Telling us it’s raining

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

There is a reason I don’t watch TV much. No. Seriously, there is a reason I don’t watch TV much. Because when I do, I start threatening to throw shoes at the TV or … or write rants at my blog about it.

Stop popping popcorn right this minute. You’re all BAD people. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

Besides most o you will say that I got what I deserved for watching a romance series. Guilty as charged, but you have to remember I read EVERYTHING including regency romances. It’s just I tend to read regency romances when I’m on low brain-effort mode. This doesn’t mean, btw, I’m calling people who read regencies preferentially stupid. People like what they like and it has nothing to do with how smart they are. I’m saying I, personally, read them on low effort or low-emotional-give mode, because they are predictable. I know they are going to end in HEA (Happily Ever After) and usually nothing too terrible will happen. It’s the equivalent of putting on something in the background when I’m cleaning that I know is not going to make some jump-scare sound and upset me. Mysteries (depending on the level of mystery) and science fiction require more engagement because the formulas are more complex, and have the potential to do things that really upset me. For me, Romance is my easy-listening. I prefer them clean, or I flip past the sex, as written sex doesn’t do much for me, and it rarely advances the plot.

Oh, the other thing is that I don’t usually read what I’m writing at that time. I’m not even sure why, but if I’m on a scifi writing jag, like now, I read mystery for fun. And vice versa. And if I’m cycling fast between sf/f and mystery for writing (which I did for much of my writing career, due to contract commitments) I STILL have to read SOMETHING. So I spent years on end reading romances, and of those mostly regencies.

Anyway, when the Bridgertons was being talked about, I watched a show, was mildly baffled at the racial thing and thought it must take place in a parallel world, which actually made it sort of cool, even if I grumphed at their not giving me the world building for how we’d got here. (I have the same complaint against 90% of Urban fantasy, so… I think I’m more of a world building geek than other people.) I asked if the racial thing was in the books and someone (I think older DIL) told me they were bog standard regencies. So I looked them up, and realized I’d read them during one of my binge-reading regencies… Well, when we still lived in downtown Colorado Springs.

It was from there that I followed through to the gobsmacking realization that the mentally impaired producer of the show (sorry, but the truth must be told) had decided Queen Charlotte was black due to two bad portraits and a rumored MOORISH ancestress FIVE HUNDRED YEARS IN THE PAST. Chilluns and babies, Moors ain’t black. Most of them are Mediterranean looking. Since this was a Portuguese “Moor” she was likely redheaded because uh… both sides kidnapped women from the other side and the Moors really liked Germanic and Celtic blonds, okay? But sure, let’s play along and pretend Moors were black from the deepest Africa. FIVE HUNDRED YEARS. That’s seventeen generations. I have black ancestry from Africa much closer than that, and look bog-standard Mediterranean. Because that’s I presume what most of my ancestors looked like. In a Northern European country a black ancestor can disappear into the background in three or four generations. Our neighbor who was in fact black and married a blond man had very light children of “undefinable race” and her grandkids look “light Portuguese.” FIVE HUNDRED YEARS. Only an idiot who believes in one-drop would believe that someone with a black ancestor five hundred years in the past would still be “black” even by the standards that Americans consider people black.

Five hundred years an ancestor from Africa might not even show up in your 23 and me. And if he does it will be in the less than 2% range.

But the producer is obviously mentally impaired by racial notions and obsession, so she decided that there must have been secret black nobility and gentry around England at that time, and that the Queen was outright black. And then ran with it.

As annoying as I found this — and I did find it annoying — I could enjoy it at the level of “this is a parallel world where things are very weird.” I still wished she had given more alternate history to go on, something that made sense. And I resented the fact that people who tend to think what they see on TV is true — mostly because of our appalling educational system — would believe that there was always parallel white and black nobility in Europe, but what the heck. The costumes aren’t realistic. The society isn’t realistic. The dances, instead of being the synchronized walking of British Regency (seriously what is with Northern Europeans and inability to dance), are this strange, beautifully choreographed thing to modern music. As a fantasy it was visually gorgeous and the male love interest for the first season, sure, was black but also gorgeous. So low brain power eye candy. And besides Dan was watching it, and I could watch with one eye (on eyestalk) while I wrote the blogs at night.

