Cruise far away from Haiti to alleviate your guilty conscience!?
Posted by admin in Political correctness on 08:19 AM
Going to a beach resort in Haiti, leaving money in the impoverished country, is “unethical”. Feasting, overeating and being obese in neigboring Dominican Republic, or anywhere else in the world is ok. Political correctness going overboard.
Blogs and message boards have been full of outrage and disgust at the idea of tourists frolicking in the sun while bodies pile up in Port-au-Prince and quake survivors struggle to stay alive. [...]
“… How can you sit there and say, ‘Waiter, bring me a drink’ while I’m on a private beach … knowing that 100 miles away, people are dying,” Jones said.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/01/21/haiti.tourism.ethics/index.html
Of course, instead of talking, maybe these do-gooders should all embark to Haiti as volunteer helpers and donate all their wages to Haiti development. This would cause a positive impact. Being obese and overeating in Paris, Los Angeles or Kansas is ok. Out of sight, out of mind.
I am so glad CNN talked to a sensible intelligent person, so I don’t need to say more:
Haiti’s plight wouldn’t improve if the cruise ships were diverted to another nearby island and pretended the disaster wasn’t happening, agreed Chris MacDonald, a senior fellow at Duke University’s Kenan Institute for Ethics and a philosophy professor at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He also writes The Business Ethics Blog.
“The cruise ships aren’t hurting anyone, in fact they’re doing some good, they’re bringing some help,” MacDonald said.
People who believe it’s disrespectful for tourists to enjoy themselves so close to a disaster zone should realize that the alternative of avoiding the area wouldn’t be more respectful, MacDonald added.
The proximity sets off our gut reactions, but it doesn’t seem to make any real moral difference, he said.
Mullis pointed out that the Dominican Republic — Haiti’s touristy neighbor on the island of Hispaniola — is also close to the disaster but is doing business as usual.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/01/21/haiti.tourism.ethics/index.html
Tiger Woods a domesticated kitten (Sex Addiction treatment)
Posted by Devils Advocate in Political correctness, Teenage Sexuality on 07:21 AM
Tiger Woods can afford a Harem
Tiger Woods, super-rich, super-powerful man being a man? He could have thousands of women, and only had 14 over many years? Maybe there should be an option for marriage without “fidelity” vows! Wasn’t he faithfully taking care of wife and family? Just having a little fun on the side? This is a disease?
Multiple sources confirmed to RadarOnline.com that Tiger is being treated at the clinic which features a sexual addiction program created by Dr. Patrick Carnes, who has pioneered treatment for sexually compulsive behavior.
The Enquirer broke the world exclusive story of Tiger’s five-month affair with Rachel Uchitel. After that report appeared, more than 14 women were linked to Tiger as his secret life of cheating became public.
Poor Tiger is paying 40++ k$ for a program to make him a domesticated kitten. Why can’t poor Tiger just have fun like any rapper or basketball player? Doesn’t he devote time to his family, take excellent care of his kids?
Didn’t his wife commit acts of domestic violence against Tiger without punishment? “A double standard that excuses female violence is not “common sense” but common sexism.” http://reason.com/archives/2009/12/04/tiger-woods-and-domestic-viole
And people resenting Tiger getting special treatment, a single room and a cleaning maid? Come on, the guy is worth almost a Billion, why can’t he pay for a maid?
Tiger is believed to have booked in for a six week Gentle Path “behaviour modification” programme designed to purge him of sex addiction.
The courses, which include “shame reduction” sessions cost around s40,000 He is having individual counselling and is not expected to attend the usual group therapy sessions.
Source: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/01/21/tiger-on-the-loose-115875-21983616/
I know some good “shame reduction” training. He should stand up for being an alpha man, as he is. No shame! Stand up for enjoying some extra fun with other women. What else is power, fame, and money good for? Did he suffer? Does he need treatment?
Maybe he should convert to Islam, at least this would allow him to have 4 wives. Maybe there should be an option for “open marriage” vows!
Mel Gibson, who endured one of the bigger Hollywood scandals of recent years, said the Tiger Woods affair has been blown way out of proportion — but that it wouldn’t do the golfer any good to whine about that now.
