Olivia Locher photos capture the most bizarre things outlawed in America - "From riding a bike in a swimming pool to carrying an icecream cone in your back pocket, America has outlawed some pretty absurd things... in Wisconsin it's illegal to serve apple pie in public restaurants without cheese and that in Texas children are banned from sporting unusual haircuts. Meanwhile, in Connecticut pickles must bounce to be deemed pickles and in Hawaii you'll be in trouble if you put coins in your ears."
Why are modern women are becoming more aggressive? - "Dr Elle Boag, social psychologist at Birmingham City University, says: 'Women feel aggression is a form of empowerment. It has become so commonplace that it's not even shameful'... Steven who works with disabled children, has learned how to cope with her outbursts. As mild-mannered as Jo is volatile, he's found that the best thing to do is to walk away and let the tantrum burn itself out... Once, when Jo wanted to eat out and Steven didn't, she kicked the air conditioning in her car so hard that it broke. 'I apologised profusely and promised I would never lose it with him again. But I obviously did.'"
The tech nerds attracting the world's most desirable women - "He became infatuated with Amber after they appeared in the 2013 film Machete Kills, and wrote to the director Robert Rodriguez many times asking him to set up a meeting. He wrote: ‘Am not angling for a date. I know she’s in a long-term relationship, but . . . Amber just seems like an interesting person to meet.’ They started dating last summer."
Two-year probe into Edward Heath branded 'idiotic waste' - "A probe into allegations of historical sex offences by former Prime Minister Edward Heath was branded an 'idiotic waste of public money'. Mike Veale, Chief Constable at Wiltshire Police, said yesterday that the £2million investigation is to end is coming weeks"
Sir Edward Heath accusers also claim parents ran sex cult - "A group of women who say Sir Edward Heath abused them as children have also accused their parents of being involved in up to 16 murders. The farce came as police probe incredible claims that the former prime minister was linked to a paedophile ring that killed as many as 16 children – which would make them the worst child murderers in British history. The seemingly far-fetched allegations have been made by a family who allege that the politician was part of a satanic sex cult run by their own parents. They say that the cult regularly slaughtered children as ritual sacrifices in churches and forests around southern England and also participated in similar ceremonies in Africa.... The paedophile ring – which they say Sir Edward was part of – stabbed, tortured and maimed youngsters in churches and burnt babies in satanic orgies before men, women and children gorged themselves on blood and body parts, police have been told."
If it sounds too good to be true...
Rupert Everett: the queen of mean - ""Why do queens want to go and get married in churches? Obviously this crusty old pathetic, Anglican church – the most joke-ish church of all jokey churches – of course they don't want to have queens getting married. It's kind of understandable that they don't; they're crusty old calcified freaks. But why do we want to get married in churches? I don't understand that, myself, personally. I loathe heterosexual weddings; I would never go to a wedding in my life. I loathe the flowers, I loathe the fucking wedding dress, the little bridal tiara. It's grotesque. It's just hideous. The wedding cake, the party, the champagne, the inevitable divorce two years later. It's just a waste of time in the heterosexual world, and in the homosexual world I find it personally beyond tragic that we want to ape this institution that is so clearly a disaster." So I wasn't entirely surprised when, just a few days later, he landed himself in trouble. It was a throwaway remark to a Sunday supplement – "I can't think of anything worse than being brought up by two gay dads" – and within hours the world's media was buzzing with letters from angry gay dads calling Everett a dinosaur"
David Starkey: Do gays need to call each other Mr and Mrs? - "Henry did not loosen but tighten the rules of marriage. And his Church has continued to keep them tight – against divorcees, including its own future Supreme Governor, Prince Charles, who was notoriously denied a Church service for his second marriage, and now against gays... Can gays really be surprised that they are being treated with the same rigour as the heir to the throne and would-be Defender of Faith? For the Church’s grounds for its refusal to countenance gay marriage are identical."
I¿m a gay man who opposes gay marriage. Does that make ME a bigot, Mr Cameron? - "Even some of the Prime Minister’s admirers concede that the policy has less to do with offering equality to the gay community and more to do with decontaminating the allegedly ‘toxic’ Tory brand... ‘This isn’t a priority for the gay community, which has already won equal rights with civil partnerships,’ says Bradshaw. ‘This is pure politics.’... Ministers have ruled out extending civil partnerships, which became law in December 2005, beyond the gay community. So we gays will enjoy rights denied to heterosexuals. What an absurd state of affairs. The truth is that no one has been able to explain to me the difference between gay marriage and a civil partnership. I have asked ministers and friends. None has an answer."
14 Major Travel Scams to Avoid
China cracks down on its sex partying, Ferrari-driving 'fuerdai' rich kids - "A woman named Guo Meimei, who is now 23 and was considered to be the queen of the fuerdais, was accused by a male rival, Chen Junyu, of selling sex in Sanya. She responded by posting a picture of 5 million Yuan's-worth (£516,000) of casino chips online along with the caption: 'Too rich to need to sell sex.'... Miss Guo fell from grace last year when, after being arrested for gambling crimes, she admitted she had accepted money for sex in the past... Perhaps the most sinister incident of fuerdai excess-related behaviour came in 2012 when Ling Gu, son of high-ranking government official Ling Jihua, crashed his Ferrari 458 Spider in Beijing. Ling Gu, aged 23, was killed in the crash and three female passengers, two of whom were found naked with the other in a partial state of undress, were seriously injured... Wang Sicong, son of tycoon Wang Jianlin, China's richest man, posted pictures online of his dog wearing two gold Apple Watches: one for each front paw.
Gender differences in moral reasoning - "This research tests Gilligan's hypothesis that men are more likely to consider moral dilemmas chiefly in terms of justice and individual rights, whereas women are more likely to be chiefly concerned with questions of care and relationships with others... both moral orientations were widely used by both men and women, but that women were more likely to employ prodominantly care considerations. In a test of mean differences in proportion of justice responses, content of the specific moral dilemma showed a strong influence upon moral reasoning. Results suggest that both gender and situational factors need to be considered in our understanding of moral reasoning."
In other words, women are more subjective in morality, and men believe more in abstract and universal moral principles
See also: Ched Evans
Why are people so terrified of Milo Yiannopoulos’s book? - "Every act of censorship in history has had these two key ingredients, the tendency to blur the lines between words and violence and the snooty, authoritarian view of the public as dim and dangerous, and so does the outburst of Milophobia. When you’re scared of a book — a book! — then you have truly lost your faith in reason and in other people. You have submitted yourself, mind and soul, to the tyrannical logic, if not the practice, of the censor. The fury over ‘Dangerous’ might not be censorship, but it is unquestionably a stab at cultivating self-censorship. Putting moral and financial pressure on S&S is about telling this publishing house, and others, that they will suffer if they bring out books the right-on don’t like. It’s a kind of blackmail, with the overarching aim of controlling, or at least skewing, what does and doesn’t get published. Remember the words of Ray Bradbury, author of Fahrenheit 451: ‘There is more than one way to burn a book.’ Some do it with matches, said Bradbury, while others, especially in the literary set, ‘lick [their] guillotine and eye the neck of any author who dares to speak above a whisper or write above a nursery rhyme’. The Milo-fearing set might not be lighting matches, but they’re licking their guillotines."
Chester Tan (陈文希)'s answer to What is the saddest thing about Singapore? - Quora - "The saddest thing about Singapore from the perspective of a young adult like myself is the false sense of helplessness ingrained in a majority of the population's psyche"
Mark Lilla: the liberal who counts more enemies on the left than the right - "Lilla, a Columbia professor of humanities, published a New York Times op-ed, The End of Identity Liberalism. It became the Times’ most read political op-ed of the year and marked his transition from academic and occasional public intellectual to polemicist. Addressed to liberal Democrats, the op-ed was both a call to arms and a rebuke. Trump’s accession to the White House, Lilla argued, was a backlash against an obsession with identity politics on the part of the American left... Lilla doubled down on his argument with The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics (2017), a short book and his first for a popular audience. “We need no more marchers. We need more mayors,” he wrote. Only by articulating a political vision that speaks to all Americans, Lilla believes, can Democrats secure political power, turn the tide of Trumpism, and help minorities. Lilla, a liberal, wants to save liberalism from itself... In a rebuttal of Lilla for the Los Angeles Review of Books, Katherine Franke, a colleague of Lilla’s at Columbia, accused him of ‘Making White Supremacy Respectable. Again’ and compared him to former Klan leader David Duke. In a hostile review for the New York Times, Yale historian Beverly Gage called Lilla’s book “trolling disguised as erudition”... The Once and Future Liberal is not an academic text, he said; it’s an “intervention, like in a psychological case where you sit down with the person in the family who’s become an alcoholic”. American liberalism has become addicted to a losing political strategy, he believes, and the window for effective intervention is closing. Macomb County, Michigan, Lilla’s birthplace just outside Detroit, was one of the rust belt counties that voted twice for Obama before going for Trump – a fact which complicates the progressive “whitelash” thesis that Trump voters were motivated by racial resentment... Lilla saw firsthand the deterioration of the relationship between the Democratic party and working-class whites in Michigan, a breakdown motivated in part by “the sense people had that there was a Democratic cultural elite that looked down on them and their religion and their family life and their traditional views”. In an influential 1985 study of Macomb, Stan Greenberg, a pollster, argued that white rust belt voters lost faith in the Democratic party due to a perception that it advocated for other groups – black Americans, the very poor, recent immigrants, feminists – but not them... Lilla believes students’ lack of exposure to conservative ideas does them a serious disservice. Progressive activists today are poorly equipped to combat the right, he thinks, in part because one cannot debate an adversary one doesn’t understand. “You have to learn about what people actually think and not rely on a fantasy sense of what they think.”... He sees the backlash against Lilla as “ridiculous and indicative of the self-defeating purity tests the left imposes on itself”. For his part, Lilla sees the pushback as a commentary on the state of political discourse. “It’s depressing to see the low intellectual level, the lack of reflection, the unwillingness to simply engage with the very pragmatic case that I make. Not only do we have to fight Republicans, and argue with each other,” it turns out “we’ve also got to fight against this kind of self-satisfied expression of the political id.”... Lilla thinks Danica Roem, who recently became the first openly transgender person elected to the Virginia legislature, is a good example of how Democrats can advance identity issues. “She’s proudly and openly trans, but her campaign was not about being trans. She talked about the issues that affect most people, and would not be baited by her opponent into making [her gender identity] the issue.”"
Are children really better at foreign language learning? - "While children are still learning the mechanics of their own first language, adults have a more developed understanding of how language works. Adults already know the more advanced elements of grammar, such as how conjugation works, or what an adverb does"
How to Sell Combs to Monks - "3 sales professionals applied to work for a huge company. As they were all evenly qualified, the interviewer decided to set a sales challenge and the person who sold the most would be awarded the job. The challenge was to sell combs to monks of any temple up in the mountains"
Everything You Thought You Knew About SHARK FINS Is A Big Lie - "Do you know how you’ve always thought that the fins you’ve been eating at wedding dinners was forcibly removed from a group of sharks before they are thrown back into the ocean, still alive, only to slowly die? That story is as true as the tale of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. “Most of the videos that you see is either really old footage, we’re talking 10 to 15 years ago, or deliberately construed. The environmentalists pay a poor fisherman from the Philippines to rip the fin off from the shark so that they can film it,” declares Executive Officer Anthony Ciconte from the Southern Shark Industry Alliance... A large number of Singapore’s shark fins come from Australia and the most common shark species fished in the land Down Under is the gummy shark. The fishermen – shark or other species – are governed by a strict set of regulations, most of which are designed to keep the marine population at healthy, sustainable levels... “the shark stocks are in the best shape that they’ve ever been for the past 30 years”, as proven by the consistent rise in the gummy shark quota over the past decade."
2 Secrets To The Good Life, Backed By Ancient Wisdom And Research - "It’s the little things. Rituals are key. You are your habits; so take the time to get rid of the bad ones and develop good ones.
Don’t make life plans. Cultivate opportunities. The master plan may fail. Your goals will change. So guarantee that new possibilities will keep coming your way by making “little bets.”"
Two heterosexual Irish men marry to avoid inheritance tax on property - "Two Irish men have married in Dublin to avoid paying €50,000 in inheritance tax on a house... O’Sullivan paid tribute to Ireland’s LGBT community. “The equality gay and lesbian people did for this country, that they fought hard for, they were discriminated against for most of their lives, they got equality for themselves but also for everybody else”... O’Sullivan said after the ceremony: “I love Matt and he loves me, as friends.”"
Comment: "People should be outraged. It’s a clear and self confessed case of tax avoidance. No different from having offshore bank accounts."
Seven Reasons the Left Is Losing - "Reflecting on what he called “the woke identity,” Freddie DeBoer observed a tendency among some leftists to forcefully reject the work of persuasion with excuses like, “It’s not my job to educate you.” The not-yet-woke are to be chided, not engaged. “The problem with making your political program the assembly of a moral aristocracy is that hierarchy always requires exclusivity... It’s just math: you can’t grow a mass party when the daily operation of your movement involves finding more and more heretics to ostracize from the community.”... He therefore rejects “the performative uselessness that is the call out”... DeRay Mckesson, the civil-rights activist best known for his work with Black Lives Matter, worried that “there is a noticeable absence of grace in the movement space,” that “some people are more addicted to fighting than winning,” and that the personal backgrounds of organizers are too often treated as if they are a proxy for their effectiveness. “We have started to police people's authenticity by their proximity to trauma, not their proximity to the work,” he said. “Both my parents were drug addicts. My father raised us. My mother left. I know what it's like to sleep on the floor when they shoot too close to the house. That doesn't make me a better organizer. It could actually just make me more traumatized. How do we stop thinking about proximity to trauma as the thing that makes you the best organizer?” Implicit in that formulation is the notion that the best organizing is that which achieves ends in the real world, not that which most defers to or elevates the traumatized... Built into the privilege framework is “the idea that the normal state of affairs is for things to be going terribly”... "It can seem as if the desired goal is for everyone to be oppressed, rather than for all to be free from oppression""
L'origine de Bert
Wednesday, May 16, 2018
The country where the British are blamed for everything
The country where the British are blamed for everything
"I grew up with conspiracy theories. Some of them very bizarre.
Bruce Lee was poisoned by his wife, I was told, and when he sensed what she'd done, he tore her apart with his bare hands.
I was also told that he could fly.
And that Hitler was still alive - having escaped the Allies in a Jeep that transformed into a plane then a boat then a submarine, from which he was still sending the occasional message, declaring: "I will be back!"
One theory, however, was particularly persistent - that the hand of the British was behind every evil in Afghanistan...
hree Anglo-Afghan wars were fought before Afghanistan announced its independence in 1919 and the British left for good.
Or did they?
In the Afghan psyche, the British were still lurking in the shadows, spying on them, plotting, and still managing to manipulate their affairs for the worse. There were tales of secret agents disguised as imams misleading the pious, others posing as fortune tellers, of treasures hidden in shrines and guarded by men pretending to be beggars.
This national obsession with conspiracy theories is not unique. A Kurdish friend told me that his mother would blame the British if a wall collapsed in their neighbourhood after a rainy night. Iranians had a character in a long-running soap opera, always paranoid that the British were plotting something. If you act too shrewdly in Bangladesh, my friends told me, people will call you English. In Kabul, we have a word for that too: Chucha E englis - malign English blood.
However, since the beginning of the Afghan civil war in the 1980s our list of conspirators has expanded, and now includes Pakistan's intelligence agency, the ISI, and of course the Americans.
Repeated foreign interventions only made us more inventive.
An Afghan taxi driver in London once complained that foreigners wanted to steal our oil and smuggle it out on passenger planes. For others it's uranium the foreigners are after. A judge in Afghanistan told me that Bin Laden was an American spy and was eventually killed because he knew too much. Others believe he is still alive on an idyllic island somewhere in America.
Afghan generals talk of Nato supporting the Taliban with cash and guns - even claiming that translators who dare to talk of this are thrown from helicopters. There are tales of Nato forces buying drugs from Afghan smugglers and transporting them to the West in the bellies of dead soldiers - apparently a lucrative business for whole range of Western profiteers, including the British royal family.
Last year I went to see a friend. His father is an old khan, a tribal chief from the east. After we drank green tea and exchanged pleasantries, I made the mistake of asking him about the presence of the so-called Islamic State group in their area. The khan recited a long speech, which I'd heard a million times before: "It's all a game between the ISI, the Americans and the British. And Afghans are paying the price," he asserted confidently.
Rather puzzled, I asked: "But what will they gain from it all?"
"They plan 50 years ahead, and we are not meant to understand," he insisted.
"If it was that simple, then they would be stupid. We see signs of it, nonetheless, you know - the new blocs forming between Russia, Pakistan and China.
"Think about it. In one week, the Americans were able to destroy the Taliban government - how is it that they can't get rid of the few insurgents hiding in the mountains?"...
A suicide bomber had targeted a Shia mosque.
"Is it the work of IS?" I asked.
"Or perhaps the work of Jews and Christians," another journalist suggested.
I knew it was futile, but I asked anyway: "What good would that bring them?"
"Two things," he said, this time sounding more assured. "Such acts would distance the believers from the places of worship… And also divide the Muslims."...
For a country so divided by languages, ethnicities and ideologies, there is still one thing that unites all Afghans - distrust of foreigners."
"I grew up with conspiracy theories. Some of them very bizarre.
Bruce Lee was poisoned by his wife, I was told, and when he sensed what she'd done, he tore her apart with his bare hands.
I was also told that he could fly.
And that Hitler was still alive - having escaped the Allies in a Jeep that transformed into a plane then a boat then a submarine, from which he was still sending the occasional message, declaring: "I will be back!"
One theory, however, was particularly persistent - that the hand of the British was behind every evil in Afghanistan...
hree Anglo-Afghan wars were fought before Afghanistan announced its independence in 1919 and the British left for good.
Or did they?
In the Afghan psyche, the British were still lurking in the shadows, spying on them, plotting, and still managing to manipulate their affairs for the worse. There were tales of secret agents disguised as imams misleading the pious, others posing as fortune tellers, of treasures hidden in shrines and guarded by men pretending to be beggars.
