On "equivocation". . .

A couple of weeks ago Naomi sent me a link to WWII era Bugs Bunny cartoon.

Great stuff. They even do the "What's Opera Doc?" parody of Wagner's Die Walküre, a decade before "What's Opera Doc?"

My enjoyment was tempered, however, upon reading one of the comments left in response to the video. First, I'll point out an earlier comment:

All U people that think that Hitler is good are the most horrible people in the planet.He killed mora than 1000 jews and homosexuals.You people wouldnt like him too kill all the people of your religon so Shut the f**k up kwgitho

Bad grammar and incorrect statistics aside, I do agree with the sentiment. Fuck Hitler, and fuck his modern-day admirers.

The comment that irritated me so much was in response to the one above:

He killed millions of Jews and thousands of Christians. Let's not equivocate the small percentile of homosexuals, which is a lifestyle preference, and though unfortunate, pales against the tragedy and degree of the Nazi's religious persecution.

That said, I miss Looney Tunes.

Hoooo-boy.

Where do I begin?

Am I to take it that if there were only a few thousand Jews murdered by the Nazi's, then the Nazi's would somehow be less evil? Supposing that Hitler was utterly incompetent and allowed millions of Jews of escape from Europe-- does inability to perform evil acts make you less evil? Is the act of genocide somehow more tolerable if your killing off a small population rather than a large one? Would wiping out every Muslim or Catholic be more atrocious than wiping out every Jew just because there are a billion Muslims and Catholics and only millions of Jews?

Of course not.

As for that "lifestlye choice" comment (a common argument made by fundamentalist homophobes), many Nazis had a somewhat different view. From Wikipedia:

Nazi leaders such as Himmler viewed homosexuals as a separate people and ensured that Nazi doctors experimented on them in an effort to locate the hereditary weakness many party members believed caused homosexuality.

I was going to point out the absurdity of dismissing homosexuality as a "lifestyle choice" while crying bloody murder over religious persecution-- as though religion isn't a lifestyle choice-- but in this particular instance, I knew it didn't apply. To the Nazis, the Jews were inherently degenerate-- conversion or apostacy solved nothing.

Anti-gay bigotry: An official member of my lifetime "Fuck Thats".

I'M. . . CAPTAIN KIRK!

Responses to the new Star Trek trailer are alreadt starting to appear on YouTube. This one rules them all:

My Childhood. . . Gone.

The cultural atmosphere of my childhood can be boiled down to a few simple, distinct elements.

Some of these elements are computer games, particularly those made for the Commodore 64 (Screw Nintendo. Jumpman Forever!).

Cartoons, of course, constitute another set. I came a but too late for things like Transformers and Ninja Turtles (that's my excuse and I 'm sticking to it!), and I quickly grew out of things likes Power Rangers. Looney Toons/Merrie Melodies shorts were a big influence on me, but everyone loves those, kid and adult alike. The two "kids" cartoons that strongly resonate with me today are ReBoot and Sailor Moon the anime. Sailor Moon, of course, led to me to the awesomely campy live action series, which has in turn come to form a large, unhealthy part of my adult psyche (I love PGSM. . . It's so bad.) And I still consider ReBoot to be a classic of television animation. It's one of the few Canadian shows that doesn't fill me with a deep sense of shame over my nationality.

But in the end, if I had to one thing that truly defined my childhood, the one thing that forged my political and ethical philosophy and made me who I am today (aside from genetics, parental upbringing, yadda yadda), it would be absolutely no contest.

Star Trek.

As a child of the nineties, I was raised by Star Trek: The Next Generation, a show that, warts and all, I love even to this day (hell, I'll even tolerate the movies). TNG eventually led me to Deep Space Nine, which started as a pretty good Next Gen clone before growing into something bigger and more epic (Screw Babylon 5-- DS9 forever!). These two shows, in turn, led to a greater appreciation of the 1960's original. Indeed, as tame and campy as it may seem now, the original Star Trek had some pretty big balls for it's day. When they said "risk is our business," they weren't kidding.

