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Post by pacinoyes on Jun 14, 2020 13:26:22 GMT
This isn't really an Unpopular Opinion - um - but it feels so wrong and shallow to say it- but then again I've seen that "Celebrity Crushes" thread y'all started which is why we get along so well I guess I can't stand Trump or Biden .......but I am not looking forward at looking at Jill Biden for 4 years - physically not politically!
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Post by urbanpatrician on Jun 19, 2020 0:20:48 GMT
Emily Browning - Sucker Punch >>>>> Hathaway + Cotillard (the combined efforts of both) in The Dark Knight Rises
gimme Synder over those horrible actors in TDKR. Even Juno Temple was better than Hathaway.
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Post by urbanpatrician on Jul 5, 2020 12:47:29 GMT
Here's one for you Pulp Fiction and Goodfellas fanboys.....
The only actor nomination worthy in Goodfellas is Lorraine Bracco. DeNiro was forgettable and nothing more than just there. Pesci while in his element feels like a fad, and there's a lot of actors you can put in place of Liotta. I give him 2 wins (Something Wild and Narc) but here you can rearrange him with Tim Roth and probably get a better performance. I'm sure with makeup you can make Roth look Italian.
The only actor that's that interesting in Pulp Fiction is Ving Rhames. That includes Uma Thurman and Samuel L. Jackson.
So come flame me, ya fanboys.
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Post by pacinoyes on Jul 5, 2020 13:21:41 GMT
Here's one for you Pulp Fiction and Goodfellas fanboys..... The only actor nomination worthy in Goodfellas is Lorraine Bracco. DeNiro was forgettable and nothing more than just there. Pesci while in his element feels like a fad, and there's a lot of actors you can put in place of Liotta. I give him 2 wins (Something Wild and Narc) but here you can rearrange him with Tim Roth and probably get a better performance. I'm sure with makeup you can make Roth look Italian. The only actor that's that interesting in Pulp Fiction is Ving Rhames. That includes Uma Thurman and Samuel L. Jackson. I definitely don't agree with Bracco - one of the flaws of Goodfellas (which HAS flaws....... is NOT Martin Scorsese's best movie, NOT the F'n Godfather, NOT the best movie of 1990 even - it's great but not THAT great - so I guess come at ME fanboys!)......is when she weirdly and unnecessarily takes over the narration briefly from Liotta - God I hate that scene - how people diss the De Niro "shopkeeper" scene in the Irishman and let THAT BS completely slide is ....... . She's fine in the movie but not nodworthy - and I saw a lot of strange things in the "De Niro nods" thread btw - but he is far better in Goodfellas than OUATIA which is also not that good, not the Godfather, not the best movie of 1984 (or top 10 actually - it's just good) and his performance in OUATIA is flat or his character at least is flat - that deserves an Oscar nod the way I deserve to win "nicest most gentle poster on MAR" . Rhames I buy a little more than Bracco .......everyone in PF does wonders with snappy dialog...........Rhames suggests a lot more with a lot less of that and fills in that character .......I wouldn't nod him and I'd nod others ..........but I get that one more than Bracco tbh.
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Post by urbanpatrician on Jul 5, 2020 13:37:07 GMT
Here's one for you Pulp Fiction and Goodfellas fanboys..... The only actor nomination worthy in Goodfellas is Lorraine Bracco. DeNiro was forgettable and nothing more than just there. Pesci while in his element feels like a fad, and there's a lot of actors you can put in place of Liotta. I give him 2 wins (Something Wild and Narc) but here you can rearrange him with Tim Roth and probably get a better performance. I'm sure with makeup you can make Roth look Italian. The only actor that's that interesting in Pulp Fiction is Ving Rhames. That includes Uma Thurman and Samuel L. Jackson. I definitely don't agree with Bracco - one of the flaws of Goodfellas (which HAS flaws....... is NOT Martin Scorsese's best movie, NOT the F'n Godfather, NOT the best movie of 1990 even - it's great but not THAT great - so I guess come at ME fanboys!)......is when she weirdly and unnecessarily takes over the narration briefly from Liotta - God I hate that scene - how people diss the De Niro "shopkeeper" scene in the Irishman and let THAT BS completely slide is ....... . She's fine in the movie but not nodworthy - and I saw a lot of strange things in the "De Niro nods" thread btw - but he is far better in Goodfellas than OUATIA which is also not that good, not the Godfather, not the best movie of 1984 (or top 10 actually - it's just good) and his performance in OUATIA is flat or his character at least is flat - that deserves an Oscar nod the way I deserve to win "nicest most gentle poster on MAR" . Rhames I buy a little more than Bracco .......everyone in PF does wonders with snappy dialog...........Rhames suggests a lot more with a lot less of that and fills in that character .......I wouldn't nod him and I'd nod others ..........but I get that one more than Bracco tbh. Oh I agree he's better in Goodfellas than OUTIA - he was a total non-entity in OUTIA. I think those users were just giving him a lazy nod. He was at least intimidating in Goodfellas, but he doesn't stand out in that movie to me either. 