I was listening to Slayer just two minutes ago, before I came across this news.  Fuck.

I guess we know what you will not be reading this month. The bit about Heidegger was not an argument, but just a teeny example of the sort of thing that's in the book.  I don't know how to respond to your first point, as Heidegger's influence on deconstruction seems as clear as day to me from every page I've read of…

Godwin's law = I can't think of a good argument against you, so I'll
just call you a Nazi, and I win.  (There's a recent, rather celebrated,
right-wing book called Liberal Fascism that argues along those lines, basically an exercise in character assassination…Obama and Hillary Clinton are Nazis, blah blah blah.) …

Japanese porn is unacceptable because of the creepiness factor (the schoolgirl stuff that you mentioned), but also, because of the censorship (basically, it's R-rated porn).  Too filthy and not filthy enough, at the same time.

In what sense are those "official porn parodies" "official"?

Just started Richard Wolin's The Seduction of Unreason, which argues that the radical, postmodern/poststructuralist critique of reason, classical liberalism, Enlightenment values, etc. has its roots in overtly fascist ideas.  Not sure what I think of it yet.  If it goes well, I'll also read Wolin's book on French…

The Thirty Years War is a total blur to me, probably because I've only read about it in Western Civ. textbooks that try to cover it in two pages.  All I remember is the Defenestration of Prague.   Someone got tossed out a window, in Prague, for some reason, with certain consequences.

Crispin Glover, "Auto-Manipulator"
(also fits in an inventory of Novelty Rap Numbers by Unlikely Celebrities)

Don't go off on a tangent.

And I will NOT be a rock n rollin'  bitch for you.

Sorry, that was totally unchthonic of me.

Pretentious
Bullshit
Irritating
Irrelevant
Pseudo-intellectual
Affected
Grandiose

Agreed, Lonesome Dove is great.  I haven't bothered with the sequels, though (since they don't have Duvall/Jones)…are they any good?

Seems like the Doors hate is a backlash against what "they" are saying about the Doors…that Morrison is the second coming of Lord Byron, that he's a "great poet."  Honestly, though, who is saying these things?!

And what about those of us who deal with death and tragedy in the world by taking solace in dumb TV shows (in the right order)?

If Fuller thinks that Hannibal is a worthwhile show, then the principled thing to do would be to show it, even if there's a tiny risk of someone getting offended.  If he thinks that his own show is trash that does more harm than good, then the principled thing to do would be to stop making the show. 

To me, it seems like a cynical gesture, rather than a principled one that we should respect.  When this sort of thing happens, it's usually motivated by PR concerns (predicting angry letters from parents to NBC, etc.), not about taking any kind of serious stand on violence in the media.  After a week or two, it'll be…

The concept of a "society run by white men" is a much more American idea than an ancient Roman one.  I doubt the Romans would even know what the term "white man" is supposed to mean.  The Roman world was thoroughly, intrinsically multicultural (which explains, for example, the spread of Christianity from the backwater…

ROMANES EUNT DOMUS!!!

@avclub-bcd70526c073dfd8bed0d20704113058:disqus  Maybe I'm putting a weird, idiosyncratic spin on the phrase, and if I'm wrong, then so be it.  Anyway, the phrase suggests to me a division of society into three groups: white (non-trash), at the top of the ladder, white trash, and finally black/non-white (at the bottom…