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Thursday, December 31, 2015

Links - 31st December 2015

Designers Are Prostitutes, Agencies Are Brothels - "When we first became designers (substitute this with your profession if applicable), we had big dreams. We wanted to get to know each of our clients. Understand their underlying problems; preferably through multiple conversations and a nice fancy dinner. Console them. And of course, eventually solve their issues with our skills and knowledge. In other words, we wanted to be a social escort."

Pentagon’s big budget F-35 fighter ‘can’t turn, can’t climb, can’t run’

Muslim children should not be forced to sing national anthem, says Hizb ut-Tahrir - "They were told Muslim children should not be forced to sing the Australian anthem and that "deradicalisation" was an agenda of forced assimilation...
"The insistence of senior government ministers that Muslim children sing the national anthem – an anthem that reflects a particular disputed view of history and celebrates particular ideological values ... Why should they be forced to sing it?" he asked the crowd, gathered at The Bellevue function centre in Bankstown."

Australia school criticised for letting Muslim students walk out during national anthem - Telegraph - "The head of Cranbourne Carlisle primary school allowed about 30 to 40 Shia Muslim students aged eight to ten to leave the assembly, saying it was the Muharram period for the children, a sacred month when Shia Muslims observe a period of mourning, and they should not be required to take part in “joyous” events... The decision angered parents, while Muslim schools said it was standard for all Muslim students to sing Advance Australia Fair, the national anthem."

Can We Take Political Correctness Seriously Now? - "The upsurge of political correctness is not just greasy-kid stuff, and it’s not just a bunch of weird, unfortunate events that somehow keep happening over and over. It’s the expression of a political culture with consistent norms, and philosophical premises that happen to be incompatible with liberalism. The reason every Marxist government in the history of the world turned massively repressive is not because they all had the misfortune of being hijacked by murderous thugs. It’s that the ideology itself prioritizes class justice over individual rights and makes no allowance for legitimate disagreement. (For those inclined to defend p.c. on the grounds that racism and sexism are important, bear in mind that the forms of repression Marxist government set out to eradicate were hardly imaginary.) American political correctness has obviously never perpetrated the brutality of a communist government, but it has also never acquired the powers that come with full control of the machinery of the state... As far as the students are concerned, they represent the cause of anti-racism, a fact that renders the need for debate irrelevant"

Brunei puts stop to Christmas celebrations to protect Muslims, religious ministry says - "The ban, instituted after Christmas last month when local children and adults were seen wearing clothes “that resemble Santa Claus”, raises fresh concerns of religious restrictions after last April’s announcement of the introduction of a penal code that will eventually include penalties such as the severing of limbs and death by stoning."

Failed Windows 3.1 system blamed for shutting down Paris airport

We Muslims should be appalled by the sale of halal meat by stealth - "Halal meat should never be forced on customers without their knowing, surreptitiously and using clandestine methods. It’s unfair to everyone, non-Muslims and Muslims alike. It’s deception on a grand scale for the former, while it could fuel bitter resentment against the latter... if the Koran does not insist on what have become the customary halal methods, why are they now so prevalent in Britain? One reason is that religious zealots and theological ideologues are deliberately promoting confusion about halal to sow discord and resentment... Muslim fundamentalist insistence on halal meat does not come from the Koran itself — it derives from a secondary and often suspect source, called the Hadith... In my hometown, Oxford, you can go to the local supermarket and pay perhaps £5.50 a kilo for lamb. But go to the halal shop and it’s £6.50 or £7 a kilo — even though, as we now know, the supermarket meat is probably halal too. That’s a big mark-up. As a British Muslim — and I underline the word ‘British’ — I want to see full transparency when I go to the supermarket. I want to know the true provenance of the food I buy, and it’s essential that businesses start labelling food better and accurately. It is high time the white, liberal, Guardian-reading classes stopped behaving like apologists and woke up. There is a fundamentalist Trojan horse in our midst, and we must take corrective action."

