A Fatal Lack Of Imagination

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Apparently over the weekend a movie called The American Society of Magical Negroes bombed pretty badly at the box office.

The first I heard of it was that Hollywood was blaming the black population of America for not doing enough to promote it. Which, as one of you put it, is bizarre lunacy, because even if all 14% of America that self identifies as black were madly in love with it and pushed it, how would it have made the movie a blockbuster.

Put that in your mental tab for a moment. We’ll come back to it.

Today I stumbled on an article on it in Bounding Into Comics, and in it this curious quote from the director.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, when Grier, Smith, and Libii talked about their own “experience with racism,” Smith said, “It’s so funny because, as black audiences… as any marginalized person can attest to, we’ve had to find ourselves in white stories.”

“We’ve had to find white characters that we identify with for so long, and then now that we’re centering ourselves in these stories white audiences, for the first time ever, are being like, ‘Oh, like, like, now I have to find myself, even though no one in this looks like me. Like, I really identify with this protagonist.’ But that’s where empathy comes from, you know, that’s where actual movement comes from,” the actor asserted.

I was flabbergasted. The whole idea that there are black stories and white stories is bizarrely racist. There are human stories. There are cultural stories.

Most of the movies made in America, before the curious plague of woke, were simply American stories. They couldn’t be written or filmed anywhere else. The skin color of the actor playing it might matter, if the character’s back story indicated the character was black or of African origin, or white, or purple with polkadots. Or it might not matter at all. Men in Black (the first) would work just as well if both leads were white, or both were black, or whatever. It would not work if the characters were other than American.

The idea that skin color is somehow a culture is one that Hitler believed in. Your skin color, your level of tan, your ancestry defines everything about you, and you must think and feel and have a common culture and values of people of similar levels of tan. This is also self-evidently crazy cakes, if you’ve ever been outside the US where the northern European cultures span the gamut from England to Scandinavia to areas of France, and no, they’re not all the same, not even close.

Even more so, if you’ve ever been to or even studied Africa, you know that it’s not all the same culture. In fact, it’s a new culture every hundred miles or so, with completely different values, language, etc.

Seriously, it’s an idea so stupid and provincial, only our exquisitely educated entertainment elites could believe this. And that’s because they’ve been indoctrinated into believing it.

Ultimately, though, given the joy with which they take over those “white stories” like, oh, the life of Anne Boleyn (I do realize that was in England, but the overculture at this point is all the same crazy) or “the Little Mermaid” just by changing the characters to black, the truth is that I have to suspect they really are extremely shallow and only believe they can “see themselves” in the stories if they are played out before their eyes by people of the same exact skin color or close enough.

I can’t describe the level of shallowness of this, which makes it doubly hilarious to hear the director lecture the world on empathy. That’s just the chef’s kiss.

To be fair I started being furious at this with women who couldn’t read books — fantasy, science fiction, whatever — unless the protagonist were a woman.

This is just as childish, and a fatal flaw of human empathy and understanding of humanity.

I don’t think it’s normal either. I think you need to be indoctrinated to be that bizarrely incapable of functioning like a normal human being.

Because as an eleven year old girl in Portugal I could read stories of middle aged men in a future US and empathize with the heroes and dread the villains. The story didn’t need to have women, or people with Portuguese names or whatever.

Okay, Sarah, you say, but if you don’t need it, why not let them do the good stories with an all black cast? Why aren’t people going to it?

Well, you know the problem is… remember I told you to open a tab and leave it open? These people apparently believe that the black population of the US is about 50%. Mostly because that’s what they see in the movies and TV. And if they grew in urban areas, they might very well think that’s reality too.

But it isn’t. And this is why movies and TV shows that have entirely black casts tend to strike people as false. And even black people tend to bounce away from it, because it’s not real, and at some level they know it’s not real. At least black people that live in the real world.

You can tell a story with an all white cast, sure, because you can tell a story with roughly 75% of the population and it just incidentally doesn’t include any other parts of it. But telling the entire story with 14% is ridiculous and it feels forced and bizarre.

And what’s causing all this lunacy, including people thinking they can’t identify with other humans of different sex or skin color, is … well, propaganda.

Propaganda has convinced people that they’re widgets who belong only with other people who look exactly like them.

And it has driven deep rifts between men and women, between people of different tans (or not even that. Again a world in which Megan Markle is black is a world not in contact with reality.) It has brought us to the edge of destruction, with everyone thinking everyone slightly different from them is out to get them.

And it’s ridiculous. All of it is utterly ridiculous.

The people who bought into it hook line and sinker, and think it’s vital to propagate it in every piece of entertainment and every news item, and every possible mass communication, also expect to be rewarded for it with accolades and told they’re doing good.

And when it doesn’t happen, they’re baffled and angry because it must mean people are really out to get them.

And this is where we are.

The only way to back out of this, particularly now when they are so lacking into imagination that they can’t tell compelling stories that aren’t the equivalent of just screaming at the audience, is to replace them.

We have to tell stories that appeal to people. And keep doing it. And break all the stereotypes. And bring people together, instead of apart.

It’s nothing, right? So?

Roll up the sleeves and get to it.

239 thoughts on “A Fatal Lack Of Imagination”

  2. My wife was just reading Batavia’s Graveyard by Mike Dash, and telling me a synopsis of the events involved. (It’s a non-fiction history book about one of the bloodiest mutinies in history — but some of the non-mutineers survived so there’s plenty of eyewitness testimony to the events). And I thought, that would make a terrific movie, but Hollywood is too stupid to ever make it properly. It would take an independent movie maker. You’d need a decent budget, because you’d need a ship and you’d need to film on some islands that looked right… but it could be done with no CGI. Budget, probably less than a million dollars (though I have no idea how expensive it would be to build a wooden ship that looked right… but maybe you could hire one). Not quite amateur-in-his-backyard territory, but easily in reach of an indie studio.

  3. Considering that one of my favorite characters is

    male

    green

    winged

    breathes fire

    a few centuries old

    I don’t think I even begin to understand the issue.

      2. And his computerized friend’s name graces my desktop computer. (Shares the same sense of humor at times, too. Oy.)

        1. Indeed my laptop is Mycroft. Of course ALL the computers and computer like things on our network are named after self aware computers. GlaDos, Wheatly, Colossus, Holly, Deep Thought, Mychelle. No HAL or SAL, so far I’m sorry we can’t do that Dave…

      4. Mine is a computer from that same book.

        I like and have identified with a lot of characters who aren’t even human beings, as I suspect most people on this blog have. I could probably name 20 or 30 just off the top of my head.

          1. That reminds me: Thanks for posting that rec a while back. One of the most fun books I’ve read in years. I’m going to have to finish the series when I get the chance.

      5. i always loved Mycroft. I’m female but I certainly didn’t identify with Wyoh. 

      6. i always loved Mycroft. I’m female but I certainly didn’t identify with Wyoh. 

      7. Possibly Brazilian with Hispano African mix? In one of the later books (The Cat Who Walks Through Walls maybe) he needs a limb and one of Lazarus’ backup clones is used as it is a good, possibly exact, match. He then notes that it is not an exact match colorwise hinting he is something other than Woodrow Wilson Smith’s rather pasty shade of white.

