Comments

  1. AlexanderZ says

    Iyeska, Tony! and everybody else!
    I didn’t know I used a “coded” slur. I’m terribly sorry for that and it won’t happen again.

  6. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    Wasn’t there a helm of opposite alignment in AD&D?

    Given that the majority of people aren’t jerks, and that fedora wearers seem to have a high percentage of jerks among them…

  13. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    pHred,

    I feel for you. Hats of any kind make my head look weird.

  14. jrfdeux, mode d'emploi says

    pHred #12
    I look Amish when I wear a brimmed hat. So I guess I’d better stick to a fez.

  16. anteprepro says

    Iyeska:

    Has michael kellymiecielica ever made one post that isn’t stupid?

    Intriguing question. You know what that means? Google Time!

    http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/03/08/theres-a-secular-argument-for-wearing-underpants-on-your-head-so/

    So…outside of physician assisted suicide, what are the restrictions on male bodily autonomy? I’d like a list please.
    Of the top of my head:
    1. Cases in which the bodily movement would hurt another. (theft, rape, murder etc.)
    2. Cases in which potential harm to another has been deemed to outweigh the respecting of the autonomy, i.e. drunk driving.
    3. Cases in which the legal enforcement of the decision made would be highly problematic, indentured servitude, voluntary “slavery” etc.
    4. Cases of euthanasia in which the person is not dying.
    5. Cases of property rights generated by a person’s labor not being fully respected. I.e taxes.
    6. Cases of what substances that are allowed to be consumed generally, i.e. war on drugs and age restrictions on alcohol, and “sin” taxes.
    7. Cases of working for standards below legally mandated minimums, but above indentured servitude.
    8. Cases in which the autonomy is regulated because of the annoyance to others but does no substantial harm, i.e. noise pollution ordinances.
    9. Cases in which certain things must be purchased, i.e. individual mandate in ACA.
    10. Cases in which the bodily movement does harm to non-human living things, i.e. animal cruelty laws

    And of course every other comment from him is similarly inane.

    http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/09/29/what-happens-when-you-lose-a-piece-of-your-thalamus/

    Professor Myers:
    “Some of the best evidence against dualism is the experience of stroke victims”
    Actually, no it isn’t. Most dualists hold that the Mind and Body interact, and get connected (somehow!) in the brain. Strokes and other classes of brain damage, on a dualistic perspective, demonstrate that the this connection is damaged, not that the mind is identical (or supervenes on) the brain……..

    Sure on a scientific understanding of knowledge, but we are not discussing science are we? What the universe fundamentally is, is not susceptible to the scientific method and must be decided a priori from my view…..

    It is not ad hoc as the interaction, and connection, between Mind and Body has always been part and parcel of dualism since (at least) Descartes formalized the concept in Discourse on Method/Meditations on First Philosophy.

    The last sentence is a sloppy description, at best: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dualism_(philosophy_of_mind)#Descartes_and_his_disciples

    Then there is this, from here: http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/09/23/perception-matters/

    With all respect due, if someone is an honest to blog Marxist/communist that is far more religious/wishful thinking than even the most hard core anarchro-captialist nutters from the right. Marxism is inherently committed to the labour theory of value, which among other things is wrong at first glance , incoherent and has been discredited for at least 100 years. Yet without this theory of value you can not even the motivate basic framework for Marx’s theory. The entire position is a nonstarter because of this issue.

    A grand “NO U” defense of glibertarianism, followed by scurrying away from the turd left in the punchbowl, never to return.

    But, wait, I finally found it. I finally found his one good comment:
    http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/09/18/how-to-protect-journalistic-integrity-in-gaming/

    For the life of me I don’t understand how and why #gamergate even happened. Even assuming that the central “crime” that Zoe is accused as doing occurred, it still isn’t worth getting work up about at all. Even assuming Zoe traded sex for a game review for Depression Quest, while it would be unethical, it shouldn’t have cost anybody anything given that you can play the game for free and really gamers calm down you may have wasted 5 minutes checking out a game! In light of this “crime” not being true, indeed cannot be true it’s so freaken absurd that it even happened.
    Likewise, I literal have no idea why anybody as a problem with Sarkeesian. Look I haven’t watched every single moment of Tropes vs. Women (I’ve seen ~80% of it) but she hasn’t said anything radical, untrue, or really nothing that wouldn’t occur to a person if they thought about the issues for 3 minutes. Why are gamerbros so up in arms about it? At worse you can say some of Sarkeesian’s examples are not the best*, but that’s minor quibbling.

    Eureka.

  18. cag says

    English is a funny language. Take for instance the word “preacher”. It is spelled “preacher”, but is pronounced “scum sucking scan artist with a degree in lying”. Or the word priest – it is pronounced “kiddie fucker”.

  19. jrfdeux, mode d'emploi says

    Tony! #15
    My dad used to wear that sort of hat. He was an old Yorkshireman so it worked for him. Whenever I see an old fellow wearing such, I have bittersweet memories of my dad. It always suited him, maybe because he already had heaps of his own dignity.

    If I put one on I’d look like a Dorky McDork. Dignity is not something he passed on to me. :-)

  20. Ogvorbis says

    I feel wrong when I go outside without a hat.

    Today, I am wearing grey wool trousers. A green twill shirt. A green wool vest (with a subtle plaid). Sandals (I am not doing well with shoes right now). And a brown felt cowboy hat. I look like a six-foot-tall hobbit.

    Tough thing about hats is that they seem to have become stereotypically politicized. A cowboy hat? Right-winger. A trilby? Hipster/dudebro. A baseball cap? Gang banger. A non-sports baseball cap? Redneck trucker.

    Please keep in mind that this was written under the influence of oxycodone and valium.

    I thought my back was doing so much better. So we went to the farmer’s market. And did some shopping (Wife needed buttons for a sweater she just finished). By the time we were coming home, my back was eligible for membership in the International Guild of Knot Tyers. So, back on the muscle relaxants and painkillers.

    I did, however, finish a model yesterday. A 1/72 scale F11C2 Goshawk ( Just like this one).

    And I made a areally good wonton soup.

    Today? Went out for a sub.

    WIfe drove.

  21. jrfdeux, mode d'emploi says

    Sorry, I should qualify my #14 above. I look like a dork wearing MOST brimmed hates, one notable exception being the Aussie Campaign Hat .

    Somehow I look normal, even sharp, wearing one of these. I’ve had one for over 15 years now. Also, I eat Vegemite.

  22. says

    In case anyone didn’t see this posted in another place on FTB:

    October 18, 2014 marks the sixtieth anniversary of the Regency TR-1, the first portable transistor radio. It was horrendously overpriced for the time ($49.95, or $440 today) much like the first walkmen, portable CD players and MP3 players in recent decades. It also wasn’t very good, but people bought it because there was nothing like it. It coincided with the appearance of rock and roll which had a huge impact on sales of it and other radios.

    http://www.regencytr1.com/

  23. says

    Going to the ‘Dome, because I’m going to get a bit shouty on these points:
    cicely

    Napalm Dallas?

    If we evacuated all the people first, I’d be in favor of that. Also Phoenix, Arizona and Las Vegas. Dynamite would also be acceptable. Not because of ebola, but because they’re unsustainable , apallingly poorly laid out blights on the landscape, and need to be done away with sooner than later. There’s no fixing those places; they never should have existed, and need to stop doing so. The people who live there can be adequately accomodated elsewhere, given a bare modicum of sensible organization, which the U.S. is in dire need of anyway in a vast, vast number of areas.
    &nbsp
    via birgerjohansson

    This week saw the first confirmed case of Ebola virus within the United States, the latest development in an outbreak that has already claimed over 3,000 lives.

    This brings me to a topic that I don’t usually talk about, because I try not to think about it, because when I do I collapse into despair. I don’t mean to seem insensitive to the tragedies involved, but Ebola hemmoraghic fever has killed about 3,300 people, ever, since it first entered the human population. That’s bad, and I’m not denying that it’s bad, but I am sick unto fucking death of hearing about it all the goddamn time when hardly anyone talks about tuberculosis, which kills 2-3 million people every fucking year, and which, unlike ebola, there’s already a fucking cure for, that people aren’t getting because of all these fuckheads who pretend that it’s more important that, say, the U.S. have a 12th aircraft carrier than that a few million poor people get to live a few more decades. For the price of just one of the two carriers the U.S. is now building, we could instead provide treatment for every TB victim on the planet roughly 1,500 times over. But that doesn’t make headlines. Ebola makes headlines.

  24. Ogvorbis says

    leftOver1under:

    Wow. Something that I am younger than. Thank you.

    On a slightly related note, does anyone else ever get weird internal dialogue when listening to, say, the Grateful Dead, or early Bob Dylan, or Pete Seeger, or The Weavers, or Glenn Yarbrough on an iPod?

  26. The Mellow Monkey says

    Dalillama @ 23

    If we evacuated all the people first, I’d be in favor of that. Also Phoenix, Arizona and Las Vegas. Dynamite would also be acceptable. Not because of ebola, but because they’re unsustainable , apallingly poorly laid out blights on the landscape, and need to be done away with sooner than later. There’s no fixing those places; they never should have existed, and need to stop doing so.

    In the case of Las Vegas, it’s worth noting that the name isn’t ironic. It was called “the meadows” in Spanish because that’s exactly what the valley had: meadows. There were also artesian wells and wetlands, with the groundwater having now been depleted so much that IIRC the valley has sunk about seven feet. Paiutes spent winters there for around a thousand years and in the 1850s Mormon settlers began farming the land. Yes, it was in the middle of the desert, but it was an oasis within the desert.

    What we see now are the ramifications of horrific abuses of the land and disregard for sustainability. The Meadows could have gone on providing a comfortable, modest life for humans willing to treat the land gently for a long, long time. It’s not just a blight on the land, but a crime against it.

  28. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I did, however, finish a model yesterday. A 1/72 scale F11C2 Goshawk ( Just like this one).

    Ah, models. Loved building the Atlas launch facility/missle back before Project Mercury.
    *Googled “atlas model*, and up popped trains, interesting when responding to Ogvorbis*

  29. Ogvorbis says

    Nerd:

    For a long time, Atlas Toy Company made model trains that were marginally better than Bachmann’s. Which is damning with faint praise at the least. Or an actionable insult at worst. Into the late 1970s and early 1980s, you had your choice of buying shit that you could afford but was, to put it mildly, shit (Bachmann produced an EMD “F7” in both N and HO scale that I think was designed from memory) or you could pay through the nose for wooden kits (lots of tedious cutting and assembling) or brass imports. Then a few other companies (MicroTrains, Kato, InterMountain, and some others) started making high quality affordable models. And Atlas and Bachmann have upped their game to the point that they look as good as, and, in some cases, run as good as or better, than the ones by Kato and MicroTrains. And the prices have, adjusted for inflation, gone down. One of the few cases I can think of in which the magic hand of the free market actually worked. Mostly because there are so many different companies, occupying so many different niches, that there is actual competition and coopetition.

    Sorry for the tangential ramble. Boy and I are getting ready for a table at a model train show in three weeks and we are trying to figure out what shit is worth. Everthing from a Tenshodo brass 4-6-4 Santa Fe prototype in HO to some old Atlas N-scale freight cars with conditions from excellent to ‘how far did it fall?’

  30. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Sorry for the tangential ramble.

    Ogvorbis, this is the thunderdome. Thanks for the lesson.
    You and Boy have a good time. And make sure to get short rests for your back for a while.

  31. says

    Ogvorbis @21

    I much prefer wearing a hat when I’m out, too. Luckily they’re not really politicised here as in the US, though I wouldn’t want to wear cowboy hats or baseball caps anyway (the latter offer very little shade and look gross with my face shape). In winter I wear my own knitted slouch caps and in summer it’s an ongoing search for a cool, shady hat that will survive being stuffed into a backpack. Easier to carry a brolly, ‘cept when the wind’s up.

    Funny thing with seeing guys who I think “Yep, hipster” – I couldn’t give a toss for their interests or attitudes (which I’ve no way of knowing anyway): I’m just pleased to see young blokes smartly and individually dressed and well groomed. Eye-candy for those who like clothes and hats. :)

    I’m sorry about your back! Ow, ow, ow. Even common or garden sore backs are the devil, but torn muscles and all … nope.

    jrfdeux @21

    Sorry, I should qualify my #14 above. I look like a dork wearing MOST brimmed hates, one notable exception being the Aussie Campaign Hat .

    Somehow I look normal, even sharp, wearing one of these. I’ve had one for over 15 years now. Also, I eat Vegemite.

    Huzzah for slouch hats and Vegemite! (Aussie here). :)

    Fedora. Paul Newman. The Sting. What more need be said?

  33. says

    Many of the Same Brain Regions Are Activated When Mothers Look at Their Pets or Their Children

    Countless pet mommies and daddies refer to their dogs, cats or iguanas as their babies, and they fawn over their animals with the fervor of proud, protective and loving parents. Now, a new study shows that those expressions of pet devotion aren’t just for show. They have a significant neurological basis—one that even compares to the mother-human child bond, reports Virginia Hughes for National Geographic:

    Researchers from the Massachusetts General Hospital scanned the brains of 14 women while they looked passively at photos of their young children, photos of their dogs, and photos of unfamiliar children and dogs.

    As it turned out, many areas of the brain involved in emotion and reward processing — such as the amygdala, the medial orbitofrontal cortex, and dorsal putamen — were activated when mothers viewed their own children or dogs, but not when they viewed unfamiliar photos.

    This looks to be a study that subtly reinforces the idea that women are nurturing. Why not study men too?

  37. chigau (違う) says

    Tony!
    Mochi is not, by itself, ‘tasty’. Unless you like the taste of steamed rice.
    But it is very versatile in its application.

  38. says

    Tony! @33

    Countless pet mommies and daddies refer to their dogs, cats or iguanas as their babies, and they fawn over their animals with the fervor of proud, protective and loving parents.

    Oh, so expressing love for an animal is fawning over them, is it? That’s offensive right there. Describing someone as fawning is always an insult.

    Now, a new study shows that those expressions of pet devotion aren’t just for show.

    Who the fuck wrote this? What empathy-deficient PoS who doesn’t think animals matter could spout this garbage? This sort of thing, this dismissal of animals, or of humans who love them, always enrages me.

  40. chigau (違う) says

    Pets matter.
    Pets can be an important part of people’s lives.
    however
    You are NOT your pet’s Mommy and Daddy.
    The pet is NOT your child.
    get a grip

  41. says

    chigau @40:

    Pets matter.
    Pets can be an important part of people’s lives.
    however
    You are NOT your pet’s Mommy and Daddy.
    The pet is NOT your child.
    get a grip

    No one has said that pets are their children. I find your comment dismissive of the love people have for their pets.

  43. says

    Tony:

    I find your comment dismissive of the love people have for their pets.

    It should be dismissive. I went on a serious rant about people referring to their pets as their ‘fur children’ and other crap like that, back in my LJ days. Drives me up a fucking wall. Pets may be many things, but they are not children. FFS.

  44. says

    chigau, seconding Tony: are you talking to me, or referring to the claim made in what he was quoting? It read like the former but I think, and hope, I’m wrong.

    I love my kitties more than any humans in the world, have no liking for children and never wanted any. I do feel the sort of visceral protectiveness toward them, or cats in general, that many people feel toward their children/children generally by extension. Do I consider them my children, or any sort of children? Nope. Do I call myself their mother? Occasionally, usually in the “I am a cruel mother who won’t fill your bowl on demand” context. Ditto furkids, occasionally, as a joke.

    Tony, yeah, fawning according to the Free Dictionary: “To exhibit affection or attempt to please, as a dog does by wagging its tail, whining, or cringing. 2. To seek favor or attention by flattery and obsequious behavior.” It’s a hell of an insult, and totally irrelevant to human behaviour to animals.

  45. says

    2kittehs @44:

    chigau, seconding Tony: are you talking to me, or referring to the claim made in what he was quoting? It read like the former but I think, and hope, I’m wrong.

    Me too.

  46. says

    Iyeska – are you talking people’s love for their pets in general, or the dress-the-pet-as-a-child variety where the animal doesn’t get any sort of respect as what zie is?

    It’s the former, which seems implicit in the piece Tony quoted, that angers me; the supposed surprise that, gosh, people do actually love animals, they aren’t putting on a show, who’da thunk?

  47. ChasCPeterson says

    You are NOT your pet’s Mommy and Daddy.
    The pet is NOT your child.
    get a grip

    Hear, hear.
    Hear!
    Pisses me off.
    Every day I drive past a billboard from some animal-welfare org that actually reads–I am not making this up–“Remember, animals are children too.”
    Um, no, by definition of ‘children’. Grrrr.

  48. Moggie says

    Iyeska:

    Tonight, we watched The Lego Movie, Jodorowsky’s Dune, and Big Ass spider. It was a good movie night.

    The Lego Movie was awesome, of course, and made me want to buy Lego. Maybe I’ll pretend it’s a gift for one of my nieces, as cover.

    One of the IMDB keywords for Jodorowsky’s Dune is “flatulence”, so… ok.

  49. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    Moggie @ 48

    A broadcaster I watch on Twitch is a 27 year old Astrophysics PhD candidate at the University of Hawaii…and he builds Lego sets in his car to pass time in traffic jams during his commute to and from school. Broadcasts Lego builds occasionally too. There’s no shame in being an adult who likes Lego. Lego is teh awesome.

  51. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    Awesome. Frank Lloyd Wright might be a little over-represented in that line but that’s hardly a bad thing. xD

  54. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    I totally built Fallingwater in Minecraft. More or less complete in creative mode: here. And like 3/4 finished on a survival server: here.

    Wish I’d taken more pics of it.

  55. Moggie says

    Sheeit, Seven of Mine, you’ve given me something to aspire to when I have time to return to the Sitosis server next year. (Along with “don’t get PZ killed again by being clumsy around the pigmen”)

  56. chigau (違う) says

    theophontes
    re: saskatoons
    I had some in the garden but the fucking robins ate them all.

  57. Jacob Schmidt says

    Tony, yeah, fawning according to the Free Dictionary: “To exhibit affection or attempt to please, as a dog does by wagging its tail, whining, or cringing. 2. To seek favor or attention by flattery and obsequious behavior.” It’s a hell of an insult, and totally irrelevant to human behaviour to animals.

    I’ve seen the same used to describe parental treatment of children; I’m not particularly upset by such a description of treatment of animals.

    —

    I have a hard time getting into minecraft, lately. I’ve built a few things I’m proud of (all lost now, I’m afraid). But I like challenge. When I first started, survival mode was a decent challenge. Monsters coming out at night and monsters in the cave were heeded. Now, though, there’s no challenge in it, even in hardcore mode; I’ve gotten the hang of dealing with the monsters, so they’re a nuisance, not something to fight against.

  58. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    @ Jacob Schmidt

    If you’re into the survival aspect, you might be interested in some of the mod packs you can find on either AT Launcher or FTB Launcher. There’s one in particular on ATL called Ultra Hard Survival which I consider to be really good. It’s very well balanced. It has just enough tech to make inventory management less tedious but it disables all of the really overpowered armor. It adds a lot of custom monsters and also forces you to have to kill them in order to get stuff they drop which you need to be able to heal.

    You might also consider challenge maps. Google Vechs Super Hostile and you’ll find a ton of pretty brutally difficult maps.

  59. Tethys says

    I came across this news story and decided to share it because it makes me happy, and I have never once seen this actually happen though football teams being bullying assholes who get away with shit because football, is something I have seen many, many, many times. New Jersey school cancels football season!

    ”There was enough evidence that there were incidents of harassment, of intimidation and bullying that took place on a pervasive level, on a wide-scale level and at a level at which the players knew, tolerated and generally accepted,” Superintendent Richard Labbe told reporters Monday night. ”Based upon what has been substantiated to have occurred, we have canceled the remainder of the football season.”

  60. Jacob Schmidt says

    Seven of Mine

    Trying out the ATLauncher tonight; there’s some interesting stuff in there, thanks for telling me about it. I’ll have to play around a bit after trying out Ultra Hard Survival. I’m curious as to how the pokemon pack works.

  61. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    Well that’s good to see, especially since, according to the article, this is a team that’s expected to have some post-season results.

  64. Ogvorbis says

    Dalillama:

    Too late.

    No real point in explaining any of it. I was weaponized by my rapist. Now I am being used as a weapon in a war against PZ.

    Why even bother with anything? The fuckers win. Again.

  65. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Why even bother with anything? The fuckers win. Again.

    Oggie, they only win if they drive you away. The horde, unlike the police, is here to serve and protect, and that includes you. To get to you, they must come through us. *sharpens titanium fang*

  68. Moggie says

    In a similar vein to that football story, the London School of Gaddafi Economics has disbanded its rugby club over a flyer distributed to new students which contained misogynist and homophobic shit.

    In her statement, Buckley-Irvine condemned comments that were “clearly sexist, and demonstrate a culture within a club that is unable to challenge misogyny, sexism and homophobia” and said the members brought shame on the club and LSE’s wider student community. She said: “After considered deliberation and a wide investigation, LSE men’s rugby club will be disbanded for the rest of the academic year and not be allowed to represent LSE or LSESU. They will be withdrawn from any competitions already entered into.”

    This action was taken after the brave heroes responsible didn’t step forward to take responsibility, so it was necessary to punish the club collectively.

  69. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    This action was taken after the brave heroes responsible didn’t step forward to take responsibility, so it was necessary to punish the club collectively.

    Sounds like the “brave heroes” were neither…..Not surprising, bullies are cowards as the end of the day.

  70. Ogvorbis says

    This is off-topic from the slime thread.

    Tethys:

    If given the choice between the two, any person with a functioning brain and moral compass would choose Oggie in a heartbeat.

    Which is where I break down a bit because I wouldn’t.

    Between back pain and medications, I am feeling so depressed right now. And the shit stirring is giving me lots of ammunition for the self-loathing heavy artillery. Sorry.

  71. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Between back pain and medications, I am feeling so depressed right now. And the shit stirring is giving me lots of ammunition for the self-loathing heavy artillery. Sorry.

    If you notice, the horde doing our job of serving and protecting you. If you need some time off, take it, but don’t ever think we don’t think you are anything other than a positive contributor here, and return as quickly as you feel OK about it.

    Better yet, just post recipes for a while, so you keep in touch.

  73. Ogvorbis says

    chigau:

    Saute
    1 green sweet pepper, diced
    1 large onion, diced
    1 stalk celery, finely diced
    1 small carrot, finely diced
    in
    1/4 cup olive oil. Saute gently.

