King Dork Speaks! Frank Portman on High School, Individualism, and the War on Free Speech

Sorry kids, life "doesn't get better" after high school, says best-selling novelist. You just get better at navigating it.

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King Dork Speaks! Frank Portman on High School, Individualism, and the War on Free Speech

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Forget what you've heard, kids.

Life "doesn't get better" when you graduate high school, says Frank Portman, one of the great chroniclers of adolescent angst and alienation over the past 30 years. Or, as he titles a recent song, "High school is the penalty for transgressions yet to be specified." Still, he's not completely downbeat: "You get better at navigating it, or fighting it off."

Portman is a novelist (King Dork, Andromeda Klein) and musician (The Mr T Experience) whose latest project is a soundtrack for the new paperback edition of his third novel, King Dork Approximately. Writing a soundtrack for his book is an attempt to recapture a uniquely intense and focused multimedia experience that the California native fears has gone missing in an age of information overload. (You can buy the book and download the album immediately here or get the book and a download code at Amazon.com.)

Like his earlier literary offerings, King Dork Approximately drew rave reviews for its honest, urgent, and wickedly funny take on the big and small ways that our high-school years mark us for the rest of our lives.

In a wide-ranging conversation with Reason's Nick Gillespie, Portman talks about his literary inspirations (including Philip K. Dick) and musical heroes (Pete Townshend of the Who and Ray Davies of The Kinks), and whether the world is getting more tolerant of oddballs and weirdos or increasingly more repressive of kids and adults who think and act differently. As a musician who made his bones in the post-punk world of the Bay Area before becoming a best-selling writer, Portman brings an absolutely perspective on contemporary American cultural and political life.

Produced by Ian Keyser.

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Comments

[Hyperion]

" whether the world is getting more tolerant of oddballs and weirdos or increasingly more repressive of kids and adults who think and act differently."

Look, you can be as freaky as you want to these days as long as you only speak 'right think', AKA politically correct, and you vote democrat. Otherwise, deplorable basket for you cause you're irredeemable.

[PapayaSF]

Indeed. Think all whites are racists and all men are rapists, and you are an enlightened thinker. Believe that Western civilization is superior, and you're dangerous and hateful nut.

[IceTrey]

Maybe I was lucky but high school was no big deal. I can't relate to all the angst about it.

[CZmacure]

You were lucky.

[Rhywun]

Me too. I liked high school.

[Hyperion]

Yeah, high school is a pretty fucked up affair. You're no longer a child, but you're not an adult either. You have all the raging hormones of a young adult, very little common sense, and little to none self autonomy. It's like that Alice Cooper song, 18.

[SchillMcGuffin]

I went to a high school significantly larger than my jr. high (what we called "middle school" back then), and I found it a lot less socially fraught. I think a more populated environment made for a bigger pool of people in which to find people you wanted to hang out with, and more room to get away from the people you didn't (conversely, more distractions from prospective bullies).

The teen angst I remember was more a function of being a teenager, than of high school as-a-place.

[Thomas O.]

Meh. I hated high school. Of course, I was a social disaster - a combination of oddball, introverted and OCD - so that may have been a factor. Sophomore year was my favorite, when I went through the whole year without a failing grade on my report card and I had hope for a better social life by year's end - but I was glad to be done with it all after I graduated.

[Ted S.]

The State is the biggest bully of them all.

[Derpetologist]

Beauty and King Dork!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMjfa-wJNnw

Such an underrated show:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RjXOO2GhhY

[PapayaSF]

It was a good show.

[Derpetologist]

There was a crime show on at the TV at the gym. The premise was an awful racist real estate mogul was running for mayor against a good, kind, woman. And his hate speech caused some whackjob to go around killing people and trying to make it look like black or Mexican gangsters did it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRPofS0YotQ

I did learn something from it though: Manson orders his followers to leave watermelon rinds at the murder sites in order to trick the police into thinking the Black Panthers did it.

[Hyperion]

"There was a crime show on at the TV at the gym. The premise was an awful racist real estate mogul was running for mayor against a good, kind, woman"

You just cannot make this shit up.

[lap83]

Hmm, that premise sounds familiar.... was it a Simpsons episode?

[Ted S.]

Sounds like Obama's hate speech and blacks creating fake hate crimes like the shit swastika.

