I fail to see how the depiction of the luna dance is offensive to Hawaiians. I wonder if she would be offended by my DVD copy of Lilo & Stitch? Or my wife's Lilo bobblehead.

Some history: Protestants banned hula in the 19th century, so the celebration of this traditional dance seems to me to be empowering versus the censorship of what the Protestants called "heathen". Sure, the introduction of the Portuguese ukulele and other Western aesthetics changed the art form, but it's practiced in both modern and traditional forms today.

You also can't simply demonize the cross-pollination of cultures, because cultural values are always changing. Hawaiian and Polynesian culture went through many changes and forms long before anyone from the West showed up on their shores. The luau itself is partly symbolic of women's rights (as well as lower class rights) in Hawaiian culture, as before the luau, women were not allowed to eat the same food as men, and commoners could not eat with royalty or eat their royal Hawaiian food.

This change didn't happen until the 1800s, so it's likely that this level of equality within the Hawaiian culture is due in part to European contact, including the the King who himself became a Christian -- and yet also encouraged the luna dance.

When cultures make contact with each other, they become entangled. They influenced us and we influenced them -- and they're Americans now so deal with it. I once had pictures of Italian Americans on my wall (Godfather/Scarface posters) and my grandma has a Jew on her crucifix. Neither of us are Italian or Jewish. LOL

As a small sidenote, I think it's slightly risky to indicate, even tongue in cheek, that any of us were involved at the start of a movement that began in the 1800s... even if you're kidding, people might get the wrong idea. Third wave feminism, which coincidentally I think you're more opposed to than the first two waves, did begin (I think?) in the US in the 1980's or 90's, but the overall movement was a well-established global phenomenon at that point. None of us were close to being involved in starting it.

As far as your main point goes, I think it's partly a question of whether you define your own vision by the end goal you want to achieve, or the first problem you want to solve. "Black Lives Matter" is not the end goal, it's the first problem we need to solve on the way to a state free of police murder. Egalitarianism, on the other hand, can be the end goal. It doesn't tell me which problem areas you want to address though.

For some feminists, feminism is the end goal - a woman-centric world would be better, more sane, and more sustainable in their view than any other world. For other feminists, feminism is the first problem area to address, ie that we are literally living in a culture of undeniable male supremacy.

The problem with only defining your end goal is that it can become a little unclear what, if any, action you want to take. "You matter" is certainly fine, but I have no idea what you want to change in society, or if you want to change anything. I matter, you matter, and the Koch brothers matter - but we still have very different ideas about what society should be. In a perfect world I might want to join up under the egalitarian banner, but in the current mess we're in, I tend more towards environmentalism, socialism and feminism - because those are the problem areas I want us to address first.

"Automatically ok"? Not necessarily. But in cases where it makes sense, at a stretch even "plot sense" for the character to be there; yeah, I think that is OK.

The Last Samurai isn't a documentary. But, the general historical justification for Tom Cruise's character being in Japan is pretty much valid. Meiji was interested in the West -- clothes, technology, weapons, and military. He actually did hire Westerners to train his army, although from what I read it sounds like they were German, French, and Italian rather than American. Still, the movie portrays the general situation/setting with at least *decent* broad-strokes historical accuracy. LOADS of movies deviate from even this degree of historical accuracy *way* more without drawing complaints; particularly if their main purpose is entertainment and not education / documentary.


Your hypothetical reverse movie makes some valid criticisms. Even though it would have been historically possible for a Westerner to be in Japan at the time -- even to be involved with training a Western-style military -- it would be unlikely for such a person to get captured, run into a Shogun that speaks English, become a badass (or at least passable) samurai warrior, and end up playing a major role in politics and significantly influencing Emperor Meiji.

My defense against those criticisms is that, for me at least, the movie is entertaining; which is kinda the point. Your "Union Samurai" movie might be equally entertaining and therefore given an equal pass on historical inaccuracies by me.

The whole characters as a "lens through which the audience can appreciate a culture/history outside their own" issue is (slightly) more weighty to me. I don't think those are often necessary, but I don't feel like my intelligence is being insulted if the movie maker feels that they are in order to sell tickets.

I love the Chinese historical novel "Three Kingdoms". A few years ago, John Wu made the movie "Red Cliff", mostly about one particular battle in the historical period portrayed in that book. For the Chinese audience, Wu made the movie in two parts, summed up about four and a half hours long. For the US / West, he made a version trimmed to just over two hours. Why? Because he (and a team of market researchers, I'm sure) knew that very few Westerners would go to see a 4+ hour long movie, entirely in Mandarin Chinese (with subtitles), about a piece of Chinese history from ~1800 years ago that very few in the West have ever heard of or know anything about.

I think the full 4+ hour long movie is great. In my personal top 10 favorite movies of all time, ahead of most Hollywood stuff. But I also understand that there's no way that movie would appeal to all but a tiny, tiny fraction of Western viewers in that full-on 4+ hour format. But, even though I personally think the cut-down 2 hour "US" version is drastically inferior to the full cut, I am glad that he made it because it gives a suitably accurate introduction to the subject matter to more people in the West (just like the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Dynasty Warriors" videogames do), and makes that tiny, tiny fraction of Western people that know anything about it a little less tiny. While being entertaining along the way.

