I wouldn't want to offend the little S.O.B.'s!

I have to admit that I'm a very thin-skinned person. But even so, I'm still bothered by the number of innocuous things that some people claim to find offensive. This came to my mind a few days ago, when they were playing that Dixie Chicks song "I'm Not Ready To Make Nice" (or whatever it's called) at work, and I thought about that whole Toby Keith thing. Now, I'm no kind of Dixie Chicks fan, but it makes no sense that anyone, Bush supporter or not, would be bothered by someone saying that they're embarrassed to be from the same state as the President. I mean, that's not even really a political statement. [1] Then you hear about people getting mad at Whoopi Goldberg's "keep Bush out of my bush" jokes (which I'm sure weren't FUNNY, but I doubt they were particularly offensive either), and Conan O'Brien saying that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert "have done for fake news what the Fox News Channel has done for fake news." [2] I realize that some of this is probably political, and that, if the Bush administration and their media buddies can convince people that even a JOKING criticism is bad, they'll steer away from REAL criticism. But it's not only the Bush-backers who do this kind of thing. As much as I hate Ann Coulter, I think that the mainstream media tend to treat her in a profoundly stupid fashion. She'll make one of her over-the-top statements about how a leading Democrat is gay [3], or we need to wipe the Middle East off the map, or September 11 widows are enjoying their fame. Then she'll go on the media circuit, and the interviewers will say, in so many words, "Ann, you're so MEAN! Why can't you be NICE?" I'm certainly not defending Coulter, and it disturbs me to no end that there are people who actually take her crap seriously. But do the mainsteam media just not realize that causing offense is what she does, and the "You big meanie!" reaction is just what she wants?

Along with this comes to whole idea of the Forced Apology. It seems like people nowadays have gotten into the habit of demanding apologies. But if someone really IS sorry for what they said, won't they apologize on their own? A forced apology is likely to be a phony apology, and what good does that do? I believe Whoopi was forced to apologize for her jokes (and not because they were too obvious), and I've heard of that happening on other occasions that I can't recall at the moment. It's like we live in a society where no one actually understands the concept of apologizing.

[1] I think the Dixie Chicks later BECAME political, but that was kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
[2] DISCLAIMER: I didn't see either of these things first-hand, and the quote might be slightly off.
[3] As I've told bethje, I don't even think her comment about John Edwards being a "fag" IS offensive. In order to be offensive, wouldn't it have to be based on something, and make some kind of sense? The "fag" comment was just utter nonsense.

Super Girls Voice

I haven't been writing that much recently, due largely to a combination of work, Sims-playing, and trying to do my taxes. It turns out that, because New Jersey doesn't have a part-year resident return, I have to fill out five different returns, only one of which can be filed online. I think I've done most of the necessary calculations, though, so pretty much all that remains is to go ahead and fill them out.

Okay, here are five other things I'd like to address:

1. Hey, Sanjaya, is having slicked-back hair and dancing with Paula Abdul the best you can do? Come on, the people are all voting for you because they want you to be amusingly bad! This, of course, makes him far superior to Haley Scarnato, who's just plain BAD. Seriously, what does she have going for her? Yeah, I know, she has nice legs. Unfortunately, the show isn't Turn-of-the-Last-Century Chorus Girl Idol. So who keeps voting for her? I can totally understand why people vote for the entertainingly bad (like Sanjaya), but not so much with the bad AND uninteresting.

2. Speaking of female parts, the latest Bullshit! episode was all about breasts, addressing, among other things, public breast-feeding and the whole breast cancer pink ribbon thing, as well as just showing a lot of nekkid breasts. While I agreed with most of the points made, the whole thing seemed a little gratuitous when there are so many other less sexy but more significant topics they could be addressing. Yeah, we get that Penn likes boobs. Hey, so do I, but I doubt I'd feel the need to point it out every week if I had my own TV show.

3. There's seriously a movie called Disturbia? Doesn't that sound like something they'd watch on The Simpsons, perhaps in a double feature with The Bloodening?

4. I heard that Britney Spears is now dating Howie Day. That's kind of weird, because bethje and I saw him open for Tori Amos a few years ago. All I remember is that he used a lot of taped loops. Back then, who would have thought he'd end up being a replacement for Kevin Federline? For that matter, who'd even HEARD of K-Fed back then?

5. In the course of my Sims-playing, one couple had twin baby boys (the first male babies born in my game), and later broke up with each other when the wife caught the husband kissing someone else. The Sims take cheating more seriously than they did in the first game, with the relationship score being lowered considerably when they see it. I've always kind of thought this reaction should vary from one Sim to another. But then, I guess the main thing I'd like with the game is more customization. The aspirations are a good start, but there are only five of them (family, popularity, wealth, romance, and knowledge), and the wants and fears often get quite repetitive. I was trying to think of some other aspirations that might be interesting, and I came up with Evil, Patriotism, and Physical Fitness. What would really be cool would be for the player to provide more input for a Sim's personality and desires, but that might be a little too complicated to program and play. Besides, having TOO much input might remove some of the challenge from the game.

Now I'd better go to bed, seeing as how I have a concert to attend in the evening.