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stalebagels · 6 months

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what’s your ranking of the talk show hosts?

Oh, thank you for asking. I am so sorry for the essay I am about to write.

Highest to Lowest:

Conan O'Brien / Craig Ferguson - I put these two in the top spot because if you asked me to choose only one of them to watch for the rest of my life I wouldn't be able to do it. Both of them are people that I watched with my dad occasionally through my childhood so maybe I'm a little biased on that front. They're probably the only two hosts that I ever cared to watch interview anyone because it never felt boring to me even if I didn't really care about the interviewee or know who it was. They were both unique and just seemed like genuinely good people both inside and outside the studio (and to add to the bias a little; I got to meet Craig at one of his Fancy Rascal tour shows last year and he was so fucking great. I was so nervous going into it because I was worried he wouldn't be the same as he was on TV as is the case for a lot of celebrities, but he went above and beyond for everyone. He signed everyone's posters and merch even though he didn't have to (I got a poster signed) and he actually took the time to have a full conversation with everyone individually and make sure everyone was comfortable. He's a wonderful dude and I wish I could go back and talk to him again.)

Stephen Colbert - When I first started watching late night shows (back when the pandemic first started), the first shows I ever sat down and watched a full episode of on TV were Stephen and Conan. I had absolutely no idea who Stephen was because up until that point I hadn't really cared enough about politics. I grew up in a heavily conservative small town with a heavily conservative family in the south where the word liberal counted as an insult, so you can imagine we didn't really watch a lot of late night shows. Stephen's show helped me make sense of things, helped me work out what my own feelings were, and provided an escape from the hell that was lockdown. He was the one that made me give a shit about what's happening in this country first, and after that first sit down I ended up going back and watching old episodes of The Colbert Report and The Daily Show (he also led me to Jon in that regard, since I had no idea either of those shows existed) and found that I loved his style of comedy. I really do wish I had discovered him sooner.

Jon Stewart - The only reason I didn't stick Jon and Stephen in the number two spot together (as well as John Oliver) was because Stephen was primarily responsible for my interest in politics - basically he was for me what Jon was to everyone before he retired - and was the one who led me to Jon in the first place. It took me a while, but once I finally went back and started watching old clips and episodes of The Daily Show; once again I wished I had discovered him sooner. I wish I had his righteous, angry optimism to look forward to every night, but a lot of the things he's said and done on the show still hold true today. Plus, his fight for the 9/11 first responders bill to get passed was absolutely inspiring and an example we should all follow when it comes to pushing for change and holding our leaders accountable. I didn't realize he started out as a stand-up comedian, but I've since watched as much of it as I could get my hands on because he's just an incredibly smart and funny dude in any situation.

John Oliver - I hate to put John so low on the list but I didn't want to cop out and put him, Jon, and Stephen all in the same tier lol. I'll be honest, I can't really remember the first time I watched John's show. I think it must have been on YouTube at some point during lockdown or even right before, but ever since the first time I watched it I was hooked. I learn so much from him and his show and I always look forward to his next episode. Generally, I don't really watch guest interviews unless I really care about whoever is there, but since John doesn't have guests it was much easier for me to sit down and watch the entire thing without getting bored or distracted. He does an incredible job of informing his viewers about a problem that - chances are - they had no idea existed beforehand and the amount of research/investigation he and his team do inspire me to do the same. It was really weird watching his stand-up and seeing him in regular clothes and not a suit though lol.

Jimmy Kimmel - I think this might... be a controversial take. His was the third show I started watching during the pandemic - I think Stephen took a break at some point and I decided to try watching Kimmel to fill the time - and I found that I actually quite liked him. His monologues felt natural and easy, and he had a lot of his family and friends on his staff which I admired (plus Guillermo). His humor is kind of the same as my dad's though (sort of), so maybe that's why I liked him off the bat. His beef with Matt Damon is hilarious, his pranks are generally harmless and funny, and he seems very down to earth and generous for someone who makes a goddamn lot of money. Plus, I watched a clip of him back during the Tonight Show fiasco where he came on Leno's show and shit talked at him about backstabbing Conan, which earned some respect from me. I don't know a lot about what he did on the Man Show because I don't think I would touch that with a ten foot pole (and from what he says neither would he), but he seems like a good guy. (Although I will say I generally only stay long enough to watch the beginning of his show like the monologue or unnecessary censorship since I don't care about musical guests or interviews).

