Date: January 20, 2018
01) #MeToo: Justice or Lynch Mob? Prof. Janice Fiamengo
“Janice Fiamengo, English professor, contrarian and a defender of free speech and the right to dissent – comments on the #MeToo phenomenon”
Applause
Date: January 20, 2018
01) 18 Dem Senators Vote For Trump To Spy On You Without A Warrant
” Citation:
https://theintercept.com/2018/01/17/fisa-section-702-nsa-internet-surveillance-senate/ “
|
||
| …. |
Date: January 20, 2018
“Annalisa Barbieri was lucky to have been able to keep her father at home for 11 hours after he died (Family, 6 January). I found my mother (aged 90) who had died in her sleep at home. Not knowing what to do, I rang her GP. This started a legal process that whisked her body away before I had time to say goodbye.” It’s not the sort of thing you immediately think about, when a loved one dies…It may sound kind of creepy and morbid, on some level… …But I’m glad we hung around for an hour or so with the body, after my father died… It may sound weird…but, there is something comforting in that time…and that peaceful exposure. I was doing some reading on this…and, actually…since this “Death with Dignity” series was a long time in the back of my mind, this was probably two, three years back… …some funeral homes actually open up the process to relatives, and allow them to come in and help bathe the body… Some families handle the entire process, on their own… I’ve also read accounts from others, as to how deeply meaningful it was to them…to be left with the body for several hours, before it being taken away. It really makes you think differently on death…experience it differently…if you don’t immediately turn away from it…You just sort of be, and remain, with it. |
…. |
  |
||
|
||
| …. |
Date: January 20, 2018
“Mention strong words such as “death” or “praise” to someone who has suicidal thoughts and chances are the neurons in their brains activate in a totally different pattern than those of a non-suicidal person. That’s what researchers at University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University discovered, and trained algorithms to distinguish, using data from fMRI brain scans. The scientists published the findings of their small-scale study Monday in the journal Nature Human Behaviour. They hope to study a larger group of people and use the data to develop simple tests that doctors can use to more readily identify people at risk of suicide.” |
…. |
 |
||
|
||
| …. |
Date: January 20, 2018
“In this (extremely informal) video commentary, Seth Andrews talks about weird dreams, cults and cultures, and the pitfalls of keeping others comfortable.” Personally…the nagging stopped after a few years… …At this point…I don’t know if they’ve just forgotten about it, or what…but it doesn’t even come up, anymore…Things are as they used to be. Sometimes, I’ll get invited to church…or a religious themed holiday card…but, that’s the extent of it. I’m at peace with this. Sometimes…I wonder why we were religious, at all… …Seth is correct…So much of it just does not make any sense…on a “we ought to know better” level. …Why is atheism even a source of tension?…It’s such an obviously sound conclusion…if you have the courage, to be starkly honest. |
…. |
 – Atheist Media Links
|
||
Date: January 19, 2018
01) Cory Booker Grandstands Against Trump For Election Year Soundbites
Date: January 19, 2018
01) POLL: Half Of America Says The US Is Run For The Benefit Of Elites
” Citation:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nation-tracker-americans-weigh-in-on-trump-immigration-remarks-first-year-in-office/ “
Date: January 19, 2018
01) White House Directed Bannon’s Silence During Testimony
“During Steve Bannon’s testimony before the House Intelligence Committee on the Trump team’s ties to Russia, Bannon’s attorney Bill Burck was on the phone with a White House lawyer who directed Bannon as to whether to answer the questions
Citation:
https://apnews.com/b8bcb053fda9444a9c0f1dc0ea7b87e4/House-panel-subpoenas-Bannon-in-Russia-probe-showdown “
Date: January 19, 2018
01) Confirmed: At Least SOME of Trump Medical Report Was Lies
“–The results of Donald Trump’s medical exam are called into question, particularly the president’s height and weight, and the credibility of the Montreal cognitive assessment
Date: January 19, 2018
01) Experts, Police, and Vigilantes Face Off Over Pedophiles on Twitter
“whenever a new measure to censor the Internet is proposed, it will be justified as being targeted at the online activities of either terrorists, or pedophiles. This justification is used so often, because it’s so effective. Nobody wants to be heard speaking up for the rights of either of these hated and feared groups.
Indeed, in order to stave off the threat of broader censorship, free speech activists are sometimes first in line to argue for the censorship of extremist material. It says a lot that the new Chair of the Internet Watch Foundation, which facilitates ISP-level blocking of child abuse imagery online, is the former head of free speech group Article 19.
So it was that Twitter’s suspension of the accounts of non-offending pedophiles last month flew under the radar for most Internet activists and free speech advocates. Although non-offending pedophiles strongly oppose child abuse imagery and adult-child sex, activists were no more inclined to defend them against Twitter’s actions than they were to defend the Nazis and alt-right hate groups whose accounts Twitter also purged.
But there’s one group that does stand against Twitter’s suspension of the accounts of these prominent online pedophiles —and it’s not who you might expect. It’s child protection workers, who together with more than twenty international clinical and forensic psychologists, sexologists, sociologists and other experts, this week sent an open letter to Twitter stating:
In our professional opinions, terminating the accounts of non-offending, anti-contact MAPs [Minor-Attracted Persons] is likely to result in the opposite effect of that which Twitter may expect or intend. Rather than reducing the incidence of child sexual abuse, if anything it increases the risk that some pedophiles will be unable to obtain the peer or professional support that they may need in order to avoid offending behaviour. It is also likely to increase the stigma and isolation associated with pedophilia and thereby increase the likelihood of some MAPs acting on their sexual feelings.”
