Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Today is International Blasphemy Day, and there’s a special new Jesus and Mo strip, called “lurid”, in honor of the occasion. (Blasphemy Day is the day in 2005 when the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published the infamous Muhammad cartoons.)
The strip also came with an email message, to wit:
Oops. Sorry I’m a bit late with the mailout this week. I forgot. I also forgot it was Blasphemy Day today, but that’s forgivable because every day is Blasphemy Day at Jesus and Mo dot net!
You can also buy the latest J&M collection, with a foreword by Jerry Coyne, here.
I remind you that I don’t get any dosh from either writing the intro or from sales of the books; my foreword was a labor of love. But do throw some love toward the creator of this long-running strip by giving a little dosh on Patreon or buying the book, which will make a great holiday gift for blasphemers.
And here’s “lurid”, with Mo’s usual cognitive dissonance.
I guess I’ll have to post twice on a race-related topic today, though I’m trying to avoid too much of this kind of stuff. Yet people keep sending me links to overly Woke initiatives, and this one was too good to pass up. It’s just one example of how every academic subject is being racialized these days. It’s certainly happening to evolutionary biology, but you’d think that math would be immune to identity politics.
Think again. The Seattle Public School system is planning an initiative that will fuse math education with Critical Race Theory from kindergarten through high school, effectively turning math class into Ethnic Studies class. (This initiative apparently comes from a branch of scholarship called “ethnomathematics.”) If you think I’m exaggerating, have a look at the official math standards framework (below) and the two articles below that.
The new curriculum;
The first piece is from Education Week, and the second from the right-wing site Reason.com. I’ll quote from both, but mainly from the first one, and you can read them by clicking on the screenshots.
From the first article:
The Seattle school district is planning to infuse all K-12 math classes with ethnic-studies questions that encourage students to explore how math has been “appropriated” by Western culture and used in systems of power and oppression, a controversial move that puts the district at the forefront of a movement to “rehumanize” math.
The district’s proposed framework outlines strands of discussion that teachers should incorporate into their classes. One leads students into exploring math’s roots “in the ancient histories of people and empires of color.” Another asks how math and science have been used to oppress and marginalize people of color, and who holds power in a math classroom.
Another theme focuses on resistance and liberation, encouraging students to recognize the mathematical practices and contributions of their own communities, and looking at how math has been used to free people from oppression.
Seattle’s proposals land as schools all over the country are discussing the role ethnic studies should play in their curricula. In most places, if schools offer ethnic studies at all, it’s usually in a stand-alone course in high school. But increasingly, schools and districts are starting to sprinkle ethnic studies across the K-12 spectrum. Seattle is taking a highly unusual approach by weaving the field’s multicultural and political questions not just through all grade levels, but into all subjects.
Yes, that’s right: all subjects. You can’t be free from Critical Theory in any class: art, music, math, physics, and so on. And it’s clear that it is Critical Theory that is being taught if you read the standards at the first link and what the educators say about the program in the article:
“Seattle is definitely on the forefront with this,” said Robert Q. Berry III, the president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. “What they’re doing follows the line of work we hope we can move forward as we think about the history of math and who contributes to that, and also about deepening students’ connection with identity and agency.”
. . . More recently, some scholars, most prominently Rochelle Gutiérrez at the University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign, have begun advocating for a “rehumanizing” of mathematics, which places dynamics such as race and oppression at the center of conversations about math and culture.
That is, the class will learn that math has been a tool of the oppressor (i.e., white people) against the oppressed (i.e., people of color). And although the initiative is supposed to recruit more minority students into studying math, or at least interest them in math, there’s a contradiction, for the program replaces math education with cultural education. And by so doing, it not only reduces the stuff available to learn in math, but also tries to eliminate the very idea that minority students aren’t doing that well in math:
Contrast this (both from the Education Week article):
When too many black and Latino students see no place for themselves in math and science, Castro-Gill said, it’s important to be explicit about how their own cultures contribute to math and how they can use it to make their communities, and the world, better.
with this:
“Math education has been very focused on access and closing the achievement gap, around grit and growth mindset. Those ideas are centered around individuals, and ways of thinking they need to adopt. We haven’t focused enough on identity or systems of power,” Gutiérrez said.
