Blogaround

1. Some thoughts on the concept of good faith and bad faith (and why that distinction is useful to have) (May 4) "What I mean to designate as 'bad faith' isn't just any and all rudeness; it's specifically the kind of rudeness I think of as 'not even trying' -- as in, not actually, earnestly treating conflict resolution as the goal."

2. How I Figured Out I’m Asexual + A Christian Ace Experience (May 1) "When you’re taught that you should avoid being interested in those things, being ace isn’t remarkable – you’re 'just being good.'  (Until you grow up and now it’s a huge problem because men are supposed to struggle with lust, and women are expected to please their husbands, so now all the expectations have done a 180 and you’re in hot water.)  So people aren’t as likely to realize something’s up for a while."

3. It Is Journalism’s Sacred Duty To Endanger The Lives Of As Many Trans People As Possible (February 17, via) From the Onion, a news satire website.

4. Feds: Hospitals that denied emergency abortion broke the law (May 2) Maybe this is good news... at least somewhere in our messed-up legal system, there's a law that can stand up and say it's not okay to deny life-saving medical care. But... the whole situation is just so awful, does it really help anything to go from "doctors are too scared to do their jobs because they might get arrested" to "doctors are too scared to do their jobs, maybe we can also make them scared of getting in trouble for not doing their jobs"? 

5. Woman at center of Till killing has died (April 27) "For many, 'it’s going to be a wound, because justice was never done,' he said."

6. Ron DeSantis Wants Very Own Chinese Exclusion Act (May 4) "The Florida state House yesterday passed a bill aimed at preventing the Chinese Communist Party from buying land in Florida, but goes well beyond that by forbidding anyone who's 'domiciled' in China from owning any real estate in Florida, unless they're a US citizen or permanent resident." Wow not cool.

And another link also from Wonkette: Please, Everyone, Calm Your Faces About Shoplifting (May 4) "These companies have actively decided that any increase in shoplifting that comes from these measures is less expensive to them than it is to hire the amount of workers they would need to have on the floor to prevent it."

7. Tagging AI art (May 7) "Why would you ever use unmoderated tags if you had any alternative?"

8. Does Having a Savings Account Mean I Don’t Trust God? (April 24) Yeah, this is something I always think about... It strikes me as interesting that apparently, the thinking is that if you give away your money rather than saving it, then when you're in need, God will provide, so you'll be fine. Maybe I thought like that long ago, when I was more naive, but now my thinking- or rather, the argument that always exists in the back of my mind- is that I should give money to people having emergencies now, and if I have a financial emergency in the future, well, I'll be in the same boat as a lot of other people, and why should I think I deserve better than them? (ie, I don't assume "God will provide.")

Anyway, for me it's just a theoretical thing that I always think about. In actual reality, the best solution I can come up with is to set a yearly goal for how much to give to charity (and it should be a percentage of my income), and then give that much and quit worrying about it.

9. Why - Michael Card [content note: Jesus' death] I am a fan of Michael Card, a Christian singer from the 1980's. 

10. On Steven Crowder, abuse and the evangelical definition of ‘respect’ (May 3) [content note: abuse] "How, then, could Crowder accuse his wife of being disrespectful? Likely because he was defining respect the way far too many in the conservative evangelical community do."