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Gratz to little bro. - 3 June
Jun. 4th, 2007 01:39 amThe youngest and tallest of the family graduated his high school today. This means that nobody has to go back there again for any occasion. Which did cause some of us to dance a jig, knowing that that particular phase of existence was behind. When all of us go away from our college days, it’ll be much more interesting to see whether it’s as happy a situation. The parents may rejoice, knowing that they don’t have to try and put any more through college, but for some of us, we’ll be much older, and hopefully wiser, when that occasion happens. Anyway, congratulations to the young one - the real education begins now.
I’m pretty tired, so there may not be that much for witty banter on tonight’s list. But we’re still trying for something interesting. Austin Cline at Jesus’ General leads with a comparison between how the French do politics and how America does politics and comes up with some interesting notes on how much Americans are religion-centered and distracted by shiny things, where the French turn out in numbers and basically don’t care that much about religion.
More on the increasing creep of “I can not do my job if what you want me to do offends me personally”, a posting in![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
bad_service about a Washington Post article on a food co-op cashier that refused to serve someone based on their T-shirt, getting another cashier to ring up the sale. (Original WaPo article here - hat tips to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
2dlife) I do not like this trend at all. If people wish to be in jobs where they can discriminate like that, fine, find those jobs. Let people who actually are able to do the stated job to all people take over your position. A stunt like that would get me fired, or at least strongly disciplined, from the position I’m going into. I thought the part of taking on a public service job meant that you had to deal with everyone, even people whom you may personally consider to be complete assholes. Upon the occasion where they do something that can get them escorted form the premises, by all means, tell them to get the hell out, but until then, you kind of have to deal with it.
Even well after the actual hurricane hit, experts contend that there are still a significant amount of deaths being caused by Hurricane Katrina and its aftereffects. It’s going to take a lot to return those areas to their former zest, so deaths from psychological causes, as well as reduced capacity at health facilities all contribute to what is probably a more accurate death count from the hurricane strike.
In China, municipal authorities reconsidered the building of a toxic chemical factory after a text message and blog campaign protesting it. (Much more manageable. Thanks,2dlife) Using “new” tech, and managing to avoid being shut down by any official channels, people made their voices known. Score one for the commoners?
Rather old piece, but I still see the signs that this particular report stems from. I don’t know if they still lead to the same place or not, but reading the Cockeyed report on "Work From Home" signs that lead to Herbalife distribution certainly makes you wary of anything that promises you money from a street sign and doesn’t identify itself. Or, actually, that promises anything from a street sign and doesn’t really identify itself.
USA Today needs to be hit, as they put up a headline like Growth in exhibitionism traced to porn and then spend most of the article talking about the change in what’s considered “sexy” as well as how technology has permitted a lot more people to be exhibitionists and the changes of behavior that follow that. While supposedly being the focus of the article, there’s actually very little about any study or much connective material that justifies the headline. I think the headline needs to be reworked some to more accurately reflect the content in the article. And if they’re tracing it back to a single cause like increased availability of porn, I really want to see some numbers backing that up. (And2dlife provides the APA report that the article is drawing from. It doesn’t look that much like the APA is pinning pr0n as a single cause there, as possibly one of many reasons why there’s increased sexualization of children, especially young girls.
Robotics continues to produce beings that attempt to help humans understand themselves better. Osaka University has completed CB2, a robot that mimics a one- to two-year old child, in an attempt to understand human infants better.
For those in the rat race, Next Nature shows off a project from the Dalhousie School of Architecture - the grass-lined human hamster wheel. So that even in the middle of the city, you can enjoy the feeling of the earth beneath your feet. This is a neat concept.
So that’s all the stuff for tonight. I think bed sounds like an excellent idea. Tomorrow is laundry and the packing part starts. Hopefully, I remember everything that I’m supposed to. Or, if I don’t, it’s something I can get easily. If I haven’t mentioned it before, I’m going to be in Washington State, starting on Wednesday. I’d love to meet people who can get into the area while I’m there. There will be some juggling with the job interviews, which take priority, but if we can work something out, that would be fantastic.
I’m pretty tired, so there may not be that much for witty banter on tonight’s list. But we’re still trying for something interesting. Austin Cline at Jesus’ General leads with a comparison between how the French do politics and how America does politics and comes up with some interesting notes on how much Americans are religion-centered and distracted by shiny things, where the French turn out in numbers and basically don’t care that much about religion.
More on the increasing creep of “I can not do my job if what you want me to do offends me personally”, a posting in
bad_service about a Washington Post article on a food co-op cashier that refused to serve someone based on their T-shirt, getting another cashier to ring up the sale. (Original WaPo article here - hat tips to 2dlife) I do not like this trend at all. If people wish to be in jobs where they can discriminate like that, fine, find those jobs. Let people who actually are able to do the stated job to all people take over your position. A stunt like that would get me fired, or at least strongly disciplined, from the position I’m going into. I thought the part of taking on a public service job meant that you had to deal with everyone, even people whom you may personally consider to be complete assholes. Upon the occasion where they do something that can get them escorted form the premises, by all means, tell them to get the hell out, but until then, you kind of have to deal with it.Even well after the actual hurricane hit, experts contend that there are still a significant amount of deaths being caused by Hurricane Katrina and its aftereffects. It’s going to take a lot to return those areas to their former zest, so deaths from psychological causes, as well as reduced capacity at health facilities all contribute to what is probably a more accurate death count from the hurricane strike.
In China, municipal authorities reconsidered the building of a toxic chemical factory after a text message and blog campaign protesting it. (Much more manageable. Thanks,
2dlife) Using “new” tech, and managing to avoid being shut down by any official channels, people made their voices known. Score one for the commoners?Rather old piece, but I still see the signs that this particular report stems from. I don’t know if they still lead to the same place or not, but reading the Cockeyed report on "Work From Home" signs that lead to Herbalife distribution certainly makes you wary of anything that promises you money from a street sign and doesn’t identify itself. Or, actually, that promises anything from a street sign and doesn’t really identify itself.
USA Today needs to be hit, as they put up a headline like Growth in exhibitionism traced to porn and then spend most of the article talking about the change in what’s considered “sexy” as well as how technology has permitted a lot more people to be exhibitionists and the changes of behavior that follow that. While supposedly being the focus of the article, there’s actually very little about any study or much connective material that justifies the headline. I think the headline needs to be reworked some to more accurately reflect the content in the article. And if they’re tracing it back to a single cause like increased availability of porn, I really want to see some numbers backing that up. (And
2dlife provides the APA report that the article is drawing from. It doesn’t look that much like the APA is pinning pr0n as a single cause there, as possibly one of many reasons why there’s increased sexualization of children, especially young girls.Robotics continues to produce beings that attempt to help humans understand themselves better. Osaka University has completed CB2, a robot that mimics a one- to two-year old child, in an attempt to understand human infants better.
For those in the rat race, Next Nature shows off a project from the Dalhousie School of Architecture - the grass-lined human hamster wheel. So that even in the middle of the city, you can enjoy the feeling of the earth beneath your feet. This is a neat concept.
So that’s all the stuff for tonight. I think bed sounds like an excellent idea. Tomorrow is laundry and the packing part starts. Hopefully, I remember everything that I’m supposed to. Or, if I don’t, it’s something I can get easily. If I haven’t mentioned it before, I’m going to be in Washington State, starting on Wednesday. I’d love to meet people who can get into the area while I’m there. There will be some juggling with the job interviews, which take priority, but if we can work something out, that would be fantastic.
