It wasn’t intended to cause offense. There’s a whole world of fun names for, you know, bits. For where I’m coming from, TtV is primarily a book, which was made into a TV series.
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
Caine: I think I concur a bit with Rey Fox. I think it’s because “Cunny” kinda sounds like a ‘kiddified’ version of cunt. You know, like ‘Peepee’ vs ‘Penis’. Except far less clinical.
I wasn’t offended, I was providing a correction. And for the record, Tipping the Velvet has been discussed here, along with Sarah Waters’ other books many a time.
I think I concur a bit with Rey Fox. I think it’s because “Cunny” kinda sounds like a ‘kiddified’ version of cunt. You know, like ‘Peepee’ vs ‘Penis’. Except far less clinical.
Yeah, I saw that, but immediately consigning it that way doesn’t make a lot of sense, because it’s not all that far off from pussy. I can imagine using cunny in a conversation, an adult conversation, without trouble. For me, the problem lies in it being used in a misogynistic way, like cunt, which I don’t think would take long if it was used widely at all in the first place.
I think the whole discussion tends to get silly, because people can use/like any word they want, but there won’t be a single one of them that is free of the insult/misogyny taint until attitudes change.
Rey Foxsays
It just sounds skeezy to me.
Probably best to just stick with the more clinical terms until you know what the bearer of the organs in question prefers.
You know, if you’re all talking about the private and personal language used between couples, you don’t have a say. Maybe a couple is more comfortable with the clinical words; maybe they prefer the raunchiest terms possible; maybe they like baby talk. As long as the words are mutually agreed upon, I’m not going to judge.
Father Ogvorbis, OM: Delightfully Machiavelliansays
This is slightly on topic.
Wife and Girl and I went to Wegmans to pick up a few things. One of the items I wanted to get was a back of roasted and salted pumpkin seeds.
Unfortunately, they are, once again, rearanging the store (to disrupt normal shopping patterns, I presume). To help with confused costumers, the store had a nice young lady and a nice young man (well, mid-20s, which to me makes her very young) to tell people where to go and how to get there.
Wife walks up to the two of them and says, “I’m looking for my husband’s nuts.” Without missing a beat, both kids answered, “Aisle nine.” No reaction at all. Girl and I damn near pissed ourselves, but no reaction from the staff.
As for cunt, Wife and I use the word in private, when being intimate. I have basically removed it from non-bedroom conversation. With Wife, I know that it is something that she has and we enjoy; unfortunately, some men view it as something a woman is rather than something she has. Which is sad. Or infuriating.
——-
And I am off until next Sunday (which will be my Monday, Wednesday and Friday all rolled into one). And I just finished a small bottle a Patron silver tequila. Wow is it smooth. And delicious.
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
I for one am talking about the public use. It’s pretty obvious to me that stuff couples or people who are otherwise intimate do is not under the same rules that apply to every day life.
Some women like to be bit a little. But we all know what happens to a coyote who runs around randomly biting people. ;)
ahs ॐsays
You know, if you’re all talking about the private and personal language used between couples, you don’t have a say.
That’s not the issue. Public standards for the 2020s are due sooner than you think! And here we are barely into the first draft.
My stance on public use remains the same: publicly, use the proper names for all the bits. Privately, do whatever you want.
We’ve had this discussion, so many damn times (I know you didn’t bring it up) and I don’t know why we keep having it, as attitudes behind the various euphemisms haven’t changed.
changeable monikersays
And (hmph!), I’m not sure how “c***y” crept into #496 without me ever mentioning it. *Twirls cape, etcetera*
Let me discuss the topic of “cunt” both synchronically and diachronically.
1. Synchornic perspective
I’ve said it before, but in language there is no absolute right and wrong. There is no absolute standard. It’s always negotiated by the speech community, but even the speech community is not a uniform thing (if you’ve always felt that it is, it is rather indicative of you being a member of a privileged class in your society, but that’s another matter). In truth, every individual has their own rules and norms, which is called an idiolect. So it might true if certain individuals claim that in their speech “cunt” is not an insult, ultimately we’d have to take their word for it unless they haven’t demonstrated it to the contrary. I’ve also seen claims of “cunt” being used in some dialects as a normal term for “person”, but not being an expert on English dialects, I’d defer to those who are.
(as far as Pharyngula is concerned, this blog has its own norms, and also give the fact that its audience is worldwide, dialect speakers to whom “cunt” really means something else should consider speakers of the dialects (which are probably the vast majority) in which the word is indeed denigrating to women)
But it doesn’t stop here. Even the same speaker can switch between different “modes”, called register in linguistics (I’m not even mentioning the cases of multilingual/multidialectal speakers here). The easiest example is a formal situation, say a parliamentary debate, or tea with the Queen, compared with an informal situation, talking sports with your friends, or enjoying dinner with your family. Your speech will be markedly different. What sounds pretentious in one situation will just be fine in another. Bedroom talk might just be another, and licence the use of “cunt” for some individuals.
The complex interaction of different language varieties and registers is marked by constant silent negotiation about those, a process called as “linguistic accommodation”. In some cases it can be observed that speakers of different dialects will subconsciously make their speech more similar to each other. But of course, the speakers of a more dominant group have an edge here. A Brit emigrating to the United States might alter their speech pattern to sound more alike, unless they move to a region in the US where British accents are regarded as desirable. Sometimes this is institutionally enforced, as in the debate on AAVE in American classrooms.
Ultimately it boils down to a numbers and prestige game.
2. Diachronic perspective
First the problem is that the vast majority of languages do not have wide-reaching written records, if they’re written down at all (linguists posit the primacy of the spoken language, as written language was always derivative). Also, written records were left behind by the elites, and often represented high registers. Consequently the origin of many swearwords is of unclear origin, like “fuck”.
What Walton alluded to is known as “semantic change”. A word starts out with a specific meaning can develop in many ways, it can a) widen its meaning, b) narrow it, c) become pejorative, or d) elevated. The problem is that these processes can be described but I don’t think we’re at a point where we can predict these processes. The data is much too limited, confined to a few languages, and the data get less the more you go back in time etc.
That said, we can observe that social changes trigger a lot of language change. Social changes might have contributed to the word “knight”, originally “servant, boy” (compare German “Knecht”) taking on a different meaning. Social changes in Germany caused the word for “noble/free-born woman”, Frau, to become the general term for “woman”, and the old term “Weib”, being pushed into a pejorative meaning.
Other changes are triggered by conquests and invasions. The Roman conquest of Gaul ultimately led to the Celtic inhabitants giving up their native languages and starting to speak the Colloquial Latin (also known as Vulgar Latin) of the legionaries. (Many slang terms survive in this variety, for instance testa “shard” which became replaced the very common word caput “head” in Gaul.) The Norman conquest of England and the Franconian conquest of France did not lead to a language shift, probably because of the numbers. But they left a number of words in the languages of the subjugated peoples, that are associated with the invaders. (for instance guerre, cognate with English “war”).
Linguistic innovation is always an ongoing process, new words are introduced to the language all the time. They can be 1) borrowed, 2) derived or 3) created completely anew. 3) is the rarest process, even many of the examples given, “gas” being one of the most typical ones, aren’t that perfect either, as “gas” was inspired by “chaos”.
This usually occurs when there are new concepts that need to be named, either because they were introduced by outside groups, or developed by insiders.
But there can also be social motivations, as alluded to by Walton. Only that I would widen it. A group can consciously try and alter its linguistic behaviour in order to reaffirm its identity. Youth language is another instance of it, or other groups that strive to (be it consciously or subconsciously) set themselves apart from the mainstream (obviously, before the advent of the mass media age, there was no mainstream, it was all region-based. If it weren’t for mass communication, Americans and English would at some point developed away to a point where they’d speak different languages, something which probably is now very unlikely to ever happen).
For instance two closely related ethnic groups do not like each other, and consciously try to make their languages be more apart, or taboo language after the death of members, something which can be found in some Australian aborigineal cultures as well as the Chinese imperial court, a conscious reversal of the more subconscious process of linguistic accommodation. Trying to avoid racist or sexist language in my opinion fits into this type of language change too*).
So the main two sources of new words would be introduction of new concepts as well as social factors. And when new words are introduced into the lexicon, they can in turn influence other words, giving them new shades of meaning. Thus, previously neutral terms can then become loaded, in a positive or negative way (which can also be socially induced). Sometimes old words just fade away, or newly introduced words just aren’t accepted by the larger speech community and die out.
Sorry, it’s become a massive teal deer already, so I’ll just stop here.
*) though I don’t like the “xe” pronoun because it seems to be confined to written language. It’s why I’ve adopted singular they, which has been attested in English since the 15th or 16th century.
I thought for sure everybody in Britain said tadger and fanny.
“Fanny” is a slang term I certainly heard very frequently when I was in high school, though it’s considered vulgar. “Todger” is archaic slang, and I’ve rarely, if ever, heard anyone use it.
changeable monikersays
(Or in real life. Is that really a word?!)
Estelethsays
I gotta say, I’ve only seen “cunny” used in high fantasy novels.
One series of high fantasy novels, a series that likes to rant about the Divine Feminine and some other shit like that. I thought that it was a word that the author invented to mean cunt without actually saying cunt.
wait, “loo” is the acceptable word? I learnt about this word in Australia and I’ve always had the feeling that it is a very colloquial term not fit for polite company. This is why Japanese people say they need to wash their hands.
Also when does a gentleman/lady ever feel COMPELLED to talk about their netherparts? Wouldn’t that just be TMI if it’s not with family, your s.o. or very very close friends (and outside of health professionals).
I think I forgot to add something to my “diachronic part”, and your bit about etiquette reminded me of that:
in some cultures, the sex act, and execration and body parts associated with those acts are considered taboo. This is not universal, I’ve worked with a language community where this was not a problem at all (though some euphemisms were present, and I don’t know if this was due to the influence of the national culture, or not). But in those cultures where this is this taboo, it is clear that these words often undergo a lot of semantic change. I don’t know much about the words for “cunt”, but AFAIK this has happened to the word for “buttocks”.
At some point, a euphemism is introduced, pushing the originally neutral term into “inappropriate” territory. At some point, the euphemism takes on a neutral connotation, and the cycle starts anew. IIRC this is what happened to “arse”. Or with the words for “toilet”. I mean “toilet” itself is a euphemism originally, referring to the makeup room (when I was in Versailles and saw the Queen’s toilet room, I was quite confused at first). Now it has become too vulgar for some.
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
We’ve had this discussion, so many damn times (I know you didn’t bring it up) and I don’t know why we keep having it, as attitudes behind the various euphemisms haven’t changed.
The difficulty in giving it up, for me at least and probably for others, is that I don’t want to lose my ‘edge’. Being ‘offensive’ and outspoken, using plenty of curse words, being able to express myself in my own way, and an instinctive hatred of anything that smells like ‘censorship’.
Yeah yeah that’s all well and good, but I suppose what I’m coming to realize is that while it’s good to retain my ‘venom’, these particular mysoginist and/or gendered forms of it do not really have the effect I always thought they had, and I don’t want to cause anyone unintentional hurt or offense. Like all weapons, it should be always under control and used properly.
This, I suppose I should point out, is a distinction the Hoggles of the world haven’t really grasped.
The difficulty in giving it up, for me at least and probably for others, is that I don’t want to lose my ‘edge’. Being ‘offensive’ and outspoken, using plenty of curse words, being able to express myself in my own way, and an instinctive hatred of anything that smells like ‘censorship’.
Yeah yeah that’s all well and good, but I suppose what I’m coming to realize is that while it’s good to retain my ‘venom’, these particular mysoginist and/or gendered forms of it do not really have the effect I always thought they had, and I don’t want to cause anyone unintentional hurt or offense. Like all weapons, it should be always under control and used properly.
This, I suppose I should point out, is a distinction the Hoggles of the world haven’t really grasped.
I think one factor is the difference between High register language (H) and Low register language (L). H language must be learnt by all speakers in school and university (giving those who went to university an advantage regarding H register situations). Here, we pretty much all accept we have to learn the rules (though the gripe linguists have with Strunk and White is that they didn’t understand the rules, but I digress). With L language though, there is a long history of prescriptivism being associated with suppression of minorities, who often end up changing their speech patterns to be more similar to those of the dominant group. Thus, I can understand the reluctance.
Ultimately though, it is a numbers game. In L registers, every subgroup of the language community just follows their own rules. Often, speech patterns of role models within the community are emulated, consciously or subconsciously (there’s research on this, but I can’t really cite anything now, as I’m no expert on this, apologies). So the more people consciously make an effort to speak in a way that avoids discriminatory language, the greater the chance it will spread within the community at large. While calling out others can be important, I think being reflexive about one’s own language use is even more important. One problem with conscious language change is that the forms objected to often creep back in when one is not thinking about them. Like language purists using foreign borrowings. Or even Strunk and White using the very constructions they rave against in other parts of their book!
* when inquiring as to whether someone caught staring likes what they see
* when it’s very cold in this water, I assure you
But wouldn’t a Gentleman/Lady (TM) avoid it under any circumstances to talk about it, as the very act of talking about it would be very ungentlemanlike/unladylike?
There are hilarious stories about how Chinese doctors speak with female patients about sex, as there’s a taboo in Chinese culture to talk about sex in “polite society”, apparently even extending to the OB/GYN office.
(In other situations, Chinese people don’t have any problem of using sex-based insults, like “fuck your mother” or even “fuck your ancestors”. I don’t think this has been researched, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a class-based difference)
changeable monikersays
This song has lots of swearwords, all of which I’d be happy to use (and do) IRL:
@ pelamun
Yeah, he pisses me off, but he’s one of the few people I know who has a car and a lot of free time.