          1. OK bad memory on my part haven’t read that since it came out the post Number of the Beast stuff never quite did it for me. I think Manny is also arrested in the North American Confederation for miscegenation (and bigamy) when he and the Professor are on the Earth when he shows pictures of his line family and Wyoming in particular in Moon is a Harsh Mistress.

            1. Yep. If I remember correctly the Professor helped engineer the arrest to gin up support on Luna. He certainly wasn’t upset by it.

    2. One of my favorite fictional characters is a Jewish father of five living in pro-Communist Russia. I have nothing in common with him. He’s still one my favorite characters.

  4. “Again a world in which Megan Markle is black is a world not in contact with reality.”

    When has Great Britain ever been in contact with reality (other than a couple of brief moments)?

        3. They may view my finger. In fact, they may view my other finger. Both, simultaneously. Digiti impudici arise!

        4. Honestly the way I’ve seen Brits talk about her now makes me wonder how she got elected to begin with. They really hate her.

      2. I’d say Churchill. Thatcher was good, but the society was way too far gone by then.

        1. The fact that they dumped Churchill at the first opportunity says a great deal about them.

          1. At the risk of someone by immense coincidence figuring out I’m in his/her parish: our priest, a South African, gave a sermon an how Churchill was so mean and made cutting remarks and stood up against evil. And how some sins can be forgiven and some strange people are called.
            He never made the parallel, but I’m sure we all did.

            1. I’m a bit confused… What was his complaint, that Churchill was mean or that he stood up against evil? Or both, which would say interesting things about his morals?

              1. I understood Sarah to be saying that the priest was praising Churchill overall, and saying that God can used flawed tools to achieve good results.

              2. Probably that Churchill was mean and made cutting remarks; similar to a certain Orange Man (except it’s not as orange anymore.) I think the point being that both somewhat irascible individuals were doing good works in the face of adversity.

                It might be said that you can’t get to Heaven without doing good works, but the point that is often missed is that you need to make sure you’re not doing evil things in the first place.

              3. No, he was actually not complaining, just telling people they don’t have to be perfect.
                South African refugees are rarely left. Happens, but rarely.

                1. I always go back to C.S. Lewis where Screwtape is rejoicing the lack of Great Sinners, because when his Enemy gets through to them, they’re just as ready to upset everyone as Great Saints.

                2. Got it; thanks (and thanks to all those who suggested the same thing). I don’t know why that didn’t occur to me; lack of sleep and just finished doing taxes, probably. Yeah, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it! 👀

                    1. Yuck is right. The only thing good about the process is the (fairly) recent ability to file electronically, even state returns. Still a PITA to gather all the receipts, etc. (which hasn’t changed, and takes hours), but the actual filling out and filing is almost painless. It’s still armed robbery, of course, but that’s another issue.

                    2. I love TurboTax. Two hours max. Hardest is the medical entries, for state. Never have them completely totaled by the way the state wants them. Easy to do because of the sub categories, but still, not fully prepared. Seriously, we are both over 66, why do you care which part of the total medical was mine and what was hubby’s? Also, don’t track total, total medical, just out of pocket. So “compensation” is always going to be $0. Usually don’t even know how much the total bill actually was.

                    3. I always did our taxes; never used a tax program. But I think I can safely say that this…

                      https://www.freetaxusa.com

                      …is the fastest, easiest way I’ve heard of to do takes almost no time, at least if they’re fairly simple as ours are: two SSA’s, two IRA RMD’s, and one pension plan distribution; standard deduction. If you’re not itemizing, it literally takes about half an hour for Fed *and* state (AZ). I went through the itemize process just to see what the difference was; standard was almost 3X better, so, with AGI of ~$21k, no taxes again this year. IIRC we haven’t paid any Fed *or* state tax since around 2012.

                    4. Cheaper than TurboTax for sure. Except we use same TurboTax for our, son’s, and mom’s, returns. Son has, and we have had, some stock dividends and gains/losses to deal with too. Easy with TurboTax Premium, straight from the brokerage accounts. Base TurboTax cost is equal to $14.99 * 3, for the state (Oregon). Although we all snail mail the state because not free to efile Oregon through TurboTax.

  5. My beloved just reminded me of the Arthur C. Clarke story about the lost colony devastated by a horrible plague. The galactic government has found them and is sending a message telling them their history. And the story ends with some variation of, “….and don’t worry, if any of you are still white, we can cure you!”

    His comment was that it was an enjoyable story with a zinger at the end. But it had to be an enjoyable story to get you to the zinger.

  6. My latest mini-hobby has been getting LLM AI systems to write woke short stories.

    The problem is that I can’t tell the difference in quality between the AI work and those of the current woke authors.

    I’ve got a factory to win Hugo awards!

    3. Indeed! As I said in a recent piece about AI/ML:

      “Machine language generated art is crude. Machine generated text is crude. If you’re Dave Barry, you have nothing to fear from ChatGPT. If you’re Joe “cut and paste” journolister, you may find that the computer does your job better and faster than you, so go ahead and feel threatened. You weren’t putting any intelligence into your job to begin with. Also, get a real job you useless drone!”

  7. A friend of mine put it, on the subject of needing “representation” to enjoy a story: “One of my favorite movies is the story of a widowed mother who performs acts of courage for her family and is also a field mouse.”

    1. This.

      Also, Redwall and that whole book series.

      Heck, there’s a reason most of the video stuff I’ve been watching lately is some flavor of Asian drama – sure, the cultures are different, but love, honor, evil, facing impossible odds? Those are human stories!

        1. Based on the short clips I’ve seen posted on YouTube, it appears to be sticking relatively close to the novel. There are some changes. For example, in the novel Blackthorn only trains the troops on musket tactics, and not on the cannons (which stay with the ship).

          And some of the names have been changed to match better with what an actual Japanese name from the era would sound like. As an example, the daimyo Yabu in the novel has his name lengthened to Yabushige in the mini-series.

          1. Interestingly enough, the cannon bit would make the show closer to actual history. There’s at least circumstantial evidence that 1) Ieyasu did, indeed, take the cannons off the ship to win at least one battle, and 2) William Adams and possibly one of the other Dutch sailors were there showing how to target.

            1. Correct. From what I understand, the cannons from the actual ship were used at Sekigahara, which was the big, important battle at the time (and the one that got Tokugawa the Shogunate). The Japanese understood cannons, and had a few. But they were in fortifications, as the rugged terrain of Japan wasn’t a good place to try and haul cannons around int.

          2. There’s a scene where the Japanese tell Blackthorn “We have muskets and we know how to load and fire them: What we need from you is infantry tactics Toranaga’s enemies have not seen.” He starts off trying to BS them with stories, gets called on not actually having been there for the story he starts, does a “Dammit Jim, I’m a sailor, not an infantryman” look, then it occurs to him to train what he actually knows: naval artillery.

            My guess is they collected up some of the complaints about the book and original miniseries, including something like “The Portuguese sold guns, just not a lot, so the Japanese already knew what the book showed Blackthorn teaching” and adjusted the story.

