Lasers, 8 o'clock

anarchovelocirachel: johinza: antigovernmentextremist: theanti...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 12:09:55 -0400

johinza:

antigovernmentextremist:

theantistatist:

statehate:

sandandglass:

I weep for humanity.

Oh for Chrissake, I’m gonna waterboard myself.

Good ol’ Faux News.

Their true colors come out in times of crises.

They believe in “Limited government.”

Oh for fuck’s sake…

The only way to protect freedom is by taking it away?

misbeliefz: atheistrose: Honestly I have a hard time taking someone seriously if they use the...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 19:44:01 -0400

misbeliefz:

atheistrose:

Honestly I have a hard time taking someone seriously if they use the phrase “check your privilege” unironically

If I’m having an open and honest discussion with someone, I want them to address my position…not my ethnicity, sex, or sexual orientation.

Well put.

The last line is the most important: “Who buys that...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 18:28:10 -0400

The last line is the most important: “Who buys that shirt!?”
Companies don’t produce (LR) what consumers don’t buy!

There isn’t some grand social conspiracy in the market to make certain arbitrary groups feel bad, there is supply and demand—which necessitates equal input from producers and consumers. In fact, the beauty of consensual market relations is that it results in all participating individuals attaining higher utility levels.

The only way you can overcome this hole in feminist thought is if you are willing to assert that individuals do not actually have agency over their demand; that they are such obedient hive-mind slaves to some social forces architects that they cannot exercise free will... and that is one rabbit hole I’d advise most strongly against going down.

Also, this commentary walks dangerously close to “shaming” women who do choose to buy the shirt of their own free agency. Social justice terms, if they are indeed valid, must be applied equally where due.

CISPA

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 13:30:17 -0400

Just passed the House…

I'm a Game Designer. I'm a Gun Owner. It's Time To End All This 'Us vs. Them'

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 14:35:48 -0400

I'm a Game Designer. I'm a Gun Owner. It's Time To End All This 'Us vs. Them':

by Christian Allen

When I originally pitched writing this piece to Kotaku, I was a bit worked up. I had read some of Kotaku’s coverage of the post-Sandy-Hook gun vs. games debate, and I sent some pointed Tweets to Kotaku staff. I felt that the games industry media had not provided balanced coverage.

I felt that every story of mass violence from the games media was slanted towards gun control as the answer—and the lack thereof as the cause.

The few interviews I saw with game developers focused on gun control as the response to any calls for a check on video game violence.

I was pissed.

I thought that, as a game developer who not only has worked on mass-market games that revolve around violence, but as a gun owner and libertarian, I could provide an argument that would reach out to both sides. My argument would explain why, at least in the America that I believe in, the right to express speech through video games and the right to bear arms shouldn’t be mutually exclusive.

I thought I could explain the nuances of magazine capacity, rate of fire, “assault” features, etc., to the masses that really don’t understand the differences. Those difference sometimes define the line between a well-meaning gun collector and a felon.

I thought I could step beyond media hype and Hollywood education to really tell people what real life was like, and make a difference.

A few weeks ago, Stephen Totilo, head of Kotaku, offered to take me up on it. He asked me to write up a piece from the perspective of a game developer who was a gun owner and wanted to stand up for gun rights.

I do fit the bill.

On the gun side, I grew up in Alaska. I have owned and fired weapons since I was a child. I have used firearms to defend myself from animals and to defend my pets from animals. I’ve used them, in that regard, in a lethal manner. I have served in multiple branches of the military—in the military police field—which involved me pointing live weapons at real humans.

I have never fired a weapon at a human. I have never been in combat. But I understand weapons. I could rattle off a list of firearm related labels…Rifle Expert, Pistol Expert, 03 Federal Firearms Licensee, Range Safety NCO, etc…

On the game side, I have been an avid video gamer from the F-15 Strike Eagle days. I became a modder after getting out of the Corps in the late 90’s and started working on games for Red Storm’s Ghost Recon franchise, moving onto games such as Halo: Reach and working in big IP’s for WB Games.

I currently run my own studio, focusing on a small, Kickstarter-funded game.

