26 November 2019

Are You a -phile?


Are you a "bibliophile"? That is a lover of books. The suffix -phile denotes a fondness for a specified thing and comes from the Greek philos meaning "loving." A heliophile is a lover of the sun.

There are hundreds of different types of "philes" with new ones being created for new things but probably using a Greek or Latin word attached to the suffix.

A retrophile loves things from the past. "Retro" itself is fairly new being a 1960s creation 1960s from French rétro, an abbreviation of rétrograde which has a number of meanings (mostly scientific) but usually refers to something going backward or reversing.

An oenophile comes from oinos, the Greek word for wine and so an oenophile is a lover of wine. This isn't just someone who drinks a lot of wine, but rather is interested in wine production and probably collects wines.



You don't hear many people saying they are turophiles, but many people do love cheeses. Taking the Ancient Greek word for cheese, "turos," is much classier than saying you're a cheesephile or cheesehead. The true turophile (as with oenophiles) doesn't just eat up all the cubes of cheddar on the appetizer table, but knows many types of cheeses and collects favorites.

A few others:

  • Cynophile - lover of dogs
  • Pluviophiles have a fondness for rain (Latin pluvial for rain). A lover of rain does not just find enjoyment in the physical presence of rain, they also find joy and peace when a rainy day descends.
  • Can you hear a color in caeruleaphile? These people have a strong fondness for blue.
  • I know many javaphiles who love their coffee. This one is neither Latin or Greek but takes the slang word ‘java’ for coffee.


More 
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/53610/15-philes-and-what-they-love

https://steemit.com/philes/

14 November 2019

Let Them Eat Cake


Right off, Marie-Antoinette didn’t say "Let them eat cake." But someone did.

Marie-Antoinette, born in Vienna in 1755 was the 15th child of Maria Theresa, the Hapsburg empress, and Emperor Francis I.

Her mother betrothed her to Louis-Auguste, grandson of King Louis XV, when she was 10 years old in order to strengthen the alliance between her Hapsburg relatives and the French Bourbons. She meet her future husband the day before they were married when she was 14 and Louis was 15.

The marriage, not surprisingly, was not great for the first years. The young couple had never consummated their marriage after the wedding. Louis XVI and his queen made the marriage official after 7 years together and the first of their four children was born the following year.

They were happy but completely different. He was indecisive, an introvert who preferred to spend his free time alone, reading or metalworking. She was a real queen - a vivacious extrovert she loved parties, gambling, theater and a big spender on amusements.

She had a miniature farm built at Versailles, not to have produce but so that she and her ladies could pretend to be shepherdesses and milkmaids. She would have 300 new gowns a year, and she loved extreme hairstyles.

France was in debt, partly because it was supporting the American Revolution. The monarchy and nobility paid almost no taxes. (Sounds familiar.) Commoners who were hit hard by crop failures and food shortages paid the state's bills.

She became a symbol of what was wrong with the government and everything that was wrong with France. Marie-Antoinette made secret arrangements for her family to flee in 1791, but the plans failed when revolutionaries captured the royal family as they were escaping and they became prisoners of the Revolutionary government.

In 1792, France was declared a republic and the monarchy was abolished. Louis was executed. Marie-Antoinette was accused and convicted of treason and the sexual abuse of her son, and she was beheaded in October 1793.


Marie-Antoinette never said, “Let them eat cake.” That was penned by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, years before Marie-Antoinette ever even came to France. He was describing a queen, but it was another foreign-born French queen, Marie-Therese of Spain, the wife of Louis XIV. But the attitude of that phrase did fit Marie-Antoinette.

05 November 2019

catfishing , catfisting, and noodling

Catfishing is a type of deceptive activity where a person creates a sock puppet social networking presence, or fake identity on a social network account, usually targeting a specific victim for abuse, deception or fraud. (not to be confused with catfisting- see below)

Catfishing is often employed for romance scams on dating websites. Catfishing may be used for financial gain, to compromise a victim in some way, or simply as a form of trolling or wish fulfillment.

That sockpuppet online identity is used for purposes of deception. The term comes from a simple hand puppet made from a sock that is easily manipulated.

Although some sources state that the modern term originated from the 2010 American documentary Catfish, the term has actually been around in the English language for decades. It was used in Arthur Crudup's "My Momma Don't Allow Me" back in 1944.

But Catfish, the documentary film directed by Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman, definitely made the term common in popular culture.

The film follows a young man, Nev, who is being filmed by his brother and friend while he tries to build a romantic relationship with a young woman. Nev is using Facebook.

The film led to an MTV reality TV series, Catfish: The TV Show that centered on the lives of others who have been caught up in online relationships.

The focus of the film is Yaniv (Nev) Schulman who helps other people investigate possible catfish attempts and the motives behind the people who use fake identities to build relationships with online users

One unlikely origin for the term catfish is that fishermen would put sea catfish in with their catch of cod to nip at their tails and keep them active during overseas transport in order that the cod be fresher.

In the popular media, the case of the University of Notre Dame football star Manti Te'o in 2013, and the Rolling Stone article about a University of Virginia rape that turned out to be a hoax may have been an example of catfishing.

Catfisting (more commonly called noodling) may also be part of the origin of the catfishing con usage. This quite literal practice is fishing for catfish by using one's bare hands. It is more popular in the southern United States where catfish are more popular for eating and more common.

You put your hand inside a discovered catfish hole and wait for the aggressive catfish to grab hold of it, and then you pull it out of the water. Yes, it can be dangerous. I suppose there is a kind of deception in this technique. Do catfish think they have just grabbed some odd hand and arm fish?