Nappy-Headed Ho's

[FrBrGr]

Is everyone else (here in the US) as sick of hearing about this as I am? Those of you who are from other parts of our small planet probably don't know what the hell I'm talking about, but of one thing I am certain - With all of the other issues facing all of us today, the two things that have dominated the "American" media recently are Anna Nicole Smith and the "nappy-headed ho's." Most of us "Americans" consider the US one of, if not the most sophisticated and progressive nation in the world (please dispense with the usual hate-speak in your responses) yet this BS is dominating our airwaves, our magazines and our newspapers. I guess we haven't gotten as far as most of us think we have, now have we . . . ?

 

 

[Guest]

Thankfully I just chucked Cable TV and I listen mostly to PBS stations and Classical music so I'm spared this crap that PASSES for news.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[LordTheNightKnight]

It's the nature of a lot of cultures to become obsessed with things we shouldn't. The US is probably one of the most sex obsessed nation on Earth, for one. Either we think about sex, having sex, or erasing all public signs that sex even exists.

 

Plus it doesn't help that news outlets jump all over these stories, anticipating public interest, which makes the public talk about it, when they wouldn't have cared about otherwise.

[Guest]

Now I can laugh at a Welsh joke so hopefully you can at this bearing in mind the subject matter of what you are talking about.

 

It is a Czech joke:

 

Q What is the difference between America and yoghurt?

 

A Yoghurt has culture

 

Yes your media doesn't help with the public image abroad.

 

Actually I think the UK is far worse than the US for poor education ignorance and lowest common denominator culture. On the whole I find Americans far better educated than the average Briton. BUT our media...the BBC for instance; faults as it has...does not give that impression to the world. But while they barely mentioned Anna Nicole Smith all the other channels we get here via sky ddin't let up about it.

 

Howver I have no idea who nappy headed ho's are.

 

As for sex...no. The impression these days we get is that America is now in the grip of right wing christian illiberalism. Europe is far more sex obsessed now. Ten years ago I would have agreed but not now.

 

As for the UK....well I went to see A British movie in France with some French lads. After they were all laughing and said they could tell it was a British movie. I said how....they said "there wasn't even one kiss in it let alone sex".

[ThoughtFox]

Actually I think the UK is far worse than the US for poor education ignorance and lowest common denominator culture.

 

Hello TOS!

 

I think it's important not to make generalisations that are based on personal experiences and personal beliefs. Actually, all countries have their share of (exp.) but most of the people I know in the UK are highly educated, cultured and decent folk.

 

ThoughtFox

 

PS. I do admire the diplomacy at the start of your post but I feel it was directed towards the wrong people. I expect an American would be delighted with your post on the whole!

[Guest]

I was a teacher thoughtfox; I can tell you for sure the standard of education in the UK hasn't just dropped; it has hit rock bottom. Thirty years ago any 7 year old was familiar with the Bushmen of the Kalahari or the Inuit. Any eleven year old could have told you the main battles of world war two and the difference between a palmate and great crested newt. Tryxie was once going to buy a Rusian T-34 for her drive. I asked forty 16 year olds what a T34 was the other day. Not one of them knew. Not one knew the difference between a rabbit and a hare. Between the lot of them they could only come up with 19 states of the US, and only four middle eastern countries and yet they all have an opinion about the war. Several more examples I could give. I was horrified.

 

But then I got out of teaching cos I could see what was happening with the national curriculum. The idea is to produce drones; nothing more. I am ashamed to say it was a Tory idea, but noteable labour have stuck with it. City technology colleges? WTF? Whatever happened to an academic education for all? Even the secondary modern didn't dispense with that model they just threw a few vocational subjects into the mix.

 

Its kids I am talking about....the under thrities. They are the victims of a dreadful education system that makes them vulnerable to the likes of PETA. they question nothing; because they have not been taught to. Their general knowledge sucks because they only know about pop culture. Both Jodie Marsh and Jade Goody's ignorance of the Inuit was staggering on BB. When I was seven I had to write letters to Inuit kids and Masai kids. They don't do that stuff now.

