Wrong again, e-commerce algorithm!

Pictured: the arcane mathematical sorcery
 that once decided that I'd want socks with
photos of the dog I don't have on them. 

A lot is made of how frighteningly intrusive the internet has become. Like, I think we all have stories of talking about something out loud only to see an ad for that very thing appear on Facebook within hours. I don't understand the math behind it, but I gather that we're constantly leaving some kind digital footprints through our online activity. Footprints that allow sites to tailor advertisements to our particular needs and interests. It's a grim commerce addled dystopia that reduces us to simple algorithmic profit potentialities.

Fine. We're nothing more than grist for the e-commerce mill to these people. But what I want to know is how come this still happens:

Well? Are you sharing my outrage?

Um, no. No I will not.

What, you don't see it? Look closely. Nestled on this gaming website in the 75% percent of the screen that is advertising, is an ad for something called Nine Line Apparel, a company that "Represents The Grit And Commitment Of All Patriotic Americans." Which, yeah...it's one of those. So if you've ever wondered where the dudes who drive their over-sized pick up trucks through crowds of protestors buy their dumb "Keep Calm and Double Tap" shirts, this is the place. And yeah, I don't think they understand what capital letters are for either. But then I'm probably not "relentlessly patriotic" enough. Or gritty enough. Patriotic Americans Capitalize Every Word. That's how much they love the shit out of America. Well, parts of America maybe. So why then am I getting this ad?

Nine Line Apparel makes it clear that if you're not constantly rocking a Don't Tread on Me t-shirt, or packing some heat in one of their 3 Season Concealed Carry Jackets, then you're probably a terrorist. Or worse, a socialist. 

I uh...holy shit. What are their everyday lives like that 
even a light fall jacket has to have a pocket for their Glock?

Despite what the t-shirt says, they
are neither silent nor a majority.

And you know, this is the kind of thing that drives me out of my mind. Look, I don't begrudge others their dumb, hyper-aggressive, black and white flag nonsense...ok, fine, I kind of do. But I just resent the suggestion that they're somehow more American because they love guns and everything they own is camouflage. They're not more or less anything, except perhaps more paranoid. And harder to see in a heavily wooded area. But not more American. It seems like it's only the political Right that does this. 

Like, you never see people on the left dismissing entire swaths of the population as un-American. Dumb, maybe, but not un-American. And in our defense, entire swaths of the population are still telling themselves that the COVID-vaccine contains tracking devices and that Trump secretly won the election so, you know, it's not coming from nowhere.

Also, we don't run around in T-shirts with progressive slogans on them.
Which, I suppose is owning more to the fact that our nuanced and
thoughtful political views can't be summed up as snappily. 

Snub Rosa

"I mean, you'd think so..."

-Jean Luc Picard

Well why the great goddamn isn't Doctor Crusher in season two of Star Trek: Picard? I ask because in an interview with Trekmovie.com--yes, I read Star Trek-related news. Don't try to shame me--anyway, Gates McFadden, the actor who played Crusher, told Trekmovie.com that she's not in the new season and I think that's-huh? Yeah, this one's going to be all about Star Trek, so if that's not your cuppa, that's fine, skip it, I won't be offended. I just need a break from Republicans dismantling our democracy for a few minutes. Which, I mean, someone's going to do something about that, right?

Seriously? Pulaski'd again?

According to McFadden:

"I'm not in the second season. I'm sad that I'm not. Things have changed a lot on different levels. So I have no idea at this point. I'm disappointed because it would have been so much fun to just work with those people. But we'll see. I have no idea. I wish I could tell you."

-Gates McFadden, on her

inexplicable snubbing

Yeah, we're taking the name
Q back, thank you very much

Well so do we. I realize that the writers and the producers behind the series said from the get-go that they didn't want the show to be just more The Next Generation. And that's fine. Tonally it was very different from TNG. But was also a spin-off and relied heavily on elements from and nostalgia for earlier Stars Trek--what? It's like mothers-in-law. And then Patrick Stewart publicly invited Whoopie Goldberg to come back as Guinan, and then the trailer for season two teased the return of Q actor John de Lancie. Q the omnipotent space wizard, not the right-wing shit merchants.

But where's Geordi? Or Worf? Or Doctor Crusher? What I'm saying is let's not pretend that Picard is just some ten episode novel for television-which, first of all, that's dumb. TV shows are not novels. And second of all, it's the fan serve-iest of fans serves.