            1. The novel makes a big deal about the 500 guns that the Erasmus brought, but those in and of themselves wouldn’t have been a big deal. While the number of guns in use by the Japanese during the period has been revised downward more recently, there’s still no dispute that there were lots and lots of guns in the Japanese armies of the time period, and that the Japanese were making lots of their own. However, the Japanese only ever made matchlock guns, and of an older design than what the Europeans were producing by the end of the Sengoku Jidai. So that’s why the Japanese would have continued to eagerly trade for European weapons. The European guns were lighter and could fire more quickly in comparison to the home-built guns.

              The novel also has samurai declaring that “Guns are dishonorable!”, which would have been an outdated attitude by then. Firearms were a widely accepted part of warfare. And as I noted elsewhere, the only reason why the Japanese didn’t use cannons in their field armies is likely because the rugged terrain made hauling the things around very difficult.

              1. And the use of mobile artillery gets really spiffed up by Napoleon with his “flying artillery” groups. This is of great use in rough terrain as likely the Mexicans found out at the battle of Palo Alto in the Mexican American war. But this requires FAR more sophisticated lighter cannons on nimble carriages than the 17th century generally had and especially than those used in Naval Warfare. Maybe some of Gustav Adolphus’ concepts, he’s early 17th century. But my memory of the earlier Shogun series sets it contemporary or earlier than Gustav Adolphus.

                1. The Battle of Sekigahara was 1600 (the exact year). The series is an alternate universe version of the lead up to it (while some of the characters – including Mariko – resemble real people, the real world lead-up to Sekigahara was completely different). So yeah, cannon at the time weren’t like what we normally think of.

                  1. And by 1630, Japan was well along the road to closing itself off from outside access, so those developments wouldn’t have made it in.

    2. See, my first favorite character was actually a lot like me.

      Lived in California, folks didn’t know him so well, clashed with a lot of idiots, liked wooshy capes…

      Wait, what do you mean Zorro didn’t have a lot in common with a bookish, 8 year old, mostly-Irish ranch girl?

      Well, then there’s a swashbuckling, teleporting, original :BAMF!: of the fuzzy blue elf! Totally like me, loved word play, and laughing with friends, and he was even Catholic! … K, Nightcrawler’s cute, too, and I’m nowhere near as cute as Kurt….

        2. Until I actually meet you, I can picture you as anything I like. So swing away, barbarian sword-swinging monster hunter!

            1. “The Sword makers guild couldn’t figure out why there was a sudden surge in sales of long daggers.”

      2. Not directly related, but a convergence of movies and political correctness, and that Californio cape and sword guy:

        ”One bit, two bits, three bits, a peso; All those for Zorro, stand up and say so!”

        You want to ponder something from a major Hollywood studio that will never, ever see the light of day again? George Hamilton in “Zorro: The Gay Blade.”

  8. We just finished “Masters of the Air” from Apple TV, about bomber crews in WWII. I highly recommend it. The men were heroic and realistic and many of them died or were horrifically injured. I was riveted. I wept. I cheered. Not a hint of the current cultural rot was in that show. Let’s have more of this, please…

    1. What? No daring Black Lesbian Luftwaffe pilots resisting the Allied Anglo oppression? How dare they!

      😉

      2. She wasn’t black, though she was very close friends with the president of Ghana, might not have been not a lesbian, but Hanna Reitsch (test pilot, crazed (IMHO) Nazi) was decidedly female.

        She survived a test flight in the ME 163, IMHO one of the scariest airplanes that flew (modulo the Christmas Bullet).

          1. Aye. Wiki mentioned the guesses that her fatal “heart attack” in the ’60s was a long delayed use of a gift of a cyanide pill that ‘Dolfe gave her when she saw him at the bunker shortly before he became a former Fuehrer. (Sorry, I don’t do umlauts. 🙂 )

  9. By demanding that people be able to “see themselves” in entertainment, they have sown the seeds for their own destruction. Individuals can now legitimately walk away from anything with the comment “Well, I am not represented there”. 

    Which, to the original point, is silly.

    I do think that this problem eventually rights itself simply because of the fact that – as recent releases have shown – this sort of thing is being rejected by almost everyone. And while studios and publishers cannot likely “say” anything, they are going to have to deal with that one cannot continually lose money and stay in business.

    I think my favorite fictional characters, for the record, are a rabbit named Hazel and a Captain of mercenaries on the world of Cecach.

    1. Oh, given my mix of things I can have an excuse to walk away from anything on that basis. Mind you, in reality I would walk away because “your movie sucked, it was boring, and/or revolted me (and not in a delightfully creepy fun way)”. Because see elsewhere about “field mouse.”

    2. Apparently you’re not the only person who likes that rabbit. Many years ago, I saw the following comment about a Gundam side story –

      “I can’t figure out the names. I mean Hazel is a normsl name, even if it’s odd for a mobile suit. But how did the author come up with Hrududu?”

      😋

    3. I do hate the whole “representation matters” school of thought. I’m not looking for a mirror in my fictional characters, I’m looking for a window.

        1. What’s Iconic/Sad/Insane is that Whites are Racist if we say anything about “wanting White Characters”.

          Mind you, White Males are also sexist if we want Male Characters (especially male characters we can see as good people).

          1. White people (and apparently I count, though I’m apparently going to age into brown, as mom did. I don’t know why) are racist for existing. I also fail to get this.

  11. The crazy idea that skin Pantone match determines how much money a movie makes is just something the studio execs will buy, and it just means that actors will be replaced faster with AI CGI characters, and there will be about 20 versions spit out for localized targeted marketing with variable Pantone mixes.

    Maybe the actors can get jobs wearing the stupid green bodysuits with the painted ping pong balls glued on to work as mocap models to help the AI with the tricky scenes.

      1. Exactly. Storytelling is all … the color, gender, species of the characters is all up for grabs.

        Just make it interesting.

        Currently, among the wokerati, that seems to be a bridge too far.

  12. Oh, and about that “Lack of representation”….

    As one of the commenters said, “I can’t. I just can’t….”

    History, people! Crack a book! It’s really not that hard.

    Sigh.

    1. They firmly believe the Bridgerton’s mini-series is History and Queen Charlotte was “black” because of a bad portrait and she ha a MOORISH ancestress 500 years before.
      Portuguese “Moors” tended red head and blond, because of the many many Germanic and Frankish concubines. But hey, Othello the Moor is traditionally played in black face therefore, add the zero, carry the stupid, they’re totally justified.

      1. Bemused I keep having to remind myself that most people actually don’t read history….

        I have to admit I especially liked the snarky comments about, “Hey, where are all the Japanese people in Black Panther?”

        1. :panther grin: Oh, those were good!

          On a side note, no bets as to how they would portray Teal’c these days. Christopher Judge took one look at the part and was all over it in an instant, said he wanted it badly because he knew he could do it. Now? Good luck. Not happening, and that’s a crying shame. I love Teal’c and watching Judge perform was a treat. I hate to think how many actors and actresses like him are being hamstrung these days and feel really bad (and really worried) for Anthony Mackie, Marvel fan extraordinaire and good actor in his own right….

      2. ”Germanic and Frankish concubines”

        Don’t neglect the genetic input of centuries of Islamic slave raiding of coastal towns in Ireland and Britain, continuing quite late into modernity.

