Peut-être

So I posted the following video elsewhere--You know for the LOLz-- after having been introduced to the English version and feeling Canadian, Québécois enough to warrant posting la version française. Comme ça:



Which elicited the comment from an American poster: La version [sic] Quebecoise [sic], peut-etre? Which seems thematic of my experience with Americans regarding Québec French: there always seems to be the implication that Québec French is somehow inauthentic. Flawed. Less correct. Now language legitimacy, purity and correctness are complex, spiky, issues particularly among the French (there are two formal language academies, which frequently disagree). Which leads me to the following question:

Mes chers amis américains, s'il vous plaît quelqu'un pourrait expliquer le problème que vous avez avec le Québec français? SRSLY. Quel est l'intérêt? What's up with that, yo?

It seems to me, whenever I am in the US or speaking French with my American colleagues, friends and acquaintances, this issue is brought up. Sometimes in jest. Sometimes sincerely. One even argued for the position because "they don't even use the liason phonetique in Québec." I of course objected strenuously because that is demonstrably untrue.

Is this just the vanity of American intellectuals, aping Parisienne arrogance?

With regards to the video itself, it purports to be from "The Republic of Bacon" ("La République du Bacon"), which apparently has two official languages, neither of which makes sense to have a regional designation, other than the already present ambiguity of French and English being both adjectives for ethnicity/nationality and language.

W o t W: Lugubrious (P, S)

The Word for this Week is

Lugubrious

...Is an excellent word because it sounds like it means. It is like emotional onomatopoeia; especially if you draw out the vowels. I came across it in Richard Dawkins' newest book, The Greatest Show on Earth (p190) in the following quote describing a colleague W. D. Hamilton:

"he had a lugubrious manner reminiscent of A. A. Milne's Eeyore (not the deplorable Walt Disney version, of course)." When stung by a wasp "knowing what a great entomologist he was, his companion said, 'Bill, do you know the name of that wasp?' 'Yes,' Bill murmured gloomily in his most Eeyoreish voice. 'As a matter of fact it's named after me.'"

Lugubrious is meaningful and phonetically pleasing. Use it sparingly to avoid sounding pretentious like me, but oh do use it.

DOCTOR WHO

We at HERESY love DOCTOR WHO. Not in a sick way, but definitely in an ALMOST you-are-a-creepy-fanboy way. SRSLY. You should see my scarf: it's 30' long.

So in the honour of the dearly departed 10th and the soon to be reigning 11th, I refer you to the following blogs and links.

Start here with a great retrospective of the series' many, many logos. I spent an hour plus refinding this link so you can bet I'm gunna post it everyfuckingwhere! "Doctor Who logos retrospective" nice analysis too.

Here's a simpler one from The Guardian without the witty commentary.

And this one, in the Wikipedian style box featuring the current incarnation in the centre.

For the record the 1974 variant immediately below, from the 4th Doctor's era, is our favourite and the official favourite of HERESY.



From the commentary: "Making it blue binds it definitively with the TARDIS. That TARDIS won't be part of the design again until the latest effort."

And with sounds, there is of course Youtube wankery. We like the following video homage though it comes short (2009), I like the blending of the various theme music.

Q:"What sort of spending would you like cut?" A:"All of it. ALL of it."

And let's be clear here it is more than just the average stupidity of people, indeed it is the tu quoque fallacy to merely to argue, "Oh well, you'd see stupid liberals/Obama supporters/left-wingers too" yet not address the underlying problem: Sarah Palin is anti-intellectual, anti-science and cultivates the ignorance seen above. Even John McCain countered such blatant xenophobia during his campaign.

Citing from the poster's sidebar on YouTube: "no politician has emerged on the national stage as undefined and unqualified as Sarah Palin, and her public persona--which is anti-intellectual by definition--discourages substance. Instead, we get winking. One could hardly imagine her giving a complex speech about race in America, or speaking eloquently about our country's relations with Islam. Not just because she couldn't write such a speech (Obama has speech-writers, of course) but because she wouldn't--such necessarily academic discussion is antithetical to the persona she's created for herself and that her supporters have come to love."

And to save y'all from having to read the damn thing read Neil Macdonald's review of Going Rogue on CBC instead.

I think it is interesting that the gentleman in the camo/hunting clothes is lamenting the end of American Exceptionalism. Perhaps I am far too left-wing to understand, but when one nation dominates another, or all others, that's a hegemony and tends not to benefit the world but that nation all but exclusively. Why would that ending be a bad thing? Oh yeah. Americans.

(I love how my spell checker finds both "Palin" and "Obama", yet not McCain, to be incorrect.)

Embedding disabled by request: The Fake Scandal of the Copyright

This is wonderful. Even more so since the fake scandal over the "accidental" release of Lily Allen's cover of Britney Spear's "Womanizer", available here: Embedding disabled by request (or not). I do think, however, it is perhaps noteworthy that the original "accidental" copyright-infringingly released version is less produced and thus better. What's the word? It's almost sincere.



How crass and disingenuous.

"Quick! Dilute it again!" "That's strong stuff."

Best. Mr. Deity. Ever.

I love how P Zed Myers gets credited as PZ "Zed" Myers. You know this O Constant ListenerZ, I called him that FIRST! Listen to the back episodes.

The final joke (with the banana) is an allusion to The Atheist's Nightmare "unintentional creationist humour" of Kirk Cameron and the Way of the Master.

Cthulhu on High

Dr. P Zed Myers and Joe.My.God. have both been following the ridiculous mess that is the painting of Jesus delivering the US Constitution. I'm not going to give you the link because I really don't want to have to find it again. It is widely available. Sadly. Instead I'll give you my favourite of the parodies featuring Cthulhu. (Dr. Myers and I both love squidy goodness).

