Re: Guest Post - I AM getting very sleepy...

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It looks like in FL there's no specific licensure system for hypnotists, but you can't practice therapeutic hypnosis without some sort of medical licensure (such as doctor, chiropractor, social worker, therapist).


Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 9:48 AM
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AIPMBAOP, my dad stopped smoking by seeing a hypnotist. He smoked for forty years, two packs a day when I knew him.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:02 AM
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AIPMBAOPII, my grandfather with a secret identity was an academic hypnotist. In fact, when he was travelling to visit his secret family, he was supposedly giving hypnotism lectures at conferences, which he must have actually been doing sometimes. A stopped clock is still giving hypnotism lectures twice a day.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:10 AM
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You're saying I should see if my dad has a secret family.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:12 AM
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I think we're related.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:13 AM
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We're all star stuff.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:16 AM
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My dad probably is old enough to be your grandfather.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:18 AM
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My cow-orker tried self hypnotism using youtube videos of some guy who claimed to be able to help anxiety disorders. It made his problem horribly worse, to the point where he could not come in to work for three days. Eventually he went to see a professional and got things sorted out, but it was a really dramatic effect while it lasted. He was really fucked up for a while there.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:31 AM
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What is an academic hypnotist? Did he work as a librarian at the Magic Castle?

I love Class of 1984. It's the real high school experience.


Posted by: Roberto Tigre | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:34 AM
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8: A professional therapist or a professional hypnotist?


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:36 AM
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Mostly therapist, but employed by a university, and did some research.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:37 AM
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I remember a guy who used hypnosis to conquer his fear of flying. A key word ("eclipse") was programmed into his subconscious that would cause him to fall asleep so that he would be able to fly. Then, during a gun battle somebody ran out of bullets and asked for "the clips" and he passed out. This may have been an episode of The A-Team.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:40 AM
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I pity the fool who cites the A-Team instead of the obviously superior choice: the recording pitching a hypnosis school in the voice intro of one episode of season 4's Rockford Files.


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:45 AM
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I haven't gotten that far yet. I got sidetracked by trying to see if I could buy a Firebird.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:47 AM
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I thought hypnotism in medicine was chiefly associated in modern times with implanting false memories of Satanic abuse and such.


Posted by: chris y | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:49 AM
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I got sidetracked watching the trailer and musing how heavily current fashion is drawing on 1984.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:49 AM
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10: Both, I think. One person, but doing hypnotherapy as well as talk therapy.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:51 AM
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Because I don't want to stream The Rockford Files at work, I read the linked article. While I agree that you somebody should have stopped the guy from hypnotizing his students, I'm wondering exactly why everyone is so sure of the connection to the tragedies.

"Less than two years later, three students were dead," is not exactly a strongly argued statement of causality.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:52 AM
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I don't want to stream The Rockford Files at work

You're expecting us to believe that?


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:53 AM
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But yes, that it's all a coincidence seems overwhelmingly likely.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:54 AM
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I don't want to stream The Rockford Files at work because I think IT might notice. Also, I don't know the Netflix password.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 10:55 AM
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Calling Moby "Lester Freamon" Hick in the evidence bureau:

http://dangerousminds.net/comments/awesome_rockford_files_diorama_available_on_ebay


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 11:03 AM
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I have one of those.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 11:08 AM
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Class of 1984 was some great punksploitation back in the day.

I used hypnosis to quit smoking back in the late 80s. It worked for about 4 months before I needed another session. And the second session didn't take for more than about a week. I'm not sure the hypnosis really did anything though, mostly I think it worked for the time it did because I would have been ashamed at spending about $300-500 on shit that didn't work.


Posted by: | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 11:09 AM
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24 was me


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 11:10 AM
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If somebody tells me Tom Deluca's act isn't legit, I'm going to be upset.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 11:26 AM
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You hear people talk about hypnosis as having some impressively helpful effects on people but I think that it's probably just that those people are really suggestible.

It's hard to tell with the school story, but I think there's a more charitable version that goes something like "these were troubled kids - see here how things turned out for some of them - and the school was giving them "counseling" that wasn't actually that at all and also circled the wagons really hard when the parents complained." I'm not sure why the magical powers of hypnosis would be as important as they come off in the article though, and obviously I'm a bit skeptical of the hypnotized-them-into-death bits. Some of the things they describe the kids going to him for (pain from sports; anxiety over auditions; depression after failing a test) do sound like things that are what people say when they're in genuinely bad places but don't want to say it that way or as openly as they could.