“I feel sorry for Tiger Woods,” the actor-filmmaker, 54, told Britain’s Mail on Sunday’s Live magazine. “Why are we talking about this when we’re sending 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan? … He’s being used as a diversion, and it just drives me crazy.”
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/01/11/gibson.sorry.for.woods/index.html
Frances Inglis’ Painless Mercy Killing of Brain-Damaged Son: Murder Conviction
Posted by admin in Assisted Suicide & Right to die on 09:27 PM
An Old Bailey jury was heckled yesterday after a mother who injected her brain-damaged son with a lethal dose of heroin to end his suffering was found guilty of murder.
Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6995295.ece
She could have petitioned to court, to allow life support to be turned off, to let him die of starvation, hunger and thirst. This would have been a slow but legal way. Wait for months and years for a court verdict and then let the kid die of hunger and thirst. How humane our laws are. Typical example of human stupidity because of religious hangups.
A painless death, this is illegal. A human has only the right to starve to death. Such is human “morality”. A horse or a dog may be killed with a lethal injection for a painless death. If you killed an animal by starvation, or if you kept it alive artificially, the humane society would sue you. And this is what this mother will go to jail for: she wanted her son to die in dignity, like any dog or horse.
The family had thought of applying for a court ruling to allow Tom to die in hospital, but decided against it as it meant stopping food and water, starving him to death.
Alex added: “How can it be legal to withhold food and water, which means a slow and painful death, yet illegal to end all suffering in a quick, calm and loving way? It’s cruel and illogical. The law isn’t keeping pace with modern medicine and surgery, which is wrong as it leaves too many people in such tragic and painful existences.
Source: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/01/21/judgment-2-no-mercy-115875-21983621/
Assisted suicide and right to die (More human-stupidity.com articles)
Inglis Mercy Killing: More Sources in the Press
Abortion foes almost kill the US universal health insurance bill
Abortion foes (so called pro-lifers) in the US want to interfere into other people’s business.
None of the proposals under discussion would ban abortion. None would take away your right to buy abortion coverage with your own money. None would force you to pay for somebody else’s abortion. These are the conceptual parameters on which all sides have, for the time being, agreed.
So they already clobbered Congress into making special complicated arrangements for abortion foes (so called pro-lifers). Only for this vociferous group. Not for other special interests or religious convictions.
Abortion, we’re told, is different from other issues caught up in the health care debate. It’s a question of ultimate values, impervious to compromise. [...]
Each side has legitimate worries. Pro-choicers fear that insurers will abandon abortion coverage. Pro-lifers fear that insurers will be forced to include it. Pro-choicers fear that women won’t buy abortion coverage if the premiums are separated up front. Pro-lifers fear that abortion opponents will be suckered into abortion coverage if the premiums aren’t separated up front. We’ll have years of studies, hearings, legislation, and lawsuits to follow up on these concerns and fine-tune the policy.Source: http://www.slate.com/id/2239647/
- “Pro-lifers” are opposed to abortion and thus want to make sure their money does not go towards funding someone’s abortion
- Well I am opposed to paying for the war in Iraq. Did they make special income tax arrangements for me? Those in favor of the Iraq war can pay a special additional war tax.
- I am also against nuclear weapons. Those who want the US to have nuclear missiles should opt into a special nuclear tax option.
- I am opposed to keeping people alive in intensive care, when they are brain dead in a coma. Or when they are terminally ill and in pain and are not allowed to die.
- Some of these guys live for 15 years in intensive care in a coma.
- Very expensive.
- Can I please have a health insurance exemption so I don’t have to pay for that?
- I am totally profoundly against this artificial prolonging of life, I consider this torture. It is against my consciousness and against my religion.
- It is unnatural. In nature, very sick animals and people get mercy killing by predators.
The above items are ultimate values for me. No compromise is possible. They are my religious belief, so by no means I must be forcet to pay for unjust wars of aggression and painful prolonging of life a against a person’s will. My beliefs on the follwing items are a little less strong, still I think I deserve exemptions in order not to pay for the following items:
- I am also against paying for diseases people caused to themselves. I don’t want to pay treatment for people who
- committed suicide attempts
- abuse alcohol and drugs
- do extreme sports and have accidents due to their recklessness
- engange in criminal activities and get shot by police or rival gangs
- overeat
- don’t exercise
- I live in a hot state. I am also opposed to treat people for frost bite. That should be an add-on.