    While that is sauteing, take about a dozen Roma tomatoes and cut an X in the bottom of each one. Dump them into a big pot of boiling water and bring it back to a boil. Let it boil a minute or two. Remove the tomatoes and dunk them in ice water. Slide the skins off, remove any non-red parts, and roughly chop.

    Add anywhere from 1 to ten cloves of diced garlic to the sauteing veggies (depends on your like/love of garlic). Add the tomatoes and about two cups of red wine (I use Gallo burgundy (yeah, I am a philistine)). Bring to a boil and then simmer for a couple of hours on as low a temperature as your stove can handle. If it gets too thick, add some water or wine.

    If your sauce is too chunky, run most of it through a blender, or all of it through a food mill. Add some salt, some red pepper flakes, some oregano, and some basil — amounts vary by taste.

    Serve over hot pasta — this one works really well with long thin pasta — spaghetti, angel hair — and some freshly grated Parmesan Reggiano or, for a stronger flavour, some Romano cheese.

    Enjoy.

  75. Ogvorbis says

    It also works with canned tomatoes. Which, during the non-farmer’s-market season, are actually better.

  76. Tethys says

    Ogvorbis. I am sadly, very familiar with the results of being subject to horrific child abuse. My father is a very sick and twisted man, and I too have to fight to even consider myself a human being at times. The dynamic of abuse is always to blame it on the victim. If an adult puts that much work into making you feel like a worthless piece of garbage, you are going to internalize those feelings. I wish I knew a way to make the shame and feeling of inferiority go away. Please do not beat yourself up that reprehensible assholes are doing their best to trigger you. Let us fight them for you. We know the truth that your heart and morals are those of the proverbial good man.

  77. Janine the Jackbooted Emotion Queen says

    Ogvorbis #64

    No real point in explaining any of it. I was weaponized by my rapist. Now I am being used as a weapon in a war against PZ.

    Why even bother with anything? The fuckers win. Again.

    I will put it this way. If you never started commenting on this blog and never said a word about your past, these same people would still be carrying on in this way. They are not after PZ, Rebecca Watson, FTB and what ever fits in their SJW infested conspiracy world because of you. Your story just makes for a convenient point of contention about how we do not live up to our rhetoric.

    Your past is something that you do have to worry about. But what these people are doing, that is not your fault. And if your were to stop commenting, the slymepitters would still exist and still be loathsome.

    Though I know that is cold comfort.

  78. Funny Diva says

    Hey, Ogvorbis

    I’m so, so sorry about the crap you’re having to deal with on the “turning over a rock” thread.
    There really is no low that slymies won’t stoop below.

    Also, what Nerd said. I value your presence here.

  79. Funny Diva says

    Oh, tomato sauce recipe.

    I made the mistake of draining the tomatoes, and I think my pan was too big. But my sister the foodie swears by this recipe.
    Bucatini with butter roasted tomato sauce

    she sez: “We make it without the butter. Don’t skip the chile flakes or the anchovies. They make all the difference.”

  80. Funny Diva says

    Also, what Janine just said at #77. times a bazillion, jillion.

    they’re total shits for using your past in this way. And they’re totally responsible for choosing to do so. That’s NOT your fault.

    I just wish I had more than “words from a stranger on the internet” to help the bad feelings go away, or at least hurt less.

  82. says

    Ogvorbis

    Any comment I might make would pretty much start by echoing Tethys’ #76.

    A twelve-year old is not responsible for an act which they’ve been groomed by an adult to see as acceptable behaviour. And, of course we shouldn’t hold adults responsible for things they did as children anyway.

    I’m sorry you’re having to deal with this shit.

  83. Funny Diva says

    Well, Chigau

    Not _mad_ mad…
    BIL has congenital hyperlipidemia and avoids stuff like butter.
    I’ve got constitutional see-food-crave-food-eeeeeat-food-reflex, and would rather not gain back more of the 80+ pounds I’ve lost over the last couple of years than absolutely necessary. So, if carmelizing the sugars in the tomatoes and roasting the garlic works for flavor, I’m all for it. That way I can eat the salted caramel oatmeal cookies from my local whole-grain bakery on the days they bake ’em. (or, really, any of their oatmeal cookies pretty much. And their brownies, which are *loaded* with buttah!)
    Here…have some of this butter I no longer buy!

  84. chigau (違う) says

    Funny Diva
    I am sad for you.
    I gratefully accept your offer of butter.
    Your local bakery sounds *awesome*.

  85. FossilFishy (NOBODY, and proud of it!) says

    I would trust you with my seven year old daughter Ogvorbis. There is literally no greater trust that is mine to give. You are a person, an adult, who is more than the acts you were groomed to do. I’m so sorry that you can’t see that. But please do us the honour of accepting that some of us can see you for the whole you’ve become.

  86. Funny Diva says

    it is terribly awesome, Chigau! They grind their own flours, and hand out sample slices of their delicious breads du jour–with BUTTAH! Which is how I get my buttah fixes without actually, you know, buying pounds of the stuff, and eating an entire loaf of sourdough toast with buttah over a single weekend when I do not ever change out of my PJ’s into leaving-teh-house clothes.
    And their cinnamon-chip/swirl bread makes amaaaaazing French toast (which I’m sure isn’t actually French…it’s just what it’s called hereabouts…)

    don’t be sad for me, I’m no longer a thin(ish) person trapped in a much-too-heavy body! I’m a thin(ish) person who can run to catch the bus without wheezing and feeling 25+ years older than my calendar age! (and I can visit the bakeries…yes, there’s one upstairs from the bread place that makes to-die-for layer cakes with delish ganache icings and fillings…and they’re in the same place as my branch public li-berry where I gets my books to read while eating buttered toast in my PJs!)

  87. says

    Ogvorbis:
    What everyone else said applies to me too. You were groomed and manipulated at a young age by a rapist to become a rapist. You’ve shared events of your past that you feel guilty for. I recognize that. Even when you were older though, that grooming was fully in play. Since then, you’ve felt tremendous guilt and you’ve refused to allow the people who manipulated you to have any further control over you. The guilt you feel over your actions shows that you’re not that person. You’re a responsible, empathetic, compassionate person. You’re not a bad person. You have my respect and I hope to keep reading you here.

  88. Lofty says

    The full moon’s gone a really neat blood red colour tonight. Is this supposed to be a portent of something? Just need to know so I can get out my anti zombie suit in time.

  91. Lofty says

    Daz

    (Jesus is coming. Everybody look busy!)

    Aah, only one zombie then. Just the safety specs required.

  94. Xaivius says

    @Jacob Schmidt

    PEOPLE BE TALKIN’ BOUT MINECRAFTS IN THE DOME! AW SHIT!

    Check out agrarian skies on the FTB launcher for an interesting skyblock experience. I Believe Vib Ribs Skyden for 1.2.5 is also up on the Technic Launcher as well! >w>

  95. Pierce R. Butler says

    Somebody has simply Gone Too Far:

    Sam Harris:I suspect that among his [Ben Affleck’s] handlers there is a fan of Glenn Greenwald who prepared him for his appearance [on Bill Maher’s mess of a show] by simply telling him that I am a racist and a warmonger.

    ‘Fess up now, and maybe the Brave Hero Police will tell the judge to go easy on you.

  97. ChasCPeterson says

    Interesting. i just noticed that Coyne’s website* has disappeared from the Pharyngula sidebar blogroll.

    *(Why Jerry** Is Cool)

    **(also cats, but mostly Jerry)

  98. says

    Totally off topic from what has been written here before, I am afraid I do not really dive into Thunderdome very often, but I thought some people might be interested in this story:
    http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/tanya-tagaq-says-she-was-sexually-targeted-by-man-in-winnipeg-1.2793123

    Inuk throat singer Tanya Tagaq took to Twitter today to share the fear she felt when a man followed her on the streets of Winnipeg in broad daylight, asking her for sex.

    “I was in Winnipeg for the ballet, walking to lunch, when a man started following me calling me a ‘sexy little Indian’ and asking to f–k,” the Polaris Prize-winning artist tweeted Wednesday afternoon.

    Tagaq told CBC News the man started to follow her after he failed to get her attention by telling her she was beautiful. His comments quickly became vulgar, and Tagaq said she had to duck into a shop to escape.

    It is a common story, an every day occurrence, but I was glad the CBC had a story about it. The comments are sadly full of the usual dismissive types, that there are more important problems, that it was just a weirdo, and so on.

  100. Owlmirror says

    i just noticed that Coyne’s website* has disappeared from the Pharyngula sidebar blogroll.

    I checked the Internet Archive, and I see that as of 2014-09-10, both his site and RichardDawkins.net were on the sidebar, and both no longer were as of 2014-09-23.

    Could something have happened somewhere in there?

  103. birgerjohansson says

    Just finished reading Richard Kadrey’s last novel “The Getaway God”. James Stark is cooler* than Philip Marlowe and Mike Hammer. And unlike the fedora-wearing scuzzbags in the slymepit he is totally cool with strong women.
    *with razor-sharp wit that makes him cooler than John Constantine Hellblazer. Kadrey is a wordsmith.
    .
    Shortly after I had read an article in The Raw Story about out-of-control cops, I got to the chapter where Stark is stopped by vigilante cops who proceed to rough him up.
    At this moment in the narrative, one of the Elder Gods that has been chasing Stark catches up, and the loose-cannon officers don’t duck fast enough (ZZZAP! A few ozone molecules remain in the now empty street).
    It might seem childish, but this cheered me up after hours of being in a dark mood from reading the news story. Also, the book is recommended for people raised in an environment where people take religion too seriously. The surviving god fragments left of Jahve are as competent as Homer Simpson.

  105. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    So you can grow more cats? Or are you growing cans of catfood?

    Or litter for litter boxes?

  108. chigau (違う) says

    theophontes
    I have never heard of anyone growing saskatoons from seed, good luck.
    They can grow almost anywhere but if you want to be able to reach the fruit, full sun is best.
    They can get *really* tall.
    They also send out runners *everywhere* and a pretty much impossible to get rid of, once established.

  110. says

    @ chigau

    Well, you’ve seen the size of my roof garden. That is all the space I have to play with. They’ll probably be grown either hydroponically, or aeroponically, so that should give me a modicum of control.

    Don’t worry about the robins, there are none around here AFAIK. Hopefully cockatoos don’t eat saskatoons…

  113. Funny Diva says

    Hello, ‘dome!

    Anyone else having problems with FTB just now? It’s suddenly either being excruciatingly slow to load or returning 502:website offline errors.

    Just curious. I’m sure if it’s a DDOS attack tech is probably already aware of it…

  115. says

    Girls and boys: the myth of hard-wired sex differences

    Myths about differences between the brains of men and women never seem to die, and the most popular ones raise real issues for women in tech, math and science.

    The most recent entry in the gender-brain sweepstakes is the BBC, with a series called “Is Your Brain Male or Female?” Stories and interviews about the series have already been featured in the U.S. on public radio stations.

    In one such interview, Michael Mosley, a British physician and BBC TV host, claimed that “studies” have found that men are better at “systemizing,” while women are better at empathizing. As a BBC.com post explains: “In other words, men are often more adept at discovering the rules that govern a system … Women, on the other hand, are thought to be better at guessing other people’s emotions and responding appropriately. They would be more likely to comfort you in a time of crisis.”

    Have “studies” actually found this to be true? In fact, no. One study has, but it has been widely debunked.

    […]

    Parents may be involved, quite unconsciously, in creating a gender bias in science and tech learning years before their kids ever even see the inside of a science classroom.

    Are boys’ brains more suited to math and science than girls’ brains? Many of us think so, including teachers and parents.

    For example, teachers of sixth-grade math students believed that boys were more talented at math than girls, even when the actual kids in their classes scored equally on tests. Parents of sixth-graders had less confidence in daughters than in sons — regardless of their girls’ actual abilities and performance scores. This attitude held true even when girls had higher grades in math than boys. Teachers and parents, it seems, often ignore the reality in front of their eyes and see, instead, the stereotypes.

    So do the kids themselves. In the third and fourth grades, boys and girls like math equally. There’s no change in fifth and sixth grade for boys, but girls’ preference declines. Between fourth and 12th grades, the percentage of girls who say they like science decreases from 66 percent to 48 percent. In those same years, the percentage of girls who say they would prefer not to study math any more goes from nine percent to a whopping 50 percent.

    […]

    The truth is that we are learning more about the brain every day, thanks to new technology. We can indeed find some different patterns in the brains of men and women; they may or may not be significant. Just finding a difference means little. The simple fact of a structural difference means nothing unless it can be proved that such a difference has some real consequence.

    Remember, we thought for years that a very real structural difference — men’s greater brain size — was important to human intelligence, and it turned out to be of very little consequence. But that mistake kept women out of universities for years.

    Cordelia Fine sees myths dressed up as science propagating a dangerous new conventional wisdom about the limitations of girls and women in math and science.

    In her book, “Delusions of Gender,” she calls much of popular gender-difference theories “neurosexism.” She notes that “the idea of hardwired sex differences is very confidently presented as ‘fact’ by many popular writers. Unfortunately, claims about [such] differences may be a particularly effective way of reinforcing the gender stereotypes that influence us in self-fulfilling ways.”

  117. says

    1984 inspired ‘Unpocket’

    The Kickstarter for the UnPocket and The Affair’s line of 1984-inspired clothing recently wrapped up at £47,427— nearly double its £25,000 goal. Once again, denizens of the Internet have made it clear that they value their privacy by supporting the “big brother”-blocking clothing technology the line offers—it’s supposed to block cell, WiFi, GPS, and RFID signals. But how well does it actually work?

    Perfectly, as far as I could tell. For those of you who are unaware, the UnPocket is the little pouch in the image above that, when closed, blocks signals to and from the devices inside. It works in conjunction with the “1984″ clothing line, as each piece of Orwell-inspired attire—a blazer, a jacket, pants, and a button-front shirt—has pockets that line up with the snaps on the UnPocket to hold it in.

  122. Lofty says

    Kibble bushes will of course have well developed claws (thorns) on their lower limbs to reduce the possibility of being moved from a warm and sunny bed.

  125. says

    Anne @104

    theophontes,

    The tardigrade family Phontes have seven cats.
    (I have ordered seeds online.)

    So you can grow more cats? Or are you growing cans of catfood?

    Kitties can be grown from seed?

    MUST HAVE

    I had a little cat-tree, nothing would it bear
    But a silver tabby and a gold longhair

    The King of Spain’s daughter
    came to visit me
    and all for the sake of of my little cat-tree

  126. Nick Gotts says

    Pierce R. Butler@95,

    Sam Harris:I suspect that among his [Ben Affleck’s] handlers there is a fan of Glenn Greenwald who prepared him for his appearance [on Bill Maher’s mess of a show] by simply telling him that I am a racist and a warmonger.

    Well maybe so – after all, Ben Affleck may not be particularly familiar with Sam Harris, who while well-known in some circles, is somewhat less than world famous. But what’s Harris’s problem with someone telling Affleck the simple truth?

  128. Akira MacKenzie says

    I tried to post the following on the North Star article, but it appears that comments are down for the moment. Since I don’t like the idea of letting an hour’s work go to waste:

    I have a confession to make: I used to write for a college paper just like this back at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee:

    I was a young, foolish, late-teenager raised on a steady diet of suburban/rural conservatism and Rush Limbaugh. In high school I had read what a horrible place academia had become with its “PC thought police” suppressing free speech (we didn’t have FREEZE PEACH back then) and Marxist professors flunking God-fearing, free market, American students who stood up for “the Truth.” Therefore, when I came upon my first issue of The UWM Times, I was drawn in by it’s apparent bravado and absolute stand against all things “liberal.”

    I started out contributing an piece here and there then I was let on as a staff opinion writer while pulling double-duty as a delivery boy, dropping papers off at the various boxes across campus. As memory serves, the staff was largely made up of business majors, a smattering of humanities majors, more than a couple law-enforcement students, ex-military “adult students” in on the GI bill, but few if any actually journalism students. The content of The UWM Times was exactly like the North Star: so-called news stories that claimed to expose university “corruption (i.e. they’re spending money on programs that we don’t like), editorials and opinion pages that would have made Fox News envious, and various “satirical’ ads and articles that targeted various university officials, professors, student leaders, and left-leaning student groups. We did have an decent sports page, but the book and movie reviews on our entertainment pages were tainted by our paper’s ideology. Pervading it all was this frat-boy mentality that case us as rebels standing up to the entrenched left-wing college establishment with it’s army of sycophantic, easily-duped, students; no commie, femi-nazi, cry-baby-minority, queer-mo-sexual, environmentalist, atheist, multiculturalist was going to tell US what to say and do. (Sound familiar?)

    Then, our Opinion Editor–a very scary fellow named Ed Buck–stuck in a piece on the O.J. verdict where he wrote that the only way Simpson got off because the jury wanted to prevent another L.A. riot because Mark Fuhrman used the word “Nigger.”. He followed up with a comment asking that his usage would touch off riots “in the core.” You can imagine the response: Angry students massed at our office door; we ended up on the local news; Buck, the Editor-in-Chief, and several others resigned. The Black Student Union along with several other student minority groups held a rally in the commons demanding the chancellor punish us. Meanwhile, many of the few hangers-on (including myself, sadly) ate it up: “See! The liberals are opposed to FREE SPEECH! Sure, what Buck wrote was out of bounds, but we have every right to publish it!” (Sound familiar?)

    Nothing happened officially to us, but the business community, for whom we relied upon for ad revenue, decided that they they just didn’t want their bars and restaurants associated with a racist paper. Soon just about the only money we had coming in was from national right-wing groups and beer ads. The remaining students didn’t have the layout knowledge or writing skills to put out a readable product on a weekly basis, and no new students joined to fill in the growing gaps. Even the local branch of College Republicans, who started and supported The Times, abandoned us. Soon our staff was down to four people trying to put out a paper every two-weeks, then every three…. About a year after the “Ed Buck Incident” we closed down shop.

    I don’t look back to my days at The UWM Times with pride. Hell, I don’t look back to my teens-to-early-twenties with any pride at all. I hate the smug, bigoted, loud-mouthed 16-to-24-year-old me, and I’m pretty sure he’d hate the far-more liberal and atheist 40-year-old-me. So fuck you younger me!

    Anyway, PZs description of the current North Star, with it’s infrequent publishing schedule and scant staff, reminds me a lot of the last semester of The Times. I got a feeling they’re circling the drain and will not be troubling the Morris campus with it’s bullshit any longer. If so, then good riddens, maybe this Geiger character can get find something productive to do with his life… though I doubt it.

  130. says

    I always seem to go into moderation. Is it because I address Michael directly? He never answers me anyway… I’ll just back it up here for truth.

    …

    Your comment is awaiting moderation.

    @ Michael Nugent

    [cross posted from Pharyngula for the good order]
    ”
    Interesting series on feminism being broadcast by France24 (pronounced: fRaans vaarn kaart) … Link: Emma Watson, feminism’s new poster girl.

    In one of the interviews they even bring up “Dear Muslima” [see the Laura Bates interview]. I would be fascinated to know what goes through someone like Michael Nugent’s mind, when he sees such TV programs. He is on the wrong side of history. When will the penny drop?

    ”
    Also:
    I see rape-victim-blaming john welch‘s little dog-whistle is still up there at #6. You may struggle to back-peddle all the standards you have accepted on your blog Michael. I had thought that you condemned such.
    Your blog is not a safe haven for such, surely?

  132. Morgan!? Militant Pacifist says

    Iyeska,
    ???? Fifteen books??????? Elvis spraying???????? felinicide??????

    How dumb am I going to feel when you explain this?

  133. The Mellow Monkey says

    Morgan!?, from context I’d assume that Elvis is a male cat who sprayed pee on fifteen books.

    Iyeska, my sympathies. My partner and I have had this exact conversation repeatedly over the past few weeks:

    “Cat did [bizarre/annoying/destructive cat behavior].”
    “Ugh. Why are cats even a thing?”

    We have yet to find an answer to this question.

  134. says

    Morgan, one of my cats is named Elvis. Elvis has a thing about spraying all over my bookshelves. I normally have them protected, at least the bottom shelves, but one shelf I forgot about, and the books were literally dripping with cat piss. No way to save them. I might kill that fucking cat.

  135. says

    TMM:

    “Ugh. Why are cats even a thing?”

    Good question. Terry Pratchett had the right of it, in that if cats were ugly, we’d see them for the evil creatures they are. Normally, I’d put Elvis, Sinister, and Teddy back out on the front porch, but we just got that set up with grow lights and it’s stuffed full of everything we saved from the garden. Fucking cats.

  136. chigau (違う) says

    Ah, but the Real™ question is, “Which books?”
    Perhaps Elvis is a Literary Critic.

  137. Ogvorbis says

    Saw my doctor today. I go back to work, half-time, on Sunday. I got new prescriptions for muscle relaxers and painkillers. And worker’s comp said no to the pharmacy. So I called workers comp. And the person who can actually change that won’t be in until Monday. So rather than taking the milder painkillers, I will be taking the strong shit. Friday afternoons are not the best time to actually get a decision on anything.

  138. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    So rather than taking the milder painkillers, I will be taking the strong shit.

    Can you cut the pills in half?

  140. Ogvorbis says

    Fuck. Monday is Columbus Day. The OWCP office will be closed on Monday. So it’ll be Tuesday before I can get this shit straightened out. Or I pay cash for the meds and hope that I can get reimbursed sometime in the next six months.

  141. Morgan!? Militant Pacifist says

    Iyeska,

    Aaahhhh, now I understand. Being a dog person and never having been owned by cats my familiarity with their destructive propensities is limited. And yeah, I feel a little dumb. I hope the lost books are either not important or replaceable.

    Ogvorbis, glad you are healing but sorry for the screw ups. Worker’s comp/pharmacies fall under Murphy’s Law.
    I hope you are all better soon.

  142. says

    Chigau:

    “Which books?”

    Guilty as Sin, Tami Hoag
    Echo Burning, Lee Child
    Invisible Prey, John Sandford
    Future Shock, Alvin Toffler
    Poirot Investigates, Agatha Christie (First Edition, that)
    Reliquary, Preston & Child
    Red Light, T. Jefferson Parker
    Twice Shy, Dick Francis
    Certain Prey, John Sandford
    Blue World, Robert McCammon
    Fear Street: The Stepsister, R.L. Stine
    Nightmare in Pink, John D. MacDonald
    Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert
    Ray Bradbury Presents Dinosaur World, Stephen Leigh
    Land of the Giants, Murray Leinster

  143. says

    Ogvorbis:

    Fuck. Monday is Columbus Day.

