Be Kind To Your Enemy
Did Jesus say to “Love your enemy” ? Some believe this, and do it. Some claim to believe this, and practice the opposite. There are others who claim to love their enemies, but you have to understand what they mean by it. It can be very confusing. This is a repost.
PG went to a source for documentation. Oh, the blessed conjunction of copy paste with public domain. When PG entered enemy (singular) in the search engine, 100 verses came up. When the request was made plural (enemies), 237 entries popped up. The last mention of enemies is Revelation 11:12 “And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them.” Loving your enemies does not include bringing them to heaven with you. There is also the star of the show.
Matthew 5:44 “But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”
There is scholarly debate about what Jesus did, or did not, say. The words available to modern man have been copied by hand, edited, translated, and interpreted. PG does not know Aramaic from Alabama. Like anyone else, PG can only read and listen, and think for himself.
In a sense it does not matter what Jesus “really” said. The cult of Jesus Worship is going to believe what it wants. More important, it is going to practice what it wants. As far as the difference between what Jesus “really” said, and what his believers say and do…they can explain.
What follows is a humble suggestion. Maybe the translators and scribes got it wrong. Maybe Jesus did not say to love your enemy. Maybe what Jesus said was to show kindness to everyone. This is a practice thing, rather than a belief thing.
It is not as much fun to be nice to someone, as it is to scream about life after death. Kindness does not need to be justified by a quote from a magic book. You just need to do it.
Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
I Believe G-d Directed That Bullet
PG was coming home from dinner. Part of the meal was chicken tenders, with the poultry raised under horrible conditions. The radio whiner, whose name rhymes with profanity, was talking about people who eat meat. How can someone who eats hamburgers be upset about the execution of Cecil the lion? All of this got PG to thinking, which is not a good idea on a full stomach.
There was a motivational video a while back called How To Be A Leader. It inspired PG to write a post, The value of sheep. Truth be known, if Cecil provided entertainment for a murdering dentist, then the feline gave something of value to the planet. Most lions contribute nothing except their own survival, at the expense of their neighbors. Here is the post:
There is a video out now, where the speaker says “It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.” This man must not like to wear wool.
A lion is a predator. It lurks in the jungle, and kills to eat. It does not produce anything except it’s own survival. A sheep lives in a community. Every once in a while, it gets the coat clipped, and grows another one. The fur goes to make woolen clothing, which keeps people warm in winter.
Maybe if you want to be an egophile, living on the destruction of your neighbor, then you might be better off as a lion. If you want to contribute something of value to others, it is better to be a sheep.
There is a trending hashtag, #alllionsmatter. It relates to a line of thinking, expressed in articles like Cecil And #AllLionsMatter Is Exposing Hypocrisy And Racism In The Media. If you can’t say anything good, you complain about hypocrisy in the media.
True,the media does not cover events evenly. A few years ago, a putrid politician named Paul Broun made a speech. The line that got attention was this. “All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell.”
That is a few seconds out of a forty two minute speech. (The link to the entire speech in the post no longer works.) Here is a paragraph about the rest of the speech. You will see in a minute why it is included here. Dr. Broun went on to resign his seat in the House of Representatives. He was soundly defeated in the Republican primary for the U.S. Senate.
The testimony was delivered at “Hitting the Mark” Sportsman Banquet, Thursday, September 27, 2012. “There were Giveaways & Door Prizes including: GUNS & SPORTS-RELATED GIFT CERTIFICATES.” The first twenty minutes of his remarks are about hunting. Dr. Broun shows slides of trophies. There is a bear he killed in Alaska. There are two lions that he killed in Africa. The second lion was leaping towards him when Dr. Broun shot it in the face. “I believe G-d directed that bullet.”
Pictures are from The Library of Congress.
