Links - 16th December 2019 (3)

'Half of all boxing photos look like gay weddings'

Father absence linked to earlier puberty among certain girls - "the absence of a biologically related father in the home predicted earlier breast and pubic hair development, but only for girls in higher income households. The findings held even after the girls’ weight was taken into account. “The age at which girls are reaching puberty has been trending downward in recent decades, but much of the attention has focused on increased body weight as the primary culprit”... Early puberty has been linked to greater risk for breast and other reproductive cancers later in life, among other health impacts... The mechanisms behind these findings are not entirely clear, the study authors said. Evolutionary biologists have theorized that the absence of a biological father may signal an unstable family environment, leading girls to enter puberty earlier.Another theory that has been posited is that girls without a biological father in the home are exposed more to unrelated adult males – specifically, the pheromones of these males – that lead to earlier onset of puberty. However, in this study, the presence of other adult males, including stepfathers, in the home did not alter the findings. It is also unclear why father absence predicted early puberty only in higher income families, particularly for African American girls. “It’s possible that in lower income families, it is more normative to rely upon a strong network of alternative caregivers,” said Deardorff. “A more controversial hypothesis is that higher income families without fathers are more likely to have a single mother who works long hours and is not as available for caregiving. Recent studies have suggested that weak maternal bonding is a risk factor for early puberty.”Another possibility is that higher income girls in father-absent homes may be exposed to more artificial light... higher income African American girls may be more exposed to certain beauty products, such as hair straighteners, which have estrogenic properties that could influence pubertal timing."
Yet another harm of single parenthood

I Gave My Cat a Fitness Tracker – the Results Were Worrying - "By attaching the tracker to their kitty’s collar and paying a monthly subscription fee of £3.33, users are able to track their pet via an app that shows their activity and location. Activity is categorised as ‘lazy’, ‘active’ or ‘dynamic’, and ‘Pet Points’ are awarded based on how active your furry friend has been, with the option of setting a daily Pet Point goal and seeing how your pet ranks on an overall leaderboard, or against your friends and their pets. You can also set up a ‘virtual safety fence’ around your home and receive notifications should your pet ever travel outside of this area. The tracker even has a 'live' mode, giving you location updates every two to five seconds, which would only really be useful in the unlikely event that Kubrick was kidnapped and we were involved in a high-speed chase to rescue him... Ultimately, the most useful (and horrifying) discovery was that according to the data collected by my iPhone’s health app, over a week of tracking him, Kubrick – a literal cat, who sleeps for a minimum of 40 percent of every day – covered twice more distance on his prowls than me, a human being with much longer legs"

'I kept going': Nine-year-old enters 5km race ... and accidentally wins 10km event - "It took nine-year-old Kade Lovell longer than expected to finish his 5km race in Minnesota, but only because he was busy accidentally winning a separate 10km event."

Primary school in Penang probed for refusing Islamic ‘doa’ recital in school programme - "Police have launched an investigation into a primary school in Penang for refraining its students from reciting Muslim prayers and only allowing Christian prayers during its Outstanding Students 2019 ceremony here last week.Bukit Aman Criminal Investigation Department (CID) prosecution and legal division principal assistant director Senior Assistant Commissioner Mior Faridalathrash Wahid said an Investigation Paper was opened following numerous reports lodged against the school, Sekolah Kebangsaan Methodist, Pulau Pinang... The school is currently being investigated under Section 505(C) of the Penal Code, for intent to incite any class or community of persons to commit any offence against any other class or community of persons. Following the incident, Education director general Datuk Dr Amin Senin said yesterday the ministry was also considering disciplinary action if necessary."
Can a Methodist school refuse to accept Muslim students?