This national obsession with conspiracy theories is not unique. A Kurdish friend told me that his mother would blame the British if a wall collapsed in their neighbourhood after a rainy night. Iranians had a character in a long-running soap opera, always paranoid that the British were plotting something. If you act too shrewdly in Bangladesh, my friends told me, people will call you English. In Kabul, we have a word for that too: Chucha E englis - malign English blood.
However, since the beginning of the Afghan civil war in the 1980s our list of conspirators has expanded, and now includes Pakistan's intelligence agency, the ISI, and of course the Americans.
Repeated foreign interventions only made us more inventive.
An Afghan taxi driver in London once complained that foreigners wanted to steal our oil and smuggle it out on passenger planes. For others it's uranium the foreigners are after. A judge in Afghanistan told me that Bin Laden was an American spy and was eventually killed because he knew too much. Others believe he is still alive on an idyllic island somewhere in America.
Afghan generals talk of Nato supporting the Taliban with cash and guns - even claiming that translators who dare to talk of this are thrown from helicopters. There are tales of Nato forces buying drugs from Afghan smugglers and transporting them to the West in the bellies of dead soldiers - apparently a lucrative business for whole range of Western profiteers, including the British royal family.
Last year I went to see a friend. His father is an old khan, a tribal chief from the east. After we drank green tea and exchanged pleasantries, I made the mistake of asking him about the presence of the so-called Islamic State group in their area. The khan recited a long speech, which I'd heard a million times before: "It's all a game between the ISI, the Americans and the British. And Afghans are paying the price," he asserted confidently.
Rather puzzled, I asked: "But what will they gain from it all?"
"They plan 50 years ahead, and we are not meant to understand," he insisted.
"If it was that simple, then they would be stupid. We see signs of it, nonetheless, you know - the new blocs forming between Russia, Pakistan and China.
"Think about it. In one week, the Americans were able to destroy the Taliban government - how is it that they can't get rid of the few insurgents hiding in the mountains?"...
A suicide bomber had targeted a Shia mosque.
"Is it the work of IS?" I asked.
"Or perhaps the work of Jews and Christians," another journalist suggested.
I knew it was futile, but I asked anyway: "What good would that bring them?"
"Two things," he said, this time sounding more assured. "Such acts would distance the believers from the places of worship… And also divide the Muslims."...
For a country so divided by languages, ethnicities and ideologies, there is still one thing that unites all Afghans - distrust of foreigners."
Post ID: 1143285168858464379
Links - 16th May 2018 (1)
WALSH: The Facts Are In. The Real Story At Starbucks Is Entitlement, Not Racism. - "We were told at first that two black men sat down at a table, and, out of nowhere, for no reason other than their race, were summarily perp walked out of the establishment by an army of police officers. This already made little sense for a number of reasons, including the fact that the incident occurred at a store in Philadelphia. The store presumably sees hundreds of black customers every week. If it was in the habit of having black people randomly arrested, why is this the first time we're hearing about it?... we find out that the two men were warned that the cops would be coming and they responded, "Go ahead and call them. We don't care."... the manager, Holly, is an "SJW feminist of the highest order," according to a regular customer at that location. Certainly not the picture of a slobbering, uncontrollable racial bigot who hates black people so much that she reports them to the police without provocation... She approached them and offered to get them drinks or anything else they might want. They declined. They were asked to leave and they declined. The police came and asked them to leave and they declined. This is their own version. When asked on "Good Morning America" how they would respond to people who say they broke the rules by loitering and not buying anything, their lawyer declared that Starbucks is a "place to meet." In other words, they have decided that this private establishment is more like a camping ground or a public park... The Starbucks CEO, who has spent all week cowering to the mob and throwing his innocent store manager under the bus, has now affirmed this interpretation. He may very well have destroyed his business in the process. So be it... There is a real victim in this case: the Starbucks manager whose life is now in ruins, and who is probably afraid to even leave her house, all because she tried her best to follow her company's policies. For that, she is Public Enemy Number One across the nation, and the CEO of her company has tossed her to the wolves. She was the victim of the rude and unacceptable behavior of these men, and now she is the victim of a pitchfork mob comprised of hysterical people who do not know the facts and do not care about them."
Perhaps this explains growing SJW hysteria - as per the Red Queen hypothesis, you need to get ever more radical in order to not get lynched
Philadelphia Starbucks manager claims loitering was ongoing problem - "The Starbucks manager who called the police on two black customers for trespassing has spoken out, claiming that loitering has been an ongoing issue in the store... she'd had problems with loiterers and one had even chased her round the shop after she asked them to leave. The manager blamed what she claimed was a corporate policy at City Center Philadelphia locations which prohibits excessive loitering in their stores."
Black men arrested at Philadelphia Starbucks say they feared for their lives - "Police Commissioner Richard Ross, who's black, said in a Facebook post that arresting officers "did absolutely nothing wrong," and added that Nelson and Robinson were disrespectful to officers. Ross said officers did what they were supposed to do and were professional in their dealings with the men, "and instead they got the opposite back... Seattle-based Starbucks Corp. has said the location where the arrests occurred has a policy that restrooms are for paying customers only"
If I feared for my life I would leave instead of waiting to be arrested
All the seats at Starbucks taken up by homeless people. : starbucks - "I’m not against homeless people at all. But as I sit and try to work, I can’t. 60% of the seating is taken up by homeless ppl. People that need the space are coming, and leaving because nothing is available. I left because of the smell. It’s always the case at this (and several other) location"
Offering free Wi-Fi leads to an unexpected consequence at Starbucks - "Three Starbucks locations in parts of Los Angeles with large homeless populations have recently closed their bathrooms to customers and noncustomers alike in recent months. The company reports the closures are linked to safety concerns, but current and former Starbucks employees told NPR that homeless people’s reliance on the bathrooms has been a struggle for the chain... Many Starbucks bathrooms, especially busy locations in cities, have solved the issue of homeless customers bathing in bathrooms by adding a lock on the bathroom door, making it only accessible for paying customers."
From 2016
Starbucks Now Calling the Cops on Laptop Hobos - "'Guy: "They told me to buy a cup of coffee or leave. That's pressure. I'm in Starbucks all the time. This isn't a Mom & Pop store."
Police: "It's a business and you have to buy something."
Guy: "Is this any way to run a business? I'm leaving, but I want your badge numbers."'"
From 2011. Too bad the laptop hobos were presumably white. Maybe the guy in the anecdote decided not to get arrested because he knew he wouldn't be able to get away so easily
Where can I find Starbucks official policy on loitering?? : starbucks - "Most of this is from the Safety, Security, and Health Resource Manual which you can find on the Portal. You can ask a disruptive customer to leave the store at any time. A disruptive customer is one who negatively impacts the Third Place environment or makes a customer, partner, or other guest feel uncomfortable. One of these instances is "Person(s) loitering or otherwise remaining on the store premise without a discernible legitimate purpose." So you are well within your rights to ask someone who is loitering to leave. To help with this, something else I got from one of our P&AP people is that Starbucks are not public property (semi-public private property is the term she used, I think) so you have the right to refuse service to anyone...just follow our policies as a CYA."
From 2013
Squattery Barn: Dealing with Lingering, Loitering Laptop Laggards - "I noticed a staffer surveying the seating area, telling people that they had to be a customer in order to sit. The presence of this Pumpkin Spice Latzi felt was surprising given the chain's traditionally relaxed Seattle vibe."
From 2014
After Starbucks debacle, 4chan trolls make fake coupons enticing homeless to flood chain’s stores - "Internet personality Bryan “Hotep Jesus” Sharpe also took advantage of the Starbucks controversy by shooting a video of himself demanding free coffee as “reparations” because Starbucks is “racist.” Sharpe boasted about his stunt and decried the outrage on Fox News host Laura Ingraham’s show. “I am sick and tired of liberals using black people and making us look like victims, making us look soft with their liberal dogma”"
Starbucks: ‘I heard y'all was racist, so I came to get my free coffee’ - "In 2015, Starbucks was widely ridiculed for a ham-fisted diversity campaign in which baristas were instructed to write “Race Together” on customers’ cups. The initiative, which came in the wake of national protests over police killings of black males, was ditched after widespread backlash slamming it as opportunistic and inappropriate. “Most people come to Starbucks for coffee,” 19-year-old African-American Ninette Musili told AP at the time. “Race is an uncomfortable thing to bring up, especially in a Starbucks.”"
Looks like pandering to SJWs isn't a viable business strategy
Some McDonald's and KFC branches are banning under-18s for anti-social behaviour - "Some branches of McDonald's and KFC are banning under-18s from eating inside because of anti-social behaviour.It's after a fight broke out between 20 teenagers near the Meir Park area of Stoke-on-Trent a few weeks ago. Eight people were arrested after police sent armed officers and a helicopter to reports of a fight and gunshots. They've now been bailed. Now it means under-18s will only be able to dine with an adult. Otherwise they'll have to take their food away. McDonald's says the ban is to protect other customers and it'll stay in place for the "time being"."
Too bad ageism is not as sexy as alleged racism
Want to Use the Starbucks Bathroom? These Are Your Rights - "A company spokesperson said Starbucks does not have a broad policy prohibiting people from using restrooms or sitting inside for free, allowing individual stores to set their own rules. Populations density plays a part too — it’s a little easier for people to wait unnoticed inside a more crowded Starbucks in a place like New York City without paying and than it is in sparser locations where policies can be enforced more strictly. The Philadelphia Starbucks store where the arrest occurred has a rule in place that customers can only use restrooms if they purchase something. Such rules would allow Starbucks to ask people to leave — under federal law, businesses like Starbucks can refuse service for reasons other than discrimination"
Why Starbucks faces toilet trouble - "Starbucks has amended its toilet policy to allow anyone to use the facilities - whether or not they purchase something - following a row over the treatment of black customers. But the move by the US coffee chain could open the door to other problems including drugs, prostitution and homelessness... Starbucks is far from the only US business to keep its toilets under lock, wanting to avoid them being used as "public bathrooms". Aside from vandalism concerns, public toilets need constant maintenance to stay functional, let alone hygienic. For many businesses, asking customers to pay for goods before requesting toilet access helps cover maintenance costs. More concerning than cleanliness is the prevalent drug use and prostitution in public facilities. A 2013 study of New York City businesses found that 58% of store managers had seen drug use in their toilets. Over the last year, US media have called public lavatories the new frontline of the opioid epidemic. The city of Seattle spent $5m (£3.6m) on five self-cleaning toilets in 2004, only to close them four years later due to rampant drug use and prostitution. One woman even told the New York Times that she used to smoke crack cocaine in the toilets but stopped because they were too "disgusting"... "Cities don't offer public restrooms because they offer more problems than they solve""
Tamika Mallory: Boycott Starbucks Over Jewish Group Partnership - "Mallory, who has been roundly criticized for her ties to notorious anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan, accused the ADL, a Jewish advocacy group, of “attacking black and brown people.”"
Anne Rice - Signing off with thanks to all who have... | Facebook - "we are facing a new era of censorship, in the name of political correctness. There are forces at work in the book world that want to control fiction writing in terms of who "has a right" to write about what. Some even advocate the out and out censorship of older works using words we now deem wholly unacceptable. Some are critical of novels involving rape. Some argue that white novelists have no right to write about people of color; and Christians should not write novels involving Jews or topics involving Jews. I think all this is dangerous. I think we have to stand up for the freedom of fiction writers to write what they want to write, no matter how offensive it might be to some one else. We must stand up for fiction as a place where transgressive behavior and ideas can be explored. We must stand up for freedom in the arts... internet campaigns to destroy authors accused of inappropriate subject matter or attitudes are dangerous to us all."
This follows in her previous words (attributed) about writing about Others
Anne Rice Claims “we are facing a new era of censorship, in the name of political correctness.” - "Rice’s comments seem to have been spurred on by the recent scandal in the Romance community over the Nazi romance novel For Such a Time. The novel, which depicts a love between a Holocaust prisoner and a Nazi officer, has overwhelmed the Romance world with controversy the last few weeks"
A Game as Literary Tutorial - NYTimes.com - "For certain writers, especially those raised in the 1970s and ’80s, all that time spent in basements has paid off. D&D helped jump-start their creative lives... The Dungeon Master must create a believable world with a back story, adventures the players might encounter and options for plot twists. That requires skills as varied as a theater director, researcher and psychologist — all traits integral to writing"
Middle East Time Bomb: The Real Aim of ISIS Is to Replace the Saud Family as the New Emirs of Arabia - "This is the deep schism we see today in Saudi Arabia, between the modernizing current of which King Abdullah is a part, and the “Juhayman” orientation of which bin Laden, and the Saudi supporters of ISIS and the Saudi religious establishment are a part. It is also a schism that exists within the Saudi royal family itself. According to the Saudi-owned Al-Hayat newspaper, in July 2014 “an opinion poll of Saudis [was] released on social networking sites, claiming that 92 percent of the target group believes that ‘IS conforms to the values of Islam and Islamic law.’”
Do You Know Your Tsukemono? A Guide to Japanese Pickles - "Japanese pickles—known collectively as tsukemono—can easily go unnoticed as part of a washoku (traditional Japanese) meal. Yet they've rightfully earned their place as a cornerstone food because they serve an important purpose: Japanese food culture is heavily influenced by principles of balance handed down from kaiseki (the national haute cuisine). These principles suggest that a meal should contain a variety of colors, flavors, and cooking methods while taking into account sensory and aesthetic considerations. Tsukemono help create this harmony. They cleanse the palate and provide piquancy to counter the heaviness of umami-rich foods. Available in a number of bright hues, they also help fulfill the general rule that a meal should contain five colors: black, red, green, white, and yellow. And although they are altered by the processes of pickling, tsukemono are still considered to be raw. Think of them as salads with the added benefits of lactic-acid fermentation."
Sex ratio and women's career choice: Does a scarcity of men lead women to choose briefcase over baby? - "Using both historical data and experiments, we examined how sex ratio influences women's career aspirations. Findings showed that a scarcity of men led women to seek high-paying careers and to delay starting a family. This effect was driven by how sex ratio altered the mating market, not just the job market. Sex ratios involving a scarcity of men led women to seek lucrative careers because of the difficulty women have in finding an investing, long-term mate under such circumstances. Accordingly, this low-male sex ratio produced the strongest desire for lucrative careers in women who are least able to secure a mate"
More from the Daily Mail: Do girls only want a career because they can't attract a man? Provocative study casts high fliers in a new light - "After collecting data from across the U.S., they found that as the number of eligible men in a state decreased, the proportion of women in highly paid careers rose. In addition, the women who became mothers in those states did so at an older age and had fewer children... When they were led to believe that men were scarce, they were more likely to prioritise career over family. However, when questioned, the women didn't believe the shortage of men would lead to more job openings for women. Instead they thought there would be more competition to find a husband... women who saw themselves as being less desirable than average were highly likely to be career-orientated."
Perhaps this explains growing SJW hysteria - as per the Red Queen hypothesis, you need to get ever more radical in order to not get lynched
Philadelphia Starbucks manager claims loitering was ongoing problem - "The Starbucks manager who called the police on two black customers for trespassing has spoken out, claiming that loitering has been an ongoing issue in the store... she'd had problems with loiterers and one had even chased her round the shop after she asked them to leave. The manager blamed what she claimed was a corporate policy at City Center Philadelphia locations which prohibits excessive loitering in their stores."
Black men arrested at Philadelphia Starbucks say they feared for their lives - "Police Commissioner Richard Ross, who's black, said in a Facebook post that arresting officers "did absolutely nothing wrong," and added that Nelson and Robinson were disrespectful to officers. Ross said officers did what they were supposed to do and were professional in their dealings with the men, "and instead they got the opposite back... Seattle-based Starbucks Corp. has said the location where the arrests occurred has a policy that restrooms are for paying customers only"
If I feared for my life I would leave instead of waiting to be arrested
All the seats at Starbucks taken up by homeless people. : starbucks - "I’m not against homeless people at all. But as I sit and try to work, I can’t. 60% of the seating is taken up by homeless ppl. People that need the space are coming, and leaving because nothing is available. I left because of the smell. It’s always the case at this (and several other) location"
Offering free Wi-Fi leads to an unexpected consequence at Starbucks - "Three Starbucks locations in parts of Los Angeles with large homeless populations have recently closed their bathrooms to customers and noncustomers alike in recent months. The company reports the closures are linked to safety concerns, but current and former Starbucks employees told NPR that homeless people’s reliance on the bathrooms has been a struggle for the chain... Many Starbucks bathrooms, especially busy locations in cities, have solved the issue of homeless customers bathing in bathrooms by adding a lock on the bathroom door, making it only accessible for paying customers."
From 2016
Starbucks Now Calling the Cops on Laptop Hobos - "'Guy: "They told me to buy a cup of coffee or leave. That's pressure. I'm in Starbucks all the time. This isn't a Mom & Pop store."
Police: "It's a business and you have to buy something."
Guy: "Is this any way to run a business? I'm leaving, but I want your badge numbers."'"
From 2011. Too bad the laptop hobos were presumably white. Maybe the guy in the anecdote decided not to get arrested because he knew he wouldn't be able to get away so easily
Where can I find Starbucks official policy on loitering?? : starbucks - "Most of this is from the Safety, Security, and Health Resource Manual which you can find on the Portal. You can ask a disruptive customer to leave the store at any time. A disruptive customer is one who negatively impacts the Third Place environment or makes a customer, partner, or other guest feel uncomfortable. One of these instances is "Person(s) loitering or otherwise remaining on the store premise without a discernible legitimate purpose." So you are well within your rights to ask someone who is loitering to leave. To help with this, something else I got from one of our P&AP people is that Starbucks are not public property (semi-public private property is the term she used, I think) so you have the right to refuse service to anyone...just follow our policies as a CYA."
From 2013
Squattery Barn: Dealing with Lingering, Loitering Laptop Laggards - "I noticed a staffer surveying the seating area, telling people that they had to be a customer in order to sit. The presence of this Pumpkin Spice Latzi felt was surprising given the chain's traditionally relaxed Seattle vibe."
