So they stop caring at all, and thus give in completely to being dicked over by the powers that be.
We're losing our privacy, our fair use rights, our jobs, our livelihoods, our health care, our tax money, and so on, and because everyone is too afraid to "care too much", they just turn their backs and say "pass me another beer".
It's cheaper, it apparently runs faster, and I also hear that it doesn't need TWO SLOTS like the FX 5900.
Ah, some freshmeat at slashdot!
on
Isn't It Ironic?
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
This issue of irony has been a big thing with me for a long time.
I was reading "Age of Irony" by Jedediah Purdy at http://www.prospect.org/print/V9/39/purdy-j.html and it all seemed to gel at last.
I have never understood why I really hated that term "don't take yourself too seriously." Well, at least now, I can study the true depths of its meaning, so as to form a counter argument.
First, what they mean, is now clear: among those who take themselves seriously, exists a large subset of people who are pompous, self-righteous, and at the worst extreme, people who are given to justiy the worst atrocities in the name of an ideology or religion.
But now, let's look at this (from Jedediah Purdy's essay):
All of this suggests that the wish to escape irony is probably mistaken--but that the hope of enriching it is not. Just as we cannot live in the flatness of irony, we cannot breathe the cloying air of anti-irony.
My argument is, that 'irony', or more specifically, people who religiously take nothing seriously, have mired this society in utter apathy.
To accurately and concisely describe the state of affairs we are in now, I will offer two quotes (one I got clarified right here at slashdot):
"[populus Romanus] qui dabat olim imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, PANEM ET CIRCENSES" "The people who had once bestowed commands, consulships, legions, and all else now longs eagerly for just two things,bread and circus games." - Juvenal
"A full belly and a diverting show makes a bad revolutionary. Television is the opiate of the people. Long may it be so." -Ned Grossberg, Max Headroom
I would add the quote "Those that stand for nothing, fall for anything" (author yet unknown to me), but the "irony" generation does profess to stand for something. What it is, Providence only knows. Let us look at this, shall we? Ironic thinkers - those who eschew seriousness and approach life with jokes, pokes, and the 'laid back approach' - accuse their opposites of being intolerant, self-righteous hypocrites. But these same modern 'ironic' thinkers are the ones who brought us Intolerance, hate, and the politics of division:
Fat bashing
Geek bashing
Religion bashing
Male bashing
Self-Righteousness:
"Get Over It" as the cure-all mantra for all manner of life traumas (abuse, molestation, etc.). What the 'ironic' thinkers forget, in this, is that everyone has issues - the profound lack of social support systems in modern society is as equally the fault of apathetic "I don't have time to listen to this, so get me my beer or get lost!" as it is the fault of Christian Repressionist "You must have demons inside you, let us drill a hole in your head to make it go away" ignorance. To note: the 'irony' crowd tends to have a profound and sometimes verbally and physically violent reaction towards people in emotional distress. The irony of this is these same people then have nowhere to turn when they themselves are depressed or feel their life is in a rut. It is not uncommon that recreational drugs are then used to provide counsel.
Hypocrisy:
SUV owning activists gathering at Starbuck's to drive out to the "No War For Oil!" protest
I can discuss a multitude of other examples here, but I won't get into it.
Ultimately, apathy, the child of ironic thinking, is why we are seeing all of our rights being taken away by the RIAA and MPAA, etc. Apathy and the refusal to be serious about things, is why our politicians and corporations continue to practically dick we the people over with impugnity.
A populace that was more serious and less apathetic, would never allow such things to transpire for so long.
Of course, a really serious, and politically active populace, might be predisposed to frequent revolts, or to
dire domestic matters first, eh? Isn't that what they said about America? Ever recall "Whitey on the moon"?
India has just as legitimate a reason to go into space as China. Aside from needing the room, they have just as much right to push into the ultra modern age as the rest of us.
Jeesh, what a bunch of racist banter.
At least the US isn't threatened with nuclear war with India over Taiwan.
The employer can fire his entire department, but who then would replace those workers? H1B visa sweatshopsters? If he can find them in time.
