Other M-nivesaries

<sotto voce> Sure has been a while. Be warned that the following post jumps around all over the place like a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.</sotto voce>

Well here we are on the anniversary of the day that everything changed. Hard to believe that it's been nine years already. Almost a full decade since America went stone cold cuckoo.

This post was going to be about that bugfuck crazee Koran burning cult, but then I realized that that guy was so nutso-whoohoo-ooga-booga-boo that even the Pammycakes thinks it's a dumb idea. Anyways, d00d's totally chickened out.

So the whole thing got me to thinking about anniversaries. Tomorrow this blog will be one year and one week old - meaning I'm late in acknowledging my own blog's birthday.

What was I doing Sept. 5, 2010 instead of some Cookie 4 Me self-congratulatory wanking? I could have lorded my big scoop over teh Mendacious one and acted like an arrogant jerk in the face of his gracious acknowledgement of my pot-smoking bear following skillz. A full week after the fact...

What could I have possibly been doing that was more important than patting myself on the back?

I was playing Metroid. Actually, on the fifth I was finishing the story mode of Metroid: Other M.

How is it? Well, I'd give it about an 80% - same as Metacritic. Why am I talking about it? Well, I'm actually using it as a launching pad for a discussion about gender - mostly with respect to this review (also the video version which is basically the same - but with Morgan Webb's voice).

SPOILERS AHEAD

When, the spoilers aren't immediately ahead - but they'll be following and I felt that I ought to give fair warning.

Maybe it's that, as a guy - I just don't get it. That's the whole thing about privilege - you don't realize you're wallowing in it because it's just a part of who you are. But SRSLY - WTF. I mean, it's not like these reviewers are reviewing their first ever video game. It's not like they raised Abbie Heppe in some sort of cultural vaccuum before letting her at Metroid. It's not like G4 didn't nominate a game where offing prostitutes rewards the player with cash and health for Game of the Year.

So let's get to the point - G4 didn't like Other M because apparently Samus Aran is a whiny crybaby. ORLY? Wot game were they playing? Because I don't think it was Metroid.

Firstly, and this is their own first big sticking point - in all Metroid games Samus gains powers as the game progresses, meaning that she needs to not have them at the beginning. In Other M, she starts off with all of them, but opts to not use them. Presumably in order to keep the guys in the Galactic Federation squad she's hooked up with happy. You know, this seems a helluva lot more "Gender Issues Progressive" than the usual approach of having her stripped of her powers by some outside force. Here she chooses not to bust out the Plasma or Ice Beam or Missiles or whatever. It's something Samus decides to do on her own.

But wait - the only reason she's doing it is to make some guy happy. Except of course - that "some guy" happens to be the commanding officer of a military squad. I guess expecting Samus to co-operate with anyone - despite the fact that she has done so throughout the series of games - is too much of a stretch. I guess that having your main character decide to voluntarily limit her behaviour when working with representatives of the military is some variety of bad writing.

Of course that "some guy" also happens to be Samus' surrogate father figure - and the lady has some serious daddy issues. Clearly writing a female main character with daddy issues is some sort of sexist insult to women everywhere. I mean it's not like she's Starkiller or Kratos or Solid Snake or Fox McCloud. SRSLY G4, if you have a problem with Samus having "daddy issues", then your problem isn't with Other M - it's with action entertainment in general. Wait - there's also the Prince from Katamari, so it's not limited to just folks who kill the ever loving crap outta people (although the Prince does kill a lot of people). And it's not like she has daddy issues because her father would only lavish her with material gifts instead of actual approval - it's because she was violently orphaned as a child. SRSLY, Space Pirates killed her parents and she's gotten revenge on them in every Metroid game including completely destroying a couple of planets in oprder to do it - and NOW you have a problem with her "daddy issues"? W. T. F.

Okay, any of you still with me? Especially those of you of the BOOBIES gender? Here's the part where I show off either how smart I are, or how unthinkably out of touch I am.

So the difference between Samus and those other icons of unresolved issues with their fathers is that Samus recognizes it. In one of the cutscenes she acknowledges the difficulties she has with Adam and how they are related to her daddy issues. And herein, I think, is the part that makes Metroid: Other M one of those post-feminist whatchamacallits. That there are differences between men and women, including things like women generally being in touch with their own motivations outside of immediate gratification (although that's not to say that women aren't into immediate gratification as well - as your mom has shown me on oh so many occassions).

One of the criticisms about Samus Aran being some sort of feminist symbol is that it didn't matter whether a man or woman was inside the Powersuit - that her gender was nothing more than a gimmick. Maybe so, but that's the feminist argument - that gender shouldn't make a difference.

But of course, gender does make a difference. Gender is part of our identity - and self-identification is one of those important things that we're all supposed to respect now. And maybe I'm totally off-base here, but isn't that what Other M has actually accomplished? A totally kick-ass action hero that has feminine qualities other than on her chest.

Then again, maybe the problem isn't that she's at least marginally emotionally self-aware, it's with how she acknowledges it - the use of the words "Confession Time". Well here's a newsflash for Abbie Heppe and Morgan Webb and all the other Samus h8rs - there's at least one very manly man that uses the phrase Confession Time with some regularity. And if you doubt my manliness - well just ask your mom.

