Friday Ephemera

“Evil is a make-believe concept,” say vegetarian cyclists, before being rammed with a car and then stabbed to death by jihadis.
I warned you.

…although President Mountain Dew…
That is President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho, to you, thank you very much.

“Liberty has produced scepticism, and scepticism has destroyed liberty. The lovers of liberty thought they were leaving it unlimited, when they were only leaving it undefined. They thought they were only leaving it undefined, when they were really leaving it undefended.”
— GK Chesterton
Tends to underpin the growing rejection of rightism and its muh constitution type of passive grandstanding-slash-martyrdom.

Millennial Couple Bikes Near ISIS Territory to Prove ‘Humans Are Kind’ and Gets Killed
At least they proved some humans are really stupid.

And this:

The face lies on a surgical tray, eyes empty and unseeing, mouth agape, as if exclaiming, “Oh!” Sixteen hours ago, surgeons in Operating Room 19 at the Cleveland Clinic began the delicate work of removing the face from a 31-year-old woman who was declared legally and medically dead three days earlier. Soon they will take it to a 21-year-old woman who has waited more than three years for a new face.
For a moment, the face rests in its astonished solitude. Surgeons, residents, and nurses, suddenly silent, gaze at it in awe as clinic staff, like unusually polite paparazzi, move in with cameras to document it. The face, deprived of blood, grows pale. With each second of detachment, it looks more like a 19th-century death mask. Frank Papay, a veteran plastic surgeon, picks up the tray, carrying it carefully in his gloved hands, and walks to Operating Room 20, where Katie Stubblefield waits.

Needless to say, the article features some quite graphic photographs.

“And finally…”
Awww, I was hoping for a skateboarding duck.

At least they proved some humans are really stupid.
Somewhat related, these. Why, it’s almost as if there’s something to be learned.

The lost art of fire-jumping
What friends are for. Or associates, or something.

The umbrella on the left is the magic one.
Stopping a train.

Anyway, this might be of interest
Thanks, Tom.

Naturopathic Quesadillas, for the healthy lifestyle.
So Much Guardian.
When guns are outlawed, only bakers will have guns, or food.

Naturopathic Quesadillas, for the healthy lifestyle.
I was won over by the “biofrequency healing stickers.” Also, the use of clothes pegs.

What, not Face/Off?

From the spider link:
Well-fed males are redder, which may be a sign of their fitness. But red also acts as a deterrent, tapping into a female’s aversion to a color that typically screams I’m toxic.

Take a lesson from the spiders, friends.

In case David and the henchlesbians ever need a new lair
I may need a bigger tip jar.

It cost about $8 and contains enough materials to rip the hair out of six nostrils. To use it, you heat up waxy pellets in a microwave oven, apply the molten wax to a plastic stick, shove it into your nostril (twisting as you do so).

News you can use.

Re the vegan bicyclists: Experience keeps a rough school, but some fools won’t learn anywhere else.
Pretending that monsters don’t exist doesn’t seem to be a winning strategy.

Straight outta IngSoc

[T]he notion that a penis is exclusively a male body part and a vulva is exclusively a female body part is inaccurate. By using the word “parts” to talk about genitals and using medical terms for anatomy without attaching a gender to it, we become much more able to effectively discuss safe sex in a way that’s clear and inclusive.
For the purposes of this guide, we’ll refer to the vagina as the “front hole” instead of solely using the medical term “vagina.” This is gender-inclusive language that’s considerate of the fact that some trans people don’t identify with the labels the medical community attaches to their genitals.

Enriched Deutschland:
https://m.france24.com/en/20180817-yazidi-ex-sex-slave-trapped-both-iraq-german-exile

Presumably, they hadn’t considered the fact that children’s stories often feature monsters of some kind as a way to introduce important information about the world.
Years ago I did a fair bit of reading of the accounts of apostates from Islam. Of those who who had been converts, most were women. And most were warned, again and again.
One that always sticks out in memory was a German girl, who as usual met a wonderful, amazingly charming Muslim male; she was smitten, believed all he told her concerning his faith, converted, married, and, eventually, was convinced to follow him back to his home country.
Along the way this created a schism with her own family, and along the way there were plenty of moments when she could have given pause, and listened to her gut, instead of her heart.
In her husband’s home country, the mask began slipping off.
She escaped, eventually, and secreted her way to the German embassy. There she told the older woman working the desk her plight. The older woman’s response was telling, in what it implied. What she said, was: “Why don’t you girls ever listen?”

Under Senator Warren’s proposal, no business with more than $1 billion in revenue would be permitted to legally operate without permission from the federal government.
I would anticipate the dissolution of many $1+ billion companies, and the incorporation of many more $0.9 billion companies.
At which point Sen. Geritolimo would lower the bar to a half-billion, and then a quarter-billion. One struggles to predict the end result of this cat-and-mouse game. Federal oversight of all commercial activity, or a re-enactment of the Sack of Washington?

