Revisiting, "We are very sorry if this offended anyone," or: Don't get caught.

So since I've written my post on "Sorry if" statements it has come to light that the asshole Adam Orth has resigned which in this kind of situation usually means he was fired but neither side wants to go through the hoopla of actual firing.

(Though, actually, Mircosoft is keeping with their I SAID GOOD DAY SIR! stance and hasn't commented beyond confirming he's gone, so all we know officially is that he's no longer with Microsoft.  Perhaps he was fired outright.)

That is not a bad step to take, as evidenced by Orth's epithet: asshole.  If you're a company you don't want the asshole Adam Orth to become your public face, which is probably part of the reason why when he was at Microsoft his job didn't include public relations.

But Orth is now a random unemployed person, Microsoft is still an important company with global reach.  So what Orth said and the positions he holds don't matter very much anymore.  What Microsoft said and the positions they hold do matter, quite a lot.

So I'd like to revisit the heart of what they said: "We are very sorry if this offended anyone".

As noted, I've already written an entire post on "sorry if" statements.  The short version is that absent the bare sophistry of vacuous statements that don't actually mean anything, "sorry if" statements are always lies.  Being sorry isn't like being wrong where you can be wrong without knowing it.  If you don't know whether or not you're sorry, you're not sorry.  There's nothing conditional about it.  Additional information may change whether you are sorry in the future, but in the present tense you are not sorry.

So if someone says, "We're sorry if..." what they mean is that they're not sorry.  It's not even hidden and does not require esoteric knowledge to work that out.  All you need to know is the English language and the concept of being sorry.

So when Microsoft released that statement they were saying in no uncertain terms that they weren't sorry.

But I want to look at the part after the "if".  Pretend that the first part isn't bullshit and thus the part after the if does determine whether or not they feel sorry.

Now I've already done this in the previous post, in the footnote that took up about half of the post, so be prepared for some repetition here.

"if ... anyone" implies that they know of no one, whom they count as someone, who was.  They did know of people who were offended, the "if ... anyone" construction just means that they didn't count them as people.  That's really, stunningly, nasty.  but let's not dwell on that.

They want us to believe that they are sorry if anyone was what?

This matters because it gets to the very heart of Mircosoft's values as a company.  Remember that unlike Orth's statements this isn't someone with no standing to speak on behalf of the the company talking out their ass.  This is an official statement from Microsoft representative of the company's views, thoughts, and values.

What does it take to make Microsoft sorry.  What cuts against what Microsoft believes in enough for them to admit, "Yup, that's fucked up and we feel bad about it"?

Is it what Orth said?  No.  The statement was not, "We are very sorry if this was said by anyone working for us."  What Orth said doesn't make them sorry.  Nor does it offend them.  It's interesting that in a statement made to point out that Orth didn't speak for them that they went to such great lengths to say that they didn't mind what he said, but that's getting ahead of myself and also drawing on parts beyond the part of the statement I'm quoting here.

Back on point, what makes Microsoft sorry?  What are their values?

Is it whether or not people are hurt?  No.  The statement was not, "We are very sorry if this hurt anyone."

It is whether anyone took offence.  That's what makes them sorry.  Not harm, not the hurtful statements themselves, just people's reaction to it.  That's the statement.  "We are very sorry if this offended anyone."  If Orth had said the same thing among a group of affluent white supremacists who preferred suburbs to rural areas and thus hadn't offended anyone they wouldn't mind.  That's what the words indicate.

They aren't sorry for Orth's words and actions, they're (allegedly if not actually) sorry that the words and actions were noticed by people who disagreed with them.

That's what it takes to make Microsoft claim they're sorry-if.  Not for something bad to be done by one of their employees, but for someone else to notice that something bad was done by one of their employees.  Someone who would recognize it as something bad.  Someone who would take offence as a result of the offensive action.

Their employees doing offensive things doesn't bother them, their employees getting caught doing offensive things does.

It's the eleventh commandment: Don't get caught.

The message is clear and unmistakable, if Microsoft had found out that Orth did the exact same thing, but had done it in a setting where it didn't offend anyone who knew about it.  Microsoft would not have a problem with it.

It's the Spartan attitude toward stealing (according to Xenophon): stealing is fine, getting caught stealing is bad.  The effect is interesting because the results are the same in theory (people can only be punished when they are caught regardless) and so Orth leaves Microsoft either way.  But because of the attitude behind it the results aren't the same in practice.  Instead of teaching people not to do the thing in question, it teaches them to do it, but better.

Get caught stealing in Sparta according to Xenophon and the message you're left with as a result of the punishment is do a better job next time.  Get caught stealing in pretty much any other place and the message you're left with is, "Don't do that again."  The Spartans are being punished for failing where they should have succeeded, those of other nations are being punished for failing where they should have never tried in the first place.

Where this matters is that since Microsoft's stated position isn't that what Orth did was wrong, but rather that Orth getting caught was wrong, Microsoft has no moral problems with what Orth did, and the message sent to everyone still at Microsoft isn't, "Don't do what Orth did," but instead, "When you do what Orth did, make sure to either do it in a place where the audience is contained and contains only those who would not be offended, or to do it in a way that can't be traced back to us."

Because Microsoft has said, in an official press release, that what bothers them is not doing offensive things, but people getting offended at the offensive things being done.  The problem for Microsoft isn't that their employees contain bigots, but that people noticed their employees included a bigot.

What Microsoft holds most sacred is the eleventh commandment, and the message they've broadcast to the entire world is that they do not mind in the least if their employees do bad things.  They just mind if someone catches their employees doing bad things.

Seriously.  Note who supposedly determines whether or not they're sorry.  Not Orth.  It's not, "We're sorry if Orth..." it's, "We're sorry if anyone," it's the people responding to Orth.  Even if "sorry if" were possible (it isn't) they're saying that what Orth did wouldn't make them sorry, instead the blame for making them feel bad is placed on those responding to what Orth did, those offended by what Orth did.  It might as well read, "Fuck you, Manveer Heir (and like minded people)!!!!" *shakes fist at the sky.*

It's like, "I'm sorry you're angry," instead of, "I'm sorry that I made you angry."  In the first it places the angered person as the one doing something wrong, in the second it places the person making the other person angry as the one doing something wrong.

Microsoft made sure to lay the blame at the feet of the people who were offended, not the one who offended them by saying offensive thing after offensive thing.  This in spite of the fact that they were willing to admit that the offending party's offensive statements were indeed inappropriate.

The problem isn't doing something bad, it's being caught.  The party to blame isn't the one doing bad things, it's whoever noticed he was doing bad things.

Those are Microsoft's values.  That's not me saying that, that's an official release, which probably had multiple drafts and several employees looking over it and parsing every word to make sure that it precisely reflected the company's values.

Prodigal Son Parable, Slacktivite edition

[Skip to the parable, if you want]

Have I mentioned that I don't like the Prodigal Son Parable?  My only real experience with being triggered in my entire life was when during the discussion of it someone accused me of not knowing what a certain type of abuse was like and in so doing managed to bring every single memory I had of suffering, or watching as someone I love suffered, that specific type of abuse right to the surface all at once.

If I've ever been triggered other than that I don't remember, and being triggered is something I don't think I'd forget.  It was during an internet discussion and for days afterward, maybe weeks, I couldn't say anything anywhere on the internet without pushing through a panic attack to do so.  (Not sure if it showed in my comments, I tried to make sure it didn't.)

