Ignorance and the 'Lord of the Rings"

[Newt]

It has to be a joke - wombats are from Australia, not Afghanistan...so the same for the LOTR petition??  Too stupid to be real - please?

[raj]

Some of the petitions are jokes (at least I hope they are-- that's why I included the wombat one.)  Some of them are sincere, honest attempts at making the world a better place, no matter that they have no basis in reality.

At least now we know that there are in fact people who are stupid enough to go to the abandoned campground where thirty years ago a group of kids were brutally murdered and the murderer was never caught. . .Newt wrote:

[Chadzilla]

J.R. wrote:
>
> I can't stand this inane "post-9/11" bulls**t. A couple
> of buildings got knocked down, GET OVER IT! They're taking
> out violence and gore from  TV shows and movies to be
> "sensitive". So this stuff is worse now just because of the
> attacks? I was in the dentist's a few days ago, flipping
> through 6 month-old magazines, and in all the television and
> movie reviews they said, "But, really, can we laugh at a TV
> show in this post-September 11th world?" YES, WE CAN!!!!!!!!
> I'm not as much of a p***y as these people, 9/11 did ot
> affect me in a profound way, I still like watching the same
> entertainment I did before. I actually saw on CNN that some
> people are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder from
> seeing the attacks on TV. That's really, really funny.

Gee, will be able to watch Deanzilla trash NYC ever again???

I concur, time to get over it and move on.  All this hand wringing and sympathy posing just makes us look emotionally weak/immature.

[Flangepart]

Hummm....if its true, or if its false, it might be at Snopes.com, the web site for confirming or denying urban legends. Oh,Lord i hope its just a joke.

[Future Blob]

 This would have made me cry for the future of America...if I cared. As it is, I think it's damned funny. Every time I start having some faith in humanity (that these movies don't squash) something like this comes up. I'm glad that Peter Jackson was able to wield the mighty sword of common sense that seems to become duller each day in order to keep the original title. As for 9/11. Yes, it was terrible. Yes, we should not forget it. But, we also shouldn't keep bringing it up and using it as an excuse or an oppertunity. It reminds me of when some guy in a movies says "It's just like 'Nam" or something like that. Don't overuse it, just cope and move on.

[AndyC]

Quite true. It has become an easy excuse. For a while, every time I saw on the news that some company was sacking a bunch of people, they would always blame 9/11. Didn't matter if it couldn't possibly have been the cause. Trim the payroll and look like the victim, how convenient.

As for this petition, I'm no longer surprised at the examples of ignorance I see. Just one more example of someone having a knee-jerk reaction instead of taking some time to get the facts. Plenty of people around who are willing to advertise their stupidity loudly. What's one more?

One thing I really wish more people would do is learn the proper way to conduct a petition.

[larry-o]

c'mon guys. don't get suckered by a fake jokey petition.

have a look at a typical page of "signatures."

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?twotower&851

[The MessiahMan]

Wow!  That's a lot of voided signatures...though I had to chuckle at "MY GRAMMA DIED THREE!!!!!!"  and the "how tasteless" comments...if they only knew Jackson's older work...muhahahahahahahaha!!!!!

[The MessiahMan]

Man!  I saw THIS one!

"Whoever this Tolkein guy is, he's an insensitive ashole if he's making a movie with a title like that. I'll bet he's not even American!! What gives him the right!!!!"

[Chris K.]

"Whoever this Tolkein guy is, he's an insensitive ashole if he's making a movie with a title like that. I'll bet he's not even American!! What gives him the right!!!!"

Now I saw this comment on the petition as well, and it just shows the ignorance of these individuals. And if they are just "joking around", regardless it still makes them look like a dumbass.

Tolkien was definately not an American but from Britian. But his works are welcome in the USA to those who are not ignorant.

[Chadzilla]

Actually Tolkien was from South Africa, but was educated (at University level) and taught in England.  He was good friends with fellow teacher C.S. Lewis who penned a fantasy series of his own, The Chronicles of Narnia).  Tolkien wrote The Hobbit for his children (much the way Milne did with Winnie the Pooh), then he expanded the story to The Lord of the Rings to give England a mythic tale of its own.  The series is quite popular, but, as is the case with most genre work, not highly respected on the academic level (Tolkien got quite a lot of ribbing and lost a great deal of prestige as a language professor in academic circles when he published the books).

As far as the 'Tolkien guy' post, and others, if I know that person, or poster, I can usually tell if they are being sarcastic.  But some people are actually that clueless (believe me, I've met some and they are frightening).  Whether it is serious or satire can be debated until the cows come home and offer me a glass of milk to drink while installing the new PC they brought with them.   "Moo."

[Jay O'Connor]

> He was good friends with fellow teacher C.S. Lewis who penned a fantasy
> series of his own, The Chronicles of Narnia).

They were friends in a group called "The Inklings"  Tolkein would read what he was working on aloud to the group and C.S.Lewis was very encouraging of Tolkien in his work on LotR.

C.S.Lewis was also influential in Tolkein's conversion to Christianity

[Chadzilla]

Jay O'Connor wrote:
>
>  
> They were friends in a group called "The Inklings"  Tolkein
> would read what he was working on aloud to the group and
> C.S.Lewis was very encouraging of Tolkien in his work on LotR.

Wouldn't you love to be a fly on the wall there!?!

 
> C.S.Lewis was also influential in Tolkein's conversion to
> Christianity

Other way around actually - Tolkien was a devout Roman Catholic and it was he that converted the Atheist Lewis to Christianity (or at least the depth of his faith did).

Now who says b-movie fans lack depth?

[PCC Fred]

What dozy wazzock wrote this?

"The Two Towers" is the title of Tolkien's second LOTR book!  Always has been!  Naming the film "The Two Towers" has f**k all to do with 9/11!