Days off, days on. - 15 December 2007
Dec. 16th, 2007 12:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
silveradeptWorking Saturday is a full day. Had lots of fun at it, with a program, but I need to remember on Monday to input the numbers for the program into our calendar. Quite the interesting time. Disrupts my sense of the weekend, though. But I should be okay now. In addition to the regular absentminded, I find that I suddenly start getting more absentminded when I’m anticipating or feeling rushed from something. I guess I just have to always be able to take things slowly.
Onward to news.
Alcohol was involved. Someone had a kitchen knife. And an argument that had already risen to the level of a shouting match broke out again. This time, though, the creationist stabbed the biochemist, killing him. Probably because of the alcohol, the judge gave a light sentence to the stabber. I have no idea what the sentence will be for the people who cut off a holy man's right leg after he claimed it could heal diseases and grant wishes. Should have also said that it only works attached to the holy man.
Either it’s good news that there’s enough of them to pass the bill, or it’s horrible news that so many people don’t get it, but a bill officially banning waterboarding and "harsh interrogation techniques" has passed the United States House of Representatives. Except that waterboarding was always illegal, because it was torture. We’d established that part, right? That said, I’d rather it were codified rather than left for further abuse. Speaking of torture and waterboarding, the Justice Department isn't giving over any information about the destroyed CIA tapes. Well, what do we expect? We couldn’t get a definite declaration out of him about the torture issue, so it would make sense that anything related to a torture issue would take a lot to get worked out.
As a reminder against blanket statements and assuming that all your opponents are wrong always, Michelle Malkin spotlights a story about a young Korean girl adopted by a Dutch consular, but then returned to adoption after supposedly not "fitting in" with her new family. As mentioned, “A child is not a returnable product.” (Which might be why Ma n’ Pa always said we were blue light specials - no returns, exchanges, or refunds.) If you adopt a child, you commit to raising that child as your own, for better, worse, or whether they “Fit in” or not. One cannot adopt children to fashionably cart around in a little purse.
Trusting WingNutDaily to report on all things involving abortion, but in this case, it's the Democratic attorney general resigning over a scandal, apparently with the AG asking for some inside information about a case developing against a Planned Parenthood in the area. It’s a mess. And it might be opposite day - Malkin and WND made sense there in both their articles. What gives?
Perhaps they realize they have to make sense for the American populace to get their message. The American Bar Association’s attempt at getting people to think of awards in a new light has failed miserably, and now Mr. Gonzales is merely the top "Newsmaker of the year" for 2007.
Or maybe there was subtle manipulation of the ionosphere, causing a broadcast scrambling, and that when I go back and see those things again, they’ll be the usual material. Who knows what the government is doing, funding research that will screw around with the part of the planet’s envelope that is really needed to do communication.
Cussing out your toilet for misbehaving is protected speech, according to a Pennsylvania judge. That someone was peeved enough over colorful language to call the police is enough of an oddity for me. If I read this article correctly, right about now, I’m thankful we don’t have ASBOs. And that anything that might cause for a re-up in membership for the Society for Librarians* who say “Motherf**ker” is protected. It still might get me fired, were I to utter such things within hearing of just about anyone.
The New York Times has a segment on the ease with which children and adults can insult, flame, name-call, and otherwise pick on each other, inside the classroom and outside it. While physical bullying still requires proximity, cyber-bullying can relentlessly follow someone around, regardless of whether they’re at home or at school. While it also has the benefit of leaving a record behind to be followed, it also reaches a potentially larger amount of people much faster - passing a link to a comment or something that they want to make fun of, an then the pile-on can commence. School really does sound more and more like a prison where the guards and warden don’t really care what happens.
Almost winning the quiche derby tonight is the state of Texas, which implemented a requirement that those seeking to flee emergencies using state transportation must first go through background checks. Ostensibly, to prevent molesters and rapists with outstanding warrants from getting on buses with potential victims. I’d like to say that if you’re scared to the point of having no piss with which to wet your pants, the idea of committing a crime like that or even an advance is probably not anywhere near the execution phase. The collected will not be left behind, but they will be evacuated separately from everyone else. Now, whether they can actually pull it off with a hurricane bearing down on them, that we’ll have to see.
