Today is the day, man. Today is the official theatrical release of Serenity. I'm catching a show at 4:25 with Fectin and my little brother, then going again to a 7:55 showing with my dad tonight. Who knows, I might even have time for dinner in between the two showings. If it is anything less than awesome, this will likely be the last post you ever see by me on AfD or anywhere, as I will more than likely have taken my own life on a pile of swordfish. Otherwise, I'll have a review tonight or tomorrow. Go see it. I've read that if it does well enough the first two weeks that a sequel is guaranteed.

From my friend who is an authority on such things:

"Joss Whedon is as liberal as a capitalist can be. He may even have slightly socialist tendencies."

She supported it too, but I feel guilty posting the whole thing like it was mine. But yeah, Joss Whedon: Good writer, crazy politics.

I guess you could call this serious I wouldn't. though.

This post has nothing to do with God, that was just a joking reference. It does, however, have to do with mindless political idiocy. Remember last week when I typed up a long, sappy post about how people need to be more open-minded towards those they disagree with, and people need to offer an olive branch now and then? I give up on that. Over at a friend's message board (yes, it's the leftist friend's board that I always mention, but never link to because I was asked not to) a few days ago there was a post up about a Christian school that expelled a girl because her parents were lesbians, which I think everyone here would agree is a pretty shitty thing to do. I said as much, though I also pointed out angrily that it would have been nice to get the same indignation from leftists as I did when I posted this article about Palestinian torture of gays. As anyone who has been reading AfD for a while knows, with the exception of a single obligatory "that's awful" in regards to the torture, all of the responses were condemnations of me for being anti-Palestinian, and American Christians for being, ya know, just as bad. Me bringing this up again got me tarred once again with the "racist" label (the last refuge of the scoundrel). I find this pretty ridiculous, because nobody would think to condemn someone who referenced "Japanese atrocities" or "German atrocities" during the World War II era as racist, but even moreso, it's a deliberate attempt to dismiss reality by discrediting the messenger. This is fucking pathetic, especially coming from the "don't you dare question my patriotism" crowd. I am willing to be open-minded and understanding towards anyone willing to extend me the same courtesy, but I don't see how humoring this kind of accusational, ad hominem bullshit could make me any better of a person. I also pointed out in the thread Al Gore's established connections to homophobic hate cults, but again presenting facts only earned me further contempt, and Al Gore was let off the hook without giving a second thought to the hypocrisy in failing to publicly condemn his association, while trashing Republicans for alleged homophobia. I have to imagine at this point that, if I were a bona fide homophobe myself, I would probably be better liked by some of these people, as I would satisfy their need to believe in their preconceived notions, something that's easier to do when the facts fall right into place with where your prejudices expect them to. On the other hand, with at least one exception that I have posted on in the past, the professors at my school, both on the right and left, tend to be pretty centrist, or at least nonhostile towards opposing beliefs, and usually keep editorializing to a minimum, especially the professors I have this semester. I think the faculty at my school deserves a great deal of credit for this. It has definitely made me a lot more receptive to what they are saying, whether I agree with it or not. It's nice to have a political discussion of politics where there isn't an attempt to exploit every detail as a justification for hatred of those you disagree with.

Now, here is a leftist blogger who dares to suggest that it is wrong to exploit a Republican's alleged homosexuality for political gain, and he's met with bitter opposition from the vast majority of his readership, the likes of which I haven't even seen on Right-Thinking. The key difference being that Lee got his readers pissed off by acting like an asshole, whereas Kevin Drum pisses his readers off by being too decent. One of the things I find most amazing about the gay rights debate, as I've pointed out in the past, is that it seems to exist completely within a bubble of fantasy, and seems to give little acknowledgement to real world accomplishments, or the lack thereof. As I pointed out in the linked post, Democrats controlled the federal government with minimal opposition for most of the 20th century, yet the issue of gay marriage never really came up on the national political scene during any of that time. It wasn't until there was Republican dominance in both parts of the legislature and a Republican in the White House that we had two of our states legalize gay unions. Not that I'm saying Republicans deserve credit for this, but they don't deserve these shitty accusations that they're sending the gay rights movement back decades, when they really aren't doing much of anything on the issue. Yes, Bush did say that he would sign the Federal Marriage Amendment if it came to his desk. He also said he would sign the renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban if it came to his desk. In reality, he signed neither. Of course, Bush is never accused by the left of setting the gun rights movement backwards. I personally think that both vows by Bush were done for political gain, and neither was fully altruistic. So, to hear Democrats (who show a lack of altruism on gay rights by looking the other way on Islamic abuse of gays and the Gore/Phelps connection) try to justify the exploitation of someone's sexuality through accusations of homophobia is pretty pathetic.

