Robert J. O'Neill on Twitter - "President Obama: 'How hard can that be, saying that Nazis are bad?'"
"Nazis are bad. Now try saying “Radical Islam...”"
"He kinda killed Osama Bin Laden, so...."
"Do you know who you’re talking to?"
Audism In the Autistic Community - "I am part of the Deaf community and the Autistic Community. Both communities are against cure culture...
A deaf baby hears for the first time. Thousands of hours of patient experimentation went into this. Science is glory". A response says "accurate headline: hearing parent doesn't know how to deal with deaf baby and decides their life for them without their knowledge or consent"...
D/deaf people who identify with the community and culture do not view themselves as disabled. They are a different culture. When they have Deaf children, the community is overjoyed. There is a language, customs, etiquette, etc. The Deaf Community fosters the feeling of belonging somewhere instead of just being different to their hearing peers. We are the only disability community with our own language. ASL isn't signed English. It is a whole different language. It has its own set of rules. A lot of the signs are paired with a particular facial expression and there is ASL syntax. Syntax is sign order. It is not a signed version of English. If you want to think about how Yoda speaks, that is similar to ASL syntax. Speaking of ASL, a Deaf person can only give a hearing person a name sign. A hearing person cannot give it to themselves. If they do, its cultural appropriation. The food of the Deaf culture is normally something cold. This is because when people are conversing, the food can get cold and people would not want to eat it. There are Deaf festivals. One example is at Mill Neck Manor in Oyster Bay, NY there is an Apple festival. They turn the school grounds into a farm. They have booths, different apples, games, hay rides, etc. Its an experience like none other. On this post, some people, including myself, brought cochlear implants into the conversation. It is not talked about enough. It erases Deaf culture. Autistic people want acceptance. Why can't D/deaf people have acceptance? In most cases, a child has the CI surgery done without consent. The parent thinks they are doing the right thing. Parents in some cases do this so they do not have to learn ASL (I'm in the United States so its ASL for me). This is cure culture. Why can't Deaf people want the same acceptance as autistic people? What are the risk of Cochlear Implant surgery?"
Presumably it would be a good thing to give all babies hearing issues, so they can decide for themselves
ceo of simp : memes - "Just realized that King Kong was a legendary simp for sacrificing himself to a woman he can't even have sex with"
"He could have sex with her, But she just would not be alive"
"Not really. Apes have much smaller penises proportionally than humans. The average ape‘s peen is about 1 1/2 inches. King Kong (in the original version at least) is 25 feet tall. Since the average ape is 5 1/2 feet tall, that would make King Kong have a penis size of just under 7 inches, which is completely survivable. I did the math so y’all don’t have to... because the female vagina can stretch up to 4 to 8 inches when aroused, king can technically clap cheeks without fatalities"
'Let us explain': iQiyi sorry for embarrassing 'Anal Malaysia' poster - "Streaming platform iQIYI has removed its embarrassing Malaysia Day poster from the internet after its tagline was widely misread as “Anal Malaysia” instead of “Anak Malaysia” (Child of Malaysia)."
Are Phytoestrogens Harmful for Men? - "While some researchers are concerned that high doses of phytoestrogens may disrupt the body’s hormonal balance, most studies have associated them with health benefits... there’s not much evidence that phytoestrogens have harmful effects in humans"
Effect of phytoncide from trees on human natural killer cell function - "phytoncide exposure and decreased stress hormone levels may partially contribute to increased NK activity."
Researchers surprised by experiment that gave homeless people thousands of dollars - "Researchers behind the bold new study that kicked off in 2018 gave a one-time lump sum of 7,500 Canadian dollars — about $5,700 — to 50 people who had recently become homeless, and allowed them to choose how to spend the money while following their lives over 12 to 18 months. A control group of homeless people who did not receive any funds was also followed by researchers conducting the study. Researchers found that those who received the money on average were able to find stable housing faster, maintain financial security and stability, and increased their spending on food, clothing and rent. Cash recipients spent just over 50 percent of their funds on food and rent, 15 percent on items like medications and bills, and 16 percent on transportation and clothing. Spending on alcohol, cigarettes and drugs fell by an average of 39 percent. The study also found the funds freed up space in shelters and saved the shelter system $8,100 per person over a year... It’s worth noting that the study included a relatively small sample size and participants in the randomized controlled trial were screened for a low risk of mental health challenges and substance abuse."
