Hello Lurkers! Yes you! Why don’t you post more? 15 15

[Ken Aldred]

It’s worth persevering here.  When I had a mere 13 posts I made the unforgivable error of using a big word, narcissistic, and giving the indication of being a newbie, a former lurker myself,  who was trying too hard to impress, resulting in several of the established boardies abusively trolling me.  I just completely ignored it.  A year or so later, several longstanding boardies described me in posts as ‘bat-‘dropping’ insane’. Despite the early struggles, eventually a degree of acceptance began to evolve with these former antagonists.

Far more important for me to continue discussing the various aspects of a subject I have a deep interest in and care about than obsess, or be completely defeated, by engaging in keyboard warfare at a distance.

If someone as supposedly socially clueless as I am can do it, the lurkers out there should consider giving it a go.

Edited October 28, 2021 by Ken Aldred

[Ken Aldred]

On 10/27/2021 at 11:55 PM, kav said:

I think its a red herring over deeper issues-kids mutilating themselves because they dont get likes.  when I was a kid we experienced actual often violent vicious bullying-sometimes from teachers.  PE teacher used to sic football players on me for beatdowns in front of the class.  No one went around cutting themselves.

That’s an oversimplification. There’s a lot of masking of abuse-related depression, and of thoughts or actualisation of self harm.

[kav]

On 10/27/2021 at 10:15 PM, Ken Aldred said:

That’s an oversimplification. There’s a lot of masking of abuse-related depression, and of thoughts or actualisation of self harm.

I'm thinking if someone is cutting themselves, if they had never seen a computer in their life, they'd still be cutting themselves.

[BigLeagueCHEW]

On 10/27/2021 at 10:16 PM, kav said:

I'm thinking if someone is cutting themselves, if they had never seen a computer in their life, they'd still be cutting themselves.

Stop shaving your legs then 

[kav]

On 10/27/2021 at 10:24 PM, BigLeagueCHEW said:

Stop shaving your legs then 

dang.  
 

[COI]

On 10/27/2021 at 11:31 PM, G G © ® ™ said:

YOU are always talking about people. Complaining how specific Boardies have targeted you, you have named names multiple times.

Fact is Roy, you are never wrong, ever. You have to have the last word ALWAYS. You have to be right ALWAYS.

You have to steer every discussion into the denouement where ROY is right. ROY knows best.

You are like a dog with a bone. You are constantly bringing stuff up that is dead and buried.

It's tiring and it's very boring.

I had sympathy for you at some points, but now I have none.

I can see now where some of those who gave you a hard time were coming from.

You are bloody annoying, and I say that with a heavy heart but with absolute conviction. 

I don't know you so don't take this personally, but you do know that you can just ignore people you don't like, right? And I don't mean using some ignore function, I mean you can just choose not to pay attention to people you don't like.

Unless Roy did something to you personally, this comes down to a personality clash. If two personalities clash, both are still responsible for their own feelings. If you don't like or respect someone, and that person isn't attacking you, your inability to brush it off is on you. I don't see the point in trying to beat him down verbally or control his speech for the sake of some sort of emotional catharsis, at the expense of everyone else trying to read this thread. When in the history of ever has one adult telling another adult to stop talking actually worked?

Again, nothing personal, we all have this issue from time to time. I annoy plenty of people around here I'm sure, and plenty of people annoy me.

[VintageComics]

On 10/27/2021 at 6:55 PM, kav said:

I think its a red herring over deeper issues-kids mutilating themselves because they dont get likes.  when I was a kid we experienced actual often violent vicious bullying-sometimes from teachers.  PE teacher used to sic football players on me for beatdowns in front of the class.  No one went around cutting themselves.

Kav, I missed this post. It's not a red-herring. I have first hand experience in this and am probably a bit better versed than the average Joe on the topic because of it.

There is a correlation and a lot of material that links the rise of social media and certain features of social media with self harm in kids and young adults.

There can be some very large differences in the ways that people and more specifically men and women deal with trauma.