          2. Fair’s fair, perhaps Ireland and the UK should pursue reparations from the North Africans.

            1. Honey child, I could get reparations from EVERYONE except possibly white Americans. Except those descended from Romans.
              Of course, I’m descended from some Romans too.
              Takes money from one pocket. Puts it in the other. Giggles.

              2. Think of all the “African-American,” celebrities who obviously have crackers in their genetic woodpiles who ought to have to pay reparations to themselves.

                1. And you could bet the government (feh) wants the biggest part for them (and a 10% cut for the big Turnip…).

              4. Looked at the family tree, family Bibles, the DNA and the volumes of history books… Nothing but mutts. Probably a few Vikings…

                I’m Slavic/German/Irish/Swedish/and whatever English mutt was in mix. I can’ figure out which one hasn’t oppressed, enslaved or killed the others. Maybe I’ll ask one of my other personalities or past lives. 

                But I’m also one of the few people I know that was forced to work in the cotton and grain fields as a child. (Payed for school and Sunday clothes)

                The spouse is a hillbilly/Eastern European Jewish combo with a large touch of West Africa. If her family opposed anyone it was their husbands and children. 😉

                And we did reparations already. It was called:

                Republicans defeating Democrats in the Civil War to end slavery and several trillion dollars that have been spent on education, busing, housing, welfare, SNAP, affirmative action, DEI, so on…

                We owe you NOTHING. GOOD DAY SIR.

                  1. Levar Burton just found out his great grandfather was a white confederate soldier. That PBS (Politburo Broadcasting Station) show roots or whatever the hell it’s called did his genealogy. He was needless to say shocked.

                2. Hear Hear. My ancestors were strong Abolitionists many fought in the Civil War viewing its cause to be that peculiar institution no matter what the actual causes might be. The church I grew up in (and my family had been in for >200 years) was one of the ones that gathered funds for the Amistad folks. Admittedly their next choices as members of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union didn’t end so well, but that is a different issue 🙂 .

                  None of my wife’s ancestors were even on this continent until after the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments were passed. As far as I can tell “Reparations” is just another shakedown to redistribute some (miniscule) portions of money and put the rest in a variety of politicians pockets.

                  1. Same with Husband. His ancestors fought and died for abolition. And did sketchy things like smuggle guns to the south in boxes marked “bibles.”

                  2. My ancestors largely sat out the American Civil War being either in Utah or in Europe.

              5. I’m sure there was a relative or two of mine from way back when who recited an entertaining edda during a winter night, of his wonderful and exciting time raiding, raping and pillaging up and down the Iberian Peninsula.

      3. is it too harsh to call them fecking maroons who are innumerate, cannot reason scientificially, and apparently cannot handle the simple mathematics of inheritance of traits by blood

        2. Not too harsh at all. These people range from incredibly stupid to pig-ignorant, and what’s even sadder is that the more intelligent among them work very hard at remaining that way.

          My only criticism is that you’re spending too much time and effort on describing them. “Progtard” and “woketard” will do the same job. I’ve also found that “dumbfuck” is a handy and accurate intensifier for those times when you just need a bit more oomph. (Apologies for the crudity, but sometimes it just fits.)

      4. Wasn’t it just a bit ago that Turkish citizens doing the genetic analysis on themselves and their ancestors being shocked to the very core of their being to find out that … because of centuries of the Turkish ruling and middle classes importing female slaves and concubines from Northern Europe and the Balkans, and getting children on them, generation after generation … that they were more European than what they were accustomed to think of as “pure Turkish.”

        Yeah, I was amused.

  13. I’m remined of two of the late great RAH novels, (one is The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, I don’t recall the title of the other off the top of my head, but it’s a very late work, and winds up in the “multiverse” concept that he was one of the original proposers of.) Where you don’t know that the protag is black until way late in the story. RAH’s point, I believe was that IT DOESN’T MATTER.
    We need to get back to that philosophy.

    1. The second one you’re looking for is The Cat Who Walked Through Walls.
      I’ve ALMOST forgiven him for killing the cat. Almost. If there’s an ever-after, he’s still going to get a good yelling at.

      3. Of course, only partially black – remember that it is also revealed that he is Woodie’s kid. (And, yes, Pixel does live. But I also didn’t forgive him until the next book.)

    3. ‘Number of the Beast’? Flying car, car’s computer gets an upgrade in Oz?

  14. I always remember Field of Dreams, where James Earl Jones plays an author. I believe the character it was based on was actually white. But in this movie, it didn’t matter at all. I remember feeling glad for him that he got the part having nothing to do with race, but simply based on his talent.

    2. Okay, you threw that pitch into my wheelhouse, so here we go.

      W.P. Kinsella’s book Shoeless Joe had J.D. Salinger as the writer Ray kidnaps and, eventually, brings to the ballfield in the cornfield. Field of Dreams avoided likely legal action by changing him to Terence Mann, who was shoehorned in as the Salinger expy with a cringeworthy scene at a school board meeting where someone was trying to keep his famous countercultural book The Boat Rocker out of the curriculum. (It was as preeningly liberal as you would imagine from Hollywood.)

      No idea whether Mann was written as specifically black, but it’s still come around to bite the movie. The usual suspects now deem it “problematic” because all the ghost ballplayers who come to the field are white, with James Earl Jones basically acting as, to bring this back on topic, the magical you-know-what waxing rhapsodic about them and their ballfield.

      (To be honest, it was kind of an omission. The script name-dropped players other than the Black Sox coming to the field, one of them as recent as Gil Hodges. One could have gotten away with having his teammate Jackie Robinson there too. Or throw in Oscar Charleston, or Josh Gibson, or Pop Lloyd …)

      Republica restituendae, et, Hamas delenda est

      P.S. #1: Years later, when Maya Bohnhoff wrote W.P. Kinsella into a story for Analog, Kinsella was in no position to gripe.

      P.S. #2: I must admit to chickening out of having Mr. Kinsella autograph my copy of Shoeless Joe one night. I’ve regretted it ever since.

    5. I haven’t seen Field of Dreams (yet), but James Earl Jones has earned my permanent support for the roles of Darth Vader and Thulsa Doom. He’s one of those actors I’m always happy to see, no matter the part.

      1. I saw him as Othello on Broadway. He was good, but he got upstaged by Christopher Plummer’s Iago. Boy, was Plummer having fun! I suddenly realized (along with half the audience at that matinee) that he was using Iago’s soliloquy to invite us all to enjoy the fun of destroying Othello with him. The body language and voice tones were all seductive. I think I remember the little gasp that rippled through the audience at that point, which for him, would have been better than a standing ovation.

        1. I remember seeing a clip of Kenneth Branagh playing Iago in the 1995 film version, and realizing halfway through his soliloquy that he was doing the same thing. He was looking straight at the camera, and you felt like he was looking straight at you and confiding in you as his accomplice.

      2. He was great in Sneakers, one of my favorite films because it’s one of the only films to get real hacking right. (There’s some messing around with electronic security, but a whole lot more social engineering, as well as many surprisingly low-tech solutions to high-tech problems.) He only had a bit part, but without his straight man role, the funny scene near the end wouldn’t have worked half so well.

