Links - 10th August 2019 (3)

Vito Gesualdi on Twitter - "Sorry what? EA is donating a million dollars to non profits working to end bullying & online harassment!?!?
Some facts:
- they didn't speak up during GamerGate at all
- @femfreq has been a non profit on the front lines of this issue for years constantly struggling with funding"
"Anita Sarkeesian is throwing a fit because EA donated a bunch of money to useful charities instead of giving it to her"
"Feminist Frequency actually abandoned their anti-bullying work in 2018. Anita is basically demanding Electronic Arts fund her terrible Star Trek podcast. "

Family horrified after porn played at father’s funeral instead of memorial video - "A British family mourning the loss of a young father and his infant son were horrified when graphic porn was accidentally played instead of a memorial video at his funeral.Hundreds of mourners had gathered Wednesday at Thornhill Crematorium in Cardiff, a port city in Wales, to say goodbye to 33-year-old Simon Lewis and his newborn boy, Simon Lewis Jr., after they were killed on New Year’s Eve in a head-on car crash.The priest hit play on what was supposed to be a tribute to Lewis’ life, but instead “very loud” sexual moans from a hard-core porn video filled the church... Church staff tried to shut off the sex tape, but had a lot of trouble.“It took them nearly four minutes to turn it off,” a grieving friend told the Telegraph. “People couldn’t believe what they were seeing.”"

Major Corporations Bravely Come Out In Support Of Incredibly Popular, Socially Acceptable Movement | The Babylon Bee - "For Pride Month, hundreds of corporations are being applauded for bravely coming out in support of an incredibly popular, socially acceptable, entirely mainstream movement: the LGBTQ+ community... "I am much more confident in my gayness when I see that these huge corporations are willing to exploit their support of gays for profit."Meanwhile, companies that openly support incredibly unpopular religious causes were booed for their cowardice."

Adults urged not to use kids' playground slides - "If you are an adult, you should not be on playground slides meant for children aged five to 12.This was the advice given by the National Parks Board (NParks) and playground contractor Semec Enterprise, after safety concerns were raised by parkgoers over a new pair of steep slides at Admiralty Park.On Tuesday, Shin Min Daily News reported that a 24-year-old woman suffered injuries to her head, shoulders and calf, after being thrown out of one of the 23m-long, 9m-tall slides. Her adult sister also suffered bruises on her feet. The twin slides are among the 26 slides at Admiralty Park, which re-opened two weeks ago after a two-year facelift.Ms Agnes Au, general manager of Semec, which supplied the playground equipment at the park, said: "The reasons why it isn't safe for adults to slide down are clear - a heavier weight will lead to a faster speed, and a bigger build is more likely to hit the sides of the slides.""

Why doesn't Gandalf use his magical powers more often in battle? - Quora - "magic in Tolkien’s world has little in common with the Force in Star Wars or magic in Harry Potter. To be precise, the name “wizards” is basically a mistake made by the ignorant Men and Hobbits of Middle-earth; since they didn’t know what Gandalf, Saruman, and Co. were actually doing, they used for them the name they gave to magicians and/or dark arts practitioners (Galadriel says she can’t really understand what they mean when they speak of “magic”, because of this confusion). In actual fact, they were angelic beings, created by the one true God, Eru, before the physical world, who had been clothed in flesh and sent to guide, counsel, and help the Free Peoples against Sauron. Consequently, their powers were basically spiritual and/or mental, not impressive shots of energy"
"It is simply not their job descriptio.The Istari were sent to council and lead the people of middleearth On their own way to greatness. Their job was to be there if needed and to keep them from doing really stupid things.So in order to do that, they started people on their quests and supervised their growth, like a shepherd. Only if the opponent (say Sauron for example) cheated by using supernatural powers in order to stop the heroes, they intervened or engaged overpowered Enemies directly."

Drugs, Vietnam, and the Vietnam veteran: an overview. - "Highlights are presented on the issue of drug use among servicemen in Vietnam and its aftereffects. Two stages of Vietnam drug use are identified-a period of increasing marijuana use followed by the 1970 influx of highly potent heroin to which 1/5 of the enlisted troops were addicted at some time during their tour. The major contributing factors appear to be: (1) the need of troops in stressful combat situations for self-medication, escape, and hedonistic indulgence; (2) the relaxation of taboos against drug use in the United States; and (3) the availability of illicit drugs at low cost, which was apparently the result of profiteering by a number of South Vietnamese officials. Related to the above was the growing disenchantment with the war and the progressive deterioration in unit morale. These drugs are seen as serving many of the functions performed by alcohol in earlier millitary conflicts. There is no hard evidence that duty performance in Vietnam was seriously affected by drug use. Since 95% of those who were addicted to narcotics in Vietnam have not become readdicted, the situation does not appear to be as severe as originally supposed. Myths as to the persistence and intractibility of physiological narcotic addiction were dispelled. A major negative effect has been the difficulty that soldiers with less-than-honorable discharges due to drug abuse have had in obtaining jobs. Other long-term effects from drug use are less clear and are difficult to separate from the overall effects of the war."
This shows that the claim that drugs are inherently addictive and unhealthy is wrong
Keywords: Vietnam War, Vietnam Veterans

