General Discussion

Ah yes, Sinister...I liked that one

You should see Incidious (by the same makers)

And the horror movie that really got me going was Grave Encounters.

Oh sweet dear baby jesus. Insidious seriously frightened me, I can't imagine what Sinister will do to me... 

It kinda worries me when I read that our human minds obviously have a major error when it comes to fear. We tend to be more scared of a spirit or deity than of for example seriously hurting another person or their feelings. The fact that seeing something dangerous makes us accumulate fear, instead of caution and calm calculated situation processing is in my opinion a big neurological flaw. For it increases the chances of dying significantly in proportion to the actual amount of danger.
Insideous,pledeus, jabridius...bring It on, but gimme some popcorn.
I watched a cool movie yesterday about human society, life , the multiverse and slavery. Pretty hardcore....with manufactured asian slavegirls, time traveling aliens and a gay composer. Very confusing yet still entertaining at first and some great acting work...I believe it was called cloud compass. But not sure...something with compass.

The thing that really got me about Insidious is that I LOVE to dream... and guess what Insidious is about. Dreams and out-of-body experiences going wrong, and getting stuck in some crazy Inbetween place where evil things get into your body while you're out. Fucked up shit. 

I don't mind thrillers and I think psychological thrillers are cool. For instance, I love the Hannibal series (Silence of the lambs, Hannibal, Red dragon and Hannibal rising) but for some reason horrors like Insidious are creepier to me because they mess with my colorful imagination too much.

I've seen insidious. First time I saw it it was im the cinema. It's a whole different setting than when you watch it at home with someone. I live in an industrial area, got no neigbors and we watched 3 scary films in a row with only candlelight. At the movies I genuenly just make fun of the film with the people I'm with because I find it so funny how other people react to them.

And Admin, the thing with Insidious and Sinister is just the build-up of the film. Which begins very subtile, but is scary enough to give you mindfucks to begin with. My sister is like a horror movie veteran or something and she even got scared. xD

Totally agree with Nomaru, the setting makes a huge difference. Also whether you watch it together with other people or alone. 

*gets the creeps* ....alone. No, never doing that again.

If you go forward you should get it back.. I have made the mistake on another of these forums several times and it worked for me.

Admin wrote:

It kinda worries me when I read that our human minds obviously have a major error when it comes to fear. We tend to be more scared of a spirit or deity than of for example seriously hurting another person or their feelings.

I don't think that goes for all people to be honest. =) 

Admin wrote:

he fact that seeing something dangerous makes us accumulate fear, instead of caution and calm calculated situation processing is in my opinion a big neurological flaw. For it increases the chances of dying significantly in proportion to the actual amount of danger.

Quote is supposed to end here but I accidently pressed backspace somewhere later so... ughh whatever I'm terrible at formatting. 

Mmm. I'll try to apply the biological viewpoint here. Well when noticing something about human psychology you should always try to think ''would this help a person in nature?'' For example the only thing that hunter-gatherers really had to 'fear' far back in human history were like big animals which could kill them, or being rejected by the group or something... Basically practical real life confrontational stuff. Fear is something that makes you focus a lot on a particular thing. For example I'm with a group of other humans and there's a lion in front of me. First there is fright, and my reaction can be either fight or flight. I'm not going to take my eyes of that lion (fun fact: our eyes are specialised in a way that we can easily follow a moving object... Let me search for that video for a minute... 

(it just continues here) Ok took me a while to find it but got it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJbKieEC49M You might want to give it a watch, it's pretty interesting.)
Anyway, in this case flight is probably the more advantageous one, as I cannot even hope to defeat a lion, so I run. The chance of me surviving when I run is probably the highest, since rational thinking, as good of a thing as it is, isn't going to help me against a lion on an empty field. To survive in nature somes being impulsive and concentrating one the threat (basically what fear makes you do) is more useful than being rational. You don't need to be smart to survive, many other species on the world show us that. Human intelligence is amazing though, not saying it isn't. I'm rather a smart human than a fast dragonfly or something... But to finish the lion situation, there's simply nothing that I can do other than run. So fear definitely has advantages, otherwise we wouldn't fear at all. Fear makes your body physically ready for a threat. Your heart starts beating faster supplying more blood, it widens your pupils, etc... It puts your body into a ... what was the name for it again? A, the sympathetic nervous system! That becomes active than. 

With these movies however, it's way more important to stay rational and realise it's not true, exactly like you say. But there are no scary movies in nature, so we don't have that skill. 