 

And after an argument two years ago with a friend of a fiend who was a primary teacher I know why. She was anti hunting but knew nothing about it. She agreed after our information that she was indeed completely ignoran about the subject, but I didn't quite realise how much had gone over her head until later.

 

She asked:

 

"so...have you had your horse since it was a pony?"

 

If we are allowing teachers like this in our schools then we have no chance. I mean wasn't the young of an animal a basic thing for primary school kids year ago? You know...cat- kitten pig-piglet etc. Hell I remember having to learn all the collective terms at that age (you know...murder of crows and stuff).

 

Yes my friends are pretty educated too.....but then either they have had an education at academic level or they have worked with horses which requires multi discipline approach.

 

What we have bred is "the computer says no" generation...and their experience of life is limited to a banal education and an abysmal poverty of pop culture. And I haven't heard an original idea or opinion from an under thirty year old thats not been fed them for an awful long time now.

[ThoughtFox]

Oh dear!

 

Thanks for your reply

 

ThoughtFox

[Guest]

A friend from NJ called me and filled me in on the stupid "news".

 

Good riddance Imass

 

FInally succeeded in not only making a compete and udder fool of himself but being toally PC suicidal.

 

Who the f&%k cares.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[LordTheNightKnight]

Now I can laugh at a Welsh joke so hopefully you can at this bearing in mind the subject matter of what you are talking about.

 

It is a Czech joke:

 

Q What is the difference between America and yoghurt?

 

A Yoghurt has culture

 

Yes your media doesn't help with the public image abroad.

 

Actually I think the UK is far worse than the US for poor education ignorance and lowest common denominator culture. On the whole I find Americans far better educated than the average Briton. BUT our media...the BBC for instance; faults as it has...does not give that impression to the world. But while they barely mentioned Anna Nicole Smith all the other channels we get here via sky ddin't let up about it.

 

Howver I have no idea who nappy headed ho's are.

 

As for sex...no. The impression these days we get is that America is now in the grip of right wing christian illiberalism. Europe is far more sex obsessed now. Ten years ago I would have agreed but not now.

 

As for the UK....well I went to see A British movie in France with some French lads. After they were all laughing and said they could tell it was a British movie. I said how....they said "there wasn't even one kiss in it let alone sex".

 

I didn't state we have the impression of being obsessed with sex. I said we ARE obsessed with it. And the christian right is just as rabid about it, just in the context of seeing it everywhere and getting offended by it.

[Guest]

You need to spend some time in Prague Amsterdam or Sweden.

[Joe]

ciao ragazzi,

 

had to chime in from work, piano piano. i miss the den.

 

 

i have never been more thankful to not have a television. i get most of my american tv by choice via the internet (battlestar galactica, anyone?), and the rest randomly when i stop by one of the american-friendly bars that deigns to broadcast our drivel. but seriously folks, i believe imus needed to go a long time ago...its not freedom of speech you have to worry about, its freedom to be bitch-slapped by the repercussions of your speech. however many powerful americans get away with far worse than a throwaway comment just because their audience is smaller and less diverse.

 

i can't wait until people really start to realize what's coming out of my generation, the mtv generation...and how many presumably well-meaning folks are getting away with absolute nonsense bordering on self-aggrandizement.

 

mamma mia, back to grant-writing. moneymoneymoneymoneymoney...

 

ciaociao,

 

j.

 

ps. folks, please excuse my temporary lack of capitalization. i don't even have time to visit the loo this week.

[LordTheNightKnight]

You need to spend some time in Prague Amsterdam or Sweden.

 

Being open about something does not mean obsessed. And I don't mean obsession in the act itself. I mean obsession with perceiving sexuality in everything. We have this Freudian fixation with seeing sex everywhere. But that does NOT mean it's in an ACCEPTING way. That means that people who are against open sexuality try to suppress things that are not even really sexual. That's why our pop culture is so much more reserved in terms of sexuality than other nations.

