In dangers-of-the-workplace news:

The grown adult quoted above is Professor Susan Jebb, employed by the University of Oxford to think deeply on matters of diet, and current chair of the Food Standards Agency. For our disapproving academic, the workplace is akin to a “smoky pub,” due to the occasional presence of cake, and therefore conjures – in her mind, at least – notions of “passive smoking.” Being offered a slice of cake during one’s coffee break is, it turns out, grounds for invoking victimhood. And because struggling with even the most routine self-possession has to be blamed on something:

Cauliflower enthusiasts will no doubt be gutted.

Professor Jebb insists that her desire to make workplace cake-bringing taboo – and seen as something harmful and antisocial – is “not about the nanny state,” or, dare I suggest, some personal inadequacy. You see, the advertising of cakes and other confections – and the fact that they may be accessible in the workplace – is “undermining people’s free will.” Free will being demonstrated only by compliance with Professor Jebb’s New Rules Of Cake-Eating. And which is why, one assumes, this grown woman, a professional intellectual, can’t say no to a bit of sponge.

Cakes in the workplace – and their allegedly unhinging effects on women – have, of course, been mentioned here before.

Via Christopher Snowdon, who, as you might imagine, has some thoughts.

From the pages of Bon Appétit, where Brooklynite pronoun-stipulator Isha Maratha is determined to overshare:

Ms Maratha’s first time, in Boston, during college orientation, is recounted in some detail:

If anyone’s getting aroused by this, I’m fetching the hose.

If madam’s outpourings seem a bit much, be assured things do not get better on that front.

One for our ongoing series on the progressive retail experience. I believe this is part 445:

A young woman asks in a brazen voice as the destruction and theft rages behind her, “Are y’all gonna make the sandwiches or are ya’ll just gonna keep recording?” The Wawa employee responded, “Uh, it’s going to be a while.”

“No arrests were made.”

Update, via the comments:

The celebratory twerking seen in the background is, you’ll agree, a charming touch. Presumably done on grounds that trashing someone’s business and stealing their property, while exulting in mob intimidation and giving two fingers to the idea of civilisation, is all so jolly. Perhaps we can look forward to another Vice article telling us how looting is a good thing when black people do it.

After all, self-styled progressives – the people who loudly announce their supposed compassion and altruism – are famed for making weirdly contrived excuses for pathological selfishness. Say, the kind of pathological selfishness seen above and throughout the progressive retail series. Indeed, excuses for sociopathic behaviour are a staple of progressive posturing, appearing all but weekly, and with increasing moral convolution and outright perversity.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

For newcomers and the nostalgic, more items from the archives:

Hush Now, Brown Person, I’ll Do The Talking.

Woke academic bemoans racism, while casually erasing agency from anyone brownish who happens to disagree with her.

For Ms Beltrán, then, those who tire of racial tribalism and identitarian drama, and who prefer to be engaged with as individuals, are merely surrendering to “whiteness” and “white supremacy,” and are therefore the enemy, traitorous, or at best, dupes. And for Ms Beltrán, the extremist is not the person who fixates on race as the overriding characteristic and sole basis for “recognition” – as the ideological mass around which all else must revolve – but the person who doesn’t.

Your Guilt Has Been Determined Via Pantone Colour Chart.

A mandatory course for dentists is announced. Confessions of pallor are expected.

If you plan to be a dentist and attend the University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine, it seems you must first submit to condescension and insults, and accusations of being either a bigot or an enabler of bigotry, based solely on unchangeable aspects of your appearance. Because apparently you can’t do dentistry without the weird political woo of dogmatic parasites who’ve managed to insert themselves into yet another sphere of life.

Her Unspeakable Woes (2). 

Haughty bitches claim to be oppressed, while disdaining the little people who serve them drinks.

Three items presented for your betterment:

First up, “Kids and kink can coexist at Pride in a totally fine way,” we’re told.

You see, exhibitionist displays of fetishes – say, transvestism, sadomasochism, nipple clamps and cock rings – constitute a “justice space” and “kids and youth voices are vital to justice movements.” “Kids,” we learn, “are a vulnerable and marginalised group” and must therefore – yes, therefore – be exposed to narcissistic psychodrama and the penises of creepy, damaged men.

It’s all about those “intersecting identities and oppressions.”

This second item reminds us, inadvertently, of two fairly obvious options. You could, of course, regurgitate pseudo-scholarly prattle in a condescending tone, complete with facial theatre. Or you could just, you know, dial back on the carbs and sugar, and thereby live longer without the serious health problems. Or the mental contortions.

Oh, and somehow, inexcusably, I’ve only today discovered this.

I think it’s safe to say that your cross-cultural interview isn’t going terribly well when the interviewee starts throwing his own faeces at you.

Also, open thread.