Things the frontpage says.

[Mr Mystery]

So I'm breaking my Golden Rule. The Golden Rule that states never read the comments.

And I'm doing it because some are just so downright hilarious, they need to be seen to be believed.

For instance, courtesy of The Emprah on the Godbeasts post...


Sigmaron. Derpest name ever.

Because no culture has ever named anything after a leader ever. Leningrad, Stalingrad, Constantinople, Falklands, Alexandria, Alexandretta, Cambodia, Rhodesia etc were all just conicidences. And the hundreds if not thousands of other places seemingly named after their Founder are likewise purely coincidental.

[Kirsten]

And don't forget Alexandria, Alexandria, Alexandria, Alexandria, Alexandria, Alexandria...

Why name something after yourself once when you can do it a dozen times?

[eldargal]

Yep, Alexander the Great names at least 70 cities after himself.

[Gotthammer]

Idk it's a little too close to Sigmoron for me to take seriously >_>

Though speaking of the frontpage, always good to see some quality "humour":


12. Robin Williams was a Warhammer fan, and it is rumored that his close friend in GW told him about Age of Sigmar and what they planned to do way before it was released. Robin wasn’t thrilled.

20. A leaked Sisters of Battle Codex that is in development has a new special rule for that army. Every 4th week of the month, all Sisters of Battle armies gain Rage and Preferred Enemy Space Marines.

Nothing like making a joke out of someone's suicide - unless it's those crazy women and their periods amitrite? :rolleyes:

[Mr Mystery]

Yahyourite.

Apparently.

I didn't find any of it particularly amusing. In fact, in terms of unamusing it registered 1.46Mightybooshes on the 'whydopeoplefindthisfunny-ometer'

- - - Updated - - -

I won't use the user's name for this, as it's not a screen name...


I love the point about the Sisters getting rage for 1 week a month. That's genius

http://www.thereturnedmissionary.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Inigo-Montoya-WORD-MEANS.jpg

[grimmas]

Sigmaron actually comes up on my predictive text as does Necromunda I've turned my phone into a Geek!!

The frontpage does attract some interesting "characters" but I've been moaning about them elsewhere. Fortunately every time I've tried to read anything on it recently I've been whisked away to an advert so have been spared the comments.

[CoffeeGrunt]

To be fair, the last comedy list The Frontpage did was something like, "Worst Places to Live in 40K," with the Rainbow Warrior homeworld on it cos RAINBOWS = GAY AND EEWWWW GAY AMIRITE?!

[Gotthammer]

Yeah I commented about that in the LGBT thread when it happened including some of the comments.

[Lexington]

12. Robin Williams was a Warhammer fan, and it is rumored that his close friend in GW told him about Age of Sigmar and what they planned to do way before it was released. Robin wasn’t thrilled.
Jesus Christ.

It's rare that I can be bothered by stupid humor, but that is incredibly tasteless and ugly.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Jesus Christ.

It's rare that I can be bothered by stupid humor, but that is incredibly tasteless and ugly.

There's risque humour, and there's trotting out Yet Another Sigmar Sucks post usingthe suicide of an awesome comedian who was damn well-regarded as a punchline for it is just terrible.

Crap like this is why I don't go on the BoLS Frontpage anymore.

[Gotthammer]

Well it shouldn't matter who they're using, well regarded or not, it's awful either way.

[Erik Setzer]

Nothing like making a joke out of someone's suicide

Oof. Holy zoinks, I'm glad I skipped that one. Williams' death was a sad loss for everyone, and the way it happened was awful. (Also really sad that The Crazy Ones was actually a pretty good show and got chucked away while garbage like Big Bang Theory keeps going, and that was a huge blow to Williams. Doubt it would have helped, but I wish I'd found a way to send a letter or something letting him know there were some fans out there.)

That's just not cool at all.

- - - Updated - - -


Sigmaron actually comes up on my predictive text as does Necromunda I've turned my phone into a Geek!!

My phone tries to change "Soooooooo" to "DOOOOOOOOOOOM".

I'm not sure how I feel about that.

- - - Updated - - -


To be fair, the last comedy list The Frontpage did was something like, "Worst Places to Live in 40K," with the Rainbow Warrior homeworld on it cos RAINBOWS = GAY AND EEWWWW GAY AMIRITE?!

That article wasn't even trying to be a humor article, though, IIRC. It listed genuinely awful places... and then ended with that one. None of that "joke" made sense.

- - - Updated - - -


Crap like this is why I don't go on the BoLS Frontpage anymore.

Doesn't help when they break up rumors/news on a single topic over at least 5-6 posts, some of which are posted right after the other, and the latter posts are always just one or two new sentences and then rehashing all of the prior posted stuff. Then tack in the "rules conundrums" that aren't examples of GW writing confusing rules but rather how far people will push things to try to argue over the rules. And finally add in complete non-news where they'll take something and speculate on it in a way that makes no sense (i.e. Warhammer World just put their Chaos Marines back in the shelf, saying "Chaos returns to Warhammer World!", and suddenly that's cause to speculate on whether it's a new Chaos codex or Chaos campaign coming up, rather than recognizing they were probably getting touched up or just rotating armies).

[Denzark]

Pimpcron has done this style of post a couple of times now - and strangely splits the 'facts' between actual facts and just random cack he thinks is funny. The Robin William thing fell a bit flat for me - it was 'reallllly?' instead of outrage - he didn't even have the balls to go all in and be explicit about it - he just hinted what his point was. So still managed to be offensive without even a WOW Black Humour rating.

[Mud Duck]

Pimpcron does admit that he thought that Robin Williams died in the car accident.

[Erik Setzer]

Pimpcron does admit that he thought that Robin Williams died in the car accident.

Yeah, and he might have actually gotten really mixed up on that (seems odd, but hey, maybe he wasn't as into Williams as a lot of us are), but then it still just feels like, "Okay, then what's the joke supposed to be? He just got sad because he didn't like the game?"

