The NYT Doesn't Get Why We're Bicameral

Althouse posted this story: "Frances E. Lee, a political scientist at the University of Maryland, said the problem was as real as the solution elusive, adding that she and other scholars have tried without success to find a contemporary reason to exempt the Senate from the usual rules of granting citizens an equal voice in their government."

You can tell this is top shelf journalism because some are saying things, while others are saying other things. As for being the least democratic legislature, it's almost like no one remembers the House of Lords still exists. I also note that all the methods suggested to balance the power, particularly the suggested fix for the Electoral College, essentially would completely neuter small states. This whine is a political power play unfounded in the recognition that we're not a pure democracy, and frankly, pure democracies are scary things.

Then again, I'm not a political scientist. Alas, if only there were some papers somewhere, that some people might have written -- perhaps contemporaneously -- that explained all of this. But, I suppose that the reasoning behind the establishment of the Senate is a mystery shrouded in myths forever and ever, amen.

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PS: This is known as "working as intended;" this is a "feature not a bug;" it is "baked into the cake."

I'm Not Suggesting EVERYONE...

"And I’m not suggesting that all stressed-out fathers should just get baked. ... But for me, at least, the benefits clearly outweigh the risks." I just don't like the reasoning that goes into this sort statement. I'm not suggesting EVERYONE act in this way, but it totally works for me."

Plagiarism Is a Firing Offense

There seems to be some extremely slow feet dragging at CNN and Time. Fareed Zakaria seems to have been suspended for a month for plagiarism. Now, the interesting thing with this is this is right on the heels of Jonah Lehrer resigning in disgrace for fabricating some quotes (which I learned about at Ann Althouse's blog.) The New Yorker, apparently, holds its writers to a higher ethical standard than Time and CNN.

Writing Friendship Is Hard

One interesting, and hard, part of writing is getting interpersonal relationships just right. Romance, for example, is really, really hard to do. I'm talking real romance, not purple prose (though, without having tried it, I'm going to assume that is also hard. I just think things I have not done are hard.) Getting a friendship right is probably harder. Romance you have easy cliches to help ease you into it; that's a different whine for later though.

Friendship is harder; you have buddy cops and awkward friendships that work. But writing them well is hard. Sort of like how writing comics is hard. Ideas of friendship morph over time, as well. So, some friendships that were well-written even just a few years ago, seem awkward today. Tropes that work in some cases (you can go to TV Tropes to look through them yourself) don't work everywhere.

The other reason is that you want to show, not tell, in writing as much as possible. I am lazy; I like to handwave details whenever possible. Saying: "Jon and David knew each other for years and consider themselves friends" is easy. Crafting a whole scene where David and Jon are on the phone after their wives go to sleep talking about comic books and their kids' sports is hard. But, the second one tells you they know each other well, though not necessarily how long they know each other, unless you work in to the conversation how they loaned each other comic books when they were kids, and it is clear their friends. They're staying up late at night to talk with each other just to catch up.


The other problem is that friends act around each other in ways that often they don't bother explaining. You have in-jokes, nicknames, noodle incidents, etc., that you bring up that are never explained with real friends. Outsiders feel like outsiders. You don't want your reader to feel like an insider. He or she should be an insider. As inside as possible! You can try and weasel around this by using a point of view character or first-person narrator. They can fill in the blanks with asides or flashbacks.

Next, you have an issue with body language. When two people are friendly, you can see it. Sense it. This is why movies and plays have it easier. They can cheat and do lots of little things that if you keep describing get repetitive. Jon and David could always glance at each other and smirk at a dinner scene when either could make a dirty joke that would offend their wives or kids. It'd be funny for the audience; it would be tedious to write in every time they do it, and if they only do it once it doesn't show us how much they are on the same wavelength. But, with a visual medium, you suddenly can cheat! You can pack more information in less. Cheating like this is good!

So, writing friendships is hard. By the end of this blog's run, you can probably make a list of things I whined about being hard to write.

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P.S.,

This is a mini-theme at Althouse's blog. She linked over to this NYT piece, that says: "Schedules compress, priorities change and people often become pickier in what they want in their friends."

You can start the process of turning random people in random places into friends just by talking. Also, it helps for people to be as judgmental as they were in college as opposed to as uptight and narrow-minded as the NYT thinks we become as we age. In college and high school, people my age routinely had friends with radically different beliefs than theirs. If that's not still happening once you get older, ask why.

The NYT is trying to make things harder than they really are. Also? Several of their examples of friends not working out are just people being jerks. Who asks about other people how much they make, and who does not know the proper response is: "Enough?"

Bare Minimums

When you make a product, there are certain standards that should apply. For newspapers, for example, you expect clean editing, the right pictures with the right articles, etc. For games, you expect a clean, understandable rule book, all the pieces to fit and be there. For food, you expect it to taste right and not kill you. For MMOs, we seem to have... no real expectations except a "smooth launch," which really just means not too crappy of a launch. Games that have smooth launches tend to be smaller, niche games, basically because they are not stressed as heavily during the initial week.

Actual Supreme Court Decision

"It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices." This is probably the most important quote from Roberts' opinion for the Court. Now, this isn't a law blog, so I'm going to spare you a lot of details. But, after joking on the Supreme Court yesterday, I figured I'd give you a quick run down of my thoughts on the matter. If you don't care about the Supreme Court case, then uh, don't click below.

More on Demise of Guys

For background, go read here. Over at Ann Althouse's blog, they were discussing this article. The author says: "I can’t argue with (Zimbardo's Demise of Guys), especially in younger men. However, these behaviors are symptoms of something deeper." Guess what? You can argue with it! In fact, it behooves you to critically analyze it and see if the argument holds. This article, itself, has some serious issues with internal consistency. I noticed I had a gender in gaming label, so, let's take some time to examine this and see where the problems are in the reasoning.

Society lets Charrlie see himself in the game.

Bragging and Boasting: It Is Science!

Ann Althouse linked to this story. Now, as you can tell from my Google+ page, I don't brag. Anyway, the thrust of the article, like any good article, is right in the front: "Talking about ourselves—whether in a personal conversation or through social media sites like Facebook and Twitter—triggers the same sensation of pleasure in the brain as food or money, researchers reported Monday." Which clearly means that I should try and blog more frequently.