“Students should be able to see themselves in the curriculum, recognize math as a tool for making their lives better, and question what math is, and the purpose of math,” she said.
See yourself in the curriculum? That isn’t on for math. But notice that they are subtly replacing achievement in math (that is, learning the stuff) with “seeing yourself in the curriculum.” “Closing the achievement gap”, well, that is overrated.
Reason.com‘s Robby Soave excerpts from the standards:
But having read over the proposed framework, I have to say that it does seem fairly terrible. It’s chock full of social justice jargon that sounds smart but is actually vapid. What does it mean to decode mathematical “beauty” or “identify how the development of mathematics has been erased from learning in school?” (Has it been erased? That seems like a problem for history class.) The guidance says it will “re-humanize mathematics through experiential learning” and facilitate learning “independently and interdependently.” That’s a fancy way of saying almost nothing at all.
The guidance also includes some extremely political, simplistic talking points that might be popular among activist academics but are in reality somewhat dubious. This is verbatim from the proposal: Students will be able to “identify the inherent inequities of the standardized testing system used to oppress and marginalize people and communities of color,” “explain how math has been used to exploit natural resources,” and “explain how math dictates economic oppression.” Each of these statements are debatable, but they are not being presented as such. It would be one thing to hold a class discussion about the strengths and weaknesses of standardized testing, but what’s happening here is that students are being trained to reject standardized testing due to its “inherent inequity,” which is asserted as some kind of proven fact.
Say what you will about Reason.com, the assertions in the second paragraph are accurate (I’ve checked).
But I’ve said enough. This initiative is ludicrous, and is explicitly designed to propagandize students with Critical Theory beginning in kindergarten.
What’s sad is that some educators actually think this is a good idea. And perhaps people really don’t care how much math people learn, and but want to replace learning math with learning about systems of oppression. But I don’t think that’s what parents want.
Surely math education can be improved. As Talking Barbie says, “Math is HARD”, and ways to get kids to learn math can always be scrutinized and presumably improved. You may not like math, for it’s one of those subjects that many people hate, but you need to be exposed to it, both for practical reasons and because it’s one of the great achievements of the human mind.
So here are two questions that the educators should answer, but haven’t:
1.) Does this kind of education actually teach kids more math than the standard methods? Where are the relevant data? Or don’t people care if the answer to this question is “no”?
2.) Do kids do better when they see their own ethnic group infused into the curriculum? (This is sort of a restatement of question #1.)
If the answer to both questions is “yes”, I’m still not completely down with this, because while it may teach more math—something I highly doubt given that math learning is replaced with Critical Theory—it still propagandizes students with a woke ideology beginning in kindergarten. Increasingly, and beginning at younger and younger ages, students are being told what to think about politics.
As a Jesuit member of the Church of Right Thinking might say, “Give me the math student for the first twelve years, and I’ll give you the Woke Adult.”
What follows is one of the most ridiculous and embarrassing instantiations of wokeness I’ve seen anywhere, much less in colleges.
If you want to see the equivalent of a full, self-abasing confession in the religion of Wokeness, then read the second article below from Inside Higher Ed. When I initially read it, without reading the forerunner article, I thought it was a joke—so over the top and groveling was it.
But it wasn’t at all a joke. It was from a professor who had written a pretty innocuous article (with a grad student co-author) on the education website, an article that simply called for college football to resume (with proper pandemic precautions) as a way of bringing people together. Though I’m not a fan of college football, it didn’t ruffle my feathers a bit, as I know many people—especially Ohio State fans—are rabid addicts to college football.
It turns out, though that the first author, Matthew Mayhew, must have been inundated with emails and social-media posts, as well as a letter to Inside Higher Ed by another professor (below), all claiming that Mayhew’s position was blatantly racist. It was not.
But read the pieces in order, starting with his pro-football editorial (with Musbah Shaneen). Click on the screenshot below. Here’s the description of the authors:
Matthew J. Mayhew is the William Ray and Marie Adamson Flesher Professor of Higher Education at Ohio State University. He has published more than 75 peer-reviewed articles in journals and is a co-author of How College Affects Students: Volume 3. Musbah Shaheen is a Ph.D. student in higher education and student affairs at Ohio State and a research assistant in the College Impact Laboratory.
