The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Janice Dawley:

Vera Nazarian: Not really contradiction here, you missed a transitional step in what I said

snip

"And assuming that we have no final information on the universal order (or lack of), then the only *responsible* way is to assume that there *may* be an order. Why? Because the tiniest possibility of the existence of such an order imposes upon all of us living sentient beings an assumption that destruction of an order is wrong and ultimately self-destructive."

I didn't miss the transition. It just didn't answer my question of how you decided what the order is. From your comments it seems that to you the definition of the word "order" includes some kind of "no killing" or "no destruction" clause. To most people that's not part of the word's meaning. In fact, as far as the "natural order" that most of us observe, it's the opposite. For as long as there's been life, there's been predation and death, and it's hard to see how it could be any other way.

Which is not in any way to impugn vegetarianism. (I aspire to be one, but have only achieved a "no mammals" diet so far.) But when you talk about an "order" underlying the entire universe that you are somehow upholding by not killing anything, I have to wonder how you came up with this metaphysics, because it is in no way self-evident in the world I see.

And apart from that, what do you see as the desired goal? What if every creature on this earth stopped killing other creatures? Where would we be then? Would it be a good thing? I am truly curious.

Vera Nazarian wrote: Can anyone here really deny this? That we simply don't know?

And: To go against an order is to go against ourselves, because we are a part of this very order (if it exists).

Vera -- Can you explain the apparent contradiction in your thought process here? You say no one can know if there's an order to existence, but you make an argument based on the existence of such an order. How did you come to believe in this order, and how do you know what it consists of if you have discounted observation as a means of understanding it?

Jane wrote: I accomodate every vegetarian (including my college granddaughter) who graces our house. I have never had my meat/fowl/fish preferences accomodated in a vegetarian's house.

Just a side point. But, I think, interesting.

Well, most meat-eating cooks also have a large repertoire of vegetable and carb-only dishes they can make. They might consider most of them "side dishes", but the range is there. The reverse is less likely to be true.

For an alternate take on the existence of Santa Claus, see this article cribbed from Spy Magazine.

Re: the relative merit of Buffy seasons. I think season 3 was the most coherent, well-written of them all, but all have standout episodes. Even season 7, which I thought really suffered from creative burnout on the part of the writers and main cast. (Might explain why my favorite episode of that season starred the newish character Andrew the geek.)

Grr. Argh.

Stefan Jones wrote: If you want the subtleties . . . "...read the book and stop griping about the movie." . . . because that's not what film is for.

Subtlety may not be Jackson's forte, but quite a number of films by other directors have been noted for this quality. I think it's a perfectly valid criticism of the LotR films =as films= that they are at times heavy-handed and coarse. We who have read the books know that they can't be blamed for this (at least most of the time), and occasionally feel compelled to cite examples. By this it shouldn't be assumed that people with complaints are ignorant of What Makes a Good Movie. We might just disagree with you.

Graydon wrote: Explicit mention isn't required, but, in the structure of the tale in the text, the moment when that banner breaks from the bow of the first ship of the corsairs IS the return of the king, the Heir of Elendil returned from the sea as his longfather of old came to Middle Earth on the wings of the storm.

Oh dear. I'm afraid this isn't what happens at all. I hope that's not saying too much.

Incidentally, I was baffled at this alteration, as well as the handling of the palantir at Orthanc. These scenes (Wormtongue throwing the palantir off the balcony and Aragorn arriving with the black ships) seem so cinematically apt in the text that I cannot understand why Jackson didn't make full use of them. If time constraints were the problem, I would have recommended ditching the largely invented Sam/Gollum conflict and showing a lot less mutant elephant.

I should add after all these gripes that I actually liked the movie the best of the three. I just haven't loved any of them. Part of that is my attachment to the source text, but an equal part is a mismatch of my aesthetics with Jackson's. I'm pretty sure that even if I had never read LotR I would have had problems with the movies.

Graydon, I noticed no one has answered your question yet. Yes, the banner was there, but not explicitly mentioned. The moment when Aragorn noticed it (and the moments immediately following) were some of more ridiculous in the movie for me.

I've decided that one of Jackson's biggest flaws as a director is his refusal to allow any (OK, most) of his characters to keep their dignity.

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