Aerosolized Homosexual Christians
Did Amy Shumer shave off her beard? ~ Sharks don’t bother Fox talking heads when they go swimming. It is a professional courtesy. ~ other than Israel there are very few people you can cheer for in the middle east ~ Gays Have Aerosolized Homosexual Christians, Covertly Attacking Chemtrails ~ Were people allowed to invest in Mr. Trump’s business ventures? That would seem to be a form of gambling. ~ Complications are overrated ~ Mr. Trump should try carbon monoxide. ~ Post Has Been Removed The post or object that you were commenting has been removed by its owner and can no longer be commented on. ~ Tacky political memes qualify as taking the “name of the lord” in vain. If you have any questions, consult the third commandment. ~ 6 Obnoxious Phrases Everyone Says Without Realizing It ~ 6 obnoxious phrases everyone says without realizing it Literally, It’s Like Crack!, I Would Totally Hit/Tap That, Man, That’s Gay, No Offense, Haters Gonna Hate, Addicted, Like, Totes, That’s so ghetto, Sorry not sorry, It is what it is, That’s retarded, ~ This is too much food for thought, and is leading to mental indigestion. There is a dandy comment, in the thread following a rebuttal post. “I blame the acronym LGBT. I think it’s become a four dimensional matrix of oppression olympics.” ~ I hope this is not derailing this thread. If it is then I can delete, and discuss later. Who made the decision to use cis- as a prefix? As I understand it, cis- is the opposite of trans. I can appreciate the need for this word. What I do not appreciate is the word itself. Cis- sounds like sissy. The s sound is tough for some people to say. There should be another phrase that we can use to designate someone who utilizes the gender of birth. ~ Every sperm is sacred! ~ Also scared. ~ They’re not scared, they’re happy! ~ There is a .005% chance they will have to work. ~ Well I think that progress is not possible without deviation. And I think that it’s important that people be aware of some of the creative ways in which some of their fellow men are deviating from the norm, because in some instances they might find these deviations inspiring and might suggest further deviations which might cause progress, you never know. Frank Zappa (VPRO-TV February 1971) ~ The previous post was “Important Lessons We Can All Learn From Franklin Graham” This is a very, very short post. ~ @norm_1142 every day I see new applications of how a policy of “don’t tell people what to do” makes everyone happier. ~ @fieldnegro No Mr. Jindal, we don’t need to “pray”, we need to change the culture of guns in this country. ~ I publish a blog, chamblee54.wordpress.com . I have a twitter account, @chamblee54. For some reason, you have blocked me on twitter. Now, this is really not a big deal, but it is puzzling. I honestly don’t think I have so much as written your twitter address on any tweet of mine. I did quote you on the Planned Parenthood video in a post I wrote.I gave full credit, and included a link. Otherwise, I have had little contact with LGF, or even read it that often. Why did you block me? ~ “White liberals talk about race all the time” The problem is that nobody listens. ~ I Am NOT Cisgendered ~ I have mixed feelings about this. I was put off by the academicism of the first paragraph. I decided to scan the rest, and look at the last paragraph. I found myself agreeing with much of what he said. I am so tired of being labelled and pigeonholed. So many of the things that people use to judge me have little to do with who I am as a human being. The whole cis/trans clusterfuck is just one more source of conflict that serves little purpose. ~ Breaking Down HuffPost’s “I am NOT cisgendered” Tantrum ~ Matt makes a good point about the looney left, and then blows it by whining about media coverage. He also does not mention that the radical right is better armed than the looney left. ~ Humor rhymes with boomer, tumor, and rumor. It is designed to appeal to poets. ~ ppl who want a white pride movement probably need a bowel movement ~ without deviation from the norm progress is not possible ~ dumb de dumb dumb ~ I have only heard the first 25 minutes Truth be known, after the first two minutes it is not that great. But the opening story. You should hear it yourself, as told with a british accent. This man is in a bdsm dungeon. (spell check for bdsm is bdrm) he asks for a bunch of bananas the idea is to see how many he can stick in his butt after a few he cries uncle, and asks for a bucket to eliminate the product. In the minute that the hostess goes to try and find a bucket, the man starts to uncontrollably projectile eliminate the bananas There are 19 episodes of sex with strangers I have downloaded all of them, with the exception of the ones that sound boring, like sex with mormons. The banana episode is 3. Episode 2, Grindr in wyoming, is recommended. ~ @WernerTwertzog Please grant me your pardon if my spell changer converted your name into an insult, obscenity, or vile liquid. ~ @Trepanatus Dennis Rodman just endorsed Trump. Parody and satire are now impossible. ~ uth pb o ~ I got to the question ” “Do you have the word ‘skanky’ in America?” Then the popup ad hit. ~ Pay ATTN: We share commentary, news articles, and videos that cover important societal topics as well as give you opportunities to take action. ~ I use firefox, for the time being anyway. Idk if what I saw was technically a popup. It is where a full screen thingie covers the entire window. Sometimes you can close it, sometime you cannot. ~ Faith is the excuse we provide to rational people who believe to be real the mad, antithetical fictions of the Bible. ~ pictures from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”. ~ selah
The Problem Of Anti-Racism
Some people are proud of being anti-racist. This is not always something to be proud about. Often, as in anti communism and homophobia, the struggle against the unseen enemy is worse than the problem you are fighting. When you denounce someone as racist, you might be talking about yourself.