In their article, Mayhew and Shaheen simply argue that football is something that can bring diverse people together in a time of trouble. For example:
Although many concerns remain about the health and safety of players and spectators, we happen to agree: college football may be an essential element of our functioning democracy. Here’s why.
That’s way over the top, for democracy in America would do just fine without football, but Mayhew really means that football narrows the divisions between people:
Essentializing college football might help get us through these uncharacteristically difficult times of great isolation, division and uncertainty. Indeed, college football holds a special bipartisan place in the American heart.
At a time when colleges and universities have been placed under extreme scrutiny, many people are questioning the very value and purpose of higher education. College football reminds many Americans of the community values that underscore higher education and by extension America itself. One Wolverine does not have to know another one by name — but the sight of maize and blue accompanied by “Hail to the Victors” unites anonymities through these shared experiences.
. . .This election season has demonstrated how stifled, polarized and dangerous our political differences have become, and college football can remind us of respect — even in the wake of deep disagreement. We can root for different teams, scream at the players, argue with the refs and question the coaches, but win or lose, at the end of the day, we leave the stadium, watch party or tailgate with a sense of respect for the game and the athletes that train so hard, leaving it all out on the field every time. Indeed, if a player is injured, the entire stadium usually applauds, not just fans from one team.
Deep difference doesn’t have to lead to disrespect.
The authors add that athletes shouldn’t risk their lives to entertain fans, and that strict enforcement of pandemic guidelines are needed.
And that’s pretty much it. Nothing is said about black people or race save for this statement that isn’t racist at all:
In addition, football players become beloved community figures beyond the boundaries of the stadium or campus. Football gives players a platform to make statements about issues they care about. We have seen student athletes taking part in protests and making demands for racial equity. We have seen student athletes kneel to protest police brutality. Colleges and universities should take many more steps to empower athletes to engage with the community. Depriving them the opportunity to play doesn’t accomplish that goal.
In other words, canceling football deprives players of the chance to make statements against police brutality and for racial equity. In what sense is that racist?
Yes, the original article is a bit silly, and pretty anodyne, and should have passed in silence. But something happened, and Mayhew immediately tendered a long and groveling apology on the site, castigating himself repeatedly as a racist. Read his ludicrous, back-whipping apology and see if you can figure out how the first article got him canceled:
Some of the apology (it embarrasses me to even reproduce Mayhew’s statements, but this is only a small bit of his groveling:
I recently led a piece in Inside Higher Ed titled “Why America Needs College Football.” I am sorry for the hurt, sadness, frustration, fatigue, exhaustion and pain this article has caused anyone, but specifically Black students in the higher education community and beyond.
I am struggling to find the words to communicate the deep ache for the damage I have done. I don’t want to write anything that further deepens the pain experienced by my ignorance related to Black male athletes and the Black community at any time, but especially in light of the national racial unrest. I also don’t want to write anything that suggests that antiracist learning is quick or easy. This is the beginning of a very long process, one that started with learning about the empirical work related to Black college football athletes.
Rather than make excuses, I should talk about which facets of the article that I have recently learned are harmful — through my students, wider social media community and distinguished academics like Donna Ford, Joy Gaston Gayles and Gilman Whiting.
I learned that I could have titled the piece “Why America Needs Black Athletes.” I learned that Black men putting their bodies on the line for my enjoyment is inspired and maintained by my uninformed and disconnected whiteness and, as written in my previous article, positions student athletes as white property. I have learned that I placed the onus of responsibility for democratic healing on Black communities whose very lives are in danger every single day and that this notion of “democratic healing” is especially problematic since the Black community can’t benefit from ideals they can’t access. I have learned that words like “distraction” and “cheer” erase the present painful moments within the nation and especially the Black community.
Then the self-castigation begins, and oy, is it embarrassing!
Upon such beginnings of reflection, I have also learned that my love for Black athletes on the field doesn’t translate into love within the larger community — that I have been dismissive of Black lives in moments not athletically celebrated. I have learned that I have taken pleasure in events that ask Black athletes to put their bodies on the line and take physical risks. I have been entertained by Black men who often are conditioned by society and structural racism in ways that lure them into athletics where the odds of making it are slim to none.
