Vox Day: "Feminism is a Satanic, anti-Christian, anti-reason, anti-science ideology that destroys literally everything it touches and everyone who embraces it."

@ skiriki – why would you ever wake up? Your dream land sounds delightful!

@grumpyoldnurse:

Well… there’s this risk of “looking for a toilet-dream” starting to happen, whether or not I want it. 😀

Essentially, people in the “Third World” have the same problems that “middle-class, white feminists” fight for too. They worry about makeup and the internet and they watch television and read magazines. They worry about street harassment and violence against women too.

Everything is not just dirt and violence in “Third World Countries”, and telling white people that they need to go and fix the poor, poor brown people’s problems is fucking racist as hell. Every time we white people get involved with the affairs of other countries (save for one or two examples, and then we did it with reservation) we always manage to fuck things up for them. It shouldn’t be up to us white people to fix the problems of other people. We are not magical, all-knowing beings who can do no wrong. In reality, we tend to fuck other people’s lives up because of this bullshit “white man knows best” attitude.

So, the whole argument of “why aren’t you helping out third world countries then instead of bullying poor white men in the US?!?!?!?” is a sad, racist attempt at a derail and devaluation of the problems of white women because our Teal Deer thinks the Oppression Olympics are a Thing, and is of the opinion that we can’t care about more than one thing at once. (Because it seems like they certainly can’t.)

Bingo.

Plus, that kind of derailing is totally inane…what exactly are we supposed to do about “those poor oppressed women Over There”, anyway? What CAN we do, unless we drop everything we’re doing here and spend our life savings to go on a futile crusade in the Middle East, where they’d just look at us like we’d lost our marbles if we tried that? Nothing…and that’s exactly what these trolls are hoping we’ll do here, too. It’s supposed to neutralize us and stop us from fighting for our rights over here, where we CAN do that, and WIN.

But, since unlike those duders, we can walk and chew gum at the same time, we can not only support, say, Saudi and Egyptian women’s fight against street harassment, but also fight on the same front over here. And realize that those women face the same problems we do, and therefore the fight against those problems is global. Our problems are not “trivial compared to theirs”, they are practically identical to theirs. Women there get killed by sexist men? So do women here. The only difference is that men here wave bibles or the Second Amendment as justification, instead of a Qur’an. Wow! BIG DIFFERENCE!

And yet, MRAs are trying to stop us from fighting them, the Anglo-Amurrican-Australian-European Taliban, by saying “Look over there! Women have it worse! Shut up, bitches!” Irony is clearly lost on the ironic.

My impression is that lucid dreaming is less well known than it might be for two reasons – no cultural reinforcement and insufficient sleep. If you consciously attempt to remember your dreams, you are more likely to go lucid, and if you sleep more than seven hours, you are more likely to have dreams that you remember.

Most Western cultures that I’m aware of minimize the significance of dreams, and fewer people sleep a full night than perhaps they should. My husband jokes that lucid dreaming is a perfect hobby for me, because the two important elements are sleep and thinking.

Skiriki, that dream world sounds great! Do you mind if I try finding it myself some night?

OMG, are we twins or what? IBS, check. Toilet dreams, check. One of the worst ones I had recently had a glass wall as a hallway-side wall. At that point, my brain decided that enough was enough, and woke me up. Cue dash to actual, real-world bathroom.

Yup, that’s usually how mine work, too. Luckily, I’ve never wet or soiled the bed during such a dream…I always wake up in time to make it to the real bathroom. But I’m still paranoid that there’s always gonna be that one time I forget. Maybe that’s why those dream-bathrooms are all so disgusting and horrid and wrong…so I don’t end up “going” while I’m still asleep! Thanks, Weird Brain!

(PS: Go Mouse Farts! Knock ’em dead!)

I’ve never fancied trying lucid dreaming, but I would dearly love to be able to call up memories of crossing the veil at night (some would call it astral travel but that has all sorts of associations that just don’t fit). I just want fuller memories of the time I spend at Home with Louis and the critters. These days I’m not getting any.

