Day: January 2, 2017

• Michael Masiello: what are your views on theodicy? (“Fuck you” is not an adequate answer)
• Am I also Shaytan?
• Am I also Kali?
• Am I also Angra Mainyu?
• Am I also the Demiurge?
• If God is Good is He also God? If God is God is He also Good?
• Should pronouns referring to Satan be capitalised?
• Why do I get to have all the good tunes?
• Is The Devil Went Down To Georgia really a good tune?
• Seriously?

• If I’m meant to have all the good tunes, what explains the albums of Anton LaVey?
• How can I revive Manichaeanism?
• How can I distance my brand from Alisteir Crowley’s?
• Are the Rolling Stones still writing good songs?
• How about those South Park guys?

I answered a related, and since deleted question, and squirrelled the answer away here:

What are some aspects of famous Quorans that you dislike? (DELETED QUESTION) by Nick Nicholas on The Insurgency:

There are frequent recurring complaints about Tier #1 writers, those with follower counts in the tens or hundreds of thousands. They are why I make a point of not following them, and have limited interaction with them. They are not intrinsic personality flaws: they are partly Quora Celebrities being the victims of their success (overloaded in Quora traffic), and partly Quora Celebrities being the victims of being the kinds of personalities that end up being followed by hundreds of thousands.

When one of the earliest of the following happens:

• Quora goes broke
• I get banned
• I decide it takes up too much of my life
• It stops being fun

Probabilities and timeframes:

• Quora goes broke: 5 yrs, 70%
• I get banned: 2 yrs, 30% (no BNBRs yet, but the more popular you get, the likelier it gets)
• I decide it takes up too much of my life: 1 yr, 30%
• It stops being fun: 30 yrs, 5%

Some stereotypes are to listed here: Aaron O’Connell’s answer to What are some cultural differences between the states of Australia?

Here’s mine:

• South Australians: more prim, more English. Boringest state capital city ever.
• New South Welshmen: enemies to the Victorians. Sydneysiders: Uncouth, arrogant.
• Victorians: enemies to the New South Welshmen. Melburnians: Stuck-up hipsters, arrogant.
• Tasmanians: inbred, farmers.
• Queenslanders: reactionary, Deep North, insane.
• Northern Territory: Crocodile Dundee.
• Western Australia: Nouveau riche miners. Don’t want to be in the same country as the rest of us.
• Australian Capital Territory: Public servants. Boringest national capital city ever.

First thing I do every morning is spend at least a half hour replying to comments in my notifications. I’ll comment on answers I read during the day, when something strikes my fancy; maybe a dozen a day? Maybe 20? I should count some time.

I use Quora sociably. Not to the exclusion of my intellectualising, and often as a supplement for my intellectualising—I often have quite good intellectual to-and-fro. I also have lots of good banter. Commenting is a core part of my Quora experience. And not just mine.

I was the OP of the first of these questions, to make a point: we should not criticise Americans for not knowing the geography of places they are not that involved in.

I am now so, so screwed:

Was I even remotely close?

• Nagaland: misplaced by two states
• Assam: Yes!
• Uttar Pradesh: misplaced by two states.
• Rajasthan: Yes!
• Tami Nadu: Yes!
• Kerala: misplaced by three states.
• (West) Bengal: misplaced by one state.
• Come on, why didn’t I get Kashmir? I think I wasn’t sure whether it was a state or not.
• I didn’t even know Lakshadweep (the islands to the southwest) was a territory. (Not a state though.)

Not… great. Sorry, India.

What Christine Leigh Langtree said: Vote #1 Christine Leigh Langtree’s answer to Do Australians cringe when non-native English speakers attempt to learn the Australian accent?

I’ll add that most dialect speakers dislike their accent being mimicked, not just Australians; I know I resented the hell out of 1960s Greek comedies’ bad imitation of Cretan. If you don’t get it right, it does come across as mockery.

BUT for non-native speakers… we make a lot of allowances, because we know it’s not mockery. The accent will gradually come naturally anyway. And the less self-conscious you are about it, the more readily it will happen. We have met IRL, Miguel, and your accent is still mostly US/Philippines—but not completely!

Oh, zut, Habib le toubib:

• European-Americans
• Oh, and Europeans as well, I guess
• White Aussies? Ok, I’ll give you them too
• The bizarre American notion that white people are uncool and bland
• Hegemony
• Racial purity
• American demographics at war with each other
• White privilege
• Oppression Bingo
• Oppression
• Plantations
• One drop rules
• Melanin
• Social constructs
• “Surely you don’t mean me, O Lord?”

Ah, Michael, Michael, Michael…

I see this has become a random word association task, and that it has spawned Be honest: what do you think of when you hear “white people”?

OK. Let’s see where this takes me.

• African-Americans.
• Not Africans. Not Jamaicans. Not Australian Aboriginals. If I see a Somali in town (our second-last refugee intake in Australia), I don’t think “black people”, I think “damn those Somalis are tall.”
• Negative media portrayals
• Being scared while in the hood in Memphis (correlated)
• Civil rights struggle
• All that awesome music. All of it.
• I know too few black people, offline or on
• The ones I have met were all awesome
• Including here
• Should really get around to reading more Langston Hughes one day
• Maya Angelou does not seem to be a good poet
• I keep thinking I’m going to be subconsciously racist around blacks
• Maybe I am, but I don’t think I’ve allowed anything to get out 🙂
• I need to know a LOT more about Frederick Douglass

Well, that was my stream of consciousness…

Habib, you’re on a roll here, aren’t you!

• Confucian virtues
• Industry
• Most people I hanged out with at high school. And undergrad.
• Spicy food
• East Asians, Not South Asians; I’m from Australia, not the UK
• East Asians, Not West Asians. Does anyone even say “West Asians”?
• East Asians, Not North Asians. People definitely don’t call Siberians North Asians.
• East Asians, Not Central Asians. Huh. It really is all about extended Sinosphere, isn’t it.
• South East Asians. Kinda sorta extended Sinosphere.
• My neighbours’ parents, who yell too loud in Chinese at their kid.
• My urbane Taiwanese psychologist friend, and his darling kids.
• Lots of cultures with venerable history, that I know too little about.