And that's what I don't like about the parable, not the parable itself which is pretty bare bones, but the discussion of it.  People will project this or that onto it when it's not in the parable.  Now some of this is that life today is not the same as life under Roman rule, some of it is that most of us do not have an encyclopedic knowledge of Jewish feasting customs in the first century CE.  Some of it is that people see something that reminds them of something and so they bring with them an entire trunk full of baggage which they empty out and use to clothe the parable until you can't even recognize it anymore.

For my part, the answer to whether the father was a total asshole or not hinges on knowing something about Jewish feasting customs in that time period that I do not know.  Specifically, while preparations were made for the feast the elder son was left in the field unaware.  Is this because the father just didn't think of him (in which case father=asshole) or because it was considered rude to call someone to a feast before the feast was ready (in which case father=polite.)  I know enough to know that the elder son didn't miss out on the feast for lack of notice because he would have been a key component in starting it, but he did miss out of the pre-feast music and dancing because no one called him back from the fields for those.

Is that snubbing him or waiting until it's ready so he won't have to wait to eat his portion of the fatted calf?  I have no fucking clue.  I don't think most people have a clue.  I think it's a very specific piece of knowledge that most people are unlikely to know.  But what people are likely to do is interpret the parable without having that specific piece of knowledge and pass moral judgement based on that uninformed interpretation.

You don't understand the parable if you don't understand that as paterfamilias (Israel was under Roman rule at the time) the father in the story could have killed either of his sons at any time and for any reason because he owned them and that was the extent to which ownership of your children went at that point in time.  That was the law.  So he could have ordered the prodigal son not to leave, he could have ordered the elder son to come into the party rather than merely plead that he do so.  He could have ordered them to do what he wanted because they were his property under the law.

You don't understand the story if you don't realize that by the end both sons will say something that amounts to either, "I wish you were dead," or, "I wish I could act like you're dead."  The prodigal son does at the beginning when he asks for his inheritance while his father is still alive, the elder son does at the end when he states his desire to have gotten a young goat to rejoice with his friends (which only would happen if he were leading the feast rather than his father, which only would happen if they were treating his father as dead.)

You don't understand the parable if you don't know whether or not it was assholic not to send someone to get the elder son the moment the celebration was decided upon.  As previously noted, I don't.  Thus I cannot honestly claim to fully understand the parable.

You don't understand the parable if you fail to notice that elder son is bullshitting when he talks about what the prodigal son has been doing.  (He doesn't know, the household had given that son up for dead and the son was in a different land.  He assumes buying prostitutes' services and presents that assumption as fact.)

But also you don't understand it if you don't realize it is a parable.  Things need to be placed in context, but there comes a point where you have to look at a parable and say, "Ok, this doesn't appear to be the point, so if I delve into the details of this aspect then I'll miss the point."

You need context.  You need to know the power the father had for him not using that power to be as clear a divergence from the possible as it would be to the listener.  But you don't need to treat it like a historical narrative.  You don't need to know the names of the men in the story, you don't need to know what happened to the father's wife/wives, you don't need to know if either son ever married, you don't need to know what season it took place in or how the prodigal son secured passage home.

It's not that kind of story.

And there's a sort of balancing act between, "You need to know this to understand," and, "That's not important, it's not that kind of a story."  You need to dig deep for context because the story was not meant for you, it was meant for someone who the context would be unstated for, so obvious a fact of life that it need not be brought up, but you need to be wary of digging too deep because in the end the story is just a parable.  Its lack of detail, bare bones style and total inability to explain how the prodigal son was able to get back to his father's place when he decided to make the journey while broke and malnourished in a distant famine stricken land, and the fact no one has names all play into the fact that it's a parable, not a historical narrative.

Anyway, discussions of it can get very charged and it has been my experience that rather than looking at the text people project onto the text.  Which means that discussion of it is usually not fun.  And if you try to bring context so that people can better understand the text, well it seems to have a coinflip's odds of working at best.

An interesting thing is that a lot of people seem to end up writing their own version of it, whether it's a simple rephrasing, or adding in characters and concerns not mentioned there, or whatever.  I am not immune to this.  I attempted to bring the parable into the context and setting of the Slacktivist community

As noted, I don't have all the requisite knowledge to understand the story, and this was written when I had a lot less of the requisite knowledge for understanding.

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[Back to Top]

I always took the prodigal son story to be both a statement that it is never to late to get saved and advice about what (not) to do when someone you don’t like gets saved.

In the second case it is something like this:

You, loyal Slacktivite, are off doing good in the world. You come back to the forum and find that everyone’s celebrating because Tim Lahaye has joined the fold. Tim Fucking Lahaye. You get all pissed off and run off on your own to be pissed off in solitude.

Everyone else is happy that Lahaye won’t be spewing his bad theology any more. They’re happy that he is working to undo the damage that he has done. They’re happy that one more person has decided to do good and stop doing evil. They’re happy because their faith in humanity has been affirmed (because if even he can reform …)

You, on the other hand, are still pissed off. Your rage seethes. You never got this kind of celebration because you never acted badly like him. Maybe if you had created the world’s worst books and tried to make everyone convert to the “Let’s torment the woman trapped in oppressive painful darkness” religion people would think it was a big deal when you came here and started being a nice person. But you didn’t do all that bad stuff, so you never got people going “Wahoo!” all you got was someone saying, “Please don’t kill us with sheep.”

You’ve been good the entire time, and what do you get for it? Nothing. Just time spent in the company of loving people. Not a damned thing. And here Lahaye is getting the fatty calf.

It’s cold where you are, and you can smell the fragrant aromas wafting out of the celebration and hear the sounds of merriment. (Yes, I am playing very lose with the idea of an internet site as a place. I liked The Nameless Mod.) People laugh as Lahaye tells an incredibly embarrassing story about that time his beliefs made him do a really stupid thing (think a good Jackie story.)

You could go over there and join in, you could laugh at Lahaye, but that would require laughing with him because he’s finally laughing at himself. That would require accepting that your presence here is still just as good if someone else, someone lesser than you, has it too. You could join in. You don’t.

It is dark. Your hands are cold, you should be shivering, only your anger keeps you warm. You’re just as pissed off as you were to begin with, if not more so. So you stay alone.

Fred himself comes out to you and says, “Come on. Please cheer up. I’ve always cared about you and you’re always welcome here. We had to celebrate. Tim Lahaye just became a good person, how is that not a good thing? It’s pretty much a miracle.” Except infinitely more eloquent.

And the story ends.
-

There are three places you can be in the story. You can be Lahaye, you can be the slacktivite alone in the cold, or you can be the person having a pi pie while laughing at how stupid Lahaye used to be. If you’re Lahaye then it means there’s always room for redemption, if you’re laughing at Lahaye then everything is good, you’re at a party.

If you’re alone in the cold then who does that really inconvenience? Not Lahaye. It hurts you, it hurts Fred. Neither of you get to enjoy the party. So the question becomes, do you really want to punish yourself rather than enjoy the party with someone you find unworthy?

Or to put it a completely different way, Heaven will really suck if you spend the entire time being pissed off at who they let in and refusing to enjoy yourself because of it. There’s a party going on. Join in and you reward yourself, get tied up in knots with outrage and you punish yourself.

