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What College Football Games Are On TV? (Week 3)
Can I confess something? I really don't like flying.
Sure, I used to love it. But then one flight, my plane hit an air pocket in clear air that caused severe turbulence. For 30 seconds, it shook so hard I thought for sure it was out of control. Then just like that, the turbulence ceased and we were back in smooth air. The pilot came on the intercom and jokingly said, "Just a reminder, not that you needed one after that, but keep your seatbelt securely fastened at all times when you're in your seat."
I gripped the armrests like a vice the rest of the flight.
Ever since, the slightest bit of bumpiness makes my heart race and my anxiety spike. I'm getting better at handling my fear, but I know it will take time.
You might say, "You know, no airplane's ever crashed due to turbulence, right?" But as anyone who's ever experienced an irrational fear will know, that doesn't necessarily help.
Take the current state of college football. Week 2 shook our expectations around. And now we're in the period of calm air right after that wild ride, wondering if it'll happen again. If you were a fan of a team that lost in unexpected or close fashion last week, even if you hope that turbulence was a fluke, it doesn't really comfort you when everything feels unsettled and out of control.
The funny thing about turbulence is that you're not actually changing altitude that much. Everything's really staying the same. It's just some jitters caused by windiness. And let's be honest, that might be the case here. If your team lost, it could just be the early season getting to it. College football has a way of sorting things out by the end. The plane will eventually land, and you'll be able to look back on Week 2 as a fluke.
But still, in this present moment, is the fear.
The one thing I've found helps me when the bumpiness comes is to embrace the fear, to realize that there's nothing I can do to stop the jerkiness from happening. If I can accept the fact that sometimes flights are bumpy and that I'm not in danger, then at least I won't feel like I'm in danger.
And a similar piece of advice might apply this week.
Could we see another batch of top teams fall, or season hopes shatter? Maybe. But if it happens, that's always the way it was meant to be. All we can do is ride it out, and maybe even have a little fun with the ups and downs.
On that glib note, here's the games you should pay attention to this college football Saturday!
Window of Opportunity
There's just not much going on anywhere in the country in the early timeslot. My advice? Grab your fam (or friends) and find some local restaurant with a freaking awesome brunch. French toast, pancakes, mimosas, bacon, the works. Go crazy. Then you might have some time afterwards for a hike to work off those calories before plopping down on the couch.
Early Games
Georgia at South Carolina
12:00pm/11:00am (ESPN)
It's slim pickings in this slate. You're probably thinking the Gamecocks don't have a chance. And they haven't looked great on the ground, but quarterback Spencer Rattler's been pretty alright through the air, and they've done well defending the pass. And so far, that's where Georgia's made its money, slinging it with quarterback Stetson Bennett. If that matchup pans out in South Carolina's favor, this one might get frisky.
Purdue at Syracuse
12:00pm/11:00am (ESPN2)
This tilt's at the Carrier Dome (I refuse to call it by its new name). And as we all know, it's where teams go . . . TO DIE. Will the Boilermakers be the Orange's next victim? They lost to Penn State in a close one and then pasted Indiana State. Quarterback Aiden O'Connell leads a balanced offense, but the defense showed some weakness against the pass. And Syracuse commander Garrett Shrader, distributing it to a diverse receiver room, seems prepared to unleash. Vegas has it as a pick 'em, which usually means a close, gutsy game.
Watch The Score
Oklahoma at Nebraska (12pm/11am, FOX)
Afternoon Games
BYU at Oregon
3:30pm/2:30pm (FOX)
This top-25 matchup's probably the flagship game of the day. BYU showed up last week against Baylor, scoring a tough win in double overtime. The Cougars' offensive line has shown up and the pass attack is strong. They should be a tough out for Oregon, who came up lame against Georgia to start the year then took out all its frustration on Eastern Washington. Oregon's favored, but it's hard to get a bead on how good the Ducks actually are given the wide range of their opponents. This should be a tough test for both squads.
Penn State at Auburn
3:30pm/2:30pm (CBS)
After squeaking by Purdue (well, I mean, Sean Clifford did toss four touchdowns), Penn State steamrolled Ohio (not State) and now rounds into a higher-tier opponent. Meanwhile, Auburn has underwhelmed tossing the pigskin. The Tigers have played well up front on defense, and they run the ball decently well, but above all else, they need a defining win. They'll be up for this game, and it's in their home stadium. Auburn should bring out a number of tricks and moves to stymie Penn State. Will it be enough? Dunno, but it should entertain.
Cal at Notre Dame (2:30p/1:30p, NBC)
Kansas at Houston (4p/3p, ESPNU)
Tulane at Kansas State (3p/2p, ESPN+)
Miami at Texas A&M
9:00pm/8:00pm (ESPN)
If I know Jimbo Fisher, he's spent this week in a deep, abiding, salty rage. App State just embarrassed the Aggies on a national stage. They had national championship aspirations, and they can still get there, but they can't afford any mistakes going forward and they'll need a lot more chaos around college football. Jimbo's contemplating a quarterback change, and it might be worth it. A&M has disappointed on offense, and Miami's vulnerable to the pass. I say that knowing full well that the Canes have played two cupcakes thus far. Do they show up on the road in a really hostile environment?
Michigan State at Washington
7:30pm/6:30pm (ABC)
Last year was an unexepected banner year for Sparty. It kept up the good vibes against Western Michigan and Akron, turning in two dominant performances on both sides of the ball, though the secondary could be better and quarterback Payton Thorne needs to turn up his pass game. They face a Washington squad bolstered by incoming transfer quarterback Michael Penix Jr., who's looked great against two weak teams. And the Husky defense has handled itself well. What we have here is the first test for both squads. Which one is for real, and which is fool's gold? We'll soon find out.
Texas Tech at NC State (7p/6p, ESPN2)
SMU at Maryland (7:30p/6:30p, FS1)
Mississippi State at LSU (6p/5p, ESPN)
Late Night Games
Fresno State at USC
10:30pm/9:30pm (FOX)
If you're hankering for some after-dark action, this might get fun. My weather eye is trained squarely on Fresno State quarterback Jake Haener. USC's secondary held up alright against Stanford and Rice, but how will it do against a loaded Bulldog pass attack? Also, neither team's great at defending the run. That could be key. Essentially, it's a matchup with a ton of variables that should show us new dimensions of what USC head coach Lincoln Riley can do in a distinct, tough situation.
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Hello and welcome to a fun, weekly, stats driven look at the state of college football! We'll share interesting trends, discuss breakout players, dive into some fun statistics, and much more. But! Before College Football officially kicks off (providing us with much more fun data to play with) we'll be previewing each conference by the ...
A Thanksgiving Feast with College Football's Most Dysfunctional Family
It's the fourth Thursday of November. A gentle snow coats the shingles of 2021 Playoff Lane, where a hodgepodge of visitors have gathered to celebrate Thanksgiving. Mere minutes remain before the holiday feast when a knock is heard at the door. Alabama, ever the gracious host, opens it to greet his guests. "Well, I'll be," ...
Sneaky Stats for Week 8 of the 2021 College Football Season
Welcome to back to the Sneaky Stats series! Week 7 brought us a new Heisman candidate, another loss from a top ten team, and plenty of sneaky stats to break down! Let's take a brief look back, and then a look ahead at Week 8 and beyond! Week 7 – It may still be a ...


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Understanding Zakat
Source: IslamiCity Jun 30, 2019 13 Comments
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Category: Faith & Spirituality, Featured Topics: Ramadan, Wealth, Zakat Values: Charity, Purity Channel: Ramadan - Day 16, Ramadan - Day 22 Views: 50064
1 Conditions for Zakat
2 Zakat Asset
3 Assets that exceed a minimum value
4 Completion of Haul
5 Beneficiaries of Zakat
Zakat is one of the major religious duties in Islam. Literally, zakat means to "purify". It refers to the purification of a believers' wealth and soul. Wealth purification denotes the mobilization of assets for the purpose of financial growth and justified distribution. Purification of the soul implies freedom from hatred, jealousy, selfishness, uneasiness and greed. Other Quranic connotations also include the purification of sin.
