Victory for wanking and free speech

I wanted to give a shout out to the federal judge in Philadelphia who dealt another blow to government efforts to control Internet pornography.

In overturning a 1998 U.S. law which makes it a crime for commercial website operators to let children access "harmful" material, Judge Lowell Reed Jr. essentially said the right of free speech outweighs parents' rights to have the government raise their pervy kids.

In his opinion, Reed wrote:

"Perhaps we do the minors of this country harm if (free speech) protections, which they will with age inherit fully, are chipped away in the name of their protection."

That's a good point. Everybody just needs to ease up a little and keep things in perspective.

I contend that if you’re a parent and you're worried about your kid seeing pornography on the internet, then you're probably already "with it" enough to use any of the myriad of blockers and filters available to prevent that sort of thing.

Besides, as the article points out there are bigger concerns for parents of connected kids to worry about such as predators on social networking sites like MySpace, identity theft through spyware, and the contagious geezerhood of Larry Moore.

tagged: free, speech , wanking, porn , Larry Moore, Judge Lowell Reed, internet

Headlines: Biting criticism

Back in high school, a friend of mine used to say he wanted to be a PE teacher.

He thought it would be cool to have summers off, wear sweats to work, maybe coach the JV basketball team.

I'm not sure if he ever pursued the dream. I lost track of him when I went to college. But I'm guessing if he had seen this story, he would rethink his grand plan.

A former Woodburn coach has gotten a state reprimand for biting the thigh of one of half a dozen wrestlers who tried to give him a wedgie. At a December 2005 practice, the Teacher Standards and Practices Commission said, team members tried to give Peter Porath a wedgie — jerking his undershorts upward.

I'm sorry. Maybe this makes me insensitive, but I gotta call a big fat BULLSHIT on this one.

Just so we understand what happened here: Half a dozen adolescent cro-magnons think it would be cool to attack the teacher and wedgie him (thank science they weren't going for the dreaded Atomic Wedgie), and the school board reprimands the teacher for trying to defend himself.

That teacher got freakin' screwed! The state board

"put him on probation for two years and said Porath must complete a class on appropriate behavior and write a public apology to the student he bit.

Public apology my ass! What kind of lesson are they teaching these kids?

If they asked for an apology from me it would go something like "I'm sorry I didn't have my posse with me to kick the shit out of those punks like they deserve."

tagged: headlines, news, wrestler, teacher, Peter Porath, Woodburn

YouTube Tuesday: Once Upon a Time in a Cage

I'm not so sure how I feel about mashup culture.

On the one hand it seems like cheating, especially in artistic endeavors, to take two (or more) works completed by someone else, combine them in some way and call it a new work of art. I mean, if I drew a beard and mustache on the Mona Lisa, that's just vandalism, right?

It just seems to signify a lack of original thought that is becoming epidemic in our culture.

But on the other hand, there are examples like today's YouTube Tuesday entry. YouTube member jthelms has taken scenes from one of my favorite westerns, Once Upon a Time in the West, and added a soundtrack from Canadian indie rock group Arcade Fire's My Body is a Cage.

The result approaches sublimity as the haunting mood of the chords make a perfect complement to the beautiful scenes of Sergio Leone's cinematography. I've watched this at least a dozen times and it still seems fresh and important to me. Let me know what you think.

tagged: movie, YouTube, video, western, music, Once Upon a Time in the West, Sergio Leone, Arcade Fire, culture, My Body is a Cage

Hollmark

It's been a few months since I posted anything about the new addition to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (you can see my previous posts on this subject here, here, here and here).

My friend and inside source, Matt the Architect, has pretty much wrapped up his involvement with the project, which is set to open to the public in June.

If you're at all interested in Kansas City and/or architecture, then you no doubt are aware of the controversy this project has spurred locally. Some keyboard critics have likened the structures to Butler Buildings, calling them an eyesore and an insult to the original neoclassical museum.

Personally I like the new addition, and not just because I have a friend who helped build it. I applaud the design daring and I'm glad the powers that be were willing to take a leap to the unconventional rather than settle for the same old thing.

And even though the rank and file plebs of Kansas City might have their doubts, the design patricians seem to be responding positively. Design journal Metropolis posted an in depth critique of the project last week, in which it calls the building an elegant, magic light box.

But the most delicate and entrancing aspect of the building is the way it pushes the current ideal of drawing natural light into exhibition spaces to its limit.

The article notes (in sometimes painful detail) the thought processes that went into solving the lighting challenges that come with building a museum out of translucent glass.

Architect Stephen Holl noted such challenges were expected, but working with light is the reason he took this commission in the first place.

"For an architect whose passion has been light from the beginning, it's really a rare opportunity to get to work with the sequence of natural light in a gallery and then have the building itself be kind of made out of light."

Read the article for more on how the particular lighting issues were addressed. There's a really good image gallery that includes some of the design sketches as well as shots of the nearly finished addition.

tagged: Steven Holl, Nelson Atkins, art, architecture, Kansas City, museum, Metropolis

They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with cheese?