[Rick Stands]

Did the mogul grab any pussies?

[Suthenboy]

I cant decide who is worse - the propagandists who think people are stupid enough not to see through that or the people stupid enough not to see through that. It is pitiful really.

[DenverJ]

You're not here. You quit last night.

[Suthenboy]

I was drunk. I also got half a dozen e-mails asking me to stick around. I was moved...really. I will stick around for the commenters. That is who I come here for anyway. One person requested I stay just so they can use the recipes I often post.

[PapayaSF]

Glad you're sticking around.

[CZmacure]

If this shit comment system had upvotes, I'd upvote your gladness.

[Cdr Lytton]

Same here, and I like those recipes too. I'll even overlook your cilantro hate. That people like you are in LA is the one bright spot if I ever get forced into relocating to Ouachita Parish.

[Mainer2]

I second that emotion

[commodious cam't contmpla..]

DON'T YOU QUIT ON ME GODDAMMIT

*applies paddles*

[Rhywun]

How do the actors make it through those turgid lines without laughing?

[Groovus Maximus]

We need to see all the outtakes. I have it on good authority that editing is bad (note Reason's own editorial gaffes and screw ups are legion, even firing one of their own for such sins), which is why we need to view *ALL* of the footage (precisely the reason why Reason only has a rarely used edit button for "editors", but no such luxury for commenters - we *MUST* see *ALL* the unedited commenting).

[Ted S.]

So what's Ukrainian TV like?

[Groovus Maximus]

"Basic" UKR TeeVee tends to be rather bland, as these examples show. Fortunately, Fortress Maximus is equipped with the finest in international satellite teevee.

[GILMORE?]

I'd hope they had like daily live Sambo tournaments on the telly

[Groovus Maximus]

They do, on occasion, but to view that stuff regularly, you need either satellite or innertoob stream, or both. It was easier to view Russian teevee in Donets'k than in Odessa, since most terrestrial teevee is broadcast centrally from Kiev proper, and at the time, Russian signals weren't blocked or received interference.

[The Late P Brooks]

Life "doesn't get better" when you graduate high school, says Frank Portman, one of the great chroniclers of adolescent angst and alienation over the past 30 years.

Oh, bullshit.

Maybe it just sucks to be you.

[juris imprudent]

People who obsess on high school always remind me of a review of a Frank Zappa album, I think it was in Playboy, in the 70s. The reviewer says something about Goethe writing Faust even while being annoyed with the smell from a nearby dairy and how Zappa who lived near some turkey farms at some point in his life was never able to get the turkey shit out of his head.

[John Titor]

Life "doesn't get better" when you graduate high school...Still, he's not completely downbeat: "You get better at navigating it, or fighting it off."

Well, except for the "hormones aren't constantly fucking with you...as much" and "you can do a bunch of things you couldn't in high school, no parental supervision, and it's probably way easier to buy beer" parts.

Also, your likelihood of getting laid can significantly increase.

[Hyperion]

I sure as hell wouldn't want to go back to the high school years. I'd rather be 55. Of course, I'd rather be 30, only with the financial success I have now.

[Suthenboy]

I would go back If I could go back with the money and knowledge I have now. I could be king of the world in ten years. Of course the problem is that I would rather be skinned alive than be king of the world. I would probably just go fishing and get laid a lot.

[Hyperion]

You could probably have done that if you would have just listened to the boring old know nothing geezers who were giving you perfectly sound advice that you couldn't take because you were already the smartest person in the world. I mean I'm saying that from my own experience, assuming all teens are the same dumbshits that I was.

[Suthenboy]

They are. I once told my father that my grandfather was a mystery to me because of all the dumb things he said and did. My father said that the older he got the smarter his father got.

At some point while trying to navigate through adult life I realized my grandfather was a hell of a smart guy.

[PapayaSF]

"When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years." (Attributed to Twain, but not verified.)

[commodious cam't contmpla..]

You know, I'm my mid-twenties I was sure I'd have everything sorted by thirty. Finished my degree, begun my career, maybe looking to settle down.

Turned thirty last week. I'd go back to high school in a heartbeat if only with the knowledge that a working man's life sucks without some guidance.

[Rhywun]

It took me until my early thirties. But I took a few detours along the way.

