The draft and more sexism (CC)

Keeping with the theme of gender issues, I have decided to talk about the draft. That being, for those who don't know, the ability of the government in times of war to mandate that males 18-25 can be forced into military service. The draft was technically stopped in 1973, now instead we have "selective service" whereas in times of "national emergency" this agency, yes there is an entire agency devoted to this, would hold a literal lottery where they would draw birthdays out of a lottery drum and if its your birthday you must sign up to fight. More on this later. Now, in both cases women are totally exempt from any form of conscription. Is this sexism - against men? The simple answer would be yes. Indeed it would appear that men are being cast as macho warrior, eager to fight the enemy, while women are once again considered fragile homemakers, the very core of their idea fundamentally incompatible with fighting. In this case, the entire institution in question is rife with gender typing and stereotypes. Neither gender should have to feel obligated to either go into combat, for men, or stay out of it, for women. I do understand that women on average are significantly weaker than men, but less physical strength does not necessarily for a less capable soldier. Moreover, I'm sure that the thinking when women were excluded from the draft was not that they were necessarily less capable, but rather that "women were weak" or "women should be cleaning not fighting" or other such overgeneralized false aphorisms. Even discounting the moral problems with forcing people into military service, the system of the draft remains yet another relic of a less developed and resoundingly worse time for people in general. I hope to see it reformed soon.        

"Playing like a girl" (IR)

The idea of "playing like a girl" has been one of the few almost totally ubiquitous insults that has been passed down throughout Americana, and cultures worldwide. The BBC article I read discussed whether this term was offensive or not. Frankly, I'm surprised they had to ask the question. When someone "plays like a girl" or does "x, y or z like a girl" it of course has nothing to do with how feminine the action in question was, it is used to paint something as weak, poor, and just bad overall. This then implies that just because something is associated with women or females at large it is automatically inferior to it's male counterpart, and any man should be ashamed to be part of any such things. This then feeds back into the idea of straw feminism. Men who defend or otherwise affiliate with women are viewed as weak and are looked down on. This is a major problem with the advancement of women's rights. These sentiments are rooted incredibly deep, so much so that even as I am writing this, the idea of a man in a traditionally female position is still off putting, still tugging at some resoundingly sexist part of my basic social schemas. This, of course, does not justify these sentiments. To add a stipulation, and refute a potential counterargument, I do understand that the large majority of men are quite a bit stronger than women in general. The article states this obscure fact by saying that women don't throw things as far as men can. Brilliant. I suppose in some minds this would justify the use of that statement claiming that it is factually accurate. It most certainly does not. The use of this statement in conversation is not fueled by logic or used as some sort of poorly-wrought scientific simile, it is used simply as a cheap insult drawing on old cultural sexism.          

/b/, Twitch, and the rules of the internet (TA)

It seems possible if not inevitable that "women become full and active participants in our digital world", but it isn't going to happen without the digital world putting up a fight.

Anyone who has become part of, or even just observed an internet culture will know that they are dominated by men, in more ways than one. Moreover than just sheer volume, the most successful members of the most popular sites are all men. And yes, I mean all of them. Go check for yourself - I point to Twtich TV and Youtube as prime examples of this male-dominated culture. In the rare and gawked-at event in which a female attempts to become part of this culture it is viewed as extremely odd, and yes, an intrusion, one which is necessarily met with blatant sexism or misogyny, but rather infantilized, made "cute", set up as a spectacle in which the male participants laugh at the ridiculous notion that a woman could actually be part of this culture. I have not seen many successful women come out of these cultures, but in the few cases that I have seen the women in question would be considered "sexy", and draws excessive attention to the fact that she is a woman. In several cases I have seen these types of female accounts/channels/whatever manner of distribution are an accessory to an already popular male one. This type of corruptive dichotomy, as well as the atheistic characteristics of said female participants serve both to perpetuate the stereotypes of women on the internet as hypersexual and manipulative, as well as serve as a microcosm of the dependency of women on men that is already such a problem, (to use the common phrase), IRL.
   