All of my games experience has one thread running through it: Violence. When not working on a shooting game—which is what I am best known for—I worked on a short-lived sword slashing game. I have never made a game that did not include violence.

So, here I am, a gun-owning, 2nd Amendment proponent who also makes violent video games.

I support the 1st Amendment just as strongly and planned to explain to you how a degradation of one can equate to the degradation of the other.

I was going to talk about how degradation of our Constitutional rights is something we should all rail against and had even planned to bring up the erosion of our 4th Amendment rights as context, in this age of “Big Brother” and the Patriot Act.

But now that I sit down to write this, I realize that I am not going to convince you.

If you want to ban guns, you want to ban guns. If you want to protect your rights to bear arms, you want to protect them. Regardless of what I say here, I will not change your mind. But in this venue, I can assume you care about video games. So, what I will do is to ask for a separation between the two.

The NRA (an organization, which ironically, I stopped supporting because of their support for the last failed “Assault Weapons” ban), cast the first stone with their stupid casting of blame onto old video games and movies as a cause for the killings at Sandy Hook Elementary School. This was a blatant misdirection and such obvious flailing designed to deflect the discussion from guns. Even folks like me groaned in disgust. The NRA made themselves look like idiots by holding up copies of GTA, Mortal Kombat, etc.

But then the games media took the bait.

Every article that talked about mass violence and the effect of video games seemed to want to push back against the stupid NRA accusations. Every interview of game developers had to call out for more legislation to ban some form of guns.

I can argue passionately for gun rights. I can argue passionately for speech rights. Both have been validated by the Supreme Court. But what do I do when they argue against each other, when special interests are turned against each other by legislators with an agenda to “do something?”

Instead of trying to educate the game audience about the nuances of gun design, gun control agendas, and other things that hopefully they will take the time to educate themselves on—before they abdicate their rights—I find myself hoping they will educate themselves. I hope they will step outside of their information zone.

What I would ask of the games media, please, is to recognize that it is not us vs them.

Just because out-of-touch NRA executives spout stupid shit about video games, that does not mean that games folks need to spout stupid shit about guns. Gamers can defend their hobby in a reasonable manner without being unreasonable.

While I do have this platform, I do want to call out two issues that I passionately feel we have been avoiding while both sides attack each other: The mental health issue, and the coverage of murderers.

America has a seriously-deficient mental health system, both culturally and governmentally. I have not heard any serious discussion about working to fix this. I don’t mean more fucking government money, I mean talking about a society where it is OK to come out and ask for help. We can figure out the money stuff after…we know how to help the crazy guy on the corner (even if we don’t want to), but what about the repressed suicidal young guy barely hanging on?

And, last but not least, I do want to call out what really gets me pissed. This is what I really think is a true causation factor in this rise of mass violence: the mass media attention that these depraved, and often suicidal killers, receive.

If you have done your homework, you know that the deadliest school killing happened in 1927 (not that you would know that based on today’s coverage). The mass shootings of today, the Sandy Hook killings included—these events, and the perpetrators—draw clicks and views. The media delves into their history, posting every available photo of them, giving them the fame that they crave.

This is what the killers want.

Let’s look back into our teenage years. You know that loner, suicidal guy who couldn’t hack society? Do you think, when he wants to check out, he would choose to be the guy who offed himself in his crappy hotel room? Or do you think he wants to get his picture and name splashed across media for the next few years?

Stop and think back to the North Hollywood bank robbers. These guys were better armed, better armored, than any mass killer in history (most of which was illegal). They fired thousands of rounds, and took hundreds of rounds. Two guys. Yet, they killed no one. Why? They were trying to escape with the money they stole. They didn’t want to get on the news. They wanted to get away.

Let’s look at the motivation of the offenders, and think about why people do this, and why this is currently a “trend.”

Could it be gun laws? Movies? Video games?

Or maybe the same folks that exploit these stories to bring out the faces of these killers should hold up a mirror and think about how they report them?

