America’s high homicide rate - "Among advanced developed countries, the United States has the highest homicide rate: 7.8 per 100,000 population in 2020. Most others, including Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Spain and the United Kingdom, have homicide rates that are a fraction of this level (Figure 1)"
Saying half the murders are committed by black people doesn't help much, because even if the murder rate is halved, it's still much higher than other developed countries
In Syria, militias armed by the Pentagon fight those armed by the CIA - Los Angeles Times - "Syrian militias armed by different parts of the U.S. war machine have begun to fight each other on the plains between the besieged city of Aleppo and the Turkish border, highlighting how little control U.S. intelligence officers and military planners have over the groups they have financed and trained in the bitter five-year-old civil war."
Meme - "A young man professed a desire to become a great writer. When asked to define 'great' he said, want to write stuff that the whole world will read, stuff that people will react to on truly emotional level, stuff that will make them scream, cry, howl in pain and anger!' He now works for Microsoft writing error messages."
Love, Sex and Jealousy: Unreasonable - FML - "Today, my husband demanded I delete all my male friends/contacts except family members. All this because I texted one of my male friends, “Happy Birthday! Hope you have a good one.” According to him, “One thing leads to another then next thing you know you both are in bed fucking like rabbits.” FML"
Meme - "Stay Safe On Ice, Walk Like A Penguin
HOW TO WALK ON ICE
Normaity, when we walk, our legs' ability to support our weight is split mid-stride
Walking this way on ice forces each leg to support the weight of the body at an angle that is not perpendicular to the surface of the ice, resulting in a nasty fall
To walk on ice, keep your center of gravity over your front leg
One animal that has figured this out is a penguin. Think of yourself as a penguin and you'll be all right"
Meme - Pooldad @pooldad: "if you pixelate the picture of justin beibers house a bit it looks like it's from a 1999 strategy game"
Egyptian Chef Reminisces on Salafi TV about Days of Saddam When Taunted by Shiite Prank Caller - "Yousuf: Is this dough made with the breast milk of Wahhabi women, or with the milk of 'Aisha? Muhammad Fawzi: You are real scum, trust me. You keep calling in, using a Sunni name, a respectable name. We accept your call, believing that you are a respectable man. Even if you are Shiite and hold beliefs that differ from those of the Muslims, you must show respect to the Muslims, you scum. I have nothing more to say. May God help you."
Meme - "Hail Satan. Heheh, I'm so edgy"
"Haha, Heil Hitler"
"Don't you know how insensitive you're being when you joke like that? Do you understand what Hitler stood for? You're perpetuating toxic ideas to other people whether you realize it or not"
This is a good illustration of how the Christian claim that atheists hate God even though they don't believe he exists is nonsense. The reason why in the moral framework it is okay to say Hail Satan but not Heil Hitler is that the latter existed (even if you ignore that Satan hardly did anything bad in the Bible and most of it was by God's instigation to Job)
Meme - "My family: For sure when he gets a girlfriend, he'll mature
My girlfriend and I: *2 people in dinosaur costumes*"
Meme - "You wanna know why they call me Peggy, Hank? *Traumatised Hank*"
Club promoter who killed schoolboy with one punch is spared jail - "A club promoter has avoided jail after been found guilty of first degree manslaughter for killing a schoolboy with a single punch in Crete. Harrow pupil Archie Lloyd, 18, was celebrating the end of his A-level exams with friends in the town of Malia on the Greek island when he was knocked to the ground by Sebastian Trabucatti in August 2015. Greek judges spared the killer any immediate jail time and handed him a suspended four-year prison sentence... They had exchanged insults which culminated in Mr Lloyd saying to Trabucatti: "One day you will work for me"... Mr Lloyd and his best friend Andy Hutchinson had been walking in the middle of the road but clashed with Trabucatti when he and two women on quad bikes hooted at them to move out of the way. They had briefly met hours earlier in a nightclub toilet where they talked about girls and their trip, the courtroom was told. Trabucatti, of Haywards Heath, West Sussex, punched Mr Lloyd in the face and pushed over Mr Hutchinson after telling the pair to apologise for shouting obscenities to the women"
Stanford Graduate School of Business on Twitter - "“The minute you have a back-up plan, you’ve admitted you’re not going to succeed.” –@Theranos CEO & Founder Elizabeth Holmes #GSBvftt"
From 2015. So much for that
Meme - "God told the man in white to drink wine but never get married. He told the man in black not to drink wine but get four wives. *Pope Francis and Iraq’s top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani*"
Antony Beevor: “No country is as much a prisoner of its past as Russia” - "Will Russia ever be a stable democracy?