FEATURE-Party drugs a hit with wealthy in Singapore - "Singapore’s party drug scene used to be the domain of high-flying foreign bankers and other expatriates who would take ecstasy and snort cocaine in defiance of the city state’s drug laws which, with a mandatory death sentence for drug trafficking, are among the toughest in the world. But these days, the drug scene for foreigners is not as pronounced as among well-to-do locals in a country which has the world’s fastest-growing number of high net worth individuals, totalling some 67,000 in 2006... Singaporean authorities say drug use is low, but anecdotal evidence tells of the emergence of an underground party drug scene mostly at night clubs frequented by the wealthy... In 2004, the CNB carried out a raid which exposed a glitzy underground drug scene. The cocaine drug bust saw 23 people arrested, including the former editor of high-society magazine Singapore Tatler, an award-winning French chef and an oil broker... "Every couple of years, they (the police) go out and get people so everyone is way too scared to do drugs," said a British lawyer, who declined to be named. "The drugs of choice here (for foreigners) really are women and alcohol.""
Previously shared in 2007, but a propos
Strange how drugs didn't ruin their lives and make them lose their inherited fortunes, and how they all still have fast paced jobs and are not in jail (at least for non-drug related offences)

Why is the EU afraid to allow Turkey in? - Quora - "there is evidence that Moslem immigrants do not always make good citizens. We can see this in the votes cast by the Turkish diaspora in Europe in the 2017 Referendum on making Erdogan into an untrammelled Dictator-President – a concept, be it noted, that is completely unacceptable to Europeans... In general, the pattern is that those countries with large Turkish immigrant populations, forming a significant percentage of the population, voted: ‘Yes’; those with small ones: ‘No’. Overall, much more heavily ‘Yes’ than in Turkey itself... we come to very high percentages of Turkish Turks favouring a system that would be illegal in their country of adoption. So much, then, for the ‘softening’ effects over generations of living in a liberal, democratic society.So the conclusion is inevitable: large-scale Turkish immigration into Christian-based countries is inadvisable. And that would be the inevitable consequence of Turkish EU membership."
"The EU just does not want a Turkish membership currently, simply because they cannot / do not want to pay for it !!!"

Sally Challen is no hero - "There is something sinister in the Sally Challen story. The way in which this woman who battered her husband to death with a hammer has been turned into an iconic figure, virtually into a heroine of justice, leaves a sour taste. Her photograph has been sympathetically emblazoned on the front page of the Guardian. Labour MP Jess Phillips said she cried with joy when she heard the news a few months ago that Challen’s murder conviction had been quashed. Many feminists are cheering yesterday’s news that Challen won’t face a retrial after the court accepted her manslaughter plea.To reiterate: this woman smashed a man’s skull in with a hammer. She’s no hero... There are many concerning things here. The first is the way in which the opinion of an expert, in this case a forensic psychiatrist, effectively overrode the verdict of a jury. This strikes me as an implicit attack on the wisdom of the jury system. Does one expert’s view carry more weight than the deliberations of 12 ordinary men and women? Secondly there is the suggestion, in the broader public discussion around the case, that killing is an understandable response to being insulted or demeaned by one’s partner. This is what campaigners are actually saying. That the courts should be more lenient with women who have killed partners who exercised ‘coercive control’ over them. Bear in mind that coercive control can include such behaviour as ‘repeatedly putting you down’ and ‘monitoring you via online communication tools’. Only nasty blokes do things like this, but that is no justification for killing them... What are we saying here: that women are sometimes incapable of controlling their emotions and their behaviour? Some men are treated abominably by their wives. They are put down, mocked, told they are pathetic, prevented from going to the pub, and so on. If one of these men smashed his wife’s head in with a hammer, would we say that wasn’t true murder?... For feminists to turn a killer into a hero suggests they have become seriously and perhaps irreversibly unanchored from moral reason."
So much for feminism not being about hating men

16 things that are more expensive in Singapore than other first world countries - "Pizza, Bacon, Wedding, Consumer Tech, Gym Membership, Musicals, Ramen, Bubble Tea, Cheese, FIFA World Cup, Health supplements, Clothes, Infant formula, Ice cream, Petrol, Alcohol"

Female teacher jailed 33 months for sex acts with 15-year-old student - "A female secondary school teacher who entered into a nine-month relationship with a 15-year-old student and engaged in sexual acts with him in a Geylang hotel was sentenced to 33 months’ jail... She was handed two years’ jail for two counts of sexual penetration acts of a minor, and an added nine months for two charges of procuring and committing obscene acts with a juvenile... They were discovered after the boy's mother found love letters, her car keys and other belongings in his room and alerted the school... she arranged for a five-day long staycation with the victim at Super 8 hotel in Geylang, where they performed sexual acts on each other at her direction. To avoid suspicion, the victim told his parents that he was at a camp with the uniformed group... In 2013, a 32-year-old primary school teacher was jailed for a year for having sex with her 13-year-old student. Another female 32-year-old teacher who had sex with a 15-year-old student was jailed for a year in 2012."
A female sexually penetrating a male - kinky

Female teacher jailed over sexual relations with her secondary school student - "In late 2016, the teacher wanted to make up for being away from the victim as she was going overseas with her friends for an extended period, the court heard.They decided to have a staycation or “honeymoon” and checked into a hotel in Geylang over five days from 28 November 2016 to 2 December 2016.The victim told his mother that he was going for a school camp.During their stay at the hotel, the teacher and student engaged in physical intimacy.On one occasion, they watched a movie on her laptop in bed before she told him that she “wanted to try something new” and re-enact a scene from the movie. She told him to kiss her from the neck down to her private parts. Around December 2016 to early 2017, the victim’s mother stumbled upon a series of letters folded into heart shapes while she was cleaning the house.“Unknown to her at that time, these were letters that the accused had written to the victim - one for each day that she would be away on holiday”... the victim asked his mother if she would consider marrying someone 11 years older than her... Sexually explicit text messages and photos of the teacher and student kissing were found on their phones. There was also a two-minute video of the duo French-kissing on a bed in the hotel room... the teacher “knew the wrongfulness of the relationship (with the victim), but was not able to shake it off due to her weakness in being decisive and assertive”. “She has a weak nature”"
Yahoo has the juicy details other outlets leave out