Reheated (55)
For newcomers, more items from the archives.
Feminist academic Dr Jane Bone has “intra-active encounters” with children’s furniture.
This traumatic and “haunting” experience – being a grown-up among lots of small chairs – apparently reveals “the undervalued nature of teaching young children.” A point Dr Bone underlines with an anecdote involving a teacher who, during a meeting, perched on a chair intended for children, rather than searching out a more suitably proportioned one. Damning and conclusive, I think you’ll agree. And Dr Bone’s mental reach extends beyond mere anecdote: “In order to recapture this [experience]… I went to IKEA to sit on some small chairs.”
Charles Murray attempts to speak on campus. A riot ensues.
As one of Middlebury’s sociology professors noted, “few, if any” of the protestors had ever read Murray’s books. Evidently, he’s nonetheless someone to be ‘othered’ and to whom the students can attach the usual out-group labels – denouncing him as “sexist,” “racist,” “anti-gay” and a “white nationalist.” (As even the briefest use of Google would reveal, Murray married a Thai woman while in the Peace Corps, has mixed-race children, has tutored inner-city black children for free, and was an early advocate of gay marriage – hardly the most obvious markers of a supposedly anti-gay white nationalist.)
Feign Diabetes, It’s The Only Way.
The Guardian’s Sarah Marsh is being oppressed by free cake.
It’s strange how the empowered, progressive ladies at the Guardian seem forever at the mercy of every small social expectation, however trivial and weightless: “What’s more,” says Ms Marsh, “some people (myself included) simply do not have the willpower.” And so, we’re told: “We’ve rallied against turkey Twizzlers in school, the fast food industry and ready meals – so why do we ignore the rising amount of cake and sweets that are filling our workplaces?” Apparently, something must be done to save us from our passing appetites and gestures of goodwill. Because adult responsibility is just too much to ask. Perhaps we should make the partakers of baked goods stand outside with the smokers? Until scientists discover a way to make cake-eating optional.
There’s more, should you want it, in the greatest hits. Also, open thread.
The Guardian’s Sarah Marsh is being oppressed by free cake.
Self-control is too grown-up for some people.
Self-control is too grown-up for some people.
It does, I think, support the idea that leftism is in large part a result of unhappy, often neotenous inclinations – in this case, an urge to displace responsibility. Apparently, our empowered Guardian writer doesn’t “have the willpower” to decline an offer of cake. And so there has to be drama, and intervention, and someone else to blame. And this is a standard template. Poke through the Guardian archives for half an hour and you’ll find dozens of these things, all whining in harmony.
As I said in the original thread,
And variations thereof.
And speaking of feminist methodology.
And speaking of feminist methodology.
Shorter version of the gals explaining the hours worked gap.
Shorter version of the gals explaining the hours worked gap.
And remember, that’s the argument our feminist lovelies had prepared and deemed good enough. Conceivably, the ladies were so accustomed to being deferred to by other mediocrities on grounds of woke piety, that an actual argument with actual relevant figures was deemed an unnecessary labour.
The unintended ironies scarcely need pointing out.
And speaking of feminist methodology.
If only they’d asked a man to help them do the maths.
Heh.
[ Slides fancy cocktail along bar to Joan. ]
In today’s exciting installment of “Tales From The Wokeside”…
Problematic, so we must disrupt Teh Patriarchy™. Not sure how that works with same sex, but whatever.
Good news is that I missed this war, bad news, MPs are as stupid as congressthings.
Manet and Cezanne aren’t here to object so let’s rename all the things. Wouldn’t to cause problematic offense by naming a painting after something mad like the main subject.
I say we all eat the cake so she won’t have to. 🎂
Self-control is too grown-up for some people.
Yes, a recent New York Times article ( https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/29/style/modern-love-race-i-broke-up-with-her-because-shes-white.html ) wailed “ If everyone is so woke, why are things so terrible?, because the relationship between cause and effect is either too difficult for some people to deal with, or simply inexplicable to them.
When we’re four years old, many of us went to the doctor for some painful condition, and we told the doctor “it hurts when I do this“. The doctor’s usual response is “then don’t do that“. SJW types are the people who look at the doctor, say “no, you don’t understand, I’ve decided I’m going to keep doing that. So why is it still hurting?“
If everyone is so woke, why are things so terrible?
