Gay Deceiver
SkyeFire
Well! This site:
http://www.reasonablyclever.com/gaydeceiver/
reminds me of why, despite the fact that so many people dislike it, TNotB
is still a Heinlein I remember fondly. Mainly because it has one of my
favorite Heinlein characters of all time -- a flying car with a sassy AI.
Okay, so I have a weakness for cool gadgets, and female computers. Sue me.
At any rate, the site bears reading on its own merits, just to admire the
builder's dedication and attention to detail.
David Wright Sr.
news:20040818113107...@mb-m29.aol.com:
Well done. However, it doesn't match my mental image at all. I am
forever canalized by a neat flying car toy which I had at the age of 8-
10 in the late 40s.
Thanks for the link to the Society's website.
--
David Wright
Heinlein Award & Dinner
Friday, September 3, 2004 at Noreascon 4
http://heinleinsociety.org/specialoffers/dinnerreservations.html
If you haven't joined the Society, Why Not?
http://heinleinsociety.org/join.html
Keep Up with the Latest
http://www.heinleinsociety.org/updates.html
Benefit The Heinlein Society by ordering books thru
http://home.alltel.net/dwrighsr/heinlein-amazon.htm
David Wright Sr.
news:Xns95497B92A...@130.133.1.4:
> skye...@aol.com (SkyeFire) wrote in
> news:20040818113107...@mb-m29.aol.com:
(snip)
Sorry, I realize that it is not your site, but I appreciate your bringing
it to our attention. I posted it on alt.fan.heinlein.
David
stePH
> Well! This site:
> http://www.reasonablyclever.com/gaydeceiver/
> reminds me of why, despite the fact that so many people dislike it, TNotB
> is still a Heinlein I remember fondly.
I thought it was a fun ride up until the last section, "L'Envoi."
stePH
--
"A lion will exert himself to the utmost, even when entering the tiger's
den to throw baby rabbits off a cliff!" -- Moroboshi Ataru
David Wright Sr.
news:2ohm73F...@uni-berlin.de:
> SkyeFire wrote:
>
>> Well! This site: http://www.reasonablyclever.com/gaydeceiver/
>> reminds me of why, despite the fact that so many people dislike
>> it, TNotB is still a Heinlein I remember fondly.
>
> I thought it was a fun ride up until the last section, "L'Envoi."
>
Have you read the article by David Potter on TNOTB?
http://heinleinsociety.org/rah/numberbeast.html
Tim McDaniel
David Wright Sr. <dwri...@alltel.net> wrote:
>Have you read the article by David Potter on TNOTB?
>
>http://heinleinsociety.org/rah/numberbeast.html
It is a kindness to those of us on dialup lines to synopsize what the
URL points to. It's also a kindness for future Google Newsing.
I didn't recognize David Potter was the late Gharlane of Eddore. The
URL above points to his HTMLized analysis of _The Number of the
Beast_, previously posted here (without the original citation of the
exact article). The meat of the article, for those who don't remember
the original:
It's nothing but a MANUAL on How To Write Good Fiction, written on
several simultaneous levels --- and people get out of it what they
put INTO it. ...
I add that he also wrote it for any nascent writers with enough wit
to realize what it was ... the supreme hacker's easter-egg.
Just exactly how blatant does the man have to be? He's written one
of the greatest textbooks on narrative fiction ever produced, with
a truly magnificent set of examples of HOW NOT TO DO IT right there
in the foreground, and constant explanations of how to do it right,
with literary references to people and books that DID do it right,
in the background...
--
Tim McDaniel; Reply-To: tm...@panix.com
Charlie Stross
as <dwri...@alltel.net> declared:
>> SkyeFire wrote:
>>
>>> Well! This site: http://www.reasonablyclever.com/gaydeceiver/
>>> reminds me of why, despite the fact that so many people dislike
>>> it, TNotB is still a Heinlein I remember fondly.
>>
>> I thought it was a fun ride up until the last section, "L'Envoi."
>>
>
> Have you read the article by David Potter on TNOTB?
>
> http://heinleinsociety.org/rah/numberbeast.html
Whoops. I now find myself saying something I never expected to say: I
badly need to re-read TNOTB.
-- Charlie
Ben Crowell
the Beast sucked. Big-time. I don't really care if it has cool in-jokes
hidden in anagrams. I don't really care if it's a writing manual in
disguise. The writer's job is to *entertain* the reader, and RAH has often
acknowledged that, both explicitly and implicitly. A nonfiction book
disguised as a novel? He tried that with For Us, The Living, and I'd
consider For Us, The Living to be the more successful of the two.
I recently reread The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, and was actually
pleasantly surprised by how much better the first 3/4 of the book was than
I had remembered. He does a good job of playing with the reader's
expectations, and he makes an entertaining story *without* leaning on any
of his usual crutches (the love angle is a monogamous relationship,
vividly depicted --- imagine that!). It falls flat, like all of his
late-period books, at the end. He marches Gay Deceiver on-stage, as if she
were a beloved character his fans had been demanding to see again. Then he
marches every other character he can think of on-stage. It becomes like
some of the Oz books, where half the book is simply an excuse to bring
back old characters; the difference is that people really *did* love
Polychrome and Jack Pumpkinhead, whereas I really have a hard time
believing that very many of RAH's readers cared that much about Gay
Deceiver or Manuel Garcia O'Kelly (who made a perfectly adequate narrator
and political mouthpiece, but was utterly unmemorable as a person, except
for the prosthesis gimmick).
The main difference between The Number of the Beast and Heinlein's other
sucky late novels is that The Number of the Beast started sucking from
page one.
****** warning, spoiler follows ******
BTW, does anyone have any insight into the race of the protagonist in The
Cat Who Walks Through Walls? Heinlein had a favorite gimmick where he
would reveal that a character was African or African-American very late in
the story, after the reader had probably visualized the character as
white. Late in this book, the protagonist has a war of
insults with a dark-skinned African general, which escalates into a
gun-battle. While insulting the general, the protagonist says he's glad
they're of the same race, because otherwise people would accuse him of
being racist for saying such things about the general. In other words, the
protagonist has been revealed to be of African descent very late in the
book. However, after that, the protagonist is revealed to be the son
of Lazarus Long, who is a red-headed Iowa farm boy. (The dust jacket of
the copy I read has the protagonist portrayed as a pale-skinned.) Does
anyone have any other insight into this? It seems to me like a clear
example of how Heinlein's last novels simply lacked craftsmanship. The
only way I can think of explaining it away is if the protagonist's parents
were very light-skinned African-Americans, who still identified themselves
as black. The copy I read is back at the library, but the other thing that
occurs to me to check is the description of the leg that's been grafted
onto the protagonist, which we eventually learn came from a clone of LL.
Is there a change in skin color where the leg is attached?
Elio M. Garcia Jr.
Crowell (croDELETE...@lightandmatter.com) said on Thu, 19 Aug
2004 11:14:53 -0700...
> ****** warning, spoiler follows ******
>
>
>
>
> BTW, does anyone have any insight into the race of the protagonist in The
> Cat Who Walks Through Walls? Heinlein had a favorite gimmick where he
> would reveal that a character was African or African-American very late in
> the story, after the reader had probably visualized the character as
> white.
I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny
Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and that
Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with
it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
> Late in this book, the protagonist has a war of
> insults with a dark-skinned African general, which escalates into a
> gun-battle. While insulting the general, the protagonist says he's glad
> they're of the same race, because otherwise people would accuse him of
> being racist for saying such things about the general.
Actually, he says, "I'm mighty glad that your skin color matches
mine," which suggests he's not very pale at all.
> The copy I read is back at the library, but the other thing that
> occurs to me to check is the description of the leg that's been grafted
> onto the protagonist, which we eventually learn came from a clone of LL.
> Is there a change in skin color where the leg is attached?
It states as much, in fact.
The cover may have misled you, if it's Michael Whelan's (Campbell
with his cane in a vest, behind Gwen in her faux-Geisha outfit and a
spacesuit). Whelan seemed to miss out on the skintone, sorta (he looks
like he just has a deep tan).
>
>
--
[Upon a Dzurlord learning of the murder of a critic by a painter]
"And it was well done, too. I'd have done the same, only-"
"Yes?"
"I don't paint." (Steven Brust, _The Phoenix Guards_)
Elio M. García, Jr. (el...@tele2.se) -- www.westeros.org
Steve Greenland
> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny Rico
> is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and that Campbell
> is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with it we
> learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I can't
> think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
Gospodin O'Kelly in _TMiaHM_ is probably black; when he is arrested
during his trip to the Southern US, there is a line that implies part of
the reason is his dark skin color, as well as the polygamy issue.
I think Rod Walker in _Tunnel in the Sky_ (hmmm, what an unfortunate
acronym) might be dark skinned as well, based on the comments when he is
face-painted for the TV news bit near the end.
Don't have the exact quotes, though...
Steve
--
Steve Greenland
The irony is that Bill Gates claims to be making a stable operating
system and Linus Torvalds claims to be trying to take over the
world. -- seen on the net
David Wright Sr.
news:MPG.1b8f1977f...@news.individual.net:
> In article <pan.2004.08.19....@lightandmatter.com>, Ben
> Crowell (croDELETE...@lightandmatter.com) said on Thu, 19 Aug
> 2004 11:14:53 -0700...
>
>> ****** warning, spoiler follows ******
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> BTW, does anyone have any insight into the race of the protagonist in
>> The Cat Who Walks Through Walls? Heinlein had a favorite gimmick
>> where he would reveal that a character was African or
>> African-American very late i n the story, after the reader had
>> probably visualized the character as white.
>
> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny
> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and that
> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with
> it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
>
Heinlein stated in a letter that Rod Walker from _Tunnel In The Sky_,
was black and Ginny confirmed that to me in a conversation a couple of
years ago. We have a thread going on this same thing on
alt.fan.heinlein. I, personally, have always had trouble with this, as I
had always assumed that Rod was white and it was his relationship with
Caroline, whom I knew to be black, that was one of the things that
helped me do some thinking and escape from the racist viewpoint that I
had at that time, (This was in the 50s in the deep south). Looking at
all of the so-called clues about his being black, they are, to me, still
very ambiguous and I am not at all convinced that RAH meant it that way
at the time when he wrote it.