I would anticipate the dissolution of many $1+ billion companies, and the incorporation of many more $0.9 billion companies
Well, exactly. This is precisely what scares me most about these things. I find it hard to believe these people are actually this stupid. Yet lacking anything close to an even remotely honest and questioning media, even in much of the “conservative” media, when crap like this comes up no one asks the blatantly obvious questions. I’m constantly torn between two dark and helpless fears, #TheyCannotPossiblyBeThisStupidTheyAreHidingSomethingEvenMoreEvil and #OMGItsTrueTheyAreThisIncreadibyStupidAndTheyHavePower. Yes, hash tags. Because these things need to be categorized and monitored until I figure out WTH is going on.

Re cyclists: Experience is a tough teacher. She gives the test first, and the lesson after.

Re dorm room flycatcher: I knew a guy in HS who would catch flies by snatching them out of the air. Then, he’d pull their legs and wings off and watch them twitch on his desk.
He went to MIT and in 4 years earned a BS and two Master’s in math and engineering. He also co-owned a restaurant.
Don’t eat the soup.

Straight outta IngSoc
Lordy… Looking at a safe sex guide which is illustrated by a double fist is driving me into the ‘A’ in LGBTQIA…
Still, nice to see the ‘progressives’ continuing to fight reality with semantics.

“Interspecies communication.“
I love the look on the dog’s face. “Is… is this okay? I mean, is he, like… allowed to… ?”
“Build your own computer.”
Build your own computer in 3D.
“This just in. Swimming caps are racist.”
Weird. For some reason, I expected them to be sexist.
“Take a lesson from the spiders, friends.”
See, I think she looks kinda cute. I have a thing for short hair. And those angular eyebrows. And dark brown eyes… and…
This is how we get into trouble, chaps.
“I may be wrong, but I think there was an Italian chap last seen hanging around who came up with a name for that scheme about a century ago.
It’s pretty obvious at this stage that they have absolutely no idea what it is they’re advocating.

I don’t find it hard to believe at all…
Prolly about the bestest most accurate speech ever given in that chamber. I see Florida as the Donald Trump of US states. Yes, we are cringeworthy, what with our compulsions to bring our alligators with us into liquor stores and trying to steal power poles by strapping them to the top of our SUVs, but we #Winning. Y’all just jealous you ain’t got no Tim Tivo.

…our compulsions to bring our alligators with us…
Your alligators indeed, like Two Toe Tom

As attacks spread to other areas and became more frequent, rumors began to spread that the alligator was not an ordinary animal at all, but rather a malevolent demon from Hell, and his allegedly sinister exploits grew from attacking livestock and humans to hunting down and raping women it found out in the swamp by themselves.

Of course if they were out in the swamps alone they were asking for it, #metwotoe. According to the legend Two Toe was originally an Alabama gator but was driven from the state because it couldn’t play football.

…there’s gay-coded speech.
“Jean has a long moustache that will wound my heart with a monotonous languor…”

“…gay men and lesbians sleeping together…”
I wondered why the henchlesbians were buying all that shaving cream.

This.
Via Dicentra.

I might replace the “can be” with “should be”. The bowdlerization and feminization of children’s entertainment is pretty much complete,
It reminded me of this thread here about the later iterations of Star Trek.

Feminism. The replying tweets are worth a look*.
Another exciting installment of “Damn Wypipo”, (though I think this may be parody).
*Eye protection may be warranted, view at your own risk.

Titiana McGrath
“You owe me an iPhoneX”
Thank goodness the coffee is still brewing or I’d be wiping off my monitor right now.

Wile E. Coyote has moved to Maine.

Star Trek really wasted the Ferengi. They were always preaching about diversity—well, here’s some real diversity, a society with totally different mores than American liberals—oops, sorry, I meant the Federation. Remember when Nog joined Starfleet? Why not have a story line about what happens when he has to take orders from one of those skinny ladies in jumpsuits who abounded on the Enterprise? Who gets the benefit of the Prime Directive, Nog or the skinny lady? Why?
Nog should have learned the Worf Scam. Worf had it made. When Starfleet told him to do something he didn’t want to do, he’d say “I can’t do that, I’m a Klingon!” and they’d back off because of the Prime Directive. When the Klingons told him to do something he didn’t want to do, he’d say “I can’t do that, I’m a Starfleet officer!” and the Klingons would back off—well, I never did quite figure out why the Klingons would have reason to back off, but they would. That whole series was a fantasy about having it both ways.
Now, the “real” Klingons, the ones who wore the striped shirts (and fishing waders, on the Klingonettes) would most likely have told Worf, “This ain’t Starfleet, this is the planet Kling, and you can do it our way or have your visa permanently revoked,” and the Klingons, Starfleet, and arguably even Worf would all have been better off.