- I live on ground floor. I don’t want to pay for elevator maintenance.
So we should have 15 different voluntary private add-on insurance options for each of the following: comatose, terminally ill, obese, self-endangering, reckless, criminal, drug addicted, alcoholics, ……
Note the absurd idea that parents or young people will, at extra cost, add insurance for abortion, criminal activity, drug addiction. They will presume that they will not engange in these behaviors, that they will not need the insurance.
This is religious zealots’ terror. If you are against abortion, then don’t do abortion. But leave other people alone.
Actually, I agree that one should use better birth control, to make efforts to avoid needing abortion. But the same people who are against abortion are the ones that are sex education and promotion of birth control.
Should Parents of Obese Kids Lose Custody?
Posted by admin in Unhealty Lifestyle on 07:26 AM
But obesity appears to be the primary reason South Carolina mom Jerri Gray lost custody of her 14-year-old, 555-lb. son in May. She was arrested after missing a court date to examine whether she should retain custody after doctors had expressed concern about her son’s weight to social services. The boy is currently living with his aunt, and his mother is facing criminal child-neglect charges. [...]“It’s happening more than the public is aware of, but because these cases are usually kept quiet [as a result of child-privacy laws], we have no record,” says Dr. Matt Capehorn, who sits on the board of the U.K.’s National Obesity Forum.
Source: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1930772,00.html
Parents have an obligation to care for their little children. Parents face legal sanctions or loss of paternal rights if they do not provide basic care for their children, for example if children are
- undernourished
- unkept and dirty
- truant missing school education.
It actually makes a lot of sense, to add this list
- morbid obesity, obviously.
- Unless if proven it is not the parent’s fault andit persists after
- medical
- nutritional
- and physical education interventions.
- Unless if proven it is not the parent’s fault andit persists after
The epidemic of obesity that kills more people then all wars together, needs more serious attention. Actually, any lack of movement, any overweight should be considered abuse. The child has no recourse against it, and when it is a fat overweight diabetic adult it is too late.
Of course, this suggestion to require responsible parenting contradicts all the
Faulty government policy regarding obesity & other health hazards (alcohol, …)
- Promote interest of big beef farmers.
- Let Coca Cola and McDonalds reign and advertise to children without health warnings.
- it is totally insane that the government does not have EMERGENCY plans against all these health epidemics.`Rather, government should be engaged in
- promotion of healthy nutrition
- natural,
- low salt,
- high in vitamins, l
- low in sugar,
- little additives
- people should NEVER imbibe enough alcohol to get drunk or even tipsy. Alcohol should be taken like in mediterranean countries (Italy, France) who have a tradition of taking one glass of wine with meals. Society should shun people who drink excessively and get drunk.
- promotion of healthy exercise
- there should be government emergency programs to promote exercise for children and adults.
- promotion of healthy nutrition
Killer’s human rights: German killers sue Wikipedia to have their names expurged
Posted by Devils Advocate in Human Rights on 11:40 PM
In 1990, Bavarian actor Walter Sedlmayr was brutally murdered. Two of his business associates were convicted, imprisoned for the crime, and recently paroled. Who killed Sedlmayr? Its a matter of public record, but if one of the men and his German law firm gets their way, Wikipedia (and EFF) will not be allowed to tell you. A few days ago, the online encyclopedia received a cease and desist letter from one of the convicts—represented by the aptly named German law firm Stopp and Stopp—demanding that the perpetrator’s name be taken off of the Sedlmayr article page.
At issue is an apparent conflict between the U.S. First Amendment—which protects truthful speech—and German law—which seeks to protect the name and likenesses of private persons from unwanted publicity.
Source: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/11/murderer-wikipedia-shhh
Human rights became a weapon to protect criminals. German courts convincingly take human rights protection to their logical conclusion. Convicted criminals should have a chance in life to re-socialize, after they get out of jail and finished their punishment.
Would it not be interesting if Walter Sedlmeyer’s heirs were fined or imprisioned for publishing the name of their father’s murderer?
Maybe off-line paper encyclopedias should be burned to expurge history? What about Hitler’s and Stalin’s rights to be forgotten?