Zakat is a fixed proportion collected from the surplus wealth and earnings of a believer. It is then distributed to prescribed beneficiaries and for the welfare as well as the infrastructure of a society in general. This contribution is made payable by a Muslim once every year.
Zakat is paid on the net balance after a Muslim has spent on basic necessities, family expenses, due credits, donations and taxes. Every Muslim male or female who at the end of the Hijri year is in possession of the equivalent of 85 grams of gold or more in cash or articles of trade, must pay his or her zakat at the minimum rate of 2.5 percent.
Zakat has a deep humanitarian and social-political value. This religious act prevents the hoarding of wealth and advocates solidarity with humanity because excessive wealth is distributed among the poor. The paying of zakat also helps purify one's soul and encourages a person to have gratitude towards God's bounties.
Zakat is mentioned along with Salat (prayer) in 30 verses of the Quran. It was first revealed in Surah 73:20;
".... and establish regular prayers and give regular charity; and loan to Goda beautiful loan. And whatever good ye send forth for your souls, ye shall find it in God's presence, Yea, better and greater in reward and seek ye the grace of God: for Godis oft-forgiving, Most Merciful."
In another verse, God declares that those who pay zakat, are included within the Muslim society
"But (even so), if they repent, establish regular prayers, and practice regular charity, they are your brethren in Faith: (thus) do We explain the Signs in detail, for those who understand." (9:11)
God says in the Quran:
"They were enjoined only to worship God, sincere in their faith in Him alone - and of upright religion - and to establish the Salat and the Zakat. Such is the upright religion, (98:5)
"Those who lay up treasures of gold and silver and spend them not in the way of God; give them the news of a painful punishment, on the Day when that (wealth) will be heated in hellfire, and their foreheads and their sides and their backs branded therewith: "This is the treasure which you laid up for yourselves! Taste, then, your hoarded treasure!" (9:34-35).
"Let not those who are miserly with what God has given them of His bounty think that this is good for them. Rather, it is bad for them. That which they withhold shall be hung around their necks on the Day of Arising. (3:180)
Bukhari and Muslim relate on the authority of Ibn Abbas that the Messenger of God sent Mu'adh to the Yemen he told him, "You are going to a people who have a Scripture, so call them to testify that there is no deity but God, and that I am the Messenger of God. If they respond to this, then teach them that God has imposed five Salats upon them in every day. If they respond to this, then teach them that God has imposed upon them a charity to be taken from the wealthy amongst them and given to their poor. If they respond to this, then beware of taking any more of their wealth! Beware also of the prayer of the oppressed, for there is no veil between such a prayer and God."
Then he recited the verse: "Let not those who are miserly with what God has given them of His bounty think that this is good for them. Rather, it is bad for them. That which they withhold shall be hung around their necks on the Day of Arising." (3:180)
Conditions for Zakat
Several conditions must be fulfilled before zakat can be paid. These conditions are necessary as zakat can only be applied on those who are of legal age and who own enough assets. These conditions are categorized into two broad categories, namely performer and asset.
Every Muslim who is of a certain age and owns enough assets is required to pay zakat.
Zakat Asset
Full Ownership A Muslim will only be required to pay zakat if he or she has full and legal ownership of an asset.
Zakat is payable only on those assets that are acquired for the purpose of creating or generating wealth. Some examples of this type of assets are livestock or crops that are traded or sold, inventory of goods used for trading, and investments such as gold or securities that have potential for appreciation in value. However, zakat is not payable in the case of fixed assets such as buildings, if they are not subjected to "capital circulation".
Assets that exceed a minimum value
Zakat need only be paid on those assets that exceed a minimum value. This minimum value is calculated based on the market price of 85 grams of gold or 595 grams of pure silver. This minimum value is termed Nisab. The Islamic Fiqh and Research Councils, as well as Jumhur (majority) of Ulama' recommend that gold be used as the basis for the calculation of nisab.
Completion of Haul
Haul is defined as the completion period for a zakat asset. The length of time for haul is one Islamic or Hijri year (1 year Hijri = 354.5 days, 1 year Solar = 365.25 days). Zakat is only payable on assets that have been held for at least this period.
Beneficiaries of Zakat
The Holy Quran (9:60) classifies the due recipients of zakat under the following eight categories.
"Zakat is for the poor, and the needy and those who are employed to administer and collect it, and the new converts, and for those who are in bondage, and in debt and service of the cause of God, and for the wayfarers, a duty ordained by God, and Godis the All-Knowing, the Wise".
Zakat can only be distributed to any of the eight eligible beneficiaries (asnaf) that are mentioned in the Quran in Surah Taubah:60. However, priority should be given to the poor and needy. Where there is no central authority to administer zakat, it can be paid directly to the needy.
"Alms are for the poor and the needy, and those employed to administer the (funds); for those whose hearts have been (recently) reconciled (to the truth); for those in bondage and in debt; in the cause of God; and for the wayfarer: (thus is it) ordained by God, and Godis full of knowledge and wisdom." (9:60)
The poor (Faqir/Fuqara)
Those without any means of livelihood and material possessions.
The needy (Miskeen)
Those without sufficient means of livelihood to meet their basic necessities. For instance, those who, although may have a job, a house and a car, but whose income is below the minimum requirement.
The administrators of zakat (Amil)
Those appointed to manage and administer zakat. This category is sub-divided into the following categories:
Group of people who go out to the society and determine those who fall Fuqara and Miskeen categories.
Those who collect the Zakat money.
The accountant of the Zakat money.
The administrator, manager, clerical worker or secretary who puts the files in order.
Those who handle Zakat distributions.
The auditor who audits overall Zakat management and administration.
The sympathizers (Muallaf-at-Quloobuhum)
Those whose hearts are inclined towards or have accepted Islam.
To free slaves (Riqab)
Zakat can also be used to free slaves or captives.
Those who are in debt (Gharimin)
Zakat can be used to pay off the debts of a person who has borrowed to pay for basic necessities so that he/she can lead a normal life. Zakat can also be distributed to those in financial difficulties e.g. bankruptcy due to the loss of employment and heavy debt.
For the cause of God (Fisabillillah)
Zakat can be used to finance any form of struggle or work for the love of God. The following examples fall under this category, e.g. Da'wah; building & developing society's infrastructure; defending Muslims, who are being oppressed; assisting poor travelers and sponsoring a student's educational expenses.
Those who are stranded during a journey (Ibnus Sabil)
Zakat can also be used to help a traveler facing difficulties in continuing his journey due to reasons such as loss of money or the break down of his vehicles, the repair of which he cannot afford.
The Prophet said, "If someone gives as charity so much as the equivalent of a single date from honest earnings - and God accepts only what is honest - God takes it in the Right Hand, then makes it increase for the one responsible, just as one of you raises foal, until it becomes as big as a mountain.
Source: The Peninsula
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13 Comments	Comment
Muslim aid USA July 23rd, 2019
Zakatul Fitr which is to be given toward the finish of Ramadan is Waajib on each Muslim male female youthful and old even another conceived child. Not at all like the general Fardh Zakat which just the rich individuals give 2.5% of their yearly profit, Zakatul Fitr is given toward the finish of Ramadan which is, for the most part, intended to cleanse and acknowledge our Ramadan Fast.
