That last open thread has been closed. I am deeply offended. People were jibber-jabberin’ about sidekicks and crime-fighting duos and no one mentioned The Avengers. I will not tolerate such slack and neglect.
Let’s begin this one with some appreciation for Diana Rigg as Emma Peel, please.
/spam on
I don’t want to turn PZ’s place into a Job Service web site, but if any Pharyngulistas in the Boise area need any fine woodwork or even basic finish carpentry done, just ask and I’ll post my email.
/spam off
boygenius,
That sucks big-time. I’m looking for jobs in the minimum wage to $15/hr range, but it’s just really hard right now to get anything. Several of my friends have been looking for months and still have nothing. Even minimum wage jobs are pretty limited right now. I hate this recession so fucking much! What really pisses me off is that most of the jobs are never coming back. Maybe I should take the LSAT and go to law school…
Surely being “overqualified” should be an incentive to the potential employer, rather than a problem?
Weird.
Why not argue the point? Ask why they’d prefer someone merely (or even barely) qualified over someone even more qualified than required.
(Are they worried you’ll leave as soon as you find better work, or that you’ll get bored and slack off, or that you’ll do things your own way, or what?)
John Morales,
I think you just nailed it right there. Apparently there are just so many jobs that I’ll get a better one right away and then they’ll just have to find someone new. Also, I’m a flight risk. Who knew? I could, at any moment, up and decide to move. GRRRR!
Something got me in the mood for
chick singersfemale vocalists tonight:Ani DiFranco
Brenda Kahn
Madeleine Peyroux
Paul W, good work on the trainwreck thread but probably a tactical mistake to point out the hypocrisy of people accepting the (ever so selective) use of the ‘bitch’ insult compared to ‘sidekick’.
Speaking of sidekicks (which, to be frank, is a lot more generous than a probably more accurate term like doe-eyed sycophant) I would like to stick up for Stephanie Z for a change (!!)
If anyone has visited the GL blog over the past year or so you would immediately realize that it is in fact a two person team. Greg has the title and kudos but it is Stephanie Z that commands us to ‘respect his authoritae’. In fact Stephanie Z appears to be the only person (Greg included!) who knows what all the blog posts are about.
So, the obvious question –
Why isn’t Stephanie Z a co-host of that blog?
Does she not realize she is being used as Greg’s first line of defense – to attack anyone who dares criticize Greg?
OK, the host is scienceblogs and she doesn’t seem to know much about science and tends to fly off the handle and call people racists or anti-Semites at the drop of a hat but I, for one would prefer this behavior, if it is going to happen, to be out in the open. At the moment it seems like an underhand tactic that allows Greg to insult people (by having Stephanie do it and then complementing and agreeing with her insult post) while allowing him the security of never having used the exact words.
So, if you read this Greg, make an honest blogger of Stephanie Z and promote her to co-host!
I’m listening to an Andrew Lloyd Webber compilation CD myself. There, I admitted it. I listen to musicals in my free time. Sometimes I turn the volume up so that I can sing along without being able to hear myself too.
I don’t know why they think I’m overqualified. I have no work expirience. Why are there no positions for broke college students?
Time to fly,
fly,
fly!
Night.
I get the point regarding the sidekick tactics, but she does have her own blog already…:-)
Which, incidentally, and for A Noyd’s info, who was concerned at me being concerned earlier, was what I was trying to point out upthread, because it just gave GLSZ an excuse to ignore his arguments and just cry “sexist” instead.
All of the above, in yesteryears economy. I’ve had dozens of employees over the years and have encountered all of those situations.
1. As soon as you get them trained to your expectations, they quit and start their own business and bid against you. (Doesn’t apply, because there is no work to speak of to bid on.)
2. People who got bored and slacked off on my job were given 1 (one) warning and if they didn’t get after it, they were fired. (I would expect no different treatment for myself.)
3. I hired a lot of people who had been self-employed that thought they knew it all and wanted to do things their way. I would gently remind them that I sign their check and I want it done my way. If they had a problem with that, see ‘ya. (When I work for someone else, I follow their lead and do what they ask, even if I disagree.)
Weirdly enough, despite my involvement in theatre I don’t actually listen to show tunes other than when I’m in/at a show – though after doing the one-off Chicago over the weekend I’m contemplating getting hold of one of the cast recordings of that.
Actually, that reminds me that Jesus Christ Superstar is another I’d think about.
boygenius,
Most of my jobs have been minimum wage drudgery that I did to pay bills. Other than that I’ve been a TA and an instructor on a term basis. There’s not much available right now in my area for full-time employment and teaching one class at a community college isn’t going to cut it.
I, personally, have always done my job the way my supervisors wanted. They are, after all, the people who hired me and who know what they want out of an employee. Basically, I follow orders because an employer pays me to. I understand that a lot of people don’t see it that way, but I do. It’s part of working for someone else.
John Morales @ 503,
It’s a common problem. In the dying days of our last Tory government I had a complete set of people like Pygmy Loris and boygenius to try to help in a Job Club I was running.
These were people with arm-loads of degrees, diplomas and a work experience to back them up and, sometimes for 3 years or more, they had been getting that same response – “you’re over-qualified.”
From that and my own experience I have come to the conclusion that employers, qua employers, are inherently stupid – thinking only of the next balance sheet, terrified that the person they take on might have his/her own personality, might know more about a highly technical job than the boss does!
Two thoughts spring to mind. I’m bloody glad I have retired and don’t have to do this again in a couple of years time. Also, I demand – and probably won’t get – a government which will kick ass when it comes to the social responsibility of employers.
How’s your head, Walton?
Pygmy Loris,
Yes, I have had many a ponderous and dreary job in my time as well. They were the impetus for me to set off on my own (stick my dick out and risk it being cut off, in the words of my mentor “Bob the Impervious”). The headaches and drudgery are a lot easier to overcome when it’s your own enterprise.
I’s the b’y that builds the boat
And I’s the b’y that sails her
Oops, I linked to the wiki. Here’s the song:
I’s the B’y
A quick Dianna Rigg story. An acquaintance of mine frequently tells the story of meeting her in the early 1970s. He worked at the time for a home decor company and went to her apartment (as a young and impressionable 19 year old) in London to hang some curtains, only to be seduced, Mrs Robinson style, by the aforementioned Avenger. The same guy went on to be a touring rock musician who had numerous tales of semi-famous conquests of european punk and new wave artistes and while I cannot verify his story he certainly sounds sincere about the Diana Rigg tale.
Even if its not really true I’d like to imagine that it might have been a possibility (with or without the cat-suit – although preferably with!)
Sigmund & Rorschach:
Y’all are right. I fucked up with the joke. If I could have delivered it in person, with the right inflection, it’d have been obviously a silly joke, and not seem like such a vicious attack.
In print, more the latter. :-( I got sloppy and just tossed it off, and it sounded way meaner than I meant to. (I did mean to sound snarky and a little mean, but not nearly THAT mean.)
The joke’s supposed to be a reductio ad absurdam argument that says
* IF I accept Greg’s use of “bitch” as not sexist, which Stephanie tacitly endorses, and
* IF I accept Stephanie’s claim that “sidekick” is a sexist, demeaning term,
* THEN I should use “his bitch” to express that relationship, rather than “his sidekick”, IF what I’m concerned about is sexism.
Which is of course ridiculous. It’s obvious that calling somebody somebody’s bitch is way more sexist than calling them their sidekick.
That’s the point—that you can’t take the conclusion seriously or literally, so something must be wrong with one of the premises: “bitch” IS sexist and/or “sidekick” ISN’T so sexist.
This joke went awry in several ways:
1. People took it as a serious attack, not recognizing that the conclusion is supposed to be obviously ridiculous. They just didn’t get it that it’s a reductio ad absurdam. They though I was actually calling Stephanie Greg’s bitch in a very serious, very vicious, very personal way.
And I was calling her that, sorta, snarkily, but only a little bit. That was just supposed to be a little snarky hyperbole, not a sincere, vicious, hurtful-as-possible attack.
My mistake. I fucked up.
2. People largely didn’t get the point, probably mostly because they were distracted by #1. They didn’t get the point that the premises are fucked up, which is the serious point, so if you accept both you’re at least inconsistent, and maybe hypocritical.
That was the part that was supposed to be sincere, and a little nasty. I was calling Stephanie hypocritical for being so hypervigilant about possible sexism in terms like “sidekick,” and trying to find dog whistles, but so blithely accepting of Greg calling SC “a bitch.”
That was supposed to be the most “offensive” part, using a joke to highlight an apparent inconsistency and possible hypocrisy.
3. People correctly pointed out that there’s a lack of parallelism between calling somebody a bitch, and calling them someone’s bitch. The former is much more accepted as a normal insult than the latter.
I think that’s what doomed me to sound like an asshole. (Well, a rather bigger asshole than I actually am.)
I think that there may be some parallelism there—“bitch” is more cutting than (say) “asshole” in a way that’s fairly parallel to how “his bitch” is more cutting than, say, “his sidekick” or even “his flunky”—but it’s not obvious, and it’s not obvious how that relates to the sexist connotations of both senses of the word.
So I managed a hat trick of gratuitous offensiveness with one ill-considered, flip joke that was actually making a serious point. Shit.
I guess this stuff’s Not Funny.
I think I do owe Stephanie a bit of an apology—the joke was a bit overly obnoxious—but not a huge one, and I’m not sure how to put it.
No I don’t actually think you do. We know they read this thread, and we had to expect that the finer points of your argument would fly right over their heads, so since you have explained and dissected it here to the point that George Bush could understand it, I dont think you have to apologize at all, because you made it crystal clear that it was not a sexist comment.
Paul W.,
That comment reads like an apology to me.
Paul W, I don’t think you have anything to apologize for. Anyone who read the context of the thread would see that you weren’t calling her a bitch, you were simply pointing out the logic of her own double standards. Where I think you made a mistake is in assuming logic has much part of that discourse. We saw how little it took for SC to be labeled anti-Semetic and I have seen in the past how easy it is to be labeled racist on that site (just disagree with Greg on any point concerning population genetics).