[Cdr Lytton]

Yeah. I'd kick my younger self's ass. But I'm also content with how my life has turned out so far too.

[commodious cam't contmpla..]

I'd kick my younger self's ass.

Happily. Fuck past me. Dumb bugger, inconsiderate bastard. Never thinking about the future.

Also, fuck future me. Smug prick, thinks he has it all figured out. I'll show him.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Wait...what?

I thought you were around my age, man. (A decade older)

Wait.

What if I am future you?

[commodious cam't contmpla..]

Smug prick! I'll show me!

[Thomas O.]

I hear ya. Having to write detailed, neat, footnoted "research papers" was the worst part of high school. You couldn't pay me a million dollars to go through that shit again.

[american socialist]

This guy sounds like some writer N.G. Hired on to Maxim back in his days of editing a magazine that put titties on the cover.

As to the assertion that life doesn't get better as you age... well, it certainly doesn't get worse. My secret is that I concentrate on what we should be grateful for. For example, I' grateful that a fascist baboon-like man won't be President for the next 4 years

[John Titor]

a fascist baboon-like man won't be President for the next 4 years

And we thank you for never running for office.

[Brian]

You always seem laser focused on the positive.

Weren't you complaining a few threads ago about having to beg your wife for money?

[american socialist]

No, I'm ok with the arrangement.

Do people that make enough money so they don't have to think about their finances rhetorically spit on people who have less than them? I guess that's why I think Marx was onto something when he talked about class consciousness. If it's right for rich assholes, isn't it also right for the unwashed 99%?

[Brian]

Listen: I'm not up on this "libertarian socialism" thing, so explain this to me:

When your wife leaves you for being worthless, will that be capitalism's fault?

Or will it be her fault, as an individual, for not personally embracing the labor theory of value?

[american socialist]

THIS ISN'T ABOUT ME, BRIAN, Its about how free market capitalism and how people who make less money than you should give up their Social Security benefits so hedge fund managers can get a tax break.

[Hyperion]

You should have a drink. And then tomorrow, wake up and think about how you can better your own situation instead of being envious and demanding what others have worked hard for. Get off your ass and earn more if you want it, or STFU.

[american socialist]

Wouldn't my situation be better if guys like Brian paid the same percentage of income on their Social Security taxes as you and I do?

[Brian]

See?

It's always about you.

[american socialist]

"See?

It's always about you."

Sorry...

Wouldn't everyone's situation be better if guys like Brian paid the same percentage of income on their Social Security taxes.

[Sevo]

american socialist|10.23.16 @ 5:21PM|#
"Sorry..."

Yes, you are.

[Brian]

Everyone other than... the obvious?

[Brian]

Yeah, I get it: whatever economic model justifies reducing inequality in your favor, the better.

That's why, despite a century of debunking, LTV is heterodox, but socialists are still whining strong.

Because it was never about economics or "value" in the first place, but just conveniently defining labor as the only "real" value.

Gee: what a shock it's embraced so much by people low in cash, but with a lot of time on their hands, regardless of its flaws.

It lets socialists try to put you on moralistic guilt trips, and pretending to be sciency, all at the same time.

I would think really smart people could come up with something better to do.

[PapayaSF]

And the best thing is, to Marxists, blabbing LTV bullshit counts as work. They're the revolutionary vanguard leading the oppressed to liberation, don't you know.

[CZmacure]

blabbing LTV bullshit counts as work

The first time I encountered one of these people using LTV to justify why they didn't have to engage with my response to their public speech, I honestly laughed myself silly.

Yes, it's "labor" for a person to talk shit on twitter. I can't imagine why people don't highly value their "labor" ... lol?

[Brian]

It's such obvious question begging convenience:

"I choose a economic theory where I produce and deserve everything and you're exploiting me."

"Hey: look! Economically speaking, I produce everything, and you're exploiting me! Shocker!"

[Suthenboy]

"people who make less money than you should give up their Social Security benefits so hedge fund managers can get a tax break."

What the hell are you even talking about? That is a fucking word salad. If I had control of the money that was stolen from me for SS so that pols could squander it I would have turned it into a million bucks.

