Girls Who Code books 'banned' in some US classrooms Books aimed at encouraging tween girls to code were removed or blocked from at least some classrooms in Pennsylvania's Central York School District, according to a free-speech campaign group. The "banned" books, we're told, were the first four in the Girls Who Code series: The Friendship Code; Team BFF: Race to the Finish!; …
But - as far as I can see - in this specific case no mention is made of any flavor of god-bothering. Had a quick look around the Moms website and nothing obvious there. Nothing in the article.
So why bring it up? As someone says downthread, misogyny is not confined to the religious!
Anyone suggesting godbothering has nothing to do with either knows nothing of US politics or is an apologist. The religious right are in charge of the Rep Party and all offshoots. Moms for Liberty deny they have anything to with the GOP and yet was founded by active GOPers and adheres totally to GOP policies. They ask "Where is the HERO of the church?".
They are allegedly concerned about sexual content violence etc and yet the book worst for such things is the Bible so that should be top of their list if their agenda was not religious. It isnl;t,m which tells you all you need to know.
So you think it’s normal to sign your daughter up to a coding summer camp with a company that claims to be encouraging coding for women, and for her to then receive a load of emails from that company about her sexuality, and more specifically questioning whether she is actually a woman?
Is there some reason to assume that girls interested in coding must actually be boys?
This is actually a legit thing to ask although you will get drowned out by the noise.
A good friends daughter is the typical tom-boy type, a bit goth, and had no real issues at all until the school counsellor talked to her. Now she is suffering anxiety, is having issues at school and is questioning her gender.
I'll assume you will claim the parents. I've known the parents for a long time and the daughter since she was born. But that probably counts for nothing.
The old saying 'if all you have is a hammer then everything looks like a nail' probably fits nicely here. Not so long ago it was all school issues were ADHD then along came the spectrum and now it has been replaced with the new 'current thing'.
I do think there is a danger that 'talking' to young teens can confuse them, and for schools to decide to just talk to kids who are not asking for any 'help' is planting ideas in their heads. The problem as always is over-zealous people who think their world-view is the only one that's real. There have always been a great variety of types of humans within either gender - just because I had very little 'frilly' needs as my young female self did not mean I needed to be steered into a sex change ! I'm still at 82 not the least bit "frilly" yet never had the slightest interest in other women, have 4 lovely kids who are the joy of my life, and enjoying my divorced, learning filled life. Leave the kids alone to figure out who they are - but also do not lecture them on what they SHOULD be - you can just introduce the great variety that is the human race so they recognize there are others just iike themselves out there !
The people behind the banning are in many cases Evangelical Christians. Many of them have this vision for the role of women in their ideal society.
Going out to work on anything meaningful is not in the model. Women should be at home raising their brood of 4+ white children.
some are even worse and are using 'The Handmaids Tale' as their blueprint for society.
Ray Bradbury wrote about book burning in 'Fahrenheit 451' May I suggest that you read it. You could even borrow a copy from your library (if you are in the USA) before it too gets banned.
I wrote a short story in 2013 about a Professor at Cambridge who was in his spare time, an author. He was awarded the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for his academic work but because his fiction stories covered LGBT issues, all his work was burned in Texas by the God Faring Right who seem to ignore all the commandments that God and Jesus left behind. The story is out on the internet if you feel inclined to read it.
I've long claimed that Bradbury got his message muddled, and his statements have in my mind confirmed it, but you're not correct. In the book, many things were blamed for the society's faults, including many bottom-up decisions to not care about books or anything else. All the things you mentioned were in there.
However, when the government goes around burning books, it's not because society doesn't care. If they're doing that, it's because they want the books burned. The book-burning part of the plot is organized by a specific group, not done by the general public, and treated as a matter of urgency. That's the government's doing. The society's failure here is that they don't care when it happens.
Its pretty much all explained in Beatty's monologue (the book is a lot more detailed than the film).
Its similar to the Cocteau plan in Demolition Man. The general public don't want to worry themselves with intellectual things. Just give them sound bytes, one line headlines, nice pictures etc... If there is nothing controversial then no-one can get offended. The people wanted to be happy so the simplest solution is to reduce everyone to the same level and constantly tell them that they are happy.
Beatty describes the book as a loaded gun. If someone is seen with a book or they want to raise themselves above the masses is scares the rest. In the same way he describes how you beat and bully the smart kid at school because that kid frightens you as it exposes your shortcomings.
So in 451 it was done as a reaction to the masses wanting to he 'happy' and on DM it was done as a tool to force conformity for control. Two different starting points with the same result, the government is now in total control.
The article says the other party is "Moms For Liberty". What have I missed?
The ever-so-often "name something the opposite of what it is to confuse people" ploy. Mom's for Liberty is anti-mask, anti-vax (ok, that's fair if really dumb), and also pro-book burning. Essentially your boilerplate Conservifascist group in the USA. They espouse the liberty to do things exactly like they like whether you like it or not.
True anti-vax sentiments (outside of a few fringe religious sects) used to be primarily on the left, but it was a few percent of the overall population (mostly in California where nuttiness breeds) not a mass movement. The right wing recently became anti vax en masse, because their overlords on Fox News starting "asking questions" about vaccines.
Nevermind that Fox News had an actual vaccine mandate that required everyone, including their on air "talent", to be fully vaccinated. They never mentioned that, because 1) their outrage over vaccines and mandates was 100% fake and 2) you don't bite the hand that feeds you (or in this case the hand that writes you multi-million dollar checks)
I think you'll find extremists on both sides are equally guilty of that one. The saddest thing is that more and more are becoming extreme right or left with fewer sane heads left in the middle.
Before you knee-jerk react, stop and think about that for a moment.
There is an apparent pipeline from crunchy (as in granola) to alt-right. It starts with anti-vax, muddles around for a bit in "alternative medicine", heads over to "every one (else) is lying to you" and then lands in QAnon/conspiracy thought/cult-ish groups.
Okay, yeah.... did you take your meds today?
Maybe, just maybe, its not that crunchy mom has really changed but that you have changed? As a child of a crunchy mom growing up in the early 80s in a small town in NY state notorious for such people I kinda find this hard to fathom.
Next you're going to tell me that the 60's pioneers of the gay movement have gone alt-right.
> Mom's for Liberty is anti-mask, anti-vax (ok, that's fair if really dumb), and also pro-book burning. Essentially your boilerplate Conservifascist group in the USA. They espouse the liberty to do things exactly like they like whether you like it or not.
I don't see how that's relevant. I'm saying why is OP talking to women as though this is a men vs women thing?
No, it's a group of women who were brainwashed into the christofascist concept that women should be controlled by men.
Here's a link that shows just how disgusting it is: https://voicesfromtheblogs.com/submitting-to-husband/
And it gets worse from there, some christofascists condone marital rape and physical abuse.
You missed that it was the article that mentioned "Moms For Liberty", they weren't mentioned by PEN.
A journalist has reached out to MFL for comment, MFL has responded that it isn't the kind of book they object to as an organization.
Yes, there are people who find all kinds of things that aren't really there in books, or in articles on the internet: comments here are a demonstration of that.
In American politics any political movement, action group, or bill that has some kind of "X for liberty", "X for responsible X", "Real X for X", usually anything that defines an in/out group, or uses some kind of nationalistic/patriotic phrases is absolutely that should be scrutinized to the fullest extent. I feel, growing up in the MidWest, that 60% of those groups are usually promoting something the opposite of what their title tries to promote. It is propaganda usually.
Americans tend to be low information voters. Some people vote on topics with only the barest of understanding of the topic. A yard sign for "YES to Prop A" is less likely to work over "True, Bald Eagle Lovin' Americas for tax responsibility. Vote YES on Prop A". People will go to the poll, never read what Proposition A does and vote: "I am true American and against tax waste and therefore Proposition A must be okay..." Nevermind, I have never met someone who was for tax waste or consider themselves psuedo-Americans.
"Culture wars may have come to gentle tales of tweens enjoying friends, fun, and programming" But the Bible, which promotes rape, incest, misogyny, slavery, war and hate is perfectly acceptable. The US is close to civil war and becoming a medieval theocracy with a God Emperor, but too many are too dumb to realise what is happening.
just... no, don't do that. Even if it is something I agree with. Unless it is a politics mailing list that I signed up for. I'm on the list for (insert activity I enjoy, like coding, role playing games, cycling, whatever).
(but then I do not know what the messages were - and in the US, I feel, people are really easily offended by things not matching their world view, and in other countries these things would be completeley inoccuous, and those movements that include "FREEDOM" in their name usually seem to try to curtail said freedom for, say, non-cis, non-white, non-male people, so it is similar to a "people's democratic republic").
Hmm. Those countries which have 'Republic' in their names mostly aren't eh? Hmm. Nice to know about France, Italy, Greece, Madagascar, South Korea, South Africa, Egypt, India, Trinidad... I can think of a bunch more.
Perhaps you might want to define what a 'Republic' is?
Now, if you'd said "People's Republic" or 'Democratic Republic' or, especially, "People's Democratic Republic" (the Kiss of Death, there) I'd agree with you. But not just 'Republic'.
Have an upvote, my wording was not clear. I was thinking of Republics that have their names in bold on maps (like the Congos); and not the other 140 odd in this Wikipedia Listing of formal names.
If we look at this Wikipedia Democracy Index about three quarters of Authoritarian regimes are "Republics" compared to over a third of Full democracies, indicating a Republic is >2 as likely to be authoritarian [/Joke]. As a proportion of World population, only 6.4% live in Full democracies and 37.1% live in Authoritarian regimes. For those on the left and right side of the Pond, the same reference lists the USA as a Flawed democracy, and the UK as a Full democracy - Make of that what you will, my irony quotient is overloaded today...
The only plausible reason is that they want to persecute trans people.
I would suggest another possible reason: fear. They're afraid of their own sexuality, and are not secure enough in it to be able to tolerate a different approach to it. Thank you, Puritans!
It may also be that they fear that they, themselves are queer or even trans to some degree or another. the acceptance of that, they fear, might just cause their heads to explode.
The Puritans were actually pretty relaxed about sexual activity and discussing sexual topics. The body panic that swept most of the US was actually post-Puritan, peaking in the first half of the nineteenth century. There's ample scholarly material on this if you're interested.
