The Gaming Den

Son1: Is Anderson Cooper the secret identity of the HQ guy?
erik: No ... but that would be pretty cool.

Mrs erik: your shirt is on backwards
Son2: second time’s the charm! *pops arms inside to rotate*

erik wrote: Mrs erik: your shirt is on backwards
Son2: second time’s the charm! *pops arms inside to rotate*

Unless it's a USB plug.

I used to do the arms-inside-the-shirt trick a lot as a kid. Still do. I don't pay a wholes lotta attention to what I'm doing when I get dressed, so I often put shirts on backwards or my underwear over my torso.

---

"Hi. My name is Samuel "Red" Whitestone III. I am a ~500 million year old opabina living in British Colombia. I am a 7cm long, bottom-dwelling, soft-bodied lobopod and computer programmer by day, but by night I like to cut loose and get freaky with some five-eyed hotties. I like to eat soft-bodied organisms, and can use my pincer like proboscis to a totally shred an electric guitar in my band, The Hallucigenias. We play every Wednesday down at Headbutt Dave's and, and at L. Marie Ford on Sundays for the kids matinee, where you can get free hot dogs, and balloons for mom.

I don't offer any wild promises or macho posturing... I offer only myself. So please, if any hot babes who also from the Burgess shale area are out there looking to share my personal space, lemme know at 1 (899) 327-1586."

Why would you need to get blackout drunk for that?
Are you allergic to peanuts? Otherwise, i'd do that sober . .

"Scan for mechanical lifeforms."
"Right. How do I do that?
"You've got a scanner, haven't you?"
"Yeah, but there's not a button for everything! You can't just say 'scan for x' and ping. You can't say 'scan for racists with a burgeoning interest in physiotheraphy' and ten second later, ta-dah! There you go."

OgreBattle wrote: Fey are probably cool with sodomy so they're chaotic.

In or out of context, this is just great.

"I cried at the end of Deadpool 2. Part was the nostalgia of the particular track blasting but mostly the emotion that they had landed the plane in such spectacular fashion. The plane is the movie in this analogy, there is no important plane landing sequence I’m referencing."
-Rob Liefeld

https://twitter.com/robertliefeld/statu ... 9386595331

https://twitter.com/Cavalorn/status/998124713649016833

"Attempting to make sense of Jordan Peterson's strange assertion that 'witches live in swamps' because it's naggingly familiar, just not from any myth or fairy tale. Then it hits me.

It's Minecraft. Witches live in swamps in Minecraft."

I don't know if that twoot was retweeted in irony, or do thousands of english speakers seriously think minecraft invented witches living in swamps

OgreBattle wrote:I don't know if that twoot was retweeted in irony, or do thousands of english speakers seriously think minecraft invented witches living in swamps

Neither, you're being dumb.

A certain subset of conservative "philosophers", for reasons I will never understand, have a peculiar obsession with the crackpot idea of mythology as the expression of a universal human subconscious - we're all the same people with the same culture expressing the same tropes in superficially different ways. We may change the names, but it's the same stories echoing over and over through time because fundamentally there is a singularly correct way for human beings to live and that singularly correct way can be found in the stories we've been telling ourselves since the dawn of time.

... Oh. So much for that whole "for reasons I will never understand" bit. Now that I've went and put it in words it's painfully obvious.
Step 1) Establish ancient stories as an authority on the human condition.
Step 2) The bible is a bunch of ancient stories.
Step 3) Make an appeal to authority.
Step 4) Everyone listens to Jeebus.

Obviously, this is the stupidest shit. Certain parts of the human experience are nearly universal (pre-sophisticated irrigation agrarian societies could really only exist on river banks; river banks flood; ergo, flooding is a ridiculously common theme in mythology across the world), but to try and extend that to a lesson about the power of culture generally is just stupid white guy shit. Jordan Peterson doesn't know or care enough about other cultures to realize they have differences, and if you pointed them out he would immediately explain them away as unimportant or call those parts an example of "culture gone wrong" (because feminism or socialism or whatever - that's not real culture, you see, it's the tainted culture we need to eradicate so we can get back the good stuff) in order to discount them.