There are also differences between physical and emotional trauma and they often can manifest differently.

We can discuss it via PM in detail if you want. 

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

On 10/27/2021 at 9:56 PM, kav said:

my god I can do a series of thats what she said drawings and boom-famous.  
"The 'thats what she said' artist, kav is opening a new retrospective at the Met.  Thats what she says anyway"

Maybe be the artist to paints portraits of Barbra Streisand , or that Kid of F'ed the Pie.. 

You could always pull a Bob Kane and start getting others to paint clowns and say you did it.. 

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

On 10/27/2021 at 8:05 PM, Bird said:

re: leaderboard / registry...stop looking for external validation man! 

now let me go look at this leaderboard, where's my name?

Just had to look up mine.  

Turns out that I am in the Top 20 Top Members by Reputation and the only one of those that isn't a "seasoned veteran " 

Now where is my Rom #1 ? 

 

Although I did get a nice welcome here not long after I quit my several years lurking and actually joined..

Greggy bestowed a loving nickname for me. 

Aka Irrelevant One... 

[Larryw7]

On 10/28/2021 at 4:04 AM, onlyweaknesskryptonite said:

Maybe be the artist to paints portraits of Barbra Streisand , or that Kid of F'ed the Pie.. 

You could always pull a Bob Kane and start getting others to paint clowns and say you did it

News From ME - Mark Evanier's blog

Arnold

Published Thursday, March 15, 2007 at 12:42 PM

The lovely Diana Schutz sent me this lovely photo she took of the lovely Arnold Drake and it made me want to write a little more about my friend who passed away Monday morning, just eleven days after his 82nd birthday. I've been fortunate to meet most of the major figures who created comic books I loved as a kid and who were still alive when I got into the business. As I must have written somewhere else on this website at least once, only a very few of them turned out not to be great people to be around. Some, of course, were special joys.

Arnold was one of my favorite comic book writers before I knew who he was…even before I knew that the guy who wrote those Tommy Tomorrow stories I thought were so great was the same guy who'd written all those Challengers of the Unknown comics I liked so much. There were no credits then and when I later did learn who'd written what, I could see the connection. Arnold's writing was a little wittier, a little sharper than most of the others then scripting books by the tonweight for DC. He seemed to presuppose a little more intelligence on the part of the readers. He didn't explain everything four times the way some of the other writers did. He expected us to "get it."

I corresponded with Arnold in the seventies and met him in person in the early eighties. This is kind of a cliché but that doesn't mean it isn't accurate. He was a writer who made you feel like a writer. He was very serious about his work and always discussed it with people as if their opinions and respect mattered to him. He was full of wonderful anecdotes about the business and unlike some others I've interviewed, I found that Arnold's accounts usually checked out. I especially loved the story he often told about Bob Kane and the clown paintings. Do you know that story? Here — here's Arnold telling it on a panel a few years ago…

Bob had gotten to the point where he never drew anything. Never drew anything on the Batman comics, anyway. [Sheldon] Moldoff was ghosting them all and when he didn't, someone else did. The only thing I think Bob ever drew was when we'd be out somewhere, in a restaurant or someplace, and a pretty girl would come over to him and say, "Are you really the man who draws Batman?" Then he could whip out a little sketch for her, a big sketch if she was wearing something low-cut and would bend over to watch him draw.

One day I'm over at his house to discuss this newspaper strip idea we had and he's talking about who we might get to draw it. I was going to write it and we were going to get someone else to draw it. I'm not sure what he was going to do on it except sign his name. I said to him, "Bob, isn't it disappointing to you that you don't draw any more? You were once such a great artist." He wasn't but you had to talk to Bob that way.

He said, "Oh, no. Let me show you something." He took me into a little room in his house. It was his studio. I didn't even know he still had a studio. It was all set up with easels and things and there were paintings, paintings of clowns. You know the kind. Like the ones Red Skelton used to do. Just these insipid portraits of clowns, all signed very large, "Bob Kane." He was so proud of them. He said, "These are the paintings that are going to make me in the world of art. Batman was a big deal in one world and these paintings will soon be in every gallery in the world." He thought the Louvre was going to take down the Mona Lisa to put up his clown paintings. I didn't have the heart to tell him.

