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narcasseAn old rant that I never posted at the time. Possibly because I got derailed spitting curses about propaganda and crowd control.
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emthornhill reminded me.
So I’ve had a poke at the latest Meine Liebe episode, initially while I was feeling very, very cranky over things. In fact I started writing a very damning rant about it, so it’s probably a good thing that I’m still on my laptop while my machine lives elsewhere for the next 24 hours, otherwise I be tempted to add said rant to my analysis. Suffice to say, you’re not missing anything, though it did contain such witticisms as “What’s that I hear? It’s the smallest violin in Kuchen playing just for you.” Because I was feeling terribly bastardly and the dialogue was pissing me off no end.
It wasn’t exactly the dialogue in of itself but the whole plot that really got me because while I may well be capable of talking cosmopolitan theory till I pass out, I’m pretty much a pragmatist at heart. Because there’s no point in having lovely ideals and wonderful rhetoric if you can’t put it into action. If you go round with all your silly ideas without any practical application, you may as well just go sit on your hands until you get over the urge to say something stupid in public. Which nicely segues into my major irk with Meine Liebe from the current episode.
Ignoring the random Orpherus-bitching and the average looking women and Torger’s bad hair and the fact that every time his name came up I wanted to call him something else…which this site claims to be football slang, while this site claims to be something else involving being slapped in the face 10 times… I always thought it was just another euphemism for complimentary part of someone else’s anatomy actually…
Aside from all that and what seemed to be the approximation of a Rosenstoltz school outing (Does that count as a pun?)…
On the matter of Torger’s fall from grace. I have to say that while he seemed to have some lovely ideas about integrity and honour and ‘speaking for the people’, his downfall was his naivety.
The particular statement about the people enjoying gossiping about the scandals that had been set up to frame him left me rather speechless for a few moments. He believed that the people would support him, believed that they would naturally seek the truth… What foolishness.
The collective intelligence of a group of people is more often than not inversely proportional to the number of members present.
And not to sound as if I’m claming some higher moral ground, who hasn’t enjoyed some cheap entertainment from time to time? Who could honestly say that they wouldn’t enjoy gossip and sensationalism at all, ever?
Perhaps I’m being a little bit of a pedant by relating that to anime after all because the power of the media and the propensity for cheap entertainment is honestly very real. When tabloids can sway the voting public, when media potentates can threaten a political party with the loss of an election by withdrawing their support…
Is that a threat to democracy? Hell, yes. But on the other side of things, if you were to remove such entertainments, the sensationalism that lets you blank your mind for a few hours each evening after work, how much worse would be the damage?
There’s an area in Cardiff with some lovely large houses but not a pub for miles because the owner who donated the land to the city would only donate it on the condition that such immoral behaviour wasn’t encouraged. And as a result, over time that area has become particularly run down… because if you lived there, there really wouldn’t be much for you to do.
The same thing would apply with the removal of many forms of easy entertainment, which is exactly what gives the media such power. It’s why the media thrives and why the population doesn’t go crazy searching for something to do.
I don’t have a TV where I live now but that doesn’t stop me for searching for mindless entertainment online. There is only so much Machiavelli I can read before my brain starts rejecting any more ‘important information’ and I’m in the mood to sit down and read![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
customers_suck instead.
But back to Meine Liebe, Torger does seem to be the poor, honest chap caught up in the middle of all the political intrigues certainly but he also seemed to be incapable of being smart about that.
Half the Strahl Council are corrupt? And? Your point being?
Why he didn’t take that information and use it to further his own and the kingdom’s gains, I don’t know. The ends do justify the means. For all the extreme examples that people will come up with when you say that, it pretty much seems to work.
Release the names of those involved in the corruption to the public?
Nice one. Take down half of the Strahl and you’ve only got half left to climb over on your way to the top. Even the blackmail idea wasn’t half bad, except you don’t need it to be monetary blackmail, call it ‘creative persuasion’ instead and use it to get the political backing you require.
Yes, it makes you fairly corrupt to be doing that but you know what? It’s in your own interests that you learn how to play the game.
And why do I now feel that I’ve just written something that will have people voting to keep me out of power for the rest of my days?
Ah, well… could be worse. I could be a Straussian instead of a pragmatist...
My choice of music is horribly ironic too.
"Hab ich die klaren; Augen nimm mir das Licht
Hab ich die reine Seele; töte sie in Flammen"
- Rammstein “Eifersucht”
Disclaimer: My opinion may have mellowed over the intervening months… wait. That’s a complete lie. Herr Washed-up-Strahl still needs a kick in the unmentionables. Where is my German dictionary of smiting anyway?
