Happy 3rd Pit Birthday!

[Guestus Aurelius]

MA = Madeleine Albright

[another lurker]

Bloomingdales in trouble for date rape advert:

https://ca.style.yahoo.com/post/1330107 ... -promoting

“Spike your best friend’s egg nog when they’re not looking,” the caption reads alongside an image of two models dressed to impress. She’s wearing a lace skirt and a white tuxedo blazer with black lapels, throwing her head back jollily, while a man in a tuxedo looks on with a mischievous look.

https://40.media.tumblr.com/5cbdc7096fe ... 68_540.jpg

Showing the dudebro all trussed up in ribbons is a little raepy too, no? I bet there would be an outcry if the woman was all wrapped up in ribbons. But it's ok if it's done to a dudebro.

[Skep tickle]

The student body president at Mizzou apparently FB-posted last night that the KKK had been seen on campus and the sighting confirmed, and that he was working with the MU PD, National Guard, and state police in light of that. Turns out, the 1st part was rumor or misunderstanding and the 2nd part appears to have been an exaggeration.

http://twitchy.com/2015/11/11/mizzous-s ... creenshot/

(This link seems to relate the posts/reactions best, but claims in its headline "then later [he] said it was all a lie" - that doesn't appear to be correct, he did remove the post, apologized, and said "I take complete blame and fault for my actions", but I don't see the claim substantiated that he ever said what he posted was "a lie" - may have been fear-driven spread of rumor & his anticipated next steps.)

[Aneris]

I don't believe that social justice warriors do it out of calculation. I'm leaning towars the view that people often don't really know themselves what they do or why they do it. Ray Comfort, PZ Myers, SJWs may be half convinced that what they say is true, believe that the end justifies the means, or think that opposing their peers would be against decent priorities ("why oppose them, when you can oppose truly horrible people" argument), and halfway they are ensared by powerful cognitive illusions, of the kind I've described before. It follows naturally by design of their communities. Since we saw now that these students seem genuinelly upset and distressed, I propose that it could be also part of what's known as a Culture Bound Syndrome (most famous is the Korean Fan Death).

What's going for this view?

1. categorization as a disease in the culture (i.e., not a voluntary behaviour or false claim):
   They don't see it as a disease, but as terms such as "oppression" and "hatred", which they conceptualize (conceptual metaphors again) in medical terms, such as that it "spreads", that speech is "inflammatory", Namazie's speech was a "risk". these are not uncommon ways to describe it, but it's not in isolation.
2. widespread familiarity in the culture;
   If we take "oppression" that makes people feel weak and ill, I'd say so.
3. complete lack of familiarity or misunderstanding of the condition to people in other cultures;
   That's certainly the case.
4. no objectively demonstrable biochemical or tissue abnormalities (signs);
   I guess that would be the case.
5. the condition is usually recognized and treated by the folk medicine of the culture.
   Safe Spaces, support, emotional comfort, pillowforts...

I know that applying one area of things to another is often with a bit of 'bending' criteria ever so slightly, granted, but that is not to say that there is nothing to it, or that the phenomenon isn't in some way related (where anyway here to speculate).

[another lurker]

On further reflections, perhaps Bloomingdales isn't all that stupid and is in fact depending on SJW outrage as a form of viral marketing.

See, now I know that Bloomingdales has an xmas catalogue. People are talking about their brand.

I have wondered about this, specifically in regards to Urban Outfitters, which, every few months, releases some new item that is grossly offensive to many groups of people.

http://theweek.com/articles/480961/14-u ... troversies

http://api.theweek.com/sites/default/fi ... e=1260x560

After a few months, people will probably forget the outrage, but they now know that Urban Outfitters exist, because of all of the free media exposure.

[dogen]

Wait. So no backups?

No backups since July, which is when I started my 6-month sabbatical in the UK. I've been regularly committing my software to repos throughout, so that's OK; the loss is mainly things like notes, figures, log files, etc.

Drop box. Get it. Use it. You'll be happy you did.

I do use it, but only for sharing files with others. Does Dropbox do versioning? What if it goes down? What are the security implications of putting everything in Dropbox?

[another lurker]

No backups since July, which is when I started my 6-month sabbatical in the UK. I've been regularly committing my software to repos throughout, so that's OK; the loss is mainly things like notes, figures, log files, etc.

Drop box. Get it. Use it. You'll be happy you did.

I do use it, but only for sharing files with others. Does Dropbox do versioning? What if it goes down? What are the security implications of putting everything in Dropbox?

Don't forget to backup your collection of dick jokes.

[feathers]

Fortunately(?), the radfems don't seem to be gathered in a single party under an authoritarian central command. The heavens forbid they should ever manage to found such a party and gain political traction.

Not the rank and file, however there are very influential feminist organisations like NOW in the US. I do get the impression from listening to Erin Pizzey that the takeover of feminism by the Marxists in the 60's/70's was very organized and what we see now is the fruit of deliberate infiltration of academia and government funded 'charitable' organisations. The feminist narrative is now so firmly rooted that central control is not needed. It's all self-perpetuating. The dogma, in common with cults, contains many thought terminating elements and provides the susceptible with ways of dismissing counter arguments in order to maintain the belief. We are at the stage where even the victims of the narrative, particularly white males, can't see the extent of the distortion.

Is there evidence for this Marxist infiltration? Like, KGB money flow, filmed meetings of KGB agents or American communist leaders with feminist leaders and so on? It's easy getting the impression of a conspiracy, but the proof is in the politburo.

[feathers]

The student body president at Mizzou apparently FB-posted last night that the KKK had been seen on campus and the sighting confirmed, and that he was working with the MU PD, National Guard, and state police in light of that. Turns out, the 1st part was rumor or misunderstanding and the 2nd part appears to have been an exaggeration.

People fetching their white linen from the laundromat had better beware.

