It’s not exactly plagiarism

But it’s hardly indicative of one a brilliant creative mind either. When I read The Sandman in preparation for writing comics, I occasionally had the strange feeling that I’d read it before, and not simply because Gaiman was mining a lot of stories and characters with which I was familiar from ancient mythology. I’ve been on a Tanith Lee kick of late, and it suddenly occurred to me why the Endless, and Delirium in particular, were so familiar:

Delirium: The youngest of the Endless, Delirium appears as a young girl whose form changes the most frequently of any of the Endless, based on the random fluctuations of her temperament. She has wild multicolored hair and eccentric, mismatched clothes. Her only permanent physical characteristic is that one of her eyes is emerald green (usually the right side) and the other pale blue with silver flecks (usually the left side), but even those sometimes switch between left and right. Her sigil is an abstract, shapeless blob of colors. Her speech is portrayed in standard graphic novel block-caps, characterized by wavy, unpredictable orientation and a multi-colored gradient background. She was once known as Delight, but some traumatic event (of which even Destiny does not know the particulars) caused her to change into her current role. Her sigil as Delight was a flower.

Note that The Sandman ran for 75 issues from January 1989 to March 1996.

The main character of The Sandman is Dream, also known as Morpheus and other names, who is one of the seven Endless. The other Endless are Destiny, Death, Desire, Despair, Delirium (formerly Delight), and Destruction (also known as ‘The Prodigal’). The series is famous for Gaiman’s trademark use of anthropomorphic personification of various metaphysical entities, while also blending mythology and history in its horror setting within the DC Universe.

Now consider this passage from Delirium’s Master, the third of Tanith Lee’s Flat Earth series, which was published in 1981. I’ve actually quoted from it here before; it’s the novel that contains her excellent tale of how the Snake became the Cat and thereby fooled Man.

There were then five Lords of Darkness. Uhlume, Lord Death, was one, whose citadel stood at the Earth’s core, but who came and went in the world at random. Another was Wickedness, in the person of the Prince of Demons, Azhrarn the Beautiful, whose city of Druhim Vanashta lay also underground, and who came and went in the world only by night, since demonkind abjured the sun (wisely, for it could burn them to smoke or cinders). The earth was flat, and marvelous, and had room then for such beings. But it is not remembered where a certain third Lord of Darkness made his abode, nor perhaps had he much space for private life, for he must be always everywhere.

His name was Chuz, Prince Chuz, and he was this way. To come on him from his right side, he was a handsome man in the splendor of his youth. His hair was a blond mane couthly combed to silk, his eye, being lowered, had long gilded lashes, his lip was chiseled, his tanned skin burnished. On his hand he wore a glove of fine white leather, and on his foot a shoe of the same, and on his tall and slender body the belted robe was rich and purple-dark. “Beauteous noble young man,” said those that came to his right side. But those who approached him from the left side, shrank and hesitated to speak at all. From the left side, Chuz was a male hag on whom age had scratched his boldest signatures, still peculiarly handsome it was true, but gaunt and terrible, a snarling lip, a hollowed cheek, if anything more foul because he was fair. The skin of this man was corpse gray, and the matted hair the shade of drying blood, and his scaly eyelid, being lowered, had lashes of the same color. The left hand lay naked on the damson robe, which this side was tattered and stained, and the left foot poked naked from under it. When Chuz took a step, you saw the sole of that gray-white foot was black, and when he lifted that gray-white hand, the palm was black, and the nails were long and hooked, and red as if painted from a woman’s lacquer-pot. Then again, if Chuz raised his eyes on either side, you saw the balls of them were black, the irises red, the pupils tarnished, like old brass. And if Chuz laughed, which now and then he did, his teeth were made of bronze.

Worst of all, was to come on Chuz from the front and see both aspects of him at once, still worse if then he raised his eyes and opened his mouth. (Though it is believed that all men, at one time or another, had glimpsed Chuz from behind.) And who was Chuz? His other name was Madness.

It’s not plagiarism, but it does tend to lend credence to my opinion that Gaiman is overrated as a writer. He certainly doesn’t compare to the late Ms Lee.

Socialgalactic discourse

@fubear: I have observed that efficient access to the beer cooler is essential enough that masked people will get shoulder to shoulder with their fellow man. The winos still maintain 6’.

