Another hit and run before I hit the hay for another overnight tonight. Gods damn but my work schedule is playing havoc with my head and I can’t brain out the thinky things. Sorry.
Via ItsPronouncedMetrosexual.com, this chart will help you sort out orientation, identity, sex, and expression. You know, if you’re having issues with it, like this guy was. Note that this isn’t the “genderbread man”, even though “man isn’t gendered” or whatever the hell.
Hat tip to Tigger_the_Wing for the pointer.
Just got word of this talk. Might be interesting. If someone local’s willing to report on it, I’d be happy to publish here.
- Starts
- Wednesday, May 16th 2012 at 7:00 pm
- Location
- The Bahen Centre for Information Technology, Room 2135- 40 St. George Street
Is skepticism for everyone? If so, then we have to grapple with the fact that some women and minorities claim to feel unwelcome in the current skeptical climate—claims that have been met with responses ranging from concern to disbelief to derision. I will critically assess this issue of perceived discrimination and discuss how organized skepticism may unwittingly alienate women and minorities.
When: Wednesday May 16th, 7pm
Where: The Bahen Centre for Information Technology- 40 St. George Street, Room 2135
How Much: $5/FREE for CFI Members
About the Speaker
Steve Livingston has twin interests in the natural and social sciences. He completed his BSc in biology and BA (Honours) in psychology at the University of Winnipeg, and his MA in social psychology at The Ohio State University. As an experimental social psychologist he studied persuasion and prejudice, and taught psychology at Ohio State and the University of Toronto Scarborough. He believes strongly in the value of open inquiry, critical thinking, and evidence-based policy.
Jodi saw someone tweet this, and I need some easy content for today after a monstrous overnight last night. So have some survival of the fittest. It’s interesting to see the paramecia completely paralyzed by amoeba until they’re completely surrounded, then they freak the hell out while they’re being digested.
Still trying to sort out issues with iDevices, let me know in the comments if you’re having problems.
Pursuant to the previously stated motion to convert our Mock The Movie transcripts into a format useable by certain media readers, I hereby authorize the immediate dissemination of the following two files as relates to the mission entitled Operation Zombie Apocalypse:
File The First: Mock the Movie Zombie Apocalypse transcript with colorized tweeters
File The Second: Mock the Movie Zombie Apocalypse transcript in monocolor, for media players that can’t handle colored subtitles
I further hereby authorize the immediate promotion of CompulsoryAccount7746 to the rank of Sky Captain for meritorious conduct in movie mockery, by building the infrastructure so future mockery can be converted to these formats quickly and easily.
Signed this 38th year of Our Lord Zardoz.
Instructions: Right-click the files and and Save As. They are uploaded as .txt files, so you’ll have to rename the file. Make its filename match the name of the movie you’ve downloaded exactly, only instead of whatever file extension it is (e.g. .avi or .mpg), make the extension .srt . If you need a player that can handle subtitle files, try VLC. And if you’re having problems getting this to work, by all means, let me know in the comments.
Thought Axe had the market cornered on odiously sexist ads with their shower gel suggesting that the only thing keeping women from physically ravaging you against even their own will is how you smell?
Something tells me the ad writers haven’t thought through all the possible ramifications of cold-propositioning strangers in elevators. Just waiting now for someone to seriously suggest that she would totally sneeze hot dogs if the guy propositioning her was an alpha instead of a lowly geek beta.
See also everything in my Problem with Privilege series.
Okay, so if this is something you can do, if this sort of thing is actually politically viable, how’s about Obama openly campaign on a constitutional amendment mandating that gay marriages be legal nationwide?
Continue reading “Mitt Romney to openly campaign on constitutional amendment against gay marriage”
The Cybermen have met their match, because here comes a full metal Doctor.
I just about burst into tears of joy when he hit the I Am the Doctor theme at 2:24. I hadn’t read the video description before listening and had a complete geek-out moment. It was epic. Undignified to the casual observer, I’m sure, but epic nonetheless.
Be right back, I’m going to go buy every single one of his covers, since he also does Castlevania, Megaman, Skyrim, Transformers, Ninja Turtles, and hell, even My Little Pony.
Hat tip to Phil Plait, who pretty much got the best title right out of the gate. Way to wreck it for the rest of us.
Good idea on the part of SunRun — pay you to install solar panels with no down payment on your part, and you pay them back for the energy your panels generate. But we’re left with a framing problem. Now that generating power using solar panels is actually cheaper overall than fossil fuel based power generation, the company has to fix the image that solar’s just for hippies.
Now I don’t have a lot of problem with focusing on the cost, but I’m not a big fan of throwing hippies under the bus yet again. I can’t think of a better way to fix the messaging without doing exactly that, though.
It’s cool to see Jeff Lewis from The Guild in something more mainstream though!
Hat tip Climate Crocks.
I don’t have much more to say about this religiously-motivated bigotry than to point you to it and go beat my head against a wall for a while.
Yesterday, Barack Obama declared that his position on gay marriage has evolved, and where once he thought civil unions were sufficient, he’s decided, rightly, that they are not, and has made possibly the clearest and most supportive statement on the matter that any president has ever made.
Critics have contended that civil unions are another way of saying “separate but equal”, only, you know, without the “equal” part. It is effectively a form of soft bigotry to say that one type of life partner contract is allowed to be called “marriage” while this other type is not, for reasons completely unfathomable to anyone but the theists who draw the line in the sand at their personal definition of marriage — a relationship sanctified by a member of their clergy and thus accepted in the eyes of God. There are, of course, legal ramifications as well, but people seem to care more about their precious words.
And while many individual members of many religious organizations would have no problem with declaring that their God has no problem with gays getting married, others obviously find it some sort abomination, owing to their particular readings of the religious traditions they hold dear. The parallels with the religiously-motivated opposition to interracial marriage are obvious and palpable. With good reason — the situations are practically identical.
Despite this good news, my initial reaction — and I suspect many of your initial reactions as well — were deeply cynical.
Continue reading “Why my initial thoughts on the Obama gay marriage announcement are wrong”
