On Female Needs and Star Trek

What follows started as an email response to Joey on Sunday, then turned into a blog post, then I didn't post it and went to bed.

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This is why I don't write anymore.

Because women need to be desired to be aroused? No.

I don't write much because you have to manufacture an opinionated topic in order to gain any sort of interest.

This author could have written a more balanced piece about the role of external sexual interest in a persons sexual self-confidence, and contrasted some of the likely minor differences between men and women. But instead, she writes a heavily biased article with the tired tropes of support for "most real women" (read as not angry feminists) and revolution against "political correctness" (which doesn't exist anywhere, it's a strawman).

Of course you can't just write a piece stating that human sexuality is an almost infinitely complex thing, with as many different motives and responses as there are human beings. That would be accurate, intellectually useful, and likely not sensational enough to generate page views.

Instead, massive generalization is used to foster animosity, and reduce the level of the discourse to a point where the entire populace can find something to take a stand for or against. No real benefit can come from this discussion now, it's reduced to a political/religious type argument where people just opine angrly at one another, and no progress is made to finding out anything new about human nature. All we're doing now is reinforcing the most well known of human traits, generalization and discrimination in order to support one's own life choices and values.

And that's just the article structure. The subject itself is also offensive in more specific ways.

You, as a woman, are proporting to speak for the other 3.5 billion registered uterus-drivers on this planet? Really? You are saying that regardless of the obvious diversity of sexuality across continents and cultures, you've finally gotten to the heart of the matter with no scientific analysis or even so much as a web survey. I may be supposed to infer that the likely target of this article, and the one you are speaking on behalf of is the same 30-55 white female demographic that you are part of, but that isn't mentioned anywhere. After all, proper qualification and speciation of your point would dilute it's provocative intent.

So you've managed to establish yourself as the visionary for your gender. What do you do now? Reinforce traditional gender stereotypes which are specific to your own insecurities of course!

It really couldn't be any more transparent. It would be like me stating that ALL men inherently, genetically, and without any ability to self-moderate, really only want women who will have sex while watching Star Trek. And like it.

And then I'd claim that any men who claim this isn't specifically true for them are just fooling themselves. Just admit it. You want to do it while watching the saucer-section separate. I KNOW that you do, because I do, and I'm a normal man. You, also being a normal man, must also want this. Unless you're some kind of freak.

There is no doubt that the degree to which a person receives sexual attention will effect their sex drive, but so will an untold number of other things. And if you want to write an article about how, FOR YOU, this external validation is the primary driver of your libido, that's great.

But don't try give one of your own insecurities a higher level of perceived legitimacy by trying to tie it your entire gender as a whole.

And don't artificially polarize a subject just for page views. There are enough genuine problems that could use discussion, we don't need to make up new ones.

Relaunch. Again. For like, the millionth time.

So as you may or may not have noticed, this blog has fallen into disuse. This may be shocking to some of you in the blogging world who are used the steadfast commitement people usually bring to blog writing. The unyielding dedication to midnight pledges of daily updates. So I feel somewhat guilty for being the first to slowly grow tired of maintaining the illusion of an aspirational writing career.

However a confluence of events has inspired me to revisit Laconic Reply.

#1 - Copying other people.

I always strive to be more like Mark Cluett. The one on the right. This guy.

In that vein I contemplated launching a Tumbr account in his model of short and quick musings. But then I realized that I already have a blog site I pay for and I'm too lazy to redirect this domain name to a new location. So the blogging will remain here.

Also, Kevin Naulls is kicking some ass with his blog to the point that people are giving him free stuff. So I think I should step it up considering I'm almost half the man he is, IN SPITE of my handicap of being unable to grow non-pedo facial hair.

#2 - I'm already writing.

I often write 90% of a blog post based on some random source of inspiration and then give up without posting it.

Also, Joey Nowak occasionally sends me emails composed entirely of a "Look at this" and a link. For some reason the content she sends me almost always illicits a 10-15 paragraph response, despite being nothing but a kitten video or poorly written copyright-related article.

Usually her response to my prose is nothing but a simple "Wow" or silence, either of which I assume signifies her being stunned dumb by the beauty and eloquence of my words. So I feel that I should not limit this valuable knowledge to only Joey's consumption, and instead share it with the world.

#3 - Living in Goldsboro, NC is boring and I have nothing else to do with my time.

So from now on I plan on posting things here more frequently.

But how am I going to do that if I wasn't able to maintain it before? By decreasing the quality of course! Previously the bulk of my blog-writing time was spent hunting photos for hours, or proof-reading my work to perfection. This new work will minimize both of those things.

This new work will largely be composed of big blocks of ranty text, quickly written, and poorly thought out. It's not intended to be perfect, or even good. It's intended to be a snapshot of my ideas and attitudes at a given moment. And if the rest of you get some entertainment out of it, even at my expense, all the better.

First new post to follow.

Lobbyists beat Democracy and Reason on Copyright

by danaoshiroMichael Giest's sources say the prime minister’s office has decided to ignore the copyright consultations and huge evidence that Canada is not piracy haven, and essentially resubmit bill C-61, a piece of legislation even more restrictive on Canadians rights than the DMCA. It seems lobbyists can cancel out democracy and reason in Canadian politics.

The government asked for Canadians opinions on copyright law in 2009 and received a stronger, larger, and more unequivocal response than almost any public consultation in recent history. Conservative MP Cheryl Gallant called it "unprecedented" and Industry Canada claimed it was a "tremendous success". But apparently the opinion of the public, interest groups, and rights holders don't make a difference because the government is choosing to ignore the consultation.

To show just how much Canadians and Canadian businesses are against this, the final tally was 6138 submissions against C-61, and 54 in support. That isn't even a debate, that's a blowout. I can't think of any other policy question you could ask the public and get 99.13% of respondents on one side of the issue. You could get a larger portion of the population to agree to raising taxes by 10% than you could to agree to C-61.

Add to that the reality that Canada is already harder on piracy then many countries. In fact, by the Business Software Alliance's own numbers, piracy is declining in Canada. Our music industry is healthier than the US or Japan. And we're one of only a few countries in the world where you can get jail time for using a camcorder in a movie theater, and probably the only one in the world to have actually convicted a guy on that law.

But that's not enough for the big content distributors. They want a giant legal stick to club Canadian citizens with at random. They want it to be strong enough to push people into jail or bankruptcy, and versatile enough to be applied to anyone with little or no judicial oversight. They want their broken business model protected by federal law in the hopes that won't have to adapt to a world where distribution is free.

Thing is, it won't work. Despite 3 strikes laws being passed in France and Britain, piracy has still increased. And when the music industry sent out 30,000 letters in the UK threatening law suits if the accused didn't immediately pay thousands in protection money, few paid, it turned into a PR nightmare, and piracy still increased. Jamie Thomas got slapped with a very public judgment of $1.9 million in damages for sharing 24 songs, and piracy still increased. The only difference is that a few dozen people have had their lives destroyed because they got Lilo and Stitch 17 off of Limewire.

The reason none of these punitive or deterrent actions make an impact is because, like I've said before, the internet makes non-commercial copyright an impossible fantasy, and probably invalidates all digital copyright entirely.

by skreuzerA recent estimate showed that there will be 1.2 zettabytes of information transmitted, created, and duplicated on the internet in 2010. A zettabyte is roughly a thousand million terabytes. And over 75% of that data is a copy of other data. Not only is there no way even a tiny percentage of that stays within copyright law, but it's impossible to even consider enforcing copyright laws on that much information. Forget DRM, how do you even track and record the copyright licenses for 1.2 thousand million terabytes of data? That's an absolutely retarded idea.