If he fires the whole department, he is likely to face a work stoppage so crippling that boiling hot shit would roll a long way upwards, or the company would go under.
The workers might or might not have a situation of no UI and a lousy reference, but the affected company might, depending on its size, not exist anymore.
People refer to Corporations vs the People because what goes on in Corporations is decided by a small handful of shareholders, or by the company's owners.
The few are deciding the fate of the many.
In that sense, you aren't the American Government, the CEO of AOL, or any of those increasingly unaccountable centers of power.
Designing a game that requires a $400+ video card, restricts sales to those with the dedication, obsession, and means, to replace the $200+ uber card that they had just bought last year.
This is not sound business economics, no matter how you cut it.
Morrowind - For its story line. the story line never stops. From Western (Cyrodiil) imperialism, to slaver, to prophecies, and so on, Morrowind's story line is so deep it's crush depth for a submarine. And going into a 6th House base, or up Red Mountain, and running into Corprus beasts... now THAT is scary. This game is a marriage-breaker for anyone who plays it long enough to get as far as Balmora.
The Thing - Because of raw FEAR. NOTHING in the world makes you crap your undies faster than running this game on a 21 inch monitor, in the dark, and watching one of those big Things stalk by the window looking for a way into your area. NOTHING, ~~except~~ seeing one of your friends down the hall, transforming into The Thing, and coming at you.
System Shock II - The raw fear and the story line. The Diego family just cannot get cut a fraggin' break. One treacherous punk spawns a son who loathes his father's legacy, only to get forcibly assimilated against his will into a monstrous conspiracy. The story is told via logfiles and live messages from the dreaded SHODAN. The sound of spiders ambushing you from the dark as you're walking up to a panel. The sound of mutants seeking you out in the hallways. Walking into an unlit gymnasium and spotting a giant Rumbler, and hauling ass back out with the beast hot on your tail. (I was playing this concurrently with Alien vs Predator - you expect what you get in AvP... System Shock II was way scarier, IMHO.)
Deus Ex - From the guys who made System Shock II. Terrorism, global conspiracies galore, pseudo-aliens, feudalist oppression, and a worldwide nanotech plague, versus one jacked up good but tough guy who looks like Blade (if you pick the African American face, which you can). The plot is thick like Morrowind, complete with texts to read. Logfiles tell much of the story, like in System Shock II. It often also gets very scary, with surprise run-ins with strange creatures. The whole bit about the Illuminati and the conspiracies to control the world, are fleshed out in depth here. This game was utterly non-linear; you could take on a mission any one of about 8 ways, including using non-lethal weapons most of the time. (My fave.) I've spent many a full day playing this game over and over and over again! Note: they say in Deus Ex 2 you can use non-lethal weapons the whole way through.
Jedi Knight II: Outcast - I'll never forget believing Jan got killed, and then rescuing her near the end, and hearing how she broke six Imperial interrogation machines that tried to pry into her mind. And what the protagonist (Kyle Katarn) said when he destroyed the archvillain's starship shield generator, should be a comedy classic.
No One Lives Forever/2 - A true heroine who would hand Tomb Raider's Lara Croft her ass on a plate. I have never laughed as much as I have in this game, nor have I seen a game where a woman has played such a profound, realistic, awesome role. And it's funny, too. Both sequels.
Star Control II - another non-linear game with an extremely deep plot line. One of the first true classics of its genre (space games with story lines).
Descent Freespace - Not even Wing Commander games made me feel as 'in it' as this space combat simulator did.
Tachyon - wasn't as epic as Freespace, but the story line (colonists vs corporate conquerors) was deeper and more non-linear. This was truly a forgotten game that should have been inducted as a classic.
Red Faction - this game made me go back to the library and dig up the history of labor rights movements. It's based in the future, on Mars, but it is very, very deeply rooted in 19th/20th century struggles for workers' rights and safety. I think most people would miss that, amidst the 'destructible' environments and shoot-em-up confrontations galore.