>> Late in this book, the protagonist has a war of
>> insults with a dark-skinned African general, which escalates into a
>> gun-battle. While insulting the general, the protagonist says he's
>> glad they're of the same race, because otherwise people would accuse
>> him of being racist for saying such things about the general.
>
> Actually, he says, "I'm mighty glad that your skin color matches
> mine," which suggests he's not very pale at all.
>
I'm at odds with almost everyone on this one. Looking at the text very
carefully, I don't find anywhere where he actually says that General Sam
Beaux is black. He is described as being like a black panther, but I got
the impression that this could be because of his uniform and such.
Another thing that bothers me is the assumption that everyone appears to
make about the comment of Richard being a racist automatically means
that the object of racism must be a black. And at one point, he calls
him 'Black Sambo'. Such 'obvious racism' seems to be out of character
for RAH. Even naming him 'Sam Beaux' seems a bit odd. (The 'Little Black
Sambo' of the book was not African,BTW, but Indian, as I understand it).
>> The copy I read is back at the library, but the other thing that
>> occurs to me to check is the description of the leg that's been
>> grafted onto the protagonist, which we eventually learn came from a
>> clone of LL. Is there a change in skin color where the leg is
>> attached?
>
This was another point. When Rabbi ben Ezra? got his transplanted legs,
much was made of the difference in color, (Richard thought he was
wearing brown knee-length socks). Whereas with LL, it was only mildly
stated that the 'foot differed in texture, size and color', but there
was not any indication that the color difference was especially
significant in any way.
RAH was a master at what I call 'the unconscious assumption'. He makes
full use of a technique to let the reader 'fill-in-the-blanks'. Some
criticisms have been made of the 'lack of description' in his works, not
realising that he does it on purpose to make the reader become more of a
part of the book.
David Wright Sr.
news:4124fd40$0$447$a726...@news.hal-pc.org:
> According to Elio M. Garcia Jr. <el...@tele2.se>:
>> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny Rico
>> is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and that Campbell
>> is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with it we
>> learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
>> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
>
> Gospodin O'Kelly in _TMiaHM_ is probably black; when he is arrested
> during his trip to the Southern US, there is a line that implies part
> of the reason is his dark skin color, as well as the polygamy issue.
>
It was the 'range of color in the Davis' family that got them upset, not
that Manny himself was necessarily black.
> I think Rod Walker in _Tunnel in the Sky_ (hmmm, what an unfortunate
> acronym) might be dark skinned as well, based on the comments when he
> is face-painted for the TV news bit near the end.
>
See my other post on this one.
Ben Crowell
> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and that
> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with
> it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
Sky:
http://www.heinleinsociety.org/rah/faqworks.html
>Actually, he says, "I'm mighty glad that your skin color matches
>mine," which suggests he's not very pale at all.
father? Redheads are generally extremely fair-skinned.
David Wright Sr.
news:pan.2004.08.19....@lightandmatter.com:
It's fairly explicit that LL is indeed his father, That's another of the
points that bothers me. Even if his mother was black, then I would
expect his color to be somewhat paler than what seems to be assumed
about Sam Beaux's color. If you take the 'black panther' description to
be an accurate impression of his 'color' then there should be more
difference between his and Richard's colors.
Ben Crowell
> during his trip to the Southern US, there is a line that implies part of
> the reason is his dark skin color, as well as the polygamy issue.
I got more of a feeling that Manuel Garcia O'Kelley was depicted
consistently throughout the book as being of mixed race, starting with his
name.
It does get to be kind of silly to think in terms of our present
conceptions of race when projecting centuries into the future. The gene
pool is getting more and more mixed. Also, people's conceptions of race
are heavily dependent on their own cultural milieu. (Some people even
think the entire concept of race is purely socially constructed, although
that may be going too far. I suspect our brains are hardwired to notice
certain differences, and make generalizations about them.) As an example,
people have argued a lot about whether Muslims, Jews, and Christians in
medieval Spain considered each other to be different races, or merely
different religions, or whether they even thought in those terms. There's
an argument to be made that Henry II of Castile basically invented modern
antisemitism as a political tool.
Johnny Tindalos
> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny
> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_,
> and that
> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with
> it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
Podkayne? Unless that was just me not realising until later on in the book
(I was only ten when I read it, after all).
stePH
> In article <pan.2004.08.19....@lightandmatter.com>, Ben
> Crowell (croDELETE...@lightandmatter.com) said on Thu, 19 Aug
> 2004 11:14:53 -0700...
>
>>BTW, does anyone have any insight into the race of the protagonist in The
>>Cat Who Walks Through Walls? Heinlein had a favorite gimmick where he
>>would reveal that a character was African or African-American very late in
>>the story, after the reader had probably visualized the character as
>>white.
>
>
> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny
> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_,
Second-to-last page, I remember.
> and that
> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with
> it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
Campbell? Why do I remember his name as Richard Eames? Am I
remembering the wrong book?
David Wright Sr.
berlin.de:
>> and that
>> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and
with
>> it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but
I
>> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
>
> Campbell? Why do I remember his name as Richard Eames? Am I
> remembering the wrong book?
>
>
Colin Campbell was his real name. Richard Ames was his pen name and the
one that he went under when he met Gwen.
David Wright Sr.
news:Xns954AA7D2E...@130.133.1.4:
> stePH <acet...@earthlink.net> wrote in news:2okgqmFbsjlmU2@uni-
> berlin.de:
>
>>> and that
>>> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and
>>> with it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same
>>> thing), but I can't think of any other instances. Am I missing
>>> some?
>>
>> Campbell? Why do I remember his name as Richard Eames? Am I
>> remembering the wrong book?
>>
>>
>
> Colin Campbell was his real name. Richard Ames was his pen name and
the
> one that he went under when he met Gwen.
>
Sorry, one of his pen names, I think.
David
Tim McDaniel
David Wright Sr. <dwri...@alltel.net> wrote:
>(The 'Little Black Sambo' of the book was not African,BTW, but
>Indian, as I understand it).
My copy of _Little Black Sambo_ has tigers in it, which rules out
Africa, and says that the tigers are reduced to "a great big pool of
melted butter (or 'ghi,' as it is called in India)". But Black Mumbo,
Black Jumbo, and Little Black Sambo are drawn as African (to my eyes)
in the last scene, with kinked hair and large lips.
Michael S. Schiffer
news:MPG.1b8f1977f...@news.individual.net:
>...Heinlein had a
>> favorite gimmick where he would reveal that a character was
>> African or African-American very late i
> n
>> the story, after the reader had probably visualized the
>> character as white.
> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals
> Johnny
> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and
> that Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_
> (well, and with it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite
> the same thing), but I can't think of any other instances. Am I
> missing some?
If "late in the story" includes after, IIRC Lazarus mentioned in
_Time Enough for Love_ that one of the prominent Howards of
_Methusaleh's Children_ was black. (I don't recall which one
offhand.) IIRC, he doesn't reveal the diversity of Manny's family
till it becomes a plot point when Manny is arrested (overtly for
bigamy, but it's indicated that the different skin tones among his
spouses was a factor).
In a similar vein, though less certain: I think there's also a
theory that Rod Walker of _Tunnel in the Sky_ was black based on how
he's described when he looks at his reflection, but I don't think
that one is clear. ISTR that he was careful to keep Eunice's race
in _I Will Fear No Evil_ ambiguous, though that's not quite the same
thing.
Mike
--
Michael S. Schiffer, LHN, FCS
msch...@condor.depaul.edu
Michael S. Schiffer
news:cg327n$daa$1...@tmcd.austin.tx.us:
My impression is that the story was originally set in India, but that
its later illustrators, particularly in the US, didn't necessarily
pay much attention to that. (Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian
Nights story is as I understand it set in China, but who ever draws
the characters as Chinese?)
Joseph Michael Bay
>In article <Xns954A9F6CA...@130.133.1.4>,
>David Wright Sr. <dwri...@alltel.net> wrote:
>>(The 'Little Black Sambo' of the book was not African,BTW, but
>>Indian, as I understand it).
>My copy of _Little Black Sambo_ has tigers in it, which rules out
>Africa, and says that the tigers are reduced to "a great big pool of
>melted butter (or 'ghi,' as it is called in India)".
Hey, how about a spoiler warning next time?
--
Chimes peal joy. Bah. Joseph Michael Bay
Icy colon barge Cancer Biology
Frosty divine Saturn Stanford University
www.stanford.edu/~jmbay/ yes right i am the king of limousines
Ben Crowell
> Podkayne? Unless that was just me not realising until later on in the book
> (I was only ten when I read it, after all).
Doesn't she encounter some racism fairly early on, from passengers who
snub her aboard the space liner?
David Silberstein
Michael S. Schiffer <msch...@condor.depaul.edu> wrote:
>(Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian Nights story is as I
>understand it set in China, but who ever draws the characters
>as Chinese?)
>
Actually, I had an edition of the Arbain Nights (a kid's edition)
that indeed had Chinese-style illustrations.
Also, this made-for-TV version of the Arabian Nights (which
was good despite being necessarily severely abridged)
http://amazon.com/o/ASIN/B00005NB94
had the "Aladdin" part done in "China".
Just to provide some counterexamples.
Elio M. Garcia Jr.
> Heinlein stated in a letter that Rod Walker from _Tunnel In The Sky_,
> was black and Ginny confirmed that to me in a conversation a couple of
> years ago.
I stand corrected, and plead ignorance -- haven't read that one.
:) Nor, apparently, one or two others where this seems to take place --
really need to get around to reading the rest...
> > Actually, he says, "I'm mighty glad that your skin color matches
> > mine," which suggests he's not very pale at all.
> >
>
> I'm at odds with almost everyone on this one. Looking at the text very
> carefully, I don't find anywhere where he actually says that General Sam
> Beaux is black. He is described as being like a black panther, but I got
> the impression that this could be because of his uniform and such.