So a few months later, I'm up at DC and I ran into Eddie Herron. Eddie was another writer up there and we got to talking and Bob's name came up. Eddie said, "Did you hear? Bob's getting sued by one of his ghost artists."

I said, "How is that possible? Shelly Moldoff's suing Bob? But they had a clear deal. Shelly knew he wasn't going to get credit or anything…"

Eddie said, "No, not Shelly." Bob was being sued by the person who'd painted the clowns for him…

Love that story. But then I just loved Arnold. I loved the guy's feisty, honest manner. He was very proud of his work but also very critical. We once talked for a half hour on the phone about the work he did for Marvel after he got booted out of DC for having the nerve to demand health insurance. Arnold was not happy with the writing he'd done during that period and very disappointed with himself for booting that opportunity. He said that after he was ousted at DC, he was so angry that he lost his bearings as a writer and forgot certain basics. He was not writing to do good Marvel stories, he said. He was writing to show DC they couldn't destroy his career, which was the wrong attitude. The difference can be quite significant as it relates to what gets on the page. While it's sometimes easy to see when others have their priorities askew, it's difficult to perceive when you do. I was impressed that Arnold had that ability.

One of my last memories of Arnold is of a moment two years ago when we were all in San Francisco for the Wondercon. For some reason, a batch of us decided to go to Chinatown on Saturday night. That would ordinarily be a fun thing but this evening was one of intermittent downpours and parades. It was around the Chinese New Year and traffic was being diverted via odd routes. You literally could not get a cab at our hotel or anywhere near it. We had to walk about four blocks to find one and we only got the one we got because I spotted it discharging a passenger and I sprinted over and practically vaulted onto the hood.

We went to Chinatown. We ate a lovely meal. When it came time to leave, it was raining as hard as I've ever seen in my life and there wasn't a cab anywhere. It was like they'd all disappeared from the surface of the planet. My friend Carolyn walked one way to look for one and my friend Sergio went the other. I stood there on the sidewalk, trying to hold an umbrella over Arnold for what seemed like the longest time. Eventually, Carolyn flagged down a limo driver and made a deal with him to take us back to the Argent Hotel. But before that, there was a moment when the situation seemed hopeless.

I was standing there in the driving rain. I don't like rain anyway and I really didn't like the idea that poor Arnold Drake was in the midst of it with only my flimsy umbrella keeping some (not all) of the rain off him. We were stranded and it didn't look like we'd ever get a cab and even though none of this was my fault, I felt like it was; like I should have planned things better so an eighty year old man wasn't standing there in the cold and wet with no way to get home. A sudden wave of sadness came over me…

…and Arnold — brilliant, perceptive judge of character that he was — sensed it. I don't think I said anything to give away how I felt but still, he turned to me and said, "Don't get upset, Mark. I live in New York. I worked for DC Comics. This is nothing." And I realized that he wasn't the slightest bit upset or worried or even troubled by our predicament. He knew we'd get back to the hotel eventually and a minute or so later, Carolyn showed up with the limo and that began to look remotely possible. (Finding Sergio was now the big problem…)

Everything worked out fine, of course. But when I think of Arnold in the future, I think I'm going to remember him on that corner. He was, of course, not happy to be there but he acted truly unbothered by it all. Didn't complain, didn't express any fear. He knew, as I didn't at that particular moment, that there was no point to any of that. It was just something we had to get through and he didn't make it any worse by dwelling on the negative or whining or being weak. In fact, he made things better by setting a good example for me.

He always did, at least in my encounters with the man. We didn't get to speak during his final hospitalization because he was asleep for most of it. But many months earlier when he was in for something else that could have been fatal, we talked almost every day and he was the same way — positive without being delusional, realistic without being glum. It struck me as the perfect mindset for dealing with any problem.

