A good friend of mine works at the Discovery Channel in Silver Spring. As soon as I heard news that gun wielding James J. Lee entered the Discovery building with bombs strapped to his body, I freaked the fuck out and called her. Fortunately, she was safely evacuated along with the majority of the employees. Only three were actually taken hostage and they made it out safe and sound after Lee was shot dead.
As more details emerged about James J. Lee, the internet exploded with liberals and conservatives blaming each other’s “extreme” philosophies as the motivating force behind his act of violence. Gun laws this. Tree-hugging radical that. Maybe he’s a Muslim. Maybe he follow some radical Asian religion. All this hateful, pedantic, straw man back and forth trying to blame the other side completely ignored the simple fact that James J. Lee was bat shit mother fucking crazy. It’s appalling to think that we’re so afraid of personal responsibility these days that we’re more than willing to blame a religion or political affiliation for the acts of a crazy man rather than the crazy man himself.
James J. Lee might have been a liberal tree-hugger. He may have believed in the living earth, Gaia. He may have listened to the Spice Girls (the Spice album, not that sellout Spiceworld crap). He was also crazy. It’s the crazy that made him do it, not the tree-hugging, not the Jesus, and certainly not the Spice Girls (I have no actual idea if he listened to the Spice Girls. But who knows). He was crazy. His crazy self had a choice to stay home and sit on his ass or strap on a bomb and a gun and go to the Discovery building. He made his choice. He is responsible for his actions. Liberalism isn’t responsible. Mother Gaia isn’t responsible. The Spice Girls aren’t responsible. James J. Lee is responsible.
What happened to personal responsibility? Are we so afraid to take ownership of our own mistakes that we’re readily willing to blame politics for this crazy fucker? If we must restore anything in this country, it’s personal responsibility. You are ultimately responsible for your own actions. You can choose to be influenced by politics or religion or music. But ultimately, it’s your choice, your fault, your responsibility.
James J. Lee should be blamed for his actions. Not politics. Not religion. Not music. Just him.
Wednesday, September 1st, 2010 at 8:57 am by Jamie
This is quite meta but also quite awesome. AZM Ally deepfreeze sent along photos of a Gundam made entirely out of gunpla sprus, those runner things that are left over once you snip out all the parts to your gundam. The 1.8 meter tall Gundam constructed by modeler Hirotyun was revealed at this year’s Chara Hobby 2010 convention.
It’s just so massively beautiful! They should have sent a poet!
There are some really impressive build-up photos over at Hirotyun’s site and more from the festival from Ngee Khiong.
At this past weekend’s Harvey Awards at the Baltimore Comic Con, Mark Waid delivered a heartfelt wake-up call to the print comics industry. Now since this is third, fourth, fifth hand since I wasn’t at the show, I can only base my assumptions of Waid’s main point from the various reports online. If I understand correctly, Waid intimated that protecting your ideas is not as important as profiting from them. It doesn’t sound like he was advocating piracy, but since this age of internet has made everything free, time would be better spent figuring out how to make money off of rather than jealously guarding our ideas.
I can imagine the gasps in the room from traditional publishers who depend on their copyrighted characters for licensing revenue and such. But for us webcomic folks, this is old news.
It is absolutely essential for artists to use the internet to promote their work. The catch is that as soon as you put something online, someone is going to steal it. You could spend ages trying to find new ways to prevent digital piracy, but you’ll never really deter the practice nor really stop it. That’s not to say that there’s no value in copyright. But it’s time to start thinking differently about our ideas. Creative Commons is a forward thinking licensing standard that responds well to the digital download era and it has benefited many artists. It gives would-be pirates a legal means to download and remix content while protecting the rights of the content creator.
Creative Commons is a good start. And it’s groups like these who provide these forward thinking tools that will help ween us off traditional notions of copyright protection that may be too antiquated to respond to a modern sensibility. I think Mark Waid was incredibly brave for sounding the call and I think once the dust settles a bit, the print comic industry might actually start moving forward along with the rest of us.
Yes, I realize that I’m the last site in the universe to post this. Hell, NPR did a story on this song before I got around to posting it. But whatever. Cee Lo Green’s “Fuck You” is the best breakup song ever, and here are six magical reasons why:
No Apologies
Breakup songs usually include lots of “I’m sorries” or “it’s my faults” and other emo bullshit like that. Not here. Though there is that one stanzas where he whines that he still loves her, the majority of the song is unapologetic. It’s not my fucking fault! You’re just a gold digger!
Expressed Rage
Besides the title, Cee Lo expresses anger at the woman in question, “Ooh, I really hate your ass right now.” That sentiment usually gets buried during a breakup, but sometimes you need to just let it out.
Upbeat
There is a mile long list of breakup songs that are really down and depressing and completely devoid of anything resembling happiness. Guess what. Sometimes you need to breakup. I certainly did. And now we have an awesome song to celebrate a proper breakup. I would have blasted this jam 24/7 after my divorce.
No Autotune
Okay, so autotune isn’t really a mainstay of the breakup song genre, but it has definitely cut a swath of ear pain across pop music of the 2010s. Thankfully, we’ve got some real vocals and real instruments in the mix.