@voxday: Of course peasants don’t mind crowding. We civilized people prefer to maintain a civilized – and healthy – distance from the unwashed masses. I generally try to maintain social distancing of at least one kilometer.

Then again 1.5 SD is usually sufficient for all practical social distancing purposes.

Bad news for Biden

In the extremely unlikely event he is ever elected President, Joe Biden will need to avoid visiting The Netherlands:

The Supreme Court of the Netherlands ruled on Tuesday, April 21, that it is lawful for doctors to euthanize patients with severe dementia…. Lower courts had previously ruled that a doctor had not acted improperly when he euthanized a 74-year-old woman with advanced dementia, even though the woman had to be repeatedly sedated and physically restrained during the procedure. 

I don’t see Creepy Joe’s dementia as necessarily being a serious impediment to his prospective Presidency, though. Let’s face it, Obama was a better President than most of us expected because he spent most of the time he wasn’t on the golf course stoned and watching ESPN.

If you think the Puppies didn’t win

Think again. We said we’d leave a smoking hole behind and that’s precisely what we did. Only it’s turned out to be a smoking, stinking hole.

Look Upon Their Works… and enjoy a hearty laugh at the incestuous wasteland the once-prestigious Hugo Awards have become.

Best Novel

The City in the Middle of the Night, by Charlie Jane Anders (Tor; Titan)
Gideon the Ninth, by Tamsyn Muir (Tor.com Publishing)
The Light Brigade, by Kameron Hurley (Saga; Angry Robot UK)
A Memory Called Empire, by Arkady Martine (Tor; Tor UK)
Middlegame, by Seanan McGuire (Tor.com Publishing)
The Ten Thousand Doors of January, by Alix E. Harrow (Redhook; Orbit UK)

There is a reason these “best novels” can’t scare up an Amazon rank that’s even within amplified shouting distance of the average pulp mil-SF novel. That’s because the Hugos are nothing but fake praise for pseudo-SF SJWage strung together by fatties, trannies, and peoplx of colorx, then published by Tor.

It doesn’t matter how hard the SJWs try to convince you their SJWage is good, people simply aren’t being fooled anymore.

*The Verge’s Science Fiction and Fantasy Book We’re Looking Forward to in 2019
*Amazon’s Best Books February 2019
*Book Riot’s Most Anticipated Books of 2019
*Kirkus Reviews’s 30 Speculative Fiction Books You Should Read in February 2019
*Bookish’s Winter’s 10 Hottest Sci-Fi & Fantasy Reads
*Bookbub’s Best Science Fiction Books Coming Out in 2019
*YA Books Central’s Buzzworthy Books of Winter 2019

Meanwhile, on Amazon: 3.9 out of 5. #71,483 in Books

It’s a sad love story about a woman in love with a terrible person who treats her terribly. Also it’s on an alien planet where it’s always night in one direction, and always day in the other. But if it’s the setting that intrigued you, this book isn’t for you. This is a clumsy slog of a love story, with some themes about doing good in the world.

Imagine that….

One can’t “ruin” Star Trek

Nor can it “collapse”, as it came into being pre-collapsed from the mind of a proto-SJW who sold it under false pretenses. All one has to know to confirm that an individual’s mind is intrinsically off-balance is to learn that he’s a fan of Star Trek in any iteration:

Star Trek very much embodied what liberal American white males of the 1980s and 1990s thought the future would (or should) look like: secular, sexually liberated, humanistic, meritocratic, equitable, and technological – a man’s world, basically. In this world, religion plays practically no role in public life. Problems are solved with diplomacy instead of violence. Money doesn’t exist, so there is no capitalism, greed, or want. People spend their lives bettering humanity and doing other such noble things like negotiating peace with aliens or exploring the universe in one of Starfleet’s advanced starships, each equipped with a plethora of miraculous technologies. In their leisure time, the crews of these starships visit a holographic room, the holodeck, which can conjure any fantasy into a photorealistic facsimile of the real thing.

Probably the only place in the Western world where this mentality can still be found is California’s Silicon Valley. As in the fictional world of Star Trek, men do most of the work; they advance through meritocracy; and there is something akin to a fraternal culture, irrespective of the prevailing progressive ideology. Silicon Valley is also still largely free of the odious diversity requirements imposed on the rest of society.

