Slashdot Mirror
Homer Becomes Omar
geekster writes "With Omar as Homer, and Badr substituted for Bart, The Simpsons is now playing on Arab television.
But in order not to risk offending an Arab audience, the characters in Al Shamshoon, as the show is now called, have modified some of their most distinguishable traits." And you thought internationalization was hard for software!
[comic book guy voice]Worst...Adaptation...EVER![/comic book guy voice]
Come on, you all were thinking it, Homer without the H or beer or hot dogs or bacon- eeeew.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Don't the Simpson's go to a Christian church and doesn't Homer often drink? I think this will be too much for the feeble Muslim mind!
D'oh has now been changed to lâ ilâha illâ allâh
Taking Homer and stripping out all of the Americanisms isn't going to make it funny to people with a mideast cultural sense of humor (it would probably be funnier if they just left the Americanisms in). Homer is a success in America because we are laughing at ourselves. I would bet Omar could be as much of a success if the show could present the same kind of local irreverent humor about life there like it does for life in the US.
The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
Does he become a Latino convenience store clerk now?
The also must be asking what evil people use nuclear power instead of that delicious arab oil! Is the nuclear power plant digitally edited into a oil refinery?
is going to ge the character with dynamite strapped to his chest?
D'oh!
Better is the enemy of good enough. - Russian proverb.
More deadly than Saddam, eh? Methinks that episode with either be neutered or omitted...
Now for all the other Obligatory Simpsons Quotes. Please keep them all to this thread, lest we quell serious discussion on Slash— oh, never mind.
The full humor of the Simpsons will never be able to be portrayed properly in another language. Alot of the jokes, subtle references, spoofs, and even the type of humor itself is specifically designed for a Western audience.
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Have to wear a Burqa?
time is a perception of a being's consciousness
time is your 6th sense, the wierd ones are 7+
Even more damning was the response of Al Jean, executive producer of The Simpsons. He said: "If Homer doesn't drink and eat bacon and generally act like a pig, which I guess is also against Islam, then it's not Homer."
Sums it up quite nicely I think.. not having seen this of course.
"This is a great dishonor to both my family and my god, but Okay."
So instead of Apu the Quik-E Mart guy you have... Joe... The Scumy cashier at the Adult Bookstore... Omar : Yes I'd like some lube, gay porn magazines, vibrating finger rings, Goatse DVD 2 and some Illegal fireworks.. Joe : Sir, we don't have any fucking illegal fireworks... *whispers* right this way... */whispers*
"Arabisation is going to boom in these next few years," she told the Wall Street Journal. "We're such an impressionable people and we aspire so much to be like the West, that we take on anything that we believe is a symbol or a manifestation of Western culture."
Oh bother. Why can't you just keep your own cultural identity instead of trying to be the same as us? Homogenizing the world just makes it a more boring place.
Allah D'oh!
This reminds me of the Doki Doki Panic/smb2 incident. Super Mario 2 was originally a Fuji Television promotion starring an arabian family called Doki Doki Panic. The people at Nintendo USA thought the Japanese version of SMB2 was too difficult, so they changed the Arabian characters in Doki Doki Panic to Mario and his friends. It's a really interesting story. Check out more here.
First you animate. Then you SUSPEND!!!
It's an improvement on the current TV situation there, which is Everybody Loves Raymond and Law and Order on even more relentlessly than they are in the US. At least here we have shows about building custom motorcycles to round out the last 8 hours of the day.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
mmmmmmm, Jihad!
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
What will Apu sound like now? Like Homer?
I voted for Saddam! :-)
-------
Warning: Slashdot may contain traces of nuts.
Somebody has to take the karma hit, so i guess I'll be be one of the people to point out this is pretty stale news already. The story is at least a week old, and i have no doubt several somebodies submitted it the very day it broke.
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Lisa is stoned to death when Badr steals her burka while playing in a park and Omar is pummeled when he is found with contraband spare ribs and a copy of Maxim
You do realize he's not an arab, right? Right?
I can't imagine that each show would last longer than two or three minutes a piece after being "converted" to be presentable to an Arab audience. One can't help but to be amused at the whole idea of "We really like the Western World, except for this, this, this, this, this, etc., et al".
You are in a maze of little twisting passages, all different.
and this is going to be adapted to a culture where blasphemy is still punishable by death? Where Jews are reviled, some of the very writers of the show? Where women are often kept at home if they do not have a man from the family escorting them? What about all the kissing scenes and sexual innuendo - will the female characters involved be honor-killed?
You fail it. If you're going to troll by editting the text of a mirror, it helps when you don't edit the second most obvious part: the very end.
...Or maybe the second time, when all "obligatory Simpsons quote" is Ontopic.
What's become of the cross screen adaptation for the Simpsons Movie? Has Brooks or Groaning [spelling funny] let any tidbits slip about it yet?
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Why did they even bother?
This
http://www.extremefunnyhumor.com/fun_singhsons.htm
The article writers have made a mistake in addition. 60% of the population is below 20, and 40% is under 15, that makes 100% of the population under 21
40% under 15
+ 20% ages 16 - 20
==================
= 60% under 20
And he can even die every show too!
Does anyone know if there are video clips and/or screen captures of this foreign show? I am curious on how this show looked. I wasn't able to find any when I last searched when I heard about it a few weeks ago.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Apu is Hindu and from India, not Muslim from Arabia. Many of the stereotypes about Indians are probably held in common.
There's a movie in France called "Les visiteurs" (the visitors). It's a hilarious movie about some middle-age french aristocrat and his servant time-travelling into our age and messing things up right and left. The movie is very funny... in France, because it relies almost exclusively on twists of the French language, and on French cultural references. I heard this movie was adapted to the US market and did a perfect flop there.
Well I believe it'll be the same for Omar Simpson: the original Homer is funny because it deforms and amplifies flaws in the US society. It's reasonably funny in many western countries, because the american culture is kind of universal, and even when it's dubbed, it's not too hard to understand half of the jokes (many very US-centric jokes are lost in France, Sweden or Spain though, particularly those involving famous personalities known only to the US public).
But in countries far from westerm values, and not as developed, with different and sometimes stricter sets of moral values, adapting the Simpsons to suit these people will suck the marrow out of the bone. It'll the arab version of the US "the visitors" flop. Either give them the full unabridged, ashamedly US version of Homer and let half of them love it and the other half hate it, or give them Omar and let all of them hate it.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Um... no. The 40% which is under 15 is ALSO under 20, so 40% of the population is over 20, 40% is under 15, and 20% is aged 15-19.
Example:
5 8 11 14 15 17 20 23 25 30
What percentage of these numbers are under 20? 60% - 5, 8, 11, 14, 15, and 17.
What percentage of these numbers are under 15? 40% - 5, 8, 11, and 14.
Microsoft cheerleader, blue flag waving, you got a problem with that?
That's funny, the OP says "geekster writes," and then goes on to quote TFA verbatim, but I could have sworn that TFA was written by someone at The Independent named "Geneviève Roberts".
Err, i think the 40% under the age of 15 are also under the age of 20.
"Religion is the most malevolent of all mind viruses." - Arthur C. Clarke.
40% are under 15, AND under 20. 60% are just under 20.
-Eric
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
The article writers have made a mistake in addition. 60% of the population is below 20, and 40% is under 15, that makes 100% of the population under 21.
Maybe this was an intentional mistake for the sake of a joke, but in the event that it's not...
Since those people aged 15 and under are also under the age of 20, to say that 60% of the population is below 20 and 40% of the population is below 15 means you're talking about overlapping groups, so to add them and get 100% is wrong because you're counting those under 15 twice.
So 60% of the population is under 20, and 40% of the population is over 20. It all works out.
Once again, if you were being sarcastic or facetious, then never mind.
"Every jumbled pile of person has a thinking part that wonders what the part that isn't thinking isn't thinking of"-TMBG
Homer WITHOUT DUFF!? it's just not the same.
It's never just a game when you're winning. - George Carlin
See last line.
being the math geek that i am, i have to make one small correction to your otherwise correct explanation.
it should be "%20 ages 15-20", since the "%40 under 15" presumably does not include those 15 years of age, only those <15 yrs of age (14 and below).