There were two ways the offending line could have been taken
1. Unhypocritical (but still hypersensitive and ignoring context)
Using the word ‘bitch’ as an insult is sexist and should never be used by anyone – so both you and Greg were out of order.
or
2. Hypocritical
How dare you use the word bitch you sexist pig!
(While ignoring several others on their side hve used it in a direct manner, including calling someone the biggest bitch on the internet because she objected to being called anti-Semetic!)
This was a no win scenario for you. You accused them of hypocrisy and they simply proved your point by reacting with more hypocrisy but now they feel justified since they have a new target (you) to hate.
Paul W., you do not owe her an apology. Your absurdum was obvious, and while there is a trivial difference in meaning between “a bitch” and “his bitch”, it is not that one is not sexist.
I am disgusted with Greg’s sexism, and Stephanie’s defense of it. If you want to apologize just because, then whatever, but I won’t watch an apology be demanded and manipulated out of you by those hypocrites.
As Greg and Stephanie seem to hold “I wasn’t calling you antisemitic” to be sufficient, they deserve no more than “I wasn’t calling you a bitch.”
In which I wholeheartedly agree with SGBM.
*marks event in calender*
;)
My heart goes out to Pygmy Loris and boy genius. So much depends on which part of the economy you are in. Positions in my field are going begging even offering six figure salaries, and all of us who do have jobs complain we have more to do than we can possibly do. At least your problems remind me that I am lucky to have my own.
I wish you luck.
a_ray,
Six figure salaries going begging? Where do I sign?
Oh, wait. Mayhaps I should have stayed in school instead of dropping out to follow the Grateful Dead around for six years. (Not that I have any regrets.) :-)
I have to agree with the others here, Paul W. You do not need to apologize; you did not call Stephanie Z a bitch. You said that by their standards, it seems like we should. They needed a taste of their own medicine. They are hypocrites to complain about it or they are still joking around and the joke is on you.
SC has been implicitly called an antisemite (by Greg and by Stephanie Z and several people who piped up out of the ether) and explicitly called a bitch (by Greg and by Dunnigan and it has been deemed acceptable by Stephanie Z), and we have been called a firing squad (and by implication, Nazis or Stalinists/Communists). The ones who need to apologize are Greg and Stephanie Z, to us.
I thought your tactical mistake was a good way to end the charade, with them huffing and puffing trying to blow down their own strawperson.
126 comments overnight. Oh man. See you later today.
Britain in 2010 isn’t the same as Britain in 1979, and we can’t offer the same solutions as though they were magic answers to everything. – Walton
I agree with the widespread approbation of Walton’s demonstrated ability to change his mind. However, I must point out that Britain in 1979 bore very little resemblance to Walton’s idea of Britain in 1979. At no time in my lifetime (and contrary to what I thought myself around 1974 and 1981) has Britain been anywhere near either dictatorship or social breakdown.
Knockgoats 363
You have got this backwards. It was Pygmy Loris* who was using the “tradition” of having (a few) Style Events in the Olympics to argue against me. I was pointing out that if he wished to invoke “tradition” as the reason (and that was the only one he gave) for retaining such events, then the “tradition” of not having any judges is even older. The Modern Olympics didn’t allow women until 1912. Does anyone want to revive that “tradition”?
My point really is that, in an already bloated Olympics, it makes no sense to me to continually add Style Events.
If anyone wants extra events then I (and I would presume, most of you) think the very first priority would be to give the women the extra events. They don’t have the same number of (eg) track or cycling events as the men do, not being allowed to compete over as many distances.
Being fobbed off with Synchronised Swimming (or prancing around with ribbons, balls, and hoops) instead seems to me to be merely adding sexist insult to sexist injury. What next? Cheerleading? Lap Dancing?
Carlie 365
:) Now you’re being silly (and, actually, many athletes have competed barefoot). There’s a difference between the cost of a pair of shoes that probably still cost less than the air fare to get to the Games, and something like a horse or a boat, that costs tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of dollars.
Yes, the richer nations, or individuals, will always have an advantage (training facilities, coaching, sponsorship etc) but I don’t see why competitors should be permitted a massive advantage by coming from a rich country, or one with better technology either (eg British cyclists at the last Games).
People should all use basically the same equipment imho. Either the Olympic organisers provide equal equipment so that anyone can compete, or remove the events in which only rich can compete. Isn’t one of the big things trumpeted about the Olympics its inclusiveness?
‘Tis Himself 375
Yeah, I deliberately ommitted mentioning sailing, in case it upset you. :) Actually, I quite like watching the sailing events (especially when someone has to stop someone else winning a round in order to win overall, it gets really dirty, all that “wind stealing” etc) but, due to the fact that only a sub-set of nations compete, I don’t regard a sailing medal as anywhere near the equal of a track or field medal.
*Just my opinion, no need to get excited, or defensive :) If I said I didn’t like children being sent to Sunday School and being brainwashed, would you just invoke “tradition” and tell me to “deal with it”? I’m open to being convinced that my opinions are BS, but you’ll have to present a better case than just that in order to change my mind.
To many employers, hiring someone for 3/4 their past wages is a good deal, but hiring someone at 1/4 their past wages is just shameful.
But Ring-Tailed Lemurian, it’s not just the equipment. It’s also the coaches, the training facilities, etc. Even if the IOC provided standard equipment and paid-for coaches, it’s being well-off enough to spend 3-8 hours every day training rather than working.
Ring Tailed Lemurian #529
@What next? Cheerleading? Lap Dancing?’
Extreme ironing?
My girlfriend does competitive Cheerleading (taken up as a fun and healthy hobby as a 30-year-old), so I’d like to point out that yours is a bit of silly comparison.
Cheerleading is a kind of gymnastic dance, and there are male and female participants, so it isn’t necessarily a spectacle simply for the delectation of leering, male, American sports fans and/or uniform fetishists that you might imagine.
I just felt the need to defend the honour of (male and female) cheerleaders everywhere. (I’m not arguing that it should be an Olympic sport. I’m off to polish my armour…)
Carlie, but…but…but I said that.
Some inequalities will always remain, but once competitors get to the Games I think everything should be done, where possible and practical, to provide “a level playing field”.
People can’t bring their own javelins or vaulting poles etc. I realise you need ‘body-tailored’ equipment in some sports (eg cycling) but the IOC could still insist that the underlying technology and constituent materials of the equipment is standardised.
Far more importantly, though, what do you think about the sexism I mentioned, where women aren’t allowed as many events as men? (track events, swimming, cycling etc). It’s just a hangover from the attitude that women are “too fragile” to compete over longer distances and it is “unfeminine” to have them sweating and grimacing.
I’d also ban from all international sporting events any country that bans female competitors domestically at any, or all, sports (Saudi Arabia, Iran etc). The IOC rightly banned South Africa for its racist policies, why isn’t there the same attitude to gender discrimination? Oh yeah, it’s “religious”, not sexist. That’s fine.
The womens’ marathon is only just beginning to fufil its potential as a result of that sort of thinking.
The rapid improvement in the world standard in recent decades (and particularly since its introduction as an Olympic sport) is testament to the fact that lack of recognised events can really impede the development of sports, and give rise to relatively artificial gender differences.
Paul:
Greg’s original post is what was obnoxious. And just as they’ve claimed that Henry Gee’s behavior was not out of line here, because of Pharyngula’s allegedly rough and tumble standards, it would be fair to make a similar claim; that given Greg and Dunnigan’s use of the word “bitch,” and Stephanie’s near-lack of an issue with that use, there was an implied standard set and that you were working within that standard.
Here’s Stephanie in response to Tulse after he/she pointed out Dunnigan’s use of the word:
And then there’s this:
Is this for real?
We don’t know what Greg Laden looks like or whether this is legit, but WTF!?
Correction to #536
We did not find any instance of Greg using the word “bitch”. That is an error.
Cursed comment system!!!!
That should be:
We did not find any instance of Greg using the word “bitch” in reference to any female at his blog.
We thought we had seen something at GLB, but couldn’t find it. We tried Googling. That’s how we stumbled across the link above, but we have no way of determining whether that comment was actually posted by Laden.
Legion #537: teh link.
Bernard Bumner ~ No need for any armour on my account. You like cheerleading. Absolutely fine by me. You don’t want it as an Olympic event. We agree. :)
I simply don’t think that the Olympics are the right place for events where style judges decide the medals. Let the dancers, gymnasts, divers, synchronised swimmers, “trick” skiers/snowboarders/BMX cyclists/surfers/sailborders/whatever survive on their own merits. I enjoy watching some of these disciplines, just not at the Olympics, which, to me, are all about going faster, higher or further, not about doing something more slowly while pirouetting. (And certainly not while women are not allowed as many events as men).
Blah blah, I think I’ve said quite enough about the events where people get medals for making pretty patterns and doing circus tricks, (unless someone wants to continue that topic :) ), but I do think the sexism is worth discussing. I’m a bit surprised no one else here has mentioned it, or thought it worth a commnent.
Thanks aratina.
Unbelievable. Hypocrisy, thy name is Greg Laden.
Bedtime.
Just found this :
PPM–Jesus met the woman at the Well
That’s why I get the feeling that they are stringing Paul W. along and the whole thing is all a big joke, a power play even over uppity commenters. He could be pulling the rug out from under Paul W.’s feet.
Ah, one more :
500 miles
Nite.
And just as they’ve claimed that Henry Gee’s behavior was not out of line here, because of Pharyngula’s allegedly rough and tumble standards,
I just wanted to clarify, as this discussion devolves into a “We” (Paul W and his followers) vs “them” (which I assume is Me and my bitch Stephanie) I don’t think I have ever made a comment condoning Gee’s earlier commentary on Pharyngula. I never read Gee’s commentary on Pharyngula. I was never involved in nor did I explore the famous “Nazi” discussion back a year ago or so. All I’ve seen of it is what was quoted and, frankly, I skipped most of that as well.