That was also once true of Hollywood itself, and it showed in the television they produced — Star Trek, for example. That franchise, spanning hundreds of television hours and a number of theatrical releases, was mostly helmed by men who got their jobs through merit – actors, writers, ship designers, show runners. The main characters of each of the television series were also men. The Original Series (TOS) featured a lead triangle of male actors – Kelley, Shatner, and Nemoy. The sequel, The Next Generation (TNG), featured mostly male characters, certainly all the most popular ones. These characters often featured something educated men are interested in: the second officer is an android; the chief engineer has a technology-supplemented vision; the executive officer is a ladies man and a master strategist who plays games of skill underpinned by mathematical rules; the captain is a wise and cultured authority figure who reads Shakespeare; the security chief is a noble warrior from an alien species whose culture is based around rules of honor.

Meritocracy in Silicon Valley? Silicon Valley is “largely free” of diversity requirements?

This guy is still stuck in 1985. When Star Trek was differently, but equally awful.

Alt★Hero: Meet the Initiative

Episode 3: Meet the Initiative is now live on Webtoons. Don’t forget to subscribe! As with Chuck Dixon’s Avalon, it’s already making regular appearances in the Canvas Top 30 in the Superhero category.

We’re anticipating adding Tuesday and Thursday webtoons in May, with a brand new respin of what used to be called Hypergamouse on the former and Quantum Mortis appearing on the latter. The Legend is also developing an entirely new comic specifically for the online platform.

The nature of the conflict

The Saker always has interesting and informative analyses, but the one thing he simply can’t seem to grasp is the nature of the struggle between Team Trump and the Deep State. I find this strange, since he clearly grasps the idea that there is no singular and unitary ruling elite in the West, but rather, a class of predatory rivals constantly jockeying for position:

A quick study of history shows that when exploiting elites are doing great, they all faithfully support each other, but when things start to go south, they immediately turn on each other. The best recent example of this phenomenon is the schism in the US ruling elites who, since the election of Trump, have immediately turned on each other and are now viciously fighting like “spiders in a can” (to use a Russian expression). In fact, this is so true that it can even be used as a very reliable diagnostic tool: when your enemies are all united, then they are probably confident in their victory, but as soon as they turn on each other, you *know* that things are looking very bad for your opponents. Likewise, we now see how southern Europeans are getting really angry with their northern “EU allies” (Macron seems to be falling in line behind Trump even if he uses a more careful and diplomatic language). Finally, the way the US CIA has one foreign policy, the Pentagon another and Foggy Bottom one of its own (even if limited to sanctions and finger-pointing) tells you pretty much all you need to know to see how deep the systemic crisis of the Empire has become.

My suspicion is that since the Saker is not a religious man, he does not understand the nature of the vicious fighting is quite literally a battle between good and evil, between those who worship the Christian God the Father and those who serve the god of this world.

It’s a war between those who would protect children and those who prey upon them. Which is why we can be confident that the Saker’s narrow focus on traditional foreign policy tends to lead him astray; President Trump is the only reason that the USA is not already at war with Russia, China, and Iran.

Why “calling the police” doesn’t work

The police, like every other elite institution in the United States, have been corrupted by the Prometheans:

Stow Police Chief Ralph Marino has been relieved of his duties after a meeting with state police over the weekend, according to authorities. As NBC10 Boston reports, Marino met with Massachusetts State Police representatives Saturday at the Stow police department, the town said. After the meeting, he put himself on indefinite administrative leave and named Sgt. Darren Thraen as acting chief.

In a statement, the town said it would cooperate fully in “any investigation of Chief Marino or any other matters.

“There is no reason to believe that the activities being investigated involve or concern the operations of the Stow Police Department,” the statement said.

As the video shows, the ‘Catch a Predator’ style format of the group found the chief waiting outside of a local establishment. The chief had allegedly been exchanging text messages with the undercover vigilantes in the Predator Poachers group, who he thought was a 14-year-old boy.

The chief’s messages were gruesome in nature and illustrated his level of depravity. The chief knew that the person he was communicating with was a child. Despite the fact that he knew the person on the other end of the text was a child, the chief described his sexual desires to him, asked the child about the size of his genitals, and arranged to meet the child in a place “out of the way.”

The video starts when the chief is waiting to meet the boy, ‘somewhere out of the way.’ In the video, the man confronts Marino and attempts to identify him as ‘Mark.” Marino looks shocked and the man filming accuses the chief of trying to meet a 14-year-old boy for sex.