From 2014
After Starbucks debacle, 4chan trolls make fake coupons enticing homeless to flood chain’s stores - "Internet personality Bryan “Hotep Jesus” Sharpe also took advantage of the Starbucks controversy by shooting a video of himself demanding free coffee as “reparations” because Starbucks is “racist.” Sharpe boasted about his stunt and decried the outrage on Fox News host Laura Ingraham’s show. “I am sick and tired of liberals using black people and making us look like victims, making us look soft with their liberal dogma”"
Starbucks: ‘I heard y'all was racist, so I came to get my free coffee’ - "In 2015, Starbucks was widely ridiculed for a ham-fisted diversity campaign in which baristas were instructed to write “Race Together” on customers’ cups. The initiative, which came in the wake of national protests over police killings of black males, was ditched after widespread backlash slamming it as opportunistic and inappropriate. “Most people come to Starbucks for coffee,” 19-year-old African-American Ninette Musili told AP at the time. “Race is an uncomfortable thing to bring up, especially in a Starbucks.”"
Looks like pandering to SJWs isn't a viable business strategy
Some McDonald's and KFC branches are banning under-18s for anti-social behaviour - "Some branches of McDonald's and KFC are banning under-18s from eating inside because of anti-social behaviour.It's after a fight broke out between 20 teenagers near the Meir Park area of Stoke-on-Trent a few weeks ago. Eight people were arrested after police sent armed officers and a helicopter to reports of a fight and gunshots. They've now been bailed. Now it means under-18s will only be able to dine with an adult. Otherwise they'll have to take their food away. McDonald's says the ban is to protect other customers and it'll stay in place for the "time being"."
Too bad ageism is not as sexy as alleged racism
Want to Use the Starbucks Bathroom? These Are Your Rights - "A company spokesperson said Starbucks does not have a broad policy prohibiting people from using restrooms or sitting inside for free, allowing individual stores to set their own rules. Populations density plays a part too — it’s a little easier for people to wait unnoticed inside a more crowded Starbucks in a place like New York City without paying and than it is in sparser locations where policies can be enforced more strictly. The Philadelphia Starbucks store where the arrest occurred has a rule in place that customers can only use restrooms if they purchase something. Such rules would allow Starbucks to ask people to leave — under federal law, businesses like Starbucks can refuse service for reasons other than discrimination"
Why Starbucks faces toilet trouble - "Starbucks has amended its toilet policy to allow anyone to use the facilities - whether or not they purchase something - following a row over the treatment of black customers. But the move by the US coffee chain could open the door to other problems including drugs, prostitution and homelessness... Starbucks is far from the only US business to keep its toilets under lock, wanting to avoid them being used as "public bathrooms". Aside from vandalism concerns, public toilets need constant maintenance to stay functional, let alone hygienic. For many businesses, asking customers to pay for goods before requesting toilet access helps cover maintenance costs. More concerning than cleanliness is the prevalent drug use and prostitution in public facilities. A 2013 study of New York City businesses found that 58% of store managers had seen drug use in their toilets. Over the last year, US media have called public lavatories the new frontline of the opioid epidemic. The city of Seattle spent $5m (£3.6m) on five self-cleaning toilets in 2004, only to close them four years later due to rampant drug use and prostitution. One woman even told the New York Times that she used to smoke crack cocaine in the toilets but stopped because they were too "disgusting"... "Cities don't offer public restrooms because they offer more problems than they solve""
Tamika Mallory: Boycott Starbucks Over Jewish Group Partnership - "Mallory, who has been roundly criticized for her ties to notorious anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan, accused the ADL, a Jewish advocacy group, of “attacking black and brown people.”"
Anne Rice - Signing off with thanks to all who have... | Facebook - "we are facing a new era of censorship, in the name of political correctness. There are forces at work in the book world that want to control fiction writing in terms of who "has a right" to write about what. Some even advocate the out and out censorship of older works using words we now deem wholly unacceptable. Some are critical of novels involving rape. Some argue that white novelists have no right to write about people of color; and Christians should not write novels involving Jews or topics involving Jews. I think all this is dangerous. I think we have to stand up for the freedom of fiction writers to write what they want to write, no matter how offensive it might be to some one else. We must stand up for fiction as a place where transgressive behavior and ideas can be explored. We must stand up for freedom in the arts... internet campaigns to destroy authors accused of inappropriate subject matter or attitudes are dangerous to us all."
This follows in her previous words (attributed) about writing about Others
Anne Rice Claims “we are facing a new era of censorship, in the name of political correctness.” - "Rice’s comments seem to have been spurred on by the recent scandal in the Romance community over the Nazi romance novel For Such a Time. The novel, which depicts a love between a Holocaust prisoner and a Nazi officer, has overwhelmed the Romance world with controversy the last few weeks"
A Game as Literary Tutorial - NYTimes.com - "For certain writers, especially those raised in the 1970s and ’80s, all that time spent in basements has paid off. D&D helped jump-start their creative lives... The Dungeon Master must create a believable world with a back story, adventures the players might encounter and options for plot twists. That requires skills as varied as a theater director, researcher and psychologist — all traits integral to writing"
Middle East Time Bomb: The Real Aim of ISIS Is to Replace the Saud Family as the New Emirs of Arabia - "This is the deep schism we see today in Saudi Arabia, between the modernizing current of which King Abdullah is a part, and the “Juhayman” orientation of which bin Laden, and the Saudi supporters of ISIS and the Saudi religious establishment are a part. It is also a schism that exists within the Saudi royal family itself. According to the Saudi-owned Al-Hayat newspaper, in July 2014 “an opinion poll of Saudis [was] released on social networking sites, claiming that 92 percent of the target group believes that ‘IS conforms to the values of Islam and Islamic law.’”
Do You Know Your Tsukemono? A Guide to Japanese Pickles - "Japanese pickles—known collectively as tsukemono—can easily go unnoticed as part of a washoku (traditional Japanese) meal. Yet they've rightfully earned their place as a cornerstone food because they serve an important purpose: Japanese food culture is heavily influenced by principles of balance handed down from kaiseki (the national haute cuisine). These principles suggest that a meal should contain a variety of colors, flavors, and cooking methods while taking into account sensory and aesthetic considerations. Tsukemono help create this harmony. They cleanse the palate and provide piquancy to counter the heaviness of umami-rich foods. Available in a number of bright hues, they also help fulfill the general rule that a meal should contain five colors: black, red, green, white, and yellow. And although they are altered by the processes of pickling, tsukemono are still considered to be raw. Think of them as salads with the added benefits of lactic-acid fermentation."
Sex ratio and women's career choice: Does a scarcity of men lead women to choose briefcase over baby? - "Using both historical data and experiments, we examined how sex ratio influences women's career aspirations. Findings showed that a scarcity of men led women to seek high-paying careers and to delay starting a family. This effect was driven by how sex ratio altered the mating market, not just the job market. Sex ratios involving a scarcity of men led women to seek lucrative careers because of the difficulty women have in finding an investing, long-term mate under such circumstances. Accordingly, this low-male sex ratio produced the strongest desire for lucrative careers in women who are least able to secure a mate"
More from the Daily Mail: Do girls only want a career because they can't attract a man? Provocative study casts high fliers in a new light - "After collecting data from across the U.S., they found that as the number of eligible men in a state decreased, the proportion of women in highly paid careers rose. In addition, the women who became mothers in those states did so at an older age and had fewer children... When they were led to believe that men were scarce, they were more likely to prioritise career over family. However, when questioned, the women didn't believe the shortage of men would lead to more job openings for women. Instead they thought there would be more competition to find a husband... women who saw themselves as being less desirable than average were highly likely to be career-orientated."
Post ID: 3834771233406650932
Monday, May 14, 2018
Links - 14th May 2018 (2)
7 Shockingly Dark Origins of Lovable Children's Characters - "if he's just a friendly, untroubled spirit who has always been that way, then why, in some of the early cartoons, does Casper seems less "friendly" and more "clinically depressed"? Half the shows follow the same basic format: Casper tries to make friends, scares friends away, immediately tries to commit suicide. In his very first appearance, titled "The Friendly Ghost" Casper fails to win lifelong companions within the first couple of minutes, so his next step is to go lie down on a train track. He did the same thing in the comic book series, too: trying to off himself by jumping from a cliff, and then again by tying himself to a rock and jumping into the ocean. It all kind of makes us question how Casper became a ghost in the first place ... When Grimace made his first appearance way back in 1971, he wasn't the lovable moron we know him as today. Grimace was "The Evil Grimace," a four-armed monster with a milkshake lust equaled only by history's greatest monsters."
Do Blacks Need Favors? - " the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act was celebrated. During the act's legislative debate, then-Sen. Hubert Humphrey, responding to predictions, promised, "I'll eat my hat if this leads to racial quotas." I don't know whether Humphrey got around to keeping his promise, but here's my question: Is it within the capacity of black Americans to make it in this society without the special favors variously called racial preferences, quotas, affirmative action and race-sensitive policies?... There are some areas of black life in which excellence can be found without the slightest hint of racial preferences. Young blacks dominate basketball, football and some track-and-field events despite the fact that there has been a history of gross racial discrimination in those activities. Blacks are also prominent in several areas of the entertainment industry. Those observations mean that racial discrimination alone is not an insurmountable barrier to success. By the way, I can't think of any two fields with more ruthless competition... when civil rights organizations and their progressive allies pursue special privileges for blacks in college admissions and when they attack academic performance standards as racially discriminatory, they are aiding and abetting an education establishment that delivers fraudulent education. They let educators off the hook, thereby enabling them to continue to produce educational fraud."
Goodbye Russia: A generation packs its bags - "Chirikova was arrested several times and other activists and journalists were set upon by unknown assailants. When Khimki newspaper editor Mikhail Beketov raised suspicions that local officials were profiting from the motorway project, his dog was killed, his car was set on fire and finally he was attacked so brutally that he suffered brain damage and never regained the power of speech... Between 2000 and 2014, approximately 1.8 million Russians left the country, according to Alina Polyakova, director of research for Europe and Eurasia at the Atlantic Council in Washington. Earlier this year she warned the trend was intensifying and called this outward migration of largely well-educated young people "a significant national security threat to the Russian Federation".
Affirmative Consent: What Do College Student Leaders Think About “Yes Means Yes” as the Standard for Sexual Behavior? - "Despite knowledge about AC, many student leaders thought that it was an unrealistic expectation for students. This suggests that college sexual health education needs to clearly articulate actions that are consistent with AC and indicate how these can be incorporated into students' sexual behavior."
If people tell you something is unrealistic, we need more social engineering!
The Hidden Perils of Affirmative Consent Policies - "The main problem with affirmative consent policies is that they don't match how people have sex in the real world, including on college campuses. They are a classic example of policies that sound good in theory but break down in practice... Requiring verbal consent seems that it would simplify proof in sexual assault accusations, but it doesn’t. We have seen multiple cases where the complainant acknowledged that they said yes, but claimed that they did not mean it, or that they non-verbally withdrew the consent later. The accused was found responsible for sexual assault in these cases. Requiring verbal consent is also patronizing. In our day, “no” meant “no,” and we assumed that everyone was capable of speaking the word during an encounter. To our minds, it is decidedly anti-feminist to tell non-incapacitated, sexually active adults that they lack the agency to say no, which is what affirmative verbal consent policies do. This brings us to consent through actions. This is where, as most communist nations eventually discovered, what sounds great in theory can be a disaster in practice... If you point to any one thing and say that’s what made me think I had consent, you’re going to be found responsible for sexual misconduct. That’s because most sexual misconduct policies explicitly say that consent for one sexual act does not imply consent for another sexual act. So if you say, “I thought because she put my hand on X, she wanted Y,” you’re toast. Goodbye, Harvard. Hello, East Whoville College (if you’re lucky). The problem is that consent through actions is all about context. It’s not any single thing, especially when the participants are in a romantic relationship. There is usually a natural progression in sexual contact. Partners start off by kissing and gradually escalate, barring any objections. But when sexual misconduct panels try to break down exactly where the consent through actions happened, that analysis inevitably becomes absurd... The practical result is that the affirmative consent policy allows any student to get his or her former sex partners expelled or suspended."
Trump's Record on Judges - "It is not simply the number of appellate judges confirmed, but the caliber. Trump's appellate nominees have been impressive, and compare favorably in terms of intellect and qualifications with those of any modern President"
COMMENT: Journalism, ethics and the Official Secrets Act - "One of the cardinal principles of journalism is the protection of sources. That protection must be sacrosanct – even working out a compromise will damage the source-reporter relations. Revelations of such compromises will only make the reporter’s job even more difficult, especially in a tightly-regulated media environment like Singapore’s... Singapore journalists go about their jobs without realising the all-encompassing nature of the OSA. Lawyer Jason Lee, of Peter Low and Choo LLC., said in an interview that even a mundane item like how many cubicles there are in a toilet can be considered secret"
Why Can't Uber Make Money? - "Uber’s elephant in the room is that its business model is fundamentally broken. To understand why, it is useful to assess Uber’s business model in the context of the history of the taxi industry... The taxi industry that Uber is seeking to disrupt was never profitable when allowed to expand in unregulated markets, reflecting the industry’s low barriers to entry, high variable costs, low economies of scale and intense price competition -- and Uber’s current business model doesn’t fundamentally change these structural industry characteristics"
What America's highways truly need: More highway traffic tolls - "SR-91, a government highway in Orange County, California, was extremely congested, but no government funds were available for expansion. So the government leased the median to a private consortium for private express lanes. The 10-mile, four-lane private highway was opened in 1995. Drivers could choose to remain on the congested "free," government highway or to pay a variable electronic toll for the private express lanes. Traffic in the toll lanes moved faster and the private company operating them even provided free roadside assistance to cars that broke down in order to keep traffic — and revenue — flowing"
Toll Roads and Political Ignorance - ""free" roads and "free" parking aren't really free if you have to pay for them with time and effort lost stuck in traffic or in futile searches for an open space. Negative reactions to tolls are, of course, likely to be much stronger among people who do not realize their potential benefits at all. Even if tolls ultimately benefit the public by reducing traffic congestion, voters probably won't realize they are the cause of the improvement and could continue to resent them."
What everybody got wrong about that viral video of a starving polar bear - "These images aren’t the work of a scientist, an impartial documentarian or even a concerned bystander. They are part of a very calculated public relations exercise by SeaLegacy, an organization whose stated purpose is to capture photos that drive “powerful conservation wins.” The group dispatched five expeditions in 2017, all with the goal to “trigger public and policy support for sustainable ocean solutions.” Terry Audla is a past president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, an advocacy organization representing all Canadian Inuit. In a Sunday tweet, he called the photos a “stunt” that represented a “complete disservice to climate change science.” SeaLegacy’s social media posts about the bear also failed to mention that the images were taken in August, when ice cover naturally disappears from many polar bear habitats... Critics have noted an obvious flaw with pointing to a starving bear as the “face of climate change.” By the same logic, Canada’s many healthy polar bears could similarly be used as mascots for climate change denial. “Arguing (climate change) is real because of a video of one sick bear is like claiming that it is a hoax because yesterday it snowed in southern Texas,” read a tweet by Université de Sherbrooke biologist Marco Festa-Bianchet"
Just what men need – a sex survey that kicks sand in our faces | Peter Ormerod - "You don’t need to be a men’s rights activist to be troubled by the academics’ language. They talk of “weaker men of poorer quality”. And the study is widely reported in a way which, were the genders and physical attributes changed accordingly, would surely be unacceptable: “Some women may claim that chiselled abs and giant biceps are not what they are seeking in a man. But a scientific study suggests that if your female partner tells you this, she is probably just being kind,” begins the Guardian’s own article. I’d also suggest that it might not necessarily be regarded as acceptable for a headline to advise women to beef up or thin out any part of their body to attract the opposite sex. And there would surely be something a little troubling about men being asked to rate headless torsos of women."
‘Snowflake students’ get University to apologize for calling snow white - "University College London was forced to apologize after a “dreaming of a white campus” tweet was deemed racist by “snowflake students.” The tweet had been intended to let students know the campus was still open as some parts of Britain remained covered by 13 inches of snow."
Moral outrage in the digital age - "digital media limits the potential social benefits of moral outrage in several ways. First, ideological segregation online prevents the targets of outrage from receiving messages that could induce them (and like-minded others) to change their behaviour. For politicized issues, moral disapproval ricochets within echo chambers but only occasionally escapes. Second, by lowering the threshold for outrage expression, digital media may degrade the ability of outrage to distinguish the truly heinous from the merely disagreeable. Third, expressing outrage online may result in less meaningful involvement in social causes, for example through volunteering or donations. People are less likely to spend money on punishing unfairness when they are given the opportunity to express their outrage via written messages instead. Finally, there is a serious risk that moral outrage in the digital age will deepen social divides. A recent study suggests a desire to punish others makes them seem less human"
Everyone should cook with MSG, says food scientist - "Witherly’s popcorn – seasoned with Parmesan, garlic powder or white pepper, and supersalt – is so good, he says, that visitors often ask, unprompted, “Why is your popcorn so much better than mine?”... Take it from the American Chemical Society, which says, “MSG can temporarily affect a select few when consumed in huge quantities on an empty stomach, but it’s perfectly safe for the vast majority of people.”... MSG might even promote healthy eating, the food scientist hypothesizes, by not only making kale more delicious but also letting you get away with using less salt."... “If you want to make something taste good, put Parmesan on anything,” he said. “The Italians have known this for about 2,000 years.”"
When the 'Arab Street' Comes to Sweden - "the western Swedish city of Gothenburg, headquarters of Volvo Car AB, saw the firebombing of a synagogue on Friday. The same evening, demonstrators in Malmö, in Sweden’s far south, called for their own “intifada” and threatened to shoot Jews. What’s going on in Sweden reflects a changed demographic and psychic reality. The “Arab street,” if that abstraction ever existed, is no longer restricted to Arabic-speaking countries. Arab and other Muslim immigrants now living in Europe increasingly play just as active a role in enacting collective political opinion as their counterparts who did not leave their home countries. Indeed, because Western European states respect civil liberties, allow peaceful protest and punish at least some kinds of violence mildly, Arabs and Muslims living in places like Sweden may have more freedom to protest -- and to go overboard into violence -- than their counterparts in majority-Arab or Muslim countries. And what’s happening today in Sweden can happen tomorrow throughout the rest of Europe."
