Teacher Accused Of Punching Neo-Nazi Says Standing Up To Fascism Isn't A Crime - "Footage of the demonstration appears to show Felarca repeatedly punching a member of the Traditionalist Worker Party, a white nationalist group described as ”a front for neo-Nazi sympathizers” by ABC 10. The taller man is holding up his hands while trying to get police officers to help. Other protesters drag the man to the ground before the police intervene... “Standing up against fascism and the rise of Nazism and fascism in this country is not a crime,” she said. “We have the right to defend ourselves.”"
Berkeley Antifa leader arrested for inciting a riot - "Felarca was captured on video hitting a member of the Traditional Worker’s Party, a white supremacist group that had taken out permits for a rally on the west steps of the state capitol. Felarca, a member of the group By Any Means Necessary, and other counter-protesters blocked the rally by chasing and hitting and even stabbing members of the Traditional Worker’s Party"
Attempted murder by antifa
Fried Chicken Beer Is the Latest Creation from Veil Brewing Co.
Pauline Hanson wears a burqa in the Senate - "She said the idea for the stunt was her own and was designed to expose the security threats to Parliament and to call for the ban. “It’s been an idea of mine to actually expose the burqa,” she said. “I’m very much against the burqa. I think it’s confronting. I think it’s un-Australian... While in the chamber, Senator Hanson asked why someone should be allowed to take their place in the Senate while obscuring their face and argued it should be banned from parliament. She eventually removed the garment before asking her question and said: “I’m quite happy to remove this, because this is not what should belong in this Parliament”."
I Changed "Men" to "Muslims" in an Everyday Feminism Post, and Here's What Happened. - "Last November, I wrote I Changed "Men" to "Black People" in an Everyday Feminism Post, and Here's What Happened. Although it drew some criticism from the regressive left ("There is no such thing as reverse racism because of the POWER STRUCTURE!"), it also resonated with a group of people who have been villainized simply due to their genitals. Since then, much has happened. Everyday Feminism nearly went out of business -- because, it turns out, in order to make money, you need mentorship, experience and a business plan -- not just a bunch of whiny, underpaid writers with degrees in feminist dance therapy... the socialization of Muslims is such that even a good Muslim – a supportive Muslim, a respectful Muslim, a trusted Muslim – has within him the potential for violence and harm because these behaviors are normalized through Sharia. And as such, we know that even the Muslims that we love, never mind random Muslims who we don’t know, have the potential to be dangerous. Surely, all people have that potential. But in a world divided into the oppressed and the oppressors, the former learn to fear the latter as a defense mechanism. So when you enter a space – any space – as a Muslim, you carry with yourself the threat of harm."
This Everyday Feminism Article Convinced Me The "R-Word" Is Okay. - "If you don't stand up to bullies, bullies take over. And if you don't stand up to the thought police, they will, too. First, they came for "retard." Then, they came for "dumb." Now, they've come for "stupid." Words are not violence, and I'm done treating them like they are."
Is Everyday Feminism... Secretly Anti-Feminist? - "Words like “attain” and “must” and “will” scare women. Also, shame on professors for teaching critical thinking and the scientific method, because women don’t like the idea of knowledge being something you can “attain” — women like dynamic conversations... Science is scary for women, so “alternative knowledges” like folklore (that are generally marginalized through colonialism, imperialism, inequality, unequal power relations, patriarchy) ought to supplement Western science.
This is incredibly offensive. I am a big girl with a big girl brain. I don’t need to be “consciously and actively accommodated.” I don’t need the scientific method to be changed to accommodate my feminized thinking style. (It's also offensive because, once again, this "research" is pulling funding away from actual research)... If you want to write about your "lived experience," start a blog! "Autoethnography" has no place in academia. Saying so isn't "academic bullying." It's criticisim of a horrible idea. Is this what "feminized" academia looks like?... I gave several alarming examples of the “hierarchy of oppression,” an implicit understanding by regressives that oppressed peoples’ rights matter more than mine, because they’re more “oppressed.”"
Here we see a tension between the "women are the same as men" and the "women are different from men so if you don't treat them differently you're sexist" schools of feminism
An Emerging Problem With "Intersectional" Feminism: The Scramble for Victimhood - "If my body positivity (or whatever cause or opinion) makes you feel bad about yourself, that is your problem. You should maybe work on developing other parts of yourself -- other talents and interests. You should work on recognizing toxic thought patterns and coming up with strategies to overcome them, such that the mere sight of me in a swimsuit doesn't ruin your day. Just because you have more "victimhood" than I do, doesn't mean you get to encroach upon my individuals rights. I'm not not going to share my thoughts, knowledge and experience, just because you believe your experience was more difficult than mine. Yet this is a growing trend in social justice circles"
Student At $63,880-Per-Year College: Mural Of Flower Gun Is ‘EMOTIONALLY TRIGGERING’ - "A student senator at Pitzer College sent an email to the entire campus this week denouncing a mural showing a handgun with flowers coming out of the barrel because, the student complained, the mural “is emotionally triggering” and reminds him of “how many Black lives have been taken away because of police brutality”... The creator of the mural, Pitzer freshman Selena Spier, said she has plans to modify her art to appease Ochiagha... Another Pitzer student, freshman Jessica Folsom noted that a mural depicting a gun shooting out flowers is a message of peace. “This mural is actually representative of a nonviolence movement to protest the Vietnam War in the 60s”... the student senate at Pitzer College, flatly rejected a student’s proposal to establish a campus yachting club due to concerns that the name of the yacht club is offensive and “exclusive” — and “luxurious” and “classist,” and fails to support “queer and trans people of color.”"
