Late night randomness - sex, assumptions, Scott Pilgrim

I always wonder if the fact my gmail gets "Phone India" adds means my account was hacked.

A review of Scott Pilgrim that goes to the issue that is so often the problem in the stories we tell in this culture: "Boys are defined by what they do. Girls are defined by who they go out with."

Which leads to a reminder that there is more than one way to think about things, and that your way may just be a default you picked up. (Not that that makes it wrong.) Do blocks have names, or do streets?

Speaking of assumptions, a sex worker talks about her experience with male sexuality and the fact that just about everyone is messed up about sex, so maybe we should all be more sympathetic to one another.

The more men I talked to, the more sympathetic I felt. I was approaching the biggest epiphany of my life: men had as much anxiety and shame around sex as women did. We were all in this together, and any ideology that couldn’t admit as much was doomed to fail.

.
Therefore, some advice on how not to be an asshole while you're having sex with someone.


I may have to check this blog out.

The Triumph of Intellect and Romance over Brute Force and Cynicism

Craig Furguson's summation of Doctor Who.

Please note that this summation is given while singing lyrics to the show's theme song (Orbital version) and dancing with puppets.

The alligator speaks the truth.

Assange has been arrested

I thought it would take a lot longer for an actual arrest, which is why I hadn't gotten around to posting about the rape/sexual assault charges. Like many people, I think the charges are being politicized - we should be so lucky that Interpol treats rape charges this seriously and with such priority as the normal course of events (Top of the most-wanted list? Really?). That said, I am a both/and kind of guy - the charges are being politicized, but that doesn't meant the charges shouldn't be taken seriously or trivialized.

It's been pretty depressing to watch the Assange supporters jump right into rape-trivializing in various ways though. I've seen the "Assange is our modern Jesus" thing in a local paper. (He is being persecuted by the Empire and his followers will continue his message.) There has been a lot of the "OMG, she's a radical feminist - CLEARLY it was a set up!" I've been told Sweden has a law making it a 2-year prison sentence for sex without a condom, as well as a law called "sex by surprise". (That term was used by Assange's lawyer. I'd like to think it was a translation error, since apparently the term is used in Sweden as slang for rape, just as it is here.) I've seen horror expressed that a man can be arrested on a woman's say so in Sweden. (One article saying it was worse than Iraq under Saddam Hussein. Um, buddy, the cops can arrest you on one person's say so in just about any country in the world. Convicting you is another story, but they sure as hell can arrest you.) There have been the "Assange is a great man, so even if he did do it, he shouldn't turn himself in" statements, which are a little too Polanski-esque for comfort.

Is he guilty? I don't know. The kind of power-tripping assault he's accused of certainly matches what I've seen of his public character and my personal experience with technophile radicals, especially tech/hacker ones, who tend to be pretty contemptuous of women. So I find them very plausible, but that's not a legal judgment. At the same time, I have a healthy distrust of cops and the legal system.

While losing their charismatic front man would hurt Wikileaks' place as the primary outlet for such material, I suspect they will continue without him and I fully expect other groups to adopt the model Wikileaks has been so effective with, or take other approaches to combating government secrecy.

Kickstarter

On a happier note than some, does this Kickstarter thing seem like a good plan? I have friends with art projects, research projects, coding projects, what have you, that might benefit. Has anyone used this or have something like it to recommend?

May the Pony be with You!

I had meant to write about the Katie story when it came out, but was swamped. As the brother of a girl who likes Star Wars, I was understandably sympathetic to the girl who was bullied for liking it because it is "for boys".

There are many things wrong with Geek/Nerd/Fandom culture - massive outpourings of support for a 7-year old who is being bullied because she likes Star Wars is not one of them. Neither is the effect it is having on her.

And Katie is learning how to reach out to help other children in the same way that she has been helped. A mother named Emily called to tell me that her first grade son was recently teased for bringing My Little Pony for show and tell. She said he was terribly upset by the incident, and when I told Katie about it, she called to leave a message for the child.

She said, "I am Katie. I like Star Wars, and you like My Little Pony. I know other boys who like to play with My Little Pony, and it's great, and umm, May the Pony Be With You!" she finished proudly.

This is a thing that makes me happy.

Computer-related things (Veruca$Holiday)

As always, tech is something I need and yet I have my love/hate relationship with it.

This year, the list of NumberSeeress-related things is pretty focused.

A videocam and a good headset with mic combo so I can Skype with people. I may or may not renew the Skype phone number for US calling, but I will find these things useful. (I actually know nothing about good brands here, so cannot offer advice on the subject.)

A decent Netbook. With the Laptop having given up the ghost, that seems the way to go.
I've heard good things about the new Asus and the Toshiba 410. I also have friends who swear by the Aspire and the HP Mini.

It straddles the computer/photography line, but a monitor calibration unit like the iOne Display 2 would be awesome. Hell, a new high-end monitor would be fantastic, too.

I suspect a new laptop is in order as well, since I've been nursing the Vostro 200 slim for a while and it definitely chokes on serious picture editing.

Link roundup

Some of this shamelessly stolen from mzrowan.

Rap group Das Racist gives awesome answers to stupid questions.

Do you see your work as a critique of white America?

Suri: I think it is solely a critique of John Boehner. As our bandmate Ashok Kondabolu would say, John Boehner represents the utmost in white demonry.

British artists record remake of John Cage's 4'33" (They are actually doing it to protest a show called X-Factor.)

Daniel Ellsberg comments on the limits of knowledge. Basically, stop listening and learning, become stupid.

For the cynical among you, the history of conservatism in 95 words.