Links - August 5th 2015

Spanish diplomat hit me, says Chinese writer - "CHINESE author Jiu Dan, who became a minor celebrity in 2001 after writing The Crows, a sensual novel set in Singapore, is back in the limelight... the Spanish media reported Mr Valencia - who is married - as telling Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Garcia-Margallo that the row was planned by Zhu to promote her new book, which was released in April in Taiwan. The book details how he had allegedly seduced her in 2013 and taken her to bed many times in the Spanish embassy, with many salacious details thrown in... "The beating has to do with the violent male chauvinist in this man and his treatment of women as sex toys. These should be the concerns," she told the magazine. "Also, the Chinese government is too weak in diplomatic matters. If an American woman is beaten in public by a foreign ambassador on American soil, how would President (Barack) Obama react?" she asked. Zhu, who lived in Singapore from 1995 to 2000, shot to fame after publishing The Crows, a Chinese book about how some women from China sell themselves for money or to secure permanent residence after coming to Singapore in search of a better life. Opinions in China's social media are divided over the incident involving Mr Valencia, with some saying that Zhu should have known better than to flirt with a married Westerner, and others lauding her for highlighting the sexual lust of foreigners in China."
She doesn't know about diplomatic immunity?

More singles than ever looking for love - ""When you're older, you're also more likely to know what you want and less likely to compromise".. When American men sent her online messages via OkCupid, an international dating website, she could find and identify them on Facebook and LinkedIn. Dating in Singapore was far less transparent. "There were men who didn't want to give their real names or say what they did for a living. Some said on their profiles that they were married but were looking for 'friends'," she says... Two years ago, she attended events organised by dating agencies, but found it "draining and depressing" when she did not find a suitable match. One criterion for her partner is that his salary should be similar to hers, that is, at least $9,000 a month, an amount she says is "realistic" for someone in his mid- to late-40s. He should also be pleasant looking and have good values... Life found that men's concerns tend to revolve around appearances and child-bearing abilities of their partners, while women's preoccupations centre on financial stability in their potential husbands. Private investor James Foo, 44, who has gone on dates via a dating agency, admits that he is "quite picky in terms of looks". But he counters that women in Singapore also have very high expectations. Those he dated tried to suss out, for instance, whether he owned a car by asking if he knew where to park at certain locations... She does not go clubbing and seldom takes the initiative to meet people, prefering to leave such things to chance. "Mainly, I work and spend time with my parents, who are very old, and the rest of my family. I sometimes spend weekends with my elder brother and sister and their children," she says. "A friend once said, 'You're content with the love you already have from your family.' I think it's a bit accurate"... At social events organised by a dating agency, he [in his late 40s] found himself sitting across women in their 20s. Problem was, he felt like he was talking to his niece, who is 24."
Somehow people think DFS (Drop From Sky) is a viable strategy in looking for dates
"if i earn 9k and am good looking, why the hell would i go for a 40 yr old grouchy and picky woman
she needs a reality slap in e face"

Woman Found Guilty Of ‘Assaulting Police Officer With Her Breasts’ - "The 30-year-old claimed that Chief Inspector Chan had tried to grab her bag but instead touched her left breast. However, Inspector Chan insisted that it was Lai-ying who bumped her breasts onto his arm before falsely accusing him of assault. The magistrate sided with Chan, telling Lai-ying: “You used your female identity to trump up the allegation that the officer had molested you.”"
Would the magistrate's statement fly in Singapore?

Marsiling knife attack: Slasher died from smoke inhalation - "A man who attacked two neighbours in Marsiling with a knife, before setting his flat on fire, died due to smoke inhalation... Blood stains on a parapet on the 13th floor of the HDB block were found to have belonged to Tan, proving that he may have tried to jump to his death but may have had difficulty due to his plump size. Neighbours reportedly referred to him as "Gemuk", which means "fat" in Malay... Mr Teo said Mr Majid had informed him of a quarrel with Tan before the slashing. This was after the Mr Majid had kicked a pig soft toy that the Tan was selling at the void deck. Tan was agitated by this but Majid apologised, stating that he did not know the toy belonged to Tan."

The Inconceivable Start of African-American Christianity - "Presbyterian theology and Anglican liturgy, however, held little appeal to most blacks. Not until Methodists and Baptists arrived—with their emphasis on conversion as a spiritual experience—did black Christianity begin to take off."

