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What do you think of Cory Bernardi trying to dilute the racial discrimination act?
I think it puts me in a strange uncomfortable place.
On the one hand, I am a libertarian in many things; I am more libertarian, certainly, than my fellow Australian latte-sippers (as opposed to American latte-sippers). And my position is that Bernardi’s dilution is right: there is a difference of threshold between “intimidate, humiliate, vilify” and “offend and insult”, and that threshold does have a chilling effect.
On the other hand, I’m a moderately Libertarian Leftist; not a liberal or a Randian Libertarian. I loathe all proponents of the dilution of 18C, with the exception of Leyonhjelm, who may be a nutjob, but is at least a principled nutjob. My blood boils whenever Andrew Fricking Bolt is mentioned in any context; and “white-skinned Aboriginals” or “Ban the burka” is not the kind of discourse I find worth defending. Bernardi is our very own Ted Cruz. The Dad’s Army backbench supporting this is who’s holding Turnbull—and in many ways, our country—back from joining the 21st century.
InB4 David Stewart…
Is your Quora avatar an image of you, or something else? How did you choose it?
My answer is the same as Philip Newton’s, which is the same as KP Wee’s. I do have photos of me, but whenever asked for an avatar, I rummage in Spotlight for “Nick Jpg”, which is rather slimmer pickings.
My avatar picture, courtesy of my wife, is me doing something uncharacteristic. Lying down in the park and taking in the sun. It’s a memento temperare: a reminder to myself to keep it cool…
Is it wrong and strange to like Richard Nixon?
Stephen E. Ambrose wrote three volumes of biography on Nixon. At the start of his undertaking, he loathed Nixon, like most academics that had lived through Watergate. His wife, as it happened, was a Nixon supporter. By the end of the three volumes, they had swapped: Ambrose had developed a grudging respect for Nixon, his wife had come to loathe him.
You can look at the same data and come away with different conclusions, of course. Ambrose thought what Nixon was trying to do with foreign policy was truly visionary, if at times conflicted. Robert Dallek, in his Nixon and Kissinger, describes their foreign policy as attention-seeking flim flam.
Like David Goure said:
In some ways, Richard Nixon is such an amazing character study. Brilliant but with incredible flaws of an almost literary character.
A lot of people out there in TV Land have grudging respect for Frank Underwood. And Nixon was a far more effective president.
Have you ever overheard someone talking about you in another language?
Originally Answered:
Have you ever caught someone talking about you in another language?
A2A. How many gajillion squintillion answers are there here already? No, not reading the thread.
OK, answering to be neighbourly, Sofia Mouratidis.
I was in Crete. I was not on my nice, cosy familiar native easternmost neck of the island, where the people are gentle and placid, and the native instrument is the violin and not the Cretan lyra, and the villagers are so laid back, they got Italians to occupy them during WWII instead of Germans.
No. I was 14 km south of Iraklio, visiting the birthplace of Nikos Kazantzakis. The birthplace of Kazantzakis is now called Myrtia: myrtle-tree.
It wasn’t called Myrtia when Kazantzakis was born. It was called Varvari: Barbarians. (Or Berbers, if you prefer.)
And as far as I’m concerned, it still is. I was waiting in the village cafe for transport back out to Iraklio. There was a sign in the cafe.
The sign said:
GUNFIRE STRICTLY FORBIDDEN.
There’s two more things we don’t do around Sitia. One is change the pronunciation of original [tj] to [θj]. So the Venetian balota “bullet” (cf. Italian pallottola) + the suffix –ja, meaning a blow or shot of something, would be pronounced balotja in Sitia. In the rest of the island, it is pronounced baloθja.
The second thing we don’t do around Sitia is use the word balotja. Because we in Sitia do not think that SHOOTING GUNS IN THE AIR IN A CONFINED SPACE, to let people know you’re having a good time, IS A PARTICULARLY SMART THING TO DO.
Like I said. Barbarians.
Oh, where was I? I had to wait a couple of hours in the cafe over at Varvari, underneath the GUNFIRE STRICTLY FORBIDDEN sign, because the local cab driver had gone over to the next village, to repair his mother-in-law’s chicken coop.
I had some rather nice chops while waiting. And I wrote a Klingon sonnet.
Eventually the staff shift changed, and I heard some say on the handover, “the foreigner over there is waiting for a cab to take him back to Iraklio.”
(Actually, given where I was, I wouldn’t be surprised if he used one of the older names of Iraklio. Like Kastro. Or Candia. Or Chandax. Or Knossos.)
*Sheepishly and very Australianly puts his hand up*
“Not… a foreigner, actually.”
… In retrospect, as a Sitiakos in Varvari: yes. Yes I was.
Can I get a Greek tattoo when I’m not Greek at all?
I live in Greektown, Melbourne. Which means I see a lot of Greek tats sported by Greeks. And I do plenty of looking down on the cookie cutter nationalism of biceps with inked Molon labe, and Maeanders that look a little too close to swastikas. But of course, I’m a cultural conservative, so I would say that.
You will have something more imaginative than that, right?
Tats aren’t a Greek thing traditionally, so Greeks won’t feel like you’re “culturally appropriating” anything (that’s a peculiarly American thing). And Greeks in the diaspora will think it’s a Frankish (Western) thing to do.
Of course, plenty of off-the-boat Greeks here in Greektown sport tats: unlike the diaspora, Greece itself is now part of Frankia (the West).
Like others have said, Greeks overall, diasporan or not, will tend to be flattered that you like their ancestral culture enough to get it inked. So long as it’s spelled correctly and thought through, of course—because otherwise, it’s just a dis.
What’s the single most beautiful image you have from your country?
I am not a visual person. And though my attachment to this image is quite predictable—me being such a homebody and desperately attached to a sense of home, it’s only grown on me gradually.
