The Gathering's Storm

April 8, 2011 12:49 AM

MinchinFilter: Storm, the Animated Film, from Tim's 'beat poem' about his confrontation with a credulous fool. (About)
Related: "If You Open Your Mind Too Much Your Brain Will Fall Out"
posted by oneswellfoop (40 comments total)

What he calls "Asparin" is actually acetylsalicylic acid.
posted by delmoi at 1:35 AM on April 8, 2011

"like a sniper using bollocks for ammunition "

heh

"Science adjusts it views, based on what's observed.
Faith is the denial of observation - so that belief can be preserved"

awesome, and it rhymes.
posted by memebake at 1:41 AM on April 8, 2011

Absolutely terrific stuff... Minchin continues to impress, both in content and implementation.
posted by benzo8 at 1:53 AM on April 8, 2011

What he calls "Asparin" is actually acetylsalicylic acid.

This is an amazingly pertinent intervention. Congratulations! Now none need live in ignorance!
posted by Wolof at 2:18 AM on April 8, 2011

This is an amazingly pertinent intervention. Congratulations! Now none need live in ignorance!

The cure for ignorance is a different acid...
posted by CautionToTheWind at 2:25 AM on April 8, 2011

Also, when we say pavement we mean sidewalk.

Lift? Elevator.

Pants? Underpants.

Tap? Faucet.

Ice cream? Hot sex so dirty it shames the gods.

Tourists are often caught out on the last one.
posted by spectrevsrector at 2:45 AM on April 8, 2011 [4 favorites]

I've been waiting for this for a long time and the teasers just weren't cutting it. Thanks for the post!
posted by Kickdrum at 2:58 AM on April 8, 2011

Metafilter: caught in the blinding headlights of vacuous crap.

That said (as it had to be), this is pretty good stuff, thanks!
posted by tomswift at 3:15 AM on April 8, 2011

This was so good I watched the whole thing and then watched the non-animated version too.

"Do you know what they call alternative medicine that's been proven to work? Medicine."
posted by mmoncur at 3:51 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

Brilliant.
posted by chill at 4:31 AM on April 8, 2011

Brilliant, indeed, but this "vacuous crap" is an essential component of the mind. If Minchin's mind were sliced, placed on slides and subjected to rigorous analysis, we'd undoubtedly see that he too holds many non-fact-based beliefs and assumptions -- just different ones from the New Age girl. Remember, the choice isn't between religion and no religion, it's always one religion vs. the other. Scrutinize your own beliefs: What's your religion?
posted by Faze at 5:17 AM on April 8, 2011

OH GOD MY RELIGION IS SNOOPY WORSHIP
posted by No-sword at 5:24 AM on April 8, 2011 [6 favorites]

Oh Faze, you trolly scamp. How very non-evidencence-based of you. Very amusing, but no nine-minute beat-poem.
posted by pompomtom at 5:27 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

Fantastic. There's few things I love more than a clever rhyme.
posted by rifflesby at 5:38 AM on April 8, 2011

Like Kickdrum, I've been waiting a long time for this. Thank you.
posted by Hactar at 6:02 AM on April 8, 2011

I'm sure we all have our own irrationalities. The difference is whether we choose to construct entire belief systems based on them while denying their irrational basis.
posted by spectrevsrector at 6:09 AM on April 8, 2011 [5 favorites]

Remember, the choice isn't between religion and no religion, it's always one religion vs. the other. Scrutinize your own beliefs: What's your religion?

Are you joking? I honestly can't tell. I don't deny that everybody inevitably uses one fallacious mental shortcuts or another to get through the day, but there's nonetheless a difference between "possessing human cognition with all the failings and pitfalls that entails" and "being religious," and it's not just semantics, either.
posted by pts at 6:32 AM on April 8, 2011 [3 favorites]

What he calls "Asparin" is actually acetylsalicylic acid.

What you say he calls "Asparin" he actually calls "Aspirin".
posted by Sutekh at 6:46 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

pts, Faze frequently posts eloquent yet half-baked pronouncements about how he thinks the world is. Don't take them too seriously, he rarely comes back to explain what the hell he's on about.

I'll take this opportunity to post one of Minchin's older songs Not Perfect, which I hadn't heard until he played it during the encore on his recent Australian tour. You can see audience members tearing up a little bit, and I can't blame them. It's a song about accepting the imperfections in our lives and maybe being a bit more grateful for how cool stuff is.
posted by harriet vane at 6:47 AM on April 8, 2011 [2 favorites]

For a moment I thought this was going to be an animated film about Nick Minchin. Which would have been interesting in its own way, I guess, but probably not so entertaining.
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 7:24 AM on April 8, 2011

I love Tim Minchin. Maybe loved. Then I had an exchange with him on twitter which made me realise that rather than being a scientifically minded agnostic (like I hope I am), he could quite possibly be one of those militant atheists I dislike talking to nearly as much as the militant god botherers.

