One Of The Most Beautiful, Touching and Meaningful Commercials I Have Seen In Years - Great Beer Too!


Selene

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heh. To get us talking.

(And drinking Budweiser - no, Millars, no- what was it again?)

Geez Tony - the only real beer - Guiness Stout!

Dark, strong and beautiful ... like a good woman..lol.

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Has it occurred to any of you gentlemen that the wheelchair-bound player, considering himself to be at the advantage, may have been allowing his able-bodied friends to level the playing field in their favor? Or perhaps, that the men, rather than feeling sympathy for their friend, felt respect for his ability to perform so well at a sport they'd never tried and that it was their respect and competitiveness that drove them to attempt to mimic his accomplishment?

For whatever reason, my first thought when I saw the commercial was a recollection of the band Hootie and the Blowfish. Their drummer once said that they are not one black guy in an all-white band but actually three white guys in an all-black band.

That's a nice reversal, but before we go embroidering on the 'story' as given, perhaps one should see it as it was intended: for maximum feel-good impact - so it had to be the creative director's intent to show the able-bodies descending to the handicapped player's level, in camaraderie. Without seeming patronising, of course.

I was considering the possibility that this fellow desires, needs nor deserves not one whit of sympathy. He might well be able to blow those jocks away, with what really counts - character, mental strength and knowledge. That's my own embroidered version.

I like your version because it is cynicism free. :smile:

Greg

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heh. To get us talking.

(And drinking Budweiser - no, Millars, no- what was it again?)

Geez Tony - the only real beer - Guiness Stout!

Dark, strong and beautiful ... like a good woman..lol.

I enjoy it myself, especially on tap. Most nutritious and great for cold evenings. Speaking of which, hope you're keeping warm old friend.

Incredibly low temps you are suffering there.

Guinness Stout was what Audrey Hepburn drank to put on weight, I seem to recall.

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heh. To get us talking.

(And drinking Budweiser - no, Millars, no- what was it again?)

Geez Tony - the only real beer - Guiness Stout!

Dark, strong and beautiful ... like a good woman..lol.

I enjoy it myself, especially on tap. Most nutritious and great for cold evenings. Speaking of which, hope you're keeping warm old friend.

Incredibly low temps you are suffering there.

Guinness Stout was what Audrey Hepburn drank to put on weight, I seem to recall.

Only way to drink Guiness is on tap...totally agree - and it is quite nutritious.

Never heard that about Audrey, however, it does make sense.

As to the weather Tony...well this ain't my first rodeo, blizzard, or, bitter cold.

The coldest I have ever experienced was 50 below on the Delaware River on News Years Day...it almost hurt to move.

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heh. To get us talking.

(And drinking Budweiser - no, Millars, no- what was it again?)

Geez Tony - the only real beer - Guiness Stout!

Dark, strong and beautiful ... like a good woman..lol.

I enjoy it myself, especially on tap. Most nutritious and great for cold evenings. Speaking of which, hope you're keeping warm old friend.

Incredibly low temps you are suffering there.

Guinness Stout was what Audrey Hepburn drank to put on weight, I seem to recall.

Only way to drink Guiness is on tap...totally agree - and it is quite nutritious.

Never heard that about Audrey, however, it does make sense.

As to the weather Tony...well this ain't my first rodeo, blizzard, or, bitter cold.

The coldest I have ever experienced was 50 below on the Delaware River on News Years Day...it almost hurt to move.

I wasn't aware you fought with Washington. Thank you for your service!

Was he as taciturn as they say? I suppose I would be too with false teeth made of scrub oak.

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Adam wrote:

The coldest I have ever experienced was 50 below on the Delaware River on News Years Day...it almost hurt to move

end quote

PDS answered:

I wasn't aware you fought with Washington. Thank you for your service!

end quote

Oh, that is funny~What year was that Adam? Does that mean wind chill or the actual temperature? On Delmarva I remember it getting to 3 above zero. And when I lived in Rhode Island the coldest was also 3 above. When I traveled to Minnesota, both times in the winter, the low was 13 above. Two people I spoke to in St. Paul said the coldest weather they had experience was MINUS 33 degrees. During my stop over in Alaska it was 33 degrees above in August and it was terrible because of the mosquitoes. They must have antifreeze.

South Korea was the lowest I ever experienced – 6 above (I think) and I had to live in my radio truck during maneuvers and could not waste the gas to warm it up. Last week we got down to 7 but there was also a 20 to 30 mph wind. One minute outside, feeding my cats, and my hands ached.

The cats live in a unheated shed or in the doghouse. The doghouse had a foot of straw on the floor which has compressed to about a half a foot. On top of that they have two leaf bags full of old clothes scattered about. It’s funny seeing a cat hugging an old tee shirt. I have a board and a pressing cinder block which shrinks the opening so much that the fat cats need to squeeze in.