Though I really don’t think it’s about Heaven specifically. It works just as well with a new convert, the joy that a loyal Christian is a loyal Christian is spread out over every day of their time as a Christian because there is no one day that’s different from the rest on which to celebrate. (Though, as someone not a Christan, I’m guessing about that.) The day that someone converts they’d probably get more recognition for converting than the loyal Christian ever did for failing to stray. If the one who never strayed gets all bent out of shape as a result they’ll sabotage their own chances of being happy.

"We are very sorry if..." means, "We're not at all sorry."

The background isn't important because "sorry if" comes up all the damn time, but if anyone is interested [footnote] because it actually takes a lot of words so explaining what brings it up this time in the body would be too much of a distraction.

Sorry is not conditional.  One cannot be in a Schrödinger's state of sorry where they're at once sorry and not sorry until such time as the box is opened and the proposition measured, and the quantum state collapsed.  It does not work that way.

It is possible to not be sorry but then discover that something previously unknown was true and as a result be sorry.  It is possible to be sorry and then discover that the thing with a previously unknown truth value was false and as a result stop being sorry.  That's as close as one can come to "sorry if".

Either you are sorry or your aren't.  There's no if about it.  It isn't conditional.

There are degrees of sorry.  One can have a tiny twinge of sorriness or crushing regret for what has been done or anywhere in the middle, but even though there's a spectrum it is still the case that one is either sorry or they are not.  There's no, "I am sorry if..." or, "We're very sorry if," because whether you are sorry in present tense does not, cannot, depend on factors unknown to you.  Causality does not function in reverse.  Learning in the future that X is true will not make you sorry in the present.  Learning in the future X is false will not make you not-sorry in the present.  And because of that, "I am/We are sorry if X," cannot be true.

Well... technically it can.  Let's say you're sorry.  Then for any proposition X the statement, "I'm sorry if X," will be true because you're sorry regardless of X.  If X is true you're sorry, if X is not true you're sorry, if X does not have a truth value, you're sorry.  The fact that you are sorry means if anything you're sorry because you're already sorry.

Similarly one can make the case that if X is impossible it would be vacuously true to say, "I'm sorry if X."  If you're not sorry then X is still impossible so therefore X is false.  Thus, by taking the contrapositive, if X is true you are sorry.

But these are technicalities that would only come to bear in the lowest forms of sophistry.  "I'm sorry if X," implies (not logical implies but the everyday meaning) that there is a relationship between being sorry and X, something that is not true in the examples where it's actually possible for the statement itself to be true.

This is not to say that sorry can never appear in conditionals, it is possible to completely honestly say, "I will be sorry if X," or, "I would be sorry if X were true," but in the first case one is talking about the future, and in the second it's a contrary to fact.  When used as a straightforward non-sophistic statement, "I'm sorry if X," is a lie.

-

It's a lie that has several benefits.  First off, it doesn't stand out as an obvious lie because there are other areas where you can have the same form, "I am [adjective] if X," and have it be true.  For example, "I am wrong if X," is totally legitimate.  Whether the person is right or wrong is unknown to them at this time, but X would mean they're wrong.  So, "I'm sorry if X," isn't going to get you called out as a liar as fast as some bullshit.

It is also a form that's often used as an informal shorthand for, "I X happens then I will be sorry, but since I already know this fact now, before I know whether or not X will happen, I'm mentioning the potential future sorriness now," which can absolutely be true and thus can be said in good faith.

So already the form of the lie provides you some cover against being called out as a liar.

But no one would need cover for saying the lie if there weren't an upside to saying the lie in the first place.

The first benefit is that it allows you to go through all of the motions of an apology without actually apologizing.  So you don't need to admit any fault or blame or thing to be sorry for, you just go through the motions and say it only applies if something is true, something you either don't know the truth value of, or pretend not to know the truth value of.

That means that whenever in the future someone brings up whatever it is you're not actually sorry for, you can point to the "sorry if" statement as your final word on the matter and since it has all the motions of an actual apology it looks good if given a cursory glance.

The lie gives you the benefits of an apology without an actual apology.

That's always fun.

It also serves to whack the other position but do so in a way that makes them look ungracious if they point out that you're still in attack mode.  "I'm sorry if X," means that X is unknown.  Consider:

"I'm sorry if I hit you in the head with a baseball bat."

The "if" makes it so the assault is brought into question.  Sure, maybe it happened, but maybe it didn't.  Who can say?  Thus the position, "You did hit me in the head with a baseball bat," is undermined by the false apology.  But if the person hit in the head argues the point, showing their stitches, and medical records, and surveillance video and whatnot then to any onlookers that person will seem to be the one being a jerk because: "He just apologized to you and you're keeping the argument alive."

It's a way to get in the last word or force your opponent into a trap.  Either the last word is "if" in which case the truth value of the thing is left unresolved (meaning you either won or tied the argument) or the other side looks like jerks who aren't willing to let things go even after they've been apologized to and the matter should close.  Ungracious jerkheaded bastards.

On top of that if it's of the form, "I'm sorry if anyone was X," it allows you to take a stab not just at the other side's argument, but at the other side as individuals.  At this point you know that someone was X (hurt, offended, hit in the head with a baseball bat, robbed, wrongfully evicted, wrongfully convicted, wrongfully executed, inconvenienced, annoyed) otherwise you wouldn't be apologizing.  So since you know that someone was/some people were, and you're still acting like it's unknown whether anyone was, you're not counting that someone/those people as part of anyone.  You're not counting them as people.  You are denying their personhood.

That's not accidental, by the way.  If someone wanted to be honest and be respectful and not class those they're pretending to apologize to as subhuman non-persons they'd say, "I'm sorry for/to all who were Xed." Making it an if statement is to erase the other people, call into question the Xing, not actually apologize, reap the benefits of apologizing, and make anyone who takes issue with you being a total asshole by making it an if statement look like they're the jerk.

It's the easiest thing in the world to offer an actual apology or to say that you really are sorry.  The non-apology "I'm not really sorry," form of, "I am/we are sorry if..." is a rhetorical trick to make multiple jabs at the opposition, cast basic facts into doubt (to your advantage) and gain the high ground by making any response seem like it's unseasonable instead of illuminating the fact that you're being unreasonable.

So to the exact phrasing used in the title, "We are very sorry if..." means:

1. We're not sorry.
2. We want to muddy the waters by confusing the facts of the case.
3. Because it was an "if [...] anyone" case: those we're supposedly apologizing to don't count as real people.
4. Anyone attempting to point out the sophistic bullshit we just pulled is the unreasonable one, not us.

And that's what the conditional sorry always means with the possible exception of three.

It's a way to look like you're doing the right thing without actually doing it.  It's a way to look like you're apologizing without apologizing.  It's a way to attack your opponents without looking like you're doing it.  It's a way to deny what are usually known facts under the guise of saying you're sorry.  It's a way to position yourself to be defended against the repercussions of any of the shit you just pulled.

It's all about winning at any cost and broadcasts a total lack of remorse to those who stop to listen but seems like an apology who just let it glide on by.  It's a way to be a total asshole while making the casual observer think you're anything but.

It's not about the people who it's supposedly addressed to.  From Thank You For Smoking:

Joey: But you still didn't convince me.
Nick: Because I'm not after you. I'm after them. [Points to nonexistent onlookers.]