The Puritans certainly had many faults, but they were always a minority among Euro-derived subcultures in what became the US, they were never particularly culturally influential outside their colony, and their cultural power diminished quickly after the New England witch hunts broke the power of the theocracy (which was already on shaky ground) to serve as the "nuclear option" in micro-economic conflicts.
No, the entire article has it, it's about how the right want to make other people behave, how they want to cancel anything that doesn't agree with their viewpoint and how stupid it gets when you start banning books.
The last sentence was the excuse for the stupidity.
It's not difficult to understand unless you're trying not to.
<Quote>Girls Who Code's founder, Reshma Saujani, has pinned the ban on a group called "Moms for Liberty", which advocates for parental rights in schools and oversight of educational material.
Saujani detailed her reaction to finding the books on the PEN America list:
To be honest, I am so angry I cannot breathe. This series was our labor of love, our commitment to our community to make sure that girls – all girls – see themselves as coders. You cannot be what you cannot see, and this was our effort to get more girls, girls of color interested in coding. And it worked!!</quote>
Can you see the "hot button causes du jour" in her tweet?
As regards "cancel culture", I think there's a not-so-subtle difference.
The "left" version is along the lines of "You have the freedom to say what you like, but not necessarily on my platform. The world does not owe you a platform for your ideas".
Whereas the "right" version is more "Freedom of speech means that the world does owe me a platform - and if you criticise my ideas you're infringing my right to freedom of speech".
Hmm... the lefts response seems to be more along the lines of "OMG HOW DARE YOU QUESTION MY WORLD VIEW!!!1" promptly followed by a mob trying to get you fired and your bank accounts locked.
It is quite amusing how the 'well just build your own platform' stance backfired.
Doing well?
What alternate reality are you living in? Gab and Trump social have a few million users each. Facebook and Twitter are not trying to shut them down. In fact they are probably happy the deplorables have a place of their own so they don't have to deal with trying to police the ones who openly call for violence.
I'm going to guess that Fox News is probably reporting that Trump social is wildly successful and has Facebook and Twitter on the ropes, and you are their target demo of someone dumb enough to actually believe that.
@LionelB
"The "left" version is along the lines of "You have the freedom to say what you like, but not necessarily on my platform. The world does not owe you a platform for your ideas"."
And so statues are brought down, private property smashed, universities aggressively protested for hosting people, police stations attacked and thugs attacking an armed citizen who had to defend himself yet judged guilty by the left before the verdict or even the facts.
Or in the UK idiots gluing themselves to everything including roads and crying when a pissed off mother nudges the nut job in the road.
You're a liar and you know it.
Southern statues were erected as oppressive measures against Black people, to celebrate traitors who fought for slavery (please don't be an idiot and try to argue that they didn't). there is no more place for them today than there is for statues of Hitler.
"The left" no more attacked police stations than all conservatives deliberately ran a car into anti fascist protestors or went out shooting black men. Ditto "private property smashed". If you refer to the BLM riots then they were widely condemned by the left and were a small group in massive protests that were 99% peaceful.
Thugs didn't attack an armed citizen. HE illegally went across state lines looking for trouble. He should be in jail.
How do you think progress is made without protest? It is only with the peaceful but highly symbolic actions of the suffragettes that women got the vote in the UK. Gluing yourself to something is a peaceful protest and being in a road does not give someone the right to hit you.
Now quit lying.
"Southern statues were erected as oppressive measures against Black people, to celebrate traitors who fought for slavery"
No. I get that you may think that, but that's not why. At least not for the white people who actually put up the statues. I realize that in your narrow world view, you think you are completely correct, but as a white southern male myself, I can tell you, you are not. Had we wanted to erect statues to "oppress" Blacks, we would have erected statues of Blacks being oppressed, which we did not do. We erected statues for the same reason we always erect statues - to honor people we felt were worthy of honor. You may not agree with it, and that's fine, but please don't go on with your out-of-touch liberal bleating about this subject.
-> We erected statues for the same reason we always erect statues - to honor people we felt were worthy of honor.
So... slavers and those in favour of slavery to such an extent that they would go to war over it, they are worthy of hono(u)r. Tell me, is there a statue for John Brown in Monument Avenue? Is there a John Brown Highway or if there a Jefferson Davis Highway in Virginia? Is there a John Brown bridge or a Robert E Lee bridge in Richmond? Is there a Stonewall Jackson Middle School or a John Brown Middle School in Richmond? Hmm, I scratch my chin and wonder.
Statues are mostly, as you put it, erected to honour people. Names of people are given to buildings to commemorate them. If I see a lot of buildings, bridges, monuments, roads, whatever, named after pro-slavers I guess the people who put them up think the same way.
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"So... slavers and those in favour of slavery to such an extent that they would go to war over it, they are worthy of hono(u)r. "
Here in the South, yes, they are. Those were our forefathers and ancestors. Were they right in holding slaves? No. Were the right in fighting for what they believed in? Yes.
" If I see a lot of buildings, bridges, monuments, roads, whatever, named after pro-slavers I guess the people who put them up think the same way."
Perhaps or perhaps not. Honoring someone for some honorable service they provided is not the same as promoting their beliefs. Those are two separate issues that are commonly tied together nowadays to justify tearing shit up for political reasons.
"Perhaps or perhaps not. Honoring someone for some honorable service they provided is not the same as promoting their beliefs."
Aye, hence the statues of Mussolini in front of all Italian railway stations.
(Actually, in light of recent events maybe that doesn't work so well... or maybe it works better?)
Crap, I have to up-vote VoiceOfTruth?! Man...
They have it right though. The statues, road names, etc. started in the 1920's and stepped up massively in the 1950's-1960's and they were done, openly, as a "Remember where you came from; 'cuz as soon as we get the chance, we'll put you back there"
I would also like to add a sentiment I have stolen from elsewhere: "Losers don't get statues"
I wouldn't be shocked in the slightest if some deep red county in a red state decides to erect a state to commemorate Ashli Babbitt (the insurrectionist who was shot by capitol police on Jan 6th, who Trump calls a "hero")
Someone should suggest to Trump he place a statue of her at Mar-A-Lago's main entrance. He will think it is a great idea but it would serve to remind those who support him even though they don't believe in him exactly the kind of loathsome subhuman they are standing behind.
"Someone should suggest to Trump he place a statue of her at Mar-A-Lago's main entrance. He will think it is a great idea but it would serve to remind those who support him even though they don't believe in him exactly the kind of loathsome subhuman they are standing behind."
I doubt it. For a man who claims to be a billionaire, he's successfully crowdfunding for his legal bills. That should tell you all you need to know about the "hero of the (poor and underpaid) blue collar workers" and his supporters.
"No. I get that you may think that, but that's not why. At least not for the white people who actually put up the statues. "
Actually it is. They were not put up in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, or even a decade or two later, which is when they would have gone up if they were going up to honor those who fought and died bravely for the south.
They were put up in the 1920s and 1930s, when there was a resurgence of racism and Jim Crow laws, to show support THEN to show support for the south of old.
"Had we wanted to erect statues to "oppress" Blacks, we would have erected statues of Blacks being oppressed, which we did not do."
Just to point out, YOU didn't erect anything, these guys in the 1920s did. (I'm assuming you are not over 100 years old.) And, no, if they'd wanted to oppress they would not have done that -- nobody does it that way. I mean, modern day neoNazis, they don't show off posters of people being loaded onto trains to intimidate -- they show swastikas and pictures of Hitler. It's symbolic and people know what it represents. The same with putting up all these statues of people defending slavery and oppression during a time of increased oppression.
Finally, just to point out, whether the people who put up statues in the 1920s had the best of intentions or not (I think not, but I wasn't around back then either!), the fact of the matter is the south lost the civil war, people in present day are made deeply uncomfortable by these statues, so they were removed.
The ones I've seen were put up in the 1890's, AFAIK. Which would have been proper for memorializing those in the war.
"Just to point out, YOU didn't erect anything, "
Thanks for clearing that up. I wasn't sure. But I can now rest easy knowing I didn't erect any statues.
"The same with putting up all these statues of people defending slavery and oppression during a time of increased oppression.... people in present day are made deeply uncomfortable by these statues, so they were removed."
So a statue of an officer on a horse, or a soldier holding a musket is "oppressive"? Wow, some people are perhaps too sensitive.
"So a statue of an officer on a horse, or a soldier holding a musket is "oppressive"? Wow, some people are perhaps too sensitive."
So a picture of a crooked black cross is "oppressive"? Wow, some people are perhaps too sensitive.
Please look up the meaning of "symbolism".
@Cav
"You're a liar and you know it."
Thats an interesting response.
"Southern statues were erected as oppressive measures"
Yadda yadda, so I didnt lie. Public property brought down by lefty protesters.
""The left" no more attacked police stations"
Lefty riots did. Defund the police was also lefty as was the cities that banned or tried to ban police action during such riots.
"If you refer to the BLM riots then they were widely condemned by the left and were a small group in massive protests that were 99% peaceful."
Condemned by the left?
"Thugs didn't attack an armed citizen. HE illegally went across state lines looking for trouble. He should be in jail."
The courts and jury seem to disagree. Especially as he was legally going about his business and was actively attacked by armed thugs protesting looking for trouble.
"How do you think progress is made without protest?"
Protest/destruction bit different.
"Gluing yourself to something is a peaceful protest and being in a road does not give someone the right to hit you."
True but when the police dont enforce laws and keep the peace the people start taking the job into their own hands.
"If you refer to the BLM riots then they were widely condemned by the left and were a small group in massive protests that were 99% peaceful."
So senior dems such as Pelosi and Harris encouraging them on TV didn't happen?
"Thugs didn't attack an armed citizen. HE illegally went across state lines looking for trouble. He should be in jail."
There was nothing illegal about him crossing a state line.
"How do you think progress is made without protest?"
So protest is OK if you agree with it? I'm sure you didn't like the Jan 6th protest.
Thing is, talking about "The Left" or indeed "The Right" is pretty much bollocks.These are various groups of extreme radicals, generally also far Left/Right sympathetic but not necessarily so and sometimes indistinguishable.They can have considerable overlap. It's not unusual to find groups from the far Left quoting antisemitic tropes from nazi web sites. for example. Or for supposedly Left wing labour union leaders to be very anti-immigration. Sometimes they share economic views even. Both can be extremely hostile to "Big Business". And so on.
