It’s time once again for news and views that you can peruse! It’s another edition of your Weekly Reader! As always, if you find something that you’d like to share, drop a link in the comments!
Trans Athletes: The Existence of Gender Identity (from Reprobate Spreadsheet via Freethought Blogs): “This argument should be the focus when discussing trans athletes. It doesn’t matter if every single one of them are fifty feet tall, what only matters is if you accept the existence of gender dysphoria as at least partly grounded in biology. If so, then the above argument demands you let them compete in the gender category they identify with. If that leads to situations you think are unfair, then you shouldn’t be using gender as a proxy for athletic ability, instead relying on metrics like muscle mass or height.”
Why Can’t Men Like Louis C.K. Accept Their Ideas Are Outdated? (from Harper’s Bazaar): “I’m not going to call for the censorship of comedy I don’t like, but neither am I going to merrily applaud for every shitty joke so that old men can continue to live in a safe space where they believe that their every utterance is a source of universal delight. I think most of us would prefer to treat bits like Louis C.K.’s as we might a pile of dog sh*t—glancing at it with some displeasure, stepping around it, and then going on our way, hopefully forgetting about it entirely and leaving it in the past.
To aging male comedians, being left in the past seems intolerable.”
Republicans: From “Tear Down This Wall” to “Build That Wall” (from Love Joy Feminism via Patheos): “Republicans today, however, clearly disagree. Trump can whip up crowds of thousands with chants of “BUILD THAT WALL!” Republicans don’t push back. I am left with a question: How did the Republican Party go from anti-wall to pro-wall? How did conservatives go from praising illegal border crossers to demonizing them? How did the Right go from “tear down this wall” to “build that wall”?”
Apple’s Biggest Problem? My Mom (from The New York Times via MSN): “Most of the journalists who write about tech for a living (including me) are early adopters — power users who like having the latest gadgets, and who are willing to fork over money for a slightly better experience. For some of these people, Apple’s announcement has come as a shock that portends potential disaster for the company.
But for my mom, and the many people who are probably in her situation, the company’s slowing iPhone sales aren’t at all a disaster. In fact, they make total sense, and they don’t have much to do with China.”
A woman in a vegetative state suddenly gave birth. Her alleged assault is a #MeToo wake-up call. (from Vox): “While many crucial details remain unknown, news of the case was met with outrage online, with women’s advocates questioning why staffers reportedly remained unaware of the patient’s pregnancy for so long, and why authorities were treating it as a “possible sexual assault” rather than calling it outright rape. The patient had been in a vegetative state for more than a decade. She could not consent to any sexual contact or defend herself during an attack, nor did she have the power to report inappropriate behavior or assault.”
Elderly, conservatives shared more Facebook fakery in 2016 (from the AP): “When other demographic factors and overall posting tendencies are factored in, the average person older than 65 shared seven times more false information than those between 18 and 29. The seniors shared more than twice as many fake stories as people between 45 and 64 and more than three times that of people in the 30- to 44-year-old range, said lead study author Andrew Guess, a politics professor at Princeton.”
What trans people mean when we say “misgendering is violence” (from Against the Grain via Freethought Blogs): “When I see someone misgendering me, I see not just that they already sit at the base of the pyramid–I see the possibility of them escalating. They’ve denied my humanity, which seems to be the prerequisite to discriminatory behaviour, and now I’m supposed to trust that they’re not going to creep up the pyramid the way the above comments do. And the best part? If I object to their misgendering, if I call out the insistence on using the male pronoun and tell them they’re denying my identity–they don’t fucking care. They flatly deny it. “No I’m not, stop being over-dramatic.”
That’s called gaslighting, and it’s a form of abuse.”
I Gave a Bounty Hunter $300. Then He Located Our Phone (from Motherboard via Vice): “The bounty hunter did this all without deploying a hacking tool or having any previous knowledge of the phone’s whereabouts. Instead, the tracking tool relies on real-time location data sold to bounty hunters that ultimately originated from the telcos themselves, including T-Mobile, AT&T, and Sprint, a Motherboard investigation has found. These surveillance capabilities are sometimes sold through word-of-mouth networks.”
Patients’ crowdfunding campaigns for alternative cancer treatments (from ScienceDirect via the Lancet): “We found three categories of rationales for seeking CAM cancer treatments: individuals who want to try every available treatment and who are using it to complement traditional treatment; individuals who chose to forgo traditional treatment because of fear of its effects or skepticism about its activity; and individuals who cannot pursue traditional treatment for financial or medical reasons but do not wish to forgo treatment.”
Facebook took advice from a far right figure who blamed gay marriage for hurricanes (from Media Matters): “In efforts to appease fits of manufactured conservative rage over the moderation of hateful content on social media platforms, Facebook and Twitter have relied on the advice of anti-LGBTQ extremists and far-right grifters “to help them figure out who should be banned and what’s considered unacceptable.””
ACLU sues Texas schools, AG over Israel boycott law (from the Houston Chronicle): “John Pluecker, a freelance writer and translator who is one of the plaintiffs in the case, said he first learned of Texas’ anti-boycott law when he reviewed a contract sent by the University of Houston this spring. Pluecker has refused to buy products from the Sabra Dipping Co. to protest the company’s support of the Israel Defense Forces. He said he believed that action violated the anti-boycott clause, and he did not want to sign a document that he said endorsed denying people the right to boycott Israel. As a result, he refused a $1,500 contract and another $250 contract from UH.”
And that’s all for today. Stop by again next week for more links and posts that you didn’t know you couldn’t live without! Until then, happy reading!
Iacon East 