It's about the onlooker, the hoi polloi.  The people not paying enough attention to notice that, "I'm sorry if," isn't, "I'm sorry," the people not paying enough attention to notice that the personhood of the people supposedly being apologized to is under attack, the people not paying enough attention to notice that "is" has been replaced with "if" in a rhetorical attempt to call into question everything that made a (fake) apology necessary, the people not paying enough attention to realize that this was all a method of positioning and framing to influence onlookers to see things the way the speaker wants them to see it while at the same time claiming the last word for themselves.

The person who says, "I'm sorry if," doesn't care about the person or group they're addressing, they care about the lurkers.  The people who aren't involved enough in the argument to notice the bullshit on display in an "I'm sorry if" statement, but are involved enough to skim what's been going on.  Because those people can be persuaded without having to actually change your position at all.

Also, on a much more minor note, it's a way to (attempt to) have it both ways.

"I'm sorry if" means that for those who think an apology isn't appropriate they can say that the if is false and therefore there's no sorry feeling.  For those who think there should be an apology they think the if is true, and therefore the subject is sorry.  Behold the power of bullshit.

But the most basic thing is this, "I'm sorry if X," means, "I'm not sorry."  "We are very sorry if X," means, "We're not actually sorry."  Because "sorry" and "if" don't go together that way.  You either are or are not sorry.  There's no conditional.  Whether you will be sorry in the future is of course subject to change, but whether you're sorry now isn't dependent on any conditional.

When someone pulls out the "sorry if" they're lying.

-

[footnote] Microsoft, apparently as part of its efforts to prove they can reach depths similar to the ones Apple has attained, might be considering a certain stupid feature in their next X-Box.

It would be silly to say that we live in a post racial society, but the progress that has been made on racial equality makes it much harder to target non-whites than it previously was.  When legally enforced segregation made it so you could say that, to at least a certain degree, the white people were over here, everyone else was over there, and such it made it easier to target people not like yourself if you were an angry white guy.

Now you have to go for looking at statistics and demographic figures and whatnot.  You have to find what disproportionately affects the non-white population you want to target and then work with that.

Of course, for anyone asking why you're working with that the fact that none of your non-racist stated reasons hold up to scrutiny and that there is an obvious racist reason hanging over the issue like a giant neon sign will quickly become apparent.

So, anyway, Microsoft may or may not have tracked down one of the areas where you can target people by race and used it as a central component in the new X-Box.  Internet access, you see, breaks down along racial lines.  It's not like segregation where you had people neatly sorted on either side of the line, instead it's just a question of percentages.  Target the people on this side of the line and you'll disproportionately be targeting white people.  Target people on the other side of the line and you'll disproportionately be targeting non-white people.  Either way you'll hit members of each group, it's just a question of which group you're aiming at and which group you're accepting as acceptable collateral.

Now anyone can use an X-box provided they get one in the first place and have power.  Maybe they saved up for two years to buy it, maybe it was a gift, maybe they bought it with ease, maybe whatever.  But once they get the X-Box it's completely race neutral.  Is it an X-Box?  Is it plugged in?  If the answer to both of those questions is, "Yes," then whoever can use an X-Box.  It's not very racist.  Sort of the opposite really.

So how to fix this and make it racist?  Well two paragraphs up we noted that internet access breaks down along racial lines, so tie the workings of the X-Box to whether you can connect to the internet and how you connect if you can and you'll make this non-racist object racist.  Make it so, even in single player, it only works if you're online and congratulations, you've managed to make an X-Box something that is disproportionately what it's advertised as for white people and disproportionately a doorstop for non-white people.  Racism achieved.

Microsoft may or may not have done that.  That's just the background.

With the news that Microsoft may have achieved racism where previously they were stuck with colorblindness naturally came questions.

Enter Adam Orth.

Adam Orth is the creative director in good standing of Microsoft Studio.

Adam Orth explained that when it comes to those who might suffer under this racism achieved system, "Those people should get with the times," (this was after pretending that "those people" don't exist.)  When it was pointed out that the people who would suffer under the racism achieved system weren't just those targeted by racism but also everyone who lived in rural areas the response was to ask why on earth he'd ever live in a rural area.

See living in a rural area is always a choice, and furthermore it's always the wrong choice.  And if you make this always wrong choice you shall never again be allowed to play Halo, this I say unto you.  Or something like that.

And other concerns were similarly dismissed.  For example creating strawman arguments in an attempt to make those who disagreed with his position (that "those people" should simply choose to live in an urban center with easy access to the internet and connect to it the way he thinks is right and not make noise) look like idiots, saying, "DEAL WITH IT" on a picture of Obama because nothing is like taking a picture of black man and using it to appropriate him for your side when you're a white guy in favor of policies that disproportionately negatively affect non-white people.

And, finally, he claimed that following pop star related news was more important than the whole thing anyway.

Later, privately, he is said to have reported that he was just "trolling" but since that was private it's difficult to say for sure whether it's true.  It does bring up an interesting question.  If he meant what he said then he is an asshole.  If he didn't mean what he said but was instead trolling then he is an asshole.  Does it really matter if he meant what he said?

Anyway Microsoft commented on the whole thing.  At this point there were of course two issues:
1 Microsoft may or may not be integrating as feature into their next X-Box that would make the question of who can use it be one tied up with race, class, and location, where not integrating the feature would make the only question be whether one could get one in the first place.
2 Adam Orth is an asshole, and pretty damn vocal about it.

Microsoft responded thus:

We apologize for the inappropriate comments made by an employee on Twitter yesterday. This person is not a spokesperson for Microsoft, and his personal views do not reflect the customer centric approach we take to our products or how we would communicate directly with our loyal consumers.  We are very sorry if this offended anyone, however we have not made any announcements about our product roadmap, and have no further comment on this matter.

Now much of that is boiler plate but when you strip it down to it's bare bones it becomes:
1 We apologize.  We are sorry if...
2 The comments were inappropriate.
3 We're totes not inappropriate like the comments are.
4 And that's all we have to say about that.

Point one is the point of this post.  "We're sorry if," means, "We're not actually sorry," which means that it's not a real apology.  It isn't even an apology in the original sense of the word (see Socrates and/or Christian apologists) except perhaps in a, "That's a really crap defense, my pebble goes for guilty," kind of way.

Point two is true, but note that they're not actually sorry about the inappropriateness of the comments. If they were then there would be no "if" it would just be "We're sorry."  Because that period is where it would need to end.  The only possible extension of the sentence beyond that would be to say that the state of being sorry had pushed them into some kind of action, like doing something about the asshole Adam Orth or trying to make sure their employees wouldn't be assholes to marginalized groups again.

Instead whether or not they even claim to be sorry is tied up in whether anyone was offended.  The inappropriateness of the comments does not bother them, only that people read them and may have reacted to them as is appropriate.  That's what the "if" means.  It means they're down with inappropriate comments provided they don't kick up a shitstorm.

The "if" also means that they themselves were not offended.  They recognized the inappropriateness of the comments, but did not take offense, did not feel offense, were just generally not in the same room as being offended.  Because if they had been offended then they wouldn't be able to pull, "if this offended anyone," since they, a group that does fulfill the position of "anyone", would have been.  If they'd been offended, "We are very sorry if this offended anyone," would logically collapse into, "We are very sorry," because of how conditionals work.

So, they recognized the comments as inappropriate but weren't offended by them or sorry regarding them.  That's the message they're broadcasting.