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn... Not anymore. It seems he's up and about. And much shorter than I imagined.



In offer this image in the true spirit of l'Action de Grâce or [Canadian] Thanksgiving.

"Transparency: The Rise of Atheism in America"

Okay there are a heap of issues with the interpretation of the very raw unqualified data, but I like the info graphic and the the atheist as the buxom bartender is actually kinda witty. At least the image is pretty?

(Brought to my attention by the amazing Pharyngula master himself, P Zed Myers. But from here originally.)

Dan Choi should run for something as he is technically unemployed.

A great speaker, a smart man, multilingual, charming, articulate, natural leader and fired for being a gay homosexual, on the tail end of [now Multi-] National Coming Out Day we at Heresy Qubec want to salute a neighbour to the south, Dan Choi. This is a great speech given at the address to the 250,000+ at the LGBT National Equality March in Washington, DC (this afternoon, the 11th of October, 2009). 안녕하십니까? 최 선생님. (Annyonghashimnikka? Choi Sonsaengnim.)

Bitchy Androids, Bitchier Actors who play them

Continuing with source citations from "Episode 8: Linguaphiles attend," here is one of the contextual quotes that lead to a discussion of a certain bitchy gold robot as portrayed by an apparently equally bitchy actor. (The source is here.)

In a recent interview with Kenny Baker (R2-D2)

INTERVIEWER: Did you get on with fellow robot actor Anthony Daniels?

KENNY BAKER: Not really. I thought it was just me he didn't get on with but recently I've found out he doesn't get on with anyone. He's been such an awkward person over the years. If he just calmed down and socialised with everyone, we could make a fortune touring and making personal appearances. I've asked him four times now but, the last tiime, he looked down his nose at me like I was a piece of *beep* He said: 'I don't do many of these conventions - go away little man.' He really degraded me and made me feel small - for want of a better expression. He's rude to everyone though, including the fans.

*Gasp*:(

Has C3PO turned to the dark side?

I also mentioned, as Quote of the Week, the nastier Daniels comment that appeared on Wikipedia and mentioned that it had further been extracted therefrom. I'm too lazy to crawl through the innards of the talk page. But the expurgated version is here.

Okay, I'm a little too obsessive. The edit is after the Revision as of 19:51, 16 September 2009

Arising from Episode 8: Linguaphiles attend

How awesome are these images? Really, The Scream? The Doom Spikes are an instant fail because I love them and totally would want to visit.

(From the article here. A more detailed look at the subject is here complete with more amazing images and thoughtful passages many of which I read on the Podcast.)

DO NOT READ Dan Brown

From the Telegraph comes a list of 20 very compelling reasons not to read the work of Dan Brown. He will not be reviewed on Heresy Québec. Ever.

Jumping to the good stuff. Well not really. The #1 and my personal favourite:

1. The Da Vinci Code: Title. The Da Vinci Code.

Leonardo’s surname was not Da Vinci. He was from Vinci, or of Vinci. As many critics have pointed out, calling it The Da Vinci Code is like saying Mr Of Arabia or asking What Would Of Nazareth Do?

Go here and read the rest of the list.

Distrubilicious: Amazing how much they look like fat cells.

Strangely Compelling: Carl Sagan - 'A Glorious Dawn' ft Stephen Hawking (Cosmos Remixed)

The Heresy Québec Review of the Marilyn Manson concert in Ottawa

For context read Lynn Saxberg's review in the Ottawa Citizen of Marilyn Manson's September 21st concert (here!) also the Calgary Herald review (here!), by Heath McCoy, of the September 11th show which is noteworthy because moral panic arose during the last time Manson performed in YYC.

I think Lynn Saxberg is a bit harsher than I was in my evaluation. Perhaps it is because I actually enjoy Manson's work and "art" (if you will). To a point. The concert opened late, but solidly with "We're from America",... and then spiralled into one of the most poorly orchestrated spectacles I have had the misfortune to attend. My beloved sister had described the Edmonton show to me and had lead me to hope that it might improve. I was really looking forward to his encore of Patti Smith's "Rock N Roll Nigger" a standard in his recent tours. (I love how McCoy can't even properly use the word "nigger" and has to instead write "n**ger" cuz changing the name of the song and replacing letters just makes all those years of slavery and oppression just melt away.) There was no encore. It seems as though the entire tour was lurching into the banal space of post-rock mediocrity and more importantly, from my myopic perspective, that the Ottawa show was the worst of the lot.

Upon exiting the Scotia Bank Überdome (or whatever the fuck it is called) I was struck by the fanboys and their overheard wankery: "That was so awesome!" And the perhaps more adulterated, "Well, at least he came to Ottawa." To the drooling first dyad I wanted ask, "Were we at the same concert?" I chose not to on the grounds that they were likely 13 and had no basis for comparison. I was reminded of the line from the Dayglo Abortion's "Black Sabbath", "he'd probably love me if I pissed on his face..." (Although the fan wankery is reversed there, the principle applies.)

I think even the over abundance of police were bored. Clearly their time was wasted in preparation for the rioting that just doesn't ever seem to happen moral panics be damned.

Mr. The Engineer made an excellent (and telling) observation: Tori Amos' performance was actually more transgressive. Perhaps that is the most salient point here. When a balladeer is more transgressive and much better an entertainer over all then perhaps the shock-rocker needs to fade back into obscurity and count the money received from residuals.

W o t W: Twee (p, s)

The word for this week, this week a long fucking time ago, was

TWEE

But somehow in my editing tonight (January 15th, 2010, 04h35!) I deleted the fucker and am too tired to rewrite it. For now.

This serves as it's placeholder. Hopefully I'll remember and fix it. I'm mildly OC so prolly I will.

[Insert negative comment disparaging the Monster that is Hello Kitty here.]