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To Catch a Predator - Hot Teacher

jwray says...

The point is the willingness of the parties involved (which in this case was related to the adult being hot. And I suppose the hotness of the adult made the crew less likely to disregard the stated preference of the young man because they could more easily see themselves in his shoes). The point is that when both people are old enough and mentally competent enough to have sexual desires and fulfill them responsibly, government should stay out of their bedrooms except in cases of violence or coersion. And when in doubt, government should err on the side of liberty over safety.

Reverse Racism, Explained

jwray says...

It's a clever rationalization of hypocrisy. If it's going to be taboo to observe patterns in groups of people demarcated by visible characteristics they were born with, be consistent about it. But I'd argue against that taboo.

What makes racism bad is treating people as specimens of a group rather than unique individuals. Group averages may differ slightly but there's tons of overlap. Common usage of the word "racism" unfortunately conflates a moral aspect (how to treat people) with an epistemological aspect (dogma that all groups are created exactly equal in every way). Epistemology shouldn't be moralized. I could give you lots of examples of sociological and psychological research getting muddled on account of an inflexible dogma that there couldn't be any heritable differences between groups other than the obvious superficial ones. I'd rather conceive of the word racism as a verb describing harmful actions towards people due to their group membership, not a noun denoting a thoughtcrime or speechcrime. Like church and state, or science and religion, epistemology and morality don't go together.

A priori based on generation times and mutation rates you should expect there could be 1/10 as much variation between historically isolated groups of humans as there is between breeds of dogs, since the most recent common ancestor of all domestic dogs is half as far back as humans' most recent common ancestor is (or rather was before 16th and 17th century explorers spread their sperm across the globe) but dogs breed a lot faster. Breeds of dogs demonstrably vary in many behavioral and psychological traits. It's not far fetched to suppose that a variety of environments over the past 100,000 years of humanity pushed population means of behavioral traits in various directions.

The Evolutionary Advantage of Really Annoying Babies

jwray says...

It's targeted at the narrow audience of those who are politically motivated to strawman & deny evolutionary psychology but scientifically literate enough to get the jokes. It's a bit sophomoric.

To Catch a Predator - Hot Teacher

jwray says...

I think the point of the video is to mock the double standard. Reversing the sexes changed the perception because there's no longer a "damsel in distress" vibe. People are more apt to acknowledge the sexual autonomy of men as agents acting of their own free will, and from that perspective Chris Hansen becomes ridiculous. Anglophone countries' ages of consent of 16-18 are higher than most of continental Europe's 14, and I suspect it's something to do with Victorian fear and loathing of sex. Certainly law almost never gets made on the basis of empirical data such as psychology research. Age of consent can be justified as a tradeoff between the quantity of foolish people below the age who will do things they later regret, and the quantity of unfoolish people below the age whose freedom will be harmed. Government should be circumspect about protecting people from their own free will.

To Catch a Predator - Hot Teacher

10 Things You Didn't Know About South Park

jwray says...

Why do they hate Family Guy?

And why is it only Muslims who still get upset enough at irreverent media to seriously deter its production with predictable threats of violence? To hell with all chilling effects and censorship based on outrage based on bronze age myths. Every threat against a speaker should and usually does spawn dozens more like him in solidarity with the threatened speaker. On the internet this is known as the Streisand effect and it's pretty much inevitable. The assholes making death threats against cartoonists are way behind the times. "Islamophobia" acquiring the opprobrium of racism is absurd. Religion is a choice like becoming a member of the asshole tea party, not something unchangeable that you're born with like skin color. One might as well coin a term "Republicanophobia" and apply it to any harsh critic of the Republican party. All religions are rotten to the core just as all major parties are rotten to the core. But some religions are worse than others and some parties are worse than others, notwithstanding individual variability.

Raise The Minimum Wage -- Robert Reich

jwray says...

A program with the desired effect but fewer unintended harmful consequences would be to:
Firstly, eliminate payroll/sales tax and replace it with increase in upper income tax brackets.
Secondly, create a bigger refundable tax credit for everyone.
Thirdly, provide high quality free education for anyone, especially the unemployed and homeless.

A minimum wage is a price control, and price controls are with few exceptions very harmful. A minimum wage makes it harder to find work, and thus harder to gain experience to justify a higher wage, and riskier to move around for a better wage. High unemployment makes the even the employed into serfs with little mobility.

Beyond scandal culture (Blog Entry by jwray)

jwray says...

In the particular case of Anthony Weiner, it is known that conservative activists created fake profiles of young women to try to seduce Weiner (premeditated revenge porn). We don't know if the actual leaks came from such sources. But whether it's just plain revenge porn or premeditated revenge porn it's far worse than sexting and the people who leaked Weiner's photos are horrible people.

Jon Stewart Skewers Toronto Mayor, Again

jwray says...

Also, whether he used crack is not a moral issue, it's a health issue. Concern for his health isn't a reason for torches and pitchforks. I may hate his policies and think he's a douchebag, but whether he once inhaled something isn't the proper grounds for dismissing a mayor. If Clinton had inhaled, that wouldn't have made him forever unfit for office.

Jon Stewart Skewers Toronto Mayor, Again

jwray says...

100% not sarcasm. A politician's personal life is none of your business. When a reporter asks a question that is none of their business they deserve to get a lie or Clinton-esque evasion (the latter is what happened in this case). He said he does not use it and is not an addict, both statements being consistent with having tried it in the past. One puff does not make him a crackhead. The scientific literature on this issue demonstrates that cocaine is about as addictive as tobacco. Even if the unverified accusations were true, that wouldn't be automatic grounds for resignation.

robbersdog49 said:

You forgot to tick the sarcasm box!

Please tell me you forgot to tick the sarcasm box...

Jon Stewart Skewers Toronto Mayor, Again

jwray says...

This is the kind of bullshit I expect from mainstream media. At least in the Lewinsky scandal there was some actual evidence made available to the public. Here they are just speculating on the personal life of a politican based on an alleged tape that no one has seen. And besides, the personal life of a politican is irrelevant. If it's affecting how he actually performed his job than focus on that. They're reporting unverified accusations against a person which aren't really any of the public's business in the first place. They only report it because it grabs more eyeballs than dissecting policy.

One Pissed Off Democrat in Michigan Speaks Up

jwray says...

Plenty of corporations make political contributions to either party, and if you work for those corporations, you're indirectly supporting those political contributions whether you like it or not. It's the same thing with unions.

For unrelated reasons, I favor campaign finance reform such that only real homo sapiens persons (not corporate or union entities) are allowed to make political donations, up to a maximum of $200 per person.

Police Motorcyclist Forgets About Speed Bump

Cookie Monster questions Prairie Dawn

VideoSift 5.0 Launch! (Sift Talk Post)

jwray says...

On chrome, the bottom part of the comments on any given video page are hidden below the bottom bar. This makes it impossible to reply. Maximizing and un-maximizing the window fixes the layout.



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