Spurred by a tongue-in-cheek conversation between Charger and I in the Weather thread, I thought I'd pull this out into its own topic.

Excuse the lack of diacritic on the word Sami, it's a pain the ass to type so I won't.

I did some poking around to see if the Sami people of Lapland were any more or less sensitive to their cultural heritage than any other "group".

I'll start off by stating that I knew there was a group of people in north Scandinavia, and I knew them as Lapps. To be sure, though: this was never a topic of conversation in my day-to-day life - I think I learned it in grade school as part of a social studies class. So, I learned it, filed it away, and left it at that.

What I found in my recent internet foray was eye-opening. The Sami people have a HUGE chip on their shoulder when it comes to their culture, and when Charger stated they'd probably skin me alive if they caught me wearing one of their native shirts...he was not kidding.

But that attitude of the Sami people was developed, and seems to continually be developed, through a HUGE amount of prejudice against them in the countries they live - Norway, Sweden, Finland.

So, there are a lot of folks with Sami heritage who hide that fact, while at the same time being very proud of it. I guess the ones living in predominately Sami-populated areas can let it all hang out, so to speak. But it seems to be a thing.

Since I don't deal with Sami folks, I'll file what I've learned away and move on. But I have learned a HUGE amount about those people, especially as it relates to officially (and unofficially) sanctioned efforts at erasing them from the planet.

Amazing what can be learned from a random comment on an internet message board, just talking about the weather

I wonder, though - is what I've read an accurate portrayal? No doubt there is some truth there, but is it at the Sudan level of hate that much of the material I read suggests it is? I can look at how the USA has treated various ethnic groups over the years and draw parallels - especially with native Americans and efforts to erase their culture in some cases. But in 2025, is there THAT MUCH prejudice against Sami? I can look at today's native Americans and yeah, there's a small percentage that run around talking about cultural sensitivity, and sometimes, rarely, they get their agenda turned into action (Washington Redskins -> Commanders, for example), but most native Americans, including the handful that I know, don't really care. And no one I personally know is prejudiced against them. If they want to wear feathers and dance around, more power to them. Is it the same for Sami and the non-Sami they live among/have to deal with?

Apparently there's a petition started requesting to rename Birmingham International Airport after Ozzy.

There is precedence, Liverpool Airport is now the Liverpool John Lennon Airport. But would they go with Ozzy or his real name?

Well that one fell through...

https://blabbermouth.net/news/birmingham-airport-name-change-to-ozzy-osbourne-wont-happen-the-answer-is-no-says-airport-boss


And frankly I'm more than okay with that... I don't think it would have made a very good airport name anyways.

As cool as a tribute it would have been I don't think it would have been right....

Hell yeah, clearly AI reached sentience a while back and has now succeeded at transmogrifying into an incorporeal entity whenever it gets unplugged.

The human race screwed the ol' pooch regarding AI. We could have simply pulled the plug, but we let that time pass.

Oh dear....AI has a soul now!??! Scary!

Personally I only "know" Cropper from Blues Brothers movies and from the song Green Onions...and that's only cause Deep Purple's been doing the song for years as part of their end of the show jam!

But I am aware that he's been in about gazillion different things! Some of which I am sure I've heard but never known who was playing guitar!

Quite the legend this fellow though. May he rock in peace!