Mixing in actual facts about the game also led to an uneven feel with the article. Would have been much better to commit to all comedy, keep the tone the same through the whole article. Leave the serious bits for a later, serious article.

Have to give credit that he at least admitted to making a mistake and worked to correct it.

(Still nothing on the PMS and wage jokes, but eh. Little steps.)

[Wolfshade]

Sigmaron, is that the total of Pearlman's filmography (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000579/)?

[Psychosplodge]

20. A leaked Sisters of Battle Codex that is in development has a new special rule for that army. Every 4th week of the month, all Sisters of Battle armies gain Rage and Preferred Enemy Space Marines.

How would they even implement that? I mean do you have a calender with every fourth week blocked out and games you play in that week apply the rule? What's to stop WAAC players having four calenders? I just can't see it working*

*tongue firmly in cheek

[eldargal]

They were making menstruation jokes in the female Sigmarine article as well, because its sooo original. Nearly tried to dig up my disqus password to yell at them but I got distracted.

[Erik Setzer]

They were making menstruation jokes in the female Sigmarine article as well, because its sooo original.

"It's okay because female comedians do it!"

(Actual comments from the articles.)

[Mr Mystery]

Well I would expect pretty much all female comedians that are pre-menopausal to menstrate....because they're female.

Oh, I see.....

Do you think anyone's told them that jokes are meant to be funny, and banter is about wit, not bigotry?

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

tbh I forgot BOLS had a frontpage at all. I only really visit this forum cos of the dozen or so of you I actually like. Otherwise I prefer FB for my internet life these days.

[Erik Setzer]

The homepage is handy as a story aggregate system, but the recent trend of breaking stories up into chunks or posting a new post just to add one new sentence of information is getting a bit tiring. Could wear down the readership, which would then actually cause them to lose more ad revenue than they're making off of the multi-post stories.

[CoffeeGrunt]

I know most people get their news and communication from Facebook groups now. I do. Forums are going the way of the dial-up modem and MySpace, sadly.

It kinda helps that I can look at a post about new releases being teased, and it's one post, not six, and it's not coated with ads or intermingled with terrible attempts at comedy and reposts from Lexicanum.

[Morgrim]

And the comment section on the frontpage is currently filled with whiny children screaming about how the SJW are ruining their fun. Why? Because an article pointed out that using sexist language like "*****", "*****" or "I totally raped him in that game!" makes you are arsehole, and also drives women away from gaming stores and clubs.

[Erik Setzer]

Had to see that coming the moment the author put that point in.

Still, I think they didn't help their case on any of their points by having the handle "AbusePuppy" and using language that wasn't entirely conducive to a productive discussion.

Doesn't excuse people going a bit nuts on that, though.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Oh, AbusePuppy runs 3PlusPlus. It's a site few read.

Gotta love angry nerds though. Yelling about how 'SJWs' are ruining their fun, how unfair it is to have small, spoken things ruin your enjoyment of a locale and hobby, and how OVERSENSITIVE SJWs are.

They appear to be immune to irony. Must be all the hypocrisy.

[Darren Richardson]

Seriously you'd think people posting crewd and unpleasent comments on 'front page news' posts would be acutally into the hobby they are posting about.....

Because I expect the people who are really into the hobby would be spending their valuable time model making, painting and playing rather then typing :p LOL

[Morgrim]

I have someone explaining to me in a comment thread on that post that women don't play wargaming, and the ones that do don't care about all that 'lack of diversity' stuff, and that he's totally an authority because he's listened to the tiny number of women that play in the same places he does.

In the interests of my own sanity I've chosen not to engage further, because arseholes like that don't listen, but it's really tempting to point out that the tiny sample size he has means he's wrong; if he were playing in a healthy wargaming environment, he'd find more women, because it's not as if we're the rare unicorns male nerds make us out to be. We just don't play in places filled with people who make it clear they don't want us there.

[eldargal]

Also, given the reaction women get if you say you DO care, I wouldn't be at all surprised if many of those women who say they don't care are saying that because they don't want to be mansplained to at best or harassed at worst.

[Morgrim]

I've gotten hate mail over my comments on that article. Post has been reported, I'm not linking it because those toerags don't deserve credit, but apparently the BoSL frontpage is becoming more like other sites. Damnit. And I thought this was one of the safest wargaming sites.

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

That is well ****ed up Morgrim :/ hope the admins do something about it.

[eldargal]

I've gotten hate mail over my comments on that article. Post has been reported, I'm not linking it because those toerags don't deserve credit, but apparently the BoSL frontpage is becoming more like other sites. Damnit. And I thought this was one of the safest wargaming sites.

The front page has always been vile, I think because all the turdstains are too stupid to actually sign up to post on the forum so they content themselves with posting on the front page. The actual lounge is thankfully much more civil, no one has expressed a desire to hire bounty hunters to kill me yet which puts it one up on Dakkadakka in my eyes.:rolleyes:

I hope the mods take action.

[Gotthammer]

Related:


The way these anti sjw people talk about logic and reason you’d think it’s some kind of underground community of mathematicians and cosmologists instead of people who have poor social skills due to pornography and video game consumption

[CoffeeGrunt]

Which article is this? I don't grace the front page much as both the content and the commenters are trash these days.

[Mr Mystery]

Related:

There is now Diet Coke on my screen.

Thanks for that :p

- - - Updated - - -


The front page has always been vile, I think because all the turdstains are too stupid to actually sign up to post on the forum so they content themselves with posting on the front page. The actual lounge is thankfully much more civil, no one has expressed a desire to hire bounty hunters to kill me yet which puts it one up on Dakkadakka in my eyes.:rolleyes:

I hope the mods take action.

Seriously? That was an actual thing?

Eff me that place is hideous.