Trans Activist: Conversion Therapy Doesn't Work, But Straight Men Must Learn to Love the D. - "trans activist Riley J. Dennis said that if you wouldn't date someone who was trans, black, fat or disabled, you're an -ist or a -phobe; you need to "think critically" and change... it really sounds like you're trying to guilt and manipulate people into having sexual contact with partners they're not attracted to. At some colleges, this would be considered sexual coercion. Not saying I agree with that definition -- just that that's the definition in some places."
Emma Watson Didn't Refuse the Corset Because Of FeminisM. She Did It Because Of Ignorance. - "The purpose, here, was to be "queenly," taking up as much space as possible, projecting worth and confidence. The fact that the inside of the dress, which no one will see except the maids who dress the queen, is made of fine silk, kind of suggests that inner beauty is just as important as outer beauty. Other versions of the corset were often focused on much more practical things than queenliness and confidence. For example, warmth and safety. Wearing several layers of big, heavy skirts helped women stay warm in drafty castles — and these big, heavy skirts needed a sturdy base to anchor to. Moreover, the shape this base provided wasn't just pretty -- it also kept skirts from getting wrapped around women's legs, tripping them and causing injury, and even drowning. Throughout many eras, the corset also increased the comfort of the skirts -- those skirts were heavy. Think about how sore your shoulders would be if you wore a heavy backpack without a waist strap... having a sturdy base also allowed dresses to be beautiful and elegant. I mean, here’s Lily James in Cinderella. And here, again, is the sad, deflated, and disappointing yellow gown from Beauty and the Beast. Without a corset, all the weight just kind of hangs. With a corset, it could have had gorgeous, airy sleeves and a skirt with shape and volume"
'Power of attorney meant Dad lost everything' - "A retired senior judge has warned the power of attorney lacks safeguards, saying he would never sign one himself. But Frank Willett, a Dunkirk and Normandy veteran, did - and was exploited by his neighbour Colin Blake... just weeks after the papers were signed, Colin Blake had begun taking out large sums of money... Colin Blake registered the enduring power of attorney (EPA) with the Court of Protection, which allowed him to sell Frank's house, a two-bedroom bungalow in North Yorkshire... all of her father's money had gone. Her father's medals - from 35 years service in the army - had gone. Her mother's wedding ring and her jewellery and all the family photographs and documents had also disappeared."
Why Are So Many Female Teachers Sleeping With Students? - "two-thirds of reported teacher-related sexual misconduct cases with students involved men; that means one-third of the cases involved female teachers. If Abbott’s statistics are accurate, it would represent an enormous increase from just a decade ago, when female teachers accounted for as little as four percent of reported sex crimes involving students"
Evacomics - Posts - "I used to do Hari Raya greeting illustrations many years ago. Initially I didn't know that dogs were sort of "forbidden" in Muslim religion because it was regarded as dirty. I was later advised by many non-Muslim friends not to put it. But on the other hand, my Muslim readers said it was alright because Kopi the dog is part of my comic series and not something I came up only for Hari Raya. In fact, after removing him from the picture, they felt quite sad because it feels as if a family member was missing... Because I was always accused of being insensitive and need to explain every single time, I eventually stopped drawing Hari Raya greetings..."
This is why we can't have nice things
I'm sure one could find one Muslim who would accuse him of being Islamophobic. But because we must pander to the lowest common denominator...
Coffee Makes You Poop: Who, When & Why - "According to the leading study on the topic, coffee makes about 29 percent of the population need to poop soon after drinking. Nineteen percent of the men in the study needed to poop after drinking coffee, compared to over half the women in the study (53 percent to be exact)."