[another lurker]

For KD. I don't know who this is, but it made me think of KD. Also, way hotter than Brother Nate. Just saying.

http://41.media.tumblr.com/38a05806f7c2 ... o1_500.jpg

[Skep tickle]

2 more comments from B&W thread "Greta spots the obvious" here

http://i.imgur.com/M1mYwmw.png?3

(my screenshots seem to be getting blurrier & blurrier, not sure why as they look fine when I take the 'cap)

[tina]

I don't believe that social justice warriors do it out of calculation....<snippitty snip>

I'm pretty sure this is correct: particularly in the younger SJW's. Most 'identify' with 'causes' because their mates do, because it's cool and edgy and rebellious. In terms of religion it's like "well of course god exists, don't be silly" Or of radicalisation " Well naturally the West is to blame for everything, that's obvious, duh." Feminism, the same, racism... ditto. Unless a young person has been exceptionally well trained in critical thinking skills, I suspect it's par for the course . How all these SJW techniques and strategies have developed is, as you said earlier, fodder for several Peehaitchdees. Like feathers I would like to see evidence of deliberate marxist radicals pulling the strings, if such exists.

[Skep tickle]

I don't believe that social justice warriors do it out of calculation. I'm leaning towars the view that people often don't really know themselves what they do or why they do it. Ray Comfort, PZ Myers, SJWs may be half convinced that what they say is true, believe that the end justifies the means, or think that opposing their peers would be against decent priorities ("why oppose them, when you can oppose truly horrible people" argument), and halfway they are ensared by powerful cognitive illusions, of the kind I've described before. It follows naturally by design of their communities.

I agree, and of course people all tend to believe that what they (we) are thinking/doing/saying is at least warranted (whether they/we believe it to be right/good/true, or at least to feel it's justified given the situation), and people tend to get emotionally fired up when interpreting a threatened position as morally based. (See especially politics, religion.)

Since we saw now that these students seem genuinelly upset and distressed, I propose that it could be also part of what's known as a Culture Bound Syndrome (most famous is the Korean Fan Death).

What's going for this view?

1. categorization as a disease in the culture (i.e., not a voluntary behaviour or false claim):
   They don't see it as a disease, but as terms such as "oppression" and "hatred", which they conceptualize (conceptual metaphors again) in medical terms, such as that it "spreads", that speech is "inflammatory", Namazie's speech was a "risk". these are not uncommon ways to describe it, but it's not in isolation.
2. widespread familiarity in the culture;
   If we take "oppression" that makes people feel weak and ill, I'd say so.
3. complete lack of familiarity or misunderstanding of the condition to people in other cultures;
   That's certainly the case.
4. no objectively demonstrable biochemical or tissue abnormalities (signs);
   I guess that would be the case.
5. the condition is usually recognized and treated by the folk medicine of the culture.
   Safe Spaces, support, emotional comfort, pillowforts...

I know that applying one area of things to another is often with a bit of 'bending' criteria ever so slightly, granted, but that is not to say that there is nothing to it, or that the phenomenon isn't in some way related (where anyway here to speculate).

Very interesting. You may be on to something here.

[Guest_0048cc29]

> Dropbox keeps snapshots of all changes made to files in your Dropbox within the past 30 days (or longer with the Extended Version History feature).

So it does versioning but drops all versions older than 30 days, keeping only your last unless you pay.

> dropbox.com/security

tl;dr dropbox's security is probably far better than what you do, with one big caveat.

here's also what dropbox business provides, which as an iso 270001 certification
dropbox.com/en/help/238

your free account will probably have similar characteristics, but not certified.

the big caveat is that what you store on dropbox is not encrypted unless you encrypt it, and so, ... if you are storing sensitive data there, your own financial records, your medical records, your inventions, your data and want it encrypted, that's on you to do so.

but you can do so, and there are 3rd party programs to help

nextofwindows.com/top-3-free-encryption-tools-to-protect-your-data-stored-in-the-cloud
alternativeto.net/software/boxcryptor-classic/

fwiw, I use boxcryptor (classic) to create a 1G encrypted partition/folder in my dropbox space and store the stuff that needs encryption there. I've had no problems with that and on windows that folder turns into a drive letter so it's very easy to use (Personal (P:)).

There are more secure dropbox services than dropbox.

BUT, dropbox really isn't a backup solution. You can use it as one, and it is free, but if you want cloud backup, that's more like:
carbonite
backblaze
mozy

pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2288745,00.asp

The difference between these and dropbox can be:

+ versions extend past 30 days, though often the number of versions is either unlimited or 10 or something like that
+ full system backup so you can trash your disk and have a byte for byte copy fedex'd to you
+ you can fed'ex a harddisk of terabytes for them to back up
+ continuous and scheduled backup

[Billie from Ockham]

(my screenshots seem to be getting blurrier & blurrier, not sure why as they look fine when I take the 'cap)

We covered this in my women's studies class this morning. Screen shots are pictures of what you can see on your screen. So if your screen is dirty or you don't have your glasses on, it will be blurry.

And those guys in STEM classes think we can't do tek.

Or is it tech?

Whatever.

Lol

[Skep tickle]

MA = Madeleine Albright

Ah. Now I recognize it; thanks.

[x_?_x]

Phil Plait remains a cunt.

Yup.

He blocked me on Twitter a long time ago for calling him out on the Hunt stuff. I was snarky but certainly not abusive.

I don't care about being blocked, though. I care about fucking witch hunts. And Plait has shown his full colors as a witch-hunter. What a scumbag.

I mean, Hunt unambiguously was joking about segregating labs by gender. The joke was reported as a serious suggestion, and he was raked over the coals for it, losing his (honorary) positions and having his reputation ruined.

Then when it comes out that it was a joke, these fuckers shift the goalposts entirely, saying, "It's just a joke is no excuse."

Why can't you just fucking acknowledge that you witch-hunted someone on a lie? You can still have the opinion that the joke was unacceptable, but OWN UP TO YOUR SHIT. If the joke hadn't been misreported as a dead-serious suggestion, none of this would have happened, and you know it.