Anyway, we were talking about females in comic books and then about women in gaming culture. It was all going just fine until he said: “There are two kinds of female gamers: ones who actually like gaming, and ones who just say they do to get attention.” As you can imagine, that set me off. I tried to explain why that was a fucked up stereotype and a lie. He got really defensive, tried to support his claim with anecdotes (that he hadn’t even seen personally), and then tried to back track. I wouldn’t let him off so easily, so he called me an insufferable bitch. I ended the conversation there and told him to take me home. I hadn’t used one single ad hominem attack the whole time, so I was extra pissed off that he decided to because he was losing the debate and looking like a fool.
When it comes to todger, I prefer the discworld version, tonker. ‘E’s got a great big tonker.
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
“tonker” makes me picture something that could be used to club baby seals.
aladegorrionsays
I never knew there were so many words for body parts. I was skimming urban dictionary a few weeks ago just for fun and also discovered that there are an astounding number of slang terms for acts I didn’t know existed. I think I need to get out more. Or less. Not sure which.
Woe is me. I don’t seem to have a happy medium between “this person is intriguing” and “hopeless infatuation”. Sometimes I trick myself into thinking I don’t care, and then other times I am really quite pathetic. Le sigh.
I have been failing, I think, in the good feminist pointing out of sexist stuff in daily life. People who are generally good about everything else still talking about bitching, hoes (is that even the correct plural?), and sluts, and I can’t figure out how to point it out except in the most obviously derogatory cases. I can see doing it if someone is calling someone a cunt, but otherwise… I suppose this is the dichotomy of be internally miffed or ruin things for others, which I read a nice essay on but I can’t remember where.
I love it when the solution turns out to be another problem.
Picked up a new headset for my computer so I don’t have to keep switching back and forth between typing for conversation and guiding my character. However, the damned thing won’t work. The computer recognizes it, but no one can hear me when I use the mic. The button used to mute is turned off, and I still don’t get anything.
Hmmm….I wonder if….yeah. I think I just thought of something. But in case that doesn’t work, anyone know if they still make adapters for headsets with dual plugs, one for the mic and the other for the headphones?
ah yes John, it looked strange to me, but since my browser didn’t underline it in read I thought it was ok (turns out execration is a word too). But do tell, how did you get the spoiler tag working?
StarStuff,
oh no that old stereotype. How much were the numbers, 40% female gamers? Or I might misremember the statistics. This is why I liked “The Guild”
aladegorrionsays
ahs ॐ , yes thank you! And I don’t think I had see its sequel. Good things to think about.
Rey Foxsays
Seems to me that if women were just out for attention, then gamers would not be the people they’d wish to seek it from. But what do I know, I tend to assume that people are honest about their interests and hobbies.
Pteryxxsays
Now my friend is trying to text me as to why he’s not sexist for what he said tonight. Bullshit.
*snrk* but women are the attention whores, yeah right.
IMHO, calling women “attention whores” in gaming, discussion or whatever field is just a blatant silencing tactic… they have nothing to contribute, all they want is attention THEREFORE we will deny them attention. Contempt, THAT they can have.
Algernonsays
WASHINGTON (AP) — Herman Cain’s husband says the claims of sex harassment against the GOP presidential candidate don’t ring true because she “totally respects men.” Gloria Cain told Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren: “I’m thinking she would have to have a split personality to do the things that were said.”
In an interview to be aired Monday during the show “On the Record,” Gloria Cain said he can’t believe the claims she harassed men when she led the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s.
“You hear the graphic allegations and we know that would have been something that’s totally disrespectful of him as a man,” he said. “And I know the type of person she is. She totally respects men.”
Excerpts of the interview were released Sunday.
Four men have now accused Herman Cain of sexually harassing them when she led the National Restaurant Association. She has denied wrongdoing and has been trying to move forward in her presidential campaign.
Cain’s husband of 43 years is often described as “gentle” and “the nicest man you’ll ever meet.”
@ Pteryxx
Pretty much. That’s why so many women pretend to be men while gaming or online.
I’m having a hard time with this blog post. I have so much I want to say and I’m so angry that I feel like I might just be rambling.
juliansays
Yeah, he pisses me off, but he’s one of the few people I know who has a car and a lot of free time.
Heh
Been there. Except I called him ‘this guy I buy dip for because he has a truck.’
Algernonsays
Now my friend is trying to text me as to why he’s not sexist for what he said tonight.
Hell, just being called a bitch for disagreeing with something is sexist. I feel for you. I just had a friend delete a long argument after it “didn’t go the way he wanted” and his wife agreed with me.
LMAO.
But really, it’s heartbreaking.
Pteryxxsays
Starstuff: Maybe write out as much ranting as you need to get out, and then edit it down afterwards? (A little ranting adds flavor.)
and yeah, gaming’s made me even more determined to claim no gender at all. I got so sick of other players harassing me on female toons and expecting me to commiserate with their misogyny/homophobia on male toons. (Occasionally the same ones. Sheesh.)
I needs statistics now. I have stats for female gamers, but how do I go about getting stats for women online/ in online communities?
aladegorrionsays
I remember meeting a woman who was really irritated that people thought she liked football for the male attention. Seems perhaps analogous to the gaming issue.
Female-Name Chat Users Get 25 Times More Malicious Messages
May 9, 2006
A study by the University of Maryland’s A. James Clark School of Engineering found that chat room participants with female usernames received 25 times more threatening and/or sexually explicit private messages than those with male or ambiguous usernames.
Female usernames, on average, received 163 malicious private messages a day in the study, conducted by Michel Cukier, assistant professor in the Center for Risk and Reliability in the Clark School’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, and an affiliate of the university’s Institute for Systems Research, and sophomore computer engineering student Robert Meyer.
Hope that’s helpful to start out with.
ahs ॐsays
Jenny Preece and Diane Maloney-Krichmar write “For example, women may get unwanted attention (Bruckman, 1993; Herring, 1992; Turkle, 1995; Turkle, 1999)”
These citations are:
Bruckman, A. (1993). Gender swapping on the internet. Paper presented at the The Internet Society (INET ’93) Conference, San Fransisco, CA.
Herring, S. (1992). Gender and participation in computer-mediated linguistic discourse. : ERIC Clearinghouse on Languages and linguistics (October).
Turkle, S. (1995). Life on the Screen. Identify in the Age of the Internet. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Turkle, S. (1999, Winter 1999/2000). Tinysex and Gender Trouble. IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, 4, 8-20.
Thanks for the sources, Pteryxx and ahs. I think my post is becoming less rant-y too.
John Moralessays
pelamun, <abbr title="spoiler">visible</abbr>
—
Hey Caine, thanks for asking; I can say that I did my best to try to enjoy it. It was an experience, anyway.
Pteryxxsays
you’re welcome, though now I feel inadequate next to ahs, with my one measly little link to a summary article of the actual research. *snif* (But I saved ahs’s sources in my hoard. NEXT TIME…) ~;>
Starstuff: I’ve gotten a few proposals since I started gaming, one of which wouldn’t stop until after I told him I had no desire to cheat on my boyfriend (I was unattached at the time, but figured it was about the best tactic to get goons to leave me alone). I’m sure part of the reasons was that my toon was female. But that was on Runescape. I haven’t had that kind of attention thrown my way on DDO, and I’ve got three characters who are all female.
It helps that the guild I joined doesn’t look kindly on sexual harassment, from either inside or outside the group. Just last week one of the members almost got booted over part of a conversation we’d had during a quest. Just one offhand comment about wishing J was there to snuggle with, in response to the other player bemoaning the fact that he had no to cuddle with at night, and we were off to the races. He pretty much made another female player in the group sound like a skank: “Hmm, oh I know! Im just loves to snuggle, maybe she’d like to join me.”
Let’s just say that he’s very lucky his ass wasn’t chucked out then and there – one of the officers happened to be online and heard the whole thing. Things have been awkward since when that player is around, but the guild founder made it clear that I and any other female player can report such behavior and they’ll take care of the problem. Joke or not, they don’t want us feeling uncomfortable.
Strangely enough, online gaming was also where I first experience racism. Again, on Runescape. My character’s last name sounded very Hispanic/Latino, and some random idiot started bothering me over it one day, even following me to and from the fishing area in the process. Another player told him to knock it off, and told me that the offender did it just to get a rise out of people, which means that jerk had done such before and probably got away with it. Anyway, I had him on my ignore list the rest of the time I stayed with that game. But I was a little shaken up, and I think that took some of the fun out of playing.
——————————————-
Well, looks like the real problem was the game settings. I’ll keep the new headset in case my old one suddenly goes kaput, but at least now my fingers won’t ache from furiously typing.
——————————————
Eggnog. Yum. I found an unopened bottle of Cutty Sark Blended Scots Whisky in the basement and added a dash of that to my glass. Perfect. Next time I’ll try it with rum, or brandy if we have any of that.
And on that note, good night.
A. Rsays
This has been the most unusual TET. Rather amusing though! :)
Josh, Official SpokesGaysays
Oh my. It’s windy as hell in New England tonight. Enough to rattle the storm windows on my wee house and provoke a bit of a draft. Every quilt has come out of the linen closet to find a bed. This, my friends, is the Romantic and Cozy (TM) part of autumn in the Northeast. The part where it’s fun to have a pot of soup on the stove, flannel pajamas on, and to make sure the backup lamps are filled with oil and there are matches next to the candle stash.
The part where it’s fun to have a pot of soup on the stove, flannel pajamas on, and to make sure the backup lamps are filled with oil and there are matches next to the candle stash.
*brain freeze* data cleaning can get boooooooring. On the plus side, I have discovered that there is a real person named Alethea, and another one named “Man Ho”. And that nearly everyone’s grandmother’s middle name is “May”.
Ray, rude-ass yankeesays
Hi everyone! Just popping in after a work weeks worth of self imposed TET avoidance. Since I’m on my day off I wanted to check in. Hope you are all doing well.
Crudely Wrott@169, Wow. What you said, wholeheartedly. I absolutely could not have said it better, thank you.
Crudely Wrott@251, They can make us get older, but they can’t make us grow up!
The Sailor@265, Not to mention the aerial photography, but were they used as evidence against you?
changeable moniker@284, Did I hear my name?
changeable moniker@285: (Emily Litella) Nevermind! (/Emily Litella)
StarStuff!383 & chigau@384, I’m not talking about football either.
@386-391, “They’re crazy, they’re all crazy ‘ceptin for me and you, and sometimes I have me doubts about you.”
cicely@412,
Thread withdrawal is a terrible, terrible thing.
Yes, yes it is.
Crudely Wrott@416, Pink Floyd kicks ass.
The Laughing Coyote@546, I thought of indestructible toy trucks.
Benjamin Geiger@580 Really? People say that?
I missed the “upgrade” but am finally caught up with this iteration of TET. The kids are asleep, the wife is pissed off at me(again?, still?), and I’m a bit tipsy, and it’s time for bed. Aint life grand?
Eh, that’s nothin’. You ought to try 6 to 7 months of a ND winter. (Not really.)
chigau (...---...)says
Hi, Ray!
Josh, Official SpokesGaysays
What year is it there, 1824 ?
;)
Why yes, good sir, it is! Come on. If I have to live in the Arctic Corner of USA-Land, can’t I at least play Little House on the Prairie?
Sally Strange, OMsays
Yeah, it’s actually kind of wonderful outside. I love a strong warm wind. It just makes me feel good.
This Elizabtht on the Tim Wise thread seems annoyingly dense. I just got back from a long drive and a relaxing weekend with family, so I’m not in the mood to respond. I’m just glad FTB is back.
Josh, Official SpokesGaysays
You should come over and play sometime this week, Sally. We could cook up some dinner.
Also, adding “-ina” to names to make them feminine is often a bad idea. Especially for poor Hubertina and Adolfina.
Only 50,000 records to go…
Sally Strange, OMsays
Dinner with Audley, Mr. Darkheart, and Esteleth was good, but too short. I’ll have to stay longer next time. Also, SO MUCH FOOD! Early Thanksgiving followed by BBQ deliciousness: I feel so utterly decadent. It’s glorious.
chigau (...---...)says
I don’t mind the first 4 or 5 months of central Alberta winters. It gets a bit tiresome after that.
Tethyssays
Eh, that’s nothin’. You ought to try 6 to 7 months of a ND winter. (Not really.)
No thanks. Mn is just as cold and nearly as long, but at least there is something to block the wind.
Sally Strange, OMsays
I’d like that, Josh. It’s been a little while.
And now… to bed!
Ray, rude-ass yankeesays
Benjamin Geiger@589, That’s pretty funny, never saw it before.
chigau@591, “Hi!” Right back! On my days off I can take some time to read and post. Five days of cold turkey withdrawal is a bear.
The rapturoids are having a right fit over the nasty homosecksuals again, just about rolling around in judgmental delight over the ‘graphic’ descriptions of what those perverted types get up to, as described by Dr. David Reagan.
Of course, the evil gay agenda is responsible for everything:
The acceptance and sanctioning of homosexuality leads to even further depravity, as you see what has happened/happening at Penn State University, one of the more well-known universities for promoting their tolerance of this agenda.
And how do they know it’s all depraved?
About 40 years ago I worked part time in a liquor store that sold all sorts of odd magazines, including some catering to homosexuals. Out of curiosity I would leaf through these rags during slow times. I can confirm every sickening detail in the above commentary is a regular practice by many gays. In fact, the magazines were much more graphic than what we have read here.