American McGee's Alice - BOOYEAAH!! American McGee did it, he really did it. Take everything you read of this story, and explain it away as the result of a tragedy-induced insanity. Create an extremely dark and unstable world tha
The FX 5800 requires an extra PCI slot, and I use all my PCI slots (one for video capture, one for USB 2.0, one for the Audigy, one for video capture, one for the NIC, I don't even have a slot available for my SCSI stuff!!).
I absolutely refuse to give up dead necessary peripheral cards to add in a video card when they can just as easily make one that doesn't take up that extra PCI slot.
I'll wait. (And no, moderators, jeez, this ain't a troll or flamebait, it's an honest opinion..)
Cable modem providers typically a) do not allow any kind of service to be running on your PC b) are coming up with draconian "bandwidth hog" charges (for people who actually constantly ~use~ the full speed the ISP advertises) c) get bogged down during peak hours d) caps their upstream to 128kbps or 256kbps (all my friends on Charter, RR, and ATTBI report this cap) e) are inherently insecure because someone can always circumvent the cable modem and snoop all the traffic on the subnet (neighborhood)
As opposed to DSL which typically a) allows you to run any service you want b) does not get bogged down when a lot of people on your block are getting online c) does not hit you with "excessive usage" charges if you use your DSL service at full speed all the time d) caps their upstream to the same speed as cable modems, and at 1.5mbps (at least for my PacBell connection) is as fast as the Cable modem service in *my* area e) is far more secure because there's no way anyone on your block can snoop your internet traffic
SPEED is not everything. Freedom, security, and reliability of service also count. A Ford Pinto with a rocket engine is still a Ford Pinto.. except you die much faster.
Slashdot Mirror
a) A Pentium-4 >=2500mhz
:)
b) An nVidia FX 5900 gpu
c) 19 inch monitor
If you set it to turn on in the morning time, the FX 5900 also doubles as an alarm clock/wake-up service.
So they stop caring at all, and thus give in completely to being dicked over by the powers that be.
We're losing our privacy, our fair use rights, our jobs, our livelihoods, our health care, our tax money, and so on, and because everyone is too afraid to "care too much", they just turn their backs and say "pass me another beer".
Ohhhhkayyyy...
It's cheaper, it apparently runs faster, and I also hear that it doesn't need TWO SLOTS like the FX 5900.
I was reading "Age of Irony" by Jedediah Purdy at http://www.prospect.org/print/V9/39/purdy-j.html and it all seemed to gel at last.
I have never understood why I really hated that term "don't take yourself too seriously." Well, at least now, I can study the true depths of its meaning, so as to form a counter argument.
First, what they mean, is now clear: among those who take themselves seriously, exists a large subset of people who are pompous, self-righteous, and at the worst extreme, people who are given to justiy the worst atrocities in the name of an ideology or religion.
But now, let's look at this (from Jedediah Purdy's essay):
My argument is, that 'irony', or more specifically, people who religiously take nothing seriously, have mired this society in utter apathy.
To accurately and concisely describe the state of affairs we are in now, I will offer two quotes (one I got clarified right here at slashdot):
I would add the quote "Those that stand for nothing, fall for anything" (author yet unknown to me), but the "irony" generation does profess to stand for something. What it is, Providence only knows. Let us look at this, shall we?
Ironic thinkers - those who eschew seriousness and approach life with jokes, pokes, and the 'laid back approach' - accuse their opposites of being intolerant, self-righteous hypocrites. But these same modern 'ironic' thinkers are the ones who brought us
Intolerance, hate, and the politics of division:
Fat bashing
Geek bashing
Religion bashing
Male bashing
Self-Righteousness:
"Get Over It" as the cure-all mantra for all manner of life traumas (abuse, molestation, etc.). What the 'ironic' thinkers forget, in this, is that everyone has issues - the profound lack of social support systems in modern society is as equally the fault of apathetic "I don't have time to listen to this, so get me my beer or get lost!" as it is the fault of Christian Repressionist "You must have demons inside you, let us drill a hole in your head to make it go away" ignorance.