Posted by: MHPH | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 12:08 PM
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I remember some study where they needed a group of subjects who were extra-susceptible to suggestion, and so they solicited survivors of alien abductions.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 12:20 PM
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Because the aliens kill all but the most suggestible of those they abduct.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 12:24 PM
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Hypnosis and hypnotherapy are perfectly real as far as that goes. Do you have to be suggestible? Sure. Is it related to the placebo effect? Probably. So?

None of which is related to the entirely cuckoo story in the OP, which is less about hypnotism than... I don't even know. A satanic bee cult, probably.


Posted by: Beefo Meaty | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 12:35 PM
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Stuff just happens in Florida.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 12:46 PM
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From that Class of 1984 IMDB link:

This school is so dangerous that the students have to go through a metal detector at the front door

I did my student teaching there! Who knew? I thought it was just some racist paranoid bullshit, but I guess it was the punks all along.


Posted by: Frowner | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:08 PM
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I mean, it's obvious that a lot of their problem is that they're making twenty-five-year-olds go to high school - I'd probably get pretty violent if I'd been in high school for better than ten years.


Posted by: Frowner | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:11 PM
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And also - it's clear that the poster artist has no idea how mohawks actually work, which is very cute.


Posted by: Frowner | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:13 PM
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I didn't know why had a function.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:16 PM
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Why s/b they. I don't know how I did that.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:19 PM
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The poster artist does seem to have skipped the crucial 'shaving the sides of the head' aspect of the mohawk, thinking of it as a hairstyle accomplished solely through the application of gel to generally long hair overall.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:49 PM
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Well, it's not just that - it's that the artist appears to think that there's sort of a giant lump of hair in the middle of the scalp in addition to the regular hair, and that's what you make into a mohawk - like, if I had my hair thickly falling to either side a la colorful-bird-mohawk guy, I would not have enough for a significant mohawk in the middle of my head as well, and I have fairly thick hair.

And I like the women character's mysterious back-of-the-head halo mohawk - I'm not sure how she achieved that, even with my personal experience with spikey and pokey hairstyles. Is the back of her head totally bald except for the spiked fringe?


Posted by: Frowner | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 1:57 PM
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Tonsure was a thing in 1982. In Canada.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 2:09 PM
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The crappy YA it reminded me of was a British import called The Demon Headmaster, much later made into a BBC miniseries.


Posted by: snarkout | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 2:14 PM
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I didn't think The Demon Headmaster was crappy!

I was also pretty young when I read it though so it probably was. It might not have been though!


Posted by: MHPH | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 2:24 PM
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I believe that the Columbo episode, "A Deadly State of Mind" is relevant here.


Posted by: J, Robot | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 2:58 PM
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"Law and Order" tips from the headlines. "Colombo" runs forty years ahead of them.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 3:03 PM
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The Demon Headmaster is not YA. I think I was under 10 when I read it. It's definitely a children's book.


Posted by: | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 3:37 PM
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THE COMPUTER DIRECTOR IS EVIL. NO-ONE IS FREE. 20 years later we founded ORG and MySociety!


Posted by: Alex | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 4:37 PM
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As for the OP, someone I know was taking the piss out of the story.

On Knifecrime Island, though, that guy would be in serious trouble; a headmaster offering troubled kids hypnosis? hard to square that with the duty of care in the Children Act '89, even less the more recent safeguarding legislation, doubly so seeing as several people involved had mental health problems of some sort. and if the law don't get you, the General Teaching Council might hit you with a professional standards and ethics hearing, if the local education authority/devolved administration/academy governing body/the department of education didn't can you via its disciplinary authority first.

If you reframe it as a serious lack of professionalism in looking after vulnerable young adults, it looks very, very different.


Posted by: Alex | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 4:44 PM
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Right, but they fire you for a serious lack of professionalism. That's what it sounds like happened to this guy, in addition to probation.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 5:18 PM
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It happened eventually, yeah, but from the article it looks like it happened really, really late and only after some bad things happened and it came out more publicly that he was doing it. Before that the school was just kind of sending him warning letters.