Muslim academic gets death threats over women and gay-friendly mosque - Telegraph - "A Muslim academic is vowing to push ahead with the launch of his woman and gay-friendly mosque in South Africa, despite receiving death threats. Taj Hargey, director of the Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford, a group of "forward thinking" Muslims, said his Open Mosque will welcome all genders, religions and sexual orientations when it opens in Wynberg, a Cape Town suburb, on Friday."

The ISIS leader was NOT trained by the CIA or Mossad, and Snowden didn’t say it - "There are three common rules when people discuss politics:
1) they are willing to believe anything on the internet if it confirms their prejudices
2) they don’t want to accept people of their tribe do awful things
3) they find a way to blame America or the UK for most of the world’s problems...
Edward Snowden’s lawyer called this claim a hoax too."

Federal Government Money Is Not The Best Way To Fund The Arts - "we can't take for granted that government funding for the arts will always be virtuous in purpose. One could argue that Western Europeans have lucked into a happy accident of history that combines exceptional largesse with a largely hands-off approach. Some countries, such as the former Soviet Union and modern-day China, have had no qualms about using state power to exercise censorship on a vast scale and co-opt the arts for nationalistic purposes. Closer to home, even Hungary's arts community has seen significant turmoil due to the meddling of a newly elected conservative government. And while it's hard to imagine anything destroying Sweden's commitment to public funding of the arts, the recent scandal involving that country's culture minister cutting a "racist cake"certainly gives critics some ripe material."

Should Government Fund "the Arts"? - "government support of specific institutions or individuals is in no way necessary or sufficient for the production of "art" (however you choose to define that gloriously nebulous term). What more do you need to know than the one point on which Alan Davey and Pete Spence agree: Britain—the very birthplace of Dr. Johnsonand Dr. Who—didn't start using serious amounts of tax money to fund art until after the second world war. How did culture in Old Blighty ever survive so long?... There's at least a third reason to stop state funding of the arts, and it's the one I take most seriously as a literary scholar and writer. In the 17th century, a great religious dissenter, Roger Williams (educated at Cambridge, exiled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony), wrote the first case for total separation of church and state in the English language. Forced worship, said Williams, "stinks in God's nostrils" as an affront to individual liberty and autonomy; worse still, it subjugated theology to politics. Something similar holds true with painting, music, writing, video and all other forms of creative expression. Forced funding of the arts—in whatever trivial amounts and indirect ways—implicates citizens in culture they might openly despise or blissfully ignore. And such mandatory tithing effectively turns creators and institutions lucky enough to win momentary favour from bureaucrats into either well-trained dogs or witting instruments of the powerful and well-connected. Independence works quite well for churches and the press. It works even more wonderfully in the arts."

Unethical health food: is your avocado habit funding drug cartels? - Telegraph - "It turns out that those nuts you love to sprinkle on your granola every morning are greedy little so and sos - it takes a gallon of water to produce each and every almond. California produces 82 per cent per cent of the world's almonds and as the state hits its fourth consecutive annual drought, the finger of blame is being well and truly pointed at the almond. Planted to meet the demand for almond milk in the US’s most hippified state, this all-year round crop guzzles about eight per cent of the area's agricultural water supply"

Free Ottawa yoga class scrapped over 'cultural issues' - "Student leaders have pulled the mat out from 60 University of Ottawa students, ending a free on-campus yoga class over fears the teachings could be seen as a form of "cultural appropriation"... The centre goes on to say, "Yoga has been under a lot of controversy lately due to how it is being practiced," and which cultures those practices "are being taken from." The centre official argues since many of those cultures "have experienced oppression, cultural genocide and diasporas due to colonialism and western supremacy ... we need to be mindful of this and how we express ourselves while practising yoga"... Scharf, a yoga teacher with the downtown Rama Lotus Centre, said the concept does not apply in this case, arguing the complaint that killed the program came instead from a "social justice warrior" with "fainting heart ideologies" in search of a cause celebre. "People are just looking for a reason to be offended by anything they can find," said Scharf... According to email correspondence between Scharf and the centre, student leaders debated rebranding the program, but stumbled over how the French translation for "mindful stretching" would appear on a promotional poster, and eventually decided to suspend the program."

