When I first saw the movie, the LDS reference went right by me. Maybe it was unintentional, I don't know.
My question is: How do Mormons react to this line?
Posted by sarcasticmuppet (Member # 5035) on :
what movie was this?
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I remember when I first heard it. First, I was delighted to be name-checked. It was like a shoutout. This was before Mitt Romney, before the 60 Minutes special, and before Mormon cinema. I was just delighted to have someone outside my world aknowledge the existence of my world.
Secondly, I had to ask why it was funny, because I'd never heard of LSD.
Third, when I found out, I thought it was funny. The fish out of water element, the clueless bluffer element, mistakenly replacing the name of a drug with the name of a church known for being clean - it's a funny joke.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I'd be surprised if the writers even realized that "LDS" was an acronym for a church. My guess is that they thought it was an amusing way to screw up the term.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
That doesn't seem plausible at all.
Posted by The White Whale (Member # 6594) on :
Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I think it's unlikely no one on the writing staff knew that "LDS" is an acronym for a church, but it's very possible no one on the writing staff connected that line with that acronym before the movie came out.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
There must be somewhere a record of someone asking that question of someone who knows. At this point we are merely guessing, and our guesses reveal more about ourselves than about the movie or the writers.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
Do they? How so? What could such a guess possibly reveal about the person making it?
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
I'm guessing the writers were all drugged into a ululating, clamorous stupor when they wrote that entire script.
I mean, Star Trek has always been a haven of screaming liberal bias-- but WHALES, Jim?
For Guevara's sake, at least TRY to hide your tree-hugging, anti-family destroying agenda.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
link I dunno, I'm not convinced.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
If it was an accident, it requires the writers to be a little clueless but still stumble onto an appropriate joke. I suppose that's possible, although implausible.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I don't think the joke had anything to do with the LDS Church, though. I never connected it with the church until much later, and it was funny even absent the connection, based solely on switching the letters.
It'd be like Picard telling someone in the 80s that Worf used to play in the NLF - funny even though NLF doesn't mean anything.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:If it was an accident, it requires the writers to be a little clueless but still stumble onto an appropriate joke.
No, see, the core of the joke is that Kirk doesn't really know what LSD is, but he's trying to use the lingo and is getting it slightly wrong.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: If it was an accident, it requires the writers to be a little clueless but still stumble onto an appropriate joke. I suppose that's possible, although implausible.
Why? Just how mainstream is "LDS"?
Because in part of where I lived all my life, I never even heard of Mormons, Latter-Day Saints or LDS until I read OSC for the first time.
Posted by aspectre (Member # 2222) on :
While many people may know that Latter Day Saints refers to Mormons, I very much doubt that anyone other than Mormons would associate LDS with Mormons, and some folks after they've joined this forum. Other than on the Web, I've never even heard a Mormon refer to Latter Day Saints as LDS.
"Imperfect memory of history" joke made obvious by the all-too-well-known LSD<->Berkeley connection. And nothing else.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
It's a sort of funny joke without the reference because it has two of the three elements I mentioned above. It's a funnier joke with the reference.
Posted by JennaDean (Member # 8816) on :
I was a teenager when it came out. The line caught me by surprise, and I thought it was funny.
Probably a lot of people not familiar with the Church just thought of it as a mildly amusing mix-up of letters ... to me it was funnier, though, just hearing our name "accidentally". As if Spock did "too much Church".
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Does anyone have a source other than their own guesses?
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
All I've got is anecdotal. But bear in mind that non-Mormons who're familiar with the term "LDS" as an alternative term for "Mormon church" are few and far between; I'd imagine that more of them are familiar with the term "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints," thanks to the commercials, but wouldn't associate that name with the "LDS" acronym or the term "Mormon."
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Bear in mind that Mormons are not as rare in California as they are in the rest of the country. There are more Mormons in California and Arizona than in Utah and Idaho combined. It is certainly possible the writers ran into it before. Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
How many of those California Mormons are Hollywood Mormons? *laugh*
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
From Mucus' link:
quote:A novelization of "Star Trek IV" was published at the time the movie was released: Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, written by Vonda N. McIntyre (New York: Pocket Books, 1986). On page 109 in this book, the scene with Latter-day Saint references is described as follows:
"There's no point in my trying to explain what I was doing. You wouldn't believe me anyway."
"I'll buy that," Gillian said. She nodded toward Spock. "And what about what he was trying to do."
"He's harmless!" Kirk said. "He had a good reason--" He cut himself off. "Look, back in the sixties he was in Berkeley. The free speech movement and all that. I think . . . well, he did too much LDS."
"LDS? Are you dyslexic, on top of everything else?" She sighed.
Note how the lines are slightly different in the novel from the way they are heard in the feature film. These lines are different because the novel was written from the shooting script, not from the release version of the film. This is standard practice. Novelizations are normally written this way so that there is time for the novelization to be written, printed and distributed to stores to coincide with the theatrical release of the film.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: For Guevara's sake, at least TRY to hide your tree-hugging, anti-family destroying agenda.
I don't know about you, but I'm all for destroying anti-families.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I read it the same way Tom did. I'd never heard LDS as an acronym for Latter Day Saints at the time. I believe most Americans would not immediately recognize LDS as an acronym for Latter Day Saints. (FWIW, Firefox's spellchecker has heard of LSD but not LDS.)
I am also unconvinced by Mucus's link. The author makes assertions, but provides no evidence. The assertion that something is clear is not evidence.
FWIW, Wikipedia's article on San Francisco makes no reference to its being founded by Mormons, to Elder Sam Brannan, or to the Brooklyn. Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: For Guevara's sake, at least TRY to hide your tree-hugging, anti-family destroying agenda.
I don't know about you, but I'm all for destroying anti-families.
Not me -- you have to destroy a family too.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I can believe all of that, Icky, but none of it answered the central question of what the writers meant when they wrote it. At this point, unless someone has access to an interview or something, EVERYONE is just guessing.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Yeah, kat, but I think Mucus' link would tend to influence us in the direction of 'Not referring to the religion.'
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I don't really like the page or the source so I don't find it convincing either way.
That's a thought, though - what it if was dyslexic joke to start with, but someone in the editing room recognized the acronym and cut it so it would look like a church reference? That brings it back to the collaborative nature of filmmaking.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
I think sometimes Mormons are desperate to see Mormonism in every shadow.
There's no harm in making it an LDS referring joke; there's not much of a point in it either, IMO.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
*ouch* Good grief.
I think that's a rude thing to say in this instance, and I disagree with your assessment of both me and the joke.
Go back to apathy.
Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
kat, you seem to be taking this really personally. Why?
Posted by Bokonon (Member # 480) on :
kat, I think your side is arguable, but I have to say that the other arguments are more convincing to me. I think it's more of a stretch for you to be right, than for there to be a happy coincidence.
I also think you're being overly defensive, and have so since the first opinion contrary of yours in this thread.
-Bok
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
If I'm wrong, then it doesn't matter.
This is not a thread about me. It's a thread about Star Trek and, possibly, film-making.
Posted by Stephan (Member # 7549) on :
It was definitely not intentional, everyone knows Spock is Jewish.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:*ouch* Good grief.
I think that's a rude thing to say in this instance, and I disagree with your assessment of both me and the joke.
You're right, it was rude in this instance.
I think you're injecting Mormonism into the text of the film without it needing to be there, and against some evidence that implies other meanings.
I don't care if you do, in this instance; like I said, it doesn't hurt anything, and if makes you smile, go for it.
But don't imply other people are missing something just because we disagree with you.
(as in this line: "our guesses reveal more about ourselves than about the movie or the writers."
quote: Go back to apathy.
Pssh. You're not the boss of me, now.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:our guesses reveal more about ourselves than about the movie or the writers."
I still think this true. It also cuts both ways...I mean, that I instantly thought at eight-years-old that it was referring to the church certainly tells you something, doesn't it?
I know we disagree as to the text. I think everyone in here is guessing as to what it means.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
And I think that's perfectly fine.
Posted by Qaz (Member # 10298) on :
If LDS means Latter-Day Saints, the joke is no longer funny but confusing. I think Paramount's writers were trying to be funny.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
It's actually funnier if the writers intended it to refer to Mormonism; funnier to me, anyway.
I'd explain why, but explanation takes the delight out of humor.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: It's actually funnier if the writers intended it to refer to Mormonism; funnier to me, anyway.
I'd explain why, but explanation takes the delight out of humor.
Are you Mormon? Because then it would make sense. It seems to hold the same amount of funny to me either way, but I am ambivalent regarding Mormonism.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
It might be interesting to consider it this way, if it was a dyslexic joke, then we have 6 combinations for the letters, LSD, LDS, DLS, DSL, SDL, and SLD
However, we can also notice that LSD permutes to LDS by only switching two consecutive letters. The only other combination with this property is SLD.
The other thing is that all five combinations match acronyms for various companies, institutes, and technologies.
It just doesn't seem very compelling that it is a Mormon reference.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: That's a thought, though - what it if was dyslexic joke to start with, but someone in the editing room recognized the acronym and cut it so it would look like a church reference?
I doubt it, I do not think it cuts away from her after she responds "LDS?"
[ April 04, 2007, 01:59 PM: Message edited by: Mucus ]
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
I am quite Mormon.
Not to be confused with a quiet Mormon.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
Whether intentional or not, the LDS/LSD joke has become a fairly pervasive part of California youth culture (or at least it has in the Bay Area) -- I've seen it crop in writing in addition to experiencing it so I don't think it can just be chalked up to it seeming to be everywhere because I'm LDS.
For awhile there active members of the LDS Church stressed LDS over Mormon. I don't know when that awareness would have become widespread though -- my guess is after that film was made because most Californians associate LDS with the commercials (which ran in regular rotation in this part of the county during the late '70s and '80s) and most of those commercials branded with the LDS Church's full name followed by "the Mormons."
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: I am quite Mormon.
Not to be confused with a quiet Mormon.
"Quite" as in you might be more Mormon than the average? Or the mean? Or are you a mean Mormon?
If so, are you quiet about that?
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Quite.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Anybody else getting the ad for MyMormonSpace.com?
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: If I'm wrong, then it doesn't matter.
If that's true, then why are you so defensive when it's pointed out that your read of it, while possible, isn't necessarily the most likely explanation?
Possibly because you'd hate to think that the inside joke (or, 'shout out', as you referred to it in your OP) you've enjoyed all these years turned out just to be a misunderstanding?
Sometimes people write or say things that have meaning beyond what the writer intended. Sometimes a person can even misunderstand what the writer meant and find meaning there. It doesn't detract from the meaning that the writer didn't intend it.
You like the joke, and there's no way (from where we're sitting) to prove it's about Mormonism one way or another. So you may as well continue to enjoy it.
I just don't think it's appropriate to be short with people who heard it differently than you did.
Edit: Man, another new page post. *sigh*
Posted by Occasional (Member # 5860) on :
It never crossed my mind that it wouldn't be meaning Latter-day Saints, although I have no argument either way. To me there are so many ways it is funnier picturing the relationship than not that I will continue to associate the two.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
JT, seriously, I didn't think or do half the things you accuse me of there, I don't want this thread to be about me, and making it about me is inappropriate. If you have issues with what I said, please e-mail me.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I've always interpreted it as a Mormon joke, and found it very funny.
*imagines Spock eating babies* Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
The only thing I accused you of is being defensive, and that was really more of an observation than an accusation. And I'm not the only one who's asked why you're being that way, so I don't think it's my imagination.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I know you're not the only one. That's irrelevant.
Let me put it this way: I will not discuss ME in this thread at all. If you honestly wants a discussion about it, you'll have to e-mail me.
Posted by Seatarsprayan (Member # 7634) on :
I don't think it was intended to refer to Mormons at all. I could be wrong, but I believe it was a just a Kirk-bluffing-because-he's-really-from-the-future-but-failing thing. He switched the letters, presumably because no on in the his time does LSD any more and for him it's 300 years in the past.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
The first time I've thought of Mormonism and Star Trek at the same time has been in this thread. On top of that, I never knew LDS was an acronym for Mormons until I started posting on this site.
That said, to me it wasn't a Mormon joke. I'd venture to say that to most of the audience, it wasn't a Mormon joke.
If someone made a comment about jello at a social gathering I wouldn't have ever thought it was a Mormon joke either, until I started posting here.
Whether or not the writers intended it to be a Mormon reference is irrelevant, I think. I mean, if someone makes a reference and no one catches it, I don't think it counts.
Whoever made the comment that it speaks more about the mindset of the audience is spot on. Obviously, someone who is familiar with "LDS" meaning "Latter Day Saints" is going to think of the Mormons every time they hear those three letters. Those with no familiarity with that acronym will not think of the Mormons when they hear those letters.
If it was intentional by the writers, it was an "in joke" - in that the vast majority of the audience would have only interpreted it as a foul-up of letters, not as any reference to the Mormon church. Those "in the know" (which, essentially, would be Mormons themselves and those who have frequent dealings with Mormons) would be "in" on the joke.