If hell existed, there'd be a special place in it for people like Phil Plait.

Did you read the medium post?

I'll be honest, that's a lot of information to wade through. If I read that medium without any prior context, I'd be hard-pressed to change my opinion.

[Guest_0048cc29]

Oh, and Dropbox has gone down, apparently for 2 - 3 days in January 2014, but your files were still on your laptop, they just weren't being sync'd to the cloud.

It is a mostly bugfree, easy experience, but like anything dealing with computers, it's not completely bugfree or totally easy.

For instance, don't store your git repositories in dropbox, especially if you are sync'ing your laptop with another computer elsewhere.

Dropbox syncs are pretty good, but I don't believe they can detect conflicting edits made by 2 or more people to the same file at the same time.

[tina]

What's going for this view?

1. categorization as a disease in the culture (i.e., not a voluntary behaviour or false claim):
   They don't see it as a disease, but as terms such as "oppression" and "hatred", which they conceptualize (conceptual metaphors again) in medical terms, such as that it "spreads", that speech is "inflammatory", Namazie's speech was a "risk". these are not uncommon ways to describe it, but it's not in isolation.
2. widespread familiarity in the culture;
   If we take "oppression" that makes people feel weak and ill, I'd say so.
3. complete lack of familiarity or misunderstanding of the condition to people in other cultures;
   That's certainly the case.
4. no objectively demonstrable biochemical or tissue abnormalities (signs);
   I guess that would be the case.
5. the condition is usually recognized and treated by the folk medicine of the culture.
   Safe Spaces, support, emotional comfort, pillowforts...

I know that applying one area of things to another is often with a bit of 'bending' criteria ever so slightly, granted, but that is not to say that there is nothing to it, or that the phenomenon isn't in some way related (where anyway here to speculate).

...And of course, you CAN be 'saved' if you sign up. To make it self-policing is the neat trick (like religion); but to make it self-perpetuating without the input of the Vatican or the Kremlin, is another, even neater, trick.

[Guest_0048cc29]

I found the medium post weird. Yes, it was long. It was very very long.

A lot of people seemed to think that being very long must mean it was brilliant, authoritative, even well-researched with unassailable conclusions.

Mainly it was long, but it seemed to repeat the same distortions as before.

It did claim to (and may have) bring in new evidence or clarify when a comment quoted by Mensch may have been pasted together out of two tweets, or two comments (but from the same person in the same conversation). And some other things too.

But though long, there were no citations, no timeline, and a lot of fuzzy thinking.

So iirc, there was a claim that the conference was a buzz immediately after the speech, and hence, IT WAS A BIG DEAL, but no support for that claim other than from the St. Louis's and Blums. How abuzz was it? What was the buzz about? No evidence.

It did report that many of the people heard the speech via translators, and I think admitted that may not be the best way to hear speeches, and then went on to quote many people where English is not their primary language, who may have heard it through translators, agreeing with the premise that what Hunt said was sexist, though iirc, not all agreed it was that bad.

Similarly they quoted some pretty young recent grads stating Hunt's joke was out of line for 2015, and suspecting Hunt may be old, or never undergone the feminist indoctrination they were blessed with as undergrads.

There is some ongoing to do over the paper naming one of the woman, who up until now had not been named as a source due to possible blowback on her career. The authors defended that doxing saying it was such an easy doxing it was her fault, and Paula Higgins threatened Mensch with EU Data Protection violations since Higgins knows that for Mensch to have seen an email Higgins thinks she saw that Higgins must have violated the EU rules along with a cohort in the ERC. Mensch lol'd.

But it was very long and so probably authoritative and well researched and that should put an end to all discussion, I would say the matter is settled, because it was so long.

[Guest_0048cc29]

To be fair, the authors defend the doxing by saying

+ it was such an easy doxing it was her fault
+ it was necessary to dox her because her anonymous testimony has been understood to be an impartial witness with no relationship to the various parties involved but in fact, they felt, maybe correctly, she was not an impartial witness and she had a conflict of interest having a substantial (professional) relationship with Hunt's sponsor on the trip. (IIRC).

[free thoughtpolice]

Now Thunderf00t's thugs are trying to silence Laughing Witch. :evil:
[youtube]IHFk1MJwkKo[/youtube]

[Skep tickle]

Holy smokes. The Red Pill Movie kickstarter is up to $210,588 (with 35 minutes to go).

[KiwiInOz]

https://thehostages.files.wordpress.com ... ozaki6.jpg

Now, to cleanse your eyes, from the previous post. Please enjoy some Ai Shinozaki.

Yay. another lurker is back.

:icon-eek:

[KiwiInOz]

"In her tirade, Luther screams “Who the fuck hired you?” at Christakis. But further research reveals that Luther actually served on the search committee that chose Christakis as the master of Silliman College. So, when Luther screams “who the fuck hired you,” the answer is, in some part, herself."

http://dailycaller.com/2015/11/09/meet- ... professor/

Yeah, "serial rapist" Michael Shermer posted the link on his facebook and got attacked for doxxing a child.

Of course he was attacked (Standard Operating Procedure) But these proto-fascist SJW's are out there in the public sphere fucking over peoples lives and I have zero sympathy for any of them anymore.

Mind you, I look at some of the comments on that daily caller article and I want to put them all in the feckin sack, beat the sack with a large stick, and throw it off the bridge.

[DaveDodo007]

The hardest part of being a woman is loving your body and conversely feeling horrible about your looks because something always seems less than ideal.... But sure trivialize what it means to a woman by telling us its all just makeup and clothes and developing confidence.

:violin:

[youtube]ienVsy0VtIg[/youtube]

If women didn't work so hard to be pretty, they'd be treated like men.

They should listen to their Aunty Britney.

[youtube]pt8VYOfr8To[/youtube]

[Brive1987]

Holy smokes. The Red Pill Movie kickstarter is up to $210,588 (with 35 minutes to go).