Devil’s advocate’s irreverant suggestion
Maybe we should re-think human rights for criminals. Maybe like in old times, criminals should be executed, or permanently marked and mutilated.
Or maybe we should go all the way with human rights and government should employ or financially support criminals for the rest of their life, This is more honest then deceiving citizens into employing ex-criminals who were given a deceptively clean police record. Some hard labor jobs where they can earn their living but not threaten law abiding citizens would be a good option.
Brazil takes human rights for adolescents to the extreme: underage (under 18 years) criminals can get a maximum of 3 years of “educational measures” even if they killed, raped, and mutiliated many people). And after these three years, their criminal record is wiped clean. So you can do a background check on your new baby sitter or house maid, and get a clean police record, even though she is a multiple rapist and serial killer. This is “human rights” taken to their extreme. It is strange: law abiding citizens have no human rights to be protected from criminals.
Praise the US constitution and the First Amendment. No discussion in the US about censoring truth. Not a chance.
Of course, on the other end of the spectrum are kids who will be on sex offender lists all life long for having had consensual sex with a 15 year old when they were 17 or 18 year old.
Latest News: the German Supreme Court decided that the freedom of press archives is more important then the right of criminals to have their records deleted (Bundesgerichtshof urteilt gegen Sedlmayr-Mörder Dec. 15, 2009)
Read more press reports about human rights and secrecy for German murderers
Self Deception: "False beliefs are helpful" paradox
Posted by Devils Advocate in Self Deception on 10:14 AM
Life is complicated. There actually are paradoxes that are very hard to solve.
Example: I am convinced religion is wrong. There is no God. But, on the other hand there is lots of research proving “miracles” of religion like
- Imagine a poor, uneducated, violent neighborhood. If any church can gain foothold there, crime decreases, the entire community starts improving and working better. It is good, it is an improvement. So even if the church teaches wrong things, even if the church is run by a fraudster who just wants to siphon away part 10% of the faithful’s income (Tenth, Tithe), the church can have a positive effect. It is false, but it does good.
- James Randi (”Flim Flam”) is a great guy who relentlessly preaches against false beliefs, astrology, wonder healers, dowsing rods etc.
- People who are very religious, people who have supersticious beliefs about their breast cancer recover better then average from breast cancer (research by Professor Shelley Taylor). So if you take their beliefs away, you are reducing their chances of recovery. Positive Illusions by Shelley E Taylor $16.95 0465060528
- Placebo effect in Medicine: if you believe in healing power, you have a good chance of getting healed. And the more invasive the method is the better it works. A huge european study on acupuncture found that sticking needles into someone has a stronger placebo effect then pills. So let us assume that acupuncture and homeopathy are quackery ( I don’t want to discuss the merit of this here and now). But it has effects when done by a professional doctor who is strongly enough self deceived that he honestly believes in it.
 Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions by James Randi $22.98 0879751983 James Randi has a US$ 1 Million bet that anyone can win who can show any paranormal effect to him. He never had to pay. For example, James Randi debunked a US$ 1000 dowsing rod that was sold to US police departments. These dowsing rods could identify criminals! But James Randi himself admits that the dowsing rods worked. They helped police identify criminals they otherwise would not have identified. |
 Health Psychology by Shelley E. Taylor $64.50 0071283609 |
So maybe the truth does harm. Very disturbing idea! Maybe I should start praising the virtues of human stupidity, self deception and unconsciousness.
Sex trafficking: An US American problem too?
Posted by admin in Prostitution on 03:13 AM
Feminists and others that are opposed to prostitution puposefully confuse issues like:
- voluntary vs. forced prostitution,
- adult vs adolescent vs child prostitution.
Here is an analysis of such a confusing article that allows for an adolescent to be a “trafficked child” even when there is no trafficker.
But the human traffickers who ensnared her had a different vision for Lena, shipping her to America and exploiting her in the sex industry for profit. They met her at the airport with news that her study abroad placement had been changed. She was given new bus tickets and sent off to Detroit, Michigan. Once there they took her passport and her freedom.