CBC's decision against airing Transgender Kids doc should leave everyone unsettled - "CBC was scheduled to air the controversial BBC documentary Transgender Kids: Who Knows Best? but scrapped the plan the day of, citing audience feedback and its own "further review of the doc." Activists had argued that the film was "harmful" and poised to "feed transphobia." In actuality, the documentary offers a rare and factual perspective on the politicization of gender therapy by featuring interviews with Dr. Kenneth Zucker, a psychologist and international research expert on gender dysphoria in children. (Zucker also happens to be a former colleague of mine.) Although his research and approach to therapy are scientifically sound, they counter transgender orthodoxy... Nowadays, clinicians face extreme pressure to endorse the early transitioning model for their young patients, even when it may not be the best way forward for them... transgender activists have harassed and intimidated sex researchers who produce work that counters their political agenda. That's a big reason why you'll be hard-pressed to find many new studies countering the early transitioning approach. More recently, this activism has influenced Canadian policy by way of Ontario's Bill 77 — the Affirming Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Act of 2015 —which incorrectly conflates therapeutic approaches like Zucker's with unethical attempts to change a person's sexual orientation. And Bill 89 earlier this year, which writes gender ideology into child welfare laws and justifies intervention on the part of the government if a parent does not affirm a child's gender identity or expression. Now the activism has made its way to Canada's publicly funded national broadcaster, which has opted against airing dissenting views on this issue. This should have individuals on both sides of the debate feeling unsettled... The issue is no longer about what's in the best interest of these children, but about winning, at any cost, the ideological war."
Trans mania means dissenting opinions are forbidden
MALCOLM: More stupid stuff Justin Trudeau says - "“We know that actually someone who has engaged and turned away from that hateful ideology can be an extraordinarily powerful voice for preventing radicalization in future generations and younger people within the community,” he said. These terrorists aren’t even back in Canada yet and Trudeau is already envisioning speaking tours and book deals for them. Not only does he assume returning terrorists have “turned away” from their jihadist ideology, he imagines they’ll perform a welcome duty within Muslim communities in Canada. Does he think Canadian mosques and Islamic schools will open their doors to an ISIS jihadist who has “engaged” in terrorism? Trudeau’s statement reveals something he has long denied: that radicalization can occur within the Muslim community. Worse, he seems to believe Muslims in Canada are so desperate for leadership they could use the help of a jihadist to speak to “younger people within the community”. Trudeau’s willingness to enlist jihadists as community ambassadors blurs the important distinction between ordinary Muslims and violent extremists, doing no favours to Canadian Muslims. Worst of all, Trudeau’s naïve assumptions about ISIS fighters omit the prospect of justice for the victims of Islamic State genocide and war crimes. ISIS members went overseas to join a terrorist organization – a crime under Canada’s criminal code. Once in Syria and Iraq, these thugs were complicit in genocide against Yazidis and Christians, selling women into slavery, throwing gay men off rooftops and beheading journalists and aid workers. A teenager sitting in his basement watching jihadist propaganda and nodding approval is engaging in a “hateful ideology”. ISIS fighters have put that hateful ideology into action by traveling across the world to join an Islamist death cult. That’s a serious crime, not a minor indiscretion that can be easily forgiven. If Trudeau welcomes ISIS fighters back into Canada, his statement will be more accurate than he realizes. These ISIS thugs certainly would be an “extraordinarily powerful voice” in Canada – in recruiting and radicalizing the next generation of jihadist maniacs"
Trudeau violated multiple conflict laws when he accepted family holiday to Aga Khan’s island: ethics commissioner
Meet the ‘pay pigs’ - "These men are hooked on “paying tribute” – giving gifts and money to women – or rather they’re hooked on being told to give money to women. Welcome to the world of financial domination. Pay pigs, money slaves, human ATMs and cash cows: there’s no shortage of men looking to get “wallet raped” online and no shortage of women happy to do just that."
This is just the ultimate form of give your money to women
Do Blacks Need Favors? - " the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act was celebrated. During the act's legislative debate, then-Sen. Hubert Humphrey, responding to predictions, promised, "I'll eat my hat if this leads to racial quotas." I don't know whether Humphrey got around to keeping his promise, but here's my question: Is it within the capacity of black Americans to make it in this society without the special favors variously called racial preferences, quotas, affirmative action and race-sensitive policies?... There are some areas of black life in which excellence can be found without the slightest hint of racial preferences. Young blacks dominate basketball, football and some track-and-field events despite the fact that there has been a history of gross racial discrimination in those activities. Blacks are also prominent in several areas of the entertainment industry. Those observations mean that racial discrimination alone is not an insurmountable barrier to success. By the way, I can't think of any two fields with more ruthless competition... when civil rights organizations and their progressive allies pursue special privileges for blacks in college admissions and when they attack academic performance standards as racially discriminatory, they are aiding and abetting an education establishment that delivers fraudulent education. They let educators off the hook, thereby enabling them to continue to produce educational fraud."
Goodbye Russia: A generation packs its bags - "Chirikova was arrested several times and other activists and journalists were set upon by unknown assailants. When Khimki newspaper editor Mikhail Beketov raised suspicions that local officials were profiting from the motorway project, his dog was killed, his car was set on fire and finally he was attacked so brutally that he suffered brain damage and never regained the power of speech... Between 2000 and 2014, approximately 1.8 million Russians left the country, according to Alina Polyakova, director of research for Europe and Eurasia at the Atlantic Council in Washington. Earlier this year she warned the trend was intensifying and called this outward migration of largely well-educated young people "a significant national security threat to the Russian Federation".
Affirmative Consent: What Do College Student Leaders Think About “Yes Means Yes” as the Standard for Sexual Behavior? - "Despite knowledge about AC, many student leaders thought that it was an unrealistic expectation for students. This suggests that college sexual health education needs to clearly articulate actions that are consistent with AC and indicate how these can be incorporated into students' sexual behavior."
If people tell you something is unrealistic, we need more social engineering!
The Hidden Perils of Affirmative Consent Policies - "The main problem with affirmative consent policies is that they don't match how people have sex in the real world, including on college campuses. They are a classic example of policies that sound good in theory but break down in practice... Requiring verbal consent seems that it would simplify proof in sexual assault accusations, but it doesn’t. We have seen multiple cases where the complainant acknowledged that they said yes, but claimed that they did not mean it, or that they non-verbally withdrew the consent later. The accused was found responsible for sexual assault in these cases. Requiring verbal consent is also patronizing. In our day, “no” meant “no,” and we assumed that everyone was capable of speaking the word during an encounter. To our minds, it is decidedly anti-feminist to tell non-incapacitated, sexually active adults that they lack the agency to say no, which is what affirmative verbal consent policies do. This brings us to consent through actions. This is where, as most communist nations eventually discovered, what sounds great in theory can be a disaster in practice... If you point to any one thing and say that’s what made me think I had consent, you’re going to be found responsible for sexual misconduct. That’s because most sexual misconduct policies explicitly say that consent for one sexual act does not imply consent for another sexual act. So if you say, “I thought because she put my hand on X, she wanted Y,” you’re toast. Goodbye, Harvard. Hello, East Whoville College (if you’re lucky). The problem is that consent through actions is all about context. It’s not any single thing, especially when the participants are in a romantic relationship. There is usually a natural progression in sexual contact. Partners start off by kissing and gradually escalate, barring any objections. But when sexual misconduct panels try to break down exactly where the consent through actions happened, that analysis inevitably becomes absurd... The practical result is that the affirmative consent policy allows any student to get his or her former sex partners expelled or suspended."
Trump's Record on Judges - "It is not simply the number of appellate judges confirmed, but the caliber. Trump's appellate nominees have been impressive, and compare favorably in terms of intellect and qualifications with those of any modern President"
COMMENT: Journalism, ethics and the Official Secrets Act - "One of the cardinal principles of journalism is the protection of sources. That protection must be sacrosanct – even working out a compromise will damage the source-reporter relations. Revelations of such compromises will only make the reporter’s job even more difficult, especially in a tightly-regulated media environment like Singapore’s... Singapore journalists go about their jobs without realising the all-encompassing nature of the OSA. Lawyer Jason Lee, of Peter Low and Choo LLC., said in an interview that even a mundane item like how many cubicles there are in a toilet can be considered secret"
Why Can't Uber Make Money? - "Uber’s elephant in the room is that its business model is fundamentally broken. To understand why, it is useful to assess Uber’s business model in the context of the history of the taxi industry... The taxi industry that Uber is seeking to disrupt was never profitable when allowed to expand in unregulated markets, reflecting the industry’s low barriers to entry, high variable costs, low economies of scale and intense price competition -- and Uber’s current business model doesn’t fundamentally change these structural industry characteristics"
What America's highways truly need: More highway traffic tolls - "SR-91, a government highway in Orange County, California, was extremely congested, but no government funds were available for expansion. So the government leased the median to a private consortium for private express lanes. The 10-mile, four-lane private highway was opened in 1995. Drivers could choose to remain on the congested "free," government highway or to pay a variable electronic toll for the private express lanes. Traffic in the toll lanes moved faster and the private company operating them even provided free roadside assistance to cars that broke down in order to keep traffic — and revenue — flowing"
Toll Roads and Political Ignorance - ""free" roads and "free" parking aren't really free if you have to pay for them with time and effort lost stuck in traffic or in futile searches for an open space. Negative reactions to tolls are, of course, likely to be much stronger among people who do not realize their potential benefits at all. Even if tolls ultimately benefit the public by reducing traffic congestion, voters probably won't realize they are the cause of the improvement and could continue to resent them."
What everybody got wrong about that viral video of a starving polar bear - "These images aren’t the work of a scientist, an impartial documentarian or even a concerned bystander. They are part of a very calculated public relations exercise by SeaLegacy, an organization whose stated purpose is to capture photos that drive “powerful conservation wins.” The group dispatched five expeditions in 2017, all with the goal to “trigger public and policy support for sustainable ocean solutions.” Terry Audla is a past president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, an advocacy organization representing all Canadian Inuit. In a Sunday tweet, he called the photos a “stunt” that represented a “complete disservice to climate change science.” SeaLegacy’s social media posts about the bear also failed to mention that the images were taken in August, when ice cover naturally disappears from many polar bear habitats... Critics have noted an obvious flaw with pointing to a starving bear as the “face of climate change.” By the same logic, Canada’s many healthy polar bears could similarly be used as mascots for climate change denial. “Arguing (climate change) is real because of a video of one sick bear is like claiming that it is a hoax because yesterday it snowed in southern Texas,” read a tweet by Université de Sherbrooke biologist Marco Festa-Bianchet"
Just what men need – a sex survey that kicks sand in our faces | Peter Ormerod - "You don’t need to be a men’s rights activist to be troubled by the academics’ language. They talk of “weaker men of poorer quality”. And the study is widely reported in a way which, were the genders and physical attributes changed accordingly, would surely be unacceptable: “Some women may claim that chiselled abs and giant biceps are not what they are seeking in a man. But a scientific study suggests that if your female partner tells you this, she is probably just being kind,” begins the Guardian’s own article. I’d also suggest that it might not necessarily be regarded as acceptable for a headline to advise women to beef up or thin out any part of their body to attract the opposite sex. And there would surely be something a little troubling about men being asked to rate headless torsos of women."
‘Snowflake students’ get University to apologize for calling snow white - "University College London was forced to apologize after a “dreaming of a white campus” tweet was deemed racist by “snowflake students.” The tweet had been intended to let students know the campus was still open as some parts of Britain remained covered by 13 inches of snow."
Moral outrage in the digital age - "digital media limits the potential social benefits of moral outrage in several ways. First, ideological segregation online prevents the targets of outrage from receiving messages that could induce them (and like-minded others) to change their behaviour. For politicized issues, moral disapproval ricochets within echo chambers but only occasionally escapes. Second, by lowering the threshold for outrage expression, digital media may degrade the ability of outrage to distinguish the truly heinous from the merely disagreeable. Third, expressing outrage online may result in less meaningful involvement in social causes, for example through volunteering or donations. People are less likely to spend money on punishing unfairness when they are given the opportunity to express their outrage via written messages instead. Finally, there is a serious risk that moral outrage in the digital age will deepen social divides. A recent study suggests a desire to punish others makes them seem less human"
Everyone should cook with MSG, says food scientist - "Witherly’s popcorn – seasoned with Parmesan, garlic powder or white pepper, and supersalt – is so good, he says, that visitors often ask, unprompted, “Why is your popcorn so much better than mine?”... Take it from the American Chemical Society, which says, “MSG can temporarily affect a select few when consumed in huge quantities on an empty stomach, but it’s perfectly safe for the vast majority of people.”... MSG might even promote healthy eating, the food scientist hypothesizes, by not only making kale more delicious but also letting you get away with using less salt."... “If you want to make something taste good, put Parmesan on anything,” he said. “The Italians have known this for about 2,000 years.”"
When the 'Arab Street' Comes to Sweden - "the western Swedish city of Gothenburg, headquarters of Volvo Car AB, saw the firebombing of a synagogue on Friday. The same evening, demonstrators in Malmö, in Sweden’s far south, called for their own “intifada” and threatened to shoot Jews. What’s going on in Sweden reflects a changed demographic and psychic reality. The “Arab street,” if that abstraction ever existed, is no longer restricted to Arabic-speaking countries. Arab and other Muslim immigrants now living in Europe increasingly play just as active a role in enacting collective political opinion as their counterparts who did not leave their home countries. Indeed, because Western European states respect civil liberties, allow peaceful protest and punish at least some kinds of violence mildly, Arabs and Muslims living in places like Sweden may have more freedom to protest -- and to go overboard into violence -- than their counterparts in majority-Arab or Muslim countries. And what’s happening today in Sweden can happen tomorrow throughout the rest of Europe."
CBC's decision against airing Transgender Kids doc should leave everyone unsettled - "CBC was scheduled to air the controversial BBC documentary Transgender Kids: Who Knows Best? but scrapped the plan the day of, citing audience feedback and its own "further review of the doc." Activists had argued that the film was "harmful" and poised to "feed transphobia." In actuality, the documentary offers a rare and factual perspective on the politicization of gender therapy by featuring interviews with Dr. Kenneth Zucker, a psychologist and international research expert on gender dysphoria in children. (Zucker also happens to be a former colleague of mine.) Although his research and approach to therapy are scientifically sound, they counter transgender orthodoxy... Nowadays, clinicians face extreme pressure to endorse the early transitioning model for their young patients, even when it may not be the best way forward for them... transgender activists have harassed and intimidated sex researchers who produce work that counters their political agenda. That's a big reason why you'll be hard-pressed to find many new studies countering the early transitioning approach. More recently, this activism has influenced Canadian policy by way of Ontario's Bill 77 — the Affirming Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Act of 2015 —which incorrectly conflates therapeutic approaches like Zucker's with unethical attempts to change a person's sexual orientation. And Bill 89 earlier this year, which writes gender ideology into child welfare laws and justifies intervention on the part of the government if a parent does not affirm a child's gender identity or expression. Now the activism has made its way to Canada's publicly funded national broadcaster, which has opted against airing dissenting views on this issue. This should have individuals on both sides of the debate feeling unsettled... The issue is no longer about what's in the best interest of these children, but about winning, at any cost, the ideological war."
Trans mania means dissenting opinions are forbidden
MALCOLM: More stupid stuff Justin Trudeau says - "“We know that actually someone who has engaged and turned away from that hateful ideology can be an extraordinarily powerful voice for preventing radicalization in future generations and younger people within the community,” he said. These terrorists aren’t even back in Canada yet and Trudeau is already envisioning speaking tours and book deals for them. Not only does he assume returning terrorists have “turned away” from their jihadist ideology, he imagines they’ll perform a welcome duty within Muslim communities in Canada. Does he think Canadian mosques and Islamic schools will open their doors to an ISIS jihadist who has “engaged” in terrorism? Trudeau’s statement reveals something he has long denied: that radicalization can occur within the Muslim community. Worse, he seems to believe Muslims in Canada are so desperate for leadership they could use the help of a jihadist to speak to “younger people within the community”. Trudeau’s willingness to enlist jihadists as community ambassadors blurs the important distinction between ordinary Muslims and violent extremists, doing no favours to Canadian Muslims. Worst of all, Trudeau’s naïve assumptions about ISIS fighters omit the prospect of justice for the victims of Islamic State genocide and war crimes. ISIS members went overseas to join a terrorist organization – a crime under Canada’s criminal code. Once in Syria and Iraq, these thugs were complicit in genocide against Yazidis and Christians, selling women into slavery, throwing gay men off rooftops and beheading journalists and aid workers. A teenager sitting in his basement watching jihadist propaganda and nodding approval is engaging in a “hateful ideology”. ISIS fighters have put that hateful ideology into action by traveling across the world to join an Islamist death cult. That’s a serious crime, not a minor indiscretion that can be easily forgiven. If Trudeau welcomes ISIS fighters back into Canada, his statement will be more accurate than he realizes. These ISIS thugs certainly would be an “extraordinarily powerful voice” in Canada – in recruiting and radicalizing the next generation of jihadist maniacs"
Trudeau violated multiple conflict laws when he accepted family holiday to Aga Khan’s island: ethics commissioner
Meet the ‘pay pigs’ - "These men are hooked on “paying tribute” – giving gifts and money to women – or rather they’re hooked on being told to give money to women. Welcome to the world of financial domination. Pay pigs, money slaves, human ATMs and cash cows: there’s no shortage of men looking to get “wallet raped” online and no shortage of women happy to do just that."
This is just the ultimate form of give your money to women
Post ID: 4142021741856575632
Paris Knife Attacks and Incels
Lucas Lynch - Leftists are rightfully outraged by attacks by...