Semi-related bit of good news: I’ve just had confirmation of my spot in a life-writing workshop that starts in a couple of weeks! Just a short course, a couple of hours a week, but it sounds fun, and unlike creative writing courses, relates to what I write.

@Robert:

Skiriki, that dream world sounds great! Do you mind if I try finding it myself some night?

Well go ahead, although I don’t think it goes beyond my brain, but no doubt there’s a variation of them inside everyone. So going to look for them is always worth some dreamtime.

Did I mention that the lake water is always just the right temperature? You don’t get too hot, or too cold. I was sort of relieved to see that it had golden/orange koi couple of dreams ago, instead of pikes. Pikes are meanies; in real world, every summer one or two goes nomnomnom on swimmers’ little piggies. While the damage is at most punctures to toes, it is still something one doesn’t want to think of while going skinny-dipping, for example…

I’ve just had confirmation of my spot in a life-writing workshop that starts in a couple of weeks! Just a short course, a couple of hours a week, but it sounds fun, and unlike creative writing courses, relates to what I write.

Yay! That sounds fantastic. Can’t wait to hear more!

I shall report in, Bina! 😀

Kirbywarp, I think those peeps are cosplaying cumuli.

Re: Babe:

The sequel (very underrated, IMO) is even darker; some of it’s almost Burton-esque. I think the fact that it’s so dark is why most people haven’t even heard of it, actually, but it’s definitely worth a watch if you can track it down.

… Also, just to be pedantic over a 20-year-old kid’s movie, Rosanna was a duck, not a goose. ^^;

*Kids’ movie. More than one kid.

I think the photo that fruitloopsie posted is from Wellington, because that looks like Te Papa in the background, and given there is a person dressed as a Fred Dagg type farmer behind them, I think they’re in costume for the Wellington Sevens.

It’s an annual sporting event where many in the crowd dress up: http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/culture/6716763/Wellington-hunting-for-another-major-event

Picture of Te Papa from the harbour: http://www.newswire.co.nz/2012/03/entry-fee-unlikely-to-deter-overseas-visitors/

Te Papa looks amazing. I’d love to visit it if I ever get the chance to visit NZ at all.

I’ll even take you myself. The museum is free to get in, although it has some visiting exhibits that have an entry fee.

I hope I’m in a position to do trips again eventually! I’d love to visit NZ and see you!

Aw, I missed all the lambasting. I’ll put one shot in anyhow.

Even if a pelvic exam were somehow not rape and a woman didn’t find it offensive, there is no way I would ever date or marry someone who believes it is okay for her sexual organs to be penetrated by another person’s fingers and metal tools. If this person weren’t a “doctor”, most people would call this cheating.

Yeah! And if someone who wasn’t a “licensed surgeon” cut you open and took out your appendix, most people would call that bodily mutilation and attempted murder! It’s almost as if society has some kind of bizarre double standard where medical professionals are trusted to undertake actions that we would never want someone else to do.

The sequel (very underrated, IMO) is even darker; some of it’s almost Burton-esque. I think the fact that it’s so dark is why most people haven’t even heard of it, actually, but it’s definitely worth a watch if you can track it down.

I was not impressed by the sequel. Parts of it were bizarrely dark, but other parts were manic and silly; it didn’t seem to know either what age category or what tone it was going for. Plus the plot didn’t really make sense.

kirby:

Matthew does know about prostate exams, right? And catheters? Medicine requires all sorts of lovely things to be inserted into every orifice imaginable.

And during surgery they (“surgeons”) even make new orifices to stick things in, sometimes entire hands and foreign objects. Sick, sick “people”.

Yep! Every orifice imaginable!

My favorite thing to insert are nasopharyngeal airway adjuncts. Those things are fun. They slide so prettily right up the nose! Well, as long as you don’t forget lube. Really, don’t forget lube. Not fun.