But as the years passed, my trekkiness began to fade. It began with Voyager. I loved it at first, but the feeling quickly died, and eventually I found myself watching it simply because it was a Trek show. But silver bullet, though, was Enterprise. If believed the hype, as I foolishly did, then this was the show that was supposed to save Star Trek by taking it back to the beginning -- and in the process, cleverly avoiding some of the less well thought out dramatic restrictions imposed on the franchise by Gene Roddenberry (In the future, you see, we humans will be the bestest buddies in the whole wide world and will never have any kind of dramatic conflict with one another because we'll all be just too busy telling the rest of the universe how fucking awesome we are -- riveting, no?).

But of course, Enterprise ended up being the final nail in Star Trek's coffin. There are many reasons why it failed. For me, personally, what killed Enterprise was the bizarre willingness of the show's creators to go along with the Bush administration's War On Terror agenda, but that's just me being a liberal ass. If you want less polemic, YouTube critic sfdebris has done a damn fine job of explaining why both Voyager and Enterprise were pretty much really bad shows.

The end result of all this was that when Enterprise aired its terrible final episode, and the curtain dropped on Star Trek: Nemesis. . . that was it. It was over for me. Sure, I'd more than enjoy the occasional TNG or DS9 rerun, but as a continuing, evolving story, it was done. If they never made another Star Trek movie of TV show, I would not lose a wink of sleep.

But then it happened: J.J. Abrahms, co-creator of Lost, announced that he would be directing the next Star Trek film. This intrigued me, to say the least. Lost, while not nearly as good as it used to be, is still the only ongoing TV show other than The Daily Show/Colbert Report that I still bother to watch regularly. I actually found myself looking forward to the prospect of Abrahms making a new Star Trek movie and, just maybe, revitalizing the series.

But I didn't count on it. The plot leaks that had been released-- something about Spock travelling back in time to save a young James Kirk from the T-1000. . . um, I mean, the Romulans-- didn't exactly seem like the kind of inspired premise you'd expect from the creator of Alias and Lost.

What finally convinced me, though, was a bootlegged leak of the trailer, which was supposed to be shown before Quantum of Solace, but was for whatever reason not shown in Prince George theatres. (Quantum of Solace, by the way, was pretty underwhelming).

Here it is:

UPDATE: This is a higher quality version of the trailer. Of, course, by "higher quality" I mean only in the technical sense.

You may think, like many YouTube commenters, that this movie looks awesome. If you do, please leave a comment so that I may put your name on a list of Stalinists, because that's what you are! Stalinists!

Incidentally, if you do happen to be a Stalinist who, like me, is severely appalled by this trailer, please accept me sincerest apologies.

It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.

-Alfred Tennyson.

UPDATE #2: The Cast.

Kirk: Chris Pine. I don't know him, but Naomi does-- she described him, quite succinctly, as "That Douchebag."

Spock: Zachary Quinto. Fucking Sylar. Hell, maybe they cast Masi Oka as Sulu.

McCoy: Karl Urban. It's funny, 'cause in photos he really looks more like James Doohan, ie Scotty.

Scotty: A.J., cover your eyes. Simon Pegg. Shaun of the Dead is playing Scotty. Maybe that will be a plus for some, but I just feel bad for Pegg.

Sulu: Masi Oka?! No, that would actually be cool. Korean-American actor John Cho, aka "Harold" from Harold and Kumar. Just ask any Korean how thrilled they would be to play a Japanese person. I mean, ever since the Japan annexed Korea in 1910, they've been pretty much the same people, right?

(Note: Apparently, this was a concern for J.J. Abrahms, but Cho, desperate for work one assumes, rationalized it by saying that Sulu, a Japanese man, respresents all of Asia. I'm not even going to go there.)

Uhura: Zoe Saldana. Don't know her.

Chekov: A Lady with a Dog.

Seven Days. . .

Okay, it's really only six days until the federal election, but I came up with the title on Monday, and you gotta admit that an allusion to The Ring is gonna be a helluva lot catchier than Six Days. . .

Six days. How the hell did that happen?! I knew that there was an election going on, but. . . damn! I've been so focused on University and the American election (I was also recently rear-ended, but that's a whole other story I'd rather not get into) that I haven't had time to really consider who I will vote for.

