look at the wingnuts and neo-conservatives who cite formative aspects of my childhood, who express interests and upbringings insanely similar to my own, who seem to have followed roads that I’m taking steps on myself… but came out very, very different.
And I think, “who’s malfunctioned here?” Am I staring my future in the eye each time I read something here about lunatics acting like the Middle East is Middle-Earth? Or how every top-rung neo-conservative ass, every New Labor fuckwit, was a former Red? Or whenever Pam Atlas starts playing “Shame the Jewish People”?
I think about that stuff, and I swear, it’s about the one thing in politics that keeps me awake at night.
Right there with ya, Patkin. I had to quit going to the VA hospital, and don’t even get me started with the AL or VFW. If I need friends that bad I’ll get a dog. Lots of people went through what I went through and somehow came away with a completely different message. How can that be? How crippled does your humanity have to be to experience the horror, shame and degradation of war and walk out thinking “damn, that was a pretty good idea”? Christ…
mikey
Dribble Dribble
Ever read “Doon”?
“The red on red eyes of beer addiction.”
And for the record, “Simply the Best” is the theme song/motto of the Ulster Defense Association, a more benighted bunch of bigoted thugs you couldn’t meet outside of… fuck… the rightside blogosphere.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
its been said before, but drugs and woman did it for me. But seriosuly, the identification between LOTR and the WOT has always amused me. Have only read bits of the book, but always thought that any rational person, if they are sad enough to make the connection, would have identified GWB et. al. as the bad guys in Lord of the Rings.
Anyway, I think it is a lot simpler than that, all these saddo’s just want to shag Erowan, or whatever her name was. If they can imagine themselves as Stricker (whatever), with his “big wand”, then so much the better.
On a related point, the third part of the trilogy was on the other night, and in my drunken state I wondered what a Fox News report on the siege of Gondor would be like?
From Newsweek’s profile of our new Ambassador to Iraq, I shit you not:
“Right now Crocker intends to stay put. He hopes to unpack another prized possession soon: a poster of Iron Maiden’s “2 Minutes to Midnight” album. He likes both heavy-metal music and the picture itself. It shows various flags—including that of Iraq—waving above a desolate scene of nuclear devastation. “It’s just like the 1983 calendar [from when he was in Lebanon],” he says. “It focuses on where I’ve been and on the stakes involved. The pressure’s on; get it right. The consequences of not getting it right are huge.” Nowhere is that more true than in Iraq.”
It is even more puzzling to me, how they can be who they are and how I can be who I am.
Simply put, I am a loser. A 25 year old virgin dude, never-even-had-a-girl-friend-virgin, still living with his parents. Many of my formative texts are the same ones they consider their formative texts. (Heinlein et al)
I was also brought up in a country (and cultural grouping) that has/had a worldwide reputation for well, not being nice. In fact crime against humanity not nice.
Yet somehow I ended believing in all the aspects of liberalism, from a womans right to choose, to societies duty to provide a safety net for its citizens.
How the hell did I manage to get to liberty, equality, fraternity? Wish I knew.
Patkin, LiberalDirk: Best I can explain it, from my own lifelong membership as a Gnerd amongst Gnerds, is that some of us have the ability to “step outside our own skins” and imagine what it would be like to not-be-us. And some of us — even the very smart, certified 4Sigma, rocket-scientist smart ones — can’t take that step. They have a perceptual difficulty, they lack a sense of humor, they were tragically born without an empathy gland… I’ve used all sorts of shorthands to try and describe this particular failure. Or, as my authoritarian acquaintances might describe themselves, they are confident enough in the correctness of their worldview not to expend valuable time trying to understand why People Like Us waste so much energy on soft-science terms like “consensus” and “other points of view”…
If you wonder what kind of grievance could turn someone into a suicide bomber, you’re on the road to becoming a progressive. If you just assume that any potential suicide bomber is “flawed”, like a bad bolt or a chip with an intermittent short, then it’s just a matter of sorting out the “bad” individuals before they can damage the political-economic machine when they fail, as they inevitably will… and you’re on the road to becoming an authoritarian.
Speaking of all things Rings, there’s a Russian take on the whole thing, from the perspective of the Orcs. Seems a pretty advanced and industrialized socirty was brought to its knees by an allianc eof white supremacists, elitists, barabarians and weak, oppressed races depending on the above for their security.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
It can’t be empathy, coz’ I got none. Not sure about my sense of humour either.
I would like to think that my superior bullshit-detection skillz made all the difference, but I suspect that the right-wing ideologues also pride themselves on their superior abilities to see through the miasma of left-wing sentimentality.
Ultimately it comes down the the fact that I dislike and distrust right-wing ideologues the most. I figure that when someone is paid to spout bollox, it’s likely to be less authentic than the bollox that someone else is spouting for disinterested reasons. It goes without saying that I have even less trust for the crap I come up with.
To put it another way, Cui bono?
I think that translates as “Why are U2 such shite?”
By the way LiberalDirk, being a 25 year old virgin doesn’t make U a loser. Don’t speak of yourself that way.
Afterthought: A friend has just sent me an article from a recent issue of Nature. Key quote:
“…disgust goes some way to trumping empathy and compassion.”
