RationalWiki:What is going on in the blogosphere?/September 2013

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September 2013

12

Why are African-American names like "DeShawn" and "Shanice" ridiculed by white Americans while names like "Reince," "Rand," "Mitt," "Newt," "Tagg," "Bristol," "Trig," and "Saxby" are given a pass?

8

It's finally happened: The New Right becomes the New Left. Update: And oh, how about all the fun we're going to have!

10

Well, at least they think it's happening, right?

24

Bradlee Dean's ministry suffers a mass walkout of staff.

15

No. You cannot boost your immune system. OK, there's one way.

9

A University of Toronto (untenured) professor whines about female, gay and Chinese literature, saying that "Virginia Woolf is the only writer that interests me as a woman" and that he only teaches "F. Scott Fitzgerald, Chekhov, Tolstoy. Real guy-guys. Henry Miller. Philip Roth." (To each an irony meter.) Update: And he doubles down!

14

Want to know how Golden Dawn appeared almost out of nowhere in the Eurozone crisis? Ask the police.

13

"Aren't you glad you didn't cite to this webpage in the Supreme Court Reporter at Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association, 131 S.Ct. 2729, 2749 n.14 (2011). If you had, like Justice Alito did, the original content would have long since disappeared and someone else might have come along and purchased the domain in order to make a comment about the transience of linked information in the internet age."

18

Homeopaths are hallucinating if they think they are humanitarians.

14

Journal of Cosmology follow-up post: how long does it typically take between data collection and paper acceptance? Does 10 days sound about right?!

6

Beavers don't kill people, people do!

6

You probably won't get this from Campbell.

5

Meet the last (economic) RINO in the House GOP: Scott Rigel of Virginia, who seems to have reversed his whining about how the Senate "empirically" stalled the Path to Prosperity.

3

Judging on this data, there better be someone making scenarios on how this would even be possible with North Korea.

15

INFOGRAPHIC: A map of the US showing state-by-state incarceration rates along with the states that have at least one privately owned-and-operated prison that has a guarantee that the prison will have at least 90 percent occupancy, or else the state will pay extra to the prison company to make up for the prison company's "loss." (I.e., the states pay extra when they have falling crime rates.)

4

"I see extended 1-D objects with no mass/What's their use? What's their use? Can they give us quark plasma?"

9

The Journal of Cosmology strikes again. This time they have found alien life in the sky. Has alien life been found in a meteorite? Or the sky? Or [Insert Location Here]?

12

"Here Are All The (self-confessed) Atheists In Congress": It's illustrative that Barney Frank admitted to being gay in 1987, then served another 25 years before announcing his retirement, and then admitted that he is an atheist.

13

Jon, we missed you. (Seriously, CNN is FUBAR.)

9

Let's just hope Brand isn't seen wearing any (more) Hugo Boss clothing anytime soon.

10

Bruce Schneier: How to Remain Secure Against the NSA.

8

First we had Spacebat. Now we have Spacefrog.

9

Well, ABC is ready to grow some gigantic balls: What happened if the Brits trounced the American Revolution? (Let's make a series about it!) So, thirteen episodes of life in Canada?

5

Syria in Five Minutes. (Fuck you, Putin.)

4

Who are you and why are you representing the US nuclear power intelligentsia?

3

Ever felt like getting into Bitcoin to make money was a sucker's bet? Rick Falkvinge details precisely how price-fixing that would be illegal in any other currency has multiplied its value by about 100.

11

How American homeschoolers enabled and funded German child abuse

20

See! Universal health care hurts businesses - the television industry!

7

The third time we've linked to the Fraser Institute in less than 20 days. Wow, they're batshit prolific!

16

Why Texas banned Tesla Motors

14

So much for trying to represent the anti-Murdoch, intellectual Tories, Telegraph.

8

Obama, even if you get confirmation that chemical attacks were ordered by Assad, please don't seriously think "common sense" is an effective argument.

8

Hey, why trash England? Can't you trash the rest of your country? (Or can you find anything to trash?)

25

Cracked: The 6 Most Humiliating Public Failures by Celebrity Psychics

5

James Carville: People are freaking out about Syria because of Iraq. He's almost right... the fact is, Americans don't trust Obama because Bush royally fucked them over, and it has left them hurting and cynical. Bush and Obama are war-mongers.

18

No! The Syrians have already experienced enough!

17

A new documentary film, Mission Congo, claims that Pat Robertson's 1994 post-Rwanda genocide aid project may have consisted of little more than people reading bible verses to the wounded, and not the "forefront" role that Pat claimed it had as he raised millions for it on The 700 Club.

14

The Prince Rupert's Drop, a simple piece of glass with fascinatingly strange physically properties, brought to you by some actual Christian scientists. (Note the Bible passage at the end of the video). Very cool.

12

Let's make a chant for the jobs you're all going to lose.

23

This infographic (from a website called "Online Christian Colleges" no less) illustrates how megachurches could easily be labeled "corporate Christianity."

13

Senator McCain, you can probably joke about a bunch of things in Congress, but slacking on the job probably isn't one.

21

IRL trolling: Calling NSA to restore lost emails

14

So much for the Catholic Church's outreach to atheists. On the Friendly Atheist blog, Sara Lin Wilde gives her take on Pope Francis's first encyclical, which was a revision of an unpublished encyclical from Pope Ratzy. Since Frank didn't moderate any of Benny's bilge, it appears that we now know what he really thinks of unbelievers.