While that's possible, I really think the humor they were going for was for more mass consumption, making the "he's from the future, so he gets little details wrong and comes off as very weird" angle far more probable.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Oh, I don't think Kirk was making a Mormon joke, I think he was misremembering/mixing up. I think the writers were making a Mormon joke.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I think that the joke would have been intended to work on multiple levels.
Posted by TheTick (Member # 2883) on :
quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow: While that's possible, I really think the humor they were going for was for more mass consumption, making the "he's from the future, so he gets little details wrong and comes off as very weird" angle far more probable.
This is what I've always thought it was, just a play on getting an acronym he may have heard of back in 'Ancient Earth History' class wrong. Considering how little a part religion played in classic Trek it would never have crossed my mind that it was referring to the Latter Day Saints.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote: If someone made a comment about jello at a social gathering I wouldn't have ever thought it was a Mormon joke either, until I started posting here.
Today I will learn something new:
How is jello a Mormon joke? Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
quote:Originally posted by Javert:
quote: If someone made a comment about jello at a social gathering I wouldn't have ever thought it was a Mormon joke either, until I started posting here.
Today I will learn something new:
How is jello a Mormon joke?
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
Lime green jello is apparently very Mormon. Don't ask me. It's just something I learned on hatrack. Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
The joke is that Mormons eat (or ate) a lot of jello.
Posted by Artemisia Tridentata (Member # 8746) on :
Its only a Mormon joke if its lime jello with shreded carrots in it.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: The joke is that Mormons eat (or ate) a lot of jello.
So does this mean that Bill Cosby is a Mormon?
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Yes. *twinkle*
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Yes. That's exactly what it means.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by Glenn Arnold: When I first saw the movie, the LDS reference went right by me. Maybe it was unintentional, I don't know.
My question is: How do Mormons react to this line?
I saw the movie in a theater in Utah when it originally came out. That line brought the house down with laughter. I suspect people in other states didn't find it quite so funny.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: I think that the joke would have been intended to work on multiple levels.
I think you give the writers way to much credit for such an innocuous line in a movie that otherwise ignores any such thing.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:"I condemn false prophets, I condemn the effort to take away the power of rational decision, to drain people of their free will -- and a hell of a lot of money in the bargain. Religions vary in their degree of idiocy, but I reject them all. For most people, religion is nothing more than a substitute for a malfunctioning brain." (Gene Roddenberry)
Now, it is known that Roddenberry was largely ignored by the movie makers, but his core ideas were not. Religion had little to no place in Roddenberry's Star Trek universe (though, DS9 improved immensely on the formula by not excluding it). He was still very much alive when The Voyage Home was made and he was still asserting influence on his brain child.
Okay, so you could still make the argument that the writers were trying to inject a little something under the radar. Fine, that seems logical.
However, that particular scene is intended to be comical. Kirk is trying to keep people from recognizing Spock as an alien. He wants him to just seem like a harmless crackpot (he did, after all, just jump into a pool full of whales and stick his hands on them in a weird way).
So, if you were in your 40's during the mid 1980's and were in San Fransisco during that time, would you think that someone was weird because they were Mormon or because maybe, just maybe, during the 60's they did too many drugs and are now a bit of a burnout still driving the V-Dub, listening to Joplin and spending an inordinate amount of time on arts and crafts?
Which is funnier?
Would you want the writers to imply that people who are LDS are crackpots?
Occam's Razor.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:So, if you were in your 40's during the mid 1980's and were in San Fransisco during that time, would you think that someone was weird because they were Mormon or because maybe, just maybe, during the 60's they did too many drugs and are now a bit of a burnout still driving the V-Dub, listening to Joplin and spending an inordinate amount of time on arts and crafts?
It is not an either/or proposition. It can be funny on multiple levels without any of the levels cancelling out the others.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
I think that it doesn't really matters what the writers intended -- it has become a line that is read as referencing Mormons and has been recycled numerous times. Or at least it has in California.
And it increases in lameness every time.
Not that I am against Mormon jokes. Quite the contrary. It's just that this one isn't particularly funny or clever.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: It is not an either/or proposition. It can be funny on multiple levels without any of the levels cancelling out the others.
He was not referring to whether it was funny. He was referring to the probability of it being intentional. You are still allowed to think it's funny even if it was unintentional, you know.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Your post does not actually address my point.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: Your post does not actually address my point.
And your post is completely unrelated to his point.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I disagree.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Zalmoxis: I think that it doesn't really matters what the writers intended -- it has become a line that is read as referencing Mormons and has been recycled numerous times. Or at least it has in California.
And it increases in lameness every time.
Not that I am against Mormon jokes. Quite the contrary. It's just that this one isn't particularly funny or clever.
I read the review, and I don't get the link you are trying to convey. Are you saying that the mistaken alliteration of "ell dee ess" instead of "ell ess dee" is something that is simply common due to the common letters the two acronyms share (which I could agree with), or that every case of such a joke in pop culture is intentional? In your link, the joke is appropriate because it's about a Mormon missionary kid. There is zero reference to anything Mormon in the whole rest of that Star Trek movie. How could the two be similar except that the mistaken alliteration is present in both cases?
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: I disagree.
Which is something else you are allowed to do.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
J A N:
I'm beginning to wonder if you are being intentionally obtuse or are just discourse-analysis-/culture-meme- challenged.
But whatever.
What I'm saying is that the Mormon component of the joke may not have been intended by the writers of the Star Trek movie, but that the joke has come to have that meaning in a large part of the Western U.S. (i.e. where there are significant populations of members of the LDS even though the percentage mix varies).
I would even go so far as to claim that the much of the popularity and longevity of the joke is due to the Star Trek movie, although it would be difficult to prove without a rigorously done survey as well as a popular literature review.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Zalmoxis: J A N:
I'm beginning to wonder if you are being intentionally obtuse or are just discourse-analysis-/culture-meme- challenged.
Careful. People jump down my throat around here when I suggest the same of my arguments.
I can see what you're saying about the alliteration-mistake-as-comedy part goes, but I would find it difficult to believe it has much relevance outside of that cultural circle, which is why I and others doubt the connection that is being made. Allow me to explain with an example less controversial in this forum.
A city I travel to often has a couple of billboards that I have noticed from time to time. It is some sort of bank or credit company or something, but that isn't important. The part I notice is that the words on the billboard have intentionally left out all of the vowels in the single sentence on the billboard. I found this amusing because, when reading it, it read to me the same way reading most modern use of Arabic reads to me, because of the very similar habit of leaving out vowels. Still, that is not exactly accurate, since Arabic vowels are totally different from English vowels, but that isn't the point. The point is the association I made respective of my understanding of how language is used, and the juxtaposition I saw between this billboard and the Arabic language. Because the area in which these billboards are placed do not have a noticably large Arabic population, I am certain the goal of the billboard is not to invoke humor by using an otherwise innocuous habit of grammar (if it was, it would incorrect anyway, because that isn't a proper correlation to how Arabic is written). It is more likely intended to reflect something else, but my own personal association made it humorous to me in a manner unrelated to the original intent. It is no less funny to me knowing such a thing, but its funny is no more contingent on that association being intention than the actual transliteration comparison would be technically accurate.
This topic has many of those same elements. Outside of the Mormon in-joke that you (Zalmoxis) have related, there is no other corresponding factor in the dialogue of the movie, so unless that mistake in alliteration was a significant Mormon in-joke prior to that movie, and only if the writers of the movie happened to become privy to such an in-joke before or during the writing process (or if they were Mormons themselves), the likelihood of the two, meaning the movie dialogue and the joke you regularly observe, being related is very, very small. That doesn't make it any less funny to those who may find it funny with that association, it just means that the association is neither required nor necessarily intended in the dialogue and context of that film.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina:
quote:So, if you were in your 40's during the mid 1980's and were in San Fransisco during that time, would you think that someone was weird because they were Mormon or because maybe, just maybe, during the 60's they did too many drugs and are now a bit of a burnout still driving the V-Dub, listening to Joplin and spending an inordinate amount of time on arts and crafts?
It is not an either/or proposition. It can be funny on multiple levels without any of the levels cancelling out the others.
I'm not saying it is. I'm comparing your most likely scenario to mine and those of most of the people I know who've seen the movie and then applying some logic. I don't know that I'm right, but, when I compare my idea to yours, mine seems most likely and yours seems like wishful thinking. YMMV, of course.
Nimoy also wrote and directed TVH, and he's Jewish. While that doesn't write him off completely, it does make the likelyhood of him tossing in a little Mormon humor for kicks pretty slim.
Here are the list of other authors, though I have little to no knowledge of their religious affiliation.
- Harve Bennett - Steve Meerson - Peter Krikes - Nicholas Meyer
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:when I compare my idea to yours, mine seems most likely and yours seems like wishful thinking. YMMV, of course.
Of course you do. That is why they are your ideas. However, no matter how strongly you believe your own assertions, it doesn't make them obvious or establish fact.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Googling
quote:"nicholas meyer" mormon -"star trek"
suggests that Nicholas Meyer (or someone with the same name, of course) is Mormon or at least involved in projects (including film and writing projects) related to the LDS church.
Also, this page: http://www.ldsfilm.com/movies/StarTrekIV.html asserts Catherine Hicks was from an area with a large number of LDS members, though who knows how that plays out in terms of intention.
Posted by Krankykat (Member # 2410) on :
For he who doubts, it looks like the LDS joke was fully intentional.
Latter-day Saint (Mormon) References in the movie Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)
quote:In what has become a famous and favorite line from the movie, Captain James T. Kirk (actor William Shatner, the main character) tells a 20th century zoologist that Spock (Leonard Nimoy) "did a little too much LDS" when he was at Berkeley in the 1960s. Captain Kirk was attempting to claim that Spock had used LSD, which damaged his brain: the cause of his erratic behavior. (LSD is an illegal drug used as a recreational narcotic.) Kirk's misuse of the word "LDS" (a common abbreviation for "Latter-day Saints," i.e., members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) displays his frequently inaccurate familiarity with this period of time. This line is typical of the abundant humor in the movie. These lines elicited enthusiastic laughter from audiences, particularly in Utah and other predominantly Latter-day Saint areas.
One place where this line likely drew a big laugh was Scottsdale, Arizona, which has a large Latter-day Saint population, and is close to Mesa, Arizona, a city founded by Latter-day Saints and the site of the oldest Latter-day Saint temple in Arizona. Actress Catherine Hicks, who plays Dr. Gillian Taylor opposite Kirk in this scene, was born and raised in Scottsdale, Arizona. After Captain Kirk claims that Spock did "a little too much LDS," Dr. Taylor realizes even more fully that Kirk and Spock are an unusual pair. She retorts, "LDS?" In the original script, she then asks if Kirk is dyslexic (because he mixed up the characters in this abbreviation). But that line is not in the release version of the film. Dr. Taylor is clearly familiar with Latter-day Saints and the use of "LDS" as an abbreviation for the Church. I do not know whether or not actress Catherine Hicks is a Latter-day Saint or a descendant of the Latter-day Saint pioneers who first settled the part of the country she comes from.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina:
quote:when I compare my idea to yours, mine seems most likely and yours seems like wishful thinking. YMMV, of course.
Of course you do. That is why they are your ideas. However, no matter how strongly you believe your own assertions, it doesn't make them obvious or establish fact.
You seem unwilling to apply this to some of your own comments.
Posted by stihl1 (Member # 1562) on :
I was 14 when the movie came out and never got the association that it was a mormon joke. In fact, I never heard the acronym LDS used until I read an OSC book. And for the most part, never heard of the mormon church until I was much older. I always thought the joke was a word play on LSD. Although, it is just as funny, if not funnier, if you think it's a joke on mormons.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Pick a fight somewhere else. I'm not interested. Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
For he who doubts, it looks like the LDS joke was fully intentional.
Latter-day Saint (Mormon) References in the movie Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)
quote:In what has become a famous and favorite line from the movie, Captain James T. Kirk (actor William Shatner, the main character) tells a 20th century zoologist that Spock (Leonard Nimoy) "did a little too much LDS" when he was at Berkeley in the 1960s. Captain Kirk was attempting to claim that Spock had used LSD, which damaged his brain: the cause of his erratic behavior. (LSD is an illegal drug used as a recreational narcotic.) Kirk's misuse of the word "LDS" (a common abbreviation for "Latter-day Saints," i.e., members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) displays his frequently inaccurate familiarity with this period of time. This line is typical of the abundant humor in the movie. These lines elicited enthusiastic laughter from audiences, particularly in Utah and other predominantly Latter-day Saint areas.
