A much-needed alternative to posts that are actually interesting

[vovat]

1. I'm sure most of you have seen this already, but if you've been thinking, "You know, I like the general idea of Wikipedia, but it's not biased and hateful enough for my purposes," fear not! Conservapedia is here! It's billed as "a much-needed alternative to Wikipedia," presumably in the same way that "shut up, God did it" is a "much-needed alternative" to evolutionary biology. I mean, I'm all for free speech and everything, but this site is incredibly petty. One complaint that was considered important enough to go right on their front page is, "On Wikipedia, many of the dates are provided in the anti-Christian 'C.E.' instead of 'A.D.', which Conservapedia uses." Not to mention that their design is a total rip-off of Wikipedia's. Aren't they afraid that God will strike them down for using heathen coding? Or do they figure He'll be cool with it because it was done for His glory? And IS it okay for Christians to eat food that was sacrificed to pagan gods? Don't ask me; I'm no theologian!

2. I'm sure nobody reading this cares about my opinion (or, indeed, the topic), but they really should kick that Antonella Barba chick off American Idol, and not just because she makes everything she says sound like a question? I mean, I think having racy pictures on the Internet is a stupid reason for someone to be booted, but they set a precedent with Frenchie Davis. And where would we be as a country if our televised talent shows didn't follow precedent?

3. If anyone still wants to play my guess the first line of the song game, do it soon. I'll probably be posting the answers in my next entry.

4. Out of curiosity, does anyone know any good places to download Sims 2 stuff? I'm referring only to FREE stuff here, mind you. And I still haven't fully explored a lot of the stuff in the regular game, but it would be nice to know for future reference.

5. Why can't people seem to grasp that they're not supposed to throw paper in receptacles clearly identified as "for cans only" or "for plastic only"?

6.

You Have a Phlegmatic Temperament

Mild mannered and laid back, you take life at a slow pace. You are very consistent - both in emotions and actions. You tend to absorb set backs easily. You are cool and collected. It is difficult to offend you. You can remain composed and unemotional. You are a great friend and lover. You don't demand much of others. While you are quiet, you have a subtle wit that your friends know well. At your worst, you are lazy and unwilling to work at anything. You often get stuck in a rut, without aspirations or dreams. You can get too dependent on others, setting yourself up for abandonment.

What Temperment Are You?

"Mild mannered and laid back"? Hey, this result isn't accurate at all! And they misspelled "temperament" there at the bottom!

Comments

When did everything become so bifurcated?

[bec-87rb.livejournal.com]

First of all, protestantism was, at some point, the wild-eyed cuckoo very liberal idea that you can talk to God directly and that He wants you to care for his creatures directly, first, not his church. Snake handlers! Now, that's protestantism at its far-outest. When did protestantism become the pole-up-the-bum vanguard of Change Is Bad?

I get tired of how conservatives are often represented by guys who think the Earth is 6,000 years old, because they can't grasp that much of the Bible is metaphorical, not literal. Hello? Jesus mostly talked in metaphors, for pity's sake. And Jesus had a sense of humor, too.

I'm not one, but I know conservatives who are lovely, genuine, intelligent people, and they think the idea that the Earth is literally 6,000 years old is just plain silly.

/rant

Re: When did everything become so bifurcated?

[vovat.livejournal.com]

I remember learning in one of my history classes that it was mostly Protestant churches that had the idea that hard work is rewarded on Earth as well as in Heaven (i.e., the Protestant Work Ethic), which, for some, later morphed to "It's okay to be filthy, stinking rich and not do anything to help those less fortunate, because it's totally God's will!" That seems to be a key idea in the style of both conservatism and Protestantism practiced by President Bush and his supporters. Even though Jesus was always saying to give to the poor.

I get tired of how conservatives are often represented by guys who think the Earth is 6,000 years old, because they can't grasp that much of the Bible is metaphorical, not literal.

If pressed to it, even the most ardent fundamentalist will generally admit that there are certain parts of the Bible that can't be taken literally. It's just that nobody can seem to agree which parts are which. But I also think there's an all-or-nothing mentality common among the Creationists. Many of them seem to feel that, if there are parts of the Bible that aren't literally true, they have to disregard the whole thing. Kind of like how you have to either be with the United States or with the terrorists, I suppose.