> Another thing that bothers me is the assumption that everyone appears to
> make about the comment of Richard being a racist automatically means
> that the object of racism must be a black. And at one point, he calls
> him 'Black Sambo'. Such 'obvious racism' seems to be out of character
> for RAH. Even naming him 'Sam Beaux' seems a bit odd.
Is it RAH's "racism"? It's presented as the character's thoughts,
after all. As it stands, it's made plain that Campbell has a visceral
loathing for the sky marshal, so having nasty, intemperate thoughts
about him don't seem to be out of line.
> This was another point. When Rabbi ben Ezra? got his transplanted legs,
> much was made of the difference in color, (Richard thought he was
> wearing brown knee-length socks). Whereas with LL, it was only mildly
> stated that the 'foot differed in texture, size and color', but there
> was not any indication that the color difference was especially
> significant in any way.
Ben Ezra is our introduction to the idea of leg transplant. We've
already been told, by way of his transplant, that you can end up having
a body part noticably different in its superifical appearance. No need
for this to be repeated. Especially if this is information he wants to
keep as a surprise for very late in the novel.
The kicker for me is that the race line doesn't really work if
they're both white. IMO, at least. If the majority of people in a room
are white, and you are yourself white, and you dislike one of them
intensely, it just seems odd to make a reference to skin color. But if
the majority of people are white, except the object of your loathing and
yourself, then it doesn't seem a large leap to make some reference to
it.
Richard Todd
> If "late in the story" includes after, IIRC Lazarus mentioned in
> _Time Enough for Love_ that one of the prominent Howards of
> _Methusaleh's Children_ was black. (I don't recall which one
> offhand.) IIRC, he doesn't reveal the diversity of Manny's family
Zaccur Barstow, wasn't it? IIRC, in _Time Enough..._ he said that Barstow
was 1/4 black.
SkyeFire
writes:
>
>> Have you read the article by David Potter on TNOTB?
>>
>> http://heinleinsociety.org/rah/numberbeast.html
>
>Whoops. I now find myself saying something I never expected to say: I
>badly need to re-read TNOTB
Hmm. Somewhere, Gharlane is... well, not spinning in his grave, obviously.
Rolling over with a contented sigh, perhaps?
Robert Carnegie
Elio M. Garcia Jr. <el...@tele2.se> writes
>
> The kicker for me is that the race line doesn't really work if
>they're both white. IMO, at least. If the majority of people in a room
>are white, and you are yourself white, and you dislike one of them
>intensely, it just seems odd to make a reference to skin color.
If we're taking it that white folks, if they have any opinion about
racial superiority, consider that they're superior to other colours,
then one way for one white person to disparage another one in
racial terms is to imply that the other person's standard of
morality, competence, whatever, is more like the other race's.
I used to know a joke that illustrates this, but I'd have to look it up,
and maybe you prefer that I don't.
It usually has to be science fiction and alternate history or another
planet or the future or alien invasion or something, before
indigenous white folks are second or lower class citizens.
_Armageddon 2419 AD_, if I got the date and synopsis right -
I once had the thing, but I didn't read it. And all those stories with
our alien masters ordering us about.
However, this aside, if we accept the thesis that lots of Heinlein
characters are non-white without this being prominently
announced, maybe they /aren't/ the majority in scenes like these -
if you consider people of "mixed" parentage non-white. But the
white minority of our-timeline twentieth century ancestry probably
still think they're superior, if they take a non-neutral opinion -
except in athletics, obviously.
Robert Carnegie at home, rja.ca...@excite.com at large
--
I am fully aware I may regret this in the morning.
Nancy Lebovitz
There was a recent NPR piece about blacks in India--their ancestors had
been brought there as slaves.
And they still looked African--a few of them visited where their
ancestors had been taken from, and they were physically indistinguishable
from the locals.
--
--
Nancy Lebovitz http://www.nancybuttons.com
"I went to Iraq and all I got was this lousy gas price"
http://livejournal.com/users/nancylebov
Urban Fredriksson
SkyeFire <skye...@aol.com> wrote:
>http://www.reasonablyclever.com/gaydeceiver/
It's a good interpretation.
"Lifting body" always made me think of something like
this, but larger:
http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Gallery/Photo/Fleet/Small/ECN-1107.jpg
--
Urban Fredriksson http://www.canit.se/%7Egriffon/
Just because something is obvious doesn't mean it's true.
David Wright Sr.
> http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Gallery/Photo/Fleet/Small/ECN-1107.jpg
I think that the description referred to the situation when the wings were
retracted. However, when they were extended, they were high enough off of
the ground for them to sleep under. That is, either the wings or the main
body was high enough.
stePH
> stePH <acet...@earthlink.net> wrote in news:2okgqmFbsjlmU2@uni-
> berlin.de:
>
>
>>Campbell? Why do I remember his name as Richard Eames? Am I
>>remembering the wrong book?
>>
>>
>
>
> Colin Campbell was his real name. Richard Ames was his pen name and the
> one that he went under when he met Gwen.
>
Ah, thanks. I really have no desire to go back and reread it -- I tend
to prefer novels with plot.
Michael Stemper
> (Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian
>Nights story is as I understand it set in China, but who ever draws
>the characters as Chinese?)
Well, one of my son's books has "Aladdin" with everybody drawn as Chinese.
It bothered me every time that I read it to him. Apparently, they got it
right. Who says Usenet isn't educational?
--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
Indians scattered on dawn's highway bleeding;
Ghosts crowd the young child's fragile eggshell mind.
Walter Bushell
Richard Todd <rmt...@ichotolot.servalan.com> wrote:
1/4 black? It was a point of Heinlein's that race is an elephant and
immaterial.
The most viscous racists have black relatives, descendants if not
ancestors.
1/4 Black, isn't that like being 1/4 Jewish? "Danger Will Robinson."
--
Guns don't kill people; automobiles kill people.
David Wright Sr.
news:proto-048B23....@reader1.panix.com:
>>
>> Zaccur Barstow, wasn't it? IIRC, in _Time Enough..._ he said that
>> Barstow was 1/4 black.
>
> 1/4 black? It was a point of Heinlein's that race is an elephant and
> immaterial.
>
>
The point of the discussion was that no one knew or remembered or cared
about Zaccur's race.
Walter Bushell
Ben Crowell <croDELETE...@lightandmatter.com> wrote:
<snip>
> (Some people even
> think the entire concept of race is purely socially constructed, although
> that may be going too far. I suspect our brains are hardwired to notice
> certain differences, and make generalizations about them.)
<snip>
AFAIK, the Roman Empire had no color bar.
And early childhood conditioning is so deep as to be very difficult to
distingush from hardware. No society bases discrimination on blood type,
because it is not visible, even though it is more important than skin
color.
In Canada it's Francophiles vs. Anglophiles.
Walter Bushell
skye...@aol.com (SkyeFire) wrote:
I say an ad in the New York Post (of all places) by the Empire State
Co. for space in the building what a lack of class. If Fay Wray were
alive, would she be spinning in her grave?
Ted Nolan <tednolan>
Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:
>
>
>In article <pan.2004.08.19....@lightandmatter.com>,
> Ben Crowell <croDELETE...@lightandmatter.com> wrote:
><snip>
>> (Some people even
>> think the entire concept of race is purely socially constructed, although
>> that may be going too far. I suspect our brains are hardwired to notice
>> certain differences, and make generalizations about them.)
>
><snip>
>
>AFAIK, the Roman Empire had no color bar.
>
>And early childhood conditioning is so deep as to be very difficult to
>distingush from hardware. No society bases discrimination on blood type,
>because it is not visible, even though it is more important than skin
>color.
>
Not true, apparently. Got this little tidbit from www.jlist.com
(They have lots of Japanese pop culture items, and region
free dvd players etc):
>
>The Japanese believe some interesting things about a person's blood type,
>mainly that it determines much of their personality. Whenever you see a
>profile of someone in a magazine, you can be sure that beside their
>birthdate, hobbies and favorite foods will be their blood type, since
>Japanese readers are always interested in knowing the blood types of their
>favorite people. Basically, type A are straight-laced, serious about
>everything, very organized (Felix from The Odd Couple, basically); type B
>are "my pace" (e.g. they go at their own pace, live in their own world),
>quickly get bored with things that don't interest them, and speak their
>minds to a fault; type O are very bold, hate to lose and have good
>leadership skills; and AB people are often so smart they look strange to
>everyone else. We saw an interesting TV show last night that attempted to
>break down the various personality types according to blood type. In one
>experiment they separated kids by blood type and asked them to move water
>from one aquarium to another one, them filmed the results. The type A kids
>used small spoons to carefully move the water from one tank to the other;
>the type B children tried to come up with a good way to move the water, but
>got bored and gave up in the middle; the type O kids lifted the first tank
>and poured the water into the second tank, not caring how much water they
>spilled on the floor in the process; and the type AB kids got smart and
>moved the two tanks around, so that it appeared that they'd moved the water
>when they hadn't actually done so.
>
>The statistical data the show presented on blood types was interesting,
>too. People with blood type O tend to be quite charismatic, and some of
>Japan's most popular male heart throbs like SMAP member Takuya Kimura and
>singer/actor Masaharu Fukuyama are type O. People reported that the blood
>type they liked least was B (my own blood type) -- it seems that men and
>women with type B blood speak their minds too easily, and can offend
>others, making them difficult to be with. Most of the top Japanese athletes
>including soccer star Nakata and Yankee centerfielder Matsui were type O,
>and the vast majority of Japan's past Prime Ministers were also of this
>blood type. However, 60% of the sumo wrestlers to reach the highest rank of
>Yokozuna (Grand Champion) were of blood type A -- it seems it takes a
>meticulous nature to work your way up the top rank in Japan's traditional
>sport. Type B people may be the least popular with people of other blood
>types, but we have the highest representation at Tokyo University, Japan's
>top-ranked school, perhaps because we're creative and don't know what can't
>be done. The blood type couplings with the highest chance of divorce are
>two people with type A blood; couples where both have type B, or one has B
>and the other has O, are supposedly the happiest. Type A people are good at
>saving money for a rainy day; type B people waste their money on things
>they don't need (like me). For the record, Japanese are usually amazed that
>many Americans don't know their own blood type. In Japan, the interplay of
>blood types is always at work in any group.
