Lurker > Criminalt

wwinterj25 posted...

He went to court for it and got a nail put through his skull.

Thought they'd have just given him a fine.

Just try not to read too much into "That'll be $3.50."

Not if the pig pulls its organ back out of you.

Wait until your own mother no longer recognizes you and she asks who you are. It's like a knife in your heart. I speak from experience.

eston posted...

It creates situations where 3 or 4 different characters in a row greet you the same way

There's a nip in the air. Cold won't be good for my crops, never is.

Surely you can't be serious.

AceMos posted...

i dont know about these racist things so that means they dont exist

the post

"Everyone knows all goblins are really Jews, but I can't explain why 'everyone' failed to include Jewish studio execs or creatives at Warner Bros."

Maybe you can see things that other people can't simply because you look hard enough and long enough for them until they're dancing in front of your eyes, and then they become real and huge for you, and you see pattern and meaning instead of coincidence and trivial detail.

I don't mind people retrospectively looking at the movies and saying, "OK, maybe the studio didn't know there are supposed to be deeper, older connotations to some of this imagery, but once you're made aware of it, you can't help but feel there were a few unfortunate decisions made in production design and makeup."

But it's one hell of a leap from there to implying that Rowling and Warner Bros are blasting on anti-semitic dog whistles, pandering to prejudices, and colluding together in some neo-Nazi conspiracy to paint Jews as evil grotesques.

Background_Guy posted...

So Jewish people have noticed the HP goblins

And yet no one at Warner Bros Entertainment Inc happened to notice anything prior to the film's release, or recommend any edits or re-shoots during post-production? If not (and I don't know whether or not anyone did) -- why not? Was it because Hollywood's motion picture industry is notoriously riddled with anti-semitism, with Jews poorly represented in senior and middle management positions and creative roles?

Or was it because studio executives, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, simply failed to see any obvious connection between goblins and Jews? Despite your insistence that it's a crystal clear connection, direct and deliberate, that practically screams itself to the world because everyone knows (and has always known) that all goblins are really Jews and only a dyed-in-the-wool racist would dare to ignore or deny it?

Maybe -- just maybe -- most people have never read Der Strmer, and aren't aware of any tenuous, putative connections between traditional folklore figures and anti-semitic stereotypes. Maybe to them, a goblin is just a goblin: a make-believe fantasy figure, and not anything more sinister or real than that. Maybe most people, including the movies' creators, would have to dig a lot deeper and look harder to see the allegedly Jewish nature of these characters than you claim.

AceMos posted...

if you make all dwarfs black smiths yes your being racist

If only more people in today's world would campaign for the rights of Dunmer refugees.

AceMos posted...

to ppl going "no no this is just tradition"

one problem witht hat allt hese traditions where made by tolken who was a hard core racist

Folklore traditions, fairy tales, have got a long heritage that stretches back way before 1937.

Funkydog posted...

To my knowledge... the original goblins from folklore had no relations to Jews (save one Cornish fey at some point) and included a whole variety of spirits from evil Redcaps to benevolent Brownies and the evil ones imagery of "ugly, thieves, murderers" etc was a part of them originally.

Later on Jewish people were then also often given these traits, as much easier to spread hatred and lets people blame them more easily when they have something defined to put on them.

Well then, the way I see it, these are the alternatives -- how Gringotts could have been conceptualized differently:

#1. Rowling writes Gringotts as a benevolent, philanthropic institution populated by avuncular, likeable souls. (Portraying bankers as greedy, self-serving, or miserly characters is to be avoided like the plague because, as everyone knows, all bankers are Jews.)

The weakness with this tack is that the bankers are still goblins. As everyone knows (apparently...), all goblins are really Jewish, and since goblins look grotesque -- well, it could be interpreted as implying that Jews are grotesque. So, maybe tear up that script and start again.

#2. Gringotts is written as a cold, heartless institution, but its bankers aren't goblins and have no grotesque attributes whatsoever.

However, this still runs afoul of the drawback that all bankers are Jews; so portraying them in any kind of negative light simply plays up to cheap, antisemitic stereotypes. Tear up that script and start again.

#3. Gringotts is a benevolent, philanthropic institution, and its bankers have no grotesque attributes nor disagreeable traits.

This is almost certainly the safest, least offensive path to take. Does it make sense from a storytelling point of view? That doesn't matter. This isn't about the story.

If you're not satisfied with any of those alternatives, tell us how you think Gringotts should have been portrayed in the movies.

averagejoel posted...

the former

I know there were medieval European woodcuts that depicted Jews as practically non-human creatures (long pre-dating the Protocols), but I think you need to make a stronger argument for a direct connection between the folklore figures sprinkled throughout many different medieval European cultures (e.g. in Ireland) and Jewish stereotypes.

averagejoel posted...

have you ever considered why magical creatures based on jewish stereotypes might be portrayed as villainous

I'm not sure whether you're suggesting that the traditional image of a goblin is based on Jewish stereotypes, or that villainous characters are inevitably based on Jewish stereotypes.

But I've considered that it's at least possible to have characters who are mythical creatures, have the look popularly associated with those creatures and be characterised as generally up to no good, but are not necessarily Jewish.

If you'd been responsible for concept art on the movies, what look would you have chosen for the Gringott's bankers in a magical world full of traditional bestiaries?

Sometimes a goblin is just a goblin. They're traditionally villainous creatures. The Gringotts bankers are quasi-villainous types. Villainous characters require a villainous look, and the traditional goblin image suits them.

It sounds more like Stewart is eager to see a Jewish face in every evil, and evil in every Jewish face.

g0ldie posted...

Talking to people, heres what I say: Have you ever seen a Harry Potter movie? Have you ever seen the scenes in Gringotts Bank?