Of course, it’s really just a spiritual problem:
This is what I heard from a preacher describing the picture of Christ and His Bride (the church)….This abominable sin of homosexuality is a very serious spiritual problem. God designed things so that the relationship of a man and his bride would be a picture, or type, of the relationship between Christ and his bride, the church. Christ is head of the church and the man is the head of his wife, or Saviour. Ephesians 5:23 For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. So in a homosexual relationship, if it is two men, the spiritual picture is one of a Saviour needing another Saviour. THAT IS WRONG!!! If it is two women, the spiritual picture is one of a person who needs no Saviour!!! THAT IS WRONG!!! Furthermore these abominable unions cannot produce children just as a so-called church with no Saviour could never produce a new birth. Check this out. What is the first command given to Adam and Eve? What is the first command given to the family of Noah after the flood? The answer is, “be fruitful and multiply”! The husband/wife relationship is to produce new births. The relationship of Christ and the Church is to produce new births!! Sodomy and the other sexual perversions destroy the picture God gave us of how relationships work in the spiritual realm. It attacks the most fundamental reason for us being here and trying to do what we do. It makes a mockery of the crucifixion. It is the ultimate of dishonor and blasphemy! May God have mercy on those involved in it, those who promote it and especially those who fall prey to it!! God says, “DO NOT MESS WITH MY PICTURES”!!!
And the ever popular eeuuw!:
It floors me that a person who sticks there tongue in such a place is considered normal, while a person who believes in a loving God Who sent His Only Begotten Son to pay for our sins is considered delusional and possibly, dangerous. These people have been given over by the Lord to reprobate minds.
I read once of a woman who had two male friends that were homosexuals and lovers. They told her the types of sex they engaged in. After hearing it, she became convinced that what they were actually doing was assaulting each other, committing violence on each other, and she became a crusader against homosexuality. Some of the descriptions of their acts are very violent. In addition to early death and eternal punishment, homosexuality is known to lead to and to be a sign of severe mental disorders. Over and above that, it causes men to become incontinent of their bowels. And yet, it is a normal and loving lifestyle? I could say these people are blind, but the truth is, I think they’re babbling idiots!!!
It floors me that a person who sticks there tongue in such a place is considered normal, while a person who believes in a loving God Who sent His Only Begotten Son to pay for our sins is considered delusional and possibly, dangerous.
So in a homosexual relationship, if it is two men, the spiritual picture is one of a Saviour needing another Saviour. THAT IS WRONG!!!
Really? That sounds way more poetic than what they got.
If it is two women, the spiritual picture is one of a person who needs no Saviour!!! THAT IS WRONG!!!
Do tell.
It makes a mockery of the crucifixion.
No, this is making a mockery of the crucifixion: Ha ha! Look at that guy on that cross! He got nailed! Hertz donut?
It is the ultimate of dishonor and blasphemy!
Keep selling it, honey.
God says, “DO NOT MESS WITH MY PICTURES”!!!
??
It floors me that a person who sticks there tongue in such a place is considered normal, while a person who believes in a loving God Who sent His Only Begotten Son to pay for our sins is considered delusional and possibly, dangerous.
Now they got me daydreaming again.
After hearing it, she became convinced that what they were actually doing was assaulting each other, committing violence on each other, and she became a crusader against homosexuality.
She sounds like the “lie back and think of England” type.
Rey Foxsays
“Fuck yo couch” doesn’t sound right without the last word in the utterance, which we can’t say because we’re not Dave Chapelle.
wow, s*gg*x has really come full circle as a troll…
Therrinsays
Part-Time Insomniac,
Picked up a new headset for my computer
Well, looks like the real problem was the game settings.
I see you’ve solved the problem, I’ll just mention that I don’t care for integrated headsets, and recommend good headphones with a cheap mic. The last three mics I’ve used (over 10 years) have been under $10 each, and worked well enough. I tie it around my neck so that the mic is against my throat (one of my peeves is other people breathing directly into their mic, making my ears bleed).
Birger Johanssonsays
There’s a way to curb carbon emissions without having to wait for governments to forge a global climate deal.
It makes sense, if you want the self-serving world leaders to take action you need the meanest enforcers available… and since we do not have alien xenomorphs around, we should bring these guys:
“Climate blame: send for the lawyers” http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21228383.200-climate-blame-send-for-the-lawyers.html
Birger Johanssonsays
Part-time insomniac:
“Eggnog”
”Eggnog…Eggnog..EggeggeggeggEggnog” (Achtung Xmas) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A3kMTZwSQ8
(I can’thelp it, I am like Peter Griffin hearing “Surfing Bird”)
— — — — — —
Good morning
I see you had an interesting night (night for me) here :)
How do people feel about “the beaver”?
Knowing the history behind that word* makes me particularly like it….
*Victorian drawers are open between the legs. Since they were worn under the corset, going for a pee would have taken half an hour if you had to take them off and also they would have distorted the silhouette.
But Can-Can dancers kicked their legs up so high that they would gape and the spectator could, with any luck, take a peek at their pubic hair.
The dancers didn’t like that and therefore closed their seams. But, well, they had to keep up with the idea that CanCan was frivolous, lasciuvous and amoral, so they sewed a bit of beaver fur on top of the fabric so the men in the audience would still think that they had seem some naughty bits.
German court does not allow club for animal lovers*) to
be founded,**) because animals cannot offer enthusiastic consent. Now if judges were always that firm on the concept in human cases….
(Source in German; some commentators exhibited a WLC-like attitude about this, asking whether “a cow would even notice if you shoved your dong inside of her”)
(Sex with animals was purged from the Penal Code in a general reform on sex-related crimes in the 60s, incl. homosexual sex acts. However, the judges found that sex with animals violates the Law against mistreatment of animals, which extends to animal pornography. The latter aspect also defeated another line of defence that the club was only there to “provide information”. The judges found it hard to distinguish informational materials on sex with animals from animal pornography)
*) probably more accurately described as “zoophiliacs”, but the original German report used a similarly ambiguous title
**) a cultural note: Germans love to form clubs to such an extent that the joke goes – what are three Germans: a club. They love to give them charters and register them with the local court, so they can put the abbreviation e.V. (registered club) after the club name.
The Protection of Animals Act was enacted in 1972, so there was a time where sex with animals was legal in Germany. Anyhow, animal pornography has a curious status between child porn and adult porn: it is legal to own but not to disseminate it. (though I’m curious how this relates to works as that of Édouard-Henri Avril)
That’s so not true!
I’m from the Saarland, 3 of us are about 4-5 clubs!
Some completely different German news:
We have a nasty case of right wing terrorism at the moment.
Actually, the terror-group is finished, but by now they’re finding out that they’ve been murdering all over Germany for 10 years, mostly immigrants but also a young police-officer.
The police investigation was a disaster from the beginning. After the murder of the police-officer, they went looking for the “Phantom of Heilbronn”. The DNA they had secured at the crime scene showed up all over Germany in ways that they were puuzled as to how those crimes were related.
After it showed up on a coke-can related to a burglary in school, they became suspicious. They caught the local kids who did it and they said they never had a female companion. Why should they lie? Why should some kids who went after the computer and the tea money team up with a high profile criminal?
Finally they found out that they’d wasted years on looking for their phantom, because the DNA belonged to a woman in Switzerland who packed the cotton swabs. The person to order them did not know that there is a difference between “sterile” and “DNA-free”.
So now finally the case is solved, the murderers killed the,selves and their accomplice is in jail.
But there are a lot of questions and one is the involvement of the German “Verfassungsschutz”, that part of the intelligence that is responsible for threats from within the country.
Maybe it’s time for the responsible people to realize that their undercover agents and their informants are not working for their side and are just paid by them.
Here’s the sauce
First Approximationsays
Because of today’s xkcd I just spent the last hour reading up various map projections. Goode Homolosine is my favourite.
that group is indeed nasty, but I think the media is hyping it too much, like the Spiegel calling it the Brown Army Fraction. I’m still waiting for the dust to settle though.
Even in the 90s, Neo-Nazis were collecting addresses of leftists and circulating them. I assume the information sharing has gotten even better by now…
For those who may have been worried, Snip is doing alright now. I took away his food for like, twenty-four hours and despite him being hungry, he seemed fine. When I gave it back he was happy, and his problem has gone away. Must have been something he ate (I mean, the kitten eats plastic for Pete’s sake!)
aladegorrionsays
I about died reading the title text for today’s xkcd.
Yay for Snip!
Okay. I need to get a Masters of Comp Sci at Wright State so I can have Doctor DOOM as my instructor XD
ahs ॐsays
Qwerty is fine, thanks. The Segway got too good of a rap. And I have no need for 3D goggles.
Estelethsays
*happily eats leftover BBQ for lunch*
Yesterday was great. I bought new shoes and then I got to have a great dinner with Sally Strange, Audley and Mr. Darkheart. It was awesome! My only complaint is that we didn’t have nearly long enough.
StarStuff, ask your friend to enter a game with a female monicker and see if he likes the attention he gets.
Re people using “sluts” and “hoes” etc. How about referring to men as “pricks” and “gigolos” a few times? Then tell them you’re just copying their vocabulary.
Don’t forget “yard” among words for penis. Yeats used it. Now I’m wondering about the etymology of “yard-arm” on ships.
Pelamun, didn’t “loo” start out as a euphemism for l’eau (water, as in “I’m going to wash my hands”)?
Eh. Mouths have a lot more germs.
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
why are there so many more nonsensical and ‘fun’ names for the ol’ swizzlestick, and yet so relatively few names that don’t have some sort of bad connotations for the female equivalent?
Coyote,
In a patriarchal society, that which is unique to men (e.g. genitalia outranks that which is to unique to women. Penis > vulva, basically.
Slang terms map on to this. A slang term for the penis is less likely to be bad/vulgar than one for the vulva. Add to that the actor/actee view of sex (the man does stuff, the woman is acted upon) and the view that women are for sex and you get additional layers.
Esteleth, I didn’t know that about can-can dancers! Charming.
Pelemun, I read every word, too.
And now I have to get to my tasks for the day.
Josh, sounds cosy! A few flowers and tropical pictures might help you to survive until spring. Dar Williams sings “February.”
A. Rsays
Esteleth, you beat me to that answer! [pouts off into a corner] :)
Estelethsays
Mondado,
Can-can dancers?
*confusion*
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
Add to that the actor/actee view of sex (the man does stuff, the woman is acted upon) and the view that women are for sex and you get additional layers.
A bit off topic but that totally reminds me of this stupid hillbilly I knew in a christian chatroom. He insisted only women could be virgins because virginity is literally defined solely by the hymen or someshit.
He also believed that God planted fake dinosaur fossils for some reason. Testing our faith? Heavenly dickery? I dunno.
Monado: I never heard ‘Poogle’ before. But I’ve noticed that in the right context, any nonsense word a person makes up can be interpreted as ‘penis’. I’ve tried it in discussions that involved sex, it’s kinda weird. Another thing I’ve noticed is that it’s hard to make up a nonsense word that hasn’t already been used to refer to the penis.
Or maybe I’m just uncreative.
Estelethsays
Coyote,
He insisted only women could be virgins because virginity is literally defined solely by the hymen or someshit.
Not just that – but a lesbian can bonk 3 times a day every weekday and 4 times on Saturday and Sunday, but still be a virgin. Because she’s never had sex. Sex requires a penis, you see.
Victorian drawers are open between the legs. Since they were worn under the corset, going for a pee would have taken half an hour if you had to take them off and also they would have distorted the silhouette.
But Can-Can dancers kicked their legs up so high that they would gape and the spectator could, with any luck, take a peek at their pubic hair.
The dancers didn’t like that and therefore closed their seams. But, well, they had to keep up with the idea that CanCan was frivolous, lasciuvous and amoral, so they sewed a bit of beaver fur on top of the fabric so the men in the audience would still think that they had seem some naughty bits.
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
No Esteleth. There are no lesbians. Just angry women, and ugly women. “Lesbian” is what happens when a woman can’t find herself a good man.*
And no, he wasn’t a misogynist. He loved women- as long as they let him be the man of the house and didn’t try to hold any opinions of their own, jest like the Good Book says.
It bugs me because back in those days I was more naive and actually thought he was an OK guy for a while- he figured he wasn’t a judgemental bastard like ‘them other christians’ because he used to be a hippy and liked to smoke pot sometimes.
All the talk about defining virginity brought to mind this little ditty, aptly named “The Most Offensive Song Ever”. It’s by Mr. Hankey and Kenny (the portions in [brackets] are by Kenny, and therefore somewhat muffled).
The virgin Mary was sleeping
When angel Gabriel appeared
He said, ‘You are to be the virgin mother’
And Mary thought that was weird
[Mary said, ‘I’m not a virgin,
I blew a guy last year’]
But then Gabriel said to Mary,
‘My child, have no fear’
[‘Cause you can suck all the dick you want]
And still be a virgin, Mary
[You can suck all the dick you want]
And still not be considered flawed
[And although you went to town, and sucked some semen down]
You’re still a virgin in the eyes of God
There was no room at the inn
When Mary and Joseph did arrive
They were so very tired, you see
[And Mary had to offer him a bribe]
Said she had no money
[And they had no place to sleep]
Gabriel appeared to Mary
And told her not to weep
[‘Cause you can suck all the dick you want]
And still be a virgin, Mary
[You can suck all the dick you want]
And still be the mother of Christ
If there’s no room at the inn, then it’s not considered a sin
[To suck a dick to get a room for the night]
(That’s right)
Then three wise men did appear
Bearing gifts of myrrh and such
They said that they had followed a star
And missed a woman’s touch
[Mary said that she might comfort them
But could not take them to bed]
But again, Gabriel appeared to her
And this is what he said
[You can suck all the dick you want]
And still be a virgin, Mary
[You can suck all the dick you want]
Everyone in the nation
[Fellatio ain’t no sin so go and blow those three wise men]
And you’ll still be a virgin [’cause there ain’t no penetration]
[You can suck all the dick you want]
And still be a virgin, Mary
[The donkey, or the ox and the lamb]
And even the little drummer boy
Folks will remember your name quick
[They’ll say, ‘Damn, that bitch can suck a dick!’
