Cynique

@TroyWell, you didn't discern that I wasn't accusing you of "mansplaining" when it came to the Bill Wither's subject. My first response in my last post was specifically directed to the last sentence in your second response wherein you said " I guess I'm looking at it from the perspective of a 50+ year old raised in a culture where we gave up our seats, held doors; you know all the stuff people seem to give two sh-ts about nowadays", an observation which struck me as kind of a non sequitur. Note that I started a new paragraph when I switched to the subject of mansplaining, - which is a ticklish subject. Moreover, "relativity" and "reality" are two different words. There are no relativity shows on prime time TV. But there are a plethora of reality shows on it. The word "relativity" would be more appropriately used on the Science or National Geographic cable channels in connection with Einstein's theory of "relativity". You didn't misspell "relativity", which was why the spell check didn't kick in. Your brain inadvertently mixed up the similarly-spelled words when you were keying. Technical expertise doesn't require being "nuanced". This is more in the realm of a woman's instinct which is triggered by her fine-tuned antennae. So you and I do have difficulty in being on the same wave length.

No, I didn't even know about these books until the series came out. Readers say the TV version is fairly true to the books. As for the phrase, "winter is coming" , it is the motto of the House of Stark. Each of the great houses has its own slogan. Where the Starks dwell, summers last about 10 years, but winter is always in the back of their minds as it grows ever close. For one of the other houses, the slogan is: "The Lanisters always pay their debts". The Greyjoy house's slogan is something about "what is alive cannot be dead". i'm surprised you are a fan of this series. It requires the audience to totally suspend its belief system. That's one reason why I am so into this compelling, well-directed, well-produced epic fantasy. Game of Thrones has fan sites all over the internet where each episode is avidly discussed and of course everybody is looking forward to the final season next year as the plot has thickened. That is actually my inspiration to try and hang around for another year. Guess why I posted this? Can you say "quiet" instead of "quite"? BLM has been laying low lately, just waiting for another incident to revitalize their cause. They have remained on the fringes of the Colin Kaepernick ongoing protests.

This is the statement that gave me the impression that you thought I was saying that Rap influenced Bill's behavior. So you initially misunderstood my original statement about how Bill's abuse allegations wouldn't have impacted on his career in today's show biz scene because misogynistic rap made abuse irrelevant. This is your admission that I might be "right", but in your second sentence, i didn't see its relevancy to my original statement. I now assume you meant that in today's world you would still be scandalized by Bill's alleged abuse in spite of gangsta rap. So, yes, people do tend to either misinterpret or misunderstand what others say in both oral and written discussions. This seems to often be the case when men and women are discussing something, and why, as women have come into their own, "mansplaining" has become such an issue. The scenario is too often where a man simply recycles what a woman has said and feeds it back to her as if it was his idea; men are probably unconscious of this because they automatically think that women need to have things explained to them. I have always thought that women's brains are more fine-tuned and detailed oriented than men's and this contributes their being more sensitive. Males are also supposedly more prone to ADD in its various degrees of severity because it's like their brains transpose letters or add or omit words or confuse similarly spelled words. e.g. Just the other day in the posted Lil Kim video you wrote: "The video did not lie, except for when they spoke about "talent" of the relativity TV show participants" Did you mean to key "reality" instead of "relativity"? And was this maybe because your fingers and your brain are not in sync? I think that is why "no" often comes out as "not" or "the" as "they". I also think that some people unconsciously key what they hear in their head, and this is why they carelessly misuse "to" and" two" and "too" or "there" and "their". Even when they proof read they are skimming and don't catch typos, etc. Of course, the most simply explanation is that people in a hurry make more mistakes! My problem is typing a word twice in a sentence. I've also been told that I write in a conversational style with a certain cadence. I know that I insert a lot of parenthetical expressions in my writing because I do like to write the way I talk. The human brain is an interesting and complicated organ.

Here we go again. Black people taking to the streets protesting white cops found not guilty of killing someone driving while black. The crowds will be referred to as rioting mobs, and the cop will be referred to a trigger happy racist. Same ol scenario providing ammunition for the opposing sides. Will there ever be a truce in this black against blue war? Like so many problems confronting this country, there seems to be no resolutions in sight. Even national disasters like hurricanes and floods spark divisive controversy. Can this house divided against itself stand? Lincoln's words of yesterday have not lost their impact today. They particularly resonate because slavery and all of the political and societal spin-offs it spawned are still having a negative impact on this country. And winter is coming...