One place where this line likely drew a big laugh was Scottsdale, Arizona, which has a large Latter-day Saint population, and is close to Mesa, Arizona, a city founded by Latter-day Saints and the site of the oldest Latter-day Saint temple in Arizona. Actress Catherine Hicks, who plays Dr. Gillian Taylor opposite Kirk in this scene, was born and raised in Scottsdale, Arizona. After Captain Kirk claims that Spock did "a little too much LDS," Dr. Taylor realizes even more fully that Kirk and Spock are an unusual pair. She retorts, "LDS?" In the original script, she then asks if Kirk is dyslexic (because he mixed up the characters in this abbreviation). But that line is not in the release version of the film. Dr. Taylor is clearly familiar with Latter-day Saints and the use of "LDS" as an abbreviation for the Church. I do not know whether or not actress Catherine Hicks is a Latter-day Saint or a descendant of the Latter-day Saint pioneers who first settled the part of the country she comes from.
This is the same link that was given before.
*shrug*
Assertions, even repeated assertions, do not equal evidence. Nothing about that paragraph is particularly compelling.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:I always thought the joke was a word play on LSD. Although, it is just as funny, if not funnier, if you think it's a joke on mormons.
The two are not mutually exclusive.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
For he who doubts,it looks like the LDS joke was fully intentional.
Latter-day Saint (Mormon) References in the movie Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)
But that write-up makes the same spurious claims as others here. How does there being large concentrations of Mormons in unrelated parts of the country to where the scenes were shot have an impact? I mean, you guys are going as far as using "this person might have grown up in an area with lots of LDS" as evidence to establish intent.
If it is so important to you to have some sort of presence like that, then I don't see the harm. It is still an in-joke the requires foreknowledge, though, to find the humor that has absolutely no relation to anything else whatsoever in the film.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: Pick a fight somewhere else. I'm not interested.
But you're interested in arguing about alleged intentions of writers who may have grown up in an area that might have had an LDS presence?
It's not a "fight," it is a disagreement where you are exhibiting unfair expectations upon those whom you disagree with. You seem to be one of the few "fighting" over it, while the rest of us keep saying, "nope, I still don't see it, unless you are already Mormon." At least some of us have pointed out that we can see how you would get that idea from your perspective. I've not seen you do that except when making a statement like 'that tells us something about ourselves' in some nebulous admittal. Can you simply admit it's just as easy to not see the association as it is for you to see it?
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I am not discussing this with you.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Katie, I have to admit that I'm not sure this approach of yours is going to be particularly beloved. IMO, it's akin to poking someone with a stick and then dancing away, saying, "Oh, I don't want to play. *poke*"
If it works for you, fine. But my gut feeling is that it's not fair for you to be handing out unsolicited opinions about other posters if you're going to simultaneously refuse to converse with them.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
J A N:
I have made no claims as to whether it was intentional or not -- I don't think anyone can with any certainty. My guess is that it wouldn't be cleared up even if everyone involved were to be interviewed about it because of the loaded-ness that the Star Trek franchise and Mormonism bring to the current cultural climate.
My only point is that the joke has taken on that extra layer for a somewhat significant part of the population -- both Mormons and non-Mormons. And that, from my observation, it is quite likely that the joke has had the life that it has had in part because of the movie.
All this talk about intention is now irrelevant because functionally, it has become a Mormon joke. Not for everybody to be sure. But it has now for this particular community (Hatrack) -- as well as several others that I am aware of [thus my comments above about the Bay Area, California, Western U.S.].
Intentionality is just not that important for the cultural currency a meme/cultural artefact has.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Okay. *edits post*
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Zalmoxis: thanks for the clarification. I'm thinking that we may not necessarily disagree about it.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: I am not discussing this with you. I find your attitude abhorrent.
Sorry, no take-backs. Either apologize or stick to your original rudeness.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Go find someone else to quarrel with. It isn't going to be me.
Posted by Krankykat (Member # 2410) on :
Icarus,
Glen's first post asked: "When I first saw the movie, the LDS reference went right by me. Maybe it was unintentional, I don't know. My question is: How do Mormons react to this line?"
It seemed the site quote addressed Glens questions pretty well. Was it intentional? Yes, according to Catherine Hicks. How do Mormans react? Big laughs in Salt Lake and Scottsdale.
If you are talking about fugu's link, I missed it because I was in the process of posting.
"Assertions, even repeated assertions, do not equal evidence. Nothing about that paragraph is particularly compelling." So what's your point?
K
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: Go find someone else to quarrel with. It isn't going to be me.
I'll take that as a "no." Okay, thanks. Carry on.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:So what's your point?
I'm guessing that his point is that you are submitting it as evidence, and it's not.
Just a shot in the dark.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Krankykat: It seemed the site quote addressed Glens questions pretty well. Was it intentional? Yes, according to Catherine Hicks.
How do you back this up?
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Either apologize or stick to your original rudeness.
Justa, it's tacky to demand more than the original concession unless you've been genuinely harmed.
--------
KK, the point is that Catherine Hicks' claim of intentionality is suspect.
Posted by Krankykat (Member # 2410) on :
El: why is this not evidence? It is a site about Morman characters, etc in movies. Are you all saying that quoting a source is not evidence?
Mucus: ok missed a couple of words "according to the quote about Catherine Hicks"
Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
quote: Are you all saying that quoting a source is not evidence?
"The sky is green."
"Provide evidence."
"Bob says it is green."
No, quoting a source is not evidence. Not unless your source has evidence you can verify.
Posted by Krankykat (Member # 2410) on :
Tom, I suspect thats the point. K
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote:Either apologize or stick to your original rudeness.
Justa, it's tacky to demand more than the original concession unless you've been genuinely harmed.
I think "harmed" isn't the right word. "Insulted repeatedly after being hounded to stop doing that same thing, and feeling an overwhelming sense of hypocrisy" is a better way of putting it. I don't really expect the apology, but this is the second time someone has deleted their ass-ish behavior toward me and then continued being high-and-mighty toward me in as many days. It is beginning to wear quite thin.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Are you all saying that quoting a source is not evidence?
Yes. Consider what your "source" is saying about Catherine Hicks: that she is from Scottsdale, and thus must know about the Mormons in Mesa, AZ, and thus must have been aware that the "LDS" acronym stood for "Latter-Day Saints." And then consider that your source is implying that she then influenced the scriptwriters.
At each stage, we're asked to make an increasingly unlikely assumption.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
quote:All this talk about intention is now irrelevant because functionally, it has become a Mormon joke. Not for everybody to be sure.
If by "not for everybody" you mean "not for most, except for a small segment of the US population almost entirely contained in the southeast" then I agree with you.
It has become a Mormon joke because Mormons and those familiar with Mormons read into a joke and attributed a larger intent, it seems. Even when explained, most people still wouldn't "get" the joke as being a Mormon one.
quote:But it has now for this particular community (Hatrack) -- as well as several others that I am aware of [thus my comments above about the Bay Area, California, Western U.S.].
Being part of this community, I still don't see it as a Mormon joke. I understand some do, but saying that the Hatrack community as a whole sees it that way is a bit of a stretch.
I'd say the Mormon community sees it as a Mormon reference/joke, and inasmuch as the Hatrack community overlaps with the Mormon community, there is a significant portion of the Hatrack community that views it in that light. But their view is likely determined from their existing culture outside of hatrack more than from any involvement with this community.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Pointing out that Catherine Hicks once lived somewhere where there are a lot of Mormons is not evidence that Catherine Hicks believed it was a Mormon reference, that "Dr. Taylor is clearly familiar with Latter-day Saints and the use of 'LDS' as an abbreviation for the Church," or that the writers intended for there to be an LDS reference in there. The logic of the author of that web page reminds of of Vizzini's in The Princess Bride.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Wow. I am really sorry for my part in critiscising kat unfairly-- I think that I may have set the tone that this thread has devolved into.
There's not a better example of what Jim-me and Dag were saying on the recent child abuse thread, about being mindful of where your actions will eventually lead, than this thread.
Why in the world did I take this so seriously?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I think the google search I mention is moderately good evidence at least one of the writers was well-acquainted with the LDS church.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: Why in the world did I take this so seriously?
Because you are quite the mean Mormon? Posted by Krankykat (Member # 2410) on :
El, Ic, Muc, Xav,
I just quoted a web-site in response Glenn's questions and you are all acting like I'm trying to cover up evidence in a freakin' police investigation. ex. "Not unless your source has evidence you can verify"
Jeez
Posted by Occasional (Member # 5860) on :
This is still going on? Must be a very slow day today in the discussions department. I know there are a lot of Mormon topics that are much more interesting than this.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Wow. A lot of serious contention over a joke from a pretty old movie. You guys don't fool around with the analysis.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:Originally posted by Krankykat: I just quoted a web-site in response Glenn's questions and you are all acting like I'm trying to cover up evidence in a freakin' police investigation. ex. "Not unless your source has evidence you can verify"
Jeez
No, you quoted a website in response to Glenn's questions and then insisted, several times, that that settled the issue. When it was pointed out to you that it does not (and that you have a poor grasp of the word 'evidence'), you got pissy and started playing the martyr.
Jeez.
Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
quote: I just quoted a web-site in response Glenn's questions and you are all acting like I'm trying to cover up evidence in a freakin' police investigation. ex. "Not unless your source has evidence you can verify"
Frankly, I don't give a crap what you were responding to. I honestly didn't even read the second page of this thread when I posted that. I was addressing your seemingly foolish belief that quoting someone who says the same thing as you is evidence of something.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: Yes. Consider what your "source" is saying about Catherine Hicks: that she is from Scottsdale, and thus must know about the Mormons in Mesa, AZ, and thus must have been aware that the "LDS" acronym stood for "Latter-Day Saints." And then consider that your source is implying that she then influenced the scriptwriters.
At each stage, we're asked to make an increasingly unlikely assumption.
Honestly, I think it's a perfectly safe assumption that someone from Scottsdale would know that there are Mormons in Mesa. The two cities border each other, and there are quite a lot of Mormons in the area, not just in Mesa. But I do agree that everything past that point is increasingly unlikely, particularly the last one.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:Originally posted by Krankykat: Was it intentional? Yes, according to Catherine Hicks.
I'm not sure how you're coming to this conclusion. The two paragraphs you linked do not claim in any way that Catherine Hicks herself said that the line was intended to mean Latter Day Saints. It just says that Catherine Hicks grew up in Scottsdale then the character she was playing in a movie reacted oddly to the term LDS.
I can certainly see how the LDS line would have gotten a laugh out of me for totally different reasons if I was a Mormon. I would totally have thought it was some kind of inside joke meant just for me and people like me. Any person who came to me later and said that I was mistaken about what the line meant would be met with hostility and I probably wouldn't approach that rationally, especially since all of the Star Trek movies have a special place in my childhood.
So, I can understand some of the reactions in this thread. I just wanted to try and explain why the rest of us saw it the way we did and why it seems most plausible that it was the author's original intent to make a damned dirty hippy joke.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:Originally posted by Krankykat: El, Ic, Muc, Xav,
I just quoted a web-site in response Glenn's questions and you are all acting like I'm trying to cover up evidence in a freakin' police investigation. ex. "Not unless your source has evidence you can verify"
Jeez
I don't believe I have acted this way.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
quote:Bear in mind that Mormons are not as rare in California as they are in the rest of the country. There are more Mormons in California and Arizona than in Utah and Idaho combined.
No, I don't think so. I think that is totally wrong. I just read (yesterday) that there are 750,000 Mormons in the state of California. There are roughly 1.5 million in the state of Utah. California does contain the second-largest total LDS population of any state in the country, but if you look at it as a percentage of California's 34 million people -- it's slightly over two percent. I lived in Orange County for several years, and found that many more people than I expected were baffled by Mormonism and suspicious of me because I was from Utah -- and at the time I wasn't saying, "I'm not LDS," to people, I was saying, "I'm not practicing right now, but yes, I'm LDS." I ran into folks who were conversant about the church, also. Don't get me wrong.
Point is: California, largely, taken as a whole, is not a mecca of LDS knowledge.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
I apologize if this seems dispassionate or going-all-meta or lecturing whatever. I don't see myself as above the fray, but I think what happened here is entirely predictable, and I think it might be good to do a little post-mortem on this because it seems to be an ongoing issue in this and other forums I am involved in.
First, LDS have a tendency to want to claim persons, moments, places, memes, cultural products, positive attributes, positive habits, etc. as their own or inspired by them. This shouldn't come as a surprise -- we all fall prey to exceptionalism even if it is only on an individual level instead of religious/ethnic/socio-political.
Sometimes these claims are dubious; sometimes they aren't. But from the perspective of the group, they are harmless, fun, interesting and something to be proud of.
Then someone takes exception with the claim and/or downplays the quality/uniqueness of it -- which is easy to do because exceptionalism is difficult to determine in many cases and/or tastes vary. It's even worse in cases like this one where the meaning doesn't not necessarily follow from the intentions of the original creators of the cultural product. They then accuse the group of puffery or bad taste or mis-reading. Sometimes this is done with good or neutral intentions and approached in a civil manner; sometimes not. Sometimes this is done because the original claims may seem to demean or ignore other groups.