Lucas Lynch: Paris attacker 'shouting Allahu akbar' shot dead by police after stabbing victims in street
Leftists are rightfully outraged by attacks by so-called "Incels"
Given how Islamists have killed scores more than Incels over many decades, I'm sure leftists will apply consistent standards and condemn the ideology behind this attack as well..
h/t Basit Saeed
Anthony Galli: Some leftists -- many, actually -- will indeed criticize Islamism, which is the most actively hostile, radical wing of political Islam bent on violently overthrowing states to create an Islamic revolution in which the Muslim heartland, and eventually everyone, is ruled by a strict Caliphate.
But many of these same leftists will say that either this is an extreme interpretation not supported by mainline Islamic scholars and jurists (mostly true), or that it's not "the real Islam." Yes, the majority of Muslims, in most countries, do not agree with this ideology. But the latter contention is based on many other assumptions we should examine - that it's a panicked reaction to modernism (it is), that it's not rooted in classic Islamic sects, movements, or theological doctrines (untrue, they can trace precedence in the Khawarij, Ibn Taymiyyah, Hassan-i Sabbah - ironically a founder of an Ismaili sect known to be tolerant and peaceful, al-Wahhab, etc.) and that it's a reaction to colonialism.
The last point is certainly true, but it also limits our understanding of historical context if it ignores the fact that Islamic imperialism is much older than European colonialism, by at least a millennium. Islamic imperialism had lulls in between centuries of expansionism, of course, but there's a continual rhythm, a trend of war, trade, and colonization of Muslims towards non-Muslim lands. Even Muslim scholars tend to view their history cyclically (though linear in the ultimate Abrahamic sense). Europeans did take advantage of situations in which there was a decline of certain empires, Sunni-on-Sunni or Sunni vs. Shiite in-fighting, and lulls in expansion.
But it was not exactly just the exploitation of an otherwise peaceful and poor people by technologically superior, greedy European warmongers on behalf of kings and the emerging bourgeoisie trading class (well, it was that too), but more accurately a takeover of once powerful Muslim kingdoms and empires by non-Muslims. Muslims didn't just forget the wealth, power, and privilege they once had. This is no where more true than in India, when during the Quit India movement towards independence, Muslims realized how much of their privilege they would lose once the British left, with a Hindu majority to rule in India instead.
Much of what motivates jihadis are beliefs historical grievances the go back before 20th century developments such as Cold War policy (and hot wars) or petro politics, in which all of these faultlines were exposed and exacerbated. This ideology based on a belief that the natural state of the world, when all is just and right, is one aligned correctly with the will of Allah (as much as the laws of physics, the instincts of animals, the phases of the moon etc., which he also wills) with Muslims ruling and deciding laws for all, and dominating the earth like good stewards. For that to happen of course they need to get their own house in order by purifying themselves - austerity, discipline, ridding themselves of all false religious innovation, and *then* bringing peace back to the world by ridding non-Muslims of their false ways too, that is, those lands permissible to wage war on and conquer (bringing the House of War all under the control of the House of Peace). Thus, we can then and only then have world peace. The big divide among Salafi purists is whether to focus inwardly only (maintaining strict sharia and enforcing it) and waiting later to expand, or to focus on overthrowing secular or insufficiently pious Muslim governments that bow to the West instead of Mecca, accomplished primarily by, and in tandem with, removing the most powerful non-Muslim obstacles in the world - America and its non-Muslim allied states.
By denying this real, old, venerable tradition of martial jihad and its underlying ideological-cum-theological structure, much of the left is... well, left explaining it only in terms of very modern -- mainly 20th and 21st, 18th and 19th at the earliest -- political developments and even more recent events (just reactions to, say, the structural racism of societies that Muslims are minorities in, or the treatment of poorer Muslim countries on the periphery who are being exploited by the global central powers). Even though many leftists are not strict or orthodox Marxists, many will look to ideas of dialectical materialism as the basic explanation, i.e. base and superstructure. Even non-Marxists sociologists, historians, and economists often find that idea useful.
So much of the leftist critique of Islamist ideology I find incomplete.
And some leftists won't even go this far, instead denying that it has anything to do with either Islamic doctrine/teaching, or historical context beyond recent global events. In many instances, Lucas is right that this critique is simply absent in leftist discourse.
Far be it from me -- a naturalist -- to deny the importance of material conditions in any analysis, but ideology does frame thinking (as do values and metaphors, in a deeper sense, cognitively). Moreover, many buy into the explanation that it's "just politics," that Islamist politics are unrelated to Islam, as though Islam isn't inherently political in nature. This is a largely Western projection, based on Christianity's distinction between the City of God vs. City of Man, which Islam never made. While medieval Europe had a dual theocratic structure, with Popes having ultimate power and often conflicting with secular kings, Islam has never really had a singular Pope-like figure, not even among Shiites. And the separation of Church (religion) and State (secular government) so far hasn't very successfully caught on in Muslim countries during the past century or so that it's been tried, except maybe Turkey, and even there it's starting to fail.
So to sum up for those watching at home: A.) Most Muslims in the world do not agree with or support terrorism; B.) Most Muslims do not subscribe to its underlying ideology; C.) There *is* an underlying ideology though; D.) This ideology should be analyzed in its full historical context (where it originated from and what it morphed into in response to changing circumstances); E.) This ideology should be critiqued; F.) The basic doctrines of Islam itself can, and should, be examined, questioned, and critiqued; G.) Recent events and material conditions alone are necessary but not sufficient to explain the causes of jihadi activity, or guiding doctrines.
Yuri Krausz: Your assumption that A.) Most Muslims do not agree or support ( Islamic) terrorism is not substantiated. Today in Indonesia a majority Muslim country, a whole family with suicide vests blew themselves up in 3 churches in order to murder Christians. The youngest daughter was 9 years old and her mother sacrificed her. Do you see any mass protests , demonstration s of Muslims to condemn this barbaric Islamic terror? Do you see any marches? Generally what I see, even the Muslims who say they oppose terror, making all kinds of excuses and blaming others, mostly West, specially USA or Israel.
Lucas Lynch: Paris attacker 'shouting Allahu akbar' shot dead by police after stabbing victims in street
Leftists are rightfully outraged by attacks by so-called "Incels"
Given how Islamists have killed scores more than Incels over many decades, I'm sure leftists will apply consistent standards and condemn the ideology behind this attack as well..
h/t Basit Saeed
Anthony Galli: Some leftists -- many, actually -- will indeed criticize Islamism, which is the most actively hostile, radical wing of political Islam bent on violently overthrowing states to create an Islamic revolution in which the Muslim heartland, and eventually everyone, is ruled by a strict Caliphate.
But many of these same leftists will say that either this is an extreme interpretation not supported by mainline Islamic scholars and jurists (mostly true), or that it's not "the real Islam." Yes, the majority of Muslims, in most countries, do not agree with this ideology. But the latter contention is based on many other assumptions we should examine - that it's a panicked reaction to modernism (it is), that it's not rooted in classic Islamic sects, movements, or theological doctrines (untrue, they can trace precedence in the Khawarij, Ibn Taymiyyah, Hassan-i Sabbah - ironically a founder of an Ismaili sect known to be tolerant and peaceful, al-Wahhab, etc.) and that it's a reaction to colonialism.
The last point is certainly true, but it also limits our understanding of historical context if it ignores the fact that Islamic imperialism is much older than European colonialism, by at least a millennium. Islamic imperialism had lulls in between centuries of expansionism, of course, but there's a continual rhythm, a trend of war, trade, and colonization of Muslims towards non-Muslim lands. Even Muslim scholars tend to view their history cyclically (though linear in the ultimate Abrahamic sense). Europeans did take advantage of situations in which there was a decline of certain empires, Sunni-on-Sunni or Sunni vs. Shiite in-fighting, and lulls in expansion.
But it was not exactly just the exploitation of an otherwise peaceful and poor people by technologically superior, greedy European warmongers on behalf of kings and the emerging bourgeoisie trading class (well, it was that too), but more accurately a takeover of once powerful Muslim kingdoms and empires by non-Muslims. Muslims didn't just forget the wealth, power, and privilege they once had. This is no where more true than in India, when during the Quit India movement towards independence, Muslims realized how much of their privilege they would lose once the British left, with a Hindu majority to rule in India instead.
Much of what motivates jihadis are beliefs historical grievances the go back before 20th century developments such as Cold War policy (and hot wars) or petro politics, in which all of these faultlines were exposed and exacerbated. This ideology based on a belief that the natural state of the world, when all is just and right, is one aligned correctly with the will of Allah (as much as the laws of physics, the instincts of animals, the phases of the moon etc., which he also wills) with Muslims ruling and deciding laws for all, and dominating the earth like good stewards. For that to happen of course they need to get their own house in order by purifying themselves - austerity, discipline, ridding themselves of all false religious innovation, and *then* bringing peace back to the world by ridding non-Muslims of their false ways too, that is, those lands permissible to wage war on and conquer (bringing the House of War all under the control of the House of Peace). Thus, we can then and only then have world peace. The big divide among Salafi purists is whether to focus inwardly only (maintaining strict sharia and enforcing it) and waiting later to expand, or to focus on overthrowing secular or insufficiently pious Muslim governments that bow to the West instead of Mecca, accomplished primarily by, and in tandem with, removing the most powerful non-Muslim obstacles in the world - America and its non-Muslim allied states.
By denying this real, old, venerable tradition of martial jihad and its underlying ideological-cum-theological structure, much of the left is... well, left explaining it only in terms of very modern -- mainly 20th and 21st, 18th and 19th at the earliest -- political developments and even more recent events (just reactions to, say, the structural racism of societies that Muslims are minorities in, or the treatment of poorer Muslim countries on the periphery who are being exploited by the global central powers). Even though many leftists are not strict or orthodox Marxists, many will look to ideas of dialectical materialism as the basic explanation, i.e. base and superstructure. Even non-Marxists sociologists, historians, and economists often find that idea useful.
So much of the leftist critique of Islamist ideology I find incomplete.
And some leftists won't even go this far, instead denying that it has anything to do with either Islamic doctrine/teaching, or historical context beyond recent global events. In many instances, Lucas is right that this critique is simply absent in leftist discourse.
Far be it from me -- a naturalist -- to deny the importance of material conditions in any analysis, but ideology does frame thinking (as do values and metaphors, in a deeper sense, cognitively). Moreover, many buy into the explanation that it's "just politics," that Islamist politics are unrelated to Islam, as though Islam isn't inherently political in nature. This is a largely Western projection, based on Christianity's distinction between the City of God vs. City of Man, which Islam never made. While medieval Europe had a dual theocratic structure, with Popes having ultimate power and often conflicting with secular kings, Islam has never really had a singular Pope-like figure, not even among Shiites. And the separation of Church (religion) and State (secular government) so far hasn't very successfully caught on in Muslim countries during the past century or so that it's been tried, except maybe Turkey, and even there it's starting to fail.
So to sum up for those watching at home: A.) Most Muslims in the world do not agree with or support terrorism; B.) Most Muslims do not subscribe to its underlying ideology; C.) There *is* an underlying ideology though; D.) This ideology should be analyzed in its full historical context (where it originated from and what it morphed into in response to changing circumstances); E.) This ideology should be critiqued; F.) The basic doctrines of Islam itself can, and should, be examined, questioned, and critiqued; G.) Recent events and material conditions alone are necessary but not sufficient to explain the causes of jihadi activity, or guiding doctrines.
Yuri Krausz: Your assumption that A.) Most Muslims do not agree or support ( Islamic) terrorism is not substantiated. Today in Indonesia a majority Muslim country, a whole family with suicide vests blew themselves up in 3 churches in order to murder Christians. The youngest daughter was 9 years old and her mother sacrificed her. Do you see any mass protests , demonstration s of Muslims to condemn this barbaric Islamic terror? Do you see any marches? Generally what I see, even the Muslims who say they oppose terror, making all kinds of excuses and blaming others, mostly West, specially USA or Israel.
Post ID: 6064134620237996079
Links - 14th May 2018 (1)
Mahathir Mohamad is back. Malaysians’ smiles may be brief | Jeevan Vasagar - "What is the likelihood of these high hopes being fulfilled? The most honest answer is that the probability is slim. We know that Mahathir is no friend of liberal democracy. Under his previous tenure, his government launched vigorous attacks on the judiciary, arrested and detained peaceful opponents under internal security laws, and tightly controlled the press. He is a defender of Malaysia’s retrograde affirmative action programme, which privileges Malays over the country’s other races... An important factor in Mahathir’s election victory was the populist pledges to scrap Malaysia’s new goods and services tax (GST) – an unpopular tax on consumption – and to bring back fuel subsidies. Both these pledges were popular with voters for obvious reasons: the GST was blamed for a rise in the cost of living, and the loss of fuel subsidies also hit them directly in the pocket. But they were important reforms aimed at strengthening Malaysia’s public finances, cutting its fiscal deficit and broadening the tax base. Mahathir has won power by promising to undo these reforms. What are the chances that the coalition he has led to power will have the stomach for the bigger changes Malaysia needs?"
Hope!
Time running out for Malaysian hitman in Australia - "How is it that an individual, who was standing trial for murder in one of the region’s most high-profile cases was allowed to come to Australia on a tourist visa and why were Malaysian officials allowed to visit and seemingly manipulate him in detention? Those questions have never been answered satisfactorily by the Australian government"
The Big Read: Voters not swayed by racial politics in Malaysian GE, but how long will that last? - "“Dr Mahathir reassured the Malays about their dominance, rather than calling for more equitable statuses and power-sharing,” said Professor William Case, of the University of Nottingham Malaysia, adding that this was crucial to PH’s success... Research analyst Rashaad Ali, from the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, added: “I think we can say with certainty that without Dr Mahathir, the opposition would not have been able to win the election.”... Malaysian Malay voters interviewed by TODAY agree that Malay rights remain an important issue for them in politics... PH's core position is that it will preserve bumiputeras’ special status and uphold Islam as the official religion."
A brave new world for Malaysia - "“Everyone is talking about how Malaysians brought down the ruling coalition. Respect for Malaysians is now sky high. Malaysians travelling and living abroad used to hide their nationality because of the 1MDB and other scandals. We no longer have to act like victims.” It is noteworthy that Datuk Seri Nazir Razak, the banker brother of Najib, had written an encouraging note in his Instagram"
Mahathir says his party will defy order by the authorities to cease activities using name, logo - "the RoS' move could backfire on the Najib administration. "It might just counterproductively amplify the Malay Tsunami (against Umno). Malay politics places high value on machismo, valuing courage and detesting cowardice. Najib will be seen as the coward who hits below the belt on a mahaguru.""
Malaysia's shock poll result gives hope to besieged Southeast Asian oppositions - "Lee Morgenbesser, an Australian academic who studies Southeast Asian regimes, cautioned that the Malaysian election could lead to more repression rather than a regional democratic awakening. "If you have this stunning election result, it sends a warning to authoritarian regimes in the region," he said. "That might actually reinforce the trend that's been happening for years. You just could see more suppression and manipulation at election time." He cited the example of the Arab Spring in the Middle East that began in 2010. Early democratic gains were reversed as rulers responded aggressively, often with brutal violence and arbitrary arrests of dissidents."
Malaysia's opposition win shakes up Southeast Asia - ""Politics in Southeast Asia is the politics of economic growth," said Takashi Shiraishi, chancellor of Japan's Prefectural University of Kumamoto and an expert on East Asian affairs. "The political arena remains stable only as long as the government fulfills expectations that living standards will rise. But as soon as it fails, stability goes out the door." In other words, people in the region will tolerate soft dictatorships only as long as they feel well-off."
Malaysia's First 'Fake News' Conviction Is All About Shielding Government from Criticism - "It is utterly unsurprising that the first fake news conviction is of somebody saying something critical of the government's behavior. When government authorities have control over what sort of criticism is allowed and what information is considered "real" or "fake," they will be tempted to use it to protect their power. Something to keep in mind whenever any official—elected or otherwise—starts popping off about how somebody needs to do "something" about fake news. It's all about shielding themselves from opposition."
Malaysian voter lodges police report, saying ballot papers were pre-marked for ruling BN - "A voter in the Batu constituency lodged a police report on Wednesday (May 9) after finding his and several other fresh ballot papers allegedly pre-marked for the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition when he turned up to vote in Malaysia's 14th General Election. In a police report seen by the Malay Mail, the voter identified as Mr Omar Anuar Roslay claimed that as he was about to cast his vote, he noticed that the ballot paper given to him was already pre-marked for BN candidate Dominic Lau. Mr Omar, in his report, said that when he requested for a change of ballot paper he claimed to have noticed that the entire ballot paper book contained similar marks. "To be more specific, the mark was right at the alphabet 'H'. "Therefore there was no new ballot papers that could be issued, so I was told to continue casting my vote""
Penang voter told he has already voted when he turned up at polling centre - "I showed them my fingers, there’s no ink, but they still insisted that I’ve already voted so I can’t vote"
Riot police called in at Ayer Hitam results centre - "Riot police were mobilised outside a results centre in Ayer Hitam, Johor on Wednesday evening (May 9) after crowds were seen stopping unmarked cars from entering... Comments among the crowd suggested that there were concerns that results in the opposition's favour were not being signed off by officials."wonk on htiw dlihc knalb a nevi
When it Comes to Color, Men & Women Aren't Seeing Eye to Eye - "Previous research has shown that women have a larger color vocabulary (link is external)—think periwinkle, azure, and other color names that are unlikely to be used by men in general conversation... women were more adept at distinguishing between subtle gradations than were men. This sensitivity was most evident in the middle of the color spectrum. With hues that were mainly yellow or green, women were able to distinguish tiny differences between colors that looked identical to men. In fact, Abramov found that slightly longer wavelengths of light were required for men to see the same hues as women—hues identified as orange by women were seen as more yellow by men. However, when shown light and dark bars flickering on a screen, men were better than women at seeing the bars (link is external). Men were better able to perceive changes in brightness across space, a skill useful for reading a letter on an eye chart or recognizing a face. This effect was increased as the bars narrowed, suggesting that men are more sensitive to fine details and rapid movement than women. These results suggest that the wiring differences in visual areas of the brain contribute to how men and women see differently, regardless of whether a person has an extensive vocabulary of color names. Sensory differences between sexes have been well studied. In the realms of hearing (link is external), smell (link is external), and taste (link is external), women perform better than men at distinguishing between slight differences. Hormone levels may be the basis for these sex differences."