1990 supporting actor is also quite strong so lends even more to that. I get tired of Pesci honestly, he's a one note actor playing that one key over again... kinda like Kingsley in Gandhi to me. Bracco was the breath of fresh air in that movie against all those gangster dudes, imo. She's the one injecting that film with a much needed relief, and I think with another actress we could've seen another boring supportive wife ala Jennifer Connelly, but I felt Bracco was excellent subverting that expectation. For PF.... Samuel L was his usual bombastic self and it reveals everything I'm indifferent to about him as an actor. He has one career defining performance tho, in Jungle Fever.... he was awesome in that. Uma Thurman is also a one-performance kinda actress to me... Kill Bill: Volume 2. Rhames should've been used better as a character actor in the 90s, but the sheer volume of character actors (Danny Trejo and etc.) made those parts scarce. I would've loved seeing him in Heat. Wanted to see what he could do with Haysbert or Williamson's character. But there were lots of reasons he ended up being so underrated, imo.
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BlackCaesar21
New Member
You're barking up the wrong acorn!
Posts: 142
Likes: 103
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Post by BlackCaesar21 on Jul 14, 2020 21:17:27 GMT
People are just so much more pretentious these days.
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Post by JangoB on Jul 14, 2020 23:43:07 GMT
Cancelling people for 'cultural appropriation' is one of the most ridiculous and horrible ways to actively stop exchange and sharing of ideas. You'd think that the woke crowd would appreciate people for expanding their viewpoints beyond their own culture and that they would appreciate someone for embracing different cultural specificities. Instead, as is very typical for them, they want everyone to stay in their lane. And of course the ones who try to cancel people are usually not people from the 'offended' cultures but are instead privileged white wokeness proponents who like to tell everyone who's ought to be offended by what.
Writing this because I'm seeing that they're trying to cancel some girlfriend that Sebastian Stan had because they found a picture of her wearing a kimono at a costume party or something. Of course Stan is a target himself - a lot of them demand an explanation or some comment on his part. It's pure insanity. And I don't even give a crap about him in general! It's funny to see all this debate online whether cancel culture exists or not. Yeah, deliberate search for 'incriminating' evidence in order to start a social media flashmob against someone is not an example of cancel culture at all, sure.
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Post by mikediastavrone96 on Jul 15, 2020 0:11:02 GMT
Cancelling people for 'cultural appropriation' is one of the most ridiculous and horrible ways to actively stop exchange and sharing of ideas. You'd think that the woke crowd would appreciate people for expanding their viewpoints beyond their own culture and that they would appreciate someone for embracing different cultural specificities. Instead, as is very typical for them, they want everyone to stay in their lane. And of course the ones who try to cancel people are usually not people from the 'offended' cultures but are instead privileged white wokeness proponents who like to tell everyone who's ought to be offended by what. Writing this because I'm seeing that they're trying to cancel some girlfriend that Sebastian Stan had because they found a picture of her wearing a kimono at a costume party or something. Of course Stan is a target himself - a lot of them demand an explanation or some comment on his part. It's pure insanity. And I don't even give a crap about him in general! It's funny to see all this debate online whether cancel culture exists or not. Yeah, deliberate search for 'incriminating' evidence in order to start a social media flashmob against someone is not an example of cancel culture at all, sure. My understanding of the idea of "cultural appropriation" is it started out as a way of addressing how white trenders, particularly those in the fashion industry, would adopt stuff from non-Western cultures that the actual people from those cultures would get shit for, like dreadlocks. In that way, the issue at hand is with the superstructure that would praise white people for something they normally look down on non-white people for. Perfectly understandable imo and to me the way to combat that would be normalization, which would require those cultural signifiers to be more widespread to the point they have to be accepted, not the exact opposite. The issue should be with the greater culture finding dreadlocks dirty, not white people who like them as a hairstyle. Now with all that said, this Sebastian Stan thing is a non-story. He's not going to be canceled, this will have no effect on his career, it's something that is already losing steam on Twitter and it's been, what, 10 hours? If this is in any way indicative of cancel culture, then it's only demonstrating something I've previously said - cancel culture is not that much of a thing and the only people who get truly, fully canceled are the people who nobody would bother to defend (i.e. Weinstein, Spacey) while even frequent offenders of the woke (Dave Chappelle, J.K. Rowling, hell Tekashi 6ix9ine) have no meaningful blowback to their careers.
