unusualmusic_lj_archive | Jan. 28th, 2008

Jan. 28th, 2008

being in a stress release and reduction class and hearing your instructor say that political correctness has gone to a ridiculous extent and that the recent flap over the "lynch" comment made at Tiger Woods and the Don Imus comment was wayyyyyyy overdone. *snort* There went the blood pressure.

Via

oyinlove an entire website featuring the history of cornrows and tutorials on how to do them! http://www.ccd.rpi.edu/Eglash/csdt/african/CORNROW_CURVES/cornrow_homepage.html

and via that same LJ community, this book:

Shea Butter Republic: State Power, Global Markets and the Making of an Indigenous Commodity. Brenda Chalfin. New York: Routledge, 2004. 295 pp.

Which I need to get.

From:http://inversesquare.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/bad-science-kills-people-bush-administrationheroin-edition/

Bad Science Kills People: Bush administration/heroin edition.

I don’t know how much attention this post by Mark Kleiman is getting around the blogosphere, but it should be getting more. (h/t Kevin Drum in this post.)

Kleiman picked up on this story from NPR, which reported two facts:

Fact 1: public health officials around the country, including those in Cambridge, MA, the city where I now sit, are distributing rescue kits that save heroin users from overdoses. The kits cost $9.50, and they are credited with reversing 2,600 overdoses in 16 such local programs around the country. For context: NPR reports that “overdoses of heroin and opiates, such as Oxycontin, kill more drug users than AIDS, hepatitis or homicide.”

Most people would think that a cheap, simple tool that allows those on the sharp end of the drug wars to save lives would be an unalloyed good.

But then there’s fact 2: I’m just going to quote here the same comments Kleiman cites:

Dr. Bertha Madras, deputy director of the White House Office on National Drug Control Policy, opposes the use of Narcan in overdose-rescue programs.

“First of all, I don’t agree with giving an opioid antidote to non-medical professionals. That’s No. 1,” she says. “I just don’t think that’s good public health policy.”

Madras says drug users aren’t likely to be competent to deal with an overdose emergency. More importantly, she says, Narcan kits may actually encourage drug abusers to keep using heroin because they know overdosing isn’t as likely.

Madras says the rescue programs might take away the drug user’s motivation to get into detoxification and drug treatment.

“Sometimes having an overdose, being in an emergency room, having that contact with a health care professional is enough to make a person snap into the reality of the situation and snap into having someone give them services,” Madras says.

Read that again.

People in dire straits should not be empowered to help themselves (in a way shown to work). Instead, a dying person should hope to have the luck to make it to the E.R.

It gets worse. The essential claim Madras makes is that improving a user’s chance of surviving an overdose will encourage further drug use, while avoiding death under the care of medical professional will induce the lucky survivors to seek drug treatment.

These are at least nominally empirical claims. They can and should be tested. But as far as we can tell, Madras pulls these statements out of her gut (I’m trying to be polite here). To the extent that there is any real data, NPR’s story also reports that “one small study suggests that overdose-rescue programs reduce heroin use and get some people into treatment.”

That is, the Bush Administration’s point person on drug policy simply ignores the inconvenient knowledge that exists about the effect of this cheap, life saving program.
R

Why?

Why doesn’t the fact that readily available cheap (and cheaper-for-the-state) alternatives to life-destroying events exist affect this view? Because of a commitment to an unexamined assumption: Exemplary suffering helps focus one’s mind, it is claimed (how else can you read Madras’s comments) and so anything that might defuse the power of the demonstration is to be avoided. Science be damned.

Read rest here:http://inversesquare.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/bad-science-kills-people-bush-administrationheroin-edition/

That kind of thinking sound familiar? Remember the HPV vaccine? Read this:
Memoirs of a Skepchick had a really good satire explaining the dangers of such thinking:

Posted in Anti-Science at 11:24 am by Rebecca

I know my position on this may be a little controversial, but I think it’s important to have an open and honest debate about the subject. Here we go.

I am anti-fire extinguisher.

Wait, don’t leave yet. Hear me out.

Before the invention of the fire extinguisher in 1816, people used sensible fire safety precautions. They did not leave oily rags piled in buckets next to the ashtray. They did not set their farts on fire. And they always kept their curtains far away from heating devices.

After the invention of the fire extinguisher, all hell broke loose. It didn’t take long for games such as “Tie a Lit Sparkler to the Cat” and “Flaming Monopoly” to explode — literally and metaphorically — in popularity all over the country. People were just looking for a license to burn, and they found it in the fire extinguisher. I present the following chart as evidence:

Read rest here:http://skepchick.org/blog/?p=120

Compassionate conservatism, anyone?