I am truly sorry that this conversation has devolved to the point that it has. My original intent, believe it or not, was to point out how there are flaws in the dynamic of the kind of group membership we see in the Skepchicks, in The Amazing Meeting regulars, at Pharyngula, at Dawkins, that ultimately result in rough interactions in places where it would be more productive to have some degree of cooperation instead.
For those of you who have been following along for a while, you will remember that I’m the guy who caused the Framing Slapdown at the Bell Muesum (with PZ, Nisbet and Mooney), yet I’m also the one that engaged most loudly (and I think effectively, in the long run) with … as in in cooperation with … The Intersection Blog on the June Wartime Rape blog event (well, that was with Sherill and not Chris, but whatever…. Oh, and that involved my arch nemesis Isis, as well.) I did that to demonstrate, to Isis, Sheril, to you’all, to myself, to others, that we can have differences but get together and put those differences aside when we want to talk about the fact that every single at of sex in a large geographical area is made up of an act of violent rape, or other similarly important issues that transcend our mutual name calling and calling-out and write slapping. These things are more important than Paul W.’s Ego, My ego, or Salty Current’s CAPS LOCK BUTTON.
To continue the theme, you will remember that I was one of PZ’s most vocal and loyal supporters in Cracker Gate, putting my own position at the U on the line writing strong letters in support and blogging heavily about it. It was ME who found the image of Jesus on PZ’s banana, after all!!! I am blest!!!!
Yet, when I finally wrote my review of Unscientific America, I dismissed the Crackergate Chapter with one or to sentences, simply saying that it should never have been written and that they had it all wrong. I have said the same exact thing to the authors in email and in person. This is not because I equivocate in my opinion. It is because I recognize that Sheril and Chris do have connections and some power in the areas that they work, and we do have common goals. Next June I want to work with Sheril on our common interest of rape in Africa, and she and I have another area of overlapping interest having to do with conservation.
I am, to some extent experimentally, not always successfully, nearly always clumsily, trying to cross boundaries.
I didn’t think that working with concepts of communication and appearance with “The Blastula” (Pharyngula, Dawkin’s blog, the other atheist and skeptic entities mentioned above) was crossing boundaries. I thought I was part of this larger borg. I thought we had common goals, I thought we had a common view that leaning hard into the problem, not backing off and appeasing, was valid and important. Indeed, I see no reason to believe that this is not true.
The two thread on this topic on my blog have been referred to as train wrecks. They are. I apologize for that.
I apologize to Salty Current for being mean to her, though I must say that my original discussion of what “looked antisemitic” was truly meant to be both helpful and academically interesting. But it did not turn out that way,that is entirely my fault, and I feel truly sorry for that. I wish that, instead of calling Salty Current a “bitch” that i had called her an “unmitigated asshole” or something along those lines. I am sorry for that as well.
Paul W., someday I will understand the points you are trying to make. At the moment I don’t have time. My daughter is burring her grandmother, and that is her first such thing in her life, it is exam time for my classes, and we are going through our first childhood illness at home… not to make excuses, but if your comments came with Executive Summaries I’d have a better idea of where you are at (I have communicated my thoughts to Paul privately. But I really have not been reading the Stephanie-Paul debate in any detail.)
I can think of a lot of snarky things to say to the comments on this and the other never-ending threads, and I can think of a half dozen ways to apologize to the Pharyngulistas (or the Paul faction thereof? I do not presume to have taken the full measure of this community). But I’m not going to do that. People are too on edge and it is all too raw, I would just fuck it up. I just want you to know that I respect your points of view and I see this as a learning process for me, and I hope that in some way we can either learn to get along or to politely ignore each other.
I like bacon.
boygenius, it’s not in Boise, but some time in the next few months there will be some construction starting in Driggs. The Geotourism center will eventually get off the ground, and they will likely need fine woodwork done on the display cases for exhibits, and perhaps even some reproduction work, such as pieces that suggest a late 1880s painter’s studio (Thomas Moran). If you want to follow up, send me an email and I will put you in touch with our exhibit consultant/designer/lighting expert. You would probably be competing with local Driggs residents, but it couldn’t hurt to make the connection as there’s going to be a lot of work to be done.
@ Pygmy Loris & Boygenious,
I’m in a similar pickle. Some of the other chemists here have given me some advice (thanks again, ya’ll!) but it’s frustrating. I’ve applied to all the entry level chemistry/tangentially related to chemistry jobs in my area and I haven’t heard back from /anybody/. I’ve also applied for some min. wage jobs, but I’ve never worked in retail, so I’m simultaneously massively overqualified for floor, but under-qualified for managerial positions.
Now, I’ll admit that I could probably (hopefully) get a job if I was willing to move, but I’m happily getting married in a few months to a wonderful guy who’s working on his Ph.D. So moving isn’t an option for a few more years.
So good luck to ya’ll and I hope the economy gets better soon.
Not really. I just don’t think it has to be the same as that jiggling sexist fantasy that is often conjured in the mind in response to the mention of it. It was the comparison to lap dancing which necessitated comment.
In terms of style events – I know that the judging can be oblique and strange to the casual observer, but I suppose that as long the judging at the Olympics is consistent with the other events in those sports, then you only have to consider whether it is important to allow those competitors equal status with those competing in event with objectively measurable outcomes.
Absolutely.
I was thinking of writing something about how there might still be sports in which the greater (average) muscle mass of men might present a natural barrier to women achieving analogous world class standards. Until, that is, I realised that I couldn’t really think of an example, and that this was probably a load of old, received bollocks wisdom.
Which just goes to show that even my own relatively consciously enlightened attitudes to sport are massively coloured by conditioned perceptions. I also know that I still find womens’ football, cricket, or rubgy to be dull spectacles compared to the mens’ events (which is even sillier, given the relative performance of England’s women teams in those sports).
All of this leads me to wonder how much of the disparity in world records between the genders is actually due to male genetic (muscle mass) advantage, and how much is due to the historical and ongoing inequalities.
Ummm…hold on…Olympic lap-dancing? Well…assuming that it’s an all-female event…yes… I think Olympic lap-dancing might be the only thing that could get me to actually watch Olympic events.
An addendum to the discussion up-thread about Senator Buttars’ good idea: eliminating the 12th grade in Utah. See the cartoon in the Salt Lake Tribune. http://extras.sltrib.com/bagley/Archive.asp?Vol=content&Num=6
In the mormon byways of the internet, talk of the End Times is heating up. Mostly it’s being used as an excuse for diminishing returns pretty much everywhere. When the the LDS Church membership is growing, it’s a sign the church is True™, and when the membership is shrinking, it’s a sign of the End Times, and that the church is True™.
Aussies, take heart, the LDSers are closing two of their missions in Australia.
Sigmund at #517,
I declare your acquaintance’s story untrue, not because I have evidence to the contrary or access to the truth, but simply because I do not want to allow for the possibility that it happened but not to me!
Still learning,
Robert
Sorry, no carpentry to be done here. Any unemployed immigration lawyers around?
Well, that’s just great. (And of course no mention of the more recent statements and actions that were under discussion.) Of course, your utter ignorance of the matter didn’t stop you from posting the most incendiary commentary about what the comments of some of the participants or critics allegedly “looked” like, followed up by a more detailed attack based on your ignorance, using “private letter” to further imply that you thought there was something shameful in their behavior. Do you have any idea how profoundly immoral this is? Any at all?
The behavior you’ve exhibited this past week should lead anyone reasonable to greet any ideas you express about what constitutes rough interactions, productivity, or cooperation with great skepticism if not outright mockery.
That is not an apology. No one, least of all me, objected to “being mean.” And I don’t believe that your “original discussion” was “truly meant”* to be any of the other rubbish you’re now using to try to justify it (though shock credit for the unabashedly condescending “helpful”). It was a swipe taken in anger that you apparently thought was the equivalent of “asshole” or “bitch.” (You may be forgetting that you also emailed me at the time.) Accusing someone of being an antisemite (having “serious antisemitic issues”) or of writing antisemitic things, or insinuating that they are, is not the same as calling someone an asshole. It isn’t just “name-calling.” It is a serious and terrible accusation, it has real consequences for the reputation of the accused, and if you’re going to make it you’d better damned well mean it and be able to back it up. All you had to say was “I’m genuinely sorry, SC. I said that in anger, and I don’t believe that your comments were antisemitic in any way. I recognize the seriousness of the insinuation and it was wrong of me to write that.” People could then have had a productive discussion about norms of civility, which is what I was trying to do in the first fucking place. All you have done here is to use the feeble “There are more important issues than your hurt feelings” to yet again try to minimize and evade responsibility for recklessly having made a serious and false charge.
You’ve crossed something, that’s for sure.
I don’t know about Paul W., but I’m happy to ignore you now. We could start to get along if and when you offer some real apologies – to me, to Sven, to Josh, and to your readers and commenters for your gross ethical violations.
*And even if it had originally been “truly meant,” when it became clear that it was wrong, it should have immediately been retracted with a sincere apology. Of course, you don’t know how wrong it was, since you couldn’t be bothered to ascertain the facts of the matter either before or after publicly presenting such a horrid allegation to your readers.
@545
Greg,
As near as I can tell, the basic issue boils down to this. There are two ways to take your original post.
1) Comments on Pharyngula* (and whatever other blogs) might be taken by reasonable people to indicate the posters are racist/support racism.
2) Comments on Pharyngula (AWOB) might be taken by someone, including unreasonable people who see racism everywhere, to indicate that the posters are racist/support racism.
Statement 1 would be serious if it were true. We might want to think it over and come up with ways we personally could prevent it in our own comments, and recognize it and correct it in the comments of others. However statement 1 is unproven.
Statement 2 is true, but since it is true of everything, up to and including my grocery list, it is trivial and we don’t need to spend time and energy on it.
The basic problem here is that you appeared to intend us to react to Pharyngula (AWOB) as though you had made statement 1 (serious) but react to you as though you had made statement 2 (true).