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Post by JangoB on Jul 15, 2020 0:31:33 GMT
Cancelling people for 'cultural appropriation' is one of the most ridiculous and horrible ways to actively stop exchange and sharing of ideas. You'd think that the woke crowd would appreciate people for expanding their viewpoints beyond their own culture and that they would appreciate someone for embracing different cultural specificities. Instead, as is very typical for them, they want everyone to stay in their lane. And of course the ones who try to cancel people are usually not people from the 'offended' cultures but are instead privileged white wokeness proponents who like to tell everyone who's ought to be offended by what. Writing this because I'm seeing that they're trying to cancel some girlfriend that Sebastian Stan had because they found a picture of her wearing a kimono at a costume party or something. Of course Stan is a target himself - a lot of them demand an explanation or some comment on his part. It's pure insanity. And I don't even give a crap about him in general! It's funny to see all this debate online whether cancel culture exists or not. Yeah, deliberate search for 'incriminating' evidence in order to start a social media flashmob against someone is not an example of cancel culture at all, sure. My understanding of the idea of "cultural appropriation" is it started out as a way of addressing how white trenders, particularly those in the fashion industry, would adopt stuff from non-Western cultures that the actual people from those cultures would get shit for, like dreadlocks. In that way, the issue at hand is with the superstructure that would praise white people for something they normally look down on non-white people for. Perfectly understandable imo and to me the way to combat that would be normalization, which would require those cultural signifiers to be more widespread to the point they have to be accepted, not the exact opposite. The issue should be with the greater culture finding dreadlocks dirty, not white people who like them as a hairstyle. Now with all that said, this Sebastian Stan thing is a non-story. He's not going to be canceled, this will have no effect on his career, it's something that is already losing steam on Twitter and it's been, what, 10 hours? If this is in any way indicative of cancel culture, then it's only demonstrating something I've previously said - cancel culture is not that much of a thing and the only people who get truly, fully canceled are the people who nobody would bother to defend (i.e. Weinstein, Spacey) while even frequent offenders of the woke (Dave Chappelle, J.K. Rowling, hell Tekashi 6ix9ine) have no meaningful blowback to their careers. I'm in full agreement with the first paragraph. As for your second one, I think the big issue here is not who's actually gonna get truly and fully cancelled. The problem is that it's seemingly becoming more and more normal for folks to actively want those cancellations to happen and to set the process in motion. It's like people have a thirst which they're trying to quench every day. That for me is the biggest problem with the whole thing. Of course Stan isn't actually gonna get cancelled because of this. But the mentality that a lot of social media people have that he should is insane to me.
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Post by Joaquim on Jul 25, 2020 2:21:34 GMT
Cultural appropriation has been with us throughout all of human history. Foreign cultures being integrated into Alexander the Great’s empire and the overall spread of Hellenistic culture was a form of cultural appropriation if you think about it. Same with how the Byzantines incorporated barbarian cultures into their own, much of which became part of the dominant culture we know and love today. There is nothing wrong with cultural appropriation, in fact it should be encouraged.
Gun control is a bourgeoisie plot to disarm and suppress the proletariat.
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Post by pacinoyes on Jul 25, 2020 8:02:55 GMT
Cultural appropriation has been with us throughout all of human history. Foreign cultures being integrated into Alexander the Great’s empire and the overall spread of Hellenistic culture was a form of cultural appropriation if you think about it. Same with how the Byzantines incorporated barbarian cultures into their own, much of which became part of the dominant culture we know and love today. There is nothing wrong with cultural appropriation, in fact it should be encouraged. 100% true - in fact in the US we are unbelievably stupid asshats about it in particular with pop music which is a small but particularly ugly and revealing example. White people liking rap music for example in the 80s - and talking the language and borrowing fashion - even got a racist term applied (or arguably invented that term THEMSELVES even - starts with W) which of course was no different at all from pale white kids in the 1950s UK liking Blues for example - which was fncking righteous both artistically and lucratively and for spreading and expanding multiple Art forms. My whole love of Gil Scott Heron was because Richard Pryor loved him and I was like "who is this guy maybe I should listen to him and find out about him?"........opens a whole world of artists, music, poetry, literature, painting.........of thought itself. It's actually the spirit of curiosity, inquisitiveness, imagination, growth....... Absolutely should be encouraged.