Ugh, I'm terrible at explaining...

The movie you watched sounds interesting by the way. Here's a cool quote about slavery I saw a few days ago. I think it's very true:
''Historically, the most terrible things - war, genocide, and slavery - have resulted not from disobedience, but from obedience.'' ~ Howard Zinn
Hasn't got much to do with this topic but like I said, it's very true. Wait, maybe it has something to do with this topic after all, since forming a ''leader follower'' structured group is something which is in our nature as well. It works, it's effective for survival. But this feature in our nature can also be misused for terrible acts (basically hitler (I know it sounds incredibly stupid but even though I rationally know words are neutral and I should capitalize names, I never feel like capitalizing people like Hitler...) used this feature of human nature and his own understanding of human psychology to realise his f-ed up ideals). 

Sorry for this terrible comment + explanation. Basically all I wanted to say, seriously ALL I wanted to say, was that fear has advantages for human beings in nature, and it turned into this mess. I'm submitting this because now it took so much time I'm not going to delete it. 
Oh by the way this comment is not meant as a ''YOU'RE WROOOOOOONG'' comment. Not at all. Just sharing a thought, that's all. Trying to share the biological perspective, but I fail... Sorry!!


Oh, and Meran, thanks, I'll remember that for in the future.

Bit of a random comment here but just had a huge facepalm moment (which is really not that uncommon for me to be honest...)
Reacted with an entire story (about as big to that comment of mine above here) to a guy on some site to something he said only to be told ''I was being sarcastic. Are you German?'' Seriously, people would probably call me a German did they not know where I am from.  That's because of some stupid stereotype by the way. There is this stereotype about how German people don't get sarcasm. Obviously stereotypes are always bullsh*t but they're fun to mess around with, and it's fun knowing them for jokes. ;P It's annoying when people think they're actually true though. You don't want to know how many times I've been asked whether I smoke weed just because I'm Dutch (fellow Dutch people here can probably relate). It's also a stupid, but harmless, stereotype. If you're French some people think you're grumpy and don't have any manners at all, that'd suck...

Anyway, any of you guys/girls have had any huge facepalm moments lately? I'm totally not asking that just to feel better about myself...

As an Asian, I get plenty of stereotype like A on everything result-oriented, mathlete and also the Asian level(highest level) on anything. Those, I am okay, as in my opinion there are a level of truth in  stereotype -- after all, if there's no math freak in Asia, then there will never be mathlete stereotype in existence so on some level, there are a layer of truth.

However, those are fine since it's harder for an American or European for example, to get to know an Asian very well because of the initial distance between continent and also language barrier and so forth. What I am more serious about is the other Asian countries stereotypical view on my country. To make things clearer, I am a Malaysian. Malaysia is a mixed country as in we have three main races - Chinese, Malay and Indian - plus a ton of natives and also most people here are (at least) bilingual for the most part. They all will learn at least their race's native tongue and also English in school. I myself is trilingual -- Chinese, Malay and English but my Malay sucks lol. However, most Chinese-speaking countries like Taiwan and China will go "OMFG, this Malaysian dude can speak fluent Chinese!" when the meet a Malaysian-Chinese. I mean seriously, is it that surprising? Vice versa, some English-oriented country will be surprised by a Malaysian's standard English. I guess when your country's national language is Malay, you cannot speak other language well.

-gains insight to Ryochoku's life- So that makes you a malaysian born chinese right?

That's actually really interesting, Ryochoku. I like to learn about other cultures and things that're going on in countries I'm not familiar with. 

And yes Houtarou, stereotypes about the Netherlands and Dutch people, ha. 

'The Netherlands' you say? Isn't that the same as Amsterdam? Because all Dutch people live in Amsterdam, right? Right. We party hard and we all do drugs, of course. That's Holland alright, sex drugs and parties!!1! Whoooo! We're all godless, abuse our freedom of speech, are disrespectful and opinionated. 

 I think Dutch stereotypes are kinda funny. Hehe.

Almost wanted to give you a leture about that opinion... But then I read the last sentence and smiled

Interesting story Ryochoku!  It's cool that you can speak three languages though! I heard the Malaysian language doesn't have verb conjugations, that sounds pretty awesome though, haha. 
Yep, the mathlete is a pretty common stereotype for Asian people. It's weird though, Asia is huge, yet you've got that one stereotype for all Asians. Europe isn't even that big, but you've got stereotype for every country. Well, that's probably also because I grew up in Europe. It might be the same for you (but then opposite of course). 
Nonetheless I think it's interesting we've got you on board here as an Asian!  Variety is nice and most people here seem to be Europeans. (Sakena being another exception I know off...)