Instead we persisted in reacting as though you had either made statement 1, (unproven–so we demanded proof) or statement 2 (trivial–so we told you it didn’t matter). And my impression was that you dodged back and forth from one to the other, depending on what seemed to suit your argument best at the time. This created an impression of evasiveness and lack of sincerity that was only compounded by publicly posting something that purported to be a private letter, but was quite obviously intended to be read by many people besides its recipient.
I understand that tempers ran high in the course of these trainwrecks and that people in a hot state will do things they wouldn’t contemplate for a second in a cold state. However I was astonished and disturbed by your willingness to flout what I had previously taken to be well established cultural norms regarding expectations of privacy and not altering other people’s comments.
I am sorry to have to say it. I would have liked to think better of you.
*I’m leaving out all the Salty_Current stuff–I absolutely feel like she was treated badly in all this and had every reason to feel angry, but I’m assuming you were scrabbling for something to back up statement 1 (which required backup, and for which I think the evidence presented so far has been completely insufficient) and took the first thing that came to hand without intending to hold SC personally up for excoriation.
so, we were doing great on this whole “ignore Valentine’s Day” thing, but then, only one hour before it was all officially over, my boyfriend decided to link to this and said it reminded him of us :-}
A lesbian former friend of mine sez Ford is the only she’ll ever love. I believe her father brought to the films from infancy.
I, too, find drunk!Walton pretty adorable.
Jadehawk,
Better than than this.
Ring Tailed Lemurian,
Um, have you followed either gymnastics or figure skating in the last twenty years? The first quad jump was landed in men’s figure skating in 1988, now it’s required to medal at the Olympics or World Championships. Women have to complete more triples than they did in the 80s. In gymnastics, Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton wouldn’t get close to the podium today. It’s all about bigger jumps and harder elements. Also, Olympic Gold is the best you can do in these sports. Taking that away would dramatically affect the sports.
The sexism of the Olympics is a related kettle of fish. The two events that are among the most watched are Ladies Figure Skating and Women’s Gymnastics. They are also both “Style Events” where the aim is to make it look easy by not sweating and grunting. Hmmm.
We’re having a cultural misunderstanding. See, many of us here are scientists, who have trained long and hard to call a spade a spade – not a stick, not a shovel*, but a spade. When we encounter a demented fuckwit, we’ll call them a demented fuckwit. No dehumanization is intended; in fact, it’s very human to be a demented fuckwit (chimps might manage to be ones, but other species… :-/ ).
We’re simply getting exasperated at your cluelessness, lack of observation, and lack of thinking about observations. And, apparently unlike you, we can distinguish between insults and physical harm.
* Yeah. I know (meanwhile) that this actually refers to the spade (pique) of playing cards. But that would ruin the metaphor, wouldn’t it.
:-)
Hang on a second. :-) I don’t have any Croatian ancestry that I know of**; my great-grandfather even was an Orthodox priest*, and much of the family still lives in Niš (where I visited them for the first time only two years ago). Myself I can only classify as Austrian because that’s what it says in my passport; unfortunately, I don’t even speak BCSM. Born in Austria, started growing up there (haven’t after all finished!), gone to school and most of university there… and, well, in Austria, football is religion. It’s not limited to eternal truths. Sports/physical education lessons in the last few years consisted mostly of “And you, you go into the big hall, take a ball, and kick”***. Absolutely everyone, at least if male, is expected to be a fan of one of about two teams; several times I got very close to the Northern Irish “but are you a Catholic atheist or a Protestant atheist?” joke. (And so would my brother have, hadn’t he simply lied and claimed to be a fan of a team from another city.)
(Also, everyone is expected to already know the rules. We were never taught them, we were simply told to play! There are still several rules that I have no or almost no idea of.)
Finally, I didn’t even know the name Sepp Herberger. Eternal truths are eternal, they don’t really need an author, they get a life of their own, they just hang around in the culture… :-)
* Almost by definition, Croats are Catholic and Serbs are Orthodox. Historically, this has occasionally been used as the official definition.
** Hang on another second! While there are other Serbian families with my surname (the minister of the interior under Milošević comes to mind), it also occurs among Croats, and the vaguely defined Most Useless Corner of Eastern Hercegovina is either a Croat area or close to one. Maybe someone went east and converted to Orthodoxy… My dad was baptized Catholic, but that’s yet another story that has to do with Hungary.
*** Moreover, this (which sounds best in the original Viennese fake-Standard German) was only actually uttered once. The rest of the time it was simply understood a priori. – Also, that was for the guys. The girls were almost never allowed to play football and were assigned volleyball or <puke> step aerobic instead.
Pure genius.
In vino veritas…
<eyes glaze over with gladness>
Morricone has composed several masterpieces. They’re half the fun of a spaghetti western.
Insert gloomy warning about the costs of ignorance here.
ROTFL!
But ihre is “their”. To get “your”, try Ihre (polite*) or eure (familiar). How polite is CATS in the Japanese original?
* That’s right, the polite address is the 3rd person plural, a bit like in Spanish, only weirder.
Yes, and so is gehören “belong”, but “all your base are belong to us” is present tense, and… er… uh… there’s only so much you can do with it anyway.
And you really think the market for lawyers isn’t saturated yet?
They’re worried that they’d need to pay you more, because you’re so well qualified.
What actually makes them think so is beyond my understanding (they think the competition might make you a better offer? What competition?), but that’s how it was explained to me.
O_O
Oooookaaaay… is there a book along the lines of “tensor calculation for dummies”?
Seriously, this is incredible.
Such genetic advantages obviously exist, but sometimes they go the other way around – women have an advantage in extremely long-distance running (like 60 km and more) because they tend not to run out of fat to burn as quickly as men.
The first quad jump was landed in men’s figure skating in 1988, now it’s required to medal at the Olympics or World Championships. Women have to complete more triples than they did in the 80s. In gymnastics, Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton wouldn’t get close to the podium today. It’s all about bigger jumps and harder elements.
Thank you for answering a question that was rolling around in my head last night as Julia and I were watching the figure skaters.
Also, am I correct in thinking that last Winter Olympics, it was more like the Fall Olympics, in that the figure skaters kept falling a LOT more than usual (more than this year so far) as though some sort of limit had been temporarily reached, or some sort of transition was happening? (or a gravitational anomaly?)
Ponyplay.
Men also can’t compete with women on balance beam. The much higher center of gravity and the greater height make it nearly impossible for them to stay on the beam while doing the elite tricks that win at major competitions.
The “Croatian” part… I forgot to add… did people get confused by the video I posted of a version of the Croatian love song that Haydn used to compose a hymn for his emperor and that got exapted as the German national anthem?
:-}
You said I look a lot like him. I took that as referring to the outside, but now I’m starting to wonder if that’s true of our brains as well. Not in terms of taste of music (if that is in fact his taste), but the message of the text…
Rorschach (#510)
She’d been avoiding arguments the entire time, anyways. That’s why I stopped engaging her. I’d ask her to support her assertions and she’d cry victim or pretend a typo made the request unreadable or drag someone else through the mud. Every. Single. Time.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Paul W. (#518)
“I’m honestly sorry if the joke made you feel uncomfortable over things you can’t help. But I’m more sorry that you can’t see how playing up your reaction makes you look a massive fool after all you’ve said about SC’s reaction to the comment of Greg’s linking her with anti-Semitism.”
~*~*~*~*~*~
David Marjanović (#560)
Well, a real person wouldn’t want to use the pronoun CATS chose in the original unless they were talking to a very close acquaintance or a child. At the same time, his manner of speech is rather elevated, but in a way that makes him sound self-important rather than polite.
impossible; you still use IE, and I bet you bought your computer in one piece. ;-)
Spaghetti Westerns
‘Once upon a time in the West’
One of my all time favourite movies – must have seen it at least 6 times but I still can’t get over my disappointment that Jack Elam and Woody Strode only last the first 10 minutes.
Yes, and why the hell not? In Britain, the poverty rate for white British is 20%, while the poverty rate for black African is 45% and the poverty rate for Pakistani is 55%. Now, maybe this is in large part the result of institutionalized racism. (Although you have to consider that many Pakistanis and black Africans will be immigrants or descended from recent immigrants — and this puts them at an intrinsic disadvantage, as there will generally be “lag” before the family can completely adapt to the norms of the background economy and culture.) Also, however, it means that in the UK there are about 10 million white people living in poverty, compared with only about 500,000 Pakistanis and 200,000 black Africans.
On top of that, ethnic minorities have the weighty advantage of the “community factor”. (OK, not much of an advantage, to put it mildly, if this community requires the wearing of a burq. But whose fault is that?)
Anyway, in conclusion, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to have a few contrarians in the periphery, telling you that you shouldn’t get carried away and lose sight of that fact that people with white skin suffer too.
True, I was trying to add some random grammar fail, but “all their base” is less funny than the original.
This had me chuckling for a while:
“MONKS. Conduct a life of celibacy and emotional solitude without joining a monastery by simply living with my ex girlfriend. It’s more comfortable, and you’ll be able to watch TV and use the internet.”
Not sure how many monks there actually are on the internet though ;)
I actually tried Linux once (on a remarkably crappy desktop in the family home). Even tried to make a network between that computer and one or two that had Windows. This involved trying to write the Samba configuration file by hand. I had to give up maybe halfway through, when despite all Internet HOWTOs and stuff it still didn’t work. We gave up on Linux altogether… though, of course, it was SuSE, and “you SuSE, you lose” say those who prefer other distributions, and I’m sure everything has become easier to use in the last 8 or so years.
Yes, I did buy my laptop in one piece, but it’s a Lenovo that isn’t sold in normal stores… The literal screwing around I’ve done in desktops is indeed limited to adding and removing harddisks, network cards, soundcards, CD and DVD drives, and ventilators.
Oh, and, Opera here has already crashed 4 times. Probably that’s the Mac’s fault (typical Mac crashes with freezing or sudden disappearance when I tried to scroll too early in the loading process of a page), but, anyway, IE crashes on Windows happen once every few months or years. The autoplay video PZ posted yesterday made the ventilator sound ugly, but that was it. Opera doesn’t even display it, it just shows a white space.
