Off-Topic and Low-Effort CW Thread for November 2, 2020OT/LE

submitted by rwkastenBring on the dancing horses from self.CultureWarRoundup

Off-Topic and Low-Effort CW Thread for November 2, 2020

Post small CW threads and off-topic posts here. The rules still apply.

What belongs here? Most things that don't belong in their own text posts:

"I saw this article, but I don't think it deserves its own thread, or I don't want to do a big summary and discussion of my own, or save it for a weekly round-up dump of my own. I just thought it was neat and wanted to share it."

"This is barely CW related (or maybe not CW at all), but I think people here would be very interested to see it, and it doesn't deserve its own thread."

"I want to ask the rest of you something, get your feedback, whatever. This doesn't need its own thread."

Please keep in mind werttrew's old guidelines for CW posts:

“Culture war” is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people change their minds regardless of the quality of opposing arguments.

Posting of a link does not necessarily indicate endorsement, nor does it necessarily indicate censure. You are encouraged to post your own links as well. Not all links are necessarily strongly “culture war” and may only be tangentially related to the culture war—I select more for how interesting a link is to me than for how incendiary it might be.

The selection of these links is unquestionably inadequate and inevitably biased. Reply with things that help give a more complete picture of the culture wars than what’s been posted.

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[–]rwkastenBring on the dancing horses[S,M] [score hidden] stickied comment (0 children)

New thread available here: https://saidit.net/s/CultureWarRoundup/comments/6ydj/offtopic_and_loweffort_cw_thread_for_december_7/

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Andrew Cuomo Wins Ted Kennedy Award For Handling Of Coronavirus Pandemic After Policies Killed Thousands In Nursing Homes

It is odd enough that the Edward M. Kennedy Institute would give out an award for “Inspired leadership,” considering the institute’s namesake left a woman to die in a sinking car and shirked responsibility for her death. It is his institute, and they can give whatever award they want, however.

So, it is actually kind of perfect that Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) has received such an award, considering his handling of the coronavirus pandemic mimics Kennedy’s treatment of Mary Jo Kopechne. Kennedy recklessly drove his car over a bridge, crashing into the water below. Kennedy escaped and returned to the party from which he had taken Kopechne, leaving the young woman to die in the vehicle as it sank. Kopechne suffered a horrible death, one that could have been avoided had Kennedy not so callously disregarded the young secretary.

When the coronavirus pandemic was just heating up, Cuomo’s Health Department issued a mandate to state nursing homes requiring them to take coronavirus-positive patients whether they were equipped to handle the virus or not. The mandate gave little to no time for facilities to prepare for potentially incoming patients. As The Daily Wire reported back in March, body bags were sent along with coronavirus patients. For one nursing home in Queens, the mandate resulted in 30 patients dying within the first month after the mandate took effect. Many of the deaths were from residents who weren’t positive for the virus prior to the mandate being issued.

About 6,326 COVID-positive patients were sent to nursing homes between March 25 and May 8, 2020. Back in August, New York was reporting around 6,600 nursing home deaths due to the coronavirus, but as the Associated Press reported at the time, that number was likely far higher.

🤡🌍️

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Republican Jews like me are being chased out of synagogues

And it just got worse and worse. Over the last few years, the social-justice movement within the Jewish community and across the nation has dominated conversations. Tikkun Olam (repairing the world) as the major expression of Judaism was now mandated, not a choice. The once-peaceful and spiritual atmosphere at my synagogue disappeared.

And I wasn’t alone in noticing this or mourning it. Many conservative friends were experiencing similar uncomfortable situations. When they complained, they were ignored by the Board of Directors, so they ended their memberships at their synagogues.

But I held on. Then, six months ago, an article appeared in the synagogue newsletter about “Jews of Whiteness and Jews of Color.” The divisive language hit a nerve, since I have an Ethiopian son. Why was this divisive language in our community? What is this self-imposed segregation?

I decided to meet with the Board of Directors of my synagogue. I wanted to know why our synagogue newsletter had become a political vehicle instead of a spiritual resource. I wanted to know what they thought about conservative Jews fleeing their synagogue. The Board listened, but took no action. And when I tried to write my own articles in the newsletter, they never appeared.

For not conforming to a specific political groupthink, I was censored, silenced and squeezed out of a Jewish religious space. This contradicts everything Judaism represents. Midrash teaches us to respect differing viewpoints, the free exchange of ideas, dialogue, debate, inquiry, investigation, and interpretation.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

The State of Oregon continues to defend a state program that distributes federal coronavirus relief funds to black people — and only black people — after two separate lawsuits have challenged the program as a violation of the U.S. Constitution.

As the Wall Street Journal‘s James Freeman noted on Saturday, a federal judge already denied Great Northern Resources’ attempt to block further disbursements from the fund, but has yet to rule on the underlying constitutional issues in the case.

The first lawsuit is being funded by the Project on Fair Representation, which describes itself as “a nonprofit legal foundation based in Arlington, Virginia” whose mission “is to challenge in state and federal courts government distinctions and preferences made on the basis of race.”

Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (D) and Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said last month: “The data show that Black Oregonians are experiencing disproportionate harm from COVID-19. … We must not allow pernicious and ideologically-motivated lawsuits to impede our efforts to deliver critical resources to Oregonians amid a devastating pandemic.”

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

14-year-old challenges UK police over secret “non-crime hate incident” lists

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Seattle policymakers want to provide the city’s underclass with blanket immunity for misdemeanor crime.

In October, the Seattle City Council floated legislation to provide an exemption from prosecution for misdemeanor crimes for any citizen who suffers from poverty, homelessness, addiction, or mental illness. Under the proposed ordinance, courts would have to dismiss all so-called “crimes of poverty”—which, according to the city’s former public-safety advisor, would cover more than 90 percent of all misdemeanor cases citywide. In effect, the legislation would create a new class of “untouchables,” protected from consequences by the city’s powerbrokers.

This is the latest and most brazen effort in the city’s campaign to establish what might be called a “reverse hierarchy of oppression.” The underlying theory is that society has condemned the lower class to a life of poverty and stigma, which leads to addiction, madness, and indigence. The poor, in the logic of Seattle’s progressive elites, are thus forced to commit crimes—including violent crimes—to secure their very existence. Therefore, as society is the perpetrator of this inequality, the crimes of the poor must be forgiven. The crimes are transformed into an expression of social justice.

On a practical level, if this ordinance becomes law, it will effectively legalize an entire spectrum of misdemeanor crimes, including theft, assault, harassment, drug possession, property destruction, and indecent exposure. Criminals must simply establish that they have an addiction, mental-health disorder, or low income in order to evade justice. The impact of this measure would be enormous. In 2019, the Seattle Police Department reported 25,993 thefts, 8,442 assaults, 6,430 property offenses, 4,194 frauds, 3,910 trespasses, and 1,640 narcotics violations—representing 72 percent of all reported crimes. If the ordinance passes, nearly all these crimes would be permitted under law.

🤡🌍️

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

YouTube to survey creators on their race, gender, and sexuality so it can manipulate algorithms accordingly

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

San Diego public school teachers required to attend ‘white privilege’ training

As reported by Christopher Rufo, (white) teachers who thought they went into education to teach reading, writing and math got it all wrong — they must become “anti-racist activists” in the classroom. (Rufo notes only 47 percent of SDUSD students are proficient in reading and math.)

A district PowerPoint presentation provided by Rufo in his piece is quite typical; my former district made use of the same subject matter nearly 20 years ago. Teachers are told to “speak their truth,” “expect to experience discomfort” and “be explicit about race and racism” (but not too explicit as “coded language” is forbidden. Go figure.)

[...]

Subsequent slides feature the statements “You are racist” and “You are upholding racist ideas, structures and policies.”

If someone said these to you, “how would this make you feel?” teachers are asked. This is followed by “what would you want to say to someone who tells you this?” (Remember, be brave! Speak your truth!) Then comes what really is the entire basis for DiAngelo’s and Kendi’s teachings, such that they are (and which “defies the principle of falsifiability“): “Your action or inaction can be racist or antiracist at any time depending on what you choose or choose not do.”

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Twitter is in China’s pocket

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Sissy porn, the gender movement's dirty secret

The fundamental assertion of sissification pornography is that being a woman is inherently degrading -- that men who are insecure about the size of their genitalia must be transformed into women through “forced feminization.” In these scenarios, the penis is referred to as a “clitty,” and the anus is referred to as a “pussy.” Prostate orgasms are referred to as “sissygasms.” Often, men who produce this content, as well as those who use it, implement a device called a “chastity cage” which prevents erections, and anal plugs are used to stretch the anus in an attempt to resemble a vulva. Extremely feminine attire may be incorporated, including pink, frilly dresses that resemble a variation on children’s clothing with an added sexualized element, like high heels or a garter belt. BDSM also plays a role in sissy porn, and often a woman in a dominatrix role -- referred to as a mistress -- humiliates the male “sub” (submissive) by mocking him as a failed man who must be feminized.

Transgender advocates, when confronted with the paraphilias of the sissification community, typically say these men do not fall under the trans umbrella, despite Stonewall UK’s inclusion of crossdressing in a definition posted on their website: “Trans people may describe themselves using one or more of a wide variety of terms, including (but not limited to) transgender, cross dresser, non-binary, gender queer.” The overlap between the sissy community and the transgender male-to-female (MTF) community can easily be seen on social media platforms like Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram, where “sissy captions” proliferate: images of women in sexualized clothing with text added, instructing men to take female hormones and “feminize” themselves to look like the women in the photos.