[Hyperion]

I know what it's like to be poor. I come from a poor family and I had virtually nothing when I was in my 20s. I was never envious of anyone. I always just looked at the people who had things and admired them and thought 'how can I get where they are'? Well, I'm still not rich, but I'm comfortable and happy. Still not envious of anyone. Trump is a billionaire, good for him, I would like to be also, but I'm content as it is and still working hard to get more stuff that I want. I worked and paid for my own college. But people like AmSoc thinks you and I should pay for his stuff.

[Rhywun]

LOL, Marx was a deadbeat - of course he was envious of his betters.

[Hyperion]

Marxism needs lot of deadbeat sheeples.

[Suthenboy]

He was worse than just a deadbeat. He was a cheap grifter.

[Pat (PM)]

I guess that's why I think Marx was onto something when he talked about class consciousness.

The only problem is that not every lazy cunt who refuses to work has an exorbitantly wealthy benefactor to keep them in luxury while their children starve.

[Suthenboy]

We already know you aren't going to be president AmSoc. Now if we could just get you to stop commenting at Reason.

[Cdr Lytton]

Fuck off tulpa.

[Hyperion]

I think it's time for a prognostication.

2 months after the election, Hillary appear on the teevee:

..."and that's why I'm ordering by executive decree today, that all Gary Johnson voters be relocated to camp... uh *smiles maniacally*, I mean safe areas, for their own good until we have time to figure things out. And since this is a democracy, cackle cackle, Donald Trump doesn't even know this is a democracy! *chuckles in the background from former CNN execs now working for administration*. Since this is a democracy, we can't know exactly who voted that unfortunate way... we're just asking all libertarians ... we're relying on friends and family to identify those who need special protection at this time... we're asking all libertarians to report to the assigned stations at this time. If anyone is unable to come in on their own, don't worry, we will send transportation for you."

1 month later:

Matt: Damnit Nick, you didn't write enough Trump articles!

Nick: Fuck off Matt, I wrote more than you did! And what about that one Hillary article you wrote where you forgot to say 'but of course Trump is much worse'? And who has the jacket? I do!

Matt: Hey, I hear there's a special camp that has cocktail parties, do you think we'll get in? I hear that Shackford got in...

[PapayaSF]

Years after a Hillary election: "Sure, the amnesties and millions of more Third World immigrants has ensured that the Democratic Party will never lose the presidency or the Supreme Court. We have more government, more taxes, more regulation, more poor people, more welfare, more crime. But Libertarians are getting 2% of the vote among Hispanics and Muslims! Libertarian moment! Too bad they have to keep undercover about their beliefs or risk disgrace, job loss, and even death, but still, good news, huh?"

[CZmacure]

more crime

As I recall, you view the 1965 bill as the high watermark.

How do you explain the dramatic decrease in crime over the last 50 years, if today's immigrants are more criminal than the immigrants of the past? Do you actually have any statistics regarding the relative criminality of immigrants and natives, or are you just, like, assuming that "Third World immigrants" are violent?

[CZmacure]

dramatic decrease in crime over the last 50 years

To be a bit more clear, there was first a significant increase, and then a significant decrease in crime during that time period. However the amount of third world immigration has steadily increased. Why, if third world immigrants equate to crime, would crime go up in the 1970s and down in the 2010s, given that "third world" immigrants were a much larger percentage of new immigrants in the 2000s than in the 1960s?

[CZmacure]

Alternately we could read what libertarian conservatives who care about supporting their arguments say, and contrast them to your nativist, reactionary view :

Butcher and Piehl examine the incarceration rates for men aged 18-40 in the 1980, 1990, and 2000 Censuses. In each year immigrants are less likely to be incarcerated than natives with the gap widening each decade. By 2000, immigrants have incarceration rates that are one-fifth those of the native-born.
...
In 2010, 10.7 percent of native-born men aged 18-39 without a high school degree were incarcerated compared to 2.8 percent of Mexican immigrants and 1.7 percent of Guatemalan and Salvadoran immigrants.

[PapayaSF]

Crime is down partly due to mass incarceration.

Because Hispanics commit crimes at a higher rate than blacks but a lower rate than whites, increased Hispanic immigration won't necessarily cause rates to rise, but it will prevent rates from falling further.