>
Ted
Wayne Throop
:: Africa, and says that the tigers are reduced to "a great big pool of
:: melted butter (or 'ghi,' as it is called in India)". But Black
:: Mumbo, Black Jumbo, and Little Black Sambo are drawn as African (to
:: my eyes) in the last scene, with kinked hair and large lips.
: na...@unix5.netaxs.com (Nancy Lebovitz)
: There was a recent NPR piece about blacks in India--their ancestors
: had been brought there as slaves. And they still looked African--a
: few of them visited where their ancestors had been taken from, and
: they were physically indistinguishable from the locals.
Interesting. I always assumed the resolution of this problem is that
the author was totally ignorant of where one could plausibly find tigers.
Are you saying I should raise my estimate of the author's intelligence
and care in presenting the facts?
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Robert St Amant
> In article <x7u0uy1...@ichotolot.servalan.com>,
> Richard Todd <rmt...@ichotolot.servalan.com> wrote:
>
> > "Michael S. Schiffer" <msch...@condor.depaul.edu> writes:
> >
> > > If "late in the story" includes after, IIRC Lazarus mentioned in
> > > _Time Enough for Love_ that one of the prominent Howards of
> > > _Methusaleh's Children_ was black. (I don't recall which one
> > > offhand.) IIRC, he doesn't reveal the diversity of Manny's family
> >
> > Zaccur Barstow, wasn't it? IIRC, in _Time Enough..._ he said that Barstow
> > was 1/4 black.
>
> 1/4 black? It was a point of Heinlein's that race is an elephant and
> immaterial.
>
> The most viscous racists have black relatives, descendants if not
> ancestors.
Racists tend to be pretty thick, I agree :-).
--
Rob St. Amant
http://www4.ncsu.edu/~stamant
David Wright Sr.
> Interesting. I always assumed the resolution of this problem is that
> the author was totally ignorant of where one could plausibly find
tigers.
> Are you saying I should raise my estimate of the author's intelligence
> and care in presenting the facts?
>
>
>
Probably not. I have encountered a number of people who consider Indians
(from India) to be the same as Blacks.
Danny Sichel
> the entire concept of race is purely socially constructed, although
>>that may be going too far. I suspect our brains are hardwired to notice
>>certain differences, and make generalizations about them.)
> AFAIK, the Roman Empire had no color bar.
> And early childhood conditioning is so deep as to be very difficult to
> distingush from hardware.
My father told me about an interracial couple he knew in the 70s - white
woman, black man - and they had a child. And the father had to go away
on work for a month, and during that month, whenever the child (age 2)
saw a black man, he called out "daddy! daddy!"
Early childhood.
lal_truckee
Not the author - I beleave early versions have Sub-Continent looking
protagonists in the illustrations.
Later illustrations are, I believe, the result of American racism.
P.S. I liked the story when I was a youngster (mid 1940s) and didn't see
anything racial in the story or the illustrations (that I can remember.)
Tim McDaniel
Joseph Michael Bay <jm...@Stanford.EDU> wrote:
>tm...@panix.com (Tim McDaniel) writes:
>
>>In article <Xns954A9F6CA...@130.133.1.4>,
>>David Wright Sr. <dwri...@alltel.net> wrote:
>>>(The 'Little Black Sambo' of the book was not African,BTW, but
>>>Indian, as I understand it).
>
>>My copy of _Little Black Sambo_ has tigers in it, which rules out
>>Africa, and says that the tigers are reduced to "a great big pool of
>>melted butter (or 'ghi,' as it is called in India)".
>
>Hey, how about a spoiler warning next time?
What, you didn't have your own copy of _Little Black Sambo_ as a
child, he asks in mock surprise?
--
Tim McDaniel; Reply-To: tm...@panix.com
James Nicoll
'phones, not 'philes. And really, that's merely one of the
many things we argue over. There's Ontario the Good vs the lesser
provinces, the West vs the East, Old Worlders vs First Nations, Quebec
City vs Montreal, UELs vs the not-inbred, the Church vs Child Services
and Toronto vs everyone else. I mean, any division that puts Alberta
and Ontario in the same catagory is obviously deeply suspect.
I realize it's hard to market this sort of information abroad
without giving the impression of a Yugoslavia North but from Confederation,
there's always at least one separation movement going on in Canada, sometimes
more, and they never go anywhere in the end, because Federal gov'ts
remember the Riel Lesson: twenty years of talk has less effect on getting
re-elected than one ill-tempered hanging.
The weird thing is so far, when former Separatists (like John
Crosby*) get into Federal power, they either forget their roots or get
bought off until they are out of office and it's too late.
James Nicoll
* Anti-Confederation, back when he was a yout' on the Rock.
James Nicoll
--
Take the piston rings out of my stomach, And the cylinders out of my brain
Extract from my liver the crankshaft, And assemble the engine again!
[from 'The Dying Aviator']
lal_truckee
> Wayne Throop wrote:
>
>> :: My copy of _Little Black Sambo_ has tigers in it, which rules out
>> :: Africa, and says that the tigers are reduced to "a great big pool of
>> :: melted butter (or 'ghi,' as it is called in India)". But Black
>> :: Mumbo, Black Jumbo, and Little Black Sambo are drawn as African (to
>> :: my eyes) in the last scene, with kinked hair and large lips.
>> : na...@unix5.netaxs.com (Nancy Lebovitz)
>> : There was a recent NPR piece about blacks in India--their ancestors
>> : had been brought there as slaves. And they still looked African--a
>> : few of them visited where their ancestors had been taken from, and
>> : they were physically indistinguishable from the locals.
>> Interesting. I always assumed the resolution of this problem is that
>> the author was totally ignorant of where one could plausibly find tigers.
>> Are you saying I should raise my estimate of the author's intelligence
>> and care in presenting the facts?
>
>
> Not the author - I beleave early versions have Sub-Continent looking
> protagonists in the illustrations.
Second thoughts. I can't picture the illustrations so this believe seems
poorly founded. I'd love to see my childhood edition of the book.
Text and illustrations are at <http://www.sterlingtimes.co.uk/sambo.htm>
but they don't exactly match my in-exact memory. The illustrations do
seem Indian rather than African, though.
Tim McDaniel
Danny Sichel <dsi...@canada.com> wrote:
>Walter Bushell wrote:
>> And early childhood conditioning is so deep as to be very difficult
>> to distingush from hardware.
>
>My father told me about an interracial couple he knew in the 70s -
>white woman, black man - and they had a child. And the father had to
>go away on work for a month, and during that month, whenever the
>child (age 2) saw a black man, he called out "daddy! daddy!"
>
>Early childhood.
My sister was born while our father was overseas, so all she knew of
his looks was a few small pictures of him in uniform. Came the day
when he was coming home, our mother took her down to the train
station. My sister saw her first man in uniform and cried out "Daddy!
Daddy!". A very black soldier turned around and gently said to the
little blonde girl, "I don't think so".
Early childhood.
Craig Richardson
<tednolan>) wrote:
>Not true, apparently. Got this little tidbit from www.jlist.com
>(They have lots of Japanese pop culture items, and region
>free dvd players etc):
Warning: as Dave Barry might say, don't access this site at work
unless you work for the Osbournes - there's porn and marital aids
strewn among the t-shirts and consumer electronics. In fact, IIRC he
did link to it from his weblog, and had to unlink and retract fairly
soon.
--Craig
--
Scientists have found Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, genetically
culpable for every contrary event and effect in modern history,
including morbid obesity, the Philadelphia Phillies' 23 game losing
streak in 1959 and Carrot Top. (From <http://www.moveonplease.org>)
Default User
>
> Wayne Throop wrote:
> > Interesting. I always assumed the resolution of this problem is that
> > the author was totally ignorant of where one could plausibly find tigers.
> > Are you saying I should raise my estimate of the author's intelligence
> > and care in presenting the facts?
>
> Not the author
Certainly not. Helen Bannerman lived in India for 30 years or so.
> I beleave early versions have Sub-Continent looking protagonists in
> the illustrations.
More so, although the original illustrations still made the characters
more African-looking than you might expect.
Brian Rodenborn
Ted Nolan <tednolan>
Craig Richardson <crichar...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
>
>On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 17:20:33 GMT, t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan
><tednolan>) wrote:
>
>>Not true, apparently. Got this little tidbit from www.jlist.com
>>(They have lots of Japanese pop culture items, and region
>>free dvd players etc):
>
>Warning: as Dave Barry might say, don't access this site at work
>unless you work for the Osbournes - there's porn and marital aids
>strewn among the t-shirts and consumer electronics. In fact, IIRC he
>did link to it from his weblog, and had to unlink and retract fairly
>soon.
>
>--Craig
True, though the front page is clearly marked with a warning. I think
jbox.com is the pg13 side. The blood type text isn't up today, now it's one
about "used houses" having no value in Japan.
Ted
stePH
> 1/4 black? It was a point of Heinlein's that race is an elephant and
> immaterial.
I've never heard that phrase, but a former boss of mine was fond of
saying, "That's irrelvant, and irrelevants are only in Africa."
Keith Morrison
>And early childhood conditioning is so deep as to be very difficult to
>distingush from hardware. No society bases discrimination on blood type,
>because it is not visible, even though it is more important than skin
>color.
>
>In Canada it's Francophiles vs. Anglophiles.
Francophone versus Anglophone, I suspect you mean. And it's not even
that. The Language Wars basically died out a generation ago and
switched to regional differences. For instance, politicians generally
don't say that any more that someone is getting treated better/worse
because of the language they speak, but because of where they are
from, which isn't necessarily the same thing.