I don't know. The more I learn about politics, the less I understand it.

I saw this cartoon over at Mike Kole's blog, and I figured Murel would appreciate it.

I bring it up because I caught the beginning of the Michael Medved show on my drive home from school today, and he was talking about an article by a New York Times movie critic, saying recent releases from Hollywood supposedly dispell the myth of a left-wing bias in Hollywood, citing movies like Just Like Heaven (which some think of us being supportive of the "right-wing side" of the Terri Schiavo debate), The Island (which is seen as being anti-cloning), The Excoricism of Emily Rose (supposedly pro-Christian), and The Great Raid (pro-U.S. military). Now, I have not seen any of these movies, but Medved acknowledged that these movies did seem to contain such messages, but he argued that they couldn't really be accused of an overt political message, and his main point was that whenever there is a really heavy-handed political message in anything out of Hollywood that it is always leftist.

Here's my take on the issue. First of all, I don't think there's any denying that Hollywood still leans heavily to the left, but I do honestly think that there has been a right-ward shift in the last few years (though, at the same time, many of the leftists got leftier), and I think there is a fairly obvious explanation for it, though the explanation is entirely speculation on my part. In a word: Jews. In 2004, Bush got a significant increase in the Jewish vote over 2000, and really over any Republican in the past. The term "neocon" is practically a codeword for hawkish Jews, and the post 9-11 atmosphere made it fairly obvious which side of the political spectrum supports Israel, for the most part. It's no secret that there are a lot of Jewish writers in Hollywood. I think it stands to reason to assume a lot of them moved to the right after 9-11, as did much of the Jewish community.

Now, as I said, this is speculation, but I have noticed more conservative or libertarian themed movies and television. I'm not sure if any of my examples had predominantly Jewish writing staffs or not, so my theory may not even apply. However, as many have pointed out, there was a pretty obvious Ayn Rand philosophy to The Incredibles. Now, the movie's creator, Brad Bird, has called this allegation ridiculous, but it really doesn't have to be intentional, as a lot of what is considered to be "conservaitve" or "libertarian" in the themes of The Incredibles could be considered plain old common sense. Not to someone who supports mandated egalitarianism maybe, or to someone who finds "hyper individualism" annoying, but to most people out there. Similarly, we've previously discussed the obvious and overt libertarian themes and messages in Firefly, but was that an intention of the series' creator Joss Whedon? I mean, the man threw a party in support of Kerry for president (though this may not necessarily make him a Democrat or a leftist, as many libertarians also hate Bush with an unholy passion, even though Bush does find fans among libertarians as well). I don't know Whedon's personal politics, but who knows, it could just be that the premise of Firefly lends itself so easily to libertarian philosophies. I think the show 24 is fairly obviously "neoconservative". Hell, Rush Limbaugh visited the set of the show before, and proclaimed on his radio show that all of the staff and writers he talked to were conservatives, and declared himself that there was a "movement" going on in Hollywood that most people didn't realize. Now, I don't think it would be fair to call 24 "unapologetically right-wing", as it often tries to be painfully politically correct when dealing with politically incorrect subject matter. For example, they'll portray Arab extremists as terrorists, but they try to secularize them as much as they can, and they repeatedly portray heroic Muslims giving passionate orations about how they hate the terrorists as much as anybody, and how they love America, and all this nice, sappy stuff (sometimes to the point where I just have to roll my eyes, as it can get to be pretty over the top). And, given time, I'm sure I could come up with plenty more examples. Now, there is a significant difference between the philosophies being promoted here, whether they're socially conservative/pro-life, neo-conservative, libertarian, or pro-Christian (not really right-wing, but it seen as such by those who adopt leftist politics as practically their religion, and many do), but regardless, taken all together I think this indicates a significant political shift in Hollywood. They are all still a minority in the industry, even if you group all four of the philosophies I just mentioned together, but they are definitely being represented. I even picked up on a right-leaning perspective in the first (and best, so far) season of Arrested Development. Granted, all political references in Arrested Development tend to be extremely subtle, and I've picked up on some more leftist perspectives in 2 or 3 of the episodes since season 1, but I doubt any of the political references on that show would get any person worked up about them, and there have been a few instances on that show where I figured something must have an intended political significance, but could not figure out what it was.

