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    Michael Munro's discussions
    michaelmunro
    Michael Munro
    michaelmunro
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    Rubber. Bear in mind that the sculptor was probably speaking in Japanese, so the word translated as “rotted” might be better rendered as “perished” or “corroded”.

    I agree that it’s wider than it is deep but I offer credit where it’s due. He’s genuinely interested in a range of topics and his thinking has advanced, I’d say pretty remarkably, from fairly wild-eyed conspiracy theories to science-positive and reason-based.  

    I don’t know if you’ve seen his recent stuff, but he’s veering much more towards “skeptic with a range of interests in the fantastical”, with a solid sideline in ethical humanism.

    To be fair, he clearly does really want to expand his mind and he spends a lot of time talking to experts in a huge range of fields.

    I think he’s on a (very public) journey towards truth.

    He’s not highly educated, but he’s definitely intellectually curious.

    The same could be said about any crime; that’s why we have a legal system predicated on systematic and professional investigation, collection of evidence, jury trials and so-on. Without all those safeguards, we’re left with vigilantism and the much greater risk of innocent people being punished

    Checking this site once or twice a day is as close as I get to fandom and from my almost-outsider perspective, “fan entitlement” is a degrading spectacle.  

    Jay told a story about that - apparently they shot a scene in which he threw a card at Pierce Brosnan from something like 50 feet away. Jay kept warning the crew that his cards flew really hard and fast, but they insisted that it would be OK, they had a guy ready to block the card, etc. So he threw it and it hit…

    I used to be an athletic white man, but now I’m old.  Can I get a discount?

    A have a friend, a lovely, well-adjusted women, whose unfortunately alcoholic and drug-addicated sister appeared on this show. The sister had called in because she was involved in some sort of scenario that matched what the producers were advertising for, and she figured what the hell, free trip to Chicago. So she…

    It could well have been a side effect of positional asphyxia. If you get literally trapped in a position in which it’s “hard to breathe”, you’re in serious trouble after a minute or two.

    That Scrubs episode was devastating.

    I asked you the question of whether, under the circumstances we were discussing, it made both pragmatic and artistic sense to hire someone like Jeffrey Tambor. My best guess re. the other actresses is that they didn’t meet the looks, age, logistical availability, talent, etc. casting criteria set by the producers as…

    “Trans actresses are every bit as talented as cis actresses” doesn’t make sense except as some sort of policy statement. Talent is an individual attribute.

    I agree that there is a difference but again, we can’t just blithely assume that there was a trans actress suitable for the part in the first place; in fact, evidence so far indicates that there wasn’t. On that basis, doesn’t it make both pragmatic and artistic sense to hire someone like Jeffrey Tambor?

    That’s probably true. As far as I can tell, the real-life scenario is that there literally were no trans actresses suitable for the part as written. I guess we could argue that, under those circumstances, the producers could have abandoned the premise of the show and created a different series, but IMO that would have…

    Can you imagine any realistic scenario in which the producers of Transparent wouldn’t have cast a trans actress had there been one available who had the acting chops and rep, was of the right age for the role, etc.?