On to Ms. Sarkeesian's predicament. I reference 4Chan's rules of the internet to attempt to explain why this happened. Rule 30: There are no girls on the internet. Obviously not true, but this idea points out the fact that it is indeed a male-dominated culture. People claiming or who actually are female are viewed with suspicion, often leading to mocking or slander. They are obviously the minority, so this makes this easy. Rules 42 and 43: Nothing is sacred, and The more beautiful and pure a thing is - the more satisfying it is to corrupt it. The anonymity of the internet lets people mock things in ways that would be wildly unacceptable, such as the misogyny shown throughout various sites. Rules 18 and 19: Anything that can be labeled can be hated, and The more you hate it the stronger it gets. Rule 20: Nothing is to be taken seriously. The amalgamation of these "rules" is the mindset and act of "trolling". That is, deliberately inciting anger or other such emotional responses in people by acting in an ignorant, extreme or otherwise inflammatory way.

And I think Ms. Sarkeesian got trolled. Hardcore.

Now, I of course DO NOT CONDONE these actions, or in any way believe that such trolling MAKES THIS ACCEPTABLE. Rather, I think that the "troll" mindset of slander and incitement, combined with male dominance of video game culture and the internet at large made her an outlet for the aimless misogynistic sentiments that reside on the internet. As for the organization of the hate campaign, the internet has an incredible ability to loosely organize itself, especially if it is against a particular individual or organization. I point to the "battletoad" meme as a more humorous example (WARNING - some strong language) http://imgur.com/VY2xE .

In conclusion, the attacks Ms. Sarkeesian are an exemplification of the worst parts of internet culture. Juvenile, thoughtless attacks based on nothing but casual misogyny and a misguided sense of tribal belonging. Even though the culture of the internet is deeply rooted, the culture in our offline lives have a profound effect on our digital ones. And as such, in our offline lives, even though women are essentially equal to men under the law, they are increasingly objectified in new and more horrible ways. We stand at a crossroads here. Will rational thought lead us to a society where genders are no longer typed, packaged and sold, or will educational and intellectual apathy combined with corporate greed lead us to a typed and chauvinistic society?

I really don't know.                

Flipped education? (IR)

I recently came across a quite interesting opinion piece in the New York times describing a different method of education, using "mastery learning" and "flipped classrooms". I guess the basic premise is that instead of the teacher determining the speed of the class, the students do. As well as that, students can work independently of one another, proving their mastery through some sort of assessment. At it's core, the idea sounds excellent, but as always, theory greatly differs from practice. Right out of the gate I am questioning the nebulous nature of the classroom environment. The article talked about one aspect of the "flipped classroom" being that rather than the teacher giving live lectures, they would create pre-recorded videos of them for students to view at their leisure. At least from my experience, the dynamics of live lectures, questions being proposed by both the teacher and the students, the discussion that stems from that an other things etc., are incredibly useful learning tools. As well as that, if my sentimentality may be excused, the idea of video lectures. would seem quite dead. The overall rationale for the video lectures being that the teacher now has time to work with individual students on practice problems and projects, the lecture being the actual homework. This lack of homework seems like it could be both a good and bad thing. Once again from personal experience, I have certainly had the displeasure of sitting at home confused about homework, having on one to really help me. Then again, having constant help on homework somewhat decreases its value, depriving students to have the challenge of practicing concepts on their own. A double edged sword I suppose, as is the entire system in a way. Speaking for the third time empirically, I went to elementary school in a Montessori classroom, where the main focus was the use of materials, but we also had a great deal of freedom to work as we pleased, but that was combined with many structured group activities, and interjections from the teacher. Now, this may have worked great with a bunch of 1-4th graders whom thought learning was "exciting", but to be perfectly frank, any system of learning that gives students large amounts of time to do with as they please is probably going to end up as more of a social time than a work one.