Naturally, members of the group reacts negatively to these disputation or denigrating of claims -- even if it's not something that an individual member really feels all that strongly about, it is seen as an attack and is felt as a blow to pride [see Scott R's comment above].
The reaction leads to reaction and things tend to devolve from there.
I'm not saying anything really surprising here. But what I am trying to do is remind us that because of the dynamics of Hatrack, we should always be mindful of how we approach Mormon topics. Mormon jatraqueros should be careful about their claims of exceptionalism; non-Mormon Jatraqueros should be more understanding of such claims, of why they are made, and also take them on good faith.
And we all should be more civil in discussing such claims.
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
Wow.
I don't know if this helps, but I really don't care what the writers intended. I was just curious to see how Mormons react to it.
I guess making assumptions about the writers's intentions is part of how people react to it, but the fact is that no proof is required. If you believe that the writers intended it that way, then say so. No citations or evidence needed.
I was more interested in whether Mormons thought it was funny, or if they were somehow offended by it. You can never tell how someone will react.
BTW, I get touchy when people spell my name with one n.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
Okay, I left this thread open for several hours, and didn't refresh.
I probably wouldn't have posted the above if I had known there were three pages of hurt feelings about this.
I probably would have just sailed on by.
I was already thinking it sounded maybe slightly too harsh, and was prepared to have to clarify.
So forgive me if that throws any fuel onto anyone's fire. (I'm pretty sure it's accurate, though.)
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
TL:
I think that is a good thing to point out.
However, I would also say that it doesn't take much knowledge of LDS to get the LDS/LSD joke, indeed, it's not that insidery off all. As long as someone has a cursory knowledge that a) Mormons are don't do drugs and b) Mormons are also called LDS that joke has currency.
Also, it seems to me that media coverage of LDS (which in the past 15-20 years has tended to use LDS Church as that is AP style) is fairly wide-spread in California. In other words, cultural awareness of Mormonism is most likely greater than that 2% figure might suggest -- at least if we're talking about a very basic cultural awareness.
In addition, if we're talking about the joke in any sort of Star Trek context, I would suggest [again, I can't prove this, but this is my experience] that the science fiction/LDS communities have a greater percentage of overlap and awareness of each other than the normal population. This is due in no small part, of course, to our host --- but there are other factors involved as well.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:Originally posted by Glenn Arnold: BTW, I get touchy when people spell my name with one n.
Yeah, me too. Same for when they spell it with an "e." It's just so wrong.
I hope I haven't led to hurt feelings. I've been making a conscious effort to be civil, though I've been known to step on toes both intentionally and otherwise. I was just hoping to bring a little extra to the table. I don't really participate in religious, political or moral debates, but that doesn't mean I don't like a good superfluous argument.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
Glenn:
I think it would have been funnier if Spock would have asked to buy some LDS and been sent to some Mormon missionaries who just happened to be hanging out in the area.
As it is, I didn't find it funny because I really don't find the attempts at humour in Star Trek to be all the funny. But no, I wasn't offended by it.
Of course, I'm a curmudgeon and not the best data point. Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
Zalmoxis:
I don't think it was intended. The science fiction/LDS communities weren't made up of the same stuff in 1986.
In 1986, the Mormon church wasn't often referred to as LDS, or the LDS church, or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. The Church has been fighting the media for legitimacy for years, and one of the aspects of the struggle has been to get them to stop using the word "Mormon" and start using proper terminology.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:Originally posted by Zalmoxis: In addition, if we're talking about the joke in any sort of Star Trek context, I would suggest [again, I can't prove this, but this is my experience] that the science fiction/LDS communities have a greater percentage of overlap and awareness of each other than the normal population. This is due in no small part, of course, to our host --- but there are other factors involved as well.
I would suggest [again, I can't prove this, but this is my experience] that the science fiction/secular humanist communities have a greater percentage of overlap and awareness of each other than the normal population. This is due in no small part, of course, to the large number of secular humanist science fiction writers that practically define the genre --- but there are other factors involved as well.
See, I can do it too.
Posted by Krankykat (Member # 2410) on :
km "Wow. A lot of serious contention over a joke from a pretty old movie. You guys don't fool around with the analysis."
Primal Curve:
I realize that "The two paragraphs you linked do not claim in any way that Catherine Hicks herself said that the line was intended to mean Latter Day Saints." Read my 5th post on this page. I said "Mucus: ok missed a couple of words "according to the [i]quote about Catherine Hicks."
El & Xav:
I fully understand the meaning of source...evidence...verify.
I didn't wake up this morning thinking I would become a pissy martyr by the end of the day.
I will make a point to from now on to do the source, evidence, verify thing to avoid any more contention.
Have a nice evening. K
OK, Glenn
Posted by Occasional (Member # 5860) on :
*blink* Um, I am one of the most touchy Mormons on Hatrack, and I still don't get what is up with this? I happen to agree that it is astounding to me personally that it would NOT be intended as a "Mormon" joke.
On the other hand, I agree that there isn't much proof or even evidence without a direct comment from a script writer. As far as I am concerned until more "light and knowledge" is given, the amount of attention to this baffles me.
Yet, I can't get myself to ignore the topic. The LDS/Sci-Fi literature is an interesting sidenote, and one that has been noted many times. Far more than this simple joke.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
TL:
Again, I'm not saying that it was intended. I'm talking about the currency that the joke has now and has had in the past 15 years or so.
PC:
I'm not sure what your point is. But it may be that you have confused me with those who are arguing for intention. I am not. I don't think the intention matters.
My point was only that if LDS and others are aware of and have appropriated the joke (and I think they have) and that's how they read it (and I think they do) then that is due in some part to the overlap between the LDS and speculative fiction communities.
I would fully agree that secular humanists and their values dominate the speculative fiction genre. I also think that's a good thing, esp. since there has also been room for writers from across the religious spectrum -- something that appears to be lacking in mainstream American literary fiction.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I admit that I figured the sudden and vehement objections to it possibly being a joke involving the church was due to bristling at my use of the word "shout out."
However, Glenn wanted to know reactions. That was my reaction. I was not SAYING it was a shoutout - I was saying at the time I saw it - in the 80s - I was delighted with what I percieved to be a shout out. That's still true. That was my reaction then.
I still think it was, although I don't know for sure. It is entirely possible both ways and in the lack of testimony from the jokemakers the argument comes down to "Is too." "Is not." which is hardly definitive.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:I admit that I figured the sudden and vehement objections to it possibly being a joke involving the church was due to bristling at my use of the word "shout out."
I don't think there were any sudden or vehement objections to it being a joke involving the church. The first vehemence I saw in this thread was yours. I know you don't want this thread to be about you, but then you go back and reiterate your view of things as if it was the definitive one. I'm sorry if it ticks you off, but I'm going to answer and say that's not at all how I saw this thread shake down.
I will say that I think a lot of us misinterpreted your line about our guesses saying more about us than about anything else. Since you were responding to Tom, and since you had already been somewhat vehement in your out of hand rejection of his interpretation (which I happen to share). It almost looked at the time like you were suggesting that it was an obvious shout out, and that anybody at all culturally literate could see it, unless they had some sort of anti-LDS bias. I realized eventually that this wasn't your intent, but since a lot of your interactions with Tom go that way, that's how I saw it. I think that's specifically what TL and JT were seeing.
I think we were mistaken in our read of you, but I still reject the characterization that there was some knee-jerk rejection of the likelihood that this was a joke.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:The first vehemence I saw in this thread was yours.
That's fine that you see it that way. I disagree, and I think my interpretation is correct. I am also not responsible for others' misinterpretations.
I answered the blasted question that started the thread. If someone wants to get mad at the ten-year-old I was at the time, I suppose they are welcome to it. I don't think it's cool.
This actually isn't the first time it's happened - I'll answer a question and volunteer requested information, and then I get blasted like I'd just started a thread all special in order to plaster it across the home page. There are many, many things that I would never bring up out of the blue because that would be tacky but will say if directly asked.
[ April 04, 2007, 09:24 PM: Message edited by: katharina ]
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I don't think anybody's referring to your answer of the original question. Nobody's mad at the ten-year-old that you used to be. Do you really believe that's what it's about? Some people have objected to your perceived shortness and vehemence in replying to other's opinions. I think a lot of it was a misunderstanding. But you keep on making it out to be people jumping all over you, and I do not believe that has happened in this thread.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
That's fine. We disagree.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: I'd be surprised if the writers even realized that "LDS" was an acronym for a church. My guess is that they thought it was an amusing way to screw up the term.
I guess I just find that implausible. Screwing up a term is just lots funnier if it gets turned into something that has a meaning than it is just a bunch a random letters. The LDS church has had a substantial presence in California since the 1850s so even if the original writer didn't know that LDS was an acronym for a church its hard to imagine that no one involved in the production recognized it and pointed it out.
I've also been told than in a big productions (like the Star Trek movies) there is always a someone paid to make sure that things things like LDS or the name of an alien planet or some other nonsense word isn't accidentally an obscure racial slur or sexual reference. All these things given, it just seems highly unlikely that the producers, directors and writers were totally unaware that they had made a reference to the Mormon church. They probaby didn't think it was all that important but its just not reasonable to assume they didn't even know they'd done it.
Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :
This thread got big fast.
(I feel like I've missed the opportunity to make a joke here. Couldn't think of one.)
--j_k
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:Originally posted by James Tiberius Kirk: (I feel like I've missed the opportunity to make a joke here. Couldn't think of one.)
Well, double dumb-ass on you!
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:I guess I just find that implausible. Screwing up a term is just lots funnier if it gets turned into something that has a meaning than it is just a bunch a random letters. The LDS church has had a substantial presence in California since the 1850s so even if the original writer didn't know that LDS was an acronym for a church its hard to imagine that no one involved in the production recognized it and pointed it out.
If I were LDS, I'd probably agree with this.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:If someone wants to get mad at the ten-year-old I was at the time, I suppose they are welcome to it. I don't think it's cool.
Katie, can I get mad at the grown woman you're supposed to be now? Or do I have to be mad at the ten-year-old girl you're acting like?
Seriously, you got huffy about a throwaway joke in a movie. I can say with complete confidence that Zal's read on this -- that the Mormons who've clung to this as an example of a cultural in-joke are reluctant to let go of it -- is absolutely the case; I don't get the impression that the rest of us even particularly care.
And once that became obvious from your reaction, everyone but Justa backed off. And even he eventually let it go.
Are you really going to get additionally huffy over what you perceive as people not sufficiently understanding the reasons behind your over-reaction? Please, seriously, don't.
You keep insisting that this thread shouldn't be about you, and in so doing implying that other people are trying to make it about you, to read something into your personality from it. By doing so, you are ensuring that this exact thing happens.
I can't speak for everyone else in this thread, but I can say with surety that nothing I've said in this thread has been meant with any animosity. Your continual attempts to read animosity into the thread, however, are upsetting me.
-----------
Zal, why do you think Mormons on Hatrack deserve any more gentle treatment than members of any other faith? The TOS isn't Mormon-specific.
-----------
quote:Screwing up a term is just lots funnier if it gets turned into something that has a meaning than it is just a bunch a random letters.
The theater in Detroit where I saw it laughed at that line. I seriously doubt that audience had a single Mormon in it.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: I guess I just find that implausible.
. . .
They probaby didn't think it was all that important but its just not reasonable to assume they didn't even know they'd done it.
From where I sit, it's not only reasonable to assume they didn't know, it's faintly ridiculous to think they did. But like kat has said, there's no way we'll ever know either way.
I certainly didn't make the connection at the time, and it's pretty doubtful I would have seeing it now, either, in that context. It's not an acronym I've ever encountered outside of Hatrack.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Informal evidence: A poll of one person familiar with the joke but not strongly enough immersed in Hatrack to know what 'LDS' stands for reveals that 100% of the American population, ([size = 1]error of 100%[/size] believes that 'LDS' was simply intended as a slip for 'LSD'.
Posted by Samuel Bush (Member # 460) on :
Well Glen, I’m a Mormon. (Oh sorry, I meant “Glenn“ ) And in answer to your question: My family and I thought it was quite funny. We understood it as a LSD/Mormon play on words. We certainly were not offended by it. (We like most Mormon jokes. And puns are especially fun.)
Anyway there was a lot of laughter in the theater here in Page, AZ.
I’ve always assumed that the joke was a deliberate LSD/Mormon play on words. That assumption is probably a result of the fact that I have lived my whole life in the western USA were there are a lot of Mormons and a lot of people who know a Mormon or two or a dozen.
The assumption is also probably due in part because of my perception of Southern California (were the movie was produced). There are a lot of Mormons in Southern California. I served a mission for the church there in the 70’s (much of my time was spent in the Hollywood vicinity) and I met very few people who hadn’t heard of the church. Also I heard the church referred to as the “LDS Church” as much as I heard it referred to as the “Mormon Church.” (What they called it when I wasn’t around to hear, I don’t know.)
