I Don’t See Anything Wrong with This, Do You?

When I read this story, all I could think was, what? That mixed with disgust were my only thoughts.

Where do I begin? Researchers at the University of Toronto and the University of Lethbridge have joined together to conduct a study on pedophiles. They want to pay 250 sex offenders $60 each to view pictures of fully dressed children and measure their responses. They want to measure two different kinds of pedophiles: the ones who have only downloaded child porn and the ones convicted of abusing children. This is, apparently, so they can better manage and treat pedophiles.

Feel the rage. Can you feel it? I know I can. Everytime I read this story, I have to sit for a second afterwards so the rage can discipate. First of all, why oh why would you pay criminals to view pictures of things related to their crime? That is so wrong, it’s beyond words. Why why why would you think this is a good idea, and how in the blue bloody hell did you get it past an ethics board? I know the ethics boards are usually most concerned with the impact of a study on the participants, but even that raises red flags for me. If you’re getting people who are sexually attracted to children to look at pictures of children, you are intentionally feeding their depravity! It’s not like the only time they get the urge to sexually assault a child is right after they just saw one naked. They get attracted by watching kids play at the playground. And I think some of these guys are out on probation. So, by making them look at pictures of kids, you’re going to steer their mind towards kids, making them more likely to reoffend, which is already something that is highly possible. Smart thinking there, Sparticus, real smart.

Second, I have a problem with their two groups of offenders. I assume they’re dividing the sex offenders by conviction records. So, How do they know that the one group has only downloaded porn? How do they know they haven’t molested children and just haven’t been caught yet? They should know that the incidence of crime is much higher than the incidence of reported crime, which is higher than the actual conviction rate. I think most people know that. So how do they even know that they’re dealing with two different groups?

Third, if you must do a study on pedophiles, why have them look at pictures? Why not ask them questions? I know measuring actual responses is more accurate, but in this case, I don’t think measuring that stuff is such a good idea.

Finally, if you’re going to conduct a study like this, you’d better give me a detailed explanation of how this is going to help society. No, “It will help us understand pedophilia better so we can better manage and treat pedophiles” doesn’t cut it. Give me something I can attempt to grasp and has a snowball’s chance of justifying the risk and the money spent encouraging pedophiles.

I’m still processing the fact that this research got the go-ahead, and even got a grant! I would be disgusted if something like this was being conducted on a voluntary basis, but the money is the final straw. Let’s just hope that this study doesn’t cause any of the participants to reoffend. I don’t think any ethics board would want that on their head.

Barenaked Ladies are Mean

You know what’s sad? When a really good band releases an awesome album, and then follows it up immediately with something that spends half the time sucking monkey balls and half being sort of kind of decent. Why did the Barenaked Ladies have to do that?

They released Barenaked Ladies Are Me. It rocked! It was cool! I don’t think there’s a song on there that I don’t at least like, and lots on there that I love. Plus that album will always have a special significance because of getting to see them live right after listening to it, but I think it still would have been a cool album without the concert.

Then they go and release Barenaked Ladies are Men. Ug why why why? Let’s be logical. If you know this album consists of 16 rejects from the good album, why would you think it’s a good idea to throw them all in the same album? Maybe it’s time to rethink this. You’re a good band, obviously you know what a *reject* is. Why would you release them all together? Maybe, if you thought they were ok enough to put on albums, you could squish them into albumvs slowly. But why make all your crap stand out?

It’s a strange album. I don’t know if I could really properly judge it because the crappy crap makes the sorta good stuff seem like the best stuff you’ve ever heard in your life. I did rip about half of the album because it was either listenable or I liked it. But the stuff that sucked, oh it sucksucksucksucked! It was like you were on a treadmill, never going anywhere. It actually made me try and figure out what makes good music good. Should I have to do that? I thought about how I like a pattern in music, but what’s wrong with this pattern, and why is it boring?

When I listen to an album of theirs the first time, I like to give it all my attention, but the sucky stuff was so monotonous that I started doing other things, and waiting, praying for the song to end. Some stuff would start off sucking right from the beginning, and some songs would make you think they had potential, and then promptly crap all over themselves. And some songs would just go on too long.

