Comments

  1. Beatrice (looking for a happy thought) says

    Damn.
    I wanted to answer with “As you wish”, but then got stalled thinking whether that was more creepy than jokey.

  2. says

    @ Tony

    Safe, legal abortions.
    Licensed doctors in medical facilities.

    Indeed.

    *Any* kind of medical procedure should be done by licensed doctors in apropriate medical facilities. Shit is always going to happen. Trying to ban activity that can lead to accident, or undesirable outcome, is beyond ridiculous.

    Is joey next going to recommend we don’t tell our children to be careful when playing outside? WTF, rather lock them up? And if they do get injured playing outside, it can only be because they disobeyed and therefore they should be refused all medical assistance. (Hey, YHWH recommends killing those disobedient kids so such legislation would be relatively mild.)

  3. says

    NateHevens@507
    Actually Taslima writes

    A small number of women say they choose to be in prostitution,

    And that may be true, but the life-style-prostitutes are few and far between.
    The problem is that this rabbit is pulled out of the hat all the time to defend not helping the millions and millions of sex-workers all over the world who are either being forced into prostitution or are driven to it by desperate need.
    And this isn’t limited to poor countries. In France e.g. the “maisons de dressage” are an open secret.
    *Trigger for rape, sexual abuse, violence – quote and links* (links all in French)

    Mais « les maisons de dressage » dans lesquelles elles sont le plus souvent affamées, battues, droguées et violées plusieurs fois par jour, avant d’être placées sur les avenues et boulevards périphériques, n’ont pas disparu. J’ai rencontré une ancienne prostituée, âgée d’une vingtaine d’années, qui a été séquestrée dans une de ces maisons. Nous avons longuement discuté. Elle m’a décrit son calvaire : pour garder, dans un tel endroit, une vague notion du temps et de la réalité, elle comptait tout ce qu’elle pouvait ; une fois, elle s’est arrêtée à son cinquantième en une seule journée…

    -LaurenceBeneux, with audio see also
    here or here.

  4. says

    @NateHevens
    Admittedly, she seems a bit confused about parthenogenesis. And I’ve read a few other things which I don’t approve of.
    But she was right about the prostitution issue. It’s like the “I know a woman and she doesn’t mind [insert sexist behaviour here]. I’m just so sick of people inventing reasons why it’s bad to fight prostitution…
    Preemptive: no, I’m not advocating prosecuting or shaming the prostitutes.
    *sigh*

  5. says

    Ronda Rousey and Cat Zingano will coach next season of UFC’s The Ulimate Fighter in September. This is a huge opportunity for women in mixed martial arts, and I could not be more excited!

  6. says

    Nate:
    I do not read Taslima either. I tried three separate posts she made and did not like them (her position on sex workers is one I dislike, and she was fond of sweeping generalizations; there is alsosomething about her posting style I do not like, but cannot put in words).

  7. says

    Nate:
    Also, when Taslima speaks of sex workers and how horrible it is and conflates that with sex slavery, there is no mention of the men in the sex industry. As you say sex slavery is 100% wrong. Sex work is not.

  8. Beatrice (looking for a happy thought) says

    Tony,

    she was fond of sweeping generalizations

    Oh, so that would mean this latest nonsense isn’t out of character after all. She really does like to tell women what they really think, doesn’t she?
    Unless she forgot the sarcasm tag.

  9. Beatrice (looking for a happy thought) says

    [from http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/04/13/the-christian-theocracy-isnt-planning-murder-me-after-all/ because it’s completely off topic there]

    anchor,

    Unless you have some problem with him from other threads, Tony did nothing to deserve your wrath over there. I tried to point out the misunderstanding politely.

    I don’t mean to argue and I certainly didn’t mean to insult you .I have just gotten to know Tony enough to know that he didn’t mean to judge or insult you either. Take a peek in the Lounge and you’ll see Tony mixing people’s virtual drinks.

  10. rorschach says

    I’m off to Singapore for a few days of 16-dollar Coronas, swimming on the 57th floor, and lots of Asian food. The only critical time will be during airport transfer, here’s to praying that I don’t cop the crazy Hillsong fan taxi driver again.(And of course there is that other crazy person with the nukes, but let’s hope he keeps it in his pants until I get back)

  11. anchor says

    Beatrice, oh no, i have not for a moment thought that you had insulted me, or the obverse, oh, no no no,. As a matter of fact, i am humbled and honored by your attention to my particular problem.

    If i’ve delivered wrath to Tony I apologize for it, down to the marrow of my bones. But i do not like anybody serving up any unsubstantiated gook on me or anyone else either. We are all, i expect, well qualified to be able to defend ourselves against a ‘casual’ insinuation that our remarks may be twisted by drink or drug instead of directly and sincerely offered by clear-headed thinking.

    After all, that’s what a rationalist/humanist/atheist must in the end ammount to, or we are – all of us – dead before we ever had a decent chance to flower.

    I know you do not have any argument or antagonism bent my way, and i thank you for that, and I know Tony fairly well from my readings in the lounge and elsewhere (like this instance) and i am well acquainted with a fine voice in Tony, but to automatically impute the onus of this problem onto me for merely reacting to a totally ridiculous charge that threatens to invite other readers to think all of what i write is bogus is, you must at last admit, a very low blow.

    The very fact that i might respond in order to so much as defend myself on completly reasonable grounds -and nothing more – becomes, incredibly, an issue in which i may be cast as the heavy.

    I know from your writing over the years that you an exceptional expnonent of the truth, and your ability to cut tu the chase of any matter in question is second to none.

    Therefore, i am obliged to defer to what you are saying, and must accept the rap that you have now crystalized for me. I get it.

    No hard feelings, please – i’m glad it was you – and your sharp and exceptional caliber – only that can i rely on, the one who could set me straight.

    Thank you Beatrice! Lots of love and range into the future!

    AAS

  12. rorschach says

    Why does anchor write as if it was the 17th century? Maybe xe should update xer translating software.

  13. Beatrice (looking for a happy thought) says

    Don’t worry, anchor, I’m quickly scurrying off your lawn. It was really too brazen of me to try and imply that you misunderstood someone. I can’t believe I acted so horribly. I’ll send myself to bed without dinner this evening.

    Have a nice day!

  14. says

    @ Beatrice

    Don’t worry, anchor, I’m quickly scurrying off your lawn

    Bah! You beat me to it.

    {Attempts to push half a falafal and a can of Tsingdao down the intertubes.}

  15. says

    Why does anchor write as if it was the 17th century? Maybe xe should update xer translating software.

    Is that the problem? I find that their writing style makes my sarcasm detector act up. I really can’t tell if they’re serious or not.

  16. says

    anchor
    To be clear, I’m not bashing you or anything, I just honestly find your style of communication very difficult to interpret.

  17. Beatrice (looking for a happy thought) says

    theophontes,

    I could use a beer. Thanks!

    Also, *arrrrgh* so that people don’t think Thunderdome is getting nice again.

  18. says

    @ Beatrice

    Also, *arrrrgh* so that people don’t think Thunderdome is getting nice again.

    Holy Fuck, I forgot about that.

    Best try it again: {theophontes rudely flings half a falafal and an empty can of Tsingdao down the intertubes.}

  19. anchor says

    Alright.

    Wow Beatrice.

    What a low blow.

    You really know how to crush a person down to the bone, don’t you?

    You solicit a frank PRIVATE conversation, i thought in confidence, with a fellow hordeling – no fuck that idiotic bullshit – a fellow Pharyngula commentor, and next thing i know it appears on the fucking thunderdome, just so you can get to squak at my expense.

    Nice.

    I trusted you, and you ripped that trust and my heart for Pharyngula to shreds.

    [PZ and Chris: my following remarks have absolutely no bearing on you or my esteem for you or for your original vision, PZ, of what Pharyngula . but what i have to say is going tyo be said just this once, and that is all]

    Well done, take a deep bow, and none of your pathetic ilk (which i would charitably compre to

  20. Eurasian magpie says

    anchor,

    These comment threads are not private. Anyone can see and read them. And it is customary to take off-topic conversations either to the Lounge or the Thunderdome.

  21. Beatrice (looking for a happy thought) says

    What the hell?!
    This is a blog, we’re talking in a comment thread. That’s hardly private. You were an asshole to Tony and you are continuing to be an asshole to me. I don’t know what the hell is your problem, but don’t take it out on me.

  22. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    You solicit a frank PRIVATE conversation, i thought in confidence, with a fellow hordeling

    If it was private, it would be done via e-mail exchange; posting on a thread isn’t private except in someones delusional dreams. Your claim is like a guy talking about stuff in public. Anybody can overhear you, and jump in. If you don’t like it, shut the fuck up.

  23. says

    …and next thing i know it appears on the fucking thunderdome…

    Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t you the one who posted it here? It’s posted via your account.

  24. says

    Another question for scientists and science fans, based upon something science popularizing shows like “How the Universe Works” does that is really fucking annoying.

    I’m currently watching the HtUW Expanded show on Orbits. They just got through talking about habitable zones, and they pull this rhetorical trick:
    “The smallest change could kill us all.”
    “…if our orbit shifted a little bit in from where we are now…”
    “…if we move just a little bit closer to the sun…”
    “…a small shift in the opposite direction…”
    “…and that’s only by moving the earth a fraction of the distance from the sun.”
    “The smallest shift in earth’s orbit, and we die by fire or ice.”

    I hate this.

    With a fucking passion.

    I hate it because it’s so fucking easy to misconstrue. It gives CreIDiots really good ammo for their bullshit. I have quite literally had Creationists try to explain to me how science has proven that the earth can’t be moved even a few FEET (not kidding) from where it is now, or we’re dead.

    Thing is, scientists aren’t talking about feet. They’re talking about Astronomical Units. 1 AU is 92,955,807.273 miles.

    So my question is this: In miles, how wide is our sun’s habitable zone estimated to be? In other words, how far could the earth move in either direction while still being pretty much habitable? I need to be able to counter CreIDiots who latch on to that with this, but I don’t know the information and Google is failing me miserably (I never denied that my Google-fu is just plain pathetic, so it’s probably my fault… but still).

  25. says

    Natehevens

    So my question is this: In miles, how wide is our sun’s habitable zone estimated to be? In other words, how far could the earth move in either direction while still being pretty much habitable?

    Between 4,647,790 miles and 23,238,951 miles, possibly higher depending on whose estimates you use. Most estimates hold that 0.95 AU is too close, while too far ranges from 1.01 AU (Which can’t possibly be right, as aphelion is farther away than that) to 3 AU. (I got my figures here.

