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We're here to talk comments and spread misinformation about books, irony and casting choices. GET INTO IT!

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Thunk

I'll have to track it down, but I think Robert M Price finishes a Shub Niggurath story with a room of people breastfeeding from a giant monster. I had no idea this was a Grapes of Wrath reference.

Anonymous

No, that was a giant orgy in a lightless room with a Dark Young at the center doing a lot of topping and bottoming at once.

Anonymous

As far as I'm concerned, the only time you should cut off someone's balls in the pre-industrial world is when they're a consenting adult that wants to be a priestess of Inanna. Especially since they'll need the estrogen from that mare urine to stave off the Bone Fairy later in life.

Anonymous

Really, this extends to all forms of pre-industrial transition, faith-based or otherwise.

Anonymous

Also, while I may not be the best person to point this out, I should note that religion-as-culture thing isn't modern. In point of fact, it's the opposite; the wholesale conflation of religion with theism is a rather *christian* idea violently propagated through colonialism and evangelism. Many religions past and present have been less concerned with what one necessarily believes than what they do. That's one of the reasons I've idly considered converting to Judaism at some vague future date. Aside from other merits I like and offering a far healthier relationship with religion than my Southern Baptist upbringing, I would still be able to be an atheist no problem. ...Which is an odd way to follow up the above talk of monster orgies and Mesopotamian HRT, I know.

Anonymous

Listening to Chad and Chris discuss episodes they haven’t recorded yet but I’ve already listened to makes me feel like a time traveller. And that is the best feeling there is! (Unless I run into Morlocks or Daleks, then I’m fucked)

Anonymous

Chris and Chad's perception about cafeteria Catholicism cultural Christianity is interesting because here in Singapore (and from my experience across a lot of Asia) actual born-again God-taking-an-active-hand-in-my-life is the default. I've always felt an outlier as a cultural Christian.

Anonymous

Sorry to bum you out, my boon companions.

Anonymous

Exactly. In my experience the societies which are far more "evangelical" in their Christianity are ones where it's a relatively recent import (much of Asia falls under this).

Anonymous

There's a Chinese folktale about a woman who breastfeeds her starving mother-in-law. There's a weird ass park here in Singapore originally built by a pair of eccentric millionaire brothers in the 1930s which has a ton of statues, one of which depicts this folktale. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-35468785

Anonymous

I think I can definitively put the Cunégonde question to bed - I have uncovered research by a group of learned scholars that reveals the correct pronunciation of Cunégonde is in fact "Throatwobbler Mangrove" (M. Python, 1970).

Steve

"Ces clameurs partaient de deux filles toutes nues qui couraient légèrement au bord de la prairie, tandis que deux singes les suivaient en leur mordant les fesses." In the original French, the monkeys are definitely biting their bums, "fesses" above, murmuring all the while "Cunégonde" in a French accent.

Steve

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman is my favourite old book. It's about 220,000 words so about 5 times longer than Candide, and would take you 20 episodes. But it would be time well spent!

Steve

Oh no, overexplainers. I feel targeted, probably with good cause.

Steve

I always really enjoyed going to the Christmas carol service with my mum. I know all the songs because we had to sing them at school and group singing is always uplifting. It doesn't really matter what you sing, although perhaps not Rent or Folk Music. But we had mince pies afterwards and a cosy chat. What's not to like?

Anonymous

I loved the discussion of gatherings based on non-belief vs. something you have a common interest in. While I salute the Freethought Society and the Unitarian churches near me, I could never gather the wherewithal to actually drive there every Sunday morning. The mention of people being arrogant jerks at atheist gatherings reminded me of the podcast My Year in Mensa. A writer who doesn't consider herself a towering intellect takes an IQ test on a lark, gets in, and meets some of the worst people imaginable. Turns out you create a crappy culture by solely attracting people who a.) got a high test score, and b.) consider that a significant part of their identity. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/my-year-in-mensa/id1492147103

Anonymous

I recently had a terrible social media experience. There was an inflammatory post on cancel culture and I tried to comment on how misleading it was and directed people to a better source of info. Many people liked my post and thanked me, but this one guy ranted at me for 3 days about how cancel culture is going to lead to concentration camps. No logic or facts could persuade this loser he was wrong. He responded to everything I said with "You know nothing..." and at one point wrote, "I'm not biased. I'm a novelist." The more and more he talked about himself, I saw this had more to do with his ego than the content of his argument. It scares me how irrational people can get. It really scares me.

Anonymous

Much better and safer to just chat and share thoughts here David with like-minded weirdos. I think I have now actually reached an infinite number of facebook and twitter posts that I carefully typed out, proofread and angst over before deleting for the very reason you mention. There is no joy, no point in trying to engage the screaming id that is the internet.

Evan

listening to Chris explain memes somehow made me feel old, and I was born in a year starting with a 2.....

Anonymous

You are correct Chris, I did not like Candide. Both when I read it in college and when you guys covered it. I gave it another go because you were covering it, but I just don't like it.

Anonymous

Chad, any chance we get more playlists like the Pitch Black Manor Halloween Party 2020? I find myself putting it on year-round and love your music taste.

Anonymous

As mentioned on the show, I don’t like it either. I found it a slog and the more I think about it, the more pretentious it strikes me

Anonymous

On the subject of people's preferences for happy endings: years ago on an episode of The Museum of Curiosity, I heard of an hypothesis by evolutionary psychologists that the reason humans tell stories to each other is to communicate essential survival information, e.g. this is how you catch a mammoth for food, this is how you escape from an angry tiger, etc. Stories that end badly are of much less use than those with a satisfactory conclusion. Certainly, there's a place for cautionary tales ("Steve was dumb and got eaten by a tiger. Don't be like Steve."), but people have a deeply ingrained preference for happy endings. Nobody wants instructions on how to get killed.

Anonymous

It has to be noted that Alessandro Moreschi was not considered an especially great castrato singer, he just happened to be one of the few, if not only, to have his voice recorded. Castratis were young boys with good singing voices, think Wiener Sängerknaben, that were chirurgically castrated before their voices broke .This was apparently seen as an acceptable career move for poor boys. Often the operation was unsuccessful and their voices did not keep and they were doomed to perform in fairs. Others made stupendous careers in church or later in opera music, Farinelli is considered the greatest of them all and his voice was synthesized mixing the voices of a male and female opera singer for the movie about his life.