[Morgrim]

Related:

Hey now, it is entirely possible to consume both pornography and video games while possessing well developed social skills. :P

And the offending post has been removed. Hopefully the offending toerag has been banned as well.

[Kirsten]

yup

[Wolfshade]

Related:
The way these anti sjw people talk about logic and reason you’d think it’s some kind of underground community of mathematicians and cosmologists instead of people who have poor social skills due to pornography and video game consumption

My first undergrad dissertation was on cosmology...so...

[Erik Setzer]

And the offending post has been removed. Hopefully the offending toerag has been banned as well.

Well, heck, if I can get apparently perma-banned just for making the same comments others did about ads and a certain article's misleading title (just actually fleshed out and not just screeching at the computer screen), I'd hope that kind of stuff earns an even stronger perma-ban.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Well, heck, if I can get apparently perma-banned just for making the same comments others did about ads and a certain article's misleading title (just actually fleshed out and not just screeching at the computer screen), I'd hope that kind of stuff earns an even stronger perma-ban.

Hopefully. Glad to see I'm not the only one perma-banned for mentioning adverts, though. It's amazing that despite such strict policing, the front page comments section is still a cesspit.

[Psychosplodge]

Criticism of the adverts? or the commenting on the problems with the spam ones that mean I have to clear the history and restart the browser on my phone if I get one and have led to me stopping visiting the site on my mobile cause of the inconvenience?

[CoffeeGrunt]

Well, I got banned three times for pointing out that titles were misleading, but I'm not sure what happened in Erik's case.

[Psychosplodge]

ah

[Erik Setzer]

Well, I got banned three times for pointing out that titles were misleading, but I'm not sure what happened in Erik's case.

There was a post, I can't remember exactly, where the title pretty much said it showed something, but it didn't, and people were pissed. I made a comment on that, and other tricks like the making a new post just to add one sentence to a collection of rumors rather than updating an existing post (haven't seen that lately that I recall, so progress?). Also, the adverts were so bad that with my a-d-b-l-o-c-k (hey, not taking chances here, that word is flagged for automatic moderation on the front page) turned off due to some new requirements I had to go in and tell it were okay, the site got unreadable at times. Not just the annoying video posts, but ads popping up right over content and comments. And none of it was remotely relevant to the site. The combination of ickclay aitingbay and obnoxious adverts meant I couldn't justify to anyone visiting the site without a blocker. It was a horrible experience.

I'll whitelist sites if the ads aren't bad and I like the site enough. There's another site I frequent, for Blizzard news, and they ask people to let them know whenever an ad does something that distracts from the site, or has inappropriate content for the site, and use a system that lets them flag ads not to show up. So if one's popping up over the content, they can turn it off.

I understand the desire to monetize a website, but at the same time, if the process of doing so makes the website a bad experience for visitors, that'll turn people off. And if they can fix a large part of that bad experience by just turning off your monetizing bits, they're likely to do that, and you're now losing any money you might have made off of them. Just a lose-lose.

Probably worded it harsher sounding than intended or something... I know it was annoying because I'd already clicked on an article that promised info that wasn't in the article (and they changed the title after all the complaints), and I was dealing with obnoxious videos and images popping up making the site hard to use.

I think it was this post here:

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2016/05/gws-may-holiday-exclusive-figure-uncovered.html

You can guess how the original title was worded from the URL. And you can see the comments section is closed, with most of them stripped out.

So, yeah... kind of surprising there's that level of thorough removal of posts and banning on a topic like that, but when people get sexist and horrible and actually make the hobby look bad, that's allowed to fester. Crazy.

I'm gonna go get a pillow and hope it softens the blow of a potential oncoming banhammer for talking about that-which-must-not-be-mentioned (but sexism, racism, homophobia, and all that is totally cool, y'all).

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

Ha, Love morgrims post on that link!

[CoffeeGrunt]

The one my first account got banned for was an article that said, "New Tyranid Units Spotted!" The Article then went on to talked about Carnifexes getting reboxed or something. I.e., not a single new Tyranid unit. I point this out, among others, and get Permabanned. Make an alt account and try and open a dialogue on how unfair a practice it is and how it'll really look bad on them in the long run. Permabanned.

Post about it on here, it gets ignored. Ask about it in the Help Desk, it gets deleted. Twice.

Personally I just gave up. No-one locally reads BoLS anymore because of how bad it's gotten, and I only visit the front page once-in-a-blue-moon. Facebook gets the info to me easier.

[Erik Setzer]

One of the locals who did read BoLS was the GW store manager, who had to read sites like BoLS and others to keep up with rumors to have an idea what might be coming up with GW stuff.

This is a guy who was good enough to be promoted to some kind of big position in the North American retail management. Still had to trawl the Internet for info because he wasn't getting anything from the company. AoS pretty much blindsided him, which made him feel bad, because he was just as convinced as we were that it'd be WFB9, and was talking excitedly about a new edition and all, and even had been working on a couple of new armies (on square bases... including an Undead army with a Zombie unit that was being built like a diorama).

[Morgrim]

Ha, Love morgrims post on that link!

Thank you. :)

I'd like it if I could whitelist the Lounge here, because the ads on the Lounge tend to be reasonable, while still having the frontpage blacklisted because whichever ad company they use has a lot of hijackers and noisemakers and other things that prevent me from using it effectively.

[Psychosplodge]

No the lounge has the same issues with the ads as well.

[Path Walker]

Pretty sure any time any one links to BOLS people just roll their eyes and comment with "****ing BOLS again", they've wrecked their credibility with the clickbaity headlines, but it almost certainly still works to get those precious clicks.

[CoffeeGrunt]

I heard the phrase "BoLSh*t" in reference to articles from BoLS on Facebook that were linked to 40K Groups. Not a great sign. :/

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

Yeah, I've seeen similar stuff around the interwebs too. Definitely not a good sign...