I am just beginning to understand how I have harmed communities of color with my words. I am learning that my words — my uninformed, careless words — often express an ideology wrought in whiteness and privilege. I am learning that my commitment to diversity has been performative, ignoring the pain the Black community and other communities of color have endured in this country. I am learning that I am not as knowledgeable as I thought I was, not as antiracist as I thought I was, not as careful as I thought I was. For all of these, I sincerely apologize.
I know it’s not anyone’s job to forgive me, but I ask for it — another burden of a white person haunted by his ignorance. To consider the possible hurt I have played a role in, the scores of others whose pain I didn’t fully see, aches inside me — a feeling different and deeper than the tears and emotions I’ve experienced being caught in an ignorant racist moment.
It goes on way beyond this, with thanks to those who helped professor Mayhew understand his racism, and his “plan for antiracist change”. My response: nobody was harmed by your fricking words. If they said they were harmed, they were either lying or need help.
Reading the original letter again, I still couldn’t understand this wailing, weeping apology, but then I found that Andrew McGregor, a Professor of History at Dallas College, had written a letter to Inside Higher Ed called “Mythic, misguided view of college football.” McGregor happens to be white, but that’s no bar to virtue-signaling, which McGregor does big time in his letter. Sure, Mayhew was over the top in claiming that college football is an essential part of American democracy, but McGregor whips him over and over again by asserting, falsely, that college football is instead “a symptom of the deep-seeded issues that have contributed to political polarization, racial unrest, the devaluation of education, and prolonged devastation of the COVID-19 pandemic.” (By the way, the term is “deep-seated,” not “deep-seeded”.)
But how did college football become so nefarious? McGregor argues that the lucrative nature of football has debased the intellectual mission of colleges, and that some college coaches, like Dabo Swinney, make unfounded statements about science and history. Well, I won’t wade into that morass, and can’t be arsed to look it up anyway, because that argument is irrelevant and can’t explain Mayhew’s fulsome apology.
No, McGregor argues that football by its very nature is racist because it demands that black athletes put their lives on the line to entertain white folk:
Amateurism and the very structure of college athletics is caught up in the United States’ system of racial capitalism. The problems of COVID-19, police brutality, and the policies currently being enacted by our political leaders all have a disproportionally larger impact on racialized folks. So too does college football. As the recent decision by a grand jury in Louisville reminds us, the status quo does not value Black Lives above apartment walls. For the Power Five, and apparently the authors, Black Lives Matter insofar as they are on the field playing an inherently risky game. In this regard, they are right: resuming college football is in line with America’s “democratic” tradition.
. . . Black athletes are embraced on the gridiron and in the community as a way to assuage white guilt.
WTF? Assuage white guilt?
And that’s about it. No matter that both blacks and whites play together on college teams, that a football scholarship is a way for disenfranchised minorities to get an education, and that it’s also one of the only routes to becoming a player in the National Football League: a way to get success and big money in sports. Sure, most college players don’t get that call from the NFL, and we can argue about whether college players should get paid for their efforts and how much “education” football players really get. But none of that is relevant to McGregor’s accusations of racism against Mayhew. McGregor is just spouting off to show that he’s a deacon in the Woke Religion.
Here’s a photo I got when I Googled “Ohio State football team 2019). The team won against the Washington Huskies in that year. The team looks pretty integrated to me, though clearly black players are represented in a proportion higher than among the general population (and surely than among students).
It’s not clear how much pushback Mayhew got from other people, but I’m sure he was inundated with emails and social-media criticism. McGregor’s letter alone doesn’t seem sufficient to elicit such a bout of groveling and tooth-gnashing.
Had I been Mayhew, I wouldn’t have responded to McGregor at all, as no response was needed. Instead, Mayhew has crumpled, spouting mea culpas as he goes down. Like so many, he was so stricken when called a racist that he immediately confessed to Father Kendi.