Wonder how will end after the same process South Park... wait, if the trouble is risk offending, it should take that process to broadcast it in US itself.
Who is going to run the Kwik-E-Mart? An American character?
The popular children's books "Where's Waldo?" will be reimagined for Arab consumers. The new series, "Where's Osma?" challenges Arab children to locate the terrorist in busy drawings of the Afgan Mountains, Syria, and New York.
The recent violence of Sept. 11 and the Iraq war has had an immense impact on the psyche of both peoples. This will translate into a deeper knowledge of each other and, hopefully, more understanding.
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Knowledge of one's enemies transmutes to some extent in a sharing of cultures. Violence, as the ultimate virus, might be seen as injecting plasmids into each sides cultural DNA.
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
"Don't have a camel, man!"
Fox had also released an excellent game (Grand Theft Auto ripoff.. but nonetheless) based on the series, called "The Simpsons Hit and Run". I am afraid to think how they will "localize" and adapt this game to play to the local market. Actually come to think of it, spreading mayhem in American cities should play quite well with the local audience. Doough to infidels!
keyboard not found! press any key to continue...
Terrorist: You are a credit to the great Satan.
Burns: Oh, pshaw.
I believe it will turn out something like this:
Burns: Then it's agreed. I'll supply you freedom fighters with delicious yogurt.
Freedom Fighter: You are a credit to the great Sultan.
Burns: Oh, pshaw.
(a) 21 drinking age is an American thing. It's 18 (or lower) almost everywhere in the world. Oh and USA's alcoholism rate is right up there with Russia, but I digress.
(b) Isn't alcohol completely illegal in Saudi Arabia? In which case, no one can (legally) drink regardless of age there anyway.
(c) as the other commenters pointed out, you did the math wrong.
Interesting factoid: everyone under the age of 15 is also under the age of 20.
Osama's sheep, after a day in the poppy field: "To-cra-a-a-a-a-cko!"
www.linuxpenguin.net
The full humor of the Simpsons will never be able to be portrayed properly in another language. Alot of the jokes, subtle references, spoofs, and even the type of humor itself is specifically designed for a Western audience. (Emphasis mine)
In case you didn't know, there are many countries in the western world that don't have English as a language. The Simpsons has been widely translated to dozens of languages, and is popular in many non-English speaking countries; I should know, I'm Spanish and I find the dubbed version (nearly) as good as the original.
However, I do agree that the re-made (and surely toned down) Arabic version will most likely be rubbish. Even if the best humourists available sat down to it, it will never be comparable to the original. Firstly for being an attempt to re-make a previous show (that never works, please inform the US TV industry) and secondly because I'm sure it will not be as scathing or sarcastic towards Arabic figures and institutions as it is to American and Western ones. Humour without freedom of speech just isn't the same.
So in the time between reading the parent post and writing my response, it looks like lots of people already beat me to it. Since I can't delete my posts, I'll just scurry off to the corner for a while...
"Every jumbled pile of person has a thinking part that wonders what the part that isn't thinking isn't thinking of"-TMBG
Actually, I realized right after I submitted the comment that it should be 40% under 15 and 20% ages 15-19, since it is 20% *under* 20. Oh well.
In the episode where Lisa converts to Budhism, there's a scene where Homer is scalding Bart for not buttering his bacon and then not "baconing up his sausage". Heh. Good times.
or rather "%20 ages 15-19", since "below 20" shouldn't include the 20 years either.
Who will play Apu? They should get the original guy, or someone with a heavy Southern US accent to turn the tables!
fak3r.com
No need. When my friend worked in Saudi for a year there were plenty of gay men around trying to pick him up when he walked to work. So many that he had to grow a beard so that they wouldn't try it on him anymore. I troll you not!
Just like Jerry Lewis!
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It's Omargenizing...
;)
Oh, nevermind!
Let me ask you, in Saudi Arabia how likely is it to put forth atheistic and/or anti-muslim views and have them broadcast...and if, by some miracle you were able to; what would happen to you?
Well, I knew from watching Jay Leno that the US education system was a steaming pile of crap, but I didn't realise it was as bad as this.
Clue: Somebody who is under 15 is also under 20.
I seem to hear a faint echo of somebody saying "D'oh!"
East Indians comprise a good deal of labor for the Middle East I would guess they work hard to become merchants in the Middle East as well. - it's just a much harder road.A .shtml
Many come as laborers through brokers and are exploited. A good deal of US support workers are hired this way and are exposed to very dangerous conditions in Iraq and are less defended than U.S. soldiers since they are cheap and don't count in the body count. http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/printer_101305L
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Homer: Good even to you, Mohammed.
Moe: And to you, Hamir.
Homer: Do you not find it odd that I so often frequent your soda bar?
Moe: I do.
Homer: It would make sense if it were a bar where liquor were served, and I were not forbidden by Allah to consume such. But a soda bar?
Moe: Yes. This troubles me as well.
Homer: Hmm.
Moe: So, you want to get your Jihad on?
Homer: Indeed.
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Er, something here doesn't add up.
The US is spending billions of dollars to try to persuade the Muslim world to be a little more Western in its outlook. A little less bombing. A little more democracy and capitalism.
So an Arab TV channel shows willing and adapts the Simpsons show. Amdittedly a slightly eccentric choice, as it's hardly the peak of Western Art. But perhaps it's a start.
American slashdotters then roundly criticize them for doing so and claim they've ruined it (not that too many slashdotters will be watching the show from Oman or Abu Dhabi, one imagines, so what the makers have done with it doesn't matter at all).
Do you actually want the Muslim world to modernize?
Las qué passoun
tournoun pas maï
The article also says "Bart continues to bate his teachers." While 'bate' is a real word, I don't think it was intended in this case. Proofreading FTW!
how many teens and 20-something year-olds in egypt are saying "damn the official distrib sucks, I'm gonna go download a fansub of the simpsons" the way many here in the states do with anime...
"goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series
Seaching Google for "Did you mean: the simpsons" and it returns:
"Did you mean: the simpsons"
Damn right, Google.
you forgot the d'oh! blah blah damn time limit blah blah
"goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series
I, for one, welcome our new American overlords.
Okay, I'm sorry. That was insensitive and I should never have pressed the submit button.
Shit, man, you must have been treated pretty harshly as a kid. Or did you mean "scolding"?
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Homogenizing the world just makes it a more boring place.
:-P
How else am I going to eat ahc Chili's when I'm on my business trip to Riyadh?
Disconnect your television. Do your own research. Draw your own conclusions. They're probably lying. Don't be a sheep.
the arabs seem eager to consume western culture, despite the tags of "inferior" and "dirty" they have associated with the west. However, it seems nearly none wants to translate arabic content into other languages. Such a weird thing for a culture whose language supposedly is the world's 4th most spoken language (altough, in practice, there's no single arabic that can be understood in all arab countries, not even by a long shot).
One I can think of is Homer getting into the fights with George Bush Senior
anyone think of any others?
- My question is: Can Slashdot be Slashdotted? -
personally i think this is a wonderful project, it's a shame he's already having skittish reaction from hollywood execs
if we could just laugh more, in both the muslim world, and the west, at each other, how awesome a leap into a better world would that be?
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
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But without the H, what will they call the Treehouse of Horror VIII segment Homega Man?
how about we stop pushing our culture on other countries? hasn't recent history shown that western overload on cultures that aren't ready for it results in some sort of backlash? okay so that was probably more due to US capitalism and oil greed shoving its way around the middle east like a bull in a china shop. but still, do we have to actively seek feeding our dribble-for-culture across the globe? i really do like the Simpsons... ? damn, i must really be hating the US these days.
7-11s run by Indian guys
Nuclear Power Plants
Catholic or Christian churches with Evangelical stereotypes
Comic book stores
Nursing homes
donuts
Tom and Jerry
American Football, Politics, National Forests, and dive bars?
If not, how is a majority of this humor going to translate? It's a heavy parody of American culture. I'm just not sure how that's supposed to sell.