On Instagram, for instance, the hashtag #sissification has been used in 110k posts. There are a variety of related hashtags, as well: #sissyhypno, #sissytraining, #sissygirl, #sissycaption, #sissymaid, all of which overlap with other hashtags like #trans, #tgirl, #mtftransgender, #trap, and #genderqueer. An account called, “The Sissy Corner,” run by an anonymous LGBTQ activist in India, posts images captioned with phrases like, “You have reached the point when words like bimbo, beta, bitch, sissy, feels like a sweet compliment,” or “Take hormones until you look like her,” and “You let a guy fck you like a girl, then why do you still think that you are a man?” A Facebook page called, “Sissy Kiss,” which has nearly 40k followers, describes itself: “We are transgender girls who love being very girly, sweet, kinky, and cute. Anyone into sissies are [sic] welcome!” Posts read: “My goal is to feminize you till your pnis is useless and you [sic] crying to remove it,” “If you’re gonna dress like a slut, I’m gonna watched you get f*cked like one,” and, “We need to up your hormones and waist training drastically.”

Men openly discuss the sissy/transgender overlap on social media and in public forums. There are many subreddits where men gather to discuss the sissy lifestyle on Reddit. These subreddits are dedicated to the proliferation of sissy porn, as well as advice and tips on how to better “feminize.” The subreddit, “Sissy Hypno,” which currently has 146k members, is described as a community dedicated to “hypnosis media that turn participants into sexy, c*cksucking sissies.” There are numerous related subreddits: r/sissy has 80.5k members; r/sissypersonals, nearly 100k; r/sissydating, 36k; r/sissies, 233k; and r/traps, 413k (“trap” is a term that refers to men who “pass” as women so convincingly, they are able to trick straight men into sexual relationships). It should be noted that there is no age verification required to access these groups, which host pornography. They are openly accessible to children, and it is not uncommon to see reddit posts from those claiming to be underage boys in sissification groups.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Facebook to give lesser punishment for “hate speech” against white people than against minorities

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Smith College alumni demand ‘further training’ for white staffer who decried anti-white work environment

Without naming her, the open letter to the Smith community says Shaw’s videos “expound at length, though with little actual detail, on various complaints” about her employment conditions. They described the targets of her complaints as “the College’s recent efforts to implement implicit bias and anti-racist training as a means of embracing equity and inclusion both on and off campus”:

While applicable to the entire Smith Community, this work is of the utmost importance for current students and staff, whose immediate safety and wellbeing during an already difficult semester have been compromised by the overt resentment and ire expressed by this community-facing member of the Smith staff, and by the national attention it has garnered.

It “reaffirm[s] our support” for earlier demands issued by black student organizations, including for race-segregated housing options and a required “Race Relations class” for graduation.

[...]

Shaw’s complaints, however, show she needs even more indoctrination:

The existence and deleterious effects of White privilege and implicit bias have been well documented and established. That this staff member, despite being employed at a top U.S. college, remains ignorant of such documentation––in service, we presume from her video, of maintaining a guiltless understanding of her own Whiteness––only reinforces the need for ongoing education at Smith.

The alleged racism she perpetuates “must therefore be eradicated with purpose”:

In the face of uncomfortable learning and change, there will always be those whose insecurity manifests as a digging in of heels. It is clear that this staff member, whose video evinces both a staggering lack of self-awareness and a deep preoccupation with disavowing the idea of White privilege, is indeed in need of further training before she can safely interact with students and fellow staff in the course of her employment.

Simply letting Shaw speak her mind “perpetuate[s] an environment that is unsafe for BIPOC [black, indigenous and people of color] Smith community members,” the letter declares.

The beatingsdiversity training will continue until morale improves.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

E-commerce platform Etsy says it is stamping out “harmful misinformation"… from knitters making MAGA-themed beanies.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Progressive Methodist group announces formation of Liberation Methodist Connexion. You know, for those who thought the mainline UMC was a bunch of conservative fuddy-duddies. The Bee gets closer and closer to reality every day.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

UNC faces a lawsuit alleging discriminatory admissions based on race

The lawsuit states that UNC is “engaging in intentional discrimination on the basis of race and ethnicity," and accuses the university favors Black and Hispanic applicants over qualified Asian and White applicants.

The lawsuit said that “UNC-Chapel Hill, like all other colleges and universities, labels every applicant by race.”

“Rather, UNC-Chapel Hill’s racial preference for each underrepresented minority student (which equates to a penalty imposed upon white and Asian-American applicants) is so large that race becomes the ‘defining feature of his or her application.’ Only using race or ethnicity as a dominant factor in admissions decisions could, for example, account for the disparate treatment of high-achieving Asian-American and white applicants and underrepresented minority applicants with inferior academic credentials,” it stated.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

British army tasked with crushing vaccine skepticism online

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Project Veritas Update: Leaked tapes reveal CNN boss Jeff Zucker approved burying the Hunter Biden story in run up to election

In leaked telephone conference calls of the news network's 9am editorial meetings, senior staff tell CNN boss Jeff Zucker that the network should downplay the bombshell story.

Zucker also tells his staff that he doesn't think 'we should be repeating unsubstantiated smears just because the right wing media suggests that we should.'

He later called it a 'rabbit hole', saying: 'The Breitbart, New York Post, Fox News rabbit hole of Hunter Biden, which I don't think anybody outside of that world understood.'

The story, which was first revealed in the New York Post, revealed emails that allegedly came from Hunter Biden's laptop and shed light on questionable foreign business dealings he had both before and after his father was vice president.

CNN political director David Chalian can be heard telling Zucker that the news network would 'obviously' not be covering the story.

[...]

Also on Wednesday, in a third release from Project Veritas, CNN executive Cynthia Hudson could be heard expressing her opinion over President Trump's influence over Cuban voters in Miami ahead of the election, saying they are 'attracted to bullies'.

She surmises that the Cuban population in Florida would likely to vote for Trump because they are 'attracted to bullies.'

She then said it was 'terrifying' how many Cubans were voting for Trump in Florida.

'No one is countering it properly in Florida, the Cubans are going to vote for Trump and that's terrifying.

Not much more than confirmation of what we already knew.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

They come in threes, I suppose: San Francisco's Dem mayor says more severe COVID-19 restrictions are on the way after being caught dining at fancy restaurant

Breed's announcement came on the same day that the San Francisco Chronicle revealed that Breed attended a birthday party for a close friend at French Laundry, the upscale Napa Valley restaurant, last month. It's the same restaurant where Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) was caught dining at last month, during which he neither wore a face mask nor adhered to social distancing guidelines.

Newsom has been ferociously criticized for the dining out activity, which came as thousands of small businesses and restaurants shutter amid increasing COVID-related restrictions. Many of those businesses will never reopen.

In fact, Breed dined at the restaurant just one day after Newsom, and several days before she admonished her residents for acting unwisely during the pandemic.

"I cannot emphasize enough how important it is that everyone act responsibly to reduce the spread of the virus," Breed said Nov. 10. "Every San Franciscan needs to do their part so that we can start moving in the right direction again."

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Austin Mayor lectured the common folk about staying home while he was on vacation in Cabo

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Conservative Cancel Culture: Paul E. Gottfried et al’s “The Vanishing Tradition: Perspectives on American Conservatism”

Scores of other right-wing intellectuals were purged by the establishment, as the book relates. From the founders of American libertarianism, such as Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard, and the fathers of post-war US conservatism like Russell Kirk and Richard Weaver to proto-Trumpians like Samuel Huntingdon, Pat Buchanan, Samuel T. Francis and John Derbyshire, dissenters were shown the door and sometimes publicly and needlessly attacked for their views on globalism, mass immigration, foreign interventions and other issues on which they failed to fall in line with the neoconservative agenda.

Then there’s Gottfried’s own cancellation. Despite having written numerous scholarly works on American conservatism, he was labelled unpatriotic by David Frum for his criticism of neoconservatism. Detractors also managed to get him excluded from consideration for a professorship at Catholic University and persuaded Modern Age to no longer allow him to contribute to the magazine.

It would be easy to write off some of the cancelled as isolationists, unreconstructed traditionalists or chauvinistic cranks. Many, however, articulated issues that later found resonance with millions of voters. And since Trump’s 2016 victory, many of them have enjoyed renewed recognition.

Furthermore, such cancellations are troubling, independent of one’s opinion of their victims. As Gottfried notes, it is worse to be cancelled as a conservative than as a liberal because of the relative paucity of right-wing media outlets—indeed, many of the cancelled languished and died in obscurity following their ousters.

Many of these people were cancelled in response to left-wing pressure. Yielding to your opponents in this way is poor political strategy, as it just encourages them to demand further cancellations. As Mark Steyn puts it in his own defense of John Derbyshire: “The more sacrifices you offer up, the more ravenously the volcano belches.”

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

With a more conservative Supreme Court, NRA brings lawsuit against New Jersey

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Incoming Texas freshmen threatened with doxxing if they join conservative campus groups

The Autonomous Student Network in Austin, Texas, a group that was previously suspended from Twitter after posting private information belonging to supporters of then-Supreme Court Justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh, is now threatening to do the same to incoming University of Texas-Austin freshmen who join conservative student organizations.