(IE for Mac, unsurprisingly, deserves every single M$ stereotype. Utter, utter trash.)
Fine, then eure (which of course fails to get any of the connotations of self-importance across, but is at least not polite; you don’t use it with adults you’re not related or close friends with).
Could somebody please give me a short and sweet killfile howto so I can block the utter tripe that dares to claim the name of Hyperion.
Some guy whose name was writ in water would be pretty pissed at the moment.
Waaaahhhhhh, we should get the crybaby a bottle. Maybe some strychnine will do the job. Poor ignorant and stupid bigot showing himself to be ignorant and stupid bigot troll. Just like the idjits we have over here. Same song, different country. Nobody listens to you because we know you are a loser bigot. Get over yourself. Trolls are stomped. As you have been properly stomped. If you want stop being stomped show some intelligence, and shut the fuck up.
I despise Macs (and, indeed, all other Apple products). PCs are a million times better in every conceivable respect.
Long time reader, occasional poster, first time to the never-ending thread. Would anyone here be able to guide me to some age-appropriate physics resources? Specifically, my seven-year old niece has decided to do her science fair project on the old “egg in salt water” trick and she’s looking for information on density. I can give her the grown-up run-down, but surely there’s someone out there who can better translate it into her language. You can email me at my username at cox dot net. Thanks!
Integrated Color Management
He doesn’t. Read again. :-)
That’s an exaggeration, but with Macs you mostly pay for “Designed by Apple in California [and made in China like everything else these days]™”. They don’t have the quirks of PCs, but they still have their own…
Uh… what?
<faints>, again.
After all the back and forth with GLSZ, I just want to know one thing: Are the OMs on Pharyngula “floating turds” or are they not? Perhaps we were floating turds once upon a time, but now we are reprieved?
@ David:
Ouch- reading fail on my part. I still don’t want to see what he writes though :)
Hmm, my keen observational facilities just observed teh CO post a comment and then edit out the blockqoute fail.
Nice perq.
I have great powers, yes.
Walton. You’ve sealed the deal. Anyone that hates everything Apple makes or does is mentally impaired and not worthy of respect.
They’ll take your Zune from your cold dead hands! right?
Hehe.
Hey, buddy, my Fuze would like to have some words with you out in the alley for that one! Oh, and it will be joined by the wad of cash I saved by getting it instead of an ipod. :D
Wth is a fuze?
I thought floating turds were good? Ain’t it a sign we’re getting enough fibre?
Now I remember what this reminds me of! An infamous German soap opera! 4212 episodes and still going. Excuse me while I open the window…
GOR
GOL
GLOUUC
¡GROJFF!
Valentine’s day is over, but there’s a great lecture on human sexual selection over at Reasonable Doubts: http://doubtreligion.blogspot.com/2010/02/rd-extra-getting-into-someones-genes.html
Oops, sorry – it’s 4412 episodes.
Some time ago I was asked to answer a question about mormon garments and temple clothing … and I couldn’t answer. My reputation was at stake, so I looked through a few conversations in the voluminous files of ex-mormons who discuss these matters as part of their recovery from cultism. Here’s some of what I found:
Ceremonial clothing can be rented at some LDS temples. According to one ex-mo, women’s white dresses for ceremonial purposes were sometimes used nurses uniforms — those were the rentals.
They make green garments for those serving in the army. For more info, see http://www.exmormon.org/mormon/mormon013.htm
“I’ll buy almost anything if it’s shiny and made by Apple”
Re: westerns, Two Mules for Sister Sara is not usually counted among the greats, but I love it and those mule sounds in the soundtrack. Not unusual for Morricone I guess, the main theme of GoodBad&Ugly supposedly imitates a coyote’s howl – biologically inspired music FTW!
It could be I have missed it but I did not see anyone linking to Magnetic Fields songs yesterday. I must rectify that.
How Fucking Romantic
No One Will Ever Love You Honestly
Zebra
Walton (@407), where on earth did you learn the Rawhide theme song? That was on US TV while JFK was president.
Methinks it shouldn’t surprise you too much that victuals is pronounced “vittles” — or, if you are Sam Veller, “wittles.” Or was that Sam’s father?
Query to aficionados of ’60s Westerns: I vaguely remember a show on which Slim Pickens was a regular. I’ve been trying to remember that show’s name for years. Don’t remember anyone one else from the cast. There was an episode where Slim P brought the first automobile to an Oklahoma prairie town. The show wasn’t mentioned in Pickens’s WIki bio last time I checked.
This show was on the air for a couple years maybe, a little before the first US airing of The Avengers.
@TheBear:
Somebody will probably beat me to this, however…
If you’re using Firefox
1. Install Greasemonkey
2. Install killfile for Greasemonkey
3. In Firefox, Go to “Tools”, “Greasemonkey”, “Manage User Scripts” and ADD ScienceBlogs
4. Behold the beauty that is: Comment by Hyperon blocked. [unkill][show comment]
If you’re using IE, run for the hills ;-)
Regarding Westerns: High Plains Drifter. Nuff said.
Re: Macs vs. WinPCs:
As a user of both, we see Macs as the Toyota of PC/Op systems. They cost more, are underpowered but are likewise more reliable in the long run and less likely to leave you stranded with a dead hard drive.
Windows PCs are like 1970’s era Chevys. They’re cheaper, and you get more power for less money, but in our experience, the only thing reliable about them is their penchant for failure.
We’ve resolved never to buy a new WinPC going forward, as we’ve been informed (second hand, by a semi-reliable source) that Vista (and presumably future versions of the WinOS) requires a social security number to register the system. Is this true?
that movie would be awesome if not for the brutal madonna-whore dichotomy. And when I say brutal, I mean brutal :-/
Hyperon,
You remind me of a guy I once met in North Carolina.
First a confession: I’m a rockhound. There, I said it. A complete total nerd when it comes to minerals. I have rocks and crystals bulging out of cabinets all over the house. A byproduct of this habit is that I also collect gemstones and occasionally set them in jewelry–my wife is the only woman I know who complains that she has too much jewelry. But I digress…
Anyway, as a byproduct of this hobby, I travel to lots of out-or-the-way places–Brazil, Sri Lanka, Madagascar…and North Carolina, the only place in the US where you can find real (and sometimes really good) emeralds among other oddities.
Anyway, I’m in Hiddenite, NC and I’m talking to this guy with about 2 teeth in his head, both severely tobacco-stained. We start out talking rocks, but soon he’s lamenting the state of the country, sounding all the world like a toothless Glenn Beck. And then he said it: “There’s just no place in America for the white man, anymore.”
My first thought was, “Wow, we have nothing to talk about!” But you know, there was no place for that particular white man, with no education, no teeth, no prospects. He knew the symptom–alienation. He just didn’t know the cause. Look a little deeper, Hyperon, and you’ll see that the 20% unemployed whites and 45% unemployed blacks have a lot more in common than sets them apart.
OK, I’ll admit it.
Westerns: I really liked Clint Eastwood’s “The Unforgiven”
I still quote the lines:
English Bob: “Bill, I thought you were dead.”
Little Bill: “Tell you the truth, Bob, I thought so, too. Then I sobered up and found I was just in Nebraska.”
Yeah, there is that. We had forgotten.
It’s been our impression that Unforgiven, which was another awesome movie, was Eastwood’s attempt to make up for some of that, both for the lone hero archetype, but we suspect, for himself as well. In that movie, the gender roles are flipped somewhat. The men are portrayed as deeply flawed, dependent, and for the most part, beyond redemption — hence the title.
It’s the town whores (OK, that’s kind of sexist too) who transition from flesh-for-sale to an empowered group. By the end of the film, they have regained their dignity (although by having hired a gunman, they lost a bit of themselves as well).
At any rate, the women are active participants in the story, and not just window dressings.
It’s the only western we’ve ever seen that left us feeling a little hollow inside.
I liked Pale Rider; also: the Outlaw Josey Wales
Re Two Mules for Sister Sara: I wanted to see the nun naked! After that disappointment, nothing could have saved that movie.
BS
Reposting this for Hyperon.
It’s true that there are white people living in poverty in the USA and UK. That’s why we have welfare, why
weyou have public health care.Poor white people’s problems are poverty. Being white, for what it’s worth, presents the relative advantage of being treated as a white person, and the assumptions and connections that come with.
Poor people of color get the poverty too, with the added disadvantage of being treated as other than white.
Directly taking account of classism+racism allows for addressing both problems simultaneously, instead of setting one aside and hoping there will be a chance to deal with it later.
(Anyway, if you want to see poverty disappear, that’s going to take a confrontation with capitalism.)
Not sure what you’re getting at there. Are you accusing me of having no education, no teeth and no prospects, or are you going for something that might actually be constructive? I don’t agree with your “alienation” theory, since if ethnic minorities are alienated, they are in a very different way from this unfortunate person you mention. In terms of social life, ethnic minorities are probably better off than us “cracker types” (do I win brownie points for saying this?) due to the not inconsiderable “community factor”.
Anyway, I would never say anything remotely like, “There’s no place for the white man.” What I would say is that we shouldn’t conveniently forget about him. This is especially applicable to the UK, where there are more white Europeans living in poverty than ethnic minorities (poverty or no) living in the country.
a_ray_in_dilbert_space,
If you don’t mind my asking, what is exactly is your field?
personal anecdote time!
for a while, when I was so poor I had to steal my food, I did so by going into semi-fancy Hotels (Hyatt, Hilton, etc.) and stole the leftovers from their Sunday business brunches. Living on coffee-cakes and little soda bottles wasn’t precisely healthy, but it beat digging through trashcans.
Now here’s the thing: the only reason I was able to do this is because I was white and had a couple outfits that made me look sufficiently upper-middle-class to not be viewed with suspicion when entering such a hotel. And even the one time I got caught all they did was kick me out, rather than call police.