The second season was actually more believable, since the female love interest was Indian (dot) which did happen in British families at the time (particularly if the girl was only half Indian and had a considerable dowry.)

But now we’re in whatever this season is, and I’m getting p*ssed off. Why? Oh, I’ll tell you why. It’s like this, it’s okay if there’s a few drops on your neck, and they tell you it’s raining. You try to believe it and go along.

BUT when there’s a stream on your neck, and you look back and there’s some grinning bastage with his pizzer out and telling you “Nah, dude, it’s raining.” you’re liable to get upset.

The first thing to piss me off came on gradually. At some point it dawned on me that EVERY couple — except the one in which the girl is morbidly obese! — is bi-racial.

Do I disapprove of bi-racial couples? Brother! If I did, and depending on how you counted it, husband and I would have to get a divorce. Also, I wouldn’t be here if my ancestors had had that attitude.

No. What I disapprove of is contrived and unnatural emphasis on race. The first one was okay. The couple had chemistry, and were both very good looking. After that it started slowly impinging on my consciousness that a-historicity aside, this was neither casual nor aesthetic, but fetishism. Race fetishism. And not even for sexy reasons. Just because someone has racial rats in their heads and wants to inflict them on others.

And then there’s the ridiculous. I’d be willing to pretend that there was a parallel world in which somehow there was a parallel British gentry that was black and that there had been some sort of apartheid that was broken by the Queen marrying the white king. (Except that of course, in the other miniseries they make the king black also? I think?)

Anyway, fine, whatever. But now there’s apparently also a parallel Chinese Gentry. All in England, which frankly was the size of a tea-tray. And among the gentry which were also known as the “upper ten thousand” because they were more or less ten thousand people, or the size of a small town.

Look, I’ll suspend my disbelief, but you don’t have permission to leave it dangling there till dead.

Then there comes the throw away stupid that one of the grand-dames of the show — who happens to be black — is retiring and going back to Africa. Africa! in the late 18th century! Someone who is the highest of the British court! I ASK YOU. My poor disbelief might not come back, even with the paddles of life. Also, I think we could kill the producer of the show by sneaking a general history of the world into her room and leaving it near her for the night. Because it’s obviously kryptonite to her.

And then comes the crowning insanity which hasn’t happened yet, but I could see them preparing for, and apparently Dan has found the producer bragging about what they’re doing and I’m right.

So, stop reading here if you are following the show and don’t want spoilers. But having read the novels… One of the daughters, the shy, bookish one, marries a man who is much like her. He then dies of brain hemorrhage and she feels guilty, because by then she was attracted to his male cousin, who is a bluff soldier and lives with them.

The romance with the cousin is one of the last books.

When this season the cousin was introduced and was female my hackles rose. For one, because the male character being really close to this cousin gave it a completely different aspect.

But there were other clues, like the cousin getting really upset at match making her with some guy, etc.

I told Dan “they’re going to make that a lesbian romance”. He didn’t believe me, till he read the producer bragging about it.

So, do I have anything against lesbians? No. There is only one person in the world whose orientation means anything to me, and as long as he likes me, other people are free to sleep with whomever they want. It’s not how I relate to other people. I relate to them as individuals. If I like them i will be nice to their significant others. If I like both of them, it’s a bonus. If Dan and I like both of them, it’s a miracle. (Those of you who are married know how rare that is. We have maybe four couples where we like both members of the couple equally. Wait, eight if you count kids young enough to be our kids.)

I am however way beyond sick and tired tv shows making the bookish, introverted girl a lesbian. It wasn’t cute or edgy when they did it to Willow on Buffy and it’s even less so now.

