All entries by this author

Steep slopes & water

Jan 9th, 2022 8:35 am | By

Back in 2014 local public radio did a story on The Little Street at the Bottom of a Landslide-prone Bluff aka Y R people so dumb?

It’s no secret that Western Washington is prone to landslides. The combination of glacial soils, steep slopes and water creates a risk that’s greater than in other parts of the U.S.

And it’s not just river valleys like the one near Oso: The region’s coastal bluffs are also danger zones that have experienced large landslides in recent decades.

But that still doesn’t deter people from living in those slide-prone areas.

Because people are just that dumb.

Ruth Trail has lived in the Magnolia neighborhood of Seattle for 23 years.

She said she loves it

Read the rest


Landslide zone

Jan 8th, 2022 4:43 pm | By

Just a little local story of no particular significance for once, simply because I saw some of it. I was out for a walk with a dog friend (or dog client, or something), on a boulevard that runs along the top of high bluffs at the western edge of Seattle, where Elliott Bay meets Puget Sound, and we came to a place with a lot of yellow tape between the sidewalk and the edge of the bluff. Part of the bluff there had collapsed recently, I’d noticed it some weeks or months back when walking the dog there, but it wasn’t yellow-taped then. Clearly this was new collapse, which was completely unsurprising given the record rains we’ve just had, and … Read the rest



The great skeptical mind

Jan 8th, 2022 11:37 am | By

Heh.

https://twitter.com/FondOfBeetles/status/1479859700103618561

Read the rest



Listen to dudes talking about themselves

Jan 8th, 2022 9:17 am | By

A new treat for your schedule:

https://twitter.com/V_Lundsten/status/1479788989846597640

“Feminist Gender Equality” – starring three men and Sally Hines talking about feminism. It doesn’t get much more equality than that.… Read the rest



Therefore not an offence

Jan 8th, 2022 8:46 am | By

Vandalism or termination of a hate crime?

THE Attorney General is considering referring the case in which four people were cleared of tearing down a statue of slave trader Edward Colston to the Court of Appeal.

Suella Braverman said the verdict is causing “confusion” and she is “carefully considering” whether to use powers which allow her to seek a review so senior judges have the chance to “clarify the law for future cases”.

The verdict prompted a debate about the criminal justice system after the defendants – dubbed the Colston Four – opted to stand trial in front of a jury and did not deny involvement in the incident, instead claiming the presence of the statue was a hate

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What Jolyon found hardest to take

Jan 8th, 2022 7:54 am | By

He’s unhappy about the Wes Streeting interview.

When’s the last time Jolyon Maugham “interrogated” the proposition that trans dogma takes nothing from women at all whatsoever in the least? My rough estimate is that would be never.

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Guest post: Empathy cannot fix a cry bully

Jan 8th, 2022 5:43 am | By

Originally a comment by Bruce Gorton on More emp and und.

There was an essay on Forbes the other day about gatekeeping in fandoms, which I actually think is kind of relevant.

…the accusations of gatekeeping are being used to leverage access to effectively run each fandom and acquire power as a result.

I think there is a lot of truth in the complaints fans of various properties have about “wokeness” invading their spaces. A lot of the time, the issue keeping people out of specific hobbies isn’t that the hobbyists are saying “This isn’t for you” – it’s that the hobby just isn’t the “excluded” person’s bag.

Which is fine. You’re not being excluded if the thing isn’t … Read the rest



To be their authentic selves

Jan 7th, 2022 3:24 pm | By

The Women’s Sports Foundation? Are they sure about that?

The Women’s Sports Foundation says we need to create sport environments that allow athletes to be their authentic selves – by which they mean we need to let men pretend to be women so that they can steal all the prizes. What a peculiar thing for a Women’s Sports Foundation to mean. You’d think they’d be cheering on women rather than men who … Read the rest



More emp and und

Jan 7th, 2022 11:52 am | By

Progress, but…

On both sides? I don’t think they’re equivalent. I don’t think you see as much testosteroney rage on the feminist side of the argument.

Still. It’s a step.… Read the rest



The choice

Jan 7th, 2022 10:03 am | By

What are we talking about when we talk about ideology?

Joe Biden marked the first anniversary of 6 January with a powerful, ideological speech about the choice between democracy and autocracy.

Is the choice between democracy and autocracy really a matter of ideology? I think of it as more basic than that. Do you want someone like Trump making all the rules, or do you prefer a system where more people get a say?

Every major news network opted for somber programming and roundtable discussions about the fragile nature of American democracy.

Except for one.