The discussion that follows should not be seen as pro racist. People should treat people with kindness. The word people does not need an adjective. This kindness should be extended to those who do not share your opinions about racism.
Maybe you should lead by example. Instead of worrying about how your neighbor thinks, worry about how you think. If you don’t like the nasty word don’t use it.
To some, racism is the ultimate taboo. It is the worst charge you can make about a person, and the quickest to be made. Once accused, you are guilty until proven innocent. It does not help that the definition of racism is expanding all the time. What one person considers racism is normal thinking to another. It used to be that racism was when you treated someone poorly because of their ethnicity. Now is is a multi faceted boogieman about power and prejudice. Keeping up can be a full time job.
Anti-communism has been compared to anti-racism. To our younger readers, there used to be a system of government called communism. It was alleged to be involved in a cold war with the United States. This cold war was the justification for a bloated military industrial complex. Many crooked politicians were elected on the basis of being anti communist. Often, the fight against communism was worse than the actual system of government.
Anti-racism is the new McCarthyism. Guilt by association is the rule. Difficult to refute charges are made against people. The charge of racism is used as a red herring.
Homophobia is compared to anti-racism. In both cases, the accuser has a set of standards. If the accused does not meet those standards, then the accused is considered fair game for abuse. The accused and the accuser may not agree on these standards. That does not matter. If someone wants to make the accusation, then they will, and will feel righteous about doing so.
It is frequently speculated that the homophobe is secretly gay. The need to be heard badmouthing gays stems from a perceived need to prove heterosexuality. Could this be the case with the anti racist? Maybe the anti-racist is secretly afraid that they might be a racist. The “calling out” of others, for perceived racism, is an effort to overcompensate for their own shortcomings.
Some things need to be said one more time. People should treat people with kindness. The word people does not need an adjective. Shaming and guilt mongering, because someone does not share your attitudes about race, is not appropriate. To use an anti-communist expression, there are better ways to win hearts and minds. This is a repost. Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
PU Is Short For Pun
1. The roundest knight at King Arthur’s round table was Sir Cumference.
He acquired his size from too much pi.
2. I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian.
3. She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.
4. A rubber band pistol was confiscated from the algebra class. It was a weapon of math disruption.
5. The butcher backed into the meat grinder and got a little behind in his work.
6.. No matter how much you push the envelope, it’ll still be stationery.
7. A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was cited for littering..
8. A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.
9. Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie..
10. Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
11. A hole has been found in the nudist camp wall. The police are looking into it.
12. Atheism is a non-prophet organization.
14. Two hats were hanging on a hat rack in the hallway.
One hat said to the other, ‘You stay here; I’ll go on a head..’
15. I wondered why the baseball kept getting bigger. Then it hit me.
16. A sign on the lawn at a drug rehab center said: ‘Keep off the Grass.’
17. A small boy swallowed some coins and was taken to a hospital.
When his grandmother telephoned to ask how he was, a nurse said, ‘No change yet.’