And then there were the few good songs. They did a really good one about the George W. Bush government, that oddly sounded like Bank Job from Barenaked Ladies are Me…which brings me to another point. They must have really liked that Bank Job tune, because they created 3 songs along the same lines. It’s pretty neat that you can make 3 different songs out of the same tune, two of them being good. The third one was just weird. Quality biology enhanced with high technology? What the hell? Oh well, they’re the Barenaked Ladies, and if they can get away with “Hey I’m a cow, I’m curious, hey watch me now, I’m furious.” I guess they can do this.

So the moral of the story is this album is far from hot stuff. If you really want it, wait for someone to buy it, go “blech!” and turn it in so you can buy it used. Otherwise, I think you can do without it. You, and your pocketbook, will be much happier, trust me.

Say A Prayer For The Kids Today

A little over a year ago, I
posted
a short note about a Sudanese man who was forced to marry a goat after he was caught having sex with it. Well, today I have the sad duty of reporting that the goat has
died
after choking on a plastic bag she tried to eat while picking up scraps on a local street.

I know that I will be keeping the “goat defiler” in my thoughts today, and I hope that all of you will do the same. It’s the least we can do to help him through this tragic time.

So Who’s Flinging the Bullshit?

I got an email the other day filled with rage at a couple of TV talkshow hosts. According to this email, the hosts in question were spewing hate-speech, being disrespectful and patronizing, calling people with disabilities “the handicapped,” and were making fun of every kind of disability, leaving noone untouched. They were bashing the ADA and calling it bullshit. This email was demanding that everyone approach disability advocacy groups and get these horrid men off the air. The email also mentioned that there were videoclips up on YouTube of this disgusting display of disrespect. That made me too curious, so off I went on a YouTube search to see this for myself.

It didn’t take me too long, since the email mentioned the cohosts’ names were Penn and Teller. Weee! Jackpot! here, here, and here. It’s all the same 30-minute or so show, just split in 3 parts with no attempt to split in logical spots, just splat! in the middle of a word.

I watched all three parts. Were they disrespectful? Sort of, but that’s just their style. That’s the way they act for their audience. Oddly, I got the feeling they were trying to tone some of it down. Did they use the words “the handicapped?” Sure, but I could give two shits about the word they used. I believe it’s the sentiment, not the word, that counts. Were they mocking every disability? I didn’t see it as such! Sure they mentioned lots of disabilities, but that’s the point of doing a show on the Americans with, um, disabilities, act. If they didn’t mention certain disabilities, I would bet money that people would be pissed that their group was excluded. Was it hate-speech? Absolutely not! They were trying to make a point, and doing it in their loud-mouthed style.

Yep, they called the ADA bullshit, but not in the way that the email claimed. They felt it went too far, was too vague about what a disability was, and they felt it made it too easy for people to sue people on the grounds of not being accommodated under the ADA. They spoke to people with disabilities who didn’t like the ADA, they spoke to a few who were in favour of the act, and they made a huge point of one dude who used the ADA as an excuse to sue the asses off of anyone he could. They made some good points about how some things that sound ridiculous are classified as a disability. They talked about how it was a good idea, but now it’s gone out of control.

Do I agree with everything they say? Hell no. They think that the government should not be forcing public places of business to be accommodating because if they want the business of people with disabilities, they’ll just do it. Obviously these folks have no grasp of how many barriers there are out there, how long they have been there, and how slooooowly they are being taken down. They say that it should be up to the people with disabilities and their families to advocate for what they want, case by case. A fine idea, in theory. If they truly put it into practice, they might run smack into a wall. They talk about how people can get sued under this law and get threatened with it all the time. Um, that’s the case with any law. The ADA is no different. And there’s one statement that kind of mystifies me. Maybe I’m missing something and someone can help me out here. At one point, Penn says that ADA advocates compare the fight of people with disabilities to the fight that Rosa Parks had to have a seat on the bus. Then these same advocates say that at the end of her life, Rosa Parks had to fight for her ability to get on the bus using her wheelchair…except, he says, that never happened. And Rosa Parks was kept off the bus because of Jim Crow laws of segregation, where as people with disabilities are being kept off the bus because of Sir Isaac Newton’s laws of Physics. So what is he saying there, that the two shouldn’t even be compared? That Newton’s laws of physics is a more justifiable reason to keep people with physical disabilities off the bus? I hope it’s the first, in the sense that I hate it when advocates for any cause whip out the Rosa Parks card. They have to realize that it just makes people mad. It doesn’t help. But he didn’t make it clear what he meant, so I was left trying to process what he’d just said for a while.