The Simpsons contains alot of American references which are impossible to translate in any sensible way. So take that away, and the fact that Homer is a beer drinking american, how will this transalte to arabic??? wont work!
Sacrilege!
Enlightenment is a pipe dream. So where's the pipe?
The summary, once again, is presented as the work of the submitter, when in fact, it isn't. It is the first two paragraphs of the article, which was written by Geneviève Roberts. Deleting a couple of newline characters does not constitute paraphrasing. I wish the editors would take two seconds to load the article and verify that the "summary" is in fact a summary before posting it. If it's just a copy and paste job, then it should be made clear that it is a quote from the article, while still giving credit to the submitter. Or not, since it was probably sent in by a dozen other people who actually bothered to write a summary.
That's really Omarsexual.
[rant] .. I cringe every time I see a US adaption of classic non-US work. It seems as if the American audience can't consume anything that is not made safe for them by converting it to a local reference point. Case in point, all the British sitcoms that have been remade over the years. Trying to take something that does not naturally occur in your culture and then (figuratively) bashing it around the head to make it fit does not result in a work with the same or better quality as the original.
As a person who is not a citizen of the US
So to all you people beating on the Arabic adaption of the Simpsons, all I can say is welcome to how the rest of the world sees what you do to non-US culture.
[/rant]
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
I'm interested to see what they do about Krusty, who's Jewish.
...yet another "kill Krusty" scheme, this time by hypnotizing Bart into becoming a suicide bomber and killing Krusty on the show. However, at the last minute, Krusty makes an on-air apology to Sideshow Bob for all the pain he's caused him, causing Sideshow Bob to have a change of heart. Sideshow Bob warns everybody that Bart is a bomb, prompting Krusty's monkey to swoop in and throw the bomb away (the only people hurt are the evil network executives, whose body parts merge into a T-1000 like monster).
Remember that episode where Sideshow Bob programs Bart, while wearing a suicide bomber's belt, to hug Krusty and blow him up? In the original version:
With "Badr" as the new protagonist, what happens in that episode now?
Did I just give away the ending?
I hear he's a master at it.
*rimshot*--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
"But in order not to risk offending an Arab audience" If one wants to avoid the risk of offending Arab audiences then the best step is to let them watch their camel cartoons. The simpsons are not their cup of tea or should i say glass of camel milk. if Homer is omar...what do you call Ned and will they show the reverend or some mullah. Whatd be really cool is South Park for the arabs with Cartman screaming obsenities in Arabic...
Old news is so exciting!
In America, you can get fired, censured, and or fined for saying the wrong thing on public airwaves, but in the Muslim world(or not, you're really not safe anywhere), you can be executed, with support from the state, for expressing the wrong views: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie.
I'm an atheist, and frankly, anyone who supports jihads, fatwas, crusades, etc., can, well, fuck off.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
It's amazing how groups that are hypersensitive of their culture tend to be the ones intolerant of others.
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A Muslim family would not even have a dog. Muslims consider dogs "unclean", and they are not kept as pets. They think you catch religious cooties by even touching a dog.
"The advanced societies of the future will be driven by competing systems of psychopathology." -JG Ballard
Are Bart's polyester shorts certified Halal? And does it have an accompanying imam-issued certificate shown on screen while an invitation has been extended by Bart to orally consume his shorts?
There are a huge number of yeast infections in this county. Probably because we're downriver from the bread factory.
I wonder how well "Pickle Matrix" translates in Arabic.
you guys do know that not all arabs are muslim right? Also several years back they had an arabic version of south park on tv and it was absolutely hilarious, just as good if not better than the english version. If done right I believe the simpsons in arabic could be a decent spin off as there is quite a lot of people arabic homer can insult without getting the producers in trouble. I didnt see the article mention which arabic network would be airing the show but I am assuming it will be the same one that aired the arabic south park episodes. If this is the case i expect it will be much more "uncennsored" for lack of a better word than expected. The reason is that its really only Saudia Arabia that does the whole killing thing these days while the network that ran the south park episode is a Lebanese network which is considerably more liberated.
http://saif.ittihadfans.com/katalong/mosalslat/ram adan/2005/All-shamshon6-1.wmv
an episode of al-shamsoon as found on a muslim website
Soap box, Ballot box, Jury box, Ammo box. Use in that order.
A little off-topic, but based on the headline, I thought at first that this story was going to be about how my home town got its name.
The last time I criticized a government official/agency, I got a call from the police making it clear that "they know who I am", and I should just drop the who thing. This was a complaint to the Mayor that the police were refusing to take reports on hit and runs in my neighborhood. It was made clear that discussions on car crashes in my neighborhood would not be tolorated.
So, I can tell you first hand. You can only criticize in the US if you have the power to take the person and their entire organization on with guns, OR if your complaint carries no weight.
My solution was to move to a new area where I was under the radar and keep my mouth shut.
Bak. Derk-derk-Allah. Derka derka, Mohammed Jihad. Baka sherpa-sherpa. Abaka-la.
---GEC
I'm but the humble pupil, seeking to snatch the scratchbuilt pebble from the master's fully articulated hand
Does this make Apu some white American??? Kevin
"To Jihad, the cause of and solution to, all of life's problems."
It's only mildy offensive...I think...maybe.
Ehh...this is the life we chose.
Honestly, it scares me a bit that this actually has to be posted. Are there really lots of /. people who don't know the difference between India and Arabia? Yes, they are both "dark skinned", but beyond that, there really isn't much in common between the two.
In fact, in parts of India, these two groups are fighting each other.
It's MBC, Duff=>Soda, Donuts=>"Cake" (or however the local delicacy is spelled)
and no bacon. But then there's the whole Christians, Jews and Hindus thing.
this is like three days old and was on local evening news.
Were that I say, pancakes?
that reminds me, george w bush doesnt care about black people
FTFA:
With 60 per cent of the population in the Arab world under the age of 20, and 40 per cent under 15, the market is likely to expand.
The cause of...and result of...all of the Arab world's problems?
A quick look at http://quickfacts.census.gov/ shows that 25% of Americans are under 18.
You are simply WRONG. He is saying that 60% are under 20. Secondly he is saying 40 are ALSO under 15. Leaving 40% over 20. Shesh. Read and think. Then post.
And I thought 4Kids sucked!
Then again, maybe just as well, people will spread uncensored bootlegs instead.
Circumcision is child abuse.
Although I haven't watched personaly to judge, Al Shamshom seems to be a failure. Few arab bloggers wrote negative reviews about it. Non of my affiliates (all with western education) even carred to watch it. The promotional advs weren't funny at all.
3 268353-lMyQjAxMDE1MjE5NDIxNTQxWj.html
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB11292510794
I guarantee this will, in the long run, have an effect on Arab/American relations. Which way it will go I haven't a clue.
Is buying a Harley Davidson as your first motorcycle since you were 16 at age 49 a midlife crisis issue?
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Try the Indian one!!!!
I've been lving in Turkey now for a few years, and recently they have come out with Married with Children, Turkish style! It's sort of funny, and Al the father is still a disgruntled man husband, but Peg the wife, well, she still cooks because god forbid that a man in this country comes home and there isn't something prepared by the wife. Kelly, well she is cute, but it would be wrong to think that a girl of teen years has sex before marriage. Bud, well he is just a good kid in school. The house was nicely kept as well. It didn't last one season.
I hope the Saudis get it somewhat original to themselves.
Pete
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This reminds me of a parody called The Singhsons, where the characters are all East Indian. http://www.badmash.org/singhson.php Homer is also Omar in that one too.
Thank goodness the USA doesn't buy overseas TV shows and make crappy sanitized unfunny versions of them.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
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I saw a couple of episodes of the Arabic version, it's not that bad, although a lot of the humor is lost in translation. I think it's impossible to convey something like The Simpsons in any language other than English, and even then, some background knowledge is required to understand the jokes. Interestingly enough, in Arabic, "The Simpsons" should translate to "Aal Simsim". "Aal Shamshoon" means "The Samsons".