  26. chigau (違う) says

    NateHevens
    I wasn’t criticizing your statement.
    I always wonder if the people who make those “a little bit closer/farther” statements realize that the Earth gets closer to and farther from the Sun all the time.

  27. says

    Frankly, the 0.95 AU figures for the inside seem kind of fishy too, given that perihelion is .~98 AU, and the difference between that and .95 is only about as much as the distance between perihelion and aphelion, which difference clearly doesn’t have any effect on the Earth’s ability to support life.

  28. says

    Ah okay chigau. I misread you. Sorry. It’s scientists on the show saying this: Michio Kaku and Michelle Thaller in this particular bit (first 8 minutes of the show… they’re on Black Holes right and are featuring Michelle and Phil Plait… and here’s fucking Michio Kaku again).

    And Dalillama… thanks.

    So our sun’s habitable zone could be as wide as 23,238,951 miles… good. That gives me some good rebuttals…

  29. says

    Bloody hell, this is driving me nuts. I’m having trouble phrasing this, so excuse me if it gets a bit muddled. Concerning this whole bit about variance in the orbit and habitable zones:

    Let’s say you have a planet A. Planet A has an orbit that has a maximum distance X from its sun. Now let’s take another planet, B, and let it have an orbit that’s constantly at distance X (never mind whether that’s possible, at the moment).
    Is it possible that planet A could be habitable and planet B could not be?

    I’m drawing an analogy here between organisms that can survive brief exposures to extreme temperatures, but will die from prolonged exposure. Is it possible that a brief journey through an area that’s technically not part of the habitable zone could be tolerated, if the rest of the orbit is within the habitable zone?
    Related to that, could there be a kind of tipping point where a relatively small difference in orbit distance could result in a massive change in climate?

    This is totally not my field, so I’m kinda feeling around in the dark here. Anybody know about this?

  30. says

    So our sun’s habitable zone could be as wide as 23,238,951 miles… good. That gives me some good rebuttals…

    No, that’s 23,238,951 in either direction. The total width of the habitable zone using those figures would be more like 46,472,902 at the low end, and estimates range as high as 206 826 671 miles total width at the high end.

  31. says

    No, that’s 23,238,951 in either direction. The total width of the habitable zone using those figures would be more like 46,472,902 at the low end, and estimates range as high as 206 826 671 miles total width at the high end.

    Damn.

    That’s even better.

    Is there any way we could petition creators of these shows to either define “a little bit” when talking about the earth’s orbit, or just stop saying that all together?

  32. says

    LykeX

    Is it possible that planet A could be habitable and planet B could not be?

    Yes. Habitability is basically defined by the presence of liquid water on the surface, which is affected not just by distance from the sun, but also atmospheric density, composition, etc.

    Is it possible that a brief journey through an area that’s technically not part of the habitable zone could be tolerated, if the rest of the orbit is within the habitable zone?

    I’m not certain this is a meaningful question; if the planet supports life, the zone it orbits in is by definition within the habitable zone. If, for instance, a planet regularly wandered far enough out to become an iceball or far enough in that all the water boiled off, it wouldn’t be able to support any kind of life that we’d recognize.

    Related to that, could there be a kind of tipping point where a relatively small difference in orbit distance could result in a massive change in climate?

    Depends on what you mean by ‘relatively small.’ A staple of SF is the planet which has a more eccentric and’or irregular orbit than Earth (often involving binary stars) where it has a mini-ice age on the farther points and then gets all tropical on the nearer approaches (see Alan Dean Foster’s Icerigger and sequels for an example of the type of world I’m talking about), but the science on those is pretty shaky, as our current sample size for habitable planets is one, and nobody’s got any actual evidence regarding what others might or might not be like.

  33. says

    Crap! This happens all the time when I venture into unknown territory; I realize that I don’t have enough background knowledge and I end up adding another dozen books to my already extravagant reading list.

    Dalillama, thanks for the answer, even though it only made it clear that I still need to learn more.

  34. says

    Crap! This happens all the time when I venture into unknown territory; I realize that I don’t have enough background knowledge and I end up adding another dozen books to my already extravagant reading list.

    Dalillama, thanks for the answer, even though it only made it clear that I still need to learn more.

    You should see my reading list…

    Lisa Randall, Stephen Hawking, Alan Guth, Leonard Susskind, Sean M. Carroll, Lawrence Krauss… I even have String Theory for Dummies on my birthday wish list…

    It’s ridiculous, but too fascinating to let go.

    If only I could do math…

  35. says

    If only I could do math…

    Don’t get me started; I’m worried I might get hooked again. This is my standard reply when people ask if I’d want to live forever; yes, I’d need the time for all he books I have to read.

    I’m reminded of Greg Egan’s Diaspora, where the main character ends up sort of stranded and ponders (in his immortality) whether to just shut himself down. He (/she/it? I’m not actually sure if the character has a conventional gender (it’s basically just an AI, at that point)) decided to postpone the decision and first get into mathematics really deep.
    I loved that ending.

  36. says

    cm’s changeable moniker
    You made me think of the “peck, peck peck” scene from Willow, but I can’t find a good clip of it.

  37. joey says

    opposablethumbs:

    Fuck you and your cute playing around with “eliminate”, as if reducing harm to women and their families were an intellectual trifle rather than a real need.

    Of course reducing harm to women and their families is not an intellectual trifle. But neither is reducing harm to viable babies. Did you actually look over the grand jury report? What about the hundreds of viable babies who had scissors shoved in the back of their necks? Yes, I would desire that we as a civilized society attempt to *eliminate* THAT.

    —————–
    cm:

    joey, compare the rate of late-term abortions in a country with sane laws and provision (I humbly offer the UK as an example) and have a think about why the US might be different, OK? (Or fuck off. Either’s fine.).

    But the UK also has certain restrictions on late-term abortion. Abortion is not free from restriction there.

    ——————
    LykeX:

    The actions of Gosnell are not legal and would not be legal under any system proposed by anybody. It’s not the kind of thing done by any actual abortion clinics (as opposed to a guy who sets up shop somewhere and calls it a clinic) and it’s not condoned by any pro-choice people, so why is this case relevant?

    Gosnell performed late-term abortions (and in many cases very late-term abortions). I don’t think you’re suggesting that late-term abortions in general are “not condoned by any pro-choice people”. Are you?

    Let’s try this one more time: What’s your point?

    That late-term abortions are especially horrendous, as is apparent to anyone who has scanned through the grand jury report and who also has the slightest bit of empathy toward babies. Let me ask you this. What do you find so unacceptable about the Gosnell case? Is it the fact that he performed late-term abortions of viable fetuses or is it the manner in which he conducted those abortions? If it’s the latter, how should have he performed those late-term abortions that would have made them not unacceptable?

    ———————–
    Tony:

    “…appalling and dehumanizing RESULT of anti-choice activism.”. refers to the unethical, vile abortions Gosnell was performing…

    I guess same questions to you that I asked LykeX:
    What do you find so unacceptable about the Gosnell case? Is it the fact that he performed late-term abortions of viable fetuses or is it the manner in which he conducted those abortions? If it’s the latter, how should have he performed those late-term abortions that would have made them not unacceptable?

    In case you’re wondering what my answer is, it is this: the late-term abortions were unacceptable because they resulted in the purposeful death of viable babies. These abortions most likely had many more things in common that made them even more unacceptable, but even the most “professional” of doctors, with the support of the most trained medical staff, under the most sanitary conditions, won’t right the wrong of viable babies getting killed.

    ———————
    theophontes:

    *Any* kind of medical procedure should be done by licensed doctors in apropriate medical facilities.

    If the person who helped one of these women to induce birth to a living/breathing/viable baby and subsequently “snip” the spinal chord with scissors to the back of the baby’s neck was “a licensed doctor in an appropriate medical facility”, would that have made the late-term abortion acceptable? If not, how can such a procedure become acceptable?

    Shit is always going to happen. Trying to ban activity that can lead to accident, or undesirable outcome, is beyond ridiculous.

    In the context of Gosnell, what “shit” or “undesirable outcome” are you referring to? You don’t think the deaths of all those viable fetuses/babies were the desired outcome?

  38. says

    anchor:
    I am so sorry. I just now got back online and saw your response in that thread. I did not express what I meant clearly.
    When you said:

    Everybody here is on pins and needles waiting for any support for that preposterous claim. Put it up. Go ahead. We dare you. Just think of how foolish you will make us all look by doing so. I’d like to know of a single example of a politically atheist rule untrammeled by religious motives myself.

    DO IT.

    my response was meant to indicate that I thought we (as in anyone in that thread waiting for raccisrick to to support his ridiculous claims) would be waiting a while on a response, and one way to kill time would be to have a drink.

    I sincerely apologize.

  39. says

    I don’t think you’re suggesting that late-term abortions in general are “not condoned by any pro-choice people”. Are you?

    As per the standard for pro-death/anti-woman assholes, you’re equivocating between “abortion” and ‘”killing the fetus”. They’re not the same, as you well know. Pro-choice people generally do not condone of the deliberate killing of viable, delivered children.

    Let me ask you this. What do you find so unacceptable about the Gosnell case? Is it the fact that he performed late-term abortions of viable fetuses…

    No, I have no problem with a cesarean; an induced birth is a late-term abortion and I’m perfectly fine with that. I have a big problem with the (as reported) cases where he deliberately killed a viable child after delivery. Once it’s separated from the mother, it’s a human being and you can’t kill it willy-nilly.

    …or is it the manner in which he conducted those abortions? If it’s the latter, how should have he performed those late-term abortions that would have made them not unacceptable?

    He should have performed the abortion without killing the fetus (if possible) and with the necessary medical care for the patient (always). He should have gotten the proper licenses and hired the proper personnel with the proper training.
    He should have acted like a proper doctor with the relevant care for his patients; how difficult is that? It’s not fucking rocket science, dude.

    How about this:
    1) Human beings have a right to bodily autonomy, which includes the right to decide who uses their body for any particular purpose.
    2) Women are human beings.
    3) Women have the right to bodily autonomy, etc. (from 1 & 2)
    4) Before viability, a fetus requires the use of a woman’s organs to sustain itself.
    5) A woman has the right to deny a fetus the use of her organs (from 3).
    6) A woman has the right to abort a pregnancy if she wants to do so (corollary to 5).

    Please explain why this isn’t true.

  40. says

    joey:
    Did you read what I wrote and process it through some christian filter?
    I said:

    Safe, legal abortions.
    Licensed doctors in medical facilities

    THIS is the situation in which *any* abortions should occur.