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As to the weather Tony...well this ain't my first rodeo, blizzard, or, bitter cold.

The coldest I have ever experienced was 50 below on the Delaware River on News Years Day...it almost hurt to move.

I wasn't aware you fought with Washington. Thank you for your service!

Was he as taciturn as they say? I suppose I would be too with false teeth made of scrub oak.

Very nice, David.

I am chuckling through my chattering teeth...

Almost sounds like a rap at a rave.

Yes, it is the anniversary of The Crossing...

51%2Bl7cbaQ4L._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,To

http://www.amazon.com/George-Washington-Crossing-Jack-Levin/dp/1476731934

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It was in the late '60's early '70's.

The 50 below was with the wind chill. I believe the actual temperature was 12 degrees below zero.

What year was that Adam? Does that mean wind chill or the actual temperature?
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Has it occurred to any of you gentlemen that the wheelchair-bound player, considering himself to be at the advantage, may have been allowing his able-bodied friends to level the playing field in their favor? Or perhaps, that the men, rather than feeling sympathy for their friend, felt respect for his ability to perform so well at a sport they'd never tried and that it was their respect and competitiveness that drove them to attempt to mimic his accomplishment?

For whatever reason, my first thought when I saw the commercial was a recollection of the band Hootie and the Blowfish. Their drummer once said that they are not one black guy in an all-white band but actually three white guys in an all-black band.

That's a nice reversal, but before we go embroidering on the 'story' as given, perhaps one should see it as it was intended: for maximum feel-good impact - so it had to be the creative director's intent to show the able-bodies descending to the handicapped player's level, in camaraderie. Without seeming patronising, of course.

I was considering the possibility that this fellow desires, needs nor deserves not one whit of sympathy. He might well be able to blow those jocks away, with what really counts - character, mental strength and knowledge. That's my own embroidered version.

The maximum feel-good impact for me is with my "embroidered" version, though. Your assumption is that the story "as given" is your interpretation of it. Without the creative director actually telling us his intent was as you say it was, based only on the commercial itself, it is at least as plausible to assume the intent was to show the relevance of wheelchair basketball as a competitive sport deserving of respect. More likely, however, I suspect the intent was ambiguity, so that your interpretation is just as valid as mine, and both leaving us with the thought, "That's a really cool commercial, that beer must be cool, too."

For futher consideration on this topic: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/wheelchair-sports-face-dilemma-as-the-ablebodied-join-in-1564752.html

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Very nice find. I was not aware of this trend.

Glad you decided to stick around.

Saves me leading up a Draft Deana Delancey movement.

The triple D initials would not have worked out anyway.
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I'm reminded of Lizzie Velásquez, whose story I've seen now and again online. What motivates certain people to be angry when they see her, and to bully her and suggest that she kill herself?

It's like, "Not only can I not empathize with what her life must be like, but there's something in me which makes me very excited about the idea of adding to her burden."

WTF? What drives that? MSK says that it's "mostly previous hurt and fear." I can't comprehend it. What type of hurt of fear would cause that type of behavior?

J

Fear at seeing something so terribly handicapped, the feeling it might be you, so trying to get it out of the way?

I remember when I was a child, there was a crippled and deformed boy, from spina bifida, who lived next door, and some of the neighborhood kids would jeer at him and even throw things at him.

Here's a link to a book called Don't Feel Sorry for Paul. Working on that was a special experience in my years of editing - the department head and I wrote the text from the photographer's notes. One of the aspects discussed about Paul's school life is how some of his classmates would jeer at him, calling him "Captain Hook," and other nastinesses.

Think of the song "Rudolph, the Red-nosed Reindeer." I've thought since I was a kid that it's an awful story. The other reindeer jeer at Rudolph because he looks strange, and they won't let him play in their games. Then, after Santa enlists Rudolph to light the sleigh's way on a foggy night, the other reindeer love Rudolph and accord him celebrity status. Ick, in both the before and after cases.

Ellen

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WTF? What drives that? MSK says that it's "mostly previous hurt and fear." I can't comprehend it. What type of hurt of fear would cause that type of behavior?

Fear at seeing something so terribly handicapped, the feeling it might be you, so trying to get it out of the way?

I remember when I was a child, there was a crippled and deformed boy, from spina bifida, who lived next door, and some of the neighborhood kids would jeer at him and even throw things at him.

The other reindeer jeer at Rudolph because he looks strange, and they won't let him play in their games.

Ellen

Completely agree with you Ellen.

That "fear" that it could happen to you, or, even be contagious operates within any child's mind while they are learning to separate reality from fantasy.