"Hey #UT23! Do you wanna be famous? If you join YCT [Young Conservatives of Texas] or Turning Point USA, you just might be. Your name and more could end up on an article like one of these," the group tweeted earlier in June, linking to a page on its website, on which it previously posted the private information, including emails and phone numbers, of Kavanaugh supporters.

"So be sure to make smart choices at #UTOrientation," the group added.

A separate tweet read, "the best #LonghornStateOfMind is an antifascist one. If you begin to spot the young racists trying to join YCT or TPUSA, send us a tip so we can keep our reports up to date #UT23. Also, if you’re an antifascist/anarchist/autonomy inclined Longhorn, reach out & let’s link up!"

The same Twitter account that threatened to release the personal information of students who join conservative groups also marked the 15th anniversary of President Ronald Reagan's death by tweeting a picture of the Republican president's grave, along with the words, "Reagan died today [retweet] to piss on his grave."

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Department of Ed. investigates UPitt for possible violation of professor's 'academic freedom'

With news of Wang’s removal from his position, the Department of Education sent a letter to the University requesting various records, one of them including, “All records of, relating to, referring to, regarding, or concerning Dr. Norman Wang.”

The letter also states, “The U.S. Department of Education (‘Department’) has become aware of facts suggesting the University of Pittsburgh (‘Pitt’) improperly targeted Dr. Norman Wang, associate professor of medicine, with a campaign of denunciation and cancellation due to the publication of his peer-reviewed scientific article in the Journal of the American Heart Association advocating race-neutral admissions and hiring in cardiology.”

The letter also states that the department is concerned that Wang may have been treated differently if he was of a different race.

“Consequently, the Department is concerned Pitt’s many representations to students, faculty, and consumers in the market for education credentials regarding its support for academic freedom are false…The facts further suggest Dr. Wang may have been disparately treated because of his race (Asian). That is, Pitt would not have acted against him for publishing an academic paper containing the same or similar arguments and empirical data if he were of a different race…”

The letter from the Department of Education states that it is opening an investigation to determine whether the University of Pittsburgh violated its promise of "academic freedom" and "freedom of expression."

The department is also investigating the University of Pittsburgh for its possible use of race-based admissions.

JAHA told Campus Reform that the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center initially requested the retraction: “As noted on our website, we adhere to COPE standards and the retraction request as submitted by the institution met those for retraction.”

Obligatory "lol, COPE"

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

BBC Studios Announces 20% Diversity Quotas On All Future Productions

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Academics face a moral dilemma

How much do academics care about what’s true, as opposed to what’s morally orthodox? This has become a much-debated question in recent years as the ‘campus wars’ have grown more heated.

To date there has been plenty of opinion on the subject, but little in the way of data. But in 2016, Glenn Geher, a professor of psychology, used an outbreak of ‘campus wars’ at his own university to conduct a study on the association between political outlook and academic values.

He interviewed 117 academics across the US about their sex, political affiliations, personalities, academic subject, and also the relative importance they ascribed to five values: academic freedom, academic rigour, the advancement of knowledge, student emotional wellbeing, and social justice.

The study revealed correlations between academic values and academics’ sex, political orientation, personality traits and subject area. Education academics de-emphasise academic rigour and the advancement of knowledge, for example, in favour of social justice and student wellbeing, as do female academics, while business studies academics prioritise rigour and the advancement of knowledge. The only value shared across all groups was the preference for academic freedom.

Geher argues, with Jonathan Haidt, that the heavy emphasis on social justice as a primary value inevitably comes into conflict with the academy’s ostensible purpose: the pursuit of knowledge. Many recent academic controversies have turned in essence on the question of whether, if something is true but appears to conflict with the aims of social justice, it’s even permissible as a topic of academic discussion. Geher’s study supports the general impression emerging from campus wars, that the academy overall answers ‘no’ to this question — but also that views on the subject aren’t evenly distributed. Women, humanities academics and those with more ‘agreeable’ personality traits are less likely to value the advancement of knowledge.

Link to study here (Google Drive, PDF)

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

UK towns use coronavirus to justify mass surveillance of residents’ personal details

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

James O’Keefe Dials in to CNN Conference Calls, Tells Network President He’ll Release Tapes of Editorial Calls Later TODAY

O’Keefe informed Zucker on the call that his organization had been recording the insider calls for months before inquiring “do you still feel you’re the most trusted name in news.”

Zucker, failing to address O’Keefe’s question, responds “thank you for your comment. So, everybody, I think in light of that, we’ll set up a new system, and we’ll be back with you, we’ll do the rest of the call later” before appearing to end the call.

The clips are set to be released on December 1st at 7pm Eastern Time.

Per O’Keefe, Project Veritas has “clips of various producers talking, the president talking, describing their motives, describing their political philosophy, describing how they don’t cover certain things and certain political parties tell them to cover things a certain way.”

Given O'Keefe's track record as of late I'll be pleasantly surprised if there's anything of substance.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Critical race theory: a ruling-class ideology

CRT’s obsession with racial categorisation and white privilege leaves little room to consider the impact of social class on people’s life chances. Indeed, in the rush to construct intersectional hierarchies that position people of colour as oppressed victims of entrenched white superiority, the experiences of wealthy, highly educated, well-connected black people are overlooked. And rather than promoting solidarity between working-class people of all skin colours, poor white people must be taught to recognise their privileges.

Some people certainly do benefit from CRT. The academics, experts and workplace trainers that comprise the burgeoning diversity industry make a good living and find an important sense of purpose in revealing our unconscious bias, hearing penance and holding out the promise of absolution. They are morally invested in the existence of racism and cannot afford for it to ever disappear. Members of the wider graduate class of experts, bureaucrats and managers have imbibed the CRT script. They know that, to paraphrase the socialite and journalist Nancy Mitford, referring to ‘people of colour’ is ‘U’ (vocabulary that marks one out as upper class), while ‘coloured people’ is distinctly ‘non-U’. They know that three years ago, the acronym BME (Black and Minority Ethnic) fell out of fashion and was replaced by BAME (with Asian specified). And they know that BAME itself is now on its way out. Attitudes change and language evolves over time but policing vocabulary in the name of enforcing anti-racism is how today’s graduate class shores up its moral authority and social status. Their special insights into white privilege and the impact of microaggressions allow them to justify their position.

This elite anti-racist project is terrible for everyone else. Black and white people alike are reduced to their skin colour and set in opposition to one another. Black people must learn to see themselves as victims, white people as privileged oppressors. Back in the days of empire, upper-class British boys were trained up for a life in the colonies, they had a role to fulfil managing and civilising the natives. Over a century on, the natives are now at home rather than abroad, and white rather than black or brown, but the civilising mission remains the same. It is now white working-class men who are made to atone for their privilege in a neverending process of repentance. As DiAngelo puts it:

‘A positive white identity is an impossible goal. White identity is inherently racist; white people do not exist outside the system of white supremacy.’

We have a new elite that uses not racism but anti-racism to invent differences between people which it exploits for its own ends. These radicals do not want to end racism but for it to continue indefinitely. They must not be allowed to get away with this.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Trans ideas are a menace to children

I’m so glad this madness wasn’t around to addle my brain when I was nine. I absolutely hated being a girl. I was the biggest tomboy ever. My mother and her extended family (Middle Eastern Jews), like those from so many cultures, openly valued and favoured boys way above girls. The options for girls from my social class, religion and background seemed so limited, so crushing. Boys in my class could be thick-as, yet still insist they were better than you just because they were boys. I desperately wished I had been born a boy. When I hit puberty a couple of years later and began to attract vile attention from so many men on the streets, I would happily have taken some puberty-blockers had they been offered to me.

But the problem wasn’t my body. The problem was frustration and indignation at being treated in ways that were patronising, limiting or predatory just because I was a girl. The problem was the adults and the cultures around me that demanded I fit into certain gender roles.

I have the greatest sympathy for the horrible, invidious situation of those contemporary parents whose child declares himself to be ‘trans’. They are trapped in a sort of vicious, virtuous circle. Parents and other adults in the children’s lives want to be sympathetic and understanding, tolerant and accepting. So, afraid of making the child feel ‘rejected’, they feel compelled to buy into the powerful pro-trans ideology, and inadvertently compound it all by accepting kids as they ‘truly are’. The trouble is, most adults, let alone young people, never know who they ‘truly are’ or what that actually means. I know I don’t. What we can know, however, is our sex. And our sex is fixed.

We need to stop confusing and unwittingly exploiting children. Puberty is already discombobulating. Children don’t just need protection and boundaries in the spheres of social behaviour – they also need boundaries and protection in the intellectual and emotional sphere, too. If they tell us they think they might have been born into the wrong body, then it is our job to put them straight and then help them deal with the chaos of growing up.

Objectively, factually, scientifically, you are male or female. And that is fixed. Your thoughts and feelings and where you stand – where you choose to stand – in society are another matter entirely. That stuff is complex, murky and often unfathomable even to ourselves. Perhaps especially to ourselves.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

UTSA student kicked out of sorority for “All Lives Matter” TikTok video

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Banned Catholic pro-life midwifery student wins apology and payout

In January, The Telegraph reported how Ms Rynkiewicz, an undergraduate at the University of Nottingham, faced expulsion from her degree after lecturers raised concerns about her fitness to practice.

