kronisk

Well, perhaps that process would be more difficult and resource-intensive in this hypothetical scenario, so it would be much easier and less hassle to just keep the bodies alive?

Well, it’s implied that a house is part of the deal, since where else is the horse going to live? A flight attendant won’t have a horse house just sitting around.

I enjoyed the movie Driveways that in part is about cleaning out a hoarder’s house. Plus it’s got Brian Dennehy in it, it’s his last movie before he died.

“Monster” fatberg found blocking east London sewer

I was wondering why I hadn’t seen your mom around lately

I agree, it should have ended after Ancient Greese.

Well, besides eventual differences in cognitive ability, this probably has a lot more to do with that a lot of teenagers today aren’t responsible for much at all. In smaller communities, you see the event chain much clearer. You probably know who has to fix the ruined thing. Perhaps you even have to help out yourself. To put it simply, you don’t shit where you drink. This of course presupposes that the small community is a community to begin with; connections and relations between people and their environment need work, need to be maintained.

In a modern context or a larger city, you have much less of an immediate connection to the consequences of breaking, say, a streetlight. Someone else has to clean it up, someone else has to fix it, and they probably get paid for doing so anyway. And this is the typical attitude of everyone around you, this is what you learn.

But to turn this around, most of the environment around you in modern society actually has nothing to do with you. In an urban environment, not much is “yours” and you have little direct investment in anything. You’re a guest in your own living space. And with this in mind, why should you care about some streetlight? Or some building you’re not even allowed to enter? Or a street full of billboards for products other people make money from?

Bear meme

I’m starting to feel like a shill because I say this so often, but Kagi is the only one I’ve found that actually does the job anymore. To me a search engine that works is worth the small cost each month, but unfortunately I don’t see paying for search becoming mainstream anytime soon.

And here is the link for anyone who didn’t read it.

Something being entertaining to you when you’re a kid that you can acknowledge was shit when you’re an adult is a normal part of growing up.

Sure, I remember my twenties well enough. And then the next stage in growing up is forgiving your younger self and understanding that books can be good in different ways, and that some books are brilliant for kids and teenagers. Good detective fiction can also be brilliant for what it is. You’re nearly there yourself in your original comment. No one is comparing Harry Potter to Gravity’s Rainbow or Wuthering Heights here.

The argument that something should be considered good because there exists other things which can be considered significantly worse is not a very good framework for arguing for the quality of a work of fiction. This is classic “damning by faint praise.”

I’m surprised you didn’t link to Wikipedia…but that’s not really the argument here. The point is one of context and being reasonable, and that in the field of young adult fiction, they stand out. Would I say they’re the best childrens books? No. And if you had been more reasonable - not called them “shit” perhaps - it would have been a different story. And I see you skirt the issue, but the reason people go on and on about the failings of Harry Potter these days is very obvious, and it has little to do with literary value.

The foundational premise of this argument is that you know something to be true because you perceive it to be so. This is like me saying that I know I’m a good cook because I cook every day and enjoy the food that I make for myself.

Or like you saying “her books are simple, accessible, designed for mass appeal, relatively thematically shallow…” Of course it’s my assessment, grounded in experience. I’m not going to do a close reading of the series in this format, I’m sorry. But I don’t really see that level of effort from you, either. (And “accessible” is a weird thing to criticize in a work geared towards children, btw…)

because she did what J. J. Abrams does with every single t.v. show he’s ever made and allude to an elaborate set of mysteries that actively drove fan engagement via wild speculation about the future of the series between novels.

Rowling delivered in the end though, which is what JJ never does and why he should be banned from ever making TV again. I don’t see how the comparison is valid, readers may have been disappointed but there were answers and genuine surprises there.

He is obviously inflated, she has to hold him down or else he’ll float to the ceiling.

And I guess the reason you read the whole thing is…that it was so awful? Be honest with yourself.

It’s certainly not without its faults. (One thing I NEVER see mentioned is the excessive fatshaming, I guess there’s not room for more than one narrative at a time.) It is, however, a book written for children and teenagers. And for what it is, the plots and themes ask more of, and give more back to, young readers than so much of the other drivel that is readily available to them. I know this, since I read to my own children and teenagers every day, and buy them books to read for themselves. There is a reason the Potter books are still as popular as ever.

If we’re being honest, the real issue is that Rowling is now le diable du jour, which means everything she ever did is now material for our daily two minutes of hate. The books have to be completely without merit as well because it’s just not possible to hold even mildly conflicting views simultaneously.

Well, I for one want to hear more about your racist dog?

Kids are extremely good at learning new things, and on average, old people are not. Whatever explanation to this state of things you prefer, and there’s obviously exceptions, this is just how it is.

“It’s a lovely morning in the village, and you are a horrible goose.”

Plus it’s an incredibly one-sided and myopic reading of the work that even a child can easily see through.

Theodor Kittelsen.

Nazis are absolutely vilified in Sweden and Finland, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’d say NSBM bands is a lot more prevalent in Eastern Europe and Russia.

I also don’t think that not having morals would necessarily prevent me from caring if people are hypocritical, or thinking that other people are morally repugnant. I’m just thinking that they’re morally repugnant by some external set of morals which aren’t my own, obviously, some morals which I haven’t internalized, and which aren’t mine, probably.

Think you have it in you to write at least one paragraph where you don’t contradict yourself? You say you care, but have no internalized morals? Which is it?

Yes, having no morals would prevent you from caring if people are hypocritical – this is what is known as a moral stance. Without morals, there is nothing wrong with hypocrisy.

Sorry to keep you from your preferred activities, I just think you should really think this through before you mention it to anyone again.

Then why care if people are being hypocritical? Why should it bother you that people adopt whatever beliefs are beneficial at the moment and then change them when it suits them? Isn’t that the smartest attitude to have? How could you even call someone else “morally repugnant”?