Stacey Campfield is a Takeicist.

In a stunningly stupid move in a state we never should have let back in the Union (I kid), a Tennessee State Senate committee has approved a bill that would require schools to pretend that there's no such thing as gay people until the eighth grade.

Gay? We literally don't know the meaning of the word!

"Put your hand down
Heather, your two 
 mommies make us sick."

I guess if your backwards worldview is out of step with the slow but steady progress we've made a nation, you have two choices: re-evaluate said worldview and join us in the 21st century or pass bigoted legislation designed to appeal to and legitimize homophobia. The sponsor of the bill is Republican Stacey Campfield who, in addition to being an avid homophobe, also thinks college campuses need more guns and that Planned Parenthood doesn't need funding. That burning sensation in the back of your throat? That's bile. This guy is just a terrible person. Also, Stacey is totally a girl's name. In a climate of bullying and marginalization that drives LGBT children and teens to suicide, this asshole has stood up and said: "I'm all for bullying and marginalization!"

Stacey Campfield:
Also a fan of slavery.

Check out this article. It's about a study that indicates an increased likelihood of teen suicide (both gay and straight) in areas that are more politically conservative. It's not because of taxes, or universal healthcare, it's because of the institutionalized and hostile homophobia that dicks like Campfield stand for. And while not all Republicans (seriously, check this story out) are anti-gay, I think it's fair to say that the party isn't exactly going out of it's way to distance itself from members who are.

"Look out Uganda, here comes Tennessee!"

-Senator Stacey Campfield

Here's his webpage with contact info if you'd like to tell him what you think. Also, here's a link to the It Gets Better Project. I wonder if Stacey's aware that his politics are so toxic that there's an entire worldwide movement opposed to them. Congratulations Stacey Campfield, you're up there with breast cancer and AIDS!  




Fortunately, it's not all bad news. There is actually lots of resistance in Tennessee to the red-state medievalism pedaled by Campfield and politicians like him. In fact, prominent gay icon and country western enthusiast George 'Mr. Sulu' Takei has offered his last name as a code for gay to be used in Tennessee should the bill become law. For example you could say you're in favor of 'Takei marriage,' or that you enjoy 'hot Takei sex.' God, George Takei is awesome.

With Takei on our side, no force on Earth can oppose us.

The Frogurt is also cursed.

Hey guess what fellow nerds? We can pay George Lucas for Star Wars...again! Or we could, you know, not. Out of what I can only assume is abject hatred for Star Wars fans everywhere, this fancy new Blu-ray re-re-re-release consists of the widely reviled Prequels and the Special Edition releases of the original movies-the New Coke of Star Wars.

You know what they say:
"If it ain't broke, tamper with it until everyone hates you and you've lost all credibility."

If only it had more
crazy CG crap on screen...

After spending the last twelve years burning off whatever goodwill the Star Wars fan base has left in what is a clearly a systematic and malicious campaign of idiocy, you'd think they'd be interested in making amends, or at least more money. Why not include the original theatrical releases? I mean we're basically begging them to let us pay for movies they already made. There's like 0% effort required on their part. Like for real, three discs of this set are 'documentaries' about how much money 20th Century Fox made off movies that aren't even included. Can we get like a court order or something? Just put them in the box. Is it really hard to not screw this up?

Wah-Wah.

Hey, guess what didn't end!

This.

On the downside, we're still stuck with
this guy...for a little while anyway.

It's May 22nd and if you're reading this it means that the apocalypse didn't happen as predicted by Harold Camping and gin. Sorry to disappoint you rapture fans out there but it looks like you're going to have to wait a little longer to watch in comfort as billions of your fellow human beings suffer the horrors of Armageddon for not believing exactly as you do.

This is what you get for
watching movies with swears.

Speaking of which, what is wrong with these people anyway? I'm no theologian, but the whole rapture/armageddon thing seems pretty jacked (are the kids still saying 'jacked'?). As I understand it (and I don't), they're actually looking forward to the world ending in a cataclysmic orgy of Emmerich-esque es'plosions and eternal torment for people who didn't hate the gays hard enough or voted Democrat. Does anyone else find this messed-up?

Run faster, God's love
is gaining on you!

I mean, what is their deal anyway? Pretend for a moment that you're God as imagined by millions of conservative evangelical christians. You have unlimited control of time, space and reality and you're unhappy with the way we're all behaving. Is destruction on a planetary scale really the only option open to you? Hasn't God ever heard of a surgical strike? Isn't he supposed to be the good guy?

"And he that believeth in me
shall know Bat-Justice. Amen."

-Book of Wayne 11:25

Take Batman for example. When the Riddler takes Gotham City's movers and shakers hostage at the Natural History Museum fund-raiser (as so often happens), does Batman crash through the skylight with a couple bat-uzis and mow down everything that moves? No. He knocks out the henchmen with a ricocheting bat-a-rang before out-riddling the Riddler in some sort of riddle contest. Fund-raiser: saved. Movers and shakers: un-murdered. That's how good guys role.