So should these so-called assholes be dragged from the airwaves kicking and screaming? No! They have the right to express their views as much as we do. We may not agree with them all, but that’s the way things go. Sometimes, people get way too protective of their point of view. Chill out, people! Use your energy to fight a real battle, and let this go.

I can feel our IQ dropping.

Ug the news. Sometimes it pisses me off. I’ve already bitched about the lameness of some news stories, but the story I saw tonight brought lameness to a brand new low.

Ok, the story was that some coffee-consumption could help prevent colon cancer and would help your liver, but drinking too much of it would cause you to get other cancers. They then said that children and pregnant women are strongly advised against drinking coffee. Um, duh! Do we need this stated again? What a waste of time.

And it gets better. The World Health Organization, you know, the body that tracks epidemics and the containment of these epidemics, said that we have a one in ten chance of being the victim of a medical error if we are hospitalized. And here were their three big pieces of advice for doctors and nurses. Get ready for these, these pearls of wisdom will knock your socks off. Can I have a drum-roll please? They are:

  1. Double-check the names of similar-sounding drugs.

  2. Wash your hands frequently,

    3. and the scariest of all,

  3. Use needles only once!

Are you gasping? I hope so. These nice reporters must be telling me that these are things that doctors and nurses don’t already know and use as well-established practices! Was I transported to the third world without knowing it? I’m scared that the WHO felt it necessary to remind doctors and nurses that they need to check meds, wash their hands, and throw away used needles. The first one, I can half understand happening rarely, like in an insane shift where you barely have time to breathe and stuff just keeps happpening. but this apparently happens frequently! Yikes! Ug I need to know what hospitals they visited so I can never wind up in one of them. Sometimes the news frightens me, but not in the way you’d expect.

They call it Facebook for a reason.

Man, I’ve been seeing all these stories on the news telling people to be careful about what they post on websites like Facebook and My Space, and I always thought, “This is news? To whom? Shouldn’t people already know that a site designed to connect people is a place where you are choosy about how much you let them connect with?” I thought this until…

I actually had a friend tell me he did something that you just shouldn’t do on these websites.

Ok, he works for a company. He’s not particularly fond of his job, but it pays the bills, so what the hell? He joins Facebook, and finds a group entitled “I hate xxx company but I still work there anyway.” Just so we’re clear, xxx company is *his* place of employment. Feeling happy that he’s found comrades who share his hatred of this company, and I guess feeling relatively secure, he posts a rant which I wish I could read, but I think I have to join Facebook to see it, and I won’t do that. His supervisor finds his choice words, and he gets a swift meeting with his bosses saying that he’d better shape up or he’s gone.

Helloooo! First of all, Facebook isn’t as anonymous a place as the rest of the internet. You have a username, and since it is Facebook, they usually encourage you to put your picture up there. So if your name is John Smith, you pick a username like jsmith, something my poor friend might have done since he’s not the most creative with his usernames, and your ugly mug is up on the site, I don’t think your boss will have too much trouble finding out who said he could shove his performance quotas where the sun doesn’t shine.

Second, Facebook is a social networking site designed to help people find each other. Ranting about work is not something that you want your coworkers to find. So as much as I look at my friend and go “Why?! why?! why?!” I also think the person who set up the group is doubly stupid, especially putting the company’s name in the group title! Way to bring flames.

