Searching for meaning is fine. Searching for this type of symbolism or allegory, which is a very specific type of rhetorical structure, is often dumb and shallow. Meaning is in place all the time, often accidentally, but not all fictional elements in a story are correlated to other fictional elements in the same story.

When straight characters express love/sexuality, it’s normal! When gay characters express love/sexuality, it’s pandering!

Not a Thicke fan, but his song sounds NOTHING like Gayes'. It shares only three basic SECONDARY concepts: falsetto vocals, a bouncy bass line, and a similar tempo. These (concepts) are not things you can copyright. The most important tangible element, the MELODY, is not even vaguely similar. Even the chord…

Also unusual in that in a trial for murder, arson, armed robbery etc, it's (generally, there are obviously excrptions) not in dispute that someone was stabbed to death, or a warehouse was destroyed, or a gas station clerk was held up at gunpoint. What's in dispute is the involvement of the accused. A finding of not…

Yes. It is, actually. But you're too busy trying to find ways that feminists hate men to realize that's a central tenant of feminism - that the patriarchy hurts everyone.

Or, "there is no evidence of rape!" As a lawyer this boggles the mind. Testimony is evidence. If she testifies that he did it, that's evidence. Just like if he testifies he didn't, that is also evidence. What people are really saying is that men are more trustworthy than women, at all times.

You make so many excellent points in this piece Jia, but this one stands out;

can you read

Marvel has been developing Psychohistory for years.

Why would I want to play games with anyone who thinks game reviews are more important than people being terrorized out of their homes?

Well you're awfully sensitive.

Technically, no business needs to make a profit to exist, so long as it tallies up all the costs of existing as expenses. You need a profit to grow, but not to exist.

Sounds like someone gets yelled at online a lot for being a jerk.

"The Law is reason free from passion" Aristole. (Yes, this was in Legally Blonde. I can't do anything about that.)

So tell it. Calling her "the victim" and posting a photo and a lurid description of her death doesn't commemorate her. She was a young woman. If you want to pay tribute to her, tell her story.

This is a very well-written piece of fiction and definitely tries to get into the mind of the other person to make them "not a villain." However, I don't think suing god and everyone is going to help the case any.

How about "Redskins?"

I was going to write a big piece about how the entire system is corrupt because it's taking value from both athletes and students by creating the idea that athletics is more important than being a functioning human being, but you know what?

The bigger, longer-term issue might be how exactly Facebook plans to monetize Oculus. Zuck said earlier today that he's not interested in making a profit off of the hardware (which is good!) but that "there may be advertising"

"A mulatto, an albino, a mosquito, my libido" sang Kurt Cobain, about four things you can kill with a shotgun. Cobain successfully killed his libido when he put a shotgun in his mouth in the 1990s.