By the logic of those who claim Singapore punishes single parents by not giving them as many benefits as married ones, the control group was punished since they didn't get the money the treatment group did
Hidden cameras and secret trackers reveal where Amazon returns end up - "perfectly good items are being liquidated by the truckload — and even destroyed or sent to landfill. Experts say hundreds of thousands of returns don't end up back on the e-commerce giant's website for resale, as customers might think... Kevin Lyons, an associate professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey who specializes in supply chain management and environmental policy, says that 30 to 40 per cent of all online purchases are sent back. That number drops to less than ten per cent for merchandise bought at bricks and mortar stores... Of the 12 items returned, it appears only four were resold by Amazon to new customers at the time this story was published. Months on from the investigation, some returns were still in Amazon warehouses or in transit, while a few travelled to some unexpected destinations, including a backpack that Amazon sent to landfill... The tactic of enticing customers to buy more than they need and return what they don't want "has had tragic repercussions for the environment and business"... "It's very difficult and expensive to effectively process product returns" for all e-commerce retailers, says Goldberg. "You're lucky if half of all returns can still be sold as new, so a huge amount of merchandise has to be dispositioned via some other means — liquidation, refurbishment, recycling, or landfill. In Amazon Canada's business agreement with companies that sell on the site, third-party sellers are given just two options when customers return their product: either pay a fee to have it shipped back to them, or pay Amazon to choose how to dispose of the return by selling, recycling, donating or destroying it. Until recently, the option to have the item shipped back to the seller was three times more expensive than letting Amazon deal with the return... Amazon's senior public relations manager Alyssa Bronikowski said in a statement that Marketplace's investigation is inconsistent with the company's findings. "A vast majority of excess and returned inventory is resold to other customers or liquidators, returned to suppliers, or donated to charitable organizations, depending on the condition of the item," Bronikowski said. "On occasion we're unable to resell, donate or recycle products — for safety or hygiene reasons, for example — but we're working hard to drive the number of times this happens down to zero." Marketplace asked Amazon what percentage of its returns are sent to landfill, recycling or for destruction. The company wouldn't answer."
Professor of gender studies cancels final and gives everyone a 100 figuring it doesn’t matter. I mean, he’s not wrong... - "Dr. Brandon Andrew Robinson, Assistant Professor of Gender & Sexuality Studies is considering abandoning the whole idea of finals as he does not believe they are useful... What does it say about a field of study when your professors don't believe demonstrating proficiency in the subject is important? I doubt Robinson would want to drive over a bridge built by an engineer whose professor didn't think the load-bearing final mattered. And I'm pretty sure Averett wouldn't want a surgeon operating on her who passed her board exam because the proctor decided to just knock off early and give everyone 100."
On HappyDot.sg: Is the Govt astroturfing by labelling its own survey company as third party company? - "HappyDot.sg, which calls itself “an online survey community for Singapore residents“, is actually owned by an entity called Rysense Ltd. Rysense is a Company Limited by Guarantee (CLG) rather than a Private Limited Company. This is unusual, because the CLG structure is normally only used by non-profit organisations such as charities and religious organisations. Why would Rysense have such an unusual structure compared to most small businesses which are Private Limited Companies? The answer is found in ACRA records showing that all of the directors of Rysense are senior civil servants from the Prime Minister’s Office, the Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) or the Government Technology Agency (GovTech). Given the composition of its Board of Directors, Rysense appears to be fully-owned and controlled by the Government, and is a captive supplier with the Government as its only customer... HappyDot.sg does not disclose that it is “owned” by the Government. Instead, it obscures its funding sources by saying that it conducts surveys “on behalf of organisations with an interest in specific social issues.” This is in contrast to its parent company, Rysense, which at least informs survey participants that its surveys are commissioned by the Government... Ironically, even as the Government warns of the dangers of astroturfing — the creation of a false impression of widespread grassroots support or opposition to a particular issue — when justifying the Prevention of Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA), its ownership of HappyDot.sg gives it a tool which could be used to push out Government messages under the guise of a private company."
Toronto bakery cleared by investigators for putting alcohol in holiday cakes - "Evidently someone wasn't happy about the Leslieville bakery's use of alcohol like Bailey's-filled hot chocolate bombs, Kahlua brownies, bourbon-peach cheesecake, and Cointreau in its fruitcake."