Some crime stats are misleading, because they count second-generation immigrants as natives. But second-generation immigrants tend to have an even higher crime rate than their parents. (I am not going to Google that for you. You do it.) So when I refer to cutting crime by restricting immigration, I mean the next generation as well.

There is no reason we should be importing criminals at all, and yet we do. See the recent MS-13 gang killings, pretty much the entire LAPD Most Wanted list, etc.

I'm not expressing some baseless prejudice, I'm referring to numbers that are out there but not often referred to because they are Hatefacts, and not to be used in polite company.

[CZmacure]

If those numbers are "out there" then you should refer to them via a link to a URL.

I pasted a study from Cato, now it's your turn.

The fact that you continually cast aspersions like referring to the LA most wanted list but never cite any actual, you know, numbers.. strongly suggests that you are in fact expressing a baseless prejudice.

I am not going to Google that for you. You do it.

You refuse to do the labor for me? Where have I heard that petulant refusal to sustain arguments with citations before? Classic.

[CZmacure]

second-generation immigrants tend to have an even higher crime rate than their parents

Meanwhile, the actual study you are citing contains a graph that shows that second-generation immigrants have... a crime rate which is indistinguishable from natives.

But in PapayaWorld, that isn't immigrants being less likely to commit crime than natives and their native children acting like natives. It's... "second-generation immigrants having an 'even' higher crime rate than their parents."

tl;dr - For your view to have validity, some cohort of immigrants or their children would have to have a higher rate of criminal behavior than natives. They don't.

[PapayaSF]

What cohort of immigrants is this?

[PapayaSF]

Or this?

[PapayaSF]

According to these figures, Hispanics are 26 percent more likely than whites to commit violent crimes. This calculation can now be made only because DOJ has finally released data about Hispanic offenders.

[PapayaSF]

But as I've written before, importing "average" levels of criminality, or even "lower" levels, is not good enough. Poverty and poor education are correlated with crime, so ending immigration by the poor and the poorly-educated will have a positive effect on crime rates.

[PapayaSF]

Hispanics in the U.S. are more violent than non-Hispanic whites

That is, non-Hispanic blacks committed 8.8 times more violent felonies per capita than non-Hispanic whites, etc.

For international comparisons, the homicide rates in 2000 were 1.7 in the U.K., 20.0 in Namibia, and 10.3 in Mexico. (The rate was 5.5 in the U.S.)

So, Mexico has twice the homicide rate of the US. Thought experiment: what happens to the US homicide rate if millions of Mexicans move here?

[PapayaSF]

MS-13 gang killings linked to immigrant surge

[CZmacure]

Thought experiment: what happens to the US homicide rate if millions of Mexicans move here?

Thanks for the flood of not-very-informative links from not very authoritative sources. Such a surprise that I cite Cato and you cite.. VDARE.

Why are we engaging in a "thought experiment" when we have studies which show what actually does happen?

Could it be because what actually does happen is... they're less violent than natives? Nah...

You've decided that "hispanics" are violent (you know, like those turn-of-the-century-Italians) and that's all you need to know. Still left unanswered is how the Italians, against whom all the same slander used to be leveled, managed to turn into plain old "white" Americans in the course of a few generations...

Thanks, though... now that you've cited VDARE, I feel quite comfortable telling you I have no interest in discussing this issue with you, ever again. Have a good one, you far-less-intelligent-than-you-think-you-are xenophobe.

In the future, I suggest that you lead with the VDARE... so no one else bothers to waste their time talking to you.

[PapayaSF]

Of course Cato is going is going to cite pro-immigration information, and VDARE will cite anti-immigration information. Duh. That says nothing about the facts.

I didn't say "Hispanics are violent." I said that statistics show they are, on average, more violent than whites (but less than blacks). Hence while increased Hispanic immigration may not increase our crime stats, it can prevent them from dropping.

It comes down to whether you are willing to look at the stats, and whether you think immigration should be structured to benefit the country, or not.

If you don't want to discuss it with me again, great.

[CZmacure]

It comes down to whether you are willing to look at the stats, and whether you think immigration should be structured to benefit the country, or not.

Your formulation here is so simple that it's hard to argue with. The problem happens when you try support it with a steaming pile of racist bullshit.

I agree that immigration should "benefit the country" but your arguments for what immigrants "benefit the country" are the same very bad ones used by racists for decades.

