Interrupted house. (h/t, Captain Nemo) || Continue the research. (h/t, Damian) || Re:scam is a service to irritate scammers. || She mingles and hobnobs like you wouldn’t believe. (h/t, Simen) || On H Tracy Hall and the invention of the synthetic diamond. || Deadpool 2. || Shoreditch. (h/t, Holborn) || Crabs of note. (h/t, dicentra) || When you need a fancier axe. || 1939 New York World’s Fair. || Because being a student is so terribly fatiguing. || What to do if your parachute fails. || Iron powder. || Translucent pumpkin pie. || “I travelled across the whole entire world for this.” || One for the ladies. Note the subtle change of title. || So does this count as “social justice”? || And finally, intimately, “Tatiana can see out of both of Krista’s eyes, while Krista can only see out of one of Tatiana’s.”

Law professor Adam MacLeod on undoing the ‘progressive’ miseducation of his students: 

Slapping a label on the box without first opening the box and examining its contents is a form of cheating. Worse, it prevents you from discovering the treasures hidden inside the box. For example, when we discussed the Code of Hammurabi, some of you wanted to slap labels on what you read [“classist,” “racist,”] which enabled you to convince yourself that you had nothing to learn from ancient Babylonians. But when we peeled off the labels and looked carefully inside the box, we discovered several surprising truths.

Related: “Who is this Mozart?”  

Michael Walsh on the real-world destination of “social justice” activism: 

In the aftermath of the Ferguson riots in Missouri and the Freddie Gray fiasco in Baltimore, the decriminalisation of crime in the name of “social justice” – long a goal of the cultural-Marxist Left – got fully underway. The result was exactly what anyone not fully invested in Critical Theory would have expected… Baltimore is a prime example of what happens when citizens are categorised by skin colour or cultural background, and then have differing standards of behaviour applied to them by what should be an impartial justice system. Instead of “social justice,” the outcome is social disruption, mistrust, resentment and lawlessness.

If violent and predatory behaviour has consequences only for the victim, then the situation is unlikely to improve. 

And David Cole on gentrification, its opponents, and the kind of nakedly racial animus that’s apparently okay: 

Activists [in Pilsen, Chicago] protested the opening of a new restaurant in the neighbourhood. The owners of the eatery, named S.K.Y., are accused of “gentrifying” the neighbourhood with their presence. So of course the activists responded by defacing the building, threatening the staff, and blocking people from entering… But the chef-owner of S.K.Y., Stephen Gillanders, is baffled. His meals start at $7, hardly the stuff of billionaire foodies. So why the resistance from the locals? Well, it turns out that Gillanders is Filipino and his wife is Korean.

Media reports that have mentioned Gillanders’ race have suggested that it’s somehow odd that the activists are attacking a fellow minority… [But] the activists speak again and again of keeping Pilsen “Mexican.” Not “diverse,” not “rainbow,” but Mexican. In fact, CBS Chicago reported that it isn’t just Gillanders’ business that’s being targeted. The protesters are “demanding that non-Mexican owners here [at S.K.Y.] and across the street get out of Pilsen.” Viva la Raza! There’s your identity politics, leftists. This is the logical conclusion of the race-centred worldview that the left encourages non-whites to embrace.

Feel free to share your own links and snippets, on any subject, in the comments.

Lifted from the comments, an intriguing choice of adjective:

This discovery of general preference, some 71%, is not only deemed “alarming,” but also “startling,” and what’s more, it apparently constitutes a “masculinity crisis within the LGBTQ community.” Says a website quoting a magazine, the front cover of which looks like this. 

As Ted S notes in reply, “How dare you gays not like the type of man we think you should like!”

I realise it may be difficult to feel great concern for the kinds of people who base their worldviews on the high and noble teachings of the publications Attitude and Queerty, but still. The unstated contortion required to achieve the indignation that is now social currency – in this instance, a belief that not being aroused by overly effeminate men is obvious and damning proof of “misogynist attitudes” and “toxic masculinity” – is a thing to behold. We’re also informed – quite confidently, yet with no elaboration – that, “[Gay men] enjoy the privilege of being male in a patriarchal society that for some reason values our genitals way above a woman’s.”