But there's something else that's not quite in the text.  It is instead in subtext that requires context to understand.

The only reason that they know about the inappropriate comments is because those comments offended enough people to cause a minor shitstorm.  In other words: they knew someone had been offended before a single word of that was thought up.  Yet still they said, "if this offended anyone," in so doing they implicitly made the claim that they didn't know of anyone, at least anyone worthy of consideration, who had been offended.

The very people who were responsible for bringing the matter to a point where it got their attention are dismissed as not counting as being human enough to merit consideration when asking whether anyone was offended.

I think that covers points 1 and 2.

Point 3 is utter bullshit.  Adam may not be a spokesperson for them but in their own message they clearly communicated that while they recognized the comments as inappropriate they had no problem with the comments per se, just with the fact that people might have certain reactions to them, and furthermore condemned everyone they knew of who reacted to the comments appropriately as not really counting.  Subhuman or some such.

The message from Microsoft may start with, "We apologize... This person is not a spokesperson ... his personal views do not reflect [our own]," but the message does point out that certainly no one involved in crafting the message found the views expressed to be offensive and they'd only feel bad about it if it had an adverse affect amoung the potential consumer base, and they have no problem with the comments in themselves. Also, it makes sure to clearly demonstrate that in the eyes of Microsoft everyone who made the fact they were offended clear does not count as anyone.

Adam Orth should take lessons from these people on how to be an asshole because they've got it down better than him.

And finally we reach point 4.  This was their response to an important employee at their company being an asshole with respect to class, race, and region.  If you're poor, or not white, or live in a non-urban area, or any combination of the three Adam Orth thinks you don't count.  The middle proposition wasn't stated outright, it's one of those things where you have to look at the statistics to understand, but the poor and living in rural areas was stated pretty clearly.

Mircosoft has nothing more to say on the matter.

Not, "We've explained to Adam Orth that we do in fact care about customers who are poor/rural/non-white/some-combination," not, "We're making sure Adam Orth is only allowed to work in areas where his blatant prejudices cannot come into play," not, "We're trying to make sure none of our employees do the same assholic thing in the future," (that would be doomed to fail, by the way.  Freedom of speech grants assholes the right to be assholes.)  Not anything that gives any indication that they actually care about what happened beyond being able to say, "We apologized for that, moving on," and point to the first two words of their non-apology: "We apologize".

No, they've indicated that they don't give a damn and followed it with saying that they're done, no further comment.

Or to sum it all up, they said:

We recognize that the comments in question were inappropriate but we ourselves do not find them offensive nor do we have enough respect for those who were offended to count them as people.  The person who made the comments doesn't speak for us.  We won't feel bad unless someone who we do count as a person is offended and that hasn't happened yet.  That is all, we have nothing more to say, I SAID GOOD DAY, SIR!

That's not how you say, "We're very sorry," if you mean it.

The giant plot hole in the Avengers

There is a giant fracking plot hole in the Avengers, a largely good movie which I recommend.  I mentioned it in passing before, but at the time I was talking about something else.

The movie, for those who don't know, is about assembling a team of superheroes to combat an unprecedented menace.  To spoil the first few minutes (and only that much) what happens is this:

A glowing cube called the tesseract which holds within it the potential for unlimited power is used by Loki to open a portal to Earth through which he passes.  One of the first things Loki does is mind control one of only a handful of people on Earth to have experience with portals, and one of only two people experienced with portals who can actually understand them.  This person and some other people he mind controlled become his servants and the race is on.

So, to recap, antagonist comes to Earth through a portal and kidnaps one of only two people on the planet to understand portals even a little.  Given that information, what would you do if you were concerned with the fate of Earth.

You'd say, "Get me Jane Foster," is what you'd do.  As the only non-brainwashed portal scientist in existence, as one of the few non-brainwashed people to have first hand experience with portals, as someone who is at this very moment studying portals she is the person you want.

She's got to be at the top of your list.  There's no other place for her to be.

The movie is about assembling a team of superheroes so clearly superheroes, which Jane Foster is not, must be recruited.  But that can only reasonably occur after Jane Foster has been recruited, or there has been an attempt to recruit Jane Foster, because at this point in time the only thing the people doing the recruiting know for sure is, "This has something to do with portals," and if it has something to do with portals your options are Erik Selvig and Jane Foster.  Erik was just brainwashed into joining the other side.  Jane is all you've got left and, so far as anyone in or watching the movie knows, Earth's only hope.

Basically, as soon as you learn the premise of the movie you know, "This looks like a job Jane Foster," (said in "This looks like a job for Superman," tones) and have a reasonable expectation that Jane Foster should play a prominent role in the movie because she is basically the only character with a compelling reason to be there.  That's not quite true when one considers Thor who has oodles of compelling reasons, but until Thor arrives the audience didn't know he could make it to Earth.  Even so, perhaps an exception should be made.

Jane Foster is the only person on Earth with a compelling reason to appear in the movie the Avengers given its premise.

Steve Rodgers (Captain America) has a loose connection to the events going on.  Bruce Banner (the Incredible Hulk) has an even looser one that didn't exist until it was introduced by a line mentioned in passing by Erik early in the movie itself.  Everyone else, not so much, none of them have a reason anywhere near as important as Jane does.

The Avengers is the story of portals.  This calls for Jane Foster (and Erik Selvig if he hadn't been brainwashed.)
The Avengers is the story of Loki.  This calls for Jane Foster, Erik Selvig (if he hadn't been brainwashed), and Jane Foster's sidekick (Darcy Lewis.)
The Avengers is the story of the brainwashing of Erik Selvig.  This calls for Jane Foster.

And that, basically, covers it.  The Avengers is not the story of mechanical battle armor (which would call for Tony Stark) it is not the story of something that has a metamorphosis between forms (which would call for Bruce Banner) it is not the story of secret WWII era technology that is very advanced even by today's standards because it goes outside the bounds of currently understood science resurfacing after being lost and subsequently falling into the wrong hands (which would call for Steve Rodgers) it is not a story of spies and intrigue (which would call for Natasha Romanoff (the Black Widow)) it is not the kind of story where a special agent with a unique weapon can get the job done (which would call for Clint Barton (Hawkeye)) it's not a story that actually calls for any of these people.

All that the plot of the Avengers calls for is Jane Foster.  Jane Foster, her sidekick, Thor, and any of his sidekicks if you want to be totally inclusive, but Thor and sidekicks weren't on Earth and if you're getting Jane's sidekick you'd be getting her too.

So basically, everything about the movie screams out, "GET JANE FOSTER ON THE CASE!"

Yes, the all-caps was justified.

Once you have the premise, Loki comes to earth through a portal and brainwashes people including Erik Selvig, Jane Foster is the only earthbound individual with a reason to be called in, and that reason is super fucking strong.

So, where is that giant plot hole mentioned in the title?  You know who isn't in the movie?  Jane Foster.  The only earthbound person in the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe we can honestly say has a reason to be in the movie.  The only earthbound person in the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe we can honestly say ought to be in the movie.  The only earthbound person in the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe we can honestly say should be on SHEILD's list of people to recruit.

Where is Jane Foster?  On an island.

In a short, easy to miss, scene it is explained to Thor that as soon as it was discovered the fate of the universe Earth might well depend on getting Jane on the case (when Erik the only person who could possibly take her place was brainwashed into joining the other side) SHIELD, in its wisdom, got her as far away from the case as possible.