So anyway this thread is the first time I’ve heard that assumption questioned. You folks may well be right who say that it was not intended by the writers. And I can now see how it could be understood differently than I did. But for now, despite only anecdotal “evidence,” I’m sticking with my first assumption. (Although it would be fun to know for sure what the writers intended.) But whichever is the truth, I’m not losing any sleep over it.
And speaking of Mormon jokes, I really liked the one I heard a couple of years ago about BYU producing a musical called “Seven Brides for One Brother.”
To Primal Curve:
Another thought that may or may not be apropos to this thread but I'm going to say it anyway -R.A. Heinlien was certainly aware of the Mormon Church. I always get a kick out of "Double Star" and "The Menace From Earth."
So was Tom Clancy
Oh and another thing, please stop beating up on Katharina. She didn't say anything wrong.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
I remember Heinlein mentioning the Mormons in If This Goes On --, but I don't recall any mention of them in Double Star.
*goes to check*
Oh yes, no Mormon characters, but it draws an analogy between the Salt Lake temple and the Martian inner nest.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
No one has beaten up on Katharina, and it's the propagating of the story that anyone has that will keep me pointing it out.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
quote:I think that's specifically what TL and JT were seeing.
Not me, man... Keep me out of this. Posted by Hitoshi (Member # 8218) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: For Guevara's sake, at least TRY to hide your tree-hugging, anti-family destroying agenda.
Um... what?
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
Mormons are mentioned in Heinlein's "Revolt in 2100" -- in a future US run by a fundamentalist fascist, Utah is one of the strongholds of resistance.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Amazingly, Tom, calling me a ten year old does not speak well of your benign motivations. I am not impressed with your behavior here. If you think you don't deserve it, that's fine, but nothing you or Icky has said is convincing has convinced me otherwise.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
We could use some tree-huggers right about now...where's that Nimoy kid?
He started all of this...
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Amazingly, Tom, calling me a ten year old does not speak well of your benign motivations. I am not impressed with your behavior here.
*sigh* Kat, I'm pointing out that (IMO) you're acting petty and childish, and explaining why your insistence on believing the worst of every non-Mormon in this thread irritates me. But prior to accusing you of immaturity, what have I said that could be construed as anything but benign geekery?
Seriously, I can understand why you'd be pissed off at Justa; he was deliberately pushing your buttons, mainly because I'm convinced that's what he does: like a moth to a flame, he pushes the buttons of people with big-ass buttons. But you're painting with an excessively large brush, otherwise.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I don't like you calling me any of the above. You're perfectly within your right to do so, but I do not agree, and it isn't accomplishing anything good.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
Mmmmm... big-ass butt ons.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Wow. An all-about-Kat thread and MrSquicky isn't even here !
Are we allowed to do that?
[ April 05, 2007, 11:32 AM: Message edited by: kmbboots ]
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Wow. An all-about-Kat thread and MrSquicky isn't even here !
Are we allowed to do that?
Ha!
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
I don't mean to imply that kat is making this about her. Just that it is a Hatrack Cultural Phenomenon. I apologize for being hurtful to kat. It was not my intention.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
You're fine, Kate. It's okay. I am completely happy with this returning to...well, the contentious issue is a bit of a dead horse at this point, so maybe a larger discussion about the treatment of religion in Star Trek?
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
No, I've covered that. There's nothing really left to say about it.
Posted by Seatarsprayan (Member # 7634) on :
I find it fascinating that so many are convinced that it's a Mormon reference and that they *want* it that way.
The actual line is "I think he did a little too much LDS."
If that is a Mormon reference, it sounds like fornication to me. Not something to be proud of.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Nah, it could easily mean participation. Like, "I did Catholicism for twenty years, but I'm getting better."
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:I find it fascinating that so many are convinced that it's a Mormon reference and that they *want* it that way.
I think it's been established that this particular line of humor is funny to different people for different reasons. No one is saying (any longer) that it MUST be a reference to Mormonism; only that if it is, it is a great deal more funny to them personally.
*I think.*
quote:If that is a Mormon reference, it sounds like fornication to me. Not something to be proud of.
Um...that's why it's funny. Irony, juxtaposition...Mormons have a certain reputation for being prudes and squares, so Kirk's mistake is funny because it contradicts the popular assumption of what the LDS church stands for.
See, it's not funny when I have to explain it.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
Huh. I never would have thought it could mean that. I saw it more along the lines of what Icarus said—something like "he got really into Mormonism in the '60s and it sort of fried his brain." It's not that I want it to be a Mormon joke, but rather that I never realized that LDS is not a commonly understood acronym outside of Mormondom, so I also never realized that it probably wasn't intended as a Mormon joke.
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
"See, it's not funny when I have to explain it."
It's still funny.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I think it's funny that he had to explain it, actually. So the screenwriters clearly intended that joke to work on, like, eight levels. Posted by Artemisia Tridentata (Member # 8746) on :
Now that the dust has settled, perhaps I could point out that it was an old joke way before the movie was even made. I remember hearing it first in Junior High. And, while I didn't go to school with Mr. Leary, I probably could have done, if we had lived on the same block.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
No it isn't.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Artemisia, you're apparently much older than I thought if you were already out of middle school in the '80s. For some reason I was thinking that you were a young woman in her early '20s.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
It's just something a small segment of the population finds more funny because it can be interpreted to mean something more personal to them.
To a small segment of society, LDS means something other than just a transposition of letters.
Small portions of society will interpret and find humor in things, whether they were intended or not.
For example, if someone said "WOW! I love it!", most people would look at "WOW" as an exclamation showing excitement. Many people might see that as a reference to the Opie and Anthony radio show, while many others might see it as a reference to World of Warcraft.
Without greater context, though, to narrow the meaning to one of those two specific interpretations, it probably is being used in the most mass-market generic way - i.e., an expression of excitement.
With the case of LDS in Star Trek IV, I'd say the most mass-market generic interpretation is that it was simply a transposition of letters meant to draw humor from Kirk being 300 years out of touch with 80s slang/acronyms. That a segment of the population finds additional humor because the letters mean something in their own right is their own prerogative. I'd imagine employees of Light Design Systems would get an added level of humor, as well, due to their more personal association with that letter grouping.
As an aside, sometimes a group of letters may have an additional level of meaning that is entirely unintended. A great deal of people who played White Wolf's Werewolf: the Apocalypse (WtA) game were very annoyed and frustrated when that game line was ended and replaced with Werewolf: the Foresaken (WtF). I can assure you that the additional meaning of that collection of letters was both a) known to the writers, and b) not intended. It was just an unfortunate coincidence.
Posted by Artemisia Tridentata (Member # 8746) on :
I left Junior High in '62. EDIT: Opps make that '61. Maybe I did too much LDS in the 60's too. As for the young woman part, you haven't googled Artemisia Tridentata. I am a grey headed old desert dweller, who read OSC before he ever published SF stuff.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
*blush* I just figured you were a girl who liked the desert.
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
quote:For example, if someone said "WOW! I love it!", most people would look at "WOW" as an exclamation showing excitement. Many people might see that as a reference to the Opie and Anthony radio show, while many others might see it as a reference to World of Warcraft.
Actually, that brings up another curiosity of mine. I've never listened to Opie and Anthony, and I never really intend to. But I've often wondered what the WOW bumper stickers meant. Can this be explained in this forum?
Second: Tom I really fail to see why you need to get the last word over Katharina on this. It seems to me she's been trying to put this thing to rest for three pages, and you're the one who won't let it go. At this point the best you can argue is that she's being defensive because she's being attacked.
Kat: If you want, I could delete the thread. I probably should have labeled it mayfly to begin with. I got my answer after all.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
From wikipedia, Glenn:
quote:W.O.W.: During their WAAF years, O&A established W.O.W., short for Whip 'Em Out Wednesdays, which encouraged women to flash anyone with a W.O.W. sign. As a result, it was common around Massachusetts to see cars with stickers, signs and even painted on letters.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
quote:Zal, why do you think Mormons on Hatrack deserve any more gentle treatment than members of any other faith? The TOS isn't Mormon-specific.
The words I used were "be mindful." Of course, I think we should be civil and respectful in all our discussions -- especially those related to forum members' beliefs.
Based on past forum activity, though, I don't think it would be a bad idea if all of us we're a little less trigger happy and a bit more thoughtful before posting something Mormon-related -- whether that's a thread about Mormonism or a Mormon perspective brought to bear on another topic.
The same advice, of course, is apropos to all discussion topics that have the potential for heated debate. It does seem to me, however, that because of the composition of this forum, an extra Mormonism filter would help. There's enough Mormons and non-Mormons around here that the piling on comes pretty thick, heavy and quick.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Glenn Arnold, I would really prefer you not delete the thread on that account. Just because you (general "you") don't like or appreciate what someone else has to say does not give you the ethical high ground to remove what was said. Sure, I may be one of the last people some here would consider should be pointing out double standards on behavior, but in this case what I am saying is regardless of others' opinion of me or my motivations.
Besides, memory is inexact and often flawed in favor of the mental, emotional, and physical state of the person holding the memory. You can't delete the memory, but you can reinforce that memory by removing the possibility to review later after emotional states level off. That does a disservice, in my possibly worthless (around here) opinion, and I personally find it a dishonest thing to do.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Second: Tom I really fail to see why you need to get the last word over Katharina on this. It seems to me she's been trying to put this thing to rest for three pages, and you're the one who won't let it go. At this point the best you can argue is that she's being defensive because she's being attacked.
I don't need the "last word." I would, however, like Katie to recognize that, as far as I can tell, she deliberately insulted a number of the people who post on this thread, mainly by making baseless insinuations about their motivations, and that they are RIGHT to be upset about this. I don't know if she realizes that this is how it appears to me (and to, I know, others, but I won't speak for them.)
Moreover, on a larger scale, I would appreciate it if she recognized that attempting to withdraw from a debate which would otherwise make her uncomfortable for any reason does not require that she claim, however subtly, that the other person is at fault for her so doing. "You're being too rude for me to have this discussion with you" is an insult, no matter how Southern an approach you take to saying it.
I'm sorry I'm having this discussion now on what was meant to be a silly, fluffy thread. It IS out of place. But that particular rhetorical approach REALLY grates on me, and I suppose now is as good a time as any to explain why.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow: For example, if someone said "WOW! I love it!", most people would look at "WOW" as an exclamation showing excitement. Many people might see that as a reference to the Opie and Anthony radio show, while many others might see it as a reference to World of Warcraft.
WOW = World of Wings.
That's still my first thought, even when people are talking about World of Warcraft.
-pH
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Glenn, there's no need to delete the thread. There is some good stuff here, and I'm okay.
Tom, I realize that a refusal to fight with someone feels like a snub. However, I can either choose to fight about it, refuse to fight about it, or agree to everything you say. The first is unpleasant and the third isn't going to happen, so I choose the second. That's actually okay. I can choose whether or not to engage in an unpleasant conversation, and I choose not to. I'm sorry you're angry about that, but I'm not going to change my mind.
Posted by Artemisia Tridentata (Member # 8746) on :
Workers of the World of course. You don't remember the Wobblies. They are still around. But, now days they use IWW.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:I can choose whether or not to engage in an unpleasant conversation, and I choose not to.
That's fine. I'm not saying it's not your right to simply walk away from a conversation.
What I'm saying is that you don't have the right (colloquially speaking) to say, "You're a stupid-headed jerk who called me an idiot and can't be civil, so I'm not going to talk to you anymore."
Especially if the other person doesn't think he called you an idiot and thinks he's been civil throughout. By departing the conversation in that manner, you now put the burden of good behavior on the other party; it's (IMO) a very passive-aggressive response.
A PASSIVE response would be to simply stop posting. If you wanted, you could even email the other person to explain why. A public accusation of misbehavior as a parting statement, though, is like a drive-by slapping. Consider what happened with Icky, here. He felt that you had insulted him indirectly by questioning the motives of anyone who'd challenge the Mormonosity of the joke; when he said this, you responded with "I'm sorry you feel that way." That's not an apology; that's an accusation of weakness coupled with a denial of further conversation. I can understand if you wouldn't want to apologize for some reason, but I'm sure you understand why that response is most certainly not a peaceful withdrawal from the field.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
That was a post filled with vivid and harsh images. None of them came from me. Wherever they came from, it wasn't my posts.
---
Side note, as this seems inevitable: I am not passive aggressive. I am not passive! If I think you should bite me, I'll say so. Really. There's no need to search my posts for hidden insults. If I want to insult you (the general you), I will do so directly.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I deliberately exaggerated them, Kat, because I really sincerely believe that you don't realize how harsh your tone sometimes sounds.
Consider your first response to my initial guess -- "That doesn't seem plausible at all." -- and your follow-up: "At this point we are merely guessing, and our guesses reveal more about ourselves than about the movie or the writers."
I hear hostility and defensiveness in both those comments. It's possible that neither is intended. In this case, I think you need to understand that a lot of us read hostility and defensiveness into these statements. In fact, that took me so by surprise that I basically withdrew from speaking to you directly in the thread from that point until much later, after Justa did his bull-in-a-china-shop schtick, because it made me think that you were deeply emotionally invested in this joke.