Posted by: MHPH | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 5:51 PM
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I'm not saying they did a great job.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 5:55 PM
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Based on the title, I'm guessing this is the debate thread?


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 6:14 PM
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This reminds me of what happened to a friend of mine. He was maybe 21 at the time. Anyway, he had a court-ordered insight into his need for treatment of alcohol abuse and one treatment session involved hypnosis. At his next session, he had a different therapist and mentioned the hypnosis. This new therapist got upset and said that they other guy had been ordered not to use hypnosis. We all made a bunch of jokes about what happened while he was under hypnosis and thus my friend stopped telling us about his therapy.

I haven't seen him drive drunk more than twice or so since then.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 6:16 PM
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|>
Just tuned in a little while ago, but this debate seems like an exercise in vigorous agreement. I agree! No, I agree!
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Posted by: Jesus McQueen | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:02 PM
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I guess that does make this the debate thread.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:13 PM
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What kind of depraved monster watches the Republican debate with Kershaw pitching in a must-win.


Posted by: Roberto Tigre | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:19 PM
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Democratic debate, whatever. I might vote for Bernie but God is it stupid to get worked up about him.


Posted by: Roberto Tigre | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:22 PM
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Mike Huckabee is keeping it classy over there on twitter.


Posted by: MHPH | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:22 PM
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I don't have cable, so I'll just have to imagine Kershaw being awesome.


Posted by: Jesus McQueen | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:24 PM
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So I was sitting in my cubicle today, and I realized, ever since I started working, every single day of my life has been worse than the day before it. So that means that every single day that you see me, that's on the worst day of my life.


Posted by: Natilo Paennim | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:28 PM
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Worst day of your working life, anyway.


Posted by: nosflow | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:29 PM
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What I meant to say was, "I don't even have a TV." Apologies for violation of protocol.


Posted by: Jesus McQueen | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:31 PM
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Ape MBA top, as a child, a friend of mine was convinced by his father* to undergo significant dental work with no anesthesia, just hypnosis. "The goggles -- they do NOTHING" apparently didn't cover the half of it.

*His father is a legitimate, well respected scientist and professor emeritus.


Posted by: Natilo Paennim | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:33 PM
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Anyway, has Webb always been such a weenie? I expected it of Chafee, but not the military dude.


Posted by: Jesus McQueen | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:34 PM
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51: We all made a bunch of jokes about what happened while he was under hypnosis and thus my friend stopped telling us about his therapy.

That's kind of harsh -- maybe his family needed the eggs.


Posted by: Natilo Paennim | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 7:36 PM
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||
Whoever is in charge of the Caltrain News Twitter feed is a mensch. I am still sorry my train hit a person, and that it took me over three hours to get home and my sick kid succumbed to cranky exhaustion before I got there.
|>


Posted by: lurid keyaki | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 8:10 PM
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Almost certainly a person hit your train. At least when I was there and reading the news, it was about a suicide a month on the Caltrain tracks.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 8:30 PM
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But ogged, how could anyone want to take their own life?


Posted by: lurid keyaki | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 8:38 PM
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Marijuana.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 8:47 PM
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Caltrain has had on-track incidents* at least once a week for the past 4 or 5 weeks, I think. Their communication has gotten way, way better in the last year. Before the twitter feed, it was hard to learn anything. Trains were just 60-90 minutes late without explanation.

*Note my deft use evasion of assigning responsibility. Most of the pedestrian incidents seem to have been suicides, car incidents drivers who don't completely cross the tracks.


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 8:50 PM
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The first time I saw "passenger strike" cross the train platform message boards I was very confused. Like... a boycott? A boycott on the tracks? People, you can boycott off the tracks. BART apparently killed someone right after I passed through San Bruno tonight, so I narrowly avoided a double whammy. Christ.

Natilo, I could riff on the marijuana line, but take good care of yourself. I don't know if I mentioned this explicitly here yet, but in January I decided I'd had enough of the antidepressant-induced artificial cheeriness and ditched the pills. The decline was really slow, too slow to trace even when I was being careful to do so, but by August I was such a fucking mess it was unreal. After three months' return to medication or so, I feel pleasantly numb again, and I will absolutely take it over the alternative. If you must work, there is less shame than you might think in chemically augmenting the whole experience.