Seth Meyers - Again I hate to put him down so low, but I have to be honest and say I don't actually know a whole lot about him. I watched him on SNL sometimes with my dad when it was on, but it wasn't very often. I never watched his show during the pandemic as I was mainly focused on juggling Kimmel, Colbert, Fallon (gag) and Conan. Honestly it wasn't until Strike Force Five came around that I really started paying attention to him. I like that he involves his writers and his staff in a lot of his bits, and he seems like a lovely person. Unfortunately, though, he is down here a little lower but I still enjoy watching him even if I haven't watched a lot of his content. (His stand-up special is on my list, though)

Jimmy Fallon - This is a weird one for me. I watched Fallon a couple of times during lockdown and even before then I knew who he was because everyone hated him. It was on a whim that I decided to watch his show one night, and I wasn't really impressed with what I saw. That said, I didn't hate it - and when the Rolling Stone article came out I was very disappointed. And the fact that he just never addressed it publicly and carried on like nothing happened rubbed me the wrong way, and every monologue I did see afterwards just.. wasn't even puff-of-nose-air funny anymore. He became much more annoying to me, even during the podcast. The only time I found him funny were the Strike Force Wives games. Otherwise he just became painfully bland, and it's a shame because his original late night show was actually pretty decent in comparison to The Tonight Show.

As for Corden and M*her; if they were being chased by hundreds of angry geese and asked me to let them in my house for shelter, I'd shut the door in their face and laugh.

So, if you got to the end of this long ass clusterfuck, here are two pics of Craig and I at the tour :) and once again, I apologize.

#I AM SORRY #this got SO LONG #thanks for the ask though i've never gotten one before lol nobody wants my opinions on things #this is probably why #honorable mention: graham norton my king #strike force five #jon stewart #stephen colbert #john oliver #conan o'brien #jimmy kimmel #craig ferguson #seth meyers #jimmy fallon #anon ask #late night

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yourfinalbow · 3 years

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hi lol this is totally random but based on a harry potter post you just reblogged and you can completely ignore me if you want, but do you think snape deserved better, or are you a quote unquote "snape apologist"? I'm genuinely curious cuz I've come across a lot of different opinions on severus. Again, feel free to ignore :)

This ended up way longer than it needed to be, and I apologize for that lmao.

Hi! Hmmm I have many mixed opinions on this. First we have to talk about which Snape. Book!Snape is actually kind of an asshole, and not in the fun way. (Way more than I remembered.) But but but Alan Rickman!Snape I like a lot.

And no I'm not mentioning Snape from TCC. That was not Snape and that world was not Harry Potter.

Snape is an interesting character because of how flawed and layered he is.

(Putting a cut because it's so long, and tw for non-detailed mentions/reference to abuse, as well as both trauma and death.)

He wasn't born in a very good household, which I can definitely see as being a reason for why he is who he is. (A reason, not an excuse. Those are two extremely different things.) You look at Sirius, who also came from a horrible household, yet he managed to dig himself out of the mud and make his own path for himself. (Though I have many angsty headcanons for the thoughts he has and being afraid of what he will do and in turn his own mind. WolfStar solidarity. Neither one of them know what they are truly capable of, and both are completely afraid to find out.

Ahem sorry I got a little distracted there.

During the Marauder's era, Snape wasn't a good person in general, but he tried to be nice to Lily. (One of the only exceptions he made.) That being said, (sorry, going on a tangent again), it does not excuse what the Marauders did. As much as they are, in my humble opinion, JK's greatest creation, they should be held accountable for both the prank, and dangling Snape upside down. (Though Remus does make a few good points in their defense later, it's still not an excuse.) Two wrongs never make a right.

