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Wednesday, July 23, 2014

Fine lines

Let me know  in comments which of these semi-finalists are your favorites.

1. Has "That Should Be A Band Name" been a band name? Because that should be a band name....Dave Holmes 

2.  I see Atheists are fighting and killing each other again, over who doesn't believe in any God the most. Oh, no..wait.. that never happens.....Ricky Gervais

3. "For God's sex, stop making fun of my English." ...мя Gяєєи 

4. Once you go black, that toe's gotta come off....Megan Amram

5. Ask your doctor if being a doctor is right for him. Everything isn't about you.....lanyard 

6.  People who say that they don't have time for my bull--- need to learn how to manage their time better. Wake up an hour earlier....Mark Leggett

7.  Hostess is bringing back the chocolate covered Twinkie. Anyone looking to eat healthy should just stick to the regular Twinkie.....Conan O'Brien

8. The inventor of the grocery store felt so strongly about the chip/cracker distinction that he required them to be at least six aisles apart.....Matthew Baldwin

Screen Shot 2014-07-23 at 11.17.06 AM9. RELIGIONS, RANKED BY TRUTH

1. Yours

2. All others ....The Tweet Of God 

10. Texted the raven, "nvrmor.".....Tim Siedell

11. Jazz hands are about the fingers you DON'T wiggle...Megan Amram
12. CosmicMystery: Why dogs can smell aromas from far away, yet are compelled to sniff each other’s butt at a fraction of an inch....Neil deGrasse Tyson

13.  Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.*

*Foreigners need not apply......Stephen Colbert
14. “We just had a baby!” - cannibals, contesting their dinner bill...matt 



I'll go with the tweet of G-d (#9), with Neil deGrasse Tyson getting runner up honors (#12)...

I also liked "That should be a band name", as just last weekend we had a whole discussion (over a few adult beverages) of good names that should be band names...

14. "Just had a baby"

-- MrJM

And with regard to Mr. Gervais's tweet, I am unaware of any current violent conflict where the issue is "love of God".

Israel/Palestine is over land. Syria is about who should rule that nation. Ukraine is about land/who should rule. To say that they're "fighting about God" is no more accurate than saying they're "fighting about flags."

^ should say "belief in God" instead of "love of God" but the point (such as it is) still stands.

Have to agree with MrJM. Makes for a nice joke, but not much God involved in these wars, even Israel-Pal.

For some reason, I was slayed by #10, Texted the Raven. And while I like the idea of a "Tweet of God" account, I sampled some of the other stuff he's (He"s?) done and didn't find it very clever.

@MrJM and quotidian - Really? You believe religious belief plays absolutely no role in the Israel/Palestine conflict or Syria? Really?

I vote 2, 9, 12 and 13.

14 - Just had a baby. Sick, but funny.
5 -- asking the doctor how he likes being a doctor (hmmmm, don't really care!)

Not a great week, but I'll go for:

#6, get up earlier


#13, Colbert

#13 by Colbert is hilarious.

14. Just had a baby.


To say their "God" gives them superiority over others in all matters is more to the point.

#2, #9

The gentility of #5 is refreshing.

Most of these are pretty good.
#1, band names
#12, dog's butts

9, 13 and 14.

After looking at this, 'Dog's Butts' is a pretty good band name...

10. the raven's text.
12. Dogs sniffing.
14. cannibals' dinner bill.

Gotta say, I was pretty surprised to see MrJM go the full Blackford on Ricky Gervais. Yeah, the conflict in Israel is simply about land. And the reasons that Jews have been persecuted for millennia have nothing to do with religion, either, I suppose.

8, Chip/cracker distinction is just silly.
13. "Foreigners need not apply" makes a good point.

Brian, religious affiliation, yes. But are they killing each other over a fight about God? No. The butcher who runs Syria isn't slaughtering his people out of religious zeal; it's all about power. And I didn't say absolutely. Jakash, no it is not simply about land. But Gervais's joke is predicated on the idea that only people enmeshed in fights over God and religion engage in such violence. These wars hardly differ from numerous secular and tribal clashes; religion is more a pretext and delineator than the heart of the dispute. Unless you would like to define the theological dispute going on in Syria.

I believe that Mr. Gervais's tweet grossly overstated the role of religious belief in wars by implying its »primacy«.* To argue that I'm wrong because religious belief plays »some« role in those conflicts is (either due to a lack of clarity on my part or) a straw-man argument.

-- MrJM

* I presume that Mr. Gervais is implying that religious belief is the primary motivator of current conflicts, because if he isn't little resembling a joke would remain of his tweet.

#9 Tweet of God
#13 Colbert
#14 cannibals

And I believe that his tweet was funny, in a simplistic way, and that you gentlemen are over-analyzing it. Hence my reference to Tom B. I am shocked, Shocked! that he's overstated his case in a tweet! ; ) (Please note that I didn't find it clever or funny enough to vote for, though!)

