Category Archives: Popular Culture

Humor, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Weird

It Has Come To This

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The Sioux Nation is Siouxing the NCAA over its political correctness:

“Though the NCAA has decided ‘Fighting Sioux’ is derogatory, the NCAA supports the University of Illinois’ use of the name ‘Fighting Illini,’ and the use by Florida State University of the name ‘Seminoles’ along with the Seminole mascot – someone dressed in Native American attire who rides into the FSU stadium on a horse and throws a flaming spear before every home football game,” said Soderstrom. “The NCAA claims these are not derogatory depictions because the Illini people and the Seminole people approve of the use of the name and mascot. Inexplicably, the NCAA fails to accept the tribal vote and the sacred religious ceremony as endorsements of the name ‘Fighting Sioux’ by the North Dakota Sioux Nation.”

The lawsuit claims that the Sioux tribe were “indispensable parties” to a lawsuit filed by the State of North Dakota against the NCAA in 2007, the settlement of which required the state to get permission from the Spirit Lake and Standing Rock Sioux tribes, but were never included in negotiations of that settlement. It also alleges defamation, violations of the Indian Civil Rights Act, defamation and an unlawful restraint on trade.

You know, in the old days, they would have just taken some scalps.

Media Criticism, Popular Culture, Social Commentary

Transformers 3

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A review, by Lileks:

It’s ridiculous to think about “Transformers 3” for more than six seconds, since it concerns “living mechanical creatures” who evolved into bipeds capable of rearranging their structure to resemble cars and trucks, even though these things do not exist on their planet. They were known as Autobots, even though those things do not exist on their planet. Then they got into a war with the Decepticons, beings who display absolutely no skill at nomenclature. If you are in the business of deception, so much so that it permeates your entire culture, it does you no service to announce the fact in your name. “Are you telling me the truth, Mr. Decepticon?” “Oh, absolutely.”

But if this bothers you, consider that you are watching a movie that has a robot from another planet who speaks in a Scottish accent. There are no words to describe the complete & utter . . . AUUUUUGHHHHH that produces in your critical brain. You can buy everything else, if you want; you can even make up some story about how they can really shape-shift into anything, not just cars, and “Autobots” is what it sounds like in our language, and really they call themselves something else, but when a character from the other side of the galaxy WHO IS A ROBOT talks in the accent of a particular part of a small island in the Northern Hemisphere, you know you’re dealing with large groups of people who don’t give a crap. The entire franchise is predicated on the unwillingness of anyone to ever utter the phrase “but that makes absolutely no sense” during any part of the creative process. Oh, I know why he speaks with a Scottish accent: he’s an engineer, and Scotty had such an accent. Ergo. Of course ergo. But it’s still wrong.

So it’s all stupid. It’s a stupid cartoon for little boys. This is fine if your inner little-boy can be coaxed out to enjoy the carnage, and your adult brain can enjoy the disjointed flow (action! broad comedy! heartwarming stuff! offkilter guy yelling a lot! action! drama!) and skip all the Trials of Shia nonsense that fill up the first hour.The only reason it has any resonance to someone who meets the technical definition of adulthood is because A) Optimus Prime sounds really wise and noble and moving, and damn, you just like the big guy, and B) it’s interesting to watch all that stuff coming at you. The CGI on this thing is just amazing. The battle in Chicago, which consumes the final seven hours of the movie, is a thing to behold.

Unfortunately, it too infested with humans. The script is designed to make you loathe every moment wasted with the human actors. GET BACK TO THE ROBOTS! No one acts like people act. No one says things people would say in these situations. Everyone is an archetype devoid of embellishment. The only way to watch the movie is to hit the NEXT CHAPTER button and unless there is a robot in the FIRST SECOND OF THE CHAPTER, hit next, because they had their chance to give you robots and they missed it. Repeat until movie is over.

I think I’ll pass. But go read the whole Bleat — there are bonus pics of classical composers, and thoughts on the elusive and mysterious nature of memories.