The one about the pale moonlight—I’m in the minority on that, Sisko getting sucked in deeper and deeper always reminded me of one of those Mash episodes where they start out with one simple trade and by the end they have to get an elephant from Korea to Poughkeepsie or something like that. Thus, I never could quite take it seriously. Also he owed Mr. Garak, who was absolutely right, a big, big apology, and never made it.
And wasn’t Garak kind to just stand there and let Sisko hit him? Why would he do that? Why not just duck?

Infuriating quiz answer of note:
https://twitter.com/Popjustice/status/1030811261615976448
Via: https://twitter.com/DamCou

Infuriating quiz answer of note:
Regarding Abba, maybe, but top left to right bottom it reads like Beethoven’s 5th.

Of course they did.
School district caves to people crying and blowing snot over the outrageously outrageous outrage du jour.

Oh, another entry into the Disparity = Discrimination Olympics.
Didn’t you know? The professional engineering licensing exam is biased against teh womyns.

Star Trek really wasted the Ferengi. They were always preaching about diversity—well, here’s some real diversity, a society with totally different mores than American liberals—oops, sorry, I meant the Federation.
Star Trek, like liberals, is incredibly racist, or at least “culturally imperialist”. Every major alien race is a roman a clef of a specific country or ethnic group, and they are always depicted as backward, primitive, naive, and in dire need of correction by the enlightened Federation. Which they always are, by the end of the episode. It’s the Englishman’s burden IN SPAAAAACE.
I’m not a big fan of hunting for things to be offended by, but the Ferengi as portrayed in DS9 are every vile anti-Semitic stereotype about Jews rolled into one. It’s not subtle. It’s been pointed out numerous times and Paramount has gotten away with it for decades.
Remember when Nog joined Starfleet?
Yup. I quite liked that subplot; for once they showed a member of one of their alien monocultures displaying some individuality and choosing his values instead of being a stereotype.
And wasn’t Garak kind to just stand there and let Sisko hit him? Why would he do that? Why not just duck
Because that episode is as much about the war between Garak and Sisko’s values as it is the Federation and the Dominion, and because Garak is a former high-up in a black ops intelligence service who specializes in psy ops[1]. Goading Sisko into striking him and taking the hit proves Garak’s point, that Sisko ultimately is – or could be – just like Garak.
It’s a mistake to evaluate any Star Trek episode on the basis of the character’s personalities and motivations. They don’t have any. Every Star Trek episode is a Shakespearean tragedy or Greek morality play, by design. The characters behave in whatever way is necessary to drive the moral lesson intended by the writers.
[1] Spoiler.

School district caves
Now hold on. The district was accused of sexism for encouraging, per Muldoon’s link, “girls to act ladylike” – but the supposedly offensive quote said nothing of the kind. The quote said the more you act like a lady, the more he’ll act like a gentleman, and while all the best people agree that’s not a message anyone should direct towards a young person who was born with or otherwise acquired a vagina, I should think there would be at least equally enthusiastic agreement that any adolescent with a penis (factory installed or aftermarket) ought to be prodded if not required to behave as a proper young lady at all times, because all the best people today are insane.

Star Trek, like liberals, is incredibly racist, or at least “culturally imperialist”. Every major alien race is a roman a clef of a specific country or ethnic group, and they are always depicted as backward, primitive, naive, and in dire need of correction by the enlightened Federation. Which they always are, by the end of the episode. It’s the Englishman’s burden IN SPAAAAACE.
I’m not a big fan of hunting for things to be offended by, but the Ferengi as portrayed in DS9 are every vile anti-Semitic stereotype about Jews rolled into one. It’s not subtle. It’s been pointed out numerous times and Paramount has gotten away with it for decades.
Raaacialist Star Trek, omg.

Worf is a black orphan
90’s raaacism:
Leftist: You’re a racist! [Invoke Victim Group]
Rightist: *snort* Buzz off, minor projecting intentionalist.
Leftist:
Rightist:
2010’s raaacism:
Leftist: You’re a racist! [Invoke Victim Group X]
Rightist: You’re a racist! [Invoke Victim Group Z]
Leftist: YOU’RE A RACIST!
Rightist: YOU’RE A RACIST!

The difference being, David Ream, that instead of it being the projected, one-way charge bearing a commensurately suspect moral component of a few decades ago, now everybody sees it as the Ultimate Thought Crime, real, potential, imaginary, or otherwise.
This is what comes of abandoning sense. Now we’re all Sneetches, whether damning honky Oklahoma farmers from a distance or greasy Hollywood producers. Now prune juice is a dog whistle.