They were wrong in a simplistic way, and so are you.

[The Late P Brooks]

grateful that a fascist baboon-like man won't be President for the next 4 years

No kidding. I think we're all agreed it's time for that guy to be put out to pasture.

[Hyperion]

I'm not grateful, I'll take 8 more years of Obama over even 1 of Hillary.

[Groovus Maximus]

Think that one through very carefully, Hyp...

[Hyperion]

I don't have to. Neither will you after 1 year of that hateful shrew.

[Ted S.]

Will she still be alive then?

[american socialist]

You see? That's exactly the response I would expect on a libertarian board. Simple agreement. Brooks, why do you think so many people on this board get so bitchy and downright nasty when someone comes on here and says what I think all of us libertarians-- of all beautiful and varied stripes-- should agree on. That Donald Trump should be condemned and not even be located close to the WH?

[Hyperion]

People on this board disagree a a lot, every fucking day. There's a difference between disagreement and trolling.

There is no us, jerkweed. Go back to HuffPo.

[american socialist]

I disagree. I think libertarians have zero to learn from right-wingers like Jason Chaffetz or Mike Lee in Congress. Those guys will just impose laws they think are important and we don't. I think our home should be on the radical and anti militarist Left who have with principle opposed US military adventurism in the ME and Africa.

[Sevo]

"Those guys will just impose laws they think are important and we don't."

"we"? asswipe.
That's a turd in your pocket.

[Contrarian P]

Really? It's odd we haven't heard from this principled left for the last seven plus years. Have you been keeping them in a box? None of those people give a damn about US adventurism as long as it's their guy doing it.

I hate to break it to you, but the left and right both want to impose laws that some people won't think are important. The reason people run for office in the first place is because they want to use the power of government to do things, most of which they couldn't get anyone to do otherwise.

[Agammamon]

1. Where have those guys been for the last 8 years? Certainly not opposing US military adventurism.

2. That's is, literally, the only thing we have in common with the radical and anti-militarist left. Who bleed into the radical left with no break.

3. All the people on the left are all for' imposing laws they think are important and we don't'.

[american socialist]

RE: MTX

How come all of this punk and post-punk music is so universally awful? Did all of the annoying, pampered kids in high school of that era wake up one day and decide to make songs about eating Cheerios in 1992? The chronicle of their late 20th century woes is exhausting and long.

[Brian]

Just try to focus on what you're grateful for.

[Ted S.]

Gangster lean.

[Hyperion]

Would be best if we all just sang gleeful songs about dear leader and his excellent horse like lady.

/AmSoc approves this message.

[american socialist]

Yeah? Which is better? Any song by MTX or the Trololo song?

[Heroic Mulatto]

OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?! OH MY GOD, WHO THE HELL CARES?!

[John Titor]

You're just upset that Reason hasn't been covering the Skeleton War.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Clearly, the editorial staff here want the fuccbois to win.

[Groovus Maximus]

Know thine enemy... There may just be a a Robby Horse or two in there...

[Rhywun]

*rubs eyes*

What year is it?

I don't what the hell I just read.

[Rhywun]

don't *know*

[DenverJ]

I think it's like ring tones that are too high pitched for anyone over twenty to hear: it's not for us, and we will never understand. Now, get them fuccbois off of my lawn

[Rhywun]

I *can* hear those ringtones. But I am not hip to today's scene.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Basic fuccboi.

[PapayaSF]

You know you're seeing youth rebellion when all they wear are different national brands.

[Groovus Maximus]

^^Oops! Forgot the, "Trigger Warning: Autoplay vid." ^^

[GILMORE?]

the fuccbois

I still don't #(*()@ get it

I looked at Groovus link, and that seemed to treat "kids wearing t-shirts jeans and sneakers (and maybe a hoodie)" as something like a dozen types of distinct sub-species rather than.... just kids wearing jeans and sneakers.

As someone who has at times specialized in the higher-form of "nah boy"-roasting, i think this sort of culture-nagging is eminently faggy

[Rhywun]

What I gathered is it has to be the right brand of jeans, t-shirts, and sneakers. That's faggy.

[GILMORE?]

Yeah, that.

the cheap cattiness is something i think was more typical of teenage girls; now its dudes all like, "Ugh, where do you even get your shoes!? So basic."