18. A chicken crossing the road is poultry in motion.
19. The short fortune-teller who escaped from prison was a small medium at large.
20. The man who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.
21. A backward poet writes inverse.
22. In democracy it’s your vote that counts. In feudalism it’s your count that votes.
23. When cannibals ate a missionary, they got a taste of religion.
24. Don’t join dangerous cults: Practice safe sects.
25. Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
26. Stories are in the public duh-main. This is a repost.
Called Ugly By A Frog
11. Thou shalt publish thy arguments in text format. ~ Not everyone received the message in 2000 to stop using colored text. ~ Isn’t the proper expression “text of color”? ~ That class was not very bright. They should have realized after the pebbles that the jar was not full. ~ @StoneCStudios 50 Cent’s name has more money than he does. ~ Nobody hates like Christians they think their ideas about life after death excuse their hate ~ top seven topics on Atlanta twitter right now #TodaysKidsWillNeverKnow #IranDeal #PlutoFlyby #Steve Spurrier #BastilleDay #CowAppreciationDay #Planned Parenthood ~ The website you were trying to reach is temporarily unavailable. ~ trees are all bark and no bite ~ Snopes has had a busy day with the #plannedparenthood video. It says that rapists use “unmarked police cars” to snare victims. However, dialing 112 is not a good idea. 911 is still your best bet. ~ @postcrunk constantly in the middle of billions of uniquely intersecting realities ~ Is that the Mod Squad? ~ I got blocked on twitter today by a “christian” website. I said that the Planned Parenthood video was a fraud, and anyone who believed it was an idiot. ~ Being heard talking the talk is much more important that walking the walk. In so many ways the ARF crowd is like overall society in that the image is more important that the reality behind the mask. ~ When you say blocked, do you mean unfriended? There are different layers of this. OK, you just answered that. I guess I have only been blocked twice by faeries, which isn’t bad considering. ~ Unfriending is hurtful. I have unfollowed a few people, but I don’t think I have ever unfriended anyone. If you change your mind later, and decide that Joe Blow really isn’t a poopyhead after all, then you still have that recorded slap in the face to deal with. Spell check suggetions… unfollowed unhallowed poopyhead pothead ~ @whittmman I am an acme of things accomplished, and I an encloser of things to be. ~ @whitman632 I wish I smelled better. @chamblee54 You have been dead 123 years What did you expect? ~ This is just a bit north of the new baseball stadium. That move was partially justified by looking for a better neighborhood. ~ Damn I hate this yahoo email thing I had to delete the first time I wrote this and start over I added the link first, and then this idiot program tried to add what I wrote to the link. ~ KimKierkegaardashian @KimKierkegaard No authentic human life is possible without a black leather jacket. ~ While the Gaza slaughter was horrible, what Israel is doing today might be worse. Along with Saudi Arabia, Israel is trying to sabotage a peace deal with Iran. ~ Has Caitlyn Jenner ever said what the preferred pronouns are? She might not be preferred. ~ Calling All Geniuses: Are you smart enough to be a Mensa member? ~ @nihilist_arbys It’s 3 am. You awake in a panic. You’re wasting your life? You’re alone? relax. You’re totally insignificant & you’ll die soon. Enjoy arbys. ~ If you like this post, please share it along: ~ The Ministry of Silly Walks ~ If you, say, call the number on a receipt and give feedback on your customer service experience in the hopes of winning $1,000, who verifies that the company actually awards a prize? ~ Quiz: Who Is Your Spirit Musician? Janis Joplin ~ The same people who verify the amount given to charity by shady merchandisers. ~ can white people be negatively affected by racism ~ can you say humbug in July? ~ People who label other people are a problem. ~ some ppl boast abt making pwoc uncomfortable this does not lead to positive change ~ It is socially irresponsible to post images of violence on the daily w/o supporting people’s mental & physical well-being. ~ Naomi Munroe sure does know a lot of big words. ~ the anagram for massive, with or without all caps, is me ass iv or save sim ~ KimKierkegaardashian @KimKierkegaard Skirt is by Chloe. Heels are by Manolo. But everything that makes me impure comes from within. ~ This post has been removed. This post by Gawker CEO Nick Denton has more details. ~ July 17 is birthday of Phyllis Diller & Camilla Parker Bowles Looks are not everything ~ This posting has been flagged for removal. ~ @alphabetsuccess The hardest thing to learn in life is which bridge to cross and which to burn. – Bertrand Russell #quote @chamblee54 What are you going to burn, the bridge or the cross? ~ Doesn’t someone have to shut up and listen, or is that obsolete? ~ this post begins with a condescending comment about the Alaskan native population. It goes downhill from there. I made it as far as the comment about Darren Wilson shooting Mike Brown because of prejudice, and getting away with it because of racism. This sort of simplistic rhetoric does not have any value. ~ When Jimmy was running for President, Lester Maddox said that Jimmy was a liar. Jody Powell replied. “Being called a liar by Lester Maddox is like being called ugly by a frog,” ~ Shut down the Canidrome, the world’s deadliest greyhound racetrack. ~ Mr. Brooks has taken book promotion to a new level. ~ is it as annoying when G-d talks about man as it is when man talks about G-d? ~ What do you think about the rumors the Caitlyn Jenner received the award as a quid pro quo for consenting with an interview with Diane Sawyer? ~ Wonder if the boat owner looks sad when he gets his credit card bill? ~ @WernerTwertzog All this fuss about #DonaldTrump is a waste of perfectly useful hatred. ~ You can always be sure to find uncertainty. ~ Did anyone else get back from riding a bicycle past a Buddhist monastery? ~ @whittmman Just because you have an irrational belief in a supreme being doesn’t mean there is one. ~ pictures today are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”. ~ selah
The Planned Parenthood Video Part Two
Last Wednesday, a sensationalized video was released. Planned Parenthood was said to traffic is baby parts obtained through abortion. On Thursday, Radiolab released a show, Gray’s Donation.