Snape doesn't deny Lily's claims at him wanting to join a supremacy group, nor does he say he isn't friends with Death Eaters.

It's clear through the flashbacks we're given that Snape is apathetic in the face of innocent people dying, but once again Lily is the exception.

Dumbledore defends Snape by saying it wasn't his fault that Harry's parents are dead. I actually semi-agree with this. On one hand, he was directly at fault, but on the other hand he had no way of knowing. As a severe Loki apologist, I do not blame Loki for Frigga's death. He may have led the dark elves to her, but he didn't know it was her she was sending them to. That's the comparison I make in my mind, and so I don't completely blame him like other people do. (One could also make the argument that Sirius is to blame. Sirius, who is 100% my favorite character in the entire franchise, gave the secret keeper job to Peter, thinking it would be safer with him. However, he had no ill will or malicious intentions towards Lily, James, and Harry, so I don't blame him.)

All that being said, Snape not only would have been fine with random people dying, he also didn't care whether or not James and Harry lived.

For context:

(Dumbledore is speaking, right after Snape comes to him for help.)

"You do not care, then, about the deaths of her husband and child?" They can die, as long as you have what you want?"

Snape said nothing, but merely looked up at Dumbledore.

He has a strange relationship with Lily. He obviously loves her, but not enough to want to stop Voldemort from killing the two things that bring her the most amount of happiness. It's clear he doesn't care about anyone except for Lily. Which on some level, I can understand why. When people have traumatic childhoods, they tend to hold on to a person that was there for them. Sometimes it can be the hands of the person who caused them pain in the first place, but other times it is another person who was there for him. He holds Lily's opinions of himself higher than anybody else, and he holds Lily above anybody else, and I think this can be attributed to some sort of trauma response, which is why his love for her is so unusual. That doesn't mean I think he should be fine with killing innocent people.

On the topic of trauma, I think joining the Death Eaters was another response to this, as well as a result of what kind of family he had.

Similar to both Harry and Voldemort, Snape much preferred Hogwarts to where he lived, and such the castle became his home more than his house ever was.

The Death Eaters could offer him something he had never been offered before. He belonged to something. In his own, twisted, traumatic mindset, he might have even almost seen the Death Eaters as a family. Not consciously of course, but there was definitely a feeling of belonging they gave him.

And there's something to be said about the fact that many serial killers in real life come from an abusive family. I don't pretend to understand the minds of someone who can do something so vile, but I have watched enough Criminal Minds episodes to know what they long for is control.

So being apart of this supremacy group, even though he was a half-blood himself and undoubtedly didn't entirely share Voldermort's racist beliefs, gave him both control and something he belonged to.

It's not an excuse, but it's a reason.

Alternatively, you can look at it through a quote from the most recent episode of Loki.

"It's part of the illusion. It's a cruel, elaborate trick conjured by the weak to inspire fear."

So it's also possible that when he was a kid, he thought being a villain was the only way to prevent others from being one to him.

Ok sorry, back on the chronological track.

So he agrees to change sides and work with Dumbledore. (Who must see just how distraught Snape was over Lily's death, to trust him immediately.)

Snape spends most of Harry's time at Hogwarts humiliating his own students. He particularly calls out Harry and his friends a lot, but I can definitely see this being a defence mechanism. He assumes Harry is James and reverts back to what we talked about earlier. (Becoming the villain so nobody else has a chance.)

But but but, he does a lot of good throughout the books. Snape mutters the countercurse, saving Harry from Quirrell during the Quidditch match. He then actually referees at the next match, preventing anything from happening altogether.

In retrospective, we see that he spends most of the first book helping Dumbledore by protecting the stone, and helping Lily by protecting Harry.

Now I could go through and list the goods and the bads of Snape throughout the entire series, but I have neither the time nor the patience, and I think you get the point.

(Except I would like the mention that Snape becomes a double agent for Dumbledore in book four, and risks his life every single day by constantly betraying Voldermort, and never once does he use this as a way to double cross Dumbledore. This was actually probably really hard on him. You can assume that having to pretend to be a Death Eater means he had to do some despicable things just so he didn't blow his cover. If he really has changed by this time, which I would like to think he has, is a lot of added guilt to live with.)