Anyone who read Arnold's comics could tell you that he was a superb role model as a writer. I just wanted to add that he was an even better one as a human being. Those two things don't always go together so it's important to notice when they do. They did with Arnold Drake.

[Buzzetta]

On 10/27/2021 at 10:37 PM, kav said:

Drawing hasnt made squat for me.  Wasted many years tho.  And people always say "oh have you tried this?"  like 40 years of trying and I never thought of the simple thing they just recommended.  One person's advice was wow you draw really good!  You should send it to the people!  

I gave you an avenue at one point and you turned it down.

When you think of it my vision was ahead of its time and something that CGC is kind of doing now.

You turned it down. 

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

On 10/28/2021 at 3:24 AM, Larryw7 said:

News From ME - Mark Evanier's blog

Arnold

Published Thursday, March 15, 2007 at 12:42 PM

The lovely Diana Schutz sent me this lovely photo she took of the lovely Arnold Drake and it made me want to write a little more about my friend who passed away Monday morning, just eleven days after his 82nd birthday. I've been fortunate to meet most of the major figures who created comic books I loved as a kid and who were still alive when I got into the business. As I must have written somewhere else on this website at least once, only a very few of them turned out not to be great people to be around. Some, of course, were special joys.

Arnold was one of my favorite comic book writers before I knew who he was…even before I knew that the guy who wrote those Tommy Tomorrow stories I thought were so great was the same guy who'd written all those Challengers of the Unknown comics I liked so much. There were no credits then and when I later did learn who'd written what, I could see the connection. Arnold's writing was a little wittier, a little sharper than most of the others then scripting books by the tonweight for DC. He seemed to presuppose a little more intelligence on the part of the readers. He didn't explain everything four times the way some of the other writers did. He expected us to "get it."

I corresponded with Arnold in the seventies and met him in person in the early eighties. This is kind of a cliché but that doesn't mean it isn't accurate. He was a writer who made you feel like a writer. He was very serious about his work and always discussed it with people as if their opinions and respect mattered to him. He was full of wonderful anecdotes about the business and unlike some others I've interviewed, I found that Arnold's accounts usually checked out. I especially loved the story he often told about Bob Kane and the clown paintings. Do you know that story? Here — here's Arnold telling it on a panel a few years ago…

Bob had gotten to the point where he never drew anything. Never drew anything on the Batman comics, anyway. [Sheldon] Moldoff was ghosting them all and when he didn't, someone else did. The only thing I think Bob ever drew was when we'd be out somewhere, in a restaurant or someplace, and a pretty girl would come over to him and say, "Are you really the man who draws Batman?" Then he could whip out a little sketch for her, a big sketch if she was wearing something low-cut and would bend over to watch him draw.

One day I'm over at his house to discuss this newspaper strip idea we had and he's talking about who we might get to draw it. I was going to write it and we were going to get someone else to draw it. I'm not sure what he was going to do on it except sign his name. I said to him, "Bob, isn't it disappointing to you that you don't draw any more? You were once such a great artist." He wasn't but you had to talk to Bob that way.

He said, "Oh, no. Let me show you something." He took me into a little room in his house. It was his studio. I didn't even know he still had a studio. It was all set up with easels and things and there were paintings, paintings of clowns. You know the kind. Like the ones Red Skelton used to do. Just these insipid portraits of clowns, all signed very large, "Bob Kane." He was so proud of them. He said, "These are the paintings that are going to make me in the world of art. Batman was a big deal in one world and these paintings will soon be in every gallery in the world." He thought the Louvre was going to take down the Mona Lisa to put up his clown paintings. I didn't have the heart to tell him.

So a few months later, I'm up at DC and I ran into Eddie Herron. Eddie was another writer up there and we got to talking and Bob's name came up. Eddie said, "Did you hear? Bob's getting sued by one of his ghost artists."

