Fire at Paris's Notre Dame Cathedral

[AliceInFundyland]

@VelociRapture I think it was a good moment for your insertion, as I assumed it was intentional.

I appreciate your furthering of thoughts

I’m fairly certain my point was made. We got sidetracked. I was specifically addressing how people grieve and her status comment. That got blown into the bigger topic. I attempted to pull it in because I thought other posters had gone there. It didn’t work. It’s ok. I’m not going to pursue it. 

[Dreadcrumbs]

31 minutes ago, VelociRapture said:

I obviously came in with my Drunk History comment at the exact wrong time. Shame on me for not finishing the thread first. I’m going to wade into the discussion a bit - apologies if I step on any toes or accidentally drift from my lane as a white person. 

@AliceInFundyland @Jinder Roles I think you both have valid points here. I think it’s perfectly ok to be sad about Notre Dame and that’s it’s also possible to feel upset about multiple things at once the way Alice has mentioned. Humans are complex and are capable of feeling multiple things and focusing on multiple topics at once.

That said, I do think Jinder has a pretty important point that might have gotten lost as well - society (and I'm speaking of American society here since I’m American) in general does not place as much value on things that are not inherently connected to white people. That doesn’t mean individuals don’t genuinely care on a personal level and I don’t think it’s meant to be a personal attack. It just means that society in general - our media, our laws, etc. - doesn’t place the same value on, say, three black churches being burnt down in an act of racism or Flint still not having clean water years later as it does on Notre Dame burning down. Another good example is to just flip through history textbooks. I’m hoping they’ve gotten better over the years, but I recall the ones I used were pretty heavily focused on white history. A lot of what I’ve learned about minority history - the Tulsa massacre and the existence of Black Wall Street, the horrific story of Solomon Northup, the massacre at Wounded Knee, that black Trans women were the ones who led during the Stonewall Riots, histories and cultures of various indigenous tribes, the fact that Japanese Americans were forced into prison camps during WW2, even the simple fact that Shirley Chisholm ever ran for President - has been learned as an adult and thanks in large part to the internet, which has connected me to people and information I wouldn’t have found otherwise. 

I think it’s fine for individuals to do whatever they want with their personal money. For our part, my husband and I have not donated to the Notre Dame efforts. There’s enough money and attention being thrown at it already - our money is not needed. I absolutely will draw the line at foreign governments offering financial assistance though, especially my government - Trump has no place offering money to France when that money could be much better spent elsewhere. For instance, again, on ensuring the people of Flint finally have access to water that is not going to kill them or making sure Puerto Rico has money to rebuild after Hurricane Maria. Notre Dame is a beautiful and important building, but the US Government has no right to be offering funds to rebuild it when they’ve done next to nothing for citizens of our own country. 

Again, @AliceInFundyland and @Jinder Roles, I think you both have decent points and I apologize if I unintentionally misconstrued what either of you was saying. 

You've managed to say everything I wanted to say and more but was too weary to say.

[Beermeet]

Trump offered France money?!  Grrrrrrrr.  I had not heard. I hate that man. How dare he!  Puerto Rico is just nothing to him and they are part of the US.  Flint. The mosques,  templescand churches that were terrorized, people mowed down in their places of worship on our soil get nary a mention.  But he wants to pledge money to help rebuild Notre Dame???!!!!  Livid. I'm livid. I need a strong drink. Fucktard. Unbelievable.  It never ends with him. ?

[Lisafer]

15 minutes ago, AliceInFundyland said:

@VelociRapture I think it was a good moment for your insertion, as I assumed it was intentional.

I appreciate your furthering of thoughts

I’m fairly certain my point was made. We got sidetracked. I was specifically addressing how people grieve and her status comment. That got blown into the bigger topic. I attempted to pull it in because I thought other posters had gone there. It didn’t work. It’s ok. I’m not going to pursue it. 