Blocking yoga classes: Multiculturalists succeed where Christian conservatives failed - "It, like all such ideas, is the common heritage of all mankind. That means of each and every one of us, even those of us who have a genetic background or culture that some people feel aggrieved at. We (Indian, American, African, Oceanian, anyone else) are entitled to use it, to adapt it, to merge it with other ideas. There’s no improper “appropriation” here because there’s no “property” here in the first place. I think it makes sense to view this as our honoring other ideas: imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and so is adaptation and modification, since it represents the view that the thing be imitated, adapted and modified is worth our time and attention."

Apple triggers 'religious' reaction in fans' brains, report says - "The neuroscientists ran a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) test on an Apple fanatic and discovered that images of the technology company's gadgets lit up the same parts of the brain as images of a deity do for religious people, the report says... People have gone to great lengths to prove their love of Apple with tattoos, bumper stickers and home shrines to outmoded Mac computers. Apple's cult-like following was highlighted in a 2009 documentary called "Macheads.""

Creationism poll: How many Americans believe the Bible is literal, inerrant, or symbolic. - "only 21 percent agreed that everything in the Bible is literally true. Thirty percent chose the second statement: that the Bible is “without errors” but that “some parts are meant to be symbolic.” This isn’t what secular people tend to think inerrancy means. But it is what a lot of Christians apparently believe. Most people who believe that the Bible is inerrant do not believe that this means everything in it is literally true... Ask whether humans have been around for only 10,000 years, and the hardcore—those who are absolutely or very certain on all five questions—shrinks to 7 percent."

On Yasukuni Politicking

"Most people end up wrongly believing the blame game played by China to divert their population's attention outward every time a Yasukuni Shrine visit is done.

They are ignorant that just 0.04% (or 1,068 out of 2,466,532 dead) of those commemorated there are war criminals.

Condemning Japan for every Yasukuni Shrine visit for that 0.004% is like screaming that a person has a shit fetish every time one sees a lady kiss her husband (since he, on conservative estimate, contains 100g of fecal matter out of his average 62kg, a massive 0.16% concentration of shit, or 4 times the concentration of Yasukuni Shrine war criminals)."

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Links - 29th December 2015

NETHERLANDS: “POOR REFUGEES” ARE WELL TO DO AND LOADED WITH MONEY - YouTube - "Some retailers are also complaining that some of the refugees have a lot of money to spend. 'They are really flashy and... Their mobiles and so! All the things (gadget) that we. as citizens, still don't have.' Asylum seekers coming sometimes with a lot of money. Notes of 200 or 500 are not accepted. "It is very frustrating for the one who hold a note of 500 Euro in his hand. As for he wants to buy something... Yesterday there was also a man who said, My goodness. I have here 500 Euro but I cannot use it!'"

Danish police refuse to seize refugee jewelry and cash - "The controversial proposals, which were revealed in parliament last week, would see migrants' valuables seized to cover the costs of their stay in the country and to dissuade others from making a similar journey. Any item with a value of more than 3,000 kroner (400 euros) could be confiscated... Danish ministers say the plan is no different from restrictions on existing Danish residents, which require them to deplete their savings to less than 10,000 kroner, before they can claim welfare."

Processed meats do cause cancer - WHO - "In the UK, around six out of every 100 people get bowel cancer at some point in their lives. If they were all given an extra 50g of bacon a day for the rest of their lives then the risk would increase by 18% to around seven in 100 people getting bowel cancer... It has now placed processed meat in the same category as plutonium, but also alcohol as they definitely do cause cancer. However, this does not mean they are equally dangerous. A bacon sandwich is not as bad as smoking... Red meat does have nutritional value too and is a major source of iron, zinc and vitamin B12."
Sunlight is in the same category too. So we should all become vampires

