This comes 1 hour after I type this at Twitter: "It came on like a slow drip. From hoarse throat & denial on Friday to fever, aches & pains today. I would get swine flu when it's not even trending."
I don't work in a Thailand gaming center, but I was at a sold-out showing of Bruno Friday morning at 12:01 AM and I feel like HELL. I think Fahey has the right idea being a shut-in. This pandemic could still get really ugly . . . especially if nothing's done about it before cold and flu season hits.
People taking this lightly, and acting so "holier than thou because it is just media scare" are the morons who are going to go around getting infected and spreading it.
Dont tread lightly, 100 million did on the Spanish Flu.
IN all seriousness, just because it is going to spread "regardless", doesnt mean one can take preventative measures, and people as a whole can do so. Dont be so ignorant about it.
I'm gonna go ahead and make the obvious joke that the 330 pound woman was a pig, thus making her more susceptible, just to get that out of the way. Additionally, talk about viral marketing.
You'd think the government was quickly reacting to prevent casualties due to the discovery of the "kid kill-switch" God secretly planted in all children. And here we though they were merely "games".
I don't intend to make light of Pongsathorn Wattanabenjasopha's death, but damn is that a mouthful of name. That doesn't seem like a typical Thai name from my experience, either. A quick Google search of the surname would indicate that every single reference on the Internet regarding Wattanabenjasopha is related to this boy.
Seems like they admit gaming isn't reaaally the source for his suicide, but just the final straw. Gaming is used more and more as a scapegoat. What new form of media will become government's next scapegoat after the masses know they aren't really to blame?
THIS JUST IN: PEOPLE WITH HARD LIVES FEEL DEPRESSED WHEN YOU TAKE AWAY THE ONLY THING THAT BRINGS THEM ANY JOY.
You ever watch the news and see a spinster crying when 4 of her 5 cats die in a housefire? It's kind of like that. Life is fucking tedious sometimes, and most people dedicate themselves to something in order to keep sane.
Does a sixth grader even understand what suicide even is??? This is just sad. I can't even muster up the coldness to give the general apathy I have for suicide victims; this kid had problems and I doubt games are the beginning and ending of it.
@Brodie John Ferguson: Oh you, with your lack of empathy for anyone who isn't you. That inability to understand why people do what they do is honestly quite impressive. Keep it up.
@Bouchart: I have a friend whose family is endangered by those militants, and it isn't fun to worry about her maybe waking up one day and finding her family died in some ill-needed coup d'état by people whose value of human lives is very low. That said, I understand what you are saying, and it's sad. Thailand is a beautiful country however and there are many areas where it is perfectly fine to visit (Phuket for example, absolutely gorgeous).
It's sad that governments react to these sorts of situations in such a way. If you ask me it does a complete disservice to the dead child, and as with eerily similar situations worldwide, the general populace always completely misses the point...
Racist people eh? I just love how people using a bastard language (aka the one I'm typing with now), seek to just slip in as much toilet humor as they can into other languages simply because they can.
Granted I know I'm speaking it too. Damn the whole world using the ugliest language in human history. At least I have Chinese to fall back on. Then I start flinging veiled insults at people whose only insults lie in variations of 'fuck'.
Normally I don't go for ad hominem attack on a god damn blog but dude:
I've been in China (Shenyang actually) for almost 3 damn years now, and I have it on good ground to say that Putonghua is quite possibly the lamest most retarded language ever devised by hominid minds. Sure that's opinion but any language that is:
1) Chock full of homonyms, some true homonyms a lot are near homonyms that are only separated by fucking TONE.
That's right in putonghua you got mai3 (third tone) means "to buy" but mai4 (forth tone) means "to sell" WTF two commonly co-located but completely opposite ideas that are simply too close together in sound for no logical reason.
The reason for all the damn tonal bullshit and homonyms is that the Chinese have a hardon for things to "sound nice" (there words, not mine) so they far prefer one or two syllable "words". By far most are two syllable. Hell they'll even double up a single syllable word to make it two syllables just to make it 'sound nice'.