Trump Restores Realism with His National Security Strategy - "The Jerusalem announcement was a preview of President Trump's larger vision of operating within reality, a central theme in the subsequently released National Security Strategy. On Jerusalem, it acknowledges that "Israel is not the cause of the region's problems," and accurately blames regional instability on Iran and jihadist organizations. This administration is the first in American history to so explicitly break from the false causation drawn between Israel's existence and the problems of the region. The rejection of this lie is long, long overdue... A second example of the National Security Strategy's recognition of reality is the usage of the terms "Islamist," "Jihadist," and "Shariah" a combined thirty-seven times, which stands in stark contrast to former President Barack Obama's National Security Strategy in 2010 and 2015 and President George W. Bush's in 2002 and 2006, none of which used those terms at all."
The U.S. Just Had a Very Good Week at the UN - "While most of the world was focused on the symbolic gang up at the UN General Assembly, the Trump administration had some quiet diplomatic success."
Muslims cannot join candlelight vigils for Kim Jong-hyun; it is haram: Perak Mufti - "Muslims are forbidden from joining candlelight vigils in memory of the late Korean pop star Kim Jong-hyun who committed suicide this week, Perak Mufti Harussani Zakaria said. He said such activity is against Islamic teachings and is akin to "glorifying" Kim's death. "No, you can't do that because it is haram. If the artist or individual was a Muslim, then we should recite Al-Fatihah for him. But if the person was a non-Muslim, why are we praying for him to go to heaven? "On top of that, he committed suicide. Why are we following the culture of infidels? What will you get out of it?""
Theresa May calls for a woman to play James Bond in future
Will Jane Bond sleep with as many men as James Bond does women?
What is a Pubic Hair Transplant? - "A pubic hair transplant is actually one of the earliest types of hair transplant procedures to ever be attempted. A Japanese dermatologist named Dr. Okuda conducted some of the world’s first successful pubic hair transplant procedures just before World War II. Among his many experiments with surgical hair restoration, he performed what is considered to be the first pubic hair transplant by transferring scalp hair into the pubic regions of women... Pubic hairs have vastly different characteristics than scalp hairs, and although hair grafts do sometimes adapt certain characteristics of the native scalp, pubic hairs still largely remain relatively shortened and wiry after transplantation. Also, in many cases, the color of the pubic and scalp hair is vastly different to begin with... While the current trend in the West is to shave the pubic hair away (especially for women), other parts of the world view pubic hair far differently. In Asian countries such as Korea, for example, pubic hair carries connotations of sexual maturity and fertility. Women do not shave their pubic hair because it is considered attractive and desirable. In fact, it is common for a woman to worry about not having enough pubic hair. This is why many Korean women have public hair transplants in order to increase the volume and density of hair in their pubic regions."
Pubic Hair Transplant Trend Korea - "According to the Korean Association of Medical Journal Editors, an insufficiency of pubes (in otherwise healthy people) is a disorder called “pubic atrichosis.” A Korean clinic called Renaissance estimates that 10% of Korean women have it. Some even suffer from psychological stress as a result"
NTU STUDENT BRINGS GUAN YIN GODDESS TO EXAM HALL, HOPES TO SCORE A+?
SGAG - Posts - "altar to the almighty bell curve god in NTU!"
"Bell Curve God" Surfaces In Local University
Netflix attacks own network with “Chaos Monkey”—and now you can too - "By forcing Netflix engineers to recover from small failures that customers won't notice, the company hopes to prevent major outages in its video streaming service. Netflix calls the software it built to automate the process of causing failure a "Chaos Monkey""
5 Weird Foods the French Consider Delicacies - "There’s an anecdote that places Napoleon’s chief advisor, Talleyrand, in a Burgundy restaurant with Czar Alexander I in 1814. They arrived late, the food was gone, and the chef spotted some snails in his garden. In a panic he added garlic to mask the taste, parsley to pretty them up and butter to make them easier to swallow. Apparently the Czar liked the dish so much, he demanded the recipe. Whenever he saw snails after that, he referred to them as “snails from Burgundy,” or escargots de Bourgogne... The French enamoration with calves also extends to another body part, the thymus gland. Again, this is an innard I have managed to avoid, although Ris de Veau is far more popular – and appetizing – than the brainy end of the animal. In English they’re known as sweetbreads, although there’s nothing sweet or bread-like about them."
Former Harvard President blasts ‘absurd political correctness’ on campuses - "Summers refers to the President of Princeton University, Christopher Eisgruber, criticizing him for “negotiating with people as they took over his office.” At issue in the 32-hour standoff was the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, which the protesters demanded be changed in recognition of Wilson’s vehement and well-known racism... Summers also mentions “attacks on very reasonable free speech having to do with adults' right to choose their own Halloween costumes at Yale,” referring to the controversy that erupted at the university in November over an innocuous email, outrage over which eventually drove two professors to cancel their course offerings... “The idea that somehow microaggressions in the form of a racist statement contained in a novel should be treated in parallel with violence or actual sexual assault seems to me to be crazy,” he declared. “I worry very much that if our leading academic institutions become places that prize comfort over truth—that prize the pursuit of mutual understanding over the pursuit of better and more accurate understanding—then a great deal will be lost.”"
Summers Decries 'Creeping Totalitarianism' at Colleges - "he condemned controversial placemats that the Office for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion introduced in Harvard dining halls last semester. Quickly denounced by a host of students and administrators as a breach from principles of academic freedom, the placemats purported to offer advice on holiday conversation with family members about race and inclusion... “I admire much more student protests about major moral issues like the Vietnam War, South African apartheid or global climate change, than protests coming from discomfort about the use of historical names”
Former Harvard President Larry Summers Calls BDS Efforts 'Deplorable' - "“The idea that Israel should be singled out as a human rights abuser was morally insensate,” he said. “It seemed to me that there wasn’t much question that if an African country was singled out for censure and there was no clear grounds for why that African country was worse or different than a number of European or Asian countries, I had no doubt that it would be seen in many quarters as racist.”"
About « Singaporelang - "the brevity of Singlish is what makes it tick. Some say it is disorderly or illogical, but Singlish evolved to convey specific feelings that can’t quite be described in standard English language. No one really ‘owns’ Singlish, and that is perhaps why free-style experimentation has led to creative spins on the language that we speak. To me, language is about the people on the streets who use it. As language historian Anne Curzan puts it, “there is no objective dictionary out there that is the final arbiter of what words mean… if a community of speakers is using a word and knows what it means, it’s real.”"
“马干马莫聚豪餐，马里马寅任乐陶。幸勿酒狂喧马己，何妨三马吃同槽。” – 邱菽园 (1874-1941) - "（马干，makan吃；马莫，mabok醉酒；马里，mari来；马寅，main游戏；马己，maki辱骂；三马，sama一起）By Khoo Seok Wan, the Poet who named Singapore “Sin Chew” (星洲) – this may be why I’ve seen people in Malaysia and Hong Kong still refer to Singapore as 星加坡，not 新加坡"
Hope!
Time running out for Malaysian hitman in Australia - "How is it that an individual, who was standing trial for murder in one of the region’s most high-profile cases was allowed to come to Australia on a tourist visa and why were Malaysian officials allowed to visit and seemingly manipulate him in detention? Those questions have never been answered satisfactorily by the Australian government"
The Big Read: Voters not swayed by racial politics in Malaysian GE, but how long will that last? - "“Dr Mahathir reassured the Malays about their dominance, rather than calling for more equitable statuses and power-sharing,” said Professor William Case, of the University of Nottingham Malaysia, adding that this was crucial to PH’s success... Research analyst Rashaad Ali, from the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, added: “I think we can say with certainty that without Dr Mahathir, the opposition would not have been able to win the election.”... Malaysian Malay voters interviewed by TODAY agree that Malay rights remain an important issue for them in politics... PH's core position is that it will preserve bumiputeras’ special status and uphold Islam as the official religion."
A brave new world for Malaysia - "“Everyone is talking about how Malaysians brought down the ruling coalition. Respect for Malaysians is now sky high. Malaysians travelling and living abroad used to hide their nationality because of the 1MDB and other scandals. We no longer have to act like victims.” It is noteworthy that Datuk Seri Nazir Razak, the banker brother of Najib, had written an encouraging note in his Instagram"
Mahathir says his party will defy order by the authorities to cease activities using name, logo - "the RoS' move could backfire on the Najib administration. "It might just counterproductively amplify the Malay Tsunami (against Umno). Malay politics places high value on machismo, valuing courage and detesting cowardice. Najib will be seen as the coward who hits below the belt on a mahaguru.""
Malaysia's shock poll result gives hope to besieged Southeast Asian oppositions - "Lee Morgenbesser, an Australian academic who studies Southeast Asian regimes, cautioned that the Malaysian election could lead to more repression rather than a regional democratic awakening. "If you have this stunning election result, it sends a warning to authoritarian regimes in the region," he said. "That might actually reinforce the trend that's been happening for years. You just could see more suppression and manipulation at election time." He cited the example of the Arab Spring in the Middle East that began in 2010. Early democratic gains were reversed as rulers responded aggressively, often with brutal violence and arbitrary arrests of dissidents."
Malaysia's opposition win shakes up Southeast Asia - ""Politics in Southeast Asia is the politics of economic growth," said Takashi Shiraishi, chancellor of Japan's Prefectural University of Kumamoto and an expert on East Asian affairs. "The political arena remains stable only as long as the government fulfills expectations that living standards will rise. But as soon as it fails, stability goes out the door." In other words, people in the region will tolerate soft dictatorships only as long as they feel well-off."
Malaysia's First 'Fake News' Conviction Is All About Shielding Government from Criticism - "It is utterly unsurprising that the first fake news conviction is of somebody saying something critical of the government's behavior. When government authorities have control over what sort of criticism is allowed and what information is considered "real" or "fake," they will be tempted to use it to protect their power. Something to keep in mind whenever any official—elected or otherwise—starts popping off about how somebody needs to do "something" about fake news. It's all about shielding themselves from opposition."
Malaysian voter lodges police report, saying ballot papers were pre-marked for ruling BN - "A voter in the Batu constituency lodged a police report on Wednesday (May 9) after finding his and several other fresh ballot papers allegedly pre-marked for the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition when he turned up to vote in Malaysia's 14th General Election. In a police report seen by the Malay Mail, the voter identified as Mr Omar Anuar Roslay claimed that as he was about to cast his vote, he noticed that the ballot paper given to him was already pre-marked for BN candidate Dominic Lau. Mr Omar, in his report, said that when he requested for a change of ballot paper he claimed to have noticed that the entire ballot paper book contained similar marks. "To be more specific, the mark was right at the alphabet 'H'. "Therefore there was no new ballot papers that could be issued, so I was told to continue casting my vote""
Penang voter told he has already voted when he turned up at polling centre - "I showed them my fingers, there’s no ink, but they still insisted that I’ve already voted so I can’t vote"
Riot police called in at Ayer Hitam results centre - "Riot police were mobilised outside a results centre in Ayer Hitam, Johor on Wednesday evening (May 9) after crowds were seen stopping unmarked cars from entering... Comments among the crowd suggested that there were concerns that results in the opposition's favour were not being signed off by officials."wonk on htiw dlihc knalb a nevi
When it Comes to Color, Men & Women Aren't Seeing Eye to Eye - "Previous research has shown that women have a larger color vocabulary (link is external)—think periwinkle, azure, and other color names that are unlikely to be used by men in general conversation... women were more adept at distinguishing between subtle gradations than were men. This sensitivity was most evident in the middle of the color spectrum. With hues that were mainly yellow or green, women were able to distinguish tiny differences between colors that looked identical to men. In fact, Abramov found that slightly longer wavelengths of light were required for men to see the same hues as women—hues identified as orange by women were seen as more yellow by men. However, when shown light and dark bars flickering on a screen, men were better than women at seeing the bars (link is external). Men were better able to perceive changes in brightness across space, a skill useful for reading a letter on an eye chart or recognizing a face. This effect was increased as the bars narrowed, suggesting that men are more sensitive to fine details and rapid movement than women. These results suggest that the wiring differences in visual areas of the brain contribute to how men and women see differently, regardless of whether a person has an extensive vocabulary of color names. Sensory differences between sexes have been well studied. In the realms of hearing (link is external), smell (link is external), and taste (link is external), women perform better than men at distinguishing between slight differences. Hormone levels may be the basis for these sex differences."
Trump Restores Realism with His National Security Strategy - "The Jerusalem announcement was a preview of President Trump's larger vision of operating within reality, a central theme in the subsequently released National Security Strategy. On Jerusalem, it acknowledges that "Israel is not the cause of the region's problems," and accurately blames regional instability on Iran and jihadist organizations. This administration is the first in American history to so explicitly break from the false causation drawn between Israel's existence and the problems of the region. The rejection of this lie is long, long overdue... A second example of the National Security Strategy's recognition of reality is the usage of the terms "Islamist," "Jihadist," and "Shariah" a combined thirty-seven times, which stands in stark contrast to former President Barack Obama's National Security Strategy in 2010 and 2015 and President George W. Bush's in 2002 and 2006, none of which used those terms at all."
The U.S. Just Had a Very Good Week at the UN - "While most of the world was focused on the symbolic gang up at the UN General Assembly, the Trump administration had some quiet diplomatic success."
Muslims cannot join candlelight vigils for Kim Jong-hyun; it is haram: Perak Mufti - "Muslims are forbidden from joining candlelight vigils in memory of the late Korean pop star Kim Jong-hyun who committed suicide this week, Perak Mufti Harussani Zakaria said. He said such activity is against Islamic teachings and is akin to "glorifying" Kim's death. "No, you can't do that because it is haram. If the artist or individual was a Muslim, then we should recite Al-Fatihah for him. But if the person was a non-Muslim, why are we praying for him to go to heaven? "On top of that, he committed suicide. Why are we following the culture of infidels? What will you get out of it?""
Theresa May calls for a woman to play James Bond in future
Will Jane Bond sleep with as many men as James Bond does women?
What is a Pubic Hair Transplant? - "A pubic hair transplant is actually one of the earliest types of hair transplant procedures to ever be attempted. A Japanese dermatologist named Dr. Okuda conducted some of the world’s first successful pubic hair transplant procedures just before World War II. Among his many experiments with surgical hair restoration, he performed what is considered to be the first pubic hair transplant by transferring scalp hair into the pubic regions of women... Pubic hairs have vastly different characteristics than scalp hairs, and although hair grafts do sometimes adapt certain characteristics of the native scalp, pubic hairs still largely remain relatively shortened and wiry after transplantation. Also, in many cases, the color of the pubic and scalp hair is vastly different to begin with... While the current trend in the West is to shave the pubic hair away (especially for women), other parts of the world view pubic hair far differently. In Asian countries such as Korea, for example, pubic hair carries connotations of sexual maturity and fertility. Women do not shave their pubic hair because it is considered attractive and desirable. In fact, it is common for a woman to worry about not having enough pubic hair. This is why many Korean women have public hair transplants in order to increase the volume and density of hair in their pubic regions."
Pubic Hair Transplant Trend Korea - "According to the Korean Association of Medical Journal Editors, an insufficiency of pubes (in otherwise healthy people) is a disorder called “pubic atrichosis.” A Korean clinic called Renaissance estimates that 10% of Korean women have it. Some even suffer from psychological stress as a result"
NTU STUDENT BRINGS GUAN YIN GODDESS TO EXAM HALL, HOPES TO SCORE A+?
SGAG - Posts - "altar to the almighty bell curve god in NTU!"
"Bell Curve God" Surfaces In Local University
Netflix attacks own network with “Chaos Monkey”—and now you can too - "By forcing Netflix engineers to recover from small failures that customers won't notice, the company hopes to prevent major outages in its video streaming service. Netflix calls the software it built to automate the process of causing failure a "Chaos Monkey""
5 Weird Foods the French Consider Delicacies - "There’s an anecdote that places Napoleon’s chief advisor, Talleyrand, in a Burgundy restaurant with Czar Alexander I in 1814. They arrived late, the food was gone, and the chef spotted some snails in his garden. In a panic he added garlic to mask the taste, parsley to pretty them up and butter to make them easier to swallow. Apparently the Czar liked the dish so much, he demanded the recipe. Whenever he saw snails after that, he referred to them as “snails from Burgundy,” or escargots de Bourgogne... The French enamoration with calves also extends to another body part, the thymus gland. Again, this is an innard I have managed to avoid, although Ris de Veau is far more popular – and appetizing – than the brainy end of the animal. In English they’re known as sweetbreads, although there’s nothing sweet or bread-like about them."
Former Harvard President blasts ‘absurd political correctness’ on campuses - "Summers refers to the President of Princeton University, Christopher Eisgruber, criticizing him for “negotiating with people as they took over his office.” At issue in the 32-hour standoff was the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, which the protesters demanded be changed in recognition of Wilson’s vehement and well-known racism... Summers also mentions “attacks on very reasonable free speech having to do with adults' right to choose their own Halloween costumes at Yale,” referring to the controversy that erupted at the university in November over an innocuous email, outrage over which eventually drove two professors to cancel their course offerings... “The idea that somehow microaggressions in the form of a racist statement contained in a novel should be treated in parallel with violence or actual sexual assault seems to me to be crazy,” he declared. “I worry very much that if our leading academic institutions become places that prize comfort over truth—that prize the pursuit of mutual understanding over the pursuit of better and more accurate understanding—then a great deal will be lost.”"
Summers Decries 'Creeping Totalitarianism' at Colleges - "he condemned controversial placemats that the Office for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion introduced in Harvard dining halls last semester. Quickly denounced by a host of students and administrators as a breach from principles of academic freedom, the placemats purported to offer advice on holiday conversation with family members about race and inclusion... “I admire much more student protests about major moral issues like the Vietnam War, South African apartheid or global climate change, than protests coming from discomfort about the use of historical names”
Former Harvard President Larry Summers Calls BDS Efforts 'Deplorable' - "“The idea that Israel should be singled out as a human rights abuser was morally insensate,” he said. “It seemed to me that there wasn’t much question that if an African country was singled out for censure and there was no clear grounds for why that African country was worse or different than a number of European or Asian countries, I had no doubt that it would be seen in many quarters as racist.”"