I can hear people now, saying I have a blog with references to people on it, so I’m just as stupid. I don’t think so. I only put people’s full names on the blog if they’re already in the newspaper. To know who other people are, you’d have to know me personally. Plus, my whole name isn’t up on this site. If you google my name, all you know is that I’m a bit of a geek. I try from time to time to see what comes up. Plus, I think I know what is safe to put up on the blog and what should stay off the net. I may be proven wrong some day, but so far, so good.

I will never join Facebook. Or, if I must for some reason or another, I will only put up the barest of details. Why? Read this post, and I think you’ll understand. Some people might love it, but for me, I think it’s a recipe for disaster.

DO NOT YELL AT BLIND PEOPLE and Other Common Sense Tips

I know I’ve said this stuff before, but somebody sent me a funny version of it, with some new and interesting twists on it, so I figured it should go up. I figure you can never repeat this stuff enough.

Ten tips for interacting with people who are blind

By: Shelley Johns
Shreveport Times, Louisiana, April 19, 2007

Shelley Johns lives in Bossier City.

My father is blind, as are both of my uncles, so growing up with blind people has given me some insight (no pun intended) into how not to treat blind people.

First, when out in public, if you happen to see a blind person, do not stare! Although, the blind person cannot see you, the family members of the blind person can and speaking from personal experience, it can send a sighted family member into a rage where you will be verbally abused and/or made an example of.

Second, when a blind person is ready to order at a restaurant, please do not assume that they are not of mental capacity to place the order for themselves. Nothing makes a blind person angrier than when a waiter or waitress asks the person sitting with the blind person what the blind person wants to eat.

Third, speaking loudly to the blind person is not going to make him or her see you. This may be shocking, but sight is not triggered by loud noise and yelling at a blind person will only result in a bloody nose, and/or cane whop, because no one likes to be yelled at.

Fourth, offering help to a blind person is OK but only if the blind person asks for it. There are some exceptions to the rule. For example, if you see a blind person about to run directly into a wall, then stopping them is acceptable. However, a blind person doesn’t normally run into walls because they are normally armed with a cane, escort or seeing-eye dog.

Fifth, moving furniture in the path of a blind person is completely unacceptable – well, unless you are the blind person’s spouse, son or daughter and they have just made you mad. It is not recommended though because the blind person has acute hearing and anything you are doing sneaky can be heard from a blind person several rooms away.

Sixth, do not treat blind people like they are stupid. Asking stupid questions or dumbing-down a conversation is completely ridiculous. In most cases, the blind person is highly educated and conversation with a blind person can be a learning experience.

Seventh, do not offer to “carry” a blind person somewhere unless you have a really strong back and fully intend to lug the blind person on your back. Leading them somewhere is OK; however, carrying them is not suggested.

Eighth, when helping a blind person descend a flight of stairs, do not grab underneath their arm, lifting half their body, forcing them to hop down the stairs on one leg. This is hazardous to the blind person, as well as yourself.

Ninth, give them the respect that you would give anyone else and don’t treat them differently. While stupidity may be contagious, blindness is not.

Tenth, and finally, if you are going to ask a blind person about their blindness, for goodness sake, just ask. In most cases, they do not mind answering your questions, however, wording it in a way that is insulting to their intelligence is not recommended.

In conclusion, I believe that I have covered the most important bases on how not to treat a blind person so please use this guide wisely.

Some of those surprised me. I’ve never been made to hop down stairs, and no one has offered to carry me somewhere and I’m not even five feet tall!! I can’t imagine having someone offering to carry me, and being a fully-grown man.

And in the leading a blind person part, I would have added, do not try to lead them by the end of their cane, by their dog’s leash, and if you can avoid it, don’t herd them like a cow. Let them grab your elbo if possible. If their hands are full of stuff, or there is some other reason why this is not possible, then other ways of leading are cool.

Hope you enjoyed that. It made me chuckle, so I thought it might be fun to post. Plus, I hadn’t posted since Friday! What’s that? Something not cool, that’s what it is.