The Skin Colour Is Chocolate

 Politics  No Responses »
Jun 172010
 

I’m watching Malcolm X about the “black” civil rights activist; there is a point in the film where a point is made about colours in the dictionary – black is bad and white is good.

This is supposedly the result of some sort of racist conspiracy to persuade people that black people are bad and that white people are good. There may be some level of truth to that.And this little rant is not aimed at undermining the achievements of the black civil rights activists.

However I have my own dictionary which is somewhat more extensive that the one used in the film – the OED. This includes references to the earliest uses of the word black in various contexts. The first use of the word black in reference to something evil goes back as far as the 13th century; the first use in reference to people of a certain skin colour is in the 19th century.

The meaning of black meaning evil to some extent obviously has its origins in the fear of the dark at night. Everyone has walked home on a dark night and been a little spooked by what can come out of the darkness. Today’s dark nights are a lot less spooky than they were in the past – we have far more artificial lighting and even where it isn’t close, a little of that distant light sheds a little into the darkest corner.

Trying to change things so “black is good” just doesn’t work historically.

And when you come down to it, “black” people don’t have black skin at all – it isn’t even a good colour description. We all have chocolate-coloured skin … mine is like white chocolate; others have milk chocolate skin, and some have dark chocolate skin. But it is all chocolate-coloured.

Humans have chocolate-coloured skin. All of us; every member of the human race.

Lesbians Spend 111% Of Their Time Checking Out Breasts!!

 Media  No Responses »
Jun 102010
 

According to this article on Sarah Palin’s alleged breast enhancements – which is just foolish speculation anyway – lesbians will apparently spend three times as much time checking out breasts. Maybe so, but the interesting point is the woefully pathetic numerical sanity checking in this article.

Who can spend 111% of their time doing anything ? We are not talking about that foolish “110% effort” which is just innumerate marketing, but a simple bit of statistics. If you spend every second of every day staring at TV, you might get to 100% time spent wasting your time, but no matter how hard you work at it you’ll never get beyond 100% – it just isn’t possible to use more time than is available. A figure of 111% translates as spending a smidgen over 26.5 hours in every 24 hours staring at boobs.

Not only impossible, but frankly the lesbians I have met do not seem any more inclined to turn into drooling idiots in the presence of breasts than ordinary men do. To go on because that could be misunderstood … lesbians seem perfectly capable of holding down jobs, joining a conversation, and doing pretty much everything others are capable of. Something they would find tricky if they were so obsessed with breasts that they spent an impossible 111% of their time staring at boobs.

In case you are thinking that the 111% figure is a simple typo, it is made clear in the article that the figure is “calculated” by taking the figure that straight women spend obsessing about their friends breasts (37%) and multiplying by three because lesbians spend three times as much time obsessed with breasts. Not the way that such a calculation is made!

Perhaps the relevant article author should spent a little less time thinking about breasts and more on basic numeracy. This kind of inaccuracy is the kind of thing that gives the “news” media (and the Internet) a bad name for inaccuracy.

Israel Does It Again: Shooting Up The Humantiarians

 Politics  No Responses »
May 312010
 

So we all woke up this morning to find out that the Israeli thugs sorry, military have seized a ship containing “humanitarian” supplies for the Gaza strip. The ship itself was in international waters at the time, leaving Israel in a very precarious legal position given that ships in international waters are subject to the laws of the country in which they are registered. The only exception to that is where the ship or the crew of a ship are an “enemy of mankind” which is usually taken to be those guilty of piracy or slavery. Terrorism is not on the list. And aid workers aren’t either.

The Israelis are claiming that their soldiers only started shooting after those on board started firing; those on board claim the Israelis boarded whilst firing. Well making a careful, thoughtful assessment of the relative believability of both sides, I know who I believe (and it ain’t Israel). But it really does not matter: those on board ship were entitled to defend themselves in whatever way they felt appropriate when boarded illegally.

Israel is claiming that the “aid” on it’s way to Gaza was merely a cover for smuggling arms to Gaza. So what? It’s not as if Israel itself hasn’t done that. But to be honest, after the amount of distrust that Israel deserves, most people will think at worst that most of the ship’s cargo is in fact humanitarian aid. And from every report, Gaza needs all the humanitarian aid it can get, although Israel thinks it needs no more than 15,000 tons a week.

Israel needs to understand that the more it sticks a finger up to international opinion, the more condemnation and less belief it will get. In normal circumstances, a country that allowed it’s military forces to carry out an act that is effectively piracy even if there is a good reason behind it would get a good ticking off and then it would be forgotten about. Israel ?

Well they keep doing this shit. Year after year, and decade after decade. There are no signs that they are willing to compromise to move towards peace with the Palestinians; whatever they might say, their actions seem aimed to inflame opinion. Perhaps the Palestinians are also somewhat to blame, but frankly Israel is the bully in that little corner of the world.

The Tassimo System – The Late Review

 General  No Responses »
May 132010
 

This appears somewhat over a year since I bought a single-serve coffee system based around the Tassimo system. For those who are not aware this is basically an automated way of making “real” coffee (and in many cases other hot drinks) from a kind of capsule with a bar code on top to indicate what method to use when brewing. For those who are prepared to pay a little more for their morning coffee … and cannot justify the waste and hassle involved in brewing from ground coffee, a single-serve solution is brilliant.

The Tassimo system should be brilliant  – in theory it is technically superior to the other systems as it allows greater freedom to the capsule makers in determining how the drinks should be brewed. Different drinks like different water temperatures, different pressures, different amounts of water, etc.

But the Tassimo’s biggest weakness is the lack of choice of prepared drinks compared with other systems.

So why in the name of the Great Cthulhu do the Tassimo people restrict the distribution of the T-Discs to certain markets? There are coffees available in the UK which are not available in the US, and likewise for Europe. A number of examples follow :-

  • Whilst in the US there are five different Starbucks varieties whilst the UK has just one.
  • In Europe there is a “3-cup” variety of Jacobs coffee which is approximately the size of the coffee cups that Americans use whereas in the UK there is not a single large US sized coffee available despite UK residents being much more likely to encounter US-sized coffee and to like it.

There is an argument that those in the US would not like European coffees because they do not match their preferences and visa versa – in particular the size of the normal coffee cup. But why not give us the choice ?

In addition I suspect that it is very difficult for independent manufacturers to produce T-Discs – indicated as such by the absence of any products on the market. Sure I can understand a manufacturer wanting to promote their own products, but when you have a new system you need to attract the early adopters who are more likely to want a great range of products. Sure the ordinary shopper is just going to pick up what is available at their local supermarket – which is always going to be the products with the famous names rather than specialist products, but he or she won’t choose your products if nobody buys your system.

I can see the Tassimo system failing – not because it is poor, or because the other products compete better, but simply because the management behind the Tassimo product are incompetent

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