To note: the 'irony' crowd tends to have a profound and sometimes verbally and physically violent reaction towards people in emotional distress. The irony of this is these same people then have nowhere to turn when they themselves are depressed or feel their life is in a rut. It is not uncommon that recreational drugs are then used to provide counsel.
Hypocrisy:
SUV owning activists gathering at Starbuck's to drive out to the "No War For Oil!" protest
I can discuss a multitude of other examples here, but I won't get into it.
Ultimately, apathy, the child of ironic thinking, is why we are seeing all of our rights being taken away by the RIAA and MPAA, etc. Apathy and the refusal to be serious about things, is why our politicians and corporations continue to practically dick we the people over with impugnity.
A populace that was more serious and less apathetic, would never allow such things to transpire for so long.
Of course, a really serious, and politically active populace, might be predisposed to frequent revolts, or to
dire domestic matters first, eh?
Isn't that what they said about America?
Ever recall "Whitey on the moon"?
India has just as legitimate a reason to go into space as China. Aside from needing the room, they have just as much right to push into the ultra modern age as the rest of us.
Jeesh, what a bunch of racist banter.
At least the US isn't threatened with nuclear war with India over Taiwan.
The Chinese can export their one child policy, forced abortions and Kent State massacre one hundred times over policy to alien civilizations.
Fossil fuels? Cheap and easily replaceable? Vs Hydrogen, which is not??
This is satire, right?
The employer can fire his entire department, but who then would replace those workers? H1B visa sweatshopsters? If he can find them in time.
If he fires the whole department, he is likely to face a work stoppage so crippling that boiling hot shit would roll a long way upwards, or the company would go under.
The workers might or might not have a situation of no UI and a lousy reference, but the affected company might, depending on its size, not exist anymore.
People refer to Corporations vs the People because what goes on in Corporations is decided by a small handful of shareholders, or by the company's owners.
The few are deciding the fate of the many.
In that sense, you aren't the American Government, the CEO of AOL, or any of those increasingly unaccountable centers of power.
Spammers don't care about the law, so why should their victims?
And not one spammer has broken that filter.
I'd sure like to see this brain surgeon try and find out who's on my whitelist and forge their address.
I can reasonably say hell will freeze over before that happens.
If the public has their food and drinks and gladiator games, they are easily controlled.
Analogically speaking, EMI just messed up the gladiator games.
Unrest will ensue.
(Gee, I wish I knew the EXACT quote and which Roman Emperor said it....)
Designing a game that requires a $400+ video card, restricts sales to those with the dedication, obsession, and means, to replace the $200+ uber card that they had just bought last year.
This is not sound business economics, no matter how you cut it.
Morrowind - For its story line. the story line never stops. From Western (Cyrodiil) imperialism, to slaver, to prophecies, and so on, Morrowind's story line is so deep it's crush depth for a submarine. And going into a 6th House base, or up Red Mountain, and running into Corprus beasts... now THAT is scary. This game is a marriage-breaker for anyone who plays it long enough to get as far as Balmora.
The Thing - Because of raw FEAR. NOTHING in the world makes you crap your undies faster than running this game on a 21 inch monitor, in the dark, and watching one of those big Things stalk by the window looking for a way into your area. NOTHING, ~~except~~ seeing one of your friends down the hall, transforming into The Thing, and coming at you.
System Shock II - The raw fear and the story line. The Diego family just cannot get cut a fraggin' break. One treacherous punk spawns a son who loathes his father's legacy, only to get forcibly assimilated against his will into a monstrous conspiracy. The story is told via logfiles and live messages from the dreaded SHODAN. The sound of spiders ambushing you from the dark as you're walking up to a panel. The sound of mutants seeking you out in the hallways. Walking into an unlit gymnasium and spotting a giant Rumbler, and hauling ass back out with the beast hot on your tail. (I was playing this concurrently with Alien vs Predator - you expect what you get in AvP... System Shock II was way scarier, IMHO.)