[Heroic Mulatto]

Not teenage girls...or dudes....

SKELETON WARRIORS

Which side do you choose?

[GILMORE?]

First of all, pretty much everyone on Tumblr is already in agreement that skeletons are awesome.

Well that's nothing if not a glowing endorsement

a fuckboy is somewhere between the male version of a basic bitch, and one of the failed Casanovas from the Straight White Boys Texting blog.

If you understand what this means, then i think its time to smash your computer and spend a month in the wilderness living off berries, or something.

[Hyperion]

Fuck some berries. You gotta kill something and eat it's flesh, or else you'd still be a fuckboy.

[John Titor]

Well that's nothing if not a glowing endorsement

Meh, that video only really describes half of Tumblr, and it's the crazy half. The other half is just dumb internet bullshit.

[Heroic Mulatto]

and the third half is porn.

[Groovus Maximus]

Which side do you choose?

Thanky mr skeltal for me good bones and calcium...

[Heroic Mulatto]

And in the "truth is stranger/better than fiction" department:

In the 1880s England there was an opposition group to the Salvation Army known as the Skeleton Army.

Their motto was "Beef, Beer, and Bacca*!"

*slang for "Tobacco"

[Hyperion]

I like these Skeletons.

[GILMORE?]

n the 1880s England there was an opposition group to the Salvation Army known as the Skeleton Army. Their motto was "Beef, Beer, and Bacca*!"

Ok, you sold me, I'm in.

I used to walk by the Salvation Army Temple on 23rd st all the time. It has a weird "Gates of Mordor" kind of vibe. I've never seen anyone walking in or out of there.

[Groovus Maximus]

I've never seen anyone walking in or out of there.

Just like the Wonka Candy Factory...

(Note the street level cutlery vendor in the clip)

[Rhywun]

I've never seen anyone walking in or out of there.

Ha, me neither.

[Rhywun]

Yeah there was none of that in my time and place. Jeans, t-shirt or sweatshirt, and it didn't matter how cheap or what brand.

[The Late P Brooks]

"It's a slaughterhouse"

The fact is that the evidence for guns as a deterrent to campus crime is weak or nonexistent. And profound evidence shows that the college environment is particularly ill-suited to gun possession.

The risks and interconnectedness of violence, alcohol abuse and reckless behavior are elevated among college-age youths. The frequency of binge drinking among college students is a deep and enduring problem, and the evidence from studies of criminal assaults both outside and inside the home and comparisons of victims who are treated at hospitals for nonlethal assault-related injuries with homicides shows that the presence of firearms dramatically increases the risk of death and injury during altercations. Freely inserting firearms into this environment is a recipe for tragedy.

These people apparently think Lord of the Flies was a peer reviewed sociology treatise.

[Rick Stands]

How about a compromise: lower the drinking age and allow gun possession on campus.

the presence of firearms dramatically increases the risk of death and injury during altercations.

Guns are like those energy balls in "Day of the Dove" -- they don't need to be touched or even seen for their mere presence to cause death and injury.

[Ted S.]

I can only imagine what the SJWs would think of Zardoz.

[Ted S.]

They say that as though SJWs being slaughtered is a bad thing.

/sarcasm

[Suthenboy]

I have seen a few of these gun-grabber articles lately. They can hardly contain themselves. They are trying to crank up the gun-control argument again so the ball will already be rolling when Cankles takes office. They are sure they will win this time, and they just might.

[Suthenboy]

"The fact is that the evidence for guns as a deterrent to campus crime is weak or nonexistent. "

Campus cops carry. Very few campuses allow students or teachers to carry so we have no data. Campuses are in a wide variety of neighborhood types with many differing populations of people in and around them. This sentence has no meaning.

"And profound evidence shows that the college environment is particularly ill-suited to gun possession."

Such as?

I had a gun in my car or my apt the entire time I was in college.

[Rhywun]

It's been mentioned around here many times that college campuses are some of the safest places in America.

[Ted S.]

Except that 5 out of every 4 co-eds get raped.

/sarcasm

[The Late P Brooks]

Panic early, panic often

The combination of gun-related Election Day rhetoric and a somewhat confusing state web of gun laws has some election officials worried ? especially in swing states with open carry laws and a history of mass gun violence.