[Path Walker]

Short term though, it works. Just not sure how much longer they can sustain that if people are getting wise to it.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Well the principle was started by Buzzfeed, IIRC. A title that teases content, without actually unveiling anything, which overblows how profound the content will be. "This dude gets off his seat, what he says next will LEAVE YOU IN TEARS."

*Man stands up.*

"May I have the bill, please?"

The thing is, people feel a bit cheated afterwards, and humans have a beautiful capability for pattern recognition. So your trick only works a few times before people end up tutting, and saying, "another bull Buzzfeed article then?" They then Block it on Facebook and never engage with it again, or are more wary of clicking links to it, reducing revenue.

Which is likely why Buzzfeed has fallen $80 million short of its revenue projections this year. (http://money.cnn.com/2016/04/12/media/buzzfeed-missed-projections/)

It's a bubble that's bursting, and BoLS really ought to think long term about how that would affect them. Buzzfeed has the benefit of posting inane crap like collections of cat photos or stories stolen from Reddit to survive. There's always a clueless load of people who'll lap that up, which is their right, to be fair. Buzzfeed has enough general appeal to survive, even if their method causes them to begin to implode and size-down.

However, Buzzfeed has been pushing to evolve into an actual journalistic site to clean up its reputation. BoLS went the other way. It started informative, and devolved into, "Eight Crazy Worlds from Warhammer 40K...You Won't Believe Number Six!"

BoLS is serving a niche, always has been, always will be. Bad word of mouth can kill an enterprise in an industry this small. Just look at how much the online vitriol is harming GW's stock, as people talk about it and become more aware of their practices on larger and larger scales as they communicate with more people. BoLS can't afford to lose its existing customer base, because what it's selling doesn't have general appeal.

I dunno, it might last for a while, it might do well, but it'll annoy a lot of people in the process. Clickbait is kinda ruining journalism in general (http://www.pbs.org/newshour/making-sense/what-you-dont-know-about-click-bait-journalism-could-kill-you/), and is the reason I just don't bother with getting my information from anywhere other than a few, select sites anymore.

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

Perhaps I should try clickbait on my music fb page "this song will CHANGE YOUR LIFE", "You wont BELEIVE how good this track sounds at full volume when played on a bus full of old pensioners"



....nah

[Psychosplodge]

17 reasons you're to blame for the trouble on the internet. Number six will amaze you.

You've only got to look at the guardian to see the dangers of clickbait. As much as it was too middle class champagne socialist for me it was considered reasonably well researched compared to say the red tops. Now look at their website, it looks like any other clickbait website out there.
I assume they're probably haemorrhaging readers as well?

[CoffeeGrunt]

Reputedly, but I can't find anything concrete:
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/features/who-guards-the-guardian-2

That said, pretty much every news outlet is hemorrhaging money these days.

[Erik Setzer]

I was looking at Google News a couple days ago, and it reminded me that I find myself a lot more likely to actually click through to read an article if it tells me the core information (or premise) in the title. I want to go to a story and read it to learn the details of a title, not to figure out what the vague inanity in the title is all about.

[Erik Setzer]

It's funny to see an article taken from the forums being called the best article many people have read on the site in a long time (even as it's being debated).

[Psychosplodge]

It's also interesting how many people have missed the nuance and gone straight to sex is bad.

[eldargal]

It's also interesting how many people have missed the nuance and gone straight to sex is bad.

Why have a sensible debate when you can create a strawman out of sheer, obvious ignorance and attack it instead?

[CoffeeGrunt]

I'm amused by how many people are accusing Yorkie of calling for Slaanesh to be removed, though. Someone even called them Puritanical.

Frontpage being the frontpage, I guess.

[Psychosplodge]

I seem to recall Yorkie being far from puritanical when having some rather frank discussions on sex and sexuality in here.

[Psychosplodge]

Did none of his other articles make the frontpage?

[CoffeeGrunt]

They do, fairly often. That one was guaranteed to umm...get discussion going, so it got up there.

[YorkNecromancer]

Did none of his other articles make the frontpage?

I've had a couple up there.

The comments on my latest one have just been super depressing: 'he wants to ban things'. Ugh. No, never. Fooksake.


I like the disagreements, but the ad hominem insults are just exhausting. I didn't even think this month's article was that good. Not had the sort of time I normally get to prepare, so had the Dickens of a time trying to think of something to write about, and just kind of bashed it out.

I don't know. Doesn't seem to be much point to keeping it going any more. I still mostly enjoy the writing, and I used to kind of like the discussions, but there's so much venom out there now. It's all very discouraging.


I seem to recall Yorkie being far from puritanical when having some rather frank discussions on sex and sexuality in here.

If the people who were saying I was puritanical had the faintest bloody idea...

[Erik Setzer]

I like the disagreements, but the ad hominem insults are just exhausting.

Welcome to the Internet. I disagreed with the idea of having a black Hermione with specific reasons and got called "racist" and told it was the only reason I could be against it, by a guy who then proceeded to say that all of us "racists" against the idea are "retarded," because he didn't seem to see the hypocrisy in using a mental disability as an insult. Never mind that the same reason to oppose it is the same reason to oppose ScarJo in Ghost in the Machine - it's an unnecessary change to an established character. But hey, you can explain it all day and all, but it all comes down to some idiot who doesn't know you calling you "racist" (and for all he knew, I could have been black, since my FB profile pic is a photo of my Imperial Knight).

I'd say I'm surprised you weren't also called sexist, but I think you were? It's hard to tell, I just skim the comments these days, since I'm not allowed to speak, lest I offend the gods.

[YorkNecromancer]

I think my favourite 'f**king d*ckhead' comment so far:


I did not not read this article but I can predict what the moral of the story is going to be *proceeds to Strawman like a motherf**ker*

Just... what a f**king d*ckhead.

[Mr Mystery]

What a tosser.

Article is a good 'un and all.