Like most of my comments, I've suddenly realised how little this has to do with the post I'm responding to...
posted by sodium lights the horizon at 8:37 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

Ice cream? Hot sex so dirty it shames the gods.

That explains the Muscles song.
I saw a bit of Minchin's Opera House performance on TV. It struck me as being like XKCD strips set to music, which isn't my thing but almost explains his massive popularity in some places. He's HUGE in Australia.
That said, most people I know subscribe to some New Age woo bullshit so he's a needed antidote. I think its the beaches. Leads to California thinking.
There was a nice documentary on Minchin's rise to fame. Humanized him a bit. I wish he'd wear shoes though.
posted by Lovecraft In Brooklyn at 9:09 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

Interesting - the deal he offers to make in regards to homeopathy is that he'll accept it after he's been shown that it works and how it works. He demands to be shown a mechanism. That's a high requirement. He'd have rejected Mendel's discoveries (made in the 1830s) until Watson and Crick came along in the 1950s.

/not homeopath-ist
posted by benito.strauss at 9:37 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

Oh, what the hell. I came across this piece (without animation) on Reddit six months ago. I'm just going to re-post my response because I'm curious to see what MeFites make of it. (I know, it's a little tacky. There's some item of internet etiquette I feel I'm violating here; I just can't pin it down.)

Great rant, but just one thing. Horton did hear a "Who". Whoville did exist. And Horton had to fight against a popular tide demanding that the there was no "Who", no Whoville. His brave obstinacy in the face of widespread skepticism saved the lives of many beings, saved an entire thriving ecosystem of a nature so different from that of the jungle that no-one could image it. So great rant, but drop the Horton, unless you want people to start thinking that reflexive skepticism might not be the final word in Weltanschauungs.
posted by benito.strauss at 9:41 AM on April 8, 2011

Scrutinize your own beliefs: What's your religion?
posted by Faze at 1:17 PM on April 8

Well, if you want to play that apologist game of blurring the definition of religion to exclude the 'belief in a divine power' bit (and I can tell you do), then my religion is to not take seriously those who try to suggest that because most people hold the odd slightly irrational view, then religion and any other full-on batshit garbage is okay.
posted by Decani at 10:48 AM on April 8, 2011 [2 favorites]

he could quite possibly be one of those militant atheists I dislike talking to nearly as much as the militant god botherers.
posted by sodium lights the horizon at 4:37 PM on April 8

Which is precisely why I like him so much. I'm not that crazy about his Tom-Lehrer-For-The-2000s shtick, truth be told, but he sure likes to give the god-botherers and new-agers a kicking, which makes him my kind of people. Oh, and "Storm" is pretty ace.
posted by Decani at 10:51 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

It's interesting that so many people here enjoyed it. I found it incredibly grating. Seriously, does that sound like a pleasant dinner party? Does anyone think this girl would have changed her mind after hearing that? It's possible to engage with people in a constructive way, but just ranting at them isn't very convincing. You can use the sort of Socratic method to get them to examine their own preconceptions. People who believe in stuff like this aren't religious, they're skeptical. The problem is that they are as skeptical of the scientific establishment as they are of, say, the catholic church or whatever.

It seems like he's more interested in basking in his own intellectual superiority self-righteous indignation and is so vain that he has to tell everyone about the awesome time he told off some hippy.
posted by delmoi at 11:22 AM on April 8, 2011 [1 favorite]

delmoi - no, it doesn't sound like a pleasant dinner party. It sounds like Storm ruined it by insisting everyone else had to listen to her garbage without criticism. And it sounds like the Minchin character tolerated that until it became intolerable, then he gave her the treatment she deserved by being so fucking rude in the first place.

Why do you imagine that we have to be endlessly tolerant of arseholes like Storm? Why do you think we have to be polite and engaging with people who are not being so themselves? Minchin's character didn't start banging on about atheism and rationality; Storm started banging on about precisely the sort of stuff anyone with any social sensitivity would know was inappropriate for a dinner party because of its potential to provoke and enrage. She acted no better than the sort of jerk who, at a party, starts ranting about workshy immigrants or grasping single mothers. Why do you feel that the prick who starts with the incendiary bullshit has to be allowed to finish it, or be treated with endless patience?
posted by Decani at 11:31 AM on April 8, 2011 [2 favorites]

Great rant, but just one thing. Horton did hear a "Who".