FADE IN

INT. Space Bar

Seven of Nine materializes dual wielding phaser rifles and starts 

blasting everything that moves super-badass-edly.

-An excerpt from the

script for episode 5 

Yup some great episodes and one
where she had sex with a ghost...which,
you know what? Good for her.

TNG had an ensemble cast and Crusher was at least as important a character as Riker or Troi who did return for season one. Arguably she's more important, at least to Picard. And this is where I get in the nerd weeds, so brace yourself. I know the show is called Picard and not Picard and Pals, but Crusher was there from the beginning. She and Picard had a decades long, close friendship and one that bordered on the romantic. Picard was a father figure to her son Wesley, and she had some great episodes of her own over the series' seven year run. 

Pictured: Mister Data and
four potted plants.

Crusher's omission is an especially bad look for the series, since in the years since TNG's run, we've heard more and more about how the women in the cast were treated. McFadden herself was fired after the first season for asking for more for her character to do. She came back, but only after the producer who fired her had left. Denise Crosby quit before season one ended, and Marina Sirtis spend the first six years in a leotards and asymmetrical cleavage dresses instead of a uniform like everyone else. 

All I'm saying is that Doctor Crusher is a beloved character played by a great actor, so the idea that she'd just go unmentioned and unseen in season two just doesn't sit right. I appreciate them not wanted to just do a retread, but there's like fifty other Trek series coming, and I think I speak for all the fans when I say we'd be 100% fine with one of them being just more TNG. 

Gates McFadden, seen here being the only person 
in this photo not on Star Trek: Picard. Booooooo.

*Snub Rosa? Get it? No? Fine...

Today in feckless wussery:

Trump, Bush, and Arianne Zucker
seen here in what should have been
the end of Trump's campaign, but...

Hurray? Like, it's good news. It is, but-huh? What am I? Oh, right, you see I'm talking about Facebook's oversight board which ruled that the company's ban on Donald Trump from its social media platforms should be upheld. Which is great. What's less great is that it also said that the indefinite ban was "inappropriate" and the company should take the next six months and make sure that it was consistent with how it treats other its users. Essentially, this means that that the former star of Home Alone 2 and that Billy Bush tape, might be back on Facebook and Instagram as early as November.

"We are the Board. Your penalties are vague
and standardless. Avoidance is futile." 

In its decision, the Board (their caps, not mine) basically called Facebook a bunch of feckless wusses, trying to avoid accountability. Which, I mean, yeah, that's exactly what they were doing:

"In applying a vague, standardless [sic] penalty and then referring this case to the Board to resolve, Facebook seeks to avoid its responsibilities. The Board declines Facebook's request and insists that Facebook apply and justify a denied penalty."

-The Board, not being wrong

Yes. Absolutely. Of course Facebook wants to pawn off any responsibility and bad press on the semi-independent board and its legally binding decisions.

In Speed terms, Facebook wants to be Dennis Hopper using Jeff Daniels
(the independent board), as a human shield against Keanu Reeves's inevitable
right-wing reaction--and apologies to Mr. Reeves, I mean this metaphorically. 

Yes. Worrying about their feelings
is exactly the problem-wait...is...is that
Dennis? Dang. I nailed that callback.

So of course the semi-independent Board is having none of it. Of course they are. And good for them, I suppose. I mean, their point isn't that giving him a platform isn't dangerous, it's that it's not their job to throw themselves on the grenade that is the rabid-foam backlash on the part of the millions of Trump fans who have--in some cases--said they are willing to die to overturn the election. Which I mean, if we're being honest, isn't worrying about these goons and their feelings kind of the problem here?

100% saw this coming the day
he electoral college won the
2016 election. 100% called it.

Like, kicking him off Facebook was the right call and it would have been the right call months or even years earlier and might have avoided a lot of the sturm and drang but the Board is saying that Facebook doesn't have a policy to fit the violation. And why would they? Who would have thought that a sitting President would openly incite violence to keep himself in power? Ok, we all did, but Facebook didn't specifically outline a penalty against the possibility, and I think what that the Board is saying is that they need to figure that out and come up with a policy. That they can't just ban indefinitely. 

"Bo-ring..."

-everyone on Facebook

And I mean, it's an easy solve right? Like, doesn't Facebook's user agreement say that they can change policies whenever they want? Huh? Yeah, I'm asking because I don't know. I never read those things. The point is they're not the government, they're a social media platform and can make up their policies as they go along so why not set a policy that says if an elected official tries to use Facebook to do a coup, they're banned? And, you know, it's not like they need an indefinite ban. 