        The protagonists have successfully stolen the MacGuffin back from the bad guys. They’re supposed to give it to the NSA in exchange for a monetary reward, but the NSA agent played by James Earl Jones does not trust them and shows up at their home base with a team of armed agents to ensure that they hand over the MacGuffin as promised. Realizing that Jones’s character is a reasonable man, and isn’t planning to shoot them as long as they cooperate, the protagonists start bargaining. In exchange for their silence, they ask for various items (which a scene earlier in the movie had established are long-held wishes). One wants a Winnebago, one asks for tickets for him and his wife to four or five tourist destinations, and so on. Then it’s young Carl’s turn, and the following exchange happens:

        Carl: The young lady with the Uzi… She single?
        Jones’s character: No. I will not do this.
        Someone else: How about lunch? You could chaperone.
        Jones’s character: NO!
        Carl: I just want her telephone number.
        NSA girl: Wait a second. You can have anything you want, and you’re asking for my phone number?
        Carl: Yes.
        NSA girl: 2739164, area code 415.
        Carl: (takes off hat, reaches out for a handshake) I’m Carl.
        NSA girl: (shyly accepts handshake) I’m Mary.
        Jones’s character: I’m going to be sick.

  15. “The whole idea that there are black stories and white stories is bizarrely racist.”

    This is the insanity that drove me to spend $60 US and join the Sad Puppy Campaign back in the ancient times before Covid. Black stories and white stories? Are you kidding me?

    Nope, they’re not kidding. This is what happens when you FINALLY defeat genuine racism in 1964, but its 2024 and the Kool Kidz still want to cosplay freedom fighter.

    I observe that these are the same Kool Kidz who think its smart to wear that Arab dishcloth on their heads and pretend HamAss are noble freedom fighters, meanwhile not knowing or caring that something on the order of a million mooselimbs have died in the last little while in Syria.

    Here’s a link to one of these hipster Leftist geniuses who’s been calling Conservatives Nazis his whole adult life, Anthony Housefather. He’s the MP for Mount Royal, the super-rich, super-connected part of Montreal. This is a video of him visibly realizing he’s a Jew working for the Nazis in 1936.

    https://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2024/03/20/the-honourable-member-for-air-india-3/

    He’s standing there in the hallway talking to a reporter, having an emotional reaction he can barely keep under control, the grief that he’s going to have to kiss goodbye to his political career because the people he works for hate Jews and don’t care if they all die. They saw the same video from HamAss that he did, of Shani Louk dead in the bed of a pickup truck with Palestinians spitting on her and putting their boots on her naked back (that’s the ultimate insult in Arabic culture), but while he’s thinking about people he knows who lost family members October 7th, they’re wearing Arab do-rags in Canada’s Chamber of Parliament and holding hands with the demon who paid for the Munich Olympics terrorist attack.

    Black stories and white stories is the same thing. Just less obvious.

  16. Saw a very enjoyable movie last year with my wife.

    She walked out of the theater with tears in her eyes saying, “that may be the best movie I’ve ever seen.” This despite the fact that there wasn’t even one 70-year-old pasty-white northern-european english-speaking woman in the cast of Godzilla Minus One.

    Go figure.

    1. G-1 was indeed the best movie released last year. My friends went to see it several times while bringing new viewers along.

    2. The closest G-1 came to a single non-Japanese character was a few seconds of archival footage of Douglas MacArthur.

      That movie did not have even a minim of what is called diversity. It didn’t need it. Indeed, it needed not to have it. Having it forced in would have undercut the story being told, maybe just a little, maybe a lot. Thank goodness the mind virus hasn’t achieved a 100% infection rate.

      Yet.

      Republica restituendae, et, Hamas delenda est

      1. Well, some of the actors were coded for different Japanese ethnic groups, dialects, etc., but that is not immediately obvious to US viewers. And mostly it was Tokyo people. Mostly.

        Gotta say, though, they really do have VERY different dialects with different grammar as well as vocabulary. Nothing weirder than finding out that Tokyo guy and Kyoto guy streamers actually are from a way different province, and that both their towns speak different dialects from each other, inside that province.

      2. Speaking of movie recommendations — My husband and I just stumbled across “Bill and Ted Face the Music” on You Tube (it’s currently free with ads). It’s planned theatrical release in 2020 was quashed by the Covidiocy so we hadn’t heard about it until now. We watched it and LOVED it, although the story is rather convoluted it has plenty of laugh-out-loud moments for fans of the first two Bill & Ted flicks. The scenes where Bill and Ted (still played by Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves) encounter progressively older versions of themselves are the best, and we can certainly relate to them now. Also, very little if any wokeness, although one of the actresses that plays their daughters identifies as “non binary” that’s not an issue in the movie itself.

  17. My biggest pet peeve along those lines is the idea that stories for children have to have child protagonists (and vice versa). It’s a conceit of publishers, editors, authors, teachers, and parents that child readers can only relate to child-characters. But children are just fine with books having older characters; they just don’t know how to (or even that they can) dispute the idea that books for them must have child-characters. So those publishers, editors, teachers, and parents confidently proclaim “You’re a child. So you MUST like this book. It has children in it!” Or worse, “… you can’t POSSIBLY like this book. It doesn’t have any children in it!”

    Then I learned that Terry Pratchett said it more wittily than I ever could: “[Wee Free Men is] a children’s book because:… 2. It has a nine-year-old heroine. This is good enough for the industry, which believes that books with children as the main protagonist are de facto books for children. For similar reasons, Moby Dick is very popular among whales.”

    2. I think that is what put me off first person stories for a long time. My suspension of disbelief broke hard running into first person stories being narrated by children.

      I realized this when reading books to my kids, and I was struck by the incongruousness of first person narration affecting toddler speak.

      1. Yeah, but I like first person. Most of Heinlein was first person.
        Then again I was the deranged mother who read Bradbury to her toddlers.
        …. Younger son writes Heinlein in Bradbury’s style, left to his own devices. Scars, he has them.

  18. I was just thinking about a saying about armies:

    You’ve got four types of people:
    1: The stupid and lazy: they’re best suited for infantry grunts. Even though they don’t want to do anything, they can be drilled into doing it.
    2: The smart and lazy: use them for your generals: they’ll always look for the least costly way to get the results you meed.
    3: the smart and energetic: use them for the camp aides. Give them a structured toast that needs to be done with vigor and they’ll get it done quickly then look for more. (But keep them away from real command: they assume everyone else has limitless energy too)
    4: the stupid and energetic: get them as far away as possible: they’ll do the wrong thing at the wrong time, and pursue it with the vigor needed to make it stick.

    I can’t help but think that our merit system has been overrun by the stupid but energetic who never questioned the system, and were vigorous enough to spin the cranks to winch themselves ever higher in their organizations.

    1. I think that’s what it’s all about. They didn’t select for talent and now it’s so bad they don’t even know what talent is. it’s not just the obvious affirmative action hires either. They selected for credentials and those credentials more or less require one to have lived a curated life where you took no risk and never spoke out of turn

      1. And now they seem to be actively working to *ensure* that credentials have nothing to do with talent or ability, while continuing to push the “expert because credentialed” idiocy. 😡

  19. Odd. I have been citing as “Be This Man” one CSM James McIntosh (RIP), perhaps the best NCO I ever met. Someone with -far far far- more military experience than I says essentially the same, repeatedly, in his many works of fiction. The CSM looks not at all like either of us.