The quiche-victors tonight are the Iraqi government, who ordered all of the women on their police force to turn in their firearms on penalty of having their pay withheld. This is the part of the “surge” that isn’t working, and is the part of the surge that has to work, lest the house of cards collapse in on itself, with or without the guy at the bottom trying to hold it all up. Having a sexist police force isn’t going to help distribute that weight.
Moving from something that can be plausibly denied as not religious-based to things that hold their core in religious beliefs, an ex-ex-gay minister interviews with the Southern Poverty Law Center. He talks about what the groups looked like at the beginning, the “exorcism” of his demons of homosexuality, and how dangerous it is for ex-gay ministries to be advertising to teens, considering their failure rate. Charged religious rhetoric, and then “recidivism” back to one’s natural inclinations can be bad juju for a teenage psyche.
Digby’s Blog puts out an interesting proposition - after having read Davidson Loehr's "The Fundamentalist Agenda", describing scary similarities between scientists presenting researched reports on fundamentalist groups worldwide, and enumerating the characteristics of fundamentalists (Men are Always in Charge, The Rules Apply to Everyone, The Children Must Learn These Rules Exactly, History is interpreted idiosyncratically, and the End Goal is a mythic Golden Era to return to), he suggests that there might be a two-birds solution to fixing fundamentalism abroad and here at home, even though the religions are different. Decrying Islam’s fundamentalists in such a way that several will be able to make the connection to how much the Christian fundamentalists at home are unAmerican might make for an effective hydra-headed attack against both groups. If liberals and progressives can also tap into conservative language and mindsets and use the key phrases correctly to get churches behind a progressive agenda, then maybe the fundamentalist strains will be forced to retreat back to the shadows.
The Germans, hwoever, are made of much actual win, making a bid to ban Scientology from the country. The Scientologists cry that they have the right to practice their religion, the German government sees them as an organization that incompatible with the German constitution. We’ll see whether or not Scientologists can convince the judiciaries that they are a religion and not a con game.
Our Cool Stuff for tonight, is pictures of some of LucasFilm's holiday cards from the past 30 years. Pop-up stormtroopers and Yoda’s philosophies to Chewie and the children. Really neat stuff.
But the last bit for tonight is Calico, the cat cafe, where visitors can play with the house felines. Which is really cool - the cats have finally found a way to start their plan to make enough money to actually take over, rather than just pulling the strings. Oh, and the part where a purring cat is one of the best psychological stress reducers there is, in my opinion. Even Sakaki might be able to pet the cats in Calico. Thus, with thoughts of kitties, it’s time for bed.
Onward to news.
Alcohol was involved. Someone had a kitchen knife. And an argument that had already risen to the level of a shouting match broke out again. This time, though, the creationist stabbed the biochemist, killing him. Probably because of the alcohol, the judge gave a light sentence to the stabber. I have no idea what the sentence will be for the people who cut off a holy man's right leg after he claimed it could heal diseases and grant wishes. Should have also said that it only works attached to the holy man.
Either it’s good news that there’s enough of them to pass the bill, or it’s horrible news that so many people don’t get it, but a bill officially banning waterboarding and "harsh interrogation techniques" has passed the United States House of Representatives. Except that waterboarding was always illegal, because it was torture. We’d established that part, right? That said, I’d rather it were codified rather than left for further abuse. Speaking of torture and waterboarding, the Justice Department isn't giving over any information about the destroyed CIA tapes. Well, what do we expect? We couldn’t get a definite declaration out of him about the torture issue, so it would make sense that anything related to a torture issue would take a lot to get worked out.
As a reminder against blanket statements and assuming that all your opponents are wrong always, Michelle Malkin spotlights a story about a young Korean girl adopted by a Dutch consular, but then returned to adoption after supposedly not "fitting in" with her new family. As mentioned, “A child is not a returnable product.” (Which might be why Ma n’ Pa always said we were blue light specials - no returns, exchanges, or refunds.) If you adopt a child, you commit to raising that child as your own, for better, worse, or whether they “Fit in” or not. One cannot adopt children to fashionably cart around in a little purse.