Frankly, while I can see ignoring the libertarian or neocon market, it surprises the hell out of me the way that Hollywood ignores the Christian market, especially after the unprecedented success of Passion of the Christ, let alone the hostility over the violence in the movie by the same critics who fellate Quentin Tarantino for every over the top gore-fest he puts out (one point worth noting, all of the violence in Passion is designed to make you feel sympathy for the one suffering the violence, whereas in plenty of other violent Hollywood movies that didn't get panned like Passion did by critics, you have the "hero" killing nameless faces without any attempt to create sympathy for those murdered or their families). It's also strange how most of the time it seems like the majority of movies in theaters are rated R, even while PG-13 has proved to be the biggest money maker. Hollywood intentionally ignores huge markets, and I think there are now people within the industry who recognize those markets, and who are having huge success in tapping them. Hollywood continues to put out the same formulaic crap again and again, and when you have all of these surprise successes like the Passion, or family friendly movies like Napoleon Dynamite and pretty much everything by Pixar (well, Pixar doesn't really fall into the "surprise success" category), which are genuinely creative and original, Hollywood still doesn't seem to get it. Now, I love me some profanity, sex, and violence, but that is not what makes the movie! I now originality can be risky, but it's less risky than putting out the same crap again and again, and expecting to do better than before. Anyway, thoughts?

(I'm too lazy to double-check my links right now, so let me know if you find any that are wrong)

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9496474/

Do we have any compelling evidence that this guy is incompetent?
I know that what he's saying is entirely reasonable, given what I know of Louisiana politics ("corrupt Hell-swamp" comes to mind as an apt description). I don't know how I can tell actual incompetance on his part from scapegoating.

I haven't been paying attention to this, so there could be strong evidence out there that he was hitting evacuees with a giant hammer (for example); I just don't know of any.

Right, so you're not going to believe this

In the news, today it was announced by the Supreme Chancellor of Cocks and Balls that the anal invasion of the outer regions will go forward ahead of schedule. The opposition anus was quoted as saying "Fuck balls. Fuck balls. Fuck balls! Fuck balls! FUCK BALLS! FUCK BALLS!!" When asked to ejaculate before the Senate commitee, Supreme Space Monster Megacocks was evasive and considerate. Anal Ring Worms is reported to have sex-shitted on allegations that his balls were less than forthcoming. The Vaginal Court convened on the issue, citing precedent of mega sex-fucking and tropical butt hemorrhages. ANALysts speculate that cocks to balls integration is at an all time high, even while truckloads of dead animals are being circumcised for insolence. Commodore Suckfuck's approval rapings are at an all time low, with meatshafts being sent to deliberate. Experts say it's only matter of time before critical balls are contemplated.

How fucking typical.

Lately I've been going to work everyday, going to school after that, trying to do homework, then spending all of my free time at either the new Kallini forum or Pointless Waste of Time. Also, I've been trying to get the entire series of Firefly rewatched before I go see it on Friday, and even trying to get a wee bit of exercise in (mostly bike riding). I haven't been paying attention to the news, I just really haven't been in the mood for it, so I honestly have nothing to post on.

Anyway, this was funny (read all of the comments too, it's pretty short).

The season premier of Arrested Development is on at 8pm tonight. If you don't watch this show, why not? It's the greatest show currently still on television in my opinion (given the current state of The Simpsons). Absolutely friggin' hilarious!

