Sigma Alpha Epsilon has a track record

It’s not the kind of track record you want.

The fraternity now boasts more than 200,000 living alumni, along with about 15,000 undergraduates populating 219 chapters and 20 “colonies” seeking full membership at universities.

SAE has had to work hard to change recently after a string of member deaths, many blamed on the hazing of new recruits, SAE national President Bradley Cohen wrote in a message on the fraternity’s website.

The fraternity’s website lists more than 130 chapters cited or suspended for “health and safety incidents” since 2010. At least 30 of the incidents involved hazing, and dozens more involved alcohol.

[Read more…]

Guest post: On celiac disease, fat deposition, and nonsense on PBS

Originally a comment by quixote on What next, How to Homeopathy?

@m-la, your two links relate to borderline celiac conditions. (I’m a biology prof with quite a bit of knowledge of both nutrition and human physiology, so forgive me for going all “Imma gonna lecture” on you.)

The links have no relation to the claim that GMO foods will somehow alter fat deposition. GMO foods, as far as I’m concerned, have plenty of other problems. (Bad agricultural practices, lower nutritional quality, potential introduction of allergens, lack of long term, independent research demonstrating safety, the list goes on for a while. I did a post on it a while back.)

None of the objections, though, have any relation to fat deposition. Or, for that matter, to causing celiac disease. Aggravating it is a different topic entirely. [Read more…]

Not new, not unique

Two University of Oklahoma students who led the racist chant have been expelled.

Two University of Oklahoma students were expelled Tuesday for their alleged “leadership role” in a racist chant by Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity members, a decision that President David Boren says speaks to his school’s “zero tolerance” policy for such “threatening racist behavior.”

The expulsions come days after the video surfaced and hours before the midnight Tuesday deadline that SAE members were given to pack their bags and get out of their house.

[Read more…]

Biden’s response

Joe Biden issued a statement on the Republican Senators’ letter to Iran:

I served in the United States Senate for thirty-six years. I believe deeply in its traditions, in its value as an institution, and in its indispensable constitutional role in the conduct of our foreign policy. The letter sent on March 9th by forty-seven Republican Senators to the Islamic Republic of Iran, expressly designed to undercut a sitting President in the midst of sensitive international negotiations, is beneath the dignity of an institution I revere.

This letter, in the guise of a constitutional lesson, ignores two centuries of precedent and threatens to undermine the ability of any future American President, whether Democrat or Republican, to negotiate with other nations on behalf of the United States. Honorable people can disagree over policy. But this is no way to make America safer or stronger. [Read more…]

You may not fully understand our constitutional system

The Republicans are such comedians. Hahahahaha they’re sabotaging an agreement that could avert Iran’s development of nuclear weapons, in order to say yaboosucks to Obama. So so funny!

Amy Davidson at the New Yorker has one opinion piece of the many many opinion pieces out there.

Forty-seven senators, all of them Republicans, have sent a letter to Tehranthat might be summarized this way: Dear Iran, Please don’t agree to halt your nuclear-weapons program, because we don’t like Barack Obama and, anyway, he’ll be gone soon. [Read more…]

I am progressive on social issues but dude

I’m reading Steve Almond’s Against Football: One Fan’s Reluctant Manifesto. There’s an interesting bit on page 98:

And I can tell you exactly what happens to any dude who dares to speak out about the moral complexities of football. Here’s a sampling of the e-mails I received after writing such a piece for The New York Times Magazine, printed here verbatim:

OMG. I am progressive on social issues but dude – you are the biggest fucking pussy on the face of the earth. Change your tampon you woman. [Read more…]

A small group of powerful people

Nick Cohen says there’s a scandal at the BBC that nobody dares talk about.

The scandal is simply this: the BBC is forcing out or demoting the journalists who exposed Jimmy Savile as a voracious abuser of girls. As Meirion Jones put it to me: “There is a small group of powerful people at the BBC who think it would have been better if the truth about Savile had never come out. And they aim to punish the reporters who revealed it.” [Read more…]

Real Sooners are not racist

The president of the University of Oklahoma posted his statement on Facebook.

Statement:

To those who have misused their free speech in such a reprehensible way, I have a message for you. You are disgraceful. You have violated all that we stand for. You should not have the privilege of calling yourselves “Sooners.” Real Sooners are not racist. Real Sooners are not bigots. Real Sooners believe in equal opportunity. Real Sooners treat all people with respect. Real Sooners love each other and take care of each other like family members. [Read more…]

Part of a culture of hate

5Pillars thinks the murdered people at Charlie Hebdo had it coming.

There are also no prizes for guessing the winner of the “International” category.

The French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo which was the target of a murderous attack in January won the prize here for its continual stoking of Islamophobic sentiment by caricaturing Muslims as terrorists and ridiculing their beliefs.

Charlie Hebdo’s repeated mocking of Muslims is part of a culture of hate that is intended to marginalise, further alienate and further endanger a community that has effectively been “otherised” in much the same way that Jews were in Nazi Germany.

No it isn’t.

I wonder how much attention 5Pillars pays to the way Ahmadiyya Muslims are treated in Pakistan. I wonder how much attention it pays to the way Christians are treated in Pakistan and Egypt and Nigeria. I wonder what it makes of the fact that the vast bulk of the victims of Boko Haram and Daesh are Muslims, killed dead by Islamists like the ones at 5Pillars.

What disgusting shits they are.

H/t Tendance Coatesy