Confession Time - the reason I'm partial to this phrase is probably related to some sexual fantasy I have involving your mom and a confessional.

I'm a Guitar Slinging Demon

via Radio 3

Further evidence of police incompetency.

Busting a marijuana grow-op is fairly routine for police in B.C.’s West Kootenay region. But when RCMP raided a grow-op near the tiny town of Christina Lake recently, they found what they say was an unusual security contingent – a troop of black bears.

Officers were “a little shocked” to discover 10 bears prowling the property like live “traps” waiting to greet intruders, said RCMP spokesman Corporal Dan Moskaluk.

Officers went about their work “cautiously,” said Corp. Moskaluk, but quickly realized the bears were quite mellow.

No doubt they were mellow. Heh.

There was no evidence the bears were also being fed marijuana.

WTF?!

But wait, there's more!

“Inside the residence there was a large pig roaming around and there was a large raccoon sleeping on the bed,” Corp. Moskaluk said. “Who knows what the raccoon was up to because he was just vegging in the house ... the pig was strolling around the household. He seemed to be a bit more nervous than the raccoon about the police officers’ presence.”

I'm starting to think that this was actually the set of a new sitcom.

Speaking of Mary Jane and Radio 3, here's your indie Canookistani song for teh post:

Clarification for Liberal Leftsists.

Apparently teh leftsist just don't get it. Atrios completely misses the point and then the guy he linked too blows it also.

Puh-leese. As noted by Doctor Zero,

This is not a First Amendment issue...At any rate, denying permission to build a single structure is not equivalent to suppressing the free exercise of religion.

Even if that denial is based solely on the religious nature of the building. You see, what you are all forgetting is that the First Amendment is for Real Americans ONLY. In fact, Obama's support for allowing Muslims the free exercise of religion is, in fact a deadly assault upon the First Amendment.

IF they had only just waited for one of the Escha-minions to explain it to them.

Teh East Coast is Backwards

How did the trip go? Pretty good - thanx 4 asking. Well, at least as good as two days in New Brunswick can get with a sixteen hour work-day stuck in the middle.

First night's dinner was on a patio in Bathurst and there was some sort of outdoor concert playing across the street at the waterfront park. Covers of that old time Rock 'n Roll - a totes serendipitous serenade. But the crowd sucked. I mean even worse than the folks at Bloodstock. Must have been a few hundred that turned out and they had about as much energy as a right blogger post-Cheeto-binge. If I were half the Dragon-King I was twenty years ago, I'd have taken a flamethrower to the place.

Anyways, no visit to New Brunswick is complete without a stop and then rolling backwards up Magnetic Hill.

Unlike Prop Hate, I'm Not Dead

Too many people beg off updating because they're too busy with their real lives. Well not me, no siree - I blame Obama DQIX. If I had sunk half the time into this blog as I did into farming Grubby Bandages off of Mummy Boys, there woulda been a masterwork of genius on this page every fricking day since July 21.

So anywho, here's your update:

SUCK IT HATERS!!!one!

Or to quote teh old white d00d appointed by Republican Bush teh Elder:

Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license...the court concludes that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional.

Enjoy. I'll be outta town teh next coupla days - not that anyone other than the folks at Questers Rest are going to notice.

Sponges Suck

I've been listening to a lot of Radio 3 recently and while it's introduced me to a lot of music I'd never listen to otherwise (but actually in a good way) - it's also reminded me of some forgotten greatness like the Arrogant Worms.


Here's one of the new things I came across - although I'm kinda ashamed that as a resident of LEAFS SUCK, I didn't know about Teh Balconies until after I heard them on Internets Radio.

Soliciting a General

At first, Elena Kagan's nomination troubled me. Her definition of "battlefield" with respect to battlefield law was problematic. On the issues of law, I general defer to those more knowledgeable. While balkinization was full of conflict o f interest in this case, it's pretty much unarguable that replacing Stevens with Kagan moves the Court to the right. So I was skeptical. Even more so when there seemed to be bipartisan support for her. Fuck. You. Bipartisanship.

Anyways, I've changed my mind. And not only because opposing her is pretty much a lost cause at this point. She's demonstrated a n actual sense of humour and identity politics and tribalism dictates that I must stand by her.

But SRSLY, the positions we've seen from her so far (barring a leaked sex video) were from her playing a position as an advocate. Her job at the time she was presenting those arguments was to present arguments favourable to her employer. That isn't to say that nothing can be determined from those arguments, obviously she was sympathetic enough to the authoritarian stances of indefinite detention that she could make those arguments. That still troubles me. It's just that these positions do not necessarily reflect how she personally feels about those issues. That issue of lack of judicial experience and record actually weighs in her favour in this case.

Although it really IS about her having a sense of humour - about being jokingly irreverant during her Senate confirmation hearing. That takes a kind of self-awareness and EPIC chutzpah that I find admirable AND that I personally believe to be antithecial to wingnut-i-tude. For example, imagine Clarence Thomas making some of the cracks that Kagan did.

As for her answer to the Team Edward or Team Jacob question? I'd have swooned if she had answered Dakota Fanning - but I guess you gotta gripe about the Supreme Court nominees that Usurper Hussein X gives you you have and not the one you might want to have.