volvoxvsmarla

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: July 6th, 2023

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  • Oh they just didn’t translate idiomatically. Alot of times they translated it literally and very badly. So a lot of puns just don’t work at all. Not the worst example but one that I remember out of my head is when Rachel and Ross have their fight in the cafe right before their first kiss. I think they say that the shop has long sailed (which is a saying and works with relationship) but they also talk about ships in German. Which isn’t too bad but it’s not a saying in German, you would say the train has left. The German word for relationship also has no “ship” so them talking about ships was really random. You can take it as a metaphor still, so it was ok-ish, but why would two New Yorkers use ships as a metaphor out of the blue.

    A lot of sexual innuendo that is more or less obvious in English just absolutely doesn’t work in German. Like the dude with the watch who claims he has a dry spell (Monica’s date) - when he starts talking about having no ink in his pen it just sounds super off. Not like in a well designed metaphor but just like “???” you get it but it’s just not something that works.

    There is also a scene that is so random that I can’t even pinpoint it down right now. Monica asks Joey (or Chandler?) whether he will be good to some specific girl and he doesn’t get the question. In English (and with context) it makes sense and it’s funny why he doesn’t get it, in German it is so random, you absolutely are on Joey’s side because you do not understand wtf is going on and what he is supposed to answer and why Monica would ask that. As I said, I’ve watched the show a lot and I can’t even tell you the context because it is so unfitting in the moment. I’ve watched the whole show like 15 times in German and about 5 times in English and I only got it when I watched it in English. If I remember what episode that was I’ll let you know.

    I wish I could provide you with more and better examples but it’s been at least 6 years since my last rerun :(

    As a side note, the Russian dub is so much worse quality wise, but they end up just summarizing more or less idiomatically what happens. Jokes are lost this way, but at least there is no confusion about what is happening.


  • Why on earth would we support people trying to hide this stuff from children, when a not-so-small number of us knew what we were looking at when we were children?

    I watched Sailor Moon on German TV in the 90s (RTL 2 gang unite!). And whenever this topic of changes in the dubs comes up I struggle to remember how they put it in the German translation exactly because of what you said. It doesn’t matter how they translated it. It was so obvious. I haven’t known anyone who didn’t know exactly what was going on (but to be fair, it was common knowledge what lesbians were).

    (Also 90s German dubs in general sometimes turned out weird - looking at you, first three seasons of FRIENDS - so I kinda didn’t over interpret the exact wording because I was so used to strange ways of putting things.)


  • Thanks, I hope so too. For now she’s very much into girls as main characters so maybe I’ll get lucky with the series.

    I once heard that a teenager will act very similarly to how they acted at 3 years old. Extrapolating from that (my child is 3.5) it’s very likely that she will also not like anything I like or listen to anything I say. When she has the choice between A and B she suggests C. Her answer to the Sally-Anne test is wild. I’m pretty sure she’ll keep destroying metaphorical boxes or playing Schrödinger’s cat instead of just thinking inside or outside the box.

    I also always dreamt of having music playing in the background and dancing to it. She hates recorded music. She likes singing and me/others singing (sometimes) but God beware I turn on a CD.

    Also, time to call your son and invite him over for a WoW weekend I guess.


  • That’s so disappointing. To me, Sailor Moon is the OG all inclusive series. (It was my very favorite show ever as a kid and probably still is.) I kinda love how they didn’t make a big deal out of it. The star sailors change sex when they transform and it’s not even talked about. It just is how it is and nobody wonders about it. Neptune and Uranus having the hots for each other is portrayed as any other romance is and iirc no character ever addresses the “taboo” of it. Even the alien incest is somehow fine (I mean they are aliens and extinct so they do them).

    I understand the LGBTQ+'s struggle for representation and acceptance, so probably they do need somewhat of an over accentuated representation on screen to eventually reach full acceptance. But Sailor Moon seems to be what comes “after” this, just normalization without it ever being a question. All the while sparking an interest in astronomy in kids who then know all the names of the dwarf planets in our solar system before they know the multiplication table.