I also think it's possible that you don't realize how offensive lines like "You have a right to your own opinion. *shrug*" sound. That might -- and I have to stress "might," because I don't think I could pull it off -- work in Meatspace, where it'd be obvious that your shrug is a lighthearted shrug and the twinkle in your eye makes it clear that there's no harm meant, but on a forum it says, "Whatever. You're not worth my attention."
I really don't think you ever mean to offend with this sort of thing. I think you're always caught by surprise when it happens to you, and are always dismayed by it. And I'm trying to explain why it often seems to you like everyone on the forum is hearing something that you don't mean to be saying: it's because your tone, which I think you're trying to make sound light and carefree, is coming off as dismissive and defensive instead. I really, truly believe that this is why this kind of thing happens to you.
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Edit: I have a problem with this, myself. In print, I tend to think before I write. This makes my words sound very precise and formal and studied, and so I come off as stuffier and more didactic than (I like to think) I am in person. I was genuinely surprised the first time someone on another forum accused me of being some snotty stuffed shirt; I didn't know enough about my own tone to realize this was how I sounded to people. I don't think you are passive-aggressive. But I think the most obvious interpretation of some of your rhetorical devices is that they're meant to be passive-aggressive responses, and it's my opinion that this works against you.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I'm polite! What do you want from me? I prefer not to. I'm not telling someone what to think and say and am careful to point that out. I'm not even saying that the discussion has been settled because I have spoken. I am registering that I disagree but do not feel like a knockdowndragout, for whatever reason - ESPECIALLY when it comes down our individual impressions - would be productive. What else do you want? Should I include more smilies? Stop talking altogether? Thrown in a nickname? I don't want to. I think it would nice to be taken at face value. There are no hidden messages. For whatever reason, I don't feel like getting into at the time. It is almost never, ever personal.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
I just wanted to add that I absolutely agree with Tom. I can't quite put my finger on it, but lines like "You have a right to your own opinion. *shrug*" come off sounding more like "You're obviously wrong, but that's your right, and it's not worth my time to try to correct you." And then you refuse to participate in the discussion when people tell you that it sounds rude, which compounds the problem.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I think you're reading things into that are not meant. If I want to say "You're obviously wrong," then I'll say it.
Like the first sentence of this post. I think you're reading it wrong. If I have a different take but don't feel, for whatever reason, like hashing it out, I'll say "You have a different opinion. Okay." The second does not mean the first.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Hrm. This may be a situation where a desire to not engage conflicts with the desire to comment on the situation. This isn't a problem I usually have -- I'm generally willing to engage ad nauseam, obviously -- but even I've been there occasionally.
What if people are saying things you disagree with, but don't want to discuss at length? Is it worth posting something like "I disagree with X" with no follow-up? Is it necessary to say "I disagree with X, but don't want to discuss this with you in particular" if that is in fact the case?
My gut reaction to that dilemma is to immediately think of Sara Sasse, who finds herself in this situation all the time. She's often uncomfortable with conflict -- heck, she'd probably be uncomfortable with my mentioning her name right now -- but cares deeply about some things. When it's an issue she doesn't care deeply about, she simply walks away without posting and has some tea (and, on some occasions, dwells on it in her head for a little while before letting it go). When it's an issue that she does care about, she'll often say something like "My head's not screwed on straight enough for me to give you the answer you deserve. I'll come back to this later." And then, a few hours or even days later, will revisit the topic -- often with something insightful. I'm not saying that kind of self-deprecation is necessary, but I think there's a level of acknowlegement of the Other in her response that's very becoming and helps to defuse potential awkwardness. It's not something I'm placid enough to pull off, but I think you could make it work for you.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I'm pretty happy with myself and I the way I post. I think CT is darling and wonderful, but I'm not her. I like me and my own style.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
*smile* I like you, too, you know. I get the sense sometimes that you're increasingly annoyed by all these weird little tempests in a teapot that follow you around, though, and -- precisely because I like you -- wanted to offer my unsolicited advice and/or suggestions on ways to avoid them.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:I just wanted to add that I absolutely agree with Tom. I can't quite put my finger on it, but lines like "You have a right to your own opinion. *shrug*" come off sounding more like "You're obviously wrong, but that's your right, and it's not worth my time to try to correct you." And then you refuse to participate in the discussion when people tell you that it sounds rude, which compounds the problem.
At the risk of dog-piling, I just wanted to say that I read it the same way as Tom and JB.
I'd like to add to what was said here by saying that I don't think it's your refusal to participate that is passive-aggressive. As you say, it's your right to not engage at any time.
The thing really makes it passive-aggressive to me is that when you refuse to engage, you don't quietly exit the thread. You stick around to say once, twice, or a half-dozen times, "I'm not talking to you. You're not polite" or something equivalent.
I know you hate the passive-aggressive label, but I don't think it's always misapplied to you. It sometimes is, and I think Tom's partially right about you not realizing how the words on the page read.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: That was a post filled with vivid and harsh images. None of them came from me. Wherever they came from, it wasn't my posts.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: I am not discussing this with you. I find your attitude abhorrent.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: For whatever reason, I don't feel like getting into at the time. It is almost never, ever personal.
Why is it that were I to say it I am, as TomDavidson described, and intentional button pusher, but when you say it we should all slap our foreheads and completely reconsider our response to what you say? If it makes you feel any better, you are not the only person on this forum for whom this double-standard exists. Also,
quote:Originally posted by katharina: This actually isn't the first time it's happened - I'll answer a question and volunteer requested information, and then I get blasted like I'd just started a thread all special in order to plaster it across the home page.
More than once now people have chided me that perhaps I should change my posting style in order to stop such a thing from happening. Maybe you should consider the same.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: I'm pretty happy with myself and I the way I post. I think CT is darling and wonderful, but I'm not her. I like me and my own style.
Remember that next time you find my posts or posting style abhorrent. Remember that every time there are posters whom you believe you cannot engage in conversation with, for whatever reason you believe so. Also, when some who has said the words you choose make you sound as if you feel you are better than others (and you do sound that way), keep statements like that in mind as an example of why some may hold that opinion.
Or, you know, don't. We certainly are not the boss of you. Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Tom, thank you for that. I must admit that the same things that prevent from wanting to get it are preventing me from wanting to get into why I don't want to get into it.
JT, you took the gamble and risked it all, but it didn't work. Especially with what came after, it's dogpiling. Sorry. Everything beyond the dogpiling point gets ignored, and yours et. al. fell into it.
*points up* Now THAT'S what I'll do if I want to be rude when blowing someone off.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
And you believe this is the high road?
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
I don't think that was rude. I knew there was a good chance I would be one too many (and I knew for sure Justa would be), but I think you honestly do want to know why this seems to keep happening to you so I thought it was worth a shot.
*for the record, I much prefer that response.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
You prefer the rude response?
*laugh* Oh, I give up. I'm just going to put whatever crosses my brain. Look! Post-its!
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
No. I actually think the passive-aggressive response is much more rude.
Saying that you're not responding to the dogpiling because it's overwhelming is a perfectly legitimate response (IMO, of course).
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
You know, as a sidenote, I DO wonder why it is that it feels so, I dunno, threatening when lots of people suddenly post "against" you in a forum. Whether they're attacking you or contradicting you or simply disagreeing, there's something about seeing one post after another in quick succession opposed to your position that seems to provoke the "fight or flight" response in most people. I know that when OSC reamed me out a while back and about six or seven of the lurker set jumped on me, I actually experienced physical fear; my heartbeat went up, my face flushed, I found myself clicking "refresh" over and over again. I like to think that my agitation with that situation didn't show too badly, but I recall how horrible it felt. It makes me feel sorry for a few posters on here who, either by virtue of their style or their substance, are almost always the recipient -- deserving or not -- of that kind of treatment, and wonder what it feels like to them.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
But I'm NOT being passive aggressive. Apparently it is perceived as such, but I am not implying any subtext. So, I'm not being rude in the first but was in the second. If someone prefers the deliberate rudeness in the second to the cool refusal to fight in the first, I give up on pleasing people altogether (not that I worked that hard at it in the first place).
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
JT, how does what I had to say there have any less relevance? Are my objections ignorable because, as TomDavidson stated, I am allegedly a button pusher? I am not saying these things to push buttons, and in at least one instance recently I was attempting to steer away from that button pushing I was being accused of and had my attempt and the subsequent ridiculous behavior toward me deleted.
I am genuinely curious. I really want to know what makes my comparison less relevant, unless the determinant factor is having met someone face to face, as others seem to imply they have.
Tom: I didn't feel that way in the thread which was deleted, but I felt a sick feeling in my stomach at constantly being called the equivalent of a traitor and an American hater for my contrary views.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
I didn't say it doesn't have relevance; merely that it wouldn't do any good.
That has nothing to do with the content of your post -- as kat said, everything beyond a certain point just turns into noise. It turns out my post was part of that noise, too.
*shrug*
It happens. A person can only sort through so many responses at once, and they're typically handled on a first-come first-serve basis.
In this particular case, your particular post isn't likely to get much response because kat's already said she's not discussing the issue with you. Not that she's hasn't been known to recant that statement in previous instances, but given that she doesn't believe you'll engage in good faith discussion I can't imagine she'd answer anything you had to say on this subject at this time.
Especially when you factor in that she's already having the same discussion with Tom, JB, and me -- 3 posters she has an amicable relationship with and who, she knows, even if she doesn't agree with them that they are discussing in good faith.
That's cachet that you haven't yet built up. That probably annoys you, so I'll say this -- if you hadn't stormed in (to Hatrack, not to this thread) so obnoxiously you'd have been given the benefit of the doubt until you earned that cachet in the traditional way.
Edit to add: You may not care, but I have noticed that you've changed your tone (again), and already you're getting a better response than just a few days ago. People here are quick to forgive and forget, and they genuinely want to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Anyway, the change hasn't gone unnoticed or unappreciated. When I saw you make an effort to be civil, I stopped antagonizing you.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: I know that when OSC reamed me out a while back and about six or seven of the lurker set jumped on me, I actually experienced physical fear; my heartbeat went up, my face flushed, I found myself clicking "refresh" over and over again...
If you don't mind my asking, while you seem to have strong opinions in several areas, I have never seen you express it particularly provocatively, what were you and OSC posting about that generated such a vehement response?
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
I'd leave that can of worms alone, Tom.
YMMV.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Oh man...
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I'm willing to drop it; if my words are unwelcome, I will. But I'm really trying to explain what I see and how it comes across, not to dogpile or insult. I see you continuing to discuss the issue, and I can't grasp that it's dropped if you're still discussing it.
What comes across as passive-aggressive, specifically, is saying, "I don't want to have this conversation, BUT _____." If you don't want to have the conversation, don't have the conversation. Feel free to say so or not. But when you say you want it to end, but you still work your statements in, what you're really saying, as far as I'm concerned, is that you want to state your peace but not have anybody reply to it. I'm sorry, but you just don't get that right. You make a statement people disagree with, and they will express that disagreement. Nobody's saying you have to surrender, but you can't have it both ways.
It also came across as passive aggressive when you commented on our perceptions saying more about us that about what really is. As I said earlier, though, I don't think you were being passive aggressive. I think people, including me, misinterpreted you.
If you want to know why you keep being accused of being passive-aggressive, there are my two cents. In one case it was misinterpretation (rooted at least partially in your history of conflict with Tom) and in the other, well, you may not have realized it was passive aggression, but in my opinion it was.
Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
quote:If you don't mind my asking, while you seem to have strong opinions in several areas, I have never seen you express it particularly provocatively, what were you and OSC posting about that generated such a vehement response?
Tom (and others) criticized the web design of the IGMS website. OSC took it both as a personal attack and as a real attempt to inflict harm on OSC's career and livelihood. He responded as such.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Jutsa, I actually enjoyed your mock-erudite tone. Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I think it's fine if people state their disagreement. A mutual "I disagree" is fine with me.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
JT,
No, it doesn't annoy me, but I am glad to hear someone else make a note of the difference in dealing with posters who have had a more familiar relationship before as opposed to those who are relatively faceless. I disagree that the benefit of the doubt is given in most cases, and that there are certain expectations that are waived for certain individuals that must be met by those who are not only not regulars, but have not experienced some type of rapport off the confines of this forum.
I am not asking for people to all of the sudden say to me that my posts are insightful and appreciated, as not even I believe that about some of my posts. Tom is correct in that there have been times I have pushed buttons, but the motives are not always the same. However, there have been plenty of posts by myself that have not been meant to push buttons, yet have been met with the assumption they are. I've noticed a number of individuals who seem to be excused from such scrutiny, especially of late, and they all seem to have that familiarity off the borders of this forum in common. For some of the more egregious examples, there are even more common threads. Maybe I should not have challenged that here, since as you say, I have not collected enough "points" in character to do so yet. But seeing the dichotomy tends to make me, and I would wager some other more silent individuals, desire to "join" that kind of communal association.