Before I get started on dissections this week, Eric, the reason why I don't have any fine lines of my own is because (a) I was unclear about the assignment: do I write my own lines or get them from other people? (b) It was a busy week with preparing for a presentation here for a math camp and (c) the dog ate my homework. I hope it's OK if I proceed with your set. After all, along with the written stories on porn sites, these criticisms (as they say) are "for entertainment purposes only."

OK, on to this week's set:

1. Eventually it will, because there are only a finite number of words in the English language, so there are only a finite number of six-word band names.

2. As if atheists killing atheists for other reasons or atheists killing religious people (China, Russia, Germany) is OK. Nice try Ricky. By the way, I guess going from the Golden Globes to Audi commercials is a step up, right?

3. Had to read it twice, and then ha-ha. The first time I was wondering how you could ever determine God's gender, or even if you'd want to.

4. Not "you", just your toe. Precision!

5. Hardy-har-har. Weak. How about "ask your doctor how he feels about the Affordable Care Act."? Some people might not like the answer.

6. Yeah, right Mark. Because our schedule should revolve around YOU, you little worm.

7. Conan is wrong. The deep-fried Twinkie beats'em both.

8. Sigh. Grocery stores were not invented, they evolved from marketplaces. And the line is wrong. Sometimes chips and crackers are in the same aisle, and some grocery stores don't have six aisles.

9. Replace "religions" with "belief systems" and the line is just as true. Also, God needs a shave.

10. Meh. Most people under 25 have never even heard of Poe.

11. Okay, whatever. Put jazz in the category of soccer, baseball, liberal thought, women and tensor products as things I just don't get.

12. Because it's not about the smell, it's about invading each other's space.

13. I know the obvious point that Colbert and some people here are making: that everyone who is for securing our border is racist hates foreigners. I'm sure this line will win the week. Even though it's not true. Are you racist for locking your doors at night?

14. Mr. Cannibal: it wasn't the baby, it was the extra steak sauce.

ZORN REPLY -- OK, you get a one-week math camp reprieve. I thought I was clear...one liners or jokes, by anyone, that YOU think are funny.

Anybody who thinks the cannibal line is funny should read Cormac McCarthy's "The Road."

Great batch this time. I'll go with #2 (atheists) and #7 (Twinkies).

Really dark, morbid humor this week.
1. Band Name

2 -- atheists not fighting
10 -- texting raven
11 -- fingers you don't wiggle (although, shouldn't it be, "It's about the space BETWEEN the fingers?).

ZORN REPLY -- No, because it's a riff on the old saying that jazz (music) is about the notes you DON'T play.

#9 Religious truth.

Reminds me of a conversation I had with an evangelical Christian some years ago.

Told him I was a religion editor at an encyclopedia some years ago, and I was good at my job because I felt all religions had equal claim to the truth.

Knowing me, he chuckled, replied, "right, zero"

I replied you can do the math..

By the way, my predecessor at the job was a Methodist lay minister, and all his articles on the various religions were filtered through his Methodist Christian perspective. To write encyclopedia articles one should not bring perspectives into the equation.

#12 - Dog's great sense of smell, but fondness for being close

Of course, liked Professor Blackford's analysis

So, Eric, if we have nominations for one-liners, should we email them to you? I saw a great tweet the other day I thought you should include. ...As far as that goes, that's where I saw the "band name" line -- on Twitter.

ZORN REPLY -- Yes, please, do email me nominations (plus links to the source).

I know this is not the forum, but I have no other at the moment! Why no posts on the news of the day -- the two OCare decisions (I can't remember if Halbig is the one Greg J. has been talking about or not), another shooting down of planes, Mayor Daley getting a pass from testifying because he's too sick ... etc. I can't think of anything else at the moment but I think there were a few other things as well.

Have to start dinner. I am, after all, the Captain of the house.

Oh, but Beth, you just don't understand! Which of these unfunny lines is the least unfunny is so much more important!

ZORN REPLY -- OK, DaveB, I'm throwing the Blackford Challenge at you as well...give us a few quotes or fine lines or jokes or quips that YOU think are funny. No need to limit yourself to just the past week (but no fair using previous fine lines). And then I'll be glad to tell you that they're not funny....I might even explain why, instead of just snorting at them.

#13 Huddled Masses
#14 Cannibals


Did you learn anything this past weekend from the lecture you had from Mr. Superiority?

Barry3 -- Well, so far I haven't expressed any opinions! I'm just waiting to hear what others say ... Besides, other people were very nice.

Band Name and Jazz Hands are the two that made me laugh.

#2 Atheists & #12 Dogs from N dG Tyson

--FWIW: I'm currently watching the first series of Ricky Gervais's HBO series "Extras" and it is hilarious.

-- MrJM

Chastened that I didn't get the Jazz Hands joke till EZ explained it. Now that I do, it gets a vote from me.

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