‘Cause sucking dick] brings peace on earth and joy
[‘Cause sucking dick] brings peace on earth and joy
[Mary, you can suck my dick!]
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus)says
Oh Benjamin, your nostalgic christmas song warms the cockles of my heart.
Silisays
Yes, Coyote, there is a lesbian.
Silisays
The Laughing Coyote (Papio Cynocephalus) says:
14 November 2011 at 1:06 pm
why are there so many more nonsensical and ‘fun’ names for the ol’ swizzlestick, and yet so relatively few names that don’t have some sort of bad connotations for the female equivalent?
The Martini glass? Inverted Martini?
I was about to suggest cocktail glass to be more general, but I spotted the problem …
Silisays
Because of today’s xkcd I just spent the last hour reading up various map projections. Goode Homolosine is my favourite.
Would a digital camera (specifically a DSLR shooting RAW) perform any sort of Fourier modification on an image? The results I’m getting from this program resemble an artifact I noticed in one of my photos. I think they call it “ringing”.
cicely, Inadvertent Phytocidal Maniacsays
And no, he wasn’t a misogynist. He loved women- as long as they let him be the man of the house and didn’t try to hold any opinions of their own, jest like the Good Book says.
This provokes memories of my ex brother-in-law. Before they were married, my sister carefully vetted his attitudes, and he alleged as how he was in favor of strong, independent women.
Turns out that, to him, a “strong, independent woman” was one who, for example, when the injuns* killed her husband, would pick up his rifle from his cold, dead hands and soldier on, running the farm and raising his kids. Strength and independence in a woman just weren’t consistent with the premise of marriage, and neither was remarriage after his death on the menu, until after the deceased’s kiddies were raised. I suspect that the issue there was that if she remarried while the offspring were not yet adult, some other man would be living on his property, and there might be subsequent kids who might be unfairly given part of it.
As far as I know, he’s still alive…and remarried.
*And that was apparently the word he used.
–
Pteryxxsays
dunno much about high-end digital cameras, but does yours have any fancy software going on, like edge detection?
It shouldn’t. A RAW image should be just that: the raw data coming off of the sensor. I know it doesn’t do any color correction (though it does store my preferences in the file, so Aperture can do it). I’d be disappointed if it was sharpening RAW images.
changeable monikersays
Oooh, a piece of art at the Place Of Work is a Dymaxion, much like this:
I have in my tentacles an Operating Manual. Fun stuff.
specialization is in fact only a fancy form of slavery wherein the “expert” is fooled into accepting his slavery by making him feel that in return he is in a socially and culturally preferred, ergo, highly secure, lifelong position. But only the king’s son received the Kingdom-wide scope of training.
Pteryxxsays
Benjamin: then I’d suspect the artifact may result from the sensor array itself and *its* handling software (it’s digital, so the raw data got processed by *something*). I get extrapolation artifacts in some very low-light pictures with my old digital camera. I’d swear I’ve gotten similar auras but can’t seem to find them now…
changeable monikersays
Debrett’s, via Walton: ‘spend a penny’.
Paxman, The English:
[1930s travel author Odette Keun] stood in front of a public lavatory that proclaimed GENTLEMEN ONE PENNY; MEN FREE and round the corner LADIES ONE PENNY; WOMEN FREE. As she stood gasping at the implications of this urinary caste system, she was comforted to be approached by a policeman who asked if she was short of a penny.
Class, eh? You either have it, or you have to cadge it from a copper.
changeable monikersays
Modern British class divisions:
Working-class females have the widest choice of beverages, in terms of social acceptability. Pub etiquette allows them to drink almost anything that takes their fancy – from creamy or sweet liqueurs and cocktails, to the full range of soft-drinks, ‘designer-drinks’ and beers. The only minor restriction is on the size of glass from which they may drink their chosen beer. In many working-class circles, drinking ‘pints’ is considered unfeminine and unladylike, so the majority of women in this social category drink ‘halves’.
Next in order of freedom of choice are middle/upper-class females. They are somewhat more constrained, in that the more sickly-sweet liqueurs and cocktails are regarded as rather vulgar by this social group, and to order a Babycham or a creamy chocolate liqueur would raise a few eyebrows. Female pint-drinking, however, is now acceptable, particularly among students, the under-25s and the aristocracy.
OK, guys: I have a conundrum that just manifested itself today.
I work in a developmental biology lab, and one of the techs is a conservative Christian and rejects the veracity of evolution (evolution has huge holes, thinks macro and microevolution are completely different processes, thought Expelled was a good movie, etc.)
This came up in the course of a casual conversation, and the very mention of evolutionary theory got her rattling off generic criticisms and the incompleteness of the theory. Whatever, I’ve spent the last 10 years countering the same tired arguments, and it’s not difficult, and it isn’t as if she is a malicious or deceitful individual – she actually believes it. However, for the time being, I simply said, “I think we should avoid this discussion, because I know where it will inevitably end up going.”
My problem is that I work directly with this person daily; it isn’t as if I can avoid this person, and she’s been in this lab for about 13 years, and is in charge of much of the day to day operations of the lab; suffice to say she’s an integral lab member, so she isn’t going away anytime soon (my PI’s don’t know this about her, but it’s not as if she preaches about it; this is the first time she’s mentioned anything about it for the 6 months I’ve been working here). If I’m going to have an amicable working relationship, as much as I want to take her to task on this and try to correct the misconceptions about the theory she’s been taught, it seems like this is a topic I should avoid bringing up.
My desire for workplace harmony, right now, is in direct conflict with my personal ethic of not allowing ignorance to go unchallenged. This isn’t just some jerk-off creationist, where I have no desire to preserve a positive relationship, or the misinformed freshmen I used to teach in grad school, where my ethical responsibility to provide accurate information and instruction is paramount – this is someone I have to work with 5 days a week, and who has authority and seniority over me. Do any of you have any advice on how to approach this, or know of any resources I can utilize to help me find an amicable solution?
Zugswangsays
The other thing, how the hell she can work in a developmental biology lab, not believe in evolution, and have zero cognitive dissonance is a mystery to me.
Silisays
How the hell does one work 13 years in a deb bio lab and still reject evolution?
It’s not like she’s just sweeping the floors, I take it?
Silisays
Jinx?
chigau (...---...)says
Zugswang
I think you answered your own question. Just don’t talk about evolution.
Although what will happen when you are talking about your work, I can’t guess.
Silisays
Yet another apocalypse (courtesy of Lars von Trier)
Stop calling him that. The man’s no more noble than the Färschdbischuf Silič O’Nopolitanopolous von Pfeil und Klein Elguth aus Ulm.
Algernonsays
changeable moniker, I notice that site did not offer much advice for tourists who are women :P
I have a coworker who waltzed into a pub in Brampton once and ordered a margarita. She didn’t get one, but it makes for a good story.
A preacher guy was on campus today. It was fun. I spent way too much time watching him and the people around him. I did get some people interested in Freethinkers though.
Algernonsays
Sili, I never bothered to look. I guess he’s really just Lars Trier. Why does he use the name, just to sound cool?
I hate all of my real names. If I were going to call myself something cool I’d get rid of all of them.
Carliesays
Submitted without comment:
MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP
Algernonsays
Maharishi University of Management was founded in 1971 by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi to fulfill the highest ideals of education.
Woah… really?
They have a computer science program, and apparently two MBA programs one of which you have to have something something TM something to attend.
It’s not like she’s just sweeping the floors, I take it?
Nope; she’s got authorship on several papers, though mostly it’s because she’s the one doing the grunt work on the research; her intellectual contributions are limited to performing the necessary tests and protocols to generate data. Her contributions to the rationales behind the research are absent, as are interpretation of the results, which are largely left to the PI’s who write the grants.
Although what will happen when you are talking about your work, I can’t guess.
Yeah, that will be the biggest problem when it invariably comes up, which is why I’m hoping someone else has had to deal with this problem and can offer advice in how to approach it properly.
Though it is incredibly aggravating; it’s like working with a pharmacist who believes in homeopathy or an MD that still believes in the four humours.
Benjamin, ringing is a normal artifact with filters, analog or digital. It’s why we have software/hardware filters.
(That’s simplistic, but you are the one who knows all about computers and is teaching.)
+++++++++++++++++++++
That xkcd about maps may be the best one ever!
+++++++++++++++++++++
IRT: terms for genitalia.
When I first moved to the south ‘cock’ was also a euphemism for the female genitalia. (Yes, really.)
And apparently ‘cunt’, as some of our world wide contributors insist, is also non-gendered.
Language changes all the time, we need to change with it. Terms get disseminated (snerk) more often and thru larger communities.
I agree with PZ, terms have different context intimately than they do publicly.
I try to keep to the pubic rules we have here in my public life.
O hai! I won’t try to catch up (except I’ve read upwards till comment 500), but I’ll try to keep up. If you think I’ve missed something interesting/cute/funny in the last month, please tell me. If you have any questions about how I survived America or how I liked everyone’s hugs, go ahead. :-)
I didn’t comment here earlier because I wasn’t able to sleep on the plane (had a seat that faced a wall, and the plane was full), got some kind of cold because my nose and throat dried out in the desert air of Las Vegas (at least I don’t wake up with totally dry lips anymore), and spent most of yesterday night working on the next paper now that we returned the page proofs of the previous one.
Mattir and onion girl, did you get my e-mail? onion girl, how was your 11/11/11 party?
First the problem is that the vast majority of languages do not have wide-reaching written records, if they’re written down at all
…and in most written languages, the same is true of the vast majority of dialects. Case in point:
Consequently the origin of many swearwords is of unclear origin, like “fuck”.
In German today, that’s ficken. If the most likely hypothesis on its origin is true (namely that it’s cognate with the English one), we’d expect it to be fücken; apparently the word died out in just those (few!) dialects that have – like Standard German – kept ö and ü instead of turning them into e and i and has entered today’s arguably standard language from a dialect that has undergone this sound change. May be impossible to test due to lack of written attestations either from dialects with the sound change before they had undergone the sound change or from dialects without the sound change before they lost the word.
Many slang terms survive in this variety, for instance testa “shard” which became replaced the very common word caput “head” in Gaul.
At least one of these dysphemisms even spread beyond the Romance languages. Modern German Kopf is from Latin cuppa, which is where English cup comes from. German does retain the native word Haupt (cognate with caput and head), but only for poetic uses and as a prefix that means “main”.
The […] Franconian conquest of France did not lead to a language shift, probably because of the numbers. But they left a number of words in the languages of the subjugated peoples, that are associated with the invaders. (for instance guerre, cognate with English “war”).
I can’t resist explaining the details! :-) One of the Old High German words for war was werra. I gather the Latin word bellum died out because the western Roman Empire had such a long period of peace before the invasions of Germanic peoples that brought the word werra with them. By that time, Latin had already turned [w] into [v], so the closest thing to the foreign [w] was [gʷ] (spelled gu, and changed into [g] in later French).
There are other examples of this representation of foreign [w]. “Glove” in French is gant, from a Germanic word with [w]. The Gascogne is named after the Basques, whose [b] is a former [w] (Classical Latin Vascones, Classical Greek Ouaskónoi, IIRC).
As for why the English word has a, that might be an instance of the shift seen in R, heart, sergeant, clerk, and more obviously in varmin(t), varsity and book-larnin’. (If so, it was followed by influence from the preceding [w].)
For instance two closely related ethnic groups do not like each other, and consciously try to make their languages be more apart
Serbs and Croats.
Or the people of Baden and Württemberg. Not that they (probably) ever hated each other that much, but the subtle dialect boundary between them only formed when their, uh, provinces (within Germany!) were merged in the 20th century.
I mean “toilet” itself is a euphemism originally, referring to the makeup room (when I was in Versailles and saw the Queen’s toilet room, I was quite confused at first).
Woe is me. I don’t seem to have a happy medium between “this person is intriguing” and “hopeless infatuation”. Sometimes I trick myself into thinking I don’t care, and then other times I am really quite pathetic. Le sigh.
*hug*
I seem to have such intermediate states, but I know too few people to apply most points in the spectrum to.
Because of today’s xkcd I just spent the last hour reading up various map projections.
I am very clever.
(I have also really looked at my hands, though. Have I already mentioned I have one white and one black hair on each wrist?)
Slang terms map on to this. A slang term for the penis is less likely to be bad/vulgar than one for the vulva.
Subverted in Hungarian*, which has “go into the” curses. Roughly, the noun that follows is the more offensive the less possible it is physically: ass < vulva < penis.
* Yes. I talk like TV Tropes. Deal with it.
But I’ve noticed that in the right context, any nonsense word a person makes up can be interpreted as ‘penis’.
Even the absence of a word can easily be interpreted that way. If I asked what you think about the length or diameter of yours, you wouldn’t ask back “my what?”.
how the hell she can work in a developmental biology lab, not believe in evolution, and have zero cognitive dissonance is a mystery to me.
Ignorance.