I won't vote Conservative. I know that much. There are many reasons for this, including this one. Stephen Harper, before becoming PM, did everything he could to come across as a far-right loon-- it's only after he got elected that remodeled his image into that of a mere centrist douchebag. I worry about what he would do if he ever got a majority government. . .

But that said. . . in his latest campaign ads-- and I am truly sorry to say this, Naomi-- Stephen Harper looks surprisingly, frighteningly similar to Josh. It makes me almost able to tolerate that insipid "Stephen Harper Loves His Kids so Vote Conservative!" nonsense.

I most likely won't vote Liberal. Frankly, the only reason I would is if there was a good chance that the Liberal candidate would beat the Conservative one-- and this being Prince George, I think you know how likely it is for that little scenario to unfold.

I won't vote Bloc-- no Bloc candidate.

I'd consider voting for the Marxist-Leninist party just to make a statement! Problem is, I don't know what that statement would be.

So, in the end, I'm torn between the NDP and the Greens. The NDP have been making a lot of headway in the polls recently. There's a chance -- and, mind you, I base this on absolutely nothing other than a vague trend-- that they could beat out the Liberals to form an official opposition. Plus, my (metaphorical, I'm not British) Old Labour blood obliges me to vote for the leftist party.

On the other hand. . . all I've really heard and seen from the NDP ad's, website, and even platform are soundbites ("Man, fuck dem Eastside Boardroom table motherfuckas! I'm all about da Westside kitchen tables up in dis bitch! Ya feel me?") along with a few vague, nice-sounding ideas(Increased support for pedestrian and bicycle paths "as part of [the NDP's] commitment to sustainable transport"-- I'm not joking). To be fair, I haven't checked out the other party platforms and websites, but my feeling is that they won't be much better.

Adding to that is the fact that, well, Jack Layton seems to be a bit of a douche. I'm basing that solely on the fact that he, along with Stephane Dion, has been judged by the public to have come off a bit dickish during the English language debate (I say "appears" because I didn't watch the debate. . . Yes, I'm a terrible citizen, but I'm getting to that). Indeed, the two party leaders who came off looking the best, according to people who I have mostly never met, are Stephen Harper and Green Party leader Elizabeth May, which leads me to the other end of my conundrum. . .

The Greens. The environmentalist party. From what I've heard, they're left-leaning on social issues and environment, but right-leaning on the economy. Considering that the economic meltdown in the U.S. appears, by all accounts, to have occurred as a result of Republican emphasis on deregulation, the latter may well be a liability. On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, their leader comes off as intelligent, knowledgeable, and reasonable-- from what I hear.

That, and they support a carbon tax, while the NDP support a cap and trade system. You see, carbon tax is good, and cap and trade is bad. . . from what I hear. . . somehow.

Sigh.

If you've made it this far, you've probably come to the conclusion that I really am an ignorant slut. You may have even decided that it would probably just be a better idea for this jackass (me) not to vote in the first place.

That, you see, was be design.

If you've been clicking on the links, you've probably visited my sister's blog, wherein she expresses her anger at those who choose not to vote for reason of every party sucking. Or, as she said herself:

I'm sitting on the CFUR couch listening to some guy rant about how he's exercising his democratic right by not voting. He claims hating every party as his excuse. . . . Enough people are stupid enough to either a) vote FOR [Harper] or b) NOT vote at all? No wonder North American politics are such a joke.

I know that Naomi isn't talking about this issue specifically, but her blog entry seems to suggest that compulsive voting might be the answer to some of our democratic woes.

I've always taken issue with the idea of compulsive voting. First, I do believe that if you have the right to vote, you have the right not to vote. While I do not agree with said CFUR guy's assessment of the political landscape, I could envision a circumstance wherein all the parties would screw the public with equal intensity. In that case, what good does it do to vote? "Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos?"

Secondly, as this blog post has demonstrated, I really have no fucking clue as to who I should vote for. Really, I'm just stringing together a few random facts (Polls! Arts Funding! Kyoto!) along with a few gut level associations (Harper = Bush = BAD! NDP = Left = GOOD!) to form the basis of what is really an incredibly significant civic duty. I mean, really, would you want someone like me choose who your political leader should be? If I were this ignorant about anything else. . . well, I am a physics lab instructor, but that's not the point!