This might not be obvious to the grand-poobahs of Hollyweird, but here in the real world, even back in my day, any girl who was awkward, bookish, or not particularly into makeup and clothes, was ASSUMED to be a lesbian. I suspect these days it’s lesbian-or-trans. And if you’ve attended public school, you know that being one of the best students is already hell on Earth. If the kids have another way you’re obviously different to fasten onto, you will be tortured at least psychologically and often physically too. I suspect nowadays being tortured by telling you how accepting they are and how you MUST come out to their idea of who you are the most exquisite torture.

Please stop. Stop it already. Stop pissing down our neck and pretending it’s raining.

If you want to do all interracial romances? Set it in the present day in a college town. Or if you absolutely must put it in the past, tell us it’s an alternate history. Or at the very least, stop claiming that you’re telling the “real” history.

And, hey, why not? Make the quiet bookish girl, or the tomboy REALLY heterosexual every once in a while. Heck, have some of them be in happy heterosexual marriages. Because I am here to tell you it can happen.

Yes, I do realize that in your bizarre tiltawhirl circles all this bs seems realistic and inevitable. But do strive to look in on reality every once in a while. Or at least send it a postcard.

Because I’m really, really, really tired of your stilted lack of imagination combined with attempt to shock people who have been seeing this stuff since they were kids and are now grandmothers.

Have an original idea. I beg you for the love of Bob. Because I can’t afford to put a shoe through the TV.

66 thoughts on “Telling us it’s raining”

  1. My husband and I just finished “Seeking Persephone,” a (clean) Regency romance, four episodes, on Amazon Prime. It has its faults (largely accent-related) but the two leads are LOVELY and have immense chemistry and from what I could see, the hair and costumes are on point. And it was crowdfunded. We actually really enjoyed it. There’s zero waif fu or girlbossing, the male protagonist is not a vicious bastid, and the production values are good.

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    2. Nah. Polycarbonate. About 100 times tougher than acrylic. 1/4″ polycarbonate will stop a thrown axe. Of course, after a while the scratches and gouges will make it hard to see the TV.

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    1. Mr. Scott, about that transporter? How long before it is repaired?

      (My line some years ago after seeing all the Beam me up, Scotty bumper stickers. With that many requests, the transporters *must* be off-line. Right?)

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      1. Chuckle Chuckle

        Well, in the original series nobody said “Beam Me Up”. 😉

        And of course, the writers created the transporters because they wanted a “quick way” to get the landing party to the planets but then had to find ways to prevent the landing party to quickly “get out of Dodge”. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

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          1. My recollection (and Memory Alpha) has the definitive quote as: “Gentlemen, I suggest you beam me aboard.” The Mr. Scott one might be in there, but MA doesn’t list it. It’s been way too many years since I’ve seen it.

            One of the interesting bits of Enterprise was the development of what was used in TOS. Again, a little vague, but Linda Park’s character (Hoshi?) was stuck in the transporter buffer for one episode. Damned if I can recall the rest. Never saw any repeats. [And I would have tried to skip the entire Xindi season, and especially the Alien Nazi scene. Sheesh!]

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  5. If the kids have another way you’re obviously different to fasten onto, you will be tortured at least psychologically and often physically too.

    I grew up in France. American by birth, but my parents took a job that took them to France when I was about 4. I left France to finish high school in the US around age 15. So I spoke good French, but everyone in school was aware that I was American. Some thought it was cool — when people asked me where I had lived in America and I told them Dallas, they usually asked me if I knew J.R. (I had no idea there was even a TV show named Dallas let alone that that was the protagonist’s name). But others apparently disliked me for it, though I didn’t notice. I was so clueless, in fact, that one day when the book I had brought to school to read during recess (an English-language book) vanished from my desk, I just thought I had misplaced it. So I hunted around my desk and my bag for a bit, shrugged, and thought “maybe I left it at home?” Then when it showed up again by the end of the day, I just figured I had missed looking in the right spot. Apparently the would-be bullies gave up after that one incident, because it never happened again. And I wouldn’t have even known it had happened except that my sister (younger than me so not in the same class) somehow heard about it and told my parents. I just went through the day completely clueless to the fact that someone was trying to pick on me. Which is probably why they gave up, because it’s no fun to pick on someone who doesn’t even know you’re doing it. (For certain kinds of people, anyway; I’m aware that there are some bullies who would have kept going. But I didn’t have those types in my class at the time).