For what it's worth, I appreciated your posts. People have every right to grieve Notre Dame and hold a vigil if that's what helps them cope. I almost cried when I heard it was burning, and I'm neither Catholic nor French. I feel sad at the destruction of anything historical or sacred, regardless of which religion or culture it originated from. 

[AliceInFundyland]

15 minutes ago, Lisafer said:

For what it's worth, I appreciated your posts. People have every right to grieve Notre Dame and hold a vigil if that's what helps them cope. I almost cried when I heard it was burning, and I'm neither Catholic nor French. I feel sad at the destruction of anything historical or sacred, regardless of which religion or culture it originated from. 

Scientologists are spending their bazillions of dollars to imprint LRon’s scifi on steel discs deep in titanium vault thingies

At the rate we are going, that is the legacy we will leave behind for what/who comes next (or the aliens). And nobody wants that. We need to preserve it all.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trementina_Base

[Lisafer]

Just now, AliceInFundyland said:

Scientologists are spending their bazillions of dollars to imprint LRon’s scifi on titanium discs deep in cryomegavault thingies

At the rate we are going, that is the legacy we will leave behind for what/who comes next (or the aliens). And nobody wants that. We need to preserve it all.

The aliens will be truly puzzled. I can see them scratching their heads. "This L. Ron dude has got some fucked-up ideas about us!" 

I was the kind of child who pored over archaeology books and wished I could see what the Pyramids looked like when they were originally completed...and when I grew up and went to see a traveling exhibit from the Royal Tombs of Ur, I was in absolute awe that I was actually getting to see these things that I'd read about in childhood. So yeah, I get pretty upset when historical artifacts are destroyed...

 

[Dreadcrumbs]

7 minutes ago, AliceInFundyland said:

Scientologists are spending their bazillions of dollars to imprint LRon’s scifi on steel discs deep in titanium vault thingies

At the rate we are going, that is the legacy we will leave behind for what/who comes next (or the aliens). And nobody wants that. We need to preserve it all.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trementina_Base

I'm cringing at the idea of L Ron Hubbard's scifi being humanity's lasting legacy on Earth. The Voyager Golden Records are out there, but it would be a shame if that's all we managed to leave behind.

[adidas]

Tiptoeing in with the news that the fire seems to have started because of an electrical short circuit. I’m so relieved that some poor person isn’t living with the knowledge that they accidentally started the blaze during renovation work.

https://www.news.com.au/world/europe/notre-dame-fire-believed-to-have-started-by-electrical-shortcircuit/news-story/3d4a58b264ef31290ce281e63a3256b1

[Lisafer]

3 minutes ago, Dreadcrumbs said:

I'm cringing at the idea of L Ron Hubbard's scifi being humanity's lasting legacy on Earth. The Voyager Golden Records are out there, but it would be a shame if that's all we managed to leave behind.

L Ron's scribblings and Walt Disney's cryogenically frozen body...   (I'm kidding, I know he's PROBABLY not in cold storage!)

[adidas]

Also the father and daughter from the Twitter photo have been found, but Dad has requested anonymity. He said: “Thanks again for that beautiful photo, we will find a special place for it.”

[Dreadcrumbs]

1 minute ago, Lisafer said:

L Ron's scribblings and Walt Disney's cryogenically frozen body...   (I'm kidding, I know he's PROBABLY not in cold storage!)

I can imagine it now.

Aliens: We traveled this far and this long for this? *alien profanity*

[AliceInFundyland]

4 minutes ago, Dreadcrumbs said:

I'm cringing at the idea of L Ron Hubbard's scifi being humanity's lasting legacy on Earth. The Voyager Golden Records are out there, but it would be a shame if that's all we managed to leave behind.

I know, right?

It leads to some interesting questions - some related to things we are discussing. How will people or lifeforms know what we valued today in 1000 years?

How will they know that Scientology wasn’t super duper important and legit?

[Lisafer]

4 minutes ago, AliceInFundyland said:

I know, right?

It leads to some interesting questions - some related to things we are discussing. How will people or lifeforms know what we valued today in 1000 years?

