White Privilege is Very Real

merc · 2020-07-01T17:32:59+00:00

Nope. Variation due to ethnicity, race, etc. only comes out to 7% of our genetic differences. Read the article I linked, it seems you are really into this stuff, you'll probably like it.

merc · 2020-07-01T14:30:59+00:00

It's kind of petty to snatch up sub names in bad faith, but you can get around it easily enough by making the same sub under a different name. No reason for a rule.

merc · 2020-07-01T14:23:22+00:00

not gonna lie I've actually been using a knife as a screwdriver recently and it works pretty damn good.

merc · 2020-07-01T14:17:30+00:00

I read about that earlier. Dude is on some whole other world of fucked up to get off on infant porn but jail won't help. Hell I don't think jail is even typical in such cases.

merc · 2020-07-01T14:14:20+00:00

...or will the coronavirus panic-demic this year cause more people to vote Democrat? Tune in this November to find out!

merc · 2020-07-01T13:52:48+00:00

If your evidence is the obvious minor differences between eyes and noses, that's not proof of races at all. We would need to see much larger differences in human genome between what you call "races" if they were to exist in a biological sense.

93% of variation in human genetics is within populations. Compare that to 64% in chimpanzees, a species in which biological races do actually exist.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3737365/

merc · 2020-07-01T13:33:38+00:00

Species	% of Variation Within Populations	% of Variation Among Populations	% of Variation Among Races
Chimpanzees	64.2%	5.7%	30.1%
Humans	93.2%	2.5%	4.3%

Over 90% of genetic variation observed in Humans is within the given population. Only about 4% of our genetic variation is due to "race." Compare that to our closest relatives, chimpanzees, where nearly a third of all genetic variation is due to race.

A general threshold for whether or not different races exist biologically is 25%. Thus we see here that there are biological races among Chimpanzees, but not among Humans.

Source here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3737365/

merc · 2020-07-01T02:32:01+00:00

those old skull shape diagrams don't mean shit, go back to the 19th century with that logic. In reality, the genetic differences between a dude from Sudan and a dude from Ethiopia are much greater than the biological differences between either one and a European, Asian, or indigenous American. And the differences within groups are huge compared to the differences between groups. Sub-races do exist in a lot of animal populations, but there is no scientific basis for race in humans. Probably comes from the fact that we are a relatively young species which did not leave the African continent until <2 MYA.

merc · 2020-07-01T00:03:19+00:00

She's sort of right to be pissed, I doubt simply cutting the budget or moving it elsewhere will result in the kind of reform the protestors want. If anything it will probably result in increased stress and tension for the officers, not good for their relations with the public.

From separate sources I've gathered that more than $5B of the $6B NYPD budget goes directly to the payroll, and de Blasio said something about "improving overtime" so we will almost definitely be seeing less officers on the streets.

As much as we want to tie the department cuts to the protests, they are probably necessary because of the economy.

merc · 2020-06-30T23:34:02+00:00

race is all make-believe anyway, why not pretend to be whatever race is convenient for you at the time?

merc · 2020-06-30T23:25:27+00:00

I know you mean well, but honestly I think that's just more bipartisan propaganda.

Here in Minnesota we elected Ventura (Reform Party) as governor in '98. He was the last third-party governor in the US (other than a couple independents who I don't count). The Reform Party was Ross Perot's party, definitely more of a top-down style than grassroots, and it was the only good third party we've had in the country in the last century. It was decidedly not concentrated on local politics.

In another vein, voting for third parties in national elections is a great way to support them. At certain thresholds of support they get access to federal election funding (5%), debate access (15%), and so on. Using your vote to increase the voice of a third party, as well as show discontent with the current discourse, seems like a fine choice to me.

merc · 2020-06-30T14:25:12+00:00

This kind of thinking is what gets us to the point we are at. Trump v. Clinton, Trump v. Biden, etc.

The only thing stopping a third party from having success is the insistence that a third party can't have success.

merc · 2020-06-30T14:15:49+00:00

The Board of Elections previously said about 800 votes would be set aside and not counted, amid charges they were found improperly bundled in mailboxes in Paterson as well as at a drop box in nearby Haledon.

I get your sentiment, but this case isn't about that type of fraudulent voting. It's about a few guys who didn't handle the ballots correctly. I assume they were acting in good faith and just didn't know the laws.

merc · 2020-06-30T14:04:22+00:00

This reads like a Trump tweet.

merc