--
Keith
David Silberstein
Michael Stemper <mste...@siemens-emis.com> wrote:
>In article <Xns954AA5D9F8F3...@130.133.1.4>,
> Michael S. Schiffer writes:
>
>> (Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian
>>Nights story is as I understand it set in China, but who ever draws
>>the characters as Chinese?)
>
>Well, one of my son's books has "Aladdin" with everybody drawn as Chinese.
>It bothered me every time that I read it to him. Apparently, they got it
>right. Who says Usenet isn't educational?
>
I wonder if that's the same edition I remember?
Interestingly enough, it would appear that Aladdin was not one
of the original corpus:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1001_Arabian_Nights
However, Aladdin's Lamp and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves appeared
first in Antoine Galland's translation and cannot be found in the
original writings. He heard them from a Syrian Christian storyteller
from Aleppo, a Maronite scholar, Youhenna Diab, whom he called 'Hanna'.
David Silberstein
Omixochitl <Omixoch...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>David Silberstein <davids_aat_k...@foilspam.invalid> wrote in
>news:I2pto...@kithrup.com:
>
>> In article <Xns954AA5D9F8F3...@130.133.1.4>,
>> Michael S. Schiffer <msch...@condor.depaul.edu> wrote:
>>
>>>(Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian Nights story is as I
>>>understand it set in China, but who ever draws the characters
>>>as Chinese?)
>>>
>>
>> that indeed had Chinese-style illustrations.
>>
>> Also, this made-for-TV version of the Arabian Nights (which
>> was good despite being necessarily severely abridged)
>>
>> http://amazon.com/o/ASIN/B00005NB94
>>
>> had the "Aladdin" part done in "China".
>>
>> Just to provide some counterexamples.
>
>Yup. BTW, how did that happen?
>
>The impression I got is that the orginal Arabic author set it in China
>then sometimes when foreigners dramatize the story they set it where the
>author was instead of where the author said the characters were.
>Like what you'd see if, say, a Tunisian director adapted Heinlein's
>_Podkayne_ for the stage and set it in Kansas City instead of a
>Brazilian-colonized Mars because she figured "hey, Heinlein was from
>Kansas City!"
Well, for one thing, looking through the story, while it begins:
It hath reached me, O King of the Age, that there dwelt in a
city of the cities of China a man which was a tailor, withal
a pauper, and he had one son, Alaeddin hight
It has almost no references to Chinese locations, concepts, or words.
For example, it says "the Sultan" rather than "the Emperor" or
"the Son of Heaven", and even the names "Alaeddin" and "Badr al-Badur"
(the daughter of the Sultan, forsooth) sound Arabic rather than Chinese.
Oh, and everyone just happens to be a Muslim, which is not impossible
I suppose, but doesn't do much to show Chinese setting.
So it's an Arabic story about China has almost all the "Chinese"
filtered out, so it is perhaps understandable that someone might feel
perfectly happy just dropping the few vestigal references to China.
It's as if Heinlein had written Mars to be so exactly identical to
Kansas City - nothing about the length of the martian year, for
example, even the name "Podkayne" being something more typical to
KC, like "Emily" or whatever, no refs to the native martians, and
so on, and "Venus" to be like New Orleans - that the director
wouldn't have much to do to set it in KC and NO.
Or something like that, anyway.
Robert Carnegie
<acet...@earthlink.net> writes
>Walter Bushell wrote:
>
>> 1/4 black? It was a point of Heinlein's that race is an elephant and
>> immaterial.
>
>I've never heard that phrase, but a former boss of mine was fond of
>saying, "That's irrelvant, and irrelevants are only in Africa."
Well, not quite, the ones with two humps come from India.
What?
Robert Carnegie at home, rja.ca...@excite.com at large
--
I am fully aware I may regret this in the morning.
Keith Morrison
>>In Canada it's Francophiles vs. Anglophiles.
>
> 'phones, not 'philes. And really, that's merely one of the
>many things we argue over. There's Ontario the Good vs the lesser
>provinces, the West vs the East, Old Worlders vs First Nations, Quebec
>City vs Montreal, UELs vs the not-inbred, the Church vs Child Services
>and Toronto vs everyone else. I mean, any division that puts Alberta
>and Ontario in the same catagory is obviously deeply suspect.
Any category that puts Alberta in with anyone is suspect.
Amusing story: a short time ago, Alberta officially came out of debt.
The one thing Ralph and the Tories insisted on was that it wasn't due
to increased royalties and taxes from higher oil prices in the last
few years that was responsible, no sirree, it was sound fiscal
management and good government policies.
What caused Alberta to go into debt starting a few years ago when that
same Conservative party was in power? Oh, that was the fault of low
oil prices and not due to bad fiscal management and government
policies.
--
Keith
P. Taine
There seems to be some conflation of India and Africa here. Is it possible that the setting is (tigers excepted)
British Africa with Indian indentured laborers? Looking at the list of other titles by Bannerman (sp?) some of the
names are close (albeit not identical) to the traditional African day-names used in Jamaica and other places in the
Western Hemisphere. These are:
Male Female Day (of birth)
Cudjoe Juba Monday
Cubbenah Beneba Tuesday
Quaco Cuba Wednesday
Quao Abba Thursday
Cuffee Pheba Friday
Quamin Mimba Saturday
Quashee Quasheba Sunday
Since these are from the oral tradition, variations in spelling are to be expected.
P. Taine
--
What's your name?
Puddin' n Taine, ask me again and I'll tell you the same
how...@brazee.net
On 20-Aug-2004, "David Wright Sr." <dwri...@alltel.net> wrote:
> Probably not. I have encountered a number of people who consider Indians
> (from India) to be the same as Blacks.
With the way the government requires people to be a member of a race, we
could have Vijay Singh (a Fijian of Indian background who is darker skinned
than Tiger) and Tiger Woods (whose mother is Thai of Chinese background, and
father is American with mostly African background) - getting minority status
as they fight to be the # 1 ranked golfer in the world this weekend.
Gary R. Schmidt
> In article <2on0s7F...@uni-berlin.de>, stePH
> <acet...@earthlink.net> writes
>
>>Walter Bushell wrote:
>>
>>
>>>1/4 black? It was a point of Heinlein's that race is an elephant and
>>>immaterial.
>>
>>I've never heard that phrase, but a former boss of mine was fond of
>>saying, "That's irrelvant, and irrelevants are only in Africa."
>
>
> Well, not quite, the ones with two humps come from India.
>
> What?
So does this mean that the ones from Malaysia and Thailand have three???
Cheers,
Gary B-)
--
______________________________________________________________________________
Armful of chairs: Something some people would not know
whether you were up them with or not
- Barry Humphries
Robert Carnegie
at_kithr...@foilspam.invalid> writes
In the version I last looked at - Richard Burton's, I think - there was
a Jewish merchant, as at least minor villain. Some business with
the genie regularly(?) providing dinner on silver or gold plates,
which Aladdin then sells to the merchant at way less than market
price for precious metal. As you say, surprising in China.
>So it's an Arabic story about China has almost all the "Chinese"
>filtered out, so it is perhaps understandable that someone might feel
>perfectly happy just dropping the few vestigal references to China.
>
>It's as if Heinlein had written Mars to be so exactly identical to
>Kansas City - nothing about the length of the martian year, for
>example, even the name "Podkayne" being something more typical to
>KC, like "Emily" or whatever, no refs to the native martians, and
>so on, and "Venus" to be like New Orleans - that the director
>wouldn't have much to do to set it in KC and NO.
>
>Or something like that, anyway.
Robert Carnegie at home, rja.ca...@excite.com at large
Robert Carnegie
Nolan <tednolan> <t...@loft.tnolan.com> writes
>In article <proto-DE62CE....@reader1.panix.com>,
>Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:
>>
>>And early childhood conditioning is so deep as to be very difficult to
>>distingush from hardware. No society bases discrimination on blood
>type,
>>because it is not visible, even though it is more important than skin
>>color.
>>
>
>Not true, apparently. Got this little tidbit from www.jlist.com
>(They have lots of Japanese pop culture items, and region
>free dvd players etc):
>
>>
>>The Japanese believe some interesting things about a person's blood
>type,
>>mainly that it determines much of their personality. Whenever you see a
>>profile of someone in a magazine, you can be sure that beside their
>>birthdate, hobbies and favorite foods will be their blood type, since
>>Japanese readers are always interested in knowing the blood types of
>their
>>favorite people. Basically, type A are straight-laced, serious about
>>everything, very organized (Felix from The Odd Couple, basically); type B
>>are "my pace" (e.g. they go at their own pace, live in their own world),
>>quickly get bored with things that don't interest them, and speak their
>>minds to a fault; type O are very bold, hate to lose and have good
>>leadership skills; and AB people are often so smart they look strange to
>>everyone else.
Or so it is said. I wonder if it could be at all true, or if it's the usual
pseudoscience - a thin layer of scientific-sounding language and
some actual science facts like chocolate chips in a hokum cookie.
It certainly looks like astrology, more than psychology.
And how long have they known blood types - about a hundred
years, I think? So it's surprising that they've come up with this.
Mind you, the West has Dianetics, which comes with graphs.
Nonsense graphs, but graphs still.
Nancy Lebovitz
Robert Carnegie <rja.ca...@excite.com> wrote:
>In article <I2rJG...@kithrup.com>, David Silberstein <davids_a
>at_kithr...@foilspam.invalid> writes
>>
>>For example, it says "the Sultan" rather than "the Emperor" or
>>"the Son of Heaven", and even the names "Alaeddin" and "Badr al-Badur"
>>(the daughter of the Sultan, forsooth) sound Arabic rather than Chinese.
>>Oh, and everyone just happens to be a Muslim, which is not impossible
>>I suppose, but doesn't do much to show Chinese setting.
>
>In the version I last looked at - Richard Burton's, I think - there was
>a Jewish merchant, as at least minor villain. Some business with
>the genie regularly(?) providing dinner on silver or gold plates,
>which Aladdin then sells to the merchant at way less than market
>price for precious metal. As you say, surprising in China.