Babandi A. Gumel from U.K July 15th, 2015
The one who pays Zakah shows that he/she has strong or real Faith and Reliance of Allah called Iman .Normally Zakah and Salah are joined together as mentioned in various places of the Quran by Allah (S.W.T) Both these two are obligations i.e Salat and Zakah are fardh (obligatory duties) and of course Salat comes first always mentioned first before Zakah ie. establish prayers and pay Zakah. The Messenger of Allah (S.A.W)is reported to have said ( something to this effect near meaning) "If I had gold equal to the mountain of Uhud,it would not please me that anything of it should remain with me (spending it all for the sake of Allah) after three nights except what I would keep for repaying debts" Subhanallah that is the Iman of our Dear Prophet who did not like to keep anything for himself for personal benefit for tomorrow it is like burden if not spent Fi Sabilillah.In short Zakah is an obligatory Charity given of a certain fixed proportion of the wealth of every kind of property liable to Zakat of a Muslim to be paid yearly for the benefit of the poor in the Muslim Community. The payment of Zakat is one of the five pillars of Islam like the Shahadah Salah Fasting and Hajj. Zakah is a major economic means for establishing social justice leading to prosperity and security in Muslim Society.
May Allah give us the taufiq to understand the importance of giving Zakah out of our wealth to help the down trodden poor Amen.
RAMATU SANI MOHAMMED from NIGERIA November 18th, 2013
VERY ENLIGHTENING AND EDUCATIVE,JAZHAKHALLAH KHAIR.
Yushau Babatunde Hassan from NIGERIA July 29th, 2013
This Article on Zakat has been very enlightening;jazaakumu~llaahu~l~khayraan.
Javaid Gill from Pakistan July 28th, 2013
Assets that exceed a minimum value i.e. market price of 85 grams of
gold or 595 grams of pure silver (Nisab).
In my opinion this Nisab was defined for the society about 1500
years ago. It means at that time a person with this nisab was
considered rich and he was placed in the category of zakat payer.But
today, the society living standard and purchasing power has been
changed. A person with such nisab can not be placed even in a poor
category. I do not think this nisab is Quaranic decision but it is
defined in the light of Hadiths and keeping in view the society's
living standard (economy).Islam has provided the opportunity of
Ijtahad that is why Islam is a dynamic Religion. It is valid for all
ages. In my opinion this nisab should be redefined from time to time
and from country to country keeping in view the society's economy
standards (living standard... per capita income, purchasing power,
currency devaluation and so many other factors etc) as on every Eid-
ul-Fitr fitrana is calculated every time.I think a group of persons
should decide the Nisab for the country for some specified
period.The nisab should not be defined for the whole life. A team of
the following persons should calculate the Nisab:
1. Economist
2. Statistician
3. Sociologist
4. Chartered Accountant
5. Ijtahadi Ulma
6. Quotation Expert Ulma
The need to define Nisab is similar as to define tax rules. As Nisab
mismatch the society standards so peoples are not paying zakat. If
some are paying but they are not sure about what they are paying.
Babandi A.Gumel from U.K July 25th, 2013
Zakatul Fitr which is to be given at the end of Ramadan is Waajib on every Muslim male female young and old even a new born baby. Unlike the general Fardh Zakat which only the rich people give 2.5% of their annual earnings, Zakatul Fitr is given at the end of Ramadan which is generally meant to purify and accept our Ramadan Fast.It is encouraged that every one gives out or does it although the head of the household would suffice by giving the Zakatul Fitr on behalf of all the family as dictated and varies according to different local condition where one finds himself or herself as it varies. As we know different Masajid sets out the amount due for Zakataul Fitr every year for that Masajid as seen here in U.K.Most important thing to consider, as I said one has to pay for his whole family including a new baby born. Anyhow the best way is to ask the Ulama who will tell us more about giving out the Zakah whether the general Zakat or Zakatul Fitr.
alias bahari from malaysia March 17th, 2013
We are paying our zakat via internet without going through emir. This
is a norm now. Why is it allowed without going through emir
Hilal Shah from USA August 17th, 2012
All the defined areas of purification is agreed, but when we talk about purification of Mall or asset, most of us imply it in diffirent way. People of knowledge who write about ZAKAT should mentioned that purification of Mall does not mean that we earned our money from HARAM means and when pay ZAKAT from it, the HARAM earnings becomes HALAL. Most of us if not all of us do think in this way. ZAKAT is obligation on Muslims, therefore; our earnings must be from HALAL means and not from HARAM means.
Ayesha from canada August 16th, 2012
I disagree with your example given under needy. What is the minimum income requirement? Who can determine that amount? Many Muslims today world because of what they see on TV and watching what their neighbours have tend to live beyond their means and then create the impression of being needy.
The needy are, WIDOWS AND ORPHANS AND THE AGED WHO ARE UNABLE TO WORK AND HAVE NO BREADWINNERS. The needy are those faced with huge health bills but have no means of paying for essential healthcare and medication. The needy are those who have no potable water and acess to clean water. In my opinion a person who has a job, a car and a house cannot be considered needy when there are other categories who are more in need.
Nowhere do you mention widows, orphans and the aged. They must be our first priority and they are the worthy recipients of Zakaat.
As-Swagaawiy Ayeyemi from Nigeria July 28th, 2012
Alhamdul'Allah it is educative. Informative. Analytic and entertaining. It really increases my understanding on what zakat is all about. But i want you to please let us know the current nisab on cash for zakat this year. Jazaka Allahu khayran.
JAVED SHAIKH from thailand September 13th, 2010
For example if last Ramadan I had cash with me 100,000 usd and I paid 2.5% of that as Zakat which comes to 2500 usd and now in 2010 I still have the balance left from previous year 97500 usd and from new earnings have saved this 2010 year 20000 usd. So this year I pay zakat on the new savings 20000 usd only or I have to pay zakat on the 97500 usd left over from last year and this years surplus of 20000 too.
Hilal from USA September 24th, 2009
It is a good article but lack the clearity. I was not able to pick out what kind of income paying Zakat is ordained, Halal or Haram or combination of both. You see, majority of Muslims in their own Muslim countires and abroad, are involed with earning Haram by selling: liqure, earning interest, gambling, bribery, and so much more. How can they purify their Haram earning by paying Zakat.
Zakat is a part of bigger picture of "Infaqe-Fee-Sabilillah". A Ma'umin with all of his love for Allah and His mesengers continue to spent through out the year and their life. They do not wait for the end of the year to see what thay have accumilated to pay Zakat on. In other words, if I am spending out of my sustinence every day, every week, every month, shuld there be any thing left for me to pay Zakat on? Teach people the purpose of Zakat, beause it is not just only the action to be performed, but a system to followed.
A K M Mohiuddin from Bangladesh September 21st, 2009
I wonder whether the category of 'fi sabilillah' has been defined too inclusively by the article writer. Certainly we know that dawah, defense of Islam, and funding of charitable Islamic schools and orphanages belong in this category. But "any form of struggle or work for the love of God" and "building & developing society's infrastructure" seem so broad and ambiguous that they can easily be misleading. I would like to know how Islamic scholars have interpreted this category over the centuries.
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MAGICK RIVER: ONLY 500 TIGERS LEFT IN THE WILD!
ONLY 500 TIGERS LEFT IN THE WILD!
William Blake (28 November 1757 - 12 August 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age.
Since 1896, our national emblem has been the tiger, king of the jungle, which figures in Malaysia's coat-of-arms and many institutional crests. The tiger symbolizes courage, strength, bravery, agility, beauty and majesty.
But what have we done with our national icon? We have already killed more than 80% of them. By clearing forests without proper planning, we have deprived them of their habitats. Hunting tigers for profit to satisfy the demands of those who believe tiger meat has aphrodisiac or tonic properties has dramatically decimated the population.
Today there are fewer than 500 tigers left in the wild. If the current rate of habitat destruction and poaching continues, these remaining tigers will be wiped out within a decade or less.
A nation that destroys the majestic animal that inspired its own national emblem surely cannot be called developed. We owe it to our children and their children to protect our tigers in the wild.
We chose the same poem! Great post.