 

What I mean is that America has a love/hate relationship with sex. We love to have it but HATE to talk about it. It's due to our puritanical roots, which are still evident in our culture.

[Guest]

An interesting insight thankyou Lord.

 

In he UK we don't see sex in anything...its the exact opposite. Not even sex.

 

It is considered fine for example for a girl just 16 to appear topless in scholgirl uniform on page 3 of the national press nearly every day.

 

 

And we just wouldn't see anything wrong with posting a pic with a child in it as long as no sex was going on. For example a candid with a child in it of a lady in fur. On some forums, they completely ban that and that is something weird to me. So seeing sex where there is innocnce is something bizarre and yes you have given us an insight there into why this is the case. Puritan roots? Yes you may be right.

 

It's odd because of the way hollywood and American media up until recently pushed the barriers of freedom of sexual expression and now its almost mccarthyist it seems.

[LordTheNightKnight]

An interesting insight thankyou Lord.

 

In he UK we don't see sex in anything...its the exact opposite. Not even sex.

 

It is considered fine for example for a girl just 16 to appear topless in scholgirl uniform on page 3 of the national press nearly every day.

 

 

And we just wouldn't see anything wrong with posting a pic with a child in it as long as no sex was going on. For example a candid with a child in it of a lady in fur. On some forums, they completely ban that and that is something weird to me. So seeing sex where there is innocnce is something bizarre and yes you have given us an insight there into why this is the case. Puritan roots? Yes you may be right.

 

It's odd because of the way hollywood and American media up until recently pushed the barriers of freedom of sexual expression and now its almost mccarthyist it seems.

 

The thing is that Hollywood did those only to an extent. The decline in those matched with the rise of the internet, where those things can be done so much better. If those sold as much as they did, they would be done as much.

[Guest]

I am not sure I follow you...can you explain a little further?

 

It appears to me...though what I know about the net can be writte on th back of a fag packet...that far from being the great liberator it is a great controller.

 

I know a girl who is an artist, and she does sand m stuff. Her site was censored and she was put in court for obsenity or something...yet her stuff was very tame. The server got done too.

That is why the servers are so paranoid I guess though.

Why is this happening?

 

And tere is some very weird stuf that we dont understand in the UK. "Underage" to us is under 16....but in the US its 18 right? Anyway there was uproar for example in the US at Melanie Griffiths lighting her daughters (who is 17) cigarette) NOBODY would bat an eyelid at that in the UK. BUT we seem to get your morality here within a few years so I guess that will come.

Anyway; that was a smoking fetishists dream pic. So it was posted all over the net and many sites were shut down over it. There wasn't ANYTHING sexual about it. Surely that is paranoia?

 

Waht do you think about his Lord with regards to what you are saying? The other thing there seems harsh citicsm against is Hentai anime. They say it is sexualising children Something I think is crap. Does this cdirection concern you? I mean there have always been sexual cartoons..Fritz the cat, Mad etc. Why is there sudden hysteria about them? I am not talking about sexual depiction of children here mind ...but just adult cartoons.

 

Would be interested to hear your views.

[LordTheNightKnight]

In many states, it's illegal to sell tobacco products to minors. So the problem with that wasn't anything sexual, but more akin to letting her daughter drink underage.

 

As for internet crackdowns, those are reactions to the freedom of the web, the same way anything sexual anywhere is cracked down in this country right now.

[FurLoverinFL]

Ignoring all the 'smoking-nonsense'...

 

Imus is an asshole, period. I remember when he was pissing in closets on WNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNBC. Go back to booze and coke Donnie-boy. Take Rev. Billy Sol Hargiss, all his other characters and toss them in the Raritan River...

 

I lived in central NJ virtually all my life (well, except the last couple of years). Imus can't call RU's womens' basketball team nappy headed ho's... only I can call them nappy headed hos!!!

 

FLinFL

[Guest]

Lord...the problem is a 17 year old in the UK and most of Europe is not underage...either for smoking or sex. The net is worldwide...hence the problem.