Wow. Tropes vs Women "only" got 158K for a series of videos.

Still can't see any good coming from using MRA personalities as a metaphor for the push back against third wave intersectional feminism.

[Brive1987]

Assuming that's how it rolls.

[tina]

Mind you, I look at some of the comments on that daily caller article and I want to put them all in the feckin sack, beat the sack with a large stick, and throw it off the bridge.

Yup....me too. :roll:

[ThreeFlangedJavis]

Fortunately(?), the radfems don't seem to be gathered in a single party under an authoritarian central command. The heavens forbid they should ever manage to found such a party and gain political traction.

Not the rank and file, however there are very influential feminist organisations like NOW in the US. I do get the impression from listening to Erin Pizzey that the takeover of feminism by the Marxists in the 60's/70's was very organized and what we see now is the fruit of deliberate infiltration of academia and government funded 'charitable' organisations. The feminist narrative is now so firmly rooted that central control is not needed. It's all self-perpetuating. The dogma, in common with cults, contains many thought terminating elements and provides the susceptible with ways of dismissing counter arguments in order to maintain the belief. We are at the stage where even the victims of the narrative, particularly white males, can't see the extent of the distortion.

Is there evidence for this Marxist infiltration? Like, KGB money flow, filmed meetings of KGB agents or American communist leaders with feminist leaders and so on? It's easy getting the impression of a conspiracy, but the proof is in the politburo.

Not Marxist infiltration as in East German agitators. Marxist infiltration as in infiltration by people with an ideology inspired by Marxism. No direct evidence, but the experiences related by Pizzey certainly point to a deliberate and directed strategy carried out by people with a Marxist bent. The first feminist meeting Pizzey went to way back when even featured posters of chairman Mao. Besides, the Marxist flavour of collectivist radfem flapdoodle is fairly obvious.

[tina]

Not Marxist infiltration as in East German agitators. Marxist infiltration as in infiltration by people with an ideology inspired by Marxism. No direct evidence, but the experiences related by Pizzey certainly point to a deliberate and directed strategy carried out by people with a Marxist bent. The first feminist meeting Pizzey went to way back when even featured posters of chairman Mao. Besides, the Marxist flavour of collectivist radfem flapdoodle is fairly obvious.

Are you referring to any particular interview or writing from Erin Pizzey where she talks about this aspect?

[Matt Cavanaugh]

Bloomingdales in trouble for date rape advert:

https://ca.style.yahoo.com/post/1330107 ... -promoting

“Spike your best friend’s egg nog when they’re not looking,” the caption reads alongside an image of two models dressed to impress. She’s wearing a lace skirt and a white tuxedo blazer with black lapels, throwing her head back jollily, while a man in a tuxedo looks on with a mischievous look.

https://40.media.tumblr.com/5cbdc7096fe ... 68_540.jpg

He's looking longingly at the tied-up dude on the other page. Cuz all male models are homos.

She's not laughing; she's getting ready to throw up lunch. Cuz all female models are bulimics.

[ConcentratedH2O, OM]

Yay. It is snowing.

/snowprivilege

And I still have to buck up some logs and split some firewood.

You'll probably need a bigger tool for all that bucking. I could help you out with that.

You've got Katamari round at yours again?

[Matt Cavanaugh]

Yay. It is snowing.

/snowprivilege

And I still have to buck up some logs and split some firewood.

You'll probably need a bigger tool for all that bucking. I could help you out with that.

You've got Katamari round at yours again?

another lurker & I bucked this afternoon. How 'bout the rest of you?

[Matt Cavanaugh]

I invited katamari, but I guess I was wearing the wrong color bandana.

[ConcentratedH2O, OM]

I invited katamari, but I guess I was wearing the wrong color bandana.

He's a size queen. He was probably in your stables while you were bucking.

[Skep tickle]

On a more serious note, in one of the articles, it turns out that the white wall was a bathroom wall. So it was just some asshole in the shitter.

Several conservative sites are reporting that there doesn't appear to be evidence that the "poop swastika" existed. (It appears that they're the only ones asking the question.)

http://thefederalist.com/2015/11/10/was ... iant-hoax/

http://thefederalist.com/2015/11/11/mee ... -swastika/

90% of the article at the 1st of those 2 links is quoted below; go to the site to see/follow the many links within the article there:

There’s only one problem: no evidence of the alleged incident, in which a poop swastika on the wall of a dormitory restroom was reported, has ever been made publicly available. Did this incident occur as reported, or was it an immaculate defecation that formed the foundation of an unimaginable deception?

According to Billy Donley, the president of Mizzou’s Residence Halls Association (RHA), the poop swastika was reported at approximately 2:00 a.m. on October 24, 2015.

“On Saturday, October 24th, at 2:00am an individual came into one of the restrooms in Gateway Hall and drew a swastika on the wall with their own feces,” Donley wrote in a letter several days after the alleged incident. “This event happened while many students, including myself, were already asleep.”

Later in his letter, Donley noted that he only found out about the alleged vandalism incident “via a flyer posted on the walls” of the dorm.

Although Donley did not respond to repeated requests for comment prior to publication, The Federalist spoke with two RHA staffers while trying to get in touch with Donley. Neither had personally witnessed the poop swastika. When asked if there was any photographic evidence of the alleged incident, one staffer replied, “Not to my knowledge.”

Frankie Minor, the director of residential life at Mizzou, did not respond to repeated requests for comment on whether he personally saw the poop swastika or any photographic evidence of it.

The Federalist also attempted to contact Christian Basi, the associate director of the University of Missouri News Bureau, who previously told the Columbia Missourian on Oct. 30 that the incident had been immediately reported to Mizzou police. Basi did not respond to requests for comment prior to the publication of this article.

Calls to the University of Missouri Police Department, which responded to and investigated the alleged poop swastika incident, also failed to yield any evidence of the poopstika.

