‘I thought buying things would make me feel better. It didn’t’: The rise of emotional spending - "None of these purchases were essential. Many I haven’t even taken out of the packaging, leaving them in a pile by the front door... I am not alone. The pandemic has prompted a frenzy of online spending... Most of this shopping is due to boredom... This is exactly how brands want you to spend: quickly and impulsively. “Everything about e-commerce is designed to remove friction”... I have experienced this fugue-like state, usually when I am brushing my teeth, perched on the side of my bath, clicking “add to cart” in the final moments before I go to bed. It turns out that companies know when I am weak – and this is when they target me. “Companies will know what kind of content you engage with at different times during the day,” says PK Kannan, a marketing expert at the University of Maryland. Marketers even analyse the circadian rhythms of their users and schedule their content at times when they are particularly receptive to buying things online. Banner ads that follow consumers across devices trap us in a “sales funnel”. “It’s scary when you look for something online and it pops up everywhere,” says Wiseman. “It’s relentless.” The only way to exit the funnel is by purchasing the item. “These are highly specialised techniques that use behaviour retargeting on consumers,” says Kannan. “You’ve shown interest, so I will follow you wherever you go with this same ad.” Khatun is being stalked by a Chloé handbag. “It follows me everywhere,” she says. “It’s very tempting. I tell myself I will be good, but I probably will cave.”"
Chinese browser Tuber offers a glimpse beyond the Great Firewall — with caveats - "China now has a tool that lets users access YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google and other internet services that have otherwise long been banned in the country — selectively.Called Tuber, the mobile browser debuted on China’s third-party Android stores this week, with an iOS launch in the pipeline. The landing page of the app features a scrolling feed of YouTube videos, with tabs at the bottom that allow users to visit other mainstream Western internet services.While some celebrate the app as an unprecedented “opening up” of the Chinese internet, such as this state media journalist, others quickly noticed the browser comes with a veil of censorship. YouTube queries for politically sensitive keywords such as “Tiananmen” and “Xi Jinping” returned no results on the app, according to tests done by TechCrunch. Using the app also comes with liabilities. Registration requires a Chinese phone number, which is tied to a person’s real identity. The platform could suspend users’ accounts and share their data “with the relevant authorities” if they “actively watch or share” content that breaches the constitution, endangers national security and sovereignty, spreads rumors, disrupts social orders or violates other local laws, according to the app’s terms of service.Rather than blocking sites beyond the purview of Beijing and tracking the “illegal” use of VPNs to circumvent the Great Firewall, China now has an app that gives its people a glimpse into the Western internet — with the caveat that their digital footprint may be under close watch by the authorities... Qihoo 360 cannot be immediately reached for comment. As of Saturday afternoon, Tuber has been removed from the Huawei Android store and the downloaded copy stops functioning, leaving users with a message that it is “undergoing a system upgrade.”"
A brief experiment in a more open Chinese web - "Asked about the app’s disappearance during an Oct. 12 press conference, Foreign Ministry Spokesman Zhao Lijian dismissed questions about Tuber as “not a diplomatic issue” and added that “the internet has always been managed in accordance with laws and regulations.”Tuber leaves a host of questions in its wake. Why was the app, with backing from a major technology enterprise with close ties to the government, released in the first place?... Zhou appears to enjoy close proximity to the Chinese government, making it unlikely that Tuber was launched without the government’s blessing. The app, moreover, had approval from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. According to the MIIT’s online database of Internet Content Providers (ICPs), Fengxuan Information Technology received government approval for Tuber on Oct. 9, shortly before the app’s official release. This leaves us with the million-dollar question: Why would an app that enables users to bypass the Great Firewall be permitted at all? What possible strategic interest could China’s leadership have in allowing the download and use of a tool that apparently allows circumvention of the world’s most sophisticated system of internet controls?The likely answer is that Tuber may be a step toward transforming the nature of Chinese access to the global internet, moving from a period of walls and circumvention (through unauthorized VPNs) to a period of controlled and “guided” access. The CCP leadership may recognize the need for a new era of more flexible information management, allowing Chinese internet users access beyond the reaches of the Great Firewall, while at the same time maintaining a decisive level of control over information the regime regards as threatening.It should be obvious that flexibility does not mean openness—as Tuber’s short-lived trial demonstrates... Although Tuber was ultimately pulled down, the fact that it was ever allowed at all is significant. In an era of porous but effectively policed access, Tuber’s brief existence suggests the Great Firewall could be replaced by the Great Filter. Such a system would require careful engineering to ensure that the CCP is able to monitor the global internet effectively, in a way that suits the regime’s interests both domestically and internationally. If China builds out such a system, the ultimate legacy of Tuber will lie in the glimpse it offered of the future to come"