Don't look now, but the front lines of the abortion battle are shifting. The decades-long face-down between insanely brave Planned Parenthood clinic workers (who accepted bodyguards and stalkers and phone harassment and the possibility that they'd be blown up at their desks or taken out by a sniper while sitting at their dinner tables as just another part of the job) and earnestly sincere raving crazies who drive around town with gruesome and bloody pictures taped all over their cars and derive their greatest satisfaction in life from howling public "murder" accusations at women who are, far more often than not, simply trying to see a doctor for a yeast infection -- well, that little piece of urban guerilla warfare, which has been ravaging lives and careers for decades in an American small town or suburb near you, is finally heading into a new phase of engagement.

And this new round looks like it may find the screeching mob of would-be fetus rescuers all dressed up -- with nowhere left to go, and nobody left to terrorize.

Or...it may not.

Christian fundamentalist trolls are fond of insisting that they're nothing at all like the Muslim fundamentalists. After all, they declare proudly, heads drawn back and chins jutting forward in quivering self-righteousness, they don't engage in acts of terrorism. Which is beyond crazy. I mean, just imagine what those same denial-mongers would have to say if radical Islamic terrorists had pulled off a 30-year campaign of violence against US and Canadian medical clinics that ended up with this kind of casualty list:

7 murders, including three doctors, two clinic employees, a security guard, and an escort
17 attempted murders
383 death threats
153 incidents of assault and battery
3 kidnappings
41 bombings
173 arsons
91 attempted bombings or arsons
619 bomb threats
655 bioterror attacks (all hoaxes), 554 of which were committed by one man
1630 incidents of trespassing
1264 incidents of vandalism
100 attacks with butyric acid stink bombs
One-third of all abortion clinics in 1981 were gone by 2005.

If Islamic jihadists had done even a tenth this much damage, every last Muslim in America would be doing stress-position calisthenics in a concentration camp somewhere in the Nevada desert right now. But since this impressive achievement in domestic terrorism was almost entirely accomplished by white Christian men -- well, y'see, it's Not Terrorism when we do it. And, as we all know by now, it's especially Not Terrorism when the targets aren't white, Christian, or male.

( Read more... )

From: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/fashion/24skin.html?em&ex=1201410000&en=06b6899885b3f203&ei=5087%0A

January 24, 2008
Skin Deep
Nice Résumé. Have You Considered Botox?
By NATASHA SINGER

IN a new self-help book called “How Not to Look Old,” chapter headings in screaming capital letters warn readers of the dreaded signs of aging that are to be avoided at all costs.

“NOTHING AGES YOU LIKE ... FOREHEAD LINES” admonishes one chapter introduction. Another chapter cautions: “NOTHING AGES YOU LIKE ... YELLOW TEETH.”

Nothing, apparently, also carbon-dates you like GRAY BROW HAIRS or SAGGING SKIN or RECEDING GUMS, according to the book written by Charla Krupp, a former beauty director at Glamour who writes a column for More, a magazine for women over 40.

The book is the latest makeover title to treat the aging of one’s exterior as a disease whose symptoms are to be fought to the death or, at least, mightily camouflaged. But the book offers a serious rationale for such vigilant attempts at age control, arguing that trying to pass for younger is not so much a matter of sexual allure as of job security.

“Looking hip is not just about vanity anymore, it’s critical to every woman’s personal and financial survival,” according to the book jacket.

Promoted recently on Oprah Winfrey’s show and “Today,” the book clearly speaks to the fears of professional obsolescence and economic vulnerability among women over 40, at whom it is aimed. “How Not to Look Old” made its debut on the New York Times best-seller list last week at No. 8 in the advice and how-to category.

“Whether we want to admit it or not, in male corporate America we would rather have a cute, sexy 30-year-old working for us than a 50-year-old with gray hair who has let herself go and looks out of it, not in the swing of it, like a nun,” said Ms. Krupp, a blonde who blurs her age by personifying her advice about donning highlights, bangs, heels and sheer lip gloss. After all, nothing ages you like dark lipstick.

“My book is hitting a nerve because I am giving not looking old a spin as if your life depended on it,” Ms. Krupp said in an interview last week.