Vancouver dad who let kids ride bus alone wins court case against MCFD - "A Vancouver dad who let his children take the bus alone has won his three-year fight with the province’s Ministry of Children and Family Development. The Vancouver father — who is not being identified due to a publication ban — was first contacted by the ministry in March of 2017 when someone reported he had let four of his five children, aged between seven and 10, take transit to and from their North Vancouver school without an adult. The social worker assigned to his case found that there were no child protection concerns, but directed him not to leave his children unsupervised. “I would like to take the opportunity to remind you that until the children are 10 years old they cannot be unsupervised in the community, at home, or on transit."... the father also says he shouldn’t have had to launch a years-long, $70,000 court battle. “In some ways, it’s very disheartening because even in a case that seems as open and shut as this, it still took slogging through two levels of our courts, and just a lot of good fortune — in terms of having so many people supporting me — to get any resolution, and most parents do not have that, especially underprivileged parents and racialized communities. They just do not have this ability,” he explains, adding he received close to $50,000 in donations to fund the case. He thinks the case could have the effect of making social workers reconsider when to launch investigations, and will force them to get orders from provincial court judges before ordering parents to follow conditions. “Hopefully it just pushes back a bit and makes the ministry think twice about intervening in cases that don’t need intervention,” he says."
'I literally weep': anguish as New Zealand's National Library culls 600,000 books - "Sheltered in the bunkers beneath the National Library in New Zealand’s capital rests a treasure trove of books, including nearly 2,200 first editions that have been carefully looked after for decades. But not for much longer. The “overseas collection” – which includes a first edition of Richard Neville’s Play Power, a 1912 edition of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility and multiple first editions of Graham Greene novels – is now headed out the door. In total, the National Library in Wellington plans to get rid of more than 600,000 “foreign books” from their collection, saying they need to make space for more works on New Zealand, of which there are an additional 80,000 to 90,000 to store each year... “No other library outside of New Zealand is going to collect all the stories of New Zealand, that’s our job at the National Library, we’re going to make more room for the New Zealand, Māori and Pacific collection,” Macnaught said, defending the cull... Hundreds of thousands of valuable and important books on religion, race, health, feminism and psychology will be removed in the cull, including works that are now out of print, and in some cases unable to be found anywhere else in the world, scholars say... Although culling in libraries is common practice, it is the scale of this cull that is alarming book-lovers in New Zealand, with opponents of the move including some of New Zealand’s literary heavyweights, such as the former poet laureate Vincent O’Sullivan, and writer and former librarian Dame Fiona Kidman, who describes the cull as “cultural vandalism”. “If you only have New Zealand books, it makes for a very narrow literature. Any great literature is founded on the literature of the past”... Janiewski says books written by New Zealanders but published overseas are also heading for the slush pile, as are the back stories of New Zealand’s vast immigrant and diaspora population. Herself a migrant, Janiewski describes the country as a nation of immigrants: “We have never lived in isolation.” “I am appalled by what seems to be a very narrow definition of New Zealand and what makes up our history and stories,” she says. “In some regards books are now being seen as out of date, old-fashioned and not useful any more. But paper lasts, if it is taken care of, for a long time. Electronic knowledge is not necessarily kept or retained or preserved.” Richard Ovenden is the 25th librarian of the Bodleian library in Oxford, and has recently written a history of book destruction, titled Burning the Books."
They should just call it "decolonising" the library, and liberals will cheer, even if the new works are most probably not going to be as good as what they're replacing
UK Commercial Law (for earning to give) - Career review - "Law is also one of the highest paying professions, however, so working directly on social justice issues isn’t the only way you can do good as a lawyer. If you enjoy commercial work and can secure a place at a high-paying firm, you can also have an impact by donating some of your earnings to charity. We call this earning to give. If you target your donations to highly effective charities, this could be just as high-impact as public interest law. Newly qualified lawyers at top-ranked firms can expect to earn upwards of £70,000. Donating 10% of this take-home pay would be enough to save somebody’s life by buying anti-malaria bednets. If you are one of the approximately 5% who makes partner, you could earn over £1m each year – enough to fund a whole team of researchers, advocates or non-profit entrepreneurs... if you want to keep your options open and your earnings high, consulting seems to be preferable: It offers comparable earnings, higher job satisfaction, and more flexible career capital."
Soccer Scores, Short-Term Mood and Fertility - "We find that unexpected losses of local teams lead to a small decrease in the number of births nine months thereafter. The effect is larger for more unexpected losses, in those provinces with the largest amount of support for the local team and robust to a number of placebo tests"
Pandemic Fuels Increase in Rice Consumption in Japan - "Scholars have noted that “as income grows, per capita rice consumption is expected to decline as consumers substitute rice with high-cost quality food containing more protein and vitamins such as processed rice, vegetables, bread, fish and meat.” Popularity of that last substitute was due to influence of the West and American culture, in particular... 5.5% said that the main reason for this shift back toward the traditional dietary staple of rice was that they had more opportunities to cook at home than eat take-out bento box meals. There is, however, still concern about the cost of rice. 63.7% of respondents mentioned that the primary factor to consider when purchasing rice is price rather than “variety” or “site of production.” Considering that rice is more expensive in Japan’s protected domestic market than in any other country, such feedback is really not all that surprising. The average price of 1kg of rice in Japan is approximately 500 yen, compared to only 85 yen in Vietnam... the tiny town of Inakadate in Aomori Prefecture has become world-famous for their giant rice paddy murals and how they make them."