The view of the central railway station of Melbourne, across the beautiful brown Yarra river (its brownness mitigated by night), from the Southbank precinct (which wasn’t there when I was in high school).
Our own little simulacrum of Paris. Only with more food options.
Source: SOUTHBANK BY NIGHT
How many shots does it take to get you drunk? What does it feel like, when you’re drunk? How do you see around you? How do you talk? What do you do?
We will never find out.
My father conducted a scientific experiment at 19, to determine his answer to this question. He vaguely remembers passing out.
My control issues are much too deeply embedded for me to recapitulate my father’s empiricism. Once I realise that I am affected by imbibing booze, I get annoyed enough at the impending loss of control that the imbibing ceases. Even if it involves quite yummy cocktails, as my birthday degustation on Monday did.
The limit is I think 5 shots’ worth.
The symptoms only get as far as me being slightly more voluble than usual, and an incipient wooziness. No room spinning or nausea or anything like that.
My threshold has dropped since my twenties too. I was capable back then of downing a Long Island ice tea. Already by 35, I was struggling with half of one.
Why are all Quora moderators Satan?
I wished, my A2A’er and True Quora Master Scott Welch, to give you a well-informed theologically-based answer to this question.
So I googled: “Satan does not”. Because there’s a lot of things that Quora moderation does not do.
I got this from the Agape Geek blog as my first Google hit: Six Things Satan Doesn’t Want You To Know About Himself
And freakily enough, the Agape Geek’s Evangelical description of Satan has several eerie touchpoints with Quora Moderation:
1. Satan DOES NOT Want You To Know That He Exists
2. Satan DOES NOT Want You To Know How He Operates
3. Satan DOES NOT Want You to Know that He Can’t Be Everywhere At Once
4. Satan DOES NOT Want You To Know That His Time Is Short
5. Satan DOES NOT Want You To Know He Was Defeated
6. Satan DOES NOT Want You To Know That You Have Authority Over Him
…
OK:
- Quora Moderation DOES NOT Want You To Know That It Exists.
Chrys Jordan’s answer to What if Quora were a country? Keyword: Cryptocracy. - Quora Moderation DOES NOT Want You To Know How It Operates.
Chrys Jordan’s answer to What if Quora were a country? Keyword: Cryptocracy. - Quora Moderation DOES NOT Want You to Know that It Can’t Be Everywhere At Once.
Quora Moderation is (hypothetically) having trouble keeping up with violations. Quora Moderation can’t (hypothetically) be everywhere at once. Which is why YOU WILL GET DINGED FOR VIOLATIONS TWO YEARS AFTER YOUR OFFENCE. Does Quora Moderation have a statute of limitations on policy violations? And if not should they? - Quora Moderation DOES NOT Want You To Know That Its Time Is Short
Quora Moderation does not want you to know how long its current arrangements will persist, until it’s too late! Hah! Just as people got the surprise notice about the end of community moderation! Or of the Elimination of Topic-Based Moderation by Jay Wacker on Quora Product Updates! Quora Moderation will keep you GUESSING! PRAISE JESUS! - Quora Moderation DOES NOT Want You To Know It Was Defeated
Nonsense! Heresy! Quora Moderation has never been defeated! Quora Moderation has never had to bring anyone back to life twice, like Steven de Guzman! That’s why QUORA MODERATION NEVER APOLOGISES! EVER! MINE EYES HAVE SEEN THE GLORY! HALLELUJAH! - Quora Moderation DOES NOT Want You To Know That You Have Authority Over It
Quora Moderation does not want you to know that you have ANY AUTHORITY AT ALL! You will respect QUORA’S AUTHORITAH! YOU WILL NOT QUESTION QUORA’S AUTHORITAH! That’s why all your moderation appeals are belong to DEV/NULL! AND SO INTO THE DEPTHS OF PERDITION!
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CAN I GET AN AY-MEN?!
…
It’s a plausible theory, OP. Good work there.
What would your Quora followers be surprised to learn about you?
Others on this thread have spoken to their impostor syndrome. I won’t answer with that: we are all, as Michael Masiello once put it to me, broken toys here, which correlates with us falling into our knowledge rather than training for it.
I’ve never formally studied Ancient Greek, for example.
I don’t say anything online I’d be ashamed of (including for this question); but then again, I tend to be an open book, both in person and online. In person perhaps less than I used to be.
People on Quora have been surprised about stuff I know that I don’t post about much. My day job being in education technology (h/t Scott Welch), for example, or that I program a fair bit, though not necessarily well (h/t Miguel Paraz).
People have also been surprised about my age. As of yesterday: 45. I certainly don’t act it, and I don’t plan to.
What city in your country do you feel would give a foreigner the best idea of said country’s culture?
So. Mate. Maaaaate.
Youse wanna hang out in a ciddy where youse’ll get the bestest idear of some dinky-di Aussie culture, mate?
Tough question, because of our parochialism, and because our culture has been shifting noticeably over the last fifty years.
For the old Australia, a regional city. Tamworth, New South Wales, because they play country music unironically?
For the new Australia, Sydney or Melbourne. Sydney and Melbourne still loathe each other, so I can’t give an unbiased answer, and I’ve give you the biased answer of Melbourne.
They’re clines of course: there’s nowhere left in Australia that you can’t get a half-decent latte from, and there’s quite a cultural divide between the hipster inner city and the burbs.
EDIT: I queried this of a better travelled colleague. Her retort: Tamworth would be so desperate to cater to out of town yuppies, that you would not see anywhere near as much Old Australian culture as I’d hope. My two colleagues concurred that Queensland was a better bet, as a more decentralised state. Christine Leigh Langtree, Tracey Bryan, what say you?