Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. Snake-in-the-Box Problem (August 6) From xkcd.

2. There are now more than half a billion mobile money accounts in the world, mostly in Africa — here's why this matters (July 7, via) "As the chart below illustrates, the percentage of people in Sub-Saharan Africa with a mobile money account grew rapidly, from 12% in 2014 to 33% by 2021."

Also from Our World in Data: Two billion people don’t have safe drinking water: what does this really mean for them? (June 23) "The vast majority of the two billion — around three-quarters of them — do have access to a piped water source or protected well that is probably safe to drink. But it’s either not located in their home, is not always available, or there’s no guarantee it’s completely contamination-free. That usually means they must travel to get there; whether that round-trip takes less or more than 30 minutes determines whether they fall into the 'basic source' or 'limited source' category."

3. You Can Now Buy Eggs From In-Ovo Sexed Hens! (July 17, via) "Most people are surprised, and often disturbed, to learn the truth: in the United States alone, approximately 350 million male chicks are routinely culled each year, typically by methods such as maceration (being ground up alive)."

4. The Element Song by Tom Lehrer

Posting this because Tom Lehrer, influential musical satirist, dies at 97 (July 27)

5. More than 1,000 rabbis and Jewish leaders denounce starvation in Gaza (August 1) The letter says they agree with Israel fighting this war, but don't agree with using famine as a weapon.

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Links related to the antichrist:

1. Cynicism Is the Enemy of Action (July 1) "I think back to the phrase climate journalist David Roberts coined a decade ago, the 'doing it wrong brigade,' for those people on the sidelines who tell those who are doing the work that they should be doing it differently, criticizing their tactics, goals, alliances, or some other thing that falls short of perfection since as Hayes and Kaba point out, when you're not doing anything you can set impossible goals and then lounge about figuring out how those doing the work fall short."

2. Federal agents spread out across D.C. streets amid Trump's vow to crack down on crime (August 11) "He offered no explanation for where homeless people would be sent, but in a social media post last week Trump suggested he is considering a federal takeover of policing in Washington."

3. Asylum-seekers thought they were following the rules. Now some are told to start over (August 10) "'You're literally making documented people, again, undocumented, and they're already in here,' said Michelle Marty Rivera, an immigration attorney who has dozens of clients who have received these letters. 'You are canceling employment authorization. You're virtually converting people that are following the normal traditional asylum rules and leaving them without a status and without protection and asking them to show their faces to ICE.'"

So the strategy that the MAGAs are using is to find some minor thing where somebody's asylum-seeking process didn't go exactly according to the "rules" (even if this was the government's fault for not having availability to do interviews) and then saying that means the entire thing is invalid. It comes across as "the government is out to get you" rather than "there should be a system where people with genuine reasons are able to claim asylum."

(I have some thoughts about the similarities between this and conservative Christian ideology about sin and hell. Maybe if I have time I'll write a post on that. See also: ICE and Hell)

Update, I wrote the post: When You Believe God is Out to Get You

4. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reposts video of pastors saying women shouldn't vote (August 9) Ah, the pastor in question is Doug Wilson. How will I explain Doug Wilson to my children?

5. A family's fishing trip ends with the dad at 'Alligator Alcatraz.' Here's their story (August 9) "Unable to show a driver's license, the couple were arrested and taken to a local jail where they were separated. M. says this was the last time she saw her husband, before he joined the hundreds of detainees at the controversial makeshift detention center, which has been dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz." She told NPR their story on the condition of anonymity for the entire family, because she fears retaliation from immigration officials."

6. Texas Showdown (August 6) "When people ask, 'But what are Democrats actually doing to save our country from MAGA fascism?' point them to the brave men and women of the Texas state Democratic House caucus. They are risking their political careers and even their personal freedoms, not to preserve their seats and their power, but to preserve our right to a fair and representative system."

On the Subject of Eating Dog

Image source.

So apparently on June 21, in Yulin, Guangxi province, they have "dog meat day" (狗肉节).

Guangxi is in southern China, and kind of has a reputation for eating weird things. (Guangdong is another province in southern China and apparently they eat even more weird things there. There's a joke I've heard that "Guangdong people eat everything with four legs, except for tables.") But in most places in China, most people think it's really weird to eat dog.

Anyway, I saw some posts on Chinese social media about "share this post if you are opposed to dog meat day", and last night I saw a news story about dog activists protesting in the streets of Yulin. (Huge warning on that video- it has a couple shots of the dead, roasted dogs.)

So... it seems like eating dog is kind of controversial, and kind of "eh, people there eat weird things, that's just how they roll, whatever."