You're correct Terry. Both "sides" like to try and polarise their ideology, and the people they are accusing.
This comment section is everything that is wrong with modern social dialogue. We've gone to dinner with friends we've not seen for ages and all they want to do is pour out political poison like they can't breath or think about anything except their activistic mentality. Trying to preach about racism. Both white, both rich, both living in a remote part of Hampshire who know precisely zero about what its like to be brought up black in the UK. (but apparently know more about this subject than someone who lives in a mixed racial environment) Sad times. The legacy media and social media have made people awful versions of themselves. Sad really.
Modern day book burning kicked off with banning racist children's books and toys. The Right seems to have picked up an old copy of the lefts play book and run with. (and run pretty damn far out in the weeds too)
I've particularly enjoyed seeing the exact same journos who wrote about evil medical patriarchal corporate conspiracies, now being all pro-vaxx and complete mouthpieces for the medical establishment. (while right wing nut jobs are now advocating lentil sprouting alternative therapies)
You have that wrong.
The left version is along the lines of "You have freedom to say exactly what you like, as long as you don't say anything I disagree with. If you do I will organise a hate mob to have you fired from your job, removed from the internet and unable to use basic financial services."
The right version is more "Say whatever you want, just don't try to indoctrinate my children into your political beliefs at school, or give them pornography".
"just don't try to indoctrinate my children into your political beliefs at school" which only the right does. American history as taught in schools is lying propoganda.
Teaching people of the horrors of American history is not "critical race theory" or indoctrination. Teaching them that it is quite normal for their class mate to have two Dads, or for them to be attracted to the same sex is not indoctrination, it is teaching kids reality.
If you do not agree then you are not in favor of freedom. EVERYONE deserves equal rights.
Truth is not political. Human rights are not political beliefs.
We don't teach about South America too much because this is the United States of America. It is far more important that people know the accurate history of the nation they live in, than the history of other countries - most of which (probably all of which in South America) do not have continuity of government to those dark times unlike the United States.
It is idiots like you who want to erase the past and pretend slaveowners and slaves had the same relationship people have with their boss at work today who a clear and present danger to the US. That and the fact you no doubt believe Trump's election lies and would be happy as a clam if he his coup had succeeded and Trump became president-for-life, and the dynasty was handed to his half wit son when he finally died from eating too many Big Macs.
Then we really would be on the same footing as those South American countries, continuity of government wise.
Impressive jump there going from teaching world history to erasing the past. Makes me think you only want to focus on certain history that makes a certain group look bad. You may want to seek help for TDS.
As for 2020 and the 'clear and present danger' to the US, just look back at 2016 (or even 2000) and the incessant screeching about how that election was stolen followed by years of not so peaceful protests and rioting. And now we have the same over the Italian elections.
I'm sure the people with the guillotine outside the white house setting fires and beating the police were just doing it for show and were not trying to remove the elected president from office through force. Jan 6 is just like the Whitmer kidnapping plot, all backed by the feds and the DNC because they have to keep the status quo or their source of personal wealth is in danger.
"Teaching kids that 'historical white man bad' is indoctrination. The US slave trade was far from good but it was not the worst. South America was pretty bad but no-one teaches that as it goes against the usual narrative."
A friend of mine live in Gambia. They get quite a few black americans coming over looking for their roots. Most are utterly shocked to learn that almost all of the slave traders were black and got very very rich in that trade. White europeans vastly increased the market for slaves, and that's nothing to be proud of, but they were joining in on an existing trade. There's a lot more to history than many think and it's up to the education system to teach it or at least make the information available, Not avoid the "hard stuff" or limit it it to what some pressure group thinks is "right".
Ah, thank you for letting us know that we don't have to listen to a single goddamn thing you ever say.
And don't start with "so much for the tolerant left". That argument is the province of fascists pushing against Popper's paradox of tolerance. To quote for you:
"If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them."
Trying to strip the rights of blacks, gays, transfolk, women of fertile age and - ultimately - anyone who will stand up for those rights is not morally equivalent to telling fascists to fuck off for doing so.
The RIGHT only tolerates those who agree with them. Which is a long way of saying they are intolerant.
There, fixed it for you.
You only need to look at the moves to limit abortion in the USA. The removal of the Roe Vs Wade president is NOT universally popular with the US population.
Those who want to strip a woman of the right to control her own body are on the right not the left.
Those who want to limit access to contraception are on the right.
Those who want to ban same sex marriages are on the right.
Those who want to ban inter-racial marriages are on the right.
Cancel Culture is mostly in the minds of those on the right. They are the ones banning things not those on the left.
Cuba, that socialist/left wing stronghold just 90 miles from Florida had just passed laws allowing for same sex marriage.
Care to think again?
Careful now, you're implying that he thought before.
Here's your mantra: "The right always project". The most common rhetorical tactic in their playbook is to accuse others of doing that which they are doing themselves, so that when their actions are responded to it looks at best like both sides are equally bad and at worst that the non-fash person is the one trying to deflect from their own sins. Goebbels expounded on the subject at one of the Nuremberg rallies - ironically, by accusing Great War propagandists of having done it to Germany. Remember that anti-gay senator who complained that the evil, corrupt and sinful Google were showing him nothing but adverts for strap-ons and gay porn, only to be informed that Google Ads chooses what ads it shows you based on your search history? That's it in a nutshell.
You also have to remember that to a right winger, only other right wingers are people with rights. By this twisted logic, the only loss of rights is when they are not permitted to act as they wish.
"Careful now, you're implying that he thought before."
This is The Register. Why would I be "thinking" in a political thread on an IT site? It's pure, caffeine-fuelled emotion, baby. Besides, this is the Arguments Department, innit?
"You also have to remember that to a right winger, only other right wingers are people with rights."
That's a bit of a grandiose statement. Sounds a bit like political bullshit, honestly. Did you read that on Facebook or something? Facebook will rot your fucking mind right out of your fucking skull. It's full of Russian instigators, you know...
Unfortunately there are many politicians in various countries including the UK, USA and Europe who have realised that by repeatedly saying something, people will not only believe it to be true, but it will also deflect attention and inspection from themselves onto others.
The recently ex-Prime Minister on this side of the pond and tlhe less-recently-ex-President on the other side were masters of this art - full of lies and misdirection, but convincing to enough people.
Hence - in my opinion - the right bang on about cancel culture (to pick one example) as an attack on the left when there is just as much evidence or counterclaim of such a charge against themselves. But by banging on about it, enough people start to believe that "it's the left doing it" and ensures enough focus on cases of "the left" doing it then it drowns out any consideration of themselves doing the same.
the right bang on about cancel culture (to pick one example) as an attack on the left when there is just as much evidence or counterclaim of such a charge against themselves.
This behaviour, especially amongst Trump and the GOP, has given rise to the phrase 'every accusation is a confession'. Every crackpot or illegal thing they declare that someone else is doing comes directly from their own playbook, because they can't imagine that someone else wouldn't do what they would do if they were in that position. Trafficking children? Hello, Matt Gaetz and Ron DeSantis. Murder by medical misinformation? Hi there, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Ubermenschen eugenics? Steve Bannon, so good to see you on a literal platform in front of a crowd of fucking thousands.
Lots of things were tried at the beginning of the pandemic, when knowledge of Covid-19 was minimal. In fact, in the US, I think remdesivir was one of those which Trump had approved for compassionate use in critical cases when there was nothing better that doctors could do.
Perhaps you haven't read the recent studies regarding the overall effectiveness of remdesivir. It saved some people from having to be ventilated.
Remdsesivir is known to to have some of the worst side effects of any treatment. The decision was largely down to making $$$. Same with ventilators. The US hospitals got paid more per patient when they were ventilated. Do no harm morphed into make more profit. And anyone questioning the 'science' was very quickly shut down.
[...] the right bang on about cancel culture (to pick one example) as an attack on the left when there is just as much evidence or counterclaim of such a charge against themselves
It's called "projection"; it is an ego-centric defense mechanism peculiar to those who can't face the fact that they themselves practice that very trait they accuse others of..
Then you are biased. The ideals of the left are tolerance but that doesn't include tolerance of the intolerant.
Everyone of legal age and sound mind deserves equal rights. Period. If you disagree with that then you have no place in a free society.
the right want to (...) cancel anything that doesn't agree with their viewpointto be honest, I associate such behavior more to the "left" and "woke" brigade.
The further away you get from the centre ground, the more both far extremes tend towards becoming just as bad as each other (albeit in slightly different ways).
(Not that you should follow a path of sitting on the fence strict neutrality either.)
I know the irony right. The left whose middle name is "cancel", getting all hot and steamy when they perceive someone from the other side doing exactly what they would do.
This ideological war is so, whatever. Humans finding ever more ways not to get along with each other.
> No, the entire article has it, it's about how the right want to make other people behave
There's some irony that the apparent 'flash point' for this ridiculous ban is a mailing list touching on abortion and trans rights. Is that not the 'left' wanting to make other people behave a certain way - that has nothing to do with encouraging women to code?
In that respect, both sides are as bad as each other. No matter how much moral high ground you have, it doesn't give you the automatic right to dictate other people's behaviour... and "they did it first" is a stupid justification.
It's still a ridiculous ban, but it's disingenuous of the founder to act innocent if they've been using the platform to involve young girls in some difficult (in America at least) political debates.
"There's some irony that the apparent 'flash point' for this ridiculous ban is a mailing list touching on abortion and trans rights. Is that not the 'left' wanting to make other people behave a certain way"
I can only interpret this as meaning you actually believe "the left" (whoever that means) are actively trying to turn people trans or make them have abortions. If so, further words fail me.
You noticed I put the "left" in quotes there, since the earlier poster seemed to deem it important to emphasise the political leanings of the group in question? The irony continues that you find it so offensive in reverse...
You can throw as many straw men at me as you like, but no, of course I don't believe either of those specious and inflammatory statements. I do believe that some people (particularly in online forums) are incredibly keen to assume and then police other people's views.
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The left are engaged in buring books - literally - and trying to block them from being published.
Others are just trying to keep books with sexually explicit content out of school libraries - something which until five minutes ago was universally considered quite sensible.
The Anarchist Cookbook, Kill or Get Killed, and Put 'Em Down, Take 'Em Out: Knife Fighting Techniques From Folsom Prison are all banned in the UK. I shouldn't have to explain why. Nor does their banning support the OP's railing against the evil bookburning lefties - particularly as they've remained banned under multiple right wing governments.