The Chinese have a hard time with any English word with more than say 4 syllables. My students would just drop a syllable here and there. Or add in that damn "er-hua" accent and color the vowels. Sorry I'm rambling.
Back on track, in summary: The nature of the Chinese (spoken) language makes it relatively difficult to create new words and concepts (neologisms) compared to say English (which can simply tack on new syllables at will), instead they co-opt old phonemes. The problem is that putonghua has a limited number of phonemes compared to say English so a lot of things start to sound alike. They try and help increase the number of possible permutations by using the four basic tones of putonghua, so they can "recycle" a phoneme (such as "mai")and get a bit more use out of it.
It would be a hell of a lot easier just to use more/different syllables though.
Still, one could say, "Impure, all that is just a different way of speaking, and that should be allowed." Okay sure fine. But there is absolutely no logical excuse for:
2) The written Chinese language.
That's right, I'm calling out the entire Chinese culture on this one. Hanzi is a completely stupid writing system. Oh, you want proof do you? Ask any Chinese over the age of say 25 (past school age a bit) to 'spell', that is write out the character, for a fucking "sneeze". Oh sure they can say it of course, but even a very educated Chinese person would probably not remember how to write it (unless of course they are a doctor). Why? Because Chinese is logosyllabic, that is it (roughly) uses one glyph per syllable. But the glyphs are not phonetic at all. So even though you might know how to say "sneeze" in putonghua, unless you remember how to draw the glyph you are truly and completely fucked on writing it. In any (mostly) phonetic language you can at least guess at the spelling and then look that up in a dictionary. In Chinese, dictionary work mostly in one of two ways: the old way is some complex ass system of stroke counting that most Chinese don't even know how to use. The newer way is to use the PHONETIC pinyin spelling of the Chinese word to look up how to draw the character. Doesn't that seem a bit redundant to you? Why not just make a phonetic system in the first place? Hell it doesn't even have to use Roman letters or anything. Sequoyah invented a complete written language for his people, the Cherokee. Why the hell can't the Chinese do that? Because they let "tradition" get in the way of common fucking sense -- all the time. I tell you right now, I fucking hate most all traditions. If a tradition isn't a benefit or if it isn't even FUN, toss it out.
This is a very un-Chinese concept.
So instead they force their children to learn hanzi. Which, by the way, takes them almost TWICE AS FUCKING LONG to learn up to the same level of literacy as any (not just English) phonetic language user. Yeah, that sounds real fucking logical to keep this writing system.
Bah, I'm out of this place in two months, good riddance.
Oh and Byakko... .
P.S. You know I have a lot of choice putonghua for you but I think my post is pushing the anger limit already.
07/13/09
Thai and Taiwanese are not the same thing dude.
It's like calling people from Austria "Australian"
07/13/09
07/13/09
I don't work in a Thailand gaming center, but I was at a sold-out showing of Bruno Friday morning at 12:01 AM and I feel like HELL. I think Fahey has the right idea being a shut-in. This pandemic could still get really ugly . . . especially if nothing's done about it before cold and flu season hits.
07/13/09
Agreed.
People taking this lightly, and acting so "holier than thou because it is just media scare" are the morons who are going to go around getting infected and spreading it.
Dont tread lightly, 100 million did on the Spanish Flu.
07/13/09
07/13/09
Thats the right mindset!
*thumbs up*
IN all seriousness, just because it is going to spread "regardless", doesnt mean one can take preventative measures, and people as a whole can do so. Dont be so ignorant about it.
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
Yeah, finding that human beings also have no respect for life or death also disgusts me.
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
07/13/09
Now eating bacon has become a challenge
07/13/09
05/25/09
...Nicely played God, nicely played.
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
You ever watch the news and see a spinster crying when 4 of her 5 cats die in a housefire? It's kind of like that. Life is fucking tedious sometimes, and most people dedicate themselves to something in order to keep sane.
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
05/25/09
It's sad that governments react to these sorts of situations in such a way. If you ask me it does a complete disservice to the dead child, and as with eerily similar situations worldwide, the general populace always completely misses the point...