Opinion | Everything I Know About Elite America I Learned From ‘Fresh Prince’ and ‘West Wing’ - The New York Times - "In “Class: A Guide Through the American Status System,” Paul Fussell argues that the criteria we use to define the tiers of the social hierarchy are in fact indicative of our social class. For people near the bottom, social class is defined by money — in this regard, I was right in line with my peers when I was growing up. The middle class, though, doesn’t just value money; equally important is education... I started watching “The West Wing.” As I watched, I had an uncomfortable realization: “The West Wing” is not very good.The show had the pacing of a 90s TV drama (fair enough); the way the characters spoke seemed strange to me (though I’ve since grown to enjoy “Sorkinese”). Still, I kept watching, because I was intrigued by what it told me about the people who’d recommended it. It turns out, as the show’s creator, Aaron Sorkin, has explained, if I didn’t like the show, that’s in part because I wasn’t really meant to. The pilot episode didn’t test well with people like me. But, according to Mr. Sorkin, it tested “extremely well” with certain audience segments. Among them: households that earned more than $75,000 a year, households with at least one college graduate and households that subscribed to The New York Times."
Human Nature and Affirmative Action - "Irene Vazquez, a senior at Yale, was quoted saying that “White people and Asian American people are overrepresented in higher education and the Ivy League in particular.” Let’s critique her claim that White people are overrepresented at Yale. According to Brookings, 51% of Gen Z and 55% of millennials are White, compared to 44% of Yale students. The claim that White people are overrepresented at Yale is, at least on paper, untrue. But the campus profile tells a different statement.As a Hispanic (God, I love being able to say that), I was a bit surprised to learn that White students are in the minority. On paper, yes I can believe that. In reality though, not so much.While technically wrong, Vazquez is actually right in a way. White students are visually overrepresented at Yale, but not on paper. This is because White students claim minority status when they can. The question is, why would White students want to claim minority status on paper?Just ask Elizabeth Warren: it is because it is disadvantageous to be White in the eyes of the Ivy League. It’s also low-risk to claim minority status. Universities don’t require you to prove your ancestry when you apply. Clever move by the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts to claim something no one could disprove - and she isn’t the only one. Even if you step into La Casa (the Hispanic cultural center at Yale), you’ll see a lot more blue eyes and blonde hair than you’d expect.
“I have a Colombian grandfather.”
“I’m half-Argentinian.”
Simply put, the Hispanics at Yale do not look like a cross-section of Hispanics in America, because they aren’t that Hispanic, at least not by blood. It’s more advantageous to be a minority for the sake of college admissions and, to a greater extent, your career at Yale. A distant ancestor who is a minority lets you claim minority status and, consequently, gives you points on your admissions score and for anything else you apply to as long as you associate with the ivory tower. So students are eager to check the box. I always got a visceral reaction from peers when I made statements like this on campus. That is because it goes against their entire narrative - a narrative built around racial injustice against minorities. A narrative built around the idea that White students have an easier time than the Black or Brown student. If this was true, students would not scour family trees in a desperate attempt to label themselves as minorities. Layers of bureaucracy and academia have been built around this claim. Millions of dollars in funding, programs, jobs, and even entire buildings exist because of critical race theory. More importantly, individuals' identities are on the line. A minority at Yale, under the current narrative, can claim that not only was it harder for them to get into Yale, but it is harder for them to be a student. Individuals like validating themselves by claiming they struggle more than their peers. A baseless claim that, when put into practice, falls apart. Strip them of their minority status, and you strip them of their self-validation. You would not have students squeezing every ounce of minority they have into their college admissions applications if it really was harder to be a minority than White. The irony is that Yale is such a manipulatable institution that the student that benefits from Yale’s “affirmative action policies” is not the poor Mexican kid from Brownsville or the Black kid from Compton: it’s the barely-tan kid from Boston whose dad is a doctor at Mass General or the Black kid from Maryland whose mom is an attorney in DC. College admissions is a game, and the type of families that send their kids to Yale learned how to play it a long time ago."