Oh dear.
As one of Middlebury’s sociology professors noted, “few, if any” of the protestors had ever read Murray’s books.
I was a college student when The Bell Curve came out in the early 1990s. My friends and I saw ourselves as independent thinkers, but it occurred to none of us check the book out of the library. We didn’t have to read it because we knew already that it was racist pseudoscience. Stephen Jay Gould was influential among us, so as soon as IQ measurement was brought up, one of us would equate it with phrenology.
If everyone is so woke, why are things so terrible?
As so often, you have to marvel at the default neuroticism – the misery-inducing mental convolutions. For some reason, I was reminded of our pet hamster, which sometimes roams about on the kitchen windowsill and then invariably tries to climb into a pot of large, sharp knives.
Can you housebreak a hamster? I know people who’ve trained rabbits to use a litter box .
Can you housebreak a hamster?
I shouldn’t think so, no. They aren’t exactly bred for their brains. Happily, ours tends to be low maintenance in that regard, and most others, come to think of it. Apart from the whole attracted-to-sharp-knives thing.
I was reminded of our pet hamster, which sometimes roams about on the kitchen windowsill and then invariably tries to climb into a pot of large, sharp knives.
Rodents living on the edge. I had a gerbil that would attempt the one foot horizontal jump from the bar shelf to the bar top. Sometimes he made it and sometimes he didn’t. Eventually it was the end of him.
When you don’t have to work for anything in your life you look for thrills wherever you can find them.
Rodents living on the edge.
It’s hard to imagine a scenario in which hamsters inherit the Earth.
Wait, you actually have a pet hamster? Here these last few years I thought it was metaphorical. Excuse me, I now must reflect for a while.
Here these last few years I thought it was metaphorical.
It’s a shocking plot twist.
Wait, you actually have a pet hamster?
Where’d you think the hamster urine he keeps in the spray bottle under the bar came from?
Having a toddler effectively exposes one to the children’s entertainment zeitgeist, and I’ve come to the conclusion that messaging about “abnormal IS normal” or “being different is ok (or even better than normal)”, though harmless or admirable by themselves, become pernicious when ubiquitous. Kids learn that “different” is desirable and it drives a fair number of the boring, normal types (who constitute 80%+ of people, hence the monikers) to engage in ridiculous behavior or , worse, take on ridiculous identities. Truly eccentric or weird people understand that their lifestyle comes with a price, but poseurs want all of the attention without the stigma.
I will endeavor to teach my child(ren) that “it’s ok to be boring”. But peer groups and adolescent social dynamics are a force of nature.
That’s REAL hamster urine, too? I thought it was liquified humpfat, which was bad enough! Damn, now I need a new coat…
At least it’s not a gerbil.
From that NYT shitefest:
“How did we get here? If everyone is so woke, why are things so terrible? Maybe everyone isn’t so woke.”
Or, maybe people being woke (and all the bullshit that entails) is why everything is so terrible?
Can you housebreak a hamster?
I shouldn’t think so, no. They aren’t exactly bred for their brains.
David, Amazon says otherwise:
Amazon says otherwise
I stand corrected. Do let me know how it goes.
In high school I had a pet rock that was perfectly housebroken.
“Rodents Living on the edge”
Band name
“Rodents on the Edge”, album name.
Also, “Liquified Humpfat”, song title of David’s much anticipated flugelhorn solo. You know you wanna hear it.
I have heard it. It’s a flugelhorn fantasia, an artistic triumph!
I stand corrected. Do let me know how it goes.
Most small burrowing mammals will instinctively urinate and defecate in a single specific part of their den, which means they can generally be litter trained. I’ve successfully litter trained hamsters, rats, and rabbits.
Charles Murray attempts to speak on campus. A riot ensues.
Actually sickening.
Actually sickening.
Well, it’s not an obvious basis for optimism.
Campus leftism is, I think, the purest form of modern leftism. On campus, these vanities are institutionally encouraged and enabled, and are unrestrained, to the point where adherents can act them out with impunity, and an expectation of impunity. It’s the template for the wider psychology, revealed in all its glory. And when you see absurd, preening wokeness in the world at large, it generally began on a campus.
