Duckliverance

Duckliverance344

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41 Responses to Duckliverance

  1. Terry Pittsford says:

    I think it says a great deal about a society when “Duck Dynasty” becomes one of the top rated shows on TV. Like “Jackass” (TV and movie) these hillbillies glorify stupidity and irresponsible actions which have become endemic, and has permeated every strata of our so-called “civilization”. How sad.

    • Chris Peterson says:

      Easy Terry, don’t get too caught up in the media-created zeitgeist.

      I guess they should be made to put a disclaimer on the show that it is for entertainment purposes only. Following families of idiots seems to have gotten quite popular but, it’s the ones who identify with them that you’ve gotta’ watch out for.

      One thing’s for sure; this family will have some great reference material when they do a genealogy search 500 years from now. I wonder how they will explain the fact that the family was filled with troglodytes in the 21st century?

    • Ryan Mount says:

      I have very low expectations from the Television, so none of this surprises me. What bothers me, I suppose, is how folks have lost their minds over a character from TV. It’s become this proxy for more mindless back-and-forth discourse and name-calling. And oh boy, has the name-calling been a doozy ion this issue.

      I will say one thing, controversial speech sure smokes out the whack jobs on any given issue. So to what Chris said, watch out for those folks. I mean, what’s worse? The nutsuck Duck Dynasty* followers that erroneously conflated Mr. Phil’s frankly bassackwards (and kinda funny in a dumbass way) comments with the 1st Amendment, or the foaming-at-the-mouth activists who want tolerance only for their kind of “enlightened” speech. I admit it’s a false choice between the two, but I really don’t care for either.

      * Add Gold Rush TV fans who see nothing wrong with the utter devastation of entire ecosystems. “No one is going there anyway, so what’s wrong with washing away all the top soil? They’re praying to God [for more gold] at the end of each show. So that’s good.”

      • Greg Goodknight says:

        The family has made millions manufacturing and selling the duck calls. All of the folks here should be so idiotic.

        No, I don’t watch the program.

        • Chris Peterson says:

          And isn’t that what Christmas is all about: as long as they’re making good money, who cares that they’re a bunch of backwoods troglodytes.(You could be onto something, Greg; Sarah Palin’s also a millionaire. Gee, I wish I could be more like her, too.) LMFAO

          Merry Christmas to all, (except those who are sexually different and will burn in hell and all the southern blacks who never once complained back in the good ol’ days), and to all a good night.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            “who cares that they’re a bunch of backwoods troglodytes”

            Daddy Trog has a Master’s in Education and turned down an NFL contract after his Jr. year. He also invented the first product of the family company; they made many millions selling the things.

            “To hate all but the right folks
            Is an old established rule” is for you, Chris.

          • Chris Peterson says:

            You don’t get it, Greg. I reject your life’s assumption that a degree equals intelligence, the same as I reject that someone who can quote the whole Bible is more of a spiritual being than I am. The average IQ of a degree holder is around 105; not a mark I personally will ever look up to.

            Einstein, Gates, Edison, Tesla, and a whole host of tech billionaires fly in the face of your assumptions. You are not smarter than anyone else by virtue of having sat in class for four years longer than they did, you’re simply more devoted to the current system of ticky-tacky minds to fit into your ticky-tacky home within the modern-day slavery of our debt system.

            You will never understand that because to do so would mean you would, by necessity, have to think less of yourself. Like whatever monetary accumulation you’ve acquired, your claim to validity is merely a piece of paper, and I am not the least bit impressed by your, or the trog’s, record of academics.

            It’s not what you can get from society that marks you as success to me; it’s what you contribute. On that scale, your duck dude is a loser.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            ” I reject your life’s assumption that a degree equals intelligence”

            Sorry, that has never been my assumption, especially for Education degrees. However, cave dwellers (trogs) don’t attend universities and idiots don’t build small manufacturing businesses that do so well. The Duck guys are from a subculture that you don’t like, I get it, but you (and many on the progressive side) are showing more intolerance than the Duck guys do.

            The issue to me is incessant name calling which, as far as I can tell, isn’t the issue with the Duckman.

            IIRC the ethnic groups in California which most soundly rejected gay marriage was blacks. Are a large majority of black Californians ‘trogs’?

          • Chris Peterson says:

            “Sorry, that has never been my assumption, especially for Education degrees.”

            Actually, in going back through your previous posts, it is a central theme of your’s to preface statements with the XYZ after their name, sometimes even with the location they got it from.

