Moonpie....

[conuly]

We've got dozens of dog toys in this house. So why is it you only want the one Finn has? It is, in fact, identical to the one you were thrilled with until he showed up with one of his own.

***************

Love Boats: The Delightfully Sinful History of Canoes

The Surprising History Of Old-Timey Swahili Postcards

Why Is a ‘Pepper’ Different From ‘Pepper’? Blame Christopher Columbus

All life on Earth, in one staggering chart

Literary Classics Retold As Two-Panel Comics

New ranked voting system to be used in Maine primaries (Ranked choice voting wouldn't be my top pick, but literally anything is better than first-past-the-post, so whatevs.)

Doctors hail world first as woman’s advanced breast cancer is eradicated

Millions of kids on ADHD meds decide their treatment as adults

Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews

The Case for ‘Sanctuary Cities’ for Endangered Species

Why Grandmothers May Hold The Key To Human Evolution

The Woman Who Challenged the Idea that Black Communities Were Destined for Disease

Ethiopia Already Is the ‘China of Africa’

The U.N. Goal That Doesn't Get A Lot Of Respect

Most Americans oppose businesses refusing to serve gay people: Reuters/Ipsos poll

Financial Aid Letters Are Really, Really Confusing

Ten Things My Ex-Boyfriend Explained to Me When I Forgot That He is a “Woke” Cisgender White Male Who Has Definitely Checked His Privilege

Our wheelchairs drive our lives forward, literally. We are no more confined to them than you are to your sneakers.

The Yellow School Bus Needs a Green Makeover

Your Phone Is Listening and it's Not Paranoia

“This Is Bigger Than Myself”: How the Women of the U.S. Gymnastics Team Found Their Voice

Transgender Soldiers of the American Civil War (Note: The article is careful not to state that any particular soldier was or was not transgender just because they had a vagina, but does point out that "they just wanted to fight" is a strange explanation for those who continued to dress and act as men for their entire remaining civilian lives as well.)

Where Are The Trans Men In Politics?

If Solar Panels Are So Clean, Why Do They Produce So Much Toxic Waste?

Paul Manafort Has Inadvertently Helped America by Showing the Absurdities of Its Bail System

As California’s largest lake dries up, it threatens nearby communities with clouds of toxic dust

Comments

[wpadmirer]

The article about trans-gender Civil War soldiers is very interesting!

[conuly]

I thought so :)

[jhetley]

Dogs are like that. Noted since at least Aesop.

[kengr]

*Kids* are like that too.

[conuly]

Related complaint:

Finn, Moonpie has already snapped at you once. Her lip is curling up again. She wants you to stop licking her. How can you not understand canine body language? YOU ARE A DOG.

[archersangel]

in the book They Fought Like Demons: Women Soldiers in the American Civil War by DeAnne Blanton & Lauren M. Cook, they speculated that the women who continued to live as men after the war did so for better rights & pay. but unless someone finds letters or journals for most of these people, we'll probably never know for sure.

[conuly]

That may be true for some of them, but if we can assume the transgender population then was the same as it is today (and why not assume that?) then at a bare minimum I'd expect perhaps 1% to have been transgender. Probably more than that, because "live your life like a man, in hiding, hope nobody finds out" seems like a more attractive proposition when you are a man, y'know?

[buttonsbeadslace]

Yeah, I read that book and the section on Albert Cashier really bothered me. A better-paying job was apparently the main reason why many women *joined* the army, but better pay/social respect as an explanation for living the entire rest of your life as a man is not really sufficient, I think. The authors seemed to be really strongly against even considering gender identity as a thing that might affect people's choices.

[greghousesgf]

No wonder he's her EX boyfriend. (wonder which TV show was being referred to....)

[conuly]

Does it really matter which one?

[mommy]

It's interesting to see how grandmothers in particular could be a key to the evolution of modern humans. Certainly, knowledge of and the skill set for gathering food is definitely an important for a hunter-gatherer community.

I never considered the waste issues caused by outdated or damaged solar panels. This is something I need to think about.

[conuly]

I never considered the waste issues caused by outdated or damaged solar panels. This is something I need to think about.

Neither did I.

Certainly, knowledge of and the skill set for gathering food is definitely an important for a hunter-gatherer community.

And we know that the existence of a grandmother is an important predictor of child survival in the early years.

[siderea]

Doctors hail world first as woman’s advanced breast cancer is eradicated

Whoa.

Don't Touch! A Scientist's Advice For Spotting Poison Ivy Before It Ruins Your Summer

[nodrog]

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/06/08/616595496/dont-touch-a-scientist-s-advice-for-spotting-poison-ivy-before-it-ruins-your-sum

Re: Don't Touch! A Scientist's Advice For Spotting Poison Ivy Before It Ruins Your Summer

[conuly]

Thanks.