[Path Walker]

Hermione was only established white in the movies, which this play is not a sequel to, its a sequel to the books, where a black Hermione is a distinct possibility. So, possibly not racist, just not aware of the context.

The idea that you'd object to a black actor playing a character and only see their race as an issue, is possibly a bit racist, especially as actors playing different races on the stage than their own is an established thing that happens and the audience doesnt dwell on it - see every white actor playing Othello, the Moor, for example.

[Haighus]

I don't know. Doesn't seem to be much point to keeping it going any more. I still mostly enjoy the writing, and I used to kind of like the discussions, but there's so much venom out there now. It's all very discouraging.
For what it's worth, I really enjoy reading your posts, and would happily carry on devouring them every time one gets posted up :) I don't always reply to the relevant threads, but I think I've read every one for about a year now. I can understand how the... 'debate', especially on the front page when your articles reach it, can be very tiring and demoralising though.

[Psychosplodge]

I don't know. Doesn't seem to be much point to keeping it going any more. I still mostly enjoy the writing, and I used to kind of like the discussions, but there's so much venom out there now. It's all very discouraging.
.

I know you already know this, but never forget arsehole seems to be the default setting for anonymous comments on the internet. Don't let those ones put you off. There were decent comments lost among the noise.




If the people who were saying I was puritanical had the faintest bloody idea...

Well considering I've only ever really seen one community use vanilla in that manner :rolleyes:

- - - Updated - - -


see every white actor playing Othello, the Moor, for example.

I imagine from his comment though regarding ghost in the machine he'd object equally to a white Othello as well.

[Kirsten]

Well considering I've only ever really seen one community use vanilla in that manner

There's only one way I ever see it used :p

[Psychosplodge]

There's only one way I ever see it used :p

;)

[Path Walker]

I imagine from his comment though regarding ghost in the machine he'd object equally to a white Othello as well.

Uncultured swine that he is.

[Psychosplodge]

Uncultured swine that he is.

Colonials can't help it, they don't know any better.

[Mr Mystery]

Hermione was only established white in the movies, which this play is not a sequel to, its a sequel to the books, where a black Hermione is a distinct possibility. So, possibly not racist, just not aware of the context.

The idea that you'd object to a black actor playing a character and only see their race as an issue, is possibly a bit racist, especially as actors playing different races on the stage than their own is an established thing that happens and the audience doesnt dwell on it - see every white actor playing Othello, the Moor, for example.

That, and J K 'look, I sodding wrote it, so I should sodding know' Rowling has fully endorsed it, on account she never did describe Hermione's skin in the books.

[Psychosplodge]

That, and J K 'look, I sodding wrote it, so I should sodding know' Rowling has fully endorsed it, on account she never did describe Hermione's skin in the books.

Death of the author?
And it would have been career suicide for her to do anything else.
I can't remember the introductory description so doesn't matter one way or the other, and considering everything else the films changed/cut *shrugs*

[Kirsten]

;)

I am sure I don't know what you mean >.>

[CoffeeGrunt]

I've now got people bombing my Disqus with "anti-leftist" videos claiming that Yorkie's article is proof of "Cultural Marxism." All in reply to my question, "what does political correctness actually mean anyway?"

I mean, BoLS bans people for raising complaints against adverts on there, but it seems like anything else goes with regards to vitriol. The Frontpage is rapidly becoming more toxic than Nurgle's Cauldron.

[grimmas]

It is a rather important part of the story that Othello is a different race to the rest of the people in the play. . Patrick Stewart did a white Othello by having the rest of the cast as black worked rather well.

[Erik Setzer]

I imagine from his comment though regarding ghost in the machine he'd object equally to a white Othello as well.

I'm not a fan of it in either direction. Just do the character as they were originally meant to be.

But it also seems so weird to me that people will jump all over "whitewashing" and all, but if you object to the reverse, it's somehow "racist." That's such a weird double-standard. It shouldn't be cool in any setting.

I also object to Gods of Egypt. For a lot of reasons, but the only relevant one is that they somehow made a movie about Egypt where I'm not sure any of the cast are even descending from people who've been anywhere around northeastern Africa. (That's an even worse situation, though, because it's a fantasy movie based on an actual nation.)

[eldargal]

Because reversing racist practice is not racist, lol. Whitewashing is racist because it takes the very few roles intended for people of colour and gives them to white people. Making more roles for people of colour is literally the opposite of racist, it is trying to end racist practice.

[Erik Setzer]

Because reversing racist practice is not racist, lol. Whitewashing is racist because it takes the very few roles intended for people of colour and gives them to white people. Making more roles for people of colour is literally the opposite of racist, it is trying to end racist practice.

No, you make more roles for people of color and all by making new characters. Marvel's been great in the comics doing that. Miles isn't a recolored Peter Parker. Sam Wilson isn't a recolored Steve Rogers. Jane Foster isn't Thor with a sex change. Kamala Khan isn't Carol Danvers with a new skin tone. They all use the same monikers existing characters had, but are new characters. (I'd bring up Rhodey, but considering he's had his spine shattered *and* been killed in the last month, it's sad to think of him.)

And it IS racist for both, if it is for either. (I prefer "lazy" rather than assuming an evil view of people, but eh, if you feel the need to judge, go for it.) You can't say one thing is okay "in certain situations" but evil in others. No. That's not how it works.

It's funny, too, because when I mention Attack on Titan, people claim, "Well, in Japan, they don't have many non-Asian people." Wait, so because the people represented in the manga are the minority in Japan, that makes it okay to not use them in the movie? So why is it a problem elsewhere? You can't say the problem with "whitewashing" is because it ignores minorities and then turn around and say it's okay for Asians to do a movie where white people are replaced with Asians because white people are the minority there. That's the best example of how stupid this double-standard is.