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Post by Joaquim on Aug 9, 2020 1:40:05 GMT
The reason many white people are so adamantly against immigration and refugees, regardless of whether it's legal or illegal, can probably be traced back to their own colonization of the Americas (remember that many of these early settlers were refugees escaping religious persecution). As we already know, the natives would come to them peacefully....and you know the rest. A crime by one native towards the Europeans would be used as an excuse to declare war on the entire tribe, etc etc. What I'm getting at here is that this early genocide probably subconsciously ingrained the idea in the minds of these early white people in America that "If we can do it to them, someone else can come and do it to us" and this got passed down from generation to generation. The result? They believe it is absolutely crucial to keep foreigners out.
Obviously if you ask someone why they're so against immigration, this is not the response they will give but it's just a theory that came to mind earlier.
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Post by Joaquim on Sept 29, 2020 5:54:35 GMT
Not an unpopular opinion but more of a batshit prediction for the future
We’re gonna experience a serious shift in the world order. The world is very globalized today, as we all know. Soon it’ll be much more decentralized, in a very big way, it just won’t happen in our life time bc we’re gonna be stuck in the beginning of a new “dark age” first.
So basically this is a cycle that’s been going back for all of recorded western civilization. The world used to be globalized back during the Bronze Age. While civilization wasn’t “global” exactly, the known world was very connected. All the Bronze Age civilizations were in touch with each other, amicably or not, and then they all collapsed at the same. This was followed by the Greek dark ages and then out of that came the rise of the more decentralized Greek city states and the early Roman kingdom, and that world order continued until Rome made itself an empire. Ik I’m kinda reaching a bit here since the first Persian empire was around, then Alexander took over the world during that time and these were literally the 2 largest empires to ever exist up to that point but the Persian empire lasted half the time the Roman Empire did and I think it’s defeat to the Greek city states is very symbolic of this era of decentralization (obviously), while Alexander’s empire also started falling apart quickly after his death and he took a more hands off approach too allowing conquered civilizations to keep their customs and traditions, creating Hellenistic culture rather than being “convert to my culture and abandon yours, or die” as you would see in other global empires. Rome was also huge as a republic but wasn’t the dominant world order until after winning the third Punic war, and then erased all doubt about being the dominant world order 100 years later when Augustus became emperor.
This “Roman globalist world order” lasted 500 years and was followed by a 300 year dark age. Yes, I know people like to say that the entire Middle Ages were the “dark ages” but that’s not entirely true since while technological advancement was pretty stagnant during this time, there were significant advances in other areas like government, religion and architecture. However I’m gonna make an executive decision and still say that the time between the fall of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne as holy Roman emperor in the year 800 was a “dark age” for western civilization, despite the Byzantine empire being at its height at this time, and really, the Byzantine empire was never the force the OG Roman Empire was, considering it spent most of its existence fighting for its own survival. When Charlemagne became holy Roman emperor this gave way to a more decentralized world order. The Holy Roman Empire was made up of hundreds of jurisdictions under Charlemagne’s rule and feudalism became the west’s go-to mode of governance for almost 700 years.
Ironically this world order didn’t end with a dark age but with a renaissance, the renaissance. With the renaissance came the rise of colonialism and that of course set up the globalist world order we’re in today. People say that we have to stop the globalists and that globalism is the devil when in reality we’ve been in a global, rather than decentralized world order for most of the past 500 years, the peak of this being the British empire at its apex or even today with how the world is really connected in a way it’s never been. What those 500 years mean and the way things are looking in America today, it seems like the world is due for a drastic shift in terms of order, balance of power, all that shit. Remember that while technological innovation was stagnant during the Middle Ages, it was China where all the innovation was happening. That changed during the colonial era when all the European powers ganged up on China (this is also why China today thinks it’s entitled to certain territories in Central Asia and the Far East). We’re already seeing China’s rise to the top while europe becomes less influential. I was gonna make a point that the world’s center of technological innovation tends to flip when these shifts in order happen as there was lots of technological advances in the Bronze Age civilizations as well but while the Roman Empire was a military juggernaut, the reality was that it did not actually bring about new innovations in technology. The fact that it was so powerful and influential in all other areas really masked the fact that they really didn’t develop many new technologies, they kinda just perfected what the Greeks created
But like I said this shift in world order won’t happen immediately, there’s always an intermediary period in between lasting a few hundred years and 2 times out of 3 it was a dark age. History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does tend to rhyme. What does repeat is cycles in human nature and behavior. I for one have been warming up to the idea of seeing the United States split into hundreds of small principalities like the Holy Roman Empire during the days of Charlemagne, despite it more than likely not happening in my lifetime although a guy can dream
TL;DR: we are fucked fucked
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cherry68
Based
Man is unhappy because he doesn't know he's happy. It's only that.