How is he trying to draw a short, straight line between Rowling's characterization of goblins in the books and their depiction in the movies? What direct input did she have on concept art, makeup or production design?

BignutzisBack posted...

Excellent, I have been waiting many years for the opportunity to take five times as long to buy groceries

It's like, why would you pretend to wheel a cart around a store and pick things off shelves, when you can just click-click-click on a menu of items while online shopping in the normal way?

monkmith posted...

well the robots they've got pulling stock off shelves to fill orders will go into a murderous rampage if they spot a human shopper so they went entirely virtual.

Except for a handful of stores about which we can expect blood-drenched headlines any day now.

rexcrk posted...

I cant imagine life revolving around a woman.

Well, you'd soon get dizzy.

Only via ouija board.

bsp77 posted...

This is the worst advice.

It's not even advice. Just some bullshit to try to self-excuse a pathological incapacity to make any friends.

Did you find you had to keep scaling it down from the original plan to build it life size?

At least you didn't have former friends who made death threats against you after things went sour.

I have never:

Done drugs
Ridden a horse
Sung karaoke
Been in a limo
Gotten a ticket
Gone Ziplining
Been on a cruise
Been Skydiving
Skinny dipped (with opposite sex)

So that's 9.

The government, or the politicians at the top who are supposed to be running it throughout this term?

There seems to be a certain Republican cognitive dissonance when championing values like patriotism -- demanding fidelity and obedience to your country and the democratically elected powers entrusted with managing its affairs -- with one breath, while actively encouraging distrust, skepticism and opposition to the government in another breath.

Like, don't tell me it's my duty to serve my country if you're going to tell me I'm an idiot for obeying orders from my superiors because they can't be trusted.

PrettyBoyFloyd posted...

So now a mass invasion or huge war can break out and they have no cards to play?

They've always had strong conventional forces, which was what allowed the apartheid regime to make cross-border incursions and attack its neighbours (or wage full-scale invasions, as it did against Angola) as often as it did. It's hardly defenceless, and since the Gtterdmmerung mentality ("we must destroy everything around us if the apartheid regime is in danger of being toppled, because no future is conceivable without it") has long since evaporated, it's been felt that the nuclear option can be safely dispensed with for the foreseeable future without imperilling the country. (Also, it might be a very expensive thing to maintain.)

I've lived in the UK all my life, and nowadays I'd say that moving to the UK is not a life change that I'd encourage unless you have a compelling reason.

"Too long" life expectancy isn't the problem. "Too short" health and quality of life is the problem; they need to be extended.

GrandConjuraton posted...

I've been seeing a therapist for almost five years. A psychiatrist too.

Pouring money into therapy that wasn't working sounds a bit like pouring water into a hole in the sand. Five years seems a long time to take reaching that decision.

Watched the original trilogy on TV; couldn't even finish the Phantom Menace, and didn't bother with the rest of the prequels; watched TFA, Rogue One and TLJ in the cinema (with wifey, because she's the Star Wars fan); have no intention of ever watching anything else Star Wars related.

I once had the idea to to save a newspaper from every day of my life, to be my own time capsule of national and world events. It lasted about three weeks before I realised I needed the space for something else.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Since 1982.

PrettyBoyFloyd posted...

Is South Africa under nuclear threat anyway.

Well, quite. South Africa's nuclear weapons program was an insurance policy to protect the apartheid state from a conventional invasion (when the reality was that neighbouring states more often needed somewhat greater protection against being invaded by the SADF).

GodardOnGodard posted...

seems like a lot of people don't find white washing offensive

White American actor in "portrays white American character" shocker!

IfGodCouldDie posted...

They are just biding their time until it is right.

Sloths have actually been in the process of an attempted global takeover for around 60 million years. It's just that they're mobilizing really, really slowly.

General-Secura posted...

Yeah, cephalopods aren't going to be it. They've been around for hundreds of millions of years and have had plenty of opportunities to seize power after a mass extinction, and yet they never did.

You'll notice that no successful revolutionary movement has ever been led by a squid.

There are probably plenty of people who enjoy what they do and are happy to be paid for it. All of the people you've named built fairly well-paid careers on doing what they loved.

Were the last four words of the topic title really necessary?

If only he was the Last Scientologist.

Trouble was that Harmony was a gated community.

At least you didn't say drunk monkeys in bars.

faramir77 posted...

It's been happening for a month for me.

Same for me.

Shablagoo posted...

^Do you still like pizza?

Did you guys ever have a bad experience with a particular food and now cant look at it? My dad got nauseous around bananas because of a bad experience with one.

Food poisoning from mussels. I would rather ingest the soupy contents of a dysentery latrine than eat mussels again. (Admittedly, after the first spoonful of diseased human shit, I might change my mind.)

DrizztLink posted...

Again, super simplistically put, the American accent is relatively similar to Shakespearean English.

Regional American accents during the colonial period echoed the distinctive British accents of the settlers' regions of origin: East Anglia/Massachusetts, West Country/Virginia, North Midlands/Delaware Valley, northern British borderlands/Appalachian backcountry. No single American accent, and no single British, "Shakespearean" accent even at the time.

Surely the American accent has been far more susceptible to change over the centuries, thanks to demographic changes wrought by hugely diverse inflows of migrants and greater mobility across a vast continent?

Flauros posted...

what are your critiques on the Quran?

Oh, these fanfic spin-offs...

You can tell they didn't really know how to wrap up the saga, either. It doesn't end, it just sort of stops.

spikethedevil posted...

No one here speaks like that. Please stop getting your ideas of England from Americans attempting English accents.

I blame Guy Ritchie.

spikethedevil posted...

No one cares about the Empire anymore.

Oh, leave him be, stuck in his own quaint little world of imagination.