Posted by: lurid keyaki | Link to this comment | 10-13-15 9:15 PM
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Almost certainly a person hit your train.

Perhaps more accurate to say the train hit a person.

61: heard that this is a thing with USMC officers: they refuse anaesthesia for dental work, to show off. Nutters.


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 1:57 AM
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The desire to impress dentists is a little-discussed facet of Marine Corps tradition.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:12 AM
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Cleaning your teeth while doing something else is known as incidental hygiene.


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:24 AM
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IMHB my distant cousin the hypnotist who does smoking cessation and breast enhancement.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:40 AM
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Breasts don't even have eyes.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:42 AM
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Is the idea to hypnotize the woman who wants her breasts enhanced, or to hypnotize everyone who's likely to look at her? Because stopping at breast enhancement seems like failing to explore the full potential there. ("Not only do you look like Ingrid Bergman at twenty-two, everytime I look at you, inexplicable harp music begins to play.")


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:50 AM
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You don't know inexplicable until you've heard Flock of Seagulls played on the harp.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:54 AM
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He was adamant that it worked.

I met a couple of his girlfriends over the years, and while I certainly wasn't going to ask, the possibility that it might actually work couldn't be ruled out. On that basis.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 5:57 AM
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That shows a very weak commitment to science.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 6:01 AM
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64: We were once insanely late getting back from a wedding rehearsal because our T train hit someone. Our friends with whom we were very sympathetic and didn't mention the fact that we had to drag them out of bed at one in the morning to be let in.


Posted by: snarkout | Link to this comment | 10-14-15 8:15 AM
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||

Uses of Anime & Feminism in Japan

Blood+ is a 2006-2007 50 episode vampire series. It has many levels, but near the top is the "Tale of Two Sister Enemies" trying to kill each other.

These vampires are a different species, but closely related and compatible with humans. They are active for three years, and then sleep for thirty years. Our story starts as both awaken.

Sister A, the bad sister, gains servants/disciples in the usual manner, by draining them and giving them her blood. She calls these servants her "family." She is also the std vampire, having no compassion or empathy for humans, killing large numbers on a whim, having no particular goal than procreation and recreation, seeing them as food. But she is very loyal and protective to her "children" as long as they return her love.

Sister B, the good sister, our main character, gets her blood from transfusions of donated blood, has two "servants," both created reluctantly in order to save their lives. She is surrounded by a large constructed family, not blood related, at their option entirely, accepted with sadness because she needs help, but she would rather not get people involved in her struggle. She only kills the evil vampires, and has such compassion and empathy for humans that she is willing to fight, die, and kill her blood relative to protect them.

They are both capable of bearing children, but only via the other's servants. Bad sister A rapes and kills one of Sister B's servants in order to get pregnant. Good sister B essentially gives up reproduction (killing A and her servants) to save the human race.

So one major theme is idea of the physical blood family versus the constructed family.

In a recent Japan very concerned with the roles of women, a declining birthrate, a struggle with cosmopolitanism vs nationalism...do you think these themes are coincidental?

There is always an allegorical level.

PS:Because of the low pay rates and social nature of anime production, at least 30-40% of production work is done by women, and for niche or arty anime, likely over 50%. Mostly of course at grunt levels, but more and more at the top creative levels, and anyway the social nature of the society allows for more input from lower levels.

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Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 10-15-15 8:18 AM
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Further on 80 above:

In Blood+ over 17 hours of content, of course the differences and nuances of interactions within and between constructed and consanguineous families are explored

2) Besides low pay, anime jobs have very long hours, are precarious and intermittent, and brutally stressful under deadline and iffy financing. So young single women. There are good jobs with high pay and security in the long-running commercial series like One Piece and these go to men.

One upside of neoliberal production is artistic opportunity and a certain degree of independence in small boutique indie studios. One of the most artistically acclaimed series of the last season was directed by a woman, her second lead position, and was also popular enough and sold so well that she is sure to get more chances. Her work is not particularly feminist but is visually exciting. Kekkai Sensen, previous arthouse production Kyousou Giga. Matsumoto Rie


Posted by: bob mcmanus | Link to this comment | 10-15-15 4:31 PM
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