Delicious LiveJournal Links for 5-4-2010

[andrewducker]

• The results of the xkcd Colour Survey
  (tags: xkcd colour statistics funny survey)
• The Nordic approach to financing the welfare state
  (tags: socialism government economics politics taxes)
• What Would Don Draper Do?
  (tags: madmen funny television)
• Frankie Boyle defends his humour and calls the BBC cowards
  (tags: bbc comedy speech)
• Discovery of genes associated with autistic traits, empathy, and Asperger syndrome.
  (tags: genetics personality aspergers autism empathy)
• Ten reasons why, if you’re considering voting Labour, you should think again
  (tags: labour politics uk)

Comments

[major-clanger.livejournal.com]

Re the Frankie Boyle joke, I'd have been with him if he'd said 'Israeli' rather than 'Jew'.

Not all Jews are pro-Israel, or supportive of its policies or politics.

(Userpic to point out I have no dog in this particular fight, but I do get perturbed by generalisations about religions.)

[missedith01.livejournal.com]

Amusingly my weekend copy of the Morning Star had a set of ten reasons not to vote LibDem. :-)

I agree with all ten of the above reasons, this Labour govt has been a disappointment. But then UK politics at the present (or indeed, ever) isn't promising for a socialist voter, consequently there are plenty of reasons not to vote for all three parties.

Labour govts are always a disappointment, but they just about get my vote because IMHO they are still the least worst option that has a chance of affecting the outcome. Even Ramsey Mac achieved something worth having.

They only ever just about get my vote ...

[randomchris.livejournal.com]

I was slightly worried by the captcha at the bottom of the xkcd survey results, which read "manacled you".

[momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com]

Re nordic tax mix -- they're letting people keep more of what they earn, but taxing more when you spend? I don't understand all the follow-on consequences. I'm sure it's very Anti-American though, not letting people consume. Though heh, they have sales tax.

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

Well, all seriousness aside...

the "most popular male colors" made me laugh for several minutes.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Re: Frankie Boyle. It seemed like what he was quoted as "kicked by a Jew" which is not explicitly racist against Jews, because it suggests some stereotypes about Jews, but not necessarily bad ones. And obviously, drawing attention to the bad things which have been done to Palestinians is good if also a difficult topic for humour. But OTOH, lots and lots of people DO make the conflation of "jew" = "evil" and "zionist", so I think it should be obvious to a reasonable person that saying that was going to make lots of Jewish people feel really awful. Of course, I don't know how offensive something should be to be banned from the BBC.