Righteous Indignation

OK. Jerry Seinfeld is a cold, unfeeling bastard who should be killed. No, wait. He's a comedic genius who should be idolized by netreaders.

The sound and fury accompanying this spot is getting tiresome.

Quite possibly, they meant to mock the woman in the wheelchair. If so, big deal. They are paid to make people laugh, and for whatever reason, people (some of us) laughed at the wheelchair down the hill spot.

We seem to have lost the collective ability to laugh at ourselves, esp. at fiction about ourselves.

Sure, I laughed at the lady flying down the hill in the chair. I feel no guilt at all. It's a TV show. If I saw a chair-bound person on my way home tonight who was barrelling down what passes for hills in Champaign, I'd do what I could to help stop the chair.

Contrary to what some may think, Scott comes to mind simply for the volume of postings on the subject, it is possible to laugh at fictional characters without being a brutal fiend. Let's all retune our senses of humor and be a little less touchy.

Waiting for Jerry's show about short fat graduate students, Jim

In article [email] (James Lloyd Hill) writes:

i did, ....and i'll do it again! you can't stop me! ...there(!), i'm laughing now!

thank you.

AHA! BUT FIRST HIS SHOW ABOUT SHORT, PERKY, JEWISH GIRLS:

possible titles:

			THE GOLDENE GHETTO
			QUEEN ESTER WHOLESALE HIGH SCHOOL
			  (now that the 90210 bunch has finally
			    graduated straight into 30-something)
			SHAINE, QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE
			  (a frum girl finds adventure and
			   mishaps in the teaming metropolis)

ciao bellos!

joHannA

You said it, not me...

Perhaps by those who wear lightning bolts on their lapels.

So is encountering ***holes all the time.

I bet those who laughed would have really liked to have been in Europe about, oh, 60 years ago....

I still have a sense of humor. I laughed at the car getting trashed, but my finger sure got a workout saluting the TV at every wheelchair joke they made.

Now, I would have laughed more if the car got Molotoved or if someone went after Seinfeld and friends with some rope....

But then you all would have upset, and God forbid the pedestrians be offended by a TV show.

What color shirt is that hanging in your closet? Get those jackboots polished really good.....

Backpedalling I see.

My sense of humor is just fine... although my condition has affected it a bit.

But I must learn that the world doesn't really give a damn about what I think.

yeah right.

Simon 'The future is a distant memory'

Who is it that once wrote, "The fourth step in a Usenet flame war is to compare your opponent to the Nazis?"

Would you have laughed at the car getting trashed if you had a son or daughter who'd just been killed by a drunk driver? EVERYTHING is going to tick off SOMEBODY. Everyone's buttons get pushed occasionally, and you're not going to get a special exemption from reality just because you happen to be in a wheelchair.

That same line could be very easily directed at you, considering your "SENSITIVITY UBER ALLES" attitude.

The world does TOO give a damn what you think. If nobody gave a damn, nobody would even have replied to your first message. A lot of us simply *disagree*. There's a difference.

--Aaron

[email] (Aaron Dickey) writes:

Ah, to see that logic and reason still exist...

deb

Sorry, I'm testing and new at this...please excuse my excusing myself.

I hope that same logic and reason will enable people here to forgive me for my postings.

Simon

I said I was sorry.... Like a nuclear missile against a bb gun attack

I was wrong. I never meant it.

I never wanted any exceptions, I just thought at the time that no one seemed concerned as to why I might have been upset by the episode. I got carried away and I am now trying really hard to somehow fix this.

Why am I seeing flames after I had posted the apology? I am totally honest when I say I am sorry to everyone in this newsgroup.

I see your point- I've explained that I was upset when I posted that.

But at least try to understand why I might have been upset about it.

Simon

In article , [email] (Simon E. Booth) writes:

You're not really...I was probably one of the first to reply to your original messages. Unfortunately, my site has a wildly unreliable newsfeed, and it probably took a good 4-5 days just for my posts to reach the outside world.

--Aaron

One interesting quirk about the way newsgroup articles propagate is that you might see messages from Austrailia before you see a message (on the same thread) from a domestic site, even though they might have been posted on the same day. I for example, on the afternoon from a user in Canada (Saskatoon). Usually a message gets to a destination in a few minutes.

I've even gotten 'undeliverable mail' messages in regards to a messages sent out several days previously.

off topic-

anyway, that's why I was apologizimg so much. I was concerned that someone would see the initial flames from a week ago and restart the flameflest. I 2 weeks or more before.

First prize though goes to the guy who flamed me this past February on talk.abortion for something I posted last October! :-)

anyway- I'm hoping there's not a major lag this time. I don't want to log in a month from now having to re-apologize! :-)

now back to alt.tv.seinfeld

Simon 'The future is a distant memory'

[email] (Simon E. Booth) writes:

Tell me about it, Simon.