I said, "How is that possible? Shelly Moldoff's suing Bob? But they had a clear deal. Shelly knew he wasn't going to get credit or anything…"

Eddie said, "No, not Shelly." Bob was being sued by the person who'd painted the clowns for him…

Love that story. But then I just loved Arnold. I loved the guy's feisty, honest manner. He was very proud of his work but also very critical. We once talked for a half hour on the phone about the work he did for Marvel after he got booted out of DC for having the nerve to demand health insurance. Arnold was not happy with the writing he'd done during that period and very disappointed with himself for booting that opportunity. He said that after he was ousted at DC, he was so angry that he lost his bearings as a writer and forgot certain basics. He was not writing to do good Marvel stories, he said. He was writing to show DC they couldn't destroy his career, which was the wrong attitude. The difference can be quite significant as it relates to what gets on the page. While it's sometimes easy to see when others have their priorities askew, it's difficult to perceive when you do. I was impressed that Arnold had that ability.

One of my last memories of Arnold is of a moment two years ago when we were all in San Francisco for the Wondercon. For some reason, a batch of us decided to go to Chinatown on Saturday night. That would ordinarily be a fun thing but this evening was one of intermittent downpours and parades. It was around the Chinese New Year and traffic was being diverted via odd routes. You literally could not get a cab at our hotel or anywhere near it. We had to walk about four blocks to find one and we only got the one we got because I spotted it discharging a passenger and I sprinted over and practically vaulted onto the hood.

We went to Chinatown. We ate a lovely meal. When it came time to leave, it was raining as hard as I've ever seen in my life and there wasn't a cab anywhere. It was like they'd all disappeared from the surface of the planet. My friend Carolyn walked one way to look for one and my friend Sergio went the other. I stood there on the sidewalk, trying to hold an umbrella over Arnold for what seemed like the longest time. Eventually, Carolyn flagged down a limo driver and made a deal with him to take us back to the Argent Hotel. But before that, there was a moment when the situation seemed hopeless.

I was standing there in the driving rain. I don't like rain anyway and I really didn't like the idea that poor Arnold Drake was in the midst of it with only my flimsy umbrella keeping some (not all) of the rain off him. We were stranded and it didn't look like we'd ever get a cab and even though none of this was my fault, I felt like it was; like I should have planned things better so an eighty year old man wasn't standing there in the cold and wet with no way to get home. A sudden wave of sadness came over me…

…and Arnold — brilliant, perceptive judge of character that he was — sensed it. I don't think I said anything to give away how I felt but still, he turned to me and said, "Don't get upset, Mark. I live in New York. I worked for DC Comics. This is nothing." And I realized that he wasn't the slightest bit upset or worried or even troubled by our predicament. He knew we'd get back to the hotel eventually and a minute or so later, Carolyn showed up with the limo and that began to look remotely possible. (Finding Sergio was now the big problem…)

Everything worked out fine, of course. But when I think of Arnold in the future, I think I'm going to remember him on that corner. He was, of course, not happy to be there but he acted truly unbothered by it all. Didn't complain, didn't express any fear. He knew, as I didn't at that particular moment, that there was no point to any of that. It was just something we had to get through and he didn't make it any worse by dwelling on the negative or whining or being weak. In fact, he made things better by setting a good example for me.

He always did, at least in my encounters with the man. We didn't get to speak during his final hospitalization because he was asleep for most of it. But many months earlier when he was in for something else that could have been fatal, we talked almost every day and he was the same way — positive without being delusional, realistic without being glum. It struck me as the perfect mindset for dealing with any problem.

Anyone who read Arnold's comics could tell you that he was a superb role model as a writer. I just wanted to add that he was an even better one as a human being. Those two things don't always go together so it's important to notice when they do. They did with Arnold Drake.

The Bob Kane Clown story for those who didn't get the reference.  

Edited October 28, 2021 by onlyweaknesskryptonite

[chrisco37]

On 10/27/2021 at 10:51 PM, VintageComics said:

So because they're adults they don't get addicted or make bad decisions that ruin their lives?

Social media engineers use teams of dozens, 100s or even 1000's of engineers and psychologists whose SOLE PURPOSE is to keep you addicted. They spend millions and billions solely to overpower your will in some way without you even realizing it.

