Truth, Whole Truth, And More Than Truth

     

Tucson Weather Today

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After skipping over the somewhat arcane notation tl;dr so many times in my reading of articles and blogs on the internet, I finally decided to look up the term. To, you know, find out what it means. Which evidently, is: too long; didn't read.

Below are two paragraphs from what Wikipedia has to say about it:

Traditionally, the phrase too long; didn't read (abbreviated tl;dr or simply tldr) has been used on the Internet as a reply to an excessively long statement. It indicates that the reader did not actually read the statement due to its undue length. This essay especially considers the term as used in Wikipedia discussions, and examines methods of fixing the problem when found in article content.

As a label, it is sometimes used as a tactic to thwart the kinds of discussion which are essential in collaborative editing. On the other hand, tl;dr may represent a shorthand acknowledgement of time saved by skimming over or skipping repetitive or poorly written material. Thus the implication of the symbol can range from a brilliant and informative disquisition being given up due to lack of endurance, interest, or intelligence, to a clustered composition of such utter failure to communicate that it has left the capable reader with a headache; judging this range is very subjective.

I have to admit that Wikipedia's first section regarding tl;dr was all I read. Why? The complete article was tl;dr.

The Urban Dictionary provides definitions for tl;dr that are much more entertaining and are just as informative.

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HISTORICAL CLIP

On this day, February 24th of 1988, the U.S. Supreme Court voted 8-0 to overturn the $200,000 settlement awarded to the Reverend Jerry Falwell for his emotional distress at being parodied in Hustler, a pornographic magazine.

In 1983, Hustler ran a piece parodying Falwell's first sexual experience as a drunken, incestuous, childhood encounter with his mother in an outhouse. Falwell, an important religious conservative and founder of the Moral Majority political advocacy group, sued Hustler and its publisher, Larry Flynt, for libel. Falwell won the case, but Flynt appealed, leading to the Supreme Court's hearing the case because of its constitutional implications. In February 1988, the Supreme Court unanimously overturned the lower court's decision, ruling that, although in poor taste, Hustler's parody fell within the First Amendment's protection of freedom of speech and the press.

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WORD FOR TODAY

parody [PAYR-uh-dee]
noun
1.
a. A literary or artistic work that imitates the characteristic style of an author or a work for comic effect or ridicule.
b. The genre of literature comprising such works.
2. Something so bad as to be equivalent to intentional mockery; a travesty.

A parody (also called spoof, send-up or lampoon), in current use, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on or trivialize an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of satiric or ironic imitation.

The British comedy group Monty Python is famous for its parodies, for example, the King Arthur spoof Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974), and the Jesus satire Life of Brian (1979).

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BORN ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY


Abe Vigoda

 Born Feb 24, 1921
Age:  91 years old

Abraham Charles "Abe" Vigoda is an American movie and television actor who appeared in dramas, including The Godfather, and in comedies such as Barney Miller, Joe Versus The Volcano, and Good Burger. Vigoda is well known for his portrayal of Sal Tessio in The Godfather and for his portrayal of Detective Sgt. Phil Fish on the sitcom television series Barney Miller from 1975 to 1977 and on its spinoff show Fish that aired from February 1977 to June 1978 on ABC.

Steven Jobs

 Born Feb 24, 1955
Died   Oct. 5, 2011

Steven Paul "Steve" Jobs was an American entrepreneur and inventor, best known as the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc. Through Apple, he was widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution and for his influential career in the computer and consumer electronics fields, transforming "one industry after another, from computers and smartphones to music and movies..." Jobs also co-founded and served as chief executive of Pixar Animation Studios; he became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company in 2006, when Disney acquired Pixar.

Edward James Olmos

 Born Feb 24, 1947
Age:   65 years old

Edward James Olmos is a Mexican American actor and director. Among his most memorable roles are William Adama in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, Lt. Martin Castillo in Miami Vice, teacher Jaime Escalante in Stand and Deliver, patriarch Abraham Quintanilla in the film Selena, Detective Gaff in Blade Runner, and narrator El Pachuco in both the stage and film versions of Zoot Suit.

Joe Lieberman

 Born Feb 24, 1942
Age:   70 years old

Joseph Isadore "Joe" Lieberman is a former United States Senator from Connecticut. A former member of the Democratic Party, he was the party's nominee for Vice President in the 2000 election. Currently an independent, he remains closely affiliated with the party.

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Satire lies about literary men while they live and eulogy lies about them when they die.
--Voltaire