University officials later U-turned on their decision and dismissed the case against her, leaving Ms Rynkiewicz, who is Catholic and who lives in southeast London, demanding an apology from university bosses “as a matter of justice”.

Following the dismissal of the allegations against her, the midwifery student filed a formal complaint with the university. It has now conceded a settlement and apology.

[...]

Ms Rynkiewicz served as president of ‘Nottingham Students for Life’, a pro-life student society that was initially denied affiliation by Nottingham University’s Students’ Union.

Concerns around Rynkiewicz’s fitness to practise centered on material available at the society’s freshers’ fair stall, as well as her public association with the society.

In the wake of the Fitness to Practise panel dismissing all allegations against her, she believes that she was unfairly targeted for her beliefs, that there were significant procedural failures compromising the investigation, and that the university should apologise to her.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Supreme Court Weighs Trump Plan To Exclude Undocumented Immigrants In Census Case

At the U.S. Supreme Court Monday, skeptical justices questioned the Trump administration's lawyer over a plan to exclude undocumented immigrants from a key census count — the first time unauthorized immigrants would not be counted for purposes of drawing new congressional districts.

[...]

That process is likely to take place after Trump's presidency.

The Census Bureau recently concluded it cannot finish putting together the first set of census numbers by the legal reporting deadline of Dec. 31.

After finding "processing anomalies" in this year's census results, the bureau's career staff determined they need to run more quality checks until at least Jan. 26, almost a week after the end of Trump's term.

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‘We need to turn Trump Hotels into prisons for his supporters’ — Radical left-wingers like Keith Olbermann call for purge of Trump supporters

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Catholic University under fire from students for espousing Catholic views

Leadership at a private Catholic Massachusetts university released a statement of stances on a variety of issues in society through a Catholic Viewpoint. This has been met by major backlash from students, alumni, and faculty who believe that the University is in the wrong for taking these religious stances.

Students at Assumption University have created a petition denouncing the University's stances, and demanding a formal apology for specific portions of the statement, specifically regarding gay marriage.

Over 4,000 people have signed the petition.

The university’s statement in part read:

“Racism and other unjust discrimination, the use of the death penalty, resorting to unjust war, environmental degradation, the use of torture, war crimes, the failure to respond to those who are suffering from hunger or a lack of health care or housing, pornography, human trafficking, redefining civil marriage, compromising religious liberty, or unjust immigration policies are all serious moral issues that challenge our consciences and require us to act."

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"Transphobic" stickers found on Edinburgh Uni campus

A fourth year Edinburgh student saw the stickers on two lampposts around uni, by 40 George Square and the other two just outside Brewlab on South College Street.

One sticker read “Seahorses ARE horses. Hotdogs ARE dogs. There is no debate. #WarOnWomen.”

[...]

“I <3 JK Rowling” stickers have been spotted. Although Edinburgh is known for its links to Harry Potter and therefore could be in reference to that, the author has found herself in hot water recently over a series of late night Twitter rants defending trans-exclusive language and policies. She has also written a book (under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith) with a villain that murders women and gets away with it by crossdressing. Her actions have been condemned by trans activists as well as LGBT+ Harry Potter fans and many cast members of the Harry Potter films.

Remember, if you don't support letting seahorses in the Kentucky Derby you're a gross shitty ichthyophobe and that is NOT OKAY.

SEAHORSES ARE HORSES

SEAHORSES ARE HORSES

SEAHORSES ARE HORSES

SEAHORSES ARE HORSES

SEAHORSES ARE HORSES

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

New Jersey bill would mandate school lessons on racism and social justice

Lawmakers in New Jersey passed a bill last month which would require schools to teach about racism, social justice and the “contributions made by prominent African Americans from the past to the present like Kamala Harris.”

Bill 3601, originally introduced back in March, awaits Governor Phil Murphy’s signature to become state law.

The bill appropriates $400,000 to, among other things, teach that “inequality is a consequence of prejudice and discrimination in the pursuit of maintaining power and dominance over certain portions of society,” and “emphasize the personal responsibility of each citizen to fight racism and hatred whenever and wherever it happens.”

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Facebook censorship covers up evidence of war crimes

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Twitter bans Senator Doug Mastriano after he led hearing over Pennsylvania election discrepancies

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Toxic Infantility and Its Social Consequences

The line between childhood and adulthood has become increasingly blurred. Take welfare politics, for example. A social safety net can help individuals in need get back on their feet. The prevailing approach to social welfare, however, presumes victimhood, fostering dependency rather than empowerment. Individual agency and responsibility rarely enter into the equation. This is not to reiterate Margret Thatcher’s contention that poverty is “a personality defect.” But if we treat adults like children they will probably behave like children. Paternalism breeds infantilism.

This principle is by no means exclusive to welfare. Take the patronizing tone of voice in which many media outlets address their adult audiences and the advertising industry’s appeal to infantile desires, which promotes impulsive behavior.

There is also a tendency to idealize childhood. However, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was mistaken when he stated, “Man is born free, but he is everywhere in chains.” At no point in life are we less free than in infancy, when we are completely dependent on adult care and guidance. Growing up means taking on obligations and responsibilities. This is crucial not only for our personal development but for society as a whole. Failure to grow up makes for a toxic personality. As Jordan Peterson has remarked, “People who don’t grow up don’t find the sort of meaning that sustains them through difficult times … and they’re left bitter and resentful and without purpose and adrift and hostile … and vengeful and arrogant and deceitful and of no use to themselves and of no use to anyone else.” In short, “there is nothing uglier than an old infant.”

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

After warnings to avoid travel, Denver Mayor Hancock flies to visit family for Thanksgiving

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University of Maryland department forces professors to acknowledge they’re on ‘stolen land’

So-called land acknowledgments are a popular form of virtue signaling for woke students and faculty.

Right in time for Thanksgiving, the University of Maryland’s School of Public Policy has decreed that faculty must participate in corporate confessions of sin to the previous inhabitants of the taxpayer-funded institution’s geography. UCLA Law Prof. Eugene Volokh, a First Amendment expert, shared an email he was forwarded from the department on its newly approved “syllabus statement” on “Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging.”

It’s mandatory for all syllabi starting this spring, raising the same question at issue in an Ohio professor’s lawsuit against his public university: Can the institution compel speech from faculty on their own syllabus?

Volokh notes the apparent final draft of the required materials is written “in the professor’s voice,” using “my” and “we” language instead of simply reiterating school policy.

Here’s the land acknowledgment:

We acknowledge that we are gathered on the stolen land of the Piscataway Conoy people and were founded upon the erasures and exploitation of many non-European peoples. You can find more information about the Piscataway Conoy Tribe at http://www.piscatawayconoytribe.com. For more information about the University of Maryland’s project for a richer understanding of generations of racialized trauma rooted in the institution visit https://go.umd.edu/SNW.

Faculty are not only told where to place the statement, but instructed to “vocally review” it with their students.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Food deemed non-essential as New Mexico governor shuts down grocery stores

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This episode, on /pol/ watch: the campaign to subvert Alegria.

The "flat" style of art seen throughout online media and big tech product interfaces has become a bête noire of the hyper-online right, comparable to their long-running distaste for Brutalist architecture. Many denounce it as a psyop intended to demoralize the populace by promoting low-effort inhuman ugliness in place of beauty. Now, after their success in co-opting the "OK" sign as a symbol of white supremacy, they're turning their efforts towards doing the same to mass-produced corporate art.

Some examples:

Alegria-styled George Floyd

Kenosha Kyle Google Doodle

A fake Vox article header (I think, it looks kind of like their font.)

Something Hollebecquian

Twitter delenda est

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Zuck personally signed off on algorithm manipulation towards establishment, legacy media

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Penguin Random House Staff Confront Publisher About New Jordan Peterson Book

Several Penguin Random House Canada employees confronted management about the company’s decision to publish a new book by controversial Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson at an emotional town hall Monday, and dozens more have filed anonymous complaints, according to four workers who spoke to VICE World News.

On Monday, Penguin Random House Canada, Canada’s largest book publisher and a subsidiary of Penguin Random House, announced it will be publishing Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life by Peterson, to be released in March 2021. The book will be published by Portfolio in the U.S. and Penguin Press in the U.K., both part of the Penguin Random House empire.

Four Penguin Random House Canada employees, who did not want to be named due to concerns over their employment, said the company held a town hall about the book Monday, during which executives defended the decision to publish Peterson while employees cited their concerns about platforming someone who is popular in far-right circles.

“He is an icon of hate speech and transphobia and the fact that he’s an icon of white supremacy, regardless of the content of his book, I’m not proud to work for a company that publishes him,” a junior employee who is a member of the LGBTQ community and who attended the town hall told VICE World News.

Another employee said “people were crying in the meeting about how Jordan Peterson has affected their lives.” They said one co-worker discussed how Peterson had radicalized their father and another talked about how publishing the book will negatively affect their non-binary friend.

“The company since June has been doing all these anti-racist and allyship things and them publishing Peterson’s book completely goes against this. It just makes all of their previous efforts seem completely performative,” the employee added.

A company engaging in performative wokeness? Perish the thought!

