Category Archives: Culture War

Culture War, Healthcare, Politics

Wednesday Linkorama

  • Why a salad costs more than a Big Mac. Hint: it’s government subsidies.
  • You know, I find it very disturbing when the subject of gay marriage comes up, dingbat “conservatives” immediately start talking about bestiality. There’s something they’re not telling us.
  • I called 2009 the Year in Fantasyland. It’s looking like 2010 may be the year of reality. Certainly the anti-vaccination nonsense is taking body blow after body blow.
  • Paul Krugman gets taken to the woodshed on trade, which is supposed to be his area of expertise.
  • More evidence that defensive medicine is not the myth the lawyers claim it is.
  • Hitch lets loose on the Pope.
  • French TV recreates the Milgram Experiment. News anchors act shocked. Fail to make connection to American embrace of torture.
  • The Social Security “Trust Fund” is now being tapped, a decade ahead of schedule. And we’re supposed to expect healthcare reform to stay within its budget.
  • Horrific story from Ethiopia about how women are raped, abducted and wed, in that order. Fortunately, there’s a rebellion going on among Ethiopian women.
    • 'Culture', Culture War, Humor, Law and Order, Politics

    Midweek Linkorama

  • How fat are the Swiss? So fat, that prostitute are getting defibrillator training in case their clients have heart attacks.
  • This is awesome. Those supposedly exploited Chinese sweatshop workers are using their earnings to start business of their own.
  • Judge Jim Gray on the War on Drugs. Incredible.
  • Finger faces? Finger faces.
  • A sad story of game addiction. I sometimes worry about internet addiction myself. I’d be a lot more productive without the blogosphere. Quitting is something that weighs heavily in my mind at times.
  • I’m sorry. Does this mean Lindsay Lohan is admitting to being a lush?
  • Is the “missing women” problem starting to fade? God, I hope so.
    • Culture War, Science and Edumacation

    One Up, One Down

    Good and bad news out of Texas. On the one hand, young Earth creationist Don McLeroy lost his primary campaign for the board of education seat. On the other hand, moderate Republican Tincy Miller lost her primary and her opponent looks to be a “teach the controversy” creationist.

    On balance, this is good. Removing McLeroy is a huge step. I just hope his replacement is more reasonable.

    Culture War, Humor, War on Terror

    Midweek Linkorama

  • Come on. You knew some organization was going to call for a ban on muslims in their military.
  • I miss Calvin and Hobbes. Where have you gone Bill Waterson? A lonely nation turns its eyes to you.
  • I don’t think our Congressmen are stupid. I think they just pretend to be stupid. No, wait, not ‘think’. What’s the word? ‘Hope like hell’.
  • The Kelo debacle reaches its inevitable conclusion. Well done, SCOTUS.
  • A scary article about the problems in the 911 system.
    • Culture War, Law and Order, Politics

    Thursday Linkorama

  • What? Not another sex scandal involving one of these uber-moral conservatives standing against homosexual hedonism?
  • Wonderful. The Iraqis are using pseudoscience to find bombs.
  • I agree with Lindsay Graham. The GOP can not get too fixated on ideological purity if they want to become a political force again. There are many districts, particularly in the northeast, where a hardline conservative can’t win but a moderate can. If the GOP runs such moderates, they won’t get their “pure” conservative Congress. But they will shift the Congressional Gaussian significantly to the right.
  • The Dems want to put nutritional info on vending machines. I guess because putting it in restaurants worked so well.
  • Occasionally, the Obama Administration makes me happy. When they are at least acknowledging the problems that Sarbanes-Oxley has created, that’s a good thing. And more than the last “pro-business” Administration did.
  • I have this crazy idea that one day government will fix problems before they blow up in our face.
  • Why the GOP is still irrelevant. They can’t even come up with earmark reform.
  • Megan McArdle explores the idea that the VA is a model for healthcare reform. The most important point? The VA provides less than half of the healthcare veterans need and receive.
  • The New Yorker asks why our murder rate is so high. I reject all the conventional arguments, which seem to be focus on our not worshiping government enough.
    • Culture War, Politics, War on Terror