The rest of us should pity Mayhew. The whole affair is laughable, save that Mayhew has been devastated and, indeed, may have had his career derailed. We shall see. But so long as people like Mayhew grovel, truckle, and beg for forgiveness for an innocuous statement, then so long will the Woke continue their tactics of demonization. As John McWhorter said, it’s time to either ignore or mock these jokers (I’m referring to McGregor, not Mayhew).
I confess that I watched only 45 minutes of last night’s Presidential debate. At that point I couldn’t take the fracas any longer: Trump interrupting both the moderator, Chris Wallace, and Joe Biden; the simultaneous talking so that nothing could be made out; the failure of both candidates to answer questions (typical in these debates); and, of course, Trump’s Mussolini-like posturing. As I expected, there was no light and a lot of heat, but the heat wasn’t even entertaining. It was a slugfest, and a very ugly one. I missed some bits in the second half that are reported in today’s news, including Trump’s reported refusal to condemn white supremacists.
Although I think Biden came off better, he seemed a bit timorous and shaken and sometimes went off topic. And at times even he couldn’t contain himself, calling Trump a “clown” and telling him to “shut up”. Biden refused to answer some questions, such as what he’d like to do with the Supreme Court.
Chris Wallace lost control of the proceedings from the outset, and I wonder if he did the best he could given the rules of the debate. Trump was like a bellowing, charging elephant that couldn’t be stopped.
At any rate, after watching this, and knowing that so many Americans will not only vote for Trump but positively adore him, I think we can clearly divide the country into two groups. There are those who will vote for Trump, and now I see nearly all of them as deplorables. I didn’t like Hillary Clinton using that word four years ago, but that was before we’d seen Trump’s performance as President. If you want him for another four years, then I think you’re either delusional or in love with tyrants (or both), and lack all political judgment.
The other group is, of course, those who will vote for Biden. Biden is clearly not the best the Democratic Party can offer, and he does seem a bit dotty. However, he won’t surround himself with sycophants and liars, and he may have a Democratic House and Senate to work with. If you’re a rational human being who doesn’t want this country destroyed, you have no choice but to vote for Biden.
There. . . . I feel better now. (I didn’t sleep much last night.)
As for the news, both the New York Times and the Washington Post reported the debate with headlines castigating Trump, which, I think, is injecting opinion into journalism. I still object to headlines like these, even though the content of the articles are accurate:
An excerpt from the NYT:
The first presidential debate between President Trump and Joseph R. Biden Jr. unraveled into an ugly melee Tuesday, as Mr. Trump hectored and interrupted Mr. Biden nearly every time he spoke and the former vice president denounced the president as a “clown” and told him to “shut up.”
In a chaotic, 90-minute back-and-forth, the two major party nominees expressed a level of acrid contempt for each other unheard-of in modern American politics
Mr. Trump, trailing in the polls and urgently hoping to revive his campaign, was plainly attempting to be the aggressor. But he interjected so insistently that Mr. Biden could scarcely answer the questions posed to him, forcing the moderator, Chris Wallace of Fox News, to repeatedly urge the president to let his opponent speak.
“Will you shut up, man?” Mr. Biden demanded of Mr. Trump at one point in obvious exasperation. “This is so unpresidential.”
Yet Mr. Biden also lobbed a series of bitingly personal attacks of his own.
“You’re the worst president America has ever had,” he said to Mr. Trump.
“In 47 months I’ve done more than you have in 47 years,” Mr. Trump shot back, referring to his rival’s career in Washington.
. . . Mr. Biden’s delivery was not always forceful. He did occasionally lose his cool and succumb to Mr. Trump’s barrage of taunts. But he mostly emerged unscathed, and for most Democrats, anything but a loss was welcomed as a clear win.
The Washington Post, too, has a headline smacking a bit of opinion (click on screenshot), though most will say, “no, it’s just accurate reporting.” I can see that, but the “Trump” appearing repeatedly in all the headlines seems to me a bit of editorializing. But that’s a quibble compared with the Big Narcissist’s execrable behavior.
An excerpt from the Post‘s main article:
The presidential campaign devolved into chaos and acrimony here Tuesday night as President Trump incessantly interrupted and insulted Democratic nominee Joe Biden while the two sparred over the economy, the coronavirus pandemic, the Supreme Court and race relations in their first debate.