On several occasions, I have also slept on public transport; and I wasn’t the only one either, but I was generally the only one who didn’t get kicked out for doing it.
what chances do you think I’d have had if I were black, or looked like an old grocery-cart lady?
Many years ago, we saw a program on TV profiling a a middle-class, white family that included a father and two sons. The father was an upper-level manager with a six-fig. income before he got laid off. Both of the sons were college aged (and we think, college educated). All three were unemployed.
What was interesting is that they all had the beleaguered, sick-and-tired, life-is-so-unfair look to them. In their own way, they each expressed dismay in what they believed was the downfall of America.
We think a key difference between blacks and whites, or between males and females, is this:
People in minority groups expect life to be unfair, and when that expectation becomes realized, they tend to roll with the punches a lot better.
People who belong to majority groups, have higher expectations and a greater sense of privilege, so that when things don’t work out as expected, they take it much harder, and are more likely to succumb to racist/sexist myths to explain their failure.
I see the video and raise this.
I laughed so hard about the one with the p-value…
Seconded and thirded. And the “et ne nos inducas in temptatione” in the same soundtrack, directly followed by a mule, isn’t a bad idea either…
But then, I only know of a single spaghetti western that fails at being awesome. That’s Keoma, basically about a guy who tries to kill as many people as Django, only with his bare hands… and the music is horrible. It’s of considerable historical interest, because it leads from the Western to the Eastern and then back to Kill Bill, but it’s still a failure.
I, sir or madam, have SIWOTI syndrome. If I used Firefox and killfiled people, they’d keep being wrong on the Internet!!! And we all don’t want that, do we.
I can imagine… but I prefer what Django brings to some town somewhere in the southwest!
:-D
Yawn, the bigot just can’t leave. One would think he has a mental deficiency. We are not interested in his inane blather. He is not our “conscience”. He has nothing to offer us except trolling, as he has been thoroughly refuted.
I think a_ray’s job is to think like god.
He was an occasionaly guest star in a show called Outlaws. I don’t recall it, but then there were a lot of oaters at that time.
:-o
Man! How did that happen? And how did it end, if I may ask?
That would have been too predictable.
OK, it not happening was also predictable, but not quite that much (because every pairing of opposite sexes ending in a full-on love story is expected in movies), so I think it was the right decision in terms of drama. :-)
That might be balanced by conscious and unconscious affirmative action. For instance, appeasement of Muslims is absolutely well-documented. Between about 10% and 20% of British Muslims agree that the July bombings were justified. Around 0% are prepared to disavow homophobia, compared with 58% of the general public.
The reaction is, for instance, to bestow a knighthood on Iqbal Sacranie, a man who remarked that “Death is too good” for Salman Rushdie. Now compare this with the scathing hatred of the BNP in the British press. (As goes without saying, I emphatically disapprove of the BNP. I just can’t see how they’re deserving of any more contempt than a significant fraction of ordinary Muslims.)
Why does it matter how many people from any particular group live in poverty? By your own admission, poverty rates are much higher among black Africans (is this the term used in the UK?) and Pakistanis. Isn’t it enough that millions of people are suffering in the UK? Why should aid to them be predicated on melanin saturation or ancestry? The suffering of others, whether they look like me or not, bothers me and impels me to do what I can to change it.
One of the things that atheism has given me is a much stronger focus on helping people right nowWhen I was religious, the poverty that many people live in bothered me a great deal, but I could take comfort in the idea that suffering comes to an end and that there is no suffering in heaven.
Now, I realize that there is nothing beyond one’s life on Earth. That means that every day someone suffers from a condition we have the power to alleviate; poverty, starvation, treatable disease, poisoned water and air, is a travesty. The person who suffers can never reclaim that day. To me, it is imperative that we try to distribute resources in an equitable manner so that unnecessary suffering is minimized and that everyone can have a chance to live a life where the good outweighs the bad.
Hyperon, you are just a loser troll. So, what is your plan to end institutional discrimination? Either put it up or shut the fuck up.
Hyperon,
I know sarcasm is sometimes hard to convey on the internet, but really if you look at things the white men are/have been well represented. 42 out of 43 Presidents of the US and 106 of the 111 Supreme Court Justices have been white males. Even today if you look congress it’s quite disproportionate. If you look at other aspects of life it’s clear being a minority or female is a disadvantage. Now, no one is advocating that white males be underrepresented. What we want is equality for all people, regardless of race or gender or sexuality.
Yes, poverty is also a problem that needs discussion. No one has said that there aren’t white people who suffer from poverty. However, as you mentioned, minorities suffer from it disproportionately.
Find me a quote from anyone on this site that has come even remotely close to alleging that people with white skin don’s suffer.
and this means what, exactly, in the context of having a harder time finding jobs, having to constantly worry about being arrested for looking suspicious and other things white people don’t or rarely get arrested for, being considered the default guilty party in any dispute, being more likely to be handed a harsher sentence when convicted of a crime, etc.?
Jadehawk,
That is one of the most awful and depressing things I’ve ever read on Pharyngula. I’m really shocked and saddened to hear that you had to live like that.
It kind of puts my problems in perspective. By my standards, I’ve had a really awful day: I completely forgot about a tutorial I was supposed to go to and will probably be in trouble with my tutor, and have been feeling ill and depressed. But your post reminded me that compared to so many people in the world, I’m incredibly fortunate, and have grown up in a pampered and privileged environment. My problems, which are largely self-created and my own fault, are nothing compared to what you went through.
In a prosperous, civilised society, no one should have to resort to stealing food in order to survive. That just isn’t right. I’m probably not making much sense (I’m tired and not thinking straight). But I just want to take this opportunity to apologise for some of the stupid, insensitive and judgmental things I’ve said about poverty and welfare in the past.
No, Walton, you are showing that despite your comparatively privileged upbringing that you have empathy.
Walton, I grew up in a middle-class European household, and I can, at any point, call home and tell my mom to send money for a ticket back home. I was never in danger of actually starving or freezing to death in the streets; as such, my problems are very much “self-created and my own fault” as well. Which, ironically, is why I had an easier time with dealing with these problems: had I not grown up as a Middle Class European, with some remainders of a Middle Class wardrobe and self-confidence, I would never have been able to pull this off. which was my point: classism and racism even privilege those that seem completely without privilege. Which is why the Chris McCandlesses of this world will always experience homelessness and possessionlessness differently from people who are part of groups that are being discriminated against, and who have never experienced anything else.
Sniff, Walton has come a long way, hasn’t he.
But Mac > PC. He still has a ways to go.
Jadehawk,
That’s horrible, and I’m profoundly sorry that you had to live like that. I’m lucky that my social safety net includes comfortably middle class parents who are willing to take me in and feed me at anytime. I also have an extensive network of relatives who would feel obligated to do the same. I’m very very lucky and very very grateful for my family, no matter how much they piss me off.
I’m not sure when I would be able to admit to my parents that I was too poor to feed myself, though. As people were pointing out on the UAH thread, so much of our self-worth is tied up in our jobs and ability to provide for ourselves in the USA that it’s humiliating to admit that you’re failing in these regards.
Anyway, your point about being white and already owing clothes that blend in was excellent. It’s little things like that that white people (like me) take for granted.
when you’re permanently below the poverty line, that experience is the difference between having a job and not having a job.
Most sense I ever heard you make (that was meant as compliment).
QFT!
That social safety net I mentioned earlier might not be available either. If your parents and other relatives/friends are poor, it can be very difficult to climb out of poverty and losing your job really is the proverbial end of the world.
and a less dramatic, more funny example of classism: whenever the boyfriend and I go to Asian restaurants, I am given chopsticks, he’s given a fork. Every.Single.Time :-p
I am going to be an absolutely shameless shill here, because what Pygmy Loris said is the basis of a foundation that was started by a history professor: Modest Needs. I’ve been following and donating since it was started, and it’s pretty fabulous. The basic idea is that it’s often a small thing that can make people spiral down into poverty when they don’t have a relative or good friend who can help out in a pinch. You have a job, but your car breaks and you have no credit cards, and you don’t quite have the cash to get it fixed, and a couple of days later you get fired for not getting to work on time since you have no car, etc. The guy who started it was an assistant professor who remembered that he had been helped out of a few pinches like that in the past, and that it really didn’t take being rich to be a philanthropist at that level. He used his own money as a secular “tithe” for awhile, then it went off like wildfire and is now doing quite well. The whole model is tiny donations, small pieces of assistance.
Jadehawk, when I was working my way through college I had to resort to stealing food a couple of times. I hated it. I would make a terrible criminal. Like you, I dressed as well as I could to avoid suspicion.
Luckily, one of the small grocery stores near my apartment had no security cameras. I would take my baby daughter into the store, buy one thing, like a loaf of day-old bread for example, and put jars of baby food in the diaper bag.
I still feel badly about having done that. But I think I would feel worse if I had allowed my baby to go hungry.
I applied for food stamps once — what a humiliating exercise that was! And it took the better part of a day to do so. After that I figured the food stamp thing was a wash. I could work cleaning someone’s house and earn some money instead.
I didn’t like cleaning houses for most of the well-to-do, either. They invariably assumed that I was an unintelligent low-life, so they would do a combination of looking right through me as if I weren’t there, and a minute later they’d order me to do more than was in the job description. It was rare to get an employer that was just all business with no condescension thrown into the mix.
I was the only one in my family to graduate from college. It took me five years to work my way through. It didn’t help that I got married and had a child, but I don’t regret that part — it was done out of love and good faith and all that.
I also think, looking back over the last few years, that I’ve wasted so many opportunities to do genuinely worthwhile things. I’ve spent a lot of my free time and energy in student politics. Yet, looking back, I’ve done next-to-nothing to help anyone or to make the world a better place. I’ve drunk a lot of port, played political games with other overprivileged students, debated politics and economics and pretended to be clever. I’m not surprised that when I first arrived on Pharyngula, people thought I was an immature, self-important, pretentious fool. I was.