Siti Kasim - "A PRAYER IS A PRAYER! WHAT'S THE FUSS??For heaven's sake! MGS started of as a Mission School. There is no ruling that says they can't recite a Christian prayer before an important ceremony.Muslims being present while a Christian prayer is being recited is NOT preaching nor promoting conversions. Otherwise, no Muslim can ever attend any wedding or funeral service in a Church. To insinuate that this is a form of proselytising is an attempt to establish religious apartheid, and an abuse of clause 11(4) of the constitution.To those parents who have a problem with the school reciting Christian prayers, please send your kids to normal SK or Sekolah Ugama. To the KPM, don't be so bias in taking action, look at orang asli children in SK schools. They're being forced to pray and recite prayers when they're not even Muslims. 4 orang asli girls were slapped by a teacher when they refused to recite an Arabic verse before eating because they are not Muslims. Did you make noise about it? Did the police arrest the teacher that slapped the children? No. Nothing. Zilch."

Penang school gets stern warning after Christian prayer recital - "he education ministry has issued a stern warning to Methodist Girls’ School in Penang following reports that the school had recited a Christian prayer during an awards ceremony.A separate warning was given to a school in Perak which is believed to have conducted an art seminar in Chinese instead of the national language.The director-general of education, Amin Senin, said the ministry is considering further disciplinary action against the Methodist girls’ school for contravening national education regulations.According to a media report yesterday, a Muslim group had lodged a police report, accusing the school of trying to propagate Christianity to Muslims."

Porridge and boiled mutton? New York foodies still love trolling London | Mina Holland - "London’s emergence as a restaurant destination is not especially recent (“flowering” suggests we are at training-bra stage), so why do many, often Americans, continue to peddle such a dim view of British food?... “What is this WEIRD obsession Americans have with London having bad food? Like, seriously, boiled mutton? Was his last visit during the Victorian era?”"

Urinals banned from newly remodeled Portland Building - "The city has redesigned all the bathrooms to be gender neutral-- which means urinals are banned eve' in the men's room... "its gonna take up a lot more space and third- anyone whose ever been to any public event - have you seen the line at the ladies room? Do you see any line at the men's room?"He also argues that urinals use far less water than toilets."
Wokeness is about spite and cutting down people, not lifting them up

‘This is completely wrong’: Evanston elementary school ‘cancels’ Halloween due to equity and some parents are not happy about it - "The heart behind the decision, according to a statement from Michelle Cooney, Lincoln’s school principal, was to honor the school’s value of equity and to be inclusive of all students within the community, particularly those who do not celebrate the holiday... “Halloween is a cultural American holiday, and it’s being canceled because of religious groups,” she said. “We’re a Bosnia and Muslim immigrant and refugee family. Halloween, when we moved (to Chicago) from a different country, was one of the greatest things.”Bajric, who came to Chicago from Bosnia in 1995 with her family, went to a Chicago public school for elementary school, and for her, Halloween was “a way to assimilate,” she said. Her parents worked two jobs, sometimes gone from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m., she recalled, and celebrating Halloween at school was often the only taste she got of the holiday.“I didn’t get to celebrate the other holidays,” said Bajric, who remembers Halloween at school being “the best day ever” for her. “Halloween was my way of being like the other kids. Other students from other countries (at Lincoln), they get to feel like the other kids and participate in a cultural holiday.”... “If you want to be inclusive,” Gruber began, “have a conversation and get input from all members of the community. It’s very hard in public school, but it was just decided and that’s why people are so upset — it was just decided. Bring out ideas and discussion about how can we move forward that tries to meet as many needs as possible, not change (our behaviors and traditions) for the views of a few people. That’s not the way society works.”"
Inclusivity is about being bland and taking away things that make people feel they belong
Time to cancel all public holidays, since not everyone celebrates them

Universal Orlando Fires Gru Actor for Flashing White-Power Symbol - "the family were offered a gift card and free tickets to the theme park"