Hilarious Pics Of Men Mimicking Women’s Instagram Photos

The Wartime Origins of the M&M - "It was during the Spanish Civil War that Mars purportedly encountered soldiers eating small chocolate beads encased in a hard sugar shell as part of their rations. In an age when sales of chocolate typically dropped off during summer months due to the lack of air conditioning, Forrest was thrilled by the prospect of developing a product that would be able to resist melting in high temperatures"

How the US Military Helped Invent Cheetos - "emulsifying salts. The chemical disperses water‑phobic caseins by exchanging sodium for calcium; this permits the now smaller particles to be diffused and suspended in liquid. Melting traditional cheeses and mixing them with the emulsifying salts resulted in a cheese‑like product that withstands high temperatures and protracted storage. Even better, this new food could be made and sold very cheaply, because it could be produced, at least in part, from the rinds and irregular bits left over from cutting wheels of cheese into bricks. Melting the ingredients also pasteurized them, inactivating the live bacteria and enzymes and contributing to a longer shelf life... what could one do with football fields full of potato flakes, a cave stuffed with dried eggs (the army’s strange storage location for one hundred million pounds of the stuff), or a mountain of dehydrated cheese? Well, there was one group always interested in lowering the cost of finicky fresh ingredients: the grocery manufacturers"

'Finland's no good': Disappointed migrants turn back - "Hundreds of predominantly Iraqi migrants who have travelled through Europe to reach Finland are turning back, saying they don't want to stay in the sparsely-populated country on Europe's northern frontier because it's too cold and boring... Finnish authorities have seen a rise in the number of cancelled asylum applications. "You can tell the world I hate Finland. It's too cold, there's no tea, no restaurants, no bars, nobody on the streets, only cars," Muhammed, 22, told AFP in Tornio, as the mercury struggled to inch above 10 deg C on a recent blustery grey day."

'Star Wars' or ISIS: Which is more Islamic? - "Take Obi Wan Kenobi, for example, and his relationship with Luke Skywalker -- as well as Skywalker's relationship with Yoda. (Ignore, if you must, the filming of the most pertinent Jedi scenes in Tunisia, an Arab-Muslim country with a very long tradition of Islamic spirituality, or Sufism). The notion of the "Jedi Knights" is built very much on the quintessentially Muslim phenomenon of tariqah Sufism -- or the spirituality of the Sufi order."

Indian restaurants band together for productivity gains - "The signing took place during the launch of two Central Processing Units (CPUs). Set up by two consortia comprising of 22 members of the association, the CPUs are aimed at boosting productivity. They are also aimed at allowing companies to save on manpower costs by up to 40 per cent, through the adoption of innovative technology and food processing techniques."
Why is food made in bulk in central kitchens considered a good thing?

Rose McGowan slams Caitlyn Jenner over Woman of the Year Awards speech - ""Caitlyn Jenner you do not understand what being a woman is about at all," Rose wrote. "You want to be a woman and stand with us - well learn us. We are more than deciding what to wear. We are more than the stereotypes foisted upon us by people like you. You're a woman now? Well f**king learn that we have had a VERY different experience than your life of male privilege. "Being a woman comes with a lot of baggage. The weight of unequal history. You'd do well to learn it. You'd do well to wake up. Woman of the year? Not by a long f**king shot." Rose later clarified her comments and added, "Let me amend this by saying I'm happy for what she's doing visibility wise for the trans community, and I'm happy she's living her truth, but comments like hers have consequences for other women. How we are perceived, what our values are, and leads to more stereotyping. If you know you are going to be speaking to media about being a woman, maybe come to understand our struggles.""