(I would also mention that he tried to save Sirius in book five, but... *falls on floor dramatically* I don't want to think about it.)

Severus Snape's time comes to the end in book seven. At the hands of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, his death is a valiant act of sacrifice. Protecting the living and defending the honour of the fallen.

So, he has done a lot of bad in his lifetime, but by the time we as readers get to know him, his fundamental set of beliefs have begun to change. Through the eyes of what started as an eleven year old boy, you can definitely see that even after this he wasn't necessarily a good person.

And that's because his good is behind the scenes. He's good on a larger scale. He's chosen the light over darkness, but in his everyday life he's still the scared, traumatized little kid he's always been.

And him being this way has reasons, but these reasons are not excuses.

Sorry anon, this kind of turned into a long winded review of the entire character. I know that's not really what you asked, so I'll sum it up in a final few sentences sentence.

Yes. I wish Snape had gotten to live. Not because I'm necessarily a "Snape apologist", but because I find his character interesting, and seeing his reaction to his sacrifice could have been a really good read. Also Harry coming up and thanking him would have been really touching, and as a cherry on top maybe we could have gotten to read Harry apologizing for his father. Maybe even Snape sharing memories of Lily?! (Sorry that might have gotten a little to fanfic-y.)

That being said, his death being a final sacrifice towards the good of everyone, and a final testimony to his change of heart, was -- and I'll give JK credit just this once -- good storytelling, and a good way to end it.

Also I like movie!Snape because fuck yeah he's just so awesome.

If anyone has anything to add/take away, or they just want to discuss the wonder that was Alan Rickman, let me know! (Ask/Comment/Reblog/Etc.)

#ESPECIALLY you anon #I never get HP asks so this was a treat #Harry Potter #Severus Snape #Character analysis #Maybe?!#Lampswered #*Spongebob Imagination Rainbow

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language-obsession · 7 years

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In Canto how widespread is this "lazy sounds"/懶音 phenomenon & what's your opinion on it e.g. Letting it just happen or trying to "correct" it? I've heard things like "nobody ever says 我 as ngo or 五 as ng anymore" but idk

AHAAAAAA this is a REALLY REALLY good ask !!!!!! I’ve gotten into some heated discussions with Cantonese speakers about “懶音” but as a (baby) descriptive linguist I just sit back and enjoy the show tbh. Humans have been complaining about the deterioration of human language since the beginning of human history, this is nothing new or special LOL. The change is actually very exciting, because it is a fairly recent shift, with a huge wave of pronunciation differences happening sometime after World War 2. Of course, sound shifts, like any other language shift, happen in layers over time, so the majority of speakers who have merged certain sounds together are still within the younger generation. Also, maybe you’d find it interesting to note that an earlier change occurred sometime in the 1800′s to early 1900′s, where sibilants got depalatalized in words like 張, 昌, 傷, in contrast to its non-palatal counterparts 將, 搶, 相; a distinction that still exists in many Northern Mandarin varieties (the classic zh/z, sh/s, ch/c), but in modern HK Cantonese we would pronounce the sets 張/將, 昌/搶, 傷/相 as zoeng1, coeng1 and soeng1 respectively, with no clear distinction within each set. (although some non-HK varieties have maintained the distinctions - older GZ generations still keep some distinctions I believe, but the younger GZ generation would speak similarly to people in HK)

My speech actually has most of the sound changes, because when I was younger I tried to imitate a HK accent in an attempt to make myself sound more native, so the way my brain interpreted “more HK sounding” was to adapt as many of these sound changes as possible LOL (oddly enough, before I even knew “懶音” was a thing). For example, I do find myself:

deleting ng initials a lot while also adding them where they weren’t originally (愛 oi > ngoi, 眼 ngaan > aan, 銀 ngan > an)

I have the gwo > go, kwo > ko shift (過 gwo > go, 國 gwok > gok)

sometimes i mix up final k/t (like in 特別 dak bit > dat?k? bit or 突然 dat jin > dak jin - funnily enough, i struggled for a second when i typed out 突然 just now in jyutping lollllll)

and i also have the classic n > l merger (你 nei > lei，奶 naai > laai，男 naam > laam)

The one change that I don’t find myself doing too much is the final ng > n merger, although I’ve heard this particularly in stereotypical 港女 speech (靚 leng > len, 橙色 caang sik > caan sik/sek, 正 zeng > zen).