I know what you're talking about Akira, haha! 
At least I like how the Dutch stereotypes emphasise... tolerance, I guess? That's a good thing!
Well more so than Netherlands = Amsterdam, you see ''Netherlands = Holland''. 
(For the non-Dutch (because I expect the Dutchies to know this!)): the country is divided into 12 provinces, somewhat comparable to how the United States is divided in states. There is a province called ''South-Holland'', and one called ''North-Holland''. These are the most densly populated and most of the stuff you hear about the Netherlands probably is there. Holland is basically what you call these two provinces combined. You leave out the other 10 though when you call the Netherlands Holland.  Calling the Netherlands Holland is like calling the United states ''Carolina'' (because of the state North-Carolina and South-Carolina). Not that I'm complaining, I used to call the UK ''England'' too, all the time, even though that's only one part of it!

Totally reminds of all the times people in Tilburg asked me where the coffeeshop is (to buy weed), note I'm a metalhead and I don't smoke or anything else that isn't alcohol or a sraw from a waterpipe once a year. I don't live in Tilburg either, I live 2 cities over and come to visit weekly for wargames night. So this one time after a party me and Yorukasa were walking back to the station and people come up to me again with the "do you know where..." "NO I DON'T KNOW WHERE THE COFFEE SHOP IS!" -keeps walking past him at full march speed-

I have to say I'm glad that mild drugs are tolerated here in the Netherlands. In my opinion regulation is better than banning it altogether and having the drugs circuit disappear to the underworld. The way it is now, the government can keep its eye on it. Plus, it takes the 'thrill' out of it, so it looses its appeal to thrill seekers. It's semi-legal, if you want something you can buy it at a coffeeshop, no big deal.

Blue Admin wrote:

-gains insight to Ryochoku's life- So that makes you a malaysian born chinese right?

Yeah. IMO(not sure if correct) there are two definition of Chinese, one is Chinese(ethnicity), which will be me and another is Chinese(nationality) for the citizens of China.

Sakurai Akira wrote:

That's actually really interesting, Ryochoku. I like to learn about other cultures and things that're going on in countries I'm not familiar with.

I am pretty interesting in other cultures as well. One dream of mine is to travel the world as a backpacker for a more "civilian" view(as in closer to the life there) rather than a "tourist" view.

Hatake Houtarou wrote:

Interesting story Ryochoku!  It's cool that you can speak three languages though! I heard the Malaysian language doesn't have verb conjugations, that sounds pretty awesome though, haha. 
Yep, the mathlete is a pretty common stereotype for Asian people. It's weird though, Asia is huge, yet you've got that one stereotype for all Asians. Europe isn't even that big, but you've got stereotype for every country. Well, that's probably also because I grew up in Europe. It might be the same for you (but then opposite of course). 
Nonetheless I think it's interesting we've got you on board here as an Asian!  Variety is nice and most people here seem to be Europeans. (Sakena being another exception I know off...)

I am not sure if I understand conjugation completely but Malay word is kind of simple, they just add things in the front and/or at the end for different meaning. I.E. "Kemas", "Mengemas", "Mengemaskan". There might be some conjugation on the advanced level but I kind of forgot about them lol. Street-style Malay is pretty simple.

As for mathlete, my theory is that the "Asian" as defined in the Internet(or maybe the ordinary Easterners) consists of the more yellow-skinned Chinese-based races only i.e. Chinese, South Korean and Japanese so the stereotype are kind of one-for-all. The brown-skinned like Indian are Asian but mostly people just call them "Indian" instead of "Asian" anyway.

For the country thing, it's based on lack of understanding I guess. Asian here does refer the Easterner with one word, so I guess it's fair they refers Asian with one word too.

As for variety, Jinno's Aussie.

Quote :

Sakurai AkiraI have to say I'm glad that mild drugs are tolerated here in the Netherlands. In my opinion regulation is better than banning it altogether and having the drugs circuit disappear to the underworld. The way it is now, the government can keep its eye on it. Plus, it takes the 'thrill' out of it, so it looses its appeal to thrill seekers. It's semi-legal, if you want something you can buy it at a coffeeshop, no big deal.

Pretty much the same thing with hard drugs really. xD The police can't do much if you have a "personal dose" on you, which is for instance one pill or one gram of whatever. It's cool like that. People try it and are like: "Meh, it's not that interesting anyway." Because it's not a taboo. People don't care as long as you don't do it in the middle of the street. 