Glamour Woman of the Year award returned by 9/11 widower - "The husband of a police officer who died on 9/11 has returned her Glamour "Woman of the Year" award because the magazine honored Caitlyn Jenner with the same award last week... Olympic gold medalist Bruce Jenner transitioned to Caitlyn Jenner over the past year in the spotlight of the "Keeping Up With the Kardashians" reality television show. It's not that Glamour honored a transgender person, James Smith told CNN. He supported Glamour's decision to honor actress Laverne Cox in 2014. As a New York City police officer, "my precinct covered a shelter for transgendered youth," Smith said via email. "On several occasions I responded there to take reports or give aid to suicidal youths. I listened to their stories of physical, emotional and sexual abuse. Young people thrown out of their homes or fleeing from unlivable conditions. "They didn't have the luxury of being part of the Kardashian circus," Smith wrote. "They weren't living in a Malibu Barbie beach house surrounded by what passes for family in Hollywood. They were truly brave people fighting hourly for existence. "When Mr. Jenner said the hardest part about being a woman was figuring out what to wear (in a recent BuzzFeed interview), he proved to me that he is not truly a woman. I believe this comment and others he has made trivializes the transgender experience as I have witnessed it."

How Terrorist Groups End: Implications for Countering al Qa'ida - "By analyzing a comprehensive roster of terrorist groups that existed worldwide between 1968 and 2006, the authors found that most groups ended because of operations carried out by local police or intelligence agencies or because they negotiated a settlement with their governments. Military force was rarely the primary reason a terrorist group ended, and few groups within this time frame achieved victory. These findings suggest that the U.S. approach to countering al Qa'ida has focused far too much on the use of military force. Instead, policing and intelligence should be the backbone of U.S. efforts... In 10 percent of cases, terrorist groups ended because they achieved victory. Military force led to the end of terrorist groups in 7 percent of cases. The authors found that militaries tended to be most effective when used against terrorist groups engaged in insurgencies in which the groups were large, well armed, and well organized. But against most terrorist groups, military force was usually too blunt an instrument."
Paper: "There is no statistical correlation between the duration of a terrorist
group and ideological motivation, economic conditions, regime type, or the breadth of terrorist goals. But there appears to be some correlation between the size of a terrorist group and duration: Larger groups tend to last longer than smaller groups."


Reza Aslan: If ISIS Says It's Muslim, Then It's Muslim
Is Reza Aslan Islamophobic for saying ISIS is Muslim?

Situation in Singapore | Project X - "In practice, police regulates and monitors a limited number of brothels. In particular, the Anti-Vice Police department issues licenses to brothels and provides clearance for brothel sex workers. Sex workers in such establishments are required to undergo monthly health checks and are given the infamous “yellow card” (literally—it is a yellow coloured card). The State does not publicly acknowledge this, however, through our work, we managed to learn of some criterion for application of the yellow card:
- You have to be between 21 to 35 years of age
- You cannot be Malay or Muslim
- You cannot be Male on your identification card (this includes pre-operative transgender persons)
- You have to be from a list of approved countries (i.e. China, Malaysia, Thai, and Singapore)
Most workers under the yellow card system are migrants. They will have to undergo an interview and sign a contract with the Anti-Vice police upon arrival. We understand that some workers were asked at this point if they have been coerced into this industry. Amongst other things, the agreement states that one will not break any local laws, and that once their contract ends, they will face a travel ban lasting between three years to a lifetime. Other terms and conditions include not soliciting outside one’s designated brothel, not loitering in public spaces, and not to have a Singaporean boyfriend...
Do sex workers truly enjoy their job?
Does anyone truly enjoy their job? Don’t we all wish to be lying on a beach looking over at fine white sand, clear blue waters and fluffy clouds?"
Majority Privilege means you're allowed to be a legal sex worker

Mark Ferguson's answer to Why do liberals defend Islam? - Quora - "In America, racism from the political right tends to treat non-white people as if they were animals; racism from the political left tends to treat non-white people as if they were children... some crimes receive disproportionate media coverage: liberal bigots expect those people to act in that way, so it's not newsworthy. It is straightforward to condemn a pastor in the American South for their homophobia and misogyny, but summon the same passion against an imam in the Middle East and many will accuse you of Islamophobia because the white criminal and the white savage is a greater betrayal of their expectations, needing condemnation, whereas a non-white criminal or savage is expected. Lowering your expectations of a person is a sign of disrespect to them."

