The Hall of Fire

"Slag" might not be as inappropriate a name as first appears. ;) Yes, until the guy brought up the idea of it being "inappropriate" I had only ever known slag to be the stuff you skim off the top of molten metal. From https://www.etymonline.com/word/slag slag (n.) "refuse f...

I am so utterly perplexed why - if this indeed is an officially licensed adaptation - the name changes, Smaug became Slag, or even generics like trolls and goblins became groans and grablins. :scratch: "Slag" might not be as inappropriate a name as first appears. ;) Slag - waste material ...

And not long ago, someone in real life told me that because his employer had not (yet) extended its support of the Black Lives Matter movement to include a full-throated apology for the company's past racist actions (which mostly amount to not hiring people of color in a proportion that reflects th...

How has Biden stalling UN Resolutions re Gaza affected his popularity with "Progressives"?

I understand there is somewhat of an uneasy alliance between ideologically competing wings of the Democratic Party. What do Ilan Omar and AOC have to say?

I wanted to repost this video here, because I believe it applies to Israel/Palestine. Sometimes, the obvious gets lost in the noise.

But is it really an existential war? For Palestine and its prospects as a functioning state, yes. For Palestinians, as a recognised people, again yes. The inhabitants who peopled the Levant prior to 1948, and their descendants, are having their existence erased. This is but the latest chapter in a ...

There are a very few examples where I might disagree with that (though honestly none are popping into my tired mind right now), but generally speaking I agree. Where Jackson adhered to the spirit of Tolkien's work (and as much as possible the letter as well) he could border on genius. When he tried...

I hated it too. I would have made the same choice. My overriding imperative was to be as close to the written word as possible. The trolls scene deviated far beyond my tolerance level. I understand film and the written word are very different beasts, but I fail to see how Peter Jackson improved on ...

Just out of curiosity, why did you leave out the capture by the trolls? It's been a while since I watched it, but I seem to remember that scene being pretty well done. I hated it. Bilbo's dialogue with the trolls after capture, the fight, the stupid resolution of the fight (all the dwarves drop arm...

I defer to your first hand experience. Mine is but snippets from US media that paint the Houthis as an Iranian proxy and hence, although some Saudi actions are deplored, on the whole Saudi Arabia is supported. I'm sure there must be some coverage with that perspective, particuarly on conservative o...

I finally got a chance to watch An Unexpected Journey. I like the idea of skipping all the backstory and going straight to Bilbo in his comfortable home life, just as the book does. Like Bilbo, we are blissfully unaware of the scary world outside of The Shire, and experience it with him. My major c...

This topic was difficult to place, but I think it sits best in Tol Eressëa as it concerns cognition and the process of information assimilation, helping illuminate how we experience our world. I hope this hasn't been addressed before! Did you count correctly the number of passes? ;) (Video is 1 minu...

And this is the "world's greatest democracy"© ?

Doesn't say much for democracy globally, does it?

I haven't read all 54 pages. Was the echo chamber escape successful?

OK 1) Is this statistically correct, and what is the methodology for determining popularity? Have incumbants performed better in elections than expected? 2) Johnson had amongst the worst outcomes if mortality is a metric. 3) The Conservatives made spectacular gains. This was unlike, for example, the...

Humour is frequently the most effective means of transmitting a serious message. Within that framework, this is comedy at its best. It challenges preconceptions of perceived individual moral authority. It's also funny!

Modi just lost West Bengal... And as you presumably saw when you checked that link I shared, Modi's popularity has in fact dropped in the past six weeks, because the pandemic is raging there at a level that country had not experienced. But he was ridiculously popular to start. Maybe six weeks from ...

I defer to your first hand experience. Mine is but snippets from US media that paint the Houthis as an Iranian proxy and hence, although some Saudi actions are deplored, on the whole Saudi Arabia is supported.

Modi just lost West Bengal...

1967