    *spits on Holiday*

    The OWCP office will be closed on Monday. So it’ll be Tuesday before I can get this shit straightened out. Or I pay cash for the meds and hope that I can get reimbursed sometime in the next six months.

    Aw, fuck, that sucks. I get stuck with the cost of my meds, Blue Cross doesn’t cover scrips.

  144. Ogvorbis says

    Iyeska @143:

    Ah, c’mon. A national celebration for the contact that, over the next 300 years, killed ~99% of the people living in the Americas? How could anyone object to that?

  145. chigau (違う) says

    Iyeska
    hmm.
    eclectic.
    Pissing on Toffler, I can understand but a first edition Agatha Christie?
    demon cat

  146. says

    Ogvorbis:

    How could anyone object to that?

    Happy Genocide, Everyone!

    Chigau:

    Pissing on Toffler, I can understand

    Well, that was a first edition too. Future Shock seems less nutty now than it did in 1970.

  147. says

    On the Whiteness Project-white people talk about being white.

    As a self-deprecating punchline, “white people” pretty much peaked last decade. Now American caucasians are getting serious about their skin color: at this point they literally believe that they face more discrimination than people of color do. (Though they probably aren’t getting pepper sprayed in their own homes by cops who think they’re burglars.)

    Into this charged atmosphere comes the Whiteness Project, an online documentary series that could easily be mistaken for satire were it not for the involvement of PBS and filmmaker Whitney Dow’s assurances that he is “deadly serious about this.” Dow plans to interview 1,000 “white people from all walks of life and localities” about how they “experience their ethnicity.” The first 24 of those interviews were conducted this summer in Buffalo, N.Y.

    Dow may have a point when he argues that white people who want “to participate in changing the racial dynamic in this country” are “going to have to deal with their own shit first.” The problem is, a lot of his subjects aren’t talking about their race—they’re criticizing minorities.

    Here, for example, is a woman who opens with the clause “If we’re going to talk about black men generally,” and describes her fear at being followed by them because she offered a friendly smile out of politeness. Or how about this dude, who says he has “a lot more respect than some of these other races around here.” And let’s not forget the guy who accuses non-whites of failing to support their own ethnicity from within their communities.

  148. says

    From our own vantage, it looks as if he was attempting a serious exploration of white identity in the tradition of Richard Dyer, but white people found a way to ruin it: by speaking their minds.

    That doesn’t surprise me at all.

  149. Arren ›‹ neverbound says

    Oh, FFS.

    We Americans already have a Whiteness Project: the lion’s share of our mass media.

  155. says

    I didn’t know (or possibly had forgotten, having chronic CRS syndrome*) you’re in Oz, Lofty!

    The Zombie Shuffle was held here in Melbourne, too – I managed to miss it entirely, didn’t even know it was on till I looked just now.

    OT, is the kitty in your gravatar your kitty? Zie looks like Joe Grey.

  160. Lofty says

    2kittehs

    So, does Tansy have tortitude?

    Bucket loads of it! I don’t think I’ve ever met a cat with her zest for living before. The only cat I’ve had that gallops across a wooden floor just to be exuberant. A real treasure.

  162. says

    LGBT activists on the front lines of the Hong Kong protests

    Thousands of protesters sit peacefully on the streets of the Causeway Bay shopping district despite the earlier downpour. The chants of ‘Leung Chun-ying, ha toi [step down]’ quieten down as gay singer Anthony Wong starts to perform.

    He shouts, ‘We need to be in unity… it is not just Occupy Central or a student boycott anymore, it has become a citywide movement.’

    And in this movement of black T-shirts, hundreds of pink activists are on the front line of the battle for democracy.

    Tommy Chen, spokesperson for LGBTI rights group Rainbow Action, told GSN it was hard to have an LGBTI movement without democracy.

    ‘The queer community actually understands this quite well, so that’s a reason the queer community in Hong Kong has been involved in the social movement for over 10 years,’ he said.

    The group is a member of one of the protest organizers Civil Human Rights Front, which Chen said had a ‘disproportionately high’ number of LGBTI volunteers and organizers.

    More than 20 Rainbow Action members have been taking turns to maintain a 24-hour presence at all four protest sites.

    Occupy Central started on Sunday amid a week-long student strike, demanding Beijing grant universal suffrage and civil nomination in the 2017 electoral reform as promised in Hong Kong’s constitution.

    Billy Leung, who successfully challenged Hong Kong’s discriminatory age of consent for gay sex in 2006, has been transferring and distributing donated supplies and making placards since the first day.

    He said, ‘LGBT Hongkongers have no legal protection from discrimination even though a good majority of people favor it to be outlawed. This view is also reflected in our legislature, only half of which is democratically elected.

    ‘The progress is held back by the other half, consisting of special interest and business groups representing 3.2% of the population. This is just one of the many human rights examples why democracy is paramount, not only for LGBT Hongkongers but to all of Hong Kong.’

    LGBTI activist Lee Faulkner, a British actuary who has lived in Hong Kong for three years, was tear-gassed at the protest.

    He said, ‘I went along to the protests on Sunday night and was, for the first time in my life, genuinely terrified. I’ve never tasted tear gas before, nor seen riot police in their menacing kit holding guns for plastic bullets. The atmosphere was frightening.’

    ‘I will continue to go to the protests every day until they end – just “being there” and adding numbers to support everyone else is enough.’

    Henness Wong, who volunteers for several LGBTI rights groups, said his conscience made him join the protest.

    He has been manning a first aid point between the government offices in Admiralty and the Central financial district since Sunday.

    Wong said, ‘I helped to organize the supplies and resources points. When the medical supplies arrived, along with other first aiders, registered nurses and doctors, we set up the first aid points.

    ‘Monday was eerily uneventful after the 87 tear gas bombs the day before, so the medical team had plenty of time at hand. So I collected trash and recycled in Statue Square throughout the day.’

    Wong has spent more than 20 hours on the streets in the past four days in the heat and rain. Why does he do it?

    ‘Democracy empowers all people to decide on someone who can represent their voices and needs,’ he said.

  164. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    I need to start cataloging those stories for the benefit of the breed of rape apologist who claims that rape is largely the result of misunderstandings about consent that happen in the heat of the moment. These are clean cut, “respectable” guys from “good homes” advocating in advance for explicitly ignoring the expressed wishes of the women they’re with.

  165. Saad says

    “No means yes if you know how to spot it” – Rush Shit for Brains Limbaugh

    Seduction used to be an art, now of course it’s “brutish” and it’s “predatory” … [According to Ohio State policy,] consent must be freely given, can be withdrawn anytime, and the absence of “no” does not mean “yes.” How many guys, in your own experience with women, have learned that no means yes if you know how to spot it? … Are these [policies] not lawsuits waiting to happen?

  168. says

    How do you get from a child holding a crayon like a gun to that child having suicidal thoughts or a desire to kill others? Chain of logic?

    http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/10/alabama-school-makes-5-year-old-sign-agreement-stating-she-wont-kill-or-commit-suicide/
    The mother, identified only as Rebecca, states the child was forced to sign the agreement after she reportedly pointed a crayon at another student like it was a gun.

    “They told me she drew something that resembled a gun,” said Rebecca. “According to them she pointed a crayon at another student and said, ‘pew pew’.”

    After the alleged incident, the child was given a questionnaire to evaluate her for suicidal thoughts and asked if she was depressed while her mother waited in the school lobby after being called to the school.

    Without asking for permission, Rebecca said her child was then given a Mobile County Public School Safety Contract to sign stating she wouldn’t kill herself or others. As a 5-year-old, she cannot legally sign a contract in Alabama.

    “Most of these words on here, she’s never heard in her life,” Rebecca said, adding that her daughter asked her afterward what ‘suicide’ is.

  169. says

    This happened on FOX News?!

    http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/10/fox-news-host-grills-tony-perkins-whats-the-damage-to-you-if-your-neighbors-are-gay-married/

    Following the Supreme Court’s decision last week not to hear appeals against rulings that struck down same-sex marriage bans in five states, Fox News Sunday invited Perkins and conservative attorney Ted Olson to debate the issue.

    “Marriage is not to affirm adults, it’s for the protection of children,” Perkins argued. “And if love is the only factor, where do you draw the boundaries?”

    Olson, who argued in favor of marriage equality before the Supreme Court last year, noted that the court had said that the thousands of children in same-sex households also mattered.

    “They deserve the right to equality, and the same respect and decency that other people have that are living right next door,” Olson noted.

    “Well, we know from the social science that children do best with a mom and a dad,” Perkins said. “If love is the factor, what boundaries are there?”

    “Do you want the sky to fall because because two people that are living next door to you?” Olson asked. “Court after court has said that allowing people of the same sex to marry the person that they love and be a part of our community, and to be treated equally does no damage to heterosexual marriage. And what court after court after court has said [is] that children living in a same-sex relationship do as well or better that people in other communities.”

    After Perkins went back to his “boundaries” talking point that marriage equality was a slippery slope, Fox News host Chris Wallace demanded to know what he was trying to suggest.

    “What are you suggesting?” Wallace asked. “That there’s going to be polygamy, that people are going to be marrying their pets?”

    “I didn’t say that,” Perkins replied defensively.

    Is this opposite day?

  171. says

    Lofty @160

    Bucket loads of it! I don’t think I’ve ever met a cat with her zest for living before. The only cat I’ve had that gallops across a wooden floor just to be exuberant. A real treasure.

    Awwww! :)

  173. Howard Bannister says

    Tony @169

    It’s pretty wild to see Fox News doing that… but my money says that they’re trying to triangulate. They know they’ve lost, and they’re trying to signal ‘we’re the MODERATE Republicans, and we include gay people!’

  176. says

    Okaaay … just looked at a job ad online that said the candidate had to have a suitable presentation and manor.

    Manor? If I had a manor I wouldn’t be looking for admin jobs!

    Sometimes I wonder if they put these bizarre typos in to see if people will say “By the way, you got this, this and this wrong in your ad. Want a proof-reader?”

  177. says

    chigau @175:
    I cannot tell a lie.
    I ated it.
    Twas tasty.
    Could have used more garlic and a dash of hot sauce though.

    ****
    2kittehs @176:
    Perhaps the ad was supposed to read “[…] suitable presentation and manors”?

  178. chigau (違う) says

    My feet hurt.
    my wrist hurts
    knees
    shoulders
    lower back
    my ex-tooth hurts
    my kitteh is still dead
    my back-pack is still in Japan and it will stay there
    .
    I want to punch something.
    Who has a target?

  179. chigau (違う) says

    Tony! #177
    My comment had a link to a yutub video.
    On futher thought, it might be better that you youngsters not know about it.

  181. says

    Dalillama – I’ve been sooooo tempted to do it for jobs I don’t want. When I see stuff like that (never mind the proliferation of apostrophes) I just think, “I Do Not Want to work for these people.”

    Centrelink might not approve, though.

    Tony! – cor, I’d love to have manors, plural. :)

    chigau – ::hugs:: for you because of your kitteh.

  182. says

    [ Kobani ]

    I am rather disconcerted at the lack of support for the YPG. There is some little bombing about the periphery, more show than force. Yet the USA … anyone really… has the means to arm the YPG, even in the very inaccessibility they currently experience.

    If Americans were trapped, there would not be so much beating around the bush. The YPG can quite easily be supported, both in terms of medical equipment, as weaponry.

    I have been thinking of robotic parachutes. These would be trivially simple to design (certainly less complicated than autonomous multirotors or UAV’s). A little googling indicates that similar devices already exist as off-the-shelf options. The US Army has a Joint Precision Airdrop System (JPAS) program that can deliver highly accurate parachute payloads.

    There are commercial options (Link here: Onyx, Autonomously Guided Parachute Systems) that are immediately available and could be deployed without delay. The linked system could deliver much needed medicines and defensive weapons, that could prevent, not only many deaths of good people, but undermine the murderous momentum of the Daesh. A single payload on a C130 could turn the current war around quite dramatically.

    I am not sharing any special insight here. The available options should be obvious to the military. The issue is rather: why is such an initiative not being undertaken? That question should be raised with much urgency.

  183. says

    theophontes

    why is such an initiative not being undertaken?

    Because it doesn’t give the Joint Cheifs a collective hardon the size of a nuclear submarine the way American soldiers killing and dying does. Also, it doesn’t involve fat cheques to bloated military contractors for ludicrously overpowered and absurdly overcomplicated weapon systems, since insurgents and militias haven’t got the logistical structure to use things like F-33s and carrier battle groups. (No one really has a need for something like that, but that’s different from being able to use it).

  186. JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness says

    So, I’m putting this here and not in the You Get Email thread but I do not want it to turn into another thread about lazinessevolved.

    lazinessevolved, that’s great that you’re saying the letter was eye-opening and are at least willing to change. Of course, I highly recommend lurking around to learn more. However, I have a huge goddamn problem with every fucking comment of yours in that that thread.
    #10

    To whomever wrote this letter, I am sorry about what I said yesterday and any reminder it may have given you of the wrong sorts of men out in the world. I won’t try to argue or justify my point of view, or to make claims about not being “one of those guys”…I am just sorry that it had this effect on you and I hope you can forgive me for it. If I am saying things that can make any woman think of guys like that, then I need to learn a lot about how to phrase my beliefs. I’m not there yet it seems, but one day I hope to be.

    Good start, then…that bullshit. The next comment you do say you’re also re-evaluating your point of view but…

    #17

    drst @ 13
    I feel like an asshole and I am sitting here trying to reevaluate not just my phrasing but also my point of view on this. If it made this person feel this way, then it’s not the way I want to be. It doesn’t really matter to me if you or others want to crow about it, what matters to me is trying to improve who I am as a person and not causing harm to others. My words hurt this person, and that was shitty of me. I want to not be that guy, and deep-down I believe I am not that guy, but it is clear that what I said yesterday conveys the opposite.
    This person’s well-spoken thoughts are all that matter. She was right, what I was saying could be taken to put me in alignment with people I am not allied with at all, and just the thought that slimeballs could have genuine support from a false ally must be distressing. If I can act internally to change that, I will, because it needs to happen. But by all means, taunt me.

    There’s no “could be taken” about this, your comments in the Harris thread DO put you on that side. Did you forget or not care about the whole “rape=consensual threesomes”, “no report to the police=no rape”, “extremist Islam is The True Enemy”, “Find your common ground with Harris”, “too much feminism waaaah”, “don’t talk to me about my ‘privilege'” the civility fetish you’re still on about and everything else? Stop fucking weaseling and own it already.

    #19

    kassad @ 16
    Thanks for that. I didn’t like how it went down, and I believe that if things had stayed civil I may have ended up feeling the same way regardless, but the fact is that raking me over the coals so mercilessly gave this person some hope that she had allies. Although she called me out by name, I want to also be one of those allies.

    #20

    Josh @ 18
    Yeah, you’re right. I have to accept people are going to crow about this and let it roll over me. So no worries, I am not engaging like that again.

    You used this twice now as if it’s a bad thing. Are we not supposed to be proud and talk about the positive effect The Horde has for that lurker, which is the topic of the fucking thread? Get over your fucking self already. Shut up and stop making it about you. (And that goes for everyone else in that thread too.) That thread isn’t about coddling the “I’m going to turn over a new leaf any minute now” racist transphobic rape apologist. It’s about the woman in the OP. So what if you were named as an example? There’s another fucking fuckface in that thread already spouting the same bullshit. You aren’t special, just another asshole in a long line of assholes who silence women and trigger rape victims.

    That’s great if you actually change. I’ll see it when I believe it and your actions so far aren’t goddamn helping. I read an emotional post that I connected with because I was just like the letter writer and I’m a rape victim who was in and commented in the Harris thread. I always read the comments before posting and was pissed off and shaking again because you just had to pop up again. drst has apologized for saying they wished you stayed flounced and others may believe your apology as sincere, but I don’t agree on either score.

    #26

    Seven @ 25
    Thanks. I really actually have lurked since 2005. I do have thick enough skin that yesterday won’t change that. This woman’s letter was eye-opening, and it wouldn’t have happened without me being fell upon yesterday. So the one required the other. I went to bed last night probably about 80% of the way to this and woke up to read this, which was the shove that made me realize I was wrong. I am still working out internally what parts exactly are wrong, but if the words I used to defend myself yesterday made that person feel that way, they have to be wrong, and I have to figure out why.

    Because there isn’t an entire thread already detailing why what you said you were wrong in multiple different ways??!?! Try fucking re-reading it for one. For two, why don’t you also apologize to everyone else you put through shit in that thread?

    #31

    drst @ 29
    But I never said I was leaving, I said I had to go make dinner for my family (veggie tamales). Always intended to stick around the site, and had a lot to think about. Sorry if it seemed disingenuous on my part to leave when I did but it was just RL. Was a good thing, honestly, because the distance plus the letter PZ posted were helpful.

    Except that in your first fucking comment there:

    I must admit I am dangerously close to simply removing it from my feeds at this point. Let me explain why before you skewer me.

    And spent the rest of the time whinging about how awful PZ’s change of focus is and how mean we were and dividing the movements, so yeah it fucking sounded like you were leaving for good and were only exiting at that specific time because dinner. Always intended, my ass. Don’t try to re-write history when we can re-read the fucking thread.

    Oh and here, we tend to use meatspance instead of “real life” because the internet is real and is part of life.

  187. FossilFishy (NOBODY, and proud of it!) says

    Seachange #65 from the “You Get Email” thread:

    The atheists here happen to be smart and interesting and if they happen to be wrong (either multiply by refusing to believe in each and every god) or categorically (not believing in gods in general) ah well.

    Go on then. Demonstrate that we’re wrong.

    Among all the samsara and aboandon illusions of life, many of the atheists here would make posts about “how x religionist could be so self-unaware”

    You do understand that this site is searchable, right? Link to someone saying that, or admit that you’re just making shit up.

    Now they are in satori about how unaware they were about religion being the only cause of this, and so are you.

    Oh really. Your mind reading skill are amazing. You might what to talk to James Randi about that, there’s a million bucks in it for you. Very few people here are unaware about religion. Speaking for myself, it was awareness that made me an atheist, and I’m by no means the most educated person on the topic of religion who posts here.

    Good for all y’all.

    Smug. Nice. That should go well for you.

  189. Akira MacKenzie says

    Gaaaaaaaaaah! My crazy right-wing uncle, twin brother of my crazy right-wing father, has arrived for his annual autumnal visit. He’s only been here a week, but the stereophonic ranting and raving is driving me to distraction–well, more distracted than I already am. If it’s not about America’s imminent invasion by ISIL through the deliberately sieve-like Mexican border, it’s about the upcoming Ebola plague being spread by filthy Africans illegas while an incompetent CDC does nothing. Both catastrophes are of course the fault of “that big-eared, Communist, n*gger,” as my father calls him.

    Meanwhile, my younger sister, a woman who once left home for six months over my father’s racist bullshit and argued that my father only wanted to carry a gun to shoot blacks, now has a CCW permit. Why? Because she claims she works in a “bad (i.e. black) neighborhood.” When confronted with her previous position she angrily suggested that I “grow up” and she needed to carry a pistol to work to make sure that “my children have a mother to come home to them!” I suppose whatever liberal sentiments she once had faded once she tasted the white middle-class life and found it sweet.

    At the same time, the polls seem to indicate that the people are willing to hand the Senate over to the Rethugs. I don’t hold out any hope that the Dems will keep the White House in 2016; I think most people have grown “tired” of the current administration, blame Obama for the inept government, and the dim-witted undecideds will decide that despite how batshit crazy they’ve become, it’s the Republican’s “turn.” Assholes like Walker and Scott will keep their governorships, and the neo-Confederate/Randite cancer will continue to spread. I think we can pretty much kiss America goodbye at this point.

    Sorry for the rant, but needless to say, I’m pretty bummed.

  190. opposablethumbs says

    My sympathies, Akira. I have a much-loved brother who used to be very left wing when he was younger but who seems to have drifted and to be drifting further away as he gets older. It kind of breaks my heart.

  192. says

    @pickwick from comment number 103 over on the “atheists wake up to the way your world works” thread.

    brianpansky, if you have the time and inclination, would you mind fleshing out your thoughts on using evidence to decide which goals are right? I’m not sure if I disagree with you on that, or if I simply don’t see where you’re coming from. You mention that it’s intuitive for most people; is that your base, or is it deeper than that? Intuition is a wee bit inconsistent, both between people and even within the same person.

    Ok so short version:

    When we consider choosing between two goals in conflict, it is most rational to try to give ourselves the most satisfying result.

    So which one will that be? The answer to that is an empirical question. Often in our heads, we do usually draw from past experience, along with a bunch of other data, to predict which action will produce the most satisfying result in any given situation. Of course, some of the data we draw on could be studies from the social sciences, or from neuroscience, or whatever. All this data helps us predict which is more likely to be better.

    There’s something I haven’t yet read on the subject, but I want to: “Moral Facts Naturally Exist (and Science Could Find Them)”. It’s a chapter contributed by Richard Carrier to the book The End Of Christianity. It’s supposed to be his definitive piece on the subject, and him and everyone in that book made sure to back up as much as they can with sources and citations to other literature on the subjects they covered.

  194. Akira MacKenzie says

    Ideally, I don’t have a problem with civilians owning firearms provided they pass criminal background checks, are licensed, and keep them in a safe place. However, the carry issue is far, far more worrying. She’s submitting to the same paranoia and fear my father wallows in, and she’s supposed to be smarter than that. However, ever since she had kids and became a “taxpaying homeowner”, she’s become more and more callous toward the rest of the world. The only thing that matters is her family–the family she didn’t get when she was a kid–and the hell with everything and everyone else.

    With that in mind, I’ve made it perfectly clear to my friends that they should put me out of my misery if I reproduced and started to slide back to the right like the rest of my family. (Since I’m too fat, old, ugly, and mentally unhinged to attract a woman, this event is highly unlikely.)

  195. pickwick says

    Thank you much, brianpansky. Will review and consider.

    Morality and ethics have always puzzled me. It’s straightforward, though often difficult, to persuade someone that they’re factually wrong, but I’ve never figured out how to formulate or adopt a moral code and persuade others that they should adhere to it. It’s one thing to learn about a harm you’ve been contributing to without knowing and try to modify your behavior accordingly; that can be difficult, and I fail at it far too often, so I try not to judge others for it. But if someone knows their actions are causing harm, and it isn’t part of their moral code to avoid or mitigate that harm, or if that harm is outweighed on their scales by an illusory benefit like the approval of a deity–what, then? Other than persuading them that their deity doesn’t exist?

