Unemployed Watercooler Fridge Buzz Commiseration, Alienation and Mental Anti-Stagnation Society (DNRIYHM)

Me, I'm counting down until Jonny starts making Thom wear a doo-rag like Marek Mos. I can't wait, that will be awesome.

Anyone who tries to tell you about evopsych, just ask them what hunter gatherer tribes they've spent time with recently. Because most modern humans can't even conceive of what our environment was like before the Industrial Revolution, let alone what is was before the tiny crust of time that spawned the Agrarian Revolution, how can they even talk about evopsych without quoting their sources. Citations or GTFO.

I just really need to stay away from all 90% male special interest internet forums.

This is actually an incredibly invaluable lesson to learn.

And it's weird that I say that, because I've spent so much of my life in male dominated and male coded spaces IRL, and my attitude in them was always that... I had as much right to be there as they did, and I would stand up for myself, and women in general, but more in the sense of leading by example, and if, say, the Sys Admin said something sexist, I'd just look at him and cough and challenge him on it in a jokey way, and slowly, I'd start to make headway. Like, my being a woman in that space, and just existing there, would slowly start to change their ideas about What Women Were.

But on the internet, that doesn't seem to happen. There's this synergy that once a forum becomes overwhelmingly male, it just seems to generate its own momentum and resistance to, like... reality?

I used to really try to stick it out on mostly-male forums with the same intentions, of opening up space by just existing there. And it really started to wear on me, and make me angry, and unhappy. And I would wonder why I was so miserable all the time, to the point where I didn't actually like who I was, when I was in those spaces. So I stopped. And I magically stopped being so angry and unhappy all the time! (obviously I still am, some of the time) But things one can avoid... it's sometimes a good idea to avoid them. And it sucks, but if it makes you less unhappy, less unhappy is a good state.

I happened to look at this thread for the first time today... Melissa W, I've often wondered if there were any other Ilxors who also follow the F$M message boards, and now I see there's at least one. That place frustrates me no end. I'm fascinated/obsessed by film music but the level of emotional intelligence on that board is pretty appalling. Even a lot of the ppl whose music-related comments I respect greatly begin to reveal themselves as clods when subjects like this come up. Sadly, I don't know of a better place to talk about film scores on the web. ILX has certainly never engaged deeply on the subject.

Hello Jon and welcome, thanks for saying something.

I've been kinda thinking about this, because this is the kind of thing that rattles around my head and irritates me.

And I guess I started it with that quip about "do they know any actual women" because I didn't think that this was a serious discussion, I thought what would be best was just "sneer at the bad people and make jokes about TY's hair bcuz that will cheer up MW"

But now I'm thinking about it, it's like... actually, they *do* know at least one actual woman. They know MW. They just choose *not* to listen to her, because women are, you know, not worth paying attention to because we have silly ladybrains and only care about rom-coms and Cosmo magazine.

But then when you go and use a word like lack of "emotional intelligence" to describe this behaviour. Um, no. that's not the right word. Because people who can discuss films, and soundtracks, and the emotional effect of sound upon vision and how music and plot work together etc etc yadda yadda - that actually shows quite a high level of emotional literacy.

So this idea that these men are dismissing the ideas of one woman in specific and all women in general - something makes me think, hey, this is not down to lack of emotional literacy. This is down to a deep level bias, a prejudice - and that has a name and that name is sexism. You can dress it up in sciencey sounding clothes, and then it's neurosexism - but this thing, of why it's still somehow such a *surprise* to other men, that intelligent, cultured men with good taste can carry around unchallenged prejudices like sexism? Don't dress it up and excuse it and call it something it isn't, because that's kind of enabling of more continued prejudice.

Anyway, sorry, this was probably the wrong thread and I should just make a Thonny reference to make everything happy-happy again, but I just wanted to say that.

Sexism, like racism, is a branch of 'pejudice'.

The idea that you can be pre-judged by people who know little about you.

pre-judice, obv

Well, you're right that 'emotional intelligence' is not what's lacking in these guys' attitudes toward women and ideas about 'how women process art' etc-- it is plain sexism. And i know it's dumb that it surprises me sometimes when it turns out someone who I thought I respected holds these prejudices.

But I was meaning to cite 'emotional intelligence' as a global problem with that board, which is to say these guys interact with other like children, constantly attacking/trolling each other over the tiniest perceived slights, holding these annoying vendettas against each other, etc etc, so that it's a lucky thing if there even is any discussion of music. And then one of the few posters who actually does talk about music intelligently shows his colors as an old school sexist and it's just ugh fuck life.

ITT I basically just wanted to give a shout-out to a fellow film music nerd and say 'sorry about those assholes.'

I didn't see your responses until now! Have you posted in that thread/what's your user name? I don't post on FSM much but I'm glad to find that someone else on ILX also posts there. I wish there were a better place to read about and discuss film music. It's far from my main musical passion, but I do enjoy having a nice discussion about Herrmann from time to time.

OK, that makes sense, Jon, thanks for the clarification. And yeah, I suppose I should find it more surprising but I'm cynical - and find it more disappointed than surprising, I guess.