For her own safety, of course.  The life of one woman or the future of France? What would you do if you were in my position? The safety of one woman or the fate of the Earth, which would you consider more important?  And while pondering that realize that she was shoved out of the way through deception.  She didn't get the facts presented to her (Portals are involved, Erik has been brainwashed, Loki did it, the fate of the Earth may well hang in the balance.  We could use your help but it would place you at risk, what's your decision?) she got lied to to trick her into going to an out of the way island for her own safety.  (Never mind that if there isn't an Earth there probably isn't an island either.)

Thor appreciates this because he cares about Jane being safe.  The people of Earth, if they were let in on this, probably wouldn't appreciate it because while they doubtless care that people stay safe as well, they'd probably be a little peeved that the person who, all available evidence says, was most likely to be able to save the planet was shoved out of the picture while they were left in harm's way.

In real life the reason for Jane not appearing is that Whedon didn't want any secondary characters from any of the other movies showing up.  Erik, who was working on the glowy cube, and Loki, who was the antagonist, he was presumably stuck with.  Robert John Downey, Jr. insisted that Pepper Potts be included and managed to convince Whedon, other than that secondary characters do not appear.  Title characters do.  Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, The Incredible Hulk.  Hawkeye, the Black Widow, Coulson, Fury and such aren't really attached to any movies, they just sort of are.  Floating out there in the space between single hero movies.

The trouble here is that real life doesn't change the plot.  The plot is one that calls, first and foremost, for Jane Foster.  Any realistic recruitment starts with her.

This is a believable way for things to go down:

"Get me Jane Foster!"

"On it, Sir!" 

Musing to self, "Who else could be helpful?  Steve Rodgers did have some contact with the cube more than 50 years ago, even if it was very limited.  I suppose we could get him. 

"Shortly before everything went kaplouee the cube started putting off very low levels of gamma radiation, but our people haven't been able to make any sense of the data, maybe we need a gamma radiation expert.  So Bruce Banner." 

*pause* 

"Who else?  There must be more than three people who could be useful here.  Well if Foster and Banner come up with something then there's a possibility we'll need to build something.  We could use an inventor who works well under pressure and can make do with limited resources since we might not have time to have all the best stuff shipped in.  So Tony Stark. 

"Stark, Banner, and Rodgers in one room is a powder keg.  We should have one of our agents involved so things can't get too out of hand.  Romanoff has had experience with Stark."

And then you've got the team as it's assembled in the movie, but it only makes sense because we start with the one person most called for and then, with her out of the way, can move on to assembling the B-team who will end up stealing the show for themselves.

This is not a believable way for things to go down:

Fury: A portal between worlds.  Who ever heard of such a thing?

Coulson: Jane Foster.

Fury: With Selvig taken by the other side we don't have anyone who can approach this from a scientific side of things.

Coulson: Well actually Jane Foster has been working on this exact area, with our full support, since the last time one of these things happened.

Fury: Right, the last time, that was Loki too, wasn't it?

Coulson: Yes.

Fury: Who do we have who knows about Loki?

Coulson: Jane Foster.

Fury: Maybe science can help us with this.

Coulson: Well Jane Foster is-

Fury: I like stuff that goes boom. That's what science is for. We should get Tony Stark in on this.

Coulson: Ok, but I really think you should consider a scientist like Jane-

Fury: I like scientists who turn into unstoppable green monsters when they get angry. Get me Bruce Banner.

Coulson: I'll get agent Romanoff right on it, Sir, but I think you should consider bringing in someone with past experience with-

Fury: Past? Blast from the past. You're right! Captain America had contact with the cube, he's got just the past experience we we need.

Coulson: I do so like Captain America.

Fury: You get Stark, I'll get Rodgers.

Coulson: Do you think he'll sign my cards?

Which is what appears to have happened in the movie.  Except I forgot to sneak Jane being sent off to an out of the way island in there, and her name should probably be brought up as, "This is the person we really need," a lot more than I did in the above.

Assembling a team should have the answer to, "Who should we get?" be, "Jane Foster, Jane Foster, Jane Foster, Jane Foster..." until either she's recruited or it becomes repeated so often that it eventually becomes a part of the background noise of the universe to the point that, "I think therefore I am," is considered to be at best a second principle with, "Jane Foster should be called in to work on this," superseding it as an absolutely true and undeniable facet of reality.

Gravity is less self evident than the fact that Jane Foster should have been called.

And yet, she was sent to an island.

And that is the giant plot hole in the Avengers.  The 800 ton Cthulhu in the room that threatens to drive you from this thing called sanity.  They should have called Jane Foster They should have called Jane Foster They should have called Jane foster... Gurl fubhyq unir pnyyrq Wnar Sbfgre -- or is that Wnar Sbfgre fuhtine?

I can never quite remember 'cause I'm not in my right mind

Since I met you

No one corrupts the way you do.

You know it's true

(Song those ending lyrics come from here.)

What gender roles look like (in a diaper commercial)

The music is, "I Feel Pretty," I wonder if there will be any male babies in the commercial.  No.  There are not.  Boys cannot feel pretty.

Voice over talks about how the diaper keeps your baby dry no matter how "he" moves.

Let's recap.  There's not a lot to recap because there's not a lot there.

1 Pretty babies is a group that consists entirely of female babies.  Baby boys cannot feel/be pretty.
2 Your baby is a he.
3 Even though the images are all of shes.

So, male is default even when talking about a group composed exclusively of females.

A Savior

[I have no idea about the larger story to go with this scene other than:
 1 The theology behind it follows a largely standard "Heaven is good, Hell is bad" set up
 2 That's with the understanding that part of the bad of Hell is a deeply ingrained misogyny making "female demon" a particularly precarious state of being
 3 At some point someone is going to quite unintentionally rip a hole straight from near the center of Hell into an equivalent area of Heaven via what at the time seemed a suicidally-ill-considered and completely-doomed-to-failure act intended to protect a total stranger on the other side.]

Person 1: So you're saying I'm the savior.

Person 2: No.  No, no, no.  I'm saying you're a savior.  The Savior isn't something that- people have tried to save the whole world for all time and thus far it hasn't worked out so well.  Instead what's needed is people to save part of the world for the time being and right here right now you're the person to do that saving.

Person 1: So that whole Jesus thing was a failure?

Person 2: No.  I wouldn't be much of a- *pause* You only said that because you noticed I'm a Christian.

Person 1: He can't very well have saved the world if it's still in need of saving.

Person 2: Salvation isn't an instantaneous one time thing.  It's a process, it needs to happen and keep happening.  There is a need for maintenance, upkeep, that sort of thing, and that's aside from the fact that the world didn't fall all at once either.

*Person 1 leans against something*
Person 1: *largely disinterested* Is that so?
*Person 1 starts munching on Skittles*

Person 2: Various people and things keep on breaking things so without the other side working to fix things the world would rapidly get worse.  Thus saving is an ongoing process which requires multiple people spread across both time and space.
*short pause*
Person 2: However as a Christian I believe that, when the skies fall and seas boil and the righteous stand up to be counted in the final conflict that will decide whether the universe is ultimately saved or instead allowed to fall into chaos, injustice, and then the twisted oppressive order that those two things eventually result in if allowed to triumph, it will turn out, in retrospect, that the critical moments that pushed things toward victory for salvation over brokenness were those of Jesus' time on earth.