    {from the Gosnell thread}

    He had a small group of poorly trained, non-professional people doing much of the ‘medical’ work — including at least one high school student who was administering tests and drugs to patients — and idled at home most of the day, coming in in the evening to do procedures. Procedures that he himself was not qualified or certified to do.

    Untrained staff.
    Improper procedures being carried out.
    Lack of certification.

    His style was cheap, lazy, and harmful to the woman. The standard procedure was for the women to come in during the day, and his staff would administer drugs to induce labor — even in women 30 weeks or more pregnant — and then send them in to the bathroom, where they would ‘deliver’ into the toilet. The toilet would sometimes get clogged with aborted fetal tissue.

    Harmful to women.
    Improper disposal.
    Horrific conditions of his facility.

    Sometimes the fetus would be delivered alive, and at an age where, if this were done in a hospital, the newborn would have a good chance of surviving. Gosnell’s job as a doctor was to take these squirming, sometimes crying babies, and stab them in the back of the neck with a pair of scissors to kill them.
    Sometimes, too, the women died.

    Murder of newborns.
    Death of mothers.

    All this was done in a filthy clinic cluttered with obsolete and broken equipment. There were bloodstains on the stirrups of the gynecological tables. There were jars with bits of fetuses snipped off and stored in preservatives. He was constantly late in paying for medical waste pickup and disposal; there were leaking bags of aborted tissue in piles in the basement. The staff complained that sometimes he was lazy and left the dead fetuses in shoe boxes out in the clinic, so they’d be greeted by the reek of rotting flesh when they walked in the door in the morning.

    Broken Equipment.
    Unsanitary facility.

    When you ask this:

    What do you find so unacceptable about the Gosnell case? Is it the fact that he performed late-term abortions of viable fetuses or is it the manner in which he conducted those abortions? If it’s the latter, how should have he performed those late-term abortions that would have made them not unacceptable?

    What do I find unacceptable about the Gosnell case?
    See above.
    Kermit Gosnell *should* never have carried out any of those abortions.
    Why did he carry out late term abortions on women? I don’t know. For all I know, their lives were at risk, and abortions were necessary. Maybe their lives weren’t at risk. Either way, he shouldn’t have been performing the procedures to begin with!

    This is not an argument against abortion.

    This is a complete condemnation of a vile, disgusting person, who murdered newborns and is directly responsible for the death of women in his care.

    I used to think you were just a dishonest christian fool.
    Now I think you are a dishonest christian asshole.

  41. omnicrom says

    joey it is pitiable and reprehensible that you choose to pretend to believe the “Satanic Baby Killer” myth that conservative Christianity tars all its critics with.

    There is no way that you are stupid enough to genuinely believe that Pro-choice advocates should have no problem with Gosnell’s “clinic”. There is no way that you cannot figure out for yourself what makes this fake “clinic” different from a licensed and professional facility that follows the highest standards for medical procedures. There is no way you can ingenuously be confused about why Pro-choice people would have issues with an “abortion clinic” (quotes because Gosnell ran nothing of the sort and you know that). You are being intellectually dishonest and it is quite sickening. Your intellectual dishonesty allows you to support policies that will create more Gosnell “clinics” and harm more women. You and your ilk allowed that tragedy to happen and lay the blame on the Pro-choice side. You are disgusting.

    You KNOW this. All of this. people have told you what the Pro-choice side believes and why a million times AND you have enough common sense to recognize the difference between reality and fantasy. Nonetheless you persist in your righteous daydream of fighting the evil babykillers with your genius wit. That you come in here after the revelation of the Gosnell tragedy and start asking leading questions to score points is monstrous. Fuck off, you aren’t wanted here.

  42. Amphiox says

    The most telling thing about joey’s latest round of disgusting, pathetic, reprehensible, sickening, and pitiful intellectual dishonesty is that virtually every single one of his “questions” are outright answered directly in PZ’s OP about the Gosnell Clinic.

    Which, just in case he might be unfamiliar with the “scroll” feature on his browser, was pointed out to him directly in almost the first reply to him.

    He hasn’t bothered to read it. Or if he has, his deliberately ignoring it.

  43. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    He hasn’t bothered to read it. Or if he has, his deliberately ignoring it.

    Yep, he deliberately ignores anything that might hurt his imagined argument. Like the non-existence of his imaginary deity. A fatal flaw for one who requires “absolutes”. NO DEITY, NO ABSOLUTES. QED.

    To date, no deity, no attempt to prove his imaginary deity with solid and conclusive physical evidence. Tacitly acknowledging he has nothing, and his philosophy is bullshit….

  44. Amphiox says

    Is it possible that a brief journey through an area that’s technically not part of the habitable zone could be tolerated, if the rest of the orbit is within the habitable zone?

    Yes. But it does depend on how restrictive you make your definition for ‘habitable zone’, which is currently a matter of some debate.

    So for example, if you define the habitable zone as the orbital region in which a planet will have sufficient solar insolation to maintain a temperature range that allows for the existence of liquid water on its surface, you could envision a planet with an elliptical orbit that takes it into and out of that habitable zone.

    For example we can consider a planet that spends 3/4 of its year inside its star’s habitable zone, and 1/4 outside. During the time outside, it’s ocean’s will start to freeze. But, it will not freeze completely instantly. If its orbit re-enters the habitable zone of its star before it freezes solid, it will still have liquid water somewhere on its surface year-round. Even if it spends enough time outside the habitable zone to freeze over “completely”, if it has volcanism there will be hotspots that can stay liquid with geothermal energy.

    Related to that, could there be a kind of tipping point where a relatively small difference in orbit distance could result in a massive change in climate?

    Yes. If an Earth-like planet transitions past the inner edge of the habitable zone, a runaway greenhouse effect will be initiated and it will turn relatively quickly into a Venus-like planet. This is in part due to the fact that water vapor is a powerful greenhouse gas. So any planet with oceans is doomed. And a planet without oceans wouldn’t count as earth-like.

    The inner edge of the habitable zone is a sharper and more stringent boundary than the outer edge. (Probably.)

  45. Amphiox says

    We must also make a distinction between ‘habitiable zone’ and ‘habitable’, or, specifically, ‘planet within habitable zone’ and ‘habitable planet’.

    As a scientifically useful concept, the ‘habitable zone’ only defines a probability. A planet within that zone has a *chance* to be habitable. Whether it is or is not habitable (currently defined as liquid water-bearing) depends on additional properties of the planet itself, such as its atmospheric composition, density, albedo, etc.

    And right now, when astronomers are defining the edges of the habitable zones around stars, they are making a variety of assumptions that are likely not to bear out in reality. So any newly discovered exoplanet hyped as being in the habitable zone, if it is only at the edge of the habitable zone (especially the inner edge), is highly likely NOT to be habitable.

    So for example, you can stretch the inner boundary of the hypothetical habitable zone by having no atmosphere to produce a greenhouse effect. This was the way that Gliese 581c was initially declared to be in the habitable zone. This of course is an assumption that cannot hold in reality, and in fact by this definition, Venus is in the Sun’s habitable zone.

    Conversely you can extend the outer edge of the habitable zone by positing ever thicker atmospheres, and you can in fact extend it very far that way. But in reality there is a limit to how thick you can make an atmosphere for a terrestrial planet before it turns into a gas giant.

    Another way to extend the inner boundary of the habitable zone that has come up in the literature is to increase a planet’s albedo. The inner edge then becomes the point where even an albedo of 100% does not reflect enough solar energy back into space to keep the planet cool enough for liquid water. But this again produces a highly over-optimistic series of assumptions. Short of an advanced civilization deciding the paint the planet white or cover its entire surface in mirrors, the only way to increase albedo is to increase cloud cover, and that will mean an atmosphere with more greenhouse gases in it.

    Another way of estimating a habitable zone that has been tried in the literature is to use climate modelling of earth, and changing the solar insolation up and down until earth is no longer habitable. Using this method there was a study that revised the inner edge of the earth’s habitable zone around the sun from 0.95AU to 0.98AU, iirc. But of course this method applies only to earth – you get a different set of values for a planet with different characteristics to earth. It should be noted, for example, that the outer edge of earth’s habitable zone extends beyond the orbit of Mars – Earth would still be habitable if it orbited where Mars orbits today. Mars of course, is not (or if it is, only barely so).

  46. says

    @joey
    Here’s a question for you:

    Do you understand and accept that the vast majority of pro-choice proponents are rejoicing to the news that Gosnell is being prosecuted? Do you understand that we’re all totally in favor of him being locked up? Do you comprehend that we do not, in any shape or form, condone the actions that he took or the general situation in his “clinic”? Do you accept that we’re totally against everything he did and that we wouldn’t in any way support legislation that would make his actions legal?

    Yes or no?

  47. says

    @ joey

    If the person who helped one of these women to induce birth to a living/breathing/viable baby and subsequently “snip” the spinal chord with scissors to the back of the baby’s neck was “a licensed doctor in an appropriate medical facility”, would that have made the late-term abortion acceptable?

    WTF? You are going to use the abhorrent example of Gosnell to suggest that we would endorse properly qualified people behaving in like manner? Methinks you are completely failing to understand the points that people are making here. Put down that bale of straw and follow what we actually say.

    If not, how can such a procedure become acceptable?

    No, that does not sound like an acceptable procedure. Where do you get that from? Are you going to scour the interwebs looking for egregious examples of criminal behaviour to pin on us?

    In the context of Gosnell, what “shit” or “undesirable outcome” are you referring to?

    In the context of Gosnell, we are discussing unwanted pregnancies. More generally, anything that would require medical attention should be attended to by a suitably qualified person, not a butcher like Gosnell. Why do you want to make such a special case for the medical procedure of abortion? Why not make the same histrionic case for the procedure of setting a broken arm? Nobody deserves to have medical attention given by such a criminal.

    You don’t think the deaths of all those viable fetuses/babies were the desired outcome?

    No. Are you suggesting there are people who fall pregnant with the specific goal of seeking an abortion? You are reading me arse-about-face. Pregnancies are not always desired. The consequences (carrying full term or undertaking an abortion) are then also not desired.

    [joey. Aside from this whole discussion, I trust we are gradually getting the message through to you that your world view is counterfeit. It was manufactured by mere mortals for rather less divine purposes than that you appear to divine. Stop projecting this counterfeit view onto the rest of us. What do you intend to achieve here, if that is all you intend to do here?]

  48. says

    My question pertains to the habitability of the planet. That is, how many miles towards the sun or away from it could the earth go and still be habitable, for the most part, to the life on it now? Or, how much room does the earth have to play with beyond its orbit before we and the other life would no longer be able to survive?

    My question is for an answer to counter shit from creationists who actually take that “only a fraction” to mean in, like, feet, or maybe a couple miles.

