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Why target the founder of the religion as a whole, which includes many followers who are NOT extremists?

So you can satirize a religion, just not it's founder, beliefs, anything that it deems sacred or anything that would affect it's non-violent followers.
posted to MetaFilter by spaltavian at 1:17 PM on January 7, 2015

This is kind of irrelevant, since the force between you and the Earth is what the scale is measuring, and that force does depend on the prevailing gravitational field strength. With a sufficiently large mass sufficiently close overhead, you could certainly reduce that local field strength to zero.

Yes but no.

In our current Universe, when you stand on a scale, you have two forces acting on you -- the gravitational pull from... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by miguelcervantes at 12:22 PM on January 7, 2015

I'm sorry, can you explain this a little clearer? What are you trying to estimate, time they will take to close? Is there any distinguishing characteristics of these things, or are they all functionally the same? It sounds like the easiest and most accurate thing to do is just straight up average the estimates of the 200 you've already done and give that estimate to the remaining 550 or so, unless there's something that separates the ones you've done from the ones you haven't.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by brainmouse at 10:23 AM on January 7, 2015

I am saying that we, the bystanders, should not fall into the rapidly growing trend to miscategorize Muslims as being too sensitive to handle nasty cartoons

Is anyone in this thread saying "Muslims, in general, are too sensitive to handle nasty cartoons"?

I mean, I think you're actually coming closest to making that claim by saying "but jeez, guys, just think how upsetting it must be to see... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by yoink at 12:16 PM on January 7, 2015

it's the difference between an atheist standing up in a Swedish church and heckling during the service, and an atheist secretly going undercover as a priest, actually getting into a Mass, going through with the Mass as normally, but then at the moment he has to start distributing the communion wafers, he pulls a can of Cheez-Whiz out from under his robe and gives each wafer a squirt like it's a canape..

That makes absolutely no sense.
posted to MetaFilter by Fidel Cashflow at 10:56 AM on January 7, 2015

the victim's part in a crime

The victims' part in this crime was getting shot and nothing else. The culpability for the crime lies entirely with the people doing the shooting.
posted to MetaFilter by one more dead town's last parade at 10:47 AM on January 7, 2015

There's satire which mocks religion - and then there's satire which mocks religion by mis-using a sacred part of that religion

I'm not sure what satire looks like if it's not mocking something that its adherents don't think should be mocked. Jay Leno?
posted to MetaFilter by spaltavian at 10:42 AM on January 7, 2015

so the basic problem with bitcoin, beyond the omnipresent layer of fraud and incompetence firewalling a technically trustless system, is that it provides the least efficient solution possible to a trivial problem.

processing seven transactions a second could be done reliably in a shell script on a raspberry pi. on the other hand, the best possible case for bitcoin is that it currently uses approximately 200 million times as much electricity to accomplish the same goal.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Ictus at 6:19 PM on January 6, 2015

Giraldi imagines himself the awkward, yet stalwart hero of an Updike story:

"The lack of recall almost frightened him. Did he help the kids with their homework? He must have. Did he and Alissa ever go grocery shopping together? He had no image of it. The beds, how had they got made, and the meals, how had they got onto the table for twenty-two years? Alissa must have done it all, somehow, while he was reading the sports page. Having the babies, now such a momentous... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by blucevalo at 2:26 PM on January 6, 2015

So you work pretty hard to keep the thread about her on-topic and respectful, and she goes to Twitter to call your site a "community of crybaby fucking nerds". Perfect.
posted to MetaTalk by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 7:38 AM on January 6, 2015

Honestly, the thing quoted upthread where he talks about his wife, who is Asian, in comparison to his friend's wife, who is white....that was really fucking creepy. I assume that he just doesn't grasp that he sounds like your classic racist white Asian fetishist, because I assume that no one known to the Baffler is actually totally skeevy and gross, and I assume that his marriage is based on a solid intellectual partnership, respect, etc. It is still... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Frowner at 1:11 PM on January 6, 2015

Also that excerpt about how it's good to have an Asian wife who dotes on the male members of her family and has no ambition beyond motherhood is really creepy and fetishizing and racist.

To add a little detail to that: as Chinese-American lady married to a white dude, it's straight-up horrifying to me because there is so, so, so little in either piece about his wife's cultural identity.

Like, there is a lot of cultural events... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by joyceanmachine at 1:10 PM on January 6, 2015

So you don't know what really happened any more than the rest of us commenters do, you just know she's lying?

According to that article she was lying, or at least exaggerating about harassment on that occasion. I suppose it's hypothetically possible that Kane's article ignores the events of the article in Medium and that she's talking about a different occasion when she actually was harassed in a way that is... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Joe in Australia at 8:22 AM on January 6, 2015

I want them to talk to me, trust me ect.

