SpongeBob Squarepants. I don't really know much about this children's character, but two months ago there was an "error" made by American Greetings Corp.
That's a hell of an error. I would like to think that someone would get their hands seriously slapped for this, funny as it is. The more I look at it, the stupider I think American Greetings is. I'm not offended at all (I forwarded it to co-workers), but, well, I don't know.
I didn't know that so many people felt so much about Curves for Women. Pineapple Girl has delivered a post about it as well. She describes Gary Heavin, CEO of Curves, as "pushing a Christian agenda to franchisees", citing this article as her source. While I agree with her first paragraph which basically states that he has the right to donate to whomever he wants to and so on, I really do not believe that he is pushing any religious agenda on anyone. Some of the franchises are Jewish, some not religious, and he does not force anyone to be anything they don't want to be.
I would like to comment on her critique of Heavin's statement, "...and that's a tragedy because of the need to put values in our boardrooms and classrooms." I don't believe that this is technically incorrect, or wrong. We just need to clarify what he means by Christian values. If he means values such as fairness, tolerance, high personal standards, compassion, responsibility, goodwill (intent) and community service (action), then I don't believe that these are such bad values to instill. I mean, really, aren't you sick of these self-styled kings that have no connection to reality and screw everyone that makes less than them so royally, and then think it unjust if they don't get away with it? I am. The real issue is when you think that these values are strictly Christian, as though patented. Or as though non-Christians, or non-Baptists, for non-Southern Baptists, simply do not have these values.
Now as far as the anti-choice thing goes, I agree with PG when she says that Heavin can do whatever he wants within the law. I am not sure that boycotting an organization that is pro-life (because I really do not believe that they are anti-choice, per se, but I suppose that's another discussion) is necessarily a feasible idea given our nature. PG is asking for a fairly strategic move, rather than a tactical move that pleases us, personally, now. And we should know by now just how bad we are at that. Still, great things have happened in that we have been able to pull together for certain causes to make things happen. I'm just not sure boycotting does any good. I'll have to look for cases where it actually did have an impact, and not just to do things like bring back your favourite show.
I have a feeling that people are far more likely to get out there and defend their favourite show than defend their favourite group of human beings.
Excellent article about the Columbine massacre that occurred five years ago yesterday that talks directly about the real reasons why they did what they did. It even suggests that the outcome was better than what might have happened if they had lived, particularly Eric Harris. When you examine the myths that prevail versus what they know now (and should have known within a few weeks, I think), you can see an example of how the mainstream media fails society, and how mainstream society can't absorb facts or new concepts easily, at least in a "push media" way.
People think that they were a part of the Trenchcoat Mafia who was angry and violent. The killers were driven to this from years of taunting and bullying, but apparently this isn't the case at all. The real reason is a symbiotic relationship between a depressive rage-a-holic and a psychopath, but in order to understand this you have to know what a psychopath really is, or at least a reasonable idea, and not the movie-of-the-week definition.
The problem with this is that to get a solid understanding of what that is, you have to have an attention span that allows you to do more than digest short sound bites and headlines. The media has to be able to get real and factual information to you in a very short time span, which they say is not possible. There's just too much news to report, and not enough time. I mean, you can't expect to have less time for Everybody Loves Raymondor American Idol.
Liz showed me an article about Curves for Women. You've all heard about them, they are everywhere apparently. This is a good article, in my opinion, about a man who has turned his life around and is going for what he believes is right in life, without trying to take apart the lives of others. Some things from the article:
But being the person I am, I can't be satisfied with this, because the fact is, I can't go to this club if I want to, because of my gender. Not because of any other reason such as having a medical problem, or anything like that. It's because I am a guy. This goes against some of my principles. A whole movement was created because people were tired of being treated differently due to their race. Another one was created for those whose gender was unfairly used to bar them from entry. And yet another was made for those who have different sexualities than the majority. And what did we learn from these things? Not that discrimination is wrong, surely.
Yet I can completely understand why it is necessary for these women. Regular fitness centres are very much "like nightclubs, catering to the sculpted bodies of affluent 17- to 32-year-old fitness buffs." If I were a middle-aged unathletic woman, there's no way I would set foot in these places. I would go to a supportive place where I could work at my own pace and be myself, and Curves seems to work for millions of women.
What I do not believe, though, is that women are the only group that needs to exclude others from its walls to feel comfortable. I see no reason why there shouldn't be other groups that do the same things. Ethnic groups let in people who are not of that ethnic group. The "outsiders" simply follow the rules of that group and everyone is happy. No one is threatened.
We already have discrimination in private groups anyway. Country clubs are for the rich and rich only. Rich usually means white, doesn't it? In any case, I don't see any reason why there shouldn't be men's only health clubs, or social clubs. Or black-only church groups. Perhaps it should be left up to the community to decide whether or not they want peaceful whites-only clubs, though. Any of these groups should be fine as long as they demonstrate that they do not promote hatred or violence.
But there's the rub, isn't it? This is very hard to prove in some cases, I would think. Imagine a convenience store where blacks and women pay more, or can't work there, or can't even enter. That might piss me off. And of course I see no useful social purpose in such a place, not like with Curves. But perhaps that is the true price of freedom, allowing the offensive to be offensive. Maybe we as free people do not adequately pay for it. Some say that freedom is not free and therefore we must fight and die. I think that paying for freedom should be done by allowing everyone to have it. It's a lot tougher than it sounds.