If showing sexual content and harsh language to children leads to the lowest birthrate among teenager, then we should do that...since we have the highest teenage birth rate. Japan's is 4, ours is 64, and this data comes from unicef.org, not exactly a obscure or untrustworthy source.
http://www.unicef.org/pon96/inbirth.htm
Saying "Did you ever consider that maybe Japan's culture is wrong?" shows not only that you are a idiot, but that you have no idea that not only do people in Japan have less sex, and lower crime rates. So to say that they are somehow immoral because of what they show their children is idiotic, they know how to raise their children, they dont let their televisions do it for they as you obviously let your television do. Stop berating people of other nations and start looking at the problems in your own home you intolerant ignoramus!
We only have your side of this personal account, and it sounds like thats not the whole story, but your side sounds dubious. Your post jumped straight to political assassination as a possible solution in just a few sentences, which is a strong hint to me that maybe its not the first time you've resorted to implied threats of violence. Dissenting speech is tolerated just fine, whether it makes a good argument or not, and plenty examples of both can be encountered on a daily basis. But its perfectly appropriate for veiled threats against public figure to be handled as if they could be legitimate.
No TV and No Beer makes homer Something Something
Bomb buildings?
Don't mind if I do!
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
I wonder how they would handle the fact that so many Simpsons characters are left-handed, and Arab culture doesn't have much use for left-handed people.
It's relatively common to remake movies and TV shows for different cultures. If the U.S. can do it, so can the Arabs.
...laura
No, I tried the media before going to the Mayors office. The media outside my city wasn't interested, and the media inside the city was afraid of the reprecussions. Yes, the local media told me so. The non-local media simply would not respond.
Yes, the local government is unnamed. While I see little risk in talking about it without detail. You must keep in mind. Armed men told me to drop it.
As for "you'd rather blame corruption in your (unnamed) local government on a failure of the entire republican system of the USA", you have got to be kidding! I certainly don't think that I am so important that I lived in the only corrupt part of the entire US. And given that I spoke with a state representative about it, and her was "nothing will ever be done about it", I know that government corruption goes at least up to the state level. This is just my first hand personal information. Of course, the question is... who is to blame, if not the total system, when local governments are allowed to take this kind of behavior to keep it's local population under control?
Is he going to be replaced with an American named Billybob and serve at their local 7-11 "Thank ya'll for comin, I'll see ya'll in Baghdad!"
Like Ebaums World? You'll love Shizzville
While in Spain this Summer (I'm Texan but speak Spanish), I was watching a dubbed version of the Simpsons. I thought the voice actors were horrible, and nearly all of the humor was lost. I asked my Spanish friend if the Spanish Bee still speaks in Spanish, and he said yeah but it's with a Mexican accent. I thought that was kind of funny.
I have found there are just two ways to go.
It all comes down to livin' fast or dyin' slow. -REK, Jr.
How about where Homer gets in a fist fight with George Bush? I bet it would be even funnier to Arabs if was GWB.
One rogue cop (and how do you know it was really a cop?) does not equal the entire U.S. justice system. Does your city have a gulag full of dissidents? Somehow I doubt it. If you ever want to criticize anyone again, realize they may try some form of petty intimidation. If you can't grow a pair and handle this, just keep your mouth shut and take whatever comes your way.
Omar could soon be subject to an import tariff:
0 496.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/arts/436
I'm pretty sure homosexual gerontophilia is frowned on in most arab countries...
Wouldn't an Arab audience miss all of the pop culture jokes in an episode of The Simpsons?
"We only have your side of this personal account"
Are you kidding me? I was threatened by armed men, and your asking me to invite them to Slashdot for a rebuttle?
"and it sounds like thats not the whole story"
No, it is not the whole story. I originally approached the problem not realizing that there was a cover-up going on in my neighborhood. As I worked my way through the system, and found that at each level it was made clear that that level already knew about the problem, and was not going to address it. It wasn't until I broke out a camera that I was threatened. If I wanted to write a book, I would have done that. Here I summed up.
"Your post jumped straight to political assassination as a possible solution in just a few sentences"
Either you cannot read, or cannot comprehend what you read. I never made any comment about political assassination. I said that the government would attack YOU, and if you don't take the other options of hiding and keeping your mouth shut, you might need to defend yourself physically.
"which is a strong hint to me that maybe its not the first time you've resorted to implied threats of violence"
Again, either you cannot read, or cannot comprehend what you read. There is not even a hint of threat of violence from me. In fact, I specifically stated "My solution was to move to a new area where I was under the radar and keep my mouth shut." Did you missread, or do you consider moving away and keeping your mouth quite to be a "veiled" threat.
"Dissenting speech is tolerated just fine"
Clearly that is not always the case.
"and plenty examples of both can be encountered on a daily basis"
plenty examples of both can be encountered on a daily basis
Television is hardly "emasculated" to conservative whims. Hello? Hollywood is the most liberal place in America.
Since when have shows like South Park ever catered to the whims of "puritanical christians?" This is just more lame, trendy conservative-bashing. It's the new trend of the left to preach tolerance all the time and yet be intolerant of religion and of opposing viewpoint. Jeez, just seeing a conservative opinion on TV aired without contempt makes these people think it's a Bush conspiracy. But anti-conservative stuff (aka The Daily Show) is a-okay.
"Sufferin' succotash."
The US has been censored on the beloved Final Fantasy games forever. I believe, but am not certian, that Final Fantasy for the NES survived relitively unchanged but that's it. FF2 and 3 were never released in the US. The FF2 here was actually FF4, and FF3 here was really FF6, FF2 and 3 are actually NES games.
However it doesn't end there. FF4 had two versions in Japan, roughly translated as easy type and hard type. Hard type was the real game, as intended. Easy type made many things easier for kids to play. Square, Nintendo, or both (never been able to find out who) decided that American gamers weren't advanced enough to handle the full game, so only the easy type was brought over as FF2 to the US. Also a good deal of content was cut. There's a big section with Cain, the dragoon in the game, relating to family honor and so on, but they decided the concepts were foriegn to Americans and thus cut from the script. There was even a porno mag you could find (really).
Also, Final Fantasy 5, a SNES game like 4 and 6, wasn't released because it was felt to be to hard for American gamers, with no way to make it easier. FF5 features a complex system of leveling a character not only in level, but in class, where all characters can be changed to be all classes, and combinations of classes. Some might recognise this job system as being the basis for FF Tactics, which indeed it is. However since it was complex and central to the game, a US release was simply never done.
Finally, with FF7, gamers convinced Square not to do that shit anymore. The decided not to renumber it, and released a rather faithful translation, with full content. Not coincidentally, it was one of their best selling FF releases in the US.
If you want, it's now possible, though illegal, to play the orignal FF1-6 in all their glory, even if you don't speak Japanese. Groups of gamers have translated the games to English, and done quite a good job. You get an emulator, the translation patch, and a dump of the ROM and go. The emulator and translation can be legally obtained form sites like www.zophar.net. The ROM dump is, of course, illegal to copy however it's not that difficult to find them posted online as nobody really cares that much.
Our culture is very different but it would make no sense trying to localize the show. Most people know the American culture enough for it to be funny. Sometimes you miss a spoof here and there, but it's no big deal.
The attitude could be seriously different in a more religious country... but hell, could they be trying to convince themselves there's no such place as USA, and no such thing as alcohol or pork? And that's no propaganda of sex, drugs & pork! That's a parody! The creators of the show neither support drinking nor eating too much bacon, they're trying to laugh at that and fight that via laughing, everyone understands that and everyone learns laughing at themselves through Simpsons, that's including (I hope) most of the Arabs which you have too much stereotypes about. So I think this show will go well and it will be loved just like here.
Since when does reporting the problems up the chain of command to the police department, followed by reporting it to the cities Mayor, who after telling me I will recieve a call from the police department, that when it comes has threats against me, "rogue cop"? While I realize I didn't write a novel detailing each and every conversation/email/letter that went back and forth, I did say that the mayor was involved. That certainly makes it more than "one rogue cop".