Re: Your Phone is Listening

[nodrog]

How many celebrities, athletes, &c., have got into trouble with the humorless commissar watchdogs of Politically Correct Thought, because they didn't realize their mike was ‘live’?  “OK, Google” works because the phone recognizes the words.  It has to hear them to recognize them:  That mike on your phone is always ‘live.’

This is why I keep my phone in ‘airplane’ mode unless I'm specifically using it.  Your phone may only be pretending to be ‘off,’ but airplane mode can't be fake, or it'd be detected immediately.  [It has a ‘selfie’ camera in front, too, watching me while I'm using the phone, correlating facial recognition with web searches &c.… or would do, if it wasn't taped over.  Snooze you, cheesers.]


The one instance I know of offhand that didn't come off as expected was recently when an athlete at a press conference answered a question from a female reporter, then leaned towards his teammate and murmured, “Good Lord, she is beautiful.

“…  What?  Uh oh, did you hear me?  Oh, I am so sorry,” and he was genuinely abashed!  Everyone present, including the reporter herself, was charmed and amused.  The local flannel-shirted ‘Gender Studies’ hippopotami promptly started screeching about “objectification” &c., and nobody was listening…  so they shut up - a rarity!

Re: Your Phone is Listening

[conuly]

We all have great senses of humor. It's just that some shit ain't funny.

“Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews”

[nodrog]

Now, that is interesting.  I may bounce that off some Jewish friends of mine here and see what they say.  Why so many American Jews are devout Leftists has always been puzzling.  Saturday Night Live particularly cemented the phrase “New York Jewish Liberal” as one indivisible word, which becomes truly odd when you realize that pogrom is a Russian word, and the Nazis were amateurs compared to the Communist Party!  [Soviet internal passports labeled your nationality - unless you were Jewish, in which case you were a Zhid (Yid) regardless.]  “Sleeping with the enemy,” indeed!

Re: “Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews”

[conuly]

What does the Soviet union have to do with the price of tea in China? It's utterly irrelevant to the state of internal American politics today.

Re: “Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews”

[nodrog]

True, but the political culture I'm talking about has been going on for DECADES - since the 1930s, in fact - and yes, still exists today, tho’ as you say, it matters less overall. 

[Despite their best efforts, that is.  If you're not old enough to remember the 1984 Presidential campaign…  Well, “Bush Derangement Syndrome” had a predecessor.  The carefully choreographed mass hatred of the Left for Ronald Reagan had to be seen to be believed…  And the result was a blow-out landslide victory not seen since their last such attempt in 1972.  (I still have a ‘Nixon Now’ campaign button and ‘President Nixon:  Now More than Ever’ bumper sticker around here somewhere…]

Re: “Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews”

[conuly]

It's not like the right wing loves Jews all that much. I wouldn't vote with them if I were Jewish. (Though the ultra-Orthodox tend to.)

Re: “Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews”

[nodrog]

Yes, it's a complex and nasty situation and I generally avoid involving myself in it. An otherwise sensible guy I know on LiveJournal is so rabidly pro-Israel that I call him 'Tweedledee,' because he sounds like Radio Tehran with the labels changed. His view is that America should rephrase Admiral Nimitz, that "when we're finished, Japanese Arabic will be spoken only in Hell."

Whereas I know what sleazy thieves and thugs Israelis have been since Day One, and watched them be their own worst enemy time and again. There are no plaster saints or cardboard demons, as both sides insist; the people who say 'Salaam Alaiken' and those who say 'Shalom Aleichem' are literally too close for comfort.

Re: “Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews”

[conuly]

Mmmm... I try to draw a distinction between the people of the country and the government. I certainly don't want to be judged on the basis of Donald Trump! I can say that I disagree with certain actions of the Israeli Government (or Hamas) without then moving on to say that all Israelis/Palestinians are bad.

My conclusion on the state of Israel is that there is plenty enough blame to go around and that there are definitely more than two mindsets in either Israel or Palestine regarding their mutual antagonism. (And all neighboring countries also get a good share of responsibility for this situation, as do all Western nations. There is no end of blame for their shitty situation.)

Re: עפרה חזה

[nodrog]

I DO draw that distinction.  Unfortunately - and amusingly - the guy I’m talking about did NOT.  “There is no Zealot like the convert,” if you’ll pardon the pun, and his take on thing was that Israel™ was a monoblock lockstep collective that could do no wrong.  Infallibly correct always, by definition.  By the same coin, Muslims (or “Islamists,” as he called them; note the identity-politics labeling) were invariably and utterly evil.  Brother John Birch fashion, he informed me quite seriously that every Muslim in this country was plotting the overthrow of this country, plotting, yes, even as we speak.  All of them.  He couldn’t actually know this, but that’s what ‘Islamists’ do, after all, so QED, right?



                … or, We Need Commies!

                The rhetoric never changes - it’s only necessary to change the labels from time to time.



‘Tweedledee’ eventually left LiveJournal because everyone (including me) was simply laughing at him.