So once again we return to the right wing saying "I want to hurt people, and the left are wicked and intolerant because they won't let me."
Frankly, I'd let The Anarchist's Cookbook loose. Anyone stupid enough to use the various recipes inside it would be eligible for a Darwin Award very quickly. Seriously, the method described to make plastic explosives _will_ blow up on you 99% of the time... and will probably poison you before it blows up. At least one Puerto Rican Nationalist bomb-maker allegedly attempted to use a method from the AC to make a timer on a pipe bomb, and messed it up, blowing off nine of his fingers, one eye, his lips, and various other items. Anything which can cause that level of self-injury is something that every would-be anarchist should read.
Bombs away, boys.
Meanwhile, some of us learned how to make nitroglycerine and nitrocellulose and ammonium tri-iodide and more _safely_ in high school chemistry class. We even figured out what happens when you (carefully, and properly) combine potassium permanganate, conc sulphuric, and petrol. (No, I'm not going to say how to do it. Work it out for yourselves, just be aware of the consequences of getting it wrong.) And we also worked out to how to make phosgene. The secrets were all in chemistry books, not in idiocy like the Anarchist's Cookbook. Note that making nitroglycerine is shockingly easy. Making nitroglycerine and not blowing yourself up, not so easy. Picric acid is fairly easily done, too. Go for it. I'll be standing over there, about 200 metres away, and upwind.
Sounds good. I say that anyone who thinks that way is an ideal person to read, nay, to be _forced_ to read, the Anarchist's Cookbook... and not allowed access to actual chemistry texts before or after. By all means, give them a copy and some materials. And then stand well back... unless you believe that conspiracy theory, too. If that's the case, stand as close as possible. Help them work. I will not stop you.
On the other hand ...
My Dad caught me reading Marx (Karl, not Groucho) when I was about 12. Instead of getting grumpy about it (this was the peak of the cold war era, people were touchy about such things), he recommended that I get a translation of Mein Kampf, Lenin's works and the newly published English translation of Quotations of Chairman Mao (if they had a copy) next time I was at the Stanford Library. So I did. And discovered these "dangerous" writings were boring, incredibly daft, quite silly in places, and certainly not worth banning. That phase of my life went away in a week or two. Funny how education often has that effect ...
Quite a bit later, I found a scanned copy of The Anarchist's Cookbook squirreled away on a Berkeley FTP site. I printed it out, and Dad and I had great fun finding all the flaws in it ... Yes, I still have all my extremities, and they are still properly attached. Dad has his, too.
"where they burn books, they will in the end also burn people" —Heinrich Heine
That scanned copy has been doing the rounds for decades. Someone back when I was at uni had a copy. Its interesting but mostly will result in missing eyebrows or missing fingers.
As for the political texts, a lot of issues surrounding research into those political texts has revolved around people not actually reading them (due to being banned in some countries or just socially unacceptable to read) so they read others interpretations of those texts which give a biased or even completely false view of the original work.
History has always been written by the winners so it has always had a bias but now we have constant editing of resources such as wikipedia and online dictionaries such that 'fact' can be altered to fit 'current thing'. And if you are only allowed one source of 'fact', as the authoritarian left now wants, you then have your Minitrue.
Somebody needs to tell them that. The entire basis of no-platforming campaigns at university is "I/we are intelligent, educated and sensitive enough to hear, analyse and reject some opinions. My/our fellow students, however, are so stupid, ignorant and insensitive that they must not be permitted even to hear opinions of which I/we disapprove."
Rejecting and opposing things is fine. Trying to prevent others from doing so is not, particularly at universities.
Yes and no. It's more precisely about saying "This person is so offensive that our ethnic minority students need to be protected". Whether or not those minorities say this themselves is a different question. So it's deeply patronising while failing to address where the line needs to be drawn. (Surely it does, but I'm doubtful it can).
>> I must admit this is the first book banning from the right in a long time (not that I particularly seek out that information).
Then can i suggest before posting such a statement you spend just a few seconds on your favourite search engine to search for book banning in America in 2022?
Because if you did so, you will find recent investigations highlighting over 2500 instances of book bans covering over 1500 individual titles, many being triggered by identifiable "right"-leaning pressure groups and in right-leaning states.
A very small number of the 'banned' books are very graphic in nature. And the 'ban' is that they have been deemed not age appropriate for certain school years. I forget the title of the book but one talks about a 6 year old doing things to adult men for money.
Most of the books on the list are probably because someone took exception to a naughty word.
I can give you “Maus” for swearing and nudity, and Anne Frank’s diary because she wrote about her private bits.
Being from Scandinavia, that’s at best incredibly narrow minded and at worst a poor excuse for banning something you don’t want your children to know about, the big story that is.
Bloody hell, 'Maus' is about bloody cartoon mice. And not heavily detailed cartoon mice, either. God help those who have conniptions about Maus if the ever see, oh, Freefall. http://freefall.purrsia.com/ Freefall is the story of Florence Ambrose, who happens to be one of 14 Bowman's Wolves in the known galaxy. Florence, never 'Flo', has been known to, on occasion, not have much clothes on, but doesn't like it. It's a bad idea to make a sapient wolf unhappy, even one as nice and well-behaved as Florence. Her boyfriend, Winston, is a bald human with spacer genes and is the least weird of his family. (Winston's mother has a mustache. She perpetuated it to annoy those who don't like genetic engineering. Her mustache is the least of her quirks.) Her captain is an alien, a Sqid, no 'u'. Just seeing him when he's not in his environment suit makes humans, even weird humans like Winston's mother, physically sick. So... interspecies romance, strange genetics, nausea-inducing aliens... those who don't like 'Maus' would have severe problems. I won't go into the robots; the current story arc has Florence taking her ship to a station to prevent the robots there from attempting to fly to another station, where humans may/may not be in danger. The station the robots are on makes nuclear bombs, for use in asteroid mining. Florence wants to get there before one of the robots remembers about Orion Drives. AI robots have intelligence, but not much common sense.
“The last you heard” was lies. All the claims you make in your posts are false. So whomever it was that you “heard” that from… You should probably stop listen to that person/organist because they are lying to you. And causing you to repeat baldfaced lies in public.
JK Rowling book burning was a TikTok trend last year for lefties and the trans community (verifiably true, and if being honest, a bunch of Christian nutjobs also burn Harry Potter books due to "Witchcraft", which is equally ridiculous).
To kill a mockingbird, while also being a classic anti racist book, has also been declared problematic, because while it may be an anti racism book, it does use the n-word.
Drama farmers all around.
Completely incorrect.
Name the instances of the left recently banning books. It is easy to verify the right recently causing hundreds of books to be removed from school libraries, thereby removing parental freedom to choose to allow or disallow their children to read them. The left has not done so. As someone else pointed out above, those on the left who burned Rowlings' books have every right to do whatever they want with THEIR OWN books. The only people who try to get them actually banned are the religious right. This is the opposite of freedom because they are trying to tell others what they can and cannot do.
If you can't see the difference then that illustrates the ignorance - to be polite - of the right.
"thereby removing parental freedom to choose to allow or disallow their children to read them"
The very crux of this matter is this. If the school mandates something you have no freedom to choose. This is a battle of 'I know what is best for the child' and is putting parents with certain views against schools with a different views. A certain political group oft complains about the tyranny of the majority and we have it here.
@low_resolution_foxxes
"I'm thinking about the elephant in the room here. Are we just going to ignore the last five years and the hundreds of books banned by left wing academics?"
To add to the list is one endorsed by the British National Education Union until they realised the links of who wrote it. So not the content but links to a group they dont like-
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/09/22/teaching-union-pulls-glowing-review-book-two-genders-trans-activist/
"it's about how the right want to make other people behave, how they want to cancel anything that doesn't agree with their viewpoint..."
And how is that different than what the left is currently doing? Didn't "cancel culture" start among young, liberal groups who realized if they banded together and used the Internet as an ultra-megaphone, they could "shame" the people that don't agree with them into compliance with their viewpoint? That was my understanding of the situation, at least.
It's a bit confusing. Why do the books need to be banned to prevent a mailing list?
I can understand parents seeking to prevent certain political agendas being taught and promoted to their children, but the books sound perfectly reasonable and fine; isn't it possible to stick copies into the school libraries and discourage signing up to politicised mailing lists?
Once it's been born of course, before that would be a sin.
Passover is a celebration of God killing all the firstborn children, if I recall correctly. God is fine with killing children, as long as he/she is the one directing it.
I'll note that the Passover story does not record God as killing as yet unborn children, even if they would be firstborn. Ergo, God doesn't consider the unborn as children.
"Passover is a celebration of God killing all the firstborn children, if I recall correctly. "
You recall incorrectly - it's a celebration of their children being spared.
The clue about "firstborn" is in the word "born"
I'm not really sure what point you're trying to make.
Reading a book does not automatically sign you up for a mailing list. Especially a book from a school library or that is taught in the classroom.
If the mother didnt like the mailing list, there is always an unsubscribe button. And since when do kids read anything from the mailing list?
This just another stupid excuse for getting a book banned because you dont like the authors...
In My Bombastic Opinion there is not enough information in the article to make any comment, especially without any specifics.being mentioned. I can speculate on possible topics not suitable for kids of all ages but I do not even want to REMOTELY go there without some specific examples.
There are just too many political hot-topic bezerk-button things these days that occasionally find their way into kids' books and set off atomic rage in one or more groups of people whose bezerk buttons get pressed by "fill in the blank."
On the surface this Mom's group sounds like concerned parents whom I might agree with on a lot of issues. But they could also be religious fanatics or something, and so more information is needed to understand what is really happening here. They should explain to El Reg and give some examples.
Anyway, need more information. How else can I put it?
'Stick to your mission and don't let it be associated with the hot button causes du jour."
I have to agree. One of my buttons these days is the "people of color" tag on things. Of course saying or writing "colored people" would be massively racist but reordering the words makes it all good. Another think that steams me is spinning something "for the children" or "low income". I find some of the arguments that something is "disproportionately affecting" low income households and "people of color". Yeah, it sucks to be poor. Most of us know that. To allude that being poor and non-caucasian leads to stupidity is more racist than a really racist thing.