Sarah Gray was pregnant with twins. The sonogram said that one baby would probably die, and that the sick baby was endangering the healthy baby. A decision was made to abort the sick baby. On the day of the procedure, something had changed. The abortion could not be safely performed. Both babies would be carried to term.
Thomas, the sick baby, lived for six days. Callum, the healthy baby, is doing fine. A decision was made to donate organs, from Thomas, to researchers. In the radiolab story, the mother goes to some of the labs, and learns what happened to the organs.
These quotes are from a story, Thomas Gray lived six days, but his life has lasting impact. “The next day, Gray met James Zieske, the institute’s senior scientist, who told her “infant eyes are worth their weight in gold,” because, being so young, they have great regenerative properties. Thomas’ corneas were used in a study that could one day help cure corneal blindness. … the Duke Center for Human Genetics in Durham, N.C., where even though the twins were identical, scientists found epigenetic differences in their cord blood, research that could one day help prevent Thomas’ fatal defect, anencephaly. … the researcher at the University of Pennsylvania who used the donation in her efforts to cure retinoblastoma, the most common form of eye cancer in children. … It is almost impossible to obtain normal retina from a child, The sample from Thomas is extremely precious for us.”
This is a unique case, as are almost all life or death situations. Things are seldom black or white, They are, pardon the pun, shades of gray. There are serious moral dilemmas involved in the use of some tissues for research. Nuance is not often communicated in 140 characters.
This does not stop the internet comment moralizers. “she a ghoul and a shyster dealer of death parts… praying on those mourning to accomplish ridiculous research” “Great story, but there is no way one of the priests should have claimed that it was OK to abort the sick baby in order to save the healthy one or the mother. The example used was completely wrong. … In Gray’s Donation there was absolutely an intention to kill the sick fetus. It would not have been an accident or unintended, and therefore there is no double effect, and is morally indefensible.”
In the Planned Parenthood video, much is made about pricing for the infant parts. Prices range from $30 to $100. In this study, we hear a researcher say “infant eyes are worth their weight in gold.” This might not be the best way to phrase this, since the tiny eyes probably don’t weigh that much. In a competitive free market, such an item would have a much, much higher price than $100.
One of the worst players in muddying the waters is the Catholic Church. A website called Life News has a misleading article, He Only Lived Six Days Outside the Womb, But Baby Thomas is Helping Cure Cancer. It ignores the fact that the mother opted for abortion, but was forced by medical circumstances to carry the twins to term. The post linked here has a header ad for Faith Focused Dating at “CatholicMatch.” Another ad promotes Affordable Biblical Healthcare.
Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
Murder Statistics
Nate Silver likes to keep busy during a non election year. He issued a report recently, Black Americans Are Killed At 12 Times The Rate Of People In Other Developed Countries. The Silver report was published June 18. The various internet content recyclers only picked up the story a day or two ago.
“If you’re a white person your chance of being murdered every year is 2.5 out of 10,000… If you’re a black person it’s 19.4, so almost eight times higher…. the murder rate for white Americans is similar to the murder rate for people living in Finland, Chile or Israel. The murder rate for black Americans, on the other hand, is similar to the rate found “in developing countries that are war zones even, like Myanmar, or Rwanda, Mexico, Brazil, Nigeria, places that have vast disorder.”
If there is one thing you can find on the internet, it is statistics. Since we are dealing with totals, not averages, the numbers used in this post should be fairly reliable. There might be some under reporting, or questions about how to deal with mixed race people. For the purposes of this post, we are going to take the numbers at face value.
The numbers used today are from 2013. The population of the United States was 316,128,839. Of this total, 77.7% are white, and 13.2% are black. There are 5.88 times as many white people as black people. There were 245,632,107 white people, and 41,729,006 black people. For purposes of this study, these numbers will be rounded off, to 316m total, 246m white, and 42m black.