This is where competent parental guidance must step in, or, lacking that, a child finding a mentor who can guide the child.

The community you live in also matters.

For example, where I grew up, making fun of a child who was deformed was just not permitted.

The offending person would basicly be "shunned." I mean that in a secular sense since that community was truly diverse.

A...

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I don't know about the shunning as a universal reaction.

It happens sometimes, but people have always paid good money to see freak shows.

Michael

Agreed. It is definitely not universal.

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I've found it's possible to have a lump in my throat and a sour taste in my mouth at the same time.

Is this ad about the joys of friendship, or is it egalitarianism by stealth?

(With what I know about the ad industry, it's both - grabbing me with the ole beer-and-friendship sell, and slipping in a mirror reflecting today's prevailing philosophy. Message in a message.)

Tony:

It is a possible perception.

It also exposes a "weakspot" most Objectivists are not even aware exists. It is ok to feel sympathy for another fellow individual.

The line in the philosophical sand is when you should feel pity. You should feel that you should sacrifice your skills/self/etc. to the "handicapped" fellow individual because it is the higher/better moral choice which is bullshit.

I do not perceive a "stealth egalitarianism" in this commercial, although, looking through your eyes I can.

It does not look like any of the four (4) "handy capable" players are not playing to their fullest skill and capacity. No "gimmes" here.

I still maintain it is beautiful.

And Guinness Stout is THE beer.

A...

Adam: It's a big subject, but I think that Objectivist-contra-compassion thing needs to be put to rest as the fallacy it is.

While it may not be often made explicit in Objectivism that those good human feelings are important to one's life - it is certainly implicit.

I think Rand almost dismissed the question as so self-evident that to pay it undue attention would be to countenance ("sanction") the premises of the detractors.

Whatever. Over all, there's plenty in Objectivism that follows or has to be worked out for oneself.

However, it surely has occurred to you personally that the more you think, the more you feel - and the more you feel, the more you think.

Intellectuality should not in the slightest entail leaving behind human feelings; if it does it's false - it upholds a body-mind dichotomy.

What proper philosophy does, I believe, is to vastly expand one's range and scope -is all.

So if anyone asks what's the connection between having a warm feeling for the harmless ad of a person being given moral support by his buddies...and egalitarianism? the link is there, as some thought will show.

If any could see (and feel) the consequences of the destructive effects of egalitarianism on people (as I see with youngsters and this cynically, pandering Statist education system in SA, dumbing-down Final Exams and lowering pass marks, to show that "all people are equal") -

to them I'd say: save empathy for where it is due, for the millions of real people whose lives are damaged by the fakery and contempt for life of this 'philosophy'.

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It also exposes a "weakspot" most Objectivists are not even aware exists. It is ok to feel sympathy for another fellow individual.

The line in the philosophical sand is when you should feel pity. You should feel that you should sacrifice your skills/self/etc. to the "handicapped" fellow individual because it is the higher/better moral choice which is bullshit.

Adam: It's a big subject, but I think that Objectivist-contra-compassion thing needs to be put to rest as the fallacy it is.

While it may not be often made explicit in Objectivism that those good human feelings are important to one's life - it is certainly implicit.

I think Rand almost dismissed the question as so self-evident that to pay it undue attention would be to countenance ("sanction") the premises of the detractors.

Whatever. Over all, there's plenty in Objectivism that follows or has to be worked out for oneself.

Agreed.

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It also exposes a "weakspot" most Objectivists are not even aware exists. It is ok to feel sympathy for another fellow individual.

The line in the philosophical sand is when you should feel pity. You should feel that you should sacrifice your skills/self/etc. to the "handicapped" fellow individual because it is the higher/better moral choice which is bullshit.

Adam: It's a big subject, but I think that Objectivist-contra-compassion thing needs to be put to rest as the fallacy it is.

While it may not be often made explicit in Objectivism that those good human feelings are important to one's life - it is certainly implicit.

I think Rand almost dismissed the question as so self-evident that to pay it undue attention would be to countenance ("sanction") the premises of the detractors.

Whatever. Over all, there's plenty in Objectivism that follows or has to be worked out for oneself.

Agreed.

Agreed here too.

Caricatures are bad enough. 50-year old caricatures are just lazy.

Of course, it doesn't help that far too many with their newly minted "white belt" in Objectivism run around making dumb-shit statements that reinforce the caricature.

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I don't know about the shunning as a universal reaction.

It happens sometimes, but people have always paid good money to see freak shows.

Michael

And they've paid a lot of good money to see the biggest freak show on earth...

...the government people have created in their own image. :laugh:

Greg

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Whatever. Over all, there's plenty in Objectivism that follows or has to be worked out for oneself.

Didn't want your point to become lost in the shuffle because it is the principle upon which all of the others rest.

