Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

A few thoughts on censorship

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One of things I occupy my day with, in addition to running around after two tots, writing, websurfing, and sometimes chatting on the phone, being the Forum Moderator at Wordplay. Normally I love this job—Terry and Ted are the coolest, not the least of which because they made this damn site out of the goodness of their hearts; I love being a community of screenwriters; I love doing my part to keep the community together and operating.

Sometimes this involves telling people when to shut the fuck up.

There are certain topics that I simply abhor. In fact, I made a list once:

  • Men and women
  • Mac vs PC
  • censorship
  • politics
  • religion
  • semantics
  • the effect of violence in the media
  • racism
  • genre
  • what is Art?
  • the Golden Compass
  • child porn

I don’t remember where the child porn one comes from. But all the others—hundreds and hundreds of posts going ’round and ’round and ’round. These conversations, when they get started, are annoying, unproductive, and, worst of all, off-topic.

The topics are—wait for it—movies and screenwriting. That’s it. That’s what we’re there to discuss.

My job is to point out when the topic is veering off of the main road, to stop it cold when it’s gone too far off, to delete posts that are offensive or spam or both, and to send e-mail to people who need a little behind-the-scenes nudge or bitch-slap, as the case may be.

Several times a year, like the change of the seasons, my quashing of a topic invariably leads to calls of “Censorship!” And this makes me crazy for a couple of reasons.

  1. I’m a person. I have feelings. I don’t like people saying I’m a heavy. I’m a nice person, a good person, and I’d like a pat on the back once in a while, you know?
  2. “Censorship” is an important word, like “Nazi,” that’s been debased and misunderstood.

The old joke is that freedom of the press is reserved for the guys who can own the presses. And as we all know, there’s no such thing as a joke.

At Wordplay we don’t have to let anyone say anything. It’s Terry’s site, he’s footing the bills, what he says goes. If you want to start your own screenwriting-themed site where any dork can say anything he or she wants to, hey: call up your ISP and cough up the dinero. Nobody owes you a platform, capiche?

(And when losers start posting things about how my ending certain threads is akin to book-burning…well, that really makes me mad. Because not only is it insulting, because clearly these morons know not a thing about actual book burning, but then I have to go through the rigamarole required to delete their stupid posts.)

Censorship is about the government stopping you from exercising your right of freedom of the press. The government is always the 800-lb. gorilla: it gets to make the laws, and it gets to enforce them at the point of a gun. The Bill of Rights, natch, is designed to remind the government of which rights belong to the citizens and cannot be taken away. They’re the rights that governments always find pesky and inconvenient, which is why the Founding Fathers decided to make it clear what they were. (Well, clear to everyone except maybe Antonin Scalia. But that’s another entry.)

Freedom of the press doesn’t apply to my press. I don’t have to publish you. In fact, I can keep printing things you don’t like. You are perfectly free to go out, get your own press, and print things I don’t like.

The problem we have these days is that we have too few presses, major or minor, and the current administration wants to ensure that we have even fewer than we do now by having the FCC lift all regulations on who can own what in which market. What’s happens, of course, is what always happens: the guys with the big money buy the little guys (or quash them), leaving only one dog in the yard. One big, rich dog, who would like to look out for his interests and doesn’t have to worry about anyone else calling him on it, because anyone else who might call him on it is, well, a big, rich dog too.

Why is this a problem? Well…Rupert Murdoch happens to be for the Iraq war. And what a surprise: so are all the editors of all the newspapers he owns. Not very many viewpoints in a world where all the presses are owned by the same guys. Who are allowed to own all those presses because of their friends in the government. It’s censorship by fiat.

And it’s a little more important than your not being able to post about whatever you like wherever you like.

Save your goddamn cries of “Censorship!” for when they matter, okay?

Draw the shark

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Today I was drawing on the white board with Fia. In the absence of any requests—a long-time favorite was “Draw a baby sun!” as in the baby sun from “Teletubbies”—I drew some waves. Then I drew a boat on the waves.

Fia came over to inspect it. “Put Daddy. And Mommy. And Sophia.”

“Anybody else?”

This seemed to stump her.

“Simon?”

She nodded. “Put Simon.”

I dutifully drew all crew members on deck.

“Okay, now draw the shark underneath the boat.”

Hmmm. The…shark?

“The shark’s going to swim up to the boat and eat everyone up.”

I’m beginning to see why parents everywhere worry about what their kids seem to get into when the parents aren’t around. Where did she learn about sharks? That they swim under boats? That they eat the people on the boats?

Okay, maybe Sophia is a little smarter than I’ve given her credit for, and trust me: I’ve given her plenty of credit.

The best lunch in LA

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You want the absolute bar-none best lunch in LA?

Go to Chaya Brasserie, which is near Cedars-Sinai Hospital. Don’t even look at the menu—it’s a good menu, everything’s great, but don’t waste your time. When you sit down, say, “I want the tempura bowl.”

This is the best tempura ever. Darin doesn’t even like tempura, but when I say, “Chay–” he cuts me off and says, “Let’s go.”

The bowl has: a slab of seared ahi tuna; tempura of two shrimp, two stalks of asparagus, two woodear mushrooms, two shiitake mushroom, and two pieces of Japanese eggplants; the best wasabi cream sauce you have ever had in your life; a superlative version of the classic tempura dipping sauce; and perfectly done sushi rice.

It’s the priciest tempura we’ve ever had and so worth it.

Chaya Brasserie has great desserts, but if you want the most total superlative finish to the meal, you get in your car, turn north on Robertson, turn right on Melrose, drive until you get to Sweet Lady Jane. Park. You and your companion should each order a dessert, but don’t worry: you won’t be able to finish both. You’ll take about half of each home.

You will go into a “fabulous food” coma. Which is unfortunate, if, like Darin, you have to go home and work.

Guess what we did today?

ps – The tempura bowl is only available at lunch, which is why this is the best lunch in LA.