There are plenty of scientists who “know everything about nothing”, so she may know too little about comparative dev bio. Don’t get me started on all the molecular biologists who use the term “higher eukaryotes” for everything except yeast because they don’t fucking know that yeasts are secondarily unicellular ascomycetes, more closely related to morels than chanterelles are. *complete chimpanzee threat display*
I guess he’s really just Lars Trier. Why does he use the name, just to sound cool?
Probably to make it ambiguously sound like he’s literally from Trier. Compare Söhne Mannheims.
Also… aaaaarrggggh. Some of the stuff I learn in my classes about immigration law in the US makes me so angry. I don’t have time to go into much detail now (though I really want to write a blog post on this when I have the time), but there are so many people – including refugees, victims of human trafficking, and others who are actually eligible for various forms of immigration relief – who simply get picked up by ICE, detained and deported, without any effective access to legal advice.
(If you’re an asylum-seeker and you can’t speak English, and you can’t find a pro bono attorney, you may find yourself grappling with a complex and opaque legal process without any access to legal advice, and, if it all goes wrong, being deported back to a country where you’re likely to be tortured, raped or killed. Not to mention the arbitrary requirements, like the one-year filing deadline for asylum introduced by an idiot Republican-controlled Congress in 1996; being unable to speak English, having no legal counsel and being unaware of the law are not considered valid reasons for missing the deadline. Likewise, if you’re a victim of human trafficking (which often means that you’ve been held in what amounts to involuntary servitude; plenty of undocumented migrant workers in America today are held in de facto debt-slavery), you are technically eligible for a type of immigration relief called a T visa; but this relies on law enforcement being willing to certify you as a trafficking victim. Again, if it goes wrong, you’ll find yourself detained in federal prison and deported.)
There is so much need for comprehensive immigration reform. The UK isn’t any better, and my (as-yet-unfinished) LLM paper is going to be an analysis and comparison of the (inadequate) forms of immigration relief available to migrant victims of domestic abuse in US and UK immigration law.
Sorry for harping on about this… I know I talk about it a lot. I just need to vent, since it’s an issue I feel very, very strongly about (and one that I know some people here are interested in, so I figured it wasn’t too off-topic for the endless thread). Justice for immigrants is right up there with gender equality and LGBT equality as a defining social justice issue of our generation. (And, indeed, it intersects with both of these issues; undocumented migrant women are at a particularly high risk of rape and domestic abuse, female asylum-seekers have often been raped and abused in their home countries because of their gender, and many LGBT migrants come from countries where being gay is illegal and where gay people live in constant fear of being murdered by homophobic mobs.)
(Sorry for filling the thread up with my off-topic political rants. I just have to vent about this somewhere, from time to time. And at least on Pharyngula most people get it; when discussing this anywhere else, I have to contend with the likelihood of some people chiming in and repeating the same old incoherent anti-immigration talking points and discredited myths.)
David Marjanović, OMsays
When I first moved to the south ‘cock’ was also a euphemism for the female genitalia. (Yes, really.)
Oh, that reminds me. Over here, the probably most common term for “penis” (at least among schoolkids, but an attempt to write it is preserved on a monument in the chemistry building of the University of Vienna) turns out to be a very contemptual pronunciation of the dialectal version of “pouch”. Looks like it originally designated the scrotum, little kids misunderstood it, and generations of little kids have been learning it from each other ever since without any intervening adults.
The two vowels of “asshole” in the same dialects probably got switched the same way by kids who didn’t know it had any meaning other than “contemptibly evil person”.
Walton, stop apologizing. I found what you wrote to be very interesting and not that long.
chigau (...---...)says
David Marjanović
Did you miss The Great FreethoughtBlogs Hiatus of Last Weekend?
It was very traumatic.
David Marjanović, OMsays
*pounce* *hug* ^_^ Stop dancing. :-)
Walton, *hug* Rant away – in a thread of 700 comments, even if you insert a few 10-screeners, it still doesn’t look like you’re trying to dominate the conversation or something. :-)
It wasn’t intended to cause offense. There’s a whole world of fun names for, you know, bits. For where I’m coming from, TtV is primarily a book, which was made into a TV series.
Caine: I think I concur a bit with Rey Fox. I think it’s because “Cunny” kinda sounds like a ‘kiddified’ version of cunt. You know, like ‘Peepee’ vs ‘Penis’. Except far less clinical.
Hope I’m making sense.
cm:
I wasn’t offended, I was providing a correction. And for the record, Tipping the Velvet has been discussed here, along with Sarah Waters’ other books many a time.
oops. I should have also said “sorry”. Sorry.
Ah, OK. But before my time, unfortunately. :-/
Coyote:
Yeah, I saw that, but immediately consigning it that way doesn’t make a lot of sense, because it’s not all that far off from pussy. I can imagine using cunny in a conversation, an adult conversation, without trouble. For me, the problem lies in it being used in a misogynistic way, like cunt, which I don’t think would take long if it was used widely at all in the first place.
I think the whole discussion tends to get silly, because people can use/like any word they want, but there won’t be a single one of them that is free of the insult/misogyny taint until attitudes change.
It just sounds skeezy to me.
Probably best to just stick with the more clinical terms until you know what the bearer of the organs in question prefers.
You know, if you’re all talking about the private and personal language used between couples, you don’t have a say. Maybe a couple is more comfortable with the clinical words; maybe they prefer the raunchiest terms possible; maybe they like baby talk. As long as the words are mutually agreed upon, I’m not going to judge.
This is slightly on topic.
Wife and Girl and I went to Wegmans to pick up a few things. One of the items I wanted to get was a back of roasted and salted pumpkin seeds.
Unfortunately, they are, once again, rearanging the store (to disrupt normal shopping patterns, I presume). To help with confused costumers, the store had a nice young lady and a nice young man (well, mid-20s, which to me makes her very young) to tell people where to go and how to get there.
Wife walks up to the two of them and says, “I’m looking for my husband’s nuts.” Without missing a beat, both kids answered, “Aisle nine.” No reaction at all. Girl and I damn near pissed ourselves, but no reaction from the staff.
As for cunt, Wife and I use the word in private, when being intimate. I have basically removed it from non-bedroom conversation. With Wife, I know that it is something that she has and we enjoy; unfortunately, some men view it as something a woman is rather than something she has. Which is sad. Or infuriating.
——-
And I am off until next Sunday (which will be my Monday, Wednesday and Friday all rolled into one). And I just finished a small bottle a Patron silver tequila. Wow is it smooth. And delicious.
I for one am talking about the public use. It’s pretty obvious to me that stuff couples or people who are otherwise intimate do is not under the same rules that apply to every day life.
Some women like to be bit a little. But we all know what happens to a coyote who runs around randomly biting people. ;)
That’s not the issue. Public standards for the 2020s are due sooner than you think! And here we are barely into the first draft.
Coyote:
My stance on public use remains the same: publicly, use the proper names for all the bits. Privately, do whatever you want.
We’ve had this discussion, so many damn times (I know you didn’t bring it up) and I don’t know why we keep having it, as attitudes behind the various euphemisms haven’t changed.
And (hmph!), I’m not sure how “c***y” crept into #496 without me ever mentioning it. *Twirls cape, etcetera*
Let me discuss the topic of “cunt” both synchronically and diachronically.
1. Synchornic perspective
I’ve said it before, but in language there is no absolute right and wrong. There is no absolute standard. It’s always negotiated by the speech community, but even the speech community is not a uniform thing (if you’ve always felt that it is, it is rather indicative of you being a member of a privileged class in your society, but that’s another matter). In truth, every individual has their own rules and norms, which is called an idiolect. So it might true if certain individuals claim that in their speech “cunt” is not an insult, ultimately we’d have to take their word for it unless they haven’t demonstrated it to the contrary. I’ve also seen claims of “cunt” being used in some dialects as a normal term for “person”, but not being an expert on English dialects, I’d defer to those who are.
(as far as Pharyngula is concerned, this blog has its own norms, and also give the fact that its audience is worldwide, dialect speakers to whom “cunt” really means something else should consider speakers of the dialects (which are probably the vast majority) in which the word is indeed denigrating to women)
But it doesn’t stop here. Even the same speaker can switch between different “modes”, called register in linguistics (I’m not even mentioning the cases of multilingual/multidialectal speakers here). The easiest example is a formal situation, say a parliamentary debate, or tea with the Queen, compared with an informal situation, talking sports with your friends, or enjoying dinner with your family. Your speech will be markedly different. What sounds pretentious in one situation will just be fine in another. Bedroom talk might just be another, and licence the use of “cunt” for some individuals.
The complex interaction of different language varieties and registers is marked by constant silent negotiation about those, a process called as “linguistic accommodation”. In some cases it can be observed that speakers of different dialects will subconsciously make their speech more similar to each other. But of course, the speakers of a more dominant group have an edge here. A Brit emigrating to the United States might alter their speech pattern to sound more alike, unless they move to a region in the US where British accents are regarded as desirable. Sometimes this is institutionally enforced, as in the debate on AAVE in American classrooms.
Ultimately it boils down to a numbers and prestige game.
2. Diachronic perspective
First the problem is that the vast majority of languages do not have wide-reaching written records, if they’re written down at all (linguists posit the primacy of the spoken language, as written language was always derivative). Also, written records were left behind by the elites, and often represented high registers. Consequently the origin of many swearwords is of unclear origin, like “fuck”.
What Walton alluded to is known as “semantic change”. A word starts out with a specific meaning can develop in many ways, it can a) widen its meaning, b) narrow it, c) become pejorative, or d) elevated. The problem is that these processes can be described but I don’t think we’re at a point where we can predict these processes. The data is much too limited, confined to a few languages, and the data get less the more you go back in time etc.
That said, we can observe that social changes trigger a lot of language change. Social changes might have contributed to the word “knight”, originally “servant, boy” (compare German “Knecht”) taking on a different meaning. Social changes in Germany caused the word for “noble/free-born woman”, Frau, to become the general term for “woman”, and the old term “Weib”, being pushed into a pejorative meaning.
Other changes are triggered by conquests and invasions. The Roman conquest of Gaul ultimately led to the Celtic inhabitants giving up their native languages and starting to speak the Colloquial Latin (also known as Vulgar Latin) of the legionaries. (Many slang terms survive in this variety, for instance testa “shard” which became replaced the very common word caput “head” in Gaul.) The Norman conquest of England and the Franconian conquest of France did not lead to a language shift, probably because of the numbers. But they left a number of words in the languages of the subjugated peoples, that are associated with the invaders. (for instance guerre, cognate with English “war”).
Linguistic innovation is always an ongoing process, new words are introduced to the language all the time. They can be 1) borrowed, 2) derived or 3) created completely anew. 3) is the rarest process, even many of the examples given, “gas” being one of the most typical ones, aren’t that perfect either, as “gas” was inspired by “chaos”.
This usually occurs when there are new concepts that need to be named, either because they were introduced by outside groups, or developed by insiders.
But there can also be social motivations, as alluded to by Walton. Only that I would widen it. A group can consciously try and alter its linguistic behaviour in order to reaffirm its identity. Youth language is another instance of it, or other groups that strive to (be it consciously or subconsciously) set themselves apart from the mainstream (obviously, before the advent of the mass media age, there was no mainstream, it was all region-based. If it weren’t for mass communication, Americans and English would at some point developed away to a point where they’d speak different languages, something which probably is now very unlikely to ever happen).
For instance two closely related ethnic groups do not like each other, and consciously try to make their languages be more apart, or taboo language after the death of members, something which can be found in some Australian aborigineal cultures as well as the Chinese imperial court, a conscious reversal of the more subconscious process of linguistic accommodation. Trying to avoid racist or sexist language in my opinion fits into this type of language change too*).
So the main two sources of new words would be introduction of new concepts as well as social factors. And when new words are introduced into the lexicon, they can in turn influence other words, giving them new shades of meaning. Thus, previously neutral terms can then become loaded, in a positive or negative way (which can also be socially induced). Sometimes old words just fade away, or newly introduced words just aren’t accepted by the larger speech community and die out.
Sorry, it’s become a massive teal deer already, so I’ll just stop here.
*) though I don’t like the “xe” pronoun because it seems to be confined to written language. It’s why I’ve adopted singular they, which has been attested in English since the 15th or 16th century.
ahs ॐ
Awesome!
I think I started it with the Oatmeal comic link. Sorry!
@pelamun, I read every word.
cm:
Either spell a word or don’t fucking use it. FFS. It’s cunny. See, the universe didn’t implode. Or explode.
Alethea:
Seems to me it was Rey Fox, who specifically asked about the usage of cunt.
Uh, I fucking hate people sometimes. I tried to go out with a couple of friends and it ended with me being super pissed off and shouting.
Sadly, Debrett’s Guide to British Behaviour appears to be silent on the question of how one should refer to the… er… lady’s area or gentleman’s area, if one is ever compelled to do so in conversation. (It does, however, have a page detailing acceptable and unacceptable euphemisms for the lavatory.)
chigau, all I can say is lol. I had no idea.
I thought for sure everybody in Britain said tadger and fanny.
@Caine, if you want, I’ll say “cunny”. But that <— is the first time I've ever said it on this blog. #496 seemed to suggest otherwise.
@ahs, #522: “todger” and fanny. ;)
“Fanny” is a slang term I certainly heard very frequently when I was in high school, though it’s considered vulgar. “Todger” is archaic slang, and I’ve rarely, if ever, heard anyone use it.
(Or in real life. Is that really a word?!)
I gotta say, I’ve only seen “cunny” used in high fantasy novels.
One series of high fantasy novels, a series that likes to rant about the Divine Feminine and some other shit like that. I thought that it was a word that the author invented to mean cunt without actually saying cunt.
The things you learn reading TET!