Update, via the comments: 

Cat kneads bread. || His garbage chute says no. || Action figure of note. || The future is now. || Beneath that old yellow varnish. || Assorted, temporary snow globes. || Samorost 3 is a game. || Why toenails and fingernails tend to grow at different rates. || His name is Lucas. || Some Soviet control rooms. || Michelin men of yesteryear. (h/t, Damian) || Mural of note. || Amanda Marcotte struggles with numbers. || Somewhat related. || Such lovely pantaloons. || Iceland has colour. || Meanwhile, in Madagascar. (h/t, Kate) || Planes, from above. || Bamboo bugs. (h/t, Julia) || Build your own 3D zoetrope. A project for the weekend. || A big fan of said devices. || Computer-generated jigsaw puzzles. || And finally, a strange object has been found, its origin and purpose still a total mystery.

And then this happened. 

Toby Young on things you mustn’t acknowledge, even politely, at least among educators: 

Unfortunately, [education charity] Teach First decided my blog was unacceptable. In spite of the fact that it was billed as part of a ‘debate’, and appeared alongside another piece expressing an alternative point of view, the organisation decided to remove it from its website and issue an apology. That’s right, it apologised for publishing my piece. “It was against what we believe is true and against our values and vision,” Teach First explained… The most disappointing thing about the whole affair is that… I was attempting to show how teachers could remain evangelical about raising standards without denying the mainstream scientific understanding about the heritability of IQ and the impact of IQ on educational outcomes. Teach First’s reaction and its description of my piece as “against what we believe is true” suggests it doesn’t share my view that its values are compatible with mainstream science. 

Toni Airaksinen on the Clown Quarter’s high standards: 

An academic journal on “white privilege” has apparently stopped publishing articles following a Campus Reform investigation in September. The journal, Whiteness and Education, published by Routledge, claimed to publish peer-reviewed research on issues including “critical discussions of White racism, White identity, privilege, power, and intersectionality.” However, a closer inspection revealed that the majority of published articles were “accepted” for publication within two days of being “received” — a very short time frame that could not allow for proper peer-review, according to professors consulted by Campus Reform. 

And further to rumblings in the comments, Michael Jones notes an inspired exercise in trolling and what it reveals: 

Signs declaring “It’s okay to be white” have been spotted on college campuses across America and even in Canada over the last week, prompting outrage… Others have questioned why saying “it’s okay to be white” is automatically racist… Even though the campaign has been widely identified as a troll attempt, many took the bait. “I am deeply disgusted that this organised online campaign to divide university communities across the country has come to our campus. It is shameful that anyone would use these posters to promote a racist agenda,” University of Kansas’ student body president, Mady Womack, told the Kansan. The flyers were denounced as “racist” and the school’s Multicultural Student Government convened an “emergency meeting” over it, according to the report.

Given the endless courses and faculty proclamations denouncing “whiteness” as both “oppressive” and a “problem,” something that pale-skinned students should atone for ostentatiously, while promising not to produce children as pale and sinful as themselves, the accusations of racism and divisiveness – because of a small notice suggesting that, actually, “It’s okay to be white” – may ring a little hollow and seem absurdly dishonest. And it’s hard not to admire the economy of the trolling, whereby a modest and unobjectionable statement, one that if applied to any other, comparable group would be utterly innocuous, is denounced, and denounced immediately, as if it were scandalous. Which suggests that there’s no position a pale person could take, short of continual deference and self-abasement, that would keep such people free of doctrinaire convulsion. And which in turns suggests a kind of madness.

Feel free to share your own links and snippets, on any subject, in the comments.

Yes, another opportunity to throw together your own pile of links and oddities in the comments. Being a generous guy, I’ll set the ball rolling with some suspicious-looking trousers; some people looking at art; a demonstration of how to have fun with blood and magnets; and Mr Tom Baker sharing tales of tingling titties and poisonous bottled farts.  

Oh, and a visit to the world of competitive grave-digging.