But that is a stand-off, isn't it? I've not earned credibility, but aspects of that same credibility make me suspect to want to earn it. Behavior like katharina's in this thread is one example of the source of my suspicion. How would you suggest I reconcile that? Do you think your perspective has any bearing on how you think I should reconcile that? And finally, do you think that a tree falling in the woods makes a sound?
Icarus: Thank you. I truly did mean it in the spirit of harmless fun.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Mucus: to sum up, I asked the forum if they agreed that the IGMS site -- which was due to go live shortly -- was poorly designed, using a less-than-judicious word choice. OSC was concerned that I was attempting to sabotage the financial success of the venture, a conclusion apparently based at least partly on previous threads in which I'd expressed displeasure with his political punditry (from which he had drawn the private conclusion that I was a destructively obsessed fan), and replied with some heat.
Over the years, there have been a handful of people (mainly trolls, in my biased opinion) who've been resentful of my presence on Hatrack. I think they saw OSC's anger as an opportunity to finally vent their frustration, and so it was a fairly unpleasant week or two for a lot of people who would have preferred that their forum not be cluttered with random NastyCrap(tm).
Like almost all forum flaps, it was ultimately just another incident of sturm und drang -- but, like the Song of Cedrios, will probably become part of the mythology for whatever reason.
------
Justa: I think you were right to be angry in that other thread. But I also think those posters were right to be angry with you -- not because you were spreading sedition, but because of the way you chose to present your case. I've already played Dr. Phil with ONE person in this thread, though, so you'll have to wait. *ducks*
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Dr Phil?
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
If you don't get the reference, consider yourself the luckiest man alive. Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Tom: I don't believe you need to analyze or explain anything. I have a good guess that some early things I said were done so in a terse enough manner and in faux-absolute enough terms that some people never got over it. Added to a preconcieved impression from posts in other threads, it's easy to see how it brewed into some fairly heavy resentment. I was in no way a 'victim' with that thread, just insulted and now subject to that imperfect memory I mentioned earlier.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Jutsa, I agree that some people get more leeway than others, and that interacting off of this forum has a lot to do with it. In particular, once I've met someone face to face, it's hard to reduce that person to "just a troll." I recommend to anyone here over the age of eighteen that they look for an opportunity to get together with another Hatracker sometime. I have met people that way I consider to be some of the highest quality people I know. (But it's not just the behavior of established Hatrackers to newcomers that changes; I have seen in the past that newcomers change their own behavior once they realize that those collections of pixels on the screen symbolize other people, and that, in many if not most cases, those other people are actually quite decent, regardless of how they might annoy you in any given thread.) Once you know and like somebody, even in your disagreements you're more committed to making sure that person knows it's not personal, and to making sure that your disagreement doesn't hurt the relationship.
I would be glad to share a beer with you sometime if we're ever in the same area--like if you're ever in Central Florida.
I don't dislike you or think you're a troll. With that in mind, I hope you won't take it as fighting words when I tell you that your worst behavior has been, in my opinion, worse than Kat's worst behavior. And Kat very obviously does not get a free pass.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
For better or worse, words are all we have here.
And, just like in statistics, the smaller the sample size the larger the error. Larger in magnitude, and in likelihood.
So, people with thousands of posts are judged by their body of work. Meaning they probably have a lot more good behavior to offset the occasional bad behavior (which, I think we can agree, none of us are immune to).
Likewise, people with a few posts, or a few hundred posts are judged by their body of work. Therefore a lot less leniency exists for them because they probably haven't had the opportunity to show as much of their good side.
Specifically, in your case, this:
quote:if you hadn't stormed in (to Hatrack, not to this thread) so obnoxiously you'd have been given the benefit of the doubt until you earned that cachet in the traditional way.
answers this:
quote:However, there have been plenty of posts by myself that have not been meant to push buttons, yet have been met with the assumption they are.
-------------------------
quote:How would you suggest I reconcile that? Do you think your perspective has any bearing on how you think I should reconcile that? And finally, do you think that a tree falling in the woods makes a sound?
As for the first, I would advise that you reserve judgment on kat for a few weeks*. I think you'll find that she's sweet, compassionate, and genuinely well-meaning. She's well-liked, and that reputation is deserved. She has bad days, just like everyone else.
As for the second, I can't think of any instance in which my perspective would not influence what I think about a given situation.
As for the third; that's a philosophy question. I'm no philosopher -- I'm an engineer. My answer to the question is, "Who gives a crap?"
*Once you turn the corner with your attitude, I think you'll find this is what most people are doing with you. Some come around quicker than others, but in time there are very few people who won't change their minds about a poster who wants to be a productive member of the community.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:And Kat very obviously does not get a free pass.
Close, though, because I dismiss and don't listen to anything I don't agree with. *twinkle*
Edit: Dagnabbit, I put that before I saw JT's post. Now it looks terrible. *sigh* JT is very sweet. Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Icarus, regarding your first paragraph: not out of the question, but unlikely enough to not be a realistic expectation of some people, myself included. Perhaps we will meet face to face sometime, but if so it will not be under the auspices of a relatioship here. That's not a slight, it just has to be that way sometimes with some people. I hope you understand.
Regarding your second part, I don't think those are fighting words. She may not have a free pass, but there is enough of a discount that it is possibly more noticable than you may believe. But no, there are other instances where I believe there is worse behavior than even my worst that has gone relatively unchallenged, and with the same general conditions.
JT, I don't know what you mean by asking me to reserve judgment. My opinion, at least in this particular case of katharina's foibles, are not based solely on this thread. All this thread has been is a more focused example of such behavior. I believe you that she is a nice person and easy to get along with, once you have met her. From my perspective, I disagree and feel it is closer to relating to a feline that will be friendly one moment and scratch you the next. Maybe that is totally wrong and not like her personality face to face. To me that is irrelevant and should not be a requisite. As I implied to Icarus, though, there are worse cases that would probably deserve more scrutiny, but I think that you and I agree that I am not the individual to introduce the scrutiny.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I have never met JT in person.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:But no, there are other instances where I believe there is worse behavior than even my worst that has gone relatively unchallenged, and with the same general conditions.
We disagree. Not that there has been worse behavior than yours, but that any such behavior has gone unchallenged--at least not in the last couple of years.
I also disagree with your assessment of Kat, and would have before I met her.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:We disagree.
Who are you speaking for here?
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Him and all who agree with him. Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
<edit to remove my now no-longer-relevant joke>
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Well, I suppose it did last too long to be true...
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I thought maybe he'd bought Sealand, so he was using the royal "We" as would befit his role as monarch.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Myself and Jutsa Notha Name. I was not speaking for any body of people. I was saying that he and I disagree. Does that clarify things?
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
katharina: you know each other outside of this forum, and that is close enough.
Icarus: I have no answer for that. I don't want to change your opinion on those things on the basis that mine is different at this time.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
So, when you said "We", you meant you and Jutsa disagree with Jutsa?
Edit: Oh, I get it. You are saying "You and I disagree." Sorry, it sounded to me like you were representing more than your own opinion as disagreeing with Jutsa.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
No, he meant Icarus and Jutsa disagree with each other about the topic being discussed.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I think he means that he and JAN disagree with each other.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Icky, feel free to speak for me concerning these matters.
Until you get it wrong once, and then you're dead to me. :pirate:
Posted by Papa Janitor (Member # 7795) on :
I didn't want to chime in, but I think I should.
I'd like to think there's a difference as to what's expected/accepted by Hatrack the community, and what's expected/accepted by Hatrack the forum. I sincerely try to be as even-handed (and as hands-off) as I can be, though I'm certain not only that I have biases of which I'm unaware, but I also have some of which I am aware, and some of those I choose to apply and some I try not to. When I do intentionally apply such biases, it's usually in the direction opposite my actual inclination (much like when my dad was the cubmaster and was tougher on me and my brothers than on all the other cub scouts in the pack, or at least it seemed that way).
I'm sure there are people who consider me to use "double-standards." Yeah, probably, sometimes. And sometimes not. I've had people on both "sides" of an issue think that I was taking the other person's side, and I've made non-person-specific suggestions in threads and had each "side" think I was talking only to the other "side." Anyway, I'm doing my best (and no, I'm not asking for affirmation -- seems like someone throws some at me every time I post anything where I admit fault of any sort).
As to what's expected by the Hatrack community, I don't think it's my place to speak as a moderator.
As a member (and this informs my decisions as moderator, but doesn't dictate them, I don't think) I believe it's important (or at least healthy) for there to be a certain degree of disagreement, and sometimes with some energy behind it. Hatrack as a community is really good at working through such things and coming out better on the other side. Usually. And as long as the TOS aren't being tossed aside, I've found it best for the working through to be allowed to happen. I'll admit I wish more of it were worked out off-forum, and at times that people valued resolution more than "winning."
If anyone has specific questions or comments regarding things I have or haven't done, they're free to contact me. I can't promise a quick answer to everyone. And while I appreciate advice, I don't expect to take all of it.
Ok -- I've gotten interrupted maybe a dozen times since I started this, so I don't know how the thread has moved on or if I've said everything I originally intended to. But I'm gonna stop here. For now.
--PJ
Posted by Bokonon (Member # 480) on :
*mind boggled*
You know what? I just disagree with the whole lot of you!
Good Day!
-Bok
EDIT: PJ's post wasn't there when I posted this.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
If it helps in any capacity, Papa Janitor, I did not intend to imply I considered my opinion is concerning you. This is only the second thread you have poasted in that I have, to my knowledge, and the other time I viewed it as a positive, not negative.
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: <edit to remove my now no-longer-relevant joke>
Trans..parent.... Aluminum? Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina: At this point, unless someone has access to an interview or something, EVERYONE is just guessing.
I'm pretty sure I heard Nick Meyer answer a question about it at a con in the late 80s or early 90s. Unfortunately, I don't seem to recall exactly what he said . . . Anyone want to try hypnotizing me?
I do recall assuming that it was a Mormon reference when I read it (I read most of the ST movie novelizations before I saw the movies), but I had at least one Mormon email-buddy at the time, so that doesn't mean much.
Oh, and Nick Meyer is Jewish. No idea if that's relevant.
Posted by Pat (Member # 879) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: Over the years, there have been a handful of people (mainly trolls, in my biased opinion) who've been resentful of my presence on Hatrack. I think they saw OSC's anger as an opportunity to finally vent their frustration, and so it was a fairly unpleasant week or two for a lot of people who would have preferred that their forum not be cluttered with random NastyCrap(tm).
Like almost all forum flaps, it was ultimately just another incident of sturm und drang -- but, like the Song of Cedrios, will probably become part of the mythology for whatever reason.
Huh. Tom thinks I'm a troll.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
quote:Over the years, there have been a handful of people (mainly trolls, in my biased opinion) who've been resentful of my presence on Hatrack. I think they saw OSC's anger as an opportunity to finally vent their frustration, and so it was a fairly unpleasant week or two for a lot of people who would have preferred that their forum not be cluttered with random NastyCrap(tm).
I think I might've been one of those trolls.
The thing is, though, I'm not a troll. And I just want to address the issue of lurkers "resenting Tom Davidson's presence at Hatrack" (from my personal perspective).
"The Tom Davidson controversy" occured shortly after I arrived on hatrack. At the time, I didn't know much about the players. But I'd been reading OSC's books since I was a kid. I met OSC once, and he was gracious and warm. I didn't know Tom Davidson. I'd seen a few Tom Davidson posts that (I remember thinking) were a bit disingenuous and mean.
(If you asked me to point them out now, I couldn't. But I could probably point you to one or two recent posts by Tom in the same basic vein. Just like someone wanting to could find the same type of posts by me (this might be one) or almost any other member of hatrack -- beacause we're all human.)
But I knew enough about our host to take him at his word. Why would OSC invent a history of misbehavior on the part of Tom Davidson that didn't exist? I remember specifically that OSC said there were communications between Tom and him that the forum was not privy to, and that Tom was up to no good.
That was enough info for me to take a side. Why? Because -- why would OSC lie? I had no real prior resentment (or even knowledge) of Tom Davidson's presence on hatrack. But why would OSC lie?
I can understand Tom's hurt feelings, but to characterize everyone who took OSC's side as a troll is ... wrong. It is natural and human for people to assume the rightness of a trusted party over an unknown.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Good lord.
Let's not drag this up again, please.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
Now? Privately, I'd tell you that I think OSC is a great writer with a (forgive me) too-thin skin, as I've offended him now a few times myself without meaning to -- so much so that he's mentioned my offending posts two separate times -- once in an interview, and once in a column. And I thought that was an overreaction.
I'd also tell you that I like Tom Davidson quite a lot, though I think he thinks he's right too often. And I don't think he cares for me. Or at least, I think there's a refusal to engage me that I don't like, specifically because he has my respect and I'd like to engage him. But either there are some kind of hurt feelings there or I don't say anything meaningful enough for him to respond to. Either way, I'm bothered by it because I've come to like him.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
quote:Good lord.