(“Fanny” in British slang refers to the female genitalia. I’m aware that it has a different meaning in American English.)
Todger? You mean one of them there omnivorous mustelids?
Oh, I also got called an insufferable bitch.
@Alethea,
Thanks :).
@Walton:
wait, “loo” is the acceptable word? I learnt about this word in Australia and I’ve always had the feeling that it is a very colloquial term not fit for polite company. This is why Japanese people say they need to wash their hands.
Also when does a gentleman/lady ever feel COMPELLED to talk about their netherparts? Wouldn’t that just be TMI if it’s not with family, your s.o. or very very close friends (and outside of health professionals).
I think I forgot to add something to my “diachronic part”, and your bit about etiquette reminded me of that:
in some cultures, the sex act, and execration and body parts associated with those acts are considered taboo. This is not universal, I’ve worked with a language community where this was not a problem at all (though some euphemisms were present, and I don’t know if this was due to the influence of the national culture, or not). But in those cultures where this is this taboo, it is clear that these words often undergo a lot of semantic change. I don’t know much about the words for “cunt”, but AFAIK this has happened to the word for “buttocks”.
At some point, a euphemism is introduced, pushing the originally neutral term into “inappropriate” territory. At some point, the euphemism takes on a neutral connotation, and the cycle starts anew. IIRC this is what happened to “arse”. Or with the words for “toilet”. I mean “toilet” itself is a euphemism originally, referring to the makeup room (when I was in Versailles and saw the Queen’s toilet room, I was quite confused at first). Now it has become too vulgar for some.
The difficulty in giving it up, for me at least and probably for others, is that I don’t want to lose my ‘edge’. Being ‘offensive’ and outspoken, using plenty of curse words, being able to express myself in my own way, and an instinctive hatred of anything that smells like ‘censorship’.
Yeah yeah that’s all well and good, but I suppose what I’m coming to realize is that while it’s good to retain my ‘venom’, these particular mysoginist and/or gendered forms of it do not really have the effect I always thought they had, and I don’t want to cause anyone unintentional hurt or offense. Like all weapons, it should be always under control and used properly.
This, I suppose I should point out, is a distinction the Hoggles of the world haven’t really grasped.
*ohno*
Must be a regional thing! As I recall,
Damn. I read ‘todger’ as ‘badger.’
I like tequila.
@StarStuff,
sorry to hear that. I hope the cause of your discomfort was not your friends.
@theophontes,
Thanks! The Circleville thing is AMAZING! It will probably become one of my favourite urban development anecdotes
Thanks also for the book suggestions, I got one of them already. And the lecture series looks good too.
I kinda like ‘todger’. I think I’m gonna try to use it someday in the future.
‘Todger’. ha.
@ pelamun
I was called that by one of my friends because I called him out on some sexist bullshit he was saying.
* when it itches something fierce
* when inquiring as to whether someone caught staring likes what they see
* when it’s very cold in this water, I assure you
@ahs anyone who can write “ane o” instead of “one of” is clearly barking … or Scottish. *runs and hides*
I think one factor is the difference between High register language (H) and Low register language (L). H language must be learnt by all speakers in school and university (giving those who went to university an advantage regarding H register situations). Here, we pretty much all accept we have to learn the rules (though the gripe linguists have with Strunk and White is that they didn’t understand the rules, but I digress). With L language though, there is a long history of prescriptivism being associated with suppression of minorities, who often end up changing their speech patterns to be more similar to those of the dominant group. Thus, I can understand the reluctance.
Ultimately though, it is a numbers game. In L registers, every subgroup of the language community just follows their own rules. Often, speech patterns of role models within the community are emulated, consciously or subconsciously (there’s research on this, but I can’t really cite anything now, as I’m no expert on this, apologies). So the more people consciously make an effort to speak in a way that avoids discriminatory language, the greater the chance it will spread within the community at large. While calling out others can be important, I think being reflexive about one’s own language use is even more important. One problem with conscious language change is that the forms objected to often creep back in when one is not thinking about them. Like language purists using foreign borrowings. Or even Strunk and White using the very constructions they rave against in other parts of their book!
@StarStuff
that’s unfortunate. Not a great friend, I think.
@ahs,
But wouldn’t a Gentleman/Lady (TM) avoid it under any circumstances to talk about it, as the very act of talking about it would be very ungentlemanlike/unladylike?
There are hilarious stories about how Chinese doctors speak with female patients about sex, as there’s a taboo in Chinese culture to talk about sex in “polite society”, apparently even extending to the OB/GYN office.
(In other situations, Chinese people don’t have any problem of using sex-based insults, like “fuck your mother” or even “fuck your ancestors”. I don’t think this has been researched, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a class-based difference)
This song has lots of swearwords, all of which I’d be happy to use (and do) IRL:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mde1b-IY3u4
Night all!
@ pelamun
Yeah, he pisses me off, but he’s one of the few people I know who has a car and a lot of free time.
Anyway, we were talking about females in comic books and then about women in gaming culture. It was all going just fine until he said: “There are two kinds of female gamers: ones who actually like gaming, and ones who just say they do to get attention.” As you can imagine, that set me off. I tried to explain why that was a fucked up stereotype and a lie. He got really defensive, tried to support his claim with anecdotes (that he hadn’t even seen personally), and then tried to back track. I wouldn’t let him off so easily, so he called me an insufferable bitch. I ended the conversation there and told him to take me home. I hadn’t used one single ad hominem attack the whole time, so I was extra pissed off that he decided to because he was losing the debate and looking like a fool.
When it comes to todger, I prefer the discworld version, tonker. ‘E’s got a great big tonker.
“tonker” makes me picture something that could be used to club baby seals.
I never knew there were so many words for body parts. I was skimming urban dictionary a few weeks ago just for fun and also discovered that there are an astounding number of slang terms for acts I didn’t know existed. I think I need to get out more. Or less. Not sure which.
Woe is me. I don’t seem to have a happy medium between “this person is intriguing” and “hopeless infatuation”. Sometimes I trick myself into thinking I don’t care, and then other times I am really quite pathetic. Le sigh.
I have been failing, I think, in the good feminist pointing out of sexist stuff in daily life. People who are generally good about everything else still talking about bitching, hoes (is that even the correct plural?), and sluts, and I can’t figure out how to point it out except in the most obviously derogatory cases. I can see doing it if someone is calling someone a cunt, but otherwise… I suppose this is the dichotomy of be internally miffed or ruin things for others, which I read a nice essay on but I can’t remember where.
Epic.
This is right up there with “fuck your sunshine”.
I love it when the solution turns out to be another problem.
Picked up a new headset for my computer so I don’t have to keep switching back and forth between typing for conversation and guiding my character. However, the damned thing won’t work. The computer recognizes it, but no one can hear me when I use the mic. The button used to mute is turned off, and I still don’t get anything.
Hmmm….I wonder if….yeah. I think I just thought of something. But in case that doesn’t work, anyone know if they still make adapters for headsets with dual plugs, one for the mic and the other for the headphones?
aladegorrion: you may be thinking of The Terrible Bargain We Have Regretfully Struck, and its obscure sequel, The Bargain, and Its Alternative
I’m doing research for a blog post about women being called attention whores online and in gaming. This is a lot of bullshit to sift through :/
I’m returned.
PS Walton, I’ve just spent 5 days being a tourist in Oxford.
PPS pelamun:
Thanks —
PPPS ॐ = SG?
Now my friend is trying to text me as to why he’s not sexist for what he said tonight. Bullshit.
*waves to John*
Of course.
ah yes John, it looked strange to me, but since my browser didn’t underline it in read I thought it was ok (turns out execration is a word too). But do tell, how did you get the spoiler tag working?
StarStuff,
oh no that old stereotype. How much were the numbers, 40% female gamers? Or I might misremember the statistics. This is why I liked “The Guild”
ahs ॐ , yes thank you! And I don’t think I had see its sequel. Good things to think about.
Seems to me that if women were just out for attention, then gamers would not be the people they’d wish to seek it from. But what do I know, I tend to assume that people are honest about their interests and hobbies.
*snrk* but women are the attention whores, yeah right.
IMHO, calling women “attention whores” in gaming, discussion or whatever field is just a blatant silencing tactic… they have nothing to contribute, all they want is attention THEREFORE we will deny them attention. Contempt, THAT they can have.
Hahahahaha! This is a mindfuck.
@ Pteryxx
Pretty much. That’s why so many women pretend to be men while gaming or online.
I’m having a hard time with this blog post. I have so much I want to say and I’m so angry that I feel like I might just be rambling.
Heh
Been there. Except I called him ‘this guy I buy dip for because he has a truck.’
Hell, just being called a bitch for disagreeing with something is sexist. I feel for you. I just had a friend delete a long argument after it “didn’t go the way he wanted” and his wife agreed with me.
LMAO.
But really, it’s heartbreaking.
Starstuff: Maybe write out as much ranting as you need to get out, and then edit it down afterwards? (A little ranting adds flavor.)
and yeah, gaming’s made me even more determined to claim no gender at all. I got so sick of other players harassing me on female toons and expecting me to commiserate with their misogyny/homophobia on male toons. (Occasionally the same ones. Sheesh.)
I needs statistics now. I have stats for female gamers, but how do I go about getting stats for women online/ in online communities?
I remember meeting a woman who was really irritated that people thought she liked football for the male attention. Seems perhaps analogous to the gaming issue.
Hallo John! Did you have a good time?
StarStuff: what stats do you need? There’s that research about female names getting 25 times the harassment of male names…
@ Pteryxx
That’d be a good thing to mention.
@ aladegorrion
I think I’ll use that as an example, if you don’t mind.
And of course, texting is the best possible medium for this sort of discussion.
Looking for Gender: Gender Roles and Behaviors Among Online Gamers
DOI: 10.1111/j.1460-2466.2009.01453.x
http://dmitriwilliams.com/LFGpaperfinal.pdf
StarStuff:
Source
Hope that’s helpful to start out with.
Jenny Preece and Diane Maloney-Krichmar write “For example, women may get unwanted attention (Bruckman, 1993; Herring, 1992; Turkle, 1995; Turkle, 1999)”
These citations are:
Bruckman, A. (1993). Gender swapping on the internet. Paper presented at the The Internet Society (INET ’93) Conference, San Fransisco, CA.
Herring, S. (1992). Gender and participation in computer-mediated linguistic discourse. : ERIC Clearinghouse on Languages and linguistics (October).
Turkle, S. (1995). Life on the Screen. Identify in the Age of the Internet. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Turkle, S. (1999, Winter 1999/2000). Tinysex and Gender Trouble. IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, 4, 8-20.
Sure, Starstuff.
@ ahs
Thanks!
Thanks for the sources, Pteryxx and ahs. I think my post is becoming less rant-y too.
pelamun,
<abbr title="spoiler">visible</abbr>—
Hey Caine, thanks for asking; I can say that I did my best to try to enjoy it. It was an experience, anyway.
you’re welcome, though now I feel inadequate next to ahs, with my one measly little link to a summary article of the actual research. *snif* (But I saved ahs’s sources in my hoard. NEXT TIME…) ~;>
John:
Any stories for us?
I probably won’t use all of those sources, but I’m definitely going to save them for later reading/use.
FUCK yo’ couch!
fuck your ancestors
fuck your sunshine
fuck your couch
best tet ever
Starstuff: I’ve gotten a few proposals since I started gaming, one of which wouldn’t stop until after I told him I had no desire to cheat on my boyfriend (I was unattached at the time, but figured it was about the best tactic to get goons to leave me alone). I’m sure part of the reasons was that my toon was female. But that was on Runescape. I haven’t had that kind of attention thrown my way on DDO, and I’ve got three characters who are all female.
It helps that the guild I joined doesn’t look kindly on sexual harassment, from either inside or outside the group. Just last week one of the members almost got booted over part of a conversation we’d had during a quest. Just one offhand comment about wishing J was there to snuggle with, in response to the other player bemoaning the fact that he had no to cuddle with at night, and we were off to the races. He pretty much made another female player in the group sound like a skank: “Hmm, oh I know! Im just loves to snuggle, maybe she’d like to join me.”
Let’s just say that he’s very lucky his ass wasn’t chucked out then and there – one of the officers happened to be online and heard the whole thing. Things have been awkward since when that player is around, but the guild founder made it clear that I and any other female player can report such behavior and they’ll take care of the problem. Joke or not, they don’t want us feeling uncomfortable.
Strangely enough, online gaming was also where I first experience racism. Again, on Runescape. My character’s last name sounded very Hispanic/Latino, and some random idiot started bothering me over it one day, even following me to and from the fishing area in the process. Another player told him to knock it off, and told me that the offender did it just to get a rise out of people, which means that jerk had done such before and probably got away with it. Anyway, I had him on my ignore list the rest of the time I stayed with that game. But I was a little shaken up, and I think that took some of the fun out of playing.
——————————————-
Well, looks like the real problem was the game settings. I’ll keep the new headset in case my old one suddenly goes kaput, but at least now my fingers won’t ache from furiously typing.
——————————————
Eggnog. Yum. I found an unopened bottle of Cutty Sark Blended Scots Whisky in the basement and added a dash of that to my glass. Perfect. Next time I’ll try it with rum, or brandy if we have any of that.
And on that note, good night.
This has been the most unusual TET. Rather amusing though! :)
Oh my. It’s windy as hell in New England tonight. Enough to rattle the storm windows on my wee house and provoke a bit of a draft. Every quilt has come out of the linen closet to find a bed. This, my friends, is the Romantic and Cozy (TM) part of autumn in the Northeast. The part where it’s fun to have a pot of soup on the stove, flannel pajamas on, and to make sure the backup lamps are filled with oil and there are matches next to the candle stash.