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Post by cherry68 on Sept 29, 2020 6:20:30 GMT
Joaquim I disagree about the Romans not bringing technological innovation. Just consider architecture. They built aqueducts in their whole empire (some of them are still working). Roman arc and the use of bricks allowed buildings that couldn't even be imagined before. Go watch the Pantheon in Rome for instance. There are roman bridges and roads in whole Europe, still functioning because of their building techniques.
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Post by Joaquim on Sept 29, 2020 6:46:35 GMT
Joaquim I disagree about the Romans not bringing technological innovation. Just consider architecture. They built aqueducts in their whole empire (some of them are still working). Roman arc and the use of bricks allowed buildings that couldn't even be imagined before. Go watch the Pantheon in Rome for instance. There are roman bridges and roads in whole Europe, still functioning because of their building techniques. I mentioned that the Middle Ages were an innovative time for architecture while also being stagnant when it comes to technological development and that’s also what I’m getting at with Rome. The architecture was innovative in that the design of the aqueducts were innovative, but the Romans didn’t invent the aqueduct. That’s why I said that what they really did was perfect stuff that had already been created, mainly from the Greeks
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Post by urbanpatrician on Sept 29, 2020 9:50:05 GMT
Not an unpopular opinion but more of a batshit prediction for the future We’re gonna experience a serious shift in the world order. The world is very globalized today, as we all know. Soon it’ll be much more decentralized, in a very big way, it just won’t happen in our life time bc we’re gonna be stuck in the beginning of a new “dark age” first. So basically this is a cycle that’s been going back for all of recorded western civilization. The world used to be globalized back during the Bronze Age. While civilization wasn’t “global” exactly, the known world was very connected. All the Bronze Age civilizations were in touch with each other, amicably or not, and then they all collapsed at the same. This was followed by the Greek dark ages and then out of that came the rise of the more decentralized Greek city states and the early Roman kingdom, and that world order continued until Rome made itself an empire. Ik I’m kinda reaching a bit here since the first Persian empire was around, then Alexander took over the world during that time and these were literally the 2 largest empires to ever exist up to that point but the Persian empire lasted half the time the Roman Empire did and I think it’s defeat to the Greek city states is very symbolic of this era of decentralization (obviously), while Alexander’s empire also started falling apart quickly after his death and he took a more hands off approach too allowing conquered civilizations to keep their customs and traditions, creating Hellenistic culture rather than being “convert to my culture and abandon yours, or die” as you would see in other global empires. Rome was also huge as a republic but wasn’t the dominant world order until after winning the third Punic war, and then erased all doubt about being the dominant world order 100 years later when Augustus became emperor. This “Roman globalist world order” lasted 500 years and was followed by a 300 year dark age. Yes, I know people like to say that the entire Middle Ages were the “dark ages” but that’s not entirely true since while technological advancement was pretty stagnant during this time, there were significant advances in other areas like government, religion and architecture. However I’m gonna make an executive decision and still say that the time between the fall of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne as holy Roman emperor in the year 800 was a “dark age” for western civilization, despite the Byzantine empire being at its height at this time, and really, the Byzantine empire was never the force the OG Roman Empire was, considering it spent most of its existence fighting for its own survival. When Charlemagne became holy Roman emperor this gave way to a more decentralized world order. The Holy Roman Empire was made up of hundreds of jurisdictions under Charlemagne’s rule and feudalism became the west’s go-to mode of governance for almost 700 years. Ironically this world order didn’t end with a dark age but with a renaissance, the renaissance. With the renaissance came the rise of colonialism and that of course set up the globalist world order we’re in today. People say that we have to stop the globalists and that globalism is the devil when in reality we’ve been in a global, rather than decentralized world order for most of the past 500 years, the peak of this being the British empire at its apex or even today with how the world is really connected in a way it’s never been. What those 500 years mean and the way things are looking in America today, it seems like the world is due for a drastic shift in terms of order, balance of power, all that shit. Remember that while technological innovation was stagnant during the Middle Ages, it was China where all the innovation was happening. That changed during the colonial era when all the European powers ganged up on China (this is also why China today thinks it’s entitled to certain territories in Central Asia and the Far East). We’re already seeing China’s rise to the top while europe becomes less influential. I was gonna make a point that the world’s center