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  6. I finally, after buying it in 2022, got the TV up and running for “Just in case” only thing I see that regularly is worth leaving on is the MeTV Toon channel, and I note the ads are ALL older folk oriented. I see mostly massager, and mail-order, discrete packaged, adult incontinence supplies commercials and the rest, I can’t really tell what they push (I really have become immune to US ads).
    Even there, in the limited things I notice, yes, mixed race. See it as well watching my British TV feeds for MotoGP. a Trad, non-mixed race couple is the standout. Even most of the gay/lesbian couples are mixed race as well (More tics for the boxes!) and at least most are mildly entertaining, or generate a comment (not bricks through screen level for me, quite)

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  7. They think if they say something enough time it will be true. They don’t always say it out loud – sometimes they are smart enough to do a SHOW and tell. Thus you frequently have gay couples on game shows and TRANS to convince you they aren’t really mentally ill if everyone on the show accepts them. You can’t escape it. Not even in the commercials. People see TV as free. When it’s in pay to view movies they just won’t buy it. This is a great mystery to Hollywood.

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  8. I was both a tomboy and a quiet nerdy library girl, and have never even been remotely attracted to other females. That’s a really odd stereotype.

    As for the other, the race thing, I’ve noticed that, too (in books – I don’t normally watch TV shows or movies). It was amusing in that old version of Cinderella, which I have watched (Cinderella is black, prince is Philippino, king is white, queen is black, step-mother white and one step-sister, other step-sister is black). It’s not so amusing when they go around changing history; that’s either stupid or evil (or both). Stupid if they really don’t know any better, evil if they are deliberately altering history to fit their ideology. I’ve heard of ‘black’ Americans who honestly thought that ‘blacks’ were in the majority in this country (somewhat excusable, I suppose, if they have only ever lived in a ‘black’ majority area). And I’ve heard of a ‘black’ man who, traveling through one of the many areas which are almost entirely ‘white,’ was scared because he actually believed that the ‘whites’ in that area must have run all the ‘blacks’ out. He didn’t know that there are a lot of places where ‘blacks’ never moved to (such as most of the places where I’ve lived). Nothing intentional about it, just never happened. It’s pretty sad to be so ignorant about your own country, downright despicable when the schools and media all deliberately, knowingly, teach false information about ‘race’ for the purpose of not only stirring up division within the country, but also keeping people with different skin colors scared of each other. (I keep putting all that ‘race’ stuff in accent marks because there is only one ‘race,’ the human race.)

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    1. When Kirk (I think it was Kirk) still commented here, he talked about having some black soldiers go into Seattle and come back irate that the city was so segregated or something that there were no black people. Their sergeant (black) sat them down and over the course of several hours explained what “minority” meant. The soldiers’ minds were in shock. They’d always lived in a majority-minority place, so it never occurred to them that the rest of the US was different.

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  9. Let’s see.

    Tallest kid in class? Check. (Not tallest girl, tallest kid).

    Usually teacher’s pet? Hand always up, right 90+% of the time? Check.

    Read all the time, minimal social skills because nobody seemed to want to talk about interesting stuff? (Also with parents with minimal social skills. Mom terminally shy, Dad was an Odd, I think). Check.

    So that’s why the two boys decided I was “a queer,” and took to ambushing me where there were no witnesses. Thankfully, we moved three months in to the school year.