Clever Use of a Racial Invective
If the N word is to be used, let it be in a clever, thoughtful manner, not as a punctuation to each stanza. Cee Lo’s background singers kind of sneak it in there so stealthily that I almost missed it the first time they sing, “(Oh shit, she’s a gold digga) Well! (Just thought you should know, nigga).”
Classy Music Video
According to the notes on the YouTube page, a “full video” is coming soon. I prefer this version. It’s rare that an artist will let the music speak for itself. Music videos have become overblown circus acts that sometimes have little to do with the lyrical content and very rarely enhance the listening experience. By just throwing the lyrics up there, “Fuck You” is allowed to shine as the perfect breakup song it truly is.
Thank you, Cee Lo Green, for giving us the perfect breakup song that we’ve always wanted.
From a homeless transvestite to a rollerskating bat boy to the woman of our dreams, Satoshi Kon pushed the boundaries of animated film to remind us that really, you can do absolutely anything in animation. I always felt a profound sense of joy and wonder after watching one of his films and while it saddens me greatly to know that I will no longer get that feeling from new works, I can return to the body of work that he left us to recapture that feeling.
My favorite Satoshi Kon film is Paprika. The interplay between dream and reality was beautifully executed. And it had the voice of Amuro Rei doing a fat Amuro Rei! We had the fortune of seeing it subtitled in a theater in Shirlington and I just remember having a gigantic stupid grin on my face the entire movie. It made me excited to see more of his work, but it also inspired me to continue to push my own work further. I really hope that other animators take inspiration from Satoshi Kon and push the bounds of what’s possible in animation, especially American studios who keep churning out the same 3D crapola. There’s more to explore with 3D and I think American studios would do well to take some lessons from Satoshi Kon’s direction.
If you have a fond memory of a Satoshi Kon work, please leave it in the comments. I feel it only fitting to celebrate the wonderful work he left behind.
If you would like to see a swarm of kids moshing to “Old MacDonald,” come out to the Ottobar tonight and see Peelander Z perform their version of the children’s classic. Evan, Yuko, Ananth, and I witnessed just such an occurrence Tuesday night at the Idol Explosion Summer 2010 at Death by Audio in New York. It was very surreal. Never did I think that Old MacDonald could inspire such feats of aggression.
Peelander Z is headlining the Ottobar’s first night of the Baltimore Independent Music & Arts fest which is a new, three-day arts and music fest taking place at 10 different venues throughout Baltimore. Should be a crazy show.
The 1/1 Gundam loves us and keeps giving and giving. According to news sent along from Angry Zen Minion Megan Rohm
and AZM Ally deepfreeze, spare parts from the life-scale Gundam were auctioned off from August 16-23 to benefit the Japan Committee “Vaccines for the World’s Children.” The initial auction raised ¥4,001,000 (about $46,900 USD). A second sets of parts will go to auction on September 13.
Honestly, I’m not so sure I’d want a piece of 1/1 Gundam Groin. I mean, I realize that without Gundam Groin, Gundam no walky. But I’d much rather go for a fin from the helmet or an vulcan cannon or a piece of thumb or something. Still, I think it’s pretty cool that the 1/1 Gundam loves us enough to save Shinjuku from colony drops and raise money to save the children of the world.
Like most Westerners, I always thought that pole dancing and other such pole related activities were only performed by strippers and sexy female athletic instructors. Imagine my surprise, then, when AZM Ally Wayne W sent along footage of Indian pole dancing known as mallakhamb.
Okay, so it’s not exactly pole dancing, but there’s a pole and there’s vigorous movement and the only poles that require vigorous movement that I was aware of were for dancing. Mallakhamb is a national Indian sport in which competitors jump on a pole and attempt to destroy any chance of having children by slamming their junk against the solid wood in a series of high speed movements. The shit is absolutely amazing.
If you want to see a less junk-smashing version, check out the post over at Wired to see mallakhamb done with a rope.
On the one hand, I absolutely love that Studio Ghibli has never made a direct sequel to its films. They are all special little moments in film wonderful to behold and completely unique. However, if sequels are to be made, let them be made of awesome things. Which is why the rumors sent over from Angry Zen Minion Jeff Posey of Hayao Miyazaki considering a sequel to Porco Rosso are so exciting! The new film would be entitled Porco Ross: The Last Sortie and would feature an older Porco and take place during the Spanish Civil War. We don’t have much more as far as details go, but in an interview with Japanese Cut Magazine, Miyazaki has been working on the background for the story.
Whether or not Miyazaki gets to make his Porco sequel depends largely on the success of Ghibli’s next two films. So, bottom line, if we want to see more Porco (and I’m pretty sure we do), we have to support Ghibli’s next two films (which is difficult here in the U.S., but somewhat doable).
As you know, I am fascinated by the dance styles of the world (how would you possibly know this). Tecktonik kinda blew my mind a little bit so I thought I was prepared to witness the Melbourne Shuffle and Jumpstyle. I was not.
Now this clip is from 2008 so I have no idea if the kiddies are still doing these two styles in the raves of 2010. Of the two, I think the Shuffle is more fun than Jumpstyle. Jumpstyle looks like the kicking exercises I used to make my kids go through when I was teaching martial arts. The Shuffle kinda looks like angry robots stomping on a swarm of cockroaches which is immensely amusing without the added possible danger of kicking someone in the teeth as presented in Jumpstyle.
Maybe I’m just not hanging out in enough anime con raves.
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