Film music is, oddly, one of my blind spots - in that it's something I should know a lot more about than I do, but that's mostly a result of my film deafness, rather than lack of interest, because, actually, I think the first 2 (possibly 3?) albums I ever bought were all soundtracks, back when albums were something I bought once every 6 months when I'd saved up my pocket money. I often think that it *should* be a way in, to film, for me. And many of the films I've managed to love or even obsess over, are ones where the soundtracking is very important to it - I guess I'm thinking of the close association between sci fi (and horror) and early electronic music. (Ironically, the only film of the past 10 years or so, whose soundtrack really moved me was Moon)

Could you maybe do an ILX thread? (Not sure if it would go on ILE or ILF or ILM) Is there one already?

lol your display name

(I had to write a cheesecake with that name. I just *had* to.)

Where do you post such things when you're done with them?

The Cheesecake Archive but I don't think that one is approved yet.

What user name are you using there?

My primary interest in the last 15 or so years has been classical music; I started getting fascinated with film music about 4 years ago because of how it uses the classical music toolbox to accomplish a quite different set of aims. I actually don't even see very many movies! I prefer to listen to the composers' angle on the story and let my sense of the film be sort of vaporous/vague.

I don't think there's ever been a hardy film music thread on ILM. Actually, I feel like a lot of ppl who would comment on such a thread keep to the ILE side. Maybe it's worth a try though.

(Melissa, my user name on fsm is my real name. I post rather sparsely there but read it frequently).

Yeah, for me my interest in film music is an extension of my interest in classical music. I'm not into the geeking out over Jerry Goldsmith or John Williams side of it at all (which most of FSM seems to be).

I really like megaliths. And long barrows. And White Horses. And megalithic long barrows that happen to be in the Vale of the White Horse near the Wlitshire / Oxfordshire border where the PRS has rambled and Pop was buried? Put those together - or just look on the recent stories, you'll work it out.

Sorry to be so cryptic. I'm still weird about it.

Jon that might be a cool thread - I know I've had discussions w ILXors (ESP Elvis Telecom) but that might have been on twitter.

X-post ok that's probably me and my Vangelis records out. ;-)

And I've just realized you were asking Jon not me so disregard previous post, stupid iPhone.

No, I asked you as well!

Are you on there? You can leave cryptic clues or just email me if you don't want to unmask.

I shall email.

Done!

help I'm trapped in the stupidest argument I've ever had and I can't get out

What now? Step away from the computer when that happens. It saves so much annoyance in your life.

STEP AWAY FROM THE COMPUTER!!!

me?

YES, YOU

tee hee hee hee heee

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1fkof2wza1qerwoao1_400.gif

I'm trying to step away from the computer but The Stupidest Argument I've Ever Had keeps beckoning.

Is it stupider than whether or not artichoke hearts = a metaphor for oral sex?

Well, I'm arguing with someone who just basically said male privilege doesn't exist "because soldiers in Afghanistan".

Oh, one of those. Who believes that feminism is not true because, well, Patriarchy Hurts Men Too?

I used to have a great myth-busting link which went through and demolished all over those, but I, uh, lost it when I left my job.

Ah, found it.

http://fortyshadesofgrey.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/female-privilege-checklist-agogo.html

and also

http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com/2008/02/09/faq-female-privilege/

Melissa, just walk away for 12 hours. They are adult children, they'll start tearing into each other if you leave them to it for awhile. Gah, that paragraph about soldiering, so stupid.

(BTW I listen to shit-tons of Goldsmith, you might as well know that now-- but I know what you mean)

just tell them you need to shave twice a day otherwise you get a beard while guys only need to shave once a day, that's bound to shut them up ;)

I have such a headache, which just won't seem to go away, no matter how many tablets I take. I hate those kind of multi-day headaches, where you go to bed and you can't get to sleep because you have a headache, then you wake up early and you just want to moan and put a pillow over your head because you have a headache.

i hate them too.

Today is a bad Nothingness and Purposelessness day and I think I should get off the interweb. :-(

Firing someone is not a pleasant job. Tears. Apologies. And then during the night sleeplessness and nightmares. Bah.

Oh god, I'm sorry to hear that. Did they at least know that it was a possibility, or did you have to break it to them as a surprise? That must be so awful, for both of you, especially since it's someone who's been with you for so long. Are you going to be OK, financially? 6 months salary is a lot to come up with, even at a good time, in a financial crisis, that's got to hurt.

We can only hope she finds a job very quickly so we don't need to pay those six months. She hadn't realized it was this bad off. But I didn't want to burden her with it (until now of course). I feel really bad because I quite like her. But otoh she has this long pay out. We don't have *zilch* as back-up. Anyway, we'll see... It's no the end of the world. We just need to get through this year (in my optimistic opinion). If we get through 2012 whole, then I think/hope we can manage.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/s320x320/379039_325044460842048_100000094897907_1356940_1041793192_n.jpg

I'm too tired for (more than a handful of) words, rassensassenfrassen' work, it's eating me up, sorry you guys are having bad times.