Take care and have a lovely evening!
Guess who dropped by for a chat last night?
P. Kamalanathan, Samy's phantom voter!
COME ON, FOLKS, LICK MY FINGERS!


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Why The Global South Should Support UN Action on Sri Lanka
A meeting of the Human Rights Council in Geneva. Credit: UN / Jean-Marc Ferré
Opinion by Meenakshi Ganguly (new delhi)
NEW DELHI, Oct 03 (IPS) - Meenakshi Ganguly is South Asia director at Human Rights WatchThe economic, political, and human rights calamity gripping Sri Lanka has made news around the world, but its roots go back years – or even decades. In September, the former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, underscored in her report on Sri Lanka that "impunity for serious human rights violations created an environment for corruption and the abuse of power."
The UN Human Rights Council will soon consider a resolution to address this issue. Countries in the global south that serve on the council, – —including Benin, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Gambia, Namibia and Senegal, have an important role in supporting the people of Sri Lanka to address the current crisis and its underlying causes.
Between 1983 and 2009 Sri Lanka endured a devastating civil war between the government and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The decades of brutality against civilians and the government's continuing attempts to shield those responsible from justice, have cast a long shadow over the country. Both sides committed widespread violations of international law.
In the final months of the conflict in 2009, the LTTE used human shields, while tens of thousands of Tamil civilians were killed when government forces shelled no-fire zones and hospitals. As the war ended with the defeat of the LTTE and the destruction of its leadership, government forces were implicated in summary executions, rape, and enforced disappearances.
Since then, many Tamils have sought to learn what happened to those who did not return. In August, a group known as the Mothers of the Disappeared passed 2,000 days of continuous protests demanding to know the fate of their loved ones. Instead of receiving answers they have been subject to intimidation and surveillance by the government's security apparatus. Nevertheless, representatives of the group have travelled to Geneva to ask the Human Rights Council to keep their hopes of justice alive.
Over many years, people from all of the country's faiths and communities have taken their accounts of suffering and their search for justice to the Human Rights Council. As the prominent Sri Lankan activist Ruki Fernando recently wrote, "It is the inability to get truth and justice in Sri Lanka despite many efforts, and the subsequent loss of confidence and hope in domestic processes, that drive many Sri Lankans to Geneva."
Successive Sri Lankan governments have appointed people allegedly responsible for these atrocities to high office, and blocked investigations, undermining the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law. In one rare case in which a soldier was convicted of murder, the president pardoned him.
Earlier this year, following years of mismanagement and corruption, Sri Lanka ran out of foreign exchange - meaning that it could no longer finance essential imports such as fuel, food and medicine, causing the government to default on its foreign debts. As inflation spiralled and people were unable to obtain basic necessities, massive protests broke out leading to the resignation of the prime minister in May and of the president in July.
On the streets, huge numbers of ordinary Sri Lankans called for constitutional reform and action to address corruption. A 2020 amendment to the constitution weakened human rights institutions and gave the president the power to appoint senior judges. It also undermined institutions such as the Bribery Commission that are responsible for combatting economic crimes.
The new president, Ranil Wickremesinghe, has promised reform. But he has responded by suppressing dissent, using the military to disperse peaceful protests and arresting dozens of alleged protest organizers. He has used the notorious Prevention of Terrorism Act to detain three student activists for up to a year without charge.
The use of the this law shows that the government's assurances to the international community on human rights cannot be trusted. As recently as June the then-foreign minister told the Human Rights Council that there was a moratorium on the use of that law, which has repeatedly been used to enable arbitrary detention and torture, and which successive governments have promised to repeal.
The resolution currently before the Human Rights Council extends the mandate of a UN project to gather and analyze evidence of war crimes and other crimes under international law that have been committed in Sri Lanka and to prepare them for use in possible future prosecutions. It also mandates the UN to continue monitoring and reporting on the human rights crisis in Sri Lanka. As people struggle for daily necessities and the government cracks down on dissent, that is more important than ever.
The Sri Lankan government has opposed these measures, falsely claiming that it is already acting to protect human rights. To support Sri Lankans who are calling for change and accountability, Council members from the global south should fully support the resolution.

Why The Global South Should  Support UN Action on Sri Lanka, Inter Press Service, Monday, October 03, 2022 (posted by Global Issues)

Why The Global South Should Support UN Action on Sri Lanka, Inter Press Service , Monday, October 03, 2022 (posted by Global Issues)


text:
Pixel Scroll 7/9/19 With Mullets Towards None
Posted on July 9, 2019 by Mike Glyer
(1) THOUGHTS ON A PROPOSED HUGO CATEGORY. Neil Clarke explains why he opposes "Hugo Proposal for Best Translated Novel":
…The biggest problem I have with this proposal is the message it sends not only to domestic readers, but foreign authors, editors, and publishers: translated works are not as good as ours, so we're making a special category for you so you can get awards too. I don't believe that's the intention of those who drafted this proposal. I think they approached it with the best of intentions, but simply got it wrong. For years now, I have been making the case that we should be treating translated and international works as equals: stories worthy of standing alongside those we have routinely seen published. This proposal sends the opposite message, and on those grounds intend to vote no.
Translated works are capable of winning the Hugo without any special treatment. As they point out in their own commentary, three translated works have won since 2015, despite the relatively low number of translations published among a wide sea of domestic releases….
(2) 'TOPIARY. Juliette Wade's Dive Into Worldbuilding encounters winner of the John W. Campbell Memorial Award and Nebula nominee "Sam J. Miller and Blackfish City". Read the synopsis at the link, and/or watch the video:
…There are some utopian elements in the story as well as dystopian ones. A lot of energy problems can be solved. The city uses methane generators to produce light. They also don't need militarized police. Sam remarked how any place can have both utopian and dystopian elements depending on who you are. To the people who live in the Capital, the Hunger Games world is a utopia.
I asked if this book was strictly speaking science fiction or whether it had fantastical elements. He explained that it is a science fiction story, but that he uses nanites to do things that might seem magical. The nanites allow some humans to bond with animals. That bond could seem fantastical but it has technological underpinnings.
There are people called orcamancers. Sam explained that the origins of the orcamancers are with illegal pharmaceutical testing that happened in the period between the present and the time period of the novel. Rival drugs were tested on people at different times. This accidentally led to a form of bonding with animals that Sam compared to the daemons in The Golden Compass. He explained that cultural practices regulate why you would bond with particular animals….
(3) CICERO – NOT ILLINOIS. Ada Palmer dives into "Stoicism's Appeal to the Rich and Powerful" at Ex Urbe
I was recently interviewed for a piece in the Times on why the philosophy of stoicism has become very popular in the Silicon Valley tech crowd. Only a sliver of my thoughts made it into the article, but the question from Nellie Bowles was very stimulating so I wanted to share more of my thoughts.
To begin with, like any ancient philosophy, stoicism has a physics and metaphysics–how it thinks the universe works–and separately an ethics–how it advises one to live, and judge good and bad action. The ethics is based on the physics and metaphysics, but can be divorced from it, and the ethics has long been far more popular than the metaphysics. This is a big part of why stoic texts surviving from antiquity focus on the ethics; people transcribing manuscripts cared more about these than about the others. And this is why thinkers from Cicero to Petrarch to today have celebrated stoicism's moral and ethical advice while following utterly different cosmologies and metaphysicses. (For serious engagement with stoic ontology & metaphysics you want Spinoza.) The current fad for stoicism, like all past fads for stoicism (except Spinoza) focuses on the ethics.
(4) DRAGON TRAINER NOW LAUREATE. "How to Train Your Dragon author Cressida Cowell named new children's laureate" – The Guardian has the story.
Cressida Cowell has become the new UK Children's Laureate.
The author of How To Train Your Dragon, and the Wizards of Once will take over from previous laureate, Lauren Childs..
