common people

Liberal empathy for underclass comes with caveat of get to keep superiority am praised for this?

Bonus link

dawkins reverse dawkins

The Dawkins fallacy (false difference):

Where the severe unnecessary human-caused suffering of A negates the lesser abuse of B, thereby, by implication trickeration, justifying the actions of those abusing B. In other words, if someone is spitting on you, the Dawkins fallacist will emphasize the fact that somewhere else, someone is getting punched. If someone's punching you, someone else is getting whipped, etc. All of this serves to silence the abused party and functions as a defense of the lesser offender (the spitter).

The reverse Dawkins fallacy (false equivalence):

Where B equates its own abuse to A's without recognizing the difference in severity, generally in order to advance its narrower interests while leaving the more abused behind. B uses A, is yet another abuser of A.

alternate universe Anderson Cooper

Here's Anderson Cooper:

You don’t think bringing guns to a mosque while families are praying inside, wearing t-shirts that say ‘F Islam’ and shouting whatever it is you’re going to shot at them, as they come and as they go — you don’t think that’s promoting violence at all?

Funny thing is, alternate universe Anderson Cooper, who's not owned by the U.S. establishment, has been asking pretty much the same question for years. 

You don't think bringing guns and tanks into American neighborhoods -- you don't think that's promoting violence at all?

Alternate universe Anderson Cooper is a blogger with 10 readers who understands what cops do.

social contract thrownness

society: Hello newborn, we love you and want the best for you. You know it's true because look at our smiles.

newborn: Hi. Well I'm genetically inclined to trust you, take on your views, become you, so...

society: And we wanna let you know you've already signed a social contract by virtue of existing.

newborn: Whaa...? Waa, waa!

society: Do you agree that oligarchy is the best political arrangement, that your life should be dedicated to production and consumption, that 100 is a good number of Senators....

newborn: I'd like to see some research.

society: Well, asking was a courtesy. We don't owe you anything, you little fuck. Like we said, you already signed the social contract when you started existing. *starts singing "We Are the World"*

death already became (personal pronoun)

The official death penalty gets treated like it's the real life/death question. Cops kill someone every day, USG kills/tortures abroad every day, USG is the world's leading arms dealer, etc. The death penalty is unquestioned all-the-damn-time policy. Now and then, the question gets asked in a court room, which is just the program asking "are you sure?" Certain people, call them liberals, having somehow explained away the vast bulk of state violence as bad apples, good intentions gone bad, etc. but mostly just not noticing, get upset when the answer to "do you really really want to end this person's life?" is still yes.

knock, knock. it's jesus.

Jesus: I'm gonna go out of my way to get brutally murdered for you.

Me: Don't do that.

Jesus: You don't understand.

Me: OK, why do you want to get brutally murdered for me?

Jesus: Because you're a piece of shit sinner, and my dad, who is perfect and good, thinks sinners deserve eternal torment.

Me: Go to hell, Jesus.

Jesus: You're gonna go to hell if I don't die for you, and maybe even if I do.

Me: Fine, I'll go to hell if it means you can avoid getting brutally murdered. Jesus, am I the only one around here with principles?

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When I was 5, "my" mom found me in my room crying. Turned out "my" kindergarten teacher had told a gruesome story. "Why did they have to kill him?," I wailed.  

assorted

These are the racially charged e-mails that got 3 Ferguson police and court officials fired

"Racially charged." Hah. Translation: "These emails may or may not have had vague references to blackness and/or whiteness in them. Not judging, not calling it racism, just pointing to the possible involvement of race in the impossibly vague content of these emails comparing black people to monkeys and dragging out several well-known racist, whoops, racial stereotypes."

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Who said it? Guess first, google second, if you want.

"We tolerate no one in our ranks who attacks the ideas of Christianity... in fact our movement is Christian. We are filled with a desire for Catholics and Protestants to discover one another in the deep distress of our own people."

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Though I agree with pretty much all of the below, by the intellectual rigor of new atheism, I hereby declare that every bad result of Soviet governance proceeded from godlessness.

"Religion is one of the forms of spiritual oppression which everywhere weighs down heavily upon the masses of the people, over burdened by their perpetual work for others, by want and isolation. Impotence of the exploited classes in their struggle against the exploiters just as inevitably gives rise to the belief in a better life after death as impotence of the savage in his battle with nature gives rise to belief in gods, devils, miracles, and the like. Those who toil and live in want all their lives are taught by religion to be submissive and patient while here on earth, and to take comfort in the hope of a heavenly reward. But those who live by the labour of others are taught by religion to practise charity while on earth, thus offering them a very cheap way of justifying their entire existence as exploiters and selling them at a moderate price tickets to well-being in heaven. Religion is opium for the people. Religion is a sort of spiritual booze, in which the slaves of capital drown their human image, their demand for a life more or less worthy of man." Vladimir Lenin

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Let's co-hate:

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Let's laugh:

"baby rays look like ravioli stuffed with tiny damned souls"

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Iran's Been Two Years Away From a Nuclear Weapon for Three Decades. My preferred frame is to point out that Iran's nuclear program is analogous to Japan's -- civilian with no indications of military.

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None of the world’s top industries would be profitable if they paid for the natural capital they use

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Life is a metaphor

I wrote a "B.A. thesis" on metaphors once, comparing Nietzsche and a bunch of analytical philosophers. Nietzsche, I think, would approve of Davidly's take.

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New Atheism, Old Empire. This writer is using the same language I do: "[New atheism] owes its popular and commercial success almost entirely to the 'war on terror' and its utility as an intellectual instrument of imperialist geopolitics." Not surprising, just hadn't seen it.