UK's three leading lagers - Budvar, Heineken and Stella Artois - are indistinguishable, according to blind taste tests - ""Our results suggest that brand loyalty in this market is likely to be driven largely by marketing and packaging and not by underlying sensory properties of the competing products"... it's certainly not the first time that an independent blind test has left a major brand's marketing department with a bad taste in its mouth. In a survey of 13 tomato ketchups by Which?, Heinz finished joint second from last, despite boasting an 80 per cent share of the market. The favourite was a Sainsbury's own brand that cost almost half the price of "the nation's favourite".

Back to basics: Nothing keeps wrinkles at bay better than moisturiser - "In the first long-term study measuring the speed of wrinkle development, experts found that women with well-hydrated faces develop persistent wrinkles more slowly than those with dry skin"

Here comes the science... - "it "wouldn't surprise me at all if other, up til now, designated cosmetic products actually have more effects on skin physiology and skin structure than we gave them credit for in the past. But then you start to question what is a cosmetic and what is a pharmaceutical." And that's the catch for the cosmetics companies. If they prove a product really can heal damaged skin, it could be classified as a medicine. That would mean they require years of expensive tests before getting a licence. So for the moment, if you want to stay young and beautiful, don't smoke and avoid too much sun exposure. And if you think your moisturiser is helping keep away the wrinkles, just maybe it could be working a little more than skin deep."

Aldi's moisturiser is 'nearly' as good as La Prairie Skin Caviar Luxe cream

Why Japanese doesn’t need swear words - "Japanese doesn’t really have much in the way of curse words. That’s not to say it completely lacks them, as there’re a few slurs for certain ethnic groups still rattling about, which are thankfully becoming less common as death thins the ranks of old-school racists. Aside from those derogatory terms, I’ve only come across two words that universally provoke an angry or shocked reaction, no matter how they’re said. One is manko, a vulgar way of referring to the vagina (it’s basically the Japanese version of “cunt”). The second instantly offensive word I’ve run into? Teme. What’s it mean? You."

Star Wars: The Force Awakens Strays From My Original Vision, George Lucas Says - ""It's a family soap opera," he added. "People don't realize it's actually a soap opera and it's all about family problems--it's not about spaceships. So they decided they didn't want to use those stories; they decided they were going to do their own thing so I decided, 'Fine.'""

Butt-Chugging Cough Syrup? - "One of my Facebook friends shared a meme about teenagers “Butt-chugging” cough syrup. I was going to put the image in this post, but it’s just too much. It involved some girl…well…butt-chugging cough syrup. In the photo, the chugger is doing a hand stand, and one of her friends is administering the dose... I don’t have kids, but I think I would rather my daughter come home, tell me she’s pregnant, was only able to narrow the father down to 12 men, and had the fetus coat-hanger aborted by an Albanian in a Waffle House parking lot – than tell me she butt-chugged cough syrup."

Carrier Eisenhower crew posts Star Wars spoof

I Turned Off JavaScript for a Whole Week and It Was Glorious - "THERE’S ANOTHER WEB out there, a better web hiding just below the surface of the one we surf from our phones and tablets and laptops every day. A web with no ads, no endlessly scrolling pages, and no annoying modal windows begging you to share the site on social media or sign up for a newsletter. The best part is that you don’t need a special browser extension or an invite-only app to access this alternate reality. All you need to do is change one little setting in your browser of choice. Just un-tick the checkbox that enables “JavaScript” and away you go, to a simpler, cleaner web."