I think it's an excellent idea to get and keep girls interested in STEM. I think it's pointless to take it further and add a classification based on melanin concentrations. It's better to just leave it at girls and women and go from there. I'd hate to see an organization such as Sally Ride Science make any distinction between any of the girls in their programs to fulfill some sort of deep seated and misplaced guilt.
"not in modern secular states"
Of course it does. Sanitary products (as an example) being expensive (prohibitively in cases), sports bras being incredibly expensive, preventing girls from taking part and succeeding in sports is just one example of how women are pushed down or at least blocked from having the same sort of access to sports as boys enjoy.
Misogyny isn't exclusive to religion.
Markets are a lot more complicated than two curves representing supply and demand. Also a market is not a natural phenomenon, rather it is a human creation and so is subject to all the prejudices and preconceptions that us humans are full of. Thus, the price of sports bras and sanitary products is not determined by some invisible hand. For example, here in Blighty, sanitary products are not zero rated for VAT and so are more epxensive than they need to be. Essential products are not supposed to carry VAT.
</pedantic ranting>
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36430504
EU VAT rules at the time pretty much blocked us moving anything from standard rate to special rate or zero rate. It was basically fixed in 1991. This is why we have oddities like safety boots are zero rated but safety shoes are not.
So not joking.
Mmm upon review and some googling, I do concede my point and agree that actually what I was thinking of was not an EU-wide change, and was actually individual country changes,
BUT!
As you have said, Ireland scrapped it - and also Germany cut the tax on such products by over 50%, and France, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands *also* cut tax on them,
Which just goes to show: they all could have cut the tax anyway without waiting for an EU decision?
And if so, how come the UK gov made such a big deal out of "if we leave the EU we can get rid of the tax on them"? Turns out we could have just done it all along? Did the Gov lie to all the women/everyone about how leaving the EU means we would be able to cut the "tampon tax", when they could have just done it anyway all along?
I won't repeat myself again after this, but anything with VAT on in a member state can not have its rate cut to less than 5%.
HM Gov did not lie, they could not go below 5% without either leaving or getting cross-state agreed and ratified permission; the latter had been fought/lobbied for for many years and was in fact in the very slow pipeline, eventually it might have been allowed but not in 2016, and I don't think even now.
If you negotiated exemptions when joining - as the UK did on food, books and children's clothing - then you can keep those VAT free. But once you add VAT to a formerly exempt product - as the UK did on household gas & electricity - you can't then remove it (hence the 5% rate we still have on household energy bills - HM Gov could now drop this, but choose not to do so).
Ireland included sanitary products (and "Supplies of wax candles and night-lights that are white and cylindrical, excluding candles and night-lights that are decorated, spiralled, tapered or perfumed") on their zero-rated list when they joined, the UK did not.
Genuinely, thank you for the explanation.
So, I guess the Gov could have reduced the rate on such products down to 5%, which would have been better than nothing.
In my opinion, I still believe they chose to use this as leverage to motivate people to vote leave - they could have just done both, reducing it to 5% and then raising a racket about how they couldn't reduce it to 0% because of the EU, but didn't. Years elapsed between them raising that as a point and when the law was changed, and in those years people could have paid 5% VAT instead.
I should clarify. Countries within the EU have control over VAT in the same way that motorists have control over the speed of their car. There are limits that you need to work within (70MPH / 15%), and exemptions that can be applied for (emergency services / certain goods), and within the EU the power to change the rules entirely. So it’s not like we were powerless - we had the power but we decided to have a strop and throw our toys out of the pram rather than use it.
@45RPM
"I should clarify. Countries within the EU have control over VAT in the same way that motorists have control over the speed of their car."
I think that was the problem. As the government they should have control over the speed limit, not be subservient.
@VoiceOfTruth
"An explanation is not a justification."
In this case it is. And so the UK couldnt which was an argument for brexit. We eventually left the EU which upset some people but now the UK is in charge of its tax rates. Of course if your railing against the injustice of the EU not letting us drop the rate then fine, but there is a reason it took so long.
"For example, here in Blighty, sanitary products are not zero rated for VAT and so are more epxensive than they need to be. Essential products are not supposed to carry VAT."
I fully support things like free sanitary products for those who need them (and to avoid any misunderstanding, "those who need them" means those who judge themselves to need them), but I've always found this line of argument about zero-rating them either misinformed or dishonest. Essential products *do* carry VAT. Toothpaste has VAT, contact lenses and prescription glasses have VAT, toilet roll has VAT, non-prescription drugs like painkillers and antihistamines have VAT. Certain foods are VAT exempt and some are not, in a weird way that sort-of-maps to luxury foods are taxed (but not quite, hence all the arguing over jaffa cakes), and people understand that to mean "VAT is for luxuries", but that's not how it works.
How is 5p for a sanitary towel "prohibatively expensive"?
5p for an unnecessarily wasteful 'use once' towel, instead of adopting environmentally friendly re-usable options.
Which is exactly why I don't support providing these disposable items for free. They're bad for the environment. We're meant to be protecting the environment, aren't we?
So you don't bleed profusely for 3 weeks out of four despite the ministrations of a slew of NHS doctors trying to help but only offering drastic surgery...
Go ask your mum or an aunty about it, then come back and apologise for your silly ill informed opinion.
We pay the top rate on heating fuel - and it is applied also on the fuel tax - it's some kind of persecution on people living in colder areas? People using gas only for cooking have a lower rate. As if living where temperature easily go below zero in Winter doesn't make heating needed.
The VAT rates applied to products never followed a real logic - most of the time they are made to ensure cash flow, established once, and never updated for different times. Often, they are a picture of a different time and society, and shows how little work politicians and bureaucrats put in managing every day citizen needs.
There was a time when expendable sanitary products were a "luxury items" because most women used something else - ask your grandmother for details.
Still, for example in tennis I never saw women blocked to having access to it. Maybe the problem was really in another sport like football? But that's not the only sport - although the one with most troglodyte followers, and who believe it's also a religion.
I have not seen prohibitively expensive feminine hygiene products, nor sports bras that are more expensive than boys' T shirts. So I do not "get" what you are saying. I actually go to a store on occasion and have purchased such things for a female relative so I have a pretty good idea of the costs involved. Maybe the only place you can find them is at an expensive department store, but places like WalMart and Target (here in the USA) have these things pretty cheap.
I do not think any of what you said makes ANY sense at all. And how is the price of women's clothing and hygiene products in any way MYSOGYNISTIC? (REAL mysogyny may exist in places like Iran and Afghanistan, but not in westernized countries, not any more)
Sanitary products should be zero-rated. They aren't really a choice unless one will willing go back to how it was handled in the dark ages. Sports bras? That's more of a choice. When I played hockey, I found it prudent to wear an extra bit of protection and had to pay for it. I didn't "have" to play hockey. While I was required to participate in physical education in school, there was no requirement that I purchase any specialized gear. I expect that if a girl were to ask to do a different activity due to it being painful to do as asked, any decent teacher should find some sort of accommodation. It's also not like the VAT is the difference for a one time purchase (or two). It's not doubling the price (yet).
-> People confuse 'freedom of religion' and 'freedom from religion'.
Hallelujah. Somebody else out there gets it. I am looking at a dollar bill right now. It is printed with "In God we trust". The same "god fearing" people are often the most rabid inhumane people you could have the displeasure to meet.
The French freedom from religion is not that good either...
The way I see it is that without some higher authority you have to face the prospect that by almost pure chance the key requirements for life just happened to occur on this small rock and that through a long and not exactly sensible set of mutations it resulted in humans. Also that we are likely totally alone in the universe and that our very short lives really mean absolutely sod all in the grand scheme of things.
I think that some people simply cannot accept that their being is purely chance and that we are tiny in comparison to a HUGE universe. And as a mental crutch they turn to religion/drugs/etc as a way of giving their life some context in the grand scheme.
Now personally, being an engineer, I believe that humans are a committee design and somewhere they are having a bloody good laugh watching us on galactic reality TV.
"The way I see it is that without some higher authority you have to face the prospect that by almost pure chance the key requirements for life just happened to occur on this small rock and that through a long and not exactly sensible set of mutations it resulted in humans. "
If you believe there may be something to panspermia that isn't just another layer of turtles, you can see that evolution didn't have to be a chance event confined to Earth. It can take away the argument of "pure chance". Life may also be inevitable in our universe given a certain environment that's conducive to life as we know it. If any sort of life or former life can be found on Mars or in other places of our solar system, the basis of that life will tell us a lot about how unique life on Earth might be. Dr Chris McKay at NASA Ames has done some very interesting work on the subject.
It's worthwhile pointing out that the Pilgrim fathers weren't leaving Britain to to seek the freedom to practice their own religion. They were leaving to seek the freedom to prevent others practising theirs.
From "History Extra" other sources say much teh same thing, though.
"What did make life difficult for many Puritans was the hostility of their neighbours. In part they brought this on themselves, by criticising not only the religious beliefs of the majority population but also their prevailing moral standards and cultural preferences. They condemned the theatre, popular music and even contemporary styles of dress. Unsurprisingly, then, the word ‘Puritan’ became a term of abuse and the holier-than-thou Puritan was, for many years, a stock figure of fun.
Gee! 4 downvotes (at the time of this posting)!
Is it that you downvoters think that the USA is not " rapidly moving from being a modern secular state to becoming a fundamentalist Christian theocracy", or is that you're upset that the rest of us have noticed, and called you on it?
"the woke bulldozer obliterating US culture "
Somehow other, far older cultures, seem to have managed fine without the poisonous right-wing populism accusing the "woke" of every sin under the sun. Can you list the US culture that's been obliterated? Statues of slavers and racists? We had one here that was thrown in a river, briefly. The UK equivalent of your kind of right-wing loon screamed the same rubbish, and we ended up with a gang of white middle-aged thugs "defending" a statue of Churchill (from nobody) doing nazi salutes.
Seems like the right is doing very well at obliterating culture.
It looks to me US is going towards a theocratic state - some US politicians could take a seat in Kabul as well - and partly it has always been - very few politicians in modern secular states - i.e. France, Germany, etc. feel the need to put the word "god" or "christ" every two others, and assert continuously how good christians they are. Most voters couldn't care less - and may even look suspiciously at those who do. Even in the recent election in Italy.
Nor write on money "in god we trust", although it could have been a typo, maybe it should have been "in gold we trust"....