Um... too bad? Talk to them and give them opportunities and invitations to talk to you. Simply spend time with them and be available. That's all you can do, just like with any other people. You can't force an intimate relationship. You just have to wait and be open to it.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by zennie at 9:39 PM on January 5, 2015

Let's cut to the chase here: Your marriage is in trouble. You two need to have a good dialogue to identify and address the issues. These issues certainly include your feelings of exclusion, and his time, energy and emotional commitment to another woman.

At this point, his attachment to her is not an issue - what is at issue is his attachment to you (and yours to him). It seems to be up to him to rebalance his attachments, one way or another, or for you to either... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by GeeEmm at 6:27 PM on January 5, 2015

the kind of shy, awkward dudes who are given to ceaselessly moaning about wanting a girlfriend don't just want a connection with a woman who is their social or emotional equal, they want a sexy girlfriend, almost always a distinctly feminine girlfriend, a girlfriend their guy friends will envy

Yeah, this a thousand times.

I, being a geek with a lot of guy friends, see this all the time. X nerd guy bemoans how the women he... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by corb at 9:32 AM on January 2, 2015

leopard, you have made eighteen comments in this thread, and sixteen of them have included sneering at everyone in this discussion who doesn't agree with you. You are not on the side of the angels of rational discussion here.
posted to MetaFilter by Etrigan at 11:44 AM on January 1, 2015

Not sure if this has been posted already, but it explains that Eric Garner was targeted by cops who had previously stolen from him and abused him.
posted to MetaFilter by urbanwhaleshark at 10:36 AM on December 31, 2014

Why gloat to a person who's account has been disabled?

I see this is your first trip to MetaTalk.
posted to MetaTalk by Elementary Penguin at 9:21 AM on December 31, 2014

This has been against the contract of carriage on nearly every airline since basically forever at this point. Inducing someone to break their contract with a third party is a tort [...]

I don't see how he's inducing anyone to break a contract. The people using his website haven't even made a contract with the airline. These are the typical elements of tortious interference according to Wikipedia:The existence of a contractual... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Joe in Australia at 9:09 AM on December 31, 2014

So, ah, apart from being unqualified to lecture on women's issues, I think Aaronson is in a bad position to speak on autism issues as well.

Oh, yes. This whole discussion is lousy with misunderstandings and misrepresentations.

The autism spectrum is NOT a mental illness, and is only a learning disability in context of neurotypical learning environments. Autism is, simply, a cluster of personality traits that occur along a... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by ernielundquist at 11:55 AM on December 30, 2014

I suspect the number of boys (and girls) with some form of mental health issue or learning disability is greater than 50%.

Really?

At that rate you have to consider it not a disability but just being average.
posted to MetaFilter by JackFlash at 10:59 AM on December 30, 2014

Common to who?

Common to a guy who was brought up in late 20th century America, not 17th century anyplace else.

He (and many other people) seem to be under the impression that if the response to their pain is not a solid "oh, honey, there there, it'll be okay," that it must be because we don't understand what they went through or are going through. I understand it fine, and it's not my duty to... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by rtha at 9:24 AM on December 30, 2014

I am sad that, even in this calm discussion, some men here have felt that the rhetoric of “figure it out for yourself” is hateful.

It isn’t hate. It is entirely the voice of experience, because most non-white-non-dudes have spent lifetimes figuring out how to navigate a world that is not entirely friendly to their desires and experiences.

He wants a cheat code? Many straight, cis, relatively wealthy white men live through life with a series of... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by a fiendish thingy at 8:52 AM on December 30, 2014

I think that would result in a divide by zero error.
posted to MetaFilter by grumpybear69 at 8:41 AM on December 30, 2014

Sounds more like she unknowingly ate a pot cookie/brownie/baked goodie while at the house.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by pintapicasso at 3:46 PM on December 29, 2014

It sounds like it might be Doodle Hex but it appears that only came out in 2008 (in the EU at least, according to Wiki)?
posted to Ask MetaFilter by threetwentytwo at 6:03 AM on December 30, 2014

We use Google Moderator for a lot of things at work. It's not perfect and the interface is not especially pretty, but it has all of the features you ask for and it's simple and straightforward.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by brainmouse at 11:02 AM on December 29, 2014 marked best answer

Einstein writing to Freud
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Pineapplicious at 7:15 PM on December 28, 2014

None of this excuses the officer from rolling up on him and escalating the situation into a fatal one

It looks to me like all the cop did here was start talking to a couple people though. If Martin drew down on the cop then it was Martin who escalated the situation into a fatal one. If Martin didn't have a gun then it is tautologically the cop who escalated it.

But if you accept the very concept of a police force then I don't... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Justinian at 5:25 PM on December 26, 2014

Is this the first Papal listicle ever?
posted to MetaFilter by Kabanos at 7:04 AM on December 23, 2014

The Holy Ghost of Perry Bible Fellowship looms large.
posted to MetaFilter by robocop is bleeding at 6:22 PM on December 22, 2014

Is that fascism?