 

It is a clash of legal and cultural differences; and the implication made is that a society who thinks sex with 16 year olds is fine is regarded by the US as criminal then? Only an issue on the net (when in Rome etc) but it is scary to many of us watching these crackdowns.

 

If I post a pic of a 16 year old in fur for example here, that would be a problem yes? EVEN if she is not engaged in sexual activity.

 

The problem with the melanie griffith thing was NOT just that she was encouraging her own daughter to smoke, but because she did so she was immediately seen as a heroine by the smoking fetish community. And then the progrom started. Now there was nothing sexual about the picture; so you see the problem.

 

I may also add at this point that the SF community numbers millions; and a large number of women too.

Ain't prohibition beautiful???

[Guest]

Incidentally Lord.

You may have some knowledge of this; anyway I use it as an example in discussion of what we are talking about.

 

Now don't get me wrong, I thought Michelle Pfeiffer played her really well given the limitations. We had all the hype of a movie in the original "dark Knight" mould with Baman's attendant psychological problms too. Yes we had all that; and we had a fine sexy performance from Miss Pfeiffer which some say was a bit risque.

 

WHAT????

 

Am I the ONLY person who remembers that in the comics 60 years ago Selina Kyle was a street HOOKER before she became Catwoman?

 

 

 

See what we have here is a society very subtley gently engineered to give the younger generation the illusion of a permissive society when actually you are right there is a New puritanism. And now its getting less subtle too.

 

YET we also have this obsession...to bring it nicely back to FRBRGR's initial point...with people like Anna Nicole Smith all over the media; and "sexy" lyrics in records, both which are considered far play for exposure to kids. Now don't get me wrong, I don't want censorship but I am fed up with dumbed down titilation.

[LordTheNightKnight]

Lord...the problem is a 17 year old in the UK and most of Europe is not underage...either for smoking or sex. The net is worldwide...hence the problem.

 

It is a clash of legal and cultural differences; and the implication made is that a society who thinks sex with 16 year olds is fine is regarded by the US as criminal then? Only an issue on the net (when in Rome etc) but it is scary to many of us watching these crackdowns.

 

If I post a pic of a 16 year old in fur for example here, that would be a problem yes? EVEN if she is not engaged in sexual activity.

 

The problem with the melanie griffith thing was NOT just that she was encouraging her own daughter to smoke, but because she did so she was immediately seen as a heroine by the smoking fetish community. And then the progrom started. Now there was nothing sexual about the picture; so you see the problem.

 

I may also add at this point that the SF community numbers millions; and a large number of women too.

Ain't prohibition beautiful???

 

I wasn't referring to the internet. I meant the reaction in the US, as our respective posts here are on the way things are perceived here. Now I do agree that even the most prudish wouldn't find those pics sexual, but there IS a legal problem, since the legal smoking age is 18 in California (and it is the law, no matter how draconian you may think it is).

 

And I'm not anti smoking. I just think it should be done responsibly, just like drinking.

[Guest]

And therein your post lies the problem: California exports its moral imperialist opression via the internet . Girls of 16 have sex. Deal with it. Most of them have sex...your laws defy human nature; and you look like the Taleban to us.

 

In the UK not only is the age of consent 16, BUT we make it a National Institution of encouraging a girl of that age to bear all in the National press almost every day!

As the lyriccs of the Lambrettas "Another Day Another Girl" once proclaimed:

 

"Sexy Susan seventeen

Says that she likes riding horses

in the altogether

But it makes her boyfriend jealous"

Now they actually tore up and burned a Sun newspaper on stage when they did that song; the point being that it is exploitative. I hate it because I think such actions encourage people to see younger girls as sexual objects; and aslo it is part of the titilation dumbd down culture that I loathe: the paper is also full of Anna Nicole Smith and the like.

 

HOWEVER in hindsight, it is an icon of Liberty next to Draconian US laws.