“…even when controlling for factors such as age, class and gender, the more prone to disgust a person was. the more he or she was likely to hold conservative views on social debates.”
The take-home message: If you’re a politician, try hard to arouse disgust in your audience. Eventually they’ll find someone to direct it onto.
Iron Maiden’s “2 Minutes to Midnight� album
“2 Minutes…” is a song (and a cool 80s video). “Powerslave” was the album.
Sigh. I still don’t regret dumping Newsweek from my reading list all those years ago.
A little late with my comment, but this one strikes close to home for me as well. I am, yes pretty damn nerdy. Love my Sci-fi and anime, though I’m not much of a gamer, the occasional older title being about it.
Anyway I think that the difference is, as others have said, a lack of humor and over seriousness. For us (I’d bet) our fannishness is just a hobby. We watch and read and play the things we do because we find the characters and concepts and universes interesting or intellectually engaging in some way. We never, or I never wanted to BE the badass super soldier or hero or whatever. These folks on the other hand, like this stuff because it allows them to live out their fantasies. To be the ultimate power fantasy killer who everyone fears and respects.
I’ve always disliked their kind. These goobers give us Sci-fi lovers a bad name. It seems we’ll always be associated with these misogynist, angry, over seriouse, over compensating, Frank Miller types.
Gundamhead, there were times in my youth when I took my sci-fi very seriously indeed, and even then I was left-of-center enough to treat my Libertarian fellow travellers with all the contempt they deserved. (And a couple of the most self-centered, clueless arseholes I have ever had to make allowances for can recite whole chunks of “Bored of the Rings”, which they think is the funniest thing ever written.)
Maybe the real distinction is something like: When you first got that wonderful What-If Rush, did you say to yourself “If I were an elf, or a Klingon, or a Martian colonist, how different would the world look to me? How would my gifts be different, or how would I perceive them differently? If Kalimac Brandigamba (Merry) were telling the story, how would Lord of the Rings be different?”
Or did you get that rush from thinking “If only I had a phaser (Conan’s muscles, the One Ring, my own anatomically correct robot ninja maid, Neo’s leather coat, Jedi mitochondria), then the kool kidz would totally have to take me seriously! I would have the baddest friggin’ weapon and they would be totally pwned!!!1!!!”
Because sometimes it seems like there are fans who want the universe to be full of strangeness and wonder, and other fans who want the universe to deliver a non-stop supply of novelty military toys & porn aids, custom-tailored to fit their existing prejudices and with all the sharp edges carefully sanded down for their protection.
Or did you get that rush from thinking “If only I had a phaser (Conan’s muscles, the One Ring, my own anatomically correct robot ninja maid, Neo’s leather coat, Jedi mitochondria), then the kool kidz would totally have to take me seriously! I would have the baddest friggin’ weapon and they would be totally pwned!!!1!!!�
I didn’t. Well, maybe a few times when I was twelve or something.
“who want the universe to deliver a non-stop supply of novelty military toys & porn aids, custom-tailored to fit their existing prejudices and with all the sharp edges carefully sanded down for their protection.”
That has to be the best description of what make these wankers tick. Thank you, I knew what they were about, but couldn’t quite articulate it. Certainly not so perfectly.
I’ve never been a fan of the really macho stuff. Not to say that there aren’t any good “big war” shows of course. I have quite a fondness for 80’s mecha stuff. But all to often the people making those sorts of shows/books seem more concerned with indulging in “pwned!!!11!!”-ing and uni-dimensional “bad-ass” characters. Even when I was in high school I found that sort of thing, as well as the people who seemed to be obsessed with it a little embarrassing. Also for what ever reason I usually find the female characters more interesting, so the “sausage fest” stuff just ain’t my style.
Well, I’m sorry for rambling, and I guess if I had to give a reason for why these “nerdo-fascists” are the way they are it would be for the same reasons real totalitarian followers are the way they are, but with the added benefit that we all know they will never do this stuff in real life.
Some people call it a God Complex; where there is no self doubt and a complete denial of the death and suffereing of others.
Easy to do, when someone else is doing the bleeding.
So how the hell did they end up the way they did and we ended up the way we did?
It is not Tolkien’s vision that corrupted their hearts. It is their corrupted hearts that bring about their twisted reading of Tolkien’s vision.
“Did not Gandalf tell you that the rings gave power according to the measure of each possessor?”
~Galadriel to Frodo
They are of course both wrong – We are Mordor.
No, not Mordor. Our black souls are not so lofty. Grima Wormtongue would be closer to the mark.
LiberalDirk, dude…you are NOT a loser…being the kind of loser you called yourself requires specifically being a member of The Corner at NRO, and more specifically being named Jonah Goldberg or John Derbyshire
They could try that, I suppose, but it turns out that Iranians like Queen. (And black metal).
“You gotta figure, though, that somewhere in the Middle East are a bunch of geek fanboys of some Islamic legend that stands in for Lord of The Rings,..”
Don’t know about the geek faction, but Saladin is one of their favorite iconic figures. I’m sure bin Laden fancies himself as The Man From Tikrit.
And as far as the U.S. being Gondor and Europe The Shire, wouldn’t that be the other way around, with France being Osgiliath?