About « Singaporelang - "the brevity of Singlish is what makes it tick. Some say it is disorderly or illogical, but Singlish evolved to convey specific feelings that can’t quite be described in standard English language. No one really ‘owns’ Singlish, and that is perhaps why free-style experimentation has led to creative spins on the language that we speak. To me, language is about the people on the streets who use it. As language historian Anne Curzan puts it, “there is no objective dictionary out there that is the final arbiter of what words mean… if a community of speakers is using a word and knows what it means, it’s real.”"
“马干马莫聚豪餐，马里马寅任乐陶。幸勿酒狂喧马己，何妨三马吃同槽。” – 邱菽园 (1874-1941) - "（马干，makan吃；马莫，mabok醉酒；马里，mari来；马寅，main游戏；马己，maki辱骂；三马，sama一起）By Khoo Seok Wan, the Poet who named Singapore “Sin Chew” (星洲) – this may be why I’ve seen people in Malaysia and Hong Kong still refer to Singapore as 星加坡，not 新加坡"
Post ID: 3456331831847087434
Sunday, May 13, 2018
Links - Guns (13th May 2018)
Why Japan youth gangs don't use guns - "Although the gang rivalry was strong—”messy,” Beck says—and the resulting injuries could be serious, fatalities were virtually nonexistent. Not because of any moral code—the gang members simply didn’t have guns. Beck initially thought this was due to Japan’s strict gun laws, but discovered it had far more to do with the narrative of heroism. Gang members knew where to get guns, legally or illegally, but they weren’t particularly interested in doing so. “Their reasons for remaining gun-free revolved around some loosely held concept of honor,” Beck says. “Being able to move your finger on a trigger is not really a skill that wows anyone.”... “A gun in Japan would earn the wielder scorn,” Beck says, “not respect.”"
"Guns don't kill people. People kill people"
How to Reduce Mass Shooting Deaths? Experts Rank Gun Laws - The New York Times - "We asked dozens of researchers in criminology, law and public health to assess a range of policies often proposed to prevent gun deaths. We also conducted a national poll to measure public support for the same set of measures."
An assault weapons ban is ranked as highly effective by experts - even though pro-gun people keep pooh-poohing it
With AR-15s, Mass Shooters Attack With the Rifle Firepower Typically Used by Infantry Troops - The New York Times - "Joe Plenzler, a 20-year combat veteran of the Marine Corps, is part of a social media movement of military veterans, including those who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, calling for reforms on the sale or possession of modern military-style firearms. “They are the Formula One cars of guns, designed to kill as many people as quickly and efficiently as possible,” Mr. Plenzler said, referring to AR-15-style rifles. “We are seeing battlefield-level casualties because we are allowing those weapons on our street,” he said... The small-caliber, high-velocity rounds used in the military rifles are identical to those sold for the civilian weapons. They have been documented inflicting grievous bone and soft-tissue wounds. Both civilian and military models of the rifle are lightweight and have very little recoil."
New assault weapons ban will prevent mass shootings, experts say - The Washington Post - "For his 2016 book “Rampage Nation,” Klarevas collected data on every gun massacre — which he defines as six or more people shot and killed — for the 50 years before 2016. His aim was to see whether there was any change in the number of gun massacres while the 10-year federal ban on assault weapons was in place. He calls the results “staggering.” Compared with the 10-year period before the ban, the number of gun massacres during the ban period fell by 37 percent, and the number of people dying from gun massacres fell by 43 percent. But after the ban lapsed in 2004, the numbers shot up again — an astonishing 183 percent increase in massacres and a 239 percent increase in massacre deaths. Klarevas says that the key provision of the assault weapons bill was a ban on high-capacity magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds. “We have found that when large capacity mags are regulated, you get drastic drops in both the incidence of gun massacres and the fatality rate of gun massacres.” The opinion is shared among many researchers who study gun violence for a living... On a scale of effectiveness ranging from 1 (not effective) to 10 (highly effective), the expert panel gave an average score of 6.8 to both an assault weapons ban and a ban on high-capacity magazines, the highest ratings among the nearly 30 policies surveyed... A number of surveys show that bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines are popular among the general public. A 2017 Pew Research Center poll found that 68 percent of adults favor banning assault weapons, and 65 percent support a ban on high-capacity magazines. More strikingly, substantial numbers of gun owners supported the measures as well"
There is a claim that Americans can't agree on what specific gun control measures should be passed even if they agree more are needed, but this is clearly false
Better gun laws could save thousands of lives, major non-partisan US study finds - "Passing an assault weapons ban might prevent 170 mass shooting deaths a year in the US, experts who support gun control estimate. Passing a universal background check law could prevent 1,100 gun homicides each year. Raising the age limit for buying firearms could prevent 1,600 homicides and suicides. These are some of the new estimates in a groundbreaking study of the potential impact of American gun control laws. The non-partisan analysis, based on a review of existing gun policy research and a survey of the best guesses of both gun rights and gun control experts, was conducted by the Rand Corporation, which spent two years and more than $1m on the project. Rand’s review of the existing research concluded that only a handful of gun control laws were backed by strong research evidence. Child access prevention laws, which are designed to keep guns out of the hands of children, had the strongest evidence behind them, the researchers concluded, and appeared to reduce gun injuries and suicides. The review also found “moderate evidence” that background checks reduce firearm suicides and homicides, and that certain mental health gun prohibitions reduced violent crime. The Rand review also found “moderate evidence” that “stand your ground” laws, which allow Americans to use guns to defend themselves without first attempting to retreat from a confrontation, may increase state homicide rates. What the two-year project revealed most starkly were the gaping holes in both the research and the basic data needed to understand what gun laws might save the most lives. There was only “inconclusive” research evidence about the impact of a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines on mass shootings and on violent crime"
What America’s gun fanatics won’t tell you - "A “well-regulated militia” didn’t mean guys who read Soldier of Fortune magazine running around in the woods with AK-47s and warpaint on their faces. It basically meant what today we call the National Guard... The one big difference between this militia and a professional army? It shouldn’t be made up of full-time professional soldiers, said the Founding Fathers. Such soldiers could be used against the people as King George had used his mercenary Redcoats. Instead, the American republic should make up its military force from part-time volunteers drawn from regular citizens. Such men would be less likely to turn on the population. And the creation of this “well-regulated militia,” aka the National Guard, would help safeguard the freedom of the new republic because it would make the creation of a professional, mercenary army “unnecessary,” wrote Hamilton... Hamilton was scathing about the idea that the “militia” could just mean every Bob, Billy and Benjamin with his musket. Such amateurs would stand no chance in modern warfare against professionals... Today we have a professional army, anyway. Military matters have become so complex that no part-time soldiers could do it all. So you could argue that makes the Second Amendment null and void, like the parts in the Constitution about slaves and Indians being counted as “three-fifths” of a person in the Census... if you’re running around waving your AK-47 under the Second Amendment, and you haven’t shown up yet at your local National Guard headquarters, you’re not a “patriot.” You’re a deserter."
This Gun Instructor Says Many Who Carry A Gun Aren't Trained To Respond To A Shooter - "On what kind of training someone would need to stop an active shooter
"You would need more training than 50 percent of the sworn active law enforcement officers in this country ever get. And by the way, when you go to the range, of course even if you're shooting at a target, the target is standing still. A person doesn't stand still""
Mass Shootings: What Role Do Guns Play? - "There appears to be little correlation between mental illness and mass shooting rates... what a young white male mass shooter may experience is relative deprivation—they compare their lives to those around them and manifest increased prejudice and rage. These young men may have been told they have privilege yet everywhere they look in their lives, they see privilege denied... bullying cannot be a predominant factor in gun violence, as disparities in respect, privilege, or opportunity exist around the globe. Bullying is not unique to the US and the US, with all of its opportunities, far outshines other nations in relation to mass shootings... patriarchy and the association between masculinity, power, and violence are hardly unique to the US. Yet, the extreme frequency of mass shootings is distinctly a US identifier... the US is not the only consumer of violent video games or media. Yet, we outpace these other nations with respect to mass shooting... prejudice and discrimination against the “other” exist around the globe, as does organized hate or extremism. Yet, it is in the US where such hatred translates into mass shootings... The key feature that separates the US from other nations around the globe is the availability and access to guns, particularly highly destructive semi-automatic weapons of war. According to the McCarthy, Beckett, and Glenza (2017), the US, which constitutes less than 5% of the world’s population, makes up between 35-50% of the world’s gun ownership with 88 guns per every 100 individuals. Just the mere presence of a gun—otherwise known as the “weapons effect (see Bushman, 2013)—makes it more likely that someone will be a victim of gun violence"
This is an interesting echo of Study: Poor Kids Who Believe in Meritocracy Suffer (aka "Why the Myth of Meritocracy Hurts Kids of Color")
US mass shootings blamed on high gun ownership and 'American Dream' - ""My study provides empirical evidence, based on my quantitative assessment of 171 countries, that a nation's civilian firearm ownership rate is the strongest predictor of its number of public mass shooters"... shooters abroad were 3.6 times less likely to use multiple weapons, something he attributed to the vast number of weapons in circulation in the US compared with any other country (200 million more). He also found that victim numbers were lower in the US, at 6.87 percent per incident rather than 8.81 in other nations -- this, he attributed to the fact US police are more used to responding to such tragedies and therefore are better prepared. US shootings were more likely to take place in schools, factories and office buildings, however, versus military posts where incidents occur more frequently abroad. "The most obvious implication is that the United States could likely reduce its number of school shootings, workplace shootings, and public mass shootings in other places if it reduced the number of guns in circulation.""
The "weapons effect" - "A review of 56 published studies confirmed that the mere sight of weapons increases aggression in both angry and nonangry individuals"
So much for pro-gun people's claims that seeing another person's gun will deter a criminal from using his (and thus more guns will lead to less crime)
How Leaving America Changes What People Think About Guns - "the likelihood of dying by gun violence in Japan "is about the same as an American's chance of being killed by lightning—roughly one in ten million." (In the US, the likelihood of dying by gun violence is on par with dying in a car accident.)"
Steve Hemmert - With some hesitation born of nostalgia, I turned... - "With some hesitation born of nostalgia, I turned in two AR style rifles to the Miami Police Department as part of their gun buy-back program today. As a former U.S. Army Infantry officer, I was well trained in the use of, and felt very comfortable with, the M-16/M-4 platform. I have always considered myself a responsible gun owner. My 14 year old daughter and I built one of the ARs- from scratch- together... There is no valid need for any civilian to own an AR. They make terrible self defense weapons because they can't safely be stored in a condition that makes them available to use quickly, and the rounds penetrate walls too easily. They aren't hunting rifles (it's not even legal to shoot a deer with one). I know very well that my little AR is never going to be used to stand up to a government that has tanks and heavy machine guns. And God forbid someone steals them and uses them to kill more innocents. Any honest gun owner will admit that the only lawful reason to own an AR is because they are fun to shoot (and they ARE fun to shoot)."
More Americans Than Ever Support Stricter Gun Laws: Poll - "Support for universal background checks, a mandatory waiting period for firearm purchases and an assault weapon ban came in at 97%, 83% and 67%, respectively"
Nuri McBride - I've noticed several people in my feed mention... - "I've noticed several people in my feed mention Israel concerning armed citizens and guns, quoting BS put out by the NRA, so let me set a few things straight. If you want to own a gun in Israel you must consider the following:
1. 40% of applications for firearms permits are rejected. There are only 170,000 active permits currently (population 8.5 million)
2. Only a small group of people are eligible for firearms licenses. Primarily licenses go to high ranking retired military personnel, police officers, prison guards, security guards, and animal control officers. There are a small number of licences for settlers in the West Bank and hunters.
5. You must pass an extensive background check (including criminal check, national security check, health exam, and mental health evaluation)
6. You must establish a genuine reason for possessing a firearm. I like guns is not an option. If you say you need a gun for self-defence, you can only have one gun, and you are limited to an annual supply of 50 bullets
7. You have to justify every gun you possess separately. Owning more than two guns is extremely rare.
10. You have to undergo a psychological assessment every six years.
11. You must have a safe at your residence in which to keep the firearm.
13. There are enormous legal repercussions should your gun be miss-handled, miss-fire, injure anyone unjustly, or be used in a crime. Even if you are not the one that committed these acts.
14. You are not allowed to sell your gun to anyone but a registered dealer or the police. In Israel, gun ownership is a privilege, not a right. It is illegal to own an assault rifle."
The AR-15 Is Different: What I Learned Treating Parkland Victims - "Routine handgun injuries leave entry and exit wounds and linear tracks through the victim’s body that are roughly the size of the bullet. If the bullet does not directly hit something crucial like the heart or the aorta, and the victim does not bleed to death before being transported to our care at the trauma center, chances are that we can save him. The bullets fired by an AR-15 are different: They travel at a higher velocity and are far more lethal than routine bullets fired from a handgun. The damage they cause is a function of the energy they impart as they pass through the body. A typical AR-15 bullet leaves the barrel traveling almost three times faster than—and imparting more than three times the energy of—a typical 9mm bullet from a handgun. An AR-15 rifle outfitted with a magazine with 50 rounds allows many more lethal bullets to be delivered quickly without reloading... With an AR-15, the shooter does not have to be particularly accurate. The victim does not have to be unlucky. If a victim takes a direct hit to the liver from an AR-15, the damage is far graver than that of a simple handgun-shot injury. Handgun injuries to the liver are generally survivable unless the bullet hits the main blood supply to the liver. An AR-15 bullet wound to the middle of the liver would cause so much bleeding that the patient would likely never make it to the trauma center to receive our care... As a doctor, I feel I have a duty to inform the public of what I have learned as I have observed these wounds and cared for these patients. It’s clear to me that AR-15 and other high-velocity weapons, especially when outfitted with a high-capacity magazine, have no place in a civilian’s gun cabinet"
“Fuck you, I like guns.” - "I’m an Army veteran. I like M-4’s, which are, for all practical purposes, an AR-15, just with a few extra features that people almost never use anyway... is anybody surprised that nearly every mass shooter in recent US history has used an AR-15 to commit their crime? And why wouldn’t they? High capacity magazine, ease of loading and unloading, almost no recoil, really accurate even without a scope, but numerous scopes available for high precision, great from a distance or up close, easy to carry, and readily available. You can buy one at Wal-Mart, or just about any sports store, and since they’re long guns, I don’t believe you have to be any more than 18 years old with a valid ID. This rifle was made for the modern mass shooter, especially the young one. If he could custom design a weapon to suit his sinister purposes, he couldn’t do a better job than Armalite did with this one already. This rifle is so deadly and so easy to use that no civilian should be able to get their hands on one. We simply don’t need these things in society at large. I always find it interesting that when I was in the Army, and part of my job was to be incredibly proficient with this exact weapon, I never carried one at any point in garrison other than at the range... The military police protected us from threats in garrison. They had 9 mm Berettas to carry. They were the only soldiers who carry weapons in garrison. We trusted them to protect us, and they delivered. With notably rare exceptions, this system has worked well. There are fewer shootings on Army posts than in society in general, probably because soldiers are actively discouraged from walking around with rifles, despite being impeccably well trained with them. Perchance, we could have the largely untrained civilian population take a page from that book?... People have to get a license to operate a car, and if you operate a car without a license, you’re going to get in trouble for that... I can’t drive a Formula One car to work. It would be really cool to be able to do that, and I could probably cut my commute time by a lot. Hey, I’m a good driver, a responsible Formula One owner. You shouldn’t be scared to be on the freeway next to me as I zip around you at 140 MPH, leaving your Mazda in a cloud of dust! Why are you scared? Cars don’t kill people. People kill people. Doesn’t this sound like bullshit? It is bullshit, and everybody knows
Maybe pro-gun people will find some angle to dismiss veterans for gun control as not knowing anything
The study that gun-rights activists keep citing but completely misunderstand - The Washington Post - ""Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million per year, in the context of about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008." So it would appear the "good use" of guns outweighs the "bad use." That may be true, except the study says all of those statistics are in dispute -- creating, in the study authors' eyes, a research imperative. The study (available as a PDF) calls the defensive use of guns by crime victims "a common occurrence, although the exact number remains disputed." While it might be as high as 3 million defensive uses of guns each year, some scholars point to the much lower estimate of 108,000 times a year. "The variation in these numbers remains a controversy in the field," the study notes. The authors also say gun ownership might be good for defensive uses, but that benefit could be canceled out by the risk of suicide or homicide that comes with gun ownership. The depth of the relationship is unknown "and this is a sufficiently important question that it merits additional, careful exploration.""
Firearm availability and suicide, homicide, and unintentional firearm deaths among women. - "Between 1988 and 1997, the suicide, homicide, and unintentional firearm death rates among women were disproportionately higher in states where guns were more prevalent. The elevated rates of violent death in states with more guns was not entirely explained by a state's poverty or urbanization and was driven primarily by lethal firearm violence, not by lethal nonfirearm violence."
More guns, more crime
Gun availability and use of guns for murder and suicide in Canada. - "The accidental death rate from guns in Canada was associated with the percentage of guns used by suicides and on homicide victims except for elderly persons."
Gun ownership and firearm-related deaths. - "The number of guns per capita per country was a strong and independent predictor of firearm-related death in a given country, whereas the predictive power of the mental illness burden was of borderline significance in a multivariable model. Regardless of exact cause and effect, however, the current study debunks the widely quoted hypothesis that guns make a nation safer."