I want to see more women, more non-white people, more LGBT characters, etc. But I want new characters. Originality. Not just changing existing characters. That's lazy. There's enough laziness in Hollywood. It's how we get absolute bull**** like the "Bourne" movies that stole the names from a series of popular novels and then shat all over the story and turned out a character who is the exact opposite of the one he's supposed to be and spits on the author's grave. They didn't feel they could make their generic action movie with its own name, so they shamelessly stole the name of a set of novels they didn't have any intention of following. It's not just a race/gender/sexuality thing.

With Rowling, if she wanted diversity, why not use this new movie? It's still as white as a freaking Klan rally. She puts white people up on the big screen where she makes a bunch of money, but then tries to act like she's "enlightened" because she was too lazy to describe anything about her characters and that means you could say Harry Potter is a dog and there'd be no contradictory proof in the books? No! She had a new story coming out and could have introduced a non-white central character, but chose not to. But she gets off the hook, and people who are unhappy with the idea of redesigning a character already are called "racist." Bollocks. Rowling is "racist" if anyone is. But she gets to have her whiter-than-primer movies *and* pretend she's ahead of everyone on race (and cries at writing character deaths).

[eldargal]

Yeah, nothing you say on these issues is worth reading.

[Mr Mystery]

But it's only you defining Hermione as white.

The books don't.

The author of the books didn't. The author of the book confirmed there's no reason Hermione should have to be white.

So where's the problem?

Also, one suspects that she has more control over a stage play than a Hollywood production, no?

[eldargal]

Rowling said the only thing she said about Hermione's skill colour was that it was brown, which people interpreted to mean tanned.

[Psychosplodge]

Didn't Rowling have final say on the casting decisions?

[Erik Setzer]

Yeah, nothing you say on these issues is worth reading.

Nor is anything you say. Your point being...?

Oh, right, as usual, you didn't have one, just wanted to insult others and claim you're better than them.

- - - Updated - - -


But it's only you defining Hermione as white.

The books don't.

The author of the books didn't. The author of the book confirmed there's no reason Hermione should have to be white.

So where's the problem?

Also, one suspects that she has more control over a stage play than a Hollywood production, no?

No.

She allowed it in a movie. She allowed the character to be represented a certain way. She could have said something about it. She could have stepped in. She made Hermione white the moment Emma Watson was cast.

She continues to churn out stories made as super-white movies, and could have had a non-white lead in her new story, but didn't. And she gets off free making money off of that, while anyone who questions it is insulted. Usually by people who are, themselves, racist (among other things).

Thing is, if she'd never defined skin tone, and they'd cast a young black girl, but then in this play swapped for a white woman, people would be crying out that it's "whitewashing" and wrong, the same people who are now defending it. And I would, in that case, be pissed off it's not a black actress, and wouldn't accept Rowling backtracking.

Just like I'm pissed if they really are trying to make Ganke white and skinny, even though according to some idiots, you can change between media and it's okay, so making Ganke white would be fine (except it wouldn't).

[Mr Mystery]

WTF are you on about, Erik?

Seriously. Girl cast as Hermione - HERMIONE CANONICALLY WHITE.

So I guess the movies erased all the stuff in the books that wasn't put in the movies, yeah?

[Psychosplodge]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BL61fWvCAAAAQqr.jpg

[Erik Setzer]

WTF are you on about, Erik?

Seriously. Girl cast as Hermione - HERMIONE CANONICALLY WHITE.

So I guess the movies erased all the stuff in the books that wasn't put in the movies, yeah?

The movies created a "public appearance" for the characters. It's perfectly natural for people to accept that as the image of those characters.

We have two choices here:

1. Rowling intended Hermione to be black, but went along with whitewashing for her movies, because that'd make her more money.
2. Rowling intended Hermione to look like the character Emma Watson portrayed, and is now claiming she left it vague so anyone could be Hermione.

You say she meant Hermione to be black. Okay. So she went along with whitewashing for money. And she's somehow to be looked up to in this situation?

All of this is incredibly off-topic. And I don't think it's going to get anywhere. My view remains the same regardless of the original/new race for the character (see Ganke news). For me, it's not race. It's keeping consistency in story-telling. (And depending on what else they changed from the books, I'd probably have other issues, but never felt like reading them, because Dan Brown is hard enough. I have lengthy issues with Bourne, and don't like how the Jurassic Park movies deviated from the books, and while I enjoyed Jurassic World, I still take issue with its very existence, as they napalmed the freaking island in the book, and everyone knew better than to allow it to happen again.) But people decide they'll claim it's a race thing and someone must be "racist" because they say so, and they judge and label and insult others. (I mean, FFS, if I could find a nice nerdy black girl who'd take me with all my flaws, I'd marry her in an instant... and still would be called a "racist" on the insult while raising my beautiful "mixed" kids.) And some of these people throw out "retarded" as an insult, mocking people with mental disabilities while pretending they're better than others.

Basically, people are awful, way too judgmental, and just... well, awful. And the Internet is a wonderful reminder of why I feel uncomfortable around people and don't trust them.

[Mr Mystery]

I'll just leave this here then, yeah?

Or are you saying you actually know better than the character's creator?

https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/status/678888094339366914?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

JK Rowling didn't describe Hermione's skin tone. It's you insisting that because Emma Watson is white, Hermione is white.

Why, nobody can figure out.

[Erik Setzer]

Eh... I have my own thoughts on that. But again, this is wildly off-topic, and not getting anywhere (well, nowhere positive), so rather than indulge in posting them, I'll keep them to myself to allow us to get back to the topic of people calling Yorkie "puritan" and "defending" Slaanesh using incredibly silly arguments.

[Psychosplodge]

tbf She has gone a bit Lucas with it though with things shes said she should have done, like harry and hermione ending up together instead. (everyone knows it should have been harry/luna :p)

[Erik Setzer]

tbf She has gone a bit Lucas with it though with things shes said she should have done, like harry and hermione ending up together instead. (everyone knows it should have been harry/luna :p)

What happened with Luna? She was the most interesting of them. It's been a while since I watched the movies (and haven't read the books), so I might just be forgetting something major.