When the mayor of a city has police threaten you, it is certainly more than "some form of petty intimidation". Why? Because after you and your family are dead, it gets reported as a "random home invasion". Since the problem involved the police covering up crimes that they didn't commit, it is safe to assume that they would be willing to cover up crimes that they did commit.
So, you can call me ball-less if you want, but I did in fact choose to move and keep my mouth shut.
You lie! There are no homosexuals in Muslim lands!
Sincerely,
Saudi Information Minister (FKA, Iraqi Information Minister)
A lot of the people commenting seem to be rather ignorant of the fact that shows such as The Simpsons, Futurama, Malcom in the Middle and numerous others have already been airing on arabic satellite stations in the middle east for years.
all subtitled. Simpsons is nothing new in the arab world.
In this case, the issue is that they decided to try a `port'.
I agree with your main point and the nudity issue, but you're not quite right when it comes to the cursing, and I see lots of people in the anime community making this point so I felt the urge to speak up. Chikushou or kuso are not as strong as you make them out to be. They convey strong emotions, but they are not offensive words as your English translations are. Kuso can be shit, but it also could be crap. Chikusho could be damn it, shit, aw man, you bastard, etc. (Rarely ever would it be so strong as to match the English "f'in christ" though.) It depends a lot on who is saying it and how they are saying it. You can't really just say "darn" or "damn" are incorrect translations. On the face of it, they're not at all if those are the types of words the character were to use in English.
Maybe we should send Eddie Van Halen over instead. Or maybe Diamond Dave just so we can see a whole society walking around in assless chaps. Wait I know, Democracy!
War throughout history has been one of the most effective disseminators of culture.
I respectfully disagree. Trade is the most effective cultural hybridisation driver. Followed by whoring. War is an epiphenomena of trade.
Da Blog
They tried for years to make the text more "local"
I'd love to hear what the French translation of "Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys" in a thick faux-Scottish accent sounds like.
Da Blog
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada
Apparently America is nowhere to be found in the official name of the country known as Canada, the official name of which is apparently simply "Canada" and not Dominion of Canada.
The reason that people of the United States of America are called Americans is because it is in the official name of the country and not because it is in the Americas.
Easy mistake to make, I know.
Also, as far as I know, the United States of America is the only country with America in its name.
If you want to throw rates around try this one, the suicide rate for males in Japan is nearly twice that of the USA's. 36 per 100,000 to our 17.5 per 100,000. For females it's over 3 times as high, 14 per 100,000 to our 4 per 100,000.
d e/suiciderates/en/
So perhaps Japan has a better handle on teen pregnancy and birth control than we do, but on the other hand, perhaps we're not doing so bad over here in the States.
My figures came from the World Health Organization, also not exactly an obscure or untrustworthy source,
http://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/suici
Oh, one more comment, someone can probably verify this for me, don't Japanese children usually spend about 12 hours of their day in school 6 days a week? Sure, they're well educated, but at what cost in lost childhood?
Annnnnnd....I'm done.
Or where Lisa is hallucinating in the sensory deprivation tank and imagines she's homer:
A sandwich...
with Bacon...
Canadian Bacon...
Mexican Bacon...*drools*
Read Pynchon.
>>> "... you intolerant ignoramus!"
... just because you disagree with a person doesn't make them ignorant. For all you know he may be Japanese (seems unlikely I know).
Presumably you mean you can't tolerate him?
Oh and just because a nation has a low level of teenage pregnancy doesn't mean it doesn't have a high level of sexual depravity (rorikon? schoolgirl pants in vending machines?) it just means you've been blinded by the prevalence of one set of behaviours into thinking association (or maybe even correlation) implies causation. [Perhaps you think sexual depravity is OK, but that doesn't stop your implied conclusion from being poorly supported].
If a nation allows husbands to beat their wives and coincidentally has low rates of teenage pregnancy (causally connected or no?) then by your reckoning $nationOfYourOrigin should encourage wife beating.
And finally
Seems to me Freud would say something about a society majorly into repression causing the ultimate out-bursting of the repressed emotion in deviant behaviour; if Japan were such a repressive society, perhaps due to an obsession with ancestor worship then this might explaing the results. I am absolutely not saying this is the case with Japan, I am not a Japan scholar by any stretch of the imagination. I guess I'm just an intolerant, ignoramus.
Americans shoot others, not themselves...
Religion has no redeeming value. Look at what it has done to Anime.
If aa God exists in this Universe, (Which I seriously doubt.) and he has intentions of interfereing with the continuation of Life on this Planet, he should be treated as an invader and Neutralized so that he can no longer be a threat to the Human race.
The rest of the Human Species should simply grow up...
Without turning this into an abortion thread, I would just like to mention that there is a HUGE difference between teenage pregnancy rate and teenage birth rate. So... Did you ever consider that maybe Japan's culture is wrong?
Those vending machines are almost impossible to find nowdays. I think the industry went underground after all the gaijins starting talking about them. It's a shame because alongside electronic goods and instant noodles, schoolgirl panties could become one of Japan's biggest exports.
I've even been thinking about striking a deal with a sorority house to begin importing "Japanese schoolgirl" panties to Japan to rejuvenate the Japanese toursim industry. Just think, sexually deprived people from all over the world will be able to buy these souvenirs, take them back to their sexually deprived friends and show them how sexually deprived the Japanese are.
(Looking at Moe's newly discovered oilfield through binoculars) "It will be as easy as taking candy from a baby!,*cough* err I mean as easy as mobilizing the sixth division of the Iraqi army to head for the Quwait border!"
not only do people in Japan have less sex
Lower pregnancy rate does not imply less sex. They could well be having more sex and just be genetically less fertile on average.
And seriously, at least the adult men in Japan have some pretty fucked up ideas regarding sexuality. Ever heard of bukkake? And that's not even the depraved end of the scale...
Of course, I'm not saying that those in my own country are sane, far from it. Just that holding up Japan as a model for sexuality... that's disturbing.
ME: Omar eats kahk
So wrong.
Sometimes at night I imagine the darkness is filled with horrible things with too many teeth, like Julia Roberts.
The first time I ever saw Bart Simpson was actually in an English language schoolbook in Kuwait in ~1986/87. Now I know that the Simpsons started as a TV show in 1989 but it must've already been a comic strip because I'm absolutely certain that it was Bart Simpson in those comic strips in the schoolbook, as I remember I hated the sight of him back then and could never understand why he was drawn that way, with a strange looking head and yellow complexion. Oh, and I also remember the TV show on Kuwait TV ~1989/1990.
Wait wait wait... bible thumper? I'm sorry but... what the hell? This got modded insightful? The guy never mentioned his religion, or if he even had one. Grow up, slashdot. You're so willing to extend freedoms and liberties to anything that you agree with, yet when you dont, suddenly you turn rabid.
Better at school than in front of the TV GOD, you moron!
The reason Japan has one of the lowest birthrates among teenagers is because they most likely have the highest abortion rate in the world. Unfortunately, most of the statistics will show otherwise, simply because in Japanese culture, teenage pregnancy is an extreme shame so these kinds of statistics will be severely underreported.
Less sex than Americans? You've got to be kidding me This is a country that has rampant problems with Enjo Kosai (prostitution among young girls, mostly junior high and high schoolers). You can honestly believe a culture where showing sexual content and harsh language to children have no effect; as a result many teenagers in Japan don't think things like Enjo Kosai are wrong.
n/t
In japan they eat with chopsticks a lot more than we in the west! and what does that get them? a high suicide rate! what could be more OBVIOUS?
must... stay... awake...
> Of course, you would not think for a second that YOU would be wrong, stupid biblethumper???
I might be wrong, but I see no evidence that you thought for a second that you were wrong, either?
/rant on
/rant off
Got a real easy solution for those Muslims who find the show offensive.
Don't watch it.
Simple as that. Don't declare a Jihad, don't call anyone an infidel, just turn off the TV and go do something else. So God (the Christian one) damned tired of Muslim's being offended by this and by that. Get thicker skin, like the rest of us, and stop yer belly achin'. Same goes for you fundamentalist Christians too.