    Man I can’t wait till my kid reaches Sailor Moon watching age.


  • How about we collect the potential inheritance of everyone that passes and then divide it equally to everyone who became 18 that year. Or it goes to a government fund that pays for a 30k bonus to everyone turning 18 (or 25, etc).

    I am seeing this myself. I grew up in a Munich suburb and everyone was growing up in houses except my migrant ass and the other migrant asses, we were in rented apartments. Then, when we became young adults, guess who didn’t have to pay for rent, who was rather worryless about their housing situation long term? Because everyone knew they would inherit the houses that were surging in value and are now between one and several million euros worth.

    Now I am getting older and am friends with refugees. You want to tell me that the daughter of the guy who worked himself off after leaving Afghanistan at age 15, learning German but only managing to get a salesman apprenticeship, deserves nothing as inheritance? Because this is what it is going to be. His parents have worked their asses off raising 9 kids in a small home, they had no money but they gave it all.

    We are all in our very early 30s and we can already extrapolate how differently our financial situations, our security nets, and our children’s security nets will be. And we are lucky living in a social democracy.


  • Again - there is and must be a distinction between the blame, responsibility and guilt of an 18 year old uneducated soldier, nurse etc and a political leader. But this does not automatically absolve the former from all responsibility and guilt. You should and hopefully do focus on the latter’s guilt and responsibility, as it is much larger than the others’. Focussing on the people who follow orders is not what I would advertise for and this isn’t the intent, it is actually the exact opposite. By differentiating different aspects and kinds of guilt you have tools and language at hand to talk about it without putting everyone in the same boat.

    It is not a black and white issue. Everyone got blood on their hands - you and me included - just in different amounts, in different ways.


  • Very honestly - I’ve still not read the book entirely and I have started because I felt some feeling of guilt myself for being a Russian living outside Russia. I think that’s actually exactly what Jaspers, along with his students (the book is basically a dialectic lecture written down with results of work of his class from one semester), was trying to figure out. So I am not the best person to lecture you about that.

    From as far as I have read these distinctions are exactly what allow people to talk about guilt, responsibility, trauma, the past, etc, without judging everyone by the same standards. Like, a criminal is judged by the court who defines for a crime they committed. A politician who took part in ordering crimes will be judged by the victor of a war. A soldier (just like a secretary) will be judged in dialogue with others and by his conscience for their individual actions, even if they were following orders. And a normal person who looked away or didn’t actively do their best to stop the atrocities that happen in the world, well, this person’s metaphysical guilt can basically only be judged by a metaphysical instance itself, be it God or another undefined transcendence. Basically all of us bear the latter.

    They are very distinct and do not have the same repercussions. It is without doubt that political leaders have a much different, much more facetted responsibility for crimes committed. And we should focus on that. But this does not clean the people who followed their orders from all guilt, and their responsibility and crimes (against humanity) will be judged, just in a different way.

    Edit: I’ve added a better phrased summary in my original comment above, since I have realized that translating German political philosophy isn’t my strength exactly.


  • In the aftermath of World War II, Carl Jaspers formulated in Die Schuldfrage that there are four types of guilt (/responsibility). Criminal guilt, political guilt, moral guilt, and metaphysical guilt. It is a great distinction in general. Yes, political leaders bear a different kind of guilt for the actions than the soldiers, but acting on clearly morally wrong commands do not obliterate guilt from the soldiers. Just like everyone who basically didn’t give their life in pursuit of the good and the right bears some metaphysical guilt for what is happening in the world.

    Edit: I realized that, since I am neither an English native, nor very articulate in philosophy or politics, I would rather ask perplexity for a summary. So here it is: Karl Jaspers, in his work The Question of German Guilt, distinguishes four categories of guilt and assigns specific instances to each:

    1. Criminal Guilt:

      Definition: Violations of objectively provable laws that are legally considered crimes.

      Instance: The court, which determines the facts and applies the laws in formal proceedings.

    2. Political Guilt:

      Definition: Arises from the actions of statesmen and the shared responsibility of every citizen for the government of their state.