Why? Because

I'm not sure if you realize it but these engineers are using the same brain pathways that are used by drug addiction to keep you on social media.

 

 

I'm saying that, as adults, we should be aware that if something as insignificant as number of likes is causing so much strife/grief/(insert negative emotion here) that one would self-mutilate over it that that person needs to seriously evaluate what's going on and eliminate that from their routine and/or get some help over it.   I'm not talking about kids/adolescents who are less capable/experienced to identify these issues; that's a different topic (and I'll agree with you there that it's very much a problem with the younger generations).     

And, yes, I know a lot about about addictions.  You're not the only "expert" on that.  Not going to say I know more than about it than everybody, but I'll wager I know as much about it as anyone.  And, yes, I am very aware of the methods that social media uses to get people hooked.  Again, you're not the only one that goes down the google rabbit hole on topics.  There are other intellectually curious people on the boards.  

I do agree with you 100% on the "why" though.    

[THE_BEYONDER]

There’s a leaderboard? 

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 10/27/2021 at 6:18 PM, G G © ® ™ said:

You're way behind the times.

Where were you when we had a massive Boards debate over this some months ago? The laughing emoji was removed and then re-instated due to the backlash.

Everyone loves that little guy.

You're idea is a dud, and was proved to be a dud.

You must have been on vacation. 

Edited 13 hours ago and still didn't correct your grammar.

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 10/27/2021 at 7:00 PM, COI said:

(even though wine sucks)

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 10/27/2021 at 8:11 PM, CAHokie said:

Sadly, I strongly suspect there are posters who do all they can to be on the leaderboard. So much so, that they check it numerous times a day to see their progress and try to post things that elicit likes.

Others are on the leaderboard the natural way. They post things that people enjoy.

I check the "leaderboard" about once a month just to see who the biggest losers are.

Spoiler

 

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 10/28/2021 at 7:37 AM, THE_BEYONDER said:

There’s a leaderboard? 

Must've been one of those days when the boards were down for 23.5 hours:

[Paul © ® ⚽️💙™]

OK guys.

I thank those who made points about me having a go at Roy. I take them all on Board.

I wish to apologise if I offended anyone with it. Roy is big enough to take it on the chin.

Roy is not my enemy. I have stood up for him and had his back numerous times in the past, but my patience has worn away. He is one of those people who cannot take 'YES' for an answer. 

I've said my piece to him. I stand by it 100%. I wish him no ill will, and he can go about his merry way from now on without interference from me. You guys can deal with it should you wish.

It had to be said, so I said it.

Again I am sorry people had to witness it.

As regards the ignore function:

This is a personal choice, and I will state for the record once again my personal stance on it.

I do not use it. I have nobody on ignore. I choose to go thru' life with full knowledge of what others say, how they think and feel, regardless of my personal feelings toward them.

I may not like someone's opinion but they have the absolute right to express it, no matter how deranged.

As regards Roy, I just couldn't deal with the constant devil's advocate, argumentative, re hashing old mess approach.

I'm sorry I blew up.

You may all sue me, but that would be the very definition of a frivolous lawsuit.

paul.

[Prince Namor]

On 10/28/2021 at 1:41 AM, COI said:

I don't know you so don't take this personally, but you do know that you can just ignore people you don't like, right? And I don't mean using some ignore function, I mean you can just choose not to pay attention to people you don't like.

Unless Roy did something to you personally, this comes down to a personality clash. If two personalities clash, both are still responsible for their own feelings. If you don't like or respect someone, and that person isn't attacking you, your inability to brush it off is on you. I don't see the point in trying to beat him down verbally or control his speech for the sake of some sort of emotional catharsis, at the expense of everyone else trying to read this thread. When in the history of ever has one adult telling another adult to stop talking actually worked?

Again, nothing personal, we all have this issue from time to time. I annoy plenty of people around here I'm sure, and plenty of people annoy me.

Jiminy H Christ on a Popsicle Stick if this isn’t hitting the nail squarely on the head.