Look, I know it's not my place to criticize how other people live their lives (I know, novel, right?), but for real. Why do people have to take a perfectly good message about not being a dick and build all this crazy mythology around it? Can't we all be nice to each other without the threat of Tim LaHaye's shitty airport bookstore novels coming true?

 On the other hand, the Apocalypse is totally metal.

How are you going to spend your penultimate day on Earth?

"Get ready to writhe in the lake of
fire you hellbound fornicators!"

-Harold Camping*

All right doomsayers, tomorrow is the penultimate day of the world. I hope everyone is ready for the moment when we settle once and for all which religion is correct and which are just a whole bunch of blasphemous horseshit for which believers will suffer an eternity of torment. I guess that's what we all get for not buying seats on Harold Camping's crazy train. What were we thinking anyway? I mean obviously God hid the exact date and time (EST, of course) of the Rapture in the modern English translation of the Bible and centuries of scholars and theologians just missed it until Camping came along. Oh well, sucks to be us.


Anyway, I for one wasn't exactly sure what to expect on Saturday when Camping's drunken prediction totally comes true, so I consulted the internet. This is what I found:

Well that clears it up...

My favorite is the part where god
stomps us like grapes and then feeds
us to birds. Can you feel the love?

If I'm reading this correctly, the four horses will ride in with seven trumpets and then there's some kind of Triceratops thing and a couple of bowls full of judgement and then something about a magic pony with a sword and then you have to fight a dragon, I think it might be the Dragon Lord (which sucks 'cause he's got like a ton of HP). I don't know, you figure it out. Here's the link, good luck. Look, this is the end of the world, why couldn't they make it simple? Check out the chart below. Better, right?

Now,  you're playing with power!
Alone, in the basement, while the other kids are getting exercise and fresh air.
Oh well, I made my choice.

This would work too.

This is the Nintendo Power fold-out guide for River City Ransom. Simple, clean, clear. Why can't the Bible be more like Nintendo Power? I mean, if god really wants to go through some kind of elaborate production just to end the world shouldn't it at least make sense? And for that matter, why go through all the monsters and seals and trumpets when you all you need is an asteroid or a zombie plague or something? I don't know, sometimes the simplest Apocalypse is the best one.

Behold The Beast: Miniboss of the Apocalypse.
He hates smoke, so use bombs to defeat him.

*p.s. Yeah, that's not an actual quote, and it's not an actual picture of Harold Camping. It's Orville Redenbacher, who kind of looks like Camping if you squint. Also, I like to imagine he sounds like Don Knotts.

Apparently we're all in shock out here on the west coast...Shock.

Ow! My sensibilities!

Shock? Is that the word we use when someone rich/famous/in politics is revealed to have cheated on his or her (mostly his) spouse? MSNBC thought so. You know if it is, I seriously think that we, as the english-speaking world, need to redefine 'shock.' The dictionary gives a few definitions and I feel like they're going for: 'a sudden or violent disturbance of the mind, emotions or sensibilities...' because I'm pretty sure no one got punched in the face with this news. John Edwards' affair shocked me, but that was because he seemed like such a nice guy. He wanted to end poverty and send people to college, but then he decided he'd rather screw around on his wife. His wife who was dying of cancer. So much for a better future.


Anyway, as far as I can tell there're two guys named Arnold Schwarzenegger (what are the odds?). One is the hilariously wooden star of Conan the Barbarian, Running Man and Terminators 1 and 2. I want to like him because I like these movies (also Kindergarten Cop. What? It was funny. Don't judge me).

At some point Skynet decided to wrap one of these in 300 pounds of muscle,
give it an Austrian accent and beam it naked into L.A. in 1984 so it could blend in.

I was hoping that we'd all wear
kimonos in the future.

The other Schwarzeneggar is the guy who exploited the ignorance of red state California (known as Calitucky. There, I've insulted one and a half states) by convincing people that they should throw out Grey Davis and replace him with someone who thought Last Action Hero would be amazing. He also appeared in Terminator 3 and now he's cheated on Maria Shriver. What a dick. It also kind of sucks that of all the future predictions made by the movie Demolition Man, Arnold's political career is the only one that came true.*

Is Rotten Tomatoes legally empowered to track down and sterilize 38% of critics and 43% of the audience?
If not, we might want to look into it.

*if you don't know what the hell I'm talking about, watch Demolition Man. It's rad.

Onward San Francisco

Hi, I'm not dead, I just moved. I've left San Francisco for slightly more southerly climes in hopes of finding a parking space some day. Well, technically I only worked in San Francisco, the only way to afford an apartment that's actually in the city is to find like 4 or 5 roommates on Craigslist and hope to hell they don't kill and eat you. I love SF, I really do, but like any giant clot of humans, it's got its ups and downs.