Also, it doesn't happen only in "Islamic" theocracies - it happens everywhere religions take power - as all religions regard women as underlings.
And it is Hungary that said that women should study less and make more children, few weeks ago...
The step between a "modern secular state" and a "retrograde theocratic state" could be smaller than you think. We got out of that thinking not very long ago - and it wasn't ever removed fully.
[...] very few politicians in modern secular states - i.e. France, Germany, etc. feel the need to put the word "god" or "christ" every two others [...]
Interesting you should mention Germany, where "Grüß Gott" (figuratively," May god bless you"; in daily use meaning "good day") is the default greeting in the southern part.
"Grüß Gottt" can also be translated as the imperative "greet God", which is the source of a joke my German friend (from Northern Germany) told me while trying to teach me German: A southern German greets you with "Grüß Gott", to which the Northern German replies "Wenn du Ihn sehest" ("When you see Him").
It happens in Islamic Theocracies, not in modern secular states.
Some of their politicians are openly calling for the US to become a Christian nationalist nation. They aren't even trying to hide it anymore. That's exactly what the Islamic hard liners did - the ones who eventually took countries like Afghanistan from being a secular state to being a theocracy.
There is little doubt that if the Marjorie Taylor Greens were running the US, we would have the Evangelical equivalent of Sharia Law. No access to contraception, let alone abortion. At least not for white women.
Non whites would be second class citizens, and deported if they committed any crime even if their family had been US citizens for 100 years. Gay/Trans people would be rounded up and placed in "re-education camps", and those who couldn't/wouldn't pretend to be straight would essentially be caged up there for life.
It would be seen as the duty of white women to have children, so white women who chose to be (or were through no fault of their own) childless would openly be discriminated against and called a race traitor. A white women having the baby of a black man would be imprisoned.
You probably think I'm making all this up, but this is all in the writings that these people follow. This is the goal of people like Steve Bannon and Steven Miller.
You've been downvoted for pointing out something which is unquestionably true. Most odd.
On the basic principle that any group including "liberty" in its name is a haven for swivel-eyed loons, it seems likely that "Moms for Liberty" is well and truly wackjob, but there seems to be no evidence whatsoever that they had any role in the ban. If the ban actually exists.
This more and more seems to be where "the free world" is going; "freedom of expression advocacy" and "for liberty" groups banning books trying to empower the less privileged. And while we read those reports from the USA, Italy is joining the growing fascist/protofascist part of the EU.
As parent of two teenage kids, it's incredibly hard to find good books for them to read. Most fiction these days is formula product written by committees of staff writers in publishing companies and published under a fake persona. They usually come in trilogies with flashy covers, because it's more profitable. It will undoubtedly soon be replaced by AI-written drivel of even lesser quality.
Then you have the modern trend of supposedly inspiring books, they've usually won some prize or other, and international plaudits. The hero/heroine has to be from a disadvantaged minority group and have some kind of hardship in their life which they constantly struggle with. Served with large helpings of moral messages and politically correct box ticking. Seriously, what's wrong with just a good interesting and engaging story?
Then you have some real authors who are amazingly still writing novels, despite being very old. It often turns out that they have retired and sold their rights to a publishing company that repeatedly pushes out disappointingly poor imitations of the original author's work.
Good writing and storytelling is a hard skill which takes years to master and is unfortunately being lost to modern education standards and corporate profiteering. The best solution that I've found is to stick to older books.
There are some fantastic new books being published for children, but they can certainly be drowned out by the dross. Long series of books written to a formula aren't new (I well remember the "Astrosaurs" and "Beast Quest" books from ~20 years ago when my son was small). But take a look at what's out there, especially from smaller publishers (but generally not self-published!).
All "heroes" in a book struggle with some kind of hardship in their life. That dramatic tension is what drives the story. How interesting is a story that goes "Jonny had a lovely life. He was driven to school where his teachers told him he was very smart. Then he had chips and chocolate ice cream for tea. The end"?
The tell here may be the phrase "moral messages and politically correct box ticking". All stories have a moral and all stories are political. The question is whether we feel we can ignore the politics because it happens to be one we agree with, or that is amenable to our view of the world.
> all stories are political
Not necessarily. I mean, what's the political content of "The Lord of the Rings" (to take an example most will have read), beyond "there is a very bad guy we need to fight against"? Tolkien did stress that despite people seeing parallels between Mordor and Nazi Germany, his work was not an allegory, and he didn't have any political afterthoughts.
You can have a nice interesting story which doesn't have any political afterthought (or worse, agenda). There is always a "bad something" to fight, since as you said, that is precisely what makes the story have any interest, but "bad something" doesn't necessarily mean an ideological/political opponent, even if people will always be able to project some unintended political meaning into it afterwards, it's basic pareidolia.
TLoTR is deeply political - it's about individual action against overwhelming evil, about the merits of industrialism and pastoralism, about how we decide when to help others, about how power should be exercised in the world...
It's not *party* political, but it's unabashedly political.
And, if your "bad something" says nothing at all, it's not very bad and won't be make a good foe. It's precisely in what we allow to be "good" and "bad" that we make political decisions. If you don't notice the moral or political dimension in that choice, it's only because you've never had to, because you agree with the author's political position.
> It's not *party* political, but it's unabashedly political
All right, we don't have the same definition of "political": For me "politics" means the art or science of government (from the greek "πολιτικά" ("politika", “affairs of state”, from the time "polis" (the city), was also the nation)), that means activities associated with running a government or country.
What you're talking about is more about ethics, the set of moral principles and values which dictates our choices.
I agree with your comment. The problem of "politics" comes in when people read politics into everything. Your buy a certain brand of sunglasses, so and so also wears those sunglasses, he/she is a left wing/right wing voicebox, therefore you too are a left wing/right wing voice box. It is no different with stories. People will find politics in everything if they want to. Jack and Jill went up the hill? Why have these stereotypes? /sarcasm/
Yup, though its political connection is during the reign of Charles I, making that article’s reference to “Imperial measure” incorrect, since Imperial measure was adopted during the reign of George IV.
Tolkien's world is formed out of his experiences, and his passions. It's informed by the First World War, the 1920s and the 1930s.
As one example, the hobbits return to an industrialised Shire.
Tom Holland and Dominica Sandbrook cover the historical cues in their Rest Is History Podcast
https://shows.acast.com/the-rest-is-history-podcast/episodes/226-the-lord-of-the-rings
Most of the tales told to children worldwide, over millenia, have included moral points. It's not a 21st century phenomenon. Maybe you're just not comfortable with the particular moral messages being delivered.
I find reading about "minority" groups fascinating, as I am eager to learn about other cultures, especially ones I live among. Maybe your teenage kids are also, and you should ask them what they might like to read about, and ask them why they like it, instead of censoring their options.
The PEN America list certainly covers a range of actions that have been taken about a book, but doesn't include "not mandatory reading". Inclusion in the list requires that the book has been removed from classrooms, been banned from being taught (not just "not mandatory") and/or removed from libraries where it was already on the shelf.
The problem is that these campaigns to get certain books (and classes of book) banned are often very organised, but operate at an extremely local level because of the way that US schools are run. So gathering the data is hard, and the picture is rarely simple because of the huge variation across cities, states and the country as a whole.
By contrast, the noise from the right-wing about "classic" literature being "banned" in colleges does generally boil down to "we're not teaching Jane Austen this year, we're teaching Emily Bronte instead."
I agree, the attempts to ban Harry Potter were pretty lame. And I would consider myself to be a christian, though I do not go to churches [sometimes God's fan club can be irritating and even toxic].
That being said, I do hope that in the case of these "Girls Who Code" books that the arguments from that Mom's group are not equally as petty. They could be. Or maybe not. More information is needed.
icon, because, it's possibly ironic
You survived, but many other people didn't. Arguing from your personal experience as a "success" is a classic example of survivor bias.
It's unarguable that computing (and tech in general) are very male-dominated and very white (that latter complicated perhaps by the importation of cheap Indian coders on special visas). Helping people imagine that they have a good future that could include in interesting and well-paid career is surely not a bad thing!
There are a lot of prerequisites to "getting the job done", and I expect that being passed over for promotion because of your color, gender, or being addressed with a name or pronoun that causes you pain, etc, is going to make it a lot harder.
@Androgynous Cupboard
"I expect that being passed over for promotion because of your color, gender, or being addressed with a name or pronoun that causes you pain, etc, is going to make it a lot harder."
That is a great argument against the current quota garbage. Racism and sexism have no place when getting the job done.
Try and get that past the woke
That is a great argument against the current quota garbage. Racism and sexism have no place when getting the job done.
Well, exactly. Which is which sensible employers fight back against the racist and sexist attitudes which have resulted in unofficial quotas (of 95%+) for white men in technology and engineering.
@Ian Johnston
"Well, exactly. Which is which sensible employers fight back against the racist and sexist attitudes which have resulted in unofficial quotas (of 95%+) for white men in technology and engineering."
Thumbs up from me. But then thats what free markets do, the greedy bastards want the available workers who can do the job and prejudice costs money. Just as these official quotas are a problem too!
@Mooseman
"It's not legal in the USA either, unless you believe the more hysterical "news" outlets. Clear enough for you?"
Are you sure about that? Seems to be a state by state issue as far as I can see, e.g.-
https://eu.floridatoday.com/story/opinion/2021/07/28/ruling-quotas-diversity-has-far-reaching-effect-opinion/8089282002/
It could be subject to legal challenges but not necessarily.
Sure, but your choice not to "worry about gender etc issues" has mean that people who don't have the choice to ignore those issues (because they're directly affected - women, disabled people, minoritised ethnic groups etc.) didn't get your support. Which was my point: ignoring the issues is a privilege that some of us have, but doing so isn't neutral.
When I read about this kind of action, I can only think, what if these nosey NIMBY people had less free time? Less time to pontificate about their next targets? Less time to worry about what other people are doing with their lives. Less time to initiate some off target attack.
But if this band of crazies gets control of our government, no one will be laughing. If Trump's coup eventually succeeds and they make elections in the US irrelevant, having a joke of a president like Trump who was restrained by the rest of the government from doing anything too insane will be the good old days you long for.
Had Trump given the order to launch nukes for some frivolous reason the generals would have refused. If voting is eliminated and the minority can rule however they wish, leadership would get crazier and crazier over time as a small and smaller minority rules over the rest until all the sane generals are fired, and then the world at large is in trouble.