>
The city of Kaifeng, located approximately 300 miles from Beijing,
contains the remnants of a Jewish community which flourished in
the city from about the ninth to the seventeenth centuries, and
which continued to be identifiably Jewish until the 1840s. The
origins of the community are unclear, although they appear to be
derived from an invitation extended by a Sung Dynasty emperor to
a group of Jews to settle and manufacture cotton fabrics in Kaifeng,
which at that time was the imperial capital. Approximately 1000
Jews responded as a group and formed a community, which reached
its peak in the Middle Ages, when Jews from Western and Southern
Asia (principally Iran, Afghanistan and India of today) were actively
involved in the China trade. They settled in at least six other
cities throughout China, including Beijing in the seventeenth century.
Between this and the presence of Africans in India, I think we should
remember that Asia, Europe, and Africa are relatively handy to each other,
and people have been travelling between them for a long time.
--
--
Nancy Lebovitz http://www.nancybuttons.com
"I went to Iraq and all I got was this lousy gas price"
http://livejournal.com/users/nancylebov
Bill Reich
Which might be because some people from southern India are very dark and
many of those have hair that would not look out of place in AbtS (Africa
below the Sahara)
Dravidians aren't generally closely related to Africans. For the most part
they have the genetic marker that marks almost everyone whose ancestors left
Africa in the second wave and hung around in the Middle East and then went
to Central Asia and then populated the rest of the world.
Of course, there are people with M130 markers in South India, from the first
Out-of-Africal migration that went the seashore route to Australia. In any
case, there are many ethnicities in India and some of them do look African.
Will in New Haven
--
"Then she stepped out in the alley with a single-shot four-ten and the road goes on forever and the party never ends."
Robert Earl Keene, Jr. lyrics from "The Road Goes on Forever and the Party Never Ends" from GRINGO HONEYMOON
----== Posted via Newsfeed.Com - Unlimited-Uncensored-Secure Usenet News==----
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Danny Sichel
>> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals Johnny
>> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and that
>> Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ (well, and with
>> it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite the same thing), but I
>> can't think of any other instances. Am I missing some?
>>Actually, he says, "I'm mighty glad that your skin color matches
>>mine," which suggests he's not very pale at all.
> Hmm...so doesn't that contradict the idea that the red-headed LL is his
> father? Redheads are generally extremely fair-skinned.
... how dark was Malcolm X?
Simon Slavin
<Xns954AA5300671...@130.133.1.4>:
> In a similar vein, though less certain: I think there's also a
> theory that Rod Walker of _Tunnel in the Sky_ was black based on how
> he's described when he looks at his reflection, but I don't think
> that one is clear.
Apart from the reflection thing (which I don't remember) read
again the description of Rod and his family sitting down to
eat at the dinner table. Read it once as a standard WASP
family and again as a very religious black family somewhere
in the bible belt.
Simon.
--
Using pre-release version of newsreader.
Please tell me if it does weird things.
Simon Slavin
<m4k8i0hnbcbr7so5f...@4ax.com>:> >Have you read the article by David Potter on TNOTB?
> >
> >http://heinleinsociety.org/rah/numberbeast.html
>
> I miss Gharlane.
Me too. Sob. Such an interesting guy that the Gods wanted
him as company.
Simon Slavin
> My impression is that the story was originally set in India, but that
> its later illustrators, particularly in the US, didn't necessarily
> pay much attention to that. (Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian
> the characters as Chinese?)
What an excellent reference. The original Arabian Nights story
was, of course, from a written compilation of stories. These
stories were part of the Arabian tradition of adventure stories.
Adventure stories are generally not set in your own land,
they're set in exotic foreign lands.
So yes, it's an Arabian story, but it's set in China, back when
most Arabs would never meed a Chinaman. There's also the
element of magic in there which doesn't sit well with the Islamic
tradition but is the kind of thing that is acceptable in
foreigners.
Michael S. Schiffer
wrote in news:cg8il1$8c5$4$830f...@news.demon.co.uk:
>...et in China, back when
> most Arabs would never meed a Chinaman. There's also the
> element of magic in there which doesn't sit well with the
> Islamic tradition but is the kind of thing that is acceptable in
> foreigners.
Though IIRC a recent skim of the story, the magic is all the work of
djinni/marids, which are part of the Muslim Arab legendary tradition
and show up all through the Nights. The character identified as a
Magician or Wizard in the story (no idea what the original Arabic
word was, of course) is Moroccan. I do think you're right in general
about the idea of setting it over the horizon (and the story gets
some mileage out of going from uttermost west to uttermost east and
vice versa).
Mike
--
Michael S. Schiffer, LHN, FCS
msch...@condor.depaul.edu
Bill Woods
> > Gospodin O'Kelly in _TMiaHM_ is probably black; when he is arrested
> > during his trip to the Southern US, there is a line that implies part of
> > the reason is his dark skin color, as well as the polygamy issue.
>
> I got more of a feeling that Manuel Garcia O'Kelley was depicted
> consistently throughout the book as being of mixed race, starting with his
> name.
And he described his ancestry on the third page:
Paternal grandfather from Jo'burg(, and probably black).
Paternal grandmother a Tatar from near Samarkand.
Maternal grandmother an American(, and probably white).
Maternal grandfather "identity ... open to question".
--
Bill Woods
"If you examine my 16-year record in the Senate, you'll see
that I'm just as effective when I'm not there as I was when
I was there," said Mr. Kerry. "... I think it's disingenuous
for Gov. Romney to suggest that my absence from the Senate
harms America in any way."
http://www.scrappleface.com/MT/archives/001737.html#001737
David Johnston
wrote:
>> Actually, he says, "I'm mighty glad that your skin color matches
>> mine," which suggests he's not very pale at all.
>>
>
>I'm at odds with almost everyone on this one. Looking at the text very
>carefully, I don't find anywhere where he actually says that General Sam
>Beaux is black.
Sambo?
David Wright Sr.
news:41283cd8...@news.telusplanet.net:
Heinlein was big on letting the reader make unconscious assumptions. Does
everyone assume that because his name was Sambo
Michael Stemper
>In article <200408201651...@mickey.empros.com>, Michael Stemper <mste...@siemens-emis.com> wrote:
>>In article <Xns954AA5D9F8F3...@130.133.1.4>, Michael S. Schiffer writes:
>>> (Compare Aladdin-- the original Arabian
>>>Nights story is as I understand it set in China, but who ever draws
>>>the characters as Chinese?)
>>Well, one of my son's books has "Aladdin" with everybody drawn as Chinese.
>>It bothered me every time that I read it to him. Apparently, they got it
>>right. Who says Usenet isn't educational?
>I wonder if that's the same edition I remember?
Well, in addition to "Aladdin", it had "The Wizard of Oz", "Thumbelina",
"The Winter Queen", "Hansel and Gretel", "Town Mouse and Country Mouse"
and a few others. It was a picture book, aimed at the three to seven set.
>Interestingly enough, it would appear that Aladdin was not one
>of the original corpus:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1001_Arabian_Nights
Well, in that case, I'll feel perfectly fine continuing to popuplate it
in my imagination with shahs and vizeers.
> However, Aladdin's Lamp and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves appeared
> first in Antoine Galland's translation and cannot be found in the
> original writings. He heard them from a Syrian Christian storyteller
> from Aleppo, a Maronite scholar, Youhenna Diab, whom he called 'Hanna'.
I've never read Burton's translation of the Arabian nights. Did he include
these apocryphal works?
--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
This message contains at least 95% recycled bytes.
David Silberstein
Michael Stemper <mste...@siemens-emis.com> wrote:
>In article <I2rIA...@kithrup.com>, David Silberstein writes:
>>In article <200408201651...@mickey.empros.com>,
>> Michael Stemper <mste...@siemens-emis.com> wrote:
>
>>>Well, one of my son's books has "Aladdin" with everybody drawn as Chinese.
>>>It bothered me every time that I read it to him. Apparently, they got it
>>>right. Who says Usenet isn't educational?
>
>>I wonder if that's the same edition I remember?
>
>Well, in addition to "Aladdin", it had "The Wizard of Oz", "Thumbelina",
>"The Winter Queen", "Hansel and Gretel", "Town Mouse and Country Mouse"
>and a few others. It was a picture book, aimed at the three to seven set.
Hm. Probably not, then. I'm pretty sure I remember small B&W
illustrations scattered among the text, which was defintely aimed
at ages older than 7.
>
>> However, Aladdin's Lamp and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves appeared
>> first in Antoine Galland's translation and cannot be found in the
>> original writings. He heard them from a Syrian Christian storyteller
>> from Aleppo, a Maronite scholar, Youhenna Diab, whom he called 'Hanna'.
>
>I've never read Burton's translation of the Arabian nights. Did he include
>these apocryphal works?
>
Burton's translation is online, and it has "Alaeddin" among the
"Supplemental Nights":
http://www.wollamshram.ca/1001/Sn_3/vol13.htm
The "Translator's Foreword" describes some of the complicated efforts
he went to to track down various versions of the tales.
John G. Morrison
news:200408221417...@mickey.empros.com:
The best explanation for this chinese style, could be explained by the
original artwork was based upon drawings back some time ago when
Oriental and Middle Eastern were interchangeable and all inclusive.
Today, many Oriental Rugs are made in the middle east. Types of
artwork, including statary, paintings and others are called part of the
Oriental School, although they are all based upon ideas and motiff's
from the middle east.
This is probably explained by the fact that China often traded through
the Middle East with Europe and Africa and many people confused the
source of these materials. Of course this was mainly through the days
of year long land caravans and should have started to fade when faster
ships came into use but somehow it did not.
It could also be that the original tellers of the stories that Burton
collected in his travels, wanted to use a place name to give their
stories more versimiltude but didn't want to talk about their own city
or someplace nearby. After all, even a young child knew that if the
rulers had the magic to raise Palaces overnight, why was daddy working
at the new palace for the last 2 years.
As for the stories themselves, Burton admitted that he had to edit some
of the stories as he heard various versions from different storytellers
over his travels. At this time, he could have also edited the stories
slightly to give it more of a Chinese orientation, I don't know and
neither does anybody else.