She said: "Books and reading are magic, and this magic must be available to absolutely everyone. I'm honoured to be chosen to be the eleventh Waterstones Children's Laureate. I will be a laureate who fights for books and children's interests with passion, conviction and action. Practical magic, empathy and creative intelligence, is the plan."
Cressida has also revealed a 'giant to-do list' to help make sure that books and reading are available to everyone. It says that every child has the right to:
Read for the joy of it.
Access NEW books in schools, libraries and bookshops.
Have advice from a trained librarian or bookseller.
Own their OWN book.
See themselves reflected in a book.
Be read aloud to.
Have some choice in what they read.
Be creative for at least 15 minutes a week.
See an author event at least ONCE.
Have a planet to read on.
(5) GEEKY GETAWAYS. [Item by Mike Kennedy.] For your vacationing pleasure, SYFY Wire has lists and descriptions of 10 hotels "Geek Road Trip: 10 nerdy hotels that'll turn vacation into a fandom pilgrimage" and 6 Airbnbs "Geek Road Trip: 6 extra-nerdy Airbnb to book for your next vacation" with fan welcoming accommodations. The latter include a Harry Potter themed apartment in Atlanta GA, an '80s throwback gaming room in Lisbon, Portugal (& other themed rooms in the same building), a Marvel-ous studio apartment in Manila Philippines, a Star Wars suite in Melbourne Australia, a riverside Hobbit hole in Orondo, WA and Pixar paradise (with differently-themed rooms) in Anaheim CA.
(6) NAMELESS DREAD. The series doesn't have a title yet, but it does have characters: "George RR Martin Says 'Game of Thrones' Prequel Includes the Starks, Direwolves and White Walkers".
HBO's untitled Naomi Watts-led "Game of Thrones" prequel pilot may not have Targaryens and dragons — but it does have Starks, direwolves and, of course, White Walkers.
"The Starks will definitely be there," George R.R. Martin, co-creator and executive producer on the project alongside showrunner Jane Goldman, told Entertainment Weekly in an interview published Tuesday.
"Obviously the White Walkers are here — or as they're called in my books, The Others — and that will be an aspect of it," the "A Song of Ice and Fire" author said, adding: "There are things like direwolves and mammoths."
The appearance of the Starks, descendants of the First Men, shouldn't be a shock to fans who remember the prequel — which is reportedly currently filming in North Ireland — takes place roughly 5,000 years before the events of HBO's "Game of Thrones."
(7) THE REEL DEAL. Yahoo! Finance expects big bucks to change hands: "'Lost' tapes of first moonwalk to be sold; former NASA intern may make millions".
A former intern at NASA may become a millionaire when he sells three metal reels that contain original videotape recordings of man's first steps on the moon.
The videotapes will be offered in a live auction on July 20th at Sotheby's New York, but interested parties are able to place bids now at Sothebys.com. The sale coincides with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. The price could reach $2 million.
According to the auction site, Gary George was awarded a cooperative work internship at the NASA Johnson Space Center in June 1973. Three years later, he bought more than 1,100 reels at a government surplus auction for $218, Reuters reported.
(8) GAIMAN'S STUDY. Variety's photo essay takes you "Inside Neil Gaiman's Rural Writing Retreat". (Hey, we have the same interior decorator!)
Although Gaiman has won multiple Hugo Awards, he only keeps one in his office; the others are in his house in Wisconsin. The one he earned in 2016 for "The Sandman: Overture" receives extra special placement not only because of his long history with the franchise ("It had a 'you can go home again' quality to it," he says) but also because "there is something magical in knowing I was awarded it for a graphic novel. I remember I was there, not too long ago, fighting for whether comics could get awards and things like that. But people loved it; it got its audience; it got awards; people cared."
(9) NATIVE TONGUE TRILOGY EVENT. On Thursday, July 18, there will be a panel discussion on feminist sci-fi with Rebecca Romney, Jennifer Marie Brissett, Bethany C. Morrow, and moderated by Eliza Cushman Rose focusing on "The Legacy of Suzette Haden Elgin's Native Tongue Trilogy". This event is hosted by The Feminist Press and will be held at Books are Magic, 225 Smith Street, Brooklyn, NY
(10) TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
Born July 9, 1911 — Mervyn Peake. Ok I'll admit I've not read the Gormenghast novels, nor have I seen the various video adaptations. Please tell me what I've been missing. (Died 1968.)
Born July 9, 1944 — Glen Cook, 75. With the exception of the new novel which I need to read, I've read his entire excellent Black Company series. I've also his far lighter Garrett P.I. Which unfortunately he's abandoned. And I should read the Instrumentalities of the Night as I've heard good things about it.
Born July 9, 1945 — Dean Koontz, 74. The genres of of mystery. horror, fantasy and science fiction are all home to him. Author of over a hundred novels, his first novel was SF — it being Star Quest (not in print) published as an Ace Double with Doom of the Green Planet by Emil Petaja. ISFDB claims over half of his output is genre, I'd say that a low estimate.
Born July 9, 1954 — Ellen Klages, 65. Her novelette "Basement Magic" won a Nebula Award for Best Novelette. I strongly recommend Portable Childhoods, a collection of her short fiction, which published by Tachyon Publications, my boutique favorite publisher of fantasy. Passing Strange, her 1940 set San Francisco novel is really great.
Born July 9, 1970 — Ekaterina Sedia, 49. Her Heart of Iron novel is simply awesome. I'd also recommend The Secret History of Moscow as well. It's worth noting that both iBooks and Kindle list several collections by her, Willful Impropriety: 13 Tales of Society, Scandal, and Romance and Wilful Impropriety that ISFDB doesn't list. I'm off to buy them now.
Born July 9, 1978 — Linda Park, 41. Best known for her portrayal of communications officer character Hoshi Sato on the Enterprise. Her first genre role was Hannah in Jurassic Park III, she was Renee Hansen in Spectres which Marina Sirtis is also in. She was in some called Star Trek: Captain Pike three years back as Captain Grace Shintal.
(11) DISTURBING TREND? Yesterday, "Jar Jar Binks spent the day trending on Twitter, baffling Star Wars fans" says SYFY Wire.
Earlier this morning, Jar Jar Binks was inexplicably one of the trending topics on Twitter. No one seemed to understand why, although there have been some theories. The Tampa Bay Times looked into the matter, which traced it back to a meme that predicts your Star Wars fate. While the image had been making the rounds online, it was shared by Mark Hamill earlier this morning, giving it some serious traction.
I refuse to be distracted by such meaningless, moronic time-wasters (especially since my home planet was blown up by an unnamed stormtrooper).#FickleFingerOfFate ? pic.twitter.com/JnlevrCNpo
— Mark Hamill (@HamillHimself) July 8, 2019
(12) VINTAGE 2018 FINNCON. Karl-Johan Norén's report on his 2018 Nordic Fan Fund trip to Finncon 2018 is up on eFanzines in both epub (preferred) and PDF formats.
…Meanwhile, Hulda and Therese participated in the Klingon language workshop, where they learnt some helpful Klingon phrases and Hulda impressed by showing a basic knowledge of the IPA symbols. Later on, when Hulda accidentally tickled Therese, Therese gave off a very Klingon-like sound, leading Hulda to ask if Klingons are ticklish. That gave rise to a very spirited discussion, including if Klingons would admit that they could possibly be ticklish, and if empirical research was advised…
(13) BUSTED. The Daily Beast reports on Streamliner Lines' inaugural run through western Nevada: "Redditors Say This Is a Nazi Bus. The Owner Says It's a Misunderstanding."
It bans "social justice warriors" and drives across Nevada with a logo that looks suspiciously like a Nazi flag. It's Reno's new bus line and the owner says the racist reputation is all just a misunderstanding.