And my opinion? Well, as an American, first I'll say EWWW NO THE POOR LITTLE DOGGIES!

But, you guys, I'm not a vegetarian, so... Is this really all that different from eating pigs and cows and sheep?

Some people here in China think eating dog meat should be banned. But I think, unless you're a vegetarian, you're not really in a position to be advocating a ban. What's the difference? Pigs and cows can be smart and friendly too, and nobody has a problem with eating them. (Except some cities in China with large Muslim populations- yeah good luck finding pork there.)

Also, in China, they sell cooked chickens with the heads still attached. They serve fish on a plate with its eye looking at you. It seems like Chinese culture is way less discreet about the fact that meat comes from animals.

So... yeah. Again, let me emphasize "dog meat day" is just something that happens in Guangxi province. Don't read this and think "Chinese people eat dog"- no, the majority of Chinese people do not. Dogs are pets, just like in America. (Haha, nope, American pets are way more spoiled.)

This dog is happy because it is a pet and no one is eating it. Image source.

Blogaround

1. Mark Driscoll Versus Everyone: Stifling Monstrosity (posted January 21) "Is there a third option between silence and being a douche?"

2. We Raise All Our Beef Humanely On Open Pasture And Then We Hang Them Upside Down And Slash Their Throats (posted January 22) From The Onion. I'll warn you that the descriptions get really graphic.

3. Judas as Severus Snape (posted January 16) Now there's a cool analogy.

4. Porn and the contemplative life (posted January 19) "An unoccupied mind is essential for serious contemplation." Some of the commenters pointed out this totally applies to every other kind of distraction too, not just porn.

5. God is Not a Torturer (posted January 22) "...the very reason I object is because of the character of the God I have come to know through the scriptures and through the Word." Questioning hell.

6. PSY curve Mathematica meets Gangnam Style.

7. The Scandal of the Evangelical Heart (posted January 24) "They said all of this without so much of a glimmer of a tear, and it scared me to death. It nearly scared me out of the Church."

8. Agree or Disagree: Gender Roles have caused unreasonable expectations on relationships. (posted January 25) "I would just assume those 'non-manly' characteristics were clever lies that he was using to get in my pants."

9. I stopped guarding my heart ten years ago. (posted November 2012) "We ripped giant paper hearts into pieces and agreed that they could never really be put back together and felt sorry for everyone who had squandered their limited love on mere boyfriends."

10. I Hate Loving Mark Driscoll (posted January 24) "If I do pray for him, I want to pray that he will change, which is in many ways the very thing I’m suggesting he has inappropriately done."

11. Faking It: Why You Should Stop Treating Your Husband Like a Toddler, and ACTUALLY Respect Him. (posted January 23) "And I’m sick to death of Christians–CHRISTIANS!–giving advice that appeals to the worst in human character, instead of calling out the best."

Cameras and Vegetarianism

A supermarket in Australia may start requiring its meat suppliers to have cameras in their sheds and slaughterhouses, in order to be sure they are following the standards for animal welfare, according to this post: Coles Supermarkets in Australia Wants Camera Surveillance In Supplier's Slaughterhouses, posted August 20.

Image source.

My first thought, upon reading this story, is "WHYYYYYYY would you want that?" Really? Cameras? Why would you want to digitally store footage of a bunch of pigs, so you can watch it and think, "All these pigs, which look quite alive in this video- they're all dead now. They were killed one by one and their bodies were cut up and covered in plastic wrap and sold."

That's horrifying. Why would anyone want MORE information available about what goes on in slaughterhouses?

But any line of thinking that says "the less you know, the better" is highly suspicious.

So here is my question: Do people who eat meat have a responsibility to know where it comes from?

In an ideal world, the right thing for me to do is become a vegetarian for now, do some research, decide what meat sources I'm okay with, based on how the animals are treated, and then only eat those kinds of meat. Right? Maybe everyone should try being a vegetarian for some short period of time.

But I can tell you I'm not about to do that. Being a vegetarian is incredibly inconvenient. And I have other things in my life that are more important than looking for information about slaughterhouses.

So I'm not sure what to conclude about this...

But here's another thing: Why is there this idea in American culture that eating meat is "manly" and vegetarians are weak and wimpy? And that caring about animals is just for crazy hippies? I've never tried being a vegetarian, but I imagine it's really hard- it's hard to find stuff you can eat when you're out somewhere, the vegetarian choices are so limited at restaurants, plus you have to deal with people thinking you're wimpy/over-sensitive/unreasonable for not eating meat. If anything, the vegetarians are the ones who are strong.