I know this article will draw some hate, and I guess I could have taken the chance to speak up more to educate the audience about the current debate about guns vs. games. Maybe it’s worth it to take the time to refocus the debate on things that could have a huge impact without eroding our constitutional rights.

brb crying

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 18:02:58 -0400

brb crying

"The mind of the subject will desperately struggle to create memories where none exist…"

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 00:46:09 -0400

“The mind of the subject will desperately struggle to create memories where none exist…”

- R. Lutece, 1889

Is This the Sanest Man Running for President?

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 21:15:22 -0400

Is This the Sanest Man Running for President?:

jeffmiller:

You need to read this article on Gary Johnson. Even if you don’t care for Gary Johnson; even if you hate all libertarians… . read it. Because it’s hilarious.

UPDATE: In case I wasn’t clear, you have to read this article.

Old, but idc. It’s a great piece.

amprog: Talk about injustice… Sure, if you take into...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 17:46:30 -0400

amprog:

Talk about injustice…

Sure, if you take into consideration only one piece of our absurdly convoluted tax structure. A very misleading statement.

"Students who acquire large debts putting themselves through school are unlikely to think about..."

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 17:44:20 -0400

“Students who acquire large debts putting themselves through school are unlikely to think about changing society. When you trap people in a system of debt they can’t afford the time to think. Tuition fee increases are a “disciplinary technique,” and, by the time students graduate, they are not only loaded with debt, but have also internalized the “disciplinarian culture.” This makes them efficient components of the consumer economy.”

- Noam Chomsky (via urbankitsch)
Absurdity

The Nerd as Auteur in Bioshock Infinite

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 16:02:41 -0400

The Nerd as Auteur in Bioshock Infinite

"Three months ago, a deranged man walked into Sandy Hook Elementary with a weapon of war…..."

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 14:21:00 -0400

“Three months ago, a deranged man walked into Sandy Hook Elementary with a weapon of war… Let’s get this straight. This is not about anybody’s constitutional right to own a weapon. For all those who say we shouldn’t and can’t ban assault weapons - for all those who say the politics is too hard, how can they say that?… When you take a look at those 20 beautiful babies and what happened to them? And those six teachers and administrators?”

- VP Joe Biden

Who needs freedom when you have feels?

No More Asking for Permission To Speak by Andrew P. Napolitano

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 13:58:48 -0400

No More Asking for Permission To Speak by Andrew P. Napolitano:

In 1798, when John Adams was president of the United States, the feds enacted four pieces of legislation called the Alien and Sedition Acts. One of these laws made it a federal crime to publish any false, scandalous or malicious writing – even if true – about the president or the federal government, notwithstanding the guarantee of free speech in the First Amendment.

The feds used these laws to torment their adversaries in the press and even successfully prosecuted a congressman who heavily criticized the president. Then-Vice President Thomas Jefferson vowed that if he became president, these abominable laws would expire. He did, and they did, but this became a lesson for future generations: The guarantees of personal freedom in the Constitution are only as valuable and reliable as is the fidelity to the Constitution of those to whom we have entrusted it for safekeeping.

We have entrusted the Constitution to all three branches of the federal government for safekeeping. But typically, they fail to do so. Presidents have repeatedly assaulted the freedom of speech many times throughout our history, and Congresses have looked the other way. Abraham Lincoln arrested Northerners who challenged the Civil War. Woodrow Wilson arrested Americans who challenged World War I. FDR arrested Americans he thought might not support World War II. LBJ and Richard Nixon used the FBI to harass hundreds whose anti-Vietnam protests frustrated them.

In our own post 9/11 era, the chief instrument of repression of personal freedom has been the government’s signature anti-terror legislation: the Patriot Act. It was born in secrecy, as members of the House of Representatives were given 15 minutes to read its 300 pages before voting on it in October 2001, and it operates in silence, as those who suffer under it cannot speak about it.

The Patriot Act permits FBI agents to write their own search warrants and gives those warrants the patriotic and harmless-sounding name of national security letters (NSLs). This authorization is in direct violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says that the people shall be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects from unreasonable searches and seizures, and that that security can only be violated by a search warrant issued by a neutral judge and based upon probable cause of crime.