I myself am a fan of stereotyping I guess. It's a daily life thing for me (still I'm usually being sarcastic about how much I hate Goths, geeks, Americans, Germans and whatever), but still it's also kinda annoying. It is a way to make life easier and well... That's all it really is. 

Also, here's a fine example of what this subject can do to a country:

I can't seem to find the cheeseburger in that picture..

You also forgot a random camera looking at him. Big brother is watching... Seriously, f*** that PRISM stuff...

I feel bad for the people from the US sometimes. They've got such a horrible stereotype!

Agreeing on the drug stuff. Banning stuff never really turns out to work, and only creates a black market with more organized crime. Look at the Amercian war on drugs, perfect example. They've got 25% of the world prison's population and a huge part is because of drug trafficing. What makes it even worse, prisons are privatized so basically people can earn money for imprisoning others. 
So banning not being a solution is one argument.

Another one is basically freedom. If person X is an adult who makes the conscious choice to smoke weed, what right do others have to take that choice away from him? I'm not a smoker either, but if that's how he wants to live his life, if it's what makes him happy, why not let him do it?

But wait, there's more...
Like I said before, Dutch drug usage is below the EU average, so it's not even like people do more drugs. Just like you guys said, it takes the ''thrill'' away when you make it legal I guess. 
And if you make it illegal the drugs people use (because if addicted they'll use it anyway, now just illegal) will probably be of a lower quality. They may also use needles injecting themselves with HIV. 

It starts to become a little difficult with the extreme hard drugs though... Not sure or you guys have for example ever heard of ''the crocodile drug'' in Russia. It's a cheap drug which basically destroys your entire body rapidly. It makes your skin rot away (saw some creepy pictures while reading up on this...), and it's basically a lethal drug. 
Would banning work here? Or is it smarter to teach children in schools and go government campaigning against the usage, while not actively banning it? Quite hard...

ANYWAY I'VE GOTTEN TOO SERIOUS WITH THIS AGAIN, GOSH! Sorry  

And Ryochoku, thanks for your explanation! Heard it from a friend who can speak a bit of Malay. 
The mathlete thing might not be entirly false though. Read an article a little while ago which showed that the average IQ (and IQ is a lot about mathematical skills) lies a bit higher in the China/Japan area than the rest of the world (although there is more variation. Africa scores a bit lower on average). 
Found a wikipedia page talking more about it. If you don't trust wikipedia, check out the sources it uses, there are quite a lot of them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nations_and_intelligence

Also, I share that interest in travel! ''The world is a book and those who do not travel have only seen one page.'' ~ some guy


By the way, check out this Dutch stereotype map, hehe: http://www.mapsandthecity.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/stereotypes-dutch.jpg

Saw this one the front page of Youtube by the way. Ironically, also about stereotyping.  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxY9RZd4vWM
It's Dutch though, sorry!

Still I think people should have their own choice in wanting their skins to rot off. Not my problem if they want to put Krokodil in their arms with gross needles. I'm not saying it should be legalized though. Just saying it's not my responsibility. xD 

Americans and dutch people are about as smart after all. Dayum! Dx I didn't read it all, just read the map really. 

Also: yay! time to get an extra hole in my body today. <3 PIERCING TIMEEEE! 8D /random

Read the IQ thing before. Apparently, Asian has slight advantage on IQ and Black has a slight advantage on physical prowess, it's all fair. But then, I think the mathlete thing is because for some reason, the education system here has a weird love with maths so there's tons of maths here. I think every place has their own "focus" while the Asian countries have maths for that.

Good luck Nomaru!! 

True Ryochoku, read that too before. Like you say, on average you tend to see that black people have a slight physical advantage, Asians (especially China/Japan area) seem to have a slight IQ advantage (although I don't really think you should judge someone's intelligence purely on IQ. IQ tests consist mostly of mathematical insight and I think there are many things to be ''intelligent at''.), and Europeans/North-Amercians are kinda on the middle ground with both I guess. 

Ultimately I don't give a single f*** about somebody's nationality, skin colour, ethnicy, and stuff though. We're all human beings, and I don't think we should categorize each other in little groups, no matter what your way of doing that is. The classical 'us VS them' mentality is a pain to ourselves. But that's just me. 
I don't feel Dutch, I don't feel European, I don't feel cacausian, I feel human!

Oh, by the way, Nomaru, if you really want to see what that crocodile drug stuff does go to google images. Warning: gore