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Broke: Reenacting the fall of Rome.

Woke: Reenacting the fall of Zimbabwe.

A new Senate bill, called the Justice for Black Farmers Act, set to be released November 30, would mount a long-delayed federal effort to reverse the “destructive forces that were unleashed upon Black farmers over the past century—one of the dark corners of shame in American history,” lead sponsor Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) told Mother Jones.

Co-sponsored with senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), the bill would, among other things, create an Equitable Land Access Service within the USDA, including a fund that devotes $8 billion annually to buying farmland on the open market and granting it to new and existing Black farmers, with the goal of making 20,000 grants per year over nine years, with maximum allotments of 160 acres. It would also fund agriculture-focused historically Black colleges and universities as well and nonprofits like the Northeast Farmers of Color Land Trust to help identify land for the USDA to purchase, and “help new Black farmers get up and running, provide farmer training, and provide other assistance including support for development of farmer cooperatives,” the bill’s summary states.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Getting (or renewing) a teacher's license in Illinois will now require becoming an acolyte in the cult of intersectionality.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Lawsuit threatened against school that won’t let student out of class promoting anti-white racism

“Sociology of Change” is required for graduation, yet the course content “served no apparent pedagogical purpose beyond ideological thought reform,” lawyer Jonathan O’Brien wrote to Popper. The student is biracial and his late father was white:

As such they object to the glib racism of your course materials and programming, which includes statements in no apparent context like “Racism is what white people do to people of color,” repeated ad infinitum.

The letter reprints a SpongeBob SquarePants meme allegedly used in the course materials that says “reverse racism doesn’t exist.” Organizational psychologist Karlyn Borysenko shared that and other slides from the class in September, including one that excuses “black prejudice” because it supposedly can’t hurt whites.

The teacher “explicitly discouraged disagreement, terminating class discussion when students objected to the content of the class materials,” and “repeatedly” told students to “publicly profess their sexual, racial, and religious identities” in order to scrutinize them “in a derogatory manner,” according to O’Brien’s letter.

The lawyer called this exercise “psychologically abusive,” “an offensive violation of privacy” and “compelled speech,” and yet such exercises “are pervasive to the class and homework assignments.” The course content is “patently racist” and violates both federal civil rights law and the school’s contractual agreement with the Nevada state charter authority.

The letter implies the school is hiding discriminatory course content from regulators “under the guise” of ordinary-sounding class titles that mention “civic engagement” and “social justice,” rather than accurately identifying the course as indoctrinating students in critical race theory.

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Google Photos is working on feature that allows users to flag “misleading” shared albums

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HBO's 'Transhood' Normalizes Child Abuse

Seven-year-old Avery's story is one of the most painful to watch in the film because the control and manipulation by Avery's mother is so blatant. Avery is the boy who infamously appeared on the cover of National Geographic's 2016 "Gender Revolution" issue as a "transgender girl." As it turns out, Avery did not want to do that National Geographic photo. In fact, Avery does not want to do most of the very public, attention-getting things his mother (who also gets lots of attention) makes him do.

As the National Geographic photographer arrives, Avery cries out, "You put me in everything and I don't approve of it," and runs to hide in his room. Eventually his mother, Debi, gets him out and he does the shoot. According to Debi, her 7-year-old said, "Her job as a trans person was to help change the world for other kids." At age 7, a kid's "job" is to play and have fun with friends.

When Debi takes Avery to the doctor at age 8, she tells the doctor that she's been reading him "all the sex education books" and he is now afraid of puberty. "I just wanna stay a kid," Avery says. Debi never thinks she should take a break on the sex education books and let her child be a kid for a while.

Avery's father largely recedes into the background for most of the film. After nearly five years of trans publicity through important development stages of childhood, Avery so thoroughly resists being paraded in public any longer, that his mother finally relents and lets him just play with animals and enjoy activities at the local nature center instead. The end of the film tells the audience that Avery now only does "activist work" with his mother on rare occasions (though he apparently still believes he is a girl).

But Debi is not the only parent in this film who has an outsized role in pushing her child to do things he or she does not want to do. The mother of 13-year-old Jay, a girl who thinks she is a boy, tells the director flat-out, "My mother thinks I'm a child abuser." Jay dresses like a boy, cuts her hair short, and tells no one at school that she is a biological girl. Jay's mother says, "I'm gonna push him to come out and be who he's supposed to be."

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Girl doxed and threatened for ‘racist’ space buns hairstyle in Animal Crossing

Fifi, better known as @stardewleaf on Twitter, is a massive fan of both Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing (as is obvious in her handle). She likes to share her creations with her followers, but she wasn’t expecting to be cancelled by an angry mob for it.

The 28-year-old Animal Crossing fan from the UK shared a picture of her character chilling in the kitchen with her pet plush puppy. Her character was sporting black boots, leggings, a pink skirt with a matching pink sweater. However, what most people were upset with was her choice of hairstyle for her videogame character.

“Cute space buns,” Fifi wrote with an accompanying smiley emoji, but a handful of people on Twitter with #BLM in their names lashed out at her accusing her of appropriating black culture and being racist.

[...]

Fifi (@stardewleaf) later shared a picture of her golden retriever. She explained that he was turning 20 and was very sick but that her dog’s unconditional love helped her cope with the hate she was receiving for her “space buns.”

Other Black Lives Matter activists used this opportunity to attempt to dox her, some even saying that they should “find and kill that racist dog”.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

UK government to propose digital “freedom pass” that allows heavily-tested citizens out in public life

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Antiracism Icon Robin DiAngelo Paid More Than Black Woman for Same Job

The prominent diversity consultant Robin DiAngelo raked in $12,750 for a speaking gig last month at the University of Wisconsin—70 percent more than the other keynote speaker, black female author Austin Channing Brown.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison's Division of Diversity, Equity, and Educational Achievement paid Channing Brown just $7,500 for her keynote address at its annual Diversity Forum, receipts obtained by the Washington Free Beacon show. The payments were negotiated with the Harry Walker Agency, a New York-based speakers bureau that represents both women.

Surely she'll stick to her principles and share the money equitably with her black co-worker!

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Why not ‘My Fuhrer’? Appeals court grills public college on forcing professor to call male student ‘miss’

A public university’s lawyer bumbled his way through oral argument last week on whether his taxpayer-funded client can force a philosophy professor to address a male student with female pronouns.

Sharp questioning by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals repeatedly left Keating Muething’s Paul Kerridge at a loss for words, including on whether Ohio’s Shawnee State University could similarly force a Jewish professor to address a student as “My Fuhrer.”

[...]

The Alliance Defending Freedom, which is representing Meriwether, believes Thursday’s oral argument went well for his case.

Shawnee State’s Kerridge gave “surprising answers” to questions such as whether the university could also force a professor to open every class with a Black Lives Matter statement, Vice President of Appellete Advocacy John Bursch told reporters on a conference call after oral argument.

Meriwether told reporters that his academic field of philosophy deals with what a person believes is reality. He cannot “express a view of reality I do not hold,” and a university is not supposed to be “an assembly line for one type of thought.”

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Progressives Declare War on Asians, Meritocracy and STEM

Progressives all across America have declared war on Asians, meritocracy, and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math). Recently, the San Francisco Unified School District voted to replace their merit admissions process at Lowell High School, one of the best high schools in America and also happens to be 61% Asian, with a lottery-based system.

When Asian-American parents opposed the school district’s plans to enact its new “lottery” system in late October, the school district blasted the parents by stating they were “racist” and responsible for the “toxic culture” at the school. Parents were accused of furthering the “Asian supremacy” agenda by making their children work so hard; their children’s achievements were demoralizing African-American and Latino students.

One African-American parent stated it’s because of Asians hogging up all the spaces “Black people can’t catch up technologically because the ‘stupid Asians’ are keeping black people down out of fear they’d be overtaken.”

When one angry Asian-American parent responded “Trust me, you’ll never catch up. If you need to lower-standards to get in, you’ll never beat us,” a near physical fight broke loose.

Another Asian parent screamed, “First you blame white people, now you blame us!? Grow up! Study harder or go home!”

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Oxford academics slam Big Tech censorship of scientific study over mask-wearing

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Illegal Alien Crossings Surging in Anticipation of Biden Presidency

Illegal alien crossings into the United States are surging and seizures of illegal drugs are also rising. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner Mark Gordon says that one reason for the surge is worsening economic conditions south of the border. But he also said that anticipation of more relaxed border policies under a Biden administration may be driving some of the surges.

Border patrol agents and the CBP say that there were 69,000 unauthorized border crossers in October, up from about 58,000 in September. Heroin seizures were up a worrying 132 percent compared to September while cocaine seizures rose 58 percent.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Research: Teacher ‘anti-bias’ trainings not very effective

One thing educators can always count on is their school districts jumping on the latest academic fads to full effect.

An example of such is so-called “anti-bias” (or “implicit bias”) trainings which are designed to weed out the negative stereotypes teachers possess (especially those of pallid hue), keep teachers aware of them, and have teachers develop strategies to overcome them.

However, a recent story in Education Week highlights the shortcomings of such trainings:

[R]esearch on implicit-bias training suggest it more often changes short-term knowledge about the vocabulary of diversity than long-term changes in behavior. …

In some cases, diversity and anti-bias training can paradoxically lead to more stereotyping, if participants come to think of biases as common and uncontrollable, and can lead white participants to feel threatened without yielding benefits for participants of color….

