What Comes Next?

This is all I'm going to say on this topic, and I doubt this will ever go up on Facebook, because this is probably as strident as I will ever be.  So read or not, as you like, in case you're interested in understanding and empathizing with me.

Continuing Confusion Concerning Consent

I'm not sure why this needs to be explained to adults, but based on the utter tripe I've seen on Facebook for the past week, it clearly does.

Incidentally, this assumes said tripe was posted because you really don't get this concept, not because you were deliberately minimizing despicable statements and attitudes simply for political reasons.  I can't even deal rationally with that possibility.

So here you go.  Two simple rules:

Survivor Bias Makes Fools of Us All

Survivorship bias or survival bias is the logical error of concentrating on the people or things that "survived" some process and inadvertently overlooking those that did not because of their lack of visibility.

We’ve all seen the Facebook memes:

“Share if you rode in the back of a truck as a kid and didn’t die!”

“Like if you played in a spent nuclear fuel pool as a kid and turned out fine!”

“Who else rode their bike without a helmet as a kid?”

(Okay, I may have made one of those up.  And yet it’s way safer than you probably think.)

The Meaning of Symbols, Again

At the moment of abstraction, when the man was imagining his life and his existence as a metaphor of the three candles, he was free: not free from rules of conduct or social constraints, but free to understand, to imagine, to make metaphor.

There's a lot (like, a LOT) that's been said already about the National Anthem protests this year that were started (or at least made known and popular) by Colin Kaepernick.  It's not my intent here to rehash that; I’m much more interested in the reactions.  To wit:  

Contagious Confusion Concerning Consent

Dear Mr. Bieber,

It has come to my attention, through one of your inexplicably-popular-and-utterly-inescapable songs, that you have some questions regarding the concept of consent.  I speak, of course, of your ode to jazz flute and the crocodile from Peter Pan, “What Do You Mean?” (By the way, I was relieved to note that the song title truly does have a question mark.  This is by no means a given.)

While a good chunk of this song consists of you being whiny and vaguely threatening about receiving mixed signals, in a far inferior (though admittedly titularly superior grammatically) knockoff of Katy Perry’s “Hot N Cold”, the first few lines (which are repeated throughout the somewhat lyrically-challenged song) deserve some special attention and discrete answers.  So let’s break those down, shall we?

The Irritation of Infrastructure Infirmity

(This was going to be my next post, but to be honest, I got bored writing it, so I can't imagine it would be very interesting to read.  However, I spent enough time on it to not want it to just sit in my drafts folder forever, so if you happen across this (it won't be posted to Facebook until and unless I finish it someday) and actually, y'know, care, you can read this partially-completed and in-need-of-a-lot-of-work post on transit and infrastructure.  Sadly, it'll probably be the last post until summer (when I'm done with school for probably ever!).)

Metaphorical Beverages

So Selena Gomez has a new single out, “Hands to Myself”.  Yes, I pay attention to these things, and no, it doesn’t make me a teenage girl, no matter what certain people may try to claim.  It just means I have eclectic musical tastes.  So there.  (Except for Ed Sheeran.  Can’t stand his music, especially since I read this article, which rang a few bells.)

I actually really like this song, and it keeps getting stuck in my head.  Plus, I’m a sucker for the chord progression, regardless of how utterly common it is (well, there’s a reason for that, isn’t there?  Kind of like the Pachelbel’s Canon chord progression, some things just work better than others).  And as far as I can tell, it’s not a song about Justin Bieber, so hooray for moving on!

But there’s one GLARING problem with this song.  I suppose you could say two, but it’s just the same line a second time.

The verses to the song are done in a rather sparse, staccato (or at least detached; it’s hard to sing staccato without sounding like you’re spitting the words out) style.  It’s a little unusual, but it’s a neat sound once you get used to it.  And for the most part, the lyrics stick to one- or two-syllable words, which works just fine.

And then you get to the line.  The dreaded, cringe-worthy line that nearly made me hate the song before I had a chance to like it:

“You’re metaphorical gin-and-juice”.

Wow.

This line is terrible on both stylistic and lyrical levels.  There’s really no redeeming feature to this line other than the fact that it actually fits the meter.  (That’s always a plus.)

Stylistically, if you’re going to be using this detached style, you simply cannot use five-syllable words.  One syllable?  Fine, you’re just spacing out the words.  Two syllables?  Still works; you don’t lose the flow of the word too much with the break. 

But five syllables?  You sound like you’re sounding out the word, or very carefully overpronouncing it to make sure you get it right, kind of my like 4-year-old saying the word “archipelago”.  It’s just not… no.  Don’t do that.

Lyrically, it’s just completely unnecessary.  Of course it’s a metaphor!  Songs use metaphors all the time!  Everyone knows that, and is familiar with the concept of metaphors.  Spelling it out (nearly literally, given the enunciation) is just awkward and makes the line feel even weirder.  No one (except maybe Jimmy Buffett?) is going to be singing a song about actual gin-and-juice (although if he did, it would probably have the word “archipelago” in it). 

BUT! Selena Gomez is someone whose bigger hits include two songs basically about songs.  Like, the songs are using songs as metaphors.  This is either brilliantly meta, or a giant red flag about her competence with metaphors.

Plus, looking at the lyrics, there’s literally no reason why this couldn’t actually be a song dedicated to gin-and-juice.  Every line works equally as well in a literal or a metaphorical context!  Including the lines that don’t really work in either context, because they don’t really make sense.  (Pre-chorus, I’m looking at you here.  “All of the downs and the uppers keep making love to each other”?  What does that even mean?) 

So maybe it’s a good thing after all that she’s clarifying that this is intended to be a metaphor. 

Or maybe I’ll just have fun substituting the words “my most-fav'rite drink” for “metaphorical” the next time I hear it.