The most anticipated event on the fall campaign calendar was an uncontrollable spectacle of badgering and browbeating, of raised voices and hot tempers. Trump’s interjections and jeers, some of them false and made in an apparent effort to fluster Biden, landed with such ferocity that moderator Chris Wallace pleaded multiple times with the president to follow the agreed-upon debate rules.
Biden, exasperated, asked Trump during the opening segment on the Supreme Court, “Will you shut up, man?”
The squabbling overwhelmed a debate that displayed substantive differences between both men on the converging crises convulsing the nation at a profound moment — from the pandemic and the related economic recession to the reckoning over racial injustice and the dangers of climate change as evidenced by the wildfires devastating the West.
Both men spoke in sweeping and at times apocalyptic terms about the other. Biden posited that under Trump, the United States had become “weaker, sicker, poorer, more divided and more violent,” while Trump argued that if Biden were elected, the country would experience “a depression the likes of which you’ve never seen.”
The attacks were extraordinarily personal, in keeping with the caustic nature of this campaign. Biden called Trump “a racist” and “the worst president America has ever had,” while Trump mocked Biden’s intelligence and pivoted off Biden’s impassioned defense of his late son, Beau, to attack the integrity of his surviving son, Hunter.
I emphasize again that I didn’t watch the last half of debate, but from what I’ve read and the videos I’ve seen, things didn’t improve. I’m hoping that Trump’s Big Baby performance will cost him votes, but I’m not sure, for, after all, there are all those deplorables. Let’s take a vote:
I importune you again to send your good wildlife photos, as I depend on the skill and goodwill of readers to keep this feature going.
Today’s lovely photos come from Tony Eales of Queensland, and he’s given his series a title (in bold at the top).
Here’s looking at you.
Here’s a series of photos of aware animals looking right down the lens.
Stick Mantis (Archimantis latistyla). This is kind of a cheat since mantises have what is known as a pseudo-pupil that, like the Mona Lisa, makes the eyes seem to follow you around the room. It’s actually an illusion made by the way light refracts in the compound eyes.
A small unknown fly. I was lying in the leaf litter looking for small spiders when this little fly landed and stared straight at me; and I decided to take the shot.
More illusionary eyes. These are eye spots on the wings of the large-eyed box owlet moth (Grammodes ocellata), presumably to deter predators.
The Grey Huntsman (Isopeda vasta) is a very large spider that one often finds peeling away eucalyptus bark. They are very sedate (until they aren’t) making close up portraits very easy as long as you hold the piece of bark steady and are willing to risk one suddenly running up your sleeve.
One of my favourite animals of all are ant-mimicking spiders and some of the best are jumping spiders. This is one of the common ones, a polyrhachis ant mimic (Myrmarachne luctuosa). This one is a large gravid female I found while looking for peacock spiders. I could fill this whole post with jumping spiders; they are very aware of their surroundings and find camera lenses extremely intriguing, possibly seeing their reflection in the glass.
Another animal that is always very aware of you are bull ants, which will watch you closely. This one is known as a jumping jack (Myrmecia nigrocincta) but they display this terrifying behaviour only if you disturb the nest. Otherwise they just watch you warily.
Another common species is the small variable lynx spider (Oxyopes variabilis). These too can jump wildly to get away from you, but if you’re careful you can catch their typical ambush pose, seen here.
A very handsome lion (Panthera leo) at Melbourne Zoo. I love the calm disdainful look on its face.
Little red flying-foxes (Pteropus scapulatus). I just love that these animals are happy to live in cities and we get to see and hear these amazing beasts nightly.
A beautiful Spectacular Crab Spider (Thomisus spectabilis). These are large for a crab spider, usually hiding flowers waiting for visiting insects, I’ve seen them take prey many times their size, including praying mantis and butterflies.
Today’s Google Doodle (click on screenshot below) is a weird one: a interactive animation of a d*g, apparently riding in a car going down the highway. When you click on the beast, it sticks out its tongue and exudes hearts. It turns out that, according to Google, it’s a “dachshund bobblehead”:
Today’s interactive Doodle celebrates the dachshund bobblehead, an iconic weiner dog doll with a wobbly, spring-attached head that originated in Germany as a friendly vehicle accessory. . .