            Point is: in a cosmos that is over 13 billion years old, (that we know of, kinda’), and the enormity of existing phenomenon we’re aware of, both large and small, it takes a stupendous amount of hubris for our self-aware specie to point to another human who looks or behaves differently, and judge them as less worthy to be here than ourselves. It is, as I said, idiotic, and that goes for the blacks in CA as much as the whites of the deep south.

            Of all of man’s idiocies; elevating tradition over truth is his greatest obstacle. And were it not for this one major flaw, we would be light years ahead in our evolution.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            From an LA Times piece:

            “We never, ever judge someone on who’s going to heaven, hell,” Robertson said in a less-quoted passage from the GQ piece. “That’s the Almighty’s job. We just love ’em, give ’em the good news about Jesus—whether they’re homosexuals, drunks, terrorists. We let God sort ’em out later, you see what I’m saying?” Robertson’s association of gay people with drunks and terrorists is, to be sure, not good.

            Similarly, in a statement on the family’s website, he wrote, “I would never treat anyone with disrespect just because they are different from me. We are all created by the Almighty and like Him, I love all of humanity. We would all be better off if we loved God and loved each other.”

            … Though some viewers undoubtedly watch as if gawking at animals in the zoo, many more surely find something deeply appealing there. The Robertsons are telegenic, in their way, and the material is scrupulously “clean” in a time when unworldly family entertainment is difficult to find on television. If the strategy of many reality TV shows is to bring out the worst in people, “Duck Dynasty” does quite the opposite — it has the shape of a homespun sitcom, as if the Clampetts had elected to stay in Bug Tussel after the oil started flowing.

            “It’s not what you can get from society that marks you as success to me; it’s what you contribute. On that scale, your duck dude is a loser.”

            I’m not a fan, CP, and have never tried blasting waterfowl out of the sky, but there are many millions of people who think they are contributing far more than you are, making superior hunting products and providing what they think is entertainment.

            Let go of your hate. Now, bend over and quack like a duck.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            “Actually, in going back through your previous posts, it is a central theme of your’s to preface statements with the XYZ after their name, sometimes even with the location they got it from.”

            Never a “central theme”, but if a rentseeker with BA PoliSci degree from a 3rd rate CalState whose only college science education was on the order of “Your Friend, the Amoeba”, or a dropout from a community college vocational nursing program, has been lecturing me on a physical science subject, you bet it will come up.

          • Chris Peterson says:

            Well, gee wilikers, Mr. Goodnight, I never meant to imply that your degrees don’t, in fact, make you certifiably more learned than I. lol

            Give me a break. (sarcasm, to be sure). I swear, I don’t know why you even bother to converse with me. I have zero college training. The test I took to get my certification is the culmination of a two year college course but instead, I chose to take a week’s vacation from work and study day and night. Passed it on my first try, and at 132, I certainly am NOT Mensa material. At that rate, I suppose I could assume the ability to get any degree within a month’s time.

            That’s just silly talk, but no sillier than your supposing that you somehow are any level of knowledge above anyone else for having sat through years of lectures. If I want to know something, I just read it. The knowledge of the world is right here at my fingertips.

            And nice try at equating my opinion of duck dude’s statements on homosexuality with “many millions of people who think they are contributing far more than you are, making superior hunting products and providing what they think is entertainment.” If that sense of logic is reflective of your institutional academics; thanks but no thanks. It is ridiculous assessments like that which convince me, more than ever, that your degree is sorely lacking any substantial credence when discussing social issues, much less the overall human condition.

            And I would never bend over in your company, much less that of the backwoods duck dude.

          • Chris Peterson says:

            Maybe your duck-hunting hero should try to prove that homosexuality is a choice, rather than a biological fact, by himself “acting” purely homosexual for a year. That way, we could all see the wisdom of his position is not one of mystical voodoo tradition dating back thousands of years, but based on a provable theory. Sounds like a sound scientific experiment to me. Many priests, conservative legislators, and religious leaders have been caught in the act of such experiments countless times.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            “I have zero college training.”

            I’d already assumed you had no college education from your past denigrations of it. Not even any “college training” is a small surprise.

            “That’s just silly talk, but no sillier than your supposing that you somehow are any level of knowledge above anyone else for having sat through years of lectures. If I want to know something, I just read it. The knowledge of the world is right here at my fingertips.”

            What a warped view of what a good education *is*. Sitting through years of lectures isn’t it, it’s what you do between the lectures, and the give and take during the lectures. Sorry, no, looking up factoids on the net to support your opinions isn’t doesn’t provide much in the way of knowledge or wisdom (or whizdumb, as Dr. Science often writes). Much of the value is that you are faced with learning a lot of stuff that you didn’t want to know but only much later realize the value in context.