of technological innovation tends to flip when these shifts in order happen as there was lots of technological advances in the Bronze Age civilizations as well but while the Roman Empire was a military juggernaut, the reality was that it did not actually bring about new innovations in technology. The fact that it was so powerful and influential in all other areas really masked the fact that they really didn’t develop many new technologies, they kinda just perfected what the Greeks created But like I said this shift in world order won’t happen immediately, there’s always an intermediary period in between lasting a few hundred years and 2 times out of 3 it was a dark age. History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does tend to rhyme. What does repeat is cycles in human nature and behavior. I for one have been warming up to the idea of seeing the United States split into hundreds of small principalities like the Holy Roman Empire during the days of Charlemagne, despite it more than likely not happening in my lifetime although a guy can dream TL;DR: we are fucked fucked Are you saying we go from a globalized ancient Rome period to a decentralized Middle/Dark Ages period, then back to a globalized period again (the period we're in presently), and then we go back to a sort of 2nd Dark Ages after this period is over? Is there any evidence to support your hypothesis?
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Post by mhynson27 on Sept 29, 2020 12:16:06 GMT
Not an unpopular opinion but more of a batshit prediction for the future We’re gonna experience a serious shift in the world order. The world is very globalized today, as we all know. Soon it’ll be much more decentralized, in a very big way, it just won’t happen in our life time bc we’re gonna be stuck in the beginning of a new “dark age” first. So basically this is a cycle that’s been going back for all of recorded western civilization. The world used to be globalized back during the Bronze Age. While civilization wasn’t “global” exactly, the known world was very connected. All the Bronze Age civilizations were in touch with each other, amicably or not, and then they all collapsed at the same. This was followed by the Greek dark ages and then out of that came the rise of the more decentralized Greek city states and the early Roman kingdom, and that world order continued until Rome made itself an empire. Ik I’m kinda reaching a bit here since the first Persian empire was around, then Alexander took over the world during that time and these were literally the 2 largest empires to ever exist up to that point but the Persian empire lasted half the time the Roman Empire did and I think it’s defeat to the Greek city states is very symbolic of this era of decentralization (obviously), while Alexander’s empire also started falling apart quickly after his death and he took a more hands off approach too allowing conquered civilizations to keep their customs and traditions, creating Hellenistic culture rather than being “convert to my culture and abandon yours, or die” as you would see in other global empires. Rome was also huge as a republic but wasn’t the dominant world order until after winning the third Punic war, and then erased all doubt about being the dominant world order 100 years later when Augustus became emperor. This “Roman globalist world order” lasted 500 years and was followed by a 300 year dark age. Yes, I know people like to say that the entire Middle Ages were the “dark ages” but that’s not entirely true since while technological advancement was pretty stagnant during this time, there were significant advances in other areas like government, religion and architecture. However I’m gonna make an executive decision and still say that the time between the fall of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne as holy Roman emperor in the year 800 was a “dark age” for western civilization, despite the Byzantine empire being at its height at this time, and really, the Byzantine empire was never the force the OG Roman Empire was, considering it spent most of its existence fighting for its own survival. When Charlemagne became holy Roman emperor this gave way to a more decentralized world order. The Holy Roman Empire was made up of hundreds of jurisdictions under Charlemagne’s rule and feudalism became the west’s go-to mode of governance for almost 700 years. Ironically this world order didn’t end with a dark age but with a renaissance, the renaissance. With the renaissance came the rise of colonialism and that of course set up the globalist world order we’re in today. People say that we have to stop the globalists and that globalism is the devil when in reality we’ve been in a global, rather than decentralized world order for most of the past 500 years, the peak of this being the British empire at its apex or even today with how the world is really connected in a way it’s never been. What those 500 years mean and the way things are looking in America today, it seems like the world is due for a drastic shift in terms of order, balance of power, all that shit. Remember that while technological innovation was stagnant during the Middle Ages, it was China where all the innovation was happening. That changed during the colonial era when all the European powers ganged up on China (this is also why China today thinks it’s entitled to certain territories in Central Asia and the Far East). We’re already seeing China’s rise to the top while europe becomes less influential. I was gonna make a point that the world’s center of technological innovation tends to flip when these shifts in order happen