“Are you going back in time?”
Most small burrowing mammals will instinctively urinate and defecate in a single specific part of their den
Yes, and I was probably being unfair to our current wee beastie, whose palatial den is easy to clean. There’s actually a surprising amount of variation in their behaviour. Some are almost scrupulous, others not so much. My point, I suppose, is that they’ll either use the provided amenities with some reliability, or they won’t. I’ve not seen much scope for training as such, at least in terms of toilet behaviour.
The Guardian’s Sarah Marsh is being oppressed by free cake.
The great problem for a rag like the Guardian is that there simply isn’t enough news to continue publishing six days a week. Nor is there enough news to have a valid opinion about. In desperation, this abysmal ‘newspaper’ turns to ever more facile and pathetically minor aspects of everyday life to fill its jaded columns.
On the other hand, people who can make absolutely no contribution to society are nowadays ’employed’ by bashing a computer keyboard until they make a number of moderately coherent sentences in order to amuse people on their way to an office job where they will, er, bash a keyboard.
On hamsters: Years ago we had a couple of hamsters who we used as paper shredders. They would not only tear every single confidential or sensitive document into the tiniest shreds but then celebrate by piddling and pooing on the shreds.
It would take a stout-hearted hero to patiently piece together those tiny bits of paper to reveal that I only had £15.28 in the bank.
this abysmal ‘newspaper’ turns to ever more facile and pathetically minor aspects of everyday life to fill its jaded columns.
Yes, I suppose it’s an inadvertent reminder of where claims that ‘the personal is political’ actually take you – lots of tedious whining by self-involved incompetents. It’s also cheaper to produce, in seemingly limitless quantities.
And when you see absurd, preening wokeness in the world at large, it generally began on a campus.
Speaking of which, “students” at George Washington University are offended by their mascot, which is, oddly enough, “George the Colonial” which clearly is offensive and has nothing to do with the namesake of the school unlike the proposed name change to the Hippos.
Be sure to watch the video for your daily dose of dumb.
Be sure to watch the video for your daily dose of dumb.
I’ve no view regarding the university’s choice of mascot, but the wider enthusiasm for sanitising history is, like the reasoning on display, hardly encouraging: “If it makes someone uncomfortable… it doesn’t really matter what other students think…”
[ Added: ]
To paraphrase slightly (but only slightly):
Given that this is presented as the principal factor in how one ought to decide things, you’d think that students – would-be intellectuals – might see a problem with that.
“Are you going back in time?”
Great video, thanks David!
-How did Ami Horowitz score an interview with a Klansman? Did he really get him to watch Black Klansman?? Amazing. It’s chilling that this galoot, who is a walking stereotype and laughable in many ways, will find more friendly ears the more the left pushes hate against white people. It’s as depressing as watching pundits and governments robotically enact the Christchurch manifesto’s predictions.
-I know students are dumb and these “(wo)man on the street” formats rarely feature great examples of the species, but how can good lefties be unaware of Brown V Board of Education? Isn’t that part of the catechism?
-Small but regrettable piece in Ami’s script: he says that Brown V Board of Ed removed the “legality of segregation”, but that’s misleading and feeds the leftist re-write of history. I would’ve phrased it as “found legally required segregation unconstitutional”. A quibble, but it’s important to remember the incentives placed on businesses and institutions by the government, regardless of popular support for the measures.
you’d think that students – would-be intellectuals – might see a problem with that
Intellectuals are bad enough, but do you really think these students are heading to college/uni to become thinkers of a higher order? They’re going because it’s better than getting a job, because they’re parents expect it, because they have no skills anyway, because their friends/peers are all there, etc. But definitely not because of some ideal to better oneself – more likely to better everyone else whether they like it or not.
These particular heathens are would-be activists, and in that regard their education is wildly succeeding.
It’s chilling that this galoot… will find more friendly ears the more the left pushes hate against white people.
My impression is that, broadly speaking, lefties need monsters that they can be seen to be opposing, heroically. They seem to want this oppositional role, and the attendant flattery, more than they want an absence of monsters. Hence, the practised hypersensitivity, the delusions of oppression, and the ever-expanding definitions of what constitutes “hate.” And so, if their own efforts to pathologise “whiteness” result in the resurrection of Zombie Redneck Nazi Gojira, all the better – for them, I mean.