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  10. Thank Gods. I thought I was the only one that absolutely despised that dreck. My wife, much to my chagrin, enjoys that show, but then her ability to turn off the “disbelief” part of her brain is absolutely stunning. It’s not that it’s suspended from a rope, it’s that when she sits down in front of a TV there’s a little button, that gets depressed. It’s labeled “This is just a TV show, it’s mindless entertainment, none of it is remotely real, it’s Plato’s wall.” That button on my butt is broken. I tend to yell at, or just turn off things that dangle my disbelief over the edge for too long, which is why she won’t watch most cop shows, or military shows with me… As much as “getting regency wrong” bugs you… about the fourth time I shout out “Warrant, motherfucker do you have one???” “Fruits of the poisonous tree, moron, have you heard of it???” or something similar, she gives me one of “those” looks and says “It’s a TV show, dear.”
    About the only one she will watch with me is “The Rookie” and the only really bad thing about that show, is the hero, gets in more bad shit in a week, than most cops see in a lifetime. More stuff in a career than a district sees in a century.

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      1. Don’t if you love your sanity watch mysteries with a doctor. “No. That poison won’t do that. No, it tastes terrible. he’d taste it. And now he’s dead. No you can’t bring him back. He’s dead in minutes.” Having someone jumping around and gibbering behind you is REALLY distracting.

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    2. While I sympathize with your wife’s viewpoint, she’s wrong. It’s not ‘just a TV show.’ It’s deliberate social-engineering propaganda. If more people would resist that stuff, they wouldn’t put so much of it out there.

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  11. If I believed in reincarnation, I’d think all the Temperance Union types had come back as social justice warriors. Still believing in the power of Edifying Stories with a Moral Lesson.

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  12. If I like both of them, it’s a bonus. If Dan and I like both of them, it’s a miracle. (Those of you who are married know how rare that is. We have maybe four couples where we like both members of the couple equally. Wait, eight if you count kids young enough to be our kids.)

    Kids don’t count.

    Seriously, runs on a different brain-pattern, we’re hacking your instincts.

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  13. This might not be obvious to the grand-poobahs of Hollyweird, but here in the real world, even back in my day, any girl who was awkward, bookish, or not particularly into makeup and clothes, was ASSUMED to be a lesbian. 

    And if you would just loosen up and go get laid– they’ll even provide the alcohol and a guy who’s willing to take one for the team– you’ll become normal.

    Not interested in sex at all?

    Then you really need to get converted. By physical experience. Which you’ll be so happy you did after it’s over.

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    1. Ah yes, from the book, “101 Ways for Guys to Get into a Girls Skirts.” Can’t remember if that was number 23 or 73. Most of them work about as well as standard pickup lines, that is, not at all.

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        1. Thumbs up

          I mostly escaped because my parents were… eh, I’ve tried rephrasing this 3 times now, and the best I can come up with is, we didn’t get to have outside contacts like friends, so that cut way down on the opportunities for anyone not-friendly to have contact either.

          And when I was still stuck at school I made sure was always in very plain view with no dark corners in sight. Which often meant sitting out in all kinds of weather. But better frostnip than getting cornered.

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  14. If you want to do all interracial romances? Set it in the present day in a college town. Or if you absolutely must put it in the past, tell us it’s an alternate history. Or at the very least, stop claiming that you’re telling the “real” history.

    Part of why I enjoy fantasy and scifi romances is that they have “interracial” couples that– well, actually hit the thing that makes them interesting, where you have to deal with the cultural pressures around it and the cultural issues inside of the pair.

    The interplay is fascinating; it has nothing to do with “reeeeee race!”, it’s about how people are and what their choices do, to them and to others, and how those choices add up. And the romance market has H(appily) E(ver) A(fter) as a common note because you can avoid a lot of gray goop that way.

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  15. This right here is why I refused to watch that stupid, ridiculous, annoying show.