Larry M Headlund
>news:MPG.1b8f1977f...@news.individual.net:
>
>>...Heinlein had a
>>> favorite gimmick where he would reveal that a character was
>>> African or African-American very late i
>> n
>>> the story, after the reader had probably visualized the
>>> character as white.
>> I'm pretty sure it's not a "favorite" gimmick. He reveals
>> Johnny
>> Rico is Filipino towards the end of _Starship Troopers_, and
>> that Campbell is black in _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_
>> (well, and with it we learn his maternal kin are, but not quite
>> the same thing), but I can't think of any other instances. Am I
>> missing some?
>
RAH, in Space Cadet, also has a "surprise" revelation that the officer
in nominal command for the last third of the book (he was injured and
unconcious) is black. This is in the context of a discusian about racism,
specifically in avoiding racism when dealing with the native Venusians.
--
--
Larry Headlund l...@world.std.com Mathematical Engineering, Inc.
(617) 242 7741
Unix, X and Motif Consulting Speaking for myself at most.
David Wright Sr.
news:cgc3dd$l0i$1...@pcls4.std.com:
(snip)
>
> RAH, in Space Cadet, also has a "surprise" revelation that the officer
> in nominal command for the last third of the book (he was injured and
> unconcious) is black. This is in the context of a discusian about
> racism, specifically in avoiding racism when dealing with the native
> Venusians.
>
Not quite. Lt Thurlow is the officer that you are referring to. Lt.
Peters was the one who was black. He stayed with Captain Yancey aboard
the Aes Triplex when the cadets dropped down to Venus.
--
David Wright
Anytime is a good time to join The Heinlein Society
http://heinleinsociety.org/join.html
Keep Up with the Latest
http://www.heinleinsociety.org/updates.html
Benefit The Heinlein Society by ordering books thru
http://home.alltel.net/dwrighsr/heinlein-amazon.htm
stePH
> On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 17:20:33 GMT, t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan
> <tednolan>) wrote:
>
>
>>Not true, apparently. Got this little tidbit from www.jlist.com
>>(They have lots of Japanese pop culture items, and region
>>free dvd players etc):
>
>
> Warning: as Dave Barry might say, don't access this site at work
> unless you work for the Osbournes - there's porn and marital aids
> strewn among the t-shirts and consumer electronics. In fact, IIRC he
> did link to it from his weblog, and had to unlink and retract fairly
> soon.
Actually, last time I looked, the front page gives you the choice to
access either the "sanitized" J-List (work-safe/kid-safe) or the full,
unabridged J-List which includes the pr0n and the "marital aids" (like
Hello Kitty vibrators, for example)
stePH
--
"A lion will exert himself to the utmost, even when entering the tiger's
den to throw baby rabbits off a cliff!" -- Moroboshi Ataru
how...@brazee.net
On 22-Aug-2004, "John G. Morrison" <Laby...@eskim-remove-o.com> wrote:
> This is probably explained by the fact that China often traded through
> the Middle East with Europe and Africa and many people confused the
> source of these materials. Of course this was mainly through the days
> of year long land caravans and should have started to fade when faster
> ships came into use but somehow it did not.
The Oriental Express takes people to the Orient (which is that part of the
world east of the Occident).
lal_truckee
If you call the eastern terminus at Istanbul "Orient" (which, of course,
Western Euros so did.) (Actually the OE wasn't a bad train ride a few
decades ago - I did a stretch on the OE in the mid-20th.)
Query: Does the "Orient Express" Become the "Occident Express" when
Turkey becomes part of the Euro Union? Can we create even more confusion?
David Silberstein
Omixochitl <Omixoch...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>David Silberstein <davids_aat_k...@foilspam.invalid> wrote in
>> In article <Xns954AD402...@130.133.1.4>,
>> Omixochitl <Omixoch...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>>Yup. BTW, how did that happen?
>>>
>>>The impression I got is that the orginal Arabic author set it in China
>>>then sometimes when foreigners dramatize the story they set it where
>>>the author was instead of where the author said the characters were.
>> Well, for one thing, looking through the story, while it begins:
>>
>> It hath reached me, O King of the Age, that there dwelt in a
>> city of the cities of China a man which was a tailor, withal
>> a pauper, and he had one son, Alaeddin hight
>>
>> It has almost no references to Chinese locations, concepts, or words.
>> For example, it says "the Sultan" rather than "the Emperor" or
>
>Ah, but does the word "Sultan" have that specifically-an-Arab-leader
>connotation *in Arabic*? Or do Arabic-language history books routinely
>use the word "Sultan" for Shi Huang-ti, Julius Caesar, Hirohito, etc.? I
>have no idea. Anybody here know Arabic? :)
That's actually a good point. Looking at the etymology, I see that
"sultan" derives from a root word meaning "to have power over" (and
I really should have remembered that, because that same root word
exists and is used in Hebrew, which I *do* know), and it's fairly
generic. So it's quite possible that acceptable Arabic for "emperor"
is indeed "sultan".
>"Allah." In English, it only applies to God in a Muslim context. In
>Arabic, it applies to God in general (Jesus is the son of Allah, the Jews
>are Allah's chosen people, etc.). Makes you wonder how many English
>words get their meanings narrowed when borrowed by other languages,
>right? ;)
Oh, indeed.
>> "the Son of Heaven", and even the names "Alaeddin" and "Badr al-Badur"
>> (the daughter of the Sultan, forsooth) sound Arabic rather than
>> Chinese. Oh, and everyone just happens to be a Muslim, which is not
>> impossible I suppose, but doesn't do much to show Chinese setting.
>>
>> So it's an Arabic story about China has almost all the "Chinese"
>> filtered out, so it is perhaps understandable that someone might feel
>
>Yeah, filtering was done. I was just wondering if the author did any
>filtering, or if the translator did the "filtering" by failing to
>translate fully.
Still, though, there's the point that there are no references to
typical Chinese cultural differences. The ruler of China would
not have been a Muslim, there's the whole issue of Chinese liking
pork (anathema of course to Muslims!), and other things that would
have at least *helped* to set the story as being of a Muslim society
which was embedded in China.
It's things like that that help set the worldbuilding for SF stories:
Things are not what the reader expects, and interesting stuff can be
done by showing the conflict between what the reader expects and what
takes place in the milieu of the story.
That's more than the translator is responsible for; that should be in
the original tale.
However, as my research indicates, the original story was almost
certainly told to the Westerner who wrote it down by someone who had
almost no knowledge of China, besides the fact that it existed in the
Far East.
The Burton translation
http://www.wollamshram.ca/1001/Sn_3/13tale2.htm
mentions "in an extreme city of the cities of China, named Al-Kal'ás",
and there's a footnote for that. I sort-of hoped that the footnote
would explain that this was what the Arabs called Kaifeng or Changan or
Beijing (or whatever), but all it says is:
"Galland omits the name, which is outlandish enough."
Which points to the original teller not really knowing much about
China.
Another hint that the original is not really knowledgeable about China
is the implication that Alaeddin has seen no woman's face except for
his mother's. I am not sure, but I don't think China *ever* had such
extreme veiling for all women - perhaps in the Muslim communities, but
surely not outside of it.
Anyway, there are lots and lots of Muslim/Arab cultural references,
and while I suppose some of them could have been translated to
their Chinese equivalents, I am not sure there would have been much
point, given the lack of other important Chinese cultural references.
David Silberstein
John G. Morrison <Laby...@eskim-remove-o.com> wrote:
[Aladdin takes place in China]
>As for the stories themselves, Burton admitted that he had to edit some
>of the stories as he heard various versions from different storytellers
>over his travels. At this time, he could have also edited the stories
>slightly to give it more of a Chinese orientation, I don't know and
>neither does anybody else.
Um. As I posted elsethread, Burton explains in nice and accurate
detail the efforts he went to to track down the story in his
foreword to the volume in which Alaeddin appears. And he's got
footnotes pointing to some of the differences between the various
versions.
If he was going to *bung in* references to China, he would have
said so. He was trying to be scholarly.
Craig Richardson
wrote:
>Craig Richardson wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 17:20:33 GMT, t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan
>> <tednolan>) wrote:
>>
>>>Not true, apparently. Got this little tidbit from www.jlist.com
>>>(They have lots of Japanese pop culture items, and region
>>>free dvd players etc):
>>
>>
>> Warning: as Dave Barry might say, don't access this site at work
>> unless you work for the Osbournes - there's porn and marital aids
>> strewn among the t-shirts and consumer electronics. In fact, IIRC he
>> did link to it from his weblog, and had to unlink and retract fairly
>> soon.
>
>Actually, last time I looked, the front page gives you the choice to
>access either the "sanitized" J-List (work-safe/kid-safe) or the full,
>unabridged J-List which includes the pr0n and the "marital aids" (like
>Hello Kitty vibrators, for example)
Again IIRC, some of Barry's readers had problems from clicking through
without reading carefully, or too quickly.
They also might not have realized the ramifications of the question
"Are you 18"? On a serious note, any site worth accessing which
carries any adult content will require a positive affirmation of
"seniority" (J-List does, another site I've quoted here - MrSkin.com -
does). It's a de-facto requirement to operate in many jurisdictions.
Like a pr0n site certifying that all performers are of legal age, it
defuses questions before they start - and from a consumer's viewpoint,
it limits the risk that you're accessing a pirate site or one hosted
in a more "tolerant" jurisdiction, with the consequent risks of
spyware, viruses, and inadvertant access to actually /illegal/
content[1].
--Craig
[1] Some of which, even making a positive action to delete the
offending file does nothing to mitigate guilt in the eyes of some
prosecutors. Burning the HD may not be positive enough. Be /careful/
to avoid that cr@p. It's illegal, of no positive value whatsoever,
hurts the people (many of them kids) coerced into it, and poisons the
well for legitimate free speech due to the overzealous laws designed
to combat it. Forget terrorists - I'd bomb kiddie-porn producers if I
had the nuclear football here in my apartment...