13 Percent of Syrian Refugees Support ISIS: Poll - "A poll published in November 2014 by the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies found that 13% of Syrian refugees have positive feelings towards the Islamic State terrorist group. The data should raise questions about the risks posed by the acceptance of Syrian refugees into the United States. The poll surveyed 900 Syrian refugees equally split between Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan. The think-tank found that 4% expressed a positive opinion of the Islamic State (ISIS) and another 9% expressed a "somewhat positive" opinion of the terrorist group. Another 10% only view the group negatively "to some extent"... The majority are aware of the Islamic State’s extremist ideology and barbarism. About 40% said they follow news related to the Islamic State very closely and 37% follow it somewhat closely. About 10% said they rarely follow ISIS-related news and 12% follow it not at all. The survey didn't even ask about more popular groups like Al-Qaeda's Syrian branch named Jabhat al-Nusra and Hamas or extremist beliefs like jihad against the U.S. When asked about the greatest threat to the Arab world, 29% of Syrian refugees said Iran, followed by Israel (22%) and the U.S. (19%). The threat of Islamist militancy was rated the top threat by only 10%... The importing of the refugees could actually increase their risk of radicalization, based on widely-cited social science studies. A study of Al-Qaeda operatives found that 70% joined thejihad after moving to a new country and 80% were isolated from the society they lived in. The aforementioned congressional report warns that that the radicalization of Americans is already happening at an "unprecedented speed" and is "straining federal law enforcement's ability to monitor and intercept suspects.""

Blog: Pew poll: Between 63 million and 287 million ISIS supporters in just 11 countries - "A new poll by the Pew Research Center reveals significant levels of support for ISIS within the Muslim world. In 11 representative nation-states, up to 14 percent of the population has a favorable opinion of ISIS, and upwards of 62 percent "don't know" whether or not they have a favorable opinion of the Islamist group... In Nigeria, the ISIS favorability rating among the Muslim population soars to 20 percent. Another 12 percent of Muslims in Malaysia take a similar positive view of ISIS."

Dream of the bed chamber | The Economist - "The country is in the midst of a sexual revolution. A 2012 study found that more than 70% of Chinese people have sex before marriage... But a lack of sex education means that many are not protecting themselves, resulting in soaring abortion rates and a rise in sexually transmitted diseases. The Communist Party has stuck its nose into people’s bedrooms for 30 years through its harsh family-planning policies. Yet taboos on sex before marriage prevailed, the result of paternalistic—not religious—values about female chastity, with a dose of Communist asceticism thrown in. Pre-marital sex fell foul of a range of laws, including the catch-all charge of “hooliganism”, only scrapped in 1997. The social climate remains chilly. Most news items about sex involve scandals or crimes. Schools ban pupils from dating and many deploy “morality patrols” to root out flirting or frolicking couples. Sex outside wedlock is not illegal but children born to unmarried mothers face obstacles obtaining a hukou, or household residency, that entitles them to subsidised education and welfare... The pill is not widely used in China, even by married women. The government encourages the use of intra-uterine devices which provide less chance of human error. Until last year advertising condoms on television was banned (abortion, by contrast, is widely promoted)."

Unsafe to sew on train - "At times, MRT trains lurch when moving or halting. If the woman is pulling the needle in an upward movement and is caught unexpectedly by a sudden staggering of the train, an involuntary jerk of the hand holding the needle may cause the needle to jab at a fellow commuter sitting or standing close by. There will be very serious consequences if the needle impales an eye or other body part of a nearby commuter who could not move away in time. How can the injured commuter seek recourse? If the SMRT's regulations do not permit sewing inside MRT trains in operation, what is the appropriate action that a concerned fellow commuter can take in such a situation? By the way, what circumstances warrant an activation of the emergency communication button?"

Subscene - Speed English subtitle - "Created and Encoded by -- Bokutox -- of www.YIFY-TORRENTS.com. The Best 720p/1080p/3d movies with the lowest file size on the internet. Come and say hi to me; World of Warcraft - Terenas (EU) / Outland(PVP) (EU) - Bokutox (name)"
What if Blizzard helps trace him?

Art does heal: scientists say appreciating creative works can fight off disease - Telegraph - "Great nature and art boost the immune system by lowering levels of chemicals that cause inflammation that can trigger diabetes, heart attacks and other illnesses."

Publicity drive for new MRT Downtown line - "About 60 per cent of the primary and secondary students of Methodist Girls' School (MGS) go to school by car every morning, estimates vice-principal Diana Goh."