[CoffeeGrunt]

:|

Well, back on topic, Yorkie's comments section is proving to be a good ol' soup of vitriol. One particularly amusing comment:

I kind of wonder why you make an argument based upon assertive assumptions without ever validating, evidencing, or justifying those asserted assumptions.
By the way: Tranphobia and homophobia are not real words. Please don't use meaningless jibber-jabber as fact.

Diversity is not a strength. A sword with a blade made of parts of copper, steel, bronze, gold, silver, and tin would fall apart instantly when used. A sword will only work if its blade is made of all steel (or other sword metals), even if small parts of the blade were decorated with non-functional bits of those metals to make it prettier.

I mean, it's the worst analogy going because this dude clearly hasn't heard of Composite Design or Alloys. Some of the best swords in the world were composites, and almost all swords were alloys of multiple materials if only because pure iron is horribly brittle due to the perfect lattice it forms.

Kinda demonstrated the level of education that these comments brew up from.

Not to mention the lack of understanding of the benefits of diversity from an evolutionary standpoint, nor the benefits from a cultural standpoint, ignoring the fact that, suck it up, diversity exists and you'll just have to deal with it.

He actually gave me probably the best analogy of the benefits of diversity I could hope for.

[Erik Setzer]

Nor is anything you say. Your point being...?
Oh, right, as usual, you didn't have one, just wanted to insult others and claim you're better than them.

Oh, I'll also just add an apology for this. Sorry, eldargal. Doesn't matter what you said, it was childish and wrong to throw out a heated offensive response in return.

- - - Updated - - -


Well, back on topic, Yorkie's comments section is proving to be a good ol' soup of vitriol. One particularly amusing comment

Wow. My brain hurts more now.

Isn't steel a combination of multiple things, providing, in the end, a stronger weapon than pure bronze or iron would?

[Mr Mystery]

:|

Well, back on topic, Yorkie's comments section is proving to be a good ol' soup of vitriol. One particularly amusing comment:


I mean, it's the worst analogy going because this dude clearly hasn't heard of Composite Design or Alloys. Some of the best swords in the world were composites, and almost all swords were alloys of multiple materials if only because pure iron is horribly brittle due to the perfect lattice it forms.

Kinda demonstrated the level of education that these comments brew up from.

Not to mention the lack of understanding of the benefits of diversity from an evolutionary standpoint, nor the benefits from a cultural standpoint, ignoring the fact that, suck it up, diversity exists and you'll just have to deal with it.

He actually gave me probably the best analogy of the benefits of diversity I could hope for.

He also seems unaware that Steel isn't an element, but a mix of iron and carbon.....And a sword without a tang, handle, hilt etc is in fact just a sharp stick, and utterly unsuited to combat. Not to mention....we're human beings, societal creatures, and not, y'know. Swords.

And indeed, unaware his arguments are really quite pathetic.

[Psychosplodge]

:|

Well, back on topic, Yorkie's comments section is proving to be a good ol' soup of vitriol. One particularly amusing comment:


I mean, it's the worst analogy going because this dude clearly hasn't heard of Composite Design or Alloys. Some of the best swords in the world were composites, and almost all swords were alloys of multiple materials if only because pure iron is horribly brittle due to the perfect lattice it forms.


You mean like the Alloy(steel) his comment specificly mentions, apparently without realising its an alloy? :D


iirc I think she ended up with Neville Erik

[CoffeeGrunt]

Indeed. In fact, pretty much any well-engineered item will use a collection of different parts. Once you get into moving mechanisms especially it is useful to use complimentary materials to reduce friction, prevent wear and tear, etc.

A car is made from an astonishingly selection of materials to form a functioning whole, a smartphone is the same. Hell, a cap from a plastic coke bottle normally has two different kinds of plastic in it. One for the cap itself, and one for the small insert that helps seal it. Hard plastic for the cap, soft for the seal.

I just found that one in particular amusing as an engineer. It has more holes than substance.

[Mr Mystery]

If I'm right in think, the best swords have a pure iron core, as it can help ensure the blade bends, rather than shatters?

Certainly Vikings used that.

[grimmas]

Pattern welding uses different pieces of iron/steel to form a sword with a tough flexible core and hard cutting edge. Viking, Saxon, British and Roman swords were made this way (and others I suspect). The process makes beautiful weapons. Later swords used case and forge hardening on one piece of steel to create the same effect. There were other techniques involved (quenching, annealing and more) but it'd take a while and that not really what the threads about.

But yes different parts did indeed come togeather to make strong swords

[YorkNecromancer]

:|
I mean, it's the worst analogy going because this dude clearly hasn't heard of Composite Design or Alloys. Some of the best swords in the world were composites, and almost all swords were alloys of multiple materials if only because pure iron is horribly brittle due to the perfect lattice it forms.

Kinda demonstrated the level of education that these comments brew up from.

Not to mention the lack of understanding of the benefits of diversity from an evolutionary standpoint, nor the benefits from a cultural standpoint, ignoring the fact that, suck it up, diversity exists and you'll just have to deal with it.

He actually gave me probably the best analogy of the benefits of diversity I could hope for.

I was thinking of posting some stuff there, but...

Christ.

What's the point? You can't argue with something than dumb. It's like arguing with a rock.

A hateful, spiteful, nasty little rock.

And I didn't even think my argument was that controversial. 'Hey, Slaanesh seems a little immature to me; how about we give it to FW because they're really good at actually mature products?' doesn't seem like a ridiculous notion to me.

Although what do I know? I'm too busy planning to take people's games away because I'm scared of sex and rude thoughts. Think I'll go change my middle name to 'If-Jesus-Christ-Had-Not-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned', get myself one of them weird hats, and start crushing local farm workers under wooden doors for refusing to admit their love of the witchery.