Wow, so do you suppose Jerry SEINFELD, et al would have like to have been there as well? That was THE most OFFENSIVE thing you have said so far. I am appalled.

You know, as an African-American I *could* interpret that comment as smacking too much of lynching. In fact, i am now *sure* that is how it *should* be interpreted so i will now accept that as the ONLY interpretation and thus criticise and denegrate you.

this negative karma is getting me down.

Right now you probably think I'm the worst of them. I don't blame you if you do think that.

Be appalled. I never really meant it, I just got so upset at what I had seen I wasn't thinking clearly.

But be appalled. There is no place for comments like that (or perhaps even for those who would post such things) on the net.

I don't know how big of an apology would be taken seriously now.

I've lost any hope of having a friendly discussion about why the episode bothered me.

Now there is no way anyone will understand my situation- I have destroyed any chances of that as well.

By all means denegrate, criticize, attack, flame, do whatever it takes.

I will not challenge it. I earned it several times over. No apology will make up for this. My actions were beyond unforgiveable. I think I'm the hypocrite- attacking percieved prejudice by promoting hate.

Flame away. I park here out in the open ready for whatever you think is right to make up for this.

I am truly sorry.

I wanted to help people understand my situation and escalated this flamewar.

I calmed down after I had posted it but it was too late to do anything except to try to apologize.

My apology is for real, but you don't have to believe it.

Simon 'The future is a distant memory'

[email] (Simon E. Booth) rants:

OK, that's it.

I've been watching this debate developing with a mild sense of uneasiness - although I respected Simon's point of view, I felt that he was being just a bit too hot-headed about the situation. If I may offer an analogy - I, personally, wear glasses. If they decided to do a bit on SEINFELD where George drops his glasses and they break and he spends a few minutes stumbling around bumping into things, I would probably laugh at it. Why? Because human beings, by nature, *laugh* at the misfortunes of others if they are presented in a comedic fashion. Now, personally, I *didn't* find the wheelchair bit that funny, *not* because I thought "Oh my gosh, this is a horrible way to portray a disabled person" - since I don't think the bit was meant to portray disabled people in a negative light. I just found it cliched and boring. In fact, I disliked most of the episode in question, especially the scene with the car being totalled - that was just way too over the top and unbelieveable to fit into the usual SEINFELDian view of the world.

Anyway, let me get to the point of my message, which is: Simon, I find your equating of those who found humour in this episode of SEINFELD to Nazis quite offensive. The logic involved in coming to such a conclusion is *totally* beyond me. Are these people saying "Disabled people are inferior and should be wiped off of the face of the earth"? No. They are finding humour in the misfortune of a single human being who happens to be disabled. Yes, that misfortune that befelled her was *related* to her disability, but as my analogy above demonstrates, taking such offense to it is pretty extreme behaviour. As I said, I respect your *opinion*, but the way you've expressed yourself, particularily the thinly veiled Nazi comments, have led me to have very little respect for *you*.

And although I hate to make such assupmtions, I would like the think that Seinfeld himself, being Jewish, would find your analogies even *more* offensive than I do. I'm sure that most of my fellow a.t.s'ers would agree.

Greg

and apologizes later as you might see in the next few days.

I was dead wrong here....and I have explaine that I got carried away.

Another mistake I'm trying to fix.....

But I thought it was it last week. I thought I had cleared this up.

I explained in numerous postings why I was offended, and I have also gone to great lenghts to apologize for it.

I figured you would have seen my apologies by now unless things are really slow on the net.

I understand your point here.

Well, at the time I did think it was only appropriate that the car got trashed, but after a couple of days I realized that perhaps that might have been a bit excessive.

I would say beyond offensive. I don't blame you. And there is no logic in equated people with Nazis.

Please read my other postings about why I was offended. I have explained and re explained and explained it again. My reactions were extreme, I'm not disputing that, but I'd at least like for people to understand why I was upset initially by the episode.

Very little respect? I'd expect respect minus zero in this case.

But please read the other postings I've made about this. I think you'll understand my initial reactions a little better. But please read the other things I've said about this, and take a good

And I agree as well. The other a.t.s'ers do agree with you as well, and all hate-mail can be directed to me- the address is real. I'm not hiding. No place for comments like mine on the net. No place for comments like that on the net.

Please keep in mind that most disabled people are not jerks. I h But I'm trying to end this flamewar. So direct all hate mail to the above address.

Simon 'The future is a distant memory'

Hey man, relax...the net isn't a place to take out our fustrations, nor to post in the heat of anger..but it happens. Apologies are tricky cause they come way after the offending post, and most people will reply immediately to the original, only to read the apology much later.

Don't let these things get you down.

Cheers! (not anymore... hehehe...)

Jay

... Hey Pee Wee, Button your fly!

I just hope I get people to know that it was a huge mistake. Over a week now and the flames are still there.

That's always my problem- mistakes never go away.

good one!

Simon 'The future is a distant memory'