"Hari Kondabolu -- whose 2017 documentary, "The Problem with Apu," thrust controversy over the character into the mainstream----"
Stop, stop, stop. Not this again.
Listen, we've gone over this before.
When I was a White Teenager, people called me Butt-Head. A LOT. Butt-head was the stereotypical dumb American White Teen. Did I like it? No. When I became an adult, did I make a documentary "The Problem with Butt-Head?" No. Did I demand that MTV pull re-runs of Beavis and Butt-Head? No.
BECAUSE BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD ARE GODDAMN CARTOON CHARACTERS.
Let's go over the voices that Hank Azaria does for the Simpsons, shall we?
Apu Nahasapeemapetilon - A Stereotype.
Moe Szyslak
Chief Wiggum - A Stereotype. I know an overweight cop. You know how many times he's been called Chief Wiggum? "Every single year I've worked on the force."
Comic Book Guy - A Stereotype. I have a friend who's into comic books. "Please don't call me Comic Book Guy, I'm not that fat." Do other people call him that? Yeah.
Lou
Carl
Dr Nick Riviera
Snake - Stereotype of criminals.
Kirk Van Houten
Captain McCallister - The Sea Captain? A Stereotype.
Bumblebee Man - You mean the character that's on nearly every Univision Variety Show? A Stereotype.
Superintendent Chalmers
Professor Frink - The zany professor? A Stereotype.
Cletus - Cletus, to me, is the most offensive Stereotype. The dumb, uneducated Southerner that is inbred.
Legs
Akira - Japanese Restaurant Worker? A Stereotype.
Luigi - Italian Restaurant Worker? A Stereotype. Why didn't the Simpsons hire a Hispanic to voice Bumblebee Man, a Japanese Man to voice Akira, and an Italian Man to voice Luigi? Because they're evil, filthy racists, who worship at the Capitalistic Alter. (I'm sorry, I can barely type that sentence with a straight face.)
Duff Man - A Stereotype.
Drederick Tatum - Not really a Stereotype. Drederick is just a fictionalized version of Mike Tyson.
Half of Azaria's Voices are Stereotypes.
Let's pretend that I made a documentary "The Problem with Cletus." I picketed Fox and demanded a meeting with executives. What if at that said meeting I showed up with a Make America Great Again Hat and outlined how Cletus was a derogatory term for country-folk (which it is). You know what would happen? As soon as I walked out of the meeting, the executives would laugh, "we should have told that yocal to hop back on his horse and ride on back to his trailer park by the tobacco fields."
And they'd laugh and laugh.
Disclaimer #32,654,819: Do Not Vote For Trump.
"Never hilarious, but consistently clever...."- Variety
That was the review for the movie The Mole Man of Blemont Avenue. And Variety was spot on, nothing more needed to be said, except....
I really liked the movie, it was fun. I caught it on Tubi because I've been on a B-Movie kick lately. Mole Man was the perfect example of tempered expectations. I wasn't looking for high art, because there's something to be said for an evening of light hijinks. If they made a Mole Man 2, I would watch that, too.
I would be remiss if I didn't point this out. Please only play the Race Card when the issue is clearly about race. Or, how about if the issue is 50% about race?
You have Freedom of Speech you say? Okay, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, you can use the race card, even if you're a lowly blogger, and the issue is only .001% about race.....
That headline blazed across CNN a few weeks back. I didn't want to write about it, but that article just festered under my skin.
CNN cited a ton of negative Meghan tweets as the reason Princess Meghan is the victim of Racism. If that's your threshold for Racism, I hate to tell you, but that would mean Donald Trump is the victim of Racism. Nancy Pelosi is the victim of Racism. Mitch McConnell is the victim of Racism.
People (and in this case, the poorly informed reporter Lisa Respers France) forget that the British Royal Family are the ceremonial Heads of State of the Commonwealth. Princess Meghan didn't marry some random rich dude or some random boy toy. She married into the monarchy. A monarchy that is recognized as the head of nearly 3 dozen nations and British Territories.
British Territories such as Saint Kitts and Nevis, population 90% black. Many casual observers "were unaware that Princess Meghan was biracial." Where did I get such a hateful quote? From France's own article....
I'm sure France is working on her follow up article "Racist Queen sends granddaughter-in-law packing."
Read an article about David Lee Roth's Las Vegas Residency. Roth takes yet another swipe at Eddie Van Halen, then says that performing is a "perishable skill." Yeah, watch the Unchained link and then we'll talk about perishable skills. I was annoyed and wondered what the comments section thought of Roth's act.