The mentally ill don't need to be stigmatised by gun lovers anymore
The NRA Myth of Gun-Free Zones - "The killers deliberately choose sites where firearms are forbidden, gun-rights advocates say, and because there are no weapons, no “good guy with a gun” will be on hand to stop the crime... Among the 62 mass shootings over the last 30 years that we studied, not a single case includes evidence that the killer chose to target a place because it banned guns. To the contrary, in many of the cases there was clearly another motive for the choice of location. For example, 20 were workplace shootings, most of which involved perpetrators who felt wronged by employers and colleagues... Proponents of this argument also ignore that the majority of mass shootings are murder-suicides. Thirty-six of the killers we studied took their own lives at or near the crime scene, while seven others died in police shootouts they had no hope of surviving (a.k.a. “suicide by cop”). These were not people whose priority was identifying the safest place to attack. No less a fantasy is the idea that gun-free zones prevent armed civilians from saving the day. Not one of the 62 mass shootings we documented was stopped this way. Veteran FBI, ATF, and police officials say that an armed citizen opening fire against an attacker in a panic-stricken movie theater or shopping mall is very likely to make matters worse. Law enforcement agents train rigorously for stopping active shooters, they say, a task that requires extraordinary skills honed under acute duress. In cases in Washington and Texas in 2005, would-be heroes who tried to take action with licensed firearms were gravely wounded and killed. In the Tucson mass shooting in 2011, an armed citizen admitted to coming within a split second of gunning down the wrong person—one of the bystanders who’d helped tackle and subdue the actual killer."
"Guns don't kill people. People kill people"
How to Reduce Mass Shooting Deaths? Experts Rank Gun Laws - The New York Times - "We asked dozens of researchers in criminology, law and public health to assess a range of policies often proposed to prevent gun deaths. We also conducted a national poll to measure public support for the same set of measures."
An assault weapons ban is ranked as highly effective by experts - even though pro-gun people keep pooh-poohing it
With AR-15s, Mass Shooters Attack With the Rifle Firepower Typically Used by Infantry Troops - The New York Times - "Joe Plenzler, a 20-year combat veteran of the Marine Corps, is part of a social media movement of military veterans, including those who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, calling for reforms on the sale or possession of modern military-style firearms. “They are the Formula One cars of guns, designed to kill as many people as quickly and efficiently as possible,” Mr. Plenzler said, referring to AR-15-style rifles. “We are seeing battlefield-level casualties because we are allowing those weapons on our street,” he said... The small-caliber, high-velocity rounds used in the military rifles are identical to those sold for the civilian weapons. They have been documented inflicting grievous bone and soft-tissue wounds. Both civilian and military models of the rifle are lightweight and have very little recoil."
New assault weapons ban will prevent mass shootings, experts say - The Washington Post - "For his 2016 book “Rampage Nation,” Klarevas collected data on every gun massacre — which he defines as six or more people shot and killed — for the 50 years before 2016. His aim was to see whether there was any change in the number of gun massacres while the 10-year federal ban on assault weapons was in place. He calls the results “staggering.” Compared with the 10-year period before the ban, the number of gun massacres during the ban period fell by 37 percent, and the number of people dying from gun massacres fell by 43 percent. But after the ban lapsed in 2004, the numbers shot up again — an astonishing 183 percent increase in massacres and a 239 percent increase in massacre deaths. Klarevas says that the key provision of the assault weapons bill was a ban on high-capacity magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds. “We have found that when large capacity mags are regulated, you get drastic drops in both the incidence of gun massacres and the fatality rate of gun massacres.” The opinion is shared among many researchers who study gun violence for a living... On a scale of effectiveness ranging from 1 (not effective) to 10 (highly effective), the expert panel gave an average score of 6.8 to both an assault weapons ban and a ban on high-capacity magazines, the highest ratings among the nearly 30 policies surveyed... A number of surveys show that bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines are popular among the general public. A 2017 Pew Research Center poll found that 68 percent of adults favor banning assault weapons, and 65 percent support a ban on high-capacity magazines. More strikingly, substantial numbers of gun owners supported the measures as well"
There is a claim that Americans can't agree on what specific gun control measures should be passed even if they agree more are needed, but this is clearly false
Better gun laws could save thousands of lives, major non-partisan US study finds - "Passing an assault weapons ban might prevent 170 mass shooting deaths a year in the US, experts who support gun control estimate. Passing a universal background check law could prevent 1,100 gun homicides each year. Raising the age limit for buying firearms could prevent 1,600 homicides and suicides. These are some of the new estimates in a groundbreaking study of the potential impact of American gun control laws. The non-partisan analysis, based on a review of existing gun policy research and a survey of the best guesses of both gun rights and gun control experts, was conducted by the Rand Corporation, which spent two years and more than $1m on the project. Rand’s review of the existing research concluded that only a handful of gun control laws were backed by strong research evidence. Child access prevention laws, which are designed to keep guns out of the hands of children, had the strongest evidence behind them, the researchers concluded, and appeared to reduce gun injuries and suicides. The review also found “moderate evidence” that background checks reduce firearm suicides and homicides, and that certain mental health gun prohibitions reduced violent crime. The Rand review also found “moderate evidence” that “stand your ground” laws, which allow Americans to use guns to defend themselves without first attempting to retreat from a confrontation, may increase state homicide rates. What the two-year project revealed most starkly were the gaping holes in both the research and the basic data needed to understand what gun laws might save the most lives. There was only “inconclusive” research evidence about the impact of a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines on mass shootings and on violent crime"
What America’s gun fanatics won’t tell you - "A “well-regulated militia” didn’t mean guys who read Soldier of Fortune magazine running around in the woods with AK-47s and warpaint on their faces. It basically meant what today we call the National Guard... The one big difference between this militia and a professional army? It shouldn’t be made up of full-time professional soldiers, said the Founding Fathers. Such soldiers could be used against the people as King George had used his mercenary Redcoats. Instead, the American republic should make up its military force from part-time volunteers drawn from regular citizens. Such men would be less likely to turn on the population. And the creation of this “well-regulated militia,” aka the National Guard, would help safeguard the freedom of the new republic because it would make the creation of a professional, mercenary army “unnecessary,” wrote Hamilton... Hamilton was scathing about the idea that the “militia” could just mean every Bob, Billy and Benjamin with his musket. Such amateurs would stand no chance in modern warfare against professionals... Today we have a professional army, anyway. Military matters have become so complex that no part-time soldiers could do it all. So you could argue that makes the Second Amendment null and void, like the parts in the Constitution about slaves and Indians being counted as “three-fifths” of a person in the Census... if you’re running around waving your AK-47 under the Second Amendment, and you haven’t shown up yet at your local National Guard headquarters, you’re not a “patriot.” You’re a deserter."
This Gun Instructor Says Many Who Carry A Gun Aren't Trained To Respond To A Shooter - "On what kind of training someone would need to stop an active shooter
"You would need more training than 50 percent of the sworn active law enforcement officers in this country ever get. And by the way, when you go to the range, of course even if you're shooting at a target, the target is standing still. A person doesn't stand still""
Mass Shootings: What Role Do Guns Play? - "There appears to be little correlation between mental illness and mass shooting rates... what a young white male mass shooter may experience is relative deprivation—they compare their lives to those around them and manifest increased prejudice and rage. These young men may have been told they have privilege yet everywhere they look in their lives, they see privilege denied... bullying cannot be a predominant factor in gun violence, as disparities in respect, privilege, or opportunity exist around the globe. Bullying is not unique to the US and the US, with all of its opportunities, far outshines other nations in relation to mass shootings... patriarchy and the association between masculinity, power, and violence are hardly unique to the US. Yet, the extreme frequency of mass shootings is distinctly a US identifier... the US is not the only consumer of violent video games or media. Yet, we outpace these other nations with respect to mass shooting... prejudice and discrimination against the “other” exist around the globe, as does organized hate or extremism. Yet, it is in the US where such hatred translates into mass shootings... The key feature that separates the US from other nations around the globe is the availability and access to guns, particularly highly destructive semi-automatic weapons of war. According to the McCarthy, Beckett, and Glenza (2017), the US, which constitutes less than 5% of the world’s population, makes up between 35-50% of the world’s gun ownership with 88 guns per every 100 individuals. Just the mere presence of a gun—otherwise known as the “weapons effect (see Bushman, 2013)—makes it more likely that someone will be a victim of gun violence"
This is an interesting echo of Study: Poor Kids Who Believe in Meritocracy Suffer (aka "Why the Myth of Meritocracy Hurts Kids of Color")
US mass shootings blamed on high gun ownership and 'American Dream' - ""My study provides empirical evidence, based on my quantitative assessment of 171 countries, that a nation's civilian firearm ownership rate is the strongest predictor of its number of public mass shooters"... shooters abroad were 3.6 times less likely to use multiple weapons, something he attributed to the vast number of weapons in circulation in the US compared with any other country (200 million more). He also found that victim numbers were lower in the US, at 6.87 percent per incident rather than 8.81 in other nations -- this, he attributed to the fact US police are more used to responding to such tragedies and therefore are better prepared. US shootings were more likely to take place in schools, factories and office buildings, however, versus military posts where incidents occur more frequently abroad. "The most obvious implication is that the United States could likely reduce its number of school shootings, workplace shootings, and public mass shootings in other places if it reduced the number of guns in circulation.""
The "weapons effect" - "A review of 56 published studies confirmed that the mere sight of weapons increases aggression in both angry and nonangry individuals"
So much for pro-gun people's claims that seeing another person's gun will deter a criminal from using his (and thus more guns will lead to less crime)
How Leaving America Changes What People Think About Guns - "the likelihood of dying by gun violence in Japan "is about the same as an American's chance of being killed by lightning—roughly one in ten million." (In the US, the likelihood of dying by gun violence is on par with dying in a car accident.)"
Steve Hemmert - With some hesitation born of nostalgia, I turned... - "With some hesitation born of nostalgia, I turned in two AR style rifles to the Miami Police Department as part of their gun buy-back program today. As a former U.S. Army Infantry officer, I was well trained in the use of, and felt very comfortable with, the M-16/M-4 platform. I have always considered myself a responsible gun owner. My 14 year old daughter and I built one of the ARs- from scratch- together... There is no valid need for any civilian to own an AR. They make terrible self defense weapons because they can't safely be stored in a condition that makes them available to use quickly, and the rounds penetrate walls too easily. They aren't hunting rifles (it's not even legal to shoot a deer with one). I know very well that my little AR is never going to be used to stand up to a government that has tanks and heavy machine guns. And God forbid someone steals them and uses them to kill more innocents. Any honest gun owner will admit that the only lawful reason to own an AR is because they are fun to shoot (and they ARE fun to shoot)."
More Americans Than Ever Support Stricter Gun Laws: Poll - "Support for universal background checks, a mandatory waiting period for firearm purchases and an assault weapon ban came in at 97%, 83% and 67%, respectively"
Nuri McBride - I've noticed several people in my feed mention... - "I've noticed several people in my feed mention Israel concerning armed citizens and guns, quoting BS put out by the NRA, so let me set a few things straight. If you want to own a gun in Israel you must consider the following:
1. 40% of applications for firearms permits are rejected. There are only 170,000 active permits currently (population 8.5 million)
2. Only a small group of people are eligible for firearms licenses. Primarily licenses go to high ranking retired military personnel, police officers, prison guards, security guards, and animal control officers. There are a small number of licences for settlers in the West Bank and hunters.
5. You must pass an extensive background check (including criminal check, national security check, health exam, and mental health evaluation)
6. You must establish a genuine reason for possessing a firearm. I like guns is not an option. If you say you need a gun for self-defence, you can only have one gun, and you are limited to an annual supply of 50 bullets
7. You have to justify every gun you possess separately. Owning more than two guns is extremely rare.
10. You have to undergo a psychological assessment every six years.
11. You must have a safe at your residence in which to keep the firearm.
13. There are enormous legal repercussions should your gun be miss-handled, miss-fire, injure anyone unjustly, or be used in a crime. Even if you are not the one that committed these acts.
14. You are not allowed to sell your gun to anyone but a registered dealer or the police. In Israel, gun ownership is a privilege, not a right. It is illegal to own an assault rifle."
The AR-15 Is Different: What I Learned Treating Parkland Victims - "Routine handgun injuries leave entry and exit wounds and linear tracks through the victim’s body that are roughly the size of the bullet. If the bullet does not directly hit something crucial like the heart or the aorta, and the victim does not bleed to death before being transported to our care at the trauma center, chances are that we can save him. The bullets fired by an AR-15 are different: They travel at a higher velocity and are far more lethal than routine bullets fired from a handgun. The damage they cause is a function of the energy they impart as they pass through the body. A typical AR-15 bullet leaves the barrel traveling almost three times faster than—and imparting more than three times the energy of—a typical 9mm bullet from a handgun. An AR-15 rifle outfitted with a magazine with 50 rounds allows many more lethal bullets to be delivered quickly without reloading... With an AR-15, the shooter does not have to be particularly accurate. The victim does not have to be unlucky. If a victim takes a direct hit to the liver from an AR-15, the damage is far graver than that of a simple handgun-shot injury. Handgun injuries to the liver are generally survivable unless the bullet hits the main blood supply to the liver. An AR-15 bullet wound to the middle of the liver would cause so much bleeding that the patient would likely never make it to the trauma center to receive our care... As a doctor, I feel I have a duty to inform the public of what I have learned as I have observed these wounds and cared for these patients. It’s clear to me that AR-15 and other high-velocity weapons, especially when outfitted with a high-capacity magazine, have no place in a civilian’s gun cabinet"
“Fuck you, I like guns.” - "I’m an Army veteran. I like M-4’s, which are, for all practical purposes, an AR-15, just with a few extra features that people almost never use anyway... is anybody surprised that nearly every mass shooter in recent US history has used an AR-15 to commit their crime? And why wouldn’t they? High capacity magazine, ease of loading and unloading, almost no recoil, really accurate even without a scope, but numerous scopes available for high precision, great from a distance or up close, easy to carry, and readily available. You can buy one at Wal-Mart, or just about any sports store, and since they’re long guns, I don’t believe you have to be any more than 18 years old with a valid ID. This rifle was made for the modern mass shooter, especially the young one. If he could custom design a weapon to suit his sinister purposes, he couldn’t do a better job than Armalite did with this one already. This rifle is so deadly and so easy to use that no civilian should be able to get their hands on one. We simply don’t need these things in society at large. I always find it interesting that when I was in the Army, and part of my job was to be incredibly proficient with this exact weapon, I never carried one at any point in garrison other than at the range... The military police protected us from threats in garrison. They had 9 mm Berettas to carry. They were the only soldiers who carry weapons in garrison. We trusted them to protect us, and they delivered. With notably rare exceptions, this system has worked well. There are fewer shootings on Army posts than in society in general, probably because soldiers are actively discouraged from walking around with rifles, despite being impeccably well trained with them. Perchance, we could have the largely untrained civilian population take a page from that book?... People have to get a license to operate a car, and if you operate a car without a license, you’re going to get in trouble for that... I can’t drive a Formula One car to work. It would be really cool to be able to do that, and I could probably cut my commute time by a lot. Hey, I’m a good driver, a responsible Formula One owner. You shouldn’t be scared to be on the freeway next to me as I zip around you at 140 MPH, leaving your Mazda in a cloud of dust! Why are you scared? Cars don’t kill people. People kill people. Doesn’t this sound like bullshit? It is bullshit, and everybody knows
Maybe pro-gun people will find some angle to dismiss veterans for gun control as not knowing anything
The study that gun-rights activists keep citing but completely misunderstand - The Washington Post - ""Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million per year, in the context of about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008." So it would appear the "good use" of guns outweighs the "bad use." That may be true, except the study says all of those statistics are in dispute -- creating, in the study authors' eyes, a research imperative. The study (available as a PDF) calls the defensive use of guns by crime victims "a common occurrence, although the exact number remains disputed." While it might be as high as 3 million defensive uses of guns each year, some scholars point to the much lower estimate of 108,000 times a year. "The variation in these numbers remains a controversy in the field," the study notes. The authors also say gun ownership might be good for defensive uses, but that benefit could be canceled out by the risk of suicide or homicide that comes with gun ownership. The depth of the relationship is unknown "and this is a sufficiently important question that it merits additional, careful exploration.""
Firearm availability and suicide, homicide, and unintentional firearm deaths among women. - "Between 1988 and 1997, the suicide, homicide, and unintentional firearm death rates among women were disproportionately higher in states where guns were more prevalent. The elevated rates of violent death in states with more guns was not entirely explained by a state's poverty or urbanization and was driven primarily by lethal firearm violence, not by lethal nonfirearm violence."
More guns, more crime
Gun availability and use of guns for murder and suicide in Canada. - "The accidental death rate from guns in Canada was associated with the percentage of guns used by suicides and on homicide victims except for elderly persons."
Gun ownership and firearm-related deaths. - "The number of guns per capita per country was a strong and independent predictor of firearm-related death in a given country, whereas the predictive power of the mental illness burden was of borderline significance in a multivariable model. Regardless of exact cause and effect, however, the current study debunks the widely quoted hypothesis that guns make a nation safer."
The mentally ill don't need to be stigmatised by gun lovers anymore
The NRA Myth of Gun-Free Zones - "The killers deliberately choose sites where firearms are forbidden, gun-rights advocates say, and because there are no weapons, no “good guy with a gun” will be on hand to stop the crime... Among the 62 mass shootings over the last 30 years that we studied, not a single case includes evidence that the killer chose to target a place because it banned guns. To the contrary, in many of the cases there was clearly another motive for the choice of location. For example, 20 were workplace shootings, most of which involved perpetrators who felt wronged by employers and colleagues... Proponents of this argument also ignore that the majority of mass shootings are murder-suicides. Thirty-six of the killers we studied took their own lives at or near the crime scene, while seven others died in police shootouts they had no hope of surviving (a.k.a. “suicide by cop”). These were not people whose priority was identifying the safest place to attack. No less a fantasy is the idea that gun-free zones prevent armed civilians from saving the day. Not one of the 62 mass shootings we documented was stopped this way. Veteran FBI, ATF, and police officials say that an armed citizen opening fire against an attacker in a panic-stricken movie theater or shopping mall is very likely to make matters worse. Law enforcement agents train rigorously for stopping active shooters, they say, a task that requires extraordinary skills honed under acute duress. In cases in Washington and Texas in 2005, would-be heroes who tried to take action with licensed firearms were gravely wounded and killed. In the Tucson mass shooting in 2011, an armed citizen admitted to coming within a split second of gunning down the wrong person—one of the bystanders who’d helped tackle and subdue the actual killer."
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