How will they know that Scientology wasn’t super duper important and legit?

Obviously the right answer is for us to somehow preserve every episode of South Park. 

[Jinder Roles]

@nausicaa my goal was really nothing but to to make an observation and use this incident as an example. I have no desire to make people do anything. 

I chose pettiness for my last post because I thought a particular person’s response to me was a hot mess IMO. Even after I expanded and affirmed feelings. Plus, how do you even tell a person what their outlook and history is?(a black person nonetheless)

The “lmao” I guess was harsh but that was more my own text speech than laughing at actual ppl. If anything, I’m laughing (in an incredulous way) at the situation. Truly sorry, if it came across that way. 

My point was about society.  Seeing it intentionally not care over and over under some “we are the world” false pretense is irksome.  

And yes, value and proximity to whiteness does affect how you internalize this event. There’s nothing “dismissive” about that acknowledgment. 

@VelociRapture Thank you. I’ve been saying this for 4 posts and people are hell bent on making it personal. I give up.  

[TheOneAndOnly]

57 minutes ago, Beermeet said:

Trump offered France money?! 

Don't worry, as soon as someone informs him that France has a few whisper brown people /whisper he'll rescind his offer.

[Dreadcrumbs]

3 minutes ago, TheOneAndOnly said:

Don't worry, as soon as someone informs him that France has a few whisper brown people /whisper he'll rescind his offer.

That "Aaaand It's Gone" South Park meme immediately comes to mind.

[VelociRapture]

7 hours ago, Jinder Roles said:

@nausicaa my goal was really nothing but to to make an observation and use this incident as an example. I have no desire to make people do anything. 

I chose pettiness for my last post because I thought a particular person’s response to me was a hot mess IMO. Even after I expanded and affirmed feelings. Plus, how do you even tell a person what their outlook and history is?(a black person nonetheless)

The “lmao” I guess was harsh but that was more my own text speech than laughing at actual ppl. If anything, I’m laughing (in an incredulous way) at the situation. Truly sorry, if it came across that way. 

My point was about society.  Seeing it intentionally not care over and over under some “we are the world” false pretense is irksome.  

And yes, value and proximity to whiteness does affect how you internalize this event. There’s nothing “dismissive” about that acknowledgment. 

@VelociRapture Thank you. I’ve been saying this for 4 posts and people are hell bent on making it personal. I give up.  

To be honest, my initial reaction to your posts was probably pretty similar to what others have said. When I took another look I felt like you were speaking more from of place of frustration and sadness than a place of mocking humor though. As I said earlier, I'm not black. I’m actually so white that I’m pretty sure I glow in the dark. I can’t ever understand what it must be like to live in a society that sends the message that your culture and your history isn’t as important as someone else's and shouldn’t be prioritized because of that, but I can at least imagine how difficult that must be and I can sympathize with why this specific situation must have struck a chord with you - especially given the fact that Trump wanted to send funding to help rebuild Notre Dame, a move that is neither needed nor acceptable given the state so many citizens of our own country currently live in. Notre Dame is a beautiful piece of art and an important part of world history, but it doesn’t hold the same importance to everyone and I don’t think it’s necessarily fair to act like it should - I personally feel like that would be overlooking and ignoring the unique histories of various peoples around the world who may not have good experiences with Catholics or the French or white people in general. 

I also don’t feel comfortable telling you how to word your posts on this subject. Maybe the word choice wasn’t the best for this specific conversation, but I feel like black people are told too often how they should feel and react about pretty much everything. I don’t want to add to that. I do see why people reacted the way they did initially though because tone can be very difficult to read in online conversations. 

I hope I’ve been clear enough in my thoughts here. I don’t want to make this conversation worse for anyone or cause the conversation to take an ugly turn. 