Jim Cantalupo, CEO of McDonald's, is dead after an apparent heart attack. He was 60. Let the dark humour ensue.
A look at what really drives people: Despite rising gas prices and falling, or at least crappy fuel efficiency, people will pay anything to operate their SUVs.
I can and do occasionally drive, but I'm not a driver per se. This seems a little fucked to me. It's bad enough driving a small car in rush hour traffic, why would you want a large, unwieldy thing as well? And then to say that you will pay anything they want you to pay to drive is just asking to be abused at the pump. But that just shows you where our priorities are. They talk about the power you get, but how much does power matter in the city? It's like having a souped up computer to get the most out of Internet Explorer. People definitely, definitely do NOT want better fuel economy, or better fuel for that matter.
Neither does George Bush apparently. Two years ago, he killed the Supercar project (excellent article, but quite long and subscription is required), which was a challenge in the 90s to make a car that gets 80 miles to the gallon, which is about 35 km to the litre. Currently most cars give around 27 mpg. I wonder if the SUV drivers that are okay paying anything for their gas would be as willing if the price of gas were to increase with inflation rates, putting it at $3/gallon two years ago.
But we get what we deserve, I think. Like I said, power is great. I just asked someone why they would want lots of power in the city. "To get to the on ramp faster." Not that they can go as fast as they want to anyway. Why, then, get to the maximum speed three seconds faster? What's the big deal, really?
And they are almost all SPV's, or single passenger vehicles. Sure you see them loading the family up into the car for the family weekend, or soccer practice, but that's not what I see every single day. Every single day I see thousands and thousands of cars with exactly that number of people inside them. No one wants to drive with anyone else, it seems, not in Montreal.
I know I should learn more about cars to really understand the plight of the driver who wants more, but from this point of view, these drivers deserve to pay $3/gallon for gas.
via MeFi: The Bush adminstration, specifically, John Asscrack, has waged another war against pornography. No matter how you feel about it, I think that this is an interesting article. Some excerpts and a few thoughts:
Department officials say they will send "ripples" through an industry that has proliferated on the Internet and grown into an estimated $10 billion-a-year colossus profiting Fortune 500 corporations such as Comcast, which offers hard-core movies on a pay-per-view channel.
That's a lot of money.
It is unclear, though, just how the American public and major corporations that make money from pornography will accept the perspective of the Justice Department and Attorney General John Ashcroft.
Any move against mainstream pornography could affect large telephone companies offering broadband Internet service or the dozens of national credit card companies providing payment services to pornographic Web sites.
Cable television, meanwhile, which has found late-night lineups with "adult programming" highly profitable, is unlikely to budge, and such companies have powerful friends.
Money, again. Am I the only one who gets the feeling that those with such high moral principles will bend knee to the almighty dollar like the rest of us?
In February, the Bush campaign honored Comcast President Stephen Burke with "Ranger" status, for agreeing to raise at least $200,000 for the president's re-election effort.
This seems strange. Maybe I was wrong about the ethics of this Administration. Maybe they will not be stepping aside for friends when pursuing its ideals, a world without porn being one of them. On the other hand, we don't know what kind of deal they will actually work out, and it will look bad if Comcast is hurt Comcast after they paid to be a "Ranger".
Obscenity cases came to a standstill under Janet Reno, President Bill Clinton's attorney general, who focused on child pornography, which is considered child abuse and comes under different criminal statutes. The ensuing years saw an explosion of porn, so much so that critics say that Americans' tolerance for sexually explicit material rivals that of Europeans.
Tolerance for this stuff rivalling that of *shudder* EUROPEANS (didn't they spawn Hitler??)!! Well heaven for-fucking-bid.
Either way, Nguyen, father of a 2-year-old girl, and his co-workers spend their days scouring the Internet for the most obscene material, following leads sent in by citizens and tracking pornographers operating under different names. The job wears on them all, day after day, so much so that the obscenity division has recently set up in-house counseling for them to talk about what they're seeing and how it is affecting them.
"This stuff isn't the easiest to deal with," Nguyen said recently while at his computer. "But I think we're going after the bad guys and we're making a difference, and that's what makes it worthwhile."
This is easy to understand, but I seriously think that Mr. Nguyen is fighting a pointless battle, and he is suffering needlessly.
Obscenity laws are supposed to be based on the community's general view of the material. I like the idea that since we are often talking about the Internet, the community should be the world at large. Perhaps.
And they want to take on Larry Flynt, the father of Hustler magazine (yes, this is a link that is NSFW) and all its spinoffs. The man who survived an assassination attempt and all their tries at silencing. I hope they try and fail miserably. Actually, for the sake of the taxpayers, I hope they leave him, and all the rest, alone. I'm glad I don't live in a country that has this waste of money happening. We have other ways of wasting money, no doubt.
An alcoholic-sugar fiend's dream come true!
I don't see anything wrong with "normalizing" alcohol. I think children would benefit from it in the long run. Exposing them to it early would make them see that alcohol is to be taken in moderation.
Of course, it may mean that parents would actually have to teach their kids something, and god knows we wouldn't want that.