"Someone's been fucking my watermelons." -from Suttree
That's the last time I run code posted in somebody's sig...
but that you have no idea that not only do people in Japan have less sex
This made me laugh... As a teacher at your average high school in Japan, I can tell you the students certainly arn't shying away from sex... The reason for the low birth rate? Abortion... If a teenager gets knocked up in America there is a good chance that their parents abhor abortion and will want them to have the baby at any cost... In Japan, if a high schooler gets knocked up I'd say 9 out of 10 times the parents would encourage them to get an abortion to save the family trouble and embarassment...
-Alex
Moe's bar will be digitally remastered to look like a mosque
Suicide is a very rare event, whereas teen pregnancy and crime are frequent events and have a much greater social impact. Therefore the net overall effect on society of these two phenomena are much greater than the effect of suicide.
Its like saying White male middle class americans are more likely to be serial killers, which is true, so they are the most dangerous population in the world...but there are so few serial killers that it is largely irrelevant to society as a whole compared to many thousands times more homicides committed the world over by spouses or intimates murdering each other, drug related homicides, and other forms of homicide that are not related to serial killers.
Of course there are many more suicides than serial killer murders, but the point is that when you compare suicide to teen pregnancy or crime in general its like comparing a flea to the dog it rides on, one is much more important than the other. Your taxes are higher because of our "highest teen pregnancy rate in world" and our "highest violent crime rate in the world" which means we have to have a vast welfare system since fathers arent around to care for the children and we have to build prisons to house all these violent offenders. Japan doesnt have those problems, suicide doesnt cause those problems, or the long term issues those problems cause, espeically since it is a much more rare event.
you are not supposed to put the closing comic book guy tag! 99% of the people on here sound like him!
I'd think that perhaps, just perhaps, that episode was one they might not screen in its entirery in Quebec, n'est pas?
Da Blog
Didn't you watch South Park. It has nothing to do with the content on TV. It's because the Japanese have SMALLLLL PENIS! They even say so themselves.
[Perhaps you think sexual depravity is OK, but that doesn't stop your implied conclusion from being poorly supported].
... just because you disagree with a person doesn't make them ignorant. For all you know he may be Japanese (seems unlikely I know).
OK, well, here goes. My as well post AC on this one. I'm Japanese, and live in Tokyo. Sexual depravity does not explain the situation. Japan is very open to sex in general, and has a thriving large sex industry. No, not the underground, illegal, dangerous industry as seen in other parts of the world (although there is a small bit of this too), but a regulated, legal industry. Want sex? Can't get any for free? Pay for it!
Whether you like the idea or not, it seems to work over here. The women get paid generously, of which the majority aren't forced into the trade as slaves or anything. As for sex related crime rates, well, there are still unfortunately a lot of "chikan" in the trains, but rape is way down on the list. Got drunk, wanna fuck? Well, I think the fact that you can walk into a brothel and get some sorta decreases the drive to actually rape anyone. Afterall, I find it amazing that rape rates are so low considering how much we drink, and how drunk we get.
And finally
Not the grandparent, but ask and though shalt receive.
if Japan were such a repressive society, perhaps due to an obsession with ancestor worship then this might explain the results. I am absolutely not saying this is the case with Japan, I am not a Japan scholar by any stretch of the imagination. I guess I'm just an intolerant, ignoramus.
Japan is repressive in a lot of ways, but very open in others compared to western nations. Sex is one of them, public drunkness another, and so on so forth. I don't think you can really compare them head on and expect to see a clear correlation of facts without considering a whole boat load of intricate details.
That said, here's my take on the issue. In Japan, there are no real dirty words to start out with. There are bad words, some are censored, but none have the same connotation as "fuck" in the English language. You could probably interpret this as being that there ARE words like this (kuso = shit, direct translation) but there's no stigma attached to them, and thus they aren't really that "dirty". So the Japanese have a difficult time in general understanding how a word like "shit" and "fuck" could be such dirty words, merely because there's no comparative word or even the concept.
As for nudity and sexual images in children's anime, it's all in moderation I suppose. For example, you can't show genitals in any publications in Japan. None. It's illegal. TV, magazines, photos, what not. (And I'm not talking about children's stuff here, I'm talking about porn.) On the other hand, the general concept is that boys will be boys, girls will be girls, and no ammount of censorship will change the fact that they'll eventually be intrigued by their sexuality. So what's the point in trying to pretend it doesn't exist. That's why mild nudity is no big deal in anime. Some parents don't want their kids to watch it, or watch it until a certain age, and they control that. But it's not a big deal.
As for teen pregnancy, I suspect there's a bit of a twist here. I think it's more prevalent than unicef makes it out to be, but that there are a lot of abortions that probably go un-reported. If you're an anti-abortionist then this may shock you, but it's not a big deal in Japan. Historically Japan has not exactly been a thriving nation where everyone had plenty to eat. Kids were occasionally "pruned" to make sure the entire village wouldn't starve at times. Same goes for the elderly. In times of famine, this makes sense, but I suppose there was a high probability of famine back in the day. (I'm talking 150+ years ago.) I suspect that such trends help in creating an atmosphere that the unborn are, well, unborn and not quite hum
America has strange vending machines too, if you look hard enough...just because there are different vending machines doesnt really say much about culture, what that tells us is that they dont have enough cheap labor to open stores and have people work cash registers...their not big on immigrant labor like we are since the japanese are notorious zenophobes. I think that says more about capitalism than about perversions. I am a trained sociologist and know a great deal about japan actually, I actually just did a presentation about asian americans, including Japanese, just last week. They are a little sexually repressed, and they do have some norms about allowing men to read pornography in public that we would consider really strange, but overall Europe is much more sexually liberated than Japan, societies just dont change their sexual customs overnight. Europe has the largest swingers clubs in the world. In Japan, neary all porn is censored, thats why cartoon porn is so popular, they dont have to censor animated pornography as much, though even that has to be censored as well. .98 people a square mile....and it gets two senators. So we are a country ruled disproportionatly by extremely rural people. (Though Alaska is not necessarily extremely religious, many of these "fly over country" midwest states are). So the "rural taliban" gets to tell us how what we can wank too.
America has the largest sex industry in the world, dollar wise, and if it wasnt for the religious zealots in the midwest and south, having a dispproportionate influence in congress I am sure that the sex industry would be just as inventive and twisted. Wyoming gets two senators and has less half a million people, which is silly, they only have 493,000 people and that equals out to 5 people per square mile of land! Alaska is even worse with
but you said I was intoleratant because I dont like one individual, that doesnt mean I am not intolerant, saying an entire cultural is inferior to your own is intolerant...your entire argument is dishonest...is your name bill o'reilly...your argumentation style is awful by the way. I am arguing statistics and your arguing...what are you arguing? Saying one person is a bad hateful person because everytime someone mentions Muslims or foriengers they say hateful things and getting angry because of it is not intolerance, thats anger, buring a cross on a black families front lawn or rounding up Japanese families during world war II and putting them in "detention camps" is. Your confusing perfectly natural irriation for intolerance, its good to get angry at people who are stupid, narrow minded or foolish, but its bad to hate people because of the color of their skin or whatever god they worship before you even speak one word to them....I never thought I would date a black woman, but my girlfriend hit on me and what do you know...here I am writing long essays on slashdot.
your comments are full of shit, but on simple point ; "schoolgirl pants in vending machines'. Nice urban myth; now try and determine if this is just more anti-Japanese prejudice or something that is common in Japan. In the US, there have been two recent cases of women trying to steal babies from other women's wombs; does this mean this behaviour is part of the US culture?
"shows not only that you are a idiot, but that you have no idea that not only do people in Japan have less sex, and lower crime rates."
Just because they don't have a high teenage pregnancy rate, doesn't meant they have sex less. Suprisingly, the Japanese educate people on condoms and have started recently allowing the pill (although it took a long time for that to be approved). Safe sex, with planned parenting works.
Having people abstain and abstain until they go ahead anyways and get preggers is something that only people in the US seem to like to do.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Will Homer be wearing his Ayatolla Assaholla T-Shirt at all? Wonder how they'd react to that
Marge and Homer go through old things in the attic in preparation for the big sale.