    I thought Benjamin Cisco was pretty cool, perhaps most especially when he punched Q. Again, not anywhere near a resemblance beyond “human male”.

    I can celebrate SGT Mitchell Red Cloud Jr., MOH, and fellow wearer of the 24th ID Taro Leaf.

    Frodo Baggins. ’nuff said.

    Any number of other characters who don’t look at all like me seemed pretty impressive “be more like”.

    Now some dickheads propose to take those all from me? No. They can fuck themselves right off, with flaming sideways cactii.

    1. Along those same lines, I note that Honor Harrington’s fan base seems oddly lacking in genetically engineered female space naval officers of slightly asian facial features.

      1. Especially with her relationship to her Treecat. Personally don’t know of many treecats. Does anyone here?

        🐈🐈🐈🐈🐈🐈

        This does not count the books of my youth, that did not have teen girls as the protagonist. Space Cadet, Tunnel in the Sky, Beastmaster, Ride Proud Rebel (+ a few more juvenile CW fiction), Time Traders, Star Flight, Star Traders, Star Flight, etc. Yes, a lot of Andre Norton, but also a lot of Heinlein, Clark, etc., too. Most the CW juveniles I haven’t found digitized and have long disappeared off the local city library shelves.

        Oh, I read books with girls/women as protagonist. Nancy Drew, Bobbsey Twins, Sabre from the Sea, etc. Also read Hardy Boys, Black Stallion and Golden Stallion, etc., books (of coarse the horse books weren’t because of the humans, horse crazy that I was).

          1. Actually read “Rebel Spurs” first, in middle school, late ’60s. Didn’t get to read “Ride Proud Rebel” until could get an ebook version, as a much older adult. But Rebel Spurs was not my first or last CW book where the view point was a young soldier, much older than me (both union and confederate sides), and not female. Also revolution books, same juvenile type books. I just don’t remember the authors. Also one juvenile one where it involved the “Swamp Fox” with echos in a Norton juvenile with independence for Venus colony (forget name, know I have in ebook, but dang if I can find it).

        2. I like the Honor Harrington books quite a bit. And I like Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys equally well.

          When I was in the summer between 6th and 7th grades, an arsonist burned part of my school (made me cry when I found out, because it took the library with it). They brought in a few portables from other schools, and we made do; English classes in the gym, etc. Some books got donated/found and put into one side of one of the portables as the new library, and I devoured most of what was in there. There was a NEW, complete set of Nancy Drew mysteries that filled a shelf…and I read them continuously; sometimes one per night. A GIRL DETECTIVE? It never even occurred to me to CARE. BOOKS, with a smart person and friends, solving mysteries. I was totally in. And I knew they were formulaic; didn’t care about that either; they were a cool world to immerse oneself in, different from mine.

          1. End of middle school year (Jr. High back then, 9th grade) got called to the Library. They bought me my first personally owned Norton book. Why? Because I had been in the Library that much, and checked out that many books (more than a few more than once) over the prior 3 years. Lunch? Unless locked out (restricted access for everyone, it happened), I was in the Library, as soon as I could be. Same with HS. Let’s just say that being grounded was not punishment. Being denied library or books, was, and still is (I’m 67, FWIW).

            1. I’ll be 60 this year.

              I grew up very rural. Somehow my mother was able to arrange for the bookmobile to stop by our house monthly. I was in HEAVEN. BOOKS! At our HOUSE! In an AIR-CONDITIONED vehicle! Those two wonderful ladies would bring books on topics (science and sci-fi and history, mainly) that I asked for! That library they operated out of received two copies of Popular Electronics every month…and they brought me the duplicate copy AND GAVE IT TO ME. Be still my heart. I can never thank them enough.

              1. Where I worked for the USFS first season (well every year, but only first summer did the extra happen) the mobile book bus came to the district housing. Unit manager’s wife would check out 4 or 5 books for me (came during the day and I was on a field crew), for the week. Didn’t have a car to go anywhere after work or on weekends anyway (my reason and sticking with it). Not like the guys were coming around offering to show me around (well they did, um, no. Just no.)

      2. Yeah, but there’s a whole lot of us running around who can claim to be genetically engineered after being conned into getting the JAB. However, I’m definitely not female, have never been to space, navy or otherwise, the U.S. military is terrified of the thought of me as a commissioned officer, and there’s no Asians in my family tree going back at least 15 generations. (Nor have I had any offers to add any to my descendants.)

  20. Slightly OT, but I’ve been giving some thought to those who complain about portrayals of a ‘blond, blue-eyed Jesus’. 

    Originally hailing from the Levant*, it is highly likely that He would look like what we would call an Arab. This means that His skin tone could range from quite fair to nut brown depending on the amount of exposure to sunshine He got, and considering how much time He spent on the road I suspect the darker tone would be likely.

    That said, we are told that God made us in His image. Therefore, when God came to Earth and robed Himself in flesh as Jesus, it could make sense that we would portray Him in some sense in our image. Thus we have art showing Him as a blue-eyed blond, a black African, Asian, etc..

    *When/why did the perfectly serviceable term Levantine go out of fashion when referring to inhabitants of the Middle East?

    1. What’s sad about much of this “Jesus wasn’t White” garbage are the people who don’t want to think of Him as White (and yes Levantine is white) because “Whites Are The Oppressors”.

      I made the comment elsewhere that says more about those people than it says about the Christ. 😦

      1. I have a nice portrait of Our Lady of the Snows and Her Son, in white parkas, from the Diocese of Northern Alaska. Why not?

          1. From the Catholic side, those aren’t so much “valid” as those are literally how she showed up looking. :big grin:

            Who are we to argue with Mary, acting by the power of her Son?

            For folks who think this sounds like fun-

            They’re called Marian apparitions, and usually they’re “translated” into the local culture– for example, Our Lady of Guadalupe had all the cultural symbols of being both a virgin and the mother to a king. (They’re not a required belief, if investigated they can be declared “worthy of belief.”)

            My favorite is Our Lady of La Vang, a Vietnamese apparition; there’s a version where she’s smiling, holding Jesus, and is standing on a boat. Some parishes do feast day celebrations where they carry the boat around. Popular with Vietnamese refugees, obviously.

  21. If you want to see exactly what fanaticism is, you’re seeing in these people insisting on “representation in all thing.”

    Nobody can dig past the first, surface layer. Nobody wants to, because that would destroy their perfect, beautiful myth.

    (I could, kind of, justify doing Anne Boyle in a historical movie as black, to make it perfectly clear that she’s an outsider, but even that is just bad form.)

    I’m saving my DVDs and BluRays and old books for a reason, and that big reason is to show people that it wasn’t like this, and these ideas start out stupid and keep getting even more stupid as time goes on.

  23. …even if all 14% of America that self identifies as black were madly in love with it and pushed it, how would it have made the movie a blockbuster.

    Actually, it would, assuming a literal interpretation of the above.

    Population of the US: circa 330 million.

    14% of that: 46 .2 million.