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Liberal feminism has failed women

Ask yourself this: if it was legal for women to walk around topless in the same way it is for men, would you do it? Would you choose to walk around in public naked from the waist up on a hot day? Or sit topless in the park, would you go into the shops to buy groceries topless? If not, why not? In fact, walking around topless is legal for women in New York City but nobody does it.

Take the ‘Free The Nipple (FTN) campaign’ which can be filed under Slutwalk for stupid “feminist” ideas. FTN was started by filmmaker Lina Esco in 2012 to highlight the fact that men do not get hassled when appearing topless in public but women are not afforded the same freedom to do so.

Notions of choice and equality underpin liberal feminism, which results in appalling ignorance when it comes to the material and lived reality of women and girls. For example, I have witnessed campaigners against Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) being abused on social media for using the term “female” to describe this human rights violation. Apparently it is transphobic to suggest that vaginas are exclusively female.

Things that are currently classed as empowering for women include: buying unbearably high shoes, pole-dancing as exercise, breast enhancement surgery, posing naked on Instagram and “sex work”. But what one thing do these submissive practices all have in common? They are all performed to please men. And all supported by liberal feminists.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

They're just fucking with us now, right?

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Rural Oregon counties vote to discuss seceding from state to join ‘Greater Idaho’

Oregon’s state politics took a sharp left turn during the past 20 years, something that has not gone unnoticed by more conservative residents in the state’s rural communities. McCarter pointed to a recently passed law that made Oregon the first state to decriminalize possession of hard drugs.

“Now you look and you say, 'well, if you're homeless, if you're a hard drug user, if you're a rioter, if you're an illegal, come to Oregon - we’re a sanctuary state and you won't get in trouble.' And that's not the way conservatives feel in Oregon.”

Portland has seen months of violent protests and riots with little government intervention since the death of George Floyd in May in Minneapolis.

“Idaho is not a sanctuary state at all, and they want to protect their citizens. That's comforting, to live in a state like that who enforces the laws and not let the lawbreakers go free.”

A measure requiring local officials to meet on the subject of changing the border was on the ballot in four counties this past election. It passed in Jefferson and Union counties and was voted down by small margins in Douglas and Wallowa counties.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Do we have any users in Spain who could provide more background on this?

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Justice Department defends constitutionality of Idaho law that keeps boys out of girls sports

The Trump administration is going to bat – again – on behalf of female student athletes whose sporting competitions are being colonized by biological males, this time in a federal appeals court.

This spring the Department of Justice filed a statement of interest in a lawsuit against Connecticut’s transgender participation policy, and threatened to yank federal funding from Connecticut school districts for depriving “benefits and opportunities” from female student athletes.

The feds then filed a statement of interest in the ACLU’s lawsuit against Idaho’s law limiting girls’ sports to girls as defined by sex, claiming the ACLU wants “special treatment” of biological males.

The court halted enforcement of the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, and now the matter is under review at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where DOJ filed a friend-of-the-court brief Thursday urging reversal of the court ruling.

The ACLU and its transgender clients “do not and cannot dispute that schools may create separate sports teams for males and females,” it says, quoting 24-year-old Supreme Court precedent: “Some sex-based distinctions comply with the Equal Protection Clause because certain ‘differences between men and women’ are ‘enduring.'”

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Major LGBT Group Urges Biden to Strip Accreditation of Christian Schools, Colleges

The Human Rights Campaign posted its goals for the Biden administration in a Nov. 11 document, Blueprint for Positive Change. The 22-page brief includes dozens of objectives for the Biden White House, but its targeting of Christian institutions would have a major impact on religious schools.

Under a current law known as the Higher Education Opportunity Act, accrediting agencies are told to ensure their standards “respect the stated mission of the institution of higher education,” including a school’s “religious” mission. HRC, in its blueprint, says the language “could be interpreted to require accrediting bodies to accredit religious institutions that discriminate or that do not meet science-based curricula standards.”

The Department of Education, HRC says in its blueprint, “should issue a regulation clarifying that this provision … does not require the accreditation of religious institutions that do not meet neutral accreditation standards including nondiscrimination policies and scientific curriculum requirements.”

Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., calls such a recommendation “sinister.”

“I’ve not seen any document like this before – the Human Rights Campaign is effectively calling for religious colleges and schools to be coerced into the sexual revolution or stripped of accreditation,” Mohler said this week in a column and on his Briefing podcast. “... In terms of accreditation, that is an atomic bomb.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

“Literal violence” and the death of the heterodox

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Fairytale of New York: BBC Radio 1 will not play original version

BBC Radio 1 will not play the original version of Fairytale of New York by The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl this Christmas, because its audience may be offended by some of the lyrics.

The station said young listeners were particularly sensitive to derogatory terms for gender and sexuality.

It will instead play an edited version with different lyrics sung by MacColl.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

CNN is still mad about alt-tech platforms like Parler

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Federal court rules students’ pro-gun shirts are protected by First Amendment

Officials in two Wisconsin school districts came up with a novel way around the Tinker precedent: redefine what counts as “speech.”

A federal judge swatted down this move in a consolidated case brought by students whose gun-themed clothing was banned on school grounds. Officials claimed the clothing “fail[ed] to convey a particularized message,” so it wasn’t constitutionally protected.

“Not only did Plaintiffs intend to convey a clear message in wearing their shirts, it also seems clear that school authorities understood the message Plaintiffs were intending to convey, at least to the extent their message included an appreciation for the right to own firearms,” U.S. District Judge William Griesbach wrote in a short ruling earlier this month.

The two schools may yet be able to prove they were “justified in prohibiting Plaintiffs from conveying their messages in the manner and place chosen by them,” he concluded. But they are wrong that “the shirts lack constitutional protection” as a threshold matter.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

World Economic Forum deletes tweet after backlash against its proposed dystopia

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Biden adds reparations advocate professor to economic task force

The campaign appointed Mehrsa Baradaran, a professor at the University of California’s Irvine School of Law, to the Department of the Treasury agency review board. Baradaran wrote a book titled The Color of Money, in which she argues that “housing segregation, racism, and Jim Crow credit policies created an inescapable, but hard to detect, economic trap for black communities and their banks," according to a description by Harvard University Press.

The same description further explains that “black banks” have “functioned as a potent political decoy to avoid more fundamental reforms and racial redress.”

Baradaran sees potential for this racial redress in the form of reparations.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

The National Association of REALTORS® to start policing private lives of members.

The newly Woke National Association of REALTORS® has long had requirements that you behave in a professional manner while on the job.

"The recommendations propose a new Standard of Practice, 10-5, that states: ‘REALTORS® must not use harassing speech, hate speech, epithets, or slurs based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, national origin, sexual orientation, or gender identity."

Sure, a list like that can be problematic, but at least now it only applies TO YOUR ENTIRE LIFE.

"Additionally, the recommendations propose changes to professional standards policy to expand the Code of Ethics' applicability to all of a REALTOR®'s activities, not just those that are real estate–related."

Their speech codes no longer only apply to real-estate related activity but also to everything-related activity as well. What if your activities include being active in your church and your faith is at odds with current progressive orthodoxy?

Why, it's almost as if the NAR's rules prohibiting discrimination against someone for their religious beliefs themselves discriminate against people for their religious beliefs. This suggests the motive here might be something other than being anti-discriminatory.

[...]

Work as a real estate agent? Watch what you say because they can search your social media accounts going back three years should there ever be an alleged infraction.

But this is not censorship, okay? Stop thinking that.

Hmm, maybe we can discipline you for that, too.

Speaking freely has suddenly become really problematic. After all, what is a "slur?" The definitions of words are a lot more fluid than they used to be. Remember a month ago when "sexual preference" was okay? Yeah, it's not anymore.

Looks like we'll have to write you up!

This was addressed in their handy FAQ:

"Doesn't this mean that if I post my opinion online and someone doesn't agree with it, that I can lose my membership and be forced out of the business?"

Their answer:

"As with any alleged Code violation, ethics complaints alleging a violation of Article 10 as interpreted by the proposed Standard of Practice 10-5 will be processed consistent with the local or state association's professional standards enforcement process, which affords all parties a full and fair opportunity to present their case, defend themselves, provide evidence and witnesses, and be represented by counsel."

So, yes.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Black Virginia police chief fired for charging prominent BLM vandals and public officials

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'To Kill a Mockingbird,' Other Books Banned From California Schools Over Racism Concerns

Schools in Burbank will no longer be able to teach a handful of classic novels, including Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, following concerns raised by parents over racism.

Middle and high school English teachers in the Burbank Unified School District received the news during a virtual meeting on September 9.

Until further notice, teachers in the area will not be able to include on their curriculum Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, Theodore Taylor's The Cay and Mildred D. Taylor's Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Owner of SUV spray-painted with racist and homophobic graffiti facing insurance fraud charges

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rY0WxgSXdEE

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

University of Michigan announces new ‘George Floyd Memorial Scholarship’

Kim Broekhuizen, a spokesperson for the school, initially referred The College Fix via email to the news release in response to questions about some of the initiatives. Broekhuizen did not respond to several follow-up emails on Friday and on Monday morning.