(Note: not a surgeon. I’m only allowed to play with some of the orifices, not all of them. But we hear about all the other orifices… ER docs are scary. Good people, but scary.)

sunnysombrera:

I think you found Dawkins’ problem.

Don’t get me started on him, he’s as much an extremist as any of the preachers he rails against.

Don’t get me started on him, he’s as much an extremist as any of the preachers he rails against.

lith, my feelings exactly!

All those “hundreds of thousands” in “tuition” for “medical school”, and years of additional “clinical training”…just an elaborate cover so pervs can hang out a shingle and lure unsuspecting women into their office for “pap smears”.

He has the same attitude about dentists. He boasts that he hasn’t seen one in decades and his teeth are in perfect condition thanks to a special secret toothbrushing technique he discovered that he gets really offended when no one asks him about it. One lady diplomatically said he was “lucky” and he went off on her in his blog, calling her a sheeple and people who see dentists lazy and irresponsible because they’re relying on someone else to fix their messes for them. (The notion of preventive care isn’t on his radar, apparently.)

I don’t know how he can know his teeth are in perfect health. Gum disease and decay under the gumline aren’t necessarily visible to the untrained eye, and they start to accelerate with age. Even if you floss religiously, tartar still builds up over time. That stuff can only be removed by a trained professional with the right tools.

kirby:

So a person could start to learn that things follow strict patterns, stay unexposed to the wide variety of human experience, and be convinced that their profession means that they have a high IQ, and are therefore better thinkers than most. Therefore all their preconceptions must already be validated.

This describes my eldest so accurately – we’re trying to teach him out of it and I think he’s improved slightly, but the arrogance is still hanging around. He treats his guesses as facts, even in the face of “Actually I know for sure that you’re wrong”, and even in the face of evidence tries to find some way in which he was still right. Don’t be that guy!

He shouldn’t diss the sheeple about teeth.
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Ahhhh! Nobody’s making any sweaters from that sheep!!

Really, I don’t care what Matthew does with his teeth, but it’s fascinating how he’s managed to twist his personal phobias (nudity, the dentist) into evidence that he is superior to the rest of the population. That’s some Olympic-level mental gymnastics right there.

Hopefully his manky teeth superiority will keep him a safe distance from all us sheeple types.

Oh, and for the real horror of upsetting sheeple, you can’t go past …

http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BNzcwMTA1MjEzMl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNzE0MzQ0MQ@@._V1_SY317_CR0,0,214,317_AL_.jpg

Buttercup:

I don’t know how he can know his teeth are in perfect health. Gum disease and decay under the gumline aren’t necessarily visible to the untrained eye, and they start to accelerate with age. Even if you floss religiously, tartar still builds up over time. That stuff can only be removed by a trained professional with the right tools.

Yep, I hit the age where it becomes a problem fairly recently. Much more brushing, flossing and mouth-washing necessary every day now mostly in the hope it doesn’t get worse (and the secret hope it’ll get better).

The teeth thing could be true. I went more than 20 years without dental care and there was no harm in it. My secret brushing technique was not forgetting to do it. My entire life, I have preferred milk over any other beverage my entire life, which gave me pretty strong teeth, and I also started to drink green tea, straight, in quantity in my 30s.

I finally had to go to a dentist because I wanted my teeth straightened, and they wouldn’t agree to give me braces if I didn’t do the regular checkups. I had some tartar but nothing more than most people develop between cleanings.

My reason for what could be viewed as a stupid, stupid move was that I am terrified of dentists. I chose a dentist who would agree to give me sedation if I needed it, which I knew I would if I had to have any fillings (hooray I didn’t).

Unlike Matthew, I’m not going to claim this is generalizable to the universe, or that people without my phobia should stop going to the dentist, or that what I did was especially smart. However, he is not necessarily blowing smoke up his own ass with that one.

kittehserf:

It’s the whole, “You’re WRONG!” attitude. You have irrefutable proof that there is no deity? Really? Or is it just a belief? And why do you feel the need to tell everyone else they must also believe it? I fail to see how it’s any different – unprovable existence of something versus unprovable nonexistence of something.