Rebecca Cannon Novicki - "Open letter to Universal Orlando: This is a very common game called “Gotcha” I’m a sports photographer and I couldn’t even tell you how many kids have tried to get away with doing this in a team picture- bonus points if they can actually do it on a teammates leg or arm or some other body part. Given the fact that the younger child is clearly making the same gesture and that Gru is a “villain” It’s painfully obvious to anyone that they were playing this game with the children and your employee went above and beyond by carrying it over into their picture which the children would have thought was hilarious. Except they have gold digging parents who want to teach them they will never be anything more than a victim and to take a harmless kids game and pretend it’s something else. Shame on them but an even bigger shame on you for firing this employee and helping to spread this ignorance, hate and division in this country... Unless you video every interaction at Universal while you are there you will get screwed. In this case, how much is this family taking you for ? And all they had to do was crop the picture and make up a fake story a la Jussie Smollet style but you still fired the employee and gave these piranhas abusing their children and ruining what was probably a fun memory for 15 minutes of fame, exactly what they wanted and I’m still stuck with the computer your employee broke. Obviously my next stop needs to be the media- that seems to be the only thing you respond to. Shameful. So feel free to share this post and media you can contact me about what happens to guests belongings in the on-site hotels while they are in the parks and how Universal “handles” it. That is unless you are too busy with made up hateful and sensational stories like this one. 🤷🏼‍♀️"
Looks like the black family needs to disown the younger son, who is clearly a white supremacist too
Addendum: This post is no longer available but here is a photo of the white supremacist son flashing it too

Candace Owens on Twitter - "To the people who fly private but lecture us about the environment. To the people who live in gated communities but lecture us about building walls. To the people who travel with armed guards & lecture us about guns: Your bottomless hypocrisy is why America chooses Trump."

Han Hui Hui's Alter Ego 'Han Hui Ying' Dances To K-Pop On Instagram

BBC Radio 4 - From Our Own Correspondent Podcast, Cash, Credit and Control in China - "A country whose generosity to refugees, hosting close to 4 million of them, has been extraordinary to witness. And yet despite that openness, that willingness to talk to us that so struck me, Turkey is also full of paranoia. The Turkish Republic grew from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire with the defeat of enemies at the heart of its identity. Western powers routed at Gallipoli and Ataturk building up a profoundly nationalist spirit. 123, long live the Turks, goes an old children's rhyme as they learn to count here. It continues: 456, Poland collapsed. 789, the Germans are pigs. 10 11 12, the British are foxes. Barely a week has gone by here when the government or the media over which it exerts near total control hasn't accused an external power of trying to tear up the country. Mr. Erdogan presents himself as the protector in chief, apparently uncovering plots on a daily basis and hitting back. Try googling Erdogan slams and you'll be spoiled for choice. NATO, the US, Israel, Europe, so-called intellectuals - all are on the list, as is, of course, the BBC. Somewhere in this pile of boxes around me is the front page of a Turkish newspaper labeling me a British traitor who should be captured and deported for daring to interview opposition activists. Agent provocateur and modern day Lawrence of Arabia are some of the names I've been called. The mayor of Ankara even suggested we were complicit in a bomb attack near our office since I was on air soon afterwards, the dastardly English still clearly intent on bringing Turkey to its knees… [On the coup] I will always remember the words of an 82 year old neuro psychologist I interviewed soon after, who'd been stripped of her pension and baselessly branded a terrorist supporter. My husband and I fled Turkey after the 1971 coup, she said. There was widespread torture. Leftists like us would have fingernails pulled out in custody. She paused, peering out at the gleaming Bosphorus. But today is worse, she said, because at least then we could trust the judiciary. To see journalists and human rights defenders, some of them friends, locked up or chased out on spurious charges has been tough. The fear and division that now stalk Turkey, the world's largest jailer of journalists, has made it progressively harder to interview people. Government supporters don't trust the Western media. Opponents worry they'll face problems if they speak out. At a party soon after I arrived in 2014, a Turkish woman Melis came up to me. So you're new here, huh?, she said with a typical warm smile. One thing you have to learn about us is we’re militant people. Whichever way we are: religious, secular, militaristic, Ataturk loving, Erdogan loving, even in how we party, we do it all 110%"