  49. says

    That difference is, of course, still an incredibly large distance: 4.8 million kilometers (roughly 3 million miles) which is about 377 times the radius of Earth. There is nothing particularly precise about it.

  50. says

    joey:
    I’d like to second this question by theophontes:

    What do you intend to achieve here, if that is all you intend to do here?

    Given the nature of this blog and the reception you receive, why are you here?

  51. says

    [Sorry about the staccato responses:] “Habitability” depends a lot on other effects, like the greenhouse-effect, without which our planet would be pretty much to cold to inhabit as we do. (On the other hand, we could all drive SUV’s if we could just move the Earth further away from the Sun. Where is Archimedes, and a long pole, when we need him?)

  52. says

    @ Tony

    Brownie points. When enough have been accumulated, joey is going to sit at the Right Hand of YHWH and look smugly down on our suffering in the Infernal Depths.

    How YHWH manages to record all joey’s electronic correspondence is anyone’s guess. Key logging? Reading over joey’s right shoulder? Attending lovingly to each individual electron in the uniBerse?

  53. says

    @ Nate

    Check out Wolfram Alpha (link). It is a really cool, and powerful, web-based program for playing around with numbers. It is also pretty good at inferring what it is that you are asking of it.

  54. says

    Nerd of Redhead@557

    Like the non-existence of his imaginary deity. A fatal flaw for one who requires “absolutes”. NO DEITY, NO ABSOLUTES. QED.

    And that’s exactly why they hang on to the deity. Because when you let go of that, you need to take responsibility for your own choices. Rather like when you stop believing Mummy and Daddy know everything…
    “Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity.”
    Not everyone seems to be ready for it.

  55. says

    Though of course even with a deity there are no absolutes.
    Even if it were scientifically proven that there was a being that had created the universe, and these were it’s commandments to us, and that it would take revenge on us if we didn’t follow them – we’d still not accept these commandments as “good”. In fact, we would feel morally obliged to oppose such a terrible monster: anti-deism I think Hitchens called it.
    So religion just preaches that whoever has the greatest power defines what is “good”… perhaps unsurprising, as religion is used to prop up those in power.
    The more I think about it, the less I understand how any adult can buy into it.

  56. John Morales says

    Delft:

    The more I think about it, the less I understand how any adult can buy into it.

    You lack their humility; they recognise that God is unto us puny mortals as we are to bacteria (but infinitely more so), and so its morality is as understandable to us as ours is to them.

  57. says

    Author: Amphiox

    So for example, if you define the habitable zone as the orbital region in which a planet will have sufficient solar insolation to maintain a temperature range that allows for the existence of liquid water on its surface, you could envision a planet with an elliptical orbit that takes it into and out of that habitable zone.
    For example we can consider a planet that spends 3/4 of its year inside its star’s habitable zone, and 1/4 outside. During the time outside, it’s ocean’s will start to freeze. But, it will not freeze completely instantly. If its orbit re-enters the habitable zone of its star before it freezes solid, it will still have liquid water somewhere on its surface year-round. Even if it spends enough time outside the habitable zone to freeze over “completely”, if it has volcanism there will be hotspots that can stay liquid with geothermal energy.

    Sounds like Alberta! Half of the year our axial tilt takes us outside the bearable zone.

  58. thumper1990 says

    @Joey #551

    Gosnell performed late-term abortions (and in many cases very late-term abortions).

    If you can not distinguish between late term abortions and inducing early birth before stabbing the baby in the neck with scissors then you are a fucking idiot.

  59. The Mellow Monkey says

    thumper

    If you can not distinguish between late term abortions and inducing early birth before stabbing the baby in the neck with scissors then you are a fucking idiot.

    Yeah, that’s what I thought. Weirdly, we have a defense of stabbing already delivered infants in the neck right here on FtB. I’m still baffled, especially by her followup comments:

    Are you arguing that when the baby comes out, it shouldn’t be aborted? I taste a bit of Freud like defense mechanism. Anyway it sure beats crazy painful abortions in the womb.

  60. The Mellow Monkey says

    Because my earlier comment might not be clear, here’s the problem with this article:

    Dr. Gosnell ended the lives of some fetuses, which, left alone, would have become cute little bouncing pink babies in adorable little outfits. He cut into the backs of their necks and severed their spinal cords. Legitimate abortion providers also do this. They dilate women’s cervices, which can be painful, they terminate fetuses, and they cut flesh.

    By referring only to what he did as abortion and not explaining that what he’s accused of is not abortion, the writer is quite likely to leave readers unfamiliar with abortion practices thinking that delivering an infant and then severing the spinal cord is what an abortion is.

  61. Rob Grigjanis says

    Nate @562: I think theophontes @564 has the best answer for creationists who think very small changes in distance would be catastrophic; we already have a variation of about 5 million km due to the eccentricity of our orbit. Ask them why they haven’t noticed it.

  62. ChasCPeterson says

    If you can not distinguish between late term abortions and inducing early birth before stabbing the baby in the neck with scissors then you are a fucking idiot….
    the writer is quite likely to leave readers unfamiliar with abortion practices thinking that delivering an infant and then severing the spinal cord is what an abortion is.

    I give up. what’s the difference? the temporal order of killing then removing as opposed to delivering then killing? That’s an important moral difference?

  63. The Mellow Monkey says

    I give up. what’s the difference? the temporal order of killing then removing as opposed to delivering then killing? That’s an important moral difference?

    Bodily autonomy. If something is inside my body and putting me at risk–which every pregnancy does–my right to bodily autonomy means I can have it removed. If the safest and most humane procedure is to kill it rather than a live delivery, then an abortion is the best option. Once a neonate has been delivered, it’s no longer a question of the woman’s bodily autonomy.

    There is also the mounting evidence regarding fetal awareness. I don’t think this is the most compelling argument, but it does point to very real differences between a fetus and a delivered neonate:

    Furthermore, there is increasing evidence that the fetus never experiences a state of true wakefulness in utero and is kept, by the presence of its chemical environment, in a continuous sleep-like unconsciousness or sedation. This state can suppress higher cortical activation in the presence of intrusive external stimuli. This observation highlights the important differences between fetal and neonatal life and the difficulties of extrapolating from observations made in newborn preterm infants to the fetus.

  64. says

    ChasCPeterson
    Once the child is separate from the mother and living independently, the abortion is complete. If, at the end of an abortion, you’ve got a living, breathing child, then you’ve got a second patient. Anything done after that point is a procedure done on a human being with all the same rights as anyone else.

    The child has a right to bodily autonomy as well and once the mother’s rights are no longer an issue (because the two are no longer physically connected), the child’s rights are the only consideration left.

    What you’re doing here is right back to the good old “But what if the mother decides to have an abortion halfway through the delivery?” It’s bullshit. It’s the same equivocation over what “abortion” means that we keep seeing from pro-life assholes.

    An abortion doesn’t have to involve killing anyone or anything. If the fetus can’t survive on its own, obviously an abortion will kill it, but that’s not the purpose of the abortion. The purpose of an abortion is to end a pregnancy.

  65. The Mellow Monkey says

    LykeX

    The purpose of an abortion is to end a pregnancy.

    Exactly. It’s not possible to “abort” a delivered neonate. Abortion terminates a pregnancy. Once a newborn has been delivered, the pregnancy is terminated.

  66. Amphiox says

    My question pertains to the habitability of the planet. That is, how many miles towards the sun or away from it could the earth go and still be habitable, for the most part, to the life on it now? Or, how much room does the earth have to play with beyond its orbit before we and the other life would no longer be able to survive?

    As of the latest calculation, which may or may not stand up to the test of time, the inner boundary is 0.98AU (ie far from being in the perfect position to sustain human life, the earth is ALMOST too close to the sun).

    The outer boundary is more nebulous, depending on how you model climate, and what amount of atmospheric alteration you allow in the moving process, but it is not that difficult to push it out beyond the orbit of Mars.

  67. Amphiox says

    From a technical stand-point, what Gosnell was doing wasn’t abortion. He was doing induced birth. In the case of the earlier non-viable fetuses he was doing induced birth against medical indication, when abortion should have been done instead. In the cases of the late-term viable fetuses he was doing induced birth followed by murder.

    All of which, of course, is already covered and prohibited by existing law.

  68. vaiyt says

    ChasCPeterson:

    I give up. what’s the difference? the temporal order of killing then removing as opposed to delivering then killing? That’s an important moral difference?

    The difference is that, once the child has been delivered, they are not interfering with the mother’s bodily autonomy anymore. Come on, you’ve been here regularly, are you really this fucking dense at this point.

  69. Amphiox says

    I give up. what’s the difference? the temporal order of killing then removing as opposed to delivering then killing? That’s an important moral difference?

    Yes, it ABSOLUTELY IS. Because the temporal order here is not a straight up reversal.

    SOMETHING HAPPENS IN BETWEEN in one case but not the other. And that something makes all the difference.

  70. Amphiox says

    That difference is, of course, still an incredibly large distance: 4.8 million kilometers (roughly 3 million miles) which is about 377 times the radius of Earth. There is nothing particularly precise about it.

    There is the fact that geologic and atmospheric processes buffer the climate. Solar energy is absorbed and some of it is only radiated back later (water has a high specific heat, after all). A watery planet that spends some time inside its habitable zone and some time outside will have its climate protected by that effect.

    In the other direction, as increasing heat increases evaporation of water, cloud cover goes up, increasing albedo, and slowing down the heating effect.

    On longer time scales, as a planet’s atmosphere warms, weathering increases as a result of more violent weather, which strips CO2 from the atmosphere (freshly weathered, exposed rock will react with atmospheric CO2), reducing the atmospheric greenhouse effect (and the opposite occurs as the planet cools).

    On earth, the runaway moist greenhouse effect will not kick in until atmospheric CO2 essentially falls to zero and the buffering capacity is lost.

    So even if the earth moved past the inside edge of its habitable zone right this moment, we wouldn’t all instantly fry. What will instead happen is that the ocean’s will start evaporating faster than rainfall replenishes them, and sea levels will ever so slowly drop. Weather patterns will become wilder, and CO2 in the atmosphere will start falling more rapidly. It may take thousands if not tens of thousands (or even millions) of years before the planet actually becomes completely inhabitable.

    You could take the earth and plop it at 0.9 AU right now, and we could still fit maybe 10 or 20 full bibles worth of history before the planet becomes uninhabitable by humans, and maybe even longer if the impact of advanced technologies that increasingly desperate humans may try to use is factored in.

  71. thumper1990 says

    @The Mellow Monkey

    That Camomile Lox commenter appears to be an idiot. And I too am confused by the OP, where it says that what he did was a legitimate method of abortion. Why is he being tried for seven counts of murder, then?