Regardless, the content business and the US government have succeeded in convincing the PMO to ignore democracy, rationality, and our rights to due process. The Conservative government will resubmit C-61 to parliament in six weeks. If you have any interest in preserving your rights to rip DVDs to your computer, jailbreak your iPhone, or being free from corporate persecution for sharing an MP3, you'll send a letter to your MP and the government. I'm not going to sit here and let Disney try to shut down technological progress so they can sell Snow White DVDs for another 200 years.

In Defence of the Single Life

by stephend9I want to see a romance movie where the couple parts amicably at the end, returning to singledom without regret, knowing that the time they spent together was valuable without having to result in marriage.

Despite the fact that a growing portion of our population is unmarried, and virtually no relationships actually last until death, we continue to frame marriage as an essential and inevitable component of everyone's life. Our culture claims marriage as the only desirable conclusion to any romance; to the point that many people would say that if you can't see yourself marrying someone, you have no business even dating them.

The unmarried are pitied as unfortunate lost souls, yet to find "the one". In popular culture anyone who doesn't actively seek out marriage is inferred to have something wrong with them. They're loners, they're socially inept, they're afraid of commitment, they're emotionally damaged, or otherwise psychologically injured. Even when conceding that marriage is difficult and often doesn't work out as planned, movies always end up making the argument that it's still better than the unmarried alternative.

There are no allowances made for people who just don't see the benefit of maintaining an aspirationally continuous monogamous relationship for eternity. Even the mountains of evidence showing that monogamy and continuity are very rarely attainable in practice doesn't seem to shake the fantasy that marriage is the only way to go. There is little tolerance for the idea that you may prefer a multitude of less-intense, close relationships, to a single hail-mary attempt at emotional and sexual monogamy.

And any claim that you just don't see yourself getting married is met with a condescending assertion that you just "haven't met the right person yet". Because you can't possibly chose to live outside of marriage forever.

by This Year's LoveThe more I think about it, the more I realize that the problem is a result of a false dichotomy. That being one where the alternatives are a supportive and blissful, if occasionally trying marriage with a big family with a plethora of coupled friends; or a solitary existence where you have no social interaction, no close relationships, and you eventually die alone in a ditch somewhere with a fridge full of condiments. 

The single option is always framed as being flawed in some way. Lacking either intimacy, support, or stability. Ignoring the fact that you can easily get intimacy and support outside of marriage, and that from a risk-analysis standpoint, locking yourself into one person gives you a single point of failure in terms of stability. 

Even the term "single" is defined in opposition to marriage, rather than an end onto itself, and implies a solitary existence. Which is ironic because some of the most solitary people I know are married or in monogamous long term relationships. It's often single people who are most active in seeking new experiences, new friends, and new relationships.

So I'd like to see a movie where the main character is unattached because it fits their personality, not because they have a personality flaw. A movie in praise of the independence, freedom, selective solitude, and diverse friendships that come with not having to compromise or validate every decision. A movie where the person comes out of an experience more certain of their lifestyle, not less. Because as time goes by the idea that I "just need to find the right person" becomes less and less true in my experience. It's not that I can't find someone that I fit with, it's that I find tons of them and I don't see upside to choosing one to the exclusion of all others. Why have only one great person in my life when I can have many.

by xmasonsI'm not saying that marriage is a bad idea at all. Obviously it works for many people, but there are a lot of other ways to run your life. You don't have to agree with me, but I'd like to be able to say that without being perceived as attacking marriage. I don't want my vocalized preference for an unmarried lifestyle met with either the condescension of "you haven't met the one", or the sort of "if you're not with us, you're against us" mentality I sometimes get.

I resent the fact that the way I've chosen to live my life is seen by many as a symptom of poor psychological health. As with other minority opinions, I don't want everyone else to be like me, I just want to be respected for what I am instead of being ridiculed for not moving with the herd.

Non-commercial Copyright will Inevitably Die

I think about copyright issues constantly. It's sort of a mental hobby of mine, a bit of an obsession even. I talk about it pretty frequently, and argue with people on the internet (I'm one of those).

by opensourcewayIt's because you can't avoid it. Just typing these words makes a copy on the screen, in the cache, in RAM, on disk, and later online, then on the computers of everyone that reads this. Just viewing digital information makes a copy, you can't avoid or control it. So reconciling this technical reality with a world based on "owning" information is an interesting thought experiment.

Recently I've more clearly defined two issues in my mind. Firstly, it's best to debate the issue from a practical standpoint rather than an ideological one. Talk about what is actually possible, not what you want to happen. And second, if you have any respect for privacy and individual freedoms, non-commercial copyright is essentially unenforceable and thus will eventually disappear through obsolescence.
 

What is Possible

As soon as you bring up copyright, many people will immediately start yelling "creators deserve to be compensated!". For the record I'd like to state that I am not arguing with that point. I don't think anyone would seriously state that people should be banned from making money off creative work.

What I am saying is that, pragmatically speaking, you cannot rely exclusively on your copyright monopoly to make money with digital goods. You have to accept that when you produce something digitally, it is not completely under your control. That is not an ideological position, it's a fact. As soon as something can be transmitted over the internet, you lose the monopoly of distribution because anyone with a computer can make a copy of what you've produced.

by hartboyYou can put in DRM, you can send people threatening letters, you can change the laws, but it won't change the fact that the internet and computer technology work by copying information from one place to another for little to no cost. There are far more people working to distribute your work without your permission than there are ways you can prevent them from doing it.

But notice that nowhere in there did I say that making money is now illegal. And I didn't say you can't charge for access to your content. The ability to access pirated songs doesn't prevent everyone from buying music from iTunes. Millions of people would rather just click a button and have it on their iPhone as opposed to searching the sketchier areas of the internet. People will pay for convenience, people will pay for added value, people will pay for certainty and security.

Getting bogged down in discussions about whether or not people have the RIGHT to pirate your content is pointless because there is nothing you can do about that. The internet has fundamentally changed the distribution of information and no amount of complaining is going to reverse that. It's more productive to focus on finding new ways to make money rather than trying to roll back technology to a previous point in time.

Ownership vs. Privacy and Due Process

Of course the content distribution companies are doing all they can to hold back this revolution. Artists themselves are not really threatened by free unlimited distribution. Musicians don't make money off of CDs, they make it off of performances. Movie producers define their success by their ability to make money in the theaters, DVD sales are mostly a long-tail bonus. Even writers have more to fear from obscurity than from piracy in a country where 150,000 new books are published every year.

It's really only the distributors that are worried, because they believe that the internet cuts them out of a portion of their market. In some cases it does the job better than them, and for free. Their solution? ACTA. A secretly negotiated international treaty designed to remove your rights to due process and privacy.

by N3T1O™In order to protect their business model they want to be able to cut off your internet access for years based solely on the accusation of copyright infringement. No court. No evidence. No trial. And they'll do that by having the ISP track the use of your internet connection continuously and pass the logs to outside corporations. If they detect three suspected infringements, you're cut off and blacklisted, potentially for life.

If the ISPs fail to turn over your records, or fail to take all possible measures to stop piracy, they are guilty by association. So they'd basically have to spy on you continuously to protect themselves against litigation.

And finally, if that weren't enough, there are provisions in the treaty which would let border guards search any electronic devices for pirated content. Whether or not that's something they'd regularly exercise is another matter, but the treaty makes it legal. If you can't prove legitimate ownership of all the media you have on your iPhone, you could get charged.