      Instance: The power and will of the victor, especially after a lost war, as in the case of Germany after World War II.

    3. Moral Guilt:

      Definition: Refers to individual actions for which every person is morally responsible, even if carried out under orders.

      Instance: One’s own conscience and dialogue with others.

    4. Metaphysical Guilt:

      Definition: A shared responsibility for all injustice in the world, based on human solidarity. It arises when one does not do everything possible to prevent injustice.

      Instance: God or transcendence.

    Jaspers emphasizes that this differentiation is meant to avoid simplistic or generalized accusations of guilt. He rejects the idea of collective criminal or moral guilt for an entire people, arguing that guilt is always individual.



  • I’m a parent too, and here are my thoughts on this. I would rather knowingly live next to a pedophile - someone who outs themselves and goes to therapy - than not knowing about whether or not my neighbor has ever had such tendencies. I wouldn’t forbid them from having contact with my child, if they are sure it is not too hard for them, and obviously, keep them supervised. (I have barely ever left my child with another adult outside of the kindergarten setting though.) As was commented above, pedophilia is a valid and incredibly unfortunate, isolating and lonely sexual orientation and a disorder that can be treated, if not “cured”. I wholeheartedly agree with what you said about society’s hostile mentality driving people into the shadows and keeping them from seeking help.

    I also want to point out that the majority of minor sex offenders (sorry I can’t remember the correct term, English isn’t my first language) has no pedophilic tendencies. A lot of sexual assault happens not because of attraction but because of power, dominance, violence, control. It’s something so important to keep in mind. Your local pedo might be the nicest and most harmless guy, while some other, heterosexual and “normal” oriented person in your neighborhood might have actually assaulted a child. Not having pedophilic tendencies does not mean a person won’t commit pedophilic acts.

    In a way, my heart goes out to pedophiles. I can’t imagine how incredibly lonely it must be to have a desire for intimacy only with people who you will never, under any circumstances, be allowed to touch. You will never be able to act on your desires. You will never be allowed to live like yourself, be yourself fully. This must be hell. Even without the witch hunt. The least we can do as a society is to offer all the help and support we can get.

    (It goes without saying - fuck all sexual offenders.)






  • It never made sense to me. You spent 1 hour of your 24 hours a day doing something you would not do for fun. Your 1 hour is just as long as my 1 hour. Both of us sacrifice the same amount of free time out of our lives doing something we’d rather not do. Why should we be paid differently?

    If anything, the higher ranking the job, the more it allows for chatting with colleagues, going out for lunch, taking coffee breaks. You get much more “fun time” than labor intense workers do. Shouldn’t you be paid less? There is an added benefit in your job to begin with. The luxury of being able to sit and get coffee when you want to is already quite a blast tbh.





  • I have actually thought it might be misinterpreted because it’s vague in that sentence - no, I don’t mean that the guy thinks the hotel sucks. He still doesn’t care. But his wife thinks it sucks and she is solely responsible for her choice. In a partnership.

    Most likely, when confronted with her dislike, he would not be comforting her like “honey, it’s ok, you picked a nice hotel, I don’t think it’s bad at all”, but just be like “look, it doesn’t matter, we’ll just sleep here”. Basically invalidating her feelings and experiences.

    The point I am trying to make is: if you are in a committed relationship you sometimes have to care, have an opinion, help with decisions, even if it was something that you usually don’t care about. But saying “I don’t care about the outcome of something that you care about” is definitely neither kind nor loving and devastating in the long run.


  • Could it be because decision making is hard and you end up telling your partner that you a) don’t care about what they care about b) leave them hanging when they might need help to decide c) they end up having decision fatigue because you don’t have an opinion? Sometimes, a consultation or just a talk about something one tries to make a decision on feels good, doing it all by yourself sucks.

    Let’s say you don’t care what hotel she books. She ends up doing all the research on hotels. Presents you with it, pros and cons. You still say you don’t care. Ok, so now the burden of choice is solely on her. You guys arrive, the hotel sucks. Can’t you see that this is frustrating in a different way than if the two of you decided on the hotel together?