    Seriously, can anyone explain that?

  72. thumper1990 says

    @Chas

    I support abortion mainly because a woman has the right to bodily autonomy. However, once the baby is delivered that argument is nullified. That’s the difference.

  73. The Mellow Monkey says

    thumper, I had to discuss it with my ob-gyn friend before it even made sense to me. She (my friend) read it as a plea for not using emotional language and instead clinical language should be used. Which might be a fine argument to make–his alleged crimes should be about crime and not the ickiness of the human body–but…that’s not how it reads to this lay person. My friend’s familiarity with delivery and abortion had her filling in a lot of blanks that just looked like gaping holes to my mind.

  74. Rawnaeris, FREEZE PEACHES says

    Fuck CNN. Seriously. They are running the Potts story, and the tag line is Alleged Rape Victim . She committed fucking suicide but her rape is alleged .

    *spits*

  75. Ogvorbis, broken failure. says

    Shit.

    Two bombs went off at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.

  76. mythbri says

    NPR is reporting 2 dead, 23 injured. I hope that those numbers don’t climb.

    ….

    I went to Cincinnati over the weekend with my boyfriend to attend his uncle’s wedding and meet/visit with his family. It was interesting – I’d only ever flown through Cincinnati before. Some thoughts:

    1. I don’t like Cincinnati-style chili. Bland, tomato-y stuff.

    2. I don’t like five-ways. Although there’s no individual component in a five-way that I don’t like in theory, in practice I really don’t care for them mixed all together:

    Spaghetti: Good.
    Chili: Good.
    Beans: Good.
    Onions: Good.
    Cheese: Good.

    All together? Yuck! I was surprised when my boyfriend said he’d never eaten chili without spaghetti until he moved out West, because I’d never heard of such a thing before.

    If I ever have this again, I’ll make it myself. And it won’t be served over squishy, over-cooked spaghetti. :P

    ….

    My boyfriend and I had dinner with some of his friends, a married couple, where I mostly just sat and listened to them reminisce about growing up and all of their old friends. This is completely foreign to me, because my family moved around a lot while I was growing up. I have no idea what it’s like to be adults with the people you were kids with, and I actually shudder at the thought. My grade-school days were full of bullying, ostracizing and no lasting friends. I would hate to be “stuck” with those same people in the same community.

    Included in the conversation was discussion of one of the people in my boyfriend’s old circle of friends – “Rich”. The other woman at the table expressed her disgust with “Rich”, who had grabbed her mother’s ass twice during a (holiday?) party. Her mother now refuses to have anything to do with any gathering at which Rich might be present. She went on to say that Rich had not apologized, and indeed claimed that his ass-grabbiness was “a compliment.” She continued to say that Rich hugs women too tight and too long, and doesn’t keep his hands where they belong.

    Later, my boyfriend floated the idea of us visiting Rich at his house, and I (DUH) said no. My boyfriend admitted, without any prompting, that he’d never noticed the behavior that his female friend had described, because he was never the subject of it. I told him that there was no way that I was going to let Rich touch me in any form, even a handshake, and that if he tried I would chew him out good. This, I considered fair warning to my boyfriend to let him know that I wouldn’t tolerate that shit, even from a friend of his. My boyfriend agreed and we didn’t visit Rich.

    When we were visiting some other friends, my boyfriend joked that I had been “freaked out” by the idea of visiting Rich.

    I corrected him and said that I was perfectly calm – I just didn’t want to be groped. I felt that was perfectly reasonable.

    I like my boyfriend, or else I wouldn’t be with him. But I’m trying to show him that negative reactions, especially when justified, are not necessarily “over-reactions” or “freak outs.” I just hate that his mind goes there immediately, even when he agrees with my judgement.

    Sigh.

  77. says

    @mythbri
    Compliment. *Snort* Want some complimentary hot tea down your trousers?
    .
    I think men in general are not really aware that practically every woman is familiar with groping, and accustomed to keeping her distance from men who can’t won’t keep their hands to themselves. So just the fact that you go from hearing about it to protecting yourself – blindingly obvious to women – may seem strange to a man, who (as a rule) simply hasn’t been in the position of needing to do that.
    So it’s back down to privilege and the paper-cut thing…
    .
    I have found an ever-so-slightly snarled “Don’t touch me” quite effective in social contexts, i.e. with others overhearing.

  78. opposablethumbs says

    I just hate that his mind goes there immediately, even when he agrees with my judgement.

    I know exactly what you mean. It’s teeth-grindingly frustrating, and these kinds of mental habits are so ingrained it can be hard to shake them.

    Sounds like you handled it just right.

  79. says

    Chas, if you show up, what the fuck is wrong with you? So a few people weren’t so sure about the NYPost as a definitive source. So what? The few comments at you because of it were incredibly mild.

    Where I’m from, when someone hijacks a public event, like a discussion about the bombings, to demand that everyone know how right they are, it’s said of that person that they’re trying to get in a pissing contest.

    Why in the fuck are you making that discussion into a pissing contest? What in the FUCK is wrong with you?

  80. chigau (違う) says

    mouthyb #597
    I’m sorry, I don’t remember how long you’ve been around here but that is one of Chas’s schticks.
    I usually just [hush] him.
    (before I got Firefox, I used scrolling down)

  81. says

    @ Mellow Monkey

    Bodily autonomy. If something is inside my body and putting me at risk–which every pregnancy does–my right to bodily autonomy means I can have it removed.

    Indeed. And it is not as if we have not had this discussion before, and recently, on Pharyngula. As in the case of Savita Halappanavar. The Pharyngula thread is here: Link.

    @ Amphiox

    which is about 377 times the radius of Earth.

    Sorry, my mistake in the piece you quote at #587:

    I meant to write 377 times the diameter (not radius) of the earth. Obviously, for the radius, the difference is double that. (For clarity.)

    Apologies for my sloppiness.

  82. says

    @ Nate @ #533

    If you want to keep shooting, I shall happily pass you more ammunition.

    Geologists are the real godkillers:

    The blows of the geologist’s hammer were here decisive.

    After investigating the details, as presented in Exodus, of camp life, of sacrifice, of numbers of men and animals — details all of which, according to contemporary ecclesiastic law, had to be literally true — Bishop Colenso was led to the conviction, painful, he said, both to himself and his reader, that

    the Pentateuch, as a whole, cannot personally have been written by Moses, or by anyone acquainted personally with the facts which it professes to describe, and, further, that the (so-called) Mosaic narrative, by whomsoever written, and though imparting to us, as I fully believe it does, revelations of the Divine Will and Character, cannot be regarded as historically true.

    Quoted from: Bishop Colenso and the Literal Truth of the Bible

    Sadly, goddists seem less honest today than they were 150 years ago.

    You will also like this argument from astronomy: Nice argument for the age of the earth Pharyngula is a damn fine go-to resource.

  83. ChasCPeterson says

    a woman has the right to bodily autonomy. However, once the baby is delivered that argument is nullified.

    That makes a certain amount of sense. It’s a very fine and not-very bright line to be drawing (the line, I mean, not the drawer), but I won’t pursue the point. I don’t disagree, btw, but it sets me off to see opinions treated as facts (where’s Nerd when you need him for some opinion-flooshing?).

    Fuck CNN. Seriously.

    Do you really not understand the excellent reasons why all news outlets–not just CNN, all–used the term “alleged” before trial? ffs.

    Chas, if you show up, what the fuck is wrong with you?

    What do you want, a list? None of it’s anyof your business anyway.

    So a few people weren’t so sure about the NYPost as a definitive source. So what? The few comments at you because of it were incredibly mild.

    yes, and I responded in kind. It’s called “conversation”. I say something, other people say stuff in response, and I…what? shut up? why? Because you think the subtopic being pursued in this conversation (of which you were not a part) is, what, inappropriate for the particular thread? Sorry, but that’s not your call.

    Where I’m from,

    obviously, the proper measure of all things

    when someone hijacks a public event, like a discussion about the bombings, to demand that everyone know how right they are

    Are you nuts? (is that ableism or frugism?; I’m not sure)
    It was a blog-comment thread at Pharyngula. Not a public discussion event. It’s OK to have conversations, even OT side-conversations, even OT side-conversations that piss you off for some reason, in blog-comment threads at Pharyngula. Ask the mgmt.
    Further, the brief argument was never about me being right. I made no assertions to be right about other than pointing out what was being reported (unquely) at a particular outlet. That was on-topic and provided new information to the discussion (what did you contribute beyond your thread-copping activities?). People responded by saying stupid shit and I responded to point out what I thought was stupid about it.
    You don’t understand what a “pissing contest” is; that, or you failed to read the thread in question for comprehension. So fuck off.

    You are a really smug asshole sometimes, mouthyb, to me at least. I don;t know where you get off with that attitude. How about just ignoring me in the future? Thanks a million.

    How many times has Sven flounced?

    I’ve attempted it once or twice. The fuck do you care?
    Why don’t you take your content-free little snipes, chigau, and shove ’em up next to that porcupine?

  84. anteprepro says

    Related to nothing in particular: Fuck Cracked. I love the site, I really do, but sometimes they really drop a deuce. They’ve done so twice in the last few days and I’m fucking pissed.

    Here are two completely unfunny entries mixed in between two actually funny entries with such insightful nuggets as asserting that critics of religion just doesn’t, like, get religion and a false equivalence-laden smearing of Rachel Maddow. Hilariously, the author says “maybe go somewhere besides MSNBC to places that take a more critical eye of civil rights abuses, not just to gays and women, but to all Americans. Things like our current administration’s stance on NDAA and drone strikes that go to the heart of everyone’s civil liberties. A stance that most of the Democratic and Republican parties seem in harmony about.” This a Cracked columnist who has been with the site for years, and he can’t even be arsed to google “Maddow drones” before putting this in the conclusion for the celebrity he considers to have the most annoying fanbase.

    But this article is far more offensive. It is a list of victims people shouldn’t feel sorry for, most often because they have “brought it upon themselves”. There is a teenager who tried to circumnavigate the globe and got shipwrecked, celebrities who went to unlicensed plastic surgeons, and Grizzly Man. Who else made the list that earned my undying hatred? The woman who dared to heckle Daniel Tosh’s rape joke act and got a personalized borderline threat “rape joke” in return. We shouldn’t feel bad for that woman, because apparently she provoked it by heckling. The columnist even uses “she asked for it” as a completely self-aware joke on the matter. Just another front on the war on women: Those Neutrals who think that Comedy trumps basic human decency.