Admittedly, it's much better to watch this show from the beginning, in order (season 1 is out on DVD, and season 2 comes out next month), but if this show doesn't pick up ratings soon it's going to join Firefly, Futurama, and Andy Richter Controls the Universe in the ever-increasing collection of brilliant and original TV shows cancelled by FOX before they're given a chance. Dammit, that can't happen to me again!

Oh, and if you're interested, the Kallini Brothers have forums now, in case you're interested in shooting the shit with the Kallini regulars on whatever the hell topic you want.

Two nights ago I finished reading a really cool piece of online fiction, a supernatural comedy/horror story called John Dies at the End, from Pointless Waste of Time, and since the author encourages people who liked it to promote the story, I thought I'd give it it's own post. Kind of long (at least, for something you read at the computer), so maybe wait until you have some free time. I don't really read that supernatural, Stephen King type stuff, it's never really been my thing, but this story kept me thinking about it after I'd stop reading and wanting to know what happened next. Plus the funny parts made laugh. I'm planning on reading it again when I have the time, to try to catch anything I might have missed.

Also, not really related except that it's from the same website, they had a pretty funny post on the fight over "God" in the Pledge of Allegiance.

AMERICANS REJECT GOD
Posted 9.17.05

...from the Pledge of Allegiance in San Francisco schools. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales promised to fight controvertial decision to his "last Godloving breath."

"Imagine a world where nobody cared about God," Gonzales passionately argued to reporters, "He would say, 'I don't need them. I'm God.' But He would slowly die inside. Everybody would screen their calls, and every answering machine would be filled with His desperate attempts to catch a movie or something. I don't want to live in that world."

The case began last year, when Atheist Michael Newdow's daughter came home late from school, crying and covered in the blood of several neighborhood heathens and the ashes of their homes. Newdow believed her deranged slaughter was incited by the "G-bomb" she was forced to drop every morning while saying the Pledge.

The history and legal chaos of the phrase "under God" goes back further than most people know. It was first added to the Pledge in 1954, after Reverend Homer Ferguson's daughter came home late from school, crying and covered in the blood of virgins she had sacrificed to Batman (the god of Atheism at the time). Ferguson believed her blasphemy was incited by the phrase "over God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, and sued to have it changed.

Legal scholars usually place the beginning of the debate in the Garden of Eden. When Adam and Eve ate of the Fruit of Knowledge, they instantly knew the infallible truth of Atheism. They argued for weeks with each other about whether they should remove "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance to God. Looking down from Heaven, God became extremely annoyed by this and said, "Pledge allegiance to this, fuckers," consigning every human being to a lifetime of horror.

Instead of the pledge, each morning school children in San Francisco will now recite the lyrics to Rapper's Delight by The Sugar Hill Gang.

My dad e-mailed me a link to a libertarian's fisking of a leftist's critique of Firefly. I think you Firefly fans here would love this leftist's analysis:

At the urging of many of my most trusted nerdfriends, I sat down to watch a DVD of the cancelled Joss Whedon series firefly. Woah. That is some heavy-duty right-wing stuff there.

...

The characters are all individually interesting, and the dialog, as would be expected, is clever and crisp. However, the entire framework of the show is a bizarre masculine-libertarian fantasy, even worse than the original Star Wars trilogy.

...

In Star Trek, we are treated to a vision of a positive future, one in which politics focuses on an expansive defense of peace and justice, rather than individual glorification. I have nothing against gritty distopias like firefly, but it’s sad that the heroes it offers are all but dressed in the Confederate Flag.

Read the rest. As Jayne Cobb would say, it's high-larious! For any AfD readers who have never watched the show, this ought to be incentive enough to go buy the DVD. Oh, plus this blogger provides a link to a libertarian's review of Firefly, and this libertarian had posted an Amazon.com review of Firefly by another leftoid:

The concept is a group of Confederate holdouts after the Civil War. In a way it's the anti-Star Trek, like a group of violently independent right-wingers who can't stand the liberal Federation of Planets (or a present-day anti-government militia group). This show panders to the worst of the Right and apparently enjoyed a strong following from that sector, but the rest of us should let it pass into well-deserved obscurity.

