Links - 13th September 2014

Why Does Scotland Want Independence? It’s Culture vs. Economics - NYTimes.com - "It seems slightly bonkers for Scots to get so frustrated about ceding power to bureaucrats in London and turn immediately to bureaucrats in Brussels, but there it is"
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Dear iPhone 6 users: Welcome to 2012! (image) - ""If you need help with your iPhone's new features, just ask an Android user. We've had this stuff for years"

Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America - "Berkeley linguistics professor John McWhorter, born at the dawn of the post-Civil Rights era, spent years trying to make sense of this question. Now he dares to say the unsayable: racism's ugliest legacy is the disease of defeatism that has infected black America. Losing the Race explores the three main components of this cultural virus: the cults of victimology, separatism, and antiintellectualism that are making blacks their own worst enemies in the struggle for success."

Ethnicity and conflict: theory and facts. - "Over the second half of the 20th century, conflicts within national boundaries became increasingly dominant. One-third of all countries experienced civil conflict. Many (if not most) such conflicts involved violence along ethnic lines. On the basis of recent theoretical and empirical research, we provide evidence that preexisting ethnic divisions do influence social conflict. Our analysis also points to particular channels of influence. Specifically, we show that two different measures of ethnic division--polarization and fractionalization--jointly influence conflict, the former more so when the winners enjoy a "public" prize (such as political power or religious hegemony), the latter more so when the prize is "private" (such as looted resources, government subsidies, or infrastructures). The available data appear to strongly support existing theories of intergroup conflict. Our argument also provides indirect evidence that ethnic conflicts are likely to be instrumental, rather than driven by primordial hatreds."
Viewing ethnic conflicts as only about race is seductively simplistic

California affirmative-action ban: Why liberals should let it stand. - "UCLA and UC–Berkeley are far more socioeconomically diverse than most selective colleges. In 2011–12, the proportion of students eligible for Pell grants (federal financial aid for lower-income students) at UCLA was 38 percent and at Berkeley 37 percent, compared with just 13 percent at another top public institution, the University of Virginia. These steps helped accomplish what education is supposed to do—promote social mobility. But they are likely to disappear if universities can go back to recruiting by race. Prestige-conscious universities receive no points from the U.S. News & World Report rankings for admitting low-income students. They’re actually “diverting” funding from things that will boost rankings... To their credit, universities care about racial diversity, perhaps because the lack of it is visible. But they generally do not aggressively pursue socioeconomic diversity except where race has been taken off the table and recruiting low-income students is the next best way to achieve racial diversity. The second major reason that liberals should be concerned about a return of racial preferences is the one raised by the Chinese-American protesters: The shift would hurt Asian-Americans, who have suffered their own history of discrimination"

A German Man Was Evicted Because His Sex Swing Was Too Squeaky - "A German court ruled Friday that a landlady had the right to evict a tenant who broke his rental agreement of keeping quiet between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. by using his “very old,” loud, chain sex swing"

What your doctor wishes you would ask about sex - ""There's this idea that women want to be magically carried off into the bedroom" to spark arousal, explained Foley. But even when women don't initially feel in the mood, said Foley, they may want to make time and effort for sexual intimacy. "Don't expect it to look like Madonna in one of her musical videos singing 'I want it. I want it,'" said Foley, referring to a lyric in the Michigan-bred pop star's 1989 song "Hanky Panky." "Instead, think that once I start being touched and touch my partner," said Foley, "my body will remind me of how much I want it.""
More problems with 'enthusiastic consent'

Dad Calls Cops on Son to Teach Him a Lesson, Cops Shoot Son Dead - "James Comstock told the Des Moines Register he called the police on his son Tyler after the latter took the former's truck in retaliation for refusing to buy him cigarettes. Ames Police Officer Adam McPherson reportedly spotted the lawn care company vehicle and pursued it onto the Iowa State University campus, where a brief standoff ensued after Tyler allegedly refused orders to turn off the engine. McPherson eventually fired six shots into the truck, two of which struck Tyler who was later pronounced dead. The official report claims the action was necessary in order "to stop the ongoing threat to the public and the officers." Tyler's dad says he was unarmed at the time."