    Weekend Linkorama

  • No, Virginia, Prop 13 and other tax revolts did not bankrupt California. I swear. What is it with liberals with coming out with pre-planned and wrong explanations for whatever has been screwed up? Conservative aren’t much better these days, of course, blaming the housing crash on the CRA. But “disaster socialism” is alive and well.
  • Someone actually checks to see if Sotomayor is the race warrior every Right Wing dunderhead is making her out to be. Hint: she isn’t.
  • Why David Petraeus rocks. I defy the Right to tell me that he is some weak-kneed liberal who wants the terrorists to win.
  • Just a peek into what constitutes “professional development” for teachers. And people wonder why I’m not friendly to the unions.
  • More information on the terrorist who murdered an abortion doctor yesterday. Despite the ugliness of the rhetoric (there’s a horrific video I refuse to link to) I remain firm in my conviction that the only man responsible for the killing is the killer. While I am pro-choice, I don’t believe that pro-lifers should be quiet about what they earnestly believe is the taking of hundreds of thousands of lives a year. I would, however, prefer to see rhetoric toned down a bit and the focus shifted away from individual doctors to the larger political and moral issue.
    • 'Culture', Culture War

    Real Women

    I’ve been meaning to post on this for a while. Last week, I read about Naomi Wolf making one of the only real arguments I’ve seen against porn, essentially saying that men will lose interest in real women when confronted with silicon perfection.

    The young women who talk to me on campuses about the effect of pornography on their intimate lives speak of feeling that they can never measure up, that they can never ask for what they want; and that if they do not offer what porn offers, they cannot expect to hold a guy. The young men talk about what it is like to grow up learning about sex from porn, and how it is not helpful to them in trying to figure out how to be with a real woman. Mostly, when I ask about loneliness, a deep, sad silence descends on audiences of young men and young women alike. They know they are lonely together, even when conjoined, and that this imagery is a big part of that loneliness. What they don’t know is how to get out, how to find each other again erotically, face-to-face.

    So Dworkin was right that pornography is compulsive, but she was wrong in thinking it would make men more rapacious. A whole generation of men are less able to connect erotically to women—and ultimately less libidinous.

    I have to disagree here.

  • To be honest, this sounds like a lot of whining. Men complaining they don’t know about real sex; women complaining men want too much crazy sex. We’ve raised a generation of whiners who are far too concerned that they’re not going to live up to what they imagine someone else’s expectations are. I haven’t noticed a drop in campus sex. Just have some God-damned sex. You’ll be fine. Trust me.

    Everyone goes into sex with very little knowledge, no matter how much they’ve read or watched. Half the fun is learning what your partner likes (and what you like). Quit fucking whining, drunk some fucking wine and do some fucking fucking.

  • Most of the women in pornography are neither interesting nor that hot. As the poster says, “I’d much rather get jiggy with Naomi Wolf than any porn starlet. How can a woman who writes like this not be incredible in bed?” I’ve consumed my share of porn and have yet to encounter any starlet who was even a fraction as exciting as my least-exciting girlfriend.
  • Porn is, by its nature — for the moment, at least — passive. Half the pleasure of sex comes from pleasing someone else and no matter how much you rub the screen, your computer is not going to enjoy it.
  • Porn is clean and antiseptic. Most people prefer the mess of reality.
  • Does Wolf really think that men want their women to act like the girls in porn? To the extent that porn has made oral sex more acceptable, it’s a good thing. But I can’t think many men are really demanding “the lesbian scene, the ejaculate-in-the-face scene”, as Wolf claims. What people like to watch and what people like to do are often two entirely different things.

    I know a few women who’ve been around and have encountered men who expect them to act like porn stars. They’re rare. Most men are perfectly happy with ordinary sex, including those who consume massive volumes of porn.