[Erik Setzer]

If you're starting a witch hunt, let me know. It's been too long.

[Mr Mystery]

But I'm the (self) appointed Witchfinder General of BoLS.

Off my manor, you!

[40kGamer]

I like the disagreements, but the ad hominem insults are just exhausting. I didn't even think this month's article was that good. Not had the sort of time I normally get to prepare, so had the Dickens of a time trying to think of something to write about, and just kind of bashed it out.

I don't know. Doesn't seem to be much point to keeping it going any more. I still mostly enjoy the writing, and I used to kind of like the discussions, but there's so much venom out there now. It's all very discouraging.

I do understand the discouragement you feel from the free flowing poison that usually follows. if it helps I'm sure there are others such as myself that read and enjoy your posts and even debate the ideas in our small groups without commenting directly. Honestly by the time I've had a chance to think through things well enough to comment the time to do so has often passed. :)

- - - Updated - - -


But I'm the (self) appointed Witchfinder General of BoLS.

Off my manor, you!

I expect to see an official photo with appropriately drab garments and an impressive hat!

[Morgrim]

I don't think the casting of the Harry Potter movies can be used as evidence for how characters should look.

In the books Harry is repeatedly and very prominently described as having very messy black hair and vivid green eyes. Those, along with his scar, are his defining visual characteristics.

In the movies Harry had smooth dark brown-black hair and blue eyes.

Also in the films Lavender Brown was black until she became a love interest of Ron and got a lot of speaking lines, at which point she suddenly became white.


A lot of characters are portrayed as white because white is seen as the 'default'. If there is no compelling reason for a character to be of a particular race, why is it a bad thing for a previously white character to be made something else, given there are a TINY number of non-white roles available? To me that just feels like being fair.

[Haighus]

The inconsistencies with how the characters are portrayed in the films compared to the books (in particular from about the 3rd film onwards) are one of the main reasons I dislike the films so much (not so much the first two). Duelling is the other aspect I really dislike.

[grimmas]

The mistake made was when Rowling said anything other than "she's the right person for the role" because that's all that needed to be said end of story. Also I wonder how many if those so het up about it were going to get down to the West End to see it.

I saw the Holy Grail in London and King Arthur was Asian ( Uk usage) and it was a bloody good show didn't ruin either my childhood or the original. But that wasn't the craziest thing they'd done they'd even had an Australian play him, mmmmaaaddddness. I also saw one with swearing Muppets, absolute genius and didn't ruin my childhood.

Now I come to think of it they really can't the nationality right on any of the British heroes. Robin Hood is either a Yank or an Aussie, William Wallace an alcoholic anti-Semitic Aussie and Richard the Lionheart a F***ing Scotsman (and a straight one at that). I also fairly sure they've never had a Welshman play King Arthur.

[Kaptain Badrukk]

The mistake made was when Rowling said anything other than "she's the right person for the role" because that's all that needed to be said end of story. Also I wonder how many if those so het up about it were going to get down to the West End to see it.

I saw the Holy Grail in London and King Arthur was Asian ( Uk usage) and it was a bloody good show didn't ruin either my childhood or the original. But that wasn't the craziest thing they'd done they'd even had an Australian play him, mmmmaaaddddness. I also saw one with swearing Muppets, absolute genius and didn't ruin my childhood.

Now I come to think of it they really can't the nationality right on any of the British heroes. Robin Hood is either a Yank or an Aussie, William Wallace an alcoholic anti-Semitic Aussie and Richard the Lionheart a F***ing Scotsman (and a straight one at that). I also fairly sure they've never had a Welshman play King Arthur.

Saint George was Palestinian, of Greek and Roman heritage, so go figure.
Dumb people be dumb.

[grimmas]

Saint George was Palestinian, of Greek and Roman heritage, so go figure.
Dumb people be dumb.

He apparently was but who played in the film (if any). Also St Patrick wasn't Irish and St Andrew wasn't Scotish. St David was Welsh. I haven't seen them portrayed in any films either.


I'm sure Hollywood could f**k it up though.

[Mr Mystery]

On Alarielle....


ok at this point GW is just ***** with us. Are you for real GW??? Who is gonna paint that model? It is greatly sculptured (I would not call it beautiful... i think its hideous but thats personal preference) but this is just almost impossible to paint. This combined with the price will make this a very rare model which is baffling seeing how sales was/is GW biggest problem with warhammer fantasy and now age of sigmar


What do we want?
GREY PLASTIC BLOBS!

When do we want them?
NOW!

What do we want?
GREY PLASTIC BLOBS! UNLESS THEY'RE FROM GW, IN WHICH CASE WE'LL JUST FIND SOMETHING ELSE TO COMPLAIN ABOUT. PROBABLY THAT THEY HAVEN'T GOT ENOUGH 'FILIGREE' EVEN THOUGH TO BE HONEST WE DON'T REALLY KNOW WHAT THAT WORD MEANS BUT IT SOUNDS NICE!

When do we want it?
NOW!

[Kirsten]

who is going to paint it? well, me, when I buy it for starters. how is it impossible to paint? I don't understand any part of that

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

doesn't look that difficult to me, also she is quite large (esp when compared to the dryads) ill be buying her if not to make a dark-alarrielle then to convert into my necron empress.

[Mr Mystery]

Yup. Nice angles on the beetle, bit of subtle blending on Theladyherself, job's a good'un.

[Erik Setzer]

Eh... I wouldn't complain she's "impossible to paint." I'd just say that they did their Kitchen Sink thing with her, and put too much unnecessary junk on the model to say, "Look, detail!" Not hard to paint that junk, but I'd rather vastly improve the looks of an overpriced model with a Dremel tool. And when you're paying that much, having to fix it shouldn't be a thing.

But hey, if you're a fan of garbage thrown on a model just to claim it's more detailed, go for it. It's your money.