Trusting WingNutDaily to report on all things involving abortion, but in this case, it's the Democratic attorney general resigning over a scandal, apparently with the AG asking for some inside information about a case developing against a Planned Parenthood in the area. It’s a mess. And it might be opposite day - Malkin and WND made sense there in both their articles. What gives?
Perhaps they realize they have to make sense for the American populace to get their message. The American Bar Association’s attempt at getting people to think of awards in a new light has failed miserably, and now Mr. Gonzales is merely the top "Newsmaker of the year" for 2007.
Or maybe there was subtle manipulation of the ionosphere, causing a broadcast scrambling, and that when I go back and see those things again, they’ll be the usual material. Who knows what the government is doing, funding research that will screw around with the part of the planet’s envelope that is really needed to do communication.
Cussing out your toilet for misbehaving is protected speech, according to a Pennsylvania judge. That someone was peeved enough over colorful language to call the police is enough of an oddity for me. If I read this article correctly, right about now, I’m thankful we don’t have ASBOs. And that anything that might cause for a re-up in membership for the Society for Librarians* who say “Motherf**ker” is protected. It still might get me fired, were I to utter such things within hearing of just about anyone.
The New York Times has a segment on the ease with which children and adults can insult, flame, name-call, and otherwise pick on each other, inside the classroom and outside it. While physical bullying still requires proximity, cyber-bullying can relentlessly follow someone around, regardless of whether they’re at home or at school. While it also has the benefit of leaving a record behind to be followed, it also reaches a potentially larger amount of people much faster - passing a link to a comment or something that they want to make fun of, an then the pile-on can commence. School really does sound more and more like a prison where the guards and warden don’t really care what happens.
Almost winning the quiche derby tonight is the state of Texas, which implemented a requirement that those seeking to flee emergencies using state transportation must first go through background checks. Ostensibly, to prevent molesters and rapists with outstanding warrants from getting on buses with potential victims. I’d like to say that if you’re scared to the point of having no piss with which to wet your pants, the idea of committing a crime like that or even an advance is probably not anywhere near the execution phase. The collected will not be left behind, but they will be evacuated separately from everyone else. Now, whether they can actually pull it off with a hurricane bearing down on them, that we’ll have to see.
The quiche-victors tonight are the Iraqi government, who ordered all of the women on their police force to turn in their firearms on penalty of having their pay withheld. This is the part of the “surge” that isn’t working, and is the part of the surge that has to work, lest the house of cards collapse in on itself, with or without the guy at the bottom trying to hold it all up. Having a sexist police force isn’t going to help distribute that weight.
Moving from something that can be plausibly denied as not religious-based to things that hold their core in religious beliefs, an ex-ex-gay minister interviews with the Southern Poverty Law Center. He talks about what the groups looked like at the beginning, the “exorcism” of his demons of homosexuality, and how dangerous it is for ex-gay ministries to be advertising to teens, considering their failure rate. Charged religious rhetoric, and then “recidivism” back to one’s natural inclinations can be bad juju for a teenage psyche.
Digby’s Blog puts out an interesting proposition - after having read Davidson Loehr's "The Fundamentalist Agenda", describing scary similarities between scientists presenting researched reports on fundamentalist groups worldwide, and enumerating the characteristics of fundamentalists (Men are Always in Charge, The Rules Apply to Everyone, The Children Must Learn These Rules Exactly, History is interpreted idiosyncratically, and the End Goal is a mythic Golden Era to return to), he suggests that there might be a two-birds solution to fixing fundamentalism abroad and here at home, even though the religions are different. Decrying Islam’s fundamentalists in such a way that several will be able to make the connection to how much the Christian fundamentalists at home are unAmerican might make for an effective hydra-headed attack against both groups. If liberals and progressives can also tap into conservative language and mindsets and use the key phrases correctly to get churches behind a progressive agenda, then maybe the fundamentalist strains will be forced to retreat back to the shadows.