  • The huge movement in porn is toward “reality”. Amateurs, natural women and girls running their own websites are the thing. Men are tired of silicon-enhanced “beauties” and miss the kind of women who used to appear in Playboy — real women with curves and hips and pretty faces.
  • I do agree with Wolf that men and women have some trouble relating to each other. That’s not exactly new nor is it the result of porn. I didn’t have any porn when I was in college (the feminists would have burned my dorm down) but had trouble relating to women. Hell, I still do. But I’m just married so it’s less of a concern.
  • I don’t see why porn giving men unrealistic images of sex is any different than romantic comedies giving women unrealistic images of romance. Or Friends giving people unrealistic images of life in New York. Entertainment isn’t reality and hasn’t been since Homer gave people unrealistic impressions of war in The Iliad.
    • Culture War, Politics, Science and Edumacation, The Nanny State

    Wednesday Linkorama

    2 Comments
  • It’s not enough we have that silly online gambling ban. Now, we’re going to have to pay $100 billion in trade agreements to keep it.
  • Carbon capture a good option? Eh, not so much. Carbon capture is one of those things that worries me. There is a stampede to embrace this idea and little, if anything, is known about the environmental impact.
  • From my old stomping grounds, a cop roughs up two jaywalkers. Oh, it was a war veteran and his pregnant fiance. Nice.
  • Jesus, is the MPAA a bunch of lunatics. You really should see This Film Is Not Yet Rated, if nothing else for the scene of Maria Bello discussing her pubic hair.
    • Culture War, Law and Order

    Emily

    On the way home, I was hearing news reports about Emily Sander, a college student who was just murdered in Kansas. Turns out, she was posing naked (probably just topless) for her own website. The idiot news media called her a “porn star”, which isn’t even close to true. She was one of hundreds of young women who are making money on the side posing naked on their own web sites. I don’t have a problem with this. They’re doing it of their own free will and men get vicarious pleasure out of looking at women who aren’t surgically enhanced bulemics.

    It will be interesting to see what happens to these women. Many of them are — or claim to be — college students. Will their websites cost them future jobs? For some reason, I doubt it. I think our society is getting a lot less puritanical about such things.

    However, the “porn star” slur that has leaked into the media is a preview of what is to come in the immediate aftermath of this tragedy. No matter why Emily Sander was murdered, this will be blamed on her web site. And we will get all kinds of dire warnings and calls for legislation. Because, as I noted, there are a lot of girls out there doing this. And a nation of 300 million certainly has no shortage of monsters.

    I have a friend who, whenever I support the freedom of women to be nude models, porn stars, prostitutes or whatever, asks me if I would want my daughter to do these things. Of course not. But I do want her to live in a country that treats her like an adult and respects her freedom to do what makes her happy — as long as she doesn’t harm anyone else.

    Culture War, Politics

    No Nonsense

    Thank goodness:

    New York is rejecting millions of dollars in federal grants for abstinence-only sex education, the state health commissioner, Dr. Richard F. Daines, announced yesterday. The decision puts New York in line with at least 10 other states that have decided to forgo the federal money in recent years.

    There is abundant evidence that this garbage is, at best, ineffective. No all we have to do is stop the federal government paying for religion-based anti-sex-education.

    Culture War, Politics, Science and Edumacation

    Thursday Night Linkorama

  • You’re kidding me.

    Programs that focus exclusively on abstinence have not been shown to affect teenager sexual behavior, although they are eligible for tens of mil lions of dollars in federal grants, according to a study released by a nonpartisan group that seeks to reduce teen pregnancies.

    …

    The study found that while abstinence-only efforts appear to have little positive impact, more comprehensive sex education programs were having “positive outcomes” including teenagers “delaying the initiation of sex, reducing the frequency of sex, reducing the number of sexual partners and increasing condom or contraceptive use.”

    “Two-thirds of the 48 comprehensive programs that supported both abstinence and the use of condoms and contraceptives for sexually active teens had positive behavior effect,” said the report.

    Abstinence and condoms. Abstinence and condoms! Abstinence AND condoms, you microcephalic Religious Right twerps!

  • Reports are coming in that kids are taking a lot more diabets medication. I have to wonder, however, if this actually means there has been an increase in diabetes or an increase in medication. Kids are taking more of every drug these days, despite being healthier than ever.
  • On that note, the ideal weight? Slightly over. Let’s see the Health Nazi wriggle out of this one. They do note that despite the better outcomes, there are some health disadvantages to being overweight. I’m inclined to agree. The whole point of the debate is that an enjoyable life is better than a miserable on that last a year or two longer. And as an overweight person, I find I have less energy and verve. But, of course the biggest problem with being overweight is that it cuts into your chances of getting laid. Now let’s try and see the Health Nazis sell that.