"Worst of the Right"? That sounds like us!

This recent post on the LEGO Serenity, and this post by Manwhore at Right-Thinking got me all reminiscent and shit about LEGOs. I suppose my fondest LEGO memories where my friend's characters, Larry, Paul, and Bernie, three LEGO men who went on all manner of exciting adventures. I quite specifically remember Andy, the camp counselor at the "summer camp" (more accurately a mass baby-sitting factory run out of the music room and the gym from the upper elementary school) jumping up and grabbing the basketball net, then climbing his way up to the rim so that he might return one of those delightful LEGO men to my friend. I also remember at one time noticing visible face melting on one of the characters, which my friend claimed was from the microwave. I don't know what kind of hell those three men went through, but let me just say that this friend is the reason that I no longer have any Ninja Turtle or WWF action figures (which, at one point I had quite a few of). Also, he is to blame for many of the disfigured and maimed Tyrannosaurus Rex's I have put away in a cardboard box to this day. Indeed, I saw many a beloved childhood toy's life ended on my dad's workbench. Ah... I miss those days. Of course, it was far more fun when the Holy Tard was breaking other children's toys. There was one time where he quite thoroughly destroyed this tree fort some neighbor kids built in the woods behind our house (don't worry, they were assholes who deserved it), while I ran back and forth from the house to grab dad's tools and implements of destruction, and later flashlights as the unholy procedures carried on into the night. Those were good times.

Anyway, this was supposed to be a post about LEGOs. Maybe you readers have some fun LEGO stories worth telling? And also less evil friends. Maybe.

I assume everyone who reads this blog is a pretty big proponent of Laissez Faire capitalism, as am I. Of course, we all know that an absolute pure capitalis society has never existed, and probably never will. A certain amount of socialism, it seems is inevitable. I am wondering where you readers would agree that a certain amount of socialism is acceptable. Obviously even our founders intended for roads and postal services to be public rather than private (though I doubt they would object to creation of roads and alternative mail delivery services by private entities). Does government have a role in regulation of business beyond protecting the life, liberty, and property of citizens from a potentially corrupt business? Back during the industrialization of this country we had company towns, where businesses pretty much owned and controlled an entire town, the entire population working for them, and were pretty much able to control every facet of the town like an authoritarian state, largely because they were able to keep people in permanent debt. Since it is the job of government to enforce payment on debt, a private entity that holds a debt over your head essentially has the power of state coercion over you, which I think is a pretty anti-libertarian concept. I'm no expert on debt and finance, but it seems to me that there is a neccessity for regulation in the area of debt, and in businesses where pretty much all they do is manipulate money on paper, because I really see a potential for danger there. I don't know, I've never heard much talk from pundits on this (I don't think conspiracy theories about international bankers counts), but when I look at the way insurance companies and credit card companies and banks operate, or have the apparent potential to operate, it just makes me uneasy.

Also, what do you folks think of the role of organized labor in society? I think so long as labor movements operate strictly on voluntary organization by individuals, and not with the coercive hand of government (or the mafia), that they are a good thing, so long as individuals can opt out of a union if they choose, and do have their role in society. Their role isn't as important as it once was, because as much as almost every job in the world still sucks, we really do have things good in this country.

What about the social safety net? What do you guys think it should incorporate, how far should it extend? I think it has it's place, but we have so much bloated bureaucracy in our system, and we have programs that aren't thought through in a way that will make them genuinely effective (except, of course, in getting votes for politicians), and many are actively harmful.

Anyway, I'm just throwing a bunch of random thoughts at you, since I know I have a lot of intelligent readers here (though I don't know what I ever did to earn an intelligent readership), and I'm really trying to help formulate my own opinions as much as anything, because I sometimes honestly don't know what to think. Lately I've been so sick of political talking points, and people going into some sort of default political mode no matter what topic comes up (this has been especially irritating to me in the wake of all of these conspiracies and finger pointing in the wake of Katrina), and I really want to have an open an honest political discussion where ideas are honestly analyzed nad thought over. It bugs me that people are so willing to just adopt some pre-fab set of political beliefs off the left/right-wing extra value menu, and let that be the dominating religion (essentially) of their life, especially since I prefer to recognize that every other person on the planet has a unique set of life experiences, and millions of unspoken thoughts that there is no way of perceiving on the surface, and aren't the two-dimensional cartoons that we try to categorize them as for convenience sake.