Deus Ex - From the guys who made System Shock II. Terrorism, global conspiracies galore, pseudo-aliens, feudalist oppression, and a worldwide nanotech plague, versus one jacked up good but tough guy who looks like Blade (if you pick the African American face, which you can). The plot is thick like Morrowind, complete with texts to read. Logfiles tell much of the story, like in System Shock II. It often also gets very scary, with surprise run-ins with strange creatures. The whole bit about the Illuminati and the conspiracies to control the world, are fleshed out in depth here. This game was utterly non-linear; you could take on a mission any one of about 8 ways, including using non-lethal weapons most of the time. (My fave.) I've spent many a full day playing this game over and over and over again! Note: they say in Deus Ex 2 you can use non-lethal weapons the whole way through.
Jedi Knight II: Outcast - I'll never forget believing Jan got killed, and then rescuing her near the end, and hearing how she broke six Imperial interrogation machines that tried to pry into her mind. And what the protagonist (Kyle Katarn) said when he destroyed the archvillain's starship shield generator, should be a comedy classic.
No One Lives Forever/2 - A true heroine who would hand Tomb Raider's Lara Croft her ass on a plate. I have never laughed as much as I have in this game, nor have I seen a game where a woman has played such a profound, realistic, awesome role. And it's funny, too. Both sequels.
Star Control II - another non-linear game with an extremely deep plot line. One of the first true classics of its genre (space games with story lines).
Descent Freespace - Not even Wing Commander games made me feel as 'in it' as this space combat simulator did.
Tachyon - wasn't as epic as Freespace, but the story line (colonists vs corporate conquerors) was deeper and more non-linear. This was truly a forgotten game that should have been inducted as a classic.
Red Faction - this game made me go back to the library and dig up the history of labor rights movements. It's based in the future, on Mars, but it is very, very deeply rooted in 19th/20th century struggles for workers' rights and safety. I think most people would miss that, amidst the 'destructible' environments and shoot-em-up confrontations galore.
American McGee's Alice - BOOYEAAH!! American McGee did it, he really did it. Take everything you read of this story, and explain it away as the result of a tragedy-induced insanity. Create an extremely dark and unstable world tha
You mean, like the way they criminalize using a knife (which is legal to have) to hurt someone?
Well, at least the rules don't say
"Never post to slashdot!"
The Trusted Thinking Architecture Alliance is coming!
All your thoughts are belong to us!
The FX 5800 requires an extra PCI slot, and I use all my PCI slots (one for video capture, one for USB 2.0, one for the Audigy, one for video capture, one for the NIC, I don't even have a slot available for my SCSI stuff!!).
I absolutely refuse to give up dead necessary peripheral cards to add in a video card when they can just as easily make one that doesn't take up that extra PCI slot.
I'll wait.
(And no, moderators, jeez, this ain't a troll or flamebait, it's an honest opinion..)
HTH
I am also not buying anything with Palladium in it.
:)
(BTW if you're reading this, Saeko, I followed this post from your "RIAA msg's Kazaa users" article post
Proxies, especially chained proxies, could make it impossible to trace.
Patriot II: Reloaded
Actually I'd agree, she's hot.
(And you'd better have divine credentials to boot.)
Cable modem providers typically
a) do not allow any kind of service to be running on your PC
b) are coming up with draconian "bandwidth hog" charges (for people who actually constantly ~use~ the full speed the ISP advertises)
c) get bogged down during peak hours
d) caps their upstream to 128kbps or 256kbps (all my friends on Charter, RR, and ATTBI report this cap)
e) are inherently insecure because someone can always circumvent the cable modem and snoop all the traffic on the subnet (neighborhood)
As opposed to DSL which typically
a) allows you to run any service you want
b) does not get bogged down when a lot of people on your block are getting online
c) does not hit you with "excessive usage" charges if you use your DSL service at full speed all the time
d) caps their upstream to the same speed as cable modems, and at 1.5mbps (at least for my PacBell connection) is as fast as the Cable modem service in *my* area
e) is far more secure because there's no way anyone on your block can snoop your internet traffic
SPEED is not everything. Freedom, security, and reliability of service also count. A Ford Pinto with a rocket engine is still a Ford Pinto.. except you die much faster.
(Whoops, I meant s/he heheh)
Which means, in my opinion, it was a highly educated act of speculation.