Even if the details change, the idea remains the same. Content distributors are trying to change the laws to allow them powers that you wouldn't even trust to your government. They'd have the right to cut off your internet connection without trial, as well as obligate ISPs to become miniature spy agencies and enforce the will of content distributors.

It comes down to whether or not you place your right to privacy and due process higher than someone else's (unduly restrictive in my opinion) copyright monopoly.

The Conclusion

On top of ACTA being an unprecedented violation of privacy and rights to due process, it won't actually work.

by deanjA simple VPN connection will effectively hide who you are, what you are doing, and where you live. Bittorrent clients already support encryption, and SSL downloads from newsgroups are untraceable. Streaming sites don't even require that I download anything, and seedboxes let me download to a server. And what if I just take my 2TB portable hard drive to a friends house and copy everything over USB? There are a million ways around these restrictions, and cracking down will only spur innovation. If they hadn't shut down Napster, the much less traceable Bittorrent probably would not exist, or at least wouldn't be so popular.

Allowing this treaty or any similar legislation to become law only erodes our freedoms while ensuring the escalation of an arms race that distributors cannot win. Computer technology and the internet in particular were specifically designed to copy information regardless of who perceives that they "own" it. The idea of "owning" information is an artificial (if morally comforting) construct to begin with and it's now falling apart.
by Britta Bohlinger 

You can control a few huge corporations with printing presses. You might even be able to control the use of photocopiers and VCRs. But there is no way to technically control the copying of digital content when everyone has a computer and an internet connection. Even heavily locked down systems like the iPhone have easy workarounds. And attempting to control it through legislation will just criminalize the entire population. It would be like trying to force everyone to only buy bottled water by banning all other sources. It wouldn't work, water falls from the sky. And it's gotten to the point where digital content is practically falling from the sky.

So we need to adjust our laws. Non-commercial copyright is completely unenforceable for digital content, and this will only become truer with time. Rather than attempting to claw back a lost business model, we should position ourselves at the forefront of a new world that profits from the sharing of ideas rather than from locking them down.

Why the iPad isn't a Gutenberg-like Print Revolution

The reason the old media is having a masturbatory field day over this thing is that  it's a vertically integrated, closed architecture. Their business model has always been built on controlling the distribution of information and this seems like a way to return to that. But calling Jobs the next Gutenberg would be incorrect, this is a step backwards, not forwards.


by su_anna

The Gutenberg press was democratizing because you no longer had to have resources of the government or the church to produce written work. But despite that, it was still expensive. As an individual you couldn't afford to own and run a printing press on your own, only corporations had that kind of money. And of course, being a corporation, they want to make the most money possible. So over the last two centuries the corporations have merged, and merged again until basically a handful control 90% of the media in any given geographic region. As the competition decreased, the prices and profits increased to where we are now.


by 4rilla

For the last few decades old media has become accustomed to making billions of dollars because they are the only way for you to get entertainment or information. But the internet came along and broke that business model. It's the next step in the democratization of information. It's the Gutenberg press in every house, and it's free. Of course the old media is not too happy about this. The control they used to have is rapidly disappearing and they are having to face actual competition for the first time in 200 years. They can't compete because the content itself was rarely worth paying for in the first place, you were mostly just buying access and now that access is free.

Their response has been to try to develop new ways to bring back that control they had. You see that in things like copyright lawsuits and DRM, or in developing new forms of physical media like BluRay or 3D TV. The iPad is another way to control distribution. It is an almost completely closed system. You cannot install the software of your choice on this, only applications specifically approved by Apple.


by FHKE

That is a huge deal and it means that this isn't a Gutenberg device, there is no freedom here, there is no democratization. This is fascism in it's purest form. Maybe beautiful, functional fascism; but still fascism. It's a corporate dictatorship where Steve Jobs tells you what is and is not permitted, secure in the belief that his judgment is superior to yours. His claim is that this control is necessary to ensure quality, but coincidentally it also ensures a healthy profit margin.  Their hope is that Apple will control the books available for you to download and the place you buy them from.

That's why the media is praising this like it's the second coming. It represents a chance to turn their sinking ship around, and have it sink in a new direction, at a slightly slower rate.


by amateur_photo_bore

Old media is hoping that this point of control will mean people will start buying newspapers and books in iPad form. And even better, those won't be transferable to any other device, or any other person. So you can't lend books anymore and you can't sell your used copies. And on top of all of this, they are priced almost the same as the dead-tree version despite costing nothing to copy or distribute, so profits per unit sold are much higher.


by I am I.A.M.

Thing is, these companies are incredibly naive. Apple's profit margin is the only one that is going to improve, and in the long run, this will mostly just add to the demise of old media. Music is a good example. iTunes offered music companies the opportunity to sell their stuff through a controlled channel to the consumer at higher profits, but the iPod didn't save the music industry, it killed it.

Once people started using iPods they may have bought some digital music, but for a variety of reasons, they pirated way more than they bought. I'd say that 97% of the music on the average persons iPod is pirated, and there is no reason to suspect that written content will be much different.

Not only will the iPad lead to a huge rise in book piracy, it'll be the content industries own fault too. All this control only produces a false sense of security for the content creator and pisses off the consumer. The App Store was
notorious for banning content Apple thought was inappropriate, both pornographic and political. That'll happen in the book store too. These books will also be laden with DRM, and only certain books will be released to certain devices. On the whole this means that if I want anything mildly 'inappropriate', want to move my books around devices, share them with friends, or don't want to pay a physical price for an digital product, I'll have to pirate it.


by de_coder

The iPad isn't revolutionizing anything by itself. The internet and digital content are revolutionary. The iPad is just one way to get that content, and in my opinion not even a very good one. It's basically just a really big iPod Touch and the only thing unprecedented about this it is the hype.

It is not a computer, it's an e-reader with extra features. It has no useful ports, you have no access to the OS, you can only install approved software, and loading it with non-Apple video or books will be a pain if it's even possible. Want to chat and watch a movie at the same time? Too bad, no multitasking. Want to download podcasts or movies over 3G? Not allowed. Want to download anything from anyone other than Apple? Are you kidding?

The Kindle is the main thing getting targeted here. The Kindle is the king of e-readers though it's admittedly ugly and very limited in function by comparison. But if Amazon drops the price of the Kindle to like... $150.. they are still solidly in the game. The Kindle has far more books, it's cheaper, the books are cheaper, the battery lasts 2 weeks (not 10 hours), it's easier to read, and the Kindle doesn't require you buy a monthly data plan.


by oskay

The exception to this is the gaming. The gaming will be impressive, different and new. Playing a strategy game like Civilization or Red Alert on this would be a really awesome experience with multitouch.

In summary it's a very pretty e-reader and gaming device. Not a revolution. Old media is still fucked, Apple is just slowing it down and taxing it.

And I still want a Macbook Pro in tablet form.


by Kent K. Barnes / kentkb

This just in - Newspapers are dead

The newspaper industry deserves to die. Or at least be substantially cut down. And this is yet another example of why. Another article by Zosia Bielski. It's basically another gender role-boosting opinion piece that is framed as being based on fact, when in reality it's just a puff piece for a couple authors that make money off reinforcing stereotypes.

I could rant for hours about this but I'll attempt to control myself. Stay on target. My point is that this shouldn't be in a newspaper. This is a blog post, not real information. And a huge amount of what I see in newspapers falls into this category. They might as well not even have a technology section, by the time they write an article about anything I've already heard of it months ago and know all the details. The same goes for most of the actual news as well. In a world with Twitter and Google Reader I know about eveyrthing the moment it happens, waiting till the tomorrow to get a piece written yesterday makes no sense.