After Katrina it seemed like everybody came out with absolute conviction in some area where all I was able to see was uncertainty. Everybody was some kind of expert, or authority, or somehow was able to know for certain the motives of people they'd never even met, and I couldn't help but think... am I the only one in the world who is clueless and uncertain about what went wrong, what went right, and everything? I felt like I didn't know what to think, as I do a lot but usually not as strongly as in this circumstance. What I want to see in the comments to this post is the kind of political discussion that I imagine we've all had in one on one situations, where the other person is respectful and considerate of our opinions, as we are of theirs, whether we agree or not, where we acknowledge an understanding of where the other person is coming from before we plainly and politely explain why we disagree. Politics as usual has been getting kind of boring for me. I want to hear where people feel uncertainties, where you have mixed feelings on an issue, any issue. I'm pretty damn sick of the news media. I want to hear the topics hovering around near the back of peoples minds, thoughts that are maybe not fully formed, as so many of mine tend not to be. Things that you ruminate over in your head, but never really thought was worth mentioning. If only for the sake of doing some that I sincerely doubt any other blog has ever done, left, right, or otherwise.

UPDATE: I didn't mean to sound sappy (or pretentious) or anything when I wrote this rant, it was just some stream of consciousness rant that kind of flowed as I typed (as most of my lengthy posts tend to be, which explains why they always see to stray from topic to topic). I was just thinking of some more personal discussions I've had on politics, and how different they are the internet conversations you see. I know when talk to one leftist friend of mine on Instant Messanger, I tend to get a lot more concessions and agreement from him then when I'm on his message board with all his leftist friends. While I suspect he may be just agreeing with me out of politeness, it's a very different situation. In a class I had back in spring I used to sit next to this girl who I had kind of a crush on, and on the other side of her sat a kid from Bosnia, and the three of us would talk failry regularly (note, when I say "kid" I mean about 20 or 21 years old, though I'm 23 and still think of myself as a big, dumb kid). We usually didn't talk politics, but I had sort of picked up on the fact that their political views were probably failry different than mine. One day the Bosnian student, who for the purpose of this conversation I will refer to as Sergevojervijikzevekjovikowich, had stated that he felt we should ban guns in this country, and he thought it would help a lot. I, of course, politely disagreed with him, and explained why. He conceded pretty much every point I made, and said he could definitely see good arguments on both sides. The purdy young lady sitting between us said nothing, so even though she had given hints of left-leaning views, she was obviously not a crazy dogmatic type like some of my friends. Anyway, how rare is it that you get a conversation like that online? However, I've actually found that in arguing with some leftists online that if I am polite and respectful (which I only really am towards those who can support their views and argue somewhat intelligently), that you can pry a surprising amount of concessions out of them. Granted, I've only tested this a few times. Anyway, here's a partial Red vs. Blue transcript that I think describes internet political debate vs. an in person debate pretty well:

* Black screen with words: Discussing Politics - Real Life *
* Church standing in front of Sarge *
Church: Look, that's just the way I feel about it.
Sarge: Well I disagree, but I respect your opinion.
* Black screen with words: Discussing Politics - Internet *
* A full fledged firefight *
Church: You deserve to DIE! Die, and go to hell and burn!
Sarge: Oh yeah!? Well I hope you get raped! Twice! Maybe then you'll feel different! Jerk!
Grif: We don't need to find any weapons of mass destruction! We just need to want to find 'em. That's the way it works!
Simmons: I voted for Nader! I hate everyone!
Doc: Would you like to change your homepage to moveon.org?
Donut: Politics makes me soooooo horny. Check out my webcam pic at presidentialsluts.com

Anyway, mabye I'm just being too self-conscious about my writing. Whatever. You read it, you can't unread it!