One “argument” against sound change in Cantonese that I’ve heard time and time again is that we are going against what the Qieyun or Guangyun rime dictionaries have written down, since we’re losing sound distinctions. and for some highly prescriptivist Cantonese linguists, this is extremely disastrous, because once the change has occurred and a large population of people have adapted to the change, it’s very very difficult to change back the way millions of people speak. But of course, I see absolutely no problem with that, because Sinitic varieties have been changing for THOUSANDS of years. The Qieyun and Guangyun were written in 600 AD AND 1000 AD RESPECTIVELY, why are we prescribing how people should be speaking based off of thousand year old records? That being said, the Qieyun/Guangyun dictionaries are EXTREMELY EXTREMELY important in learning about Chinese phonology and to Sinitic linguistics in general, but I think it’s problematic to assume that somehow we are magically going to maintain all sound distinctions with no losses. That’s why I roll my eyes when I see Youtube videos about 粵語正讀 like “pls spare me from ur overly prescriptivist ways i do nut need u to tell me how to do the spek”

On a relevant note, if Old Chinese had never lost its derivational affixes, the Chinese varieties MIGHT (key word: MIGHT) not even have developed tones, although ofc it would be 100% impossible for a language to remain completely frozen in time for thousands of years, especially if people were actively using it on a daily basis. As well, ever since the rime dictionaries were written down, we have been merging a lot of initial consonants, and we actually lost the entire voiced consonant set in some Sinitic varieties (we have no b, d, g initial consonants in Cantonese OR Mandarin, contrary to popular belief - shocking, I know - although there’s still b, d, and g in Taiwanese Hokkien and Shanghainese for example). Some people act as if the “懶音” of today are some kind of new event started by the Youth of Today™ but it’s been happening since the time of Confucius and even way before that. Humans generally use language creatively and efficiently: we may shorten things, simplify articulation, introduce new sounds, mix things up, etc etc., and that’s all a natural part of language development, which is why old Cantonese linguists who can’t get over these so called “懶音” drain the life out of me LOL ;;;

I assume you’re a Canto speaker as well, so next time someone tells you to stop speaking with lazy sounds, you can rant about natural language change hahahahhaa

This is more of an afterthought actually, but some non-HK varieties of Cantonese have already undergone initial ng- dropping and certain vowel changes, even faster than some of the changes in HK and GZ Cantonese !!! On the other hand, some other Guangdong varieties have maintained a lot of sounds (even sounds that we don’t pronounce in HK/GZ Cantonese anymore). Like in 中山 and 珠海 Cantonese, they still pronounce words like 魚，驗，研，語 with an ng- initial (which is actually closer to the reconstructed Middle Chinese pronunciations), even though we’ve reduced it to a y- initial in HK/GZ Cantonese, although no one would even try to argue that /ŋ-/ > /j-/ is a detrimental sound change to Cantonese.

tl;dr - im hella salty about extreme cantonese prescriptivists and i’m excited to be part of a modern sound change !!! speak however you want bc it literally doesn’t matter !!! language is cool and dont be afraid to embrace change !!!

Edit: I have been informed that TW Hokkien does not have a d-initial I AM A GOOF, I should’ve double checked that oop. Thanks @bessely for pointing that out though!! (Also YES I WAS GONNA MENTION THE HAKKA STUFF TOO but I don’t know enough about it to talk about it confidently hehe)

#this is a super good question #thank you so much #cantonese #historical linguistics #sociolinguistics #i guess this is kinda socioling?#idk what to classify this as #linguistics #chinese #hk #hk cantonese #asks #anonymous

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