User:Tommyt

My occupational hazard...
I'm a college reference librarian & I love facts. I also believe that Wikipedia has a long way to go before it's what librarians like me would consider a truly accepted & objective source of information - it's slowly getting there but there's much work to be done. An arrogant opinion? You betcha! But, there has got to be standards for information sources, how they're presented & where to find them.

My favorite leisure activity: Cinema
Perhaps the grandest form of entertainment - I'm a movie nut! I'm a Netflix junkie. I watch movies of all types & like to critique the good as well as the bad - I might just be the only outspoken critic of Braveheart which I don't think is as untouchable a film as it's fans want to believe. And I consider Armageddon (1998 film) to be the absolute worst popular film of the 1990s. I also pay close attention to the synopses of films in Wikipedia & constantly correct problems like grammar (more on that in a bit...), erroneous plot details, the elimination of gushing fancruft.

Side note: the iconic image from the tag at the left that says "This user enjoys film" is from George Méliès' film A Trip to the Moon. I've visited his grave in Père Lachaise Cemetery cemetery in Paris, France - quite a moving experience.

The tunes that define me...
Ok, that's a pretentious statement, I know! But I'm as inclined to listen to Bach or Brahms as I am to thrash out to Ministry (band). My latest obsessions are Radiohead (Thom York and Jonny Greenwood are 2 of the most talented musicians alive today. Period), Them Crooked Vultures (I wish they'd release a new album!!) and Sonic Youth. Other favorites are Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Nine Inch Nails. There's a lot of great music out there & a lot I have yet to discover.

There is NO excuse good enough for bad grammar!!!
If you want to know how serious I am about proper grammar, consider this: "alot" is TWO WORDS!!! Seems that these days everyone is making a concerted effort to spell words wrongly, use "then" in place of "than", or "would of" in place of "would have". I OBJECT!!! If Wikipedia is to be an objective source of info, then these practices & others like them need to cease right now.

The way I think, the way I believe...
I'm a progressive person, which means that I don't like the GOP leadership or their attempts to turn the United States into a right-wing, Evangelical, fundamentalist society ruled by their interpretation of the beliefs of Jesus Christ. Christ was NOT a white protestant, he was not the type who would dislike gay folks or single mothers &, if he'd lived long enough, he would NOT have hated Muslims or anyone who worships god in a way differently from His followers. Their idea about what Christ said, did or believed in is a perversion that only serves to mask their own prejudices about others. If we're going to solve any societal problems, this type of thinking must be stopped.

Likewise, we need to stop major corporations from hijacking our economy & law making processes. I've always felt that the GOP has devolved into a tool of big business and that so-called Republican pushes for tax cuts are nothing more than the influence of big business on GOP members of Congress to lower the taxes of the rich to minuscule levels so they don't have to pay their fair share like the middle class does; in fact, I think, rather conspiratorially, that their sole purpose is to weaken the middle class, keep us complacent & worried about where our next buck is coming from so that we won't realize exactly how much we're being screwed.

Also likewise, there is NOTHING more important than the strength of education. Without education, a person is nothing; just look at George W. Bush, a man who slept through his education & wound up president w/out having any capacity for abstract or critical thought. You can put the economy, gay marriage, poverty, war and every other problem that seems to be more important behind education for one simple reason: educated people solve problems like these, no matter what background they come from.

Censorship?? Are you KIDDING me???
I've been a dedicated foe of censorship since I was a teenager, right about the time that Tipper Gore started her PMRC campaign against rock music. The idea that something can be removed from society because it offends a small group of people offends ME. It's pretty obvious that most people who would challenge or ban a book or an album or a film have not read, listened to or watched it in the first place. This gives them no frame of reference or a place to stand by their beliefs, which are hollow & empty.

Where I've been...
I've only recently become a "world" traveler, having been to Italy in May, 1999 & to Paris twice (March of 2007 & 2008) and to Bavaria, Germany and Prague in the Czech Republic in March 2014. Most recently I went to Peru & found it fascinating! Best thing I did there was fly over the Nazca Lines.

My journeys in the States are listed below as well. I think that if you really want to appreciate your own culture, you need to travel so you can appreciate others -- it's the only way to gain a truly solid perspective.

Userboxes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Tommyt/userboxes