    Chas, if you show up, what the fuck is wrong with you? So a few people weren’t so sure about the NYPost as a definitive source. So what? The few comments at you because of it were incredibly mild.
    Where I’m from, when someone hijacks a public event, like a discussion about the bombings, to demand that everyone know how right they are, it’s said of that person that they’re trying to get in a pissing contest.

    I’ve always found Chas a little grating, but that thread is where I lost any semblance of respect for him.

  85. anteprepro says

    . People responded by saying stupid shit and I responded to point out what I thought was stupid about it.

    Stupid shit like “The Post isn’t a reliable source”? Fuck, Chas, because if that isn’t what you meant by “stupid shit”, then you must have intentionally been ignoring the main point of contention. The Post is a borderline tabloid. By design . It is Fox News on paper. That does not make for a reliable source. Everyone who criticized you for relying on them as a sole source was right. You were wrong. And you could have just left at it that instead of going into Full Defensive. Why the fuck did you double down on defending content from the New York fucking Post? Why the fuck did you do so on a thread about a fucking bombing that happened on that very fucking day, Chas? That is not the place or time to play Glib Contrarian.

  86. says

    Just to remind you all: the comment threads here are not a safe space. Even the Lounge only aspires to be a moderately safe space, and has that status only by comparison with other threads.

    Arguments and disagreement and shouting matches are perfectly ordinary things here. I only step in and get grumbly when they cross the line into, for instance, racism/sexism, or when they just go on way too long and derail a thread way too much. Smoking craters are exciting during the brief moment of their creation, but are damned boring when we linger over them.

  87. ChasCPeterson says

    It is Fox News on paper. That does not make for a reliable source. Everyone who criticized you for relying on them as a sole source was right. You were wrong.

    Do you understand the difference between facts and rhetoric?
    Neither the NY Post nor even Fox News are in the business of making up shit that isn’t true.
    And in point of fact, everything I reported them reporting checked out, did you notice?

    [If anybody tries to interpret this as me advocating the politics or editorial policies of of the NY Post or Fox News, I will laugh out loud.]

  88. Rob Grigjanis says

    Chas @610:

    And in point of fact, everything I reported them reporting checked out, did you notice?

    From your reporting of their reporting;

    NY Post reports that a suspect has been IDed and is under guard in a hospital.

    A law enforcement source confirmed to The Post that 12 people were killed

    Am I misunderstanding what “checked out” means?

  89. John Morales says

    Rob, heh.

    Well, if everything he reported them as having reported was indeed reported by them, then to that extent it indeed “checks out”.

  90. Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine" says

    Sven, you’re honestly complaining about smug sniping?

  91. Rob Grigjanis says

    cm’s changeable moniker (quaint, if not charming) @617: Thanks for that.

  92. says

    SallyStrange:

    Not only that, Ing, but a couple of weeks ago he was complaining about an excess of assholery around here.

    Yeah, but I haven’t been posting as much since then.

  93. vaiyt says

    @Chas:

    It’s a very fine and not-very bright line to be drawing

    Fine and not very bright? Care to tell us why you think so?

    Because, from my point of view, the line is very clear.
    Inside the woman’s body -> using her organs -> interferes with her bodily autonomy -> her right to decide.
    Child is born -> no longer inside the woman’s body -> no longer using her organs -> independent entity with their own right to life.

  94. ChasCPeterson says

    Rob Grigjanis, touché on the number of fatalities.*
    However, this: “NY Post reports that a suspect has been IDed and is under guard in a hospital” was indeed true.

    radio silent. Funny, that.

    yeah, I went to the bar, Sally, to drink delicious ales, watch the hockey game, and enjoy a bit of real life with people who are my friends. If you get there before 8, pints are only $4. Is that funny to you?

    Ing, you‘re honestly complaining that I’m complaining about smug sniping?
    I’ll just file that away in my tu quoque collection. (Yours too, Sally!)

    Care to tell us why you think so?

    If you care to read the rest of the sentence from which you quoted, you’ll see that the answer is “no”.
    I’ll even give you a reason: because my explanation would be biologically technical, pedantic, and PaulW-esque in length and detail. Then I would be thoroughly pummeled (rhetorically) for paying so much attention to considerations that are not necessarily directly focused on the rights and feelings of women.
    no thank you.
    So you’ll have to continue to be satisfied with your own absolutism; fine by me.
    (But if you want food for thought–which, frankly, I doubt you do–consider that your list of simple dichotomies are all different concepts that could be (again, I do not intend to do so here) extensively unpacked; i.e., child is born ≠ no longer inside the woman’s body ≠ no longer using her organs ≠ independent entity ≠ with their own right to life.)

    *however, to be fair to meee: a) somebody else linked the Post for the 12-dead report, not me; b) the quote you attribute to me was actually the last sentence of a long direct blockquote directly from the Post report, in a context in which I was obviously focused on the rest of it; c) the number of people that were killed in any incident like this is something that I would never have any interest in arguing about; d) I was explicit about the possibility that the Post‘s federal source could well be wrong. So although I know you just going for the snerky laffs you got, Rob, it was pretty dishonest of you and I didn’t appreciate it.

  95. anteprepro says

    However, this: “NY Post reports that a suspect has been IDed and is under guard in a hospital” was indeed true.

    For an especially broad definition of “suspect”.

    I’ll even give you a reason: because my explanation would be biologically technical, pedantic, and PaulW-esque in length and detail.

    And then you decide to go on at length, anyway, without an explanation?

    (But if you want food for thought–which, frankly, I doubt you do–consider that your list of simple dichotomies are all different concepts that could be (again, I do not intend to do so here) extensively unpacked; i.e., child is born ≠ no longer inside the woman’s body ≠ no longer using her organs ≠ independent entity ≠ with their own right to life.)

    How is “child is born” distinct from “no longer inside the woman’s body” and “no longer using her organs”? Are there many cases of children born who are still in the woman’s body? Are there many cases where a child is outside of the woman’s body but still using her organs? If that wasn’t just a mistake, perhaps it is best that you didn’t go into it further, because the level of hair-splitting pedantry involved would have been so absurd that it would liquefy the eyeballs of we mere mortals.

  96. Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine" says

    Chas I remind you again. Since were all so much dumber and ideological than you and you spend so much time sneering at the hippies; you can leave.

    Other people here may be jerks or assholes (yo!) But youre the regular who is just downright nasty and mean spirited

  97. mythbri says

    @Chas

    So you’ll have to continue to be satisfied with your own absolutism; fine by me.

    I only wish that I was satisfied that my bodily autonomy was absolute. People keep trying to take it away from me and other female-bodied persons.

  98. says

    I don’t mind admitting that I’m an asshole. But then, that is why I don’t complain about the level of assholery around here. That would make me a hypocrite. Hey wait a minute…

  99. says

    Tomorrow, some televangelist is going to be screaming about the end of the world right fucking now.

    We go all the way back to Steubenville. Two more cases followed, but those two victims committed suicide.

    Then the Boston Marathon gets bombed.

    And while that’s happening, our fucking bullshit piece of crap Congress (*spits*) decides that 91% of USians is not enough to pass gun control.

    Oh no. To add on to that wonderful bout of fucking misanthropic humanity-hating anger, we have a complete accident.

    This is literally happening now.

    Fertilizer plant 18 miles outside Waco, TX explodes… in a really big way (felt 15 miles away and heard 45 miles away… apparently a preschool and nursing home were damaged… no confirmed numbers of fatalities or injuries, but estimates are in the hundreds… this last is from MSNBC which I’m watching right now).

  100. says

    I’m fucking done. After these last couple incidents, piled on top of everything else, and personal stresses, I’m checking out for a bit. May there be some good news for somebody somewhere before this whole fucking world goes to hell in a hand basket. I’ll be back when my head isn’t so stuck in the dark…

  101. chigau (違う) says

    John Morales
    What’s that you say?
    The Undead Evolve?
    How’s that work then?

    *aside* Has hyperbole ever solved anything?*/aside*

  102. John Morales says

    chigau, I’d tell you but it’s ineffable.

    (Seek the succour of the King in Yellow in Lost Carcosa if you dare)

  103. chigau (違う) says

    John Morales
    I’ll have to save that reference for the morning.

    Hey!
    “effable” is a word!

  104. says

    Here’s hoping “anything goes” includes test posts. I’ve sold my nonexistent soul for a gravatar, and I’m skeptical that it’s going to work…

  105. John Morales says

    meursalt, your evident pleasure is my reward.

    (… and if not I, then another would have)

  106. ChasCPeterson says

    an especially broad definition of “suspect”

    Go ahead. Let’s hear your narrow and therefore correct definition of ‘suspect’. Be sure to note exactly how that rubric differs from “potential suspect’, ‘person of ionterest’, and ‘guy to whom we refuse to publicly attach a label but for whose apartment a federal search warrant was obtained’. dumbass.

    And then you decide to go on at length

    lol. One sentence? You’re quite a reader, aren’t you?
    And then you decide to go ahead and ask a bunch of questions that you know damn well I already said I wasn’t interested in answering. Sorry. You can either think about it or simply dismiss me as a hair-splitting pedant. *shrug*
    Either way, have a nice day.

    Hi Ing! You have a nice day too!

    I only wish that I was satisfied that my bodily autonomy was absolute. People keep trying to take it away from me and other female-bodied persons.

    To be clear, I am not one of those people.
    I am merely a hair-splitting pedant when it comes to physiology. so sue me.

    I don’t mind admitting that I’m an asshole. But then, that is why I don’t complain about the level of assholery around here. That would make me a hypocrite. Hey wait a minute…

    Oh, Sally. I never called you an asshole. Not recently, anyway. Rather, I pointed out your tu quoque and then look, in your response quoted just above you just do it again. I guess you don’t know what it means.
    Here, learn something: The tu quoque fallacy is “oh yeah? well, you do it too!” It’s a fallacious argument because, for example in this case, my being an asshole in no way addresses my argument that somebody else is an asshole.
    It might, admittedly, make me a hyporite, if the kind of asshole behavior I complained about was the same kind that I display. I don’t feel that’s the case here, but if it was, and you had conclusively proven my utter hypocrisy to the world, so what? I’d just quote Whitman at you.
    I’ll also point out that exactly this kind of hypocrisy gotcha is the favorite activity of them slimepitizens. just, as they say, sayin’.

  107. anteprepro says

    And then you decide to go ahead and ask a bunch of questions that you know damn well I already said I wasn’t interested in answering. Sorry. You can either think about it or simply dismiss me as a hair-splitting pedant.

    You are willing to baldly assert that vaiyt is wrong in saying that birth leads to leaving the woman’s body which leads to not using the woman’s organs, but are uninterested in answering questions on the topic. Uh huh. A troll by any other name. Go fuck yourself.

