Links - 2nd March 2012

"Never go out to meet trouble. If you will just sit still, nine cases out of ten someone will intercept it before it reaches you." - Calvin Coolidge

***

Germany urged to halt castration of sex offenders - "surgical castration was mutilating and irreversible and there was no evidence it prevented men from committing new sex crimes"

Could vegetarians eat a 'test tube' burger? - ""People who are vegetarian for moral reasons - the environment, the treatment of animals - have a moral obligation to eat this meat. They need to do this because it will contribute to an ethical alternative to conventional meat"... Of course, there are plenty of nutritionists who speak of the value of eating some meat. Dr Elizabeth Weichselbaum, a nutrition scientist at the British Nutrition Foundation, says meat is an important source of a number of nutrients in our diet, including high quality protein, iron, zinc, selenium, vitamin D and some B vitamins"

Kermit as Mogul, Farting Fozzie Bear: How Disney's Muppets Movie Has Purists Rattled - "Frank Oz, the most famous living Muppets performer -- known best as Miss Piggy -- spoke more harshly in a recent interview with the British paper Metro. "I wasn't happy with the script," he said bluntly. "I don't think they respected the characters. But I don't want to go on about it like a sourpuss and hurt the movie.""

Syria is not Iraq. And it is not always wrong to intervene - "We rightly slam generals who are always fighting the last war, but I wonder if today's peace movement is guilty of the same crime... Stop the War were, in fact, calling for a rally outside the American embassy, urging the US to stay out of Syria and its neighbour Iran. Its slogans were directed not at the butchers of Damascus, but against the planners in Washington... if it is nonsensical to propose military force in every case, as some on the bellicose right do, then it is surely just as nonsensical (for anyone but an absolute pacifist) to oppose it in every case. We need to see again what we understood well before Iraq: that every case is different... Many, chiefly on the right, argued against intervention in Bosnia in the 1990s – and yet if the west had acted earlier, it would have saved tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of mainly Bosnian Muslim lives"

Libya: job done? - "The National Transitional Council, the body the west funds and recognises, is neither trusted nor in control. The country is run by hundreds of militias which refuse to give up their arms or submit to the NTC's authority. Misrata is a city state, with its own prisons and justice system. Militias have co-ordinated to form alternative committees to the NTC, but it's everyone for himself. Torture carries on and, according to a recent Amnesty report, widespread human rights abuses are committed with impunity"
Ahh hope!; "the road to Jerusalem lies through Baghdad" - 2003

The "Can't Find Workers" Meme - "These young folks don’t want to spend a lot of money and time training to do a specific job they might not get only to get laid off when some private-equity slicks (where the real money’s at) buy out the company and ship the jobs to China. That’s what happens when owners and management have shredded the social contract. They find workers can’t or won’t do what they need them to. A flexible workforce has its downsides too... Letting companies complain that there’s no reserve supply of labor when they need it amidst mass unemployment is a bit much. If you need the perfect fit, you’d better be prepared to pay that prospective employee or to train him or her"

Think Again: Islamophobia as an offensive weapon - "The New York Times has devoted numerous news stories and two editorials to The Third Jihad, which is described as “anti-Islam” and “a dark film on US Muslims” whose producers seek to advance a pro- Israel agenda. The Times coverage failed to mention the long roster of authorities interviewed for the film, including the director of the CIA under president Bill Clinton, James Woolsey, the first secretary of Homeland Security, Gov. Tom Ridge, and a host of former US government intelligence officials. The title The Third Jihad was provided by the most eminent living historian of Islam, Professor Bernard Lewis... the NYPD’s undercover terror prevention program, including intelligence-gathering within the Muslim community, has been one of the prime tools allowing the NYPD to foil several credible threats that have arisen from within the community. And given that even one successful terror attack in New York City could claims tens of thousands of lives, the NYPD cannot afford to decrease its intelligence-gathering activities... Abdul Rahman Alamoudi, the founder of the American Muslim Council, who was invited to speak at an ecumenical service in the National Cathedral after 9/11, is another so-called “moderate” Muslim. He is shown in The Third Jihad boasting, “Either we do it now or we do it in a hundred years, but this country will become a Muslim country”... Islamist front groups constantly raise the specter of Islamophobia to suppress discussion of radical Islam... One Muslim former chaplain is filmed telling prisoners, “Brothers, be prepared to die, be prepared to kill. [T]his is history, this is the Koran, nobody can deny it... Read it in... the Koran... When you fight, you strike terror into the heart of the disbeliever.” At least 30 compounds associated with Jamaat ul Fuqra, a radical Pakistani organization, mostly populated by converts to Islam while in prison, dot the American landscape. In a video obviously not made for public consumption, we watch practice in ambush tactics and bomb-making in one such compound."