The point is, I'm somebody who actually gives half a shit about politics, or at least that's what I thought. Just imagine someone who really couldn't give a damn one way or the other being forced by law (or social pressure) to participate in the voting process. They don't care one way or the other, so they may as well vote for the guy who looks like Naomi's cute boyfriend.

Next Week?

Hi A.J.

I'm going to be pretty busy next week-- I have to attend a committee meeting and give my final presentation for my Octave course. But Friday night or Saturday should be good.

Would it be cool if Naomi came as well?


Oh. . . and for you other people reading this (and A.J. as well):

YOR!

(It's over twenty minutes long, but its worth it!)

You're Welcome

Sunday

My mom contacts me to tell me that my sister, Naomi, and her band The Arbitrarys are in trouble. It was pretty much the same trouble that they were in a few days before: the transmission in their van went kaput in Merritt, and they needed another vehicle to get to their gigs. They had already borrowed a vehicle from our aunt Sandy and uncle Joe in order to go to Vancouver Island, but now they needed a new vehicle fortheir trip back north. That's where I came in. . .

Monday

I drive 730 kilometers from PG to Surrey in our Suburban, which I am to give to Naomi. I leave PG at about 10:30 and arrive at a quarter to seven. Excluding bathroom breaks, snack breaks, and lunch, that leaves roughly eight hours of actual driving time. Everyone at Sandy and Joe's is surprisingly impressed by how "fast" I got to Surrey-- I'm more impressed by the fact that I managed to do this trip on 80 litres of Diesel, about half a tank on the Suburban. It was not an especially fun drive. I was so concerned with getting to Surrey at a reasonable time that I couldn't really sit back and enjoy the view (I considered visiting Chasm, about fifty kilometers north of Clinton, but decided against it.) One thing that struck me, though, was the absence of snow caps on the mountains of the Fraser valley, something I've noticed in a mountains near PG as well. In all the years I've gone down that stretch of road, never have I seen the mountaintops so bare. Maybe there's something to this global warming thing. . . .

I arrived just in time to join the gang for dinner. My cousin George recounted how he flipped over his quad and broke his left arm, and injury that required him to have pieces of metal surgically inserted into his arm to keep the bones of his forearm in place. Apparently, this is only the latest in a series quad flipping accidents of which George has been a part. George. . . he's a character!

After dinner and conversation, me, Naomi, Josh and Robin took the Suburban on a drive to Vancouver. After visiting Stanley Park we went downtown, where we got Starbucks and ice cream. While I was waiting for everyone else, a charming older lady with a large bruise across the right side of her face asked if I would like to buy her a pint. Romance.

Owing to Naomi's shitty directions, we didn't get home until midnight. . .

Tuesday

Once we did, Sandy set up our beds for the night. I had been under the impression that I would be getting a guest room, but unfortunately, all that Sandy could manage was foamys and sleeping bags far too small for my frame. I realize Sandy was on very short notice and did her best with what she had, but that said, putting a blanket on the carpet would have done just as well as the foamy that I had been given. Of course, Naomi and Josh got the big inflatable thing. You know, they needed rest after their long day of driving a distance roughly equal to Germany.

Joe got up at five in the morning, and since I was sleeping in the living room next to the kitchen where Joe was preparing his breakfast, I did too. Sandy took me to the airport and by 10:00 in the morning I was home. Fifteen hundred kilometers in twenty-four hours.

So, yeah. You're welcome.

(Note: Naomi did thank me numerous times.)

(Also: A.J., I got you're comments, and replied to them in the same comment thread.)

Tycho Crater Imaged

Remember Selene/Kayuga, that probe Japan sent into lunar orbit? Well, using photographs and altitude measurements taken by the probe, scientists at the Japanese Space Agency have constructed a 3D map of the lunar crater Tycho.

Click here for a video. It's a big file, but it's worth it.

(Thanks Bad Astronomy)