Multiple activists on Twitter pointed to this photo as proof that the incident occurred as reported, but a Google search for the same image shows that it has been floating around the Internet for nearly a year. A reddit thread from November of 2014 appears to contain the earliest publication of the photo in question, meaning that it most certainly does not constitute proof of the incident alleged to have occurred at Mizzou on October 24, 2015.

Maj. Brian Weimer, the public information officer for the Mizzou police department, told The Federalist that he also did not personally see the poop swastika that was reported to police. When asked if anyone in the police department personally witnessed the swastika, Maj. Weimer clammed up and referred all questions about the incident to the university’s custodian of public records.

The Federalist also repeatedly contacted @ConcernedStudent1950, the Twitter account representing Mizzou protesters who issued a series of demands of university administrators after the alleged poop swastika incident made headlines. The individuals running the @CS1950 account failed to produce any photographic or documentary evidence of the incident prior to publication of this article.

While a mere absence of evidence is not synonymous with evidence of absence, the complete lack of any verifiable photographic evidence of the alleged poop swastika and the lack of any named eye witnesses raises serious questions about the veracity of a racially charged incident of vandalism that eventually led to the resignation of the University of Missouri’s two top administrators.

Did the incident happen as reported, or did two university administrators resign over protests that were sparked by a hoax? And if the incident did happen as reported, a proposition for which no publicly available evidence currently exists, how did university administrators and law enforcement authorities confirm that the vandalism was driven by racial animosity, as opposed to being promulgated as a public relations stunt meant to tar the university for failing to provide an environment free of racist invective? It would not be the first time a public university fell victim to a high profile PR stunt that was later revealed to be a fabrication. Either way, students, their parents, university employees, and Missouri taxpayers deserve solid, verifiable answers based on clear evidence about what exactly transpired in that Gateway Wall bathroom in the early morning of October 24.

Under the provisions of Missouri’s broad public records laws, The Federalist has requested from the University of Missouri copies of any and all records relating to the alleged vandalism, including any police or incident reports describing the investigation of the poop swastika by law enforcement authorities, as well as any photographic records of the alleged swastika, and will make that information available if and when it is received from university officials.

[another lurker]

I invited katamari, but I guess I was wearing the wrong color bandana.

He's a size queen. He was probably in your stables while you were bucking.

KD is also into bairs. How many of Matt's horses identify as bairs I wonder?*







*species is a social construct

[Phil_Giordana_FCD]

Whether the poopstika (eh!) existed or not is irrelevant. The important thing is that it sparked a discussion on a very serious problem. And even if he was innocent, he still can learn from the experience.

Or whatever. Same shit, different day.

[fuzzy]

Wow. Nobody knows if the poop swastika was an inch big or twelve feet tall?

[tina]

Don't think Peezee quite has a handle on this issue quite yet....

[KiwiInOz]

Wow. Nobody knows if the poop swastika was an inch big or twelve feet tall?

Or was a Rorschach smear.

[Shatterface]

Don't think Peezee quite has a handle on this issue quite yet....

If a group of white students gathered together to discuss race would Peezus be happy if they shut out the press?

He's a fucking retard, no doubt about it.

[ConcentratedH2O, OM]

I invited katamari, but I guess I was wearing the wrong color bandana.

He's a size queen. He was probably in your stables while you were bucking.

KD is also into bairs. How many of Matt's horses identify as bairs I wonder?*







*species is a social construct

I don't care, I'm gonna do it. I am doxxing Mykeru. This man/bear love should not be kept apart:

http://i.imgur.com/ygdrZzS.jpg

Just look at his ballsack, quivering with rage hot jizz.

[CommanderTuvok]

Oh dear. Tentacle rapist PZ Myers really misses the cruise liner with that rambling nonsense.

[Sunder]

PZ's skull is so dense a neutrino couldn't wiggle through.

[CommanderTuvok]

I've only just clicked, but the college at Yale is called SILLIMAN college.

You couldn't make that fucking shit up.

[Clarence]

On a more serious note, in one of the articles, it turns out that the white wall was a bathroom wall. So it was just some asshole in the shitter.

Several conservative sites are reporting that there doesn't appear to be evidence that the "poop swastika" existed. (It appears that they're the only ones asking the question.)

http://thefederalist.com/2015/11/10/was ... iant-hoax/

http://thefederalist.com/2015/11/11/mee ... -swastika/

90% of the article at the 1st of those 2 links is quoted below; go to the site to see/follow the many links within the article there:

There’s only one problem: no evidence of the alleged incident, in which a poop swastika on the wall of a dormitory restroom was reported, has ever been made publicly available. Did this incident occur as reported, or was it an immaculate defecation that formed the foundation of an unimaginable deception?

According to Billy Donley, the president of Mizzou’s Residence Halls Association (RHA), the poop swastika was reported at approximately 2:00 a.m. on October 24, 2015.

“On Saturday, October 24th, at 2:00am an individual came into one of the restrooms in Gateway Hall and drew a swastika on the wall with their own feces,” Donley wrote in a letter several days after the alleged incident. “This event happened while many students, including myself, were already asleep.”

Later in his letter, Donley noted that he only found out about the alleged vandalism incident “via a flyer posted on the walls” of the dorm.

Although Donley did not respond to repeated requests for comment prior to publication, The Federalist spoke with two RHA staffers while trying to get in touch with Donley. Neither had personally witnessed the poop swastika. When asked if there was any photographic evidence of the alleged incident, one staffer replied, “Not to my knowledge.”

Frankie Minor, the director of residential life at Mizzou, did not respond to repeated requests for comment on whether he personally saw the poop swastika or any photographic evidence of it.

The Federalist also attempted to contact Christian Basi, the associate director of the University of Missouri News Bureau, who previously told the Columbia Missourian on Oct. 30 that the incident had been immediately reported to Mizzou police. Basi did not respond to requests for comment prior to the publication of this article.