as there was lots of technological advances in the Bronze Age civilizations as well but while the Roman Empire was a military juggernaut, the reality was that it did not actually bring about new innovations in technology. The fact that it was so powerful and influential in all other areas really masked the fact that they really didn’t develop many new technologies, they kinda just perfected what the Greeks created But like I said this shift in world order won’t happen immediately, there’s always an intermediary period in between lasting a few hundred years and 2 times out of 3 it was a dark age. History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does tend to rhyme. What does repeat is cycles in human nature and behavior. I for one have been warming up to the idea of seeing the United States split into hundreds of small principalities like the Holy Roman Empire during the days of Charlemagne, despite it more than likely not happening in my lifetime although a guy can dream TL;DR: we are fucked fucked Are you saying we go from a globalized ancient Rome period to a decentralized Middle/Dark Ages period, then back to a globalized period again (the period we're in presently), and then we go back to a sort of 2nd Dark Ages after this period is over? Is there any evidence to support your hypothesis? I can answer that for you:
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Post by Joaquim on Sept 29, 2020 16:51:09 GMT
Not an unpopular opinion but more of a batshit prediction for the future We’re gonna experience a serious shift in the world order. The world is very globalized today, as we all know. Soon it’ll be much more decentralized, in a very big way, it just won’t happen in our life time bc we’re gonna be stuck in the beginning of a new “dark age” first. So basically this is a cycle that’s been going back for all of recorded western civilization. The world used to be globalized back during the Bronze Age. While civilization wasn’t “global” exactly, the known world was very connected. All the Bronze Age civilizations were in touch with each other, amicably or not, and then they all collapsed at the same. This was followed by the Greek dark ages and then out of that came the rise of the more decentralized Greek city states and the early Roman kingdom, and that world order continued until Rome made itself an empire. Ik I’m kinda reaching a bit here since the first Persian empire was around, then Alexander took over the world during that time and these were literally the 2 largest empires to ever exist up to that point but the Persian empire lasted half the time the Roman Empire did and I think it’s defeat to the Greek city states is very symbolic of this era of decentralization (obviously), while Alexander’s empire also started falling apart quickly after his death and he took a more hands off approach too allowing conquered civilizations to keep their customs and traditions, creating Hellenistic culture rather than being “convert to my culture and abandon yours, or die” as you would see in other global empires. Rome was also huge as a republic but wasn’t the dominant world order until after winning the third Punic war, and then erased all doubt about being the dominant world order 100 years later when Augustus became emperor. This “Roman globalist world order” lasted 500 years and was followed by a 300 year dark age. Yes, I know people like to say that the entire Middle Ages were the “dark ages” but that’s not entirely true since while technological advancement was pretty stagnant during this time, there were significant advances in other areas like government, religion and architecture. However I’m gonna make an executive decision and still say that the time between the fall of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne as holy Roman emperor in the year 800 was a “dark age” for western civilization, despite the Byzantine empire being at its height at this time, and really, the Byzantine empire was never the force the OG Roman Empire was, considering it spent most of its existence fighting for its own survival. When Charlemagne became holy Roman emperor this gave way to a more decentralized world order. The Holy Roman Empire was made up of hundreds of jurisdictions under Charlemagne’s rule and feudalism became the west’s go-to mode of governance for almost 700 years. Ironically this world order didn’t end with a dark age but with a renaissance, the renaissance. With the renaissance came the rise of colonialism and that of course set up the globalist world order we’re in today. People say that we have to stop the globalists and that globalism is the devil when in reality we’ve been in a global, rather than decentralized world order for most of the past 500 years, the peak of this being the British empire at its apex or even today with how the world is really connected in a way it’s never been. What those 500 years mean and the way things are looking in America today, it seems like the world is due for a drastic shift in terms of order, balance of power, all that shit. Remember that while technological innovation was stagnant during the Middle Ages, it was China where all the innovation was happening. That changed during the colonial era when all the European powers ganged up on China (this is also why China today thinks it’s entitled to certain territories in Central Asia and the Far East). We’re already seeing China’s rise to the top while europe becomes less influential. I was gonna make a point that the world’s center of technological innovation tends to flip when these shifts in order happen as there was lots of technological advances in