What’s Up?

I cannot tell you how excited I am to be joining Freethought Blogs.  Interestingly enough, I was asked to join FtB exactly 2 years after I started blogging about skepticism and atheism.  I am a relatively new voice in this atheist/skeptic/oh-my-god-don’t-conflate-the-two blogosphere, though I have been blogging for 14 years.

Many of you know me, but some of you do not.  So hello!  I’m Ashley, there’s a bio over there that basically says I know too much about movies and talk a lot.  The thing that most people seem to find shocking about me is that I worked on Toddlers & Tiaras.  What else?  They should be bringing my archives over eventually, but my old site is http://ashleyfmiller.wordpress.com

Here is a list of things I love:

  • The World Cup
  • Karaoke
  • Baby Sea Turtles
  • Rainbows, Sparkles, Sparkly Rainbows, Rainbow Sparkles
  • Drag queens
  • Otters
  • Alan Rickman
  • Great White Sharks

Here is a list of things I hate:

  • Perfume
  • Allergies
  • Ron Paulians
  • The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
  • Everything
  • Dark Harbor
  • Kevin Costner

In summation:

 

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What’s Up?
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69 thoughts on “What’s Up?

    1. 10.1

      They have been combined, though very briefly.
      In one of the Harry Potter movies (nr3, Prisoner of Azkeban) the students must face their fears in the form of a monster called the Boggart. They must cast the ‘Rediculous’ spell that makes that fear harmless.
      So in comes Neville who’s fear is prof. Snape, played by Alan Rickman. He casts the spell and prof Snape is made harmless by wearing his grandmother’s dress.

      Damn, been reading these blogs too much. I now realize how sexist that is…

      1. You can rationalize this away! Presume Neville was not acting on subconscious sexism and instead relying on the authentic harmlessness of his grandmother to himself in particular. Now it’s just essentializing one woman instead!

        Harry Potter series is full of “default cultural sexism” though if you look for it; doesn’t make me hate it.

        Baby sea turtles are super cute.

        1. He was terrified of his grandmother, so the harmless thing makes no sense. I think in the books it comes off less as haha boy in dress and more that if he combined the two things he feared the most they would have less power. But the humor, other people laughing at it, definitely problematic.

          1. Now that you mention it, I am pretty embarrassed about forgetting that! (I.e.,his home life.) Neville is sort of the unsung hero of the series to me, the Wedge Antilles of the Potterverse.

  1. 14

    That’s the WEIRDEST goddam coincidence. I’m writing a movie script right now in which Alan Rickman, menaced by great white sharks while rescuing baby sea turtles and sea otters, moves to the city and becomes a karaoke-singing drag queen who goes on to make the winning shot in the World Cup, at the instant the sun breaks through the clouds and forms a perfect rainbow over the goal line.

    I was hoping to write Chuck Norris into it, too, as a motorcycle rowdy who comes into town and seduces the youth away from use of the Oxford comma. But that would be just too implausible.

    Anyway: Welcome, Ashley!

        1. Neither zombies or vampires are on the list because they each have to be qualified. I do not have a universal love of them, there are bad vampires and bad zombies. I do, however, love them when used as tools of exploring love, death, and the other. Werewolves, which are for exploring man’s primal violence, are not interesting to me. I worked on a short film called Prombies! which was awesome, and have a treatment for a zombie movie. Horror is very progressive, I’m a fan of the genre.

          I can offer unqualified love for Buffy.

          1. All Firefly characters I would consider underdeveloped. Mid-season cancelation will do that. (ancillary material notwithstanding.)

            🙁

      1. (Name changed to protect real name)Was she Ms Rachel Tension in that movie? Awesomeness. I’m new to your bloggerdom, but I was wondering if you plan on doing scathing articles about PhiPhi O’Hara?
        I’m a lurker from Pharyngula who was directed here by PZ’s post, just realized who you are w.r.t the whole TAM thing. Thanks for fighting the good fight, and also thank you for replying to me and what seems like everyone’s questions. Wow you have energy!

        1. Yes, she was Rachel Tensions and wore a tight, sequined, confederate flag gown.

          I blog about anything I find interesting. If you want me to write about phi phi, by all means point me to what you hate about her. 🙂

          1. Well, if you reeeeeally want to know (big breath in): I think her treatment of Sharon Needles (for being goth/punk) and Willam (for being more successful and talented) was horrifying. Especially how she used her privilege as a more “mainstream drag queen” (those words sounds like oxymorons anywhere else but in RuPaul’s world) to shovel shit on Sharon Needles. You’d think as a non-white, effeminate, gay man working as a drag queen, he/she’d have more empathy about someone being an outsider, but it didn’t seem to be the case.
            And I was disgusted how the judges and Chad Michaels wrote all this venom off saying “Well, she’s been through a lot!” and “She had a rough childhood!”. I think that’s ultimately a stupid sentiment, because the whole point of advocating for gay rights and feminism is trying to teach people to think beyond the opinions and morals they were raised on and try to be better people. That should apply just as much to an angry drag queen as it does to some sub-literate redneck who thinks the word “fag” is a perfectly fine description of a group of people.

  2. 19

    I love your blog, which I only recently discovered, so congratulations on making the big league 😉

    I’ll be the first to bring up the topic, so I might jinx it, but i foresee some rumbling about how convenient it is that one of the combattants in the recent discussion about sexism in skepticism is now joining FTB.

  3. 26

    I’ve not read your blog before, but from your introduction… I have a feeling I may end up an avid reader. Welcome!

    Perfume is the worst. I regularly shoot off passive aggressive emails to the office about it.

  4. 29

    Ashley:
    Welcome to FtB.
    I do hope you Kevin Costner is not on the “Hate” list because of Waterworld. It wasn’t as bad as Battlefield Earth; which means it was good (and yes, I’m aware of the ridiculous argument I just made).

  5. 35

    Welcome to FTB, Miss Miller. I will confess… the love of karaoke thing has me concerned; but you totally make up for it by playing the ukulele. Oh, and the whole insightful voice in the atheist movement thing… that’s good too.
    Enjoy.

  6. 36

    Ashley, I am so happy for you! And happy for me, because it’ll be that much easier to keep up with your blog now that you’re here at FTB.

    Oh, and the fact that they brought on you AND Zinnia on the same day? That rawks.

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