Let's not drag this up again, please.
I had something I wanted to say about it, so I'm saying it.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
I have something to say, too.
But I figure the forum's a healthier place if I refrain.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Huh. Tom thinks I'm a troll.
quote:I can understand Tom's hurt feelings, but to characterize everyone who took OSC's side as a troll is ... wrong.
Tom did not say that everyone who took OSC's side was a troll. He said that some people took the spat as an opportunity to do something he considered nasty, and that most of those people were trolls. Nowhere did he equate siding with OSC as being nasty itself, nor that all who sided with OSC engaged in the nasty behavior.
Posted by TL (Member # 8124) on :
quote:I have something to say, too.
But I figure the forum's a healthier place if I refrain.
Can I ask, in the healthiest way possible, why what I wrote has offended you? Because I'd like to express myself properly about this. And if I'm coming across the wrong way, I'd like to correct it.
Basically what I'm trying to say is that I value Tom's presence on the forum; while at the same time explaining my own misbehavior towards Tom... And maybe I'm working my way up to an apology.
I'd like to know how I've expressed this so wrongly that you've become offended.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
You didn't offend me, TL.
I should have been more concise. I have LOTS of things to say about LOTS of people. But I figure the forum's a healthier place, all around, if I refrain from making those comments except where I feel a need and can direct a solution.
I was speaking in general terms, not in specific ones.
I was not happy to see Tom bring up that old sore spot; I'd happily see it be forgotten forever.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Or at least, I think there's a refusal to engage me that I don't like, specifically because he has my respect and I'd like to engage him.
:: laugh ::
It may not be personal*, TL
In the early 90s Tom and a cat were in a teleporter accident, and the cat's genes were mixed in with Tom's. The only discernable result of this is that there is an inversely proportional relationship between the intensity of a person's desire to engage him and his interest in doing so.
*though on the other hand it may be.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
What Dagonee said.
-o-
Noemon
Posted by BandoCommando (Member # 7746) on :
Not having read the majority of this topic, I can't speak to some of the main issues. However, I noticed some discussion relating to reputations gained from those with high post counts.
I have a great amount of respect for the frequent posters here. While opinions vary along a wide range of not just one, but MANY different continuums, I value the opportunity to read the thought out and often eloquent statements posters make here. So much so that I rarely feel the need to add my own two cents. Someone has usually said it, and worded it far better than I would have.
Nevertheless, I find myself wondering how I might go about building the kind of respect and "points", if you will, that many of you have built up here on Hatrack. I have been a member for 2 or 3 years, but only infrequently post, for the above-mentioned reasons.
Anyway, I suppose that all this amounts to is a lot of respect mixed with a certain small amount of jealousy for those whose posts are listened to.
In the meantime, my thanks go out to Hatrack for providing me with endless reading material, enlightenment in various ways of looking at topics, and a plethora of useful advice about any number of topics. Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
The best way I can think of to generate respect is to role play as an elven bar wench and write steamy romance passages about fellow posters.
*shrug* It's worked for me.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
It worked for Olivet too, neh?
Bando, I tend to notice your posts. Posted by BandoCommando (Member # 7746) on :
Woohoo! Someone with a massive post count noticed me!
Wait...
I hope that means you notice me in a GOOD way, rivka. Ah well. I'll live either way.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by BandoCommando: Nevertheless, I find myself wondering how I might go about building the kind of respect and "points", if you will, that many of you have built up here on Hatrack. I have been a member for 2 or 3 years, but only infrequently post, for the above-mentioned reasons.
Bando, all you really have to do is post a whole lot, talk about things that are going on in your life, and not be a colossal jackass*. When people don't respond to you, just assume that it's for the same set of reasons that you often don't respond to posts that you find worthwhile, and post some more.
*Note that I'm not saying that you *are* a colossal jackass. I've never seen any kind of jackassery from you, colossal or otherwise.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I get what you're feeling, and it's perfectly normal. In any peer set, it's natural to want to enjoy the respect and general good opinion of the group. On the other hand, if you don't post a lot, I would question why you care so much what these people you hardly interact with think of you. (I don't mean for that to sound cold. I'm just failing to come up with the precise words for what I do mean.) I mean that you have invested less into the community than someone with thirty times as many posts, and so I wouldn't expect the forum to have the same power to elevate or hurt you. (Crap, I still can't get that to sound like an observation and not a rebuke of some sort. I'll quit before I make it sound worse. Actually, maybe it will help if I talk about how I used to feel about Hatrack popularity and how I feel about it now.)
It's only human to want to be one of the popular kids.
In my case, I have in the past enjoyed a good deal of popularity at Hatrack. If you want to know "how I did it," I posted a landmark thread at (what I in hindsight consider to be) the height of the landmark thread fad. I shared an awful lot of my life in it, and was fortunate enough to have people read it and receive it well. The problem with that approach is it's not exactly as duplicable (does that word mean what I think it means?), because with over three hundred landmark threads in existence, virtually none gets the attention that most of them got when there were a couple dozen. It also seems to me--and I could be totally off base here--that Hatrack moves faster than it used to. It used to take most people longer to reach a thousand posts, I think, and so people noticed things like that more. I think there were also fewer active posters. Of course, like anybody looking back, I could be totally off base in my perceptions. Another thing, though, is it's much less likely for a landmark post to be unique anymore. We've had happy landmarks, sad landmarks, confessional landmarks, fictional landmarks, funny landmarks, narrative ongoing landmarks, artwork-based landmarks, photography-based landmarks, etc. I think mine might possibly have been the first really confessional landmark, and so it got a lot of attention at the time. But a similar landmark now won't get the same attention.
I don't think it's terribly likely for someone to become popular in the exact same way that I did, but the principle behind it amounts to basically what Noemon said. I posted a lot, I shared a lot, and I wasn't as colossal a jackass back then as I am now. Anybody who really wants to can still do that.
What I found, though, was that having achieved that kind of popularity, I didn't care so much anymore. Popularity doesn't change whatever kind of self-image you had before you were popular. If you were secure, you're still secure. If you need popularity to validate you, then you constantly obsess over whether you're still popular. In all honesty, I've reached the point where I don't particularly care how popular I am at Hatrack. I don't work for it. I don't give as much as I used to, and I'm not quite as nice as I used to be. I come here to be exposed to things I wouldn't be exposed to otherwise, and I respond when I'm not too lazy to. When the conversation stops being rewarding, I drop out of it. I'm not as interested in making new friends because I've already made a lot of friends here, and I don't perceive a need for more. Instead of trying to make people like me, as I once did, I'm wondering if I should bother to like specific people. (I think that's an important point, and I wish it were at the beginning or end of the paragraph instead of stuck in the middle, but I'm too lazy to try and rework this paragraph.) I'm not saying this is a nice thing about me--I'm not sure it's good or bad; it just is. I have to say it's pretty healthy. (I am still pretty neurotic about keeping the friendships I have developed, though.) What popularity I have now is an artifact of the fact that I have many good friends who post here who will treat me like a friend when I am here, so someone has my back in any fight, and of the fact that any newbie can look at my absurd postcount when looking at my posts.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by BandoCommando: Woohoo! Someone with a massive post count noticed me!
Wait...
I hope that means you notice me in a GOOD way, rivka. Ah well. I'll live either way.
Mostly. I confess I originally noticed you when it was suggested that you might have another, really annoying poster, as an alt. (This was quite a while back, when you were pretty new.)
However, it didn't take long to determine that you are considerably too intelligent and interesting to be that other (who has since disappeared anyway).
Posted by Nato (Member # 1448) on :
quote:Icarus: It also seems to me--and I could be totally off base here--that Hatrack moves faster than it used to. It used to take most people longer to reach a thousand posts, I think, and so people noticed things like that more. I think there were also fewer active posters.
Really? It seems like it's way slower than it used to be (in terms of how frequently threads are bumped), although I would agree that it seems to be taking new posters less time to reach 1000--(It took me almost four years, not that this is normal either)
When I came to this side of the forum, this was the fastest forum I'd seen. Now I regularly post on a forum that goes through a month's worth of Hatrack threads every day, so perhaps it hasn't slowed down, and I'm just impatient. < >
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Icarus: The problem with that approach is it's not exactly as duplicable . . .
I can't believe you just used that word! Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
And misspelled it to boot. *shakes head sadly*
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:Originally posted by Nato:
quote:Icarus: It also seems to me--and I could be totally off base here--that Hatrack moves faster than it used to. It used to take most people longer to reach a thousand posts, I think, and so people noticed things like that more. I think there were also fewer active posters.
Really? It seems like it's way slower than it used to be (in terms of how frequently threads are bumped), although I would agree that it seems to be taking new posters less time to reach 1000--(It took me almost four years, not that this is normal either)
When I came to this side of the forum, this was the fastest forum I'd seen. Now I regularly post on a forum that goes through a month's worth of Hatrack threads every day, so perhaps it hasn't slowed down, and I'm just impatient. < >
Maybe threads get bumped less, but there are more active members who post more often. That's the only way to reconcile the observation that people reach a thousand posts faster, on average, with your perception that threads get bumped less--unless we have fewer active members who have become individually more active.
It makes a certain sense to me, though . . . more people posting more often might lead to a greater superficiality of conversation. There are so many conversations going on that people become less invested in all of them, on average. And so once one falls off the first page it is forgotten more readily. For what it's worth, this describes my posting reasonably accurately. When I come to Hatrack I don't look at the thread list beyond the first page, and I can drop a conversation more readily, without feeling the need to hash out every nuance of our opinions.
Jon Boy: Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:Originally posted by rivka: And misspelled it to boot. *shakes head sadly*
Not according to Dictionary.com.
Look! Here's a nit! -----> .
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
As long as it isn't in my home or on the person of one of my children, I could not care less.
Posted by Nato (Member # 1448) on :
quote:Originally posted by Icarus: Maybe threads get bumped less, but there are more active members who post more often. That's the only way to reconcile the observation that people reach a thousand posts faster, on average, with your perception that threads get bumped less--unless we have fewer active members who have become individually more active.
It makes a certain sense to me, though . . . more people posting more often might lead to a greater superficiality of conversation. There are so many conversations going on that people become less invested in all of them, on average. And so once one falls off the first page it is forgotten more readily. For what it's worth, this describes my posting reasonably accurately. When I come to Hatrack I don't look at the thread list beyond the first page, and I can drop a conversation more readily, without feeling the need to hash out every nuance of our opinions.
You're right. My gut feeling that things are slower now doesn't really pan out logically. v;)v
Posted by BandoCommando (Member # 7746) on :
Well, Icarus, the truth is, I respect and value those people who provide interesting, clear, and intelligent arguments in whatever subject they discuss, particularly if they are considerate of others. You may have thought you came off as cold or inconsiderate, but at least you made an appropriate effort to indicate that you did not intend to do so.
Do I want to be popular? Yes, that's sort of it. I think it's more of a desire to be ABLE to spend more time on here and reply to posts sooner, so as to make some of the excellent posts before others beat me to it.
It's not that I don't care enough to post, it's just that by the time I get to my short 30-minute burst of free time to browse the net, most everything worthwhile has been said already.
Additionally, I tend to avoid posting on terribly controversial topics, due to the fact that several posters on here know who I am in real life, as a former teacher of theirs. As an educator, I have to take certain cautions in what I go "on record" as saying and believing. I have seen far too many stories of teachers and public figures getting into trouble for what was done said in a blog, myspace, facebook, or forum message.
rivka, I am glad to know I'm no longer considered to be an alt for someone else. I was quite surprised when the accusation arose, but didn't figure that denying it would do very much good. Instead, I remained relatively active, posting in topics wherein I felt I had something useful to say. Imagine my relief to know that I don't regularly come across as either juvenile or stupid, though I request your (Hatrack's) pardon in advance for any such transgressions.
That said, post count +1!!! Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:I was quite surprised when the accusation arose, but didn't figure that denying it would do very much good.
For what it's worth, I think it would have. It's one thing to try to pull the wool over everybody's eyes with an alt, and it's another thing to then lie about it when asked.
Posted by orlox (Member # 2392) on :
This conversation really makes me wonder how many people there are out there who have read this entire thread but haven't said a word.
Could I have a show of hands? Posted by BandoCommando (Member # 7746) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head:
quote:I was quite surprised when the accusation arose, but didn't figure that denying it would do very much good.
For what it's worth, I think it would have. It's one thing to try to pull the wool over everybody's eyes with an alt, and it's another thing to then lie about it when asked.
I may HAVE denied the accusation, but if I did, I didn't expect it to make a difference, particularly since my supposed alternate had already made the denial. Honestly, I don't remember what I did with all of that, and I'm too lazy to look it up...
Well, I might, now that I'm curious.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
IIRC, the fact that the others were vociferously denying it and you took it in stride was a definite point in your favor.
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For some reason I was thinking that you were a young woman in her early '20s.
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Noemon
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