. . . The dachshund has long been recognized as a popular German symbol. That special status was only strengthened in the 1970s with the manufacture of the first daschund bobbleheads, known affectionately in German as the “Wackeldackel”–or “wobbling dachshund” in English. The agreeable canines could soon be found perched on the rear dash of traditional German notchback cars, nodding along to every twist and bump in the road.
And there’s an interview with the Doodle’s “lead engineer” David Lu, who tries to explain this:
Q: What do you hope people take away from your Doodle?
A: I want all non-German speakers to appreciate the word wackeldackel, which perfectly encapsulates what this Doodle is about. It’s also way more descriptive than “German Wiener dog Bobblehead”.
All I can say is “WTF?” Perhaps German readers can explain more.
News of the Day: There is the debate, of course, and I’ll watch some of it, though it will give me indigestion to hear Trump (I’m writing this on Tuesday evening), and I’m worried that Biden will make fluffs. We’ll discuss the debate in a post this morning; hold your thoughts until then. All I’ll say now is that it was a godawful mess, too dreadful to watch in its entirety.
In the meantime, Trump is planning an October ICE assault on “sanctuary cities,” getting ready for a big roundup of undocumented immigrants in places that have irked him. As the Washington Post reports,
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation, known informally as the “sanctuary op,” could begin in California as soon as later this week. It would then expand to cities including Denver and Philadelphia, according to two of the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe sensitive government law enforcement plans.
Given that most Americans favor some immigration reform, and the Democrats have done little about it, this brazen move could well work in Trump’s favor, and was clearly calculated to boost his chance of reelection.
The New York Times has an editorial by law professor Joan Wlliams, “The case for accepting defeat on Roe,” arguing that maybe the demise of Roe v. Wade would be a good thing, allowing states to make the rules. Now that seems dumb, doesn’t it? For the states themselves have been chipping away at women’s ability to get abortions. But somehow Williams thinks that people’s goodwill will lead to a “legislative restoration of abortion rights” in the states, as the referendum did in Ireland:
. . . the best tribute we can pay to [Ruth Bader Ginsburg’ is to do what she suggests: open up the kind of dialogue that occurred in Ireland, where young people knocked on grannies’ doors and persuaded them to vote to legalize abortion, which — much to the distress of the Catholic Church — they did. (At the same time, activists galvanized to ensure that, in the absence of a referendum, women throughout the country would have access to and knowledge about medication abortions.)
Who is Williams kidding? Does she know what state legislatures will do if Roe v. Wade were overturned?
UK Animal news 1: Several readers called my attention to a BBC report that five African gray parrots have been removed from public display in a wildlife park because they said BAD WORDS. There is no information about who taught them to cuss.
UK Animal news 2: Villagers in the town of Tredegar, Wales, built a scaffold to rescue a kitten stuck in a tree for four days after the fire service couldn’t reach it. There’s a video at the site. Another article, with a photo, reports that the kitten was finally rescued. (h/t Dom)
1520 – Suleiman the Magnificent is proclaimed sultan of the Ottoman Empire.
1541 – Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto and his forces enter Tula territory in present-day western Arkansas, encountering fierce resistance.
1791 – The first performance of Mozart’s opera The Magic Flute takes place two months before his death.
1888 – Jack the Ripper kills his third and fourth victims, Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes.
1915 – World War I: Radoje Ljutovac becomes the first soldier in history to shoot down an enemy aircraft with ground-to-air fire.
Liutovac used a modified Turkish cannon to shoot down the plane, and sure enough if the replica of that cannon (or maybe the original) adorns his grave:
1939 – NBC broadcasts the first televised American football game.
1941 – World War II: The Babi Yar massacre comes to an end.
1947 – The 1947 World Series is the first to be televised, to include an African-American player, to exceed $2 million in receipts, to see a pinch-hit home run, and to have six umpires on the field.
1949 – The Berlin Airlift ends.
1962 – James Meredith enters the University of Mississippi, defying racial segregation rules.
