Weekend Open Thread

8 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread”

1. Who hasn't stolen office supplies when leaving a job?

   "Trump to return Ancient Israeli artifacts." How did they get to Mar a Lago?

   Donald Trump has apparently been shamed into returning ancient Israeli artifacts. All it took was the nation going public with its efforts to get its antiquities back from Mar-a-Lago. After all, it’s not like the ceramic oil lamps and coins were something Trump cared about keeping, like classified documents. But the story of how the Israeli artifacts got to Mar-a-Lago, as reported by The Wall Street Journal, is both predictable if you’ve observed Trump over the years, and incredibly weird by any standards but Trumpian ones.

   The artifacts were originally supposed to be displayed at the White House over Hanukkah 2019, but didn’t make it there in time. So Saul Fox, the big donor (to both Republicans and the Israeli antiquities authority) who facilitated the loan, hired a courier to bring them to his house and then “sort of forgot about it,” like you do when possessing national treasures that missed their chance for display at the White House.

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   1. Trump "forgot" about the antiquities. Just like he "forgot" about all those boxes of classified documents.

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2. 

   Oppenheimer is overrated. Christopher Nolan is a pompous hack. Watch Fat Man and Little Boy it’s the better a-bomb movie.

   Barbie is a complex, rich, display of humanity. SEE BARBIE! 

   I tell you as a movie fan and a man, dig the stick out of your ass, get your butt to Barbie. 

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3. All too true 🙁

   

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4. Excerpt from an Alexandra Petri satire of what conservatives think they're trying to get across in the Barbie movie:

   The lawn sign outside reads “In this house we believe ALL MEN MUST DIE” in pink six times.

   Barbie wakes up and stretches.

   KEN: Hiya, Barbie!

   BARBIE: Hi, Ken! I despise all men, and I have come to take away everyone’s testosterone! Even the testosterone of those people who are using and enjoying it.

   KEN: Good! It is bad that I exist! Please, Barbie, I would like to be burned at the stake to set an example!

   BARBIE: No, Ken! How dare you suggest appropriating witch culture! Furthermore, it would release chemicals into the atmosphere, something that is bad to do and I oppose. I want America’s coal and gas industries to die! But first, all men.

   KEN: Good. All men deserve to perish because of the patriarchy, which is something we each are doing every day, individually, and could stop whenever we wanted. If any little boy is watching this movie now, I want him to know (stares directly, dead-eyed into camera) you should hate yourself.

   BARBIE: That’s right! I am not complaining about systems but about individuals! Now, come admire my map, which is propaganda for China.

   KEN: China is the best place to live!

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5. Thank you for sharing. I think that its perhaps more imaginative than conservatives actual resistance to seeing the movie. Though a good indicator it mentions is from a conservative who did see the movie: 

   https://twitter.com/LuckeyGinger/status/1681329395343007746

    

   “tries to normalize the idea that men and women can’t collaborate positively (yuck).” 

   Ginger Gaetz

   She might have left during ending or ignored President Barbie (because she is black) who says that they will integrate more of the Kens. Ultimately the point of their critiques is not about the movie but rather the world they would like presented to them. 

   For the last 8 years or so there has been a push to make an alternate universe a Conservative universe or the “con-verse”. In the con-verse colored people arent upset by you calling them names and are gracious for their history of being slaves. In the con-verse the word ‘patriarchy’ doesn’t exist because why would you examine ‘gender roles’. Coffee companies agree with your worldview because everyone agrees with your worldview. In the con-verse is just as good as it is in the real world so long as you don’t know the real world exist.

   ‘Barbie’ the movie could never speak to conservatives when it illustrates too much of what they cant recognize without tearing down their own world. Similarly to Sound of Freedom they can’t recognize the movies shortcomings because it would diminish their world view. 

   Seeing Oppenheimer and Barbie back to back is a slog. Seeing Barbie second will help bring you back to the real world. 

    

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   1. Full disclosure, I've seen none of Barbenheimer but hope to see them both someday. Your "con-verse" take seems quite accurate, interesting, and unfortunate. I'm concerned about the lack of a "second gear" in thought and discourse in all kinds of segments of our society. Too many of us have turned way too binary. Never in my wildest dreams did I think folks would freak out so much over Barbie or Bud Light.

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   2. Abridged version:  People who live in a MSU world are gonna’ be mostly concerned with, and worked up by, MSU stuff.

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