Marge: Can we get rid of this Ayatollah T-shirt [it says: "Ayatolla Assaholla"]? Khomeini died years ago.
Homer: But, Marge! It works on any Ayatollah: Ayatollah Nakhbadeh, Ayatollah Zahedi... even as we speak, Ayatollah Razmada and his cadre of fanatics are consolidating their power.
from The Simpsons, "Two Bad Neighbors" (3F09)
airdate: 14-Jan-96
We don't have a word in our culture equivalent for what you refer to as "offended". No matter how badly you insult someone's Christianity, it is unlikely that they will put a death threat on you. It is very, very unlikely that the bulk of Christendom will accept a death warrant on you for saying (having never read The Satanic Verses, I can only guess) "JESUS HAD STINKY FEET AND I BET HE LIKED TO FIST LITTLE BOYS TOO".
I just can't imagine a culture so brittle that it can't tolerate that sort of thing, y'know?
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
If showing sexual content and harsh language to children leads to the lowest birthrate among teenager, then we should do that...since we have the highest teenage birth rate. Japan's is 4, ours is 64, and this data comes from unicef.org, not exactly a obscure or untrustworthy source.
...but that you have no idea that not only do people in Japan have less sex...
http://www.unicef.org/pon96/inbirth.htm
And do you know how many abortions are there in Japan?
Here it says that abortion in japanese teenagers has more than quadrupled. This article, even though it's old, states that abortion is under-reported.
Guess that if you're talking about knowing japanese culture, you've heard of "enjo kosai" and its reality, or not?
When the American 60's TV situation comedy "Hogan's Heroes" was finally able to be shown in Germany, there was the delicate issue of the various 'Heil Hitler' salutes done by the various Nazi officers. Delicate because this gesture is illegal (as I understand it) on television shows in the post-war German Republic.
So, (I'm been told) whenever anyone makes a stiff arm salute, the voice-over dubbing says "Look how high the corn grows!".
I wonder if young Germans ever insult their bosses and superiors by calling them 'corn growers' as an oblique reference to their acting like fascist assholes.
Apparently he watches too much Simpsons, and in the episode where the Simpsons went to Toronto, Homer referred to it as Little America. :P
My college roommate once did a performance art project by learning how to say "Do you have a cigarette? Do you have any spare change?" in 40 different languages. He went to all the foreign students who were hanging out in the student center cafeteria for a month and asked them to translate the phrases into their home languages. He told them that he wanted to learn to mooch his way completely around the world.
He took off to Zurich, Switzerland to perfect his craft. But Zurich is the last place on earth that anyone should go to learn to be a begger. So he was back in town a month later: broke, busted, disgusted.
Nice flame ... http://www.snopes.com/risque/kinky/panties.htm
I never said it was common either.
WRT your final question. Yes, probably a small part though.
What about Itchy and Scratchy?!?! I'll bet their show would fit in well with the Arab Culture ...
Less sex?
Which really,is a problem.
A) just look at their birth rate: 9.47 vs our 14.14 births/1,000 population (2005 est.) (http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geo
B) Sex is fun, people hsould have more of it.
Honestly, japan and the US are soooo different in so many ways that looking at just one thing, or even a dozen, doesn't say much.
I mod everyone down who says "I'll get modded down for this." I hate to disappoint.
The overall crime rate may be lower, but they have a FAR more serious problem with sexual assault, rape, etc. than the USA.
Then there's the suicide rate...
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
>>> "... you intolerant ignoramus!"
Presumably you mean you can't tolerate him?
Not tolerating an individual is very different from not tolerating a group. The former is perfectly reasonable.
Your comment on causality isn't relavent. The poster never said that sexual television prevented teen pregnancy. He was giving examples of various metrics that Japan has over us, particularly the ones those fighting sexual television are most likely to gripe about. The real problem that the people griping about sexual television think there is a causal relationship. Japan is simply evidence that there is not, and that's worth pointing out.
The original poster was an ignoramus. How can anyone seriously call an entire culture, especially one of the most sucessful on earth, "wrong"?
Cheers.
...is the one where the fudge truck collides with the bacon truck. Homer picks up some fudge covered bacon and proclaims: "Mmmm. Move over, eggs. Bacon just got a new best friend".
Cheers.
the original Homer is funny because it deforms and amplifies flaws in the US society.
I agree, but only that the original Homer did so.
The Homer of today relies heavily on slapstick.
>>> How can anyone seriously call an entire culture, especially one of the most sucessful on earth, "wrong"?
What's your metric for success?
As to how. Suppose I thought that eating rice was bad. Cultures which encouraged rice as a staple would then be wrong, wouldn't they? Not that they'd be entirely worthless, just wrong.
I don't understand you post-modernists, _I_ can't understand how you can't see that a culture can be wrong. But I'll think about it some more!
Ho-hum.
They changed (the aforementioned) Zoisite into a woman because he originally had a homosexual relationship with one of the other generals. (Malachite)
Later in the series, they introduced Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune who had a lesbian relationship.
The US dub tried to tone that part down and also portray them as cousins, presuming that it would give a reason for their close relationship. Unfortunately it just ended up with them appearing to be lesbian cousins.
Well, I'm not a muslim, but I own a dog that is of a breed originally imported to Europe from muslim countries - Saluki, namely, from the Bedouins. It's the only exception from the "dogs are filthy" rule. Interestingly, saluki is a sighthound like Santa's Little Helper (who looks like a whippet or something, was used at dog races)
Those here who wonder if The Simpsons can survive cultural localisation should know that it has indeed been done almost since the beginning of the series over here, and IT IS HILARIOUS. The show's always been a huge hit, because the voice work has been adapted to use talented national voice actors, so the characters adopt a Quebequer's accent. They could have used a more varied cast but still, the ones they have are very appropriate. My friends and I love it, sometimes even more than the English American version, since the joke are mostly adapted to use Quebec folklore. The whole idea of localisation dates back from when The Flintstones were adapted in this same way, it was a huge success.
There's nothing quite like hearing Homer shouting : "Bart! Vient-en icitte mon maudit toé que j'te passe une volé!"
"Les Simpson" is even better in Quebec's french, lucky us.
Thanks for the insight and bridging the cultural divide... appreciated!
PP in regards to Japan.
... causing the ultimate out-bursting of the repressed emotion in deviant behaviour"
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>> "
I'm not sure Japan is any worse but just that the fetish's are slightly different. The porn industry in the USA is huge.
from [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pornography_by_regio
"Pornography generates billions of dollars in sales in the United States alone, and economists have suggested that it has now gotten to the point where the outlawing of the industry, which has been tried on many occasions, could have a major negative economic impact upon the country, and a prohibition-style legislated ban might spark a rise in organized crime."
I suspect that it is just that over exposure to one sort of fetishism leads to desensitization which leads you to codemn the Japanese porn industry as depraved whilst implicity giving the OK to the US one. It would be interesting to hear from a Japanese person on what thier view of American porn is and whether they see it as depraved as compared to Japanese stuff. I suspect the result would be interesting.
Though I do agree that it is hard to use one metric to judge an entire society. That's just predjudice.
The bikini - security through obscurity since 1943
I'd heard that pro-abortionists who've put their opinion forth on television in the USA have had death threats and occasionally get killed- is this true?
Star Ac. is french.
But I understand why I was interested now.
Heroscape, it's like legos combined with anachronistic wargames.
The problem is the statistics can only say Japan has a low rate and the US has a high rate. There is no correlation to only media content and sexual habits of teenagers. There is also the whole sense of honor in Japan, that AFAIK is reinforced in much of anime. The US doesn't have this ingrained sense of honor. How many teenagers will think of the implications to their family's honor?
Heroscape, it's like legos combined with anachronistic wargames.
When I asked my Dutch friends what they felt about exposing their children to this hard-core porn, they replied: "What porn?".
When you are brought up in a society like that and constantly exposed to porn, you don't really notice it. It takes a stupid, repressed Anglo-Saxon to be amazed at such behaviour.
