What's the Fun of Winning if You Can't Gloat?

[tealin]

NO.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Powers That Be in Iraq (I don't care if it's the US or whatever supposedly local government is in charge): You're not listening.

You weren't supposed to kill Saddam Hussein. You were supposed to put him in a bomb-proof plexiglass box in Burbank so animators could draw his fabulous facial expressions and gestures for the rest of his days ... which probably wouldn't be very many if he were in a bomb-proof plexiglass box in direct sunlight with no air conditioning, especially if he were wearing one of his fancied wool suits. Even with personal animator consideration aside, this argument can be framed in a vaguely political way – because hey, that's what the Romans did! Haul the leaders of your conquered tribes back home and put them on display! Okay, okay, and then kill them, but that is inevitable with the aforementioned wool, plexiglass, and California sunshine. You like the Romans! You obviously want to be the Romans! Look at your political architecture and symbology! Why do you randomly pick this moment to suddenly get all 'mature' and, as a consequence, forfeit one of the greatest life drawing models the world has ever seen? Think how a study of such a man could benefit future generations both artistically and entertainment-wise. The budding animator who draws Saddam Hussein today could go on to make the seminal classic of family entertainment tomorrow, but no! You deprive your children of their generation's Cinderella or Beauty and the Beast – How could you?? Sheesh.

Comments

[pandoras-closet.livejournal.com]

May I metaqoute you?

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Feel free... someone did that last time I ranted on Hussein as life drawing model too, but no one listened. Now it's too late. Sigh.

[canisdoofus.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure the Dunkin Donuts guy is still alive. Maybe they could put HIM in the Burbank Box... :\

[canisdoofus.livejournal.com]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Vale) He's dead, too!!! I was wrong! D: Is there any funny moustache-man left in this pitiful world???

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

... Dunkin Donuts guy?

[canisdoofus.livejournal.com]

he kinna looked like Saddam!

[trashcanbaby.livejournal.com]

I remember seeing that box, I wonder how lucky you had to be to get stuck in there for a day.

"Your scene is late?! INTO THE BOX!"
"NOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!"

[i-have-boydism.livejournal.com]

That is absolutely the best thing I've ever read.
Props to you.
Keep Smiling,
Gaby

Vivat Res Publica

[tannhaeuser.livejournal.com]

[azvolrien.livejournal.com]

The main problem with wanting to be exactly like the Romans is that eventually their empire FELL.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

All empires fall ... it's just a matter of how much of a crater you can carve out of history before you go.

[azvolrien.livejournal.com]

Such as the British Empire. It covered most of the world, and yet I wouldn't be surprised to learn that several people in America didn't know it existed, outside of America once being part of it.

Anyway. Romans. After watching Terry Jones' Barbarians, I'm much less impressed with the Romans than I once was.

[tannhaeuser.livejournal.com]

[azvolrien.livejournal.com]

Barbarians was very good and, as I reinforced by doing a fair bit of research of my own, entirely accurate. And since when am I a 'serious student of history'? I dropped History at the end of second year.

Every empire leaves a mark on the world, and it cannot reasonably be denied that Rome was one of the greatest. However, it always rankles with me that the Romans are touted as the inventors of practically everything when the only inventions still in use today that was Rome's original idea are, as you said, the alphabet and the archway. Like most great civilisations, a lot of their technology was taken from earlier ones such as the Greeks and the Etruscans.

That, and I can't truly respect a civilisation whose idea of a fun day out was to go and watch people kill each other in an arena. Also, it was no doing of Rome's that their alphabet is used all over the world. They invented it, but it was the British Empire that spread it as far as it is now.

[tannhaeuser.livejournal.com]

And since when am I a 'serious student of history'? I dropped History at the end of second year.

[azvolrien.livejournal.com]

I would never presume to be a 'serious student' of Greek mythology, yet I know a tremendous amount about that.

[(Anonymous)]

you lost me about halfway through the text...how is suddam hussein going to relate to cinderella???

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Because ... if you put him in a plexiglass box in a place where animators and animators-in-training could draw him, they could use what they learn from his unique gifts of gerning on animated features of the future, possibly leading to future films with the artistic value of the classics.

But it's too late for that now...