Here’s a photo of Meredith at the University; the caption is “Photograph shows James Meredith walking to class accompanied by U.S. marshals.; James Meredith walking to class at University of Mississippi, accompanied by U.S. marshals. According to http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3c35515, the men flanking Meredith are U.S. Marshal James McShane (left) and John Doar of the Justice Department (right)”
Here are the cartoons, which will undoubtedly get me reported in Pakistan and this post removed by WordPress in that country. (They’re also in Wikipedia at the link; I wonder if that entry is also banned in Pakistan.) In a book about the cartoons, The Cartoons that Shook the World,Yale University Press was too cowardly to reproduce them.
2016 – Two paintings with a combined value of $100 million are recovered after having been stolen from the Van Gogh Museum in 2002.
Maddox, an inveterate bigot and segregationist who refused to serve blacks in his restaurant after the Civil Rights Act of 1964,, was interviewed by Dick Cavett on December 18, 1970. The discussion got heated, and Maddox stormed off Cavett’s show:
1917 – Buddy Rich, American drummer, bandleader, and actor (d. 1987)
1924 – Truman Capote, American novelist, playwright, and screenwriter (d. 1984)
Here’s one of three videos of Capote on the Tonight Show on November 27, 1972. He was sui generis, and in the interview he talks about his masterpiece In Cold Blood. But do not neglect his short book A Christmas Memory, which is also a wonderful remembrance from Capote’s childhood.
1928 – Elie Wiesel, Romanian-American author, academic, and activist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2016)
1931 – Angie Dickinson, American actress
1935 – Johnny Mathis, American singer and actor
1942 – Frankie Lymon, American singer-songwriter (d. 1968)
1943 – Marilyn McCoo, American singer
Those who flatlined on September 30 include:
1955 – James Dean, American actor (b. 1931)
1989 – Virgil Thomson, American composer and critic (b. 1896)
1990 – Patrick White, Australian novelist, poet, and playwright, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1912)
2012 – Barry Commoner, American biologist, academic, and politician (b. 1917)
2017 – Monty Hall, American game show host (b. 1921)
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili’s washing herself on the windowsill, embellishing her intentions:
A: Are you practicing yoga?
Hili: No, I’m striving to achieve perfection through hygiene.
In Polish:
Ja: Uprawiasz jogę?
Hili: Nie, dążę do doskonałości przez higienę.
From Su, a logo of this crappy year:
Speaking of 2020, this is from reader Charles:
From Rick; this is pretty much me these days. I do know some things, but so does everybody.
From Titania. Yes, this is a real article, and it was in Slate.
Sounds to me like you’re raising a transphobe and internalised misogynist.
A followup tweet. I guess Matthew and Tina are enjoying their Big Day Out:
First time out since the gig @Ri_Science with @AdamRutherford 6.5 months ago. Ended up a bit tipsy and giddy with Tina trying to get into a punt and me discovering I know the words to Chantilly Lace in the restaurant. pic.twitter.com/EFRV1U98o9
Both Greg and I, going by this tweet alone and not having read the paper, are guessing that the work is good and the analysis sound, but naming these things as separate species is dubious:
It's Fall: #Eddiethetortoise has been in his burrow for a few days and Bob is also sleeping a lot & his appetite is tapering off. But today Bob looked perkier, so I rang the dinner bell (drummed my fingers on the plastic greens container).
An original (and a retouched) color photograph—of Rodin!
I have only dusted the very lightest of colour re-balances on what was already, frankly, a magnificent autochrome taken 113 years ago by Edward Steichen. It is the great sculptor Rodin (famous for 'The Thinker' and 'Eve') in his studio, way back in 1907. Original colour. 😍 pic.twitter.com/BeumYsnS9O
The first Presidential debate is two minutes away, and I’ll be watching at least an hour of it—if my digestion holds out. If you wish, put your comments on the debate below. I may put some reactions in this post, or I may wait until tomorrow.
I’m of course rooting for Uncle Joe.
. . . It’s already three minutes late. Let’s get started!
It’s already a slugfest, and Trump is pugnacious and continually interrupting not only Biden, but the moderator. Shut up, Trump! I can’t believe his rudeness.
Uncle Joe seems to be all over the map, though, not staying on point, conflating Obamacare with Roe v. Wade.