@Delano @TroyI am not saying that Bill Withers was influenced by Rap! I am saying that, as witnessed by how Chris Brown's career has not been derailed by his beating up Rihanna, in today's musical climate, Bill Withers' career wouldn't have been so negatively affected because the misogyny of gangsta rap seems to have removed the stigma of abuse. I don't really have to seek out discussion. There are all kinds of articles about current events and controversial subjects jumping out at you on as you scroll down FaceBook where in addition to a "like" option, there is a "Comment" one to click onto. Once you click on to it, a whole thread of discussion is opened up to you where highly-opinionated strangers from all over the country engage in heated exchanges. I also argue with friends when they post something I don't agree with. FaceBook is the only social media I participate in. It's enough. @dashi365 I'm sure the royalties are rolling in for the insurance ad featuring singer Jenifer Hudson's "impromptu" duet with a guitar player on Withers' "Gonna Be a Lovely Day". TV is literally saturated with this commercial. Which is to say that Bill Withers' music certainly seems to have adequately compensated him for whatever his shortcomings were because his songs are still popular. I think he should've just manned up and not let the criticism take such a toll on him. Whenever I heard the rumors about him and Denise, it was usually in a humorous context.

e I don't think Bill Withers career would be affected by his alleged abuse of his wife in today's show biz climate because.gangsta rap robbed such behavior of its shock value. I haven't notices any drastic changes in FaceBook fare. It's as stupid and pedestrian as ever. I appreciate, however, the memes for people of every persuasion. Heated political and religious discussions are still just a click away.

Over-the-hill baseball player, and former drug addict Darryl Strawberry has come to Donald Trump's defense in light of this latest incident. He calls Trump "a good guy". Seems like many black sports celebrities and Trump share a mutual admiration, probably because he was a celebrity whore who sucked up to famous jocks dumb enough to be flattered by this.

I don't think Bill's marital problems would be a factor in the climate of today's musical industry. Chris Brown's beating up of Rihanna didn't seem to affect his career. He's kind of become the poster boy for irresistible bad boys, of which there are many nowadays in the show biz world. Maybe we can thank the misogyny of Rap for that.

Too bad Serena is regarded as not desirable enough to simply appeal to a man who likes her for herself. Something she has said was not the case with the black men she dated. Just maybe the parents of newborn , Alexis Olympia, really like each other. This same old litany about self love is growing old. Black people are going to wear their hair however they want and date whomever they choose, and laying guilt trips on them , parroting the same old patented arguments dating back to the 1960s is apparently not going to change things. Welcome to 2017, like it or not. Maybe this is what diversity is all about. And it's not as if brothas and sistas have yet to develope wide-spread, harmonious rapport. They still voice the same old complaints about each other. BTW, i wasn't aware that there was a reservoir of wealth in the black community that could be taken out.

The video struck me as showcasing how shallow rather than "diverse" Americans are.

America, the beautiful... a circus presided over by an inept clown.

@Troy it's not so much about grammar; it' s about omissions or additions. With a garbled sentence like the one you posted, one is so busy figuring it out that the meaning can be missed. When i stumble over typos, or omitted or added words, what is written loses its impact because my mind is busy correcting what i'm reading or figuring out what was meant to be said. Also, to me, these threads are posts that will be saved in the archives for others to browse through and read cold. Many are like articles in a magazine, the equivalent of essays or dissertations for people to read. i don't think of them as being "informal". But i don't think this bothers anybody else. So, no "biggie".

Read your first sentence word-for-word out loud to yourself. Did you write what you meant to say? Troy apologized for the typos in a post which, itself, contained 2 typos. i wouldn't bring this up if there wasn't an "edit" feature on this board. What this says to me is that you, and Troy, and Pioneer often write what you don't mean to write, and don't realize this. This is something Mel never does. Her writing is perfect. ( It may be a male thing.) All 3 of you are very intelligent men but if you can't discern your simple mistakes, does this carry over in other areas? i just ask these things because I'm curious and I'd be interested in your responses, which may very well put this ol nit-pickin' bitch in her place. Slow day...

i haven't seen it yet. Hopefully it will be available on Cable TV when it's run its course in the movie theaters. i didn't go see it because i am too old to be included in its demograph. Which means that i don't relate to a lot of the things young folks of today find "cool". But in the comfort of my cave I will have no problem checking it out. Apparently, this movie genre has certainly found an audience among a segment of black women - and maybe even the white ones, too. Sistas are so hard-up for anything geared at them in a positive way that they turned out in droves to patronize it. Everybody is a winner in this project. You go, Girls!

So after you went to all of the trouble to travel to South Carolina to see the solar eclipse, you now refer to this celestial phenomenon as "stupid", huh? That's like saying rain is "silly"; as if acts of nature have an obligation to live up to human expectations. You don't sound like an open-minded person to me but rather someone who requires the instant gratification of tangible ,observable results as opposed to spiritual essence. Whatever. Since the sun emits rays which are neutrinos why wouldn't they have an effect on the energy frequency that represents an entity gazing at the moon passing across it? i was in awe of being able to witness something that was happening billions of miles away in a universe that I felt in sync with. I opened my spirit, not my intellect. For whatever reason, i am experiencing subtle changes in my life.