Rum Doings Episode 191: Squashed Twins
by John Walker on May.21, 2015, under Rum Doings
In our 191th ever Rum Doings, our topic is, never mind space – what about the kiddies in the hospitals?
We talk about the universal changing of numerical suffixes, the matriarchy in which Nick finds himself, and Radio 4 plays. (Here’s that good astronaut play.) Nick learns about the greatest thing on television, Tipping Point, we sort-of argue about “trigger warnings”, then rail against the idiocy of “clickbait”.
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[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/191_rumdoings.mp3]
May 21st, 2015 on 15:55
Thanks for the Radio 4 play commendation, looking forward to hearing it. Btw, I did also enjoy your transatlantic podcast.
May 21st, 2015 on 16:29
With regards to Game of Thrones I’ve been far more disappointed with the horrible way they’ve implemented the Dornish sub-plot. This season especially the show’s started getting really weak at the points where it departs from the books; it’s beginning to look like the showrunners just can’t construct a plot very well, and have only managed so far by following the path George Martin set out for them.
May 21st, 2015 on 17:43
I appreciate this new weekly upload schedule.
May 22nd, 2015 on 01:29
I’ve seen content warning used in the place of trigger and it feels like a more honest term. It gives people the chance to veer off but doesn’t presuppose that the material would actually trigger someone.
Also of possible interest: Health Canada may finally remove fruit juice as a recommended example of fruit/vegetable serving.
May 23rd, 2015 on 12:28
I think John is unfair to compare Hoff Sommers to Ukip. Ukip’s ideology is fundamentally xenophobic whereas Hoff Sommers is trying to use enlightenment values, in the tradition of Wollstonecraft, as a basis for feminism. I accept all her obvious failings, though some are less pronounced to me as I don’t care about telly games and therefore gamergate (and don’t really know anything about it so would bow to John’s superior judgements). Certainly someone like Sarkeesian (also with obvious failings) is producing much more insightful and intellectually stimulating analysis but I think it is reasonable that a non-awful person can think that her first principles are more flawed than Hoff Sommers, whilst acknowledging that Hoff Sommers’ position offers support mostly to reactionary right wingers.
I agree with John that the concept of triggers (though just for the sake of PR we should probably re-name them something like Content Warning*) are useful in various obvious ways and a compassionate thing to do. I don’t see the problem being that it is fundamentally impossible to judge what may trigger as Nick says. This seems mostly to fall under Dawkin’s ‘tyranny of the discontinuous mind’ for “where do we draw the line?” Having said that, the idea has been fundamentally warped (e.g. the study of statistics does not silence anyone’s voice or erase their experience and is does not warrant a trigger warning for rape denialism) by a pocket of feminist culture obsessed with, for want of a better term, winning the oppression olympics – being seen to be the most sympathetic to those they judge, in their gender studies calculus, to be most worthy of our concern. This distortion of the concept into a now rigid mantra has happened with a lot of hashtag feminism, with the notion of privilege, with analysis of power structures, with the concept of safe spaces etc. None of this is ultimately to the betterment of social attitudes as many people find such academic dogmatism alienating and have now misunderstood how these ideas are useful.
*I see Alec has said the same thing.
May 28th, 2015 on 08:51
I am astonished that John hasn’t watched Parks and Recreation! He’d love it!
And Nick, the show is probably at its best in seasons 2, 3 and 4, so you’ve got something to look forward to.