After almost a year of enslavement, Lena risked her life to make a daring escape.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/OPINION/11/25/carr.human.trafficking/index.html
Now lots of questions arise. How can a girl be kept imprisioned for a year, while in constant contact with customers? Are there any details that were omitted? did Lena really come with an I-5 Student visa? How come her schoold did not miss her? Or was she smuggled into the US, consensually?
Now, in the US, prostitution is illegal. This might be a good reason for girls to claim being a trafficing victim when caught. But, let us suppose the story is true. I believe such stories exist, but they are probably very rare.
The “Human Trafficking Clinic at the University of Michigan Law School [...] works to identify solutions to combat human trafficking“. I am here to help to identify such solutions:
How can such tragedies be avoided? Well, this is similar to the drug industry: legalizing lighter drugs would solve a lot of the crime connected to drug trading. Equally, the problems of true human trafficing can be solved by methods that Mrs. Carr probably would not endorse:
- legalizing prostitution and
- legalizing prostitution by foreigners by emitting work visa to sex workers
would make most human trafficers jobless. Easy availability of 18 year old legal prostitutes would probably reduce the desire for 16 year old illegal jail bait.
Now Mrs. Carr somehow changes topic. Lena was seemingly not underage, but she mixes these things up with child prostitution. Children are under 12 or under 14 years old, but prostitution of adolescents does not sound as catchy as child prostitution, so conveniently, Mrs. Carr introduces some more confusion.
“Belle de Jour”: Cancer Scientist financed Doctorate with Prostitution Work
Posted by admin in Prostitution on 01:13 PM
Today a positive example, against human stupidity: An independent professional women comes out of the closet and admits she enjoyed her work as a prostitute to finance her doctorate studies.
Last month John Sentamu, the Archbishop of York, said on his Web site that “fiction” like “Belle de Jour” created a “myth” that sex workers were “independent women, empowered by the hold they have over men.”
Source: http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/11/16/sex.blogger.identity/index.html
Well, Mr. Archbishop, the myth is true. And independent empowered women made money with the power she had over men! Not a poor victim of male violence, as feminist myth and religious zealots want to insist. Maybe the true victims are lonely men that paid prices as high as 300 pounds per hour.
The 34-year-old said she became a call girl in 2003 to support herself in London while completing her doctoral thesis after realizing she had no qualms about being paid for sex.
She contacted an agency, working as a prostitute until late 2004, describing it as “so much more enjoyable” than an earlier job as a computer programmer.
Race differences in intelligence: how research changed my mind to overcome the “all races are equal” dogma.
Posted by Against Irrational Unconscious in Race & Intelligence on 11:09 AM
I grew up indoctrinated by political correctness. Like a large part of citizens in Western countries I was brainwashed: Races do not exist, all are equal. Saying anything different, saying that there are racial differences, is racism, a crime.
Read this, everything you need to know about scientific research about racial differences: RACE, EVOLUTION, and BEHAVIOR: A Life History Perspective, by J.P. Rushton
In school I heard disparaging remarks about Artur Jensen and other “unscientific” “dishonest” “cheating” scientists doing faulty research about race differences.
The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray actually looked fairly convincing to me, but if even President Bill Clinton denounced it, there must be something wrong about it.
There always was some complex theory to explain away the IQ differences:
- different culture
- parental expectation
- mother’s malnourishment
- IQ measurements are racially and culturally biased
Adopted Children's IQ by Race
My opinion changed when I read about trans-racial adoption studies. That was the last drop that really disproved all these desperate attempts to explain away racial differences in intelligence.
“The best evidence for the genetic basis of race-IQ differences comes from trans-racial adoption studies of Oriental children, Black children, and Mixed-Race children. All these children have been adopted by White parents at an early age and have grown up in middle-class White homes.”
Chart 9 summarizes the results for Oriental children adopted into White middle-class homes.
Korean and Vietnamese babies from poor backgrounds, many of whom were malnourished, were adopted by White American and Belgian families. When they grew up, they excelled in school. The IQs of the adopted Oriental children were 10 or more points higher than the national average for the country they grew up in. Trans-racial adoption does not increase or decrease IQ. The three-way pattern of race differences in IQ remains.”
In plain English: adopted Asian babies grew up to be very bright, adopted black babies grew up to have low intelligence.
More about how science changed my dogmatic belief that
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