In three months it’s gonna be real tired.
Now to read TET, as it has rematerialized.
What year is it there, 1824 ?
;)
*brain freeze* data cleaning can get boooooooring. On the plus side, I have discovered that there is a real person named Alethea, and another one named “Man Ho”. And that nearly everyone’s grandmother’s middle name is “May”.
Hi everyone! Just popping in after a work weeks worth of self imposed TET avoidance. Since I’m on my day off I wanted to check in. Hope you are all doing well.
Crudely Wrott@169, Wow. What you said, wholeheartedly. I absolutely could not have said it better, thank you.
Crudely Wrott@251, They can make us get older, but they can’t make us grow up!
The Sailor@265, Not to mention the aerial photography, but were they used as evidence against you?
changeable moniker@284, Did I hear my name?
changeable moniker@285: (Emily Litella) Nevermind! (/Emily Litella)
StarStuff!383 & chigau@384, I’m not talking about football either.
@386-391, “They’re crazy, they’re all crazy ‘ceptin for me and you, and sometimes I have me doubts about you.”
cicely@412,
Yes, yes it is.
Crudely Wrott@416, Pink Floyd kicks ass.
The Laughing Coyote@546, I thought of indestructible toy trucks.
Benjamin Geiger@580 Really? People say that?
I missed the “upgrade” but am finally caught up with this iteration of TET. The kids are asleep, the wife is pissed off at me(again?, still?), and I’m a bit tipsy, and it’s time for bed. Aint life grand?
I did it. I finished the post! Yay :D
Ray: Apparently it’s a reference to this. My colleagues use it constantly.
Rorschach:
Eh, that’s nothin’. You ought to try 6 to 7 months of a ND winter. (Not really.)
Hi, Ray!
Why yes, good sir, it is! Come on. If I have to live in the Arctic Corner of USA-Land, can’t I at least play Little House on the Prairie?
Yeah, it’s actually kind of wonderful outside. I love a strong warm wind. It just makes me feel good.
This Elizabtht on the Tim Wise thread seems annoyingly dense. I just got back from a long drive and a relaxing weekend with family, so I’m not in the mood to respond. I’m just glad FTB is back.
You should come over and play sometime this week, Sally. We could cook up some dinner.
Also, adding “-ina” to names to make them feminine is often a bad idea. Especially for poor Hubertina and Adolfina.
Only 50,000 records to go…
Dinner with Audley, Mr. Darkheart, and Esteleth was good, but too short. I’ll have to stay longer next time. Also, SO MUCH FOOD! Early Thanksgiving followed by BBQ deliciousness: I feel so utterly decadent. It’s glorious.
I don’t mind the first 4 or 5 months of central Alberta winters. It gets a bit tiresome after that.
No thanks. Mn is just as cold and nearly as long, but at least there is something to block the wind.
I’d like that, Josh. It’s been a little while.
And now… to bed!
Benjamin Geiger@589, That’s pretty funny, never saw it before.
chigau@591, “Hi!” Right back! On my days off I can take some time to read and post. Five days of cold turkey withdrawal is a bear.
Seriously though, ME. BED. NOW.
G’night
The rapturoids are having a right fit over the nasty homosecksuals again, just about rolling around in judgmental delight over the ‘graphic’ descriptions of what those perverted types get up to, as described by Dr. David Reagan.
They have three threads going on the evils of being gay, this one being the latest: http://rr-bb.com/showthread.php?169543-Homosexuality-as-an-End-Times-Sign-Consequences-%28WARNING-GRAPHIC-DESCRIPTIONS%29
Of course, the evil gay agenda is responsible for everything:
And how do they know it’s all depraved?
Of course, it’s really just a spiritual problem:
And the ever popular eeuuw!:
False dichotomy.
FUCK yo’ couch!!!
How about this for a tattoo?
Michele Bachmann is an awful person.
Really? That sounds way more poetic than what they got.
Do tell.
No, this is making a mockery of the crucifixion: Ha ha! Look at that guy on that cross! He got nailed! Hertz donut?
Keep selling it, honey.
??
Now they got me daydreaming again.
She sounds like the “lie back and think of England” type.
“Fuck yo couch” doesn’t sound right without the last word in the utterance, which we can’t say because we’re not Dave Chapelle.
WTF were you thinking, Urina’s parents?!!! W. T. F.
(partially testing)
wow, s*gg*x has really come full circle as a troll…
Part-Time Insomniac,
I see you’ve solved the problem, I’ll just mention that I don’t care for integrated headsets, and recommend good headphones with a cheap mic. The last three mics I’ve used (over 10 years) have been under $10 each, and worked well enough. I tie it around my neck so that the mic is against my throat (one of my peeves is other people breathing directly into their mic, making my ears bleed).
There’s a way to curb carbon emissions without having to wait for governments to forge a global climate deal.
It makes sense, if you want the self-serving world leaders to take action you need the meanest enforcers available… and since we do not have alien xenomorphs around, we should bring these guys:
“Climate blame: send for the lawyers” http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21228383.200-climate-blame-send-for-the-lawyers.html
Part-time insomniac:
“Eggnog”
”Eggnog…Eggnog..EggeggeggeggEggnog” (Achtung Xmas)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A3kMTZwSQ8
(I can’thelp it, I am like Peter Griffin hearing “Surfing Bird”)
— — — — — —
Adolphina? Hitler + aircraft = Adolphine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Me_261
Good morning
I see you had an interesting night (night for me) here :)
How do people feel about “the beaver”?
Knowing the history behind that word* makes me particularly like it….
*Victorian drawers are open between the legs. Since they were worn under the corset, going for a pee would have taken half an hour if you had to take them off and also they would have distorted the silhouette.
But Can-Can dancers kicked their legs up so high that they would gape and the spectator could, with any luck, take a peek at their pubic hair.
The dancers didn’t like that and therefore closed their seams. But, well, they had to keep up with the idea that CanCan was frivolous, lasciuvous and amoral, so they sewed a bit of beaver fur on top of the fabric so the men in the audience would still think that they had seem some naughty bits.
Yet another apocalypse (courtesy of Lars von Trier)
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/movies/2011/11/lars_von_trier_s_melancholia_reviewed_starring_kirsten_dunst_and_charlotte_gainsbourg.html
I just saw this movie now for the first time, hilarious ! My Last Five Girlfriends
I’m waiting with bated breath for the sequel tho, “My Last Five Boyfriends”.
German court does not allow club for animal lovers*) to
be founded,**) because animals cannot offer enthusiastic consent. Now if judges were always that firm on the concept in human cases….
(Source in German; some commentators exhibited a WLC-like attitude about this, asking whether “a cow would even notice if you shoved your dong inside of her”)
(Sex with animals was purged from the Penal Code in a general reform on sex-related crimes in the 60s, incl. homosexual sex acts. However, the judges found that sex with animals violates the Law against mistreatment of animals, which extends to animal pornography. The latter aspect also defeated another line of defence that the club was only there to “provide information”. The judges found it hard to distinguish informational materials on sex with animals from animal pornography)
*) probably more accurately described as “zoophiliacs”, but the original German report used a similarly ambiguous title
**) a cultural note: Germans love to form clubs to such an extent that the joke goes – what are three Germans: a club. They love to give them charters and register them with the local court, so they can put the abbreviation e.V. (registered club) after the club name.
The Protection of Animals Act was enacted in 1972, so there was a time where sex with animals was legal in Germany. Anyhow, animal pornography has a curious status between child porn and adult porn: it is legal to own but not to disseminate it. (though I’m curious how this relates to works as that of Édouard-Henri Avril)
That’s so not true!
I’m from the Saarland, 3 of us are about 4-5 clubs!
Some completely different German news:
We have a nasty case of right wing terrorism at the moment.
Actually, the terror-group is finished, but by now they’re finding out that they’ve been murdering all over Germany for 10 years, mostly immigrants but also a young police-officer.
The police investigation was a disaster from the beginning. After the murder of the police-officer, they went looking for the “Phantom of Heilbronn”. The DNA they had secured at the crime scene showed up all over Germany in ways that they were puuzled as to how those crimes were related.
After it showed up on a coke-can related to a burglary in school, they became suspicious. They caught the local kids who did it and they said they never had a female companion. Why should they lie? Why should some kids who went after the computer and the tea money team up with a high profile criminal?
Finally they found out that they’d wasted years on looking for their phantom, because the DNA belonged to a woman in Switzerland who packed the cotton swabs. The person to order them did not know that there is a difference between “sterile” and “DNA-free”.
So now finally the case is solved, the murderers killed the,selves and their accomplice is in jail.
But there are a lot of questions and one is the involvement of the German “Verfassungsschutz”, that part of the intelligence that is responsible for threats from within the country.
Maybe it’s time for the responsible people to realize that their undercover agents and their informants are not working for their side and are just paid by them.
Here’s the sauce
Because of today’s xkcd I just spent the last hour reading up various map projections. Goode Homolosine is my favourite.
Giliell,
that group is indeed nasty, but I think the media is hyping it too much, like the Spiegel calling it the Brown Army Fraction. I’m still waiting for the dust to settle though.
Even in the 90s, Neo-Nazis were collecting addresses of leftists and circulating them. I assume the information sharing has gotten even better by now…
For those who may have been worried, Snip is doing alright now. I took away his food for like, twenty-four hours and despite him being hungry, he seemed fine. When I gave it back he was happy, and his problem has gone away. Must have been something he ate (I mean, the kitten eats plastic for Pete’s sake!)
I about died reading the title text for today’s xkcd.
Yay for Snip!
America has Dr. Doom!
http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/2011/11/weekend_diversion_youd_better.php
@Birger:
Okay. I need to get a Masters of Comp Sci at Wright State so I can have Doctor DOOM as my instructor XD
Qwerty is fine, thanks. The Segway got too good of a rap. And I have no need for 3D goggles.
*happily eats leftover BBQ for lunch*
Yesterday was great. I bought new shoes and then I got to have a great dinner with Sally Strange, Audley and Mr. Darkheart. It was awesome! My only complaint is that we didn’t have nearly long enough.
Again, please!
ahs ॐ:
agreed: Bucky Fuller ftw
StarStuff, ask your friend to enter a game with a female monicker and see if he likes the attention he gets.
Re people using “sluts” and “hoes” etc. How about referring to men as “pricks” and “gigolos” a few times? Then tell them you’re just copying their vocabulary.
Don’t forget “yard” among words for penis. Yeats used it. Now I’m wondering about the etymology of “yard-arm” on ships.
Pelamun, didn’t “loo” start out as a euphemism for l’eau (water, as in “I’m going to wash my hands”)?
Eh. Mouths have a lot more germs.
why are there so many more nonsensical and ‘fun’ names for the ol’ swizzlestick, and yet so relatively few names that don’t have some sort of bad connotations for the female equivalent?
Because men write/talk more than women?
I’m still voting for “poogle”.
Coyote,
In a patriarchal society, that which is unique to men (e.g. genitalia outranks that which is to unique to women. Penis > vulva, basically.
Slang terms map on to this. A slang term for the penis is less likely to be bad/vulgar than one for the vulva. Add to that the actor/actee view of sex (the man does stuff, the woman is acted upon) and the view that women are for sex and you get additional layers.
Esteleth, I didn’t know that about can-can dancers! Charming.
Pelemun, I read every word, too.
And now I have to get to my tasks for the day.
Josh, sounds cosy! A few flowers and tropical pictures might help you to survive until spring. Dar Williams sings “February.”
Esteleth, you beat me to that answer! [pouts off into a corner] :)
Mondado,
Can-can dancers?
*confusion*
A bit off topic but that totally reminds me of this stupid hillbilly I knew in a christian chatroom. He insisted only women could be virgins because virginity is literally defined solely by the hymen or someshit.
He also believed that God planted fake dinosaur fossils for some reason. Testing our faith? Heavenly dickery? I dunno.
Monado: I never heard ‘Poogle’ before. But I’ve noticed that in the right context, any nonsense word a person makes up can be interpreted as ‘penis’. I’ve tried it in discussions that involved sex, it’s kinda weird. Another thing I’ve noticed is that it’s hard to make up a nonsense word that hasn’t already been used to refer to the penis.
Or maybe I’m just uncreative.
Coyote,
Not just that – but a lesbian can bonk 3 times a day every weekday and 4 times on Saturday and Sunday, but still be a virgin. Because she’s never had sex. Sex requires a penis, you see.
Sorry, Giliell!
No Esteleth. There are no lesbians. Just angry women, and ugly women. “Lesbian” is what happens when a woman can’t find herself a good man.*
And no, he wasn’t a misogynist. He loved women- as long as they let him be the man of the house and didn’t try to hold any opinions of their own, jest like the Good Book says.
It bugs me because back in those days I was more naive and actually thought he was an OK guy for a while- he figured he wasn’t a judgemental bastard like ‘them other christians’ because he used to be a hippy and liked to smoke pot sometimes.
*hope my sarcastic parroting isn’t TOO offensive.
All the talk about defining virginity brought to mind this little ditty, aptly named “The Most Offensive Song Ever”. It’s by Mr. Hankey and Kenny (the portions in [brackets] are by Kenny, and therefore somewhat muffled).
Oh Benjamin, your nostalgic christmas song warms the cockles of my heart.
Yes, Coyote, there is a lesbian.
The Martini glass? Inverted Martini?
I was about to suggest cocktail glass to be more general, but I spotted the problem …
Mollweide.
Would a digital camera (specifically a DSLR shooting RAW) perform any sort of Fourier modification on an image? The results I’m getting from this program resemble an artifact I noticed in one of my photos. I think they call it “ringing”.