  108. anteprepro says

    As for suspect, Chas, you should know damn well how serious the implication of the word “suspect” is. Any possible lead could be legitimately called a “suspect” but when you announce to the public that you have a “suspect” people usually think that it is a serious one. I know you love you some semantics, and being technically right, because you are a ripe, puckered asshole, but when the real fucking news says “suspect” the implication is “well, just a matter of a time until the case is closed, then”. But when the real fucking news and when the police actually dare to say “suspect”, though you’ve nothing but contempt for their reservations in doing so, it means that they really, really, really suspect them. And they aren’t just working on a hunch, or something just north of jack shit. Like they were in this case.

    Oh but continue to defend the New York Post and how it was accurate here. Because it fucking wasn’t. The very article you linked to said there was 12 dead. The very article you linked to, in its haste to mention a Saudi suspect, ironically is unable to say whether or not that suspect was also a victim of the bombing. It says that he was “caught” and that he may have been injured in his “apprehension”. You know, evoking exactly the serious definition of “suspect” that you are trying to avoid in order to remain technically right. How about instead of not being willing to say a peep about technically right you are about abortion issues, you instead decide to shut the fuck about how technically right you were to cite the fucking New York Post? How about you do us all a favor and become uninterested in that issue as well?

  109. ChasCPeterson says

    I decided to write a puppet show! Here’s what I’ve got so far:

    [the curtain goes up on Judy, reading a newspaper. Punch enters, stage left.]
    Punch: You’re a shit Judy, and not as half as smart and the objective superman you think you are. You’re a complete and utter asshole
    Judy: Oh, hi, Punch. Have a nice day!
    Punch: Youre the puppet who is just downright nasty and mean spirited.

    it’s just a draft, I’m still working on an ending.

    You are willing to baldly assert that vaiyt is wrong in saying that birth leads to leaving the woman’s body which leads to not using the woman’s organs, but are uninterested in answering questions on the topic. Uh huh. A troll by any other name. Go fuck yourself.

    No, I baldly asserted that none of those things is equal to (the same as) any of the others. Were those little arrows supposed to mean “leads to”? I guess that wasn’t clear to me. That makes some difference. But yes, you correctly note that I repeated my disinterest in pursuing the topic. and…so…I’m a troll who should fuck myself. I guess that’s your way of dismissing me as a hair-splitting pedant? *shrug*

    Oops but wait there’s more.

    Any possible lead could be legitimately called a “suspect” but when you announce to the public that you have a “suspect” people usually think that it is a serious one.

    Yes, that’s correct. That’s exactly why police never use the word ‘suspect’. Because it’s so widely misinterpreted. Example:

    when the real fucking news says “suspect” the implication is “well, just a matter of a time until the case is closed, then”.

    That’s simply not true. That’s a mistaken inference, not an implication. I suspect that when the real fucking news says “suspect” they mean “suspected of involvement”, on account of that’s what it menas. The state of my asshole is irrelevant.

    But when the real fucking news and when the police actually dare to say “suspect”, though you’ve nothing but contempt for their reservations in doing so, it means that they really, really, really suspect them.

    You’re simply projecting what you think it might mean onto “the real fucking news,” whatever that’s supposed to mean–it reflects a naive view of reality, imo–and, as noted, police never use the term any more, for this very reason.

    The very article you linked to said there was 12 dead.

    What it actually said was that a federal law-enforcement official had told the Post there were 12 dead, and yes, that turned out to be inaccurate. So?
    (the official 2 that all other sources were taking from BPD also turned out to be inaccurate. but a lot closer) The whole business of the Saudi guy, though, is what we’re talking about.

    The very article you linked to, in its haste to mention a Saudi suspect, ironically is unable to say whether or not that suspect was also a victim of the bombing.

    uh wut? So now you’re criticizing them for not reporting stuff about the guy? They said he was under guard in a hospital with burn and shrapnel wounds; was that not in the very first report?
    And look up the word ‘ironic’. (oops, more semantics, i.e. knowing what the words you use freakin mean.)

    It says that he was “caught” and that he may have been injured in his “apprehension”.

    At this point I’m not sure which Post article you’re quoting, as there were 2 or 3 different pages being both linked and updated at various times. But I agree those seem like rather loaded words, depending on the context and timeline. (I mean, later reports had either an alert and/or racist bystander or three BPD detectives observing strange behavior and deciding to tackle the guy as he tried to flee. As far as I know all those ‘facts’ are still unconfirmed, but what do you think ‘apprehended’ means?)

    However the poor guy got stopped, though, the facts as reported by the Post about him were, it turns out, accurate. He was apprehended by police and taken to B&W Hospital where he was treated for injuries while under police guard. He was questioned by both BPD and the FBI. A federal search warrant was obtained to search his apartment (hint: it’s the warrant and search that make him a ‘suspect’ at the time). They interviewed his roommate. The Saudi consulate got involved, they had found nothing to tie him to the bombs, so they cleared him and let him go.
    Please identify which part of that is innacurate. because that’s how far I am willing to defend the NY Post.

  110. ChasCPeterson says

    technically right you are about abortion issues

    You’re a nut. I have never asserted any opinion “about abortion issues” that I need to be “technically right” about. ‘Birth’is a process, not a nice bright dividing line, and issues of bodily autonomy do not end with the end of that process. That’s all. I could make similar biologically based arguments about ‘conception’ if that was the topic under discussion; it wasn’t. I entered the discussion by asking an honest question, and when I received a good-faith answer I acknowledged that it made sense. I also felt that for technical reasons the answer was a bit simplistic, and made the evident mistake of saying that too. What’s wrong with that? What do want from me?

    How about you do us all a favor and become uninterested in that issue as well?

    Tell you what, maybe we can avoid this kind of thing in the future if you’ll just give me an approved list of what I should and should not be interested in, in your opinion. Thanks so much.

  111. mythbri says

    @Chas

    To be clear, I am not one of those people.

    But you’re willing to characterize the fact that I own my body and have the right to make decisions about it “absolutism”? I suppose it is absolutism in the sense that I am the supreme ruler of a country of one: Me.

  112. anteprepro says

    No, I baldly asserted that none of those things is equal to (the same as) any of the others. Were those little arrows supposed to mean “leads to”? I guess that wasn’t clear to me.

    Aww. Adorable. You weren’t straw manning, you are just an idiot who thought didn’t bother to make sense of someone’s argument before smugly deriding it. *Applause*

    That’s a mistaken inference, not an implication.

    An inference based on how the news and police typically use the term (a use that admit to immediately above and below the quoted line) is not a mistaken inference.

    uh wut? So now you’re criticizing them for not reporting stuff about the guy? They said he was under guard in a hospital with burn and shrapnel wounds; was that not in the very first report?

    READ YOUR OWN FUCKING SOURCE YOU FUCKING IDIOT.

    It’s not they didn’t report stuff about him: It is that they explicitly said that they didn’t know whether or not his injuries came from the bomb or from being “apprehended”. As in, when reporting about this “suspect” they assumed that it was maybe sort-of possible that there was a violent pursuit involved, based on something something something. That’s not journalists doing journalism, as you dishonestly suggested when defending them: That is them doing their best Glenn Beck impression.

    At this point I’m not sure which Post article you’re quoting, as there were 2 or 3 different pages being both linked and updated at various times.

    What kind of gibbering fuckwit are you? THE ONE YOU FUCKING LINKED TO AND QUOTED AT THE BEGINNING OF THE RELEVANT THREAD! What the fuck is wrong with you?

    ‘Birth’is a process, not a nice bright dividing line, and issues of bodily autonomy do not end with the end of that process.

    Issues of bodily autonomy pertaining to abortion DO end with that process. Because you can’t abort something that isn’t inside of the woman, and wouldn’t really need to for the same reasons as if it were still inside her. It is a pretty fucking bright line and the fact that you still insist that isn’t casts some doubt on the honesty of the following line:

    I also felt that for technical reasons the answer was a bit simplistic, and made the evident mistake of saying that too. What’s wrong with that? What do want from me?

    Because calling it simplistic implies that it is incomplete or wrong. Just like asserting that isn’t a bright enough of a line for your tastes.

    But no, you aren’t a smug asshole at all. So right, yet so misunderstood.

  113. anteprepro says

    Wow. I fucked up the blockquote, omitted some words, added some unnecessary ones. Well, whatever. I’ve said my borderline incoherent piece. Keep on keepin’ on then.

  114. Rob Grigjanis says

    I must congratulate Chas on his convincing impersonation of the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

  115. dianne says

    Excuse me for dropping in with a nonsequitor, but just wanted to leave the most perfect steaming turd of chivalrous sexism that I’ve seen in a long time. I can not believe that there are people out there that still get away with this sort of shit!

  116. says

    From dianne’s link:

    It was the modern world who began to denigrate, oppress and abuse women by expecting them to put on overalls and work in factories. It was the modern world who began to treat women badly by telling them they had to lower themselves to be equal to men. It was the modern world who abused women and insulted them and treated them as men’s sex slaves by telling them to use birth control chemicals to turn off their natural instincts to conceive and bear new life. It was the modern world which abused and tortured women by expecting them to go to the abortionist to have the children they had conceived ripped out of their bodies for the convenience, economy and continued irresponsible sexual pleasure of the men in their lives.

    Holy historical revisionism, Batman!

  117. mythbri says

    Ah, Patheos.

    I’m going to guess here…

    ….some kind of Christian….

    ….Protestant or Catholic?…..

    I’m gonna say Protestant….

    …..Evangelical?

    Now I’m gonna check and see if I’m right.

  118. chigau (違う) says

    Also from dianne’s link

    How can I count the ways in which women are superior? First of all, they are better than men at communication. They not only know how to talk, but they know how to read body language, interpret silent signals and they do so with expert finesse and empathy. Women are naturally more compassionate and caring than men and are more in touch with their feelings. Women generally look and smell much nicer than men.

    *stunned silence*

  119. says

    Reading that thing, there are plenty of specific things to object to, but what made me most uncomfortable is a more nebulous thing: I got the distinct impression that he considers women an other. His descriptions are all about how women are these strange, fabulous creatures.

    It’s almost like he’s describing elves; graceful and beautiful, innately talented in various ways, intuitive understanding of this or that; wisdom and maturity.

    It’s hard to put a finger on, but it kinda creeps me out.

  120. mythbri says

    @LykeX

    What he’s doing is setting women up for failure. He’s Pedestalizing them. He’s building them up so much that any woman who doesn’t adhere to that mythical, wondrous standard is fair game for abuse and exclusion.