In Virginia's Prince William County, where you can bring your gun into county government buildings, The Washington Post's Patricia Sullivan reports the electoral board is considering seeking a one-day ban on weapons at polling places on private property.

In Colorado, poll workers in Denver and the suburb Aurora ? the site of the 2012 "Dark Knight" mass shooting ? are being trained on how to respond to a mass shooting.

In New Hampshire, where guns have been an issue in the U.S. Senate campaign, election officials are letting people know that some of their fellow voters might legally carry a weapon into polling places ? even into schools.

"It could happen, so we'd better ban it."

[Hyperion]

Voting is too unsafe. Because someone might have a gun, somewhere. Let's just ban voting and let a secret cabal decide elections, for the children.

[GILMORE?]

Whats embarrassing about the MSM desperation to create these idiotic "Us/Them" civil-war narratives is that i don't even think they work as they might think they're intended.

If people are truly afraid that there's some invisible armed populace waiting to leap up and seize power... it would seem to me to probably have just as great an effect in reducing the likelihood of showing up at the polls as anything.

[american socialist]

Yeah, man. Voters who take right-wing threats seriously are morons.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Oklahoma_City_bombing

[Groovus Maximus]

Both McVeigh and Jones were and are your fellow traveller Lefties. They weren't and aren't "Right Wing" in any sense of the term.

[CZmacure]

Both McVeigh and Jones were and are your fellow traveller Lefties.

Don't you know that opposing the state is the sole domain of the right wing? This doesn't at all imply anything about the statism at the heart of modern leftism, tho.

[Sevo]

"Yeah, man. Voters who take right-wing threats seriously are morons."

Of course the left LUVS peace and harmony:
"1933
By June, at the height of the famine, people in Ukraine are dying at the rate of 30,000 a day, nearly a third of them are children under 10. Between 1932-34, approximately 4 million deaths are attributed to starvation within the borders of Soviet Ukraine. This does not include deportations, executions, or deaths from ordinary causes. Stalin denies to the world that there is any famine in Ukraine, and continues to export millions of tons of grain, more than enough to have saved every starving man, woman and child."
http://holodomorct.org/history.html

Very peaceful when you're surrounded by dead people.

[John Titor]

You know amsoc, it might be slightly disingenuous to start lecturing people on the dangers of right-wing threats, after, you know, actively arguing for and justifying massacres and forced labour.

[JayU]

So essentially:

"Voter fraud doesn't exist, so we don't need to do anything to prevent the possibility of it."

But:

"Violence at the polls doesn't exist. So we're going to ban shit to prevent the possibility of it."

[juris imprudent]

It's different when we do it.

/proggie

[DenverJ]

I thought it was already illegal to shoot up polling places. If you're telling that is not, then... well I'ma change my election day plans.

[Rick Stands]

some of their fellow voters might legally carry a weapon into polling places ? even into schools.

Um no, that would be against federal law....

[CZmacure]

a history of mass gun violence

One whacko goes crazy once and you forever have a "history of mass gun violence" because that's how logic and history work. Michigan has a "history of school bombings," for example.

[Cdr Lytton]

In Colorado, poll workers in Denver and the suburb Aurora ? the site of the 2012 "Dark Knight" mass shooting ? are being trained on how to respond to a mass shooting.

Responding by... returning accurate well aimed fire?

[The Late P Brooks]

I'd hope they had like daily live Sambo tournaments on the telly

Sambo tournaments? Is that some sort of minstrel show competition?

[Groovus Maximus]

The Quimbo tournaments are much worse. Even Jolson would wince.

[DenverJ]

The word "SAMBO" is an acronym for SAMozashchita Bez Oruzhiya, which literally translates as "self-defense without weapons". Sambo is relatively modern since its development began in the early 1920s by the Soviet Red Army to improve their hand-to-hand combat abilities.[1] It was intended to be a merger of the most effective techniques of other martial arts.- Wikipedia

[CZmacure]

The Sambo origin story involves Little White (Russian) Sambo using hand to hand combat to defeat Siberian tigers.

[SchillMcGuffin]

We may or may not "get better at navigating" the world after high school, but we certainly have more freedom to navigate it, physically and socially.

At least for now.

[thomasammy45]

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