Mugabe

Things Mugabe has called his opponents in the latest election cycle:

- prostitutes (many times)

- witches

- charlatans

- traitors

- two-headed creatures

- frogs

See, this is the sort of level of political discourse we should be demanding from our leaders. 

Oh, and I only really feel to write a post this dumb because it's Leap Day, so nothing is real. 

Life Less Ordinary

You are abnormal. 

Kind of a slap in the face, huh?

Try this:

You are extraordinary. 

Better?

Think about it.

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

Quote of the day: "But who knows what the hell else is going on deep in the soul of a carrot?"

And I will start writing actual posts instead of just linking things, at some point, I promise.

So much awesome:

seriously, just look...

and I thought there was never any good news in the world. 

p.s.

also I think I need to learn to write properly.

this may involve Orwell and a typewriter.

The Day the Music Died

Today, apparently. 

In better news, the next President of Serbia will not be from a party whose leader is currently on trial for war crimes. Huzzah!

Also, I know I'm late on this one, but if you haven't seen The Lives of Others, do so. 

People are nice, too!

The tone here has been way too depressing for a bit, so I thought I'd just note that people can be really very nice sometimes too, and that that can make a big difference. I'll just note three recent examples:

1) My classmate, who put in a huge amount of effort to put together a party for the rest of us to try and make sure we get to know each other as people, rather than just as fellow students. It was super nice of her AND it worked, which is awesome.

2) Ultimate at Oxford - apparently, an integral part of the games is not just being friendly in the actual competition, but then getting together and playing summer camp-style icebreakerish games afterwards. While this involves getting muddy in the winter, it is friendly and awesome and happy-making. 

3) Nice people at the grocery store (which, by the way, seems to be gradually getting in more fair trade stuff...woot!) who have nice and friendly conversations with you at the grocery check-out and brighten up your day and welcome you to Oxford when your day isn't going great because carrying groceries is hard when you busted your shoulder playing ultimate. 

So all in all, yay people! recently...

Really? Are you sure that's your example?

So I was reading what is otherwise a very interesting article by one David Sussman entitled "What's wrong with torture" when I hit this passage:

"Consider a case where the police confront a very obese man who is trying to suffocate another by sitting on his chest. Like the terrorist, the fat man is defenseless before the police, who can wound or even kill him easily. Yet if the fat man dies or loses consciousness, the police lack the strength to shift him off his victim. Only the fat man can end his attack, even though he does not now need to do anything further in order for it to succeed. Here it seems that the police might well be justified in menacing the fat man or twisting his arm (or threatening to kill him) in order to get him to derail a set of events that he has intentionally set in motion, even though he no longer has to actively contribute anything to it. The terrorist relies on a bomb's mechanism to accomplish his goal, the fat man on his weight, and it is hard to see how this difference of method could be of any great moral significance."

Really? Why? Why on earth? Who are these people who call themselves moral philosophers? What strange and bizarre world have I stumbled into?

The key comes in the last sentence - the crazy fat man example is there to show us why it might be considered plausible that you could coerce a terrorist who has been captured but has planted a bomb into telling us where it is. So the fat man example is supposed to be so clear and so persuasive that it helps develop the other point by analogy. 

Again...why? Why why why? Is there anything about the fat man example that's more plausible, more convincing? No! Then why on earth, given its utter irrelevance and the obvious relevance of the other example at hand (the captured terrorist bomb-planter) wander off into bizarre, unrealistic, and possibly (although I'm unsure on this) offensive hypothetical crazy-examples? Why why why!?!

Ok I'm done. Sorry, for anyone who actually reads this...its not so much intended for consumption as for venting purposes. 

In more interesting news - well, not all news, but still more interesting, if also more depressing:

- garbage gyre

- why I feel the society I come from is a little ill around the edges - it would be cheaper to take care of people, and still we don't do it