    This is a huge thing in Mormon culture, actually (and I’m sure it is in other religions, too, it’s just that I have direct experience with this).

    With great Pedestalization comes great Responsibility. Mormon women are required to dress “modestly” because they are responsible for putting naughty thoughts in righteous men’s minds. Mormon women are required to serve quietly, reverently, faithfully, without complaint, objection, or shirking her duty. Anything less than that is willingly and consciously accepting imperfection, and that is the Kryptonite of Mormon women. You must be perfect. And since you cannot be perfect, you must strive for perfection. And if you are not striving for perfection constantly, then you are defective.

    Mormon women’s mantra should be this: “Mormonism: When Perfect Just Isn’t Good Enough.”

  121. dianne says

    Rule of thumb I’ve developed for dealing with chivalrous sexism: Anyone who pays you a compliment that limits your options is not really paying you a compliment.

    I think Lyle’s got it right: He sees women as “other”. Not part of the same species, not people with whom he could be a friend and partner, just some mystical being that is inherently different. And “too good” for mere humanity and thus in need of protection. And so the oppression begins-in women’s own interest, of course.

  122. says

    @mythbri
    You’ve got something there:

    Women care much more for children and family and will more often than men have the right priorities when it comes to the most important people in life…
    …women are more mature than men and are quicker to step up and take responsibility and get a job done–especially if it is a job that does not necessarily have anything to do with making money or being the top dog…
    …their natural instincts to conceive and bear new life…

    If those are the qualities of women, then anyone not exhibiting those qualities cannot really be a woman. If you’ve got ambitions beyond being a house wife and baby-making machine, you’re compromising your natural womanly instincts.

    Fuck.

  123. mythbri says

    If you click back, you’ll see that the author is now allowing comments.

    Shockingly, my comment of “Huh. What a load of shit.” has not yet appeared.

  124. says

    I took the liberty of writing a brief reply also. I tried to keep the invective to a minimum (to not give him an excuse), while still keeping the critique strong.

    I’m sure you think your words exhibit praise of women. I don’t think they do. I think your post exhibits a deep alienation from women, coupled with some highly disturbing essentialist notions and a hearty slice of historical revisionism. Quite frankly, I find it offensive.

    To make it clear what I mean:
    You keep talking about women as if they’re some alien species. They have this or that quality, they are so and so. It resembles an anthropological study of a strange tribe, rather than a description of everyday people all around us.

    The essentialism comes through in almost every sentence. You’re constantly talking about how women are this or that and have thus and such “natural instincts”. Not only is this a gross generalization, but it sets up a problematic relationship with any women who does not have these qualities.
    How would you respond to a woman who doesn’t want to have children? Would you consider her unnatural? And if not, then to what degree is the “instinct to conceive and bear life” really natural for women?

    Finally, the entire last paragraph is full of statements so far from the truth that it’s only with the most extreme charity that I refrain from calling you an outright liar. Your relationship with actual history must be tenuous indeed, to allow you to write such nonsense.
    To just pick out one example, my mother has repeatedly told me about what a relief it was for her to get access to reliable and safe birth control. She was certainly not told by anyone to use the pill, she grasped for it as soon as it was available. So did many women, not in order to squelch any natural instinct, but to gain control over their own bodies.
    And I’m not even going to dignify your outrageous mischaracterization of abortion with any more than a dismissive “what have you been smoking?”

    I hope this is simply a result of you not having thought very much about these subjects. I hope that you will reconsider and wise up. I hope you will understand that this post is not flattering of women.
    It’s insulting, disturbing and deeply problematic, to the point where I could easily write another page or two on the flaws of this short piece.

    Let’s see if he lets it through. Considering how tame the displayed comments are, I somehow doubt it. I think when it comes to moderation policy, the good father is an advocate of the old saying: “If less is more, think of how much more more is.”

  125. mythbri says

    @LykeX

    I admire your restraint and your writing – it will be interesting to see if it gets posted.

    I couldn’t stomach the sage head nods and scriptural “proof” that women were “superior” to men, or the woman that thanked him for his condescension and basically just admitted to hoping for a permanent end to their difficult situation.

    How hopeless it is to believe in God.

  126. mythbri says

    Wow, you made it, LykeX! Congratulations, he’s playing the “Ha ha ha, you reacted exactly the way I wanted you to!” game.

    I wrote the piece to amuse and infuriate and stand conventional ideas on their head. It looks like I have succeeded.

    I replied thusly, though you likely won’t see it there:

    Actually, all you did was reinforce conventional ideas. Looks like you failed.

  127. cm's changeable moniker (quaint, if not charming) says

    Now reading: John Wyndham — The Chrysalids.

    (It’s off the back of the NZ thread. Those Sealanders, once they develop telepathy …)

  128. cm's changeable moniker (quaint, if not charming) says

    Test:

    re-reading
    re(re-)reading
    re(re-re-)reading

    (There were more “re-“s in my #669. Not sure where they went.)

  129. says

    Well, it’s been over half an hour and my follow-up still hasn’t gotten out of moderation. Maybe he’s just busy, maybe not. When the next comment clears moderation, we’ll know. In the meantime and for the record, here’s a copy:

    Stand conventional ideas on their head? If that was your goal, you’ve failed miserably.

    Putting women on a pedestal, treating them as aliens, using essentialism to control them, distorting the past to fit your agenda: None of these things are new and revolutionary. This is business as usual. The ideas you lay out here are not only traditional, it’s like I’m reading an opinion piece from the 1950s.

    You’ve reinforced ideas about gender essentialism. Not only is that not new, the exact qualities you’ve picked; in touch with their feelings, caring for children, desire to reproduce; these are ideas that go back generations and are still widely held.

    And you defend your blatant distortions of history by saying you’re trying to “amuse and infuriate”? Well, congratulations, I suppose: Having someone manipulate facts and then act smug when it’s pointed out does infuriate me.

    Why you’d consider that a success, I have no idea.

  130. anteprepro says

    I wrote the piece to amuse and infuriate and stand conventional ideas on their head. It looks like I have succeeded.

    Regressives who think they are iconoclasts are just fucking sad. As are the pathetically unfunny people who jump in over their heads in an argument and then desperately try to find sanctuary in the hallowed halls of Comedy. Because Comedy is so sacred that you can’t be challenged for the bullshit you are pushing as long as you were intending to be humorous while doing so. Comedy is so sacred that you don’t actually have to be funny in order to gain the benefits of its ironclad defenses.

  131. mythbri says

    Looks like both of our replies were posted, surprise surprise.

    The thing is, LykeX, that I think he really believes that he’s “upsetting the status quo” or “bucking the system” by making these ridiculous claims.

    This is incredibly sad, that he thinks that placing women on a pedestal is so revolutionary, because it only serves to illustrate the way in which the Catholic church, and society in general, consider women to be inferior. To put them higher is avant-garde. Even though it is also massively sexist.

  132. chigau (違う) says

    I just commented thus:
    “Are you planning on mentioning your dishonesty when next you confess?”

  133. ChasCPeterson says

    convincing impersonation of the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

    That all you got, Grigjanis?
    bah. ’tis but a scratch.

  134. ck says

    Lovely, the NY Post gets it wrong again, and posts a picture of two people at the Boston Marathon to the front page and says they’re wanted by the Feds. Of course, they’re Arab, and one has a black backpack (the wrong kind). I hope the two people the NY Post put on their front page sue the paper for lots of money and win.

  135. ChasCPeterson says

    But you’re willing to characterize the fact that I own my body and have the right to make decisions about it “absolutism”?

    No, you misunderstand me (my fault). The absolutism I referred to was drawing a magic before-and-after line at ‘birth’ as if that was equivalent to body-autonomy. Once again, it’s a pedantic, technical point only. And no, I don’t know a better line to draw; they’re all somewhat problematic (imo): my point. That’s precisely why I support personal choice over top-down restrictions on abortion.

    Adorable.

    fuck you and your condescension.
    If somebody uses little arrows instead of words, they are inviting misinterpretation. And it makes only a little bit of difference. I acknowledged the ostensible error, but I don’t feel bad about it.

    how the news and police typically use the term

    Evidence? The police never use the term any more (officially) and as for news my guess is that some writers and editors know what the word means and others are as ignorant as you guys apparently are. *shrug*

    READ…

    fuck you and your yelling, jackass. I can read conventional orthography.

    they explicitly said that they didn’t know whether or not his injuries came from the bomb or from being “apprehended”

    Because at the time the report was posted, only a few hours ater the bombs, they didn’t yet know. What’s your problem? If you’re a jouirnalist and you report somebody’s in the hospital, people will always ask “why”? If you know, you report it, if you don’t know, you say so. When you find out, you report that additional information. This is actually ethical journalism, not a “Glen Beck impersonation”.
    Again, you are confusing facts with rhetoric. This seems to be a widespread problem around here.

    At this point I’m not sure which Post article you’re quoting, as there were 2 or 3 different pages being both linked and updated at various times.

    What kind of gibbering fuckwit are you? THE ONE YOU…

    there follows more yelling. Look, dumbass. My first comment on that thread was from the link already posted by WhatGarbl @#31 in that thread. My second comment linked a different page. Later I quoted a different (updated) version of the seconf page. Both were updated and changed a number of times since they were first linked. That’s why your reference was unclear to me. If you had simply pointed to the quote I posted @#79 all would have been clear. OK? Shove your insults into any available orifice.

    calling it simplistic implies that it is incomplete or wrong.

    Something like that. ‘Incomplete’ is closer than ‘wrong’.

    Just like asserting that isn’t a bright enough of a line for your tastes.

    It has nothing to do with ‘taste’. I’m a hair-splitting pedant about physiology, OK? That’s it. I know that prediliction is not shared by other readers, so I elected not to explain further. Do you not like me for that reason? I guess I’ll have to live with it.

    So right, yet so misunderstood.

    yeah, something like that.
    Have a nice day.

  136. ChasCPeterson says

    ck @#677: yeah, that’s pretty bad.
    Not quite as bad as your comment implies (a. the men are not Arabs, b. they were in fact being sought for questioning (as witnesses), and law enforcement had in fact circulated their photos for that reason, but they were never suspects. And the Post never claimed explicitly that they were (in fact they said explicitly that it was unknown if the pictures were of the suspects that the FBI had already announced had been identified, and whose photos were circulated later)).
    But yeah, they went off half-cocked and fucked up. They should be embarrassed.
    Have I mentioned I am no fan of the Post in general?
    None of this changes the fact that they got the story of the Saudi guy right. (With the possible exception of confusing a lot of ignorami by using the term ‘suspect’.)