For other movies, sometimes the best way that a filmmaker can sell a movie to an audience that otherwise might not accept it (at least in large enough numbers to justify the production costs) may be to insert one of these "lens" characters for the audience to identify with. I don't think there is inherently anything wrong with that. It might not work for movies that are taking a more hardline approach to historical / contextual accuracy (ie., if Tom Cruise showed up in "Red Cliff" in circa 200AD China), but outside of those situations, if that is what the studio thinks it will take to sell tickets... Cool.

The Last Samurai is, like @ChaosEngine said, a movie primarily about an outsider learning a new culture (and accepting his own past). He serves as that lens character, but actually the hows and whys of his character arc are the main points of interest in the movie, at least to me.

I'm sure that an awesome, historically accurate movie could be made dealing with young Emperor Meiji, Takamori (who Katsumoto seems to be based on in The Last Samurai), and the influence of modernization on Japanese culture at the time. It could be made with no Western "lens" character, no overt influence by any particular individual Westerner, and be entirely in Japanese. But that movie wouldn't be The Last Samurai, wouldn't be attempting to serve the same purpose as The Last Samurai, and very likely wouldn't sell as many tickets (in the US) as The Last Samurai (starring Tom Cruise!) did. That wouldn't make it a worse movie, just an apple instead of an orange.

@Sayja
i can agree that that this is not a zero sum situation.

but i have to disagree that this video,or even the other video i posted has anything to do with 'mens rights".

and i have to take you to task for your specious claim that 'there seem to be a lot of men on the internet that feel threatened by feminism".

while i cannot speak for anybody other than myself,i can quite confidently state that i personally,do not feel threatened by feminism,but i find this "intersective third wave feminism" to be a form of feminism that,until recently i have been wholly unaware of ,to be out of touch and nothing that resembles the feminism i grew up with.

and i think that distinctions differentiating the two forms of feminism extremely important.

equality,fairness and justice are noble ideals to fight for and classic feminism did just that.it took amazing courage for those women to stand up and fight for issues regarding women.
see:suffragist movement of the 1800's.

or the bra-burners of the 60's fighting for their sexual rights and rejecting traditional social norms.that they owned their bodies and therefore.their future.

even the proud women of the 70's 80's and 90's who brought to light the casual nature of our society in regards to womens sexuality and heightened rape awareness.

what i find most disturbing,and i am struggling to understand (and maybe you can help me in that regard) is how the feminist movement which has taken courage and determination,addressing real and actual womens issues,has been perverted into this weird,perpetual victimhood decrying the "oppressive patriarchy".

because this new feminism is threatening and is garnering actual real life consequences.
see: stephanie guthrie vs greg elliot
see:the duke lacrosse players

cases where you don't actually have to BE harassed,you just have to "FEEL" as if you are being harassed.

or where you can accuse three boys of rape,get the coach fired and ruin three boys lives,and when it is revealed to all be a fabrication?

the accuser walks away with zero consequences.

so i find it delicious irony when some will defend these "third wave' feminists and state EMPHATICALLY,that words have consequences and that these men SHOULD pay a price for their words.

yet the accusers rarely,if ever,pay for THEIR words.no consequences for THEIR misrepresentation.they just falsely accused.which had real world consequences.

hypocrisy much?

and where was this "oppressive patriarchy" swooping in to protect these men?

can you explain how that is morally,or intellectually consistent?
because it appears to me to be pretty damn hypocritical.

so this woman disagrees with the current trend of feminism.
that is her right and she explains why she disagrees.
does this mean she deserves the death threats and threats of physical violence from these feminists?

so if you could explain to me this "third wave feminism" i would really appreciate it my friend,because i dont get it and it is a real break from the philosophical feminism that have grown accustomed.

I really wish he hadn't heated it to 1800 degrees.

I can just picture the truther morons saying "aha! so the government added something to the jet fuel to make it burn hotter!"

Why not just heat it to 1500 and show what happens then (i.e. not quite as malleable, but still more than enough to bend under... oh, I dunno, about 45000 tonnes of tower sitting on top of it)?

I've been reading these news reports closely.

I am afraid that the people resigning aren't "core" Mormons, with temple recommends. I am afraid they are people who have already drifted away from the church and now they are making a political statement that isn't going to make a difference to the church leadership.

One person was quoted, in another news report I read, that they hadn't gone to church in 17 years and they were resigning today.

Having said that -- I am 100% convinced that the Mormon Church will eventually allow gay people full membership. Because, even if few of these resigning are "core" members of the church, more and more gay kids are coming out of the closet. And as they become more visible, as they are more and more accepted as human beings "made in God's image", it will be harder and harder for parents' to choose their church over their children.

And there is a mechanism for change in the church -- hence full membership for blacks when it became impossible to continue the overt 1800's racism of the originators.

It's coming for the Mormons. When loads more people quit and take their 10% tithing with them... well, the Mormons are excellent business people. They aren't going to cut themselves off from their revenue stream.