                  My wife, who is a Buddhist, presumably disagrees on when and where the critical moments took place.  That said, we generally don't focus on the eventual future, so it hasn't really come up in conversation.  Reason being: if we stop trying to make things better now then it won't matter what has come before.  If we don't keep on the work of saving, and the world needs constant saving, then it won't be good that triumphs in the end.  Neither Jesus nor Buddha will be able to be pointed to as the ones that lead to the triumph of good over evil because our own inaction will mean that good won't triumph over evil.

                  So, no, I don't think Jesus failed.  I just think that the game isn't over yet, and who won is still up in the air.  And given that the stakes of the game are the souls of everything that lived, lives, or will live, it's kind of important that we don't call it quits in the middle.

*silence for a bit*
*Person 1 stops munching on Skittles*
*Person 1 thinks over what has been said mouthing a word here and there*

Person 1: Ok, so here's what I took from that.

Person 2: Yes.

Person 1: You claim to be a supernatural being-

Person 2: I am.

Person 1: That's not actually from that, that's from earlier.

Person 2: This I know.

Person 1: And yet in spite of this previously claimed semi-divine nature that puts you in touch with who is or is not the savior of the moment-

Person 2: Seriously, more than just a claim.  I can do a miracle or two to prove it, provided they're not too flashy.  (We've been in the process of toning down the overt non-natural for, more or less, all of human history.) Give me your water-bottle, I'll turn the water into something else.

Person 1: I could do with European Fanta, provided that they haven't changed it since I was there, but that's really not the point.

Person 2: What is the point?

Person 1: You don't know which religion is the right one.
*pause*
Person 1: That's what I took from your speech.

Person 2: It's really not that important.

Person 1: So you don't deny not knowing.

Person 2: If I spent all eternity arguing religion then then I would never get around to doing my job, which is to make the world a progressively better place and fight against those forces -supernatural and otherwise- that attempt to make it backslide.  The correctness of a given religion really has very little role in that.  If a Satanist is working to fix the world they're my ally, never mind me being a Christian or me having been to Hell and briefly encountering a being that claims the title of Satan.

Person 1: Do tell.

Person 2: I ran away. *beat*  Very fast. *pause* Anyway, that has little bearing on whether or not I should be working with the Satanist.  Maybe they're right and the thing I met was just a pretender taking on the title for its own purposes.  Doesn't matter.

Person 1: And how do you deal with atheists?

Person 2: Depends on many factors.  I'm never again going into a laboratory setting to preform miracles, even if she did keep her word to keep the results of the tests confidential, and that's all I'm going to say on the subject.

Person 1: All you'll say?

Person 2: That's it.

Person 1: Are they still atheists after meeting you?

Person 2: Some are, some aren't.  It's not import-

Person 1: You said more.

Person 2: Ok, fine.  It wasn't all I was going to say.  I'll finish the more: '-ant.'  Now that's all I'm going to say.

Person 1: You sure?

Person 2: Religion, or lack thereof, is of secondary importance at best when it comes to the work I do and the work I'm asking you to do.  And when I say, "Secondary importance," I mean a very, very distant second.  So distant that any extended focus on it is detrimental.

*Person 1 looks back at bag of Skittles*

Person 1: I'm just saying that even if I were about to turn my life upside-down for a divine messenger I think I'd hold out for one who knew what divinity they were working for.

Person 2: The one who favors good over evil.

Person 1: And that would be?

Person 2: Doesn't matter.

Person 1: I kind of think it does.

Person 2: It doesn't.  Good and evil -right and wrong- are things that you use to judge divinities, not things you judge via divinities.  I can assure you that even those in Hell working toward oppression and injustice don't twirl their mustaches and talk about how evil they are.  Listen to them and they'll tell you it's all for the greater good, what they do is right, so on, so forth.

Person 1: And you know they're wrong about that because?

Person 2: There's no such thing as the greater good.  Something is either right or wrong.  There is complexity and confusion and so forth to a degree that some things are difficult to untangle, but if you go to Hell it's very clear that whatever good may come of it, if any, is more than outweighed by the evil that it is.

                  Injustice is injustice.  If a god tells you otherwise then it's not a god you should be following.  All other religious concerns are secondary, again, at best.  I support the side that supports what is right, details beyond that don't matter.

Person 1: *dismissive* Uh-huh.

Person 2: You would say they're above my pay grade-

Person 1: I would never use such a phrase.

Person 2: *ignoring the interruption* but I assure you, they don't matter.  What matters is that left unattended the world isn't fallen, it is falling.  What matters is making sure it isn't left unattended.  Whenever those who should know better stop pushing to make things better things invariably get worse, and that's without even considering that there is a supernatural support network for those pushing in the wrong direction, whether those pushing that way are aware of it or not.

Person 1: And I'm supposed to save the world- sorry, part of the world for a little while- how exactly?

Person 2: *Tone of voice as if talking to a small child about how babies are made* Well you see, when an angel and a human have sexy fun times together sometimes, nine months later-

Person 1: You're saying I'm inhuman.

Person 2: *Serious this time* A combination of your genetics, your personality, your placement in time and space, and the fact that you don't actually have something better to do-

Person 1: Who say's I have nothing better to do?

Person 2: Are you making the world a better place at the moment?

*awkward silence in which Person 1 again turns attention to the bag of Skittles*

Person 2: I say you have nothing better to do.  Anyway, this combination (and other factors that I'm not going to get into unless someone can explain to me how PowerPoint works in small words) make you singularly -and I do mean singular, I've looked, there's no number two option that fits anywhere near as well as you- equipped to be the kind of savior needed for this moment in time.

Person 1: And you want me to do what exactly?

Person 2: You'll like it; it involves your favorite word.

Person 1: Does it?

Person 2: I want you to fuck up Hell's plans.  Do that and I'm reasonably confident the good humans on earth can hold their own against the other humans on earth.

Person 1: But corporations are people my friend.

Person 2: Don't start.

-

[Original Work Index]

Snarky Twilight: Falling off the Wagon and Murder and Stuff

[Originally posted at Ana Mardoll's Ramblings.]

Edward: Even the strongest of us fall off the wagon, don’t we?

Bella: I wouldn't know. That would require me to: a) know the strongest of us, b) know that they had an addiction, c) note them falling off the wagon, d) put all of that together into a pithy saying, e) see no difference between that and murder. I mean- *doing Arlo Guthrie impression* I mean- I MEAN *beat* when most people fall off the wagon it doesn't result in someone else's death.

*pause*

Bella: Usually it just results in a logically impossible space ship not being flagged down with a towel. Or something like that.

Edward: Why must you always go off script?

Bella: Because the alternative would be to say something that acknowledged that you might be classed amoungst "the best of us" and I do not hold to that.

Edward: But you're supposed to.

Bella: Do you always do what you're supposed to do?

Edward: YES!

Bella: So I shouldn't have to fear you killing me, right? Because you're not supposed to do that.

Edward: No, you should have that possibility in mind because the book says it's there and the book is what you're supposed to do.

Bella: So the book trumps common sense and morality in terms of "supposed to"?

Edward: Yes.

Bella: I call bullshit.

Edward: You would.

Bella: What you're supposed to do does not include murder so if you always do what you're supposed to I have nothing to fear.