    WHERE, precisely, are these people supposed to have come from? Sure, when Britain colonized India there were men who brought Indian wives home and thus had half-Indian children who then may have married into English society. But not a great many, for a variety of reasons starting with travel times and going through racial and social attitudes on BOTH SIDES, class problems, etc.

    And considering the actual history of white men bringing their black mistresses/slaves and passing them off as wives (without manumission or mariage licenses), the odds of there being black gentry, even, let alone aristocracy…

    I’ve read all the Bridgerton books. I’ve read all the Smythe-Smith books (connected series by the same author). And I will reread them. I refuse to even entertain the existence of the show.

    Also also, the entire Francesca storyline with the cousin WON’T BLOODY WORK with a girl because the premise of that story is that the cousin is the heir to the title!

    Also cubed, apparently there were some indications that they were setting Benedict up as bisexual, having threesomes with two men and a woman before getting with Sophie. Which absolutely would have been a thing that kept him out of polite society if it were even hinted at.

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    2. British men who, permanently, married Indian women tended to stay in India. Very few, if any, brought their Indian wives back to Britain. There must have been some, but I can’t think of any.

      There were recognized high status Anglo Indians, in India. For example the three senior Indian cavalry regiments, Skinners, Gardner’s, and second Skinners were founded and commanded by so called Anglo Indians, the descendants of British Officers and high caste Indian women. Later in the empire, a newspaper editor brought up that the commander of Gardner’s had “ a touch of the tar brush” and the head of the Gardner family horse whipped him to general acclaim in the army.

      Then there were the local “marriages” and more causal and negotiable liaisons which as those things tended to do produced children. Among other things, those children, when grown, staffed the Indian Railways so much that they became a recognized caste.

      once British women began going out to India in numbers, the Indian marriages stopped and the colour line was very firmly drawn. The provision of negotiable liaisons was intermittently suspended and VD rate exploded. Make of that what you will.

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      1. I listened to The Gardener by Rudyard Kipling on the Classic Tales podcast last week. https://sites.libsyn.com/30031/ep-1118-the-gardener-by-rudyard-kipling-vintage

        I was moved to tears, which is very rare for me. Its delicate handling of the relationship between an Englishwoman and her Anglo-Indian nephew is powerful.

        A younger reader will probably have to learn something about the British empire and the first world war, in order to understand the story.

        And that’s what’s so wrong with the ahistorical race swapped casting. It has never been easy for people to get along. To pretend that there are no difficulties erases the past.

        Then again, that’s what people are trying to do, erase the past. They tear down statues, change street names, remove books from the library. It’s purposeful, and it should be resisted.

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  16. I know they are going to end in HEA (Happily Ever After) and usually nothing too terrible will happen.

    The first thing that popped into my head was this:

    https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_threedecker.htm

    “The three volume novel is extinct”

    Full thirty foot she towered from waterline to rail.

    It cost a watch to steer her, and a week to shorten sail;

    But, spite all modern notions, I found her first and best—

    The only certain packet for the Islands of the Blest.

    2

    Fair held the breeze behind us—’twas warm with lovers’ prayers.

    We’d stolen wills for ballast and a crew of missing heirs.

    They shipped as Able Bastards till the Wicked Nurse confessed,

    And they worked the old three-decker to the Islands of the Blest.

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  17. One of my best friends is a big Georgette Heyer fan, and at his recommendation I’ve read a couple. But they don’t speak to me enough for me to buy them. The first one I read had a young man of aristocratic origins marrying a young woman with a mercantile background, and that was okay, and both of them seemed like human beings; but the father-in-law was a walking stereotype who spoke some sort of dialect and seemed to be intended as a humorous figure, despite his being successful and indeed wealthy. I like supporting characters to have more humanity.

    Now I totally enjoy Austen, and I’ve very much liked the Gaskell I’ve read, especially North and South. I’m not sure what makes the difference.