Anyway, Jordan Peterson thinks it makes sense that witches live in swamps while kings live in castles because women are less competent than men. The mythology of the swamp witch is universal, and because it is universal we can trust that it represents an underlying truth about the human condition; specifically, that women are dumb bitches who can't run a society. Obviously that's fucked up and stupid in a bajillion ways, but there's a single, almost trivial-seeming question you can ask that gives the whole scam away; why the fuck does Jordan Peterson think witches live in swamps?

See, the iconic hermit witch does not actually live in swamps. Hermit witches live in the unknown people can see when they look outside their door. If forest stretches for miles in one direction from your home, that is where the witches and dragons be. If mountains tower over your home, that is where the witches and dragons be. And for the most part, people don't live near swamps whenever they can avoid it because swamps are inhospitable shitholes of death and misery, and so people don't look out their doors and see swamps, and therefore they don't tell stories about witches in swamps. The most prominent examples of swamp witches are actually modern because modern technology has made swampland insanely more habitable than it has ever been at any point in history. Of course, the hermit witch doesn't have to be a swamp witch to make Peterson's point about how powerful women are unfit for society and have to go be hermits. But "where is this swamp shit coming from" is just a comical illustration of Peterson's broader ignorance; hermit witches aren't the only folklore witches! Morgan le fucking Fay, queen! Medea, priestess of Hecate! Hecate herself, goddess of magic! The motherfucker has literally no idea what he's talking about it, he's just trying to sound smart. By refusing to make an actual argument and instead just loosely chaining concepts together, he can get his audience from point A to point stupid without making clear, concise statements that could be rebutted.

Jordan Peterson is using the concept of mythological universalism to argue that swamp witches teach us that women are dumb bitches. And swamp witches aren't even remotely mythologically universal, not even after you give him the benefit of the doubt and improve his own argument for him.

Responding to that tweet with "but I can think of witches that live in swamps" is the entire conversation sailing over your head. Woosh. The point is that Jordan Peterson couldn't think of a single witch that didn't live in a swamp, and as soon as you do, his entire argument falls apart. Making it about Minecraft is just a funny way to call Jordan Peterson an uncultured moron, because Minecraft is an example in which witches are entirely a swamp-based phenomenon.

God, I hate sharing a universe with Jordan Peterson.

Also, in light of yet another school shooting I can't help but keep thinking about how so many misogynist fuckwads are only in favor of limiting individual freedoms for the good of broader society when that means dudes get to choose how/when women put out. The moment you suggest that gun ownership is often harmful to broader society suddenly you get a bunch of screeching about individual agency is sacred and how tremendously unjust it would be if gun owners had to buy smaller magazines just because people keep getting shot in the face.

Don't know who any of those people are, thought it was some author that really thought witches in swamps was a minecraft thing as the following comments thread is mostly about "I don't know of any witches in swamps!"

I am glad that conversation went over my head as it looks retarded to be a part of.

The whole idea of universal concepts of gender is just so obviously ridiculous that it's hard to even engage with it. We have actual fucking languages which gender everything, and they don't gender things the same way. They aren't even gendered the same way in very closely related languages. Color is feminine in German or French where it's Die Farb or La Coleur, but it's masculine in Spanish or Latin where it's El Color or In Color.

It's not even like you could limit such concepts to things that are literally symbols. Even a casual walk through the concept of nationalism would tell you that the nation is male in German (Vaterland) and female in English (Motherland). The gendering isn't even consistent within langugaes or cultures, since the United States' national personification is Uncle Sam (a man) but used to be Columbia (a woman).

Jordan Peterson's work is just very hard to engage with without just doing spit takes. You have to be extremely isolated and uncultured to not immediately see that the core claim is horse shit. It's such obvious crap that I can only assume that the author knows it's bullshit and is scamming people. I can't imagine even doing enough research to have some laughably terribly examples to prattle on about without disproving the hypothesis.

-Username17

1.) Die FarbE
2.) The Nation / Die Nation in german is very much female as clearly indicated by use of the female Article DIE.
3.) Das Vaterland is neither male nor female, as indicated by the article DAS instead of DER or DIE. Das LAND unserer Väter. The Country of our Fathers.
The State / Der Staat is male again.