Must. Stop. Incoming. Rant.
Grrrr. Fanatics.

I’m kind of amused at how this thread turned into an open thread.

@PoM:

It has really, hasn’t it? Heh.

On an unrelated note, Ched Evans apologising for the backlash and disassociating himself from it and the people doing it:

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/ched-evans-wholeheartedly-apologises-to-the-woman-concerned-in-rape-case-after-oldham-deal-collapses-9965308.html

and Oldham aren’t signing him seemingly due to pressure from sponsors and (sadly) threats to staff and their families.

PoM – Yeah, it is true that some people can get away with less dental care than others. Mouth bacteria, saliva composition, diet, access to fluoride, and genetics all have a lot to do with oral health. Some people can brush a lot and still get cavities, others can be more cavalier about it. I wasn’t terribly diligent about getting regular cleanings during my twenties and early thirties, mainly due to lack of insurance, and my teeth got along fine – but now that I’m in my forties, I’m having to get regular cleanings and step up my tooth care regime. Physical wear and tear alone takes a toll, plus changing hormones affect how dry your mouth gets (and thus how long the acid-secreting bacteria hang around after meals).

Matthew seems to have the cause and effect backwards. It’s not that his teeth are healthy because he doesn’t go to the dentist. They’re healthy in spite of it.

He reminds me of my college boyfriend, who was a Christian Scientist. He claimed he never got sick or needed to go to the doctor because prayer took care of everything, so other people (such as our future hypothetical children) shouldn’t need doctors either. I was like “yeah, but you’re young and healthy – prayer has nothing to do with keeping the doctors away, you’ve just self-selected into a belief system that rewards pre-existing good health.” Needless to say, we broke up.

Thus Spake ZaraButtercup Q. Skullpants:

One lady diplomatically said he was “lucky” and he went off on her in his blog, calling her a sheeple and people who see dentists lazy and irresponsible because they’re relying on someone else to fix their messes for them. (The notion of preventive care isn’t on his radar, apparently.)

That’s another thing typical of techbros, in my experience: Many of them tend to ascribe any possible illness or dysfunction to “bad lifestyle choices”. They don’t understand that an ounce of prevention really is worth a pound of cure — and far cheaper to boot.

The thing that bothers me most is the arrogance.

I actually have no problem with people who, for whatever reason, do not seek medical or dental care or certain components thereof. If you’ve got a hang up about someone else having their hands in your mouth, or you honestly do (for yourself only) liken a pelvic exam to molestation, and you are an adult and you understand the risks that you are putting yourself at, fine, refuse anything. Do not, however, have the unabashed bloody arrogance to tell everyone else that they are weak little sheeple who need to wake up!

Also (and I know others have said it on this thread) stop bloody conflating your own bloody good luck and privilege with good bloody management! /endrant

Sorry, everyone, but thanks, too!

@ Pocket Nerd – I’ve also met this type, They neglect themselves for decades and then get mad when “medical science” can’t fix them. It’s called medical science, d00d, not medical magic!

This isn’t the first time “Matthew” has joined us, is it? Wasn’t he skulking around about a month ago complaining about how the courts are keeping him from disciplining his son because they let him live with his mother or something?

He’ll change his mind about going to the dentist if he ever gets an abcess.

I’ve seen a report saying police say their were no threats to Oldham’s staff and fgamily. Thank goodness.

Buttercup Q. Skullpants, I sincerely hope your ex has either changed his views or does not have children. I hate when kids suffer needlessly because their parents have some goofy views regarding doctors and medicine

@Plaatsvervangende Schaamte

Wasn’t that one of the Allman guys?

…my awful bathroom dreams — invariably, when I look for a bathroom in my dreams, there will be something about it that makes it impossible to use: no doors, no locks on the doors, toilets too dirty or broken, or no toilet stalls at all, just a long row of outhouse seats completely exposed, and people everywhere looking at me like I’ve lost my mind. Of course, I always get that one right before I wake up needing a bathroom for real…

This is rather common for me, too, and they always vary; I never get the same scenario twice.