Calls to the University of Missouri Police Department, which responded to and investigated the alleged poop swastika incident, also failed to yield any evidence of the poopstika.

Multiple activists on Twitter pointed to this photo as proof that the incident occurred as reported, but a Google search for the same image shows that it has been floating around the Internet for nearly a year. A reddit thread from November of 2014 appears to contain the earliest publication of the photo in question, meaning that it most certainly does not constitute proof of the incident alleged to have occurred at Mizzou on October 24, 2015.

Maj. Brian Weimer, the public information officer for the Mizzou police department, told The Federalist that he also did not personally see the poop swastika that was reported to police. When asked if anyone in the police department personally witnessed the swastika, Maj. Weimer clammed up and referred all questions about the incident to the university’s custodian of public records.

The Federalist also repeatedly contacted @ConcernedStudent1950, the Twitter account representing Mizzou protesters who issued a series of demands of university administrators after the alleged poop swastika incident made headlines. The individuals running the @CS1950 account failed to produce any photographic or documentary evidence of the incident prior to publication of this article.

While a mere absence of evidence is not synonymous with evidence of absence, the complete lack of any verifiable photographic evidence of the alleged poop swastika and the lack of any named eye witnesses raises serious questions about the veracity of a racially charged incident of vandalism that eventually led to the resignation of the University of Missouri’s two top administrators.

Did the incident happen as reported, or did two university administrators resign over protests that were sparked by a hoax? And if the incident did happen as reported, a proposition for which no publicly available evidence currently exists, how did university administrators and law enforcement authorities confirm that the vandalism was driven by racial animosity, as opposed to being promulgated as a public relations stunt meant to tar the university for failing to provide an environment free of racist invective? It would not be the first time a public university fell victim to a high profile PR stunt that was later revealed to be a fabrication. Either way, students, their parents, university employees, and Missouri taxpayers deserve solid, verifiable answers based on clear evidence about what exactly transpired in that Gateway Wall bathroom in the early morning of October 24.

Under the provisions of Missouri’s broad public records laws, The Federalist has requested from the University of Missouri copies of any and all records relating to the alleged vandalism, including any police or incident reports describing the investigation of the poop swastika by law enforcement authorities, as well as any photographic records of the alleged swastika, and will make that information available if and when it is received from university officials.

It doesn't matter, sadly. If you go to pretty much any 'progressive' site, even ones that aren't strictly SJW (I'd call them Fundamentalist Progressives now that I think about it) you'll see that pretty much no one questions the narrative. Hell, on sites like KOS and such they rarely if ever acknowledge false reports of sexism, racism, or rape exist anyway, esp if the alleged oppressor is a white male or a group of the same. Down the "Memory Hole" things like Duke Lacrosse go, and if they are brought up again, at most you get wishywashyness, or concern about the 'true victims' or outright banned. The really sick shit is how much of this has spread to the local and national press organs. I know my local paper, The Baltimore Sun has hardly ever run articles that questioned even the slightest bit about anything Black Lives Matter has claimed at various places like Ferguson. The only exception is that they are a bit more 'fair' to the Freddy Grey defendents perhaps because its local news and more perhaps because not only do they have a big business relationship with Baltimore, but they've long been bootlickers (at the editorial level) of the Powers That Be around here, and accussing the mostly black and progressive city government of racism (which is what the BLM "narrative" requires) will not do.

[tina]

Oh dear. Tentacle rapist PZ Myers really misses the cruise liner with that rambling nonsense.

Sort of working their way up to justifying the gulags and the re-education camps in the comments too...but not without some pushback. :popcorn:

[Clarence]

I should mention there are two 'alternative' papers around here. One online is called the Baltimore Brew. The other one with a 40 year old history and some actual historical news chops (sadly, not anymore) is the Baltimore City Paper and it has gone from leftwing-progressive (with an occasional right wing columnist as variety) to full-bore SJW over the past few years to the extent that they had to be called out when one of their 'journalists' tried to claim that a picture of a hoodlum grabbing a ladies purse during the riots was a white woman attacking a black man.

[fuzzy]

I've only just clicked, but the college at Yale is called SILLIMAN college

https://cranberrychroniclez.files.wordp ... ysilly.gif

[Skep tickle]

Don't think Peezee quite has a handle on this issue quite yet....

Oh fer gawd's sake. This isn't about privacy inside anyone's home. This is about speech on public (state) property, and you'd think a professor at a state university would recognize the distinction.

http://www.cjr.org/united_states_projec ... ndment.php

...I mean, yes, it puzzles me why it would seem principled to the student activists to overtake a public forum for their own expressive activities and then to declare the forum a safe space, with the intent or effect of making it unavailable for others to engage in expressive activities there. That’s inconsonant with the values that underlie the First Amendment—and the theory that public forums, like the quad, have been “held in trust for the use of the public and, time out of mind, have been used for purposes of assembly, communicating thoughts between citizens, and discussing public questions,” according to the US Supreme Court. Indeed, a Missouri state law recently codified that very idea.

But the students feel passionately—with good reason—and I wouldn’t expect them to know where all of the constitutional speed bumps are located in the quad. I’ll simply implore them to consider the First Amendment’s nonexclusivity along with the righteousness of their cause.

The adults, however, are another story. Basler and Click did not respond to my requests for interviews. But based on the evidence in the video, they behaved inexcusably—as adults in positions of some authority who should have known better. They should have known better than to think that people gathered in public have a right “to be alone,” and known better than to call for “some muscle” to “get this reporter out of here.” Basler and Click treated students at their own university, journalists or not, in a way that dishonored the public trust placed in educators.

Moreover, as public employees and arguably government actors under the federal constitution, Basler and Click tried to regulate First Amendment activity in a public forum (i.e., the media’s peaceable assembly and newsgathering).* That potentially exposes them and the University of Missouri to liability under 42 USC § 1983, a federal law that allows individuals to sue public agents and entities for deprivations of civil or constitutional rights. Because of the physical contact shown on the video, it’s even possible that they could be liable for assault in the third degree under Missouri law.