05/25/09
Bangkok, and Phucket, really now people? And blaming gaming while you are at it?
05/26/09
05/26/09
Was gonna say that.
href="#c13068998">DragnFiyar:
Racist people eh? I just love how people using a bastard language (aka the one I'm typing with now), seek to just slip in as much toilet humor as they can into other languages simply because they can.
Granted I know I'm speaking it too. Damn the whole world using the ugliest language in human history. At least I have Chinese to fall back on. Then I start flinging veiled insults at people whose only insults lie in variations of 'fuck'.
05/28/09
Normally I don't go for ad hominem attack on a god damn blog but dude:
I've been in China (Shenyang actually) for almost 3 damn years now, and I have it on good ground to say that Putonghua is quite possibly the lamest most retarded language ever devised by hominid minds. Sure that's opinion but any language that is:
1) Chock full of homonyms, some true homonyms a lot are near homonyms that are only separated by fucking TONE.
That's right in putonghua you got mai3 (third tone) means "to buy" but mai4 (forth tone) means "to sell" WTF two commonly co-located but completely opposite ideas that are simply too close together in sound for no logical reason.
The reason for all the damn tonal bullshit and homonyms is that the Chinese have a hardon for things to "sound nice" (there words, not mine) so they far prefer one or two syllable "words". By far most are two syllable. Hell they'll even double up a single syllable word to make it two syllables just to make it 'sound nice'.
The Chinese have a hard time with any English word with more than say 4 syllables. My students would just drop a syllable here and there. Or add in that damn "er-hua" accent and color the vowels. Sorry I'm rambling.
Back on track, in summary: The nature of the Chinese (spoken) language makes it relatively difficult to create new words and concepts (neologisms) compared to say English (which can simply tack on new syllables at will), instead they co-opt old phonemes. The problem is that putonghua has a limited number of phonemes compared to say English so a lot of things start to sound alike. They try and help increase the number of possible permutations by using the four basic tones of putonghua, so they can "recycle" a phoneme (such as "mai")and get a bit more use out of it.
It would be a hell of a lot easier just to use more/different syllables though.
Still, one could say, "Impure, all that is just a different way of speaking, and that should be allowed." Okay sure fine. But there is absolutely no logical excuse for:
2) The written Chinese language.
That's right, I'm calling out the entire Chinese culture on this one. Hanzi is a completely stupid writing system. Oh, you want proof do you? Ask any Chinese over the age of say 25 (past school age a bit) to 'spell', that is write out the character, for a fucking "sneeze". Oh sure they can say it of course, but even a very educated Chinese person would probably not remember how to write it (unless of course they are a doctor). Why? Because Chinese is logosyllabic, that is it (roughly) uses one glyph per syllable. But the glyphs are not phonetic at all. So even though you might know how to say "sneeze" in putonghua, unless you remember how to draw the glyph you are truly and completely fucked on writing it. In any (mostly) phonetic language you can at least guess at the spelling and then look that up in a dictionary. In Chinese, dictionary work mostly in one of two ways: the old way is some complex ass system of stroke counting that most Chinese don't even know how to use. The newer way is to use the PHONETIC pinyin spelling of the Chinese word to look up how to draw the character. Doesn't that seem a bit redundant to you? Why not just make a phonetic system in the first place? Hell it doesn't even have to use Roman letters or anything. Sequoyah invented a complete written language for his people, the Cherokee. Why the hell can't the Chinese do that? Because they let "tradition" get in the way of common fucking sense -- all the time. I tell you right now, I fucking hate most all traditions. If a tradition isn't a benefit or if it isn't even FUN, toss it out.
This is a very un-Chinese concept.
So instead they force their children to learn hanzi. Which, by the way, takes them almost TWICE AS FUCKING LONG to learn up to the same level of literacy as any (not just English) phonetic language user. Yeah, that sounds real fucking logical to keep this writing system.
Bah, I'm out of this place in two months, good riddance.
Oh and Byakko... .
P.S. You know I have a lot of choice putonghua for you but I think my post is pushing the anger limit already.