Another one that’s fairly common is the I’m-late-for-work-and-can’t-dial-the-phone-properly dream. My favorite dreams have always involved going into familiar buildings and finding all kinds of secrets rooms and passages.

Dreams are fascinating. Teal deers, not so much!

@POM, Plaatsverrvangende Schaamte:

I thought it was one of the Allman’s, but it’s been a while and they all blend together. I remember a strong banhammer on whoever it was, because they got a bit scary and disgusting.

Sex is not simply a form of entertainment to make you feel good about yourself. It’s meant to create life. It’s disturbing that this isn’t obvious to more people.

And why exactly is sex not a form of entertainment? If sex doesn’t entertain you, don’t do it unless you want a baby. Easy peasy, right?

What gets me about some of these authoritarian prude types is: If humans are sooo speshul and totes different from animals, why is sex so sacrosanct? Why is it bad and awful for teh sooper speshul hyoomans to be creative with sex because all teh anumuls only do it for the babbies*? This seems to be silly argument. Not that this is what I think Matthew is saying (and I’m not going to read his bog to find out) but it is a set of arguments I’ve seen a lot.

And the spiritual freedom of pets? My cat is terrified of the outdoors and would probably be dead within a month of being “freed.” Matthew doesn’t seem to know that most domesticated species wouldn’t last long without humans. Maybe he feels they shouldn’t exist anymore anyway. What I’d like to know is whether he thinks everyone should be a vegan or that everyone should hunt for their meat**.

*Plus that’s not even true!
**Again, not going to read his bog.

@Skye Last I heard, he was married and had a couple of kids. Hopefully the kids haven’t had any major medical issues (or maybe his wife persuaded him to allow doctors). The Church has gotten a lot of negative publicity in the past few years from children who’ve been denied care and died needlessly. Recently they’ve started to soften their stance and allow limited medical intervention in conjunction with prayer.

It wasn’t just the “no doctors” thing that was the dealbreaker, it was the whole belief system that illness is imaginary. A lump in your arm, for example, is regarded as the physical manifestation of fear or sin. It all sounds so medieval and blame-the-victim. When a patient is suffering, the last thing they need to be told is that their pain is illusory and caused by negative emotions.

I strongly dislike antivaxxers too. The childhood diseases the vaccines prevent are far, far worse than the supposed side effects of the vaccines. Then there’s the fact that they want the rest of us to bear all the risk and responsibility of getting protection, so that they can reap the benefits for their own kids, who are much too precious to subject to those nasty shots. Shots are for the sheeple. But antivaxxers are perfectly happy to mooch off of herd immunity.

lith,
I completely agree with Dawkins that gods are merely fantastical creatures like mermaids and unicorns. There is a big difference between claiming things exist without evidence and claiming it doesn’t because there is no evidence of their existence, it’s an extraordinary claim and everything we know about the world points to the belief in those things evolving from animism and ancestor worship. I also think Dawkins is a douche. I don’t think that makes saying “There are no gods” arrogant. I don’t mock or complain about people’s supernatural beliefs here, even though religious people have been particularly nasty to me and to people close to me because their religion tells them we are wicked. Could you please do the same for my lack of faith in the supernatural? That’d be great. My atheism has been used as an excuse to attempt to stop me from adopting. Religion has been aggressively pushed on me and on my kids. I don’t care for it but I support people’s right to believe in it and I keep my opinions to myself unless it is appropriate to the discussion. Let’s just live and let live.

I strongly dislike antivaxxers too.

Me too. Whooping cough is making a strong comeback and people are still dying in the tens of thousands from the flu every year. If this trend continues, we’re in big trouble. Antivax is gaining popularity here. It seems to go hand in hand with the spread of Libertarian politics, fundamentalism and a love for the stars and bars. It’s a nasty combination.

It’s also normally accompanied by creationism and climate change denial.