    That’s the epiphany I’m hoping to have. I’ll look at Carrier’s post–I haven’t read any of his books yet–and I’m also starting Shelly Kagan’s Normative Ethics in hopes that learning the framework for moral theories will spark some thoughts. As it is, I don’t know what else to do but avoid those whose morals strike me as repugnant. If instead some could be brought ’round, they might help make the world a better place instead of a worse.

    I’m probably going to go back to absent-mindedly lurking, but I appreciate your response. Toodle-pip!

  197. says

    Is anyone else getting a redirect from the “You must be logged in to post a comment” link? It’s taking me straight back to the page I was viewing. F’rinstance:

    http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/wp-login.php?redirect_to=http%3A%2F%2Ffreethoughtblogs.com%2Fpharyngula%2F2014%2F10%2F06%2Fthunderdome-55%2F

  198. says

    Daz @197:
    Hasn’t happened to me.

    ****

    Astronomy on Tap

    Drawing a crowd for a lecture on astronomy isn’t easy — unless, of course, you have alcohol on your side.

    That’s where Astronomy on Tap comes in. The group of outgoing astronomy enthusiasts brings cosmic science to the people by explaining complex astronomy topics in clear, concise presentations and liquoring up the audience.

    The Way Station — a bar that served as the venue for the group’s Aug. 14 event — was appropriate for discussions of space and time. The bar sports a “Doctor Who” theme, right down to a bathroom that imitates the famous time-traveling TARDIS.

  201. says

    Lofty @196

    70,000 Witnesses descend on Melbourne, Australia. Loved the published tweet:

    Dear World, it’s safe to answer your door today. I’ve just passed the Jehovah’s Witness global convention in #Melbourne. They’re all here.

    /Slight hyperbole

    I saw that on the news last night. I am SO glad I wasn’t going into town today.


    Daz     @197 – I’ve been getting a return to the page after I log in, with the “you must be logged in” line still on it, sometimes. Refreshing the page brings the comment box up, for me.

  204. azhael says

    I’m having a bit of a row with a guy in an exotic animals forums who claims that ebola was created intentionally by some government and released to create mayhem, paranoia and fear, from which they are benefitting…and get this…..he says this is his opinion because he is too much of a sceptic to accept otherwise…xDDDD They are fucking everywhere this morons….

  205. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    Tony @ 203

    It felt a little weird when he first asked for clarification on why the Jeremy Lin thing got a negative response. Like, we just had a fairly long conversation about why it was a problem…what don’t you get? But I decided to be charitable and explain it again and he comes back with “well blackface doesn’t bother me” and “the same would be true if she’d dressed up as a cat.” IDEK.

  207. says

    Tony @ 203:

    The fuck is up with Marc Abian?

    I’ve noticed his comments have been pure WTF over the last several months, regardless of the subject. If this was Futurama, I’d suspect a brain slug.

  208. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I’ve noticed his comments have been pure WTF over the last several months, regardless of the subject. If this was Futurama, I’d suspect a brain slug.

    Personally, I keep getting a tinge of liberturdism….

  210. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I think that it’s possible that The Muppet Show was the best TV show, ever.

    *looks for arguments, finds none*
    Funny how the topic of discussion on Friday mornings at the University was the Muppet show the night before.

  212. FossilFishy (NOBODY, and proud of it!) says

    Dear World, it’s safe to answer your door today. I’ve just passed the Jehovah’s Witness global convention in #Melbourne. They’re all here.

    Ah, that explains it. I’ve been having an episodic argument with a JW and he missed the most recent instalment. I can’t wait for him to come back from this. No doubt he’ll get some apologetic advice at the convention, so maybe I’ll actually have to think about my arguments next time.

    Score to date:
    -Infinite regress. He admitted it was a problem and abandoned that line.
    -Evolution. Couldn’t convince him that his “If people came from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?” proved that he had no idea what the theory of evolution is and thus couldn’t argue against it.
    -The problem of evil. He had no response, exact quote: “I’m going to have to think about that.” followed by a quick exit.
    -Pascal’s wager. Still hasn’t come up. I’m a bit surprised about that.

  213. says

    Where do they come up with these ideas from?

    Feminine care brand U by Kotex is financing Carmilla, a quirky Canadian vampire web series.

    Kimberly-Clark’s new tampon line is executive producing the YouTube series, which will consist of 36 four-minute episodes, from Canadian producer Smokebomb Entertainment and digital agency shift2 that asks whether vampires get their periods.

    The scripted series, inspired by a classic gothic vampire novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, features a young university student, played by Elise Bauman, sharing a dorm room with a young vampire (Natasha Negovanlis).

  214. says

    I’d be mightily pissed off if I was a vampire, as in undead, and still got periods! Imagine an eternity of having to stock up on pads.

  215. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    2kittehs,
    *shudder*

    You know, I’m actually surprised no one ever thought of giving vampires periods. Imagine all the “that time of the month” jokes that could be vomited out on that basis.

  216. says

    Imagine all the comebacks, though.

    “Yes, I am bleeding. Which means I need replenishment, fucker.”

    I read a short story once where Dracula had chosen to take on the form of a woman, so he could more easily cruise bars looking for victims (men). I’m betting having periods was not part of the deal.

  218. chimera says

    My sister asked me what I meant by “mansplaining”. I told her what I thought and then looked it up on Urban Dictionary. The definitions there were mostly of the kind you’d expect an MRA to write, like “a get out of jail free card for feminists”. So, I decided to write my own. It was rejected, apparently by an anonymous panel of readers. I think it was a good definition or, in any case, not a bad one.

    I’d like to know what the horde thinks of it. I think that, if anything, it is too tame and not funny enough. I’d also like to know what you think of the Urban Dictionary. And, as a result of your opinion of the definition and of the Urban Dictionary, if you think this is worth pursuing or not.

    Here’s the definition:

    What a man does when he assumes that most of the women he talks to need to hear his explanations. The problem is not the explanation itself but the underlying and often unconscious belief in inequality, the systematic assumption that women are not very intelligent, knowledgeable or competent. Mansplaining is always talking down, a form of condescension. It can be done with contempt and scorn or with benevolence and generosity, the way a father may explain something to a child. It can also be part of an attempt to impress a woman, like any other show of strength, competence, skill, money, cojones or bravery.

    How can you tell that a man is mansplaining?
    – It is most obvious when a man who knows little about something explains it to a woman who knows a lot about it, like when a layman attempts to explain how the brain works to a female neurosurgeon.
    – When a man doesn’t attempt to find out how much a woman knows about something before explaining it to her.
    – When a man disregards evidence of her competence to continue his explanation more than once.
    – When the explanations are unsolicited, uncalled for or otherwise inappropriate.
    – When he continually cuts her off to continue his explanation.
    – When he explains her thoughts, feelings and behavior to her despite her objections.

    When a man treats both men and women this way he is not a mansplainer per se, he is simply an entitled ass with an inflated ego who believes humankind stands to benefit from his knowledge.

    What are the effects of mansplaining? It puts the man in the dominant position. It immediately increases his self-esteem and, in the long run, decreases hers.

    “I get tired of the guys in the tech department mansplaining me.”

    mansplain, mansplainer, inequality, dominance, patronizing, condescension, power plays, showing off, chauvinism, power differential, entitlement, self-aggrandizement

  219. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    Does Urban Dictionary have a funny requirement? I don’t use it much but I’ve run across plenty of definitions on it that are quite matter of fact. I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised that your definition was rejected on the grounds that it’s far too sympathetic to a feminist point of view.

    Is it worth pursuing? I think Urban Dictionary is a pretty widely used resource and it’s worthwhile not to have definitions be dominated by an anti-feminist perspective. Whether it’s worth your time specifically is obviously another question entirely. I have no inkling of how much of a hassle they’d give you for trying to protest.

    With regard to your definition it doesn’t come off as especially funny to me but it also doesn’t come off as jargon-y or difficult to understand. I don’t see any reason objectively why it wouldn’t be acceptable.

  220. chimera says

    Hi Seven,

    They sent me an email with a link to a “Why your definition was rejected” page. It said funny definitions had the best chance of passing.

  222. chimera says

    I’m not sure Urban Dictionary has any pretension to impartiality, fairness, balance, factuality, credibility or public service.

  225. magistramarla says

    Sorry about that – part of the address got cut off. Let’s try this again.
    -http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local/article/Texan-s-truck-has-possibly-the-most-racist-decal-5829486.php

  227. Tethys says

    Iyeska

    I’ve lost weight. Now I’m going to get The Lecture

    I feel your pain. I hate that lecture. I can’t help it if sometimes I’m just not very hungry, or stressed, or both. Keeping lots of high calorie snacks in the house is my current strategy. *shoves cookies, chips, cake, trail mix, and chocolate into USB*

  228. says

    Tethys, thank you. I’ve been good about eating, I’ve made sure to eat once a day (often more than once), after the whole broken pancreas business. Doctors…you can never win.

  229. Tethys says

    Iyeska, I think we probably have similar eating habits and get similar doctor lectures. Salad and veg is not enough food! You need to eat more protein! You need to keep your blood sugar from dropping too low by snacking! Cigareetes are the cause of all health issues! Osteoporosis!!! Chocolate never makes me feel bad about these things. :D

  230. says

    Tethys:

    Salad and veg is not enough food! You need to eat more protein! You need to keep your blood sugar from dropping too low by snacking!

    I had no idea that we had the same neurologist! The ‘you must eat more protein’ one is the major theme, as I have problems absorbing B vitamins, but he wants me to eat a fucking steak twice a bloody day. I don’t care for steak, and don’t eat much meat, and I get to fucking hear about that way too much. Then there’s the ‘eat small amounts, 6 times a day’ business. Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.

  232. Al Dente says

    I get the opposite lecture from my doc. He keeps telling me I have to lose 20 to 40 pounds (the exact amount depends on how much weight I’ve actually lost). I’ve gone from 210 lbs to 180 lbs in the past year and I hate the everyday feeling of being starved.

  234. says

    Al Dente:

    I’ve gone from 210 lbs to 180 lbs in the past year and I hate the everyday feeling of being starved.

    Has your doc acknowledged this? Told you how fantastic that loss is?* Always seems to me they are happy enough to lecture and be dissatisfied, but not so great on acknowledging actual work you’ve done. I don’t know what to say about feeling starved, except that it’s pretty shitty to feel that way. I eat a lot of fruit (this, apparently, doesn’t count as food when it comes to my neurodoc), have you tried that? Because you can eat a fucktonne of fruit and not gain any significant weight.

    I’m 66″ tall, and there’s a fairly wide range of weight in the ‘healthy’ range for me. The recent loss of 10 lbs takes me to 114 lbs, which results in many fucking lectures, and more than a few Serious Looks™. I eat when I’m hungry, and that’s just never good enough.
     
    *I think that is great, Al Dente!

  235. Ogvorbis says

    Watching NFL’s Sunday night game.

    Saw a commercial for nomore.org during the game. Have tried, repeatedly, to go to the site. Keep getting 505s and other errors, that the site is not available. Seeing the advert during a football game made me smile. I keep hearing people say that abuse is natural, rape is something we can’t do anything about, that there is no point in trying — same shit we used to say about drunk driving. It’s about fucking time that a company built on organized violence starts having their feet held to the fire — the power of the NFL could make a real difference and raise awareness.

    And I am making no sense. I blame percocet and vicodan. But it is helping my back. Back to work half time. See the doctor on Friday. If she says I can go back to work full time (there will be limitations), my boss wants me to come in for what will be 10 hours of overtime on Saturday. I already have Sunday off (Boy has a talbe at a model railroad show/sale and he and I will take turns staffing the sales table while the other one browses) so what the hell? Why not?

  236. Ogvorbis says

    Iyeska:

    Hugs to you on your health issues. Weight, diet, nutrition, balance, has all become such a cultural hot point (not to mention profit source) that dealing with any of it in a manner like most other medical issues is tough. My doctor still wants me to double my intake of eggs (she figures that upping my total cholesterol will make my bad cholesterol ratio lower) and though I have gone from 290 down to 250 in the past two years, she thinks I should be losing weight faster. I told her, the last time she told me that, that I couldn’t lose weight faster as all my old clothing only wears out so fast. If I lose weight too fast, I’ll get too small before I’ve worn out the old clothes.

    ============

    And just saw an SVU commercial in which, it appears, the plot revolves around a student who is raped and then her past as a porn star comes out and it suddenly becomes ‘she lied to us!’ Mythical rape culture my pasty white arse.

    =============

    And now my nose feels numb, so the painkillers are in full effect. Off to bed — rereading The Lord of the Rings again.

  237. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Sleep well Ogvobis.

    Some days I swear the Redhead doesn’t get it. I keep a 6A-10p schedule so I can keep my job, and get my rest. When she stays up all night, and sleeps from 6A to 2p, and then has a big brunch, and expects me to wait until later for cleaning, etc., there is a reason she doesn’t get all the attention and taskes she thinks she should get. Simple arithmetic.*sigh*

    Still having problems making sure she has all the wound care items she needs (the new budget starts 10/22). Progress though, one of the wounds only needs a 4X4 adhesive pad, instead of 6X6. But the 2X2 Fibracol for that wound is ordered and on the way, but I used the last on hand today. I can substitute the calcium alginate for her big wound, which also ran out, but is in the materials management office at work, arriving last Friday after I had checked for orders. *sigh*

  238. Dhorvath, OM says

    If I am not hungry, I am gaining weight. Sigh. Makes for easy muscle growth though, so there is a bright side.

  239. chigau (違う) says

    Iyeska
    I haz sympathy.
    I’ve been sickish and on antibiotics for a couple of weeks.
    Not to mention my teeth.
    I’m afraid to weigh myself.

  245. chigau (違う) says

    So.
    Getting all weepy in the kitty-food aisle at the grocery store is normal.
    Right?

  257. says

    Ogvorbis:

    I have gone from 290 down to 250 in the past two years, she thinks I should be losing weight faster.

    Oy. If only it were that easy.

    Chigau:

    I’ve been sickish and on antibiotics for a couple of weeks.
    Not to mention my teeth.
    I’m afraid to weigh myself.

    Oh no. I hope you’re better soon. I know what you mean, I’m staying away from the weight machine.

  258. toska says

    This is a response to aerinha #42 in the Rage More thread.

    First off, Felicia Day does have my support, and she doesn’t need to be an angel, and I don’t think she meant any harm with her comment. But I also think it’s important to point out ableism when you see it, even if it’s coming from a statement that you otherwise support 100%. That’s how we become more aware of prejudices that we, as a society and as individuals, have.

    I don’t think insults or strong language are the same thing, and I think they are appropriate for issues like this. I went back and read Chris’s entire post, and he also includes ableism by calling GGers “b/tards.” This is equally wrong and should be called out as well, but it wasn’t part of the block quote in the OP.

    Again, just to be clear, I support the sentiments by both Felicia and Chris, and I’m disturbed by the uneven backlash against Felicia. I hope she stays safe and that harassment against her does not escalate. But I don’t think it is wrong to point out problematic statements when you see them.

  259. aerinha says

    For tosca here at 258
    Normally I’m fine with calling out ableism wherever. I certainly appreciate when people don’t judge me for seeing a therapist, or once being on antidepressants. That particular spate of comments, though, got under my skin because it seemed so dismissive of Felicia. It seemed so familiar, where the guys get a free pass for whatever, and the women get picked on for tone and language. A woman, when attacked, has to be perfect to deserve our support, and a guy can just assume you will see his attackers as wrong.
    My skin on this is probably thinner due to my reading this week. Too many ‘gater threads, studies on women receiving more criticism at work and in reviews for behaviors over performance, and other sexist things. It tends to rub me a bit raw, and I may be a little ragey this week.
    (Autocorrect is being a particular bane today. It really does not like my slang words)

  260. aerinha says

    And, blah, sorry for misspelling your name. I can’t enemy blame autocorrect for it, just a dad who liked opera and wandering attention. I’ll pay more attention going forward.

  261. toska says

    aerinha
    I like the opera Tosca, so no offense taken :)

    I totally get what you’re saying, and one of the things I really liked about the OP was the side-by-side comparison of the posts, and it really shows how disproportionate the responses, in general, have been. Chris Kluwe should have been called out for his ableism, and I think that it’s very likely people read his post less critically because he’s a man.

    I still think there is a productive conversation that can be had about ableism regarding both Chris Kluwe and Felicia Day, and I hope it gets back to both of them, and that they try to avoid it in the future. But after reading your comment, I agreed that the focus of the thread should be on the GGers and sexism.

  262. aerinha says

    The other thing, though, is that the ableism in the two posts aren’t even on the same level. Felicia’s was talking about particular stalkers, who may have themselves used mental illness in their own defense, or been defended by others as such to minimize the severity of the stalking(a variation of, “but, he’s just awkward and doesn’t know better”)
    Chris’s insults included ableist slurs(I’m remembering “cretin” in particular) and they were INSULTS. That’s actually the first thing I tried to cut out of my language myself. This is the 101 level stuff, the easier stuff. Getting the other mental illness stereotypes out of my own head was harder than the action of not using ableist slurs. I find catching and not using ableist slurs easier than rooting out my own stereotypes, so, I expect it to be easier for others in the same fashion.
    I LIKED Chris’s rant. I did. But, he did not meet the (my) lower bar, to my mind, and so seeing Felicia called out for not meeting the higher standard, when she had already suffered a higher price made me angry. Not angry actually at you, though, but the original person with the one line post, and at society in general.

  263. carlie says

    I’m sorry about the health rottenness, Iyeska. And everyone else with food problems. And hugs to chigau.

    I was going to go on a bit about the military, but it looks like the people who were directed to come here didn’t. My point was just that in the same way I don’t blame women for trying to get ahead within the system (certain fields have dress codes, and you abide by them or else, for example), I’m not going to blame people in the military for simply being there. I have a big problem with the way our military is used, but I’m not pinning that on the people who are not making any of those decisions.

  265. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    aerinha @ 262

    You argue that Kluwe was spouting ableist slurs which are, according to you, the easier thing to excise from your vocabulary so…what? Because Day didn’t use slurs and Kluwe did, she’s clearly farther along the path to not being ableist and thus less deserving of criticism than Kluwe?

    I mean, I could argue that the slurs Kluwe used are more subtle than what Day said. The -tard suffix is pretty obviously a slur because “retarded” still retains most of its meaning as “mentally disabled.” But the other stuff? Most people aren’t going to know the etymology of words like “cretin” because they’ve been out of use as medical terminology for a lot longer. Sure, not using ableist slurs is 101 stuff but I would argue that recognizing “cretin” as an ableist slur to begin with is somewhat beyond 101.

    What Day said, on the other hand directly targets the mentally ill; it’s not subtle or oblique. As someone (maybe toska?) said on the other thread, the fact that you’re reading her as talking about specific individuals whose mental state she knows about a) doesn’t mean she actually is and b) even if she is, it’s not her business to go repeating that information and c) its not relevant to her harassment because neither being mentally ill nor being a harasser/abuser entails the other. What Day did was draw a straight line from mental illness to harassment. To my mind, that’s far more blatantly ableist than pretty much anything Kluwe said other than possibly “/b/tard”.

    TL;DR I don’t think it’s useful to wank over which was worse. An argument could be made either way and, in the end, they’ll both still be objectionable.

  266. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    My point was just that in the same way I don’t blame women for trying to get ahead within the system (certain fields have dress codes, and you abide by them or else, for example), I’m not going to blame people in the military for simply being there.

    There’s a difficult balance to be struck, here. People entering the military should know that the enterprise of war* as practiced by the US, is a means to accumulate wealth for a small number of people. They should know that they may be asked to kill people who are not a threat. They should know that they may be asked to fight in support of those who are a threat. They should know that the capacity for morally repellent behavior is within all of us, and can be exploited easily through strong group identity, authority, and license…and that the military leadership knows this.

    I don’t think it makes sense to talk about “blame”, so much as responsibility. We are all responsible for this shit, and we should try as best we can with the options that we have to end it. I think abstaining from military service is a moral choice, that many would make if they thought carefully about how soldiers are used. The rest of us can help by supporting alternatives to military service, by refusing to glorify war, and by holding our government accountable. I know lots of young people who dropped out of university** to fight overseas. I hope they make it home safe. I hope tht they never have to do terrible things. But I also wish that they had never joined, and whenever I have an opportunity to counsel a student considering military service, I try to help find other paths.

    *Fuck “military intervention”, “peace action”, or whatever weasel-words are applied to what our military actually does.
    **I work at one, so that’s how I know them.

  267. Rob Grigjanis says

    Antiochus Epiphanes @266:

    People entering the military living in the West should know that the enterprise of war* life as practiced by in the US and elsewhere, is a means to accumulate wealth for a small number of people.

    FTFY. How about working for large corporations, directly or indirectly, or buying their products? Their policies kill people every day. Or how about simply paying taxes? People in the military are just easy targets for sanctimonious twits.

  268. anteprepro says

    265 Seven of Mine: The point aerinha is making is, I believe, that the critical focus on Day’s post over Kluwe’s is indicative of a sexist bias. Which is a fair point. Both said problematic shit. Hell, Kluwe said A LOT of problematic shit (anyone notice the word “gunt”? I didn’t even know what the fuck that was, but my gut instinct was on the right track). And yet the focus was on the one problematic thing Day said. Despite the fact that she said in the context of describing her own personal, emotional distress and harrassment, while Kluwe was just saying shit to insult people. Yet the former drew all the criticism. I too think that is indicative of something.

  270. consciousness razor says

    FTFY. How about working for large corporations, directly or indirectly, or buying their products? Their policies kill people every day. Or how about simply paying taxes? People in the military are just easy targets for sanctimonious twits.

    Or they have a real choice to not be in the military and do some other kind of work, unlike people eating/living/paying taxes/etc. Voluntarily joining the military generally means you have at least some idea of the sort of endeavor you’re getting into, before you’re already in it. I didn’t know what I was getting into when I was born in the US in a certain political/economic situation, and I can’t very well back out of it. I can fight back against the problems in it (choose to shop at certain places rather than others or not buy such things at all, engage in civil disobedience, etc.), but that’s not electing to be a part of the whole mess and supposing that I’ll be compensated for it.

  271. anteprepro says

    Rob Grigjanis

    People in the military are just easy targets for sanctimonious twits.

    What a grand, logical defense of the United States military. Right up there with “Support Your Troops, or you are a commie”.