The Fix asked for information on the amount Willian donated and how much money had been raised in addition to Willian’s donation for the scholarship fund. It also did not respond to a request to connect The Fix to Willian for questions.

The Fix reached out via email to Rick Fitzgerald, the assistant vice president for public affairs, to confirm the scholarship money goes to incoming students for tuition. The Fix also asked Fitzgerald on Monday for information on the amount of money raised so far for the scholarship fund.

Fitzgerald told The Fix that he had “someone checking into this” but did not provide a further response or answers to the questions.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Hungary’s war on woke

It is not a love of democracy or concern about Hungary’s health system that motivates this propaganda war against Hungary and its government. It is the fact that, from the globalist standpoint of the Western cultural and political establishments, the values promoted by the Hungarian government are antithetical to ‘our worldview’. In the Hungarian government’s upholding of traditional values, many of which are associated with Christianity, or its defence of national sovereignty, the likes of the European Union or Big Tech see something archaic and threatening.

The EU establishment, in particular, regards tradition as either irrelevant or as an object of scorn. And it is especially hostile towards traditional customs and practices associated with family life, the socialisation of children, and sexual relations between people.

This is why, in recent months, its crusade against Hungary has focused on what it describes as the culture of ‘heteronormativity’. According to the woke dictionary, heteronormativity is to sexual relations what xenophobia is to national pride. So, just as pride in one’s nation is denounced as a form of xenophobia, so the conviction that heterosexual relations are the norm is now condemned as a form of bigotry.

In reality, the Hungarian government is far from alone in taking the view that heterosexuality is the norm. Nor is it alone in retaining the centuries-old belief that there are two sexes, male and female. Yet this view is now considered not only old-fashioned but also transphobic by supporters of Western identity politics.

If the Hungarian government remained discreet and diplomatic about its views on chromosomes and sexuality, it would not have provoked the wrath of the West’s woke elites. But it has not been discreet or diplomatic. Rather, it has incorporated its views on chromosomes and sexuality into its public programme.

This came to a head when the Hungarian government submitted a proposal to amend its Fundamental Law, which is the cornerstone of its 2011 constitution. The amendment affirmed the view that in a family relationship, ‘the mother is a woman, the father is man’. If this amendment to a nation’s constitution was proposed 30 years ago, there would have been no international outcry. Indeed, most commentators would have wondered why Hungary had made a law stating the obvious. But that was then. Today, such a statement has been denounced by the EU oligarchy as an outrage.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

WordPress deplatforms popular blog The Conservative Treehouse

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

The Gender Cult is Winning the War of Language

A misnomer is a powerful thing, and the gender cult knows this. Men who pretend to be women have chosen the term “trans woman” very carefully—not “transsexual,” not “trans-woman,” not “transwoman.” They insist upon “trans woman.” The space is important to them, because it sets up “trans” and “woman” as two separate words. Noun: woman. Adjective: trans. This allows them to claim that “trans women” are fundamentally women—that “trans women” are a type of women, more similar to than different from other types of women; the adjective is trivial, just a detail. This simple linguistic sleight of hand entitles men to everything women once had. If “woman” is accepted as the correct noun—and the dictionary now accepts it as such—then every legal case, political policy, or academic study that attempts to separate these men from women is doomed to fail. Nouns matter. In losing the noun “woman,” we have already lost everything.

Adjectives matter, too. Genderites currently modify the noun “woman” with the adjective “cis” (though “non-trans” is becoming more prevalent). The presence of the adjective implies that “cis” women are just one subcategory of women, existing alongside other subcategories of women.

The gender cult’s entire linguistic regime is made up of these politically-motivated misnomers, or what Mary Daly has called “reversals.” She uses Orwell’s 1984 as an example: “the Ministry of Truth was where they made up lies, the Ministry of Love was where they tortured people.” So, too, with every term the gender cult coins or appropriates. Men are “women.” Pushing lesbians out of LGB spaces is “inclusivity.” Threatening women is “feminism.” Mutilation is “healthcare.” Anything that would prevent gay people from turning their internalized homophobia into a lifelong medical condition is “trans conversion therapy.” None of these terms represent reality. In fact, they do exactly the opposite. They represent an attempt by the gender cult to overwrite reality, and to convince the public that everything is the opposite of what it is.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Joe Biden transition official wrote op-ed advocating free speech restrictions

President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team leader for US-owned media outlets wants to redefine freedom of speech and make “hate speech” a crime.

Richard Stengel is the Biden transition “Team Lead” for the US Agency for Global Media, the US government media empire that includes Voice of America, the Middle East Broadcasting Networks and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Stengel, an Obama administration alumnus, wrote last year in a Washington Post op-ed that US freedom of speech was too unfettered and that changes must be considered.

He wrote: “All speech is not equal. And where truth cannot drive out lies, we must add new guardrails. I’m all for protecting ‘thought that we hate,’ but not speech that incites hate.”

Stengel offered two examples of speech that he has an issue with: Quran burning and circulation of “false narratives” by Russia during the 2016 election.

“Even the most sophisticated Arab diplomats that I dealt with did not understand why the First Amendment allows someone to burn a Koran. Why, they asked me, would you ever want to protect that?” Stengel wrote.

“It’s a fair question. Yes, the First Amendment protects the ‘thought that we hate,’ but it should not protect hateful speech that can cause violence by one group against another. In an age when everyone has a megaphone, that seems like a design flaw.”

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

University banned autistic student from class for saying ‘snowflake.’ She threatened to sue. It backed down.

Portland State University considers the slang term “snowflake” a potential form of “harassment and intimation.”

The public university justified a professor’s decision to ban Lindy Treece, an autistic student, from the weekly class for using such “derogatory language” in relation to the presidential election.

The professor told Treece (above) she would only be allowed to rejoin the class if she agreed not to use unspecified offensive language going forward, the graduate student told The College Fix in an email.

Treece said PSU backed down after she threatened to sue, and she attended the following week’s session. She also sought help from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which publicized the incident.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Norway introduces new LGBT law, jailing people for “hate speech,” even in private conversations

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[Glenn Greenwald] The Ongoing Death of Free Speech: Prominent ACLU Lawyer Cheers Suppression of a New Book

It is nothing short of horrifying, but sadly also completely unsurprising, to see an ACLU lawyer proclaim his devotion to “stopping the circulation of [a] book” because he regards its ideas as wrong and dangerous. There are, always have been, and always will be people who want to stop books from being circulated: by banning them, burning them, pressuring publishing houses to rescind publishing contracts or demanding corporations refuse to sell them. But why would someone with such censorious attitudes, with a goal of suppressing ideas with which they disagree, choose to go to work for the ACLU of all places?

Sometime on Friday, Strangio deleted that second tweet without comment, and then noted he was locking his account. In response to a series of questions I sent Strangio about his position, he told me that he had read the book over the summertime and found it repellent. He said he deleted the tweet because “ there were relentless calls to have me fired, which I found exhausting as I was navigating work and childcare” and “it was supposed to be a cheeky response to Bari [Weiss] not something to be taken on its own terms without that context.” He told me, however, that the book is dangerous:

The book and the arguments contained within it are fueling a wave of bills in state legislatures to criminalize health care for trans youth including through felony bans on the provision of care and forced outing of trans youth by school officials (an actual serious First Amendment concern).

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Polish education minister: Gender theory is a Marxist ideology and a false vision of humanity

“Gender is a Marxist ideology, a false vision of humanity. I’m on the side of scholars who declare that it is not a science,” Czarnek declared in an interview for Polskie Radio 24.

“We should remember that every tragedy in the world has its basis in a false vision of humanity – an anthropological error. This is an anthropological error, which leads to tragedies. It’s not a science,” stated the minister.

In context of gender studies being taught at Polish universities, Czarnek emphasized that one of the most urgent tasks is to introduce freedom of speech and a marketplace of ideas at those universities.

The aim is to guarantee the right of scientists who oppose gender ideology to organize conferences and talks without fear of disciplinary repercussions from university authorities, he stated.

The minister believes that the biggest issue today involves scientists who challenge liberal orthodoxy, even with data and supporting arguments, as these scientists "are often discriminated against".

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Violent extremism linked to failure of migrants to integrate, EU says

The statement issued on the fifth anniversary of the attacks in Paris, in the Bataclan theatre and outside the Stade de France offered few new policy initiatives.

Talk of sanctions against those who fail to integrate was removed and replaced with a softer warning to NGOs found to be breaking the law.

“Organisations that do not act in accordance with relevant legislation and support content that is contrary to fundamental rights and freedoms should not be supported by public funding, neither on national nor on European level,” the statement said. “Also, the undesirable foreign influencing of national civil and religious organisations through non-transparent financing should be limited.”

Wow, who could have foreseen this?

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Damn white people and their *shuffles deck* Biblical scholarship!

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Austria will make it a criminal to offence to spread 'political Islam' following Islamic extremist's terror attack last week

The proposals include the ability to keep individuals convicted of terror offences behind bars for life, electronic surveillance of people convicted of terror-related offenses upon release and criminalizing religiously motivated political extremism.

Kurz said the measures, which will be brought before parliament in December for a vote, take a two-pronged approach, targeting both terror suspects and also the ideology that drives them.