the Bronze Age civilizations as well but while the Roman Empire was a military juggernaut, the reality was that it did not actually bring about new innovations in technology. The fact that it was so powerful and influential in all other areas really masked the fact that they really didn’t develop many new technologies, they kinda just perfected what the Greeks created But like I said this shift in world order won’t happen immediately, there’s always an intermediary period in between lasting a few hundred years and 2 times out of 3 it was a dark age. History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does tend to rhyme. What does repeat is cycles in human nature and behavior. I for one have been warming up to the idea of seeing the United States split into hundreds of small principalities like the Holy Roman Empire during the days of Charlemagne, despite it more than likely not happening in my lifetime although a guy can dream TL;DR: we are fucked fucked Are you saying we go from a globalized ancient Rome period to a decentralized Middle/Dark Ages period, then back to a globalized period again (the period we're in presently), and then we go back to a sort of 2nd Dark Ages after this period is over? Is there any evidence to support your hypothesis? Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. It wouldn’t be exactly like the dark ages, obviously, since civilization has come a long way since then but it would be a sort of futuristic dark ages. These 2nd dark ages would actually be a 3rd dark age (or 2nd renaissance) since the world went through the Greek dark ages after the collapse of the Bronze Age civilizations which was another “globalized” period. A big reason for the collapse of these Bronze Age civilizations was climate change. People like to blame the Sea Peoples but they were very likely climate refugees from the west. Climate change may have played a part in the fall of Rome too, although I haven’t read much into that yet. Like I said in the first post, history doesn’t repeat itself but it tends to rhyme. What does repeat itself is cycles in human behavior and nature. You can’t rely on humans, but you can rely on human nature (for better or worse). I literally just come up with these theories by reading a bunch of books and watching history docs and trying to connect what’s happened in the past to what’s going on today and coming up with my own interpretations. As Marcus Aurelius said, “Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too." Would not recommend studying history for fun, this shit is a fucking wormhole
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Post by theycallmemrfish on Sept 29, 2020 17:08:03 GMT
The Earth is flat.
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flasuss
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Post by flasuss on Sept 29, 2020 20:33:45 GMT
I think Joaquim is going too far on the whole dark ages thing, since technology makes it impossible to not stay connected anymore, but the rise of nationalism in recent years is a symptom of people getting scared or mad about the big changes in the world, and add that to Coronavirus showing the importance of having a strong local production of goods and services during a major crisis and I can see a more isolationist attitude happening.
Alternatively, we see quick improvements in space technology that make space colonization viable, and then we go the exact alternate route. Or maybe something in between- the more cosmopolitan and forward thinking people leave and the ones that stay are more backwards looking.
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CookiesNCream
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So what else is new?
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Post by CookiesNCream on Dec 19, 2020 21:36:32 GMT
I have no problem with transracial people and people with BIID.
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Post by franklin on Jun 30, 2021 12:30:50 GMT
Unpopular opinion:
Despite considering her a great actress, Scarlett Johansson was never believable as Black Widow. She's way too small and curvy to be convincing as this tough kickass female assassin who can physically overpower and beat guys two times her size.
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Post by pacinoyes on Sept 9, 2021 19:27:45 GMT
* Robert Duvall - a great actor, no question - is actually overrated because he's so plain looking and considered "underrated". He's so underrated............. he's overrated. * Paul Giamatti is like Robert Duvall ..........but not as good as he is. * Peanut M&M's are the f'n worst snack ever, like literally you can break a tooth on these things ......and then I forget that and keep buying them every 6 months ...... * I like Val Kilmer but he's never given "one of the best performances ever" - not in Tombstone....not in The Doors..... he's been great, but a little perspective ........I feel bad the guy got sick - I like him a lot but the hyperbole is too much * Faye Webster made a better record than any female solo act so far in 2021 .....ok this might not be unpopular but.......it's true
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Post by Johnny_Hellzapoppin on Sept 15, 2021 9:09:08 GMT
Farts are funny.
Smoking is cool.
Cursing is a wonderful form of expressiveness through language.
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SZilla
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Post by SZilla on Sept 15, 2021 16:43:03 GMT
I prefer the anime's ending to Neon Genesis Evangelion over The End of Evangelion.
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