  272. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    Rob Grijanis: There nothing in your FTFM that I disagree with, but:
    1. The conversation I was engaging was specifically about those entering the military.
    2. There is a second paragraph.
    3. Those who pay mob extortion are not committing morally equivalent actions to those committed by mob assassins. We all live in the military industrial complex, and we should do what we can to end it because it is a moral evil. One way to resist it is to resist military service if one can. Another way is to avoid working for large corporations if one can.
    4. If seeing that those entering the military are making a moral decision*, makes me a sanctimonious twit, I’ll cop to the title. My family and I have been deeply affected by the loss of a family member to war violence. My dad dodged the draft, to avoid participating in a war that he thought was wrong at no small sacrifice to his own well-being. I’m really glad he did. I’ve been asked several times to write letters of support for students wishing to enter specialized military programs. I know some of these students well, and I can see how service has changed them, and not really for the better. This isn’t academic to me.
    *I recognize that it is also a financial one, in most cases.

  273. Rob Grigjanis says

    antiprepro @271:

    What a grand, logical defense of the United States military.

    Not condemning people for joining the military is not the same as supporting military institutions, or how they are used. You really need that explained? I actually do believe in supporting the troops. Don’t send them off on stupid, criminal wars. If you must send them to war, make sure they’re properly equipped. Take care of those who return. That kind of support.

  274. anteprepro says

    Rob Grigjanis:

    Not condemning people for joining the military is not the same as supporting military institutions, or how they are used. You really need that explained?

    Condemning the military necessarily means that there is at least some degree of blame for people willingly participating in the military. Some degree of blame is not the same as condemning. You really need that explained?

  275. Rob Grigjanis says

    Antiochus Epiphanes @272: Since you weren’t being sanctimonious, I was not numbering you among the twits. But they are out there.

    As you note, the decision is often a financial one. It’s all to easy for some folk to talk about ‘real choices’.

    Both my parents’ families were torn apart by war, so I’m not unaware of its effects.

  276. The Mellow Monkey says

    Seven of Mine @ 265

    The -tard suffix is pretty obviously a slur because “retarded” still retains most of its meaning as “mentally disabled.”

    While I think it’s irresponsible to use the name without explanation (and I also don’t think it should be used at all except in an explanation), “/b/tard” is the name they use for themselves. Kluwe didn’t make that up as an insult: he’s using their own identification. That doesn’t absolve anything, but that is some context that needs to be unpacked. I suspect a lot of people who would generally know better than to use the -tard suffix believe it’s okay because it’s been chosen as a self-label by loathsome people. By knowing the context, we can be better address why it’s still wrong.

  277. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    anteprepro @ 268

    I’m not sure I buy that the critical focus, here at Pharyngula anyway, has a sexist bias. The ableist thing Day said is in the quote in PZ’s OP. There’s nothing problematic in what he quotes of Kluwe. I think the person who called out Day’s comment may have called it out because it was right there in the OP. The exchange that followed was a few people questioning applebeverage’s interpretation, toska clarifying and then the thread moved on until aerinha came along and tried to make something of it. Trying to pin what happened in that thread on a sexist bias requires assuming that everyone involved actually clicked through and read all the links.

    Obviously the backlash in general against Day vs. Kluwe has a sexist bias. She was doxxed within an hour of publishing her post.

  278. carlie says

    There can be other reasons besides financial that the military might make sense for someone as a career, too. I know a young man in the Merchant Marines who has a lot of attention and concentration issues and he and his family were unsure if he would do well out on his own; the regimented and controlled nature of being in the military was exactly the environment he needed to succeed and be independent from them.

  279. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    carlie: there may be many factors to consider when deciding to enlist. I think that ethics should always be one of the factors.

  280. says

    carlie #263

    I was going to go on a bit about the military, but it looks like the people who were directed to come here didn’t. My point was just that in the same way I don’t blame women for trying to get ahead within the system (certain fields have dress codes, and you abide by them or else, for example), I’m not going to blame people in the military for simply being there. I have a big problem with the way our military is used, but I’m not pinning that on the people who are not making any of those decisions.

    I totally understand that sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, and a whole lot of folks in the economic wasteland that is the American South and much of the Midwest have basically zero economic opportunity outside (or frankly inside, but that’s another matter) the military, and who ‘join to get a job, it was either that or rob’ as a folksinger put it (I can’t find who at the moment, I’ve not heard the song in years). That, in and of itself, is, of course, an indictment of our economic system but that goes without saying. That doesn’t mean it’s a thing to celebrate when someone joins.
    #278

    I know a young man in the Merchant Marines who has a lot of attention and concentration issues and he and his family were unsure if he would do well out on his own; the regimented and controlled nature of being in the military was exactly the environment he needed to succeed and be independent from them.

    The Merchant Marine is not a military organization, unless you’re saying that the individual was in the Navy or something first?
    Rob Grijanis #267
    The ethical ramifications of a decision are not removed by the fact that economic necessity is the primary driver; a person who has a viable choice between being directly involved in active mass murder operations vs. merely living under a flawed infrastructure should choose the latter. Paying taxes and having a job, you see, are not intrinsically harmful to others, and although a considerable amount of tax monies go to unconscionable causes, a significant portion also goes to essential functions, and there’s no way for the individual to separate or parse their contributions. In other words, this is a stupid argument. Please don’t make it anymore.
    #273
    I don’t beleive in supporting the troops, because I’m opposed to having the troops in the first place. We ought better to disband the U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marines entirely, and leave the defence of the nation to those properly constituted for that task, to wit the National Guard, Air Guard and Coast Guard. The Army Corps of Engineers, along with certain other technical/infrastructural divisions should be retained on an entirely civilian footing, and ditch all the silly bang-bang stuff in favor of their useful jobs.

  282. Nick Gotts says

    FTFY. How about working for large corporations, directly or indirectly, or buying their products? Their policies kill people every day. Or how about simply paying taxes? People in the military are just easy targets for sanctimonious twits. – Rob Grigjanis@267

    Yeah, yeah, none of us live perfectly ethical lives, so how can we condemn Ted Bundy or Pol Pot?

  283. Rob Grigjanis says

    Yeah, yeah, none of us live perfectly ethical lives, so how can we condemn Ted Bundy or Pol Pot?

    Connlann Myers is Pol Pot? Nice leap there, Nick. You been exercising your quads?

  284. Nick Gotts says

    Rob Grigjanis@283,
    I know you’re not so stupid that you can’t recognise the rhetorical trope of taking a position one disagrees with to its logical conclusion, so I’m forced to conclude that you’re pretending not to because you know your argument is untenable.

  285. Rob Grigjanis says

    Dalillama @280: Spell my last name correctly, or call me ‘Rob’. I don’t care which. More later, when I have time.

  286. Rob Grigjanis says

    Nick @284: You are good at rhetorical tropes, including the ‘I am forced to conclude’ crap. Your trope can be applied to a large percentage of jobs, at least in the West, so it’s sort of useless. If you work for a clothing chain, you are responsible for unsafe working conditions, and worker deaths in Bangladesh, right?

    Attack the policies that create this bullshit, not the people caught up in the machinery.

  288. Rob Grigjanis says

    chigau @281: We’ll be in the same, or adjacent, circles of hell, because I wrote software for a company whose clients included Exxon Mobil. BYOB?

  289. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    This is the proper forum for criticizing the military at the moment.

    My complaint with the antimilitary tirades in the Caption Myers thread was that essentially PZ invited us into his house to celebrate with both PZ and Mary, the success of their son at this point in the son’s life, which happens to be in the military. As I saw it, either behave properly, and congratulate the honoree and his parents, or hold your words. That wasn’t the place for you to get on your soapbox and opine about the whatever problems you see the US military has, especially strawman or over exaggerated problems.

    The people in the military aren’t the ones who want overseas adventures in war zones. Every military person I have talked to, mostly officers, want to avoid that. You could have taken your soapbox here and unloaded, without insulting your host and his family. Frankly, you should be ashamed of yourselves for bringing political polemics to family celebration.

    Nor I am not arguing with you on the potential evils of the military. Keep in mind, I spent five months as one-A (eminently draftable) during the ‘Nam war. Many of you haven’t have such a pleasure *snark*.

    I also realize that the military can be a vehicle for social advancement, or a job that gives some people purpose when they have none. Two examples

    1) I have a cousin who wasn’t doing much as a civilian, and eventually joined the air force. He got his twenty in, so he retired at half-pay as a top enlisted rank. He ended up as the avionics crew chief, and supervised the repair, and at times, rebuilding of the instrumentation in fighters. He has even mentioned having to repair the repairs made during the ‘Nam war era. The military gave him something to work for, and get up for.

    2) When I was teaching, one the university committees created letters of recommendation for those applying to medical schools. I was on that committee for four years. The first person I interviewed was one using the military for social advancement. He grew up dirt-poor in bumfuck UP. One of those towns with twenty houses, a feed/grocery store, a bar, a filling station, and maybe a couple of churches, and the schools for the area, which included a couple of hundred small farms and a few small lake resorts. He wanted to become a doctor, and his only option was through the military.

    So, he enlisted in the navy, and ended up as a pharmacist mate on a destroyer. This gave him the GI bill, 80’s version, so he was back in Dah YooPee for pre-med. He needed a little spending money for books, etc., and joined ROTC, air force, as there wasn’t a navy presence on campus. This helped him graduate. He could have been accepted at any medical school in the state, but chose the Armed Forces Medical School, which started a couple of years earlier. Why? If he served the military for the duration of his medical training (five years training plus five years service), he could retire without debt. The typical debt for a doctor graduating and getting though internship/residency was a mere $250,000. Since all his Navy/Air Force/ROTC time counted toward his seniority, he was looking at being in his late thirties, an MD, and no debt. With another 2 year hitch, retire on half pay. So he could be about 40, and set up his own little practice anywhere, or if the UP, a small hospital attached to the practice, essentially debt free.

    One little item of interest. The “GI Bill” is a reward for services rendered. He could go to divinity school and become a preacher, all legal and above board.

    I never heard how he was doing, other than he was accepted by the AFMS. By now, he either retired with half-pay (major or light colonel) or is sticking out to thirty for three-quarters pay (full colonel or one-star general).

  290. Nick Gotts says

    Rob Grigjanis@286,

    It’s your trope, not mine. Putting your position honestly, rather than in the JAQ-ing off fashion you were using, you were saying that if you pay taxes, you can’t, without hypocrisy, criticise those who join a military where they may find themselves legally obliged to kill large numbers of innocent people in the service of imperialism, and also unable to leave the job or register any protest. You could be educating poor children, raising money for famine relief, or conducting investigative journalism into the arms trade, but if you’re paying taxes, you can’t criticise a member of the middle class who joins the military. It’s not as if it’s some far-fetched possibility that Capt. Myers could find himself ordered to take part in a war of aggression involving hundreds of thousands of deaths, is it? Maybe, if it came to it, he would be one of the handful who said no and took the consequences, but is it morally justifiable to join an organisation that does such things? Yes, I think those who have choices should take ethical considerations into account: if you have a choice of jobs or careeers, you should take into account what your potential employers do and what you may be required to do. Capt. Myers had choices: he is not “caught up in the machinery” like someone who has no choice but to join up or starve – or even to work for a clothing chain or live in abject poverty. To claim that he is, is plain dishonest.

  291. Nick Gotts says

    Nerd@289,

    Fuck off. If PZ doesn’t want comments on his son’s career choice – and he has not said so – then it’s up to him either to keep it out of the blog, or make it explicit.

  292. chigau (違う) says

    Rob Grigjanis #288
    I have also worked for almost every aspect of the fossil fuel industries.
    and forestry
    and hydroelectricity
    and metals mining
    and one weird gig where I had to wear a dosimeter.
    among others
    …
    A bottle wouldn’t do, I’ll have to bring the brewery.

  293. says

    Nerd

    Keep in mind, I spent five months as one-A (eminently draftable) during the ‘Nam war. Many of you haven’t have such a pleasure *snark*.

    No, indeed I haven’t. I refused to register for the draft, a decision which has had consequences in my life since then (notably, it’s what stopped me getting a job with the Postal Service).

    1) I have a cousin who wasn’t doing much as a civilian, and eventually joined the air force. He got his twenty in, so he retired at half-pay as a top enlisted rank. He ended up as the avionics crew chief, and supervised the repair, and at times, rebuilding of the instrumentation in fighters. He has even mentioned having to repair the repairs made during the ‘Nam war era. The military gave him something to work for, and get up for.

    The Civilian Conservation Service could have done the same, with a damn sight better return on the effort. If it were still around, of course. Likwise could the Corps of Engineers, even if they were (as they should have been from the beginning) divorced from the Army. The fact that some people have benefitted individually from time in the armed forces is not an argument in favor os same unless those benefits cannot be provided by other means.

    He grew up dirt-poor in bumfuck UP. blah blah blah

    I like the way you completely fucking ignored my commentary on people in shitty economic situations, and how we really need to be spending money fixing that shit instead of processing them through the murder machine to prove their worthiness for such benefices first. Oh, wait, I don’t like it at all, because you’re being a disingenuous shithead.

    One little item of interest. The “GI Bill” is a reward for services rendered.

    It’s no such thing; it was created explicitly as a tool of social advancement for the working class, and carefully tailored to insure that only the right (i.e. white and male) sort of people got access to it. Same with the mortgage subsidies. Both benefits ought to have been made universal then, and still should be now, and it’s apologies like this that help keep that from happening.

  294. Nick Gotts says

    But Dalillama@293, if you went on paying taxes, you’re just as guilty as William Calley or Henry Kissinger!

  295. carlie says

    Merchant marines do act as auxiliary service to the military, though, so would be included in any discussion of the ethics of supporting the system (in a much loser way than, say, paying taxes). And their cadet system is very similar to the military branches in terms of the overall way they work. I did too broadly slop around my language, though.

  296. Rob Grigjanis says

    Nick @290: Pol Pot was all yours, sunshine.

    Putting your position honestly, rather than in the JAQ-ing off fashion you were using, …

    Oh, do fuck off. The ‘you’re being dishonest’ nonsense is the first refuge of the hack. We’re all enablers, but you want to distance yourself from the horror. Good for you. Interesting that you pick out the paying taxes, and ignore the working for corporations. Who’s paying you?

  297. chigau (違う) says

    on another but related topic
    the newest OS for iPads is a lump of SHIT
    if that twirlywhirly of reloading doesn’t STOP
    I may put an axe to my iPad
    srsly
    “Preview error”
    ??!

  298. Ichthyic says

    yeah… bad OS design was why I went with a tablet I could easily hack and gain root access on.

    then I get to choose my own version, or modified version, of any OS that will run on the chip.

    It hasn’t been a cakewalk, but with the money I would have spent on an apple tablet, I have 3 tablets (2 7″ and 1 10″), two of which I have hacked into something I can actually call useable and functional for all my needs.

    tablet OS is still not really at the consumer friendly stage, IMO. It’s stuck between limited phone technology and trying to cram a desktop functionality into it. And the manufacturers keep waffling on whether they want to give up and just do phone OS, or actually continue to develop the tablet market.

    personally, I find tablets to be the best idea for a computing device… ever.

  299. Nick Gotts says

    Rob Grigjanis@296,
    I’ll stop calling you dishonest when you stop arguing dishonestly.

    We’re all enablers, but you want to distance yourself from the horror.

    See, you’re using exactly the same dishonest tactic once again: implying, but not saying, that just existing in the western world means you can’t without hypocrisy criticise a middle-class person who chooses to join an imperialist military – although for some reason, this inabilty to criticise stops when we get high enough in the chain of command – safely above where anyone you happen to want to protect from criticism resides, I guess.

    Who’s paying you?

    Ah, that rare beast, the true ad hominem. It wouldn’t affect my argument if I worked for Megadeath, Inc. devising biological weapons and torture equipment, would it? As it happens, as far as corporations are concerned, I’ve had a couple of short stints working for Debenhams, a medium-size UK department store (as a porter and as a driver), and one for Acres the Bakers, a (now defunct, I believe) bakery (as a driver). That was nearly 40 years ago. Since then I worked for about 18 months for what was then the Inland Revenue (having refused to take a job in the Ministry of “Defence” on political grounds), for a number of universities (where I refused to apply for military funding or supervise student projects with a military sponsor), and for a non-profit research institute focused on rural land use and latterly (and to a small extent I was part of this extension of research focus) on climate change and energy demand. As a result of the latter job, my pension comes from the Scottish government (the institute was once a branch of the civil service, and its employees retained civil service pension rights when it became an independent non-profit). Since my D.Phil is in artificial intelligence, I could probably have gone into corporate research; I could certainly have sought military or “security” funding. Yes, I was lucky enough to have choices, and never had to make the kind of sacrifice Dalillama did; but yes, I did consistently avoid working for organisation or on topics on ethical grounds.

  300. chigau (違う) says

    Ichthyic
    I have not been able to ‘gain access to roots’ since the Apple ][e.
    and now I’m old and cannot be arsed
    axe. that’s the ticket.
    …
    I have an Osborne II down in the basement…

  302. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    Criticism is really not the issue. I don’t believe that many enter the service with their eyes open to what they are really doing. It isn’t a perspective that is widely shared. Saying that entering the service is a moral decision is not a criticism of those who make that decision without having considered ramifications that were never presented to them.

  304. Nick Gotts says

    Rob Grigjanis@301,
    What a devastating argument.

    Antiochus Epiphanes@302,
    Well there’s something to that – but past a certain point, and particularly when you are considering well-educated people from a background where critical viewpoints were readily available, I think such moral obliviousness is worthy of criticism. It’s not like the invasion of Iraq and its consequences are ancient history.

  305. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    Nick: true enough, but, those critical viewpoints are often covered by tides of nationalism. At least here in the US, enlistees are treated as heroes before they see a day of service. They receive special privileges at restaurants and airports and are lauded at every graduation and sporting event. I think for the most thoughtful person considering enlistment, the struggle is between their own conscience and every other message that society is giving them: enlistment = heroism. Just look at the response from some in this so-called enlightened community to that critical viewpoint. In some sectors of the meat space that I inhabit, expressing such a critical viewpoint could easily earn a punch in the face, but not so for the uncritical jingoism that has been getting people killed.
    end ramble; I’m glad that the critical view gets expressed. My dad (especially) had a strong influence on me as being anti war even when the rest of my family and community were waving the flag.

  306. Ryan Gem says

    @Nick Gotts 290

    I had a longer response, but it got lost in the ether when I couldn’t connect to the server a minute ago.

    Basically, “they may find themselves legally obliged to kill large numbers of innocent people in the service of imperialism” is not a valid assumption. Soldiers on the ground are not ordered to kill innocent people – it goes against any counterinsurgency mission that the military takes on. Murders in the battlefield are committed by individuals, not distant commands.

    Given that, you can take a moral position that you can enter the military and essentially “take” the job away from someone who is less competent or less ethical, and save lives by performing your job ethically.

  308. anteprepro says

    Ryan Gem:

    Soldiers on the ground are not ordered to kill innocent people – it goes against any counterinsurgency mission that the military takes on. Murders in the battlefield are committed by individuals, not distant commands.

    Bullshit. They regularly kill innocent people: they just do so up front and in person. Bombing. Look up the dirty war index for the Iraq War. And stop peddling propaganda.

  310. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    Ryan Gem:

    Basically, “they may find themselves legally obliged to kill large numbers of innocent people in the service of imperialism” is not a valid assumption

    It is not an assumption so much as a fact.
     
    Your second argument makes little sense. Would it be reasonable to take a job as an executioner to insure that executions were carried out competently and ethically?

  311. JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness says

    Antiochus Epiphanes

    Your second argument makes little sense. Would it be reasonable to take a job as an executioner to insure that executions were carried out competently and ethically?

    Isn’t that the reason some doctors do it since others botching lethal injections, which happens at an alarming rate by amateurs is so painful?

    I’m against the death penalty but prisoners are still people so making it so they die in a long, painful process seems unethical too. I’m not really okay with just shrugging that off, especially given the prison population makeup, just to claim some moral high ground. Seems fucked up to trade on their pain and suffering before dying just to score a gotcha! that isn’t moving the USA towards no death penalty anyways.

    Of course, I understand why the medical ethics boards are all against it and I don’t really want them to reverse that decision at all. But it’s an uncomfortable situation to put it mildly so I understand why some doctors have. Shouldn’t we be for less pain while fighting to remove the death penalty completely? The arguments against it still stand if none of them are botched and tortuous.

  312. Nick Gotts says

    Ryan Gem@306,
    What anteprepro and Antiochus Epiphanes said. The individual unauthorised killings (for which the perpetrators generally get a slap on the wrist) are – well, I was going to say the tip of the iceberg, but that grossly understates it. Best estimates are that the invasion of Iraq caused several hundred thousand excess deaths, with several million people displaced from their homes.

  314. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    JAL: Physicians (and other health care professionals) don’t administer lethal injections since it would be a violation of medical ethics. Department of corrections officers do it because they are told to.

    Seems fucked up to trade on their pain and suffering before dying just to score a gotcha!

    We are discussing people who get paid to kill other people. The discussion itself is about pain and suffering. Nobody is trading on anything.

  315. JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness says

    Antiochus Epiphanes

    JAL: Physicians (and other health care professionals) don’t administer lethal injections since it would be a violation of medical ethics. Department of corrections officers do it because they are told to.

    So, wait. It’s okay for doctors to do everything but put the drugs in and they’re in the clear. Yet every soldier is guilty of murder regardless of their job and placement?

    Today, all 38 death-penalty states rely on lethal injection. Of 1012 murderers executed since 1976, 844 were executed by injection.5 Against vigorous opposition from the AMA and state medical societies, 35 of the 38 states explicitly allow physician participation in executions. Indeed, 17 require it: Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Virginia, Washington, and Wyoming. To protect participating physicians from license challenges for violating ethics codes, states commonly provide legal immunity and promise anonymity. Nonetheless, several physicians have faced such challenges, though none have lost their licenses as yet.7 And despite the promised anonymity, several states have produced the physicians in court to vouch publicly for the legitimacy and painlessness of the procedure.

    Source

    We are discussing people who get paid to kill other people. The discussion itself is about pain and suffering. Nobody is trading on anything.

    Then doctors helping with lethal injections do qualify. The doctor’s team at the end of the article get $18,000 a pop.

    I was just responding to your executioner line from #310. There are those that feel that way and follow through is all I’m saying.

  316. JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness says

    Okay, so I said more than that but it was about the death penalty, which doesn’t apply to the discussion on military personnel like accepting more painful executions for the sake of privileged people’s ethics, headlines, and an argument against the death penalty that isn’t needed.