Oh, and I was listening to E Nomine's "Deine Welt" at the time.
Posted because
emthornhill reminded me.So I’ve had a poke at the latest Meine Liebe episode, initially while I was feeling very, very cranky over things. In fact I started writing a very damning rant about it, so it’s probably a good thing that I’m still on my laptop while my machine lives elsewhere for the next 24 hours, otherwise I be tempted to add said rant to my analysis. Suffice to say, you’re not missing anything, though it did contain such witticisms as “What’s that I hear? It’s the smallest violin in Kuchen playing just for you.” Because I was feeling terribly bastardly and the dialogue was pissing me off no end.
It wasn’t exactly the dialogue in of itself but the whole plot that really got me because while I may well be capable of talking cosmopolitan theory till I pass out, I’m pretty much a pragmatist at heart. Because there’s no point in having lovely ideals and wonderful rhetoric if you can’t put it into action. If you go round with all your silly ideas without any practical application, you may as well just go sit on your hands until you get over the urge to say something stupid in public. Which nicely segues into my major irk with Meine Liebe from the current episode.
Ignoring the random Orpherus-bitching and the average looking women and Torger’s bad hair and the fact that every time his name came up I wanted to call him something else…which this site claims to be football slang, while this site claims to be something else involving being slapped in the face 10 times… I always thought it was just another euphemism for complimentary part of someone else’s anatomy actually…
Aside from all that and what seemed to be the approximation of a Rosenstoltz school outing (Does that count as a pun?)…
On the matter of Torger’s fall from grace. I have to say that while he seemed to have some lovely ideas about integrity and honour and ‘speaking for the people’, his downfall was his naivety.
The particular statement about the people enjoying gossiping about the scandals that had been set up to frame him left me rather speechless for a few moments. He believed that the people would support him, believed that they would naturally seek the truth… What foolishness.
The collective intelligence of a group of people is more often than not inversely proportional to the number of members present.
And not to sound as if I’m claming some higher moral ground, who hasn’t enjoyed some cheap entertainment from time to time? Who could honestly say that they wouldn’t enjoy gossip and sensationalism at all, ever?
Perhaps I’m being a little bit of a pedant by relating that to anime after all because the power of the media and the propensity for cheap entertainment is honestly very real. When tabloids can sway the voting public, when media potentates can threaten a political party with the loss of an election by withdrawing their support…
Is that a threat to democracy? Hell, yes. But on the other side of things, if you were to remove such entertainments, the sensationalism that lets you blank your mind for a few hours each evening after work, how much worse would be the damage?
There’s an area in Cardiff with some lovely large houses but not a pub for miles because the owner who donated the land to the city would only donate it on the condition that such immoral behaviour wasn’t encouraged. And as a result, over time that area has become particularly run down… because if you lived there, there really wouldn’t be much for you to do.
The same thing would apply with the removal of many forms of easy entertainment, which is exactly what gives the media such power. It’s why the media thrives and why the population doesn’t go crazy searching for something to do.
I don’t have a TV where I live now but that doesn’t stop me for searching for mindless entertainment online. There is only so much Machiavelli I can read before my brain starts rejecting any more ‘important information’ and I’m in the mood to sit down and read
customers_suck instead.But back to Meine Liebe, Torger does seem to be the poor, honest chap caught up in the middle of all the political intrigues certainly but he also seemed to be incapable of being smart about that.
Half the Strahl Council are corrupt? And? Your point being?
Why he didn’t take that information and use it to further his own and the kingdom’s gains, I don’t know. The ends do justify the means. For all the extreme examples that people will come up with when you say that, it pretty much seems to work.
Release the names of those involved in the corruption to the public?
Nice one. Take down half of the Strahl and you’ve only got half left to climb over on your way to the top. Even the blackmail idea wasn’t half bad, except you don’t need it to be monetary blackmail, call it ‘creative persuasion’ instead and use it to get the political backing you require.
Yes, it makes you fairly corrupt to be doing that but you know what? It’s in your own interests that you learn how to play the game.
And why do I now feel that I’ve just written something that will have people voting to keep me out of power for the rest of my days?
Ah, well… could be worse. I could be a Straussian instead of a pragmatist...
My choice of music is horribly ironic too.
"Hab ich die klaren; Augen nimm mir das Licht
Hab ich die reine Seele; töte sie in Flammen"
- Rammstein “Eifersucht”
Disclaimer: My opinion may have mellowed over the intervening months… wait. That’s a complete lie. Herr Washed-up-Strahl still needs a kick in the unmentionables. Where is my German dictionary of smiting anyway?
Oh, and I was listening to E Nomine's "Deine Welt" at the time.
