May 27th, 2007 by 5cents
A short time ago I posted an article on the stoning of a young Yazidi girl for “consorting with the enemy” and posted a link to the gruesome video footage. The article didn’t really garner much attention, which was a bit surprising to me, but so it goes. Since then, the story has spread like wildfire through the blogosphere and many have come forward with their opinions. Repulsion at the act seems unanimous but there are quite a few bloggers who seem to think that watching the video, or indeed linking to it, is somehow a bad thing. One such blogger is a friend over at the Chapati Kid so I thought I’d take her to task on what I see as a completely skewed point of view (her short intro HERE). Let’s begin.
The Chapati Kid links to THIS article by Joss Whedon, the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel (which contrary to my beliefs are apparently well-liked shows). I should Read On! »
Popularity: 43% [?]
Topics: Commentary, Religion, The Sexes/Sexuality | 5 Comments »
May 17th, 2007 by 5cents
Some time ago (in THIS article) I commented on a BBC article that stated research proved the average condom was too large for the average Indian male. That was back in December 06. Courtesy of a BBC widget on their front page (that lets you see the top five most read articles each day), I’ve been keeping track of the popularity of this article. Over the last five months it has repeatedly been in the top 5. Today after a gap of about two months it has returned. Now what the bleeding hell does this say about the BBC’s readers? They’re either all Indians with a penis-complex, scores of Pakistanis looking for excuse to finally trump an Indian or the just the general public with a strange affliction for details about the desi male’s genitalia.
If the latter is true, I’ll volunteer to dispel the myth/put the issue to bed/get off. Read On! »
Popularity: 27% [?]
Topics: Commentary, Public Awareness, The Media | No Comments »
May 14th, 2007 by 5cents
The United States military has just decided to prohibit access to 13 social networking sites for all currently deployed personnel. These sites include Myspace, Facebook, YouTube and the like. So far, I’ve been unable to get the complete list of 13 banned sites. The military claims it’s an issue of bandwidth, namely, that with all the traffic the soldiers are generating with their emails, comments, pictures and videos, they are clogging the network and adversely affecting operational readiness and communication.
What a crock of shit. This is the United States military here, the best funded army in the history of our planet. An organization with numerous black projects that use up countless billions of dollars that no one sees or hears about, the military that created the fastest air-breathing aircraft of all time, inventors of the stealth bomber, laser weaponry Read On! »
Popularity: 32% [?]
Topics: Commentary, Tech, War/Conflict | No Comments »
May 10th, 2007 by 5cents
There’s a lot of noise these days about alternative fuels. Most of it is due to the fact that people are finally realizing the weather is changing rather drastically and that we humans might be responsible for it. In the US, there’s is a big push for bio-fuels, primarily distilled from grains such as corn (ethanol or E86). Elsewhere, it is created from other crops (that usually are inedible). There is also a big push to harness wind energy, hydropower and to a lesser extent, tidal energy. Does anyone else think these are stupid ideas? We’e practically making the same mistakes we made with fossil fuels in that we’re being short-sighted. I don’t know what asses came up with these ingenious alternative fuels, but here’s my limited (and perhaps uninformed) take on the aforementioned choices. Read On! »
Popularity: 22% [?]
Topics: Commentary, Public Awareness, Tech | No Comments »
May 10th, 2007 by 5cents
Before you even attempt to read this article, be aware, clicking the link at the end of this post will take to a website that has actual graphic footage of a young girl being stoned to death. DO NOT watch if you queasy in the slightest or if you are easily offended. It is very graphic, very disturbing footage.
My preliminary research into the video seems to indicate that the young girl (17 years old) is an Iraqi from the Yazidi sect, a pre-Islamic Middle Eastern religion. Apparently she fell in love with a Sunni Muslim boy and for that her community stoned her to death. You’ll notice people are throwing cinder blocks at her and filming the incident on their cell-phones. Truly abhorrent behavior. And then I wonder why there are those in the West that want to turn the whole place into a glass crater. In India, we had an individual stand up and fight injustice, xenophobia and intolerance. His name was Gandhi. The Middle East is in sore need of their own Gandhi but I fear he will Read On! »
Popularity: 43% [?]
Topics: Commentary, Fear, Public Awareness, Religion | 4 Comments »
May 9th, 2007 by 5cents
I was talking to my roommate the other day and we happened across an interesting characteristic of North American life, namely, the rigid, plan-everything-beforehand, scheduled lifestyle.
This is in contrast to the spontaneous, carefree life of the third world. Both my roommate and I agreed that in our respective home countries, people are incredible casual about meeting up and hanging out. It’s usually not necessary to call and plan a meet before hand, you could just swing by your friend’s place and he or she will entertain you. Sure, they might be busy, but they’ll always take the time out to be a good host and hang out, even if only for a short while. If it’s night-time, it’s usually easy to rustle up a crew without myriad posturing, planning and the like. Read On! »
Popularity: 9% [?]
Topics: Commentary, Public Awareness | No Comments »
May 5th, 2007 by 5cents
I got bored of the dark background and orange borders (even though they remain my colors of choice). It seemed to come across as a little to busy (this coming from someone who is color-blind).
So instead, behold a new, more coherent, more serious, easier to read and somehow simpler color scheme. To keep things from getting out of hand vis a vis scrolling down the page, everything is just a little bit wider too. That should make better use of screen estate. And there are sharp corners now, so mind them yeah? Likely this is just another temporary change until I find something I really like but until then, what say ye? Screenshot of old and new inside if you’re interested. Read On! »
Popularity: 19% [?]
Topics: Womb News | No Comments »