All I can say, to try and make amends, is that I’m planning to make up for it (as best I can) by doing something worthwhile with the rest of my life, rather than wasting it on party politics. I think Pharyngula has helped teach me to be a little less arrogant and judgmental, and helped me understand that I still have a lot to learn about real life.
Sorry for the rambling, but, as I said, I’ve had a very bad day, and am not feeling great about myself at the moment.
If you want to be horrified by American attitudes toward the poor, read this. If your view of humanity hasn’t already been crushed, don’t read the comments. They’re horrible.
Walton,
Some of that is probably the post alcohol depression talking.
I apologise for having suspected you of congenitally lacking empathy.
<headshake>
Third-world country.
<headscratch>
See also Grameen Bank and other microcredit institutes.
Jadehawk (#625)
Get him a nice pair of lacquer chopsticks and a carry case like these that he can ostentatiously take out and feed himself with after dropping the fork off the side of the table.
CunningLingus, #570:
Some, but probably not most. I guess it depends on the monastic order. A guy who graduated with me in high school is a monk, probably Dominican or Franciscan but I don’t remember anymore. I haven’t heard from him in a long time (no surprise), but I do still have his email address. The last time I saw him was years ago, while still a crazy kid touring through California with some friends. We got drunk and smoked a few joints up in the hills just outside his seminary. Good times.
YES!! *does idiotic football victory dance* :-p
And while I have to say that my slow descent into abject poverty was the best way to learn some vital lessons, it’s not a course I would suggest you take. ;-)
Walton, you are young and still learning. Just because you have not done much in the past does not mean that it will also be the case in your future. Most of us go through having a self important stage, it is normal for an adolescent. You learn and move on, hopefully as a better person.
Do not think it was all a waste. If a person did not spend part of their college years not debating politics, economics and other so called big ideas, that person truly waste their time.
Jadehawk and Lynna, about the only reason why I never stole food as an adult is because I did not get to that bad of a state. If my circumstances were just a little more dire, I would probably done the same. Except I did not have the nice clothes.
About equivalent to arguing that a car is now over the speed limit because 10 minutes earlier it was riding on the freeway. If we want to determine whether society is currently sexist, we have to look at society now. Going 100 years back, or even 50 years back, isn’t exactly helpful.
Surely this is more to do with the wealth of your parents than their ethnicity. I’m sure much the same would apply if they were wealthy and black.
Ooh.
What kinds of Asian restaurants? I know how to say “do not want, I know how to use chopsticks” in Mandarin…
Hyperon, we are still waiting for your inane and bigoted point. You have privilege simply by being white and male. You absolutely should not be crying wolf like you are. It just makes you look like a spoiled imbecilic brat. Which rubs everyone here the wrong way, if you haven’t noticed the testimony…
Surely this is more to do with the wealth of your parents than their ethnicity. I’m sure much the same would apply if they were wealthy and black.
Wrong! A well dressed black woman is much more likely to be questioned by hotel staff than a well dressed white woman.
‘facepalm’
*wants video evidence* :-þ
And don’t think that’s an attempt to belittle you. Some people, like me, just grow up more slowly than the cultural norm…
That much, yes, but not the entire rest of her previous comment…
I’m planning to do some volunteer work this summer. Longer-term, if I actually manage to complete my degree and can afford to get through the Legal Practice Course, I’m hoping to be a legal-aid lawyer specialising in immigration and asylum cases.
The American attitudes towards the poor, which Pygmy Loris outlined above, are mirrored by British attitudes towards refugees and asylum-seekers. At present, these people – who are often fleeing serious persecution, torture and threats to their life in their own countries – are locked up indefinitely in “detention centres”, in worse conditions than criminals, and deprived of civil rights while the bureaucracy processes their paperwork. They are treated very, very badly by the system. Yet if you ask the average middle-class Briton, he or she will rant about how asylum-seekers are “taking our jobs” and/or living off (imaginary) generous state welfare.
I want to do something about this. I’m not currently sure whether I’m emotionally stable enough to succeed in the legal profession (or in any high-pressure job), and I’m equally unsure that I can actually get a job in the practice area I want to work in. But I intend to try, because it matters. I’m not going to change anything through party politics; but I may change people’s lives for the better, through using my skills and time to actually help people on the ground.
the sophisticated European traveler (me) would know how to use chopsticks; the unmannered redneck punk (him) would probably just hurt himself trying. or something like that.
It’s moments like this I wished I could read minds; I’m sure the internal monologue that led to that decision would have been awesome.
ha!
funny thing is, he’s actually better at using the damn things, too. and in reality, he’d be above me in “class” anyway, since he’s got a finished education, makes more money than I do, and owns property. judging on appearances is so fucking stupid and ridiculous!
It’s tedious to do this over and over, Hyperon.
You keep saying this. But you do not have evidence.
Watch your brain break:
What an appalling non sequitur. Are you just reciting the list of things you dislike?
Pharyngula is not the therapy you need. Go away.
Hyperon,
First of all, ignoring what happened in the past is extremely naivé. If you want to know why things are the way they currently are you need to look at history. Second, what happened 50 or 100 has tremendous effect on what is going on today. A significant proportion of the population were alive 50 years ago. Third, the next sentence I wrote after what you quoted was:
I wasn’t just looking at the past. I was also looking at the present. Although things are nowhere near as bad as they were in the past there is a significant amount of discrimination.
I hope you’re feeling better about yourself soon.
You’ll help make the world a better place. You’re smart, you’re self-aware, and you seem to have the desire to not fuck the world over for your own gain. I think this is really all that’s required.
Also, I’ve seen you develop over the last year or so. You are genuinely nice. And I think that counts for a lot.
Time for another thread about why Hyperon is so smart and charming, and why we lackwits need him to help us think for ourselves.
Hyperon, I don’t get what your point is.
Yes, society is less sexist and racist (in both the UK and US) than it was fifty years ago; but it is still, in many respects, profoundly sexist and racist today. The US had centuries of entrenched racial discrimination, and that didn’t just magically disappear when LBJ signed the Voting Rights Act. African-Americans are still disproportionately concentrated in poor communities and lower-paying jobs; and since poverty tends to be self-perpetuating across generations, not to mention the effect of informal racial discrimination in education and employment, the racial disparity continues.
As to sexism, it’s a little more subtle than it was, but it’s still there. People still hold women and men to different standards, largely unconsciously. As a society, we perpetuate gender stereotypes – which hurt men as well as women – in the way that we speak and think. How many times have you heard a cowardly person told to “man up” or “grow some balls”? How often have you heard sexually active women described as “sluts” or “slags”, while no such stigma attaches to a sexually active man? And how rare is it, still, for a woman who doesn’t meet conventional standards of attractiveness to be treated fairly in her professional life?
dude, get therapy. real, permanently mind-changing therapy; let them stuff you with meds if necessary. USE THAT GODDAMN UNIVERSAL FREE HEALTHCARE YOU HAVE! if you don’t, you risk ending up in exactly the same spot I am: barely functioning, and not a great help to anyone.
Hyperon, here is the difference between you and Walton, it never seemed that he was arguing in bad faith, even when he was arguing that most inhumane positions. As for you, well, the simple fact that you are jumping all over Walton at this moment says a lot about who you are and what you stand for. It does not speak well for you.
I was by no means trying to flatter other people here, or claiming that Pharyngulites are all perfect. Rather, I was simply expressing the fact that I regret the way I originally behaved. That doesn’t mean other people’s responses to me were always right or justified. But I was young, intellectually arrogant, naive, and thought I knew everything. I eventually learnt, through a variety of experiences in RL as well as debate here, that the world is more complicated than I thought, and that some things can only be understood by experience.
Walton,
Hyperon thinks that fighting oppression is a zero-sum game. If we manage to eliminate the oppression of women, for example, that oppression has to go somewhere, and for him it goes to men. That’s the thing about being a privileged asshole, giving up one’s privilege is seen as identical to oppression. One cannot argue against Hyperon.
We’re talking about a person who once called being raped a “temporary inconvenience.”
Mr T @ #633
Now I come to think about it, i’m finding it hard to recount an instance of Monks being openly, or even secretly anti anything. We’ve all heard the various reports of Nuns being evil, sadistic servants of god, (that Theresa person springs to mind),in regards to various schools they teach at, just as sadistic as priests, but Monks seem to be a non entity in the media, as far as I know. What I mean, I already know all religion is poisonous, no matter how diluted the blend, but fuck me if I can recall a single Monk scandal !
I shall have to research more !
Hyperon @612
Wrong; you misrepresented your own data source.
The question was: “….you PERSONALLY BELIEVE that it is MORALLY acceptable or MORALLY wrong? Homosexual acts…0%”
(Caps from Gallup, ref: page 31)
Hardly the definition of homophobia, which is the “fear of or contempt for lesbians and gay men”.
Interestingly only 3% of UK Muslims thought it was morally acceptable to there being sex between unmarried men and women, which would explain their conservative views.
I point out that that in France the view is somewhat loosened for morally acceptable to 35% homosexual acts, and 48% sex between unmarried. So, any suggestion on your part for “Muslims in general” is gone
I was prepared to try and give you a little help here, but you cannot fairly represent your own data sources. Would be fun to prove “group think” here, but I have failed. They are right using all of the negative descriptions that have been directed at you. BYE BYE
ExmoRadioShow on Blog Talk Radio interviewed Mr. Deity. http://www.blogtalkradio.com/search/mister-deity/
Unfortunately, there’s about five minutes of music intro before the Mr. Deity segment begins. I guess you could just turn the volume down for the first five minutes.
It also isn’t clear whether that actually has anything to do with discrimination. Psychologists tell us women are less competitive and status-driven. Maybe that has something to do with it. Sex differences are really quite substantial, in all sorts of ways. You can’t assume as a null hypothesis that any disproportionality has to be the result of discrimination.
Yes, history tells you why things are the way they are, but not how.