Japanese Girl Achieves Life Long Dream By Going On A Date With Godzilla - "Imagine being able to go on a date with your favourite fictional character. That’s exactly what 13-year-old Seira Watanabe got to experience with the man, or should we say kaiju, of her dreams. Watanabe is such a huge fan of Godzilla that she even wrote in to to the producers of the television show Tantei! Knight Scoop, an Osaka television show which takes (often silly) requests from viewers, and turns those dreams into reality... The two then went on a sweet date with the girl even preparing a bento lunch for Godzilla. Her supportive grandfather even went along as a chaperon. The couple held hands and visited the Godzilla Museum on Awaji Island. Afterwards, the two stopped for lunch but as Godzilla couldn’t really eat the bento, Watanabe pretend-fed him and even served him tea. The cute date for the couple ended on a sparkling beach at sunset. The girl tried proposing to Godzilla but unfortunately, he had to reject her. Nonetheless, she still got to share a kiss with him and exchange roars on the seashore."
Meme - "If you pull the lever, Harambe will die. If you don't, his existence will never be appreciated. What do we value higher? Harambe or the idea of Harambe?"
Japanese "Cosplay Queen" Shocks Fans by Revealing That She Is Actually a Man - "A popular Japanese cosplayer known for transforming herself into real-life versions of hot female anime characters, recently came out as a man who uses makeup, wigs and various accessories to achieve a shockingly feminine look. With over 65,000 followers on Twitter, and several other thousands on Instagram, Rei Dunois can safely be described as a fairly popular female cosplayer... in case you’re wondering how the male cosplayer got those big boobs, they’re actually a silicone prosthesis concealed with makeup"
This cute 'Japanese girl' is actually a 42 year old man; truth will leave you shockedBorn in 1977, Takuma is a Japanese singer. His pictures often go viral on social media, in which he is seen as a school girl."
Facebook - "When you go after someone with full on aggression especially online, (this appalling incivility hasn't reached face to face interaction yet, but it's starting to bleed in) you must understand and anticipate the response might, and often times will be disproportionately heavy handed. This is part of the game. A vicious game. A game you chose to play on your own free will. Don't get mad, get better at defending your ideas. We've all heard, "Everyone is entitled to their opinion." No. No they are not. You're only entitled to opinions when you can defend the ideas within them. If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. Or at least understand that not every exchange between opposing sides need be a fully loaded salvo. There is another way though. If you disagree with the argument being put forth, engage without aggression. We have this tendency to escalate situations especially online. When that happens, neither party gains much insight on the opposing view. So then what was the point of it all?"
Core progress in AI has stalled in some fields - "Artificial intelligence (AI) just seems to get smarter and smarter. The surge reflects faster chips, more data, and better algorithms. But some of the improvement comes from tweaks rather than the core innovations their inventors claim—and some of the gains may not exist at all. Researchers have evaluated 81 pruning algorithms, programs that make neural networks, a type of AI, more efficient by trimming unneeded connections. All claimed superiority in slightly different ways. But when the researchers tried to evaluate them side by side, there was no clear evidence of performance improvements over a 10-year period. There are other signs of shaky progress across AI. A 2019 meta-analysis of information retrieval algorithms used in search engines concluded the "high-water mark … was actually set in 2009." Another study in 2019 reproduced seven recommendation systems, of the kind used by media streaming services. It found that six failed to outperform much simpler algorithms developed years before, at least when the earlier techniques were fine-tuned, revealing "phantom progress.""
Meme - "Broke men are hurting American women's marriage prospects"
"lots of insecure men replying to this one"
"You literally have your cash app in your Twitter bio, pipe down you tramp
"and your dad sends me money, what of it"
"At least he made more of an effort than your actual dad"
Mystery tree beast turns out to be croissant - "When animal welfare officers received a report of an unusual animal lurking in a tree in the Polish city of Krakow, they were not sure what to expect."
I thought it was a joke. Until I found out he thinks it’ll make his child tougher... : insanepeoplefacebook - "I grew up without a father, and I want my child to feel that pain too."