Abandon all hope, ye who park here.

Also, it's got one of these.

In the plus column it's a shining liberal utopia that's into environmentalism, equality, and sourdough bread. It's what the rest of America would be like if a certain judgmental pack of bible-thumpers would just get raptured already (come on 5/21/11!) and leave the rest of us alone. They have parties at the Natural History Museum. How awesome is that? I went to one once, it was a delightful combination of over-priced booze, DJ's and earth science.


On the other hand, if you're reading this, you, like me, are probably not cool enough for San Francisco. In fact reading this is probably significantly lowering your stock. You should probably stop now and pretend we've never met.

If you know what these are, roll them and then subtract the total from your coolness score.  

"Television? I only listen to NPR on a
compostable radio an artist friend made
for me out PBR cans and irony."

Places like New York and L.A. have a reputation for being full of phonies, but San Francisco is full of reallies. What the hell is a 'really'? Since I just made it up, allow me to explain. A phony thinks they're better than you because they only eat carbon-neutral hormone-free food but they drive a Land Rover half a block to Trader Joe's to buy it. Also, they park across three handicap spots and leave the engine idling. A 'really' actually is better than you because they're bike-riding vegans who don't own a television and compost their own waste. I think they're an offshoot of hipsters, but with slightly more credibility. Same stupid facial hair though.

Some people would take this as a sign. 

But if you think San Francisco is all hippies and pot-cookies, you should also know that San Franciscans are in fact incredibly bad-ass. As if to give Poseidon, god of earthquakes and the sea the middle finger, they built the city on seven active fault lines. Seven. Actually they re-built on seven fault lines. In 1906 Poseidon gave this place a pretty good shellacking and in response they re-built on the smoking remains. Also, all the best hard-boiled detective and suspension-destroying cop-chase movies were filmed there. So, suck on it every other city in America.

In San Francisco we believe in marriage equality, universal healthcare and
sticking it to those fat asses down at city hall. We get results. 

...And also with you.

"A Star Trek holiday? Pfft. Dork."

Holy crap it's Star Wars Day! So like, happy Star Wars Day! I'm embarrassed to admit it, but this one kind of snuck up on me and I almost let it pass without comment. I'm a fan of spacey-things and made up holidays, so really, I should have this day marked on my calendar. The choice of May fourth is a sorta clever pun ('May the fourth be with you,' see? Cute huh?) so I have like, no excuse. But what I, and presumably tens of other Star Trek fans want to know is where's our holiday? (Ok, other than this one.)

My feelings? Expressed on a T-shirt?
What will they think of next?

Look, I like Star Wars. I do, but I've always been more of a Trekkie. It's not that the two are mutually exclusive. No matter how many nerd debates pit Borg against Jedi, there is certainly room in our geeky chest cavities for both. However there is among the both the mainstream and geek communities the perception that Star Wars fans are somehow cooler than Star Trek fans. To this I take great umbrage. Yeah, it's a little like saying Arnold Schwarzenegger's a better actor than Keanu Reeves but for years we trekkies have accepted our slightly lamer status with good nature, but why should we?

And while I'm at it,
Boba Fett: totally overrated.

I'm just going to say it: Star Trek is better. Yeah, I know it's apples and oranges, and yes, I realize the blasphemy of saying this on today of all days, but proportionately there are more good entries in the Star Trek canon than in the Star Wars canon. There was a time when Star Wars consisted only of three superb movies (and one ignominious Holiday Special) compared to three sometimes cheesy seasons of original Star Trek, the cartoon and the Wrath of Khan, but that was 1983. Since then, Star Wars has kinda suffered.

Sure this happened, but did you see
Episodes I-III?

Like I said, the holy trilogy is still pretty holy, but the CGI-marred re-releases were unnecessary and the three prequels are objectively garbage. Throw in the theatrically released animated movie and the original trilogy becomes the exception, not the rule. The Star Wars movies are between 65-75% crap. Sure, Star Treks 1, 5, 7, 9 and 10 are unwatchable to the average theater goer (i.e. non-trekkies). But that leaves 2, 3, 4, 6, 8 and 11. According to my math, at least 50% of Star Trek movies are good. Also, there's like 6 TV series. Sure, not every episode is Tapestry, or In the Pale Moonlight, but there's more good ones than bad.

Bea Arthur tending bar at the Mos Eisley Cantina was both the best
and worst moment of Star Wars outside the Original Trilogy.

So stand up and be proud my nerdish brothers and sisters, for our thing we're into is mathematically superior. No longer should we be ashamed to put on our pointy ears and strap on our tricorders! Well, maybe a little ashamed, but no more so than the people that showed up for the Star Wars prequel in costume to stage plastic lightsaber fights. I mean come on. Losers.

The carpets of Conference Room C at the airport Hilton came to know the
taste of nerd blood on that terrible day.