Well, in the US there is a significant amount of that in the form of the “immigration debate” (aka, let’s get rid of those Mexicans). People complain about having to having to press 1 for English and 2 for Spanish. We also have prominent Republicans saying dumb shit like a bilingual country never ever worked (um, just look north buddy) or calling Spanish a “ghetto” language. Hell, I’ve even heard children of Latin American immigrants complaining about immigration. Many people, especially the poor, need a scapegoat for why things are the way they are. The Republicans cynically use their xenophobia to get votes. So many people end up voting against their own interests because of their hatred.
The upper class actually likes immigration though. They want to pay Sonia to babysit their kids and José to water their lawns at a dirt cheap pay. Also, employees that can be deported tend are very cooperating. Talk about amnesty for immigrants however and they’ll make a fuss.
Walton
“Discovery Institute has two intensive summer seminars on intelligent design, science, and culture from July 9-17, 2010 in Seattle. The first seminar is for students in the natural sciences and philosophy of science; the second seminar is for students in the social sciences and humanities (including politics, law, journalism, and theology).
These seminars are designed for highly-motivated college students who seek a deeper understanding of science and its implications for society. The seminar focusing on ID in the natural sciences will explore the scientific issues in greater technical detail and the seminar on ID in the social sciences and humanities will give more in-depth attention to the social impact of science. This year’s seminar will feature Michael Behe, Douglas Axe, Stephen Meyer, Jay Richards, and many other leading lights in the intelligent design community”
Maybe you could go and report back. I am x decades too old but you…..
CunningLingus, #653:
Well, if you insist…
Oh… research… right. Your pseudonym is playing tricks with my mind. ;)
More seriously, the monks I’ve met have generally been more amiable than priests or nuns, but with even less grounding in reality. Perhaps this is just my impression, and it’s definitely anecdotal. Anyway, it makes some sense, because they’re not dealing with people in the outside world on a daily basis.
I’m not sure how that would affect the tendency toward scandal. Many don’t interact much (if at all) with students or altar boys, so there are fewer opportunities for child rape and abuse. They cloister themselves to avoid “temptations” of all sorts; so I have to wonder if monks are more likely than parish priests to be pedophiles (for example), and joining an order is how they’ve chosen to repress themselves.
You still are an immature, self-important, pretentious fool. You weren’t Walton. Walton did listen. Your ego won’t allow you to be refuted. Hence, you don’t listen. To quote a vice presidential debate, where Danny Boy Quayle compared himself to Jack Kennedy. The response by an ex-admiral was (paraphrased) “I knew Jack Kennedy. Dealt with him may times. You are no Jack Kennedy.” Stop your delusions. You are nothing but a bigot.
Nerd, that was a blockquote fail. Hyperon was quoting Walton, and basically begging him to not desert from the “white privileged male, clueless” category
OK Jadehawk, I see the missed punctuation (my excuse is dinner and a couple of trips carrying some of the laundry back upstairs). Walton has matured. I even posted on it upthread. There is no hope for Hyperon. He is just an arrogant bigoted fool. Lights dimmed, nobody home…
First I want to apologize to Walton for being cruel to him. I’ve said some things, including threatening to resign my OM if he was given one, that were completely uncalled for. While we’ve had our arguments he’s never been rude or condescending to me and I’ve been both to him. I’m sorry, Walton. You deserved better of me.
I’m impressed that Walton is considering going into immigration law. I suspect it’s not a high paying field, but from his description of how asylum seekers are treated in Britain, it’s obviously a job where a dedicated person can make a difference.
This article mentions a few monks, as part of a larger scandal involving Roman Catholic pedophiles in Alaska in the 1970s. Here are some rather disturbing excerpts:
…
…
Sorry, I forgot to link to that article:
The “Pedophile’s Paradise”, The Stranger, Feb. 3, 2009
+1
skank of the beast
watch the portcullis
Walton makes comments, but tries as hard as he can to back them up, and when he makes one and then realizes it isn’t as supported as he thinks it is, he is open to other interpretations and potentially changing his mind. His underlying goal also seems to be to have a society that is the most fair for everyone, regardless of how that is achieved.
Hyperon makes comments, acts as though his own opinion is as much support as anyone or anything needs, and assumes that no one else knows as much as he does about anything even when confronted with voluminous evidence to the contrary. His underlying goal for society seems to be “if you’re not doing as well as me, it’s because you’re not as good as me and you deserve it”.
I know who I’d rather have as a member of my community, and it ain’t Hyperon.
Incredible MrT .. and thank you for the enlightenment, yet again it seems no matter how benign certain religious beliefs appear, the reality is abuse and cover-up, and of course pain for the recipients of such “love” from most religious institutions.
Dumping all those pedophile priests into remote Alaskan villages had to have been a plan, not an accident.
*blinkblink*
I assume that s/he (I get the impression that Hyperon is male, but I could be wrong) doesn’t mean that s/he was raped, and found it to be a “temporary inconvenience”.
He said nothing to suggest that interpretation.
cicely,
Here’s the link to the post where Hyperon called being raped a “temporary inconvenience.” Hyperon has absolutely no humanity.
Sorry,
Here’s the link to his first use of that odious phrase.
When was the last time the undead thread went three and a half hours without a comment?
stunned silence at PL’s links?
or the Australian contingent, whose turn it is right now, is busy arguing with the NZ contingent in the OZ vs NZ thread.
Crap, did I kill the undead thread?!
I posted this over on the Kevin Smith/airplane thread, but maybe someone will see it here.
United Airlines First Class Suite.
Apparently it’s $10,000 and up for that seat on a round-trip transatlantic flight.
I really wish I was rich sometimes.
oh yeah. they shoo us peasants past that every flight to rub it in our faces…
I was just thinking the same thing. Must be Olympic Fever or something. I’m almost to the point where I want to start posting links to random music vids from youtube just to entertain myself.*
*I kid Janine because I love her. :-)
At least one airline (Delta, maybe?) offers first class passengers their own entrance. The plebs don’t get to see first class, and the rich get to pretend those of us in steerage don’t exist.
Please, Walton, don’t beat yourself up. You are doing bloody well.
Sure, it is by fits and starts. Sure, you sometimes take refuge in comfortable old ideas – or in decanters of port. Sure, you get lost in the sort of self-examination to which the highly intelligent are prone. I know! Been there and got the T-shirt.
I don’t know who your criminology lecturer has been this last year or so but props to her or him – as well as the massed ranks of Pharyngulites – because you have clearly grasped the complexity of the interplay between what it says in the textbook and what happens in the real lives of people. Long may it continue.
I, like ‘Tis Himself, have sometimes expressed exasperation and rather sharply. I reserve the right still to argue with you, though. Would it amuse you to know that I have a virtual notice on my computer – a Mac – which says, “Back off, woman. You are not personally responsible for saving Walton from his moments of idiocy.” And compared with when you first arrived here they are just moments.
Not really.
I for one just got back from the local Casino where I spent a pleasant afternoon drinking alcoholic beverages and gazing at asian women’s legs(why are their legs so perfectly shaped??) while winning 250 bucks on poker machines.
Last thing PZ needs with a buggered back is to be flying another 4 hours to get to NZ I guess !
Attn. A. Noyd:
LOL!! Just dropped in on the Causabon thread ( http://scienceblogs.com/casaubonsbook/2010/02/things_i_have_learned_from_blo.php ) and read from where I last left off (which was #96).
Dewey = PWNED
Too bad your virtuosity was wasted in a backwater, but I guess we should hope that that blog remains a backwater. (Oh, BTW–I originally got the link from…Greg Laden’s Blog…)
@Walton, 628: don’t beat yourself up over not having saved the world by the time you’re in your twenties. You’ll be fine. Also, I think you’re hungover, that college port has a vicious afterkick as I know only too well.
Rehydration mix recipe: a litre of tepid water, as much salt as you can pinch between three fingers (thumb, index, middle), as much sugar as you can scoop in three fingers (make a shovel of the index, middle, ring) and a dash of orange for flavouring. Cures hangovers, good for sports, saves lives during cholera epidemics.
Terry Pratchett has a gag in one of his footnotes about why universities are such great repositories of learning. Students arrive at them knowing everything. A few years later they leave full of doubts and only too ready to admit their ignorance. Clearly all of the knowledge has leaked out of them and into the fabric of the buildings :)
Personally I admire the fact that you’ve kept coming here for several years now, you’ve argued your positions honestly, and you’ve adapted your position openly without standing on pride or stubbornness. Truly there is more rejoicing over one lost sheep that is found, etc. etc. :)
I and others spent a long time pointing out the problems of those dodgey statistics about Muslims that Hyperon is still bandying about. I can’t remember which thread it was on.
:-D
The pain, the stinging pain… ;-)
The e is silent and therefore must not carry an accent. What there is (in French, but also often done in English) is a dieresis on the ï, because otherwise the entire ai would have to be pronounced as “e” like in “bed”.
Everything is the way it is because it got that way.
– J. B. S. Haldane
Let me just second that. Absolutely don’t be ashamed or anything. In case an example helps you, I’ve visited a couple of psychologists over the years, on and off, till less than 10 years ago (when I was already a university student).
<lightbulb above head>
Haven’t read beyond comment 652 yet, need to go, just one thing…
Looks like it; it already had 82 comments last time I was on the main page.
*facepalm*
I’m ashamed of myself.
We need to get this thread jumpstarted, especially if we can make PZ work a little to stretch his back. I got to bring some towels up from the dryer.
Oh yeah.
I’m still kinda massaging my temples, here, after reading that…
I mean, sure, I know these people are really, really dreadful excuses for human beings. But still…
I’m just trying to picture the brainstorming session went on behind that one:
I mean, hey, I know: let’s take our nastiest predators and dump them on the most vulnerable communites we can fucking find… seein’ as, sure, they’re probably about as deadly there as they could possibly be anywhere else we could put them, but hey, these are nice, remote communities, full of people no one much gives a rat’s ass about. So it’s a PR win, baby…
It’s impressive, really… I mean, there’s nasty, there’s really nasty, there’s just downright way fucking wrong, and then there’s these asswipes.
If you want to continue, you’re going to have to follow this link.