Interesting Links for 30-11-2021

[andrewducker]

83% of English people support mask wearing in shops and on public transport

(tags:UK Pandemic polls )

Nicola Sturgeon: The first minister's conference speech fact-checked

(tags:facts Scotland snp )

Northern Ireland economy has outperformed rest of UK

(tags:economy UK Europe trade NorthernIreland )

If you think punter forums are grim you should see how this parenting website talks about sex workers

(tags:sexwork women mother OhForFucksSake )

I am not quite this dad. I do aspire to this level of ridiculousness though

(tags:fun fatherhood video dancing viaClare )

How do people cope with death in the age of social media?

(tags:death socialmedia neilgaiman )

The $5 billion hoard of metal the world wants but can't have

(tags:meta trade )

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition to still matter today, but it does

(tags:religion history sociology spain )

Are humans good or bad?

(tags:morality comic )

Richard Dawkins Doesn't Know What a Woman Is

(tags:RichardDawkins lgbt transgender genetics )

Comments

[cmcmck]

With that 83% you wonder if there's a difference in what they say and what they do?

We were in town this morning and I wouldn't say 83% were wearing them in the shops.

[andrewducker]

Oh yeah. There'll be a few people who will wear masks no matter what, a few people who won't wear masks unless physically forced to, and the vast majority of people who will wear masks if everyone else is wearing masks.

[cmcmck]

And clearly Dawkins, who claims to be some sort of scientist, hasn't heard of intersex conditions which didn't get mentioned in the hammering he gets here................

I know about those! :o)

[andrewducker]

Yeah. For someone with a science background he's exceptionally black and white about things.

[autopope]

I have a certain sympathy for him in view of how much time he's spent being badgered about evolution by pig-ignorant creationists—that's enough to reduce anyone to screaming into the void.

The problem is, he subsequently got suckered into the New Atheist snakepit and uncritically soaked up all the value-added intolerance and snarky shit they were throwing around, and has gradually drifted into very strange waters indeed—and very bad company. And he no longer recognizes when he's being opposed not by superstitious bloviators but by other folks with nuanced and scientifically-informed opinions.

[cmcmck]

Or even folks with personal experience of what he chooses to hatemonger about...........

[calimac]

4) I've always been vague about what the word "punter" (which is purely UK slang: in the US a punter is someone who kicks an American football) actually means. It means "an ordinary person," yes?

6) I leave deceased LJ/DW people on my reading list. It's doing no harm, and if there's a limit in numbers I'm nowhere near it. However I like to keep my phone contact list trim, because I have to page through it a lot, and I had no hesitation in removing my mother when she died.

10) Blimey. Maybe Dawkins felt he had to oversimplify because of time pressure, that's the only excuse I can think of. Surely he knows better. At least he draws a distinction between using the correct names and pronouns for politeness sake and his internal sense of what sex they "really" are - many transphobes refuse to do so - but the real problem is that internal sense. They need to free themselves from the idea that an arbitrary biological classification principle (that genetics - or even phylogenetics - is how we define sex) is the one true reality.

[andrewducker]

Punter means "customer", I mostly think. Generally a working class word,I believe. Sometimes specialised to a customer of a gambling establishment (where one might "have a punt" on a specific horse) or a sex worker (punter might translate to "John" for Americans).

The main issue I have with dead people on my friends lists is that Facebook does birthday reminders, and Steam tells you who else played the same games, so you get occasional reminders at unexpected moments.

[original_aj]

I think it derives from the gambling idea - having a punt on something means taking a chance, putting out some money which might but is not guarenteed to produce a desired return.

In my experience, people refer to their customers as Punters in situations where what they are selling is an experience, rather than an item, and the customers are taking their expected enjoyment on trust, gambling that the experience will be worth the cost. So customers of sex workers, visitor attractions, bars and cafes/takeaways and similar businesses - but not shops. Usually used in a context where there is little or no personalisation, the customers are interchangeable rather than individuals, and between the staff rather than to the customers themselves.

[mellowtigger]

re: Ireland
There's not a free copy at archive.org yet, so I haven't read that article. Does it say anything about Ireland recently being a haven for corporate tax dodging, and what effect the new corporate minimum taxes will have on that practice and Ireland's finances?

[andrewducker]

Try archive.is

And no, all about Northern Ireland