Targeting American Diplomats, Cuba Is Up to its Dirty Old Tricks | Foreign Policy - "In one case, after one family privately discussed their daughter’s susceptibility to mosquito bites, “they returned home to find all of their windows open and the house full of mosquitoes”... Other forms of abuse over the years include attempted sexual entrapment, especially among married personnel, telephones ringing and front-door bells buzzing all hours of the night, freezers unplugged, and air conditioners turned full blast with windows opened in Havana’s tropical heat. One diplomat reported his mouthwash had been replaced with urine... There will be those who will attempt to explain away this sordid record as “spy-vs-spy” games, as if both sides were equally at fault, as if FBI agents try to run Cuban diplomats off the road or defecate in their homes... therein lies the fundamental flaw of Obama’s policy, that somehow a relationship with the Castro regime can be normalized"
Do Nvidia drivers cause planned obsolescence? - "each card was tested with the drivers one release after the initial product launch, and from there forward... The results of the testing: in general, all the tested cards show an equal or upward trend in performance. Or in other words, claims that Nvidia is intentionally sabotaging performance of its older hardware are bogus... Bottom line: it looks like poor performance in newer games on older hardware is due to those games using hardware features that perform substantially better on newer hardware"
How the end of slavery led to starvation and death for millions of black Americans - "freed slaves were often neglected by union soldiers or faced rampant disease, including horrific outbreaks of smallpox and cholera. Many of them simply starved to death... Many northerners were little more sympathetic than their southern opponents when it came to the health of the freed slaves and anti-slavery abolitionists feared the disaster would prove their critics right."
Tunisia wades into controversy amid calls for equality - "Tunisia’s President Beji Qaid Al Sebsi has called for the abolition of a circular that banned Tunisian Muslim women from taking non-Muslim husbands... Al Sebsi hinted at amending the inheritance laws to allow equality between male and female inheritors... In Cairo, Al Azhar Al Sahreef, the highest Sunni religious institution, reportedly criticised both calls, saying they clashed with the precepts of Islam and insisting that the matters were not up for new interpretations"
Wife canes husband when he refuses to have sex - "For years, the 32-year-old would be ordered to kneel before being caned if he rejected his wife’s demand for sex, which could be up to 10 times a day. Unable to bear the torment, the man sought help from Community Policing Malaysia founder Kuan Chee Heng."
Update gone wrong leaves 500 smart locks inoperable - "Hundreds of Internet-connected locks became inoperable last week after a faulty software update caused them to experience a fatal system error... The incident is the latest reminder that the so-called Internet of Things—in which locks, thermostats, and other everyday appliances are embedded with small Internet-connected computers—often provide as many annoyances as they do conveniences"
Millennials love being offended by everything - "Sometimes it feels like millennials gather in droves to trawl through the net – hungry to drink the blood of their next victim to “shame” on twitter or through a bull-dozing think piece. It seems like rationality and context are irrelevant. Doesn’t matter what the piece was about, just pull out that juicy quote that sounds completely offensive in isolation. Cuntry Living posts sometimes seem like “baits” to trap someone from a white, privileged background into commenting, so that they can be swiftly shamed. Recently, Bristol university demanded that student Benjie Beer take down an online short story – a first-person narrative about a sexual predator who targets women at Lakota and Lizard Lounge – or face a disciplinary hearing after a small number of students complained that the story “sweeps issues of rape under the carpet”. It recalls the controversy that embroiled Stephen Fry a few months ago when he said we shouldn’t skip over works of literature just because they might mention scenes of rape. Yes, the phrasing was incongruously clumsy, but Generation Snowflake didn’t even give him a chance, they took his words out of context and twisted them until they gave them the perfect canvas for them to react against. It’s the Generation Snowflake equation, rehearsed to perfection - if you can’t find something to be organically offended by, find something that can loosely be moulded into an offence you’d quite like to react to. It’s probably good for your brand."
The Problem With Trigger Warnings - Thoughts From a Person With PTSD | Wendy Blacke - "The difficulty with triggers is that they are often things that are difficult to pinpoint and impossible to avoid. They can be things that wouldn’t make sense to someone who doesn’t understand what it’s like to be genuinely psychologically triggered... I’m triggered by the obvious ones, like rape, pedophilia, domestic violence, etc. And then I’m triggered by the ones you wouldn’t expect, like the cologne that my dad used to wear or the smell of sawdust. I’m triggered by certain words, toys, and books. I’m triggered by moustaches. I’m triggered by old carpet. I’m triggered by guns. I’m triggered by high winds or heavy snowfall. I’m triggered by being a passenger in a car. These are just a few examples. Now, I’m going to say something that seems to be contrary to popular opinion: I am responsible for my triggers. Me. I don’t believe it’s the responsibility of writers, filmmakers, bloggers, or educators to tell me I might be triggered by something they create for consumption... The problem with trigger warnings is that they make PTSD worse, not better. By avoiding everything that makes you feel uncomfortable, you can never overcome your affliction. You can never face your demons and you will never really get better. You’ll just get better at hiding... how did I keep myself safe without trigger warnings? I took responsibility for myself. I didn’t expect my friends to tip-toe around me. If something was triggering me, I’d remove myself from the situation, or I’d sit with it until it went away. I spent time educating myself about my illness until my smarts outranked its strength. Most importantly, I dealt with my demons instead of letting them chase me."