  318. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    So, wait. It’s okay for doctors to do everything but put the drugs in and they’re in the clear. Yet every soldier is guilty of murder regardless of their job and placement?

    No and no. I’m not sure how you drew these conclusions from anything I wrote. I don’t think it’s OK to kill people except with their fully informed consent (as in an assisted suicide). I don’t think it’s OK to abet in the killing of other people either.

    There are those that feel that way and follow through is all I’m saying

    OK. Not that I am especially down with that either*, but do you think that a significant number of people are entering the military because they think that they’ll be able to end life more humanely than others? They are against killing in other words, but take a practical stand that if it’s got to be done, it might as well be done quickly and painlessly.
     

    *it undermines the AMAs stand against the death penalty which I think is not a positive contribution.

  319. Nick Gotts says

    Yet every soldier is guilty of murder regardless of their job and placement? – JAL@315

    Point me to where anyone said that. It would be taking part in an immoral act of war, such as the Iraq invasion, that makes a soldier morally guilty of the death of those it kills. But joining a military which past experience shows is highly likely to be involved in such an act of war is highly questionable. Similarly, medics should not take any part in the application of the death penalty (if they order others to inject the lethal chemicals, clearly that’s morally the same as doing it themselves – but I’m not sure that’s what Antiochus Epiphanes was referring to), and if they put themselves in a position where they could be ordered to do so, they are perhaps morally compromised – but unlike soldiers, they would have the legal right to refuse such an order and resign.

  320. says

    From the comments at Michael Luciano’s new post at the Daily Banter:

    BrandonSPilcher

    I don’t mind that Myers and his gang are for social justice. Social justice by itself is a good thing in my book. What I find insufferable about them is that they pretend that the movement hasn’t attracted its share of the screechy, knee-jerk politically correct harpies that the label “Social Justice Warriors” most commonly applies to. When I brought up one example of this tendency (namely Suey Park’s ridiculous #CancelColbert jihad against blatantly obvious satire), they started defending it, as if the concept of people on their team ever behaving badly was unfathomable to them.

    Mind you, you have assholes attracted to all political movements. Social justice movements are no different from the rest in this regard. But when people on your side of the political spectrum behave like assholes, it is especially embarrassing

    Not a fan of people who unironically use the phrase “Politically Correct”. Harpies ain’t cool either.

  321. toska says

    Tony! @320
    People who use the term “jihad” to describe criticism are also not cool. Everyone knows that we perform witchhunts, not jihads. *facepalm*

  323. anteprepro says

    I’ve finally discovered the name for our movement!

    Politically Correct Misandrist Radical Feminist Harpies, Divisive Leftist Authoritarian Female Supremacist Lynch Mobs and Nanny State Echo Chamber Thought Police for Witch Hunting, Token Diversity, Purity Tests and Social Justice Wars.

    It doesn’t have quite the same ring as “Gamerghazi” and “Menz Rights Bowel Movement”, though.

  324. toska says

    anteprepro
    I’m good with your title, except I’m pretty sure “Commie” should be in there somewhere.

    chigau
    How could I forget the lynching??? I repent for the error of my ways! Mercy! Mercy!

  327. anteprepro says

    Tony!: That’s only if you make an acronym in the way that is dictated by the Totalitarian Fascist English Grammar and Group Identification Police of the United States of American Internet (also known as the group NAZI).

    Freedom vs. Freedom Fighters and Status Quo Warriors have no need for such arbitrary strictures.

  328. says

    anteprepro:
    Elsewhere, you said:

    What do I like? RPGs and old school platformers, especially Mario and Sonic games

    Ah, them’s what I call games!
    I loved playing Super Mario Brothers and Super Mario 2 (part 3 to a lesser extent). And Sonic rocked!

    Also loved R-Type for Sega Genesis (?)

  329. says

    Windowless airplanes?

    UK-based tech innovation company Centre for Process Innovation (CPI) hopes to be among the first to design a windowless aircraft. Instead of windows, the plane would have high-definition, flexible screens to show what’s happening outside, as it soars through the air.

    In other words, there are no actual windows in the plane’s passenger section; the displays create the illusion that the cabin walls are transparent.

    The concept for windowless aircrafts with displays isn’t entirely new. A Paris-based company has a similar project in development, and there’s also a design in the works for a windowless jet. But CPI believes the vision could become a reality within 10 years.

    The imaging you’d see from the panels would come from mounted cameras outside of the aircraft that the developers say could offer an unobstructed panoramic view, meaning no visible wings or engines. Users could adjust the settings and use the displays for in-flight services, the company said.

    The plane would use OLED screens (a high-end, thin-film display technology) with protective coatings made to preserve the displays for its lifetime.

    Passengers would also be able to see and set their screen to show a live stream of outside surroundings from a completely different portion of the plane.

    But this isn’t just about a sleek new flight experience. CPI has made some pretty substantial claims about what this sort of technology could do for the flight industry. For starters, the plane walls would be thinner, more lightweight and stronger than what we have now.

    It’s also cheaper, CPI said, which could lead to less costly flights for consumers. According to its calculations, each time plane weight reduces 1%, there’s a 0.75% savings in fuel cost, so the passenger, manufacturer and the airline will save money.

    I’m all for the purported benefits, but it seems odd to me –all you’re going to see around you for much of a flight is a bunch of clouds. Not exactly the greatest view.

  330. says

    It gets hard to argue when the meanings of words get twisted. For example, I should call myself a republican (coming from a constitutional republic), yet the term has been twisted out of recognition by the ‘Merkin Republican Party. Should we be scrambling about looking for a new word, conceding the original to the GOP?

    Another such word is “Libertarian”. The original word was defined along the lines:

    …anarchists use the terms “libertarian”, “libertarian socialist” and “libertarian communist” as equivalent to “anarchist” …. the anarchist goal is freedom, liberty, and the ending of all hierarchical and authoritarian institutions and social relations.

    Unfortunately, in the United States the term “libertarian” has become, since the 1970s, associated with the right-wing, i.e., supporters of “free-market” capitalism. That defenders of the hierarchy associated with private property seek to associate the term “libertarian” for their authoritarian system is both unfortunate and somewhat unbelievable to any genuine libertarian.

    Authoritarians will end up appropriating every word in the dictionary. Try reading any of their literature, with an understanding of the original use and meaning of the words they have stolen, to get an idea how topsy-turvy their world view is.

    “Libertarian” =”COMMIE” !

    .

    (Quoted text.)

  331. says

    When is the term “Redskin” not a racist slur?

    When you can find people to co-opt:

    Snyder offered Red Mesa students free tickets and transportation to the Redskins’ Oct. 12 game against the Arizona Cardinals in Glendale, Ariz.., and more than half (150) of the school’s 220 students accepted them.

    Inside the stadium, Snyder sat in the visiting owner’s box with Ben Shelly, the outgoing president of the Navajo Nation. Outside the stadium, Amanda Blackhorse, who is the lead plaintiff in a case threatening the Washington Redskins’ trademark protection, criticized parents and faculty for allowing the Red Mesa High students to be used as pawns by the NFL team owner in his charm offensive.

    (Linky)

  332. AlexanderZ says

    Tony! #329

    all you’re going to see around you for much of a flight is a bunch of clouds. Not exactly the greatest view.

    Some people find clouds very pleasing, and I assume the cameras could be turned downward to show a landscape. Regardless, it’s usually done to prevent a claustrophobic anxiety in passengers. That’s one of the reasons why bus ads are printed on a perforated mesh film – early on passengers complained that regular ads where “walling” them off inside the bus.

    I’m more concerned with the accumulated energy impact. Sure, they say that the planes would require less energy, but does that factor in maintenance for the new systems? Surely that bill will rise pretty quickly. And what about accidents? Very often a problem is spotted early by a passenger noticing smoke or some abnormality in the wings and alerting the pilots. Now it’s all about trusting the staff.

  334. Rey Fox says

    all you’re going to see around you for much of a flight is a bunch of clouds.

    I’m a window watcher on planes. Sure, the view’s not always great, but I like trying to figure out where we are. I flew from Oakland to Austin last month for a job interview and flew over southern Utah, where I had lived and worked this previous summer. I recognized Cedar City, Bryce Canyon, and some places I never got to like Lake Powell and Monument Valley. I loved it.

  336. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    @Chas, #333:

    Brilliant share. Thank you.

  338. says

    Eric Liu gets talks about the need for effective gun laws

    So, what do we do about the public health crisis of gun violence? We have to turn to both law and norms. Many gun-rights absolutists respond to the death and mayhem of a Marysville or a Sandy Hook by saying that a particular gun law — say, background checks for gun purchases — wouldn’t have prevented that tragedy.

    But when someone driving under the speed limit dies in a car wreck, we don’t throw out speed limits and declare them an ineffective burden. We recognize that speed limits and seat belt laws are part of a grown-up system of rules that reduce the overall likelihood of traffic fatalities.

    In precisely the same way, a requirement of background checks for gun purchases reduces the overall likelihood that people will die of gun violence. That’s why in the state of Washington, I’ve been working with other citizens to secure passage of a ballot initiative that will create such background checks. And it’s why that measure seems to most people here not like tyranny but like common sense.

    The challenge extends beyond lawmaking to norm-setting. The coalition of parents, faith leaders, educators, businesspeople and others in Washington who are uniting behind background checks do so in the name of a core social norm: responsibility. All our American rights — and particularly Second Amendment rights — come with responsibilities.

    The responsibility, for instance, to minimize the danger inherently created by the circulation of weapons that can kill en masse. The responsibility to foster a culture of safety, especially for our youth.

    When middle-aged “open-carry” activists walk into Kroger with semi-automatic rifles slung over their shoulders, they aren’t exercising their rights with an ethic of responsibility. They’re trying to intimidate their way to respect and esteem. They’re acting out, demanding attention and rejecting curbs on their desires. That’s not being a citizen. It’s being a toddler.
    We the people get to decide whether that’s normal. Whether it’s acceptable or laughable to brandish firearms in the produce aisle. Whether it’s tolerable or disgraceful that we average more than one school shooting a week now. Laws like background checks can help set a tone for what’s OK. But ultimately, with our family and friends and neighbors, each one of us must decide what kind of civilization we expect in the United States.

  339. Lofty says

    Windowless planes? Just give every passenger a video head set and they can choose their own reality. Wanna cross the continent in formation with a flock of giant pink elephants? Just choose option 33.

  341. says

    Tony! @329

    In other words, there are no actual windows in the plane’s passenger section; the displays create the illusion that the cabin walls are transparent.

    No fun for people who’re scared of being up in a plane anyway. I’m scared of heights, (not in planes, oddly enough) but I would not enjoy having the illusion of the walls being transparent, at all. Sounds like a way to make a lot more people a lot more uncomfortable, to me. I like Lofty‘s idea @339 much better!

    theophontes     @330

    It gets hard to argue when the meanings of words get twisted. For example, I should call myself a republican (coming from a constitutional republic), yet the term has been twisted out of recognition by the ‘Merkin Republican Party. Should we be scrambling about looking for a new word, conceding the original to the GOP?

    Liberal has suffered the same fate here, with its meaning reversed by the Liberal-National coalition being the slightly watered-down version of the GOP.

  342. Jacob Schmidt says

    8 women have now accused Jian Ghomeshi of sexual abuse.

    http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2014/10/29/jian_ghomeshi_8_women_accuse_former_cbc_host_of_violence_sexual_abuse_or_harassment.html

    Baring something similar to alien sightings, where numerous people imagine similar things en mass,* I don’t think this is going to go over well for Ghomeshi.

    Also, I like the way this is going. Too often, sexual abuse is simply thrown under the rug. Here, CBC seems to have taken serious action, and within days numerous women felt comfortable coming forward in some capacity. I don’t think this would have happened 20 years ago.

    *I bring this up because I fully expect the argument to be used at some point. I’ve already seen people assert unfalsifiable models of fake memories to dismiss allegations; “rape allegations are like alien sightings” can’t be too far off.

    —

    Wrong.If man can make woman laugh he can win her heart.

    Ignoring the rest, it doesn’t work. “Laughing at” has negative connotations and positive connotations: laughing at the comedian, or someone trying to make you laugh, is good. It’s complimentary. The sort of “laughing at” one might fear is certainly not good: its mocking, or contemptuous. The response reads like “I’m going to deliberately misread you to make my point.”

  343. chigau (違う) says

    If the walls of my plane were transparent
    I would spend a portion* of the flight running up and down the aisles, arms out-spread, making airplane noises.
    Along with all the small children on the flight.
    —
    *until They ducktaped me to my seat and diverted the flight.
    [sigh]

  345. Saad says

    If the walls of my plane were transparent
    I would spend a portion* of the flight running up and down the aisles, arms out-spread, making airplane noises.
    Along with all the small children on the flight.

    I would join you but I have brown skin.

    Amirite, Sam Harris?

  347. AlexanderZ says

    2kittehs #341

    Liberal has suffered the same fate here, with its meaning reversed by the Liberal-National coalition being the slightly watered-down version of the GOP.

    Same thing in Russia and other post-Soviet countries. The “Right” is anti-authoritarian and, in part, pro-social equality, while the “Left” ranges from Communist quasi-fascism to the National-Bolsheviks (try to guess their ideology).

    Jacob Schmidt #342

    Here, CBC seems to have taken serious action, and within days numerous women felt comfortable coming forward in some capacity. I don’t think this would have happened 20 years ago.

    Admirable. Has the police been involved yet? I don’t see it mentioned anywhere.

    The response reads like “I’m going to deliberately misread you to make my point.”

    Exactly! It’s not that they don’t understand the original point, they do. They know exactly what it means, which makes them all the angrier. Anything even remotely resembling a retort, no matter how moronic, would have been accepted Sommers and her supporters. She could have farted and it would have been seen as equally witty by her MRA allies.

  348. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Admirable. Has the police been involved yet? I don’t see it mentioned anywhere.

    Now, why did you say this? The CBC handling of the situation has nothing to do with the police.

  349. AlexanderZ says

    Nerd of Redhead #348

    Now, why did you say this? The CBC handling of the situation has nothing to do with the police.

    I know it doesn’t. And I wasn’t sarcastic about CBC – their actions are admirable.
    However, I want to know what happened to the police. Ghomeshi is a dangerous and violent criminal and the police (as far as I know) doesn’t lift a finger. It’s the same thing as with Sam Popper – the organization that employed him acted well, but the scum is still walking around free.

  350. AlexanderZ says

    Nerd, probably what I’m angry about is that Israel – a country that has segregated buses for men and women – seems to be dealing with rapists better than Canada and other Western countries that I like and hold to a higher standard.

  353. chigau (違う) says

    So.
    I made for me a big bowl of “stuff to eat one-handed whilst internetting”.
    [nuts berries chips junkysnacks]
    After a while, I note that I’m getting no nuts.
    So I shook the bowl.
    There they are! On the bottom.
    Is there a metaphor in there … somewhere?

  354. says

    @ Alexander Z

    National-Bolsheviks (try to guess their ideology)

    I cannot imagine. It sounds like a contradiction in terms. The only commonality one could suggest in the case of the Spanish War, for example, is the shear mean-spiritedness of both the Nationalists (Franco) and the Bolsheviks (Stalin). That and a fixation on hierarchy.

    …

    For anyone looking for a religious experience: How Tripping On Mushrooms Changes The Brain
    (long-term and in positive ways)

  355. says

    @ chigau

    Is there a metaphor in there … somewhere?

    The nuts are smaller and heavier?

    A variation on Stoke’s law … ? Perhaps if you filled the bowl with water, the nuts would place higher up the bowl.

    I suggest that, with your next bowl, you measure and weigh all the ingredient particles carefully and then log their relative positions wrt the top of the bowl as you eat them.

  356. chigau (違う) says

    theophontes
    Yeah.
    Weighing and measuring my junk-food.
    That’s gonna happen.
    —
    What about fully-laden popcorn?
    —
    jeez
    Have you ever tried to eat wet potato chips?L!?

  357. says

    @ chigau

    wet potato chips

    Mmmmh… you might have a point there. In that case I’d suggest stringing the different snacks together with a needle and thread, in the exact order that you like to eat them. If you use dental floss as the thread, you can keep your teeth clean at the same time.

  358. chigau (違う) says

    theophontes
    I just did a $500Canadian Dentist Visit.
    I think it would be easier to just not eat.

  359. Nick Gotts says

    Same thing in Russia and other post-Soviet countries. The “Right” is anti-authoritarian – Alexander Z

    Really? According to wikipedia, there are 4 parties in the Russian Duma at present. The largest is “United Russia”, a.k.k. “Putin’s fanbois”, which has no coherent ideology. The right-wing party is Zhirinovsky’s LDPR, which is fascist in ideology, but refrains from criticising Putin. The two left parties are the Communist Party, which does fit your claim, and A Just Russia, which does not appear to do so. In Ukraine, the now-dominant parties of the right have close links with neo-Nazis when they are not neo-Nazi themselves. Belarus may give you a better case, but the opposition parties appear to come from all over the political spectrum, and Lukashenko does not rely on party support. In the Baltic states, right or centre-right parties have mostly dominated politics since 1990, but these remain highly sexist and homophobic societies. AFAIK, all the other former Soviet republics are personal dictatorships. Looking to former satellite countries (I don’t know if you intended to include these), important parties of the right in Hungary (Fidesz, Jobbik), Poland (Law and Justice), Bulgaria (Attack), and Slovakia (Slovak National Party, which describes itself as “a socialist, nationalist party based on the European Christian system of values” – draw your own conclusions) are authoritarian, closely allied with the dominant Christian denomination, and in some cases fascist.

  360. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    However, I want to know what happened to the police. Ghomeshi is a dangerous and violent criminal and the police (as far as I know) doesn’t lift a finger.

    How is the police to act without formal complaints? Which don’t appear to be filed? Why do you want a police state?

  361. AlexanderZ says

    Nick Gotts #359

    Really? According to wikipedia, there are 4 parties in the Russian Duma at present.

    This might surprise you, but Russia isn’t a democracy. All those parties support Putin either explicitly (“United Russia” and “A just Russia”, which operate as basically the same party, the supposedly different ideologies are nothing but lipstick on a pig. Hell, Mironov is a personal friend of Putin) or implicitly – LDPR and the Commies always show support when Putin plans some thing big (like, say, invading and annexing Crimea), they allow themselves to dissent only when they know they can’t affect policy in any way. Zhirinovsky (LDRP’s leader for life) made a career out of this.

    The only people who do oppose Putin aren’t allowed into the Duma. They comprise a wide variety of organizations, but they usually unite as the Union of Right Forces. Other important liberal campaigns and groups can be found here. Almost all of those are or were part of the Right Coalition at some point, or part of Yabloko, its predecessor. Also, the Wiki article focus mainly on the groups’ financial policies (which are usually Neoliberal), they were also the only groups in Russia to protest (and get arrested, as is customary there) against anti-LGBT laws, anti-dissent laws and many other decisions to oppress the people.

    As for Ukraine: Despite being pals with Nazis, the right-wing Ukrainian parties still manage to have more progressive politics (mainly because they need Europe’s support) than the Left-wing Russia oriented groups. Not that it’s a high mark considering that they support the break-away regions and their action: ethnic cleansing of Roma people, murder of LGBT people, persecution of all faiths except the Moscow Patriarchy Pravoslavs.

    Looking to former satellite countries (I don’t know if you intended to include these)

    No, they’re more Western and their political system is closer to a Western one.

    Nerd of Redhead #360

    How is the police to act without formal complaints? Which don’t appear to be filed? Why do you want a police state?

    I don’t want a police state. Some countries allow for independent investigations even no charges are made, if there is a high likelihood that a crime was committed. I know that’s the case for Israel.

  362. AlexanderZ says

    timgueguen #352
    Thanks!

    theophontes #354

    I cannot imagine. It sounds like a contradiction in terms.

    They do have some history. However, if you want really strange combinations, then how about an important figure in Israel’s ruling party supporting (until he was forced to backpedal) Hitler? Or certain synagogues distributing fliers about the necessity of concentration camps for amalek (codename for Arabs)? Or the time when one Israeli colonel said that “we must learn the lessons of how the Nazis crushed the Warsaw Uprising so as to be better prepared when fighting Palestinians in residential areas”.

  364. chigau (違う) says

    I think Uri Geller has been into my cuttlery.
    Aren’t the tines on a fork all supposed to point in the same direction?
    Is this related to Hallowe’en?

  366. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Some countries allow for independent investigations even no charges are made, if there is a high likelihood that a crime was committed. I know that’s the case for Israel.

    Canada and the US? I don’t think so Tim. Which is why even thinking about it is not worth it.

  368. chigau (違う) says

    There are only two of us in this household.
    Neither of us abuses cutlery.
    The SO is very, very, very serious about Tools™.
    No. The only Logical™ explanation is Uri Geller.

  369. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    No. The only Logical™ explanation is Uri Geller.

    *raises left eyebrow*

  370. chigau (違う) says

    I wish I could do that one eyebrow thing.
    I can raise my right eyebrow but the left sortof halfraises.
    I cannot move the left by itself.
    Do I need to turn in my Vulcan card?

  372. Jacob Schmidt says

    I’ve already seen people assert unfalsifiable models of fake memories to dismiss allegations; “rape allegations are like alien sightings” can’t be too far off.

    I fucking told you.

  374. Nick Gotts says

    This might surprise you, but Russia isn’t a democracy. – Alexander Z

    No, that doesn’t surprise me, but thanks for the additional information.

  375. Nick Gotts says

    Alexander Z,

    Further to that, I note that the Union of Right Forces is affiliated to the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Democrat_UnionInternational Democrat Union, where it rubs shoulders with Fidesz, the Bavarian Christian Social Union, the US Republican Party, the Conservative Party of Canada, National Renewal of Chile (fans of Pinochet), and El Salvador’s ARENA – the party of the death squads – among others. I wouldn’t trust their liberal postures for a moment.

    As for Ukraine, if you’re having to say:

    Despite being pals with Nazis…

    before praising someone, I think your claims pretty much collapse of their own accord.

  378. AlexanderZ says

    Nick Gotts #375

    Further to that, I note that the Union of Right Forces is affiliated to the… International Democrat Union, where it rubs shoulders with Fidesz…

    Yeah, and the Israeli Labor Party was (and still is) a member of the Socialist International at a time when its action would make the current Netanyahu government blush. And that it is just one example. Some of the other members were much worse. Your point being?

    before praising someone, I think your claims pretty much collapse of their own accord.