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    1. I like Heyer. Dave Freer introduced me to her. The secondary characters sometimes lean into the utter stereotype, yes, but the primary characters have personality. If you haven’t tried it, try Venetia. It’s my favorite.
      Now Dan actually likes “mindless romances” or thrillers. the key is “mindless” because he has a demanding mind-job, so he needs something to just read or sit in front of that runs on “spare cycles” till he’s ready to go to bed. Heyer’s romances LANGUAGE are a barrier for him because of that.

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  18. They do it with super heroes too, it’s more of the were all the same nonsense. It’s also intellectual laziness. Some of it is being pushed by the top down, BBC, England is not a free country, it is a Socialist hell hole.

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    1. Back in the early 1990s, IIRC, the comedy show “In Living Color” had a parody where the Justice League had to do Affirmative Action, and brought in a black lesbian super hero, and “Handyman,” who had CP and who could be called by shining the handicapped sign on the clouds (like the Bat Signal). It was purely for laughs, and worked.

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      1. the Justice League had to do Affirmative Action,

        This is the same Justice League that has a girl with wings, not to mention a Martian who can shapeshift to be any hue required, right???? 8-)

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  19. Yeah. We enjoyed the first two seasons of Bridgerton in my hosue–adopting the “well, the producer is an absolute idiot, but we’ll go with “fantasy world” (and not just for the racial thing, good GRIEF was that costuming inaccurate!! They did not wear corsets in this period for crying out loud and you can tell its wrong because stuffing the women into corsets ruined the line of the dresses!!), but when we hit season 3 and it was painfully clear that they were now going to go whole hog DEI that was it. Not even the remotest desire to watch it going forward or even rewatch earlier stuff. What especially pissed me off wasn’t just “we’ll make the sweet, shy girl ackshually a lesbian, was…look, I’ve read the books. Her whole storyline (which supposedly was going to be finished out in this most recent season?) was her struggles with infertility and remarrying even with that fear/grief hanging over her. But no, they decided to throw all of that out the window by introducing her primary love interest at the end of the season and doing a gender swap. Because of course this bunch doesn’t care about the “having children” part which was not just a social need of the time (and now) but also a desire men and women have had since forever. Because children aren’t just widgets you have because “supposed to” people actually love their kids and want to have them… (though what else can we expect from the abortion-worshipping lobby?) I was already teetering on the “ugh, this is getting worse” with the whole bisexual, polyamorous crap with one of the brothers but that pushed me right over into “Nope, done, kill it with fire.”

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    1. Your reading assignment for this weekend is Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James. It’s her Pride and Prejudice sequel/cozy mystery. I don’t recall whether there was a romance per se in it, except that Elizabeth and Darcy were still very happily married.

      If that does not scratch the itch, I am certain there is something out there more on target. Quality not assured.

      Republica restituendae.

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    3. There are a number of regencies with murder mysteries or foul play investigations as the external non-romance plot, yes. And there are murder mysteries set in the regency era. Combining a romance as a romance with the murder mystery as mystery is a lot harder, because the tropes and expectations and structure are fundamentally different. Mystery series tend to follow the sleuth as he/she/it finds themself in circumstances where murder occurs, over and over. Romance series that aren’t interconnected stand-alones (like the Bridgerton series, one of which does include an investigation into a character’s family background as a way to bring the two protags together) don’t necessarily lend themselves to murder mystery plots, either, unless it’s something like a Jack the Ripper murder series and each book advances both the romance storyline and the mystery storyline.

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  22. It’s somewhat amazing. They piss on legs, people move away, and they go to drink more from their fountain of fantasy, and hope someone will stand there long enough for them to piss on their leg.

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  23. The whole point is how unbelievable it is. Rather like the art in art galleries, the newer stuff is cr*p because it’s supposed to be cr*p.

    Because if you say it’s cr*p you’re showing that you’re not part of the initiated.