Andrew F. wins the internet for the day.
Last week College Humor announced that they were laying off about 90% of their staff.
I know it's not funny, but do you think they were running around their offices singing this?
Talking about funny videos, I can't remember if I ever shared Remy's People Will Die!
Well, if so, too bad, here it is again.
I'm just asking a rhetorical question here. Is Steve Serby the Worst Sports Writer in America?
I just re-read Steve Serby's article Ravens Star Lamar Jackson Picks Worst Time to Turn into a Mortal for the fifth time.
Before 2020, I thought that perhaps Nancy Armour of the USA Today was the worst sports writer in America. But then I listed in my mind what parameters being the worst sports writer in America would actually entail and realized that Nancy Armour is just the most agenda-driven sports writer in the nation. Technically, her writing is very good, she's just biased as hell.
I think that Steve Serby may yell random thoughts into the air like a senile ol' codger and then have Siri capture his ramblings. Then he has Siri text his thoughts to the NY Post where they try to assemble some sort of coherent article. Bad takes AND bad writing.
Even when I take a run at cleveland.com sports writers, I don't think of their writing as bad.
Mary Kay Cabot, for example, buys what the Browns are selling, (which is a poor way to approach covering the Browns). Most of the other writers at the site are independent thinkers, but all of them have some sort of writing skill, I just question their angles.
I write like I talk, which is a fundamentally poor way of writing.
Before I finish, I just want you to know I'm not done bitchin' about CNN. Maybe it's something, maybe it's nothing, but Eminem dropped a surprise album and it's getting drilled from some unlikely sources.
CNN: Eminem Went too Far
The Daily Beast: Juvenile Shock Tactics Ruin New Album
NBC News: Eminem Gets Slammed for Lyric(s)
NY Times: Eminem Faces Backlash....
Folks, Eminem is a rapper. Since when is CNN is the record review business?
Seriously. When is the last time they reviewed an album and you saw it at their website?
A few weeks ago I posted an article: The Top 10 Videos of the Decade
I couldn't understand why OK Go wasn't on more end of decade lists. I was perplexed. Then I came across a promotion for the OK Go Sandbox. The OK Go Sandbox is an educational website that promotes Inspirational Tools for Playful Learning.
I honestly think that OK Go aren't more popular because they're too nice.
And on the other end of the spectrum, Angelina Jolie is kind of taking it in the tabloids today.
I don't like Angelina Jolie, but I do like Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston. I remember Angelina Jolie absolutely nailing her part in the movie Girl, Interrupted, but I always questioned whether she was acting crazy, or if the producers found a crazy girl, and then put her in the movie and told her to be herself.
Either way, one thing Angelina Jolie has rarely been in her life is a sympathetic figure. But with Brad Pitt taking subtle shots at her at the SAG Awards, part of me thought that he really shouldn't be doing that. Brad Pitt left Jolie and their 6 children as she was beset with health issues, including a preventive Double Mastectomy, Salpingoophorectomy, and Premature Ovarian Failure.
And Finally:
This is one of the funniest articles I have ever read. I'm no Ken Starr fan, but the article is from Partisan Hack Michael Tomasky. I could have written the same EXACT article about him!
Michael Tomaksy is America's Most Poisonous Creep
Tomasky's defense of Clinton was one of the sleaziest episodes in recent American political history, at least until Trump came along.
Fred Hunt Jan. 20, 2020 4:40 AM ET
I had to chuckle over the weekend as pundits tried to square the circle of Tomasky, who led the impeachment defense for Bill Clinton in 1998, but now constantly attack Donald Trump on impeachment charges in 2020. Why, it seems so inconsistent on its face!
But for Tomasky, it’s 1,000 percent consistent. It’s who he is.
He’s a political hack. A total partisan hatchet man. One of the most poisonous political figures of our time. No—worse. One of the most poisonous public figures. Not just in politics, but in any realm. I’d sooner have O.J. over for dinner.
Let's go over this again, too, shall we? Bill Clinton should have been impeached.
Should Donald Trump be impeached? If you go by the letter of the law, yes, he should be impeached, too.
The problem with Trump's Impeachment is that he did something all of his modern predecessors did, which is put conditions on foreign aid. What Trump did was withhold aid in a very partisan and distasteful way. Which is why we have this partisan feeding frenzy today.
What there should be is an investigation into what both Biden's kid did in the Ukraine AND what Trump's kid did in the Ukraine.
That should be the story.