Expanded Homicide Data Table 6 was produced by the FBI. For white people, there were 3,005 murders in 2013. This is 12 per million. For black people, there were 2491 murders in 2013. This is 59 per million. These numbers are different from those quoted by Nate Silver.
Who is committing these murders? For the white people, 2,509 (83%) were killed by a white person, and 409 (13%) were killed by a black person. (These numbers will not add up to 100%, as there are “other” and unknown killers.) For the black people, 189 (7%) were killed by a white person, and 2,245 (90%) were killed by a black person.
Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
A Study Of Cusswords On Twitter
There was a link on facebook to a Gawker situation, Do You Live in a “Bitch” or a “Fuck” State? American Curses, Mapped. The article has a series of maps, with unappealing red and blue splotches embedded. Each map is dedicated to a cussword: asshole, bitch, cunt, damn, darn, faggot, fuck, gosh, motherfucker, and shit. Red splotches means a word in a particular region, while blue splotches mean the phrase is less popular. Only three of the Carlin seven words are studied.
We only know that the words are being used on twitter. The technology is not advanced enough to determine if the words are used as a compliment, or an insult. Are these wirty dords employed as nouns, verbs, or modifiers? Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient only goes so far.
“Jack Grieve, a professor in Forensic Linguistics at Aston University in England, has been tweeting out maps of the U.S. with geotagged data from Twitter that show where in the country we are using which swearwords. Almost a billion tweets, from October of 2013 to November of 2014, were collected by Diansheng Guo at University of South Carolina, totaling nearly 9 billion words.” In other words, this is based on tweets. Peeps who communicate in 140 character segments are a tiny subset of the overall population. The utility of this group as a representative sample is questionable.
The results are amusing. Cunt is popular in New England, and not so popular in the south. This designation for vagina apparently has a latin root… cunnus also gave us cunnilingus. There was a tasteful comment exchange The 3 Legged Horse Quite disappointed with the lack of cunt usage in my area. tortfeasor “Tell me about it.” —Random desperate guy
There is a 333 mile wide zone around the southeast states, from Virginia to Texas. In this region, shit, bitch, and fuck are popular. Fuck and faggot enjoy great popularity with California tweets. New England and Utah are full of 140 character assholes.
On his twitter page, @JWGrieve, round 2 has started. The words analyzed here are bastard, crap, douche, fuckboy, hell, pussy, slut, whore. The shit/fuck/bitch belt shows a propensity for pussy and hell. Slut is popular in Seattle, and the Texas rudder.
Jack Grieve has a website, where the cusswords are undigitized. He discusses other projects. “Here’s a map of the alternation between LOL and haha on Twitter, ignoring all of the other ways of signalling laughter, including variations on these two forms. This map clearly shows that regions with high LOL percentages also tend to have large African American populations. … So it appears that white speakers are taking the lead here and that African American speakers are resisting the incoming form haha.”
Mapping Lexical Spread in American English is another study. It studies the top rising words on twitter, for 2014. The winner is fuckboy, which is not a compliment. This noun is popular in New Jersey, Central California, and parts of West Texas.
“Identify emerging words from 2014 based on an analysis of a multi-billion word geocoded corpus of American tweets. The team at USC are in the process of compiling a multi-billion word corpus using the Twitter API, consisting of almost all geocoded Tweet from the US and the UK since 2013. These tweets come from the approximately 2% of users who are tweeting from a geo-tracking mobile device. The analysis presented here is based on a 8.9 billion word corpus of American Tweets from October 2013 to November 2014.The corpus contains approximately 980 million Tweets from 7 million users from within the contiguous United States. We first extracted the 67,000 words that occur at least 1,000 times in the corpus and identified rising words by correlating word relative frequency per day to day of the year using a Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient”
Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
The Planned Parenthood Video
At some point yesterday, a video was released by The Center for Medical Progress. . It showed a secretly recorded luncheon with an official with Planned Parenthood. This official seemed to be discussing the sale of fetal body parts. Heads began to explode in teabagistan.
PG heard about it on twitter. He checked with Mr. Google. The sites reporting on the video included TOWNHALL, The Daily Caller, Breitbart, and the blaze.
@chamblee54 Has anyone checked with snopes? This sounds far fetched and many reporting on it are not dependable @nickmiller Featured in @WORLD_mag Highly reputable news outlet.