"What about real journalism?" Well this argument may be slightly valid if the media did real journalism anymore. They don't. Most news outlets these days are composed of reprinted AP pieces, reprinted corporate press releases, week-late coverage of YouTube memes, sports commentary, and celebrity cutlure info lifted from Perez Hilton. In any given paper there might be one or two genuine articles that don't fall into one of those categories. And frankly, there are bloggers that are willing to produce this information much more quickly, more accurately, and for free.

If the news system did not currently exist no one create it in it's current form. Who would suggest employing hundreds of people for the purposes of writing a piece, having it edited for format, edited for content, shrunk to fit within a certain portion of a physical piece of paper, sent to a factory for printing onto pieces of deadtree in massive quantities, then place this deadtree into trucks to physically distribute it throughout an entire country within one night. No one would do that. Because instead of all of that mess, you could take just the writer themself, give them a blogspot account, and they have instant worldwide distribution for free. Oops, I just broke your business model, time to get a new one.

But they aren't getting a new one. Instead they are trying to force that existing massively unnecessary infrastructure into the digital age and then bitching that it isn't working. Rupert Murdoch wants a pay-wall to get into all his news sites to force people to buy their content. He has already decreed it will be so. (I think it's quite telling of their maneurvrability that it's still not implemented 8 months later, but I digress.)

Almost no one is going to pay for online news. It won't happen. I'll pay for National Geographic because it's beautiful and well produced unique content. I will pay for an in depth piece on the movie industry in Nigeria and how it functions without effective copyright. But I will not pay any amount of money to hear the latest update on balloon boy. In fact, I'd pay NOT to hear about that. (Maybe there is a business model there, having people pay to not be subjected to your bullshit pointless slow-news-day stories.) And that's the problem, those first two are not anywhere in The Globe and Mail, the third was front page.

The music industry dealt with the threat to their business model by adpating slowly, while frequently using their monoploy over artists and the copyright club to beat down any new competition. The news industry has no such weapon and are not adapting nearly fast enough. At the moment they are pretty much  only riding on the fact that old people don't like the internet, and advertisers haven't yet completely abandoned them. They have to lean down and start producing real journalistic content that surpasses that of your average blogger, or they'll be driven out of business in the next 5 years. My bet is on the latter rather than the former.

The newspaper industry deserves to die. Or at least be substantially cut down. And this is yet another example of why. Another article by Zosia Bielski. It's basically another gender role-boosting opinion piece that is framed as being based on fact, when in reality it's just a puff piece for a couple authors that make money off reinforcing stereotypes.


by bitchcakesny

I could rant for hours about this but I'll attempt to control myself. Stay on target. My point is that this shouldn't be in a newspaper. This is a blog post, not real information. And a huge amount of what I see in newspapers falls into this category.

They might as well not even have a technology section, by the time they write an article about anything I've already heard of it months ago and know all the details. The same goes for most of the actual news as well. In a world with Twitter and Google Reader I know about everything the moment it happens, waiting till the tomorrow to get a piece written yesterday makes no sense.


by respres

"What about real journalism?" Well this argument may be slightly valid if the media did real journalism anymore. They don't. Most news outlets these days are composed of reprinted wire pieces, reprinted corporate press releases, week-late coverage of YouTube memes, sports commentary, and celebrity culture info lifted from Perez Hilton.

In any given paper there might be one or two genuine articles that don't fall into one of those categories. And frankly, there are bloggers that are willing to produce this information much more quickly, more accurately, and for free.


by Bill McIntyre

If the news system did not currently exist no one create it in its current form. Who would suggest employing hundreds of people for the purposes of writing a piece, having it edited for format, edited for content, shrunk to fit within a certain portion of a physical piece of paper, sent to a factory for printing onto pieces of deadtree in massive quantities, then place this deadtree into trucks to physically distribute it throughout an entire country within one night.

No one would do that. Because instead of all of that mess, you could take just the writer themself, give them a blogspot account, and they have instant worldwide distribution for free. Oops, I just broke your business model, time to get a new one.


by AKMA

But they aren't getting a new one. Instead they are trying to force that existing massively unnecessary infrastructure into the digital age and then bitching that it isn't working. Rupert Murdoch wants a pay-wall to get into all his news sites to force people to buy their content. He has already decreed it will be so. (I think it's quite telling of their maneuverability that it's still not implemented 8 months later, but I digress.)

Almost no one is going to pay for online news. It won't happen. I'll pay for National Geographic because it's beautiful and well produced unique content. I will pay for an in depth piece on the movie industry in Nigeria and how it functions without effective copyright. But I will not pay any amount of money to hear the latest update on balloon boy. In fact, I'd pay NOT to hear about that. (Maybe there is a business model there, having people pay to not be subjected to your bullshit pointless slow-news-day stories.) And that's the problem, those first two are not anywhere in The Globe and Mail, the third was front page.

The music industry dealt with the threat to their business model by adapting slowly, while frequently using their monopoly over artists and the copyright club to beat down any new competition. The news industry has no such weapon and are not adapting nearly fast enough. At the moment they are pretty much  only riding on the fact that old people don't like the internet, and advertisers haven't yet completely abandoned them. They have to become leaner and start producing real journalistic content that surpasses that of your average blogger or they'll be driven out of business in the next 5 years. My bet is on the latter rather than the former.

Change is good

A little over a year ago I wrote a post about being addicted to change. That post is consistently one of my most popular and receives the most emphatic comments. But what's interesting to me isn't that a lot of people identify with what I said, but that over half of those people seem to want to squash their need for a dynamic lifestyle. 


by toastycakes

Our society breeds conformity and stability. Public education is designed to ensure that everyone is marshaled to the same pace as everyone else and everyone meets the same established milestones of knowledge at the same time. Deviation from the norm is met with reprimands or ostracization from the group. And don't think that this changes as you get older, you just get better at coloring inside the lines and fooling yourself into thinking that you're doing it because you want to. 


by atibens

University may allow you to pick a field of interest rather than having one forced upon you by the government in public school, but then you're held to even stricter definitions of what is acceptable for that narrower slice of society. The enforced mediocrity of one institutional holding pen is replaced with the enforced elitism of another.


by directorebeccer

The corporate and professional working world may claim to do looking for new ideas and paradigm shifts and blue-sky solutioneering, but socially speaking it's often about as conservative as it's possible to get outside of a theocratic state. There are expectations about your behavior and lifestyle, both at and outside of work, that you have to meet in order to escape criticism. 


by inju

The fact that I've dated three women in the last year seems to make me a ladies man in this environment. Using a ceramic plate instead of tupperware, and washing and reusing my plastic forks gets me comments and side glances. And even suggesting that you might want to go to school just to learn is met with looks of incredulity and confusion, as if I had suggested just setting $7000 in cash on fire. And I'm a single white male under 30, I don't even have to factor in the well documented sexism and racism that's rampant in corporate culture.

And that assumes that I have the sort of job that the rest of society attributes some level of respect to. If I quit my job as an aerospace software developer to become  a waiter because I like people, well.... try explaining that move to about 95% of the human population. Everyone knows that your total worth is equivalent to your high score in pin-ball machine of life, so to them, choosing to make less money is like choosing to fail. It doesn't matter if you are more happy with less money and responsibility, your score is lower, so you lose.


by radcliffe_photos

So really, given all of this I probably shouldn't be surprised that people are ashamed of their addiction to change. In this sort of society you can't even wear pink if you're a guy without getting comments, let alone desire something as mind-blowing as wanting to experience a new city every 12 months.