I saw this on mental_floss and wanted to pass it on in celebration of St. Patrick's Day.

Mental_floss is helping us hone our snake-fighting kung-fu with this worksheet featuring history's most famous snake fighters, St. Patrick (who drove the snakes out of Ireland) and Samuel L. Jackson (who kicked major snake ass in Snakes on a Plane).

Here's the worksheet (or click the image below to embiggen). The instructions, from mental_floss:

...Decide which statements apply to St. Patrick (circle the shamrock), which apply to Samuel L. Jackson (circle the Royale w/ Cheese) and which apply to both (circle both). It’s tougher than you think.

tagged: snake, St. Patrick's Day, Samuel L. Jackson, Snakes On A Plane, quiz

Friday Blogthing: Your Leprechaun Name

This is appropriate in many ways.

Your Leprechaun Name Is:

Little Potfiller

What's Your Leprechaun Name?

tagged: leprechaun, blogthing, Friday, St. Patrick's Day

Sometimes a scimitar is just a scimitar

Some coworkers were discussing the movie 300 earlier today, noting that it brought in a staggering $71 million in its first weekend (nearly enough to cover KCMO's TIF tax bill for a year).

For those of you not paying attention to current events (or for those of you in Independence), 300 is the new motion picture adaptation of the comic book graphic novel by Frank Miller. It depicts, in a loosely historical account, a battle between the ancient Greeks and ancient Persians.

Let me be clear, I haven't seen the movie yet. And based on my Supermodel Wife's taste in cinema, I probably won't see it until it comes to HBO and I can DVR it.

But I have read/heard a lot about it. According to my many inside sources* it's essentially a wall-to-wall fighting fest with generous doses of CGI animated gore. Like Apocalypto without the storyline.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. Sometimes you just need an hour and a half of fantasy blood and guts to exorcise our baser savage instincts -- very much like NFL, hockey and KMBC Channel 9 News.

Of course, a person can interpret a book/movie/song/whatever in any way they want. But sometimes interpretation is taken way too far. Case in point is this AP story.

The hit American movie “300” has angered Iranians who say the Greeks-vs-Persians action flick insults their ancient culture and provokes animosity against Iran.

The offended Iranians say the movie denigrates them by portraying them as flamboyant, savage and evil. They say that the film is aimed at inflaming public opinion against Iran.

Frankly, I think the Iranians are giving Hollywood too much credit. Consider the source material (the original comic book graphic novel) and the audience for this movie (your 12-40 year old male) and I think you'll begin to see my point.

How many Americans from this demographic could even find Iran on a map? How many think of Persia in the context of anything but a rug?

Besides, if the Iranians are worried that people will think of them as decadent barbarians bent upon destruction, they might want to rethink their strategy of being an Islamist state with the stated goal of wiping the Jewish state off the map.

*© Greg Beck at Death's Door

tagged: movie , 300, Iran, Islam , Hollywood, Frank Miller, culture

Brooksidian

One of the annual traditions my family has developed is attending the Brookside St. Patrick's Day parade, which always takes place a week before St. Paddy's Day.

Admittedly, I'm not much of a parade guy. But being able to experience them through the eyes of our 4-year-old makes them much more enjoyable.

Anyway, does anyone else think the Brookside parade is loosing a little of its lustre? I dunno, it just seems like there used to be a lot more pageantry, more effort put into making the floats more festive. I seem to recall more costumes and costumes that were more elaborate.

To me it seemed like this year's parade was just a bunch of politicians in fancy cars. There were only a couple of floats.

I don't know if it's because some of the local stores are being run out of Brookside, but I got the impression that the businesses that did participate opted to just walk along and pass out fliers rather than build a decorated float. Doesn't seem like they quite got into the spirit of the event this year.

Anyway, that's just one man's opinion, and I admit that I'm not much in to parades anyway. If you were there, tell me what you thought.

In the meantime, here are some pics I snapped (and yes, that is KCMO mayoral candidate Mark Funkhouser dressed as a leprechaun).









tagged: St. Patrick's Day, Brookside, parade, family, Kansas City, float, green

Chinese checked

I followed a link posted by Dan at Gone Mild and found to my amusement that, like Dan, my blog has been banned by China.


I can only assume this is because of my recent rant against the poisonous food at China Star buffet at 95th and Metcalf.

But it's good to know that China is protecting all those little Chinese from the dangerous ideas that I spout out in this virtual fish wrap. Check your blog and let me know what you find out.

tagged: China, ban, blog, censorship, culture, free speech

YouTube Tuesday: La Traviata

The long-time reader of this virtual fish wrap will know that I'm kind of into opera. And since today's kind of a culture Tuesday, I'm posting another animated opera adaptation, this one from Giuseppe Verdi's La Traviata.

Interestingly enough, I find this entertaining not just for the music, but also for the dancing gobs of goo that remind me of a psychedelic mushroom trip I once took at a party in Niagara Falls (man, that was one crazy Yom Kippur!)



tagged: movie, YouTube, video, Verdi, music, opera, La Traviata, mushroom, culture