On Friday, Streamliner Lines launched its maiden bus run from Reno to Las Vegas. Streamliner president John Wang told The Daily Beast it ran a little behind schedule (traffic), and sold few tickets (the Nazi reputation). Still, the trip was the first victory for Streamliner, which previously failed inspection on its only bus and has spent the past month embroiled in spats with Redditors over the company's logo and its ban on some left-wing passengers.
(14) BLADE RUNNER. Titan Comics advertises Blade Runner 2019 as "the first comic to tell new stories set in the Blade Runner universe!"
(15) KORNBLUTH TRIBUTE. Andrew Porter passed along a scanned clipping of Cyril Kornbluth's obituary in a 1958 New York Times.
(16) UMM, YUM? Gastro Obscura calls her 'Annabel Lecter' because "These Made-to-Order Cakes Look Like Beautiful Nightmares".
English pastry chef Annabel de Vetten crafts what may be the world's most fantastically morbid confections. Her Birmingham studio and cooking space, the Conjurer's Kitchen, is filled with feasts of macabre eye candy rendered with ghoulish precision.
Here is a plate heaped with thumb-sized maggots and grubs. There a bloodied human heart lies in a pool of green, molar-strewn slime. A stainless-steel coroner's table hosts the disemboweled upper-torso of a corpse. It's flanked by a four-foot statue of a saint, his face melting away to bone. On the counter, the neck of a deer's partially fleshless head sinks its roots into a bisected flowerpot; a sapling bursts from its skull like a unicorn horn.
(17) THE ART OF FILLING OUT THE HUGO BALLOT. Steve J. Wright moves on to review "Hugo Category: Best Art Book".
…Taking a look at this year's offerings – well, the Hugo voters' packet contains partial content (the images, really) from three of the six, and the full text and images from a fourth, which last was something I really didn't expect. I bought one of the remaining two myself… but the last one, Julie Dillon's Daydreamer's Journey, is a self-published job funded by a Kickstarter project and put together using indie tools, and the ultimate result was, I figured I could just about afford the book, but then I looked at the cost of overseas shipping, and my wallet instinctively snapped shut. Pity, really. Julie Dillon is a familiar name from recent Pro Artist final lists, and a book of her artwork (with accompanying descriptions of her creative process for each piece) would be a very nice thing to have. The Kickstarter makes it look very enticing indeed….
(18) THEY CAME FROM SPACE. NPR finds that "Moon Rocks Still Awe, And Scientists Hope To Get Their Hands On More"
Darby Dyar says that as a kid, whenever Apollo astronauts returned from the moon, she and her classmates would get ushered into the school library to watch it on TV.
She remembers seeing the space capsules bobbing in the ocean as the astronauts emerged. "They climbed out and then they very carefully took the lunar samples and put them in the little rubber boat," Dyar says, recalling that the storage box looked like an ice chest.
Nearly a half-ton of moon rocks were collected by the six Apollo missions to the lunar surface. And as the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 first landing mission approaches, NASA has decided to open up a still-sealed, never-studied moon rock sample that has been carefully saved for decades, waiting for technology to advance.
(19) I PRAY FOR ONE FIRST LANDING. Even if it's not one of Glyer's Chinese 'bots I'm sure you'll cheer when "AI pilot 'sees' runway and lands automatically".
An automatic pilot has landed a plane using image-recognition artificial intelligence to locate the runway.
At large airports, systems on the ground beam up the position of the runway to guide automatic systems.
But in late May a new AI tool landed a small plane carrying passengers, by "sight" alone at Austria's Diamond Aircraft airfield.
One expert said it could potentially improve flight safety.
The new system, developed by researchers at the technical universities of Braunschweig and Munich, processes visual data of the runway and then adjusts the plane's flight controls, without human assistance.
Because it can detect both infrared light as well as the normal visible spectrum, it can handle weather conditions such as fog that might make it difficult for the human pilot to make out the landing strip.
Another advantage of the technology is it does not rely on the radio signals provided by the existing Instrument Landing System (ILS). Smaller airports often cannot justify the cost of this equipment and it can suffer from interference.
(20) LE GUIN ON PBS. THIRTEEN's American Masters presents the U.S. broadcast premiere of the "Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin" documentary on August 2.
Produced with Le Guin's participation over the course of a decade, American Masters – Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin tells the intimate coming-of-age story of the Portland, Oregon, housewife and mother of three who forever transformed American literature by bringing science fiction into the literary mainstream. Through her influential work, Le Guin opened doors for generations of younger writers like Neil Gaiman, Margaret Atwood, Michael Chabon and David Mitchell — all of whom appear in the film — to explore fantastic elements in their writing.
The film explores the personal and professional life of the notoriously private author through revealing conversations with Le Guin as well as her family, friends and the generations of renowned writers she influenced. Visually rich, Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin illustrates the dramatic real-world settings that shaped Le Guin's invented places using lush original animations over her own readings of her work to provide a firsthand experience of her fantastic worlds.
(21) TOUGH TIME AT NASFiC. Artist Newton Ewell had a terrible experience at SpikeCon and wrote about it on Facebook. Friends of his told me he's okay with sharing it on File 770. (I'm adding this at the last minute, in preference to waiting for tomorrow's Scroll.)
Have you ever been invited to a convention, only to be treated like you don't belong there? I have.
Thursday was really hard on me. I felt very unwelcome at Spikecon, and have realized that driving an hour one-way, being shoved off into an unlit corner and having to confront people who hate me just really isn't my thing.
Frankly, I'm afraid to come back to the convention. Libertarian Loudmouth Guy came by the table yesterday evening to drone on at me like a broken record about the same crap (his skewed politics) as usual. Being buttonholed by wackos who see my skin color and use it as a pretext to spew hateful talk at me does not make a good convention experience. Racist DrawGirl's grudge against me was on full display. I'm not there to compete with anyone, nor am I there to be hated on by weirdos with strange fetishy grudges. Right-Wing Space Guy still can't grasp that I don't want to talk to him either, because of the Trump fanaticism displayed toward me.
I have friends there, but I was isolated from them, making the whole experience into an ordeal for me. I wanted to bring my large pieces, but something said, "don't". I'm glad I listened to that inner voice, because if I'd brought them, they'd have been ruined by the rain. I was supposed to have an electrical outlet for my drawing light, but all the outlets were taken up by the USS Dildo-prise people.
I don't have money to afford driving back out there, let alone commuting back-and-forth, food etc. Being placed into a hostile working environment is too much pain for too little reward.
I realized that being presented with a symbol of racial oppression and corporate greed (a plastic golden spike) really hurt. All I feel from that is the pain and death dealt out to the people who worked so hard to join the two railroads, and it makes me sad. I'm hurt that my art is on all the con badges, but once I get there I'm made into a problem, a bothersome individual who's not worth having the space I contracted for….
[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster, Andrew Porter, Cat Eldridge, JJ, John King Tarpinian, Contrarius, Robin A. Reid, Trisha Lynn, Mike Kennedy, Chip Hitchcock, and Carl Slaughter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel Dern.]
This entry was posted in Pixel Scroll and tagged Ada Palmer, auction, Bethany C. Morrow, Blade Runner, Cyril Kornbluth, Dive Into Worldbuilding, dragons, Eliza Cushman Rose, Finncon, George R. R. Martin, Jar Jar Binks, Jennifer Marie Brissett, Juliette Wade, Karl-Johan Noren, Mike Kennedy, Neil Clarke, Neil Gaiman, Nelson Ewell, Rebecca Romney, Sam J. Miller, Star Wars, Steve J. Wright, Suzette Haden Elgin, Ursula K. Le Guin by Mike Glyer. Bookmark the permalink.
74 thoughts on "Pixel Scroll 7/9/19 With Mullets Towards None"
Miles Carter on July 10, 2019 at 12:18 pm said:
3) just because the ravenous monsters of the Silicon Valley have adopted (in part) a philosophy doesn't necessarily mean it's evil or otherwise unworthy. It's not a great endorsement, but also not a deal breaker.