The most recent polls show Trump as the choice of 52% of republicans for the 2024 presidential nomination. The next highest was 19%. So he is still a clear and present danger to the future of the world if people are dumb enough to re-elect him. Hopefully he's fled the country to avoid prosecution before the election.
Trump can't even manage a RAMP. Have you seen how he walks down a ramp, it is comical to watch! If you are worried about a feeble president, he's more feeble than Biden who goes on bike rides regularly. I doubt Trump ever even learned how to ride a bike, and can't even be bothered to walk on a golf course - he drives his cart on the greens!
The author/organization is using their raised profile to advocate for abortion and trans ideology. If they didn't sell these books, they'd have very little exposure for their newsletter, and I'm sure many people weren't expecting to get that sort of content when they just want their kids to program and get interested.
The mom's for liberty have the ability to say what sort of books and content they want in their library system due to a democratic process. They don't want to support a book series where the author then uses the mailing list to push for the chemical castration of children and abortion.
I would expect the same in a Left district if there was a book series about any subject where the author sent out things on their mailing list that were prolife and against trans ideology.
I think the mission of teaching women and visible minorities to take on engineering roles is admirable, and it sounds like this group is being effective towards that end. HOWEVER, I wanted to call out the quote in my title as being dangerous.
So long as people are raised with a general sense of empowerment, they certainly can "be what they cannot see". If there is a group of people that does not feel they are able to determine their own aspirations, then it's important to target that lack of confidence directly; don't tell them it's normal, and that they should still be limited by the roles that society has shown them to be acceptable.
The people pushing that message further fail to address the need for boys to have role models to aspire to too.
Imagine being a poor white boy these days. You're being told you're guilty of every crime under the sun, the education system is going to fail you and you know that any job you apply for will be given to another demographic in preference to you even if you do overcome the system and gain the needed qualifications. I can't see this ending well.
That's why Critical Race Theory and the stuff they are pushing in classrooms and corporations is not actually inclusive. The language is divisive. It comes from the liberal left, and the language being adopted is from the US where they have hardly "solved" race relations.
Everyone, from every side needs to stop pointing fingers. Stop putting people into pots before they even know the other person.
Simply treat everyone how you would want to be treated yourself.
"Critical Race Theory and the stuff they are pushing in classrooms and corporations is not actually inclusive"
It's not taught in classrooms - it's the usual nonsense when you know quite well its only ever an option at university level. You are like so many right wingers insinuating its taught in schools.
It's not inclusive because it originates from a liberal viewpoint? Sorry, did they hurt your feelings by pointing out the actual history of the USA?
You're being downvoted by people who clearly aren't aware that this is backed by statistics and not just opinion.
https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/203/education-committee/news/156024/forgotten-white-workingclass-pupils-let-down-by-decades-of-neglect-mps-say/
"Imagine being a poor white boy these days. You're being told you're guilty of every crime under the sun, the education system is going to fail you and you know that any job you apply for will be given to another demographic in preference to you even if you do overcome the system and gain the needed qualifications"
Except not a single word of that is true. And you know that perfectly well. Why are you trying to perpetuate a well-known lie?
In addition to the link provided in the comment above yours,
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/poor-white-boys-are-underdogs-of-the-education-system-ddjb6j2p6
Yet https://www.barnardos.org.uk/blog/white-privilege-guide-for-parents tells those same poor boys that they're privileged.
Meanwhile, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/police-white-heterosexual-male-discrimination-job-cheshire-matthew-furlong-a8793331.html
It's still happening.. https://news.sky.com/story/raf-pauses-job-offers-for-white-men-to-meet-impossible-diversity-targets-12674409
Sorry for every word of that being true, and for being able to prove that I am not perpetuating a lie. Sadly the truth is the thing that isn't well known. I wonder why.
Makes a change from girls being the underdogs of the education system. But no-one should be deprived of a decent education to whatever level they wish/are capable of, irrespectve of gender, colour, creed or whatever. And whilst I have no idea what the educational system is like on the subject these days, it signally failed to do a good job developing the education and abilities of particularly bright kids, when I was a nipper.
:@ cederic - ;ike so many people who believe the myths, you don't know what "privilege" in this context means.
It doesn't mean you were wealthy, it means you have or had all the disadvantages of being poor but without the additional disadvantage of being black or asian or whatever. It's an inconvenient fact that you are more likely to get a job if you're white and male.
The RAF case was ridiculous, I agree, and they have apologised for it.
Weird, the books do not contain overt problematic material, but it's clear the mailing list, author and underlying messages fit in with a fairly far left mindset (I'm not saying that in a judging way, just calling a spade a spade).
I presume this originated with the "hot potato" gender/culture wars issue in the US. Hell, while I notionally support an initiative to encourage "girls to code", I have at least three progressive lefty academic friends who would ban this book on the grounds there is even a hint of 'gender targeting' at all within a teaching environment (even those that are ostensibly well meaning).
The author may also have trod on some toes by targeting (her own words) the book at "girls, women and non-binary heroes". Or the newsletter mailing list that states "SISTERHOOD NEWSLETTER:
Weekly updates about all things tech, equity, diversity, and Girls Who Code".
Falling in that awkward category of "inclusive club that doesn't allow boys to participate in". It's the classic "you can't have male only golf clubs but we can have girls only coding classes" trap.
I'm worried about the ongoing "ban everything" nonsense. It's weird how this was a primarily 'right wing" trend when I was young, then it sorta became a trend with the progressives, and now we seem to going through a 'tit for tat' phase.
Arrticle: As for banning books, MFL cofounder Tina Descovich told Fox News the group is only concerned with children's access to pornography and sexually explicit material in the school environment
I wonder if Ms. Descovich allows her children to have smartphones and, if so, is access to pornography in the home environment somehow OK?
The first thing I notice here, and in TOA, is people talking about the "left". This article is in the USA - they do not have a left!
They have a mildly right-of-centre party that is currently in government and a party that repeatedly says that the party of Biden and Obama is far to their left.
If a little bit right of centre is far to their left, where does that mean that they have defined themselves?
I always remember an expression I hear from that country "If all the other cars are far to your left, you may not actually be on the road!"
"I always remember an expression I hear from that country "If all the other cars are far to your left, you may not actually be on the road!""
Equally those other cars might not be on the road.
The USA has 2 massively corrupt parties in the pockets of bis business, big tech, big pharma and the military industrial complex. There is fundamentally very little different between the core aspects apart from a few sound bite talking points on the 'current thing' and pandering to some vocal fringe minority.
I sort of agree. American politics is an absolute quagmire. Even Biden has the weirdest business connections (it is a weird coincidence his son was an energy executive in Ukraine when the war started).
The Democrats are odd. They are a mix of progressives, teaching unions and perhaps the inevitable connections with big business and big tech.
Not sure how I feel about Biden. I was quite comfortable with Obama's personality, been a bit crazy since he left. Biden seems to constantly be trying to appease, while the reality is he should have probably been ten years younger taking this job
Both the simpsons and futurama got american politics pretty much summed up:
"I voted for Kodos!"
and
Jack Johnson vs John Jackson
Either way you are voting for slight variations of self interest and little care for the average person. From a UK/European perspective the idea you can be arrested for overly long grass in your garden or have your possessions taken because you MIGHT have some ties to criminal activity but they have zero proof are just crazy.
> you can be arrested for overly long grass in your garden or have your possessions taken because you MIGHT have some ties to criminal activity but they have zero proof
That's the perks of living in the Land of the Free!
Disclaimer: Actual freedom only available for people with higher education and income. Terms and conditions apply. Actual product doesn't look anywhere like the cover picture.
Sounds like there is still a lot of late nineteenth and early twentieth century thinking about women's rights and place in society. Keep women out of IT and science, keep women in the home and kitchen. Keep women subservient and meek, don't teach them to stand up for them selves or fight back and don't let them into management.
The ignorant, scared, and insecure want to keep woman lesser than in society, less pay, less power, less knowledge, less opportunity...etc. We are quick to slam the strict cultures and religions that restrict and suppress woman's rights and freedoms, yet we are just as guilty but refuse to see or acknowledge it.
The founder later tweeted: "Maybe they don't want girls to learn to code because that's a way to be economically secure …"
This.
It is an unspoken credo (to the "outside world", at least) of the "conservative movement" that an ignorant populace is easier to control. And the hayseeds fer sher don't want uppity young women and <gasp /> girls getting that radical idea that they are smart and can control those computer things, no sirree!
There's a nasty, but appropriate, pun that goes along with "conservative movement", but I'll let that go for now...
These books have not been banned by the Central York School district. But it does go to show who then brainwashed really are, since you automatically believe this is true when there has been no verification of any of this. The school district just went through a huge thing recently about how they will not ban books. This was voted on by the parents and the school board. I am a member of this school district. This is a blatant lie by the left since the Central York School district is very conservative when it comes to politics. I am so sick of these media outlets writing stories and you all just believe oh well it must be true. This story only further proves the lies the media tells.
There was a specific list of books - first generated a list of recommended reading, then used a list for banning - and that banning was instituted in 2020, and repealed in 2021. https://buckscountybeacon.com/2022/09/teachers-students-and-the-central-york-community-defeated-a-racist-book-ban-in-their-school-district/
And it does appear that "Girls who code" series were on that list: https://pen.org/banned-in-the-usa/
So apparently it was banned for some time and then rescinded after blowback - you are therefore partially right but also wrong because you forgot(?) to mention that it was banned until the media started writing stories about it.
Robin Williams once said:
Canada is like a nice apartment over a meth lab.
And the two parties are the two chemists running the production.
The immediate conclusion we can see from what is presented in TFA and amongst the commentary is that somehow, someone who likes to meddle with what other peoples children are exposed to in an educational environment, decided that an author, who encourages folks to support other people making choices for themselves in a mailing list, not the books, was offensive enough to demand that the books written by the author be removed from schools even though those books didn't violate her rules about what can be in books found in schools.
Now, to be honest, there are books that are banned all over the US, and in some schools up here above the meth lab too, that I'm inclined to agree should not be in grade school libraries. But trust me on this, you can find 'em in the public libraries here. There's a *very* subtle difference.
"But trust me on this, you can find 'em in the public libraries here. There's a *very* subtle difference."