I mean if you don't have a steady job what are you going to do without a company gym membership and dental plan? Just run outside and brush your teeth consistently? That's crazy. You need some soul-destroying stability in your life. 


by Ouij

I find that functioning in society is sort of like walking in tightly packed crowd of people all moving in the in same direction. If the direction or speed you want to move at is even a little different you'll suddenly find yourself coming up against resistance. It probably won't be violent, it might just be passive or occasionally verbal, but it's there. The thing is resistance doesn't mean you're doing something wrong, it just means you're doing something different.

If you're going to dance in a crowd you might step on some people's toes, and some people might think you're crazy, but that doesn't mean you should stop dancing.


by Stuck in Customs

Telco's are ripping us off

The Canadian telecommunications industry is essentially a oligopoly, group of corporations in collusion that strive to maintain consistent profit margins by cooperatively screwing the consumer from as many angles as possible. There are piles of evidence for this. Telus and Bell (the only two CDMA carriers in the country) insistuted fees for incoming text messages at exactly the same time. So now they get to charge twice for the same tiny packet of data. The equivalent of charging you to mail a letter, then charging the recipient to pick it up.

In a healthy competitive environment Rogers would have seen this as an opportunity to differentiate their service by not implementing the same pricing structure. That way they could take customers away from Bell and Telus. However, that didn't happen. Rogers knows that they stand to make more profit by implementing the same fees than they would by engaging in a price war, so starting in July, they will. This is price fixing. It may not be conspiratorial or organized, but it's still price fixing.

This adds to the already ridiculous idea that we are paying extra for text messaging to begin with. They are not charging for this service because it costs them money. It doesn't. In fact it's built so deeply into the cellular system that it actually costs them more money to monitor it and bill you than it would to just let you have it for free. When you pay a premium for an unlimited messaging service you are essentially subsidsizing the cost of tracking and billing other customers per message. At 20 cents per message you are paying $1300 per MB for that data, and because they bill twice for every message, they get $2600 per MB. This is price gauging at an unbelievable level.

And text messaging is just one facet of a hugely complicated prcing structure thats designed specifically to prevent you from directly comparing competitors and get you to pay the largest possible amount for the littlest possible service. They fracture the service into as many small pieces as possible and charge ridiculous prices for them individually in order to make the bundles look cheaper by comparison. 

They charge separately for call display, text messaging, email, voice, long distance and internet even though it's all similar data all travelling over the same network. (And charging for long distance is just lying, as if it costs more $0.35 a minute more to send data to Waterloo than it does to send data to Mississauga.) It would be as if when you purchased an internet connection you had to pay for a certain number of IM's per month, extra for accessing sites from the US, extra for watching video, extra for uploading files, and extra for using Skype. There would be protests in the streets if that was attempted, but it's tolerated on cellular service because we've been beaten by them for so long that we don't think to call the police anymore.

But changes are coming. There is no technical reason that you even need a voice plan or call display or voicemail or text messaging at this point. All you need is a smartphone, a data plan, Skype, and Google Talk. You could get about 1000 minutes of Skype on a 500MB data plan. But oh right, I almost forgot, you also need the cellular service providers to allow Skype on their network, and allow you to install it on the phone that you own. And that won't happen without a huge increase in competition or a government intervention.

The Canadian telecommunications industry is essentially a oligopoly, group of corporations in collusion that strive to maintain consistent profit margins by cooperatively screwing the consumer from as many angles as possible. There are piles of evidence for this. Telus and Bell (the only two CDMA carriers in the country) insistuted fees for incoming text messages at exactly the same time. So now they get to charge twice for the same tiny packet of data. The equivalent of charging you to mail a letter, then charging the recipient to pick it up.


by dulcie

In a healthy competitive environment Rogers would have seen this as an opportunity to differentiate their service by not implementing the same pricing structure. That way they could take customers away from Bell and Telus. However, that didn't happen. Rogers knows that they stand to make more profit by implementing the same fees than they would by engaging in a price war, so starting in July, they will. This is price fixing. It may not be conspiratorial or organized, but it's still price fixing.


by sashafatcat

This adds to the already ridiculous idea that we are paying extra for text messaging to begin with. They are not charging for this service because it costs them money. It doesn't. In fact it's built so deeply into the cellular system that it actually costs them more money to monitor it and bill you than it would to just let you have it for free. When you pay a premium for an unlimited messaging service you are essentially subsidsizing the cost of tracking and billing other customers per message. And at 20 cents per message you are paying $1300 per MB for that data, and because they bill twice for every message, they get $2600 per MB of what is essentially pure profit. 


by aresauburn™

And text messaging is just one facet of a hugely complicated prcing structure thats designed specifically to prevent you from directly comparing competitors and get you to pay the largest possible amount for the littlest possible service. They fracture the service into as many small pieces as possible and charge ridiculous prices for them individually in order to make the bundles look cheaper by comparison. 

They charge separately for call display, text messaging, email, voice, long distance and internet even though it's all similar data all travelling over the same network. (And charging for long distance is just lying, as if it costs more $0.35 a minute more to send data to Waterloo than it does to send data to Mississauga.) It would be as if when you purchased an internet connection you had to pay for a certain number of IM's per month, extra for accessing sites from the US, extra for watching video, extra for uploading files, and extra for using Skype. There would be protests in the streets if that was attempted, but it's tolerated on cellular service because we've been beaten by them for so long that we don't think to call the police anymore.


by malthe

But changes are coming. There is no technical reason that you even need a voice plan or call display or voicemail or text messaging at this point. All you need is a smartphone, a data plan, Skype, and Google Talk. You could get about 1000 minutes of Skype on a 500MB data plan. But oh right, I almost forgot, you also need the cellular service providers to allow Skype on their network, and allow you to install it on the phone that you own. And that won't happen without a huge increase in competition or a government intervention.


by acroll

Dating

Dating is a weird and wholly unnatural sort of situation. Online dating even more so. I think Seinfeld had a bit where he compared dating to a job interview, except that if it goes well you both take your pants off at the end.


by spudgunner

Up until very recently I wouldn't really say I had ever dated. For the most part I'd just sort of meet someone and a relationship would somehow just organically grow out of it. No special fertilizers or grow lamps required. While I have met two of my previous girlfriends through Lavalife, in both cases they were the first people I went out with and in both cases the first date turned into a relationship in short order.

This is why my current situation is new to me. For the first time in my life I'm actually going on dates in the stereotypical sort of way, and it's a completely novel experience.


by enggul

It starts with the online application process. You read the job description and provide your resume along with a cover letter that you try to tailor to the qualities they are looking for. You want to seem pleasant, eager and qualified, and not desperate for any position you can get. Too much or too little of anything is bad at this point.

Which is why my first instinct at this stage is already incorrect. I want to essentially write the person a long winded and grandiloquent blog-post-like response extolling my knowledge of some factual minutiae that they included in their description.

And it's sentences like that that prevent women from sleeping with me.

I think that an appropriate response to "I like Woody Allen movies" is a half-assed doctoral thesis on the subject, made up of some random facts and some random made-up facts. Instead of, you know, just saying I liked Annie Hall.


by chesswithdeath

At this point I've discovered that the key to getting over the first hurdle is just sending a quick message that I don't think about and is no longer than about four sentences. No one wants to read through a dissertation length message from someone you don't know.

And this isn't dishonest or hiding my true personality. In fact I've come across it naturally. I've gotten to the point now where I can't be bothered to put in that much effort when my experience tells me that there is probably only a 20% chance they'll acknowledge you.


by nattu

Then the actual date. That thing where two strangers meet in a public location to figure out if they want to meet again in another public location.