I have spent the day at the National Gallery losing myself in medieval Italian art and falling head over heels in love with 17th Century Diplomat/Spy/Agent/Art Dealers. Or rather, just one. With astonishing cheekbones. Why are we separated by 4 Centuries? we were meant to be together.

http://www.shafe.co.uk/crystal/images/lshafe/Van_Dyck_George_Gage_Looking_at_a_Statuette_1621-2.jpg

(This may be the wine and the limoncello talking.)

he looks kind of like tilda swinton!

He is pretty.

I'm in a hotel on campus at Warwick University. I'm exhausted & need to be up early tomorrow and will have a long day, but I'm not *sleepy* because I fell asleep the minute I hit my hotel room earlier and slept for over an hour. On the upside, the unplanned nap cut my headache in half.

Oh well. I have all the Anne books on audio, I will put Anne of Avonlea back on, it is dreadful stuff, but seems to work better than prozac for shutting the anxiety off.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/data.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1kjrffTvj1qbmduso1_500.gif

He is Thom Yorke channelling Tilda Swinton in Orlando = HE IS MY DREAM MAN.

I've been doing that quite a lot, too, lately. At least, the falling asleep too early because I am exhausted, and then waking up a few hours later and being unable to sleep at all. Considering you, me and Nath and our sleepless nights, we should add "insomniacs society" to the thread title.

And now I need to have a little moan that probably no one but MW will get, but I need to moan because this has made me feel awful for the second day running.

Why do people feel the need to give bad/negative reviews on amateur fiction sites? By which I mean, yes, fan fiction sites? There's something just so small and mean-spirited about it. I really do believe that in the world of fan fiction, if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. It's *not* professional fiction, you're paying nothing for it except your time, and if you don't like a story, it's really easy to hit the back button and find something you do like.

If something's actually poorly written (grammatically incorrect, plotholes, whatevs) then that's fair enough - my response, when I was an editor, would be to write *privately* and say "Hey, your work shows potential, but I think you could really do with a beta editor." Because fan fiction is often so much more personal than other forms of art, it's just *rude* to publicly attack it.

I just feel really shit because I've received 2 bad reviews in as many mornings, and it's got me down. Yes, I know, I don't take criticism of any kind well (I was near suicidal over some of the reviews when I put out a pop album.) But it's just... my life feels so grey and hopeless right now, fanfic is the shiny happy place I go to feel better. It feels like people are determined to ruin even my happy-place for me.

One of them was just so off-base (completely misread a passage where I was praising something, as my "making fun of it") that it was easily dismissed. But the other one was just... whu? The complaint was "this is just straight-up wish fulfillment" which is like... HUH? ALL FAN FICTION IS WISH FULFILLMENT IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER. Please show me a piece of fan fiction that isn't wish fulfillment - whether that wish is "I wish I could have sex with Thom Yorke" or "I wish Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood would have sex with each other, so I can watch" or "I wish that minor character or throwaway comment or lyric had been expanded on" or "I wish my favourite television show hadn't been cancelled after the second series." This is the nature of the thing. Complaining about wish fulfillment in fan fiction is like complaining about sugar in candy.

The problem is, my head always goes and fills in the rest of what I think they're complaining about - like, OMG, yes, it's terrible that I made the lead character someone who is not actually in the band - and even worse, godhelpus, a woman. Because I wrote it in first character, that means that that character is a MarySue and an Author Insert, because all original characters written by women are MarySues and Author Inserts. Maybe my "wishes" that I was fulfilling were too far away from their wishes. Or, more likely, that they were too *close* - I had at least two people email me after reading the story, saying "thank you for writing out something I've always secretly wanted to do with the band" (ironically, neither of them were sex-related at all.) - and they were embarrassed by their own fantasy. Or realising that other people shared that fantasy and they weren't such a special snowflake.

I don't know! Writing this out here has actually made me feel a bit better about it, but I'm still smarting. And that makes me not want to do it any more. Which basically means that one of the few last things that really brought me pleasure in life is gone. Well, I suppose I can always just write it and not publish it. But that makes me angry, like other people's prohibitions are keeping me from doing something I really want to do.

But god I hate people right now. :-(

I know the short answer is "get a life, then you won't care so much about this stupid shit."

But the thing is, as an ~artist~ (cue sound of violins playing and jack up the pretentiousness) my work p much *is* much life.

And yes, I know that lots of people don't consider fanfic to be art but I don't draw any difference between any of the things I do, drawing, writing, songwriting, fanfic, whatever. It all comes from the same place.

The damn shame of it is, is that all (or, nearly all) crit/reviewing of any kind of art/production is 'performed' by someone who got it/in free.

I liked John Lydon's comment to some music journalist who was 'discussing' why he was playing Sex Pistols songs during his PIL gigs, "Did you get in to the gig free? Yeah? You know, that's fine, that's OK, just don't come on like you're my employer!"

No, that's completely different. When someone is reviewing a gig, for the media, they are doing a job. They are paid for the service, that's fair enough. They are paid for their opinion, and they should write their considered opinion.

When someone does a free review (they chose to hit that "review" button and use their time, for free, to give their opinion) of a free piece of art, it's like... you chose, to spend your time and effort - just to be nasty to someone? Why?