And Jesus died on the cross for your sins.
posted by eyeballkid at 11:52 AM on April 8, 2011

And there's a hidden magic university called Hogwarts.
posted by eyeballkid at 11:54 AM on April 8, 2011

Seriously, does that sound like a pleasant dinner party?

That would have been an awesome dinner party! Beats talking about mortgages, which is the usual topic of conversation in North London.
posted by memebake at 12:08 PM on April 8, 2011

When I hear that kind of New Age thing at a party I just smile and nod.
posted by Lovecraft In Brooklyn at 2:58 PM on April 8, 2011

> Seriously, does that sound like a pleasant dinner party?

No, it sounds like an awkward dinner party because Storm started proselytizing about new-agey pseudo-science at a physician's house. The physician just had more restraint and less wine than Tim.

Anyway, he didn't say "let me tell you about a pleasant dinner party." It's more like "let me tell you an exaggerated rhyming version of an uncomfortable dinner party where I found myself in a situation we've all been in and went a bit too far in response." Awkwardness and discomfort is half the source of comedy here. (Yes, taking cheap shots at hippies is the other half.)

> Does anyone think this girl would have changed her mind after hearing that?

No, and you obviously didn't hear the last sentence.

You can use the sort of Socratic method to get them to examine their own preconceptions.

While I agree that this would be a much better way to win an argument, I've found that my invoking of Socratic dialogue usually leads to dinner parties every bit as uncomfortable as Tim's.

Anyway, as someone who has often found himself in the same situation (and usually bit my tongue and saved the rant for my poor wife in the car later) I found it quite funny.
posted by mmoncur at 3:21 PM on April 8, 2011 [4 favorites]

Yeah, when you see him perform it live, there's a lot more self-deprecation that comes across in the body language. The animation is great, but it does kind of bury that last line where he admits it didn't really make any difference to argue with the woman who was rude enough to insult the host of the dinner party.
posted by harriet vane at 9:47 PM on April 8, 2011

Tim Minchin reminds me of the Joker redesign from The Batman cartoon (the one between Animated Series and Brave & the Bold) that nobody liked. The bare feet, the stooped posture, the makeup.
posted by Lovecraft In Brooklyn at 11:47 PM on April 8, 2011

Can anyone help someone who's not a comicbook-nerd (ie, me) find a pic of the Joker that Lovecraft In Brooklyn is referring to?
posted by sodium lights the horizon at 5:27 AM on April 9, 2011

I tried, but for some reason doing a google image search for Joker "The Batman" crashes Firefox. I blame The Joker. just search Joker "The Batman". it's the one that isn't Heath Ledger or Jack Nicholson.
posted by Lovecraft In Brooklyn at 7:09 AM on April 9, 2011

delmoi - no, it doesn't sound like a pleasant dinner party. It sounds like Storm ruined it by insisting everyone else had to listen to her garbage without criticism.

Without criticism? I didn't hear anything about her saying she couldn't be criticized. But there's a difference between engaging with someone thoughtfully and flipping out and ranting.

It's possible that listening to her could be annoying but there is a difference between having an opinion that happens to offend someone and being confrontational. I mean, there are plenty of conservative teabagger types who can't stand hearing 'liberal' stuff, yet, it wouldn't be rude to talk about politics at a dinner party.

If you're so short fused that you actually can't stand hearing anyone who disagrees with you, maybe you should, you know, get a grip?

No, it sounds like an awkward dinner party because Storm started proselytizing about new-agey pseudo-science at a physician's house. The physician just had more restraint and less wine than Tim.

There are plenty of doctors who either buy into that crap or don't care.
posted by delmoi at 9:16 AM on April 9, 2011

Presumably he realised his friend wasn't one of them. I don't want to take a poem as a literal interpretation of events, but it did seem like story is that people tried to politely change the subject, but she persisted. It is rude to be invited to a doctor's house and insult their profession, telling a him that his work is harmful and medicine is only for corporate benefit while you drink his wine. Miss Manners probably has a better solution for that than Minchin, but she didn't get an animation made of her solution.
posted by harriet vane at 11:50 PM on April 9, 2011

Here's the words.

If you’re going to watch telly,
you should watch Scooby Doo.
That show was so cool
because every time there’s a church with a ghoul
Or a ghost in a school
They looked beneath the mask and what was inside?
The fucking janitor
or the dude who runs the waterslide.

posted by memebake at 8:01 AM on April 10, 2011