Idiots Are Paying For Service that Adds "Sent From My iPhone" Signature to Messages

Bouquets - "Schools are now sending students to old folks' homes to keep the elderly company. Compassionate people are still present in our society, and that is what makes all of us 'cool'"

Kenyan men urged to boycott meals in abuse protest - "The organisation, Maendeleo Ya Wanaume, wants Kenyan men to stop eating meals cooked at home by wives and partners. It says men should instead eat together outside the home, and share experiences of emotional and physical abuse. Kenya's government does not take domestic violence against men seriously and may be fuelling it, the group says"

Study: Occasional pot smoking not as damaging as cigarettes

Infographic: Everything you need to know about boobs - "

How To Be a Parisienne: 10 Golden Rules - "1. Cultivate austere beauty.
2. Don’t smile much.
3. Nail the “I don’t think so, but I guess if you do…” look.
4. Be thin"

Pavlovian Reflex

Why men and women are late (pic)

9GAG - This made the front page today... on my newspaper

Study Abroad: Racism In Eastern Europe - "About five minutes later the man appeared again, this time with a bodyguard on each side of him. He matter-of-factly stated “I am Albanian Mafia. I vill kill you.” All alcohol-induced impairment quickly evaporated. And all hopes that the men were engaging in some kind of sick joke disappeared when the girls’ smiles suddenly turned to expressions of pity... For a traveler of color, being recognized as an American may well be your greatest advantage. American citizenship carries with it a certain prestige and association with wealth. Since you’re obviously going to stick out, it’s important that people know that you’re a tourist as opposed to an African immigrant... I don’t mind attention, so I must admit it was not all that disagreeable, especially that of gorgeous Slavic women. Was most of it shallow and patronizing? Yes. But this did not make my trip to Eastern Europe unpleasurable. Except for the attack by the Slovakian skinheads, I was in no real physical danger and had a memorable time"

Love Is The Opposite Of Underwear

Suing LSE for discrimination against men is silly and wrong - "The source of his complaint appears to be that the reading list did not consist of articles and theory that he wanted to read... A solution to Martin’s problem is simple, and what is generally expected of a Master’s question. If Martin believes that there is some sort of systemic bias against men, or that the gender studies literature is lacking in its discussion of men’s issues, he should write his dissertation about it."
"The culture of dead white men, built on the bodies of silenced women and colonialized people of color, has become a weapon to keep living women of all races silent" - Suffering and Speech / Andrea Dworkin

CVS Limits Condom Access For Some - "CVS pharmacy apparently has a policy, in many places, of locking up condoms... This is bad public health policy, period... while we may wish to live in a world where no one saw openly acknowledging sex or discussing contraceptive use as embarrassing — I certainly do — the fact is that we don’t live in that world... CVS is a hell of a lot more likely to use this lock up policy in neighborhoods with high populations of people of color"
Requiring people to ask for condoms is equivalent to restricting access, and CVS combating shoplifting where it is high means they are "racist assholes"; One commenter has worked in retail and confirms that "condoms are one of the most shoplifted items in store", and still brands this "classist and racist"

For Women Under 30, Most Births Occur Outside Marriage - NYTimes.com - "Researchers have consistently found that children born outside marriage face elevated risks of falling into poverty, failing in school or suffering emotional and behavioral problems... Liberal analysts argue that shrinking paychecks have thinned the ranks of marriageable men, while conservatives often say that the sexual revolution reduced the incentive to wed and that safety net programs discourage marriage... Women here often describe marriage as a sign of having arrived rather than a way to get there... Almost all of the rise in nonmarital births has occurred among couples living together. While in some countries such relationships endure at rates that resemble marriages, in the United States they are more than twice as likely to dissolve than marriages... Even as many Americans withdraw from marriage, researchers say, they expect more from it: emotional fulfillment as opposed merely to practical support... Money helps explain why well-educated Americans still marry at high rates: they can offer each other more financial support, and hire others to do chores that prompt conflict. But some researchers argue that educated men have also been quicker than their blue-collar peers to give women equal authority... Reviewing the academic literature, Susan L. Brown of Bowling Green State University recently found that children born to married couples, on average, “experience better education, social, cognitive and behavioral outcomes”"