I doubt, though, that Tai or Schierbecker will press the issue. As Tai told me, “I don’t have ill will toward the professors, staff, and students. I think they had good intentions but were very passionate, and I wish we could both learn something from the encounter. But, at the end of the day, the constitution is the constitution, and I’m dismayed that [faculty and staff] didn’t understand that.”

I’m equally dismayed, and in the spirit of collegiality, I’m cordially inviting Basler and Click to audit my First Amendment course. I’ll even explain what the big words mean.

News about that Missouri state law, as linked in the article above: (bolded part below is the headline)

With the passing of a new bill, students can hold protests all throughout campus
The passing of the Campus Free Expression Act makes Missouri only the second state in the country to protect students First Amendment rights in this manner.

On July 14, Gov. Jay Nixon signed Senate Bill 93, also known as the “Campus Free Expression Act.” The bill expands free speech zones on the campuses of public institutions of higher education in Missouri, such as MU’s Speakers Circle, and allows protests and speeches to take place on any outdoor space.

By eliminating free speech zones, expressive acts, such as protests and speeches, can be held throughout campuses, making college campuses “traditional public forums,” according to the bill. The bill was passed unanimously in the state Senate, making Missouri the second state along with Virginia to have passed legislation of this kind to protect the First Amendment rights of students on college campuses. ...

[CommanderTuvok]

http://i.imgur.com/sILQvHc.jpg

When all those co-ordinated attacks on ThunderFoot, Dawkins, Shermer and all the other "witches of the week" were promoted in the infamous back-channel, did Ofie doth protest at all? Did she fuck! She was often on the warpath.

I have no sympathy with her at all.

[Clarence]

Phil Plait remains a cunt.

Yup.

He blocked me on Twitter a long time ago for calling him out on the Hunt stuff. I was snarky but certainly not abusive.

I don't care about being blocked, though. I care about fucking witch hunts. And Plait has shown his full colors as a witch-hunter. What a scumbag.

I mean, Hunt unambiguously was joking about segregating labs by gender. The joke was reported as a serious suggestion, and he was raked over the coals for it, losing his (honorary) positions and having his reputation ruined.

Then when it comes out that it was a joke, these fuckers shift the goalposts entirely, saying, "It's just a joke is no excuse."

Why can't you just fucking acknowledge that you witch-hunted someone on a lie? You can still have the opinion that the joke was unacceptable, but OWN UP TO YOUR SHIT. If the joke hadn't been misreported as a dead-serious suggestion, none of this would have happened, and you know it.

If hell existed, there'd be a special place in it for people like Phil Plait.

Did you read the medium post?

I'll be honest, that's a lot of information to wade through. If I read that medium without any prior context, I'd be hard-pressed to change my opinion.

I read it.
Listened to the clip (again) magnified the picture.
I believe it was a joke and the clip and the picture tell the story. The man was happy not angry, not defensive. While our dishonest writer mentions only one woman smiling and says it was a nervous smile (its a 'perhaps' thing) there is also another person with a huge smile at the podium. Hunt is smiling. I don't see lots of people with arms crossed body language, indicating discomfort. The audio clip doesn't sound like a bunch of silent stony faced people. No one is swearing and standing up and storming out.

The audio and the photo tell the story. This medium story makes many claims but ultimately the 'star witness' for the prosecution was caught lying and no amount of handwaving and claiming so and so also saw this and trying to claim almost none of the Korean Women Scientists spoke English (I bet that if I looked that isn't even true) will change that.

And yes, as noted, the goalposts have been moved. Supposedly this man -who has mentored many women in the sciences and has good relationships with so many - was being serious. Now that it turns out it is a joke, whining about how inappropriate it is is just another deflection. I will believe audio,video, and photography over alleged eyewitnesses any day of the year and twice on Sunday.

[CommanderTuvok]

The SJW entitlement crybaby nonsense virus continues abound. Remember Sandi Thom? Nope, neither do I. I just about recall her only single ("I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker") and that was SHITE. Anyway, RADIO 2 has not play-listed her latest single (she's still releasing stuff, aparently)....and she goes on a highly amusing salty sob-fest.

[youtube]xsddvv9ca0A[/youtube]

[free thoughtpolice]

Tuvok wrote:

Did she fuck!

I'd lay odds are no, never has. :rimshot:

[Billie from Ockham]

Don't think Peezee quite has a handle on this issue quite yet....

PZ Myers is using the same, pathetic argument that many cops use when they object to be filmed: "how would you like it if I came to your house and did that?"

If you can't tell the difference between a public place and your own house, you're a moron.

As to the possibility that the poop swastika never happened, you all are missing the point. It doesn't matter if it happened or not. Swastikas will learn a valuable lesson from the incident, regardless. Or maybe poop will. One or the other.

[free thoughtpolice]

Not a poopstika, so a bit of change of pace:
[youtube]PJ2imDYaylw[/youtube]

[Aneris]

I found the medium post weird. Yes, it was long. It was very very long.

A lot of people seemed to think that being very long must mean it was brilliant, authoritative, even well-researched with unassailable conclusions.

Mainly it was long, but it seemed to repeat the same distortions as before.

It did claim to (and may have) bring in new evidence or clarify when a comment quoted by Mensch may have been pasted together out of two tweets, or two comments (but from the same person in the same conversation). And some other things too.

But though long, there were no citations, no timeline, and a lot of fuzzy thinking.

So iirc, there was a claim that the conference was a buzz immediately after the speech, and hence, IT WAS A BIG DEAL, but no support for that claim other than from the St. Louis's and Blums. How abuzz was it? What was the buzz about? No evidence.

It did report that many of the people heard the speech via translators, and I think admitted that may not be the best way to hear speeches, and then went on to quote many people where English is not their primary language, who may have heard it through translators, agreeing with the premise that what Hunt said was sexist, though iirc, not all agreed it was that bad.

