sundries

[rm]

There are just a few more days to bid on things at debsliverlovers. Some more really cool stuff went up yesterday (an awesome novel with art drawn into it directly by Thomas Canty! An original page of comic art from Colleen Doran!) and some more awesome stuff will be going up today. So far the auction looks like it's raised 6K, but the goal is 10K to help with the costs associated with this live donor liver transplant. Go check it out.

This UK trip is still confusing.

I know it's super easy to go to Cardiff for a day. Patty and I did it last month. What's not super easy is leaving New York on July 7, landing in London on July 8, going to Cardiff on July 9, heading to Bristol that night, heading back to London on July 11, leaving for New York on July 12. See how much better this plan is if Cardiff just gets removed? SO MUCH BETTER. But I'm still torn because of the nature of my research and my desire for fabulous gluten-free welsh cakes. Also, the part where I am whiny.

On the other hand, after reading an article about how awfully hard it is to manage to use points on Delta, I'm a bit more "fuck it" and leaning towards Virgin Atlantic. Did you know, however, that you can't trade frequent flier points between Virgin Atlantic and Virgin America? Also, the most ideal times for the flights to allow me to actually do stuff in London on Monday involve me flying back into Newark. Getting home from Newark sucks, but a little bit of inconvenience is worth it, right?

Also, what do I want to see in my brief stays in London this time? Imperial War Museum. But what else? What do I want to see in my super brief sojourn in Bristol? Cardiff is the WORST possible plan, right? The question is whether not going to Cardiff is an even more terrible plan.

smirnoffmule made a warning for slash bingo card. If you start to say one of those things on the card? Stop.

Remember that thing when LJ tried to make people indicate a gender _and_ the options sucked? Now it's DeviantArt's turn. Bad plan, DeviantArt, bad plan.

Life on the subway was super annoying this morning: don't fucking litter and don't fucking sit like your balls are the size of New Jersey. It kept making me want to burst out in Buffy-esque song.

Last night after helping a friend put stuff into storage and fighting the subways Patty got home super late, so we have no Buffy or Angel update for you. Also, I am pretty damn tired, as we stayed up too late talking when she did get home, because we prize the check-in time.

The love from fictional characters meme hasn't just been funny, it's been oddly sweet.

redstapler links us to sidewalk lanes for New Yorkers vs. Tourists. Pity it's a joke.

I got a ticket to the White Collar event at the Paley Center. Yay.

Meanwhile, Patty and I must get Metropolis tickets immediately.

My parents have started to read my Bristol paper. They're on page 9. They are proud of me. My mother says she didn't know science fiction was about things. I explain that genre is merely incidental to the work - Sherlock Holmes isn't science fiction (although, fiction with science!) - as SFF has more ways of talking about death constantly. So far she finds the paper "sweet" and "fascinating" but I don't think she's gotten to the part that I expect will break her brain yet. My father relays his more muted opinions through my mother, which is good, or else he'll talk to me about god.

Comments

[curriejean.livejournal.com]

But, it looks from here like the purpose of a bingo card (any time the meme is used) is to turn an opposing position's defenses (however incorrect they are) into cliches. I think that's a passive-aggressive form of refutation, and it bugs me when I see bingo cards made from positions I agree with because passive-aggression isn't necessary.

You're right because you're right, not because the opposing side's statements are cliched. Cliches can be correct or incorrect, and using criticism of cliche as an argument (I am viewing the card as an attempt at argument -- it's been posted publicly) is really just a form of rhetoric. Rhetoric is unreliable. It only works on people who don't know any better, and the rest of them are likely to be offended by its use, making the bingo card self-defeating.

I think I've been bugged into actually saying something because I agree hard with your point -- that 'warning' for slash (maybe 'warning' at all, even, since it's normatively regulatory) is inflammatory. Just label for content when the displayed pairing doesn't make it evident (if that ever even happens). It's as simple as that, and people do need to get it. I think this would be done best by telling them directly.

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

I am viewing the card as an attempt at argument -- it's been posted publicly

It wasn't intended to start an argument at all (though I'm happy to engage anyone who wishes to contest a square with me; and actually, I did edit in an explanation of my choices when I became aware people were linking this in order to provide a better context). And as it happens, I do tell people directly, frequently. This bingo square isn't about that first step of telling people, it's about that next step, when someone has been told, and isn't buying it, and comes back with all the highlighted arguments - which went into the squares because I've heard them often enough to consider them cliches. I didn't invent a single one. In fact, I was moved to make the square because I've been participating in and seeing this kind of conversation so often that I've long since stopped hearing any original or unrefutable counter-arguments. As well as allowing me to collect my own thoughts, I hoped it might be useful to others who are less familiar or confident with this issue - certainly I've found similar cards to be useful in helping me recognise and refute common derailing techniques.

You do seem to be proceeding from the assumption this bingo card is the pinnacle of all engagement in this conversation, either for me personally, or for the wider fandom, but it isn't; it's intended as a meta-comment on a wider discourse, not the entire discourse itself - and it's not intended to be an argument in itself, but a comment on one.

I grant also there's an element of expressed frustration and humour there, and I won't even try and deny it could be construed as passive-aggressive if someone's been presenting the kind of argument that's likely to lead them to take it personally - but, honestly, this is a deeply personal issue for me, and others, and if you're going to argue we are never ever allowed to be the ones who are snarky, even among ourselves, when we're the ones who stand to be hurt by this issue, then basically what you're making is a tone argument. If I don't happen to want to be patiently teaching people who ought to be perfectly capable of teaching themselves today, then I'm not actually obliged to.

[curriejean.livejournal.com]

I don't even have anything to say to this. I have been educated, probably pwned. Thank you. :)