I pray that that will happen one day, but no country is as much a prisoner of its past as Russia. The country has never had the opportunity to develop democracy. I was deeply struck by Konstantin Paustovsky’s observation. “The idyllic aspect of the first days of the revolution was disappearing,” he wrote in his memoir. “Whole worlds were shaking and falling to the ground. Most of the intelligentsia lost its head, that great humanist Russian intelligentsia which had been the child of Pushkin and Herzen, of Tolstoy and Chekhov. It had known how to create high spiritual values, but with only a few exceptions it proved helpless at creating the organisation of a state.” A great friend of mine who is Russian once told me why she and other women found it so hard to find the right Russian man. Half-joking, she argued that either they are poetic dreamers and hopeless with the practicalities of life, or else they are successful shits who treat women badly."
Nordstrom in Toronto tries to sell single shoes in last-ditch efforts of clearance sale - ""Any single leg amputees need a single, new shoe? Nordstrom $5 SALE alert!" someone posted on Toronto Reddit along with a photo of few shelves that do indeed advertise single shoes for only $5 each. The sale signage notes that the products are great for dogs — because what the heck else would most people be able to use only one shoe for? — but the considerate poster also noted that perhaps the items could be of use to persons with disabilities. One user in the comment section said that as someone with a leg brace that necessitates wearing two differently-sized shoes, Nordstrom was one of the few stores that allowed them to break a pair between sizes rather than having to purchase two pairs... The single items could also be a result of theft, damage, or errors in boxing up pairs for purchase, those with retail backgrounds added."
Meme - "Remember when you were making out with your first girlfriend and you came right as she touched your leg? It was me, Barry. I jerked you off at super speed so it would seem like you nutted at just a woman's touch"
Meme - "This was the last question on my English final...
100. In Mrs. Thompson's class, we had ___ with sonnets.
a) Torture
b) Fun
c) Nothing
d) You should probably answer B"
Meme - "Pop psychology is not psychology.
Seerut K. Chawla I @seerutkchawla
Everyone you dislike is not a narcissist.
Every unpleasant experience is not trauma.
Having needs does not make you codependent.
Disagreement is not gaslighting.
Conflict is not abuse.
Taking offence is not being triggered.
Everything does not need to be normalised.
Speaking like an HR memo is not self-awareness."
Meme - "When you're too white for the Mexicans and too Mexican for the whites *girl*"
Meme - "JACK DANIELS
LISTERINE WHISKEY FLAVOR
40% ALCOHOL"
Meme - "saw this today at a local carnival
Help Wanted. Only apply if
- You have a babysitter for the kids you forgot you have
- You are willing to work
- You are not looking for or have another job
- everyone in your family is in good health and not in the hospital
- you can stand and work
- you can count money
- you can add
- you don't need a smoke break every 15 minutes
- you can get to work on your own
- you don't need a cell phone glued to your ear
- you don't need a break every 30 minutes
- Ladies please dress for work in a family atmosphere (not a street corner)"
Meme - "Oh no! This man is doubting his existence! Is there anyone here who's a philosopher?"
"I am!"
"Excuse me, sir: According to Rene Descartes, you exist because you think. You think, therefore you are"
*cheers*
Cat: "That dream again where your philosophy degree is useful?"