( Read more... )

http://frankwu.livejournal.com/122837.html?thread=1184213#t1184213

I have long complained that I can't find books written about and by POC. Turns out, I just didn't know where to look. Will have to come back to this comment, tis full of info...

http://oyceter.livejournal.com/697678.html

Who are actually happy, for a change. No depression, oppression, gangs, murder etc.

http://seeking-avalon.blogspot.com/2008/01/enough-anti-street-urban-anti-exotic.html 7th POC Carnival: ENOUGH The Anti-Street / Urban Anti - Exotic / Lit Carnival

leneypoo get on this immediately.

via

skywardprodigal

http://theangryblackwoman.wordpress.com/2007/05/02/how-to-promote-diversity-in-fiction-markets/

Via

skywardprodigal

How To Promote Diversity in Fiction Markets
Posted on May 2, 2007 by the angry black woman

The Internets are abuzz lately with talk about inclusiveness and diversity in Science Fiction/Fantasy/Speculative Fiction. There’s the whole dustup with SFWA (Science Fiction Writers of America) which NKJ touched on in this post. There’s the Hugo nomination list that includes only one female writer and about two or three writers of color. There’s this insane argument pertaining to that. And then there’s the issue of diversity in fiction markets and the slush pile*.

That last issue came up several times in the last few weeks both in public (see Mike Resnick’s comments here) and in private conversation regarding Fantasy magazine. (Yes, again… it never ends.) In both instances, two editors who differ in age, experience, and probably ethnic or religious background said nearly exactly the same thing to me. To wit: ” I didn’t know (or care) if [the people who submitted to my markets] were black, white, purple, or polka-dot” (Resnick) or “I don’t choose stories based on race or culture or gender, I just choose the best stories” (an editor friend).

I really, really hate this excuse - for several reasons. The first of which is that it gives the appearance of being reasonable, thereby shutting down further discussion or debate. In writing, only the story should matter, not the writer! It also assumes that the submission pile represents an adequate and accurate cross-section of writers and stories. Therefore, by picking the best, the editor is automatically being fair.

The appearance of fairness, though, is false. That’s not readily apparent. Thus, anyone who disagrees seems, to the casual listener, unreasonable and strident.

I submit that I am neither unreasonable nor strident (at the moment). I hope that means people will hear me out.

Read rest here: http://theangryblackwoman.wordpress.com/2007/05/02/how-to-promote-diversity-in-fiction-markets/

From:http://theangryblackwoman.wordpress.com/2007/04/21/no-more-lily-white-futures-and-monochrome-myths/

Posted on April 21, 2007 by nojojojo

Note: This post was written by my guest blogger, N. K. Jemison. While I would love to take credit for its awesomeness, I cannot.

OK, been working up to this one for awhile now. Bear with me; it’s going to be long.

I should preface the following rant by saying that I’m fully aware it may hurt my career as a writer. I don’t want it to. But it probably will.

So. One of the most frequent questions that I get, when I tell friends and family that I’m a writer, is, “Oh? What kind of stuff do you write?” When I say speculative fiction — by which I mean science fiction, fantasy, and horror, since there are multiple definitions of that term — the next question that follows invariably comes only from my chromatic acquaintances. Usually it’s accompanied by a blank or confused look, and sometimes an outright grimace of distaste, and the words are then spoken in a tone of slight disbelief: “Why do you write that?”

There’s some history here that I should explain for the laypeople.

Speculative fiction (SF) has been, historically, one of the most racist genres in American literature. Oh, it hasn’t had as many Stepinfetchits or Uncle Toms as the mainstream, but there are few more powerful ways to wrong a people than to wipe it out of existence, and this is precisely what countless SF novels have done. If the crew of the Space Navy Vessel Whozimawhatsit is all white; if a vast medieval epic spanning several continents contains no chromatic folk; if the scientific accomplishments of ancient nonwhite empires are dismissed as alien leftovers; if China is the only continent toasted by an invading space warship; all of this is a kind of literary genocide. (Yes, genocide.) And it’s something that SF has not only done well for years, but continues to do; shit like this gets published all. the. time.

And even when SF makes an attempt to be inclusive, the results are usually ham-handed and painful to witness. Star Trek, for example. The show is set several hundred years in the future. White men are in the severe minority now on this planet, destined to become far more so if current demographic trends continue. Yet the Enterprise has a crew overwhelmingly dominated by white men. Another example is the current longest-running SF show on TV, Stargate SG-1, which has pretty much relegated people of color to the role of superstitious space-primitives (carrying space-spears, no less). There’s a whole planet of ‘em, or two or three. But there still aren’t many in the show’s version of the American military.

http://theangryblackwoman.wordpress.com/2007/04/21/no-more-lily-white-futures-and-monochrome-myths/