Why Prisons Thrive Even When Budgets Shrink - "According to Fordham law professor John Pfaff, the rate at which prosecutors chose to pursue heavy felony charges increased dramatically in the 1990s, leading to more incarcerations. Recent high-profile cases like those of Marissa Alexander, Aaron Swartz and Cecily McMillan show prosecutors pressing the harshest charges and requesting long prison sentences, far in excess of any conceivable notion of justice. Prosecutors, as county-level employees, are also in the unique position to gain the electoral upside of looking “tough on crime” while passing off the costs of incarceration to the state...  Many will seek to make our system of incarceration more “fair.” But as Naomi Murakawa argues in her new book The First Civil Right, it’s precisely this response that feeds an unjust system resources and lends it legitimacy. Many of the initial sentencing acts were meant to provide fair, predictable guidelines, but prosecutors took advantage of them instead to rapidly escalate incarcerations"

Marijuana possession laws, ACLU report: Why blacks are four times likelier than whites to be arrested for marijuana possession. - "cops tend to focus their attention on neighborhoods with high rates of crime. Those neighborhoods tend to be populated by members of low-income minority groups. Cops patrolling those neighborhoods are often empowered to stop and frisk residents on the slimmest of pretexts, and, because of that, they are likelier to find people who are carrying marijuana. So, in order to bring the crime rate down, they will arrest people on these marijuana possession charges, which helps foster the impression that poor neighborhoods have high rates of crime. It’s a stupid, self-perpetuating cycle. You can blame a lot of this on the controversial “broken windows” theory of policing, which essentially maintains that minor violations beget major ones, and that you can combat violent crime by rigorously enforcing small quality-of-life offenses."
Going by disparate impact theory, it is racist for cops to focus their attention on neighborhoods with high rates of crime

Overweight Teens Often Underestimate Their Weight - "A significant proportion of overweight or obese adolescents in the United States and the United Kingdom think they are just about the right weight and are not concerned about their weight status, two new studies suggest."
Despite lots of handwringing about the media giving people inaccurate perceptions of body image, a lot of overweight teens actually think they are normal weight. So it is clear where the real misperception (and problem) is

Self portrait with cropped hair - by Frida Kahlo - "She also cut off her long hair, which has attracted Diego so much. She was holding scissor in her right hand which means she did it all by herself. In her left hand she was holding her shorn hair which is a symbol of her sacrifice. In the background strands of hair are everywhere and it seems each one has its own life. Surrounded by the hair she was sitting on a chair with an empty expression. The space around her is uninhabited which adds to her despair. The lyrics of a song painted across the top of this potrait which reads:
"See, if I loved you, it was for your hair, now you're bald, I don't love you any more.".
After the separation with Diego, Frida choose to abandon her feminine image. She cut her hair shot, got rid of the Tehuana dress Diego is obsessed with and started to wear man's suit. The only thing she keeps as a feminine decoration is her earrings. This self-portrait expressed her desire to be independent and not relying on men"

The rise of games you (mostly) don't play - "Player retention is “amazing” on these games, Pecorella said, pointing out that three of the top 10 most played games on Kongregate in the last month have been idle-games and, extraordinarily, that there are even Twitch channels dedicated to watching a computer play a game itself"

The French Riviera: ‘A sunny place for shady people’

YourClassical from American Public Media - "According to the Boston Symphony historian Richard Dyer, Casella “made the only great mistake in the Pops' history: He sought to elevate the audiences.” Although he programmed popular pieces such as Gershwin's brand-new "An American in Paris," Casella also included entire Beethoven symphonies on his Pops programs and even works by contemporary avant-garde composers such as Arthur Honegger. Casella's contract was not renewed, and the Bostonians turned to one of their own, a 35-year-old viola player in the Boston Symphony named Arthur Fiedler, as Casella’s successor. "

'Star Wars': Michael Jackson Wanted to Play Jar Jar Binks, Says Ahmed Best - "Jar Jar Binks will go down as one of the worst and most hated characters from the Star Wars universe, but it could have all been so different, and a whole lot stranger, if Michael Jackson had got the role he coveted. In an interview with Vice, Ahmed Best, the man who voiced Jar Jar in Episode I — The Phantom Menace, revealed that George Lucas had told him Jackson was keen on the part and wanted to do it in prosthetics and makeup."

China curator replaced stolen masters with forgeries - "he was surprised to find his own fakes were being stolen and replaced with yet more copies... In 2012 Chinese news agency Xinhua reported that art forgery was "increasingly rampant" in the country. That year it became the world's largest market for art and antiques, according to the European Fine Art Foundation."

Children Benefit From Having a Working Mom - "Women whose mothers worked outside the home are more likely to have jobs themselves, are more likely to hold supervisory responsibility at those jobs, and earn higher wages than women whose mothers stayed home full time, according to a new study. Men raised by working mothers are more likely to contribute to household chores and spend more time caring for family members. The findings are stark, and they hold true across 24 countries.
Comments: "the positive effects were particularly strong among low income and single-parent households, but studies have shown negative effects on middle income and dual-income households. And most of people rejoicing with this study are likely from the latter."
"Working mothers in two parent households tend to be better educated than non-working mothers in two parent households. They also tend to be more emotionally stable. They naturally have smarter and better educated kids. This has all been documented in other studies."
I guess it's too much to ask for a Business School study to correct for omitted variable bias