Structural racism means it is advantageous to be a "minority"
Meme - "daedalion @daeoleo: I value animal life over WHITE humans, but poc and animals are the same level of valuable"
Anti-racism is just hating white people
Does the NHS need to check its white privilege? - "The NHS is in crisis. No, not because of Covid-19, but because of racism. That was the verdict of senior health chiefs, who have vowed to tackle ‘white privilege’ in the NHS... She added that being a senior member of an organisation does not mean you are ‘protected from racism’ – though the fact she has such a high-level job would suggest the NHS isn’t exactly dripping with prejudice... This bizarre wave of health service woke-ism comes amid news of record backlogs in NHS treatment. Some 4.2million people currently await NHS care, and 110,000 have been waiting more than a year. It appears the NHS hasn’t quite got its priorities right... It seems very unlikely, however, that an institution so diverse is really plagued by ‘structural racism’ – one in five NHS staff are BAME and 30 per cent of doctors come from Asian backgrounds. The fact that the NHS is already diverse has not done anything to temper the NHS’s enthusiasm for diversity initiatives. Diversity managers at hospital trusts earn considerably more than junior doctors and nurses. The NHS also has a Race and Health Observatory which seeks to address health inequalities, while the NHS Confederation, a membership body for healthcare providers, set up a BME Leadership Network last year to promote diversity. The health service has already ticked all the woke boxes – it hardly needs another pointless race initiative.Instead of worrying about diversity, the NHS should focus on its job – treating the sick."
Priest arrested for threesome with dominatrices on altar - "A Louisiana priest was arrested for allegedly filming himself having sex with two dominatrices on the altar at his Catholic church, a report said Thursday.The priest, identified by Nola.com as the Rev. Travis Clark, was busted after a passerby saw the lights on later than usual on Sept. 30 and peeked inside Saints Peter and Paul Roman Catholic Church in Pearl River. The unidentified witness saw the half-naked priest having sex with the two women, who were dressed in corsets and high-heeled boots. The altar was also adorned with stage lighting, several sex toys, and a cellphone mounted on a tripod that was recording the act... Dixon, who is also an adult film actress, had posted on social media a day prior that she was traveling to the New Orleans area to meet up with another dominatrix to “defile a house of God.”The archbishop of the New Orleans Archdiocese visited the church to perform a ritual that would restore the sanctity of the altar."
Toto: Hyper-political Hollywood gives us little reason to return to theaters - "Stars have not been behaving as well as anyone hoped during the pandemic. When the virus first hit celebrities struggled with their messaging. Some created online-only content to entertain the masses, a simple, noble gesture.Others looked shockingly tone deaf, witness the galling “Imagine” cover featuring Gal Gadot and her celebrity pals.“Imagine no possessions,” crooned singers with tons, and tons, of them.Ellen DeGeneres whined about being stuck in her mega mansion, the first of several news cycles that damaged her populist appeal. Later, when ordinary Americans fought back against the lockdowns decimating their livelihoods, stars mocked them as hicks who didn’t understand science and wanted to kill grandma while their paychecks kept a-coming.Not a nice look. It got worse from there.The usual celebrity angst against President Trump ramped up, if one can believe that was possible. The ugly comments got uglier, with some directly targeting Trump voters.You know, the folks who also like to unwind at the local cineplex. Some stars took their activism in a ghastly direction, donating to the Minnesota Freedom Fund which bails out jailed protesters. Celebrities like Seth Rogen, Steve Carell and Janelle Monae didn’t care if their money sprang unfairly arrested protesters (unlikely) or folks who eagerly set the city on fire (or committed even worse crimes)... Other stars directly poured digital gasoline on the fires, including Trevor Noah, Ice Cube, John Cusack and Michael Moore.More recently, stars reassembled their classic TV show casts, something that could have proved a fun diversion in our locked down world.Instead, they turned these reunions into Democratic fundraising efforts."