Why not just ban him for say, twenty years? To be clear, I'm not wishing Donald Trump any physical harm. It is my fervent wish to see him held accountable for all that terrible shit he did and is continuing to do and absolutely will do in the future, but no physical harm. I'd rather see him in prison or in front of The Hague. But if that doesn't happen, just wait him out. I mean, the dude's seventy-four and eats cheeseburgers in bed. 

What? I'm not body-shaming, I'm treason shaming. And I'm not sorry.

Let's call him Dennis.

Look, I don't want to tell other people what to do but--well, ok, I do want to tell other people what to do, but Burning Man is cancelled again this year and all I'm saying is go get your vaccine. That's all. It's not hard.

For real. Do this.

My hair is also nonsense, but it's
been like a year. Give me break.

And I mean, is this really a lot to ask? Like, seriously? I got my second shot on Saturday, and--wait, is it a humble brag if I didn't really have a hand in it? I ask because I was about to tell you that the whole thing was super fast and it's not because I did anything to deserve it, it was just a slow morning at the hockey arena where they were doing the vaccinations but it took nineteen minutes. Nineteen. That's including the fifteen minutes they make you sit in a chair just in case you go into anaphylactic shock. Which I didn't. Almost nobody does. It's incredibly unlikely. Vanishingly rare I think is the phrase. So if that's the thing you're clinging to as a reason not to get vaccinated, stop. Just shhhh. That's nonsense. 

Yes, vaccine. What's wrong with you?

Sorry, not you. You're doing it right (I assume) I'm speaking to that hypothetical you. Maybe it's the stress of the last year, or the least five years or whatever, but I find myself flying into blind rages. Not like, at people, but about people. Not people I know, just people. People I read about on the news or on social media or just people I imagine exist. Usually I find myself railing against this image I have of a theoretical person who refuses to get vaccinated. I make a lot of assumptions about them. Wanna hear?

See? Effective. Less so when you're
 browsing the housewares section.

Let's call him Dennis. Apologies to actual people called Dennis, I just need a name and I have chosen Dennis. Anyway, Dennis drives a pickup, but not like a pickup you have if you're a contractor or if you help people move. It's like a Dodge Ram or F-150, brand new, black, and it has one of those black and white flags with the blue stripes, or an NRA sticker, or a Punisher emblem decal on the window. Maybe all three. Dennis parks across two, sometimes three parking spaces. Dennis just takes up space, in general. He wears camouflage, even when he's just walking around a Target or somewhere other than, you know, the woods. Oh, and guns. Dennis is into guns. Super into guns. You have no idea.

Plenty of places to hide a tracking
device on a pickup though. Also,
Dennis carries a smartphone, so...

Dennis says his love of all things assault rifles is for self-defense, but Dennis also won't get a COVID vaccine even though catching coronavirus is like a million times more likely than a home invasion, but he heard the government uses the shot to track us and change our DNA, so here we are. Arguing with Dennis. You can try to explain that there is no technology on Earth capable of tracking devices small enough to be injectable and that DNA doesn't work like that, but Dennis knows what's really going on. Dennis and his guns.

I think you get the picture. Am I a dick for making all these assumptions? Yes. Am I wrong? Probably not. And I know there's no actual Dennis,* but this figure, this phantom of a selfish, Trumpy, willfully ignorant goon upon whom I pile all my frustrations and who can't be bothered to just be a person and take even a modicum of social responsibility is real in a sense and they're the reason we still can't go to restaurants or movies or to Burning Man. So what I'm saying is get the shot Dennis. Get the goddamn shot.

If nothing else, I'm just really, really ready to stop talking about this.

*obviously there are people called Dennis, again, it's just a name.

I sure this will be above boards...

Because you shouldn't fill a Supreme Court
seat in an election year except when you should
fill a Supreme Court seat in an election year. 

We're like a hundred days in to this new Senate, so why haven't we abolished the filibuster, passed H.R. 1, made D.C. a State, and added three new Supreme Court Justices to balance out the three Mitch McConnell seats stole? The GOP has spent all this time trying to make it harder for people to vote, redrawing district lines and as I type this the Arizona State Senate is letting some random stop the steal nuts re-re-re-count the 2020 ballots because Trump keeps spouting nonsense about how he won. Which he didn't. But sure, let's listen to him some more. 