This provokes memories of my ex brother-in-law. Before they were married, my sister carefully vetted his attitudes, and he alleged as how he was in favor of strong, independent women.
Turns out that, to him, a “strong, independent woman” was one who, for example, when the injuns* killed her husband, would pick up his rifle from his cold, dead hands and soldier on, running the farm and raising his kids. Strength and independence in a woman just weren’t consistent with the premise of marriage, and neither was remarriage after his death on the menu, until after the deceased’s kiddies were raised. I suspect that the issue there was that if she remarried while the offspring were not yet adult, some other man would be living on his property, and there might be subsequent kids who might be unfairly given part of it.
As far as I know, he’s still alive…and remarried.
*And that was apparently the word he used.
–
dunno much about high-end digital cameras, but does yours have any fancy software going on, like edge detection?
Pteryxx:
It shouldn’t. A RAW image should be just that: the raw data coming off of the sensor. I know it doesn’t do any color correction (though it does store my preferences in the file, so Aperture can do it). I’d be disappointed if it was sharpening RAW images.
Oooh, a piece of art at the Place Of Work is a Dymaxion, much like this:
http://www.artnet.com/Galleries/Artwork_Detail.asp?G=&gid=112558&which=&ViewArtistBy=online&aid=6600&wid=168551&source=artist&sortby=imgorder&rta=http://www.artnet.com/ag/fulltextsearch.asp?searchstring=buckminster%20fuller
I shall be taking a closer look tomorrow.
Chas:
I have in my tentacles an Operating Manual. Fun stuff.
Benjamin: then I’d suspect the artifact may result from the sensor array itself and *its* handling software (it’s digital, so the raw data got processed by *something*). I get extrapolation artifacts in some very low-light pictures with my old digital camera. I’d swear I’ve gotten similar auras but can’t seem to find them now…
Debrett’s, via Walton: ‘spend a penny’.
Paxman, The English:
Class, eh? You either have it, or you have to cadge it from a copper.
Modern British class divisions:
http://www.sirc.org/publik/ptpchap6.html
OK, guys: I have a conundrum that just manifested itself today.
I work in a developmental biology lab, and one of the techs is a conservative Christian and rejects the veracity of evolution (evolution has huge holes, thinks macro and microevolution are completely different processes, thought Expelled was a good movie, etc.)
This came up in the course of a casual conversation, and the very mention of evolutionary theory got her rattling off generic criticisms and the incompleteness of the theory. Whatever, I’ve spent the last 10 years countering the same tired arguments, and it’s not difficult, and it isn’t as if she is a malicious or deceitful individual – she actually believes it. However, for the time being, I simply said, “I think we should avoid this discussion, because I know where it will inevitably end up going.”
My problem is that I work directly with this person daily; it isn’t as if I can avoid this person, and she’s been in this lab for about 13 years, and is in charge of much of the day to day operations of the lab; suffice to say she’s an integral lab member, so she isn’t going away anytime soon (my PI’s don’t know this about her, but it’s not as if she preaches about it; this is the first time she’s mentioned anything about it for the 6 months I’ve been working here). If I’m going to have an amicable working relationship, as much as I want to take her to task on this and try to correct the misconceptions about the theory she’s been taught, it seems like this is a topic I should avoid bringing up.
My desire for workplace harmony, right now, is in direct conflict with my personal ethic of not allowing ignorance to go unchallenged. This isn’t just some jerk-off creationist, where I have no desire to preserve a positive relationship, or the misinformed freshmen I used to teach in grad school, where my ethical responsibility to provide accurate information and instruction is paramount – this is someone I have to work with 5 days a week, and who has authority and seniority over me. Do any of you have any advice on how to approach this, or know of any resources I can utilize to help me find an amicable solution?
The other thing, how the hell she can work in a developmental biology lab, not believe in evolution, and have zero cognitive dissonance is a mystery to me.
How the hell does one work 13 years in a deb bio lab and still reject evolution?
It’s not like she’s just sweeping the floors, I take it?
Jinx?
Zugswang
I think you answered your own question. Just don’t talk about evolution.
Although what will happen when you are talking about your work, I can’t guess.
Stop calling him that. The man’s no more noble than the Färschdbischuf Silič O’Nopolitanopolous von Pfeil und Klein Elguth aus Ulm.
changeable moniker, I notice that site did not offer much advice for tourists who are women :P
I have a coworker who waltzed into a pub in Brampton once and ordered a margarita. She didn’t get one, but it makes for a good story.
Submitted without comment:
http://teizoku.tumblr.com/post/12719235156/your-dash-lacks-some-birds-with-arms
A preacher guy was on campus today. It was fun. I spent way too much time watching him and the people around him. I did get some people interested in Freethinkers though.
Sili, I never bothered to look. I guess he’s really just Lars Trier. Why does he use the name, just to sound cool?
I hate all of my real names. If I were going to call myself something cool I’d get rid of all of them.
MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP
Woah… really?
They have a computer science program, and apparently two MBA programs one of which you have to have something something TM something to attend.
Algernon, you need chapter 7.
Nope; she’s got authorship on several papers, though mostly it’s because she’s the one doing the grunt work on the research; her intellectual contributions are limited to performing the necessary tests and protocols to generate data. Her contributions to the rationales behind the research are absent, as are interpretation of the results, which are largely left to the PI’s who write the grants.
Yeah, that will be the biggest problem when it invariably comes up, which is why I’m hoping someone else has had to deal with this problem and can offer advice in how to approach it properly.
Though it is incredibly aggravating; it’s like working with a pharmacist who believes in homeopathy or an MD that still believes in the four humours.
Well, since we have #666. New Thread?
I’m leading my Freethinkers meeting this week and I came up with the topic. I feel like such a leader :D
For Rorschach: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KnBVJfXHx8.
Happier days, eh?
Benjamin, ringing is a normal artifact with filters, analog or digital. It’s why we have software/hardware filters.
(That’s simplistic, but you are the one who knows all about computers and is teaching.)
+++++++++++++++++++++
That xkcd about maps may be the best one ever!
+++++++++++++++++++++
IRT: terms for genitalia.
When I first moved to the south ‘cock’ was also a euphemism for the female genitalia. (Yes, really.)
And apparently ‘cunt’, as some of our world wide contributors insist, is also non-gendered.
Language changes all the time, we need to change with it. Terms get disseminated (snerk) more often and thru larger communities.
I agree with PZ, terms have different context intimately than they do publicly.
I try to keep to the pubic rules we have here in my public life.
Ha… I love the obscure Danish royal reference. Combined with the less obscure Monty Python reference.
O hai! I won’t try to catch up (except I’ve read upwards till comment 500), but I’ll try to keep up. If you think I’ve missed something interesting/cute/funny in the last month, please tell me. If you have any questions about how I survived America or how I liked everyone’s hugs, go ahead. :-)
I didn’t comment here earlier because I wasn’t able to sleep on the plane (had a seat that faced a wall, and the plane was full), got some kind of cold because my nose and throat dried out in the desert air of Las Vegas (at least I don’t wake up with totally dry lips anymore), and spent most of yesterday night working on the next paper now that we returned the page proofs of the previous one.
Mattir and onion girl, did you get my e-mail? onion girl, how was your 11/11/11 party?
…and in most written languages, the same is true of the vast majority of dialects. Case in point:
In German today, that’s ficken. If the most likely hypothesis on its origin is true (namely that it’s cognate with the English one), we’d expect it to be fücken; apparently the word died out in just those (few!) dialects that have – like Standard German – kept ö and ü instead of turning them into e and i and has entered today’s arguably standard language from a dialect that has undergone this sound change. May be impossible to test due to lack of written attestations either from dialects with the sound change before they had undergone the sound change or from dialects without the sound change before they lost the word.
At least one of these dysphemisms even spread beyond the Romance languages. Modern German Kopf is from Latin cuppa, which is where English cup comes from. German does retain the native word Haupt (cognate with caput and head), but only for poetic uses and as a prefix that means “main”.
I can’t resist explaining the details! :-) One of the Old High German words for war was werra. I gather the Latin word bellum died out because the western Roman Empire had such a long period of peace before the invasions of Germanic peoples that brought the word werra with them. By that time, Latin had already turned [w] into [v], so the closest thing to the foreign [w] was [gʷ] (spelled gu, and changed into [g] in later French).
There are other examples of this representation of foreign [w]. “Glove” in French is gant, from a Germanic word with [w]. The Gascogne is named after the Basques, whose [b] is a former [w] (Classical Latin Vascones, Classical Greek Ouaskónoi, IIRC).
As for why the English word has a, that might be an instance of the shift seen in R, heart, sergeant, clerk, and more obviously in varmin(t), varsity and book-larnin’. (If so, it was followed by influence from the preceding [w].)
Serbs and Croats.
Or the people of Baden and Württemberg. Not that they (probably) ever hated each other that much, but the subtle dialect boundary between them only formed when their, uh, provinces (within Germany!) were merged in the 20th century.
toilette au Wiktionnaire.
*hug*
I seem to have such intermediate states, but I know too few people to apply most points in the spectrum to.
I am very clever.
(I have also really looked at my hands, though. Have I already mentioned I have one white and one black hair on each wrist?)
Subverted in Hungarian*, which has “go into the” curses. Roughly, the noun that follows is the more offensive the less possible it is physically: ass < vulva < penis.
* Yes. I talk like TV Tropes. Deal with it.
Even the absence of a word can easily be interpreted that way. If I asked what you think about the length or diameter of yours, you wouldn’t ask back “my what?”.
Ignorance.
There are plenty of scientists who “know everything about nothing”, so she may know too little about comparative dev bio. Don’t get me started on all the molecular biologists who use the term “higher eukaryotes” for everything except yeast because they don’t fucking know that yeasts are secondarily unicellular ascomycetes, more closely related to morels than chanterelles are. *complete chimpanzee threat display*
Probably to make it ambiguously sound like he’s literally from Trier. Compare Söhne Mannheims.
Also… aaaaarrggggh. Some of the stuff I learn in my classes about immigration law in the US makes me so angry. I don’t have time to go into much detail now (though I really want to write a blog post on this when I have the time), but there are so many people – including refugees, victims of human trafficking, and others who are actually eligible for various forms of immigration relief – who simply get picked up by ICE, detained and deported, without any effective access to legal advice.
(If you’re an asylum-seeker and you can’t speak English, and you can’t find a pro bono attorney, you may find yourself grappling with a complex and opaque legal process without any access to legal advice, and, if it all goes wrong, being deported back to a country where you’re likely to be tortured, raped or killed. Not to mention the arbitrary requirements, like the one-year filing deadline for asylum introduced by an idiot Republican-controlled Congress in 1996; being unable to speak English, having no legal counsel and being unaware of the law are not considered valid reasons for missing the deadline. Likewise, if you’re a victim of human trafficking (which often means that you’ve been held in what amounts to involuntary servitude; plenty of undocumented migrant workers in America today are held in de facto debt-slavery), you are technically eligible for a type of immigration relief called a T visa; but this relies on law enforcement being willing to certify you as a trafficking victim. Again, if it goes wrong, you’ll find yourself detained in federal prison and deported.)
There is so much need for comprehensive immigration reform. The UK isn’t any better, and my (as-yet-unfinished) LLM paper is going to be an analysis and comparison of the (inadequate) forms of immigration relief available to migrant victims of domestic abuse in US and UK immigration law.
Sorry for harping on about this… I know I talk about it a lot. I just need to vent, since it’s an issue I feel very, very strongly about (and one that I know some people here are interested in, so I figured it wasn’t too off-topic for the endless thread). Justice for immigrants is right up there with gender equality and LGBT equality as a defining social justice issue of our generation. (And, indeed, it intersects with both of these issues; undocumented migrant women are at a particularly high risk of rape and domestic abuse, female asylum-seekers have often been raped and abused in their home countries because of their gender, and many LGBT migrants come from countries where being gay is illegal and where gay people live in constant fear of being murdered by homophobic mobs.)
It’s a Marjanović! *happpy dance*
(Sorry for filling the thread up with my off-topic political rants. I just have to vent about this somewhere, from time to time. And at least on Pharyngula most people get it; when discussing this anywhere else, I have to contend with the likelihood of some people chiming in and repeating the same old incoherent anti-immigration talking points and discredited myths.)
Oh, that reminds me. Over here, the probably most common term for “penis” (at least among schoolkids, but an attempt to write it is preserved on a monument in the chemistry building of the University of Vienna) turns out to be a very contemptual pronunciation of the dialectal version of “pouch”. Looks like it originally designated the scrotum, little kids misunderstood it, and generations of little kids have been learning it from each other ever since without any intervening adults.
The two vowels of “asshole” in the same dialects probably got switched the same way by kids who didn’t know it had any meaning other than “contemptibly evil person”.
Walton, stop apologizing. I found what you wrote to be very interesting and not that long.
David Marjanović
Did you miss The Great FreethoughtBlogs Hiatus of Last Weekend?
It was very traumatic.
*pounce* *hug* ^_^ Stop dancing. :-)
Walton, *hug* Rant away – in a thread of 700 comments, even if you insert a few 10-screeners, it still doesn’t look like you’re trying to dominate the conversation or something. :-)
*hugs back*
Except for its aftermath yesterday night, when I wanted to announce my presence, couldn’t get the comments to load at all, and gave up.
David – “Walton, *hug* Rant away – in a thread of 700 comments”
Yeah, that’s what I thought, but renumbering and more goddam glitches has taken it to 680.
WTF is going on here?
NEW THREAD!