[HerNameIsBuffy]

1 hour ago, VelociRapture said:

 Notre Dame is a beautiful piece of art and an important part of world history, but it doesn’t hold the same importance to everyone and I don’t think it’s necessaril y fair to act like it should

who said it should?  no one here implied everyone should care about it.

this is a thread where people who do care were discussing our feelings, not imposing them on others.

however valid the overarching point of the importance of other issues, coming to a place where people were sad about an event and tossing whataboutism around is a shitty thing to do.

to have the conversation is fine.  to sit in judgement of people for talking about it rather than other issues is not the way to do it.

1 hour ago, VelociRapture said:

Maybe the word choice wasn’t the best for this specific conversation, but I feel like black people are told too often how they should feel and react about pretty much everything. I don’t want to add to that.

I have never told anyone how they should feel, but tbh I think its infantilizing an entire group of people to not expect rules of civil discourse to apply.

if I see someone shitting on fj I'm not going to ask their ethnicity and factor that into whether I call it out or not.

[Lisafer]

@VelociRapture the worst thing that was said was not actually in this thread, in case you missed it. I think you sort of came in in the middle and missed the fact that @Jinder Roles came off as mocking the mourners of Notre Dame in their status and basically handwaved it away. 

I may be so freaking white I glow, too, but that doesn't mean I can't say something when people make a poor choice of words. I call it like I see it.

[HerNameIsBuffy]

9 hours ago, Jinder Roles said:

The “lmao” I guess was harsh but that was more my own text speech than laughing at actual ppl. If anything, I’m laughing (in an incredulous way) at the situation. Truly sorry, if it came across that way. 

words and acronyms have meaning, but 'textspeak' isn't a buffer.  we all misspeak at times and if you're now sorry that's nice… but there was no misunderstanding due to text speak.

[Lisafer]

@HerNameIsBuffy THANK YOU. Bless you, you've said everything I wanted to say. I think I can be done posting in this thread now.

[HerNameIsBuffy]

Just now, Lisafer said:

@HerNameIsBuffy THANK YOU. Bless you, you've said everything I wanted to say. I think I can be done posting in this thread now.

I'm hoping if people have comments about ND they'll keep posting.  I learned a lot before the derail and found it really interesting.  @laPapessaGiovanna post about the importance of art and beauty alone filled my heart and said what I felt but couldn't articulate.

but when it comes to discussing whether people should be shamed for caring about this...I, too, hope that's done.

[VelociRapture]

29 minutes ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

who said it should?  no one here implied everyone should care about it.

Honestly? I do feel some people unintentionally implied this. I doubt that was the intention, but that was still the impression I got and I’m actually rather sad about the destruction. 

I understand this is a difficult conversation for various reasons and emotions are heightened on both sides. I’m not trying to make things worse (as I’ve stated multiple times), I’m just trying to help people understand why each side may have reacted the way they did. At this point I’ve pretty much said everything I think is necessary, so I’ll leave you all to it. 

23 minutes ago, Lisafer said:

@VelociRapture the worst thing that was said was not actually in this thread, in case you missed it. I think you sort of came in in the middle and missed the fact that @Jinder Roles came off as mocking the mourners of Notre Dame in their status and basically handwaved it away. 

I may be so freaking white I glow, too, but that doesn't mean I can't say something when people make a poor choice of words. I call it like I see it.

I actually did see that status. Again, it was not the best choice of words to spark a productive conversation, but given her background and the state of the country I can at least understand why she might have reacted the way she did. 

And now I really am done. I just didn’t want you to think I was ignoring your comment.  

[Beermeet]

12 hours ago, VelociRapture said:

I LOVE THAT SHOW!!! 

Can we make this a regular thing on FJ? We get our favorite posters their beverage of choice (grape juice and root beer included because fundies) and have them recap stories about their favorite Fundies or FJ moments?! ?

We really need to chat about this!  I love that show too!  

[VelociRapture]

24 minutes ago, Beermeet said:

We really need to chat about this!  I love that show too!  

The more I think about it, the more I legitimately need FJ Drunk History to happen. Anything David Waller related would be pure gold. ?