    If every single one of those saw the movie and paid a $16 ticket price, the box office would be: $739.2 million.

    That would put it at the top of the box office for the year so far by quite some distance (a low bar this year, granted). It would also be bragworthy for any movie with a budget of $200 million or less. (And Magical Negroes cost no where near that much, even if the budget is not public info. Just going by the trailers, if the budget was over fifty million, somebody was lining his pockets.)

        1. To paraphrase Mr Twain, there are “Lies, Damn Lies, and Hollywood earnings numbers”. They’ve been fudging those numbers in a variety of fashions since before there were talking pictures. Their accounting firm seems to be Bialystock and Blum. Particularly with respect to ANYONE that has a % of net contract they will find no movie ever makes money. Hell the Tolkien estate had to hammer New Line Cinema for several years as they claimed the LOTR movies made only very tiny profits

    2. ”…somebody was lining his pockets”

      Um, you know this is from Hollywood, right? The second most concentrated center of creative accounting, lagging behind only organized crime.

      But enough about the Bidens, we were discussing Hollywood…

      1. Considering I lived in Glendale and Burbank for a decade, trying to break in, yeah, I am fully aware of how things operate in town. But you can’t look at the trailers and think this cost more than a Netflix show. It looks slick and professional, but the budget for “background artists” and other basics was clearly limited.

      2. Ummm… Hollywood? “The second most concentrated center of creative accounting, lagging behind only organized crime.”?

        Try third. DC says, “Amateurs! Hold my martini!” 😎

    3. So far it’s only made about a million and a half, with an opening day high of $457 per theater, dropping from there. That’s 28.5 tickets sold per theater on average (at $16/ticket) for all showings the entire opening day.

      I guess if you know that your story is dreck, you can try and pump the opening day numbers by going nuts in interviews, hoping to attract the nuts audience, but word of mouth will sink you pretty quickly.

  24. You know… back when I was a child and then a teenager there were all black films that folks (us honkys) were expected to identify with the black leads and cast. They were called Blaxploitation films. “They Call Me Mister Tibbs” starring Sidney Poitier, “When Cotton Came to Harlem” featuring Redd Foxx (he wins by the way, just like the mules in Treasure of the Sierra Madre) and countless others. Blackula comes to mind also as they were of all the various genres of film. Saw a trailer of the magical negro film and it just looked like a silly film to me. Replace the negroes with some fantasy race and call it urban fantasy and it still would be a bad film.

    2. I like the Humanxploitation films like “Blazing Saddles” where Mel Brooks and Richard Prior made fun of everyone.

      2. Uh, Blazing Saddles starred Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder and Madeline Kahn.

        Richard Pryor was in Stir Crazy.

        “He said the sheriff is near!”

          1. Correct. Cleavon Little took the role of the sheriff when Pryor decided he did not want to play the part, only help write the move.

            1. The way I heard it told the execs nixed Pryor as they really thought he’d be WAY too offensive. Like Jadorowsky’s Dune finding a timeline where Pryor did the part might be interesting, but it might not have held up as well as the Little/Wilder pairing.

  25. I think this gets to a key part of why I enjoy science fiction and fantasy so much–the characters are not like me in many, many ways. 

    Am I a manic genius who compensates for physical deformity through fast talking? Am I a genetically engineered super soldier? Am I a tree rising to rule the cosmos? No! But they can all be very engaging stories.

  26. “The idea that skin color is somehow a culture is one that Hitler believed in.”-given that this ideology is part of the core of Democratic Party policy, it is why the Democrats are the party that is genuinely emulating the Nazis. When they accuse non-Democrats (because let’s face it, even libertarians are declared to be Nazis by the woke leftists controlling the Democrats) of being Nazis, they are projecting. 

  27. Great piece on how feckless Team ObamaBiden is regarding Israel including things like how the “temporary” port is actually planned to be permanent and enable Hamas to bypass both Egypt and Israel efforts to prevent weapons from being imported into Gaza:

    https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20488/israel-betrayed

    Yes, the contractor who will build, run and control it is tied to Hamas.

    Keeping Israel from destroying Hamas’ remaining forces is of course part and parcel of this effort to facilitate the efforts of those who seek to replace Israel with a Jew-free Jihadist state, an effort Team ObamaBiden is on board with.

    1. When the war is over, and Israel leaves, the port likely won’t last long. The Israelis will find proof that it’s being used for weapons smuggling, and wreck it. And it’s not like the Palestinians will be able to rebuild it.

        1. Yes, that might be what wrecks it, as well. Gotta get materials for those rockets, after all!

    2. Israel has very capable submarines. A pier is an easy-peasy target. And lots of third-party torpedoes fit a NATO-standard large tube. Assuming they want deniability, its going to go anonymously kablooey one evening. Otherwise they will air-strike it to wreckage.

      The remainder of Ham-ass better get itself to Switzerland, or some other neutral country with a real capable military. Because Israel is done playing idiot against genocidal savages, and has rediscovered the key concept:

      Victory.

      And they are not going to settle for “Let’s play this losing game again, soon.”. More like “Let’s play Rome versus Carthage, episode III”

      1. “Assuming they want deniability, its going to go anonymously kablooey one evening. Otherwise they will air-strike it to wreckage.”

        Which is why there will be Americans within any possible blast radius. Guaranteed.

        If you assume these people will do the scummiest and most underhanded thing possible, you’ll be able to properly assess the risks.

  28. And in other news, I have an update on OJ the rescue cat. He spent three weeks with us, mostly cowering in our bedroom closet. For two weeks he came out only for the necessities. In the third week he jumped up on our bed and let us pet him sometimes, but quickly retreated back into the closet for hours on end if our male cat came into the room, or merely hissed from the other side of the door. Thankfully, my wife found him a forever home. The new owner and her grandson loved him on first sight, and within a couple days OJ was settled in getting along with their girl cat. The new owner sent adorable photos. Yay! Cat rescued from being shot, and our house and cats are back to normal – or as close as any house with an infant can be.

    1. Grabbed a screencap from a friend who used to work in the Hollywood film industry; this quote is a little over a decade old.

      “The film industry is the only place where you can be required to sit in on a seminar on racial sensitivity, and then immediately after, order a ‘heavy-set hispanic maid’ and some ‘black thug gangbangers with low-rider cars’ from Central Casting.”

      Note that Hollywood claimed for decades that they couldn’t cast non-white actors because “it won’t sell in the heartland” (thoroughly disproven by Black Panther) at the same time as a large theater company was casting race-blind for Shakespeare in an area that is, historically, so very racist that the resident KKK went after religions because they’d chased away all the black people… and selling out tickets. My point being that I was often yelling at Hollywood “The [racism] call is coming from inside the house!”

      And for decades, and now, the only answer they have is to swap places and have racism in other directions. Because heaven forfend they write good stories and cast good actors and be done with it.

  30. The loses Hollyweird is accruing from their wokeness is starting to really make a point. Maybe not to the actors and directors, but the producers and investors are noticing big time. Look for a second Hollyweird to spring up in a red state. Those actors and actresses that can flee, are fleeing, and generally to those evil ( but safer and saner ) red states. They are not doing it quietly either.

