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Let's Rename Swine Flu As "Colbert Flu"
Bruce Perens writes "The World Health Organization will no longer refer to Virus A(H1N1) as 'Swine Flu,' citing ethnic reactions to 'swine,' for example among middle-eastern cultures who feel that swine are unclean. Or, is it because meat packers are concerned that people might stop eating pork in fear of the virus? WHO suggests that the public select a new name for the virus. I suggest that we all start calling it The Colbert Flu, after the comedian and fake pundit who asked his audience to stuff a NASA poll so that a Space Station module would be named after him. What can we do to make the name stick?"
Call it the Colbert flu? I don't think so. Colbert was just being funny, which is his job. It's why people watch him, and why they'll go so far as to stuff a poll. Plus, it was good publicity for the space station, led to an astronaut on his show, and even the naming of some widget or other after him. Treadmill? Whatever.
Anyway, Colbert is generally a positive influence. His "fake punditry" is pungent social comment, with the intent of nudging the his audience to think about these issues. While being funny, which keeps them coming back. All in all, a good thing. So I don't think naming a killer flu after him is appropriate. Entirely the wrong set of connotations, you see.
Flus are annoying, they show up wether you want them to or not, right in the middle of something else you were doing. Vaguely similar to your suggestion we name a nasty flu after a cool guy showing up on slashdot.
So in honor of your annoying and inappropriate post, I'm simply going to counter-suggest that we name H1N1 after you instead: The "Perens Flu." Does that seem fair to you?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
"Bacon Lung"
Much better name.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Let's call it "H1N1" flu. You know, like, what it is actually called BY SCIENCE!
crazy dynamite monkey
Characteristics of a flu...
given all these, the choice is obvious...
I hereby dub this latest flu the CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN FLU
Not be named after 'unclean' animals after all. I only get kosher diseases, thank you very much!
Unfortunately for us, the origin of the flu is turning out to be from the United States, not Mexico. So, the USA Flu then you are suggesting?
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
His running joke is that he will sell out in nearly any way to get his name out there. He'd probably love the idea and go on his show next week and urge viewers to write to WHO to ask for the rename.
"Contrarily the lookaside buffer might not be the panacea... "
There is a real problem in Egypt, which is persecuting its Coptic Christians by slaughtering their pigs. A minority in Egypt are Christian, the word "Copt" refers to their Egyptian ethnicity.
Some of the Copts farm pork, which the majority of Egyptian Islamic citizens (and their powerful clerics) feel are unclean. The Copts feed the pigs by recycling garbage, compounding their unclean nature in the eyes of Islamics. So, the Egyptians are slaughtering the pigs in the fear that they are influenza vectors.
We don't actually know that the pig is a vector for the virus at all. Thus, the Egyptian slaughters are unwarranted. We do know that human-to-human contact is a problem this time. The pigs are where influenza genes are often mixed, because they are susceptible to avian, human, and swine viruses. There probably was one pig-to-human transmission at the beginning of this epidemic, but there isn't evidence of continuing transmission after that.
The Copts are persecuted like most religious minorities in religious states. You don't see many of them in government (and none in high positions) or education. They don't often get government permission to build churches, and in 2007 there were Islamic riots because the people around the Copts thought they wanted to build a church. They need government permission to perform religious services.
The bottom line here is that the Egyptians, by slaughtering the pigs, remove the livelyhood of the Copts. They aren't promising to restore that livelyhood.
Bruce Perens.
"I can't come in to work today. I have space herpes."
"Some guy on the subway gave me space herpes."
"CNN Reporting today that another 35 cases of space herpes have surfaced in New York."
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
How about we stop giving stupid suggestions their own Slashdot articles?
I came here for a good argument
Colbert is an example of cultural humor. The Colbert character is a parody of American right-wing demagogues.
Unless you are familiar with those demagogues, you'll not understand the comedy.
It's like slashdot humor. Unless you're familiar with the memes, the subject matter, and the jokes that have come before, 3/4 of the jokes just won't be funny to you.
That's the problem with humor... little of it is universal (not even poop jokes are universal, as some cultures don't have the same hang-ups about doody that we do). Slapstick is probably the only truly universal humor.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
I'm telling you Bacon Fever!!!
oogly boogly!
It's like slashdot humor. Unless you're familiar with the memes, the subject matter, and the jokes that have come before, 3/4 of the jokes just won't be funny to you.
I am familiar with the memes, the subject matter, and the jokes that have come before, and 4/4 of them still aren't funny.
Wilbur's flu
Flu Z
Montezuma's revenge
Tequila flu
Panic flu
Non-Kosher/Non-Halal flu
One flu over the cuckoo's nest
(just flat out ignore my poorly formatted list above. Sorry)
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
> ethnic reactions to 'swine,' for example among middle-eastern cultures who feel
Actually, they do not "feel" this at all, it has been force-hammered into their heads from early childhood, when they minds could not defend themselves, because several hundreds of years ago, their self-appointed religious founders had no refrigerators (but forgot to leave a "or any later version" in their GPLs.. err... holy scriptures).
So basically a secular, neutral, international health organisationen now forces a disease renaming onto the whole planet because a few backwards theocracies, who happen to have stuck themselves into a religion without a feasible upgrade path (hehehehehe), threaten to let their people die en masse in order to avoid pronouncing the word "swine" loudly. (I'm writing this, but still cant grasp that they rally mean this seriously. Jeez.)
I'm sorry but "Colbert" and "Comedian" only belong in the sentence if the words between them are "is not a ". Maybe I'm English and I just don't get him....
That's OK, mate. We don't get the whole cross-dressing thing here.
Cheers.
The virus has genetic characteristics of avian flu and swine flu.
The obvious way to distinguish this one is to call it the Flying Pig Flu.
Late-night comics and morning zoo types will flog it for all it's worth, so it will overtake the current moniker.
And the zealots will have to try to kill all the flying pigs.
Sorry, Stephen.
I bought this house and you know I'm boss
Ain't no h'aint gonna run me off
Further more, I suggest we submit that for further discussion in an article of its own.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I prefer the name Pandemic Influenza Germ...although people will undoubtedly shorten that to an acronym of some sort.
Well, in that case, the problem seems to be you. Have you considered that possibly you are just a humorless twit?
More likely, the memes you cherish just aren't that funny.
Oh look, another In Soviet Russia joke. More hot grits. Another set of Profit!!! steps. Hey, there's that same Beowulf cluster joke again.
You're right, the problem is that the humor is all too rich for us.
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