Chip Hitchcock on July 10, 2019 at 12:44 pm said:
@2: This argument suggests to me the counter that the proposed Hugo could encourage translation of more works into English; statistics I've seen suggest that not nearly enough fiction is so translated. However, that's a pretty thin cause for a Hugo, and doesn't offset any of the objections raised in a previous thread.
@3: Palmer deals glancingly with the fundamental problem with stoicism-as-she-describes-it: the notion that the universe is not capable of alteration. That's a very attractive approach for them as has.
@5: sounds like a good list of places to avoid, from my PoV; what's the point of traveling to immerse onesself in fantasy rather than seeing what's local? I get that ~"destination traveling" has become a thing, but I grew up with jokes about travelers who didn't interact with their temporary neighborhood. ("The Dardanelles — that's where you trumped my ace!")
@10: Ellen Klages has also done excellent genre-related work, with 2 YA-ish novels about people connected to the development of the atomic bomb and its aftermath; IIUC, the youngest child of that line is the lead in the latest, about a girl trying to get into Little League in the middle 1950's — not even genre-related (unless you treat the final scene as inconsequential alternate history), but a good and plausible read.
@19: I read this as a former instrument-rated pilot and wondered how it will compare in cost with current systems, which I've heard use GPS (which doesn't require any ground equipment)
@21: Spikecon's web site shows a ridiculous number of guests for a convention that size (does even SDCC have that many?); IMO the fact that a local con appears to have merged with two elective cons is no reason to have 18 guests. With such a load, I can see the GoH liaison being overwhelmed on-site — but this should have been foreseen and backup provided; stress is not an excuse for that reaction. Not providing promised electricity to someone who is both a guest and a provider of something of value (the badge art) is just appalling. I'm not surprised at the whiteness of a semilocal convention deep in Mormon country, given that the faith was explicitly racist until a recent "revelation", and very few SF cons are proclaimed Safe Spaces — but I wonder whether Spikecon's published harassment policy was ever actually invoked (in this case or any other), and if so what effect it had.
@Andrew, re @15: I wonder whether that obit is the reason Kornbluth is one of a very small number of genre authors in Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia (1987 edition — numbers may be better now). The obit waffles on the exercise being connected to his death, not mentioning that K was hypertense following his military service but was unhappy with the treatment because the only drug available made him feel mentally slow; IIUC he'd stopped taking it.
@Miles Carter: you are correct in theory. (I'm flashing vague memories of typing somebody's paper on Nietzsche, in which the writer argued that the racism attributed to his philosophy is a result of his sister's distortions after he was dead.) However, the philosophy as described sums up to "nothing can be done"; this reads like a variant of ethical naturalism's "whatever is, is right" — which requires a careful consideration of what really is. (I ran across EN in a discussion of John Norman's reported support for it;- he reportedly believes that women are happier when treated as objects. Do not treat the above as a repeatable summary.) Almost-stairstep thought: how can any advice amounting to "don't struggle, what you lost wasn't yours anyway" be plausible? If the universe has intent, could it intend that you struggle to recover; if it does not, then how can one claim in the face of obvious contradictions (consider: tossing an egg up to the ceiling, vs not tossing it) that action cannot alter the universe? I'm again reminded of a snarky view of Christian Science as a religion of the rich on account of it viewing health as a sign of God's favor.
Peer on July 10, 2019 at 12:59 pm said:
@PJ Evans : I wonder if Darth Vader trapped us in the same ice cave?
Hampus Eckerman on July 10, 2019 at 1:01 pm said:
I've always thought you should confiscate all belongings of all stoics. They should be as happy without any stuff, so we who aren't stoics need them more.
Mike VanHelder on July 10, 2019 at 1:07 pm said:
@Mike Glyer If you think that I'm taking any undue glee in being on the predictive side of such an on-the-nose "I told you so"… well, guilty as charged, your honor. I am but flesh. Mea culpa.
If you think my metaphor was inapposite, I'm happy to take correction. I've been wrong before and I'm sure I will be wrong again.
If, however, your issue isn't with the content of what I'm saying, but rather the feeling of how what I'm saying about a lot of this stuff seems to be splashing onto you and what you believe, I respectfully submit that that's not an issue with my argument, and more about about where you're standing.
Mike Glyer on July 10, 2019 at 1:23 pm said:
It can't be an issue with your argument, because this isn't an argument, it's a slur:
what you're saying is an awful lot like "well, black people are allowed to use the N-word in their music, so how come I can't yell it at someone in the middle of Cracker Barrel"?
It's not even a perceptive slur. My witness to multi-ethnic participation in the Golden Spike anniversary by groups that also show awareness of the history of discrimination is to the point that they considered it appropriate for everyone to participate with them. No black person is ever going to ask me to participate in using that term.
P J Evans on July 10, 2019 at 2:28 pm said:
In other news, they're setting traps in Humboldt Park Lagoon in Chicago, to catch an alligator that's living there.
https://www.myplainview.com/news/crime/article/Chicago-police-confirm-an-alligator-is-living-in-14083999.php
KTO on July 10, 2019 at 4:11 pm said:
@Mike Glyer:
I do have to agree I had an impulse to sympathize with the concom — I think the nuances of your comment indicate something more, but the reason was that a good friend of mine helped advise their bid. My feelings about the whole thing became more fraught a few months ago when I found out he gave a lecture at a Utah convention in February about the history of sff fandom which amounted to a Sad Puppies apologetic. (A Mad Genius Club columnist wrote a post about it.) Sort of pulled the rug out from under me.
Ouch. That sort of revelation stings. And that information adds to my sense that the convention was doomed. :/
The Chinese Railroad Worker Descendants Association talk plus the treatment of Newton Ewell leads me to a sense that they were ticking off boxes for people who'd be satisfied by some minimums. (I have some snarkier thoughts that I will refrain from sharing here.)
Intersectionality isn't about traffic control at the crossroads of marginalizations. It's about how living with multiple marginalization (and privilege) is intertwined, intensifying, and inseparable, and that protecting identities singly leaves people unprotected when their marginalization is about the combination (i.e. Black women experiencing misogynoir and not being protected by separate policy regarding [white] women and Black [men].) You can't tally up marginalizations and expect similar results for "equivalent" numbers.
Vicki Rosenzweig on July 10, 2019 at 4:59 pm said:
@Chip:
"Religion of the rich" could describe a number of other Christian denominations, which have taught in so many words that wealth is a sign of divine favor.
I think the consistent "action cannot alter the universe" argument is "there is no free will, whatever you do is the only thing you could have done because your choices are made by your mind, which is deterministic." This is not a position I am advocating, but I think it's logically consistent. However, it's pointless to try to convince people of that position, because if it's correct, the entire argument is foreordained.
Also, as far as I can tell that position is useless, because it doesn't offer answers to "what should I do?" If I'm deciding whether to donate to Amnesty International, or what to have for dinner, I cannot know what I will decide [will have decided] until the decision is made.
Many years ago, I came across the joke/paradox formulation "We must believe in free will, we have no choice."
John A Arkansawyer on July 10, 2019 at 5:10 pm said:
10) I especially liked The Green Glass Sea; White Sands, Red Menace isn't quite as good, I don't think, but I still liked it a lot. I'll give the new one a whirl.
Cassy B. on July 10, 2019 at 5:12 pm said:
@PJ Evans, that's just down the street from where my husband works. (Well, one Chicago neighborhood over.)
Andrew on July 10, 2019 at 5:17 pm said:
@Vicki:
The matching formulation is "I freely choose to believe that all my actions are determined."
Chip Hitchcock on July 10, 2019 at 6:24 pm said:
Rejoice, rejoice, we have no choice
But to carry on.
(Since I saw Stephen Stills interview just last week.)