Pictured: Kern, seen here being
super-impartial you guys. 

It's the exact same nonsense that incited a coup that no one from his own party thinks is a problem. In fact, one of the people auditing the ballots is former police officer and State Representative Anthony Kern. Kern lost in 2020, but while in office proposed a bill to get his name taken off the "Brady" list, which is a list of law enforcement officials with "integrity concerns." It's a bad cop list and Kern's a bad cop who tried to use his position as a legislator for personal gain. And he was part of that coup attempt. So that's cool.

Oh, and the reporter who discovered that Kern was part of the recount was kicked out of the building. They said it was because the reporter, Ryan Randazzo, tweeted a photo that included a ballot. It was illegible, and plenty of other photos and videos from the audit have been published, and Randazzo's also showed Kern involved in the audit. But I'm sure that had nothing to do with it.

If you can't choose hyper-partisan operatives with an
agenda and an aversion to transparency who can you trust?

Above: Just some of the Stop the Steal
people who rioted because the don't like
Democracy. So, let's keep humoring them.

And I mean, what even is the point? The election is over, there's already been like multiple audits, and the count was certified, and, Arizona's eleven electoral votes wouldn't change the outcome. So even if the audit turned up something, it won't, but whatever. These are a bunch of Trumpy conspiracy goons, at least one of whom is on an official list of liars, so let's say they just make something up, which they almost certainly will. What then? I guess they could point to it as justification for some racist voting restrictions, but they already passed those.

So what even are we doing? You know, I think the real frustration here is that if this fake-ass audit run by people who love Trump so much they literally shat in the halls of the U.S. Capitol doesn't turn up the voter fraud they imagined, they're not going to go away. Like, all this time and money and effort and there's nothing, nothing that will solve their crazy. 

"Ah ha! Right here in this envelope is proof that Donald Trump won the election
and-huh? No, no we can't show it to you. Just...just trust us and swear Trump back in."

-Republicans, on the assumption 

that we're all idiots

Today in "is this even for real?"

I mean, did whoever printed this up honestly not think it was going to end in apologies, embarrassment and serious questions about who should be allowed to teach kids? I'm genuinely asking because look at this, just...just look at it:

We'll get to the "holy shit is this even for real?" part in a moment,
but are we seriously saying that photocopiers are not only still in use
but haven't improved in the decades since I was in elementary school?

"Um, actually, we had a Black
president, so racism: solved."

-America

So to address the question posed in the caption above, oh yes, this is even for real. It's from a worksheet given to fourth-grade students in one of the suburbs of my hometown and while you probably thought that slavery in America was a five century horror show of kidnapping, forced labor, and murder that separated families, decimated communities, and established a system of discrimination that still echoes down through the ages, it was apparently just a big mix-up. If you need a minute, I completely understand. I'll just wait here while you compose yourself. Take your time. 

History: it's what ever you want it to be!

Back? Great. So this: "As an exchange for the trip to America, African Americans agreed to work for colonists for _______ years, but then were kept as slaves." Which--is whoever handed this out maybe, you know, unfamiliar with...everything? How does one even--like this is presumably an adult who's not only allowed to drive and go to the store and stuff, but can vote and teach kids. This is bad. This is flat Earth, dinosaurs are extinct because Noah ran out of room on the ark bad. 

Given the size of antebellum plantation
houses, there is nothing that can go in that
blank that isn't back-breaking labor. 

The rest of it looks like pretty basic info that might not be technically wrong, but it's definitely not ok. Like, take the "What jobs did slaves have?" section for example. I think it probably wants kids to answer with: 

• -Worked in the fields.
• -Churned butter.
• -and I don't know, Puttered? around the house. Seriously, what is it supposed to be?

When you reduce the suffering of generations of enslaved people to some fill-in-the-blanks, it sometimes fails to capture the--what's the word? Gist? The gist of an unforgivable crime that stains the very soul of the nation. You know? Huh? Oh, no, not the genocide of the indigenous peoples, our other unforgivable crime. We've uh...we've got a few of those here. 

"This isn't so bad, what was the big deal?"

-kids in this class

"But what I'm saying is how come
there's no white history month?"

-dumbs who are out there*

The worksheet came from something called The Classroom Nook, which is an online resource for teachers although evidently not a great one and the teacher who used it was new to the job--which, well clearly. But like, surely there is a basic level of knowledge about U.S. history that is requisite to being a history teacher, right? And that level has to better than someone on a Jimmy Kimmel live on the street segment. I mean, if you just let anyone teach, you'll get a generation of ignorant adults who--oh, right...