            You can’t just read math, chemistry, physics or engineering and understand the physical sciences anymore than you can read a cookbook and really know how to cook or read about English composition and really know how to write. Or read how to play a trumpet and then be able to cover the Bobby Hackett solo in In the Mood and not lose the audience.

            Fermented sour grapes just results in a hangover with a bad aftertaste. Give it a rest, then quack like a duck.

            BTW 132 is right at the edge of MENSA membership; if you think a MENSA card would make you smarter and respected, give it a try. I remember a euphonium player (since passed away, rip) named Everett C. (very possibly known by some folks here) in the Nevada County Concert Band was mighty proud of his. He’d come to rehearsals with M logowear and accessories placed just so to be unavoidable. Once, when I’d not been giving him the deference he so craved, he came over to me with something for me to read and while holding that right in front of my face, he oh-so-nonchalantly had a MENSA key fob draped perfectly so as to also be right in my face.

            I think you could get into it.
            http://www.us.mensa.org/join/testscores/qualifyingscores/

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            In short, my friend Steven Frisch, rent seeking six figure CEO of a local 501c, people like you who think pure argumentum ad hominem et verecundiam is appropriate. This started rolling when I found the local K-12 “educators” having all drunk the progressive Romantic view of education just in time for my son to learn reading, writing and arithmetic (now often called ‘algebraic thinking’), but especially, having found catastrophic anthropogenic global warming based on groupthink activist science, having your progressive scientific illiterate comrade in arms call me “denier” for not continuing to drink their koolaid after March 2007 when I found multiple threads of research the IPCC process was actively ignoring rather than incorporating.

            You do a great job stringing words together to make a point, especially if the point is only to insult or damage; not so great in being factual. BTW yesterday, I had a lovely and long chat with a very progressive friend of mine, a local Union muckymuck and county Democratic Central Committee member. A better question might be: what the fuck happened to Steven Frisch?

          • Chris Peterson says:

            Greg,
            I submit that it is you who have the warped sense of intelligence. Give me a recipe, and I can cook as well as anyone. Give me the manual, and I can fix it. And many authors these days, and certainly those who write TV scripts, do so using templates. Truly great works in the arts are a different sort but, hopefully, you get the point.
            To Steve’s point, there are uncountable examples of people who are educated in one field, only to find their calling in another. That’s not education; it’s intelligence. You can go to school until you’re 80 and still be the dumbest guy in the room.
            Rene Descartes was educated as a lawyer, but never practiced law. Instead, he had a couple of dreams that inspired him to delve into a completely different field, for which he is now held as a leader. History is littered with the genius of those who think outside the box, discarding their cookie-cutter, formal education. Just as there are those who need zero education to be virtuosos at a particular musical instrument, there are naturals in every other phase of our lives. I am not one of them and, I assure you, neither are you.
            Give me a “factoid”, and I can do nothing; give me the whole recipe, which I can find anywhere on anything, and I can do it as well as anyone.

            And finally; you mention the word wisdom. I have a strong suspicion that it will take an incredible epiphany on your part to ever attain that particular attribute. You most assuredly won’t learn it from an outside source. Wisdom takes humility. ‘Nuf said.

          • stevefrisch says:

            I was going to make the same point about wisdom, Chris. Smart, undoubtedly; sharp and witty at times, without a doubt; but, emotionally and socially intelligent and wise, never.

            Waste of time; always.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            First. to get back to the thread at hand, last night I was sitting with my son, home for the holidays, in independent play (both on computers doing different things) and channel surfing for background noise… he insisted I change to… Duck Dynasty. We had it on for a few minutes. Moderately cute at times but with the same flaws of any “reality” show… not much reality.

            “Smart, undoubtedly; sharp and witty at times, without a doubt; but, emotionally and socially intelligent and wise, never.” -Frisch, on yours truly

            How much social or emotional intelligence, or wisdom, must one have to make the claim someone you have never met is never “emotionally and socially intelligent”, or wise?

            The answer is: Very little, nor has anything Frisch seeks to imply about me here supported by any citations, either quotes or first person accounts. A good question is probably “Why not?”. This was just one more exercise in Steven Frisch, with malice, defaming someone he doesn’t know but who he knows he doesn’t like.

            “To hate all but the right folks
            Is an old established rule.”

            “Waste of time; always” -SF

            And yet, here you are.

    • steve cottrell says:

      Terry:

      Coming from a former hillbilly guard at a moonshiner’s still, those are pretty harsh words about hillbillies. (You were a still guard in “Moonshine County Express,” weren’t you?)

      Have a Merry Christmas, Terry –– hope Santa is good to you. And, yes, it is a sad commentary on society that 14 million people actually watch Duck Dynasty each week. And probably more now, what with all the publicity.