I say it will be within 30 years. Maybe even sooner.

It's a friendly sparring match. Did you think he was going to crush his head or something?

I've no doubt that McGregor could beat people a lot bigger than him, but there's a limit.

McGregor is 1.75 m and 66 kg (that's 5' 9 and 145 lb for the people still living in the 1800s), and Björnsson is 2.06 m and 190 kg (6' 9, 420 lb). He's nearly 3 times his size!

Except the 19th century is the 1800's.

I'm overweight, had a heart attack 9 years ago when I was 30. I'm on low sodium diet, have 2 cordis brand stints in my chest. Grade 1 diastolic dysfunction from a little scar tissue on left ventricle.

I had severe depression and the heart attack at 30 messed my head up fierce in my thinking. First off I've never had a physical before then and I've never been sick. When my parents caught flus and I didn't they had me tested and I was a 1 in 10 or 100 thousand I forget that are immune to flu. Once a year I donate blood here in Ga that is sent to Emory in Atlanta I get paid $350 for my blood once a year.

But back to heart attack since I never had physical due to never sick I knew I was not eating healthy and used to smoke and nicotine is a vascular constrictor. It triggered the attack and was my last cigarette. It scared the addiction out of me and never had withdrawals.

But my severe mental depression although obese I became scared to eat, I went on starvation diet. I'd drink water but no food at all.

After 5th day I was so weak I couldn't move. Later I realized it takes a lot of calories to move my fatass. But I had a new danger that almost triggered cardiac arrest.

I live alone and was able to crawl to phone and call 911. They first thought it was another heart attack but heart was slowed but no problems. They did blood test and took 7 vials. About 6 hours later was the embarrassment.

Doctor came in, along with psychiatrist, nutritionist, and another counselor. I was hypokalemic. Which means potassium was dangerously low almost fatally low. Which was red flag for usually the stereotypical teenage girl with anorexia.

Took 2 IV bags of riggers lactate, shot of potassium, a little amphetamine to boost blood pressure up to normal and 24 hour observation on regular saline IV.

I still have severe depression due to weight. I have degenerative disc disease in my back so I can't get around very good. My diet is set at 1800 calories yet my I only lose 1 to 2 pounds a month. Extensive testing has shown my metabolism has come to a stop. So even though I eat very little calories and low sodium protein diet with barely any carbs with no metabolism the body only stores it as fat because at zero metabolism the body thinks it has to store instead of burn thinking its starving but its not.

But my cardiologist and general doc are trying an extremely dangerous and risky treatment to try and JumpStart my metabolism. I have to record my blood pressure hourly and go in once a week for ekg and blood enzyme test but they are using a drug not made for this as "off label" use and you aren't supposed to even use it with heart disease but that's the strict monitoring by both my doctors. The controversy is they are using adderall to force my metabolism up. Your body is forced to burn through energy stored, and the idea is once my metabolism kicks back in it should stay up on its own.

Tests look promising its my second week on it and I was averaging 1-2 sometimes 3 pound loss in one month. Now since the low dose adderall trial I lost 5 pounds in 1 week!!!

And that little victory has done wonders for my severe depression. I've actually got hope.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

I feel like Soylent might be one of those unpopular ideas like the automobile - (why would you want to get in one of those infernal, noisy contraptions) - that might have a bright future - mainly because of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population#/media/File:World-Population-1800-2100.svg

The technique to making true Damascus steel was lost in the mid 1800s. The technique and composition to Greek Fire was lost in the 13th century or 19th, depending on whose stories you want to believe.

We were well on our way to losing the schematics and information on our original Apollo and Gemini space programs until they started trying to sort and salvage that data a few years ago. The problem is that when we replace something old with a better technology or limit the knowledge of a technique to a few people, we rapidly lose the methodology of 'how' to do the technique.

In the case of proper war and hunting archery, when guns became more common and easier to use, people gravitated to them because they were MUCH easier to learn than archery. Archery required specific training for war and for survival it was from the time you could hold a bow. Anyone could learn to use a gun quickly, so people just....forgot how to properly use bows. Probably as soon as the remaining archers died out.

It's not so much racism as xenophobia. The Russians might be white, but during the cold war, they may as well have been Martians.

And no, I don't believe Americans support drone strikes because the "get" to kill brown people. It's simply that they don't care as much about them.

You're deluding yourself if you think otherwise. It goes way beyond terrorism. And it's not even a US issue either.

Look at other tragedies, natural disasters, etc.

Katrina killed 1800 people. Undoubtedly a significant event. The 2004 tsunami killed nearly a quarter of a million people, but which one got more media coverage in the developed world?

So, once again, answer the question. Would you have been ok with the British government drone striking Ireland in the 80s?

*Walks up and down 1800 block, 73rd Ave NE, Medina, Washington*

Excuse me sir, can you spare $39,999 for some coffee?

To say increased wealth doesn't come from exploitation because there's always been exploitation is fucking stupid.

In the 1800s people just became better at exploiting labourers. You could call that innovation, I guess.. if you are a callous bitch.