Look, maybe the crushing reality of slavery is difficult to talk to ten year olds about but there's probably a better way to teach American history than suggesting that enslaved people were just indentured servants who got duped or that slavery was just a kinda shitty job. Glossing over it or making it sound not so bad because you don't want to upset the children is dangerous and probably the cause of a lot of what's wrong with everything.

Sorry kids, history is a bummer, so maybe let's not repeat it?

*I just made this up and grabbed a screen shot. This person probably didn't really say that, and I'm sure they're very nice in real life. Probably.

Soliloquize like no one is watching!

I say since 2009, but in 17th century England
every day was talk like Shakespeare Day

So today, as you almost certainly know, is talk like Shakespeare day and I was thinking that-huh? Yes it is. I looked it up and-what's that? Ok, sure, it's also Independence Day in the Conch Republic, Canadian Book Day, and the Feast of Saint Adelbert of Prague, fine, but it's also Talk Like Shakespeare Day. And Shakespeare's Birthday. And his death day, because poetic symmetry. Anyway, because of that, April 23rd has been, since 2009, recognized by some--theatre nerds mainly--as Talk Like Shakespeare Day. And that's why I'm so insufferable at work one day a year. And possibly others as well.

Pictured: the glare Talk Like Shakespeare
Day usually illicit from co-workers.

But where I was going with this is that Talk Like Shakespeare Day is somewhat less exciting when you can't really go anywhere or do anything. I mean, if you're at work, you're almost certainly social distancing and wearing a mask, and dropping zounds and prithee into your office interactions is just going to add tension to an already difficult work environment. And, if you're working from home, what's even the point of talking like Shakespeare if your exasperated officemates aren't even going to ask you to shut up?

I'll tell you the point. The point is that this pandemic has taken enough from us already, and I say no more. As the playwright himself might say: the line must be drawn here.

Yeah, ok, fine. I know it's Captain Picard, but Shakespeare might 
have said it also. At some point in his life. What? You don't know...

It's a look that says: I'm
pear-shaped, yet upholstered. 

In that spirit, I'd like to offer some alternative ways you can mark the occasion. Just little things you can do which will almost certainly drive anyone you live with insane, but isn't that the true meaning of Talk Like Shakespeare Day? Let's start by dressing up in Renaissance-era costume. Shakespeare once wrote "The clothes make the man" and I think it--huh? What now? Fine, Mark Twain said that. But Shakespeare wrote "apparel oft proclaim the man" which is basically the same thing. What I'm saying is why not dress for the occasion? I mean, assuming you have some tights, or a neck ruff or maybe a even wimple lying around, now's your chance. And really, if you're reading this blog, there's a better than fifty-fifty chance you're the kind of person who frequents the Ren Faire, so it's not outside the realm of possibility that you have some period garb in your closet. 

But if that's not curling the tips of your carefully trimmed and waxed Van Dyke beard, then maybe try something super Shakespearean like, not going to the theatre. 

"Hey, works for us!"

-Americans

Sure they believed in the four
humors but look. A mask.  

If there's one thing Elizabethan England was famous for, other than Shakespeare it's--well, actually it's probably Queen Elizabeth. I mean, it's named after her. And then there's the Spanish Armada, and then maybe public executions, but a close fifth or sixth is periodic outbreaks of plague. Theatres were frequently shut down because those unwashed barbarians had no concept of germ theory, and were constantly dropping dead of the plague. That said, they still had the basic sense to shut down large gatherings during times of pandemic, making them way the hell smarter than most red state governors. So in many ways us staying indoors, bored to tears, and waiting for this all whole thing to blow over is one of the most authentically Elizabethan things we can do.

But if neither of those ideas appeals, you can just take the traditional route and talk like Shakespeare. Who cares if you're stuck at home? In fact, if you're alone, you're not just talking like Shakespeare, you're soliloquizing. And that's pretty Shakespearey. I say go for it. Who cares if no one's around to hear you? Detail all your fell deeds, your ear poisoning confessions, your rank offenses, all of it to an empty room. It is, after all, Talk Like Shakespeare Day and I say we make the most of it.

"Stars hide your fires. Let light not see how many episodes of
The Great Brittish Baking Show I've watched in one sitting..."

-Everyone