Action panda. // The great guinea pig migration of 2014. // This machine balances things better than you do. // At last, tan leather brogues with liquor in the heel. // The hurdy gurdy man. // Biodegradable cat litter boxes. // Concrete speakers. I suspect the postage may be expensive. // The chemistry of sprouts. // Pasta extrusion. // Test: school lunch or prison food? (h/t, Ace) // Quarter-tonne porn stash “belonged to a friend.” // Snowflakes, categorized. // The public sector debt clock. // Up, down, sideways. // The truth about truth serum. // One man and his organ (or how to play Hard Times). // Tweet of note. // Clouds in the Grand Canyon. // The jigsaw you’ve always wanted. // Jamaica Street, Glasgow, 1901. (h/t, EBD) // And finally, festively, he just won’t stop jingling. 

Speaking, as we were, of academia’s efforts to eradicate stoicism, self-possession and any residual sense of proportion, here’s Noah Rothman marvelling at the pretension and self-flattery of a third year student at Harvard Law School. A student whose acute political consciousness has driven him to the brink of nervous exhaustion:

“Our request for exam extensions is not being made from a position of weakness, but rather from one of strength and critical awareness,” wrote William Desmond in the National Law Journal… “The hesitancy to recognise the validity of these psychic effects demonstrates that, in addition to conversations on race, gender and class, our nation is starving for a genuine discussion about mental health,” he continued. “But to reduce our calls for exam extensions to mere cries for help exhibits a failure to understand the powerful images of die-ins and the booming chants of protestors disrupting the continuation of business as usual in cities across the country.” 

You see, you simply fail to comprehend the impact of chants and reclining as expressions of civil disobedience. Their moral gravity eludes you.

If the quotes above lead you to believe that Peak Hyperbole™ must surely have been reached, and camped upon in triumph, I should point out that Mr Desmond, our tearful hero, is barely getting started. 

Tissues and fainting couches are available at the back. 

Update:

And on the subject of student fortitude, another attempt to escape exams on similar grounds proves equally revealing. Della Kurzer-Zlotnick, a freshman activist at Oberlin College, invoked the “significant trauma” of unspecified “students of colour,” on whose behalf she presumed to speak, as grounds for delaying scheduled exams. Apparently, these traumatised students are “tired” and “hurting beyond belief,” and focussed not on their studies but “on their survival” in a racially oppressive environment. Ms Kurzer-Zlotnick’s own “privilege” as “a white, middle-class person” was dutifully confessed.

When her demand was refused, Ms Kurzer-Zlotnick rushed to Facebook to share her deep, deep feelings:

TRIGGER WARNING: Violent language regarding an extremely dismissive response from a professor. This is an email exchange I had with my professor this evening… We are obviously not preaching to the choir. Professors and administration at Oberlin need to be held accountable for their words and actions and have a responsibility to their students.

The violent and triggering language used by her professor, for which he and the entire college must be held accountable? One word:

No. 

Charles Cooke on the Rolling Stone “gang rape” saga and the contortions of certain feminists: 

Just a few short weeks ago, when Rolling Stone’s story was almost universally believed to be true, we were urged to read each and every sordid detail of the case so that we might better acquaint ourselves with the broader problems that are presented by “rape culture.” Today, as the story continues to collapse, the opposite view is regnant, and the very same people now contend that we should not be focusing on an individual case such as this in the first place… “Not sure,” Vox’s Libby Nelson asked last night in a tweet that summed up the volte-face, what the Washington Post’s “endgame is in continuing to pursue” the facts.  

Somewhat related, James Ceaser on the madness of crowds on campus: 

Every adult [on campus], if not every student, knows what happened at Duke eight years ago, where, under pressure from the same kind of academic crowd behaviour, members of the men’s lacrosse team were tainted and criminally prosecuted for rape, under charges that ultimately proved baseless. Every professor in media studies is fully aware of the spectacular hoaxes of modern journalism, from the accounts of urban poverty by Janet Cooke in the Washington Post to the multiple fabrications of Stephen Glass in the New Republic. And scholars of literature and history cannot be ignorant of the psychology of false accusation, from the biblical story of Potiphar’s wife down to the rape charges by Tawana Brawley, cynically perpetuated by Al Sharpton. Yet, in the climate of the moment, none of the perspective that these teachers could have offered, even if they had wished to do so, was ever brought to bear.

Speaking of Mr Sharpton, Ms Brawley and their lies, here’s Bill Whittle on identitarian politics and the new barbarism: 

In 1991, legal scholar Patricia J Williams wrote that Brawley “has been the victim of some unspeakable crime no matter how she got there, no matter who did it to her, and even if she did it to herself.” Are we all clear on that now? A Doctor of Jurisprudence from Harvard Law School and current Law Professor at Columbia University said that Tawana Brawley, who slandered an innocent man with the most vile charges imaginable, was not the perpetrator of an unspeakable crime but the victim of one.   

And Katherine Timpf reports on academia’s ongoing cultivation of stoicism, fortitude and self-possession: 

Princeton University students recently launched Tiger Microaggressions, a service that takes other students’ reports of microaggressions and publishes them on its Facebook page — so that no one has to “carry the burden alone to call out” offences against political correctness… The page, by the way, also refers to microaggressions as “papercuts of oppression,” which are “so small but slice deep.” […] According to the operators, “microaggressions are all around us” and anything can be a microaggression because “there are no objective definitions to words and phrases.”

Yes, “papercuts of oppression.” And “no objective definitions.” At Princeton University. Feel free to share your own links and snippets in the comments.  

This just in from the University of Wollongong: 

A ‘bionic bra’ that automatically tightens in response to breast movement is one step closer to reality with the development of a new prototype… Professor Julie Steele has been investigating the movement of women’s breasts during physical activity for more than 15 years… However, technology is only starting to catch up with the researchers’ imaginations.

Via Ace. 

Number 2,047: 

A pay cut means we have had to sack our cleaner to save the £25 a week she cost, but, a month on, nothing’s being cleaned and the house is starting to resemble a squat. We set aside two hours on a Saturday morning but it’s not happening. How do other couples divvy up the cleaning without major rows?

Sadly, there’s no word on the fate of the cleaner. Via Anna.