[ Edited. ]
Are you going back in time?
The video is trading on two rhetorical currencies.
The gold standard of white racism is Nazi or KKK. Given that the rest of the video was low hanging fruit gathered before lunch in Columbia University and its surrounding city blocks, the makers went to an awful lot of trouble to fly to Deplorableville SC to film a KKK man to calibrate the levels of rayciss.
And in the media economy of Twitter reaction gifs, the gold standard of man-in-the-street genuineness and keeping-it-real is the unfiltered first impression of blacks. Blacks aren’t burdened, like whites and other races to a lesser extent, with the expectation to transcend their instinctive reactions, to question their assumptions and educate themselves on the complexities.
With those measures defined, the Goodwhite students who walk on eggshells around black campus activists are shown to be the Real Racists. Look, they’re saying the same thing as this KKK man. And just to show how wrongheaded the students are, here are some real black people who evidently haven’t attended classes on Punching Up and Intersectionality and Hegemonic Whiteness, because they’re still at the MLK 1963 stage.
But missing from the video is an interview with the actual black campus activists who are demanding the separate racecentric institutions. If they could find a KKK man in Flyoverland, how difficult would it have been to knock on the door of one of the many well-funded black organizations on campus? Or are the videomakers as deferential as the Goodwhite students, unwilling to subject black activists to skeptical scrutiny and reasonable follow-up questions?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unkWbEmtYXs
I’ve no view regarding the university’s choice of mascot…
If it was the East Overshoe Normal and Drovers College, I would agree, but to wax indignant over the remarkable coincidence of a mascot called “George the Colonial” at George Washington U is such a stupid contrivance, what student could have expected such a thing ? That is almost as mind blowing as the Carlisle Indian Industrial School sports teams being called the “Carlisle Indians”.
…the makers went to an awful lot of trouble to fly to Deplorableville SC to film a KKK man to calibrate the levels of rayciss.
That should read “…to gin up the level of rayciss.” What is remarkable is that they were able to find an openly KKK goon these days. As I have said before, I now live, and was raised, south of the Line of Mason and Dixon, and when I was a kid segregation was very much a thing, schools, latrines, water fountains, the whole nine yards. Since coming back to these parts after having wandered the world, I have run into precisely one guy out of “old redneck” central casting who gave me and a black co-worker the stink eye because we were at lunch together. You want real raycisssism, head to Wokeville and to the Clown Quarter, the “Heat of the Night” stuff is long gone down here.
the “Heat of the Night” stuff is long gone down here.
I grew up in the South and lived in York, S.C., a small mill town, during the ’90s. A few incidents stood out:
* Getting a haircut in a barber shop on main street, and listening to the locals joking about seeing one of their own on the street during the MLK parade.
* Leaving Wal-Mart and seeing two guys approaching, one of them wearing a shirt displaying a Klansman riding a horse, torch uplifted, with the slogan, “It’s a white thing; you wouldn’t understand it.”
* During the kerfluffle over taking down the Confederate flag over the statehouse, one of our state legislators called the NAACP the Nationals Associated for Retarded People. When pressed to retract his statement, he did issue an apology. To the retarded people.
A few incidents stood out:
Yeah, as good old fashioned rayciss “incidents” go, that is not exactly Emmitt Till stuff there…
Meanwhile, assuming he is also an atheist, the most obnoxious man on the planet.
“White woman and white man calling the police.”
Wishful thinking in Arizona.
an extension of the KKK
Leftists used to have at least some grasp of reality, but today’s Progressive students an professors seem to be utterly devoid of knowledge and understanding.
Call them the lumpen intelligentsia.
…the most obnoxious man on the planet.
He looks like quite a character, Farnsworth, dare one ask where you dug him up from?
to the point where adherents can act them out with impunity, and an expectation of impunity
pace Lord Acton it’s not power that corrupts, but immunity. Power being but one way to acquire immunity. Nowadays one has immunity by virtue of posessing the correct genetalia and/or melanin levels while TPTB are dolts.
The weird thing about a comment thread interspersed with Guardian and rodent defecation posts is how it doesn’t seem at all weird.