Weekend Links!

* Call for applications: 2014—15 Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellowship.

* So Paul Di Filippo really liked Green Planets.

* Receive this petition in nomination of three candidates for MLA Executive Council and one for 2nd Vice President.

* Explaining Tuition Hikes at the University of Michigan. Construction Not Instruction: Bonds and Buildings at the Public University. 5 Links Between Higher Education and the Prison Industry.

* And this is the pattern with austerity. The measures introduced under the rubric of an emergency, the supposed need to consolidate debt and appease “the market,” ultimately do little for the debt, and only consolidate the market’s tyrannical reach.

* On trigger warnings and who gets to count.

* Journey to the Centre of Google Earth.

* I was born too early.

* The Lion King: A short history of Disney-fascism.

But the emotional trauma that Disney tries its damnedest to induce in young children is only the spadework for the ugly principles it feels it must implant in each new generation. Although the film takes place in an imaginary jungle, THE LION KING really expounds the Law of the Schoolyard: only the strong and the beautiful triumph, and the powerless survive only by serving the strong. As Disney sees it, children must not only acknowledge the supremacy of those born privileged and violent, the children must love them. The young must gaze in hushed veneration at the princely predators who stand ready to harvest the labor and flesh of their subjects. They must learn to giggle at the hopeless scampering of weak and stubby creatures as they dodge the jaws of their overlords. They must accept that true friendship means flattering those who would otherwise feast on their entrails.

* Climate denialism and the Outer Banks. These time-lapse maps show how much hotter the USA will be when you’re old.

* Why Did Borges Hate Soccer?

* Was the U.S. Robbed Against Portugal? It Depends on What Time Means.

* You got your class-based analysis in my intersectionality NO you got your intersectionality in my class-based analysis

* Another exciting week of Good SCOTUS, Bad SCOTUS.

* Kunkel reviews Piketty. The circle is complete.

* Title Now Everybody Sue Everybody: expulsion and sexual assault at IHE.

* Democrats are the worst, Daily Show edition.

* Hillary Clinton 2016 and the Folly of the Left-Flank Push.

* If you or any other speculator on my body and rights, wish to know how I regard my rights, they need but come here and lay their hands on me to enslave me. Did you think to terrify me by presenting the alternative to give my money to you, or give my body to Slavery? Then let me say to you, that I meet the proposition with unutterable scorn and contempt.

* The Star Wars museum is coming to Chicago.

* Konczal v. student debt.

* Obamaism v. teacher tenure.

* People aren’t worried about robots, they’re worried about who owns the robots.

* A New Bike Lane That Could Save Lives and Make Cycling More Popular.

*  “You express amazement at my statement that ‘civilized’ men try to justify their looting, butchering and plundering by claiming that these things are done in the interests of art, progress and culture. That this simple statement of fact should cause surprise, amazes me in return.”

* What could go wrong? Missouri School Districts Start Training Teachers To Carry Concealed Weapons In Classroom.

* Former College Basketball Player Sues NCAA Over Concussions.

* ‘Think They Got Killed?’ 1964, L.B.J. and Three Civil Rights Icons.

* When Rambo was going to fight werewolves.

* In praise of Janelle Monáe.

* On phone horror.

* Another Fermi Paradox post.

* Here comes Pacific Rim 2. Plus a cartoon! But we still live in a vale of tears.

* Humanity Surprised It Still Hasn’t Figured Out Better Alternative To Letting Power-Hungry Assholes Decide Everything.

* ​The 20 Most WTF Magical Items in Dungeons & Dragons.

* Free at last: Oakland to decriminalize pinball.

* Kill Bill as an 8-bit video game.

* Episode 7 is already ruined.

* But the kids are all right.

The Director’s Commentary Will Be *Epic*

Arnold Schwarzenegger Will Return as Conan in New Reboot.

A Few Links

* If you’d been foolish enough to bet $5 that Joe Biden could walk into a Midwestern custard shop and not create some sort of national incident by uttering a mild profanity, well, it’s time to pay up.

* FIFA to address calls for technological replays in the stupidest manner possible.

* Following up on yesterday’s links, Robert Byrd has died.

* One reason why humans are special and unique.