[onib.livejournal.com]

I love the fact that Conservapedia has commandments rather than rules. Reading through their list of bias complaints about Wikipedia was pretty funny too. I like how they complain that an international project does not reflect the beliefs and understandings of Americans. One of my favorites was the one on Henry Liddell. They complain that an article on an English gentleman focuses too much on English terminology and royal titles rather than skipping all that to get to the information that Americans would find interesting. Um, yeah.

Don't get me wrong. I think Wikipedia has some serious problems, especially with an elitist attitude among editors toward anyone with whom they don't agree. But saying that a balance to that is to go entirely in the other direction just seems ignorant (fair & balanced = single-minded focus). You see that a lot with Conservatism though. Rather than working with others, they seem to prefer to take their toys and run home where they can mock, dismiss, or ignore everyone else.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

I love the fact that Conservapedia has commandments rather than rules.

It's also a .com site, while Wikipedia is a .org. I realize that the fact these are supposed to stand for "company" and "organization" is pretty much a moot point by now, but it still seems to fit with their general "Hey, we're more serious!" attitude.

I like how they complain that an international project does not reflect the beliefs and understandings of Americans.

On their own page about Wikipedia (http://www.conservapedia.com/Wikipedia), they say, "The administrators who monitor and control the content on Wikipedia do not represent the views of the majority of Americans, and many are in fact not American." Yes, because when Al Gore invented the Internet, he intended that only Americans should use it, right? :P

Incidentally, looking at Conservapedia in order to write this reply, I found that they had a link to this article (http://www.thestar.com/article/190501) criticizing it, which mentions that the creator is the son of Phyllis Schlafly. Go figure. There's also a rebuttal (http://www.conservapedia.com/Talk:Canada_newspaper), which consists pretty much entirely of "libertarians aren't conservative." Well, maybe not by the traditional definition of "conservative," but some of them are definitely right-wing, and I'd say Ayn Rand fell pretty firmly into the right-wing category by American standards (which, according to Conservapedia, should be the only ones that count {g}).

[vilajunkie.livejournal.com]

Oh god. Just look at this entry for Hans Christian Andersen: http://www.conservapedia.com/Hans_Christian_Andersen. It really looks like it was written by a freshman in high school; the use of vocabulary was trite and vague enough. And then look at the entry in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Christian_Andersen. Hmm, which one actually looks researched and is informative? I wonder...

[vovat.livejournal.com]

It seems like a fair number of Conservapedia articles are incredibly short and have very poor syntax. I forget which article it was, but there was one that used the same word at least three times in the same sentence. I guess that stuff doesn't matter, as long as the bias is correct. :P

I also love how Conservapedia complains that too many Wikipedia articles are full of rumor and celebrity gossip, yet a substantial portion of that Andersen article is about how he was rumored to have a crush on a singer.

[rockinlibrarian.livejournal.com]

Isn't the point of Wikipedia that it is written and edited by the masses? In that case, why not add their own entries to the format that's already there?

[vovat.livejournal.com]

Well, I obviously can't speak for them, but I get the idea they would argue that the left-wing moderators at Wikipedia would change or delete all of their new content.

[loz]

I choose to believe that the basis of Conservapedia is a parody and that some clueless Conservatives think it is for real.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

While such things as the article on unicorns (http://www.conservapedia.com/Unicorn) and the very fact that it's called "Conservapedia" do suggest parody, I've seen some much more ridiculous things that were totally real. I think it's more likely that it's the opposite--the site is for real, but people occasionally take advantage of its wiki nature to post parodic entries.

[slfcllednowhere.livejournal.com]

I've only looked at Conservapedia a bit so far but it does appear pretty fabulous.

I've been using The Sims Resource since back when Sims 1 was on its first expansion pack and it was actually FREE...but they still have a pretty wide selection of stuff that you can download without joining and joining is fairly cheap and worth it, in my opinion. I was last on it for just a few months last year and ended up getting something like 10,000 downloads.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

Maybe I'll check that out. Thanks!