Aside from the rare cases where the other person is clearly just conducting an interrogation to find your faults, this is generally where I begin to enjoy the process.

I like meeting new people and exploring their personalities. Having discussions where you have no idea what the other persons perspective will be. You come across these conversational surprises, points of view or opinions you hadn't considered before. It may be going well, it may be going horribly, but it's all intellectual gravy to me.


by iambigred

And that's where the next hurdle comes up. I often become so immersed in discovering this person that I forget that this is supposed to be a romantic experience for some people. Overt flirting may become a secondary concern compared to figuring out why someone thinks the way they do.

Don't get me wrong, I'm frequently a very flirty person, but I don't feel the need to steer the conversation exclusively in that direction. For me, psychologically sparing is also flirting, and intellectually respecting someone is essential to me finding them sexually attractive. A good debate is foreplay in my opinion.


by Steve Wampler

So online dating doesn't seem to mesh terribly well with my personality. And maybe that's the case with most people.

So why do it? Why not go to AGO or take a cooking class and talk to girls?



Aside from the fact that those two options are kind of creepy, I do the online dating thing because it's a relatively easy way to meet a lot of interesting people that you otherwise would not come across. At least in these situations you know that the person is single, the person is at least somewhat interested in talking to you, and everyone involved is aware that this is a date.

So I'll keep trying it out. I'll keep talking the way I talk and acting the way I act and hopefully at some point it'll click. But in the mean time regardless of whether or not I actually end up with any of these people, I still enjoy figuring out what makes them tick, as well as what that means for me and what I'm looking for.

This round of dating started off with me looking for someone. But the more people I meet, the more I find out things about myself that are of greater interest and value than if I had hooked up right away. And that may just be me rationalizing my current position, but even if it's an unintended consequence, it's still true.


by kxlly

Getting sucked into the life you don't want

As time goes by, I'm finding it harder and harder to ensure that I'm following my own goals, rather than the expectations set out for me as a consequence of living in this society. I occasionally compare myself to my coworkers or family, and then, when I find myself lacking, I strive to get what they have. But in those times I've forgotten that they are not the sort of people that I want to be.


by josephp

They are not bad people at all, just not what I want to be. I'll describe them for you. Firstly, they are all engineers, male, and over the age of 30. Almost all are married or in committed relationships, and those who aren't are nerds who have probably not seen a woman naked in quite a long time.

The ones that I talk to frequently tend to be very focused on making as much money as possible, as quickly as possible, so they can buy a bigger TV for their house in Oakville, Richmond Hill, or some other commuter suburb of Toronto.


by Carnotzet

Their life plan was get degree, get a job, marry the girl you are dating at 28, and get a house in the suburbs. Have kids at 30, work like crazy to retire at 55. Then golf till you die.

These are not inherently bad goals, they are just not my goals. But because they occupy so much of my life that their mentality bleeds into mine occasionally.

I constantly have to reanalyze what it is I'm stressing out about and whether or not it's worth it in light of MY goals, not theirs. I literally spent a couple days worrying about the fact that I don't have a stock portfolio before realizing that I don't give a shit about having a stock portfolio. I mulled over getting an MBA instead of an arts-PhD until I remembered I hate business people and I want to write, not work in a cubicle.


by static416

I'm going to spend the next 8-12 months minimizing my expenses and paying off my debts. Then I want to go back to school to learn things I'm interested in, doing only enough software development to keep my condo paid for and food on my table.

Can't get into a PhD program? I'll keep taking classes and doing my own research if necessary but I'm not giving on intellectual pursuits because it can't be sanctioned by an institution. I don't want to get married. I don't want to have kids. I don't want to move to the suburbs. No nuclear family, no maximizing my RRSP contributions. At least not for as far as I can see into the future.


by Quasimondo

Right now my dream would be to write and learn new things during the day, then solve the world's problems over some drinks with friends at night. To those that read this blog this post may seem repetitive, rehashing what I've already said. But if I don't keep reminding myself of what is really important to me I'll get sucked into the life that I don't want and won't be happy with.

I start my class in 2.5 weeks. I can't wait.


by Jōsé

Values, opinions, and arguments

I have opinions, I don't really have any values. At least not in the sense that some of our neighbors to the south tend to use the phrase. I'd say that they would define values essentially as beliefs that are tied more some kind of faith or 'truth' than to evidence. Values are core beliefs that you cling to for strength, and are usually unchanging and inflexible.

If that definition is accurate, no one should have values, they should just have opinions.

by MissBlythe

Opinions can change, opinions can be revised, and values cannot. Values are never wrong. And for me, being able to admit that you are wrong is one of the fundamental qualities of an intelligent person.

You shouldn’t hold an opinion because you like that point of view, you should hold an opinion because the evidence points in that direction. And should that evidence change, your opinion should change with it.

Having an opinion that is not subject to revision upon the discovery of new evidence (aka 'values') means that that opinion is based on faith and dogma, not logic and reason. It’s the difference between finding evidence to fit your theory, and finding a theory to fit the evidence. It’s the difference between religion and science.


by Mike Babcock

Once you've formed an opinion you need to evaluate it using an arguement and that's where things get difficult again. Most people don't know how to argue and it ends up causing 90% of the conflict in this world and my life.

Having a meaningful argument with a useful resolution is dependent upon agreeing on some common evidence and common truths as a foundation for the argument. This is why arguments about religion don’t go anywhere, because you’re arguing from different foundations. One person is claiming that only that which can be measured is valid, and the other person believes in magic and unicorns. There is no common ground.


by calium

For a different, more subtle example, Person A says to me “Women make 25% less than men for the same work”. Then I’d say, “Well I read two studies that both showed that once you control for other factors (children, family life, differing priorities) there is only about 10-12% that can be attributed purely to sexism.” Then Person A says “Yes but the entire society and scientific system was created by men and therefore has a built in bias against women”. And the argument is wreaked.

That last bit basically destroys the ability to even continue the argument because it removes any common foundation. Person A has claimed that all of society, and therefore any evidence coming from that society, is suspect. So nothing I say, and nothing Person A says is useful anymore. It’s like the nuclear weapon of arguments, it just destroys everything, no one wins. And it’s pointless, Person A hasn’t accomplished anything other than to prove that they don’t know how to argue a point to a meanful resolution.


by teaeff

The funny thing is, most people don't realize that the foundation of the argument has been destroyed at that point and the argument is now unwinable. Most people (myself included) will frequently allow the argument to continue off into some deeper existential debate, or onto another subject entirely. They may not realize that whatever they started arguing about is off the rails and is not going to go anywhere at this point. Because if you can't agree on a common point of reference and stick to that then there is no argument, there is just yelling.

But they'll keep trying. They'll just keep yelling and the person who yells the loudest wins. That doesn’t mean they've resolved anything. It doesn't mean that they've tested the evidence for their opinions and found it strong. It just means they don't know how to argue and they're a better yeller.


by Simmy.

Turns out I'm not rich

I was never really been under the illusion that I was particularly wealthy, but after doing a little math I've realized I'm not doing as well off as I had thought.


by misterbisson

Since the end of university I've been using a spreadsheet to project my finances forward a year or so in order to ensure that I have enough money to meet my monthly expenses. These are extremely detailed, day-by-day, expenses and income.

While this ensures the money is there when withdrawls come out, the downside is that it means that I tend to cut things very tight, often to within a few dollars a month.


by midnightglory

When I was renting a little over a year ago I was able to keep my credit card clear and pay down my student debt at the same time without too much difficulty. But then I bought a condo and my housing expenses tripled.


by woodleywonderworks

But it's not just housing costs. It's also a combination of impulsive buying and poor luck. I've had to replace a computer and repair $1200 in damage to my car. I've also bought an Xbox and a lot of clothes. Both of which may make me happier, but probably aren't completely necessary.