Why you shouldn't give Christmas gifts / Pourquoi il ne faut pas donner les dons

"How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live." - Henry David Thoreau

***

‎"Among all these very complex themes and this multiplicity of social `things' that are in a state of flux, we seek here to study only one characteristic - one that goes deep but is isolated: the so to speak voluntary character of these total services, apparently free and disinterested but nevertheless constrained and self interested. Almost always such services have taken the form of the gift, the present generously given even when, in the gesture accompanying the transaction, there is only a polite fiction, formalism, and social deceit, and when really there is obligation and economic self-interest. Although we shall indicate in detail all the various principles that have imposed this appearance on a necessary form of exchange, namely, the division of labour in society itself - among all these principles we shall nevertheless study only one in depth. What rule of legality and self-interest, in societies of a backward or archaic type, compels the gift that has been received to be obligatorily reciprocated? What power resides in the object given that causes its recipient to pay it back?"

--- The gift: the form and reason for exchange in archaic societies / Marcel Mauss


"De tous ces thèmes très complexes et de cette multiplicité de choses sociales en mouvement, nous voulons ici ne considérer qu'un des traits, profond mais isolé : le caractère volontaire, pour ainsi dire, apparemment libre et gratuit, et cependant contraint et intéressé de ces prestations. Elles ont revêtu presque toujours la forme du présent, du cadeau offert généreusement même quand, dans ce geste qui accompagne la transaction, il n'y a que fiction, formalisme et mensonge social, et quand il y a, au fond, obligation et intérêt économique. Même, quoique nous indiquerons avec précision tous les divers principes qui ont donné cet aspect à une forme nécessaire de l'échange - c'est-à-dire, de la division du travail social elle-même - de tous ces principes, nous n'en étudions à fond qu'un. Quelle est la règle de droit et d'intérêt qui, dans les sociétés de type arriéré ou archaïque, fait que le présent reçu est obligatoirement rendu ? Quelle force y a-t-il dans la chose qu'on donne qui fait que le donataire la rend ?"

--- Essai sur le don. Forme et raison de l’échange dans les sociétés archaïques / Marcel Mauss


"Il vaut mieux ne pas prier (demander)
que de sacrifier trop (aux dieux):
Un cadeau donné attend toujours un cadeau en retour.
Il vaut mieux ne pas apporter d'offrande
que d'en dépenser trop."

Australia 2011 - Day 6, Part 3 - Kings Canyon: The Garden of Eden

"You get fifteen democrats in a room, and you get twenty opinions." - Senator Patrick Leahy

***

Australia 2011
Day 6 - 3rd August - Kings Canyon: The Garden of Eden (Part 3)

There was a short detour to a place imaginatively called "The Garden of Eden", which we decided to check out especially on the recommendation of a group on the way out. Uncharacteristically, I decided it was rather aptly-named. The lack of flies, compared to above, didn't hurt.


The Garden of Eden


About The Garden of Eden and its wildlife


2 birds flew by in an erratic path in unison while making a noise. Perhaps it was a courtship flight.


Garden of Eden






Creek


Tree




Garden of Eden Watering Hole


She was going, not coming.


Folks scared of going in


They manage to make it sound very dangerous


Cliff and water


Me being lame (see: Me being lame at Chopin's grave)






"Anti Dolphin League"
I liked this Australian guy's T-shirt. He said the first time he'd worn it had been at "Byron Bay" on the Gold Coast, and there'd been a ruckus.


Garden of Eden from above


Rock Domes and Kuninga Men




Group ahead of us. They were shouting in the direction of the other canyon wall to hear the echoes




A Patchwork of Colour


Canyon wall panorama from the other side


Mammals of the Plateau






Survivors from a wetter time - plants from when the dinosaurs were around


Fern




Rock layers


Tree and landscape






Kestrel Falls


View before going down. The white you see on the other side is bird shit.


People going down before us


Postcards from the past


Kings Canyon and the Luritja people


By camel and coach


The Diverse Landscapes around Kings Canyon

We finished at 12:05pm, which meant we took 3.5 hours - a bit longer than we had expected. I suppose the estimated time to do the walk didn't include both detours (Cotterill's Lookout and the Garden of Eden).

Whereas my favourite form of exercise is climbing cathedral bell towers, my second favourite is hiking in temperate countries outside of summer. Unfortunately Singapore doesn't afford any opportunities to do either.