azurelunatic | (no subject)

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http://www.teachsoap.com/bombs.html#fizzybombs -- RPG-watching stuff led me into doing some research. OMG SOAPMAKING. I could have been very, very, very much a hazard to the sanity of those around me with this if I had decided that I wanted to really make real soap as a teenager.

Via

hotarunokokoro, some articles:
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/ek20080520a1.html -- four-kanji phrases (beyond me at this point)
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/ek-wh-all.html -- "So, What the Heck is That?" -- articles on little baffling bits of Japanese culture.

Consider, if you will, the implications of true freedom of speech, anywhere and anytime. It's a great idea. Actions are a little more clear-cut. Your freedom to swing your fist ends at my face. How far should your freedom to run your mouth go? I don't think this one is going to get a quick answer, nor a full answer any time soon, but it's one of the major issues online.

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Of course, when I think of 'soap' and 'bomb', I think of Fight Club.

Heh.

Inquire of your wife sometime what the hell that is that she is doing to the bathtub. Maybe she will share!

Oh, I'm aware of 'bath bombs' - I've been in a Lush. Once. And I stayed near the door.

Our bathroom is covered in Lush. There's over twenty bottles and tubs arranged around the edge of the bath - one of them is my shampoo, the rest is her scary lush. (Then there's all the stuff that's wrapped in paper and piled around every dry surface...)

i love bath bombs! Lush's bath bombs are the best! i tried making candles once, but was too adhd to keep dipping them in and out of the wax and ended up with stirrer sized candles!
you think people would only argue about what they know. but unfortunatley, they venture into unknown territory and ignorance usually rises to the surface and are revealed. but hey, its a free country and anyone can admit their lack of knowledge whenever they want, hai?
^_~

Hee! I made some but I was too impatient and also too obsessive, and some of them slid off the wicks!

You know I touched on this recently (in a somewhat inflammatory way, heh ^^;; ), but... with me, the freedom of speech is largely related to personal space. If I actively seek out someone's opinion, then I have given consent to the other person to say whatever they want, even if it's not something I really wanted to hear or something I may full-out disagree with. This is perfectly fine and I accept that.

But with regards to unsolicited opinions, my philosophy has always been something to the effect of "your freedom of speech ends where my mailbox, email inbox, voice mail, front door, etc., begins." In turn, I respect this for others (to the point of obsessively putting stuff under special filters and/or lj-cuts if I think it might offend at least one person on my Friends list... my endorsements for the LJ Advisory Board election being a perfect example of how paranoid I can get about this, LOL).

As far as actual content of speech goes, I feel as though we don't really have true freedom of speech because of the social consequences, having little to do with the law itself, of expressing an unpopular opinion. While it may be perfectly legal for me to express my feelings and thoughts on someone or something, it may end up costing me the respect of others or, worse, my job. To that end, I have kept quiet on a number of things, not because I wanted to but out of fear of the potential consequences.

I'm terribly concerned that certain candidates who seem to be running on a freedom of speech campaign, but have otherwise gotten a reputation as generally unsavory characters, are advocating freedom of speech not so that others will be free to write in their own journals on controversial topics, but so that they can feel free to get in others' space and write things that are just shy of libel, and not just one of them, but the whole merrie gang. Unfortunately, the only thing that would prove otherwise to me is to see the erstwhile leader smacking down the followers for acting like asshats in public in their name, and a collective halt to the asinine behaviour.

They know better, which is why it's so disruptive. It's not like they're ignoring all propriety, which is sometimes a sign of rudeness and sometimes a sign that someone doesn't know any better or doesn't have the capability to interpret those social signals. From where I sit, the collective gestalt is based on twisting and perverting those social signals. They're like an evil Miss Manners.

Ahhhh, thanks for explaining this! This makes more sense now.

Btw, when you said "libel," you just reminded me of the old "freedom of speech" defense for invading others' privacy by doing what you mentioned (which I think still fits in with the personal space thing I talked about, unless I'm misunderstanding) or, more insidiously, the posting of others' personal information without their permission. ^^;; When I had posted my comment, I knew I was forgetting a point regarding what I consider to be a reasonable condition of freedom of speech, and this is it.

Again, this is where I can be obsessively paranoid about protecting others' right to their own privacy and to try to conduct myself properly in other people's space, whether it be their journal or their own front room. I can't tell you how appalled I have been to see how other folks behave elsejournal in some cases. And I sure as hell don't want to see the "right to troll" on LJ, or anywhere else, for that matter. ^^;;

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