  2. Greg Goodknight says:

    Courtesy Tom Lehrer, a message just as fresh as it was in the ’60’s:


    During National Brotherhood Week various special events are arranged to drive home the message of brotherhood. This year, for example, on the first day of the week Malcolm X was killed which gives you an idea of how effective the whole thing is. I’m sure we all agree that we ought to love one another and I know there are people in the world that do not love their fellow human beings and I hate people like that. Here’s a song about National Brotherhood Week.

    Oh, the white folks hate the black folks,
    And the black folks hate the white folks.
    To hate all but the right folks
    Is an old established rule.

    But during National Brotherhood Week, National Brotherhood Week,
    Lena Horne and Sheriff Clarke are dancing cheek to cheek.
    It’s fun to eulogize
    The people you despise,
    As long as you don’t let ’em in your school.

    Oh, the poor folks hate the rich folks,
    And the rich folks hate the poor folks.
    All of my folks hate all of your folks,
    It’s American as apple pie.

    But during National Brotherhood Week, National Brotherhood Week,
    New Yorkers love the Puerto Ricans ’cause it’s very chic.
    Step up and shake the hand
    Of someone you can’t stand.
    You can tolerate him if you try.

    Oh, the Protestants hate the Catholics,
    And the Catholics hate the Protestants,
    And the Hindus hate the Muslims,
    And everybody hates the Jews.

    But during National Brotherhood Week, National Brotherhood Week,
    It’s National Everyone-smile-at-one-another-hood Week.
    Be nice to people who
    Are inferior to you.
    It’s only for a week, so have no fear.
    Be grateful that it doesn’t last all year!

    Now… quack like a duck.

    • Chris Peterson says:

      Something you remembered from college, or simply cut and pasted from the web?
      We must all remember that when you google something, it comes from your education. When we do it; it’s a random factoid we happened upon.

      We all have more brain cells than there are stars in the sky, and more connections between them than there are galaxies, but only those who have been to college use them correctly. What a gasbag.

      • Greg Goodknight says:

        A Tom Lehrer fan? I memorized them when still in high school. Knowing them did me some real good just once… had a business trip to the Chicago area in the early ’90’s. Return trip I was sitting next to an absolutely stunning lady about my age, and early on she was doing her best to keep our conversation to a minimum. However, we did talk enough to figure out we were the same age, at some Hollywood bowl shindig her dancing troupe performed (she still looked like a dancer), and I was in the production band providing back up… a bit more chat and we figured out we were both Tom Lehrer fans from high school. She had never run into anyone else similarly afflicted, and we ended up singing duets from O’Hare to Sacramento Metro. None of our seatmates complained but I expect some were less than happy with the serenade.

        Catherine B. was an accountant at Arthur Anderson; the one thing I’m sure of is she isn’t any more.

        “We all have more brain cells than there are stars in the sky, and more connections between them than there are galaxies, but only those who have been to college use them correctly.”

        I’ve no clue how one could deduced that from anything I’ve written. It was certainly never intended.

  3. Brad Croul says:

    I don’t even know what the “Duck” show is supposed to be about, but just looking at pictures of “duck dude”, I am not surprised to hear that he has a typical backwoods worldview.

  4. stevefrisch says:

    The “Duck” show? I have never seen it. But everyone should remember the First Amendment applies to the government, not private entities. Did he have a right to say it, of course. Do they have a right to fire him (which they won’t), of course.

    • Judith Lowry says:

      ‘Yall,

      Camo is the new black.

    • Greg Goodknight says:

      The Duck Dynasty brouhaha was never over the first amendment and A&E’s reaction is akin to Capt. Renault’s “I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!”.

      They’re fundamentalist rednecks, and the gambling will continue.

      • Chris Peterson says:

        I completely agree, Greg, but Fox news vociferously refutes your statement of the issue not being about the first amendment.

        On your second point; man creates god in his image, not visa versa but, having said that, I would argue your depiction of duck dude being a “fundamentalist” Christian. Seems to me that a religion based on the words of the character Christ would be, fundamentally, all about “love thy neighbor”, “love thy enemy”, “who shall cast the first stone”, etc.

        On that, I’m completely with Ghandi, who said, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

        • Greg Goodknight says:

          As neither a Christian or a regular Fox News viewer, I’d not speak for either, and of course, outside of South Park, Man made God in His Own Image. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a God or that there needs to be one.

          Of what little Fox I saw over the weekend, FN Sunday and the WSJ Report, it seems Fox News was making no 1st Amendment claims. Juan Williams made a point of saying he was fired for saying something he had a perfect right to say, and all agreed any network has every right to dump anyone they want. Then there was that progressive public relations expert who tweeted something she thought was funny about Africa, AIDS and being white and then finding upon landing in Africa that she’d already been fired. Oopsie.