The Germans, hwoever, are made of much actual win, making a bid to ban Scientology from the country. The Scientologists cry that they have the right to practice their religion, the German government sees them as an organization that incompatible with the German constitution. We’ll see whether or not Scientologists can convince the judiciaries that they are a religion and not a con game.
Our Cool Stuff for tonight, is pictures of some of LucasFilm's holiday cards from the past 30 years. Pop-up stormtroopers and Yoda’s philosophies to Chewie and the children. Really neat stuff.
But the last bit for tonight is Calico, the cat cafe, where visitors can play with the house felines. Which is really cool - the cats have finally found a way to start their plan to make enough money to actually take over, rather than just pulling the strings. Oh, and the part where a purring cat is one of the best psychological stress reducers there is, in my opinion. Even Sakaki might be able to pet the cats in Calico. Thus, with thoughts of kitties, it’s time for bed.
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no subject
Date: 2007-12-16 06:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-16 07:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-17 05:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-16 07:28 pm (UTC)I hate to sound like I'm blaming the victim but are kids getting a little oversensitive or is it me? Maybe it's MySpace where you can rank your friends or something but I don't remember anyone caring if they sat at the popular table vs. the "second best" table. Sure, in secondary school we had rumors spread but usually they weren't vicious and they certainly didn't cause anyone to shun anyone else. I got into my fair share of shouting matches over ICQ chat rooms but we'd usually glare at each other for a week or so and then forget about why we were even mad at each other. Heck, I'll even admit I did my fair share of bullying, but the converse is also true: I got picked on a good amount too and I also did the good natured-kid thing where I tried to stick up for people who were too shy to stick up for themselves. We all split up for lunch into our respective groups but that was mostly because of different activities.
Sure we said bad things about each other and heck when one kid shaved his head (he'd gotten hurt and the doctors had to shave off a chunk to give him stitches) he didn't get any peace about it for a week. He laughed it off and proceeded to wear a different hat each day just to show off. I was good friends with the least popular girl in school ... seriously, THE LEAST ... there were some VICIOUS rumors about her everywhere (sadly, almost all of which were true). Everyone knew I hung out with her (heck we were a two-person team in a city-wide speaking contest -- my idea -- I mean how dorky can you get.) That never hurt my street cred, even with the jocks. I just don't understand how the kids in the article could 1) care so much about their image that a little rumor-spreading is bloody murder and 2) assign so much status by association. Cliques are fine ... we all want friendship groups ... but in my day they weren't that stratified. It would suck if you were shunned by every major group, sure, but no one in one group really wanted to be in another. And if you were a loner, there was always a few kindred souls or more than a few if you went looking.
Plus, we never went to our parents. Cruel e-mails? Our parents didn't care. We either had to laugh it off or fight back. I assure you that unless I came home via the hospital, the most my parents would do is check my knuckles to make sure I landed a few of my own. Maybe that's the problem. These days parents coddle the kids so much that they never learn to tough it out. Sure school was like a mini-prison yard but damned if we didn't all have our own shivs. Then again, I had it easy. By the time I left, my best friends were the top jock and the top chess player; and I was very good friends with the top Magic player (sad that this was a measure of status in certain groups) and the really rich kid, and at least a third of the senior class (I was a junior). It wasn't like this when I started (middle-of-the-school-year transfer, I was) but I grew up being told not that respect is automatic and free, but that you have to win people over one at a time.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-17 06:29 am (UTC)I think that's what has the kids being oversensitive - it's not necessarily that there's teasing and bullying going on, because that's what happens in schools right now (though I wish it wouldn't). I think it's the problem that the one incident where you weren't complete serenity and indifference gets captured in text or video or whatever and just stays there, continually being revisited and shown to new people all the time.
Could be that there's a bit more coddling, too, but I really think it's the perpetually on-camera attitude that you have to have when things migrate to the Web that's getting to most of them.