Similarly they quoted some pretty young recent grads stating Hunt's joke was out of line for 2015, and suspecting Hunt may be old, or never undergone the feminist indoctrination they were blessed with as undergrads.

There is some ongoing to do over the paper naming one of the woman, who up until now had not been named as a source due to possible blowback on her career. The authors defended that doxing saying it was such an easy doxing it was her fault, and Paula Higgins threatened Mensch with EU Data Protection violations since Higgins knows that for Mensch to have seen an email Higgins thinks she saw that Higgins must have violated the EU rules along with a cohort in the ERC. Mensch lol'd.

But it was very long and so probably authoritative and well researched and that should put an end to all discussion, I would say the matter is settled, because it was so long.

One good rule of thumb to cut through confirmation bias jungles of reporting bias.

Step One

1. What did people believe before all this information transpired. What was the original news.
2. What did people believe after all this additional information transpired.
3. Did their opinions change? Was there reason to change opinions?

Step Two

People keeping opinions they adopted early on can be an indicator for confirmation bias. Of course, things that are true will stay true later on. To rule that out you check whether the first information was accurate or reliable, according to what was later reported. If the later information is different in some crucial ways, you know that you need to be careful. If you rejected the claims that were made as not substantiated enough, you don't have such problems. You don't have to accept anything, and changing stories only improve your position.

Step Three

If you found that the first information that came out was inaccurate, or is strangely missing in later reporting, or falsely portrayed as noticably more accurate than it was, you have a good reason to reject whatever claims are being made (which doesn't mean that they are untrue, see Broken Clock). Reason: HOW people arrive at a position is important.

Case: Tim Hunt

In this instance, it was first reported Tim Hunt meant his statement straight-face seriously. It was later reported that he made a joke. People can say that joking is not a sufficient defense, but then they have to argue on that basis, and not pretend the dispute was whether he made certain statements in the first place.

The authors, Dan Waddell and Paula Higgins, even introduces witnesses they then cite as having paid not attention, or having only heard a few words. How are they witnesses worth mentioning? They also introduces anachronisms, and cite one journalist witness who complains about how the situation was handled later (after the story broke), when the context at that point is finding out what happened in the first place. The later alleged situation does not retroactively make the former true.

They try to disqualify one witness, because she made inaccurate statements about the schedule. Fine, she's maybe confused. But Natalia Demina is one who has solid material in photographs and even an audio clip, and not just memory! This makes it unimportant whether she's confused or not. So why does the article spents time on this? WHat she says on the subject matter is consistent with the material she provides. The author picks out one image. Let's see...

http://i.imgur.com/0jGdajc.jpg

Demina took some photographs on her phone which Mensch purports to show his entire audience in fits of laughter. In fact, the only faces fully visible are those of Hunt, the Korean translator (standing), and a seated Korean woman. Her downcast eyes and close-lipped ‘smile’ betray body language of embarrassment rather than hilarity.

...faces fully visible

• Hunt,
• the Korean stranslator (standing)
• seated Korean woman

http://i.imgur.com/qe6PBJF.jpg?1

They're serious. What about the women on the left, also seemingly happy. That makes it four faces in full, and a sitting man almost in full and all seem happy. What should I think of authors who can't even count to four. The resolution isn't all that good, but white teeth are usually a good indicator that people are having a good time, but pretending that you can tell embarassment or even read body language from such photographs can only be meant as satire. This passage alone is a reason to disqualify everything, unless you want to double check everything they write.

Further, the article spents a lot of time casting doubt on the audio-recording. Given the reporting so far, I don't know if what he reports is true about the confused Russian journalist. It might be. But the audio clip does show that Connie St Louis claim "there was this deathly, deathly silence. Very clearly, nobody was laughing" was blatantly untrue. The authors mentions this briefly "Does the audio shed light on the story? It proves Connie St Louis was wrong when she spoke about a deathly silence", so basically, people were orginally going on false claims that left out the nature of the passage (was a joke), and it was pretended there was "deathly silence" and that made a huge part of the perception of what happened. And this only worth a short mentioning? Now we know it was a joke, and people did laugh. Why exactly should we believe this author?

The author links somewhere, disapprovingly to Louise Mensch, she complains about these things:

• Misreported Hunt’s words by omission
• Misreported Hunt’s intent
• Failed to correct the record
• Sought to give false impressions of the event
• Colluded, instead of independently reporting
• Failed to declare their conflicts of interest
• Failed to declare their positions as conference organizers
• Re-tweeted attacks on Sir Tim that their own accounts contradicted
• Attacked in gross terms the personal character of Sir Tim Hunt, including tweeting out cartoons portraying him as a racist and a misogynist

Was anything of that addressed? Barely. It was an obscurantist piece, and it's good to know that Phil Plaitt has endorsed it. He's like PZ Myers a good indicator of bullshit.

Tweets and reporting and aftermath is all stuff we can see and check ourselves. What happened in Korea is no longer verifyable. What the Hunt's defenders have brought forward is hard evidence and consistent. There's laughter. We see people who seem to smile. That he made a joke is no longer disputed (and is also consistent since Tim Hunt meet his wife at work). We also know that Dan Waddel and Paula Higgins have obscured and fabulated.

Yes. These authors begin with George Orwell. Cannot count to 4. Use a lo-res image that shows 4½ happy faces (as far we can tell), claim you can read the body language of a woman sitting, and downplay that the first source of everything lied that there was "deadly silence" when we can in fact hear laughter, even if briefly (record ends), which happens to be consistent with the image (as far we can tell).

In sum...
https://i.imgur.com/2VVXkAi.png

[Ape+lust]

Phil Plait remains a cunt.

Darling Phil, a cunt? The best non-objectifying, non-horndoggy ally a woman ever had?

http://imgur.com/xuoF0RU.png

http://imgur.com/wXarHHY.png