Interestingly, in the league table you present, the Netherlands also does well in curbing teen pregnancy. It has the third lowest teenage pregnancies in the World, only betterd by Switzerland and Japan.
--- "We've always been at war with Eastasia."
United States Citizens defining themselves Americans since by their (IMHO wrong) reasoning every resident of North & South America is an American.
My only point is that American is the unique and proper term reserved for citizens of the United States of America.
Hey pendejo, solo para que sepas yo soy de México y aunque te resulte difícil también soy Amerciano. El que los pinches gringos se llamen "Americanos" a si mismos es simplemente por la falta de un verdadero nombre para su país,Estados Unidos De America? no sabes lo que eso significa Conjunto de "estados" que están UNIDOS, en dónde? en AMERICA.
Mi país se llama Estados Unidos Mexicanos, y el nombre (al igual que en EEUU) viene de la división política. Los únicos que llaman Americanos a las personas de Estados Unidos de America son ustedes mismos, nosotros les decimos Estadounidenses (o pinches gringos), los Canadiences les dice "People from USA". Qué culpa tenemos que no tenga nombre su país?.
Ahora, a mi me parece PERFECTO que te llames Americano, estás en lo correcto, lo que me parte la madre es que digas que ustedes son los "únicos" que tienen el derecho de llamarse Americano.
Eso, es una pinche mamada por la que te puedes ir a chingar a tu madre.
Gracias.
Translation for your eyes:
Hey asshole, just for your knowledge, I am from Mexico and although it is difficult for you to get it I am also American. That the fucking gringos call themseleves "Americans" is just because their country lacks of a real name. United States of America? don't you know what does that means? it means a Set of "states" that are Where?, in America.
My country is called "Estados Unidos Mexicano" (Mexican United States or United states of Mexico), and the name (as USA name) comes from the political structure division of the states. The only people that name "American" to the persons of USA is themseleves. We [Mexicans] call them "Estadounidenses" (something on the lines of USenians] (or fucking gringos), Canadians name you "People from USA". What guilt do we have that your country does not have a proper name?
Now, it is perfect for me that you call yourself American, indeed you are correct, what I can not stand is that you (the gringos) are the only ones that have the right to be called "Americans"
I wont translate the last line.
Thank you.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
there's nothing like swearing in Russian. We had a saying here, why learn foreign languages when entire Europe understands russian curse words :)
--Coder
I think your remark about openness of society about, for example sex, of 'the western world' applies more to the united states than to western Europe. In the Netherlands there's even sex on 'public' cable television (not state sponsored though),there are no problems with nudity in any media (not even for children) and being a prostitute is officially 'just a job'. As for the rest of Europe, it might not be exactly the same, but it's not that different at all. I think the USA is one of the most prudish countries of the western world.
Please don't link low pregnancy rate with abortion this way. You'd only fuel (as if they need any) the already crazy anti-abortionists. If you compare the low birth and abortion rates for teenagers in Western Europe to the American figures you'll see that there's no correlation. (see this and use google). I suspect the same is true for Japan, but I couldn't find any figures.
As a side node, I'm not a big supporter of abortion, I too am troubled by the notion that an unborn child is not considered human until it has reached a certain age. However I very much dislike the self-righteousness of some of the (mostly christian) 'pro-life' groups.
(Same AC as grandparent)
I think your remark about openness of society about, for example sex, of 'the western world' applies more to the united states than to western Europe.
Agreed. I've only visited Europe on vacation, but lived in the U.S. for a while. However, even then I think there's a bit of a difference between western Europe in that sex is both open and closed. It's weird in a sense if you think about it, but I think it's typically Japanese that every story has two sides. (Honne and Tatemae, the best equivalent translation I can think of is "The true story" and "The official story".) It's that way in every aspect really. For example, technically the brothels are illegal, but everyone knows that banning them will simply create an underground black market, so while they are still illegal, they're regulated by the police. I suppose it's kind of like marijuana in the Netherlands, openly available and illegal. The pretense is that these brothels are public baths. No sex, nope, just a bath. A really expensive bath.
Please don't link low pregnancy rate with abortion this way. You'd only fuel (as if they need any) the already crazy anti-abortionists.
I don't have any hard facts (too lazy to look them up), but whether you like it or not, it's a rather obvious truth in Japan. Again, the Official Story v.s. the True Story. As long as no one knows you were pregnant, and it was aborted, then officially it never happened. Again, you can like it or dislike it, but it's the current situation. Part of it probably has to do with the fact that highschoolers with kids aren't very well accepted, which is the "closed" side of Japanese culture, unlike what I saw in the U.S.
If you compare the low birth and abortion rates for teenagers in Western Europe to the American figures you'll see that there's no correlation. (see this and use google). I suspect the same is true for Japan, but I couldn't find any figures.
Agreed, again. I'm not stating that the low teenage pregnancy rate is entirely due to abortions. Like my original post said, I suspect a lot of it has to do with the wide availability of condoms, and kids that know better to use one than not. I would have a very, very hard time believing, however, that the low pregnancy rate had anything to do with the age at which kids first have sex over here though. I suspect there's no real difference between the U.S. and Japan in that sense, hardly suprising since it's a natural urge that doesn't make consideration for cultural differences. That doesn't mean there aren't a fair number of teenage abortions though.
As a side node, I'm not a big supporter of abortion, I too am troubled by the notion that an unborn child is not considered human until it has reached a certain age. However I very much dislike the self-righteousness of some of the (mostly christian) 'pro-life' groups.
The difference between what I observed in the U.S., and what I observe in Japan, is that in the U.S. much too often the entire issue is handled in high emotion and lacks logical thought, often (but not always) directly related to particular religious beliefs. Abortion isn't a cool, casual act in Japan either, but I think people weigh the consequences of the decision in a much more logical manner. This might be partially related to the fact that while the Japanese have been very superstitious in some ways, they are certainly not, and never really were, religious. Spiritual, yes, religious, no. Thus, the moral connections to religion are mostly non-existant.
As to the idea of when exactly life begins, well, I don't expect that to be answered in any acceptable logical way for a long, long time, if ever. It would likely break down further into the question of what exactly "life" is in the first place, which is exactly the issues struck in most modern nations when it comes to brain dead people and organ transplants. I see it as a kind of Zen-like question, where the answer is in t
no comment...
#!/usr/bin/english
You say, "But don't you ever wonder what exactly causes those high suicide rates?"
4 ). While karoshi is not a leading cause of suicide (nor a leading form of karoshi as roughly a third of karoshi are suicides) it is an important and relevant place to start in understanding the societal (and thus family/work) pressures that lead to suicide in Japan (to get in a /. meme). It wouldn't hurt to research conformity, pop-culture, Buddhism (including Zen), bushido and their enduring effects (in no particular order) on loyalty, honor, "saving face", filial and ancestral relationships, perception of after-life, taboos, etc.
:-)
First, it's important to mention the suicide rates aren't high or low, they are relatively higher or lower (to say otherwise is ambiguous and nearly meaningless -- what is high and low?). It is more precise to say that Japan's rate is higher than America's. Sorry for the nitpick. Back on topic...
One doesn't have to 'ever wonder' about it. You can read about it. A good place to start is googling "karoshi" or "karoushi" (here's my blurb about it http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=47605
To save you the trouble, the short version is something like this: We think suicide is bad... our acculturation demands it, but not so much in Japan. It's a sin for us but in some cases it is seemingly requisite to a Nihonjin. The "barrier to entry", if you will, is lower. Once again it's the context that matters.
Finally, not to you specifically (but to take part in the hand-waving of this thread), the teen pregnancy rates and violent or sexual TV have essentially nothing to do with it.
Anyhow, nothing personal.
(Plural, personal pronouns used broadly and loosely.)
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
You said, "And seriously, at least the adult men in Japan have some pretty fucked up ideas regarding sexuality. Ever heard of bukkake? And that's not even the depraved end of the scale..."
Bukkake would only be a good argument for Japanese depravity if we Americans didn't have a phrase like circle-jerk. Don't google that unless you want to see some sick shit.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
Ahhh... karoshi. The thing that our American laziness saves us from.