Links - 2nd December 2019 (1)

Why Are American Houses So Big? - ".S. houses are among the biggest—if not the biggest—in the world. According to the real-estate firms Zillow and Redfin, the median size of an American single-family home is in the neighborhood of 1,600 or 1,650 square feet. About five years ago, Sonia A. Hirt, a professor of landscape architecture and planning at the University of Georgia, was working on a book about land-use patterns in the U.S., and when she tracked down the average size of dwellings for about two dozen countries, the U.S. came out on top. Her comparisons were rough because she’d cobbled together her data from various sources, but she found that American living spaces had a good 600 to 800 square feet on most of the competition. Looking just at the average size of newly built houses—as opposed to an average for all houses in a country, which is a smaller number—Australia, Canada, and New Zealand are on par with the U.S.; the averages for new houses in these countries approach or exceed 2,000 square feet. These same four countries have the most rooms per household occupant of 40 mostly wealthy countries studied by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development... It’s not that the U.S. has large houses because it has more land than other countries do. “People intuitively often think that this is the explanation … because America is such a big country,” Hirt told me. “Well, this is true, but Russia is a big country. Kazakhstan is a big country. Space itself doesn’t really make people do one thing or another.”Government policies, however, do... “[A] nation of homeowners, of people who own a real share in their own land, is unconquerable,” Franklin D. Roosevelt said in 1942. Of course, it doesn’t necessarily follow that a nation of homeowners must own big houses, but a slew of policies—from the creation of the Federal Housing Administration in 1934 to the zoning mandates of individual towns and cities—fueled the growth of suburbs, and in turn the growth of the houses of which they were composed. Many houses in postwar suburbs—such as those in the famous preplanned Levittowns—were actually quite modest, at roughly 850 square feet, says Dolores Hayden, a former professor of architecture and American studies at Yale. But over the course of the 20th century, government policy, the invention of cheaper, mass-produced building materials, marketing by home builders, and a shift in how people regarded their houses—not just as homes, but as financial assets—encouraged ever larger houses... One key difference is that America’s period of suburban expansion (which, it’s worth noting, largely excluded whole categories of Americans) coincided with the uptake of the automobile and the development of a more connected network of highways. Being able to drive farther from a city center meant cheaper land, which meant more space and bigger houses... She added that there seems to be a fascination with “newness” in the U.S., whereas Europeans tend to be more content “recycling [buildings] and therefore living within the spatial parameters of the past.”... Perhaps a fondness for space helps explains why Australia and Canada—both former British colonies with some cultural roots similar to those of the U.S.—also tend to have really big houses...  the median size of a newly built house in the U.S. has risen as the average number of people per household has declined, such that the average number of square feet per person in the median new home nearly doubled from the 1970s to the 2010s."

How Boris and his cabinet broke the left - "Since becoming PM, Johnson has been called a ‘fascist’ and has been accused of leading a ‘far-right’ administration. Calling Johnson a ‘fascist’ and labelling his new cabinet ‘far-right’ doesn’t only trivialise the suffering of those who experienced the brutality of fascist regimes — it is also an odd way to describe a liberal Tory like Johnson. While fascist dictators of the past systematically oppressed and brutalised minority groups, Johnson has long supported an amnesty for long-term illegal immigrants and has just removed the government’s cap on new migrant arrivals. He has also handed two of the great offices of state to ethnic-minority ministers: Sajid Javid is now chancellor and Priti Patel is home secretary. Javid, of Pakistani-Muslim origin, and Patel, of Gujarati-Hindu stock, are part of a diverse cabinet which also includes Alok Sharma as international development secretary and Rishi Sunak as chief secretary to the treasury. But this development was also greeted with rage. Had Johnson selected an all-white, all-male cabinet, he would have been absolutely hammered by the left. But his appointment of non-white cabinet members was also derided. It was dismissed by the likes of Kehinde Andrews, a commentator and professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University, as ‘window dressing’. According to Kerry-Anne Mendoza, editor-in-chief of the Canary, the black and Asian MPs serving in Johnson’s cabinet are ‘turncoats of colour’. By being Tories with non-white skin, they are legitimising ‘oppression’... This is nothing but vile bigotry. Ethnic-minority conservatives are increasingly being subjected to slanderous attacks from the left. Instead of being congratulated for reaching the highest offices of state, the likes of Javid and Patel are derided as ‘coconuts’, ‘bounties’, ‘turncoats of colour’ and ‘Uncle Toms’. They are accused of being traitorous upholders of ‘white privilege’. One of the worst responses came from Cambridge academic Priyamvada Gopal. Gopal asserted that ‘Asian Toryism’ is primarily based on ‘anti-blackness’. According to her, ‘Asians have a good line in white supremacy’... if ‘Asian Toryism’ is based on anything, it is a belief in economic self-sufficiency, a positive approach to integration and a deep love for family. It has nothing to do with ‘anti-blackness’ or racism of any kind... Mirza is a vocal critic of the British model of multiculturalism for its championing of difference over cohesion. She has also called out misogynistic behaviour and patriarchal structures within migrant communities.But for the left, it seems that ethnic-minority achievement is only worthy of celebration if it fits within the left’s own agenda or narrative... There is another reason why the likes of Mirza, in particular, will be targeted by the more regressive sections of the left. It is because their personal life stories undermine the left’s prevailing narrative of ethnic-minority victimhood... For all of his many flaws, Johnson is a welcome break from the stale, lacklustre and uninspiring leadership we have recently had to endure as a country. The PM’s confident, optimistic, inclusive brand of patriotism will go down well with many voters – including those who do not usually vote Conservative. In sharp contrast, the British left increasingly offers very little apart from divisive negativity and personal attacks against anyone who challenges the politics of grievance and victimhood. The left’s divisive identity politics and hysteria could play right into Johnson’s hands. The wing of British politics which supposedly celebrates diversity is increasingly hostile towards diversity of thought. And our politics is much poorer for it."
Maybe Gopal thinks blackness is about welfare dependance, non-integration and single parenthood