Man: "Yep."
Many people are in need thanks to Covid-19 – we should be supporting as many as we can, especially children
The original headline was "Children as state assets may be the way forward" but reality is less sexy
'Dark design' can nudge you into tipping more, says expert - "approach to design — and those preset amounts — can be designed to play on a customer's desire to appear generous, and nudge them into tipping more... There's an aspect of the social desirability bias that comes into this, we want to be viewed by others as being good or as being socially accepted. So what is the norm in terms of tipping to be socially accepted, to not be seen by either the person who was selling us a good, or the people we go to the restaurant with and we hang around with — if you go with a bunch of friends to not be seen as being cheap... It's social desirability bias, and then it also plays with the Hawthorne Effect, which shows that when we're being observed, we tend to change our behaviour to be slightly more positive... If you give three options, for example, let's say 8 per cent, 10 per cent and 15 per cent, people will normally not pick the first option because it looks like you're being the cheapest.... So people will pick the second or the third option"
Here's what cusomers can do to take charge of out of control tipping | Toronto Sun - "A recent poll by the Angus Reid Institute seems to show customers growing frustrated with tipping. Their poll from February 2023 showed 59% annoyed with “tiplflation” and wanting to move to a system where establishments did away with tipping and paid higher wages compared to just 40% saying the same thing in 2016... Toronto restaurateur Eric Wang told City News that he was going tip-free in part to deal with biased wait staff who wouldn’t treat customers of some backgrounds the same. While restaurants in Toronto and other Canadian cities are still moving towards going tip-free, in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago many are abandoning the move. Anyone skilled in serving can earn more than $100,000 per year in a good restaurant in a major city, an income that pays better than many other jobs. That may not be the reality for most servers, but even in lower-rent establishments, tips can be impressive. Cutting them out and paying servers “fair wages” may sound good to the owners, the patrons and the media establishments who cover them, but it isn’t something many in the service industry want because for those who are good at their jobs, it can cut wages... The old rule might still be the best, 10% for standard service in a restaurant, 15% for good service and 20% for great service."
Tip-flation has some restaurants asking for up to 30% in tips - "prompts on credit card machines that previously asked for tips of 10 to 20 per cent have now crept up to 18, 20 or 25 per cent. Carson has also been asked to tip as much as 30 per cent, and said she finds the higher prompts annoying. It's leading to an overall feeling that could be called tip-flation. "Because food and wages cost more, the bill is now 10 per cent higher than it used to be. So it still equals a very large tip because the bill is so high," said Carson. The restaurant reviewer, who typically eats out three to six times a week, started noticing this trend during the first COVID-19 lockdown. "Restaurants couldn't do anything but takeout. People felt very badly for restaurant workers, and so people were leaving much higher percentages than the suggested tip levels," said Carson. Carson suggested restaurants noticed that customers were willing to tip more, so they began asking for more... In Canada, either the employee or the employer can control the distribution of gratuities."
Canada's tipping culture is flawed and there's no clear fix in sight: experts - ""I went to my local craft brewery the other day, just to the bottle shop, to pick up a couple of cans of my favourites," von Massow said. "When I was paying there, literally someone grabbed beer out of the fridge and gave it to me and I was prompted to tip in that circumstance." He calls it a "double whammy" for consumers, with more businesses asking for tips while simultaneously raising their prices. "You know, I've started to wonder if I give a particularly good lecture, should I put a jar at the front of the lecture hall at the end, and as they file out? Maybe they could drop a few bills in there for me, too. I mean, where does it stop?"... many businesses that replace tipping with service charges don't succeed. Customers like the illusion of having power over the server and the server likes the illusion of controlling the amount of their own income"
Meme - "#gay
#lesbian
#bisexual
All the gay hashtags are rainbow
Now watch
#kissingthehomiesgoodnight
See it's not gay"
Male masturbation may increase chances of having offspring, scientists say - "Analysis by University College London (UCL) said the act of self-pleasuring may help with successful fertilisation by increasing arousal before sex. The scientists also said ejaculating after masturbation helps shed low-quality semen, leaving fresh sperm available for mating. The researchers added it may also reduce the risk of contracting sexually-transmitted infections (STIs). However, the scientists said the benefits of female masturbation – from an evolutionary perspective – remain less clear."