There Really Is No 'One Size Fits All' Diet Plan, According To Study - "people can metabolize the exact same foods in very different ways. What this means is that a healthy diet for one person may not be healthy for another person... "After seeing this data, I think about the possibility that maybe we're really conceptually wrong in our thinking about the obesity and diabetes epidemic,” Segal said in a statement. "The intuition of people is that we know how to treat these conditions, and it's just that people are not listening and are eating out of control -- but maybe people are actually compliant but in many cases we were giving them wrong advice"... the participants all responded very differently to foods, even after meals in which participants were eating the same exact provided foods. In the video above, the researchers explain that sushi actually caused one man’s blood sugar to spike higher than ice cream did. For another participant who had struggled to lose weight on different diets all her life, the researchers found that eating a seemingly healthy food -- tomatoes -- spiked her blood sugar... The researchers then selected 26 of the participants to see if they could provide personalized nutrition recommendations would bring down the subjects' blood sugar levels. And indeed, Elinav and Segal were able to lower blood sugar levels after recommending meals made of foods they knew wouldn’t spike individual participants’ blood sugar. Interestingly, these dietary changes also resulted in a change in gut bacteria in the participants."

Peter Jackson: 'I didn’t know what the hell I was doing' when I made The Hobbit

13 dreamy overseas homes you can get for the price of a Bidadari BTO flat

Turkey fans boo minute’s silence for Paris victims

Ninja rocks - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - "Ninja rocks are broken shards of spark plugs formed by smashing the ceramic portion of the spark plug with a hammer or other large object. Since they can quickly and quietly fracture the glass side windows on most cars, ninja rocks have been used in "smash-and-grab" auto burglaries since at least 1995"

Sexism In China. A Good Thing For Foreign Business? - "Had an interesting lunchtime discussion the other day with two very dynamic international entrepreneurs on global prejudices. Both told me of how they “take advantage” of it. These two take advantage of it by hiring women, the disabled, and ethnic minorities in countries where other businesses are either reluctant or refuse to hire these people. And let’s face it, these prejudices exist, at least to some degree, in every country. One guy told me of how his small factory in Russia had hired one physically disabled person and of how that person ended up recommending a whole slew of his disabled friends and of how in fairly short order, 22 of his 40 employees were physically disabled"
Markets tend to clear

Malay Racism in Singapore

Re: Chinese kid in S’pore said he doesn’t want to sit beside ‘Malay people’ during Star Wars movie. Malay guy responds. | Mothership.SG

Comment:

"I find it ironic that a Malay person is trying to pin Racism on Chinese people over one kid and how this hack of an alternative news site "TheMothership.sg" is trying to sensationalize "Chinese guilt".

I just hope more Chinese people are smart enough to see through this bullshit.

I'm 1/4 Chinese, many people here think I'm Chinese.
Growing up in Singapore, I faced so much racism from... guess who?
Malays.

Primary school I had a had a racist Malay teacher who would single me out, give me low marks, hold me back in detention for the pettiest reason all because I looked Chinese, this was when I was 11 -12.

Wondering why I speak Malay poorly, there you go.
She turned me off from wanting to learn Malay.

Madrasa, again same problem.
Only this time on top of putting up with the racism from the ustazas, I also had to put up with the religious bigotry from them.
Often Id be picked on because of being mixed as the reason why did poorly at parroting jawi/urdu.

And now with Islamic fundamentalism on the rise, imagine how the Malay Muslim community would react to the Malays who identify as Ex-Muslims.
You want to talk about racism and tribalism, look into your own community first and how badly it treats outliers, the ex-Muslims, the homosexuals, the trans-gendered and the others who don't fit in.

And I'm not saying that there are no racist Chinese people.
I'm not even saying racism doesn't exist in Singapore.
I'm well aware that it's alive and well in ALL ethnic communities.
So before you start pointing your finger at other people and widening the ethnic chasm, look at yourself.

What irks me this is Malay guy trying to play victim over something so trivial in an attempt to demonize and put the responsibility of abolishing racism onto Chinese folks.

I'm Human."
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