I'm not an Objectivist, so I'll state this in broad generic terms.

If the ideal of any ideology is the sovereignty of the individual, then that also includes the ideal of the self actuated individual who does not need anyone to tell them what to think, say, or do.

Having noticed a previous reference to Nassem Taleb I had never heard of him and so was curious as to who he was. Watching one of his videos, a point he made jumped right off the screen. Paraphrased, he said:

I'm not telling you what to do.

I'm only telling you what I do.

This is a wise man.

Greg

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Having noticed a previous reference to Nassem Taleb I had never heard of him and so was curious as to who he was. Watching one of his videos, a point he made jumped right off the screen. Paraphrased, he said:

I'm not telling you what to do.

I'm only telling you what I do.

This is a wise man.

Greg,

Taleb is a two-edged sword. Look at who he hangs out with (the COBS people) and dig deeper.

Taleb is among those who both tell you what to do if you know where to look and (going by the attitude Kahneman treats him with) is probably telling them what to do, but says he does not tell you what to do.

Them government paychecks keep rolling his way.

This is a cunning man.

Michael

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Having noticed a previous reference to Nassem Taleb I had never heard of him and so was curious as to who he was. Watching one of his videos, a point he made jumped right off the screen. Paraphrased, he said:

I'm not telling you what to do.

I'm only telling you what I do.

This is a wise man.

Greg,

Taleb is a two-edged sword. Look at who he hangs out with (the COBS people) and dig deeper.

Taleb is among those who both tell you what to do if you know where to look and (going by the attitude Kahneman treats him with) is probably telling them what to do, but says he does not tell you what to do.

Them government paychecks keep rolling his way.

This is a cunning man.

Michael

Thanks for the heads up, Michael. :smile:

All I know about him so far is just a couple of youtubes, and didn't know he's sucking the government teat.

His antifragile concept is of interest to me because I can already identify its operation in my life, having remained completely unaffected by the 2008 collapse and the current recession.

Greg

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Having noticed a previous reference to Nassem Taleb I had never heard of him and so was curious as to who he was. Watching one of his videos, a point he made jumped right off the screen. Paraphrased, he said:

I'm not telling you what to do.

I'm only telling you what I do.

This is a wise man.

Greg,

Taleb is a two-edged sword. Look at who he hangs out with (the COBS people) and dig deeper.

Taleb is among those who both tell you what to do if you know where to look and (going by the attitude Kahneman treats him with) is probably telling them what to do, but says he does not tell you what to do.

Them government paychecks keep rolling his way.

This is a cunning man.

Michael

What is COBS?

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Greg,

I don't mean to insinuate one should not read Taleb or watch videos of him. He is extremely intelligent.

But he is like the bad boy of the intellectual elite behind big government apologists. He pisses a lot of those people off, but they accept him and sing his praises. Let's say Cass Sunstein's monkey-shine phrase "paternal libertarianism" (with Thaler) is amateur compared to what Taleb does for smoke and mirrors.

Obviously he claims the government is screwed up. But his thing is to claim that systems (all systems) are more robust if they can withstand a certain amount of randomness and significant unexpected events (he calls them black swan events). Up to here, OK.

But now let's take this to the social realm. What social system can be better prepared for the unexpected than a strong central government? Taleb doesn't outright say that (to my knowledge), but he strongly implies it. He lets others come to this conclusion from all the hints he drops along the way. And he points enough fingers at this and that person, method, system, etc., (he loves to bash statistics stuff) that those in the middle have reasonable-sounding excuses for government failures while still bolstering the need for big government.

Put it this way. He's an advisor to the International Monetary Fund. That's enough to give anyone in our neck of the woods pause.

But I encourage you to watch videos where he and Daniel Kahneman are on stage together. You will learn a lot.

Michael

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What is COBS?
I know, I do not speak alphabet either. The link is an acronym finder which can be helpful.
Category Filters > All

definitions (7) Information

Technology (1) Military &

Government (2) Science &

Medicine (1) Organizations,

Schools, etc. (3) Business &

Finance (2) Slang, Chat &

Pop culture (0) sort results: alphabetical | rank ? Rank Abbr. Meaning **** COBS Conduct of Business Sourcebook (Financial Services Authority; UK) find2.gif *** COBS Colorado Outward Bound School find2.gif *** COBS Consistent Overhead Byte Stuffing (RS-232 protocol) find2.gif * COBS Command Operating Budget System find2.gif * COBS Change of Body State (psychological and chemical changes in the brain) find2.gif * COBS Colours, Old Boys, Staff find2.gif * COBS Certified Outpatient Billing Specialist (various locations) find2.gif Note: We have 15 other definitions for COBS in our Acronym Attic

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