'We will create a criminal offence called 'political Islam' in order to be able to take action against those who are not terrorists themselves, but who create the breeding ground for them,' Kurz tweeted after the Cabinet meeting.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

The Swedish U-Turn on Gender Transitioning for Children

Swedish child psychiatrist, Sven Roman has compared the explosive growth in the number of cases of gender dysphoria to other psychiatric conditions, such as eating disorders and self-harm behaviour, that are known to spread with social contacts. He documents the process of discovery that the medical community went through to understand how to best treat these kinds of conditions. Over the past decade, he says research has proven that supportive psychotherapy can reduce or stop self-harm behaviour within 3 months. Of the avalanche of gender dysphoria cases being referred, he says:

Unlike the epidemic of self-harm behavior, (gender dysphoria) care providers are not exploring to find the right treatment. Instead, on a broad front, drastic treatment with high doses of sex hormones and breast and genital surgery is introduced. This despite the lack of any scientific evidence for these treatments for children, and probably not for young adults either.

In the fall of 2019, there was a 65% decline in the number of referrals to gender clinics in Sweden. This corresponded with experts calling on the government to review clinical protocols and more balanced media coverage of the phenomenon of regret among gender transitioners, including the airing of a documentary entitled “Trans Train”.

The 3-part documentary includes several interviews with detransitioners and revealed that medical transition of minors is not evidence-based. A high profile transwoman in Sweden – Aleksa Lundberg – also came out in the media saying that if she were to go back and make the decision again “I might not have had the surgery”. She said she had believed that “there was a more scientific basis” for this healthcare – but has since realized that that is not the case. She says people deserve “a more complex narrative” than the simple public narrative that the media has been promoting on the topic of gender transition.

Referrals have remained steadily lower, indicating that the medical necessity of gender transition was questionable for many of the youth being referred for treatment. We are told that the treatment of minors now (unofficially) includes referring many to psychiatric evaluation. Previously, we are told that almost 100% of trans-identified youth who were referred to the gender clinics were prescribed puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones.

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Wisconsin Supreme Court tosses governor's stay-at-home order

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Google Is Still Erasing Breitbart Stories About Joe Biden from Search

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New Ohio Covid restrictions prohibit STANDING at social gatherings

It is essential that we also remember the existing orders that are already in place to slow the spread of the virus. In April, we issued an order to limit gatherings of more than 10 people. That limit is still in effect and applies to public events and private gatherings.

Despite this order, we have seen rampant spread of the virus as a result of banquets, wedding receptions, and social gatherings following funerals. We have seen great tragedy associated with such events. It’s not the ceremonies causing the problem. It’s the party afterward.

To address this, we will be issuing a new order soon to place significant new restrictions on these social activities.

Specifically, open congregate areas can no longer be open. The order will require everyone to be seated and masked unless they are actively consuming food or drinks and it will prohibit things such as dancing and games.

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Xi Jinping Ordering Erasure of Genghis Khan from Chinese History

“During the past month, fourteen stone tablets summarizing the life story of Genghis Khan and his achievements were painted over or destroyed in Genghis Khan Square in the Hailar district of Hulun Buir prefecture-level city, in Inner Mongolia. Protests of the local population were ignored,” Bitter Winter revealed on November 7.

“In a middle school in Hexigten Banner under the jurisdiction of the prefecture-level city of Chifen, also in Inner Mongolia, portraits of Genghis Khan and slogans promoting Mongolian culture have been replaced with the portraits of characters of Han Chinese history and slogans promoting Han culture,” the magazine reported.

The History Museum of Nantes, France abruptly canceled a long-planned Genghis Khan exhibit on October 13 after the Chinese Cultural Affairs Bureau demanded that the museum alter the exhibition’s title, removing the words “Genghis Khan,” “empire,” and “Mongol.”

[–]WickedWitchOfTheWest 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Xi Jinping Ordering Erasure of Genghis Khan from Chinese History

“During the past month, fourteen stone tablets summarizing the life story of Genghis Khan and his achievements were painted over or destroyed in Genghis Khan Square in the Hailar district of Hulun Buir prefecture-level city, in Inner Mongolia. Protests of the local population were ignored,” Bitter Winter revealed on November 7.

“In a middle school in Hexigten Banner under the jurisdiction of the prefecture-level city of Chifen, also in Inner Mongolia, portraits of Genghis Khan and slogans promoting Mongolian culture have been replaced with the portraits of characters of Han Chinese history and slogans promoting Han culture,” the magazine reported.

The History Museum of Nantes, France abruptly canceled a long-planned Genghis Khan exhibit on October 13 after the Chinese Cultural Affairs Bureau demanded that the museum alter the exhibition’s title, removing the words “Genghis Khan,” “empire,” and “Mongol.”

[–]mo-ming-qi-miao 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Newspeak update: Oxford Dictionary and Google redefine the word “bigot” to give it a looser meaning

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Florida governor moves to allow citizens to shoot looters, rioters targeting businesses

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has drafted “anti-mob” legislation that would expand the state’s Stand Your Ground law – a move that some worry would allow armed citizens to shoot and potentially kill anyone they suspect of looting.

DeSantis’ newest legislation comes in response to months of protesting that frequently lead to rioting this summer in Florida and across the U.S., following the death of George Floyd, a black man who died after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.

The legislation is an attempt to prevent “violent and disorderly assemblies” by permitting violence against anyone involved in the “interruption or impairment” of a business, reportedly described in the draft as being a burglary within 500 feet of “violent or disorderly assembly,” according to reporting by the Miami Herald Tuesday

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Trump supporters are flocking to alternative social networks to plan election-office protests after Facebook banned groups that attracted hundreds of thousands of members

Pro-Trump activists have found a new online home to protest vote-counting less than 24 hours after Facebook shut down an organizing group of more than 365,000 members for breaking its policies around inciting violence.

Thousands have flocked to such groups on MeWe, a social platform emphasizing users' rights and privacy that anti-lockdown protesters turned to earlier this year after they were kicked off Facebook. Nearly a dozen "Stop the Steal" groups have popped up since Thursday on MeWe, Business Insider has found, filled with posts claiming voter fraud and organizing state-by-state protests of election results.

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UK Police are secretly adding people to “hate” lists based on their tweets

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CBS reality shows must now have 50% non-White casts, network says

CBS’ slate of reality shows, which include “Survivor,” “Big Brother” and “Love Island,” will become more diverse in 2021.

On Monday, the network introduced an initiative that requires these shows to ensure that 50% of their casts are Black, Indigenous or People of Color, or BIPOC. Additionally, the network has committed to putting at least 25% of its development budget towards creators and producers who are BIPOC.

These reality TV targets will kick off during the 2021-22 broadcast season.

Hamburgers?

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System ‘Glitch’ Also Uncovered In Wisconsin – Reversal of Swapped Votes Removes Lead from Joe Biden

PA House GOP Members to Call For a Legislative-Led Audit of Election and Demand Results Not Be Certified, Nor Electors be Seated, Until the Audit is Complete

From tngrjnlchaqvg, so don't pop the champagne yet.

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Books, bibles and newspapers would be seized and destroyed under the SNP’s plan to criminalise “inflammatory” publications, religious and secular organisations have warned.

The offence of possessing inflammatory material could extend to the Bible and other religious texts, according to the Bishops Conference of Scotland, the Free Church of Scotland and the Evangelical Alliance, which represents 4,000 evangelical churches in the UK.

The Free Church, a presbyterian denomination, said its critics “should be free to mock us, ridicule us and insult us”, adding that outspoken ministers would “need to have their lawyer on speed dial to check that their sermon each week does not fall foul of the offence of stirring up hatred”.

It said in its submission: “The right for a warrant to be issued to enter a premise and remove inflammatory material and ultimately destroy it is deeply worrying to us as it could lead to certain books and publications essentially being banned.

“As books are confiscated and destroyed, precedents would develop that would amount to a list of banned books . . . and as Christians we are deeply concerned that the Bible could fall foul of this offence.” The Bishops Conference, which represents Catholic bishops, said that priests could face prosecution for saying that “a man cannot become a woman”.

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Gender Activists Are Trying to Cancel My Book. Why is Silicon Valley Helping Them?

The efforts to block my reporting have been legion, starting with staff threats at a publishing house, which quickly reversed its original intention to publish my book. Once I obtained a stalwart publisher, Regnery, Amazon refused to allow that company’s sales team to sponsor ads on its site. (Amazon allows sponsored ads for books that uncritically celebrate medical transition for teenagers).

Because the book tackles an interesting phenomenon, a number of established journalists wanted to review it. The issue of trans-identification has seemed to come out of nowhere with Gen Z, the generation begun in 1995 whose large-scale mental-health crisis already has us so on edge. And the issue has created surprising bedfellows. Religious conservatives are concerned about the trend—but so are lesbians, who look upon the shocking numbers of teen girls transitioning with abject alarm. Many suspect that all this transitioning of girls is effectively euthanizing a generation of young lesbians.

In any case, every major newspaper and legacy magazine summarily turned interested journalists down. Whether they would have reviewed my book favorably or unfavorably, I have no idea—and it doesn’t matter. Kirkus, which reviews 10,000 titles per year, including self-published and obscure works—pretended my book didn’t exist. Its editors, too busy heaping praise on the Trans Teen Survival Guide, When Aiden Became a Brother, Jack (Not Jackie), Rethinking Normal, and of course, Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out.

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