Boris should scrap our archaic Sunday trading laws, and let people choose when to shop - "The Sunday Trading Act 1994 came into force 25 years ago this weekend, allowing shops to open but restricting the opening times of larger stores – those over 3,000 sq ft – to a maximum of six consecutive hours between 10am and 6pm... The current rules were supposedly designed to protect small, family-run stores from the growth of the major supermarket chains. They have done no such thing. The supermarkets have moved on to the street corner anyway, and towns are awash with their “Express”, “Local” and “Little” stores, designed to get around the rule on square footage. And consumers have paid the price. The big retailers’ smaller shops charge up to 11 per cent more for the same family shopping basket compared with their larger stores. Some items are more than twice the price... During the 2012 London Olympics, the Government was so embarrassed by the archaic Sunday trading laws that they were suspended for an eight-week period. Visitors, tourists and British shoppers were free to shop at a time of their choosing, with no harmful side-effects. In fact, sales rose 3.2 per cent compared with the previous year for those two months... When the coalition Government tried to liberalise Sunday trading in 2015, it was thwarted by the votes of Scottish Nationalists, seeking to deny shoppers in England and Wales the same freedoms that Scots already enjoy... Even in over-regulated France, shops in designated tourist zones in Paris have been allowed to open on Sundays since 2009. The current Sunday trading laws do not preserve any valuable cultural aspects of our way of life. They can make it harder to get to church and to serve a traditional family Sunday lunch at home with fresh produce... The argument that people need a day off is valid. But in today’s society, that doesn’t always have to be a Sunday. More and more people are in work Monday to Friday and so can only shop at the weekend. A poll for Open Sundays found that 64 per cent were in favour of a permanent extension of Sunday trading hours. The Sunday economy also gives those who cannot work on weekdays the chance to earn some money – from students wanting to keep down their student loans to those who care for elderly relatives or children. Sunday shopping can actually help to sustain modern family life. Children inclined to spend time on screens alone are brought out of the house to participate in an enjoyable family experience. Not all shops would opt to open at all hours of the day, even if the law allowed them to. It is a matter of choice for shopkeepers, as it should be for individuals as to whether they choose to shop on a Sunday."

BBC Radio 4 - Best of Today, Monday's business with Dominic O'Connell - "There's a fascinating study out from the International Monetary Fund about the real nature of foreign direct investment... 40% of all foreign direct investment around the world is not real investment at all. It's just multinationals shuffling money around between various subsidiaries in order to lower their tax liabilities. This is an amazing study, because politicians paying so much attention to foreign direct investment when it's really all just tax management"

The Lazy Susan, the Classic Centerpiece of Chinese Restaurants, Is Neither Classic nor Chinese - "Sixty years ago, Chinese food got a makeover. Its new look—in American restaurants, at least—revolved around a single piece of furniture, the “Lazy Susan” rotating table. Through the 1950s, many Chinatown restaurants had a reputation for being dingy and cramped, but the introduction of lazy susan tables was the key element in a transformation toward refined and spacious restaurants... The first known mention of a Chinese revolving table, and the source of much speculation about the Lazy Susan's origins, comes from the 700-year-old Book of Agriculture. Its author, Wang Zhen, was a Chinese official who helped pioneer movable type. He faced the challenge of organizing thousands of individual Chinese characters (alphabetic languages, by contrast, require about 100). Wang's solution was to make the table move, so the typesetter didn't have to. In this sense, it worked very much like a tabletop Lazy Susan."