“I forgive Malik”, says Soh Rui Yong, but what for? - "The Judge found that Soh had behaved unreasonably and in an illogical manner and showed a lack of empathy, compassion and gratitude based on three incidents relating to the 2017 SEA Games, namely:
The dispute between Soh and SNOC on SNOC’s Blackout Period where Soh promoted his own sponsors and publicly disparaged SNOC’s officials for implementing this rule;
Soh’s cutting of ventilation holes in the attire provided by SA’s sponsor, 2XU, contrary to the instructions of 2XU; and
Soh’s public protest against SNOC’s requirement that he donate 20% of his prize money to SA.
Soh promoted his own sponsors and in his post of 9 August 2017, made a personal attack that SNOC officials “who agreed upon implementing this rule, many of whom sit on comfortable salaries while policing the social media activity of the very athletes that make them money in the first place. Without the athletes … sports officials wouldn’t even have a job!”... It was undisputed that Soh wore a 2XU singlet with ventilation holes cut into the singlet, contrary to 2XU’s instructions. The Judge decided that it was unreasonable of Soh to insist on wearing the cut singlet, when the sponsor had expressly stated that it was not agreeable to this. The Judge stated that this further showed that Soh was only thinking of himself, lacked empathy for the concerns of the sponsor, the concerns of SA which had to manage the sponsor, and the concerns of his fellow athletes who may be affected by any decision of the sponsor to review its sponsorship of athletes. In relation to Soh’s public protest against SNOC’s requirement that he donate 20% of his Multi-Million Dollar Award Program (“MAP”) prize (which amounted to $2,000) to SA, the Judge decided that Soh went far beyond just criticising the administration of SA. Soh stated that “underperforming SA administrators … should be getting a 20 percent pay cut”. Although it may have been open to Soh to express concerns about SA which had also been expressed by other athletes, Sports Singapore and Singapore Sports Institute, it is hard to fathom how his unnecessarily combative and personal attacks on SA administrators stood to benefit either himself or his fellow athletes. Again, it appears that Soh was simply grandstanding to his supporters, without caring whether his words would facilitate the change which he claimed was needed at SA. The words used by Soh were unreasonable and illogical and gave the impression that Soh was more concerned with stoking controversy, rather than working towards real change that would benefit the sporting community... In Soh’s post of 1 August 2019, he attacked and mocked SNOC, stating that: (a) “SNOC President Tan Chuan-Jin and his team have chosen to behave in such a petty manner”, and (b) their actions were “akin to primary school playground politics”. The Judge found that the language Soh used went beyond expressing his objection to not being selected despite meeting the objective criteria. Soh’s personal attacks went far beyond any disagreement on whether SNOC should take into consideration his attitude and behaviour. The Judge found that the Soh’s personal attacks against SNOC had descended to a level that was unreasonable and illogical. In the light of the aforesaid reasons, the Judge found that Soh had persistently behaved unreasonably and illogically to the extent that it showed that his sense of logic and reason had been impaired. The incidents highlighted by the Judge showed that Soh displayed a lack of empathy, compassion and gratitude"
Somehow, Soh Rui Yong not being allowed to compete because of his antics is being spun by some people as political persecution, then you get irrational claims
Someone claimed this blog post was written by his lawyer so it was unreliable. I told him that he can report the lawyer for misquoting the judge and hit him for contempt of court or something similar
Meme - "Hello?"
"What?"
"i'm fine
thank you for accepting my invitation
I hope I do not disturb you?"
"No problem are you a robot?"
"How old are you?"
"4 thousand years old."