 

86% of UK girls lose their virginity before age 18. I have always been embarassed about that statistic but not any more! In some parts of Europe the age of consent is 14.

 

Let me get this straight....kids can join the army and go off and die, but they can't get laid?

 

So when I see British people on a forum being thretened by American zealots for posting a pic of Mel griffiths and her daughter (which appeared in newspapers but is a problem on a smoking fetish site where the sever is not California based but some of the mods are) I see Taleban. Except the Taleban don't spread their morality/legal system world wide.

[LordTheNightKnight]

And therein your post lies the problem: California exports its moral imperialist opression via the internet . Girls of 16 have sex. Deal with it. Most of them have sex...your laws defy human nature; and you look like the Taleban to us.

 

In the UK not only is the age of consent 16, BUT we make it a National Institution of encouraging a girl of that age to bear all in the National press almost every day!

As the lyriccs of the Lambrettas "Another Day Another Girl" once proclaimed:

 

"Sexy Susan seventeen

Says that she likes riding horses

in the altogether

But it makes her boyfriend jealous"

Now they actually tore up and burned a Sun newspaper on stage when they did that song; the point being that it is exploitative. I hate it because I think such actions encourage people to see younger girls as sexual objects; and aslo it is part of the titilation dumbd down culture that I loathe: the paper is also full of Anna Nicole Smith and the like.

 

HOWEVER in hindsight, it is an icon of Liberty next to Draconian US laws.

 

86% of UK girls lose their virginity before age 18. I have always been embarassed about that statistic but not any more! In some parts of Europe the age of consent is 14.

 

Let me get this straight....kids can join the army and go off and die, but they can't get laid?

 

So when I see British people on a forum being thretened by American zealots for posting a pic of Mel griffiths and her daughter (which appeared in newspapers but is a problem on a smoking fetish site where the sever is not California based but some of the mods are) I see Taleban. Except the Taleban don't spread their morality/legal system world wide.

 

What part of "the sex has nothing to do with it" don't you understand? You think all our underage laws have to do with sex? I know I stated we see sex in everything, but that doesn't mean we base all our actions on a perception of sex. Drinking was made illegal for under 21 instead of 18 due to statistics about drunk driving. And smoking is illegal for minors for health reasons, not with sex.

 

And the reaction is not the furor you make it out to be, or else I would have heard about it before you posted it on this thread. I follow the news enough to have caught it, if it were the big deal you are making it out to be.

[Guest]

Right arm Lord

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Guest]

You clearly have no knowledge understanding or information about smoking fetishism, how huge it is, how opressed it is, or the allegations that are made against it citing a direct link between smoking fetishism and interest in young people taking up the habit. Something that IS directly related in the minds of those who would like to prove a link. Start with Wikipedia "smoking fetishism" . It is all part of the same puritanism. As is the opression of fur IMHO..you know damn well that PETA lurkers here would love to catch us out on that one; though such a thing in my opinion does not exist. But did you know for example that at least SIX of the models in our smoking thread her were UNDER he age of 18 when some of the smoking and fur pics were taken BUT I had the sense NOT to link them because I have already seen TWO smoking sites close SPECIFICALLY for posting pics of thse models ON THE CATWALK OR IN VOGUE etc SHOOTS (not involved in sex) smoking.

 

I can point you to a dozen SF sites where that photo HAS been a problem...something that to the rest of the world looks absurd. Remember one PRIVATE members only smoking site alone has 68 000 members. This IS a big issue. It is only a small one here because far fewer people are involved.

 

I agree....such pics are NOT sex related. BUT it IS the Net sex police that closed these sites NOT health fascists.

[LordTheNightKnight]

I'm not disputing some prudes shut down fetish sites, but if the thing with Griffith and her daughter doesn't have anything to do with that, why are you making points in relating one to another? That hurts the points you are trying to make.

 

And don't deny you did. It's right here in the posts you made.

 

Trust me; I learned this the hard way before. Make sure all factors you bring up in a point actually relate to each other. If they don't, it looks like rambling, and hurts your credibility.