Disney+ ruins classics with new trigger warnings - "I adored the story of Cinderella as a child. The prospect of having a man so in love with me that he’d crisscross the Kingdom searching for my size 6 ½ foot, was heady stuff. It never occurred to me that Cindy was oppressed by the patriarchy or that she should just buy her own darn pair of shoes.Similarly, I was untroubled by the fact that Snow White was victimized by her stepmother or lived with a variety of short men to whom she was not married. While the scenario seemed to present a negative view of both blended families and female sexuality, my 8-year-old psyche survived unscathed. I emerged from that Disney-centric childhood with happy memories and a deep appreciation for the power of imagination.Sadly, the current employees of Disney must think of me as some aberration... Disney deserves credit for not censoring the films and cartoons, and tailoring them to meet 21st century sensibilities. John Legend and Kelly Clarkson recently recorded an updated version of the Christmas song “Baby It’s Cold Outside” in recognition of the #MeToo movement and out of a desire not to offend those who said it conjured images of rape. But instead of improving the flirtatious holiday standard, they sexualized it even more by adding the line “It’s your body and your choice,” making what was a clever back-and-forth between two adults into a primer on consent...   Isn’t it at all possible that the little girl who sees the handsome prince on bended knee with the crystal slipper will both sigh with delight and one day grow up to be president? Must every childhood memory be tweaked so that it fits the evolved narrative?  Can’t we just enjoy the movie?"

‘Adorkable’ or rapist? Uncovered documents challenge Zoe Quinn’s abuse story (but #MeToo won’t care) - "In 2012, feminist activist Zoe Quinn called her romance with game creator Alec Holowka “adorkable”. Seven years later, she decried the same relationship as abuse. The troubled Holowka was then disgraced and took his own life.There is something touchingly naïve about journalists at Canadian alternative news site The Postmillenial going on an old-fashioned internet deep dive to compare Quinn’s contemporaneous accounts of her relationship with indie developer Holowka, with her current description. As if they assume that her credibility with the mainstream media and #MeToo campaigners rests on facts, the psychological plausibility of her narrative, or personal trustworthiness, consistency and objectivity.Nonetheless, it all makes for interesting –if somewhat macabre– reading now... actual details do not matter. Even by virtue of these emails it had been possible to somehow prove what her plentiful social media detractors had accused Quinn of. Namely, that she had opportunistically misrepresented a failed but not strictly abusive dalliance from years ago, in a bid for attention and sympathy, and thus pushed a man she knew was emotionally unstable towards suicide, the path that Holowka chose on August 31, shortly after being dismissed from his latest project due to the allegations.What then? Within the paradigm of “Believe all women” that is embraced by #MeToo, it changes nothing. A woman can be in a consensual coupling, but the moment she decides that it wasn’t such, she is the victim... In fact, there seems to be a perverse and tribal tendency here – the more toxic the person on the movement’s own side is, the harder they get defended, as a matter of principle. Despite countless accounts of Quinn’s dubious conduct and integrity – regardless of what happened in Winnipeg - each time she gets into a new pickle her supporters double down. Inconvenient facts are tossed away or aggressively countered.One example: most of the mainstream media has stayed awkwardly silent on Holowka’s suicide (despite covering the allegations). A column in Wired bemoaned “male fragility” – the feminist equivalent of the “snowflake” putdown. Apparently, Holowka’s very real death was about keeping women “hostage” to male feelings. That hardening, that lack of empathy, that cruelty is only possible for decent people when you are no longer aware of your biases. At best what we will get now is a treatise on how questioning the victim is just another form of male abuse."

ZeroHavens - "It's absurdly hilarious that Zoe Quinn's mere tweet accusations killed a man and now she's being given a job writing a comic about bringing death to people."
On her being hired by DC Comics to write "The Infected: Deathbringer

Black Sheep Memes - Posts - "Woman: "you keep on hurting me. you need to stop"
Ex: "I'm sorry I'm a piece of shit.. I should kill myself."
Woman with demon eyes: "FUCK your Emotional manipulation!""