          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamentalism#Christian

          One can play Dictionary Bingo with a lot of phrases but I think “Fundamentalist Christian” fits just fine which is why I used it; from the other quotes of the Duckman, it’s clear he makes all the usual claims of loving the sinner but hating the sin. An actual quote of any of the Duckmen illustrating hate of the sinner would go a long way to proving your claim and so far I’ve not seen one.

          • Chris Peterson says:

            The only news programs I watch are Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, and I suggest if you need proof of my assertions about Fox, you should youtube them. That’s not to say they are wrong; this IS a 1st amendment issue in that duck dude can say whatever he wants.

            And you are also correct that nowhere, I can find, does duck dude ever say anything against sinners; just the sin.

            But dictionary Bingo? Even if you don’t mean to, (doubtful), you always use such distasteful terms. Someday we’ll have a normal conversation, but I won’t hold my breath.

            Merry Christmas, Greg. Enjoy your time with your son.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            Daily and Colbert are comedy shows on the Comedy Network, Chris, not news. Maybe a baby step like CNN would be appropriate.

            I’m guessing you were a bit surprised to not be able to find any Duckman quote that supported him hating both the sin and the sinner and I thank you for looking; I suspect were you to search for a Fox News assertion the DD issue was a 1st amendment you’d be similarly skunked.

            What is distasteful about Bingo?

          • Chris Peterson says:

            There more truth in 5 minutes of either Daily or Colbert than there is in a day at Fox. And I wasn’t the least bit surprised at not seeing any sinner comments from duck dude. I never said there was.

            Here’s your helpful heapin’ of Fox 1st amendment blather via Stewart:
            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pc_5zRYExfI

            The only way to get skunked by Fox is by getting too close. Now, do your usual deflection and carry on with your myopic political reality.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            I watched the clip and didn’t hear the 1st Amendment cited even once. Could you find it and tell us the time(s) of the utterance?

          • Chris Peterson says:

            Go play someone else for the fool; maybe the guy who stands by to wipe your drool. And while your at it, would you bring me my mail.

            Steve is right when he asks: WTFHTY?

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            Sorry you feel the need to flail in such a way, Chris. Certainly there was bitching and moaning about private parties restricting speech politically incorrect speech, but, as I said multiple times before, NOTHING I could find referencing it as being a 1st Amendment issue.

            “Fox news vociferously refutes your statement of the issue not being about the first amendment.”

            That is apparently not the case.

          • Greg Goodknight says:

            Chris, I did think that a genius such as yourself, with all the world’s knowledge at their fingertips, would understand a 1st Amendment issue means one in which the government is restricting speech, the press, assembly, to petition the government for a redress of grievances, and the implied rights of association and belief. It’s a Bill of Rights, not a Bill of Entitlements.

            http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/first_amendment

          • Chris Peterson says:

            You must be nearly as amazed as me, when the first words out of anyone’s mouth in the Daily Show clip of Fox is some wanker saying specifically that it’s a 1st amendment issue.

            You pride yourself on listing multiple sources for your news, yet out of all that, you still only hear what you want to hear. Selective hearing is one thing, but your;s seems to have progressed into more of a psychotic state.

            Try little pieces of reality and eventually you will work your way up to an open mind. Either that, or put on a pink shirt and go hang out in a biker bar, pinching guys on the ass. It might hurt for a while, but it could just shake you free of the mental constipation you seem to suffer from.

            It’s been fun, but now I turn my full attention to family. And wow; what a contrast in feelings. Thanks for helping me appreciate just how good I have it.

  5. Ryan Mount says:

    Again: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uh7tgX_Uaqs

    Ron Burgundy: Boy, that escalated quickly… I mean, that really got out of hand fast.

    Champ Kind: It jumped up a notch.

    Ron Burgundy: It did, didn’t it?

    Brick Tamland: Yeah, I stabbed a man in the heart.

    Ron Burgundy: I saw that. Brick killed a guy. Did you throw a trident?

    Brick Tamland: Yeah, there were horses, and a man on fire, and I killed a guy with a trident.

    Ron Burgundy: Brick, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. You should find yourself a safehouse or a relative close by. Lay low for a while, because you’re probably wanted for murder.

  6. Judith Lowry says:

    Bob,

    BTW, your renderings of Jon Voight and Ned Beatty with just a few gestural lines testifies to your fine draftsmanship.
    Well done, again.

  7. Why did “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” keep running through my head when I read the comments?

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