--
Scientists have found Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, genetically
culpable for every contrary event and effect in modern history,
including morbid obesity, the Philadelphia Phillies' 23 game losing
streak in 1959 and Carrot Top. (From <http://www.moveonplease.org>)
SkyeFire
writes:
>
> The weird thing is so far, when former Separatists (like John
>Crosby*) get into Federal power, they either forget their roots or get
>bought off until they are out of office and it's too late.
Check me on this, but wasn't Buchard the same way? Or do I have my
Canadian PMs mixed up again?
James Nicoll
Well, Buchard was never PM, thank God, but he was in Mulroney's
government as Secretary of State and then Minister for the Environment.
He had been a seperatiste but in the wake of the 60% pro-non vote in 1980
opted to support increased Federalism. He left because the Meech Lake Accord
collapsed and he didn't care for the way Mulroney tried to deal with that
Not that I am a fan of Buchard, but a lot of people grew to be uncomfortable
with a man who used the phrase "rolling the dice" wrt the nation's future and
leaving is a perfectly valid way to express that, much as I would have
prefered him not to form and then campaign for BQ. As long as it looked
like Canada was en route to a grotesquely unfair agreement that would
elevate Quebec over other provinces, Buchard was as loyal and honest as
any other Conservative MP of that era.
[List of Mulroney era PC MPs who served time goes here]
Interestingly, although BlocHeads and Pequistes would point to
the rejection of what followed Meech, the Charlottetown Accord, as a
regection of Qc, Qc has the highest percentage turnout of voters, and
56.7% of them voted -against- the Accord [1]. This is almost certainly
the single largest bloc of anti-Accord votes in that election.
James Nicoll
1: For the record, I voted no because the Mulroney government was curiously
unwilling to supply copies of the Accord to read over before the Referendum.
--
"This has been fascinating but I need to shoot you into space now."
J.B. Moreno
> They also might not have realized the ramifications of the question
> "Are you 18"? On a serious note, any site worth accessing which
> carries any adult content will require a positive affirmation of
> "seniority" (J-List does, another site I've quoted here - MrSkin.com -
> does). It's a de-facto requirement to operate in many jurisdictions.
> Like a pr0n site certifying that all performers are of legal age, it
> defuses questions before they start - and from a consumer's viewpoint,
> it limits the risk that you're accessing a pirate site or one hosted
> in a more "tolerant" jurisdiction, with the consequent risks of
> spyware, viruses, and inadvertant access to actually /illegal/
> content[1].
>
> --Craig
>
> [1] Some of which, even making a positive action to delete the
> offending file does nothing to mitigate guilt in the eyes of some
> prosecutors. Burning the HD may not be positive enough. Be /careful/
> to avoid that cr@p. It's illegal, of no positive value whatsoever,
> hurts the people (many of them kids) coerced into it, and poisons the
> well for legitimate free speech due to the overzealous laws designed
> to combat it. Forget terrorists - I'd bomb kiddie-porn producers if I
> had the nuclear football here in my apartment...
Yeah, but what do I do about the B64 encoded shit that arrived via email
before I put a size cap on my email via procmail? It got downloaded,
marked as spam by my filters, and deleted -- but it got as far as my
computer.
And before I became absolutely conviced that html just wasn't worth the
potential problems (and set up another procmail filter for that), I did
occasionally either intentionally (subject looked like it might be
"real") or accidentally[1] click on email that downloaded pictures from
whereever...I know some adult porn was downloaded that way, and while I
don't *think* I "got" any kiddie-porn that way, I couldn't guarantee it.
(Which reminds me, I need to add another couple of procmail filters
[incest and drugs, and why the hell do they morph the names in the
Subject?]).
[1] Funnily enough, immediately after closing this, I made this exact
mistake with a message that made it through my procmail filter by being
multipart/mixed, and downloaded some pictures -- fortunately in this
case, it was just some asian writing as far as I can tell.
--
JBM
"Everything is futile." -- Marvin of Borg
stePH
> (Which reminds me, I need to add another couple of procmail filters
> [incest and drugs, and why the hell do they morph the names in the
> Subject?]).
So that it'll pass through your filters. Duh.
Robert Carnegie
Nancy Lebovitz <na...@unix5.netaxs.com> writes
>In article <sTUAIGAg...@redjac.demon.co.uk>,
>Robert Carnegie <rja.ca...@excite.com> wrote:
>>In article <I2rJG...@kithrup.com>, David Silberstein <davids_a
>>at_kithr...@foilspam.invalid> writes
>>>
>>>It has almost no references to Chinese locations, concepts, or words.
>>>For example, it says "the Sultan" rather than "the Emperor" or
>Badur"
>>>(the daughter of the Sultan, forsooth) sound Arabic rather than
>Chinese.
>>>Oh, and everyone just happens to be a Muslim, which is not
>impossible
>>>I suppose, but doesn't do much to show Chinese setting.
>>
>>a Jewish merchant, as at least minor villain. Some business with
>>the genie regularly(?) providing dinner on silver or gold plates,
>>which Aladdin then sells to the merchant at way less than market
>>price for precious metal. As you say, surprising in China.
>>
>http://www.jcpa.org/dje/articles2/china.htm
>
>
> The city of Kaifeng, located approximately 300 miles from Beijing,
> contains the remnants of a Jewish community which flourished in
> the city from about the ninth to the seventeenth centuries, and
> which continued to be identifiably Jewish until the 1840s. The
> origins of the community are unclear, although they appear to be
> derived from an invitation extended by a Sung Dynasty emperor to
> a group of Jews to settle and manufacture cotton fabrics in Kaifeng,
> which at that time was the imperial capital. Approximately 1000
> Jews responded as a group and formed a community, which reached
> its peak in the Middle Ages, when Jews from Western and Southern
> Asia (principally Iran, Afghanistan and India of today) were actively
> involved in the China trade. They settled in at least six other
> cities throughout China, including Beijing in the seventeenth century.
>
>Between this and the presence of Africans in India, I think we should
>remember that Asia, Europe, and Africa are relatively handy to each other,
>and people have been travelling between them for a long time.
Hmm. I thought China was traditionally not very open to
immigration, international trade, etc. But perhaps I somewhat
confused China and Japan? Then I go to bed wiser than when
I rose.
Robert Carnegie at home, rja.ca...@excite.com at large
--
I am fully aware I may regret this in the morning.
J.B. Moreno
> J.B. Moreno wrote:
>
> > (Which reminds me, I need to add another couple of procmail filters
> > [incest and drugs, and why the hell do they morph the names in the
> > Subject?]).
>
> So that it'll pass through your filters. Duh.
If I've got filters set up against them, I'm hardly going to be buying
their stuff now am I? What I'm all fired up and ready to buy a big
batch of "VlAGRA" (with an lower case L) but I'll just pass on the
"VIAGRA"? "inc.est" is at the top of my to-buy list, but "incest" is
something I never want to see?
I think they just want to be annoying....which makes you right....
Ted Nolan <tednolan>
Some ISPs are applying filters higher up the food chain than your mailbox.
Some companies as well. If they make it down to any individual
users they're still in the game.
Ted
David Johnston
Moreno) wrote:
>stePH <acet...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> J.B. Moreno wrote:
>>
>> > (Which reminds me, I need to add another couple of procmail filters
>> > [incest and drugs, and why the hell do they morph the names in the
>> > Subject?]).
>>
>> So that it'll pass through your filters. Duh.
>
>If I've got filters set up against them, I'm hardly going to be buying
>their stuff now am I?
It's not just the filters of individual users they have to get past.
Many servers do their own filtering without need for the individual
to specifically filter out out that heading. And of course since it
costs them nothing, it's worth it to them to get through on the
off chance that one or two users are weak willed.
how...@brazee.net
On 24-Aug-2004, pl...@newsreaders.com (J.B. Moreno) wrote:
> If I've got filters set up against them, I'm hardly going to be buying
> their stuff now am I? What I'm all fired up and ready to buy a big
> batch of "VlAGRA" (with an lower case L) but I'll just pass on the
> "VIAGRA"? "inc.est" is at the top of my to-buy list, but "incest" is
> something I never want to see?
>
> I think they just want to be annoying....which makes you right....
The only thing I can figure is that these are designed to get past corporate
filters to employees who don't mind SPAM. But I am curious how effective
such misspellings are.
stePH
> The only thing I can figure is that these are designed to get past corporate
> filters to employees who don't mind SPAM. But I am curious how effective
> such misspellings are.
"pr0n" for one has become a common alternate spelling; I'm sure it
doesn't work for getting past filters any more (if in fact it ever was
used that way.)
Robert Carnegie
J.B. Moreno <pl...@newsreaders.com> writes
I gather that sometimes the relationship is between the sender of
spam as agent, providing a service to the retailer of fake medicine
or censorworthy media or some financial scam, and they may be
paid for successful delivery or even eyeballing of the message,
not necessarily for actual sales leads - more fool them. And,
unfortunately, it means that simply getting the spam to us can be
worth someone's while, regardless of the outcome.
I also read that spam nowadays is substantially sent through
zombied computers in homes, taken over by viruses of one or
another sort, which does mean that there's a positive thing that we
can do against spam - keep that junk out of our own machines.
Robert Carnegie
Your district attorney will tell you that you have a perfectly good
remedy - don't log on to the e-mail server. No one asked you to*,
and the consequences are your responsibility.
They may even have a case that isn't utterly ridiculous; the POP3
protocol allows you to inspect a catalogue of messages before
downloading them - although a lot of mail client software doesn't
give you that option.
*Well, if you get a free domain space with your Internet access,
your contract and Internet rules may require you to accept e-mail
to postmaster@... I'm not sure if you could be prosecuted for not
reading the porn e-mails to postmaster...
how...@brazee.net
On 25-Aug-2004, stePH <acet...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> "pr0n" for one has become a common alternate spelling; I'm sure it
> doesn't work for getting past filters any more (if in fact it ever was
> used that way.)
Except that I had to Google pron to find out what it meant.
This double layered word change is similar to Pee, which is the initial of
piss, which is just a sound.