Or maybe that's just us.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/23/in-flipped-classrooms-a-method-for-mastery/              

Cats (FW)

I like cats. I enjoy the softness of their fur, the playfulness of their temperament, and the excellent companionship they can provide. I, however, do not own a cat. This is due in no small part to the fact that my dad does not like cats. I do not understand why. He sides with most people in his adoration of dogs and dislike of cats. That, however, is not to say I do not like dogs. I find it strange that people group themselves as either "dog" people or "cat" people. "Dog" people associating themselves with extroversion and boisterousness, "cat" people associating themselves with introversion and quietness. But why do people feel the need to group themselves in such a manner? Perhaps it is simply a feature of human disposition. People obviously have this group attachment mentality, as one can see easily from the formation of cliques. If people didn't have this desire, would there be such thing as a "cat" or "dog" person? Or is it a deeper, less frivolous connection? Perhaps we do see some sort of solidarity between our individual psyche and the generalized behavior of a species of animal. But then again, if people have a desire to fit in to a particular group, could they be wrongly interpreting themselves as a mechanism for fitting in? And, in that case, could that extend beyond the "cat"-"dog" dichotomy, to behavior, even entire personalities?

Maybe. Probably not.

In any case, cats are furry and awesome, and in fact, are the superior animal. QED.            

Aliens (CM)

An absurdity to some, a reality to others, the idea of extraterrestrials have captivated people's interest for centuries, and even more so in the modern world. The origins of people's belief ranges from solid scientific reasoning, to poor education, to downright psychosis. People's disbelief usually stems from internal skepticism, solid scientific reasoning, and in some cases, religion. I myself fall on the "believe" side, I hope for solid reasoning. To expound on that hopefully solid reason, I would like to begin with a staple of extraterrestrial belief, Drake's Equation. 

(Bad copying srry D: Please click the image)

R_* = the average rate of star formation in our galaxy

f_p = the fraction of those stars that have planets

n_e = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets

f_l = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point

f_i = the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life (civilizations)

f_c = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space

L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space 

Through a series of very complicated estimations, and some very simple multiplication, the current answer comes out to be 36.4 million at current estimates. However, this is still not really the point of the equation. The point is to show how improbable it is that life doesn't exist elsewhere. When thought about, even only our galaxy is an incomprehensibly large place containing an estimated 300 Billion stars. If the majority of those stars have planets orbiting them, and in all of those solar systems there is the "Goldilocks" zone, where the heat from the sun is neither too cold nor too hot. In a galaxy and universe full of elements waiting to be formed into planets, than it would seem highly probable that a significant number of planets have formed in this zone. These planets would have been very similar, if not identical to the early conditions of our planet. The aliens, you might be wondering, come in not long after this. Though the molten and volcanic early planet may seem inhospitable, in 1953 Stanley Miller proved that organic compounds such as amino acids would be formed by running electric current through an abiotic chemical environment, one that would closely resemble the atmosphere of early Earth. This process, as I sit here typing my highly abstract thoughts into my semi-conductor powered electric computation machine, obviously works. 

As another point of information is the discovery of several "super-Earths" relativity close  to our solar system. These planets are larger than ours, but are in the same "Goldilocks" zone, and NASA says, are potentially habitable.

If this is what lies within our small view of the Universe from here on Earth, I can hardly imagine what lies outside it. 

http://www.space.com/20720-earth-like-alien-planets-discovery.html  

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake%E2%80%99s_Equation     

Vaccines (CM)

As much as people (myself included) hate vaccines, they are indeed a vital part of modern healthcare. They have been proven again and again has an effective method of preventing many diseases, such as measles, mumps, rubella and more. It would be very difficult to dispute their effectiveness. People still do however, and even more than that, that claim that vaccines are the cause of, mainly, autism of all things. The idea is intrinsically preposterous. Autism is a disorder that is not fully understood, and what we do know about it points to it being mainly genetic. That is even besides the point. There have been multiple studies showing that there is no correlation between vaccination and autism spectrum disorders (ASD). In addition to that, it is a well established statistic that as many as 1 in 88 people have some sort of ASD. That compared to the large amount of people that receive vaccines, its not hard to draw a pseudo-scientific relation between the two. A final, and very sad reason that people may blame vaccines for autism is that the parents of children with severe autism may simply be looking for something to blame. Sad, but it's not a unreasonable conclusion. Hopefully you can see that vaccines have been proven to be effective, and the surprisingly large faction that believes autism and vaccines are connected, are very wrong.

Some citations:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/data.html
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10997&page=1
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/autism/