American shares contacts of almost 100 Singapore girls he slept with on Craigslist - "During these 4 years, I've bedded 65 Chinese women, 13 Malay ladies, 5 Indians and 9 Eurasian girls.... All very friendly and wonderful sex partners. About 70% were single, the rest married. The one thing common among all of them is that they love sex and other than a half dozen of them, seem to only want to be fucked by Caucasians (at least that's the impression I got from our conversation)"

Answer to What does it feel like to be hit on as a woman? - Quora - "It's really annoying.
A few weeks ago I went to the beach on the prettiest day ever to walk around and take photos and read for a few hours. I left after one hour, because my day was literally going like this:
5 minutes of reading. Interruption by a dude wanting to hit on me. 15 minutes of trying to get rid of him politely.
5 minutes of reading. Another interruption by a dude. 15 more minutes of getting hit on.
Pack up my stuff and go for a walk, because maybe if I'm moving dudes won't bug me so much. Accidentally make eye contact with a passerby. Get hit on by passerby. Tell passerby 3 times that no, I don't want to go get lunch with him and no, I don't want a tour of the downtown.
Walk down the beach some more. Get hit on by three dudes while taking photos of waves. Give one my number just so he'll leave me alone. Save his number in my phone so I know not to answer when he calls.
Leave beach and look for someplace I can read my book in peace."

Rosie Law's answer to What does it feel like to be hit on as a woman? - Quora - "It can be very flattering, but mainly it tends to be annoying. It can be much like being stuck, in the middle of the High Street, by market researchers! You don't want what they're offering, you've told them that you're not interested, but they still keep pestering you in the hope that they can persuade you to change your mind."

I’ve Raped Countless Women—According to Feminists - "If you want to get angry at a bunch of stupid feminist broads, check out this collection of these signs... worse than her sanctimonious expression is what her sign actually says: “I need FEMINISM because men can still RAPE even without laying a hand on a woman.” Now that is one talented man, let me just say. I’ve never heard of such an ability as to rape someone while your hands are basically tied behind your back (and hopefully the guy’s in jail so he never demonstrates his act on me). Of course what this radical feminist is saying is that ogling women is tantamount to rape, and that she needs feminism (as if abstract ideas can be in one’s possession) until that day when men get their choice (choice!) taken away as to whether or not they may direct their eyeballs in the direction of a female."

The coolest, weirdest Internet community you’ll never be able to join - "Bushfield is the one-man impresario behind LearnedLeague, a booming, invitation-only, underground trivia competition I joined two years ago"

Queen Victoria’s Secret Scottish Sex Castle - "Victoria’s grief at the premature death of Albert from typhoid in 1861 was as intense as her passion for him when alive – she became the epitome of the inconsolable widow perpetually in black and invariably sour in temperament. That is, until a rough-tongued Scotsman rekindled the flame."

Jose Canaura - Mobile Uploads - "So I was nominated for ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. I'm not going to participate nor will I pay the donation money. With a little bit of research, fairly simple, I found the following. As of 2012, ALSA has directed only 7.71% of its budget to Research"

That awkward moment when you haven't unlocked your boyfriend as a playable character yet.

People Keep Getting Into Strangers' Cars Because They Think It's An Uber

Draper Kauffman's answer to What does it feel like to be a male who pretends to be a female online? - Quora - "I swapped accounts with her, and you won't be surprised to find out that when I was writing as her, I got all the same sexist shit, and when she was writing as me, she got treated with considerably more respect. So was it the perceived gender, not the writing style, that made the difference? Probably, because the difference was immediate. But I was also intrigued by the fact that our writing styles did gradually shift. Hers became more direct and concise, and I found myself trying to sound more sympathetic to people's emotions and stress levels and writing things like, "It's important to all of us to maintain a level of civil discourse, so it would be helpful if you would be less confrontational in these situations," instead of, "Stop flaming everyone or we'll boot you!"... A decade or so later, playing WoW, I was amused at how people treated female toons differently, even though most people were aware that many (most?) female characters were being played by male players. Random strangers were much more helpful, but also less likely to accept advice, if you switched from a male character to a female character. I also had the impression that male players seemed more cooperative and less confrontational when playing female characters than when playing male characters. So, again, it's a chicken and egg question. Do male players change behavior when playing female toons, and thereby elicit different responses from others? Or do the different responses elicit the changed behavior? Or is it a mutual reinforcing loop based in part on real interactions and in part on our knowledge of the expected differences in gender roles? My hunch is the latter, but I think that we really do automatically adopt the gender identities of our avatars to a considerable extent."