Oh the Humanities

Trauma from George Floyd's death will result in students receiving higher grades... at Oxford.

Ymar's Post

Wednesday.

Father’s Day

It’s almost here, for any of you so fortunate as to still have living fathers.

Blues Didgeridoo

When "Kill him!" turns to "Run!"

You've got to pick your victims carefully.

Congratulations to West Point

They have graduated their first Sikh female cadet. Normally these “first!” stories don’t interest me, but I am glad to see the military availing itself of the opportunity represented by Sikh culture.
“My grandfather was an armor officer in the Indian army, so I grew up hearing about tanks and his recollection of fighting in the mountains of northern India," Narang told Task & Purpose. “Everything he told me grew my interest in the military … he embedded that culture of service and giving back to your country.”
That is the kind of thing I wish more Americans of all stripes felt.

Treat it as an unplanned donation

Or an attack of undocumented shoppers.


Someone is going to have to sit these children down and teach them some of life's long words.

Progressives and the Guillotine

A retrospective.

Related.

Just for Fun


Biological Sex & SCOTUS

Interesting logic at work here from Gorsuch.
"An employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex," Gorsuch writes. "Sex plays a necessary and undisguisable role in the decision, exactly what Title VII forbids."
That's really plausible; the only issue is that mere statutory law should not be able to override constitutional protections for religious liberty. An Orthodox/Catholic/Muslim employer who declines to employ gays because they don't wish to provide material support their spouse is acting according to an ancient religious doctrine in each case. They're not motivated by mere animus, but by an attempt to live according to orthodoxies that are being declared illegal here -- exactly what Amendment One forbids.

The author of the piece has another bit of logic to advance.
To be clear, the court could deliver one of greatest legal protections for gay and transgender workers specifically because it acknowledges a fact deemed heretical by the most vocal woke activists: Namely that biological sex is real.

For years, the wokes have attempted to cancel everyone from right-wing trolls to liberal scientists for pointing out that biological sex is a scientific reality, one that specifically validates gay and transgender folks as a distinct class. And now the court has decided that because of that distinction, they're a protected class.... This is a victory for gay and transgender people, and hopefully one that puts to bed this hysterical canard that acknowledging the reality of biological sex is somehow hateful or dangerous toward transgender folks.

Emergency Lockdown

It is clearly a mistake to have given the government the idea that it can order people into house arrest for their own protection any time it decides to issue an emergency.
Shelter in Place

At the request of Lower Makefield Township Police Department, all residents requested to shelter in place due to a black bear sighting. Specifically the Yardley Hunt Development residents. If sighted please call 911 immediately. The Game Commission is en route. pic.twitter.com/sFNzk80Vyt

— Lower Makefield (@LMTPD) June 14, 2020
First of all, black bears are really not very dangerous at all. If treated with respect, they will generally not harm anyone and will move along in their own good time.

Second, what is the legal mechanism for issuing lockdown orders to the community via Twitter? All Americans do not use Twitter; I wouldn't use it myself if I weren't required to do so. It's a poisonous hole of a website that any reasonable person would be wise to avoid. If one should encounter police, could one be arrested for violating a Twitter order? Is there some other mechanism for issuing these orders? Is there an adequate lawful basis for allowing the police to constrict basic rights on their own, without consulting even the governor, let alone the legislature?

Third, I hope the bear had a nice romp through the empty town streets.

Ymar's Post

On Monday.

To Be an Independent Mind in the University is Not Tolerated Today

There's an open letter going around, apparently from a professor in the history department at UC Berkeley, and it's not what you'd expect.  It's a very well thought through, careful, and serious letter about the current issues of race, policing, and the black community, and I highly recommend reading it (Pastebin deleted it, but the internet is forever).  As you might expect, it's not been well received by the rest of the UC Berkeley History Department, apparently:

Of course, that it wasn't well received is unsurprising, but that the *department* would openly come out and tweet a condemnation, and claim it goes against their values- without stating why or how- was a bit of an eyebrow raiser to me.  It's perhaps the most anti-intellectual thing I've seen in the University wars and the shutting down of the right on campus.  Typically, they do this via individual counter opinions and student uprisings, or bring in outside agitators to shut down campus speakers, or some other proxy.  To have a department come out like this is a bit shocking honestly.  Though the ability of anything like this to shock me diminishes by the day as we see more and more like actions.

Up the Militia in Minneapolis

The police being useless and on track for dissolution, armed citizens secure their neighborhoods.

Beverly Hills Cops

We just want to expose you to a conversation, and you get all tear-gassy.

Bryson City


Sadly, not the Bee



But this is how "largely peaceful" counter-protests get reported:

A Speedbump on the Road to Revolution

Truck drivers say they won’t deliver to cities that disband police departments.

Tough luck, Minneapolis! I’m sure you’ll come up with a suitable substitute for food delivery. Of course you could go the capitalist route and pay more until people are willing to dare the risk. Probably citizens won’t mind the increase in food prices as much as they’d mind starvation.

Unfortunately embracing capitalism would defeat the purpose of the revolution.

Higher Dimensions

Swedish scientists say your brain can’t handle more than 11.

Cross-Tied Like a Stallion


Oil change today, new tires soon for the wife’s scoot.