Edward: What I'm supposed to do, as a character, is follow the narrative.

Bella: Always hiding behind the moral shield of, "The narrative says this," or, "The narrative says that," never taking responsibility for your actions.

Edward: Can we get on with it?

Bella: I suppose. Where were we?

Edward: The concept of me eating you.

Bella: Ah, yes. *flatly* Are you asking my permission? *melodramatically* I mean is there no hope then?! *pause* How was that?

Edward: Horrible.

Bella: So you agree with me that the script sucks.

Edward: No. Just your delivery.

Bella: I can't take it seriously, and the fault for that rests with the writer.

Edward: What was that you said about responsibility?

Bella: What was that you said about your brothers being murders and then completely glossed over by making it sound like they went down to the pub and had a shot of tequila thus completely erasing the people whose deaths they caused from discussion by means of analogy and a cliched turn of phrase?

Edward: That was in the script.

Bella: Which was by the writer.

*pause*

*awkward silence*

Bella: So if I accept your claim that the script must be followed the fault lies with whom?

Edward: Can we just-

Bella: Sure. Has all the hope been sucked from the world by your statement that even the best fall off the wagon?

Edward: No, no! Of course there’s hope! I mean, of course I won’t . . .

*pause*

Bella: You see how strange and out of place that sounds at this point?

Edward: I wasn't finished yet.

Bella: You'd just stopped talking.

Edward: Could you not feel my eyes burning into yours?

Bella: Did you know that I once had tea with Medusa's surviving sisters? *beat* She was one of triplets you know, the only mortal one. So when someone wanted a gorgon head they had to go after her.

Edward: *ignoring the fact the conversation has gone off track* It’s different for us.

Bella: Because we're main characters?

Edward: Yes- no! You're not supposed to know that. You're way too meta. It's different for us because... Emmett . . . these were strangers he happened across. It was a long time ago, and he wasn’t as . . . practiced, as careful, as he is now.

*silence filled with Edward watching Bella intently*

Bella: I'm about to stick to the script. Word for word. Ellipsis for ellipsis. I'm going to do it without sarcasm or playing around. Does that make you happy?

Edward: Yes.

Bella: So if we’d met . . . oh, in a dark alley or something . . .

Edward: It took everything I had not to jump up in the middle of that class full of children and —

*Edward stops and looks away*

Bella: You are aware that I'm the same age as those "children", right, old man?

Edward resumed not having heard: When you walked past me, I could have ruined everything Carlisle has built for us, right then and there.

Bella: It's so nice to know that what Carlisle has built for you ranks above my life or death on your list of priorities.

Edward: *ignoring Bella's comment* If I hadn’t been denying my thirst for the last, well, too many years-

Bella: Hang on. How can a streak of not killing people possibly be considered "too many years"? If I live a thousand years without a single murder to my name that won't be too many years without a murder. Ditto for a million. Or a hundred million. *beat* Are there vampire dinosaurs?

Edward: Can I finish?

Bella: I'm just imagining a velociraptor, rock hard features, brilliant white plumage, deciding it doesn't give a damn about the masquerade and strolling through Time Square.

Edward: Can I Finish?

Bella: *dismissively, still thinking about vampire dinosaurs* Sure. You can even restart if you want.

Edward: If I hadn’t been denying my thirst for the last, well, too many years, I wouldn’t have been able to stop myself.

*pause*

*Edward scowls at trees*

Bella: What did the trees ever do to you?

Edward: It's in the book for fuck's sake. I didn't write it.

Bella: Then why follow it?

Edward: Because we're characters. People should know their places and my place is-

Bella: To be an asshole.

Edward: To do what the book says I do.

Bella: Then do it, and hurry up. I'm getting bored.

Edward: Ok.

*pause while Edward takes an unnecessary breath and tries to get in the right frame of mind*

*Edward glances at Bella dimly and they both recall their first meeting lo those many pages ago*

Edward: You must have thought I was possessed.

Bella: That was one of the more charitable interpretations, yes.

Edward: To me, it was like you were some kind of demon, summoned straight from my own personal hell to ruin me.

Bella: Who says I'm not?

Edward: The fragrance coming off your skin . . . I thought it would make me deranged that first day.

Bella: Most people can control themselves regardless of the particles entering their nasal passages.

Edward: In that one hour, I thought of a hundred different ways to lure you from the room with me, to get you alone.

Bella: Only a hundred?

Edward: And I fought them each back, thinking of my family, what I could do to them.

Bella: Once more the life of the murder victim doesn't enter into your consideration of whether or not to commit murder.

Edward: I had to run out, to get away before I could speak the words that would make you follow. . . .

*Edward pauses to scorch Bella with his eyes*

Bella: I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Some of them had more impressive eyes than anything you will ever be able to muster.

*Edward continues to attempt the smolder*

Edward: You would have come.

Bella: No, I wouldn't.

Edward: Yes, you would.

Bella: No.

Edward: You totally would have-

Bella: Let's review the facts here for a moment. One: you were clearly aggressive, maintaining a threatening posture for a full fucking hour. Two: supernatural romance with aspirations, however flat they may have fallen, to romance thriller as evidenced by the prologue. Sorry, the preface. Three: your obviously inhuman form. Four: the fact that you match the profile of evil supernatural thing for the real love interest to save me from much more than that of real love interest. Five: in that hour you only came up with one hundred ways to lure me out while I came up with many times that many ways of getting away from you, labeled them with numbers (in four bases) and letters (in three alphabets) broke them down by type, and subclassified them on a scale of where they would leave you ranging from "At large in the community," to, "Chopped into little pieces each of them drenched in silver nitrate, UV emitting fluids, essence of garlic, and so forth, locked in separate lead lined boxes, surrounded by symbols of every religion practiced in the last five thousand years, and then dropped into separate concrete foundations spread out over an area with a radius of approximately 200 miles."

*pause*

Bella: At this point you're just pathetic, but at that first meeting you were downright scary.

*pause*

Bella: Plus an hour is a long time to think.

*pause*

Edward: *somewhat shaky at the start, but gaining force throughout* And then, as I tried to rearrange my schedule in a pointless attempt to avoid you, you were there — in that close, warm little room, the scent was maddening.

Bella: Still blaming my BO for your murderous urges.

Edward: I so very nearly took you then.

Bella: That's comforting. Fortunately I had exit strategies.

Edward: There was only one other frail human there — so easily dealt with.

Bella: She has a name, you know.

*pause*

Bella: The person whose death you were nearly responsible for just because you wanted to get to succulent me, she has a name. Ms. Cope. Maybe if you focused less on your own murderous desires and inclinations and more on the people you'd be hurting to fulfill them you'd find it easier to resist.

Bella: If all that was holding you back was being worried about ruining the life Carlisle built for you that means you were overlooking a critical factor: if you gave into your urges people would die. Focus on the people. Bring them into your fucking heart if you have one.

Bella: Think about their lives and relations and hopes and dreams and pains and fears. Think about how much they matter. People much older than you who have traveled much more widely than you have yet to meet someone who isn't important.

Bella: Each person is important, and end in themselves, not a means by which you can get the fun smelling blood. Maybe if you focused on that you'd have an easier time staying on the "not-murdering wagon".

*pause*

Bella: Failing that, you could always remind yourself that some things smell great but taste horrible.

-

[Snarky Twilight Index]

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