The probable cause requirement compels the feds to acquire evidence of criminal behavior about the person whose records they seek, so as to prevent politically motivated invasions of privacy and fishing expeditions like those that were common in the colonial era. Judges are free, of course, to sign the requested warrant, to modify it and sign it, or to reject it if it lacks the underlying probable cause.

niamharthur: The Philosophers International Trailer (x) Em…Can...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 13:54:00 -0400

niamharthur:

The Philosophers International Trailer (x)

Em…Can someone please tell me why Tumblr isn’t talking about this?!!

Because it looks absolutely atrocious. That acting, that script, that filmography, that damn generic suspense music, that everything.

Dr. Strangelove pretty much covers this idea in the “mineshaft” scene.

Hell, I’ve played videogames which tackle this topic more intelligently.

JEZEBEL

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 13:28:00 -0400

articles are unreadable. There is absolutely zero intellectual honesty going on, just mindless zealotry and a focus on pandering to some extreme base. I just went through 6 pieces (which read like blog posts) and did not consider a single one objective or even mildly stimulating, but surely angering. I’m not a feminist or any other “social justice” crusader (because I prefer real legal equality over forced social equality) and after having perused Jezebel I feel more justified in that stance than ever.

Steubenville: This is rape culture's defining moment

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 21:51:00 -0400

Steubenville: This is rape culture's defining moment:

NewStatesman:

It lasted for hours. The pictures circulated online show the unconscious teenage girl hung like a shot steer between two laughing young men, Trent Mays and Ma’lik Richmond, who were convicted this week of driving her from party to party, raping her, assaulting her, and filming themselves doing so. Videos from the night include an extended tape of a friend of the attackers in drunken spasms of joy about just how ‘dead’ the girl looked as she was handed around.It was sadistic young men like this with whom the mainstream media expressed immediate sympathy following the guilty verdict.

Here, there was no question that Mays and Richmond are guilty: there is enough film, photographic and text message evidence to make the case clear. The arguments in their defence, instead, revolve around the notion that these boys, beloved athletes in a town where football is everything, did nothing wrong when they assaulted their helpless victim. They are tragic heroes who were just having fun, like young men do, and the pictures prove it. Everyone looks so happy. High-profile rape cases have happened in American football towns many times before - remember the cheerleader who was forced to cheer for her rapist? - but Steubenville is different. The pictures make it different. What the Steubenville footage recalls most chillingly is the torture photographs from Abu Ghraib prison almost a decade earlier, showing American soldiers in Iraq smiling chummily around the prone bodies of political prisoners.

Steubenville is rape culture’s Abu Ghraib moment.

It’s the moment when America and the world are being forced, despite ourselves, to confront the real human horror of the rapes and sexual assaults that take place in their thousands every day in our communities.

The pictures from Steubenville don’t just show a girl being raped. They show that rape being condoned, encouraged, celebrated. What type of culture could possibly produce such pictures? Only one in which women’s autonomy and right to safety counts for so little that these rapists, and those who held the cameras, felt themselves ‘perfectly justified’. Only one in which rape and sexual humiliation of women and girls is so normalised that it does not register as a crime in the minds of the assailants. Only one in which victims are powerless, silenced, dismissed. It is impossible to imagine that in such a culture, assault and humiliation of this kind would not be routine - and indeed, the most conservative estimates suggest that ninety thousand women and ten thousand men are raped in the United States alone every year. That’s what makes the Steubenville case so very uncomfortable - and so important.

Everything is dead on… until the last paragraph. Your assertion that this incidence is evidence of a systemic, cultural issue is unfounded and dangerous. “Culture” did not make these criminals rape their victim. It never has. It can’t.

What this is is a terrible act committed by individuals. They hold 100% of the responsibility. This abstract culture/society you assert cannot override the fact that they had free agency.

Removing responsibility from individual offenders by blaming culture assumes we are all but mindless automatons moving our mechanized limbs at the will of some hidden grand architects. Sounds like a conspiracy theory to me.

Arizona bill would tie public restroom use to birth gender

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 20:33:52 -0400

Arizona bill would tie public restroom use to birth gender:

helvetebrann:

existentialcrisisfactory:

helvetebrann:

iwasthesilentgirl:

Lawmakers are delaying a debate over equal access rights after dozens of transgender people flooded the Arizona House of Representatives to fight a proposed law that would have made it illegal for them to use the bathroom of their preferred gender.