* How a superhorse travels through time (and why).

* Rithmomachia: the Philosophers’ Game.

* And Conan the Barbarian: The Musical. It’s been that sort of week.

Letterman v. Conan v. Palin

Letterman beat Conan’s Tonight Show in the ratings on Tuesday, but that’s been lost in the controversy over a pair of borderline Palin family jokes from Monday night. The “slutty flight attendant” line, though certainly uncalled for, seems to me equivalent to the sorts of things that are said about the Clintons and the Kennedys—uncool, that is to say, but roughly commensurate with the price of fame. The “knocked up by Alex Rodriguez” thing strikes me as significantly worse because celebrity children who are underage or don’t seek the spotlight should, I think, be left alone, even in the otherwise unrestrained pursuit of comedy. (I think I’d probably feel differently in Letterman had been in a comedy club or on a college campus somewhere; the Chelseas and Bristols of the world shouldn’t have to see themselves mocked on TV.)

The idea currently shooting around the right-wing blogs that this was a joke about raping a fourteen-year-old girl, though, strikes me as a completely hysterical overreaction. There’s no remotely charitable reading of the situation that suggests the phrase “her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez” would ever be intended to trigger thoughts of Willow Palin. (To whit: Instapundit.) That it was Willow and not Bristol at the game is certainly bad luck for Dave, and I wouldn’t have blamed Sarah Palin for getting in a jibe or two about it, but that fact is not something either the audience or Dave himself can reasonably be believed to have been thinking of. You can call Letterman out for crossing the line without turning things all the way to 11.

Celebratory Links

I had a nasty case of food poisoning or something last night—fever, chills, the whole bit. But now I’m back and quite literally better than ever. A few links to celebrate my recovery:

* Early reviews of Dollhouse remain mixed. We’ll know tomorrow….

* This YouTube clip (via MeFi) captures just the barest sliver of the greatness of the Conan DVD commentary. It is our civilization’s highest cultural achievement.

* The trailer for the new Tarantino is out.

* How to teach non-canonical material responsibly in a composition class: lesson plans from Scott Eric Kaufman on Dark Knight and Watchmen.

* Two satellites have collided in orbit. Apparently that’s never happened before. More from MeFi.

* Happy birthday, Charles Darwin. More from Satisfactory Comics.

Link Dump #2

Link dump #2. So many open tabs.

* The Case against Candyland. Playing games with Jaimee’s nieces and nephews has taught me this lesson too—the games we used to play are terribly unfun.

* ‘Obama Disappointed Cabinet Failed To Understand His Reference To Savage Sword Of Conan #24.’

* Also in the news: ‘Blagojevich Claims Behavior Was Just Elaborate Plan To Surprise Patrick Fitzgerald With Senate Nomination On His Birthday.’

* Remember when Conservapedia was sort of hilarious? PZ Meyers catches them with a very disturbing post that reads like a hitlist of Democratic senators.

* The bad news: Climate change may choke the oceans for 100,000 years. The good news: Damage to the rest of the biosphere may be limited to only 1,000 years. A little more from the sporadically blogging Alex Greenberg.

* The Space Adventures of Krypto, Superbody’s dog.

The Triumph of Barbarism over Civilization

We should also consider the predominant theme in most of Howard’s original tales: the triumph of barbarism over civilization. Howard saw a certain noble beauty in the simple ways of the barbarian, and considered them superior to the decadence of the civilized world (he and H.P. Lovecraft actually exchanged a series of renowned letters that debated the virtues of barbarism vs. civilization). Conan was by no means a philosopher or a man of deep thoughts, but when the story came back to Howard’s predominant theme, Conan proved himself more than capable of elucidating his thoughts on what he wished from life. Conan was never stupid; he lived life through his body as opposed to his mind because that’s what appealed to him. When he needed to use his mind though, he was more than up to the task. Obviously, in his later years, when he became king, necessity demanded he modify his ways, but as we witness in “Phoenix on the Sword,” the barbarian is always lurking just beneath the surface.

A brief history of Conan. Via MeFi.

I don’t think I’ve met anyone else who watched this cartoon, but I’ll be dead before that theme song ever stops floating around my mind.