DSMatticus wrote:Certain parts of the human experience are nearly universal (pre-sophisticated irrigation agrarian societies could really only exist on river banks; river banks flood; ergo, flooding is a ridiculously common theme in mythology across the world), but to try and extend that to a lesson about the power of culture generally is just stupid white guy shit.

As well as all the other ways doing that is obviously terribly wrong, the actual universalish parts are quite interesting and don't need to be drowned out in that rubbish. Cultures all across the world independently developed things we'd recognise as spears, swords, pyramids and castles, but often with striking variations.

Stahlseele wrote:1.) Die FarbE
2.) The Nation / Die Nation in german is very much female as clearly indicated by use of the female Article DIE.
3.) Das Vaterland is neither male nor female, as indicated by the article DAS instead of DER or DIE. Das LAND unserer Väter. The Country of our Fathers.
The State / Der Staat is male again.

The point is that natural gender isn't the same as linguistic gender, and that the gender of symbols aren't constant between or within cultures by either standard. "Das Mädchen" is linguistically neuter in gender because it is little, but it's natural gender is female, because fucking obviously. Similarly, the Vaterland is a symbolic concept that is naturally male gendered regardless of the gender of the root noun "Land." However, the equivalent concept in English is "Motherland," whose natural gender is feminine despite English assigning a neuter linguistic gender to every non-living noun.

Which goes to the root of the problem with Jordan Peterson's analysis. Obviously symbols don't have consistent or meaningful gender assignments in any universal cross-cultural fashion. They don't even have universal gender assignments within cultures. Symbols change in gender over time and are even of multiple different genders simultaneously when discussed in different contexts in the same time period of the same culture.

It's fucking inconceivable that Jordan Peterson doesn't know this, which means that he's a liar and a fraud, promoting a sexist worldview because he knows that a bunch of angry failsons will pay him money if he tells them what they want to hear. And what they want to hear is apparently that they deserve to be elevated by the patriarchy.

When looked at from that perspective, Jordan Peterson is clearly evil. He's lying to people in order to promote oppression.

-Username17

erik: so where is the vet? (Taking the cat to a new veterinarian)
mrs erik: right next to the Chinese food place.
erik: um. ah, that’s...

On the same low brow humor note there is a pet groomers next to a Chinese restaurant where I live.

erik wrote:erik: so where is the vet? (Taking the cat to a new veterinarian)
mrs erik: right next to the Chinese food place.
erik: um. ah, that’s...

At least vets try to make animals better. It's not as problematic as, say, an animal shelter/pound.

erik: "I don't wanna take off Thursday to do rehearsal for this wedding!"
mrs erik: "Then you shouldn't have agreed to be an usher!"
erik: "I could have said no?"
mrs erik: "No you could not."

Conversation with the IT gaming bros today:


(Discussing Monster Hunter coming to PC)

1: Yeah I pre-ordered it.

2: You know every game I've pro-ordered has flopped.

1: Really?

2: Yeah. If I pre order something, it doesn't sell well. It's like I'm cursed or something.

3: You know that means we need to make you start pre-ordering the Call of Duty Series, right?

1: And Madden. Also you're forbidden from Pre-ordering Monster Hunter.

2: You already have it for the PS4.

3: Yeah but Mikey and Bill don't have a PS4 and are interested in it so Tommy and I are going to buy it (again) and play it with them.

People aren't islands, and unlike them they needn't shoulder mountains alone.

Hicks wrote:People aren't islands, and unlike them they needn't shoulder mountains alone.

Reminded me of this.

http://www.threepanelsoul.com/comic/fantasy-armor

Started my kids playing DnD since I've broken them in with Betrayal at Balder's Gate. Time to start em on Sunless Citadel.

eldest lil erik: (after finishing his equipment shopping) I have a crowbar, now we're ready.

Chief Quimby: "There won't be any shining sun where you're going on your next mission."

Inspector Gadget: "Great! Some of my favorite places are where the sun doesn't shine!"

Me: "...Wow."

10-year-old: "What?"

7-year-old: "It means 'butts'."