Madworld I believe the ONLY reason abortion is legal in the US is because the biotech/medical/scientific community profits from baby parts. Mad scientists get to experiment baby parts and slip them into drugs/vaccines. Also, the CDC recently officially recommended circumcision, because baby foreskin, like aborted baby parts, is a profitable commodity with various uses–including cosmetics (look up foreskin fibroblast cells). Sadistic perverted sickos. Our govt will allow any sickening procedure if corporations will profit from it. (Comment at the blaze.)
As soon as you could say snopes the internet fact checkers were weighing in on the story. Planned Parenthood issed a press release. While the video may have a grain of truth, it sensationalizes a common medical practice. There is an ongoing ethical discussion about these practices. These issues will not be resolved by tabloid videos.
The best observation might be at Little Green Footballs. “The sentence I put in bold explains the section of the video where they do talk about money, specifically “$30 to $100 per specimen.” This is not a “purchase price” for the specimens — it’s for transportation and other incidental fees. Anyone who thinks human body parts would be sold for the ridiculously low price of $30 to $100 is (not to put too fine a point on it) a gullible idiot.“
Yeah, Obama’s a Communist The “doctor” explains that there is a price range of $30-$100 per specimen. Since the abortion is already paid for, that disparity of pricing no doubt covers differences in quality. So yeah, you get what you pay for. (Comment at The Daily Caller.)
The luncheon in the video took place July 25, 2014. Why was this video released nearly a year later? Is it a coincidence that a nuclear deal with Iran was announced on this day? The video was somehow released, and was all over digital dingbat land within minutes. How this happened might be an interesting story. Pictures for this voyage to the underbelly of the internet are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.UPDATE: Part Two.
Witch Part Two
PG went to a poetry reading on May 21, 2015. It was a very positive night. Nobody reading was angry, or at least none of the poems were angry. The star performer went on last, and that was that.
PG wrote Witch abut the evening. There was soon a comment on facebook. “i am frequently misgendered throughout this article and it makes me angry.” PG went back, and tweaked the gender references in the post. There is only so much you can do.
The only indication that PG had seen about trans status was a line about pronouns on twitter. The poet said that their pronouns were they and their. The last thing the poet said in the reading was “I am a fricking witch.” Maybe this was a clue.
A few days later, PG went to a building to work. A group was going to use the building… a former elementary school, now used by artists … and the grounds, for a party. In exchange, some people from this group were to come by and work in the building. Although PG had misgivings about the party, he was happy to make a contribution by working in the building. The job this Sunday afternoon was painting a room.
The story of the poet was told. PG was using he/him pronouns to describe the poet. One of the other painters was “aggressive” in objecting to this. PG protested, but wound up not using he/him pronouns. At least that is what PG remembers. The “aggressive” painter says that PG continued to use he/him pronouns. Two people do not always remember a dispute the same way.
The concept of using a plural pronoun like they, to describe a single person, did not make sense to PG. Apparently, this is a common practice. PG appreciates that gender based pronouns can be problematic. However, PG does not feel that redefining they, for use in describing a singular person, is a good solution to the problem.
The rest of the afternoon went by. PG gave the “aggressive” painter a ride home after the work session. PG did not think much more about the incident.
On thursday, the “aggressive” painter sent PG a facebook message. One of the other painters identified as trans. The “aggressive” painter said “You played the role of oppressor … with your intolerant remarks.” The message exchange got nasty and nastier. The “aggressive” painter lost control of their temper, and said some hateful things.
In the week before the poetry reading, PG had tried to promote the appearance by the poet. This mainly consisted of placing notices in facebook groups. PG was irritated that his reward was to be chewed out by the pronoun police.
The poet had said things on twitter that made PG question any trans status. The overall sanity of the poet also came into question. After the incident with the “aggressive” painter, PG kept an eye on the poet’s twitter feed. There was little information about trans status. Most of what PG saw had to do with a cross country poetry reading tour.
A few weeks after all this, the poet had a long series of tweets. Twitter monologs run in reverse order, and can be a lot of trouble to read. PG left a tweet. “don’t you have blog/facebook acct? Your twitter monolog would be much easier to read in order instead of scrolling backwards”
The next few days were quiet. PG went to the poet’s twitter page. You are blocked from following @johnmortara and viewing @johnmortara’s Tweets. And so ends the story. The spell check suggestion for @johnmortara is mortarboard.
UPDATE:Read Poetry and Eventually Die was hacked by by Mr.dexter.305. Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
Chamblee54 
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