Fox News’s primetime lineup of rightwing hosts used rock guitar licks to introduce a different narrative: one of hysterical Democrats “jilling up noise” and crying

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Be sure to uSe randoM caps

Jan 7th, 2022 9:15 am | By

Trump issued a “statement” (i.e. a rambling incoherent page of words) in response to Biden’s speech yesterday.

As reasonable and responsible as ever.… Read the rest



Stands with

Jan 7th, 2022 7:58 am | By

Elite institutions fall all over themselves to support men destroying women’s sports.

https://twitter.com/IvyLeague/status/1479165876007886852

“Unwavering commitment” to destroying women’s sports.… Read the rest



Seems, madam, nay it is, I know not seems

Jan 6th, 2022 5:28 pm | By

An interesting, teasing conundrum here. Is it possible to be insulting and ragey in public for hours every day while not actually being as insulting and ragey as that would seem?

Seen on Twitter today: “I’m not nearly as mean as I probably seem on Twitter.”

The tweeter, as you’ll have guessed, is someone who is insulting and ragey on Twitter for hours every day, so much so that that “probably seem” is laughable. Probably? Probably?

Anyway, is that possible? I’m not sure it is. I think if you act “mean” (i.e. sadistic and belligerent) a lot of the time then…well, you are sadistic and belligerent, aren’t you. Acting it is being it. “Seeming” it is being it. Doing it … Read the rest



Put them over here on the side

Jan 6th, 2022 4:47 pm | By

Ah yes setting aside their differences.

Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas and her UPenn teammates set aside their differences over the last week to train for their final home meet of the season behind a cloak of secrecy.

It’s not really something the women can just set aside, is it. He’s intruding on them and stealing their chance to be first.

The twice-daily winter practice sessions passed without incident but the 41-strong team remains bitterly divided over Thomas’s record shattering feats as a newly-transitioned female, according to insiders.

They’re not actually “feats,” are they. He didn’t have any “feats” on the men’s team, so he’s not really racking up feats now that he’s competing with people who have multiple disadvantages … Read the rest



The real perps

Jan 6th, 2022 12:21 pm | By

Who was it who instigated the attack on the Capitol?

Around the same time President Biden said former President Donald J. Trump encouraged the violence that took place at the Capitol on Jan. 6, some of Mr. Trump’s most prominent supporters deflected blame for the attack during an appearance on a live online show.

It’s not a “show.” It’s a vanity project-insurrectionist plot.

On the show, hosted by Stephen K. Bannon, one of Mr. Trump’s top former advisers, Representatives Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene laid responsibility on Democrats, the Capitol Police, the federal government and others.

The socialists, the FBI, the Critical Race Theorists, the Pentagon, the feminists, the State Department. They’re all in it up to their eyeballs. … Read the rest



Goddess energy & critical thinking

Jan 6th, 2022 11:39 am | By

The circular belief system in action.

See, no women I know carry themselves with grace and respect for the goddess energy, nor would I want them to. I certainly don’t carry myself that way, and would be horrified if anyone accused me of it. Yuck. What women need to carry ourselves with is confidence that we have a place in the world just as … Read the rest



What brazen politicization

Jan 6th, 2022 11:00 am | By

How dare ANYONE politicize a violent attempted insurrection in the form of physical invasion of the legislature complete with weapons and threats? Could there be anything more outrageous?

Yeah, that Biden, man, politicizing something as obviously apolitical as an attempt to prevent him from taking office after he won an election. Brazen indeed – practically harlot-level brazen.… Read the rest



Cha-ching

Jan 6th, 2022 10:37 am | By

This seems fairly astounding.

https://twitter.com/genderisharmful/status/1479054517568167936

Those numbers. Seven hundred sixty five thousand pounds to from the Foreign & Commonwealth Office??? For what?? It’s not as if they’re building anything or healing anyone or feeding anyone. Their “work” is telling people what to think – how is it possible to spend £765,061 on that? Plus £616 k on the Coronavirus Job Retention scheme, where you’d think the need for Stonewall’s views would be zero*. £256 k on all of the Welsh government seems thrifty in comparison (but is actually quite profligate).

Jobs for the boys, eh?

*See comments for corrections on this point. It’s a grant to keep employees paid, not a payment for stonewalling.… Read the rest



The laying on of hands

Jan 5th, 2022 4:49 pm | By

Lord, I pray, take pity on this cardboard cutout of a deranged criminal.

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Not what he said

Jan 5th, 2022 11:29 am | By

And yet another follow-up to the story – Jon Stewart says with much emphasis that he’s not calling Rowling anti-Semitic and that Newsweek is full of shit for saying he is.

That’s roughly where I am, except that I’m much less keen on Harry Potter, precisely because of the crude stereotypes and Manicheanism. … Read the rest