I've gone on a couple small vacations, decorated my condo, and had fun on the weekends. Last week I enrolled in a course at Ryerson to the tune of $500.


by Thomas Hawk

To be fair though, I should get at least a little credit for the things I didn't purchase. Like using a ethernet cable instead of buying a faster router, living without a 50mm 1.4F lens, and getting a kitten for free.


by static416

So for the last year I've been telling myself that I've been paying down my Visa as fast as possible. Well today I actually charted it and I wasn't impressed with what I found.

At the beginning of the year my Visa was briefly paid off, then quickly skyrocketed to about $4300. Since then it's fluctuated between about $2200 at the lowest and $4800 at the highest. Adding an average trendline for the year shows that I have only decreased my average debt by about $250. That's not good.



Decreased fixed-expenses and a raise mean I end up with an extra $350 a month compared to 8 months ago. So it's not my expenses-to-income ratio that's the problem either. Oscar Wilde said something to the effect of "Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination." It looks like the problem I've got is a little too much imagination.


by oppositeofsuper

The good news is that despite my Visa sitting at a rather lofty $4000 right now, I'll probably have it paid off by the end of the month. My boss is paying out my banked hours on or around November 30, so I should be greeting Christmas with a clear credit card.


by romanlily

The next trick will be to keep it that way.

My brain is stuck in repeat

I don't know if you'd call it a rut, it's not that negative. It's really more of a routine. Leave for work at 7am, get home at 6:30-7pm, work out (sometimes), look at the stupid internet, sleep with frequent kitten-related disturbances, repeat. Weekends involve sleeping in, family visits, and Emma/Eric-time. None of this is bad, in fact I feel more productive than ever, and my RescueTime charts support that.



No it's not bad, it's just kinda... I don't know... numbing? repetitive? I'm left wondering if this is what it feels like to get older. I wonder if this is why some of the adults in my life (I'm not one of those yet) seem to be happy, yet have such narrow lives, restricted viewpoints, and simple interests. The worst part is that I know that it's entirely my own doing.


by scytale.name

Maybe a small part of it is that I need to get back to maintaining my own friendships rather than relying exclusively on girlfriend(s), ex-girlfriends, and their friends to provide entertainment. And I'm not inferring that those relationships are not interesting or rewarding! On the contrary! I'm lucky to have the opportunity to meet so many unique people with diverse interests and viewpoints. I mean really... who likes monopoly that much?


by static416

Plus they quite literally compose almost my entire readership. None of my old friends read this. So if I piss you off Ethan, I'll just be talking to myself here.

I definitely consider myself fortunate to have such a wide network of acquaintances, but lately I've favored that network out of convenience rather than making the effort to hang out with old friends.


by static416

These are the people I've known since I started university 8 years ago or the people I started public school with 20 years ago. These are the people that remember things about me that I've forgotten, can predict my words before I've said them, and challenge me in ways that have shaped my personality into the world-class intellect that I am today. I need to get out of my routine and reconnect with these people while continuing to see those that are gracious enough to put up with me on a more frequent basis.



It's certainly a self-created problem, I don't want to make it sound like blaming anyone else here. I need to mix up my own life a bit. I don't think it's that I don't have any Eric-time, I think it's that I need to spend Eric-time more effectively. Do something new rather than sitting around being lazy.


by moneboh

I need to explore the city and come up with novel ways to entertain myself. I want to buy some stinky cheese and some wine, and take pictures of myself consuming those things while reading Dostoevsky in a pretentious public location.


by QXZ

I want to get drunk with Liam in Peterborough and inevitably come close to getting into a fight in a bar. I want to buy a vintage t-shirt in Kensington market, and then wear it and tell everybody that this is the vintage t-shirt that I bought in Kensington market.


by Zach_ManchesterUK

I want to eat things that I don't think want to eat.


by iwishmynamewasmarsha

I want to do stuff that I haven't done, rather than continue to do the stuff that is creating industrial-Eric. This industrial-Eric is commercially productive, yet has all the self-motivation and unique thoughts of an inanimate assembly line robot. That is not the Eric that I want to be, and that is not the Eric that writes blog posts.


by Scott Beale / Laughing Squid

I want to be the Eric that writes blog posts. But with fewer hyphens next time.


by xkcd

Dino Comic - Readers assume real-life inspiration

I can totally identify with T-Rex here. Lots of people assume that because I write something it's somehow about them or me. Sometimes a rant is just a rant. Sometimes it's not.



Or maybe I just like it because Lolita 2: The Prequel would be awesome.

Why is tradition an excuse for intolerance?

I was listening to the CBC Radio today and they were talking about how the Anglican Church in England will now allow women to become bishops. My favorite quote is this part, from an female Anglican synod:

"When God created man and woman, yes, they're equal, but there's also a difference," she said. "And I do not want to see a situation of women bishops that men would actually be under the authority of a woman."

A large part of the defense of this stance is that it the policy of exclusively male bishops is part of tradition and should not be changed.


by mtsofan

Recently in Quebec, it was suggested the crucifix be removed from the Quebec legislature. In Ontario it was suggested that they cease saying the lords prayer in at the opening of the Ontario legislature. In many religions, discrimination against the marriage of gays is openly accepted, if not encouraged. And in all these cases tradition was cited as a reason for quickly and openly refusing to respect rights they don't agree with.


by ebby

Why is it that something which clearly shows intolerance, or at least inequality, can be made defensible when framed in the upholding of "tradition"?

Institutionalized slavery was (and is) a tradition in many cultures. Restricting the rights and freedoms of women was a tradition in virtually every culture for much longer than bishops of any sex even existed. And yet if a politician seriously proposed that we resurrect slave ships and return women to the role of second class citizens in the name of tradition, they would probably be stoned in the streets (also a tradition).


by Majiscup - Drink for Design

If your employer openly refused to hire you because you were a woman or demanded that you recite a line from the Koran every morning, they would inevitably be sued and possibly put in jail because it's against the law. Why does it become acceptable when a church or government is doing the discrimination instead of an individual? Am I to understand that intolerance on a small scale is somehow more damaging than broadly sanctioned and institutionalized intolerance?


by selva

Clearly it's not. Clearly we're writing laws and then making exceptions for the most potent example of why these laws are important. It's those who believe in their intolerance so completely that they've codified it, literally written it in stone, and unapologetically promote it that most need to be penalized.

by Wonderlane

We don't have rights to equality just to ensure something as minor as a small-breasted woman getting a job a Hooters. We have rights to equality to ensure that no tradition of the powerful is levied as justification for the subjugation of a particular class, sex, or race.

But it seems that even in Canada, sacred cows can still hate gays and women despite laws to the contrary, provided that they are traditional sacred cows.


by betta design

Photos of the Week - Week 3

On Canada Day Steph and I walked around.


by static416

We went down Richmond St, up Spadina and I got some Pho, then down to the Waterfront. By the time it started getting dark we were sitting in a park near the ferry to Toronto Island drinking wine out of transparent water bottles (sneaky) and talking about how I'm basically a hater of people of every description.

Friday I did pretty much nothing.


by static416

Actually I did pretty much nothing for the entire weekend, but the height of my day Friday was walking over to Sobey's and getting the required materials to produce the pizza that I eat almost exclusively now. It's awesome pizza. It's got everything you need for a balanced diet. Bread, tomato sauce, onions, provolone cheese, and prosciutto. It's in the Canadian food guide.... look it up.