That's ok, the local public library where I am never seems to be open. They also operate under a strange practice of getting rid of books that haven't been checked out in a while when they have all sorts of shelf space going unused and room for many more shelves.
I think the problem is that these groups use religion as an excuse for their actions, where in reality, religion has nothing to do with it. I know plenty of people practicing various religions who don't oppress women like this. Hell, I know plenty of Christians, and was taught a lot about Christianity when I was younger. I would not call what the Republicans and other extremists preach in the US "Christianity". They say the words, but whatever they are preaching is something far more offensive..
I'd like to point out that while evangelicals may be Conservative, Conservatives are not evangelicals. I can kinda see what they think their point is, they think learning coding means learning how to find pron as opposed to how it actually is found - open browser in private mode, type your particular flavor of pron.
I'll also point out, as a Conservative, that I see no issue with girls pursuing a tech career of any sort, IF that is what they want to do. I am against forcing girls into a tech career just so some government bureaucrat can check a box. My own granddaughter wants to be an astronaut and my son is going to help her pursue this.
The problem is the republican party, the one conservative party in the US (because we have a broken system that only allows for two viable parties) has been co-opted by the evangelicals. How else do you explain the republican shift into extremist positions like total bans on abortions without any exceptions? They may be a minority of the republican party, but they are a majority of republicans who vote in primaries so they (along with Trump) effectively own the party.
There are things that could be done to fix our system to reduce the chances of extremist candidates (on either side, because the republicans aren't the only ones moving away from the center) winning, such as ranked choice voting, banning gerrymandering, and open primaries. Unfortunately the party in power in a given state has little incentive to enact any changes that might limit their own power.
Not to mention that thanks to Trump's election lies, the chance of republican legislators voting for any change to elections like ranked choice or open primaries is zero, because those with something to lose will claim the proposal "makes elections easier for democrats to steal".
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Not to mention that thanks to Trump's election lies, the chance of republican legislators voting for any change to elections like ranked choice or open primaries is zero
Well, not quite 0. Alaska (no bastion of progressive, liberal thought there...) recently installed ranked choice voting. Sarah Palin lost a vain (in both senses of the word) attempt to become a Congresscritter because of it.
And naturally, railed against the "insane, confusing and unconstitutional (!) voting system that stole the election" from her.
I recall seeing that - as well as Palin's inevitable criticism of it. Wasn't that instituted via a ballot initiative the people were able to place there via petition? Like how California's propositions work?
It would be nice if all states have that, but AFAIK only 8 do. That allows the people to do an end run around the legislature when it isn't serving their needs. Probably Alaska's legislators will not only seek to overturn the ranked choice voting, but to remove the ability of the people to put things on the ballot as a result.
Agreed 100%. Another thing that REALLY needs to change is to somehow persuade the old media to acknowledge the existence of 3rd party or independent candidates. It's absurd, even when you've had some getting 20-25% of the vote, the old media would pretend they don't exist, never even mention they're running, not list them in poll results OR in polls (I got polll calls "are you planning to vote for A or B?" 'Umm, no, I'm planning to vote for candidate C'. "Oh I'll put you down as undecided." "No, I'm not undecided". *click*, end of phone call. So I got falsely listed as undecided since other candidates can't exist according to the old media.)
(Just to note, these poll calls were like 20 years ago, I did everything possible to oppose Nutjob Trump.)
Without a way to vote for minority candidate C, without worrying that by not voting for candidate A that candidate B you find loathsome will win, third parties are pointless.
I have in the past supported third parties even though I knew they couldn't win, I figured it was sort of a 'protest' vote when I didn't think it mattered much who won. I can't do that today, because if election deniers win then elections themselves will become a thing of the past. And the way things look we might have election deniers on the ballot for years to come until they are either stamped out, or they have won and the US becomes an autocracy.
"banning gerrymandering,"
So how is that done? Somebody has to draw the lines that define the districts, and there's always going to be someone else who complains that putting the lines "there" instead of "over here" hurts their party's chances of ever winning again. I've seen it go both ways in the past, and both times I think it was finally resolved by the courts.
It is easy to do, write software (which may already exist) that divides districts along natural boundaries to the extent possible (county, city, precinct) and creates maximally compact districts (i.e. the smallest total size of all districts as measured along their outside edges) without looking at any demographic information like political registration, race, income, etc.
All it would need as inputs are precinct, city and county boundary maps, the census figures for population in each precinct, and the number of districts you want to create and any size restrictions (i.e. must be greater than x or less than y)
Politicians will complain if the lines change so they get put in another district, but that's all they could do, complain. It would be a completely impartial system with no possibility of political interference.
Writing the software would be the easy part. The hard/impossible part would be getting politicians to vote in favor of giving up their party advantage.
Probably not, districts like that are what the 'compactness' algorithm tries to avoid if at all possible - though you might end up with a few of those since you can probably can't make every district nice and square especially in states that have wonky borders like some of those out east.
New York (where your example is from) permits gerrymandering, though the courts restrict how bad it can be. Some states allow essentially unlimited gerrymandering, and there are districts that connect multiple big cities (skipping their suburbs) by having narrow corridors along interstates so they can put all the black people into one district and dilute their voting power.
For a perspective on this kind of thing, please see the fine shows on politics "Yes Minister" and "Yes, Prime Minister." These shows didn't (from what I recall) have any episodes with these types of anti-rights, book-burning weirdos but these groups use many of the same political techniques as anybody else, as shown on these fine shows. (These fanatical, anti-rights book-burning types are a scourge in the US, but luckily most of the US does not take them seriously, they'll get stuff banned in some backwater and laughed right out of the room in the next place they try it.)
The name of the group itself is the prime "let's give our book-burning fanatic group a nice name", a name "Moms for Liberty" for a group that may or may not be moms and are in fact directly against liberty.
"I haven't seen any of our chapters that want to get rid of any books that help children find characters they identify with," said Descovich. She also conceded "there are a lot of books in gray areas." Weasel words if I've ever seen them. "I haven't seen any of our chapters ..." means literally that she doesn't look around, with her eyes, at what they are doing, so she doesn't SEE them do anything. Hoping she'll be misquoted a soon as some media tries to paraphrase what she said. This seems like the kind of thing that'd come up in Yes Minister too to be honest.
"When the missionaries came, we had all the land and they had the Bible. They said, “Let us close our eyes and pray.” When we opened our eyes, we had the Bible and they had all the land."
and
"I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."--
Mahatma Gandhi
"'No good excuse' for lack of women in tech"
""Businesses can't cop out and say 'there's not enough women taking computer science - therefore I can't hire enough'," says Mr Cook."
Also in the same interview...
"He was fascinated by my BBC audio recorder and turned it over in his hands a few times once we had finished our interview.
I confessed that I'd had to ask his colleagues if I could borrow some wired headphones to plug into it - ...
"Oh we still sell those," he said seriously of the wired pair hanging from my ears. "People still buy them."
Unless you're committing a crime, it's invariably better to ask for forgiveness than permission.
While the censorship occurring when any school system bans a book is reprehensible, there's nothing wrong with a student bringing in the book on their own, reading it with friends at lunch or on recess, or lending it to them to take home.
Contrary to popular belief, the U.S. does still have a First Amendment, so I'd just love to see the footage of some teacher trying to rip a book out of a kid's hands that they brought to class on their own. How fast can you say "fired" ? The ACLU would eat up a case like that.
I read Sybil in the 8th grade. In class. Big whup. Poor kid, she really got abused. But my mind was old enough to read it, so I did. Went from that to The Minds of Billy Milligan, then the Eden Express. Crazy people are crazy! Does that make me crazy? No, but I've always been fascinated about how the mind works, and it's no one else's business what I read.
Did reading those books turn me into a psycho-killer? No way! It was education, and I learned a lot about why some people don't act "normal".
Books aren't dangerous. Honestly, if anything you read can mess you up that much, the problem isn't in the book.
If America hopes to reclaim its (recently) past glory, part of it is remembering it's up to us, not the State, to say who's in charge. We have the most incredible liberties - on paper. Do we exercise them? Why do folks keep blaming the State for undue control? If you want to do something, just do it. So long as it's not an actual crime (stealing, assault, etc.), you're good. Fake crimes such as would be prosecuted by so-called "morality police" are just tripe, fear-mongering control methods by those so weak and fearful of social "cooties" they can't stand others having their own opinions, their own way of living their own lives.
Disappointing to see how many racists are on this board.
I frequent here always in hopes of the universality of code (in principle).
The code should not care, if the coders care enough not to.
Demonstrably, that is not the case.
Maybe someday someone will make a Black Code site free of white racism.
Fragile whites note: I'm not saying you shouldn't be fragile, white and racist.
It'd just be nice to find a place away from you.
Guess this ain't it.
There are plenty of very idiotic people here - IT staff are apparently just like ordinary people in the you know, outside world. Some nice, some assholes.
I've seen plenty of mind-blowingly misogynistic posts, some very silly political posts, but very little actual racism, and none on this particular thread, apart from, sadly, your post. What were you hoping to achieve ?
Since Brexit, the pay of people at the low end of the labour market has gone up and this look likely to continue into the next generation. My children will need cheap people to cook and clean for them, serve coffee and look impressed art the rather nicer cars and home they will be able to afford. Moms for Liberty are ensuring that there are plenty of such women in the future and I thank them for that.
Without religion my sons and I would be obliged to treat women as equals and that will never do.
"Since Brexit, the pay of people at the low end of the labour market has gone up"
Apart from not seeing that at all, other than perhaps in specific trades where the sudden lack of plumbers and builders has put a premium on their services, I'm not sure what the point of your post is?
There are a LOT of people on very low wages in the UK - the vast majority of those claiming UC are working people whose salaries are ludicrously low. Why would your children be unable to cook and clean for themselves?
I *think* your point is that religion causes a lot of the issues about women working in the same roles as men. Am I right?
.. but a quick perusal of their website highlights some fairly obvious reasons.
Turning your kids into activists (under the guise of something actually useful I might add - presumably they never expected anybody's parents to check their aims and the content) isn't a good way to make them into contributing members of society who can pay their own way. It does the other thing. Also not for nothing there are better ways.
Unless they're after racial studies grants (which are not long for this world).
You may now downvote me for being right.
Prima facie it's a good cause, I suspect the reality is radical leftist intersectional ideology and nobody is supposed to mind, right?
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