"me i'm 22
what's you job?"
"I basically bring souls across an interdimensional portal to feed to the Ancient Ones. What do you do for fun?"
"me i'm a Caregiver
what are you doing now?"
"Harvesting an elderly lady for organs and eventually collecting her soul."
"I'm alone in my room and naked, you want to see me ?"
"Not really, this old bitch is kinda putting up a fight. Maybe later."
"promise me that it will stay between us OK ??"
"Bitch, I just admitted to harvesting organs. You better be the one to keep quiet. Snitches get stitches."
The Divorce Rate Is Much Lower Than You Think - "You've heard it a million times: Half of marriages end in divorce. But is that even true? Not even close, according to the new book The Good News About Marriage: Debunking Discouraging Myths About Marriage and Divorce by Shaunti Feldhahn... According to 2009 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the average percent of all marriages that have ever ended in divorce is 30.8 percent, says Feldhahn. "But that's all marriages—the first, second, third, and tenth marriages. What most people are interested in are first marriages." According to that same data set, on average, 72 percent of people are still married to their first spouse. "And of the 28 percent who are aren't, a big chunk of that could be people who were married for 50 years and their spouses died," says Feldhahn. See why it's so complicated to get an exact number? "So no one knows what the first marriage divorce rate actually is, but we can get a lot closer," says Feldhahn. "We know it's lower than 28 percent, because 28 percent includes death and divorce. Based on the rate of widowhood and a few other factors, you can estimate somewhere around 20 and 25 percent of first marriages have ended in divorce." That said, there are some groups who are at a higher risk of divorce than others. For instance, the Baby Boomer generation (those aged 50-59) has a 41 percent ever divorced number (on average), says Feldhahn, yet that also includes any remarriages, which tend to have a slightly higher divorce rate. But even among this high-risk group of people, 73 percent of them, on average, are still married to their first spouse, says Feldhahn. That's pretty huge! The fact is, your rate of divorce is nowhere near 50 percent if you get married tomorrow. Plus, it's decreasing every year... Here's another sad stat you've likely heard: Second marriages are even more doomed than first marriages. While it's true that your divorce rate is slightly higher for remarriages, it's not all bad news. According to those 2009 Census Bureau numbers, 65 percent of remarried people, on average, are still married to their second spouse. And again, Feldhahn notes that a good chunk of the 35 percent who are not still married may be due to spouses passing away... Another myth that Feldhahn was delighted to bust: that many married people aren't all that happy. In fact, studies show that about 80 percent of married people enjoy being husband and wife, says Feldhahn. "The reality that most sociologists have found is that among all of society, people who are the happiest are those who are in long-term, committed marriages.""
Meme - "Kids these days will never know the struggle
Saving: from ftp.netscape.com
Estimated time left, 39 years
(8.89 MB of 180 MB copied)
This is not an exaggeration. Your download speed would slow down to the point where Windows would make this kind of absurd estimate, and you'd sigh and leave the room for a while (because you couldn't use the computer while it was doing this for fear it would crash and lose all your progress) and then you'd come back in 40 minutes and maybe it would now say 52 years or maybe it would say 3 minutes, who knew, not Windows."
Preetam Rai - "When i miss the world, i go to Bangkok. Bangkok has the widest range of budget international food in Asia, you can find Afghan, Ethiopian, Yemeni, Peruvian,Tibetan along with more mainstream Japanese, Korean, Sichuanese etc. Thanks to liberal visas, the sheer number of international connections, and somewhat neutral stance (Bangkok airport is the only place in SE Asia where you spot an Israeli and Iranian plane next to each other on the tarmac), you can meet people from almost anywhere. Neighbouring Burma is also well represented. My current favourite is Kalyana (for live music and immaculately dressed staff) and a little hidden away alley off Phetchaburi 15 that has three Burmese places next to each other and is a sort of meeting place of the community. Try the spicy Arakan soup and the various salads. Thanks to Emily for recommendations."