Sunday came around and I realized I didn't have much for the Photos of the Week thing, so I went for a bit of a walkabout before Emma came over.


by static416

This building is weird. People actually live in it. There are multiple apartments in there. It would be an eyesore if it wasn't so weird as to actually be intriguing. I really want to go inside and have a look around, I mean how do you furnish a place like that? I couldn't find too much info on One Sumach Street online, only this.

After that I broke into the West Don Lands construction site.


by static416

I suppose "found a large hole in the barrier and walked in" would be a more accurate, though less dramatic description.

It's pretty neat, lots of dirt and broken stuff.


by static416

I was constantly worried about injuring myself. Not because it's a dangerous area. But because I'm a klutz and frequently manage to hurt myself in odd situations. Like when I pulled a concrete block out of a tree using a rope and it landed on my head. Or when I sprained my wrist after wiping out on skies in a parking lot. Or when I rolled my truck on an empty road in nice weather. Or when I sprained my knee while standing (just standing) on a snowboard for the first time. Or when I fell down a flight of stairs at Steph's katimavik house immediately after being told to "watch out, the stairs are slippery".

So I'm special. Special like this plant. A point of brilliance and beauty straining to grow in a desert of stifling ignorance and hatred.


by static416

Then again it could just be a weed.

I wreck peoples fun

Seems like I occasionally suck the small joys from people's lives. Ignorance is bliss, and occasionally I bring enlightenment and disappointment to conversations. Some would argue more disappointment than enlightenment (assuming I'm even right in the first place), but I feel like I have to say something.


by macten

The most blatant and frequent opportunity for this comes from the emails that are forwarded to me by my friends and family. "OPP says to look out for needles on gas pump handles" No they don't. If the police wanted to alert the public to a terrorist whose weapon of choice was virus-filled hypodermic needles taped to gas pump handles, I'm sure they would find a better way to do that than to rely on a email chain letter. When i break the news to them that this is probably just a hoax, there is denial, followed by embarrassment and acceptance. It's gotten to the point that I feel so bad about it that I don't even bring it up anymore.


by OntCopper

Then there is the opposite end of the spectrum, brief technical inaccuracies that I can't prevent myself from pointing out. "Is that snake poisonous?" Nope, because poisonous refers to toxin delivery through consumption. Some snakes are venomous, which means they deliver their toxins through injection, but they are not poisonous, because you aren't eating them. By now my friends have heard this so many times that as soon as someone in the room misuses the term poisonous, they yell "Shut up Eric" before I even have a chance to go on my rant. It's unfair really. I've practiced it so many times already it's a shame not to use it.


by static416

In between those extremes, there is everything else. Echinacea very probably does nothing. Space ships don't need to bank in turns. The moon landing was not faked. Snakes cannot eat adult humans. Few scorpions even have the potential to be deadly. Fish don't just grow to the size of their enclosure. Centrifugal force does not actually exist. I could keep going.


by tricky ™

I try not to be a dick. I try to minimize my interventions, or at least phrase them in the most gentle way possible. But I still think that it's better that I at least challenge these urban myths or common misconceptions, because sometimes you should question the things you read. I'm by no means above this myself, and expect people to challenge my claims as well. Because as much as I'd like to think otherwise, I have a feeling I'm just as full of crap as everyone else.


by Jeremiah Britt

Why Sci-Fi is a valid literary genre

Any time I mention to anyone that I enjoy science fiction, people either enthusiastically agree, or dismiss me as a Star Wars fan-boy with my head in the clouds.


by Unhindered by Talent


The latter is especially prominent with those who consider themselves avid readers of "literature", which is just a pretentious way of saying "boring books".  (I kid. But seriously, I don't know a single person who actually likes Margret Atwood or Ayn Rand)



Of course I completely disagree. I've always found sci-fi to be thought provoking and in many cases, provide a unique framing for ethical questions. One of the often addressed questions is "What does it mean to be human?".  Trapped within a timeframe of past or present, you are somewhat limited in exploring this issue. But if you allow your imagination to expand, if you allow for cloning, teleportation, cybernetics, or advanced AI you can really get some interesting points of view on the issue.

If being human means being my particular unique self, what happens if I am completely duplicated? Would both of us have a soul. Would that disprove the existence of a soul? If one Eric entered the machine and two exited, which one of us would be "Eric" in that case?


by BGLewandowski

If being human means being a conscious, self-aware being, what happens if my mind is duplicated in a computer? If that computer behaves identically to me, is it human? If that computer improves on me (not possible, don't worry) is it still human? More human? Less?


by d-d-daisy

While I tend to think about existential issues the most, sci-fi also allows for humanitarian issues to be presented in such a way that the morality and motive may not be immediately evident. I mean you may pick up the book because you want to read about time-travel, but you end up thinking about racism or environmentalism. Robert Sawyer recently did a lecture for Big Ideas (which you should definitely listen to) in which he talked about this specific issue and how Hollywood sells sci-fi short, undermining and ignoring its literary roots.


by StarbuckGuy

Robert J. Sawyer on Big Ideas

Author Robert J. Sawyer explains how Hollywood's approach to science fiction, starting with George Lucas's Star Wars, has dulled the edge that made science fiction such a pertinent film genre. Sawyer dissects the problematic aspects of the original Star Wars film and shows how science fiction books continue to tackle difficult issues while their big screen counterparts take the easy road of big explosions and small ideas.

Don't get me wrong, Catch 22 was great, and Atlas Shrugged would have been interesting if it was 300 pages instead of 1200 pages. Collapse was very informative, and I'm sure Lolita will be stirring. However, I haven't found anything that will beat Fahrenheit 451 for commentary on modern society, or Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy for making you laugh and think at the same time (picture that facial expression).

Just be honest

I've never really understood why people lie in situations where the truth isn't any more damaging, which is the case for about 90% lies in my opinion. Just be honest, it's really the much simpler and easier solution.


by atomicity

For example, you agree to dinner with Friend A. But after agreeing to the dinner, you find out that Friend B is having a pool party which you would prefer to go to, because who doesn't like pool parties. Now, assuming that you decide to go to the party instead of the dinner, how do you break the news to Friend A?


by tricky ™

Many people would come up with some sort of lie to justify them not showing up to dinner. "I'm not feeling too hot" or "I have to work late". But why lie? If you lie, Friend A is not going to be any less disappointed that you aren't coming to the dinner because you claim to be reading to orphans or something. Besides, people can tell that you are lying most of the time anyways, they just don't know why. All you gain with the lie is the appearance of a slightly more valid reason for bailing. But if Friend A is a reasonable person, they would accept the real reason just as readily as the lie anyways, without you having to risk all the negative consequences of being dishonest. So just be honest.


by Martin Deutsch

Furthermore, lying in many situations will just worsen the problem that caused you to lie in the first place. If you lie to get out of a date with someone you don't like, you're just delaying the inevitable and stringing the other person along. Now the other person is going to ask you out again because they'll assume (naively) that you still like them, but you were just busy that one time. Just be honest. If you lie to a close friend to go out with another, you now cannot tell your close friend anything that happened that night without introducing more lies. And there are always good stories from pool parties. Just be honest.


by Mike Monteiro

In almost all everyday situations, risking the negative social consequences of being caught in a lie outweigh the damage of telling the truth in the first place. The worst case scenario for telling the truth is generally that you are viewed as an honest person who made a decision the other person doesn't really agree with. Being caught in a lie means that you have now lost some credibility, and in the future your friends are likely to assume that excuses are actually lies when they are valid.

Just be honest.