Predator Poachers knew that Marino was their man, as he had asked the chief to send a picture of himself to the 14-year-old boy, and the chief complied. The chief appears to be frantically scrolling through his phone in an apparent attempt to delete the conversation with the pretend boy. However, as he reportedly attempts to delete the texts, the man filming tells him that he has them all in screen shots already.

Many of the police chiefs in the USA are similarly corrupted. If you ever wondered why the Hollywood sickos never face any consequences for their crimes, it’s because all of the relevant police departments and district attorney positions for the relevant jurisdictions are similarly controlled.

And this is why so many child abuse and other criminal complaints go nowhere. There is no legitimate police or justice system in the USA. They are there to serve globopedo, not the public. Notice that the police chief hasn’t even been arrested yet, he’s merely on “administrative leave”. The only reason he might not get away with it is because the group that exposed him is private and the story has gone national.

Labour Party spied upon its members

And, allegedly, did so by violating the EU’s General Data Privacy Regulations in connivance with Twitter and Facebook:

A leaked internal Labour Party report has hit the headlines because of lurid statements allegedly made by staff. What has been missed however, receiving barely any coverage, is an apparent admission that, using a secret deal with Facebook and Twitter, the Labour Party has been running automated surveillance on its own members. If true, this is manifestly unlawful – each member affected would almost certainly have a valid claim in damages under Data Protection legislation.

In the furore about the leaked Labour report, many commentators have focused on the supposedly racist, sexist, and / or ableist remarks. There is also the apparent dishonest treacherous plotting. It is important to remember of course that this report was produced by a bitterly infighting party and its contents are disputed. Former staff who were criticised claim that accusations about their conduct were never put to them.

Labour had automated software that reconciled its privileged access to Twitter and Facebook data with their membership database to identify and monitor member accounts.

It is worth turning to the Data Protection Principles set out in the Data Protection Act 1998, which was in force at the time (replaced by the EU General Data Protection Regulation and Data Protection Act 2018 in May 2018). The principles were set out in section 4 (archive) and Schedule 1 (archive).

Of especial relevance, these principles included processing data, “fairly”, holding data that was “not excessive”. Fairness usually means notifying members of the way their data will be used. A quick glance at Labour’s current terms on its, ‘Join’ page does say that email addresses will be used to contact members. It says nothing about consenting to Orwellian real time monitoring for wrongthink.

Furthermore, on the topic of fairness, it is alleged that the Governance and Legal Unit deliberately hid aspects of the project from the Labour Party’s supreme body, the NEC. It is alleged that Sam Matthews, a Compliance Officer, stated – “we don’t want the NEC to have much of an idea how many there are to review (we’re worried they’ll get scared)”.

Volunteers were used to review the data produced by the automated scan, including 10 Labour Students. Two were from pro-remain group, “Britain Stronger in Europe”. The program would scan for juxtapositions of wrong or abusive terms and the Twitter handles of Labour MPs. That is, for tweets likely to be rude tweets directed at Labour MPs. However, it only included a subset of Labour MPs. Some MPs were not included for protection. Whilst the report alleges that this was factional, the reason does not really matter. Personal data linked to members and MPs was apparently processed in a manifestly unfair way, with oversight and disclosure intentionally thwarted….

This is probably the most sinister thing I have ever seen ever out of Big Tech. A major political Party, conspiring with the world’s two largest social media companies, to scan its members feeds and expel or suspend them for “incorrect” views. I would say it should be against the law but of course it is.

It’s long past time for European countries to follow the wise lead of China and Russia by banning systematically lawless technology companies like Twitter and Facebook. And the allegation that Twitter is guilty of violating the GDPR is strongly supported by the fact that it responded almost immediately to the author’s email, in contrast to the smug silence with which it greets most emails from its users.

“Twitter disputes the factual characterizations and legal conclusions in your email and your draft blog post. We reserve all rights and defenses.”

Ooh, they reserved their rights and defenses? So intimidating! As if Twitter wants to get within one thousand miles of a European court investigating their GDPR violations and data security practices. And Twitter is very far from the only US-based tech company to be suspected of serially and systematically violating GDPR as well as other data privacy laws.

But they’ll have their chance to defend their practices, as they have already been reported to the Information Commissioner by the author.