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Category Archives: Uncategorized

Women, Mermaids, and Mystique: Why We Don’t Really Want to Be Part of Your World

“I want to have fins”, she sighed, gazing longingly at an advertisement for Disney’s The Little Mermaid.
I could hardly have been more relieved; for a moment I’d thought I’d walked in on every modern mother’s nightmare - a preschooler who longs to be thin.  It’s not healthy for a four year old to fret about [...]

Alphabetical Social Justice

“It’s not nice to take people’s L’s”, she told me.  “There’s an L in my name and an L in your name, but lots of poor people out there don’t have L’s like we do.”  She’s only four, but my young friend already has a sharply defined sense and right and wrong.  Much as I’m [...]

Re:Kindle-ing

Three years spent repairing old books in the basement of a university library can’t help but leave a girl like me with a definite bias.  I love books–and I don’t just love reading them.  I love the smell of leather, I love the texture of fine paper, and I love the way a well-bound volume [...]

Tea Party Democrats

Rasmussen announced yesterday that Americans agree with the tenets of the Tea Party movement more than with President Obama “on most major issues” by 48%-44%.  Additionally, The Hill reports that 40% of Tea Partiers identify themselves as Democrats or Independents.
This is hardly surprising in the wake of the healthcare bill’s unpopularity, and it reminds one [...]

Barack Obama: The Populist Professor?

Last night’s State of the Union address changed nothing, aside from Chris Matthews’ eyesight, which I trust has returned to normal.  President Obama is still committed to the same unpopular policies that have left him with a dropping approval rating, and he “won’t quit”.
Neither will Republicans, despite-or perhaps because of-the verbal reprimand they received last [...]

The Christian Web Conference: Incarnating Digital Relationships

Last weekend’s Christian Web Conference put flesh on the disembodied personas of several well-known online Christians.  While internet technologies continue to help people form increasingly complex relationships online, nothing has yet replaced the richly unique dynamic of face-to-face meetings - that’s why conferences like CWC are so useful.
This year’s conference, an expanded version of GodBlogCon, [...]

No on David Michaels: A Chance to Help Stop the Sale of Science

When scientific evidence becomes a commodity, it is cheapened and easily misused, making it difficult for anyone to sort life-saving facts from fiction.  Remember this story about the “scientifically based” scare tactics used to market Bisphenol A -free plastics?  Thanks to the efforts of Fenton Communications, the liberal marketing firm behind the “General Betray Us” [...]

BPA: One less thing to worry about

Fear sells.  No one knows this better than advertisers, whose aggressive marketing content is unconsciously absorbed by millions of consumers who don’t - or can’t - think critically about what advertisers tell them.
That’s why it’s such a shame when advertisers and marketing firms invent false crises in order to exploit these unprepared consumers.  BPA-free baby [...]

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You know you’ve missed your calling…

… when you start to sound like this guy:

This guy clearly missed his calling… whatever it was… by over-specializing in his field.
So is it better to know a lot about a few things, or a little about many things?
(HT to Brandywine books for the video.)