Inquiry does not work that way.

What is fascist lite, The Arrow Cross?

If we're going to be thorough and insist on assiduous fidelity to the actually-existing fascism of history, it seems unlikely that fascism per se will ever emerge again. It's entirely possible that it was a sui generis political form peculiar to early and mid-20th century Europe.

However,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by clockzero at 5:04 PM on December 22, 2014

knoyers: "The US should have required that Cuba at least pay compensation for property that was stolen from Americans before taking this step."

Sounds good. Can we put this in line right after compensation for descendants of slaves and Native Americans displaced by forced relocation?
posted to MetaFilter by edgeways at 1:07 PM on December 18, 2014

no album by a person of color is better than the first Strokes album?
posted to MetaFilter by scose at 5:55 PM on December 17, 2014

(jfc “classic memes” what are we doing)?
posted to MetaFilter by Potomac Avenue at 2:27 PM on December 17, 2014

Interesting but this sample seems to skew awfully white and male. It's also about 70% british and 100% guitars. Maybe this could be inverted to make some statistical generalizations about people who enjoy making top 10 lists?
posted to MetaFilter by mr.ersatz at 2:59 PM on December 17, 2014

Why yes, out of two dubious states, I do distrust the greater power more, funnily enough, particularly in the wake of NAFTA. If Obama is doing this because of morality rather than because there's some incredibly dodgy benefit for the US, I will eat my hat - the itchy wool one, too.

Reading this makes me know what moderate Republicans feel like when Sarah Palin shoots her mouth off.
posted to MetaFilter by feste at 8:38 AM on December 17, 2014

Netflix is jettisoning most of its older content in favor of TV shows, original content, and whatever recent films that it can convince the studios to hand over.

Wait wait wait. We should be concerned about the rise of a monoculture, and our culture cannibalizing itself, because one of the internet services that make more movies more easily available to human beings than anything else in history, ever, period, is jettisoning a bunch of its older... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by mstokes650 at 1:43 PM on December 16, 2014

(To clarify, this is not me disagreeing with the above Sarkeesian tweet; it's me trying to help by putting a finer point on it.)

Is there sexism against men? Is there racism against white people? Yes. In the sense of each ism being purely academic (meaning without cultural context): a prejudice against someone because they are a member of a group that they did not choose to be a part of.

But in a functional, real-world sense, the answer to those... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by grubi at 1:10 PM on December 16, 2014

GRACE OF THE FIREFLIES

With a little help from some wisecracking magical fireflies, two happy-go-lucky orphans find a new home.
posted to MetaFilter by Iridic at 9:43 AM on December 16, 2014

I'm pretty sure the alternate title to "The Munchkin" is "We think we can get Dinklage" and the subtitle to that is "not in a thousand years".
posted to MetaFilter by Artw at 7:08 AM on December 16, 2014

When I looked at that first chart earlier, all I could think it "only three superhero movies coming out next year? That sucks!" I am, as ever, "part of the problem."
posted to MetaFilter by Bulgaroktonos at 8:32 AM on December 16, 2014

The article descends into pompous self-parody here:

These tendencies all came together in the enormously influential Thorstein Veblen, who did more than any other American thinker to shape educated Americans’ understanding of their encounter with material things.
posted to MetaFilter by Nevin at 10:32 PM on December 15, 2014

GOD COMPTROLLER OF DUNE
posted to MetaFilter by benzenedream at 11:49 AM on December 15, 2014

But my point is that if it were a B-brain filled with memories and concepts, it would be higher-entropy for those memories and concepts to correspond to one of the universes that previously fluctuated into existence.

This is just a cute supposition though, and doesn't actually make any sense. You're totally right that if there were some process by which that was true, then there's justification in both trusting our knowledge AND accepting a physical... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by vibratory manner of working at 11:20 AM on December 15, 2014

If you really want to make the financially smart decision buy a relatively new used car. Like one driven by someone on a lease!
posted to Ask MetaFilter by srboisvert at 8:34 AM on December 15, 2014

An ex-boyfriend who was a casual acquaintance found me at a gaming store about 3 weeks after I started dating his ex (once she told him), asked to talk to me outside and hit me in the face with a roll of dimes in his hand. My jaw split on the side and ripped down so it looked like I was missing a bottom front tooth.

So there you go. He did not have a history of violence. They had been broken up for over a month when we met at a party and started dating so I was not... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by OnTheLastCastle at 8:47 AM on December 15, 2014

The Elephant In The Room Is Iraq
posted to MetaFilter by homunculus at 2:08 PM on December 12, 2014

Will drone warfare one day be branded ‘a stain on our values’? Critics of US counterterrorism tactics say drone program deserves same scrutiny as torture under Bush administration
posted to MetaFilter by homunculus at 2:09 PM on December 12, 2014