    1. Between NYC and LA, I’m waiting for the next seasons of the real estate reality shows to have the realtors panicking. They were (more or less) when the market was turning/slowing, whatever, because of interest rates rising. Now with money fleeing the area. Yea. I watch it for the view into the homes that are shown. Not that I would own one if I could. (Seriously. Why?) But do enjoy the tours.

      1. And the whole mandatory 6% commission thing for Realtors just blew up, with the NAR agreeing to a settlement which includes them removing that number from their requirements.

        Were I a Realtor, especially one of the riffraff residential flavor, I would be pondering learning to code.

        1. Locally the most likely real estate company sign to see is “Help You Sell” essentially “sale by owner”. Buy services wanted, including the contracts, for fees. If a buyer has an agent, it isn’t split the fee, it is pay their agent. (Negotiable obviously.) That is, at least last few years, if a house even has a sign out front at all, usually with “pending” on it. Most houses someone even hints they are thinking of selling, they have had multiple offers before they have decided. Still getting “Selling? We buy houses.” cards/letters/flyers for our house and mom’s house. Latter to me, or one of my sisters (we’re on county filed forms as getting the house on her death). Slowed down, but we still are getting them.

          Real Estate has slowed in our broader geographic area, but not specifically for the specific area of town we are in. An area that even in the last few years, homes changed hands (not always sold, because more than a few, family moved in) because grandparents either passed or went into assisted living. With interest rates climbing? Inventory is going to get worse. No one is giving up those sub 4%, 30 year, interest rates, unless forced.

          Worse. The area has been filled in to the northern urban growth boundary. Last two large swaths filled in over the last two years (putt-putt par 3 golf coarse, and last dying filbert orchard, both gone). Some pre-’80s large acre lots still being split, but those are limited. Other than that there are the “opportunity” small condos being built on land sold by churches with large swaths. Just learned the grade school near us (can see from the house) is one of two being considered for shuttering by the district (staff told “lack of money”). Which is interesting, because the only grade school in our section of the district, closest next one is 5 miles away (another grade school close, but over the *district line). My guess? Developers are swarming the district. The other grade school would be commercial developers swarming the district.

          ((*)) Thinking our district is considering, for considerations, of letting the other district to have the area east of the rail road tracks, which would move our area from Bethel Irving, Shasta, and Willamette, to 4J Spring Creek, Madison, and North. (Irving is on the chopping block.) For reasons, it would make sense. Watch those whose taxes will change, scream loudly, and long. Including us. Property tax school 4J taxing / $1k value is higher. Mom pays around $200 more just because of 4J than we do. Same taxable valuation, only a mile apart, difference is school districts.

          1. “Still getting “Selling? We buy houses.” cards/letters/flyers for our house and mom’s house. Latter to me, or one of my sisters (we’re on county filed forms as getting the house on her death). Slowed down, but we still are getting them”

            Here in DFW, we’re getting an average of one cold call a day asking if we want to sell.

            1. we’re getting an average of one cold call a day asking if we want to sell.

              I don’t take cold calls from numbers I don’t know. I shut off the sound of the ring. Since cold calls rarely leave messages, I have no idea if that is why they are calling. Hubby has gotten a few too. But again he usually doesn’t answer cold calls.

              It was a PIA when we were selling the RV. Actually put in the add to message first. Not that most did. Until it sold, did answer most unknown numbers (tried). But then most left messages.

  31. Just a note about what my day brought. Equinix, an $80B REIT specializing in data centers and a player in the AI bubble seems to have decided that re-running worldcom’s — you might remember them from the tech bubble — accounting fraud would be a good thing to do. op ex as cap ex is the thing. A nice little accounting no no. Management has entirely cashed out leaving what seems to be mostly pension funds holding the bag. I don’t have any of it, long or short.

    I’m not entirely sure that anything will happen to the crooks in the USA of 2024, especially looking at who the principals are involved with, but it does show a lack of imagination to run last tech bubble’s favorite fraud again in the middle of the most recent tech bubble. tonight we’re going to party like it’s 1999.

    Sigh, even their crimes are boring and repetitive. For more interesting fraud, you need to look at China (e.g.,) where Evergrande (remember them?)keeps on delivering as the most comprehensive fraud, ever. I haven’t written about China for a while, but it gets worse and worse.

      1. Ah, the dopamine hit, I do have something about Biden’s latest malarkey around wages if there’s interest. Full disclosure, there’s arithmetic, and maybe a graph.

  32. So there was a fantasy book back in the early 80s or thereabouts called The Revenants. It takes place in a declining society, said society declining because they are self-segregating more and more along traits and looks. The overall theme of this novel is that separating yourself from another person or group because they look different or act different is Bad and you should Do Better.

    The amusing part is that the author is Sheri S. Tepper, who is pretty well known as a Feminist Writer™ and for whom most of the works show the zeitgeist of the time, but also center the views of The Movement. And… I can’t imagine this book in her hands today.

    1. She passed away in 2016.

      She had some remarkable books. _Grass_. _The Gate to Women’s Country_. The Marianne books. The True Game books. _Blood Heritage_.

      1. If by remarkable you mean burn instead of reselling because the pervasive depression and hatred steam up from them, they’re completely irrational and make you hate everything, you’d be correct.
        I LOATHED the first two. LOATHED.

        1. IMO Tepper started out with “fun reads” but ended up with garbage.

          It’s “interesting” that the “fun reads” are out-of-print (I think) and definitely not in e-format.

          1. The books became predictable over time, and less interesting, as the message overwhelmed the story.

            But I do have a fondness for dystopias, even for stories that make me think, “no, it wouldn’t work out that way.”

      2. Was ‘Grass’ the one where they’d used genetic engineering so that humans could digest cellulose like cows do, and they proceeded to eat the planet down to bare dirt?

        All die. O the embarrassment!

  33. It’s time to pull out my copy of Bad Boys so I can fail to identify with the characters. I should probably see what Tyler Perry is up to these days as well. Or maybe check out a Denzel Washington movie.

  34. How does anyone relate to Management, Centauri (Last Star Fighter), Admiral Ackbar, Dobby, Tinkerbell, Mr. Trashbags, Martin (one of the good guy Aliens from the V mini-series), R2-D2, the Wee Free Men, the quickly evolving aliens on a neutron star, or the Star Beast?

    How can fantasy or science fiction even sell if we can’t relate? Does this mean I can’t relate to rich people who live the high life in major metropolitan areas? Or people who have lived their entire life in a tiny rural town in the MidWest (or – pick your own spot in the world)?

    I guess I’ll have to tell my kids to stop reading Manga. Pink haired vampires wielding magic for good just isn’t very relatable (Don’t know if there is a character that fits that, but from the ones my kids have talked about, I wouldn’t be surprised if there is).

  35. I think, on the pink haired vampires, to my knowledge yes and no.

    There is room to debate WRT Moka in Rosario Vampire. Quibble one: Do we label what she does magic? Quibble two: Her super/true mode has white hair. Quibble three: I have not read the entire run of the manga, so could not testify as to how good she is.

    There are patterns in manga character designs, and there is room to infer trends, but I just do not really know.

  36. This is what I have been trying to do at Abyss & Apex for the past 20 years. Entertaining stories. Thanks for this post.

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