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  24. Look, SH, you and I know what’s going on. Being a white cracker homophobe from the North Northeast, I’ve spent a fair part of my life disavowing the racism, sexism, and root intolerance of my upbringing. It does not serve me. But it has to be defeated. Sometimes daily.

    So, in a world where it is spoken out loud, IN BRITAIN, that England has been TOO WHITE FOR TOO LONG, we have to accept that there are forces out there trying to remake our world in their image, and to their desires. Just so we are clear, these forces are saying, truthfully, that Britain has been Britain for too long. And I pray that Britons reject that premise.

    You and I know that will take blood. And Britons are hampered greatly by their heritage of government limiting their freedoms. The equation is different in America, for obvious reasons.

    These same forces are attempting to remake America, for, if prodded, they will tell you and I that America has been TOO AMERICAN for TOO LONG. And truth told, for much of the world, we have been, for more than 250 years. But we were not instituted for them, but for us, people who cherish liberty and justice. May they be exiled to the darkness, where they belong, and leave us.

    I am with you. Call it out, but these producers, show runners, pretenders, they are trying to invent history that does not exist and never existed. They are making a concerted effort to invalidate my, and I suspect your, education and beliefs. They hate us, because we reject their beliefs. And they are influenced by others, who intend to rule when they derive their followers to depose the current powers, systems, and norms (such as they are).

    We must prevail. To fail is to guarantee not only a rule of pain and destruction worldwide, but to see that rise out of a struggle between the two usurpers, The Left, and Islam. We are seeing it in Britain and Europe, and it is underway in America.

    Watching these series is entertaining, but I’m not deceived. They are not historical in any meaningful way. Soon I will have to disregard them, lest the producers claim popularity and therefore approval. I’ll pretty much be limited to reruns of Star Trek: Enterprise, but it’s better than paying to be lied to.

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    1. A certain Bad Orange Man had been “American-ing” our enemies and annoyances. Even some of the more sane Left folk are starting to say “I agree we needed to stop -that- enemy.” or “About Time -that- thug got thumped.” or even “Hell yeah! I can agree with -those- turds getting flushed.” Or worse.

      Folks were worried about war with a “near peer”. No need. There isn’t one.

      Not one near peer. None.

      Yes, there are those that out size us, us, out ruthless us, out stubborn us, etc. But there is not a single one that can out -capability- us -in total-. And the moment we become aware of something new, we are five-ish years away from stealing it and operationalizing it. Or less. And we do some of our our very best fighting after getting sucker-punched, so that is a losing strategy.

      The have to convince us, politically, to quit. because not a one can make us say “Uncle.” It takes our own (poop)heads to demoralize and discourage us.

      We don’t want nor need to rule the world. Not even “police” it, really. We just need to convince its bullies by sufficient demonstration that FAFO is a thing, and the worst thing you can do is annoy us greatly. Leave us be, or get bagged and tried, or bagged and tagged, depending on amusement value either way.

      “Let them hate so long as they fear” is actually correct. And we -can- be friendly where even somewhat mutual respect is possible.

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  25. The African Vikings always make me want to giggle. Not all blue-eyed blond? Sure. More of a mix, like pre-1940 Germany? Not a problem. Sub-Saharan black, because of “diversity” and “of course it had to have been that way”? Oh [BLEEP] no.

    Kinda like the two books where Islam developed, and Norse paganism, but not Christianity. And the Arabs and Vikings took over North America and staffed plantations with white slaves (who were gentle Celtic pagans). Yeah, no, not a workable first premise.

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  26. Television is mostly crap. I think the last really enjoyable show I saw was Justified. The Justified sequel? I didn’t finish the second episode.

    Definitely agree on Willow. Though vampire Willow in the alternate reality… Anymore, the TV here is reserved for the pretty women that do the local morning weather and cooking shows from Jacques Pepin or Jamie Oliver. Trek and Stargate reruns are readily available on the Pluto app.

    >

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