    I’m not praising anyone – I’m telling things as they are. You have an extremely West-centered worldview and refuse to understand that there are other worldviews and each characteristic has degrees. A party that is willing to sit with fascist and Nazis at a time of civil war and ignores their demands is less authoritarian that those that support or carry out ethnic cleansing with gusto. A party that aligns itself with Republicans but still is committed to democracy and civil rights (this is a good point to note that the GOP is less authoritarian than the vast majority of political organizations in the world simply because they recognize at least some form of rule of law or human rights) is much less authoritarian than a regime that jails LGBT activists, kills and tortures its opponents and is generally vile in every conceivable way.

    P.S.
    Your gravat has an… interesting shape. LOL.

    Nerd of Redhead #366
    So what happens with cases of corruption? I mean, it’s not like the briber or the bribed are very likely to report the crime. How does the police act in those situations?

  379. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    So what happens with cases of corruption? I mean, it’s not like the briber or the bribed are very likely to report the crime. How does the police act in those situations?

    Look it up yourself. FBI. Still not making your point, when it is a crime against a person, and not society in general.

  380. Dhorvath, OM says

    Daz,

    More prosaically, bent tines on forks in my experience generally means some sod’s been using them as tyre-levers.

    If you can get it off using fork tines, you can do it with no tools at all. At least, I have never seen a fork that was stiff enough to help with a stubborn tire.

  382. says

    Bored, anyone?
    At the end of an argument with sexist asshole, woman responds by re-tweeting / blogging this:

    mamastiles:
    men don’t get to decide what is misogynistic
    straight people don’t get to decide what is homophobic
    cis people don’t get to decide what is transphobic
    white people don’t get to decide what is racist
    people in positions of power
    don’t get to decide what is considered oppression
    that’s how we move backwards, not forwards

    Other man jumps in, explaining (at some length) just why she is wrong…
    Anyone care to explain why that’s bad? (I’ve tried, I give up.)

  385. Ogvorbis says

    chigau:

    You turned off the outdoor tap? How will you get your beer while shoveling snow?

  387. chigau (違う) says

    Ogvorbis and Tony!
    Intravenous direct feed
    or
    dozens of those teeny airplane boozebottles
    or
    a St. Bernard

  393. Ogvorbis says

    No. Rum should also be treated gently. Same for cognac. You can bruise the hell out of vodka and gin and it’ll still taste just as bad.

    But, y’know, SCOTCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  394. says

    But, y’know, SCOTCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    …should be poured down a drain as quickly as possible.

    (note to self: if ever I encounter Ogvorbis at my bar, I should immediately, ummm accidentally break all bottles of scotch)

  395. chigau (違う) says

    Tony! #394
    No. Just No.
    Put a chair on the patio, give him a big cigar, pour him 2 or 3 fingers hands of Glennnmorangyfidiky and wire him for sound so everyone can hear his stories.
    That’s a night out!

  397. says

    chigau @395:
    Oooh, there’s an idea. Instead of smashing all the bottles, I’ll pour them all in one vat, mix them together and serve it to him.
    Hey Ogvorbis! How does Johnny Walker Black/Blue/Green/Red/Gold, Dewars, Chivas, Glemorangie, Glenlevit, and Glenfiddich all mixed together sound?

  400. opposablethumbs says

    Tony!

    How could you.

    Mix Glenmorangie, Glenlivet or Glenfiddich? With anything, let alone that Johnny Walker nonsense?

    I would not have thought this of you. Ever.

    I – I – words fail me. ::sobs:: ::iz devastated and retires in shock::

  401. opposablethumbs says

    Daz, understandable, and you have my sympathies. I got lucky/was incredibly prescient, in hindsight: the one and only time I ever got trashed (at about 16 or so) was on Martini – I never drank it again either, so I’m glad I inadvertently ruled out something so eminently unmissable and kept the good stuff ;-)

  402. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    Mine was votka.
    I think I can manage it still (and I probably had in some cocktail sometime), but it really wouldn’t be my first choice. Or second. Or tenth.

  404. Nick Gotts says

    Alexander Z

    Yeah, and the Israeli Labor Party was (and still is) a member of the Socialist International at a time when its action would make the current Netanyahu government blush. And that it is just one example. Some of the other members were much worse. Your point being?

    My point being that who you are willing to associate matters, a lot. It’s often said here that the standard you walk past is the standard you accept: that’s even more the case of the standard you sit down with. Certainly, the Israeli Labor Party should be expelled from the (so-called) Socialist International (most of whose members aren’t socialist in any sense I recognise), as should a number of the other members, if it wants to deserve any respect.

    You have an extremely West-centered worldview and refuse to understand that there are other worldviews and each characteristic has degrees.

    Actually, I’m quite familiar with views structurally similar to yours among sections of the western left, which believe that anyone who opposes American imperialism is an ally. You appear to just reverse that and say anyone who opposes Putin is an ally.

    A party that is willing to sit with fascist and Nazis at a time of civil war and ignores their demands is less authoritarian that those that support or carry out ethnic cleansing with gusto.

    Sitting with fascists and Nazis is unacceptable under any circumstances – as, of course, is ethnic cleansing. Notice that in the Ukranian case, colluding with Nazis has also been tactically disastrous, in giving cover to Putin’s crimes.

  405. Nick Gotts says

    Further to #404,

    My specific point about the International Democrat Union is that many of its members are rabidly homophobic: if you are willing to associate with rabid homophobes, then your opposition to homophobic legislation is clearly not important to you, and is inevitably suspect of being merely tactical.

  406. Nick Gotts says

    Further still to #404:
    Alexander Z, With regard to your words on the US Republican Party:

    this is a good point to note that the GOP is less authoritarian than the vast majority of political organizations in the world simply because they recognize at least some form of rule of law or human rights

    you’d actually need to survey the vast majority of political organizations in the world in order to make that case. Meanwhile, I would think respecting the right to vote was a minimal standard of decency for a political party. If you haven’t yet picked up that the Republican Party regards this right with contempt and hostility, you could start here.

  407. rq says

    Tony @397

    Johnny Walker Black/Blue/Green/Red/Gold

    True to Queer Shoop form, you have invented Johnny Walker Rainbow. ;)

    Nick</b @359

    In the Baltic states, right or centre-right parties have mostly dominated politics since 1990, but these remain highly sexist and homophobic societies.

    Oooooh boy have they ever, and they still do – there are no viable left-wing (never mind progressive) alternatives. And to claim that these right-wing parties are anti-authoritarian and pro-social equality (as Alexander Z does in 347)? I laugh. And no, the government here is not a unified, pro-Western one. The pro-Western side is the one that generally gets enough of a majority (via coalition) to maintain power, but the pro-Russia side is by no means weak, quiet, or complacent.
    I could also mildly quibble with the ‘sexist’ aspect of local society, but that’s on a more institutional level (which is decent and Latvia seems to do well on a lot of international surveys about women in top jobs and the like – not brilliant, but well). Social life can be incredibly segregated and internally enforced, though it relies very much on benevolent sexism (in personal experience) rather than outright attempts to keep women down.
    The homophobia, that one hurts, because it’s huge. Silent and kept under wraps, but huge.
    (That’s 2 euro-cents from me. Sorry for butting in on the conversation.)

  408. Ogvorbis says

    Tony! @394:

    …should be poured down a drain as quickly as possible.

    Don’t worry. I’m not one of those Scotch snobs — I actually prefer blended.

    chigau @395:

    Put a chair on the patio, give him a big cigar, pour him 2 or 3 fingers hands of Glennnmorangyfidiky and wire him for sound so everyone can hear his stories.

    I would be too drunk to tell any story.

    Back to Tony!, now at 397:

    Hey Ogvorbis! How does Johnny Walker Black/Blue/Green/Red/Gold, Dewars, Chivas, Glemorangie, Glenlevit, and Glenfiddich all mixed together sound?

    I already said I aintent a snob. I like blends. Especially the smokey ones — Johnny Walker Black by itself, neat, would fit the bill.

    opposablethumbs @400:

    How could you.
    Mix Glenmorangie, Glenlivet or Glenfiddich? With anything, let alone that Johnny Walker nonsense?
    I would not have thought this of you. Ever.
    I – I – words fail me. ::sobs:: ::iz devastated and retires in shock::

    One of them there Scotch snobs.

    I actually prefer the blends. More predictable. I have had some excellent single malts — LaFroig, for example — but I’ve also had some shitty ones. I’ll stick with the blends.

  411. Rob Grigjanis says

    Since when was the p in Laphroaig capitalized? Is this some French conspiracy? Also, how can spirits be ‘bruised’?

  413. Ogvorbis says

    Since when was the p in Laphroaig capitalized[1]? Is this some French conspiracy[2]? Also, how can spirits be ‘bruised[3]’?

    1. Since I am an idiot.

    2. No.

    3. I remember an old Wizard of Id cartoon in which Bung is rescued by a Saint Bernard with a cask of cognac and Bung is telling him to stop jumping around or he will bruise the liquor.

  414. rq says

    Attencion, polyamorous folk!
    I have a university classmate who is studying couples therapy, and is doing research into polyamory (and thus how would couples therapy work in that context). Is there anyone willing to offer their personal experiences? If yes, please email me at: eye zed ay enn dee ay at google’s mail service.
    I may or may not have an internet survey link from her later, for those not comfortable with email contact.

    Cross-posting to the Lounge.

  415. Morgan!? Militant Pacifist, SJW says

    I was recently introduced to Laphroaig. Never have been a fan of scotch. Tasted like liquid dirt. Give me a good tequila, over ice, for sipping. No lime or salt required.

  416. Ogvorbis says

    Morgan!?:

    Liquid dirt? weird. I taste iodine and seaweed in Laphroaig. I prefer the highland Scotches which are peaty (earthy) and smoky.

  417. AlexanderZ says

    I return home and decide to lie down. My cat comes, jumps on my chest, as he usually does, and begins purring. Then, for no reason what so ever, he reached with his paw and slowly cut my face. What the hell?!

  418. AlexanderZ says

    Nick Gotts #404-6

    You appear to just reverse that and say anyone who opposes Putin is an ally.

    God damn it! I’m not saying anything about who you should ally with – it’s up to you to decide. I’m saying how things are: Russian, Ukrainian, etc. Left is more authoritarian than the Right.
    You think the Right is still too authoritarian, homophobic, racist, etc.? Good. You’re correct. It doesn’t affect my argument in any way. First look at the world how it really is and then decide who is worth allying with, under which circumstances and to what end.

    Sitting with fascists and Nazis is unacceptable under any circumstances – as, of course, is ethnic cleansing. Notice that in the Ukranian case, colluding with Nazis has also been tactically disastrous, in giving cover to Putin’s crimes.

    That’s true. I’ve said that much myself back in the day. It doesn’t change the fact that one side tries to maintain at least a semi-functional democracy and another is trying to build something between a theocracy and old fashioned fascism. Again, in politics degrees matter.

    if you are willing to associate with rabid homophobes, then your opposition to homophobic legislation is clearly not important to you, and is inevitably suspect of being merely tactical.

    Tactical? Being trampled down by OMON is a tactic? Do you think Russian prisons are a holiday resort?
    There is a disconnect between the ground level activists who are more liberal (they also came to defense of Pussy Riot and pretty much at any other time Putin decided to oppress someone) and the leadership who are mostly former Yeltsin cronies. Still, it’s quite obvious which is the less homophobic one – it’s the one that doesn’t call for SWAT teams to beat LGBT activists.

    Meanwhile, I would think respecting the right to vote was a minimal standard of decency for a political party. If you haven’t yet picked up that the Republican Party regards this right with contempt and hostility, you could start here.

    I’m well aware of Republican attempts of vote suppression. Nevertheless, they compare favorably to countries which are complete or de facto dictatorships, so it’s small wonder that the dissidents from those countries try to ally themselves with GOP.
    “Why they don’t ally with the Democrats?” you might ask. One very important reason is because they know very well that only the willingness to use force will stop a leadership that rules through nothing but force, and since GOP is hawkish they get the support by default.

    rq #407

    And to claim that these right-wing parties are anti-authoritarian and pro-social equality (as Alexander Z does in 347)?

    I’m talking just about the eastern Slavic countries and the Georgia region. I’m not familiar enough with the Baltic states enough to voice an opinion. Those countries were considered foreign and Western even before the fall of the Iron Curtain.

  419. says

    Tony #397

    How does Johnny Walker Black/Blue/Green/Red/Gold, Dewars, Chivas, Glemorangie, Glenlevit, and Glenfiddich all mixed together sound?

    Like an abomination unto all that is good. Bourbon can be acceptably blended, but whisky cannot.
    Ogvorbis

    I taste iodine and seaweed in Laphroaig.

    Better than dead bodies and seaweed, I suppose. (Reference to a fanstasy novel, one of the Jhereg books, but I forget which.)

    I prefer the highland Scotches which are peaty (earthy) and smoky.

    ?! This I don’t get at all, I’m afraid; the whole point of the Islays like Laphroig on my veiw is the peaty, smoky flavor.
    AlexanderZ
    I haven’t the energy right now to properly fisk your recent posts, but I’ll simply note that you appear to have a rather…unique… usage of the concepts of the political left and the political right.

  420. rq says

    Alexander Z
    It’s just that you conveniently wrote under the umbrella of ‘post-Soviet countries’.
    And Latvia is not considered foreign and Western, it is still perceived as a rightful part of the Russian Empire by no small percent of the Latvian (and probably Russian, considering some of the media gems coming out of there) population. It may have been exotic, because BEACHES!!!, but definitely not foreign. Or Western.
    I can’t speak for the other Baltic countries, though.

  422. Lofty says

    AlexanderZ, congratulations. Your owner has raised your status to favourite scratching post.

  424. says

    TW: Murder, rape.

    I am forever getting stuck at MN’s blog:

    {cross-post}

    Your comment is awaiting moderation.

    @ Michael Nugent

    If an alleged rapist were to seek out a haven in the form of a blog, he ¹ might do worse than coming here.

    If he was to chose just one of three options:

    A. Pharyngula
    B. Michael Nugent’s blog
    C. Slymepit

    … which would he most likely chose?

    I would posit that he would go with option B. Pharyngula would be too uninviting, whereas Slymepit would make him look even worse in the public eye, and undermine his carefully cultivated persona.

    An alleged rapist like Michael Shermer would be pleased that you support rape apologism – as per Richard Dawkins (who thinks the victim‘s drunkeness somehow excuses the rapist‘s behaviour) – and tackle the people accusing him, by trying to silence them and their allies.

    This weekend there was a murder near my home in Hong Kong. A young women was stripped and stabbed to death by a Bank of America Merrill Lynch banker named Rurik George Caton Jutting (to name names). A group of Indonesian women had been warning about this man. Sadly the victim did not heed the warnings.

    Imagine that a friend of Jutting’s had defended him online with put-downs of the accusers, diminishing of the accusations, insisting that no names be named, that the perp is innocent until proven guilty, … etc. Think of the harm such a person may have done.

    Consider also the case of Jian Ghomeshi, the recently fired Canadian radio host, who physically attacked and beat his victims. His crimes are only “alleged”. Yet should women in his proximity not be warned of his behaviour? He has a large support group, so probably won’t need your services in supplying a haven for him, from the accusations being levelled at him. He has more than enough fans to play your game, and play down the accusations levelled against him.

    …
    ¹ Though rapists can be of any sexual persuasion, we are here refering to allegations made against adult² males.
    ² Bye the bye: You appear to be allowing your blog to be used as a platform to attack a child victim of rape. Last year you told people to stop and even redacted the person’s name. Why the sudden change in policy?

  427. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I just read over at Almost Diamonds.

    I’m so sorry.

    Good bye.

    You have nothing to be sorry for. No need to leave.

  431. opposablethumbs says

    Ogvorbis, I don’t mean to tell you what you should or should not do in order to protect yourself – but please, absolutely DO NOT FEEL YOU NEED TO GO for our/FtB’s sake. I am sorry if the accusations being bandied about by the Pitters are making you sick; those douches are knowingly and deliberately, actively implying a number of absolute lies both about you and about Pharyngula. PLEASE DO NOT GO unless you need a break in order to keep yourself whole. PLEASE STAY HERE if it is of any good to you. Please stay, unless it is harming you more than it helps.
    And if you go, I hope you will come back when you can. Your voice is valued here.

  432. Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy says

    2nding opposablethumbs. Of course take some time away if you need to for your own health and safety Ogvorbis, but don’t feel you need to go for our/FtB’s sake. You don’t owe us an apology.

  434. says

    I second the comments by others. Ogvorbis, if you feel the need to go for your own well-being, that is understandable, but please know that we appreciate you and your comments here.

  436. toska says

    Ogvorbis
    I’m also seconding what others have said. Do what is best for you, but don’t leave because you think anyone else here will be better off without you.

    I’m fairly new here, so I don’t know you very well, but I’ve seen in your comments that you are a compassionate person, and your harassers are in the wrong here. It is not your fault.

  437. Rob Grigjanis says

    Ogvorbis: You have absolutely nothing to apologize for. You’ve shown honesty and courage, while the arseholes have only transparent bullshit and spite. They truly are little people.

  439. rq says

    Ogvorbis
    I’m going to get on the pro-Oggie bandwagon.
    If you need the time for self-care, please take it. If you’re doing it ‘for us’, then please stick around. *hugs*

  441. Morgan!? Militant Pacifist, SJW says

    Oggie, my friend, I hope you stay. I do not recall if you have ever sought formal professional help in dealing with the horrific trauma you experienced as a child. But in lieu of formal counseling, I can think of no better place to interact and confront and hopefully slay your demons, demons NOT of your own making, than here with The Horde. And we are honored to participate. You are a sterling human being. It is a stain on the species that so many are so cruel and so empathy-deficient that they now seek to re-traumatize you. I have an image of you, standing tall, in the center of a group of Hordlings, all standing shoulder to shoulder, arms locked and determined to protect you from the shit flung by the unevolved bastards of the ‘pit.

  442. Excluded Layman says

    Ogvorbis
    This is probably the nicest community I’ve ever stared at from the cover of bushes. If you need time, take it! They’ll have a place set for you when you come back. The thing about good people is that remorse counts for more than history.

    Here’s a sad song, because it came to mind.

  446. says

    Meh, even if I don’t name names, my comments go into moderation with Michael Nugent.

    I wish he would decide on his comment policies and how to apply them. He lets through ‘pitter comments that name victims, yet blocks comments about the (alleged) perpetrators, even if they are not named.

    …….

    Your comment is awaiting moderation.

    @ Michael Nugent

    Feel free to comment on issues without alleging that named people are responsible for serious crimes.

    Michael, I am not the person making the allegations:

    1. In the case of your best buddy, the allegations were made by several different people who are claiming, inter alia, that he molested or raped them. I am not making this up, it is common and public knowledge as to what he is alleged to have done to these people. Are these people wrong in warning people? Are all these disparate people out to smear him? Why does his own story, (in his own, not my, words) keep changing?

    2. No one is claiming Dawkins committed any crime. I am only highlighting the very damaging and irrational things he has chosen to post online.

    3. In the murder case in Hong Kong, the perpetrator himself called the police to arrest him. Perhaps he will succeed in his current tack, of claiming lack of culpability by way of insanity. Even then: Is it wrong of me to suggest that the women who were warning others about him actually did the right thing? Do you have a different suggestion?

    4, In my final example, the person in question freely confessed to beating up women. Is it wrong of me to have suggested that women in his proximity at least be allowed to warn each other of his aberrant behaviour?

    ……..

    This is becoming tedious. I thank people here for their patience.

  448. AtheistPilgrim says

    Daz 399
    Empathy: I bombed out on a bottle of Dewars when I was nineteen – ditto.

  449. says

    Ogvorbis
    As much as it looks like it, this is not about you. You are just a convenient target because of your history. If you’d never joined the Scouts and if you’d never babysat those kids and if none of this had ever happened they would simply choose someone else, go after them and try to blame all of us for the gods would know what if they existed.
    Take care, but don’t leave in order to “protect” us. Leave, take all the time you need, come back, do whatever helps you.

  452. drivenb4u says

    I’m looking for some cohorts to help me stir things up in the comments on The Blaze. Not trolling per se, but bringing up opposing viewpoints (though they might see it as such).

  456. AlexanderZ says

    rq #420 (420? 420!)

    It’s just that you conveniently wrote under the umbrella of ‘post-Soviet countries’.

    You’re right. Should have rephrased that as Eastern Slavic countries and Georgia, plus the the breakaway regions and quasi-countries there.

    And Latvia is not considered foreign and Western, it is still perceived as a rightful part of the Russian Empire by no small percent of the Latvian (and probably Russian, considering some of the media gems coming out of there) population. It may have been exotic, because BEACHES!!!, but definitely not foreign. Or Western.

    That’s their attitude. I, on the other hand, still remember my relatives discussing trips to Riga and the preparations that they needed to do just to get there. The checks and talks with the local political figures (just to clarify: these figures were low-level people, head of councils in the workplace or housing, etc. Despite that their word was more than enough for the KGB to take interest in you, which would usually end very badly) about the dangerous Western influences and corrupting ways of the locals was very unusual for visiting a country which was part of the USSR. It was very similar to what you had to go through when visiting Czechoslovakia or even Yugoslavia, which showed that Latvia was treated as if it was foreign by The Party and by the people.

    Does that mean that Putin wants to leave the country alone, instead as some sort of Russian Lebensraum? No, it doesn’t. Russians feel they should dominate Eurasia, if not the world. However, it doesn’t mean that there aren’t any differences in how countries are viewed. Do you honestly believe that a country like Latvia, whose people made of habit of intentionally not speaking Russian even when they were ruled by Russia are viewed just as close and similar as countries like Ukraine and Belarus which had to resurrect their own languages after the fall of USSR simply because most people in major residential areas spoke only Russian?

    As for the Latvian Russians: They are mostly settlers and descendents of settlers. They are Stalin’s legacy, and it’s small wonder they act as such. They are obviously much more radical in their view of Latvia than almost all Russian, perhaps in the same way that the Orange Order doesn’t represent the English mainstream.

    Daz #421, Lofty #422
    :)
    Nothing like feline love, eh?

  457. rq says

    Alexander Z

    It was very similar to what you had to go through when visiting Czechoslovakia or even Yugoslavia, which showed that Latvia was treated as if it was foreign by The Party and by the people.