Republican Rep. John Kavanagh said Wednesday…

Sorry but I actually agree with this. I respect trans people and all, but I feel that having trans people in a public bathroom not of their birth gender should be a place-by-place basis, not a law. I don’t know about anyone else but I as a female do not want any penises in the female restroom. Public bathrooms (and I’m talking the kind with stalls) are traditionally a gender-segregated safe-space (particularly for girls/women). While sometimes that does not work out, it is at least assumable that it is an safer place for women to talk and/or take care of female body issues. Have it as an option, sure, but don’t make it the only option.

When have you ever seen someone’s genitals in the bathroom? I sure as hell know that I haven’t seen anyone’s except my own. There is absolutely no reason to force trans* individuals to use a bathroom out of their comfort level. You are forcing them to use a bathroom that does not align with their true gender. You are making bathrooms unsafe for them.

I’m honestly just confused by what the worry is about having trans people in the bathroom.

Are people worried about seeing their junk? Because I’ve never seen anyone’s junk in the bathroom. And I thought that a sort of unspoken rule in the mens’ is that you don’t peek at other people’s junk.

Are people worried that they might unwittingly try to talk to a trans woman about periods or something? Because what are you doing talking to strangers about your vaginal bleeding?

Are people worried that trans women might listen in on some sort of secret girlfriends period talk? Because I don’t think that’s a thing that happens. And how would you know? And why would that be any more uncomfortable than any other stranger hearing about your period?

I mean, this isn’t even fear of rape (which is also absurdly irrational) here. It’s just some bizarre, nameless fear that if trans people are allowed in the bathroom, they might do something. Public bathrooms are for pissing, washing hands, and occasionally taking a dump or changing a tampon. There are stalls in all of them that provide privacy for these purposes. How on earth could the mere possibility that someone with different genitals than you is using a different stall make you unsafe?

If we agree it is fine for individuals to use public restrooms of the opposite sex if they are trans because of the reasons listed (not unsafe, won’t see genitals, etc) then doesn’t it follow that anyone should be able to do the same thing?

If the test for entry into a restroom is what gender you identify with instead of your genetic sex then how are we to objectively administer it? And, really, if there is no true problem with entering the other sex’s room (any issue people may have actually has nothing to do with sex) then nobody should be excluded. Cis males/females should be allowed in whichever room they please because it isn’t harming anyone else. Which makes me ask:

Why should we have separate bathrooms at all?
Since when has “separate but equal” been a good standard?

If you follow the previous posters’ line of thought then you have to let it reach its logical conclusion.

jillbiden: this is only like a fraction of why he’s awesome and...

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 19:50:19 -0400

jillbiden:

this is only like a fraction of why he’s awesome and i love him

he’s done so many good things for america and is an amazing politician.

whaaaattttta man

oh and btw, him and barack are the cutest of the cute tbh

Seen here: a fundamental flaw of representative democracy

"Racism is America’s original sin. Until we put as many young blacks in colleges as we do in jail, we..."

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 19:25:23 -0400

“Racism is America’s original sin. Until we put as many young blacks in colleges as we do in jail, we should be expanding affirmative action.”

- To the Editor [NY Times] - a response to a three page opinion on affirmative action by some white dude. (via thenoobyorker)

Because solving racism with racism is a noble plan.
Because the only way to fix social ugliness is to use state force.
Because two wrongs make a right.

Continuing to look at people merely as members of classes/groups can only lead to future division and conflict. To solve racism, sexism, and every other group-centric problem we need to start thinking of others as autonomous, unique individuals and not a piece of some meta-entity we have subjectively constructed.

I am good friends with individuals who are black but I have never met a “black” person before. An individual is a kaleidoscope of traits, some inherent and some chosen. Aggregating individuals into masses according to some unchosen characteristic is unethical, dehumanizing, and dangerous.

YouTube reacts to Bioshock Infinite

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 12:36:22 -0400

YouTube reacts to Bioshock Infinite