In a turn of events that could only be described as "SUPER AWESOME!!!!!111!!1!111111!", I am now an administrator at Kallini.com. This is mainly so I have a permanent home for Angry Stick-figure Man, that doesn't make me agree to stupid terms of services, but it means I can post now, and I have my bio up with the rest of the Team Kallini bloggers. Don't worry though, I'll still blog here at AfD, because really most of the crap I post here does not belong on an even moderately decent blog. If I have important or interesting posts that aren't getting much attention in the Blogosphere, then I will probably post it there, but the posts where I talk about TV shows and crap like that will probably be here.

For you Firefly fans, this is pretty cool, somebody made a model of Serenity out of Legos. (hat tip)

The movie comes out on the 30th of this month, which means less than three weeks left to wait! Huzzah!

I have all of my Angry Stick-figure Man cartoons on PhotoBucket.com, which hosts images for free. Today I logged in to my PhotoBucket account, and got a new terms of service message that I have to agree to to use my account. One of the terms I have to agree to is:

By using the Services you agree that you will not:

Upload, email or otherwise transmit any images that are unlawful, obscene, harmful, threatening, defamatory, hateful, invade the privacy of any third party, or are otherwise objectionable. Photobucket.com does not control the content of users' accounts and does not have any obligation to monitor such content for any purpose. You acknowledge that you are solely responsible for all content and material you provide to the Service; [emphasis added by me -- MA]

So, do you think my comics fall under any of those forbidden categories? If so, does anyone know of a good free image hosting site I can use, that is considerably less... moral? I haven't agreed to the terms yet, because I'm frightened to. I still have all of my original drawings, but PhotoBucket is the only place I have the files stored, as I remove them from my computer after I upload them. It sounds like they don't intend to monitor all of the files hosted, so I'll probably be fine regardless of what their standards are (and really, there's nothing in ASM any worse than what every single teenage boy in the country drew in his notebook in high school), but I thought I should get some more opinions on this.

Oh my God, Pointless Waste of Time is by far one of the greatest websites I have ever seen! I think their Monkeysphere essay should be required reading for everyone and anyone. It would definitely help to eliminate much of the asshole behavior in the world if everyone read it.

Some more great essays on there,

The Suicide Guide
The Ultimate War Simulation
10 Ways Online Gaming Will Change the Future
The Second American Civil War
A Message Regarding the War

also, their Snopes-parodying Urban Legends Database is hilarious.

I recommend reading everything on there (as I have spent nearly all of my internet time of late attempting).

Dear people of New Orleans,

I hate you.

Love MA

For the first time since the original Angry Stick-figure Man cartoon, ASM reprises his role as Lee from Right-Thinking, in this Oscar-worthy performance. Bask in its radiant glory!

Still, you gotta give Lee credit though, for openly admitting when Powerline makes him their bitch.

I've been spending almost all the time I've been on the internet lately over at the hilarious Pointless Waste of Time. I completely lost it watching this flash, which goes through the entire original Star Wars, but adds captions to all the pictures, which had me laughing my arse off. The site warns of the Star Wars flash, "John made this and I am deeply sorry to anyone who clicks it. THIS CONTAINS ADULT, GUT-WRENCHING LANGUAGE AND SHOULD NOT BE READ EVEN BY ADULTS.", and I advise you not to take that warning lightly, but I assume that since we have a bunch of Angry Stick-figure Man fans here that most of you would enjoy it. Anyway, the entire site is completely hilarious, and highly recommended by me.

I just wanted to make sure that none of my beloved AfD readers died in the hurricane, or the flooding of New Orleans. If you are still alive, please post an acknowledgement of this in the comments. If you didn't make it, please make sure to let us know. If you survived with all of your mental prowess in tact, please post a scathing and accurate political commentary of the opposite -wing of the political spectrum from yourself, that we may all relish in your astute logic and keen observations.

Okay, yeah, I can't think of anything to post that other bloggers haven't already posted and offered better commentary on than I could. Sorry folks, I just plain suck. Read Free Will, it's awesome, and Aaron has some great hurricane coverage.