    Meh, not so much foreign, I would say, as exotic. Plus it bordered the rest of the world, so it would be considered more dangerous (honestly, Sweden is just across the bay!!!) from a ‘foreign influence’ sort of sense. But I don’t think it has been considered foreign per se. And from what my relatives tell me, discussions on “the dangerous Western influences and corrupting ways of the locals was very unusual for visiting a country which was part of the USSR” were not actually that unusual, as any sort of travel (or just a desire to travel) was looked on with suspicion (unless The Party was sending you on a Special Mission). Again, there may have been a bit more of that when preparing to visit Latvia (and, no doubt, Lithuania, Poland and Estonia and other countries bordering Europe), but not enough to foreignize it. This sort of suspicion was quite commonplace.

    As for the Latvian Russians: They are mostly settlers and descendents of settlers. They are Stalin’s legacy, and it’s small wonder they act as such.

    Nope, not mostly, as far as I know. There’s a huge portion of the population that have been living here since Tsarist times – maintaining their language and culture, sure, but they’re still Latvians-of-Russian-descent. They’re far less combative than more recent arrivals, since the whole reason for them being here is somewhat different and less imbued with the idea of superiority. This discrepancy within the ethnic Russian population showed up quite nicely when they did a survey of police employees and their knowledge of the Latvian language. The common expectation was that the worst results would be in Daugavpils, a traditionally ‘Russian’ city complete with Tsar-era fort (now in ruins) and a majoritarily ethnically Russian population dating back to the 18th (? should double-check that) century. However, the worst results came out of Riga, the capital, where the majority of the ethnically Russian population are settlers and their descendants from the Stalin era.
    The postulated reason for this was that those who came during Tsarist times (a) came for different reasons and were already present during the declaration of independence of Latvia and (b) were already (and have continued to be) better integrated by virtue of living here longer, while those arriving in the Stalin era were sent in as colonizers to push out the local population, leading to a lot of friction between the newly-arrived ethnic Russians and the local ethnic Latvians.
    Either way, this doesn’t diminish the fact that most of the Stalin-era arrivals do believe that Latvia should be a part of Russia, because they choose not to see themselves as Western-aligned. And they have a completely different media influence, as the pro-Russian/pro-West media is almost perfectly split along language lines.

    And in the long run, whether Putin sees Latvia as ‘exactly the same’ as Ukraine (which I doubt he does) doesn’t make a difference in his potential quest to own it. It’s a former Russian territory – never mind the language, this is enough.
    (Sometimes I kind of wish the Swedes would wake up to their historical right to Latvia – wouldn’t that be nice!)

  458. Badland says

    Ogvorbis
    I’m a lurker who values your voice and has learned more than I would have believed possible from you. Without hesitation I count you as Good People and I hope to see you here again

  459. AlexanderZ says

    rq #457

    Plus it bordered the rest of the world, so it would be considered more dangerous (honestly, Sweden is just across the bay!!!) from a ‘foreign influence’ sort of sense.

    So was every other part of the Soviet empire. It didn’t stop people from going to St. Petersburg’s countryside (which borders Finland), catch fish near (or from inside of, depending on your viewpoint) Japan, or going to Armenia which happens to border a very important NATO member (as opposed to Sweden which wasn’t and still isn’t any of those things).

    And from what my relatives tell me…

    Who are Latvians, I presume, and were not treated the same as the majority of Soviet population (which is exactly my point).

    …any sort of travel (or just a desire to travel) was looked on with suspicion (unless The Party was sending you on a Special Mission).

    This is entirely false. I, and my entire family, had yearly trips between Ukraine, Russia and most of the Caucasus and not even once had to go through the Riga ordeal. In fact, this route (Ukraine-Russia for work or school, then Georgia for summer vacation) was a common routine for much of the Soviet middle class. You only had to state a reason for travel (work, education, health or vacation) and provide the address of your future stay. And even that wasn’t always enforced. Some people (many people in the Donetsk region, for example) crossed those borders as a weekly routine. Without any background checks or unusual ideology talks (i.e. something that you wouldn’t get at work anyway).
    Oh, and that “Special Mission” stuff is cartoon nonsense. 250 million people didn’t live their lives that way. They weren’t Boris&Natasha.

    Latvia (and, no doubt, Lithuania, Poland and Estonia and other countries bordering Europe)

    This is the whole point. Poland wasn’t part of the Soviet Union. It was a Warsaw (duh) Pact country. It, and all other Warsaw Pact countries, were entirely set aside from core Soviet population. They were removed politically (day-to-day business weren’t dictated by the Kremlin, but by their own Communist Party), militarily (they had their own secret services), economically (they were exempt from core 5-year plans and other Soviet nonsense, as well as having greater access to cooperatives) and culturally (they didn’t undergo the Russification that was the norm for core). A Polish cartoon or a show set in Poland were celebrated precisely because they were foreign.
    The fact that you mention the Baltic states in the same breath as Poland shows their unique status; that of countries which are formally part of Soviet Union are de facto aren’t.

    Nope, not mostly, as far as I know. There’s a huge portion of the population that have been living here since Tsarist times…

    Thanks. I didn’t know that about Latvians. Most of the the things I read about Russia and the Baltic states focused on WWII and its aftermath, entirely neglecting the Russians that came with Peter I. I wonder if there is a parallel here to Volga Germans…

    Either way, this doesn’t diminish the fact that most of the Stalin-era arrivals do believe that Latvia should be a part of Russia, because they choose not to see themselves as Western-aligned.

    They views are an inter Latvian problem. Tough, but it’s better than open war between Russia and NATO.

    And in the long run, whether Putin sees Latvia as ‘exactly the same’ as Ukraine (which I doubt he does) doesn’t make a difference in his potential quest to own it.

    Yes, it does! Russia isn’t a hive-mind – it has its own power structure and Putin must appease it. He commits only to causes which look undisputed and only to an extent that won’t rock the boat too much, as both the Oligarchs and the Siloviky are sufficiently invest in Western countries and don’t won’t their quality of life reduced because of a new Cold War brought by a dubious military campaign.
    Take a look at Ukraine:
    Crimea is and has been very close to Russian hearts (mainly because of the Crimean wars which defined late Russian empire and the access to the Black Sea and the world beyond which was seen as a national goal since, well, pretty much early Rus) and so was annexed in a show of strength.
    The rest of Ukraine is less important, particularly west Ukraine, so it’s less of a priority. Even eastern Ukraine doesn’t get the full military support – they only get enough to keep the conflict going. Indefinitely, if need be. In Russian eyes they aren’t worth dying over.
    This may change, of course. In time Russians may grow bolder and may launch a full assault. However, for the time being it’s important to understand the Russian psyche, what they view as their own and what they view as foreign, to get an idea of future Russian actions.

    (Sometimes I kind of wish the Swedes would wake up to their historical right to Latvia – wouldn’t that be nice!)

    0_0
    Errm… no. No, it would not be nice. Unless you think throwing the established and barely functioning geopolitical balance to the wind and risking a nuclear war is nice.*

    * Granted, in my darker moments I despair with humanity and do sometimes find it a nice prospect. *Sigh*. I’ll go pet my cat.

  461. Owlmirror says

    Remember this guy (OK, the post has been redacted, but do you remember the approximate text)?

    As the most recent comments on that thread reference and link to, he received a bad review of his book, and trolled the reviewer with sockpuppets. This was discovered, and the sockpuppets were removed from the site.

    So then he travelled from England to Scotland, stalked the reviewer at her day job, and hit her from behind with a wine bottle.

    Holy shit.

  466. Nick Gotts says

    Ogvorbis
    *hugs* nthing the above commenters. We like you round these parts. – Dalillama, Schmott Guy

    n+1thing.

  467. Nick Gotts says

    Alexander Z@418,

    There is a disconnect between the ground level activists who are more liberal (they also came to defense of Pussy Riot and pretty much at any other time Putin decided to oppress someone) and the leadership who are mostly former Yeltsin cronies. Still, it’s quite obvious which is the less homophobic one – it’s the one that doesn’t call for SWAT teams to beat LGBT activists.

    The context made it quite clear that I was talking about the leadership. I see no reason to believe they would be any better than Putin if they came to power.

    I’m well aware of Republican attempts of vote suppression. Nevertheless, they compare favorably to countries which are complete or de facto dictatorships

    Such a comparison tells you nothing, because the political situations are utterly different: at present, the Republicans are not in a position to establish a de facto dictatorship, but I see no reason to doubt that many of them would if they had the chance. They have all the signs of a proto-fascist party: fervid nationalism, scapegoating of minorities, bizarre conspiracy theories, racism and misogyny, contempt for democracy.

    so it’s small wonder that the dissidents from those countries try to ally themselves with GOP.

    If they choose to ally with evil, they cannot expect support or sympathy from those suffering under or fighting that evil.

  470. ChasCPeterson says

    I haven’t been paying attention, so sorry if this is rehash, but I just saw where Richard Dawkins apologized, or at least expressed remorse, for the ‘Dear Muslima’ comment.

    There should be no rivalry in victimhood, and I’m sorry I once said something similar to American women complaining of harassment, inviting them to contemplate the suffering of Muslim women by comparison.

    link to Dawkins site

  473. says

    Chigau:

    Iyéska is embroidering and quilting.

    Sort of, anyway. I don’t know if I have a cold or flu, but I feel flattened.

    Oh, and to all the Feds who thought it was a brilliant idea to move all codeine drugs to Schedule II? FUCK. YOU.

  474. AlexanderZ says

    Nick Gotts #467

    I see no reason to believe they would be any better than Putin if they came to power.

    Some of them have been in power before and weren’t nearly as oppressive as Putin. On the contrary, a common criticism against them is that they were too lenient and allowed anarchy to flourish. Others have a long history of civil rights activism, often serving sentences during Soviet times and in some cases under Putin’s regime as well (Putin isn’t keen on giving people a one-way ticket to Siberia, he has other ways to deal with his opposition). Saying that they might be as bad as Putin is frankly preposterous.

    If they choose to ally with evil, they cannot expect support or sympathy from those suffering under or fighting that evil.

    Considering that such support is symbolic at best, I think they are happy to forfeit it.

    Lofty #472
    The article has a link saying that Mr Blanc’s supporters claimed his controversial methods helped socially awkward men.
    Yet the pictures in the articles you posted show the man on the boat smiling, confident and not socially awkward at all. It’s almost as if his supporter are lying scum who think we’re too stupid to see through their deception.

    Iyeska #473
    Good to see you here and hope you’ll get better.
    P.S. I like your new dragon :)

  476. Lofty says

    Sydney installs a giant pink condom on an obelisk for HIV awareness.

    IT’S the erection that has Sydney – and the world – talking.

    A giant pink condom towered over workers bustling along Elizabeth St in Sydney’s CBD this morning after being lowered onto the Hyde Park Obelisk overnight.

    The 18m love glove was slipped on by ACON, a NSW health promotion organisation specialising in HIV and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex health.

    ….and the local xtians are not amused….

  477. chigau (違う) says

    I am tired.
    I am in pain (I am always in pain discomfort).
    But [giant pink condom] makes me smile.

  479. opposablethumbs says

    Sydney installs a giant pink condom on an obelisk for HIV awareness.

    Great campaign! Argentina did exactly this a few years ago – they used the obelisk in Buenos Aires which is one of the landmarks of the city/of the whole country (a bit like Big Ben is for London and the UK). (I didn’t hear about any xtian squeaking in Bs As, though that only means I didn’t hear about it, not that there wasn’t any of course)
    Maybe it’s the same condom :-)

  481. Nick Gotts says

    Some of them have been in power before and weren’t nearly as oppressive as Putin. On the contrary, a common criticism against them is that they were too lenient and allowed anarchy to flourish.

    What they allowed, and indeed assisted, was large-scale corruption. It was under Yeltsin that state assets were sold off at ludicrous prices to the oligarchs, remember?

    Others have a long history of civil rights activism, often serving sentences during Soviet times and in some cases under Putin’s regime as well (Putin isn’t keen on giving people a one-way ticket to Siberia, he has other ways to deal with his opposition).

    Unfortunately a record of such activism is by no means a guarantee that someone will not turn out just as oppressive as those they previously fought against. For example, many of those who proudly put “JB” (Jailed by the British) after their names in anti-colonial struggles went on to support, or become, dictators.

    Saying that they might be as bad as Putin is frankly preposterous.

    Blaming the oppressive nature of Russian government exclusively on Putin is preposterous. Putin flourishes because he has huge popular support, which is in turn because Russia is a hugely dysfunctional society due to decades of totalitarian rule followed by kleptocracy.

    Considering that such support is symbolic at best, I think they are happy to forfeit it. – Alexander Z@474

    Well if they think the Republican Party gives a shit about Putin’s oppression, other than as a way of scoring political points, they are fools. And that’s without mentioning the elements in that party that admire Putin for his anti-LGBT campaign and for cosying up to the Orthodox Church.

  482. Maureen Brian says

    Ogvorbis,

    Please don’t feel you have to leave this rowdy but honest crowd. Do what is right for you, of course, but please remember that we value you for your honesty, for your courage, for your ability to tell us gripping tales of the many good things you have done.

    If at some stage you decide to come back I, along with many others, will welcome you.

  483. says

    Oh fuck, I’ve just gotten up to speed on what Og’s been subjected to.

    Fuckfuckfuck. Sometimes people fill me with despair.

    Og, I’m so sorry you’ve been subjected to this shit. And doubly so that you’ve been targeted because of your dedication to honesty and human decency. Those qualities are why I visit this space, and why your voice is one I look for when I’m here.

  484. AlexanderZ says

    Russians hear Tim Cook is gay, pull dead Steve Jobs’ enormous erection: (not my wording)

    “In Russia, gay propaganda and other sexual perversions among minors are prohibited by law,” ZEFS said, the statue had been on display “in an area of direct access for young students and scholars.”

    “After Apple CEO Tim Cook publicly called for sodomy, the monument was taken down to abide to the Russian federal law protecting children from information promoting denial of traditional family values,” the group said.

    ——-
    14 years after Bush v. Gore, we still can’t get voting tech right:

    On Tuesday, the problems included 11 voting machines in Virginia Beach and Newport News, Virginia that were “knocked out of calibration.” In a statement, the Virginia Department of Elections said that some AccuVote TSX Touch Screen voting machines changed votes to something other than what the voter intended.[…]

    Estonia, the tiny, post-Soviet country in the northeastern corner of Europe that reclaimed its independence in 1991, has held Internet-based elections for nearly a decade. The country started issuing digital ID cards that look very similar in size to other European Union ID cards or American driver’s licenses and feature a front-facing chip that can be read by a small handheld device.

    With that infrastructure in place, the Estonian government began testing Internet-based voting in local elections in 2005. Two years later, it expanded to national elections. In the 2009 elections for the European Parliament, 15 percent of all votes cast were submitted online. That number grew to almost 25 percent for the 2011 domestic parliamentary elections and topped 31 percent during the European Parliament elections in 2014.

    I still think that old fashioned ballots are better and harder to falsify.

  485. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I still think that old fashioned ballots are better and harder to falsify.

    I’ll let you take the Redhead to the precinct voting place (a local elementary school) on voting day. There’s a reason why alternative methods are in play, and are getting very popular.
    Why are you so afraid of “voter fraud”. In this country, that is a dog whistle for a RW bigot not wanting anybody not like them to be able to cast legitimate ballots easily.

  486. Maureen Brian says

    AlexanderZ,

    Seconding Nerd!

    Please compare the extent of your anxiety with the facts. How many cases of voter fraud have there been in your jurisdiction in, say, the last 20 years? How many incorrect votes does that amount to? How many people who are entitled to vote have been deterred by all this bullshit? How many people who have voted before and know they are still entitled to have been turned away at the poll? How many names have been deleted from the voters’ list in error?

    If you could produce actual figures and set them out in a table we – and you! – would be able to see whether your anxiety is in any way justified in reality.

  487. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Oh, and if you aren’t a regular reader AlexanderZ, the Redhead requires a wheelchair to get around, and it takes about 30 minutes each way to go from the car, to the back door, to the kitchen, and reverse. Plus the extra time wheeling her to the one ballot stand designed for wheelchairs. While I’m still working full time.
    There needs to be easier ways to vote. Like vote by mail, which we both did.

  488. AlexanderZ says

    chigau #477
    Feel better!

    Nick Gotts #481

    What they allowed, and indeed assisted, was large-scale corruption. It was under Yeltsin that state assets were sold off at ludicrous prices to the oligarchs, remember?

    Of course I remember. Nevertheless that’s better than the current oppressions. Besides, that was a transition to an entirely different political and economical system. You don’t believe that not a single lesson was learned by anyone at all?

    Unfortunately a record of such activism is by no means a guarantee that someone will not turn out just as oppressive as those they previously fought against.

    True, but that’s a constant risk everywhere. You cannot live in eternal inaction just because sometimes you may fail.

    For example, many of those who proudly put “JB” (Jailed by the British) after their names in anti-colonial struggles went on to support, or become, dictators.

    Dictators who rose while a country was moving to a different political, cultural and/or economical. Hard time and sudden revolutions give rise to hard people. In Russia’s case the needed change is minor: Russia has a reasonable constitution, a separation of power in the form of the Duma and the Constitution Court, and a semi-modern economic system. Structurally speaking are relatively (to the monster that was 25 years ago) minor things that need changing. I doubt this will result in the same conditions that spawn dictators.

    Blaming the oppressive nature of Russian government exclusively on Putin is preposterous.

    “Putin” is codename for Siloviky. Removing that power structure – a power structure that was already overthrown once and was out of power for the entire Yeltsin presidency – is enough to improve things significantly.

    Well if they think the Republican Party gives a shit about Putin’s oppression, other than as a way of scoring political points, they are fools

    The GOP has enough people (like McCain, for example) who itching to take a stand against Russian military expansion. That is exactly what the opposition wants. They, unlike you, understand perfectly that the Putin’s Russia is feeds off imperialistic ideas. Putin is very vulnerable on internal matters such as corruption, criminal policemen, Moscow-centric economics, etc. If Russia’s parade of military victories is stopped it would be enough to kill the support for Putin, just as Yeltsin’s defeat in the 1st Chechen war was enough to destroy his popularity.

    Putin flourishes because he has huge popular support, which is in turn because Russia is a hugely dysfunctional society due to decades of totalitarian rule followed by kleptocracy.

    You think I don’t know that? Do you have any way to improve things other than changing the ruling elite? Do you think that people simply change their views without political or economical change? Do you think that progressive thought just springs out of the ground on its own? Are you being contrarian?

    Maureen Brian #486

    How many cases of voter fraud have there been in your jurisdiction in, say, the last 20 years?

    Tens in my ballot box alone, which translates to thousands city-wide and country wide it added up to over 43000 in the last election – enough for about two seats (which is frighteningly a lot when a few parties have only 3-4 seats). These votes may include honest mistakes which are treated as false votes.
    I have no idea what the voter fraud was/is like in Russia and Ukraine – there are no credible numbers, but I wouldn’t be surprised at anything.

    Nerd of Redhead #487

    There needs to be easier ways to vote. Like vote by mail, which we both did.

    You’re right. I took it for granted – when I talked about “ballot voting” I meant all old-fashioned non-digital methods. Also in most countries voting is done on a non-working day (Ukraine and Russia do it on Sunday, Israel has a general “holiday” on each election). I have no idea why USA doesn’t do that, except as yet another way to suppress the vote.

    I’m a relatively recent regular reader, but I don’t read the Lounge. I didn’t know about your wife’s disability. I’m very sad to hear about it. My sympathy to both of you.

  489. chigau (違う) says

    AlexanderZ
    Thanks.
    ….
    re: voter fraud
    I’m in Canada.
    Our polling station for every election (municipal, provincial, federal) is the small elementary school a couple of blocks away.
    In the nearly 30 years I’ve been living here, I’ve never heard of a single case of fraud.
    I don’t know if that means anything.

  490. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I have no idea why USA doesn’t do that, except as yet another way to suppress the vote.

    The old “We’ve always done it that way” dating back to the days when most of the populace was farmers. With any quality system, it would be required to update the reasons why something better wasn’t being done. But government, especially one controlled by rethuglicans, tradition is more important than doing things right. Which in my business, claiming “we’ve always done it that way” results in hefty fines from the FDA….

  491. Maureen Brian says

    AlexanderZ @ 488,

    That 4300? Is that figure verified anywhere? Were there any convictions? Who made the decision that the votes were fraudulent and on what basis?

  492. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    AlexanderZ, I’m not interest in your pity. What I am interested in is getting you to think about more than able bodied folks, more than folks who drive, more than those who have easy access to afford and obtain state ID cards. Think about how universal suffrage should be obtained. I don’t worry about the possibility of five fraudulent votes, if trying to prevent those votes causes 500 (or 5,000) people to lose theirs in the process.
    The first step for locking down on voting is proving, not sloganeering, that there is fraud. And the hard evidence is not there for those trying to prevent fraud. But the evidence they are trying to disenfranchise people who don’t vote their way, overwhelming…..

  493. ChasCPeterson says

    That apology came several months ago, and preceded the horrible Rape Culture enabling comments he has been heavily criticized for

    So what?

    (If you follow the link, you’ll find that the apology actually came in the context of responding to some of the criticism of which you speak.
    But so what?)

  494. chigau (違う) says

    jebus
    Chas
    Do you really think that “I’m sorry I said…” is an apology for being wrong?

  495. Tethys says

    Chas

    So what?

    So in light of Dawkins subsequent actions and twitter rampage vis a vis the rapist MS, endorsing CHS anti-feminism, and throwing the SJW feminists under the bus, the fact that he managed a grudging, insincere apology for “Dear Muslima” years after the fact is hardly a point in his favor.

  496. says

    If money transfers can be done (mostly) securely over the internet, why not voting?

    I long for the day where government participation becomes the new facebook ^^

    (or the new email? the new ebay?)

  497. says

    [godbots]

    Want to know how goddists feel in the presence of Lawd jeeBus? There are master-slave robotic systems that can help you:

    Based on these data and recent experimental advances of multisensory own-body illusions [5, 6, 7, 8 and 9], we designed a master-slave robotic system that generated specific sensorimotor conflicts and enabled us to induce the FoP and related illusory own-body perceptions experimentally in normal participants. These data show that the illusion of feeling another person nearby is caused by misperceiving the source and identity of sensorimotor (tactile, proprioceptive, and motor) signals of one’s own body. Our findings reveal the neural mechanisms of the FoP, highlight the subtle balance of brain mechanisms that generate the experience of “self” and “other,” and advance the understanding of the brain mechanisms responsible for hallucinations in schizophrenia.

    Link here.