Joe H. on July 10, 2019 at 6:27 pm said:
10) Gormenghast (at least the first two books) is worth the effort. Yes, "Dickens smoking opium" doesn't seem too far off the mark. And Steerpike is one of the great villains.
I also liked the BBC miniseries from 2000 or so. It certainly had an excellent cast — Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Christopher Lee, Celia Imrie, Ian Richardson, Stephen Fry and Richard Griffiths, amongst many, many others.
The opening paragraph to Titus Groan, just to give a sense of Peake's style:
blockquote>Gormenghast, that is, the main massing of the original stone, taken by itself would have displayed a certain ponderous architectural quality were it possible to have ignored the circumfusion of those mean dwellings that swarmed like an epidemic around its outer walls. They sprawled over the sloping earth, each one halfway over its neighbour until, held back by the castle ramparts, the innermost of these hovels laid hold on the great walls, clamping themselves thereto like limpets to a rock. These dwellings, by ancient law, were granted this chill intimacy with the stronghold that loomed above them. Over their irregular roofs would fall throughout the seasons, the shadows of time-eaten buttresses, of broken and lofty turrets, and, most enormous of all, the shadow of the Tower of Flints. This tower, patched unevenly with black ivy, arose like a mutilated finger from among the fists of knuckled masonry and pointed blasphemously at heaven. At night the owls made of it an echoing throat; by day it stood voiceless and cast its long shadow.
blockquote>
Lenore Jones / jonesnori on July 10, 2019 at 7:35 pm said:
@Vicki, yes, sorry, white as far as I could tell. My leaving that out shows how hard it is to root out one's own biases.
KTO on July 10, 2019 at 11:05 pm said:
Since when have Asian Americans ever gotten to have any say about whether our gatherings are closed to others?
I did not speak clearly enough in my note earlier, Mike Glyer — there's a distinct difference between the attitudes of sourcelanders and determined descendants and recent immigrants and politically active diasporans in this, and it's far too easy for the non-marginalized bystander to prioritize the voices of those who seek conciliation or complicity and to pretend that POC are a monolith.
Again, I infer no ill-intent, but there's a persistent societal pattern of cherrypicking the comfortable framing and disclaiming the challenging ones that one might wish to avoid evoking.
And in that, I think Mike VanH's comparison has some teeth.
The railroad work was brutal and people were worked to death, not in heroic choice as in the legend of John Henry, but as they were driven to it and denied rest in order to meet a deadline…and if attendees of the commemoration weren't informed of that, then that was a white-pleasing whitewash. I don't think he slurred you, if that's what you meant to convey. I think he expressed the simplistic framing that was coming across in your initial description.
Mike Glyer on July 11, 2019 at 12:19 am said:
KTO: Since when have Asian Americans ever gotten to have any say about whether our gatherings are closed to others?
That doesn't make sense to me. I live in Arcadia, CA and drive through three other cities to visit my mother in the nursing facility (Temple City, San Gabriel, and Alhambra), which all have huge Chinese-American and Chinese immigrant populations. Any of them are in a perfect position to hold a closed meeting whenever they want.
Also, if you're going to justify Mike Van Helder's statement, you should analyze it, not just unilaterally declare that it "has some teeth." His quote was:
In addition to being condescending and insulting, I found VanHelder's comparison to be irrelevant to my point about how some people who have Chinese origins in common, whether living there now, came from there, or whose ancestors came from there, thought it fitting to help celebrate the anniversary of the Golden Spike with people of other races and ethnicities.
You also say —
there's a distinct difference between the attitudes of sourcelanders and determined descendants and recent immigrants and politically active diasporans in this, and it's far too easy for the non-marginalized bystander to prioritize the voices of those who seek conciliation or complicity and to pretend that POC are a monolith.
Yes, I'm pretty sure that happens. What also happens is people tend to want to simplify information and analytical concepts to a level with which they feel most comfortable. Or to skip even that step and resort to predetermined ideological answers.
It also matters what a person's agenda is. If a person is seeking to exercise power over a social situation, they may discourage others from seeking information and thinking for themselves.
And despite all that, there I was, not announcing to myself "When I was in grade school, the building of the transcontinental railroad was treated as a patriotic accomplishment, and the work was dangerous, but sort of equal opportunity danger. I'll just go with what I learned in the fourth grade." Instead I asked myself, "I wonder if people of Chinese heritage outside fandom think the idea of celebrating the Golden Spike sucks as much as the people expressing an opinion in JOF on Facebook?" And I went and looked. I expected to find the same disapproval, frankly. But that's not what I found, as in the examples I linked to. And why would I persist in believing something that is contradicted by the evidence?
KTO on July 11, 2019 at 9:01 am said:
Mike Glyer:
And why would I persist in believing something that is contradicted by the evidence?
I understand how you got to that conclusion. I'm trying to explain the dynamics behind the why of the domination of that sort of apparent lack of disapproval, and I can see why, being in proximity to SGV, you don't see the way Asian American narratives are throttled.
I'm not claiming you didn't see what you saw. I'm trying to explain why that was the preponderance that squashes the other voices. Not about your intent or experience, but offering more data and more nuance…and exposing a struggle within Asian American complexity that isn't obvious to outsiders.
The struggle to make it obvious that JAs had a lot of pain from the Great Incarceration was a big thing two decades ago — the question is not whether there's complicit pressure within Asian American circles, and circles dominated by sourcelanders and recent immigrants (which is what SGV is) to follow the white narrative on Asian American history, but why, and how that affects the narrative you'll see.
My objection regarding SpikeCon is not that the concom started off in ignorance. It's that they persisted despite multiple attempts to redress the issue, and further that bystanders are exacerbating the issue by providing an apparently "reasonable" view, and painting any sort of speaking up as a fanatical fringe excess.
My own comparison wouldn't have been Mike VanH's. I would have referenced https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drapetomania and the myths of happy slaves. The people who originated those myths knew what they were doing, and for whose benefit. The people who spread those myths included those who believed sincerely that this must be true based on the evidence they could find, in an era when slave narratives were suppressed.
I come back again to "cui bono?" on this. I understand the desire to have fandom be a space apart from politics, but that ends up inevitably serving the status quo. Science fiction, a genre about the future, bent to serve what exists now, is a thing that I have no love for. I love the genre not merely for lasers and rocket ships but for dreams of what might be.
Heather Rose Jones on July 12, 2019 at 8:13 am said:
(10) Ellen Klages and her SFF-adjacent books
The two atomic-bomb books (and thus all the ones with characters linked to them) are also linked via family connections to Passing Strange. It's very subtle and background, but if you view the entire story-network as part of the same fictional universe, then they're all technically SFF even if a particular book doesn't have overt SFFnal elements. Someone needs to do a family tree diagram showing the links, just for fun.
Patrick Morris Miller on July 12, 2019 at 12:45 pm said:
@Heather Rose Jones: in the same sense, King of the Hill and Law & Order are SFF, because both can be connected through guest character appearances to The X-Files.
bill on July 12, 2019 at 1:21 pm said:
@Patrick Morris Miller
I knew about the connection between Law and Order and X-Files, but how is King of the Hill related?
Tommy Westphall Universe
Patrick Morris Miller on July 12, 2019 at 1:40 pm said:
@bill: The Hills briefly appeared on an episode of The Simpsons, and a Simpsons episode had Mulder and Scully as guest characters.
It isn't quite the "same sense" because the connections in the Klages stories are all set up by the author, not crossover-fic. Also, not quite as tangential as "guest appearances" since many of the characters involved have genealogical connections.


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text:
Q: Is it a good idea to use gzcompress I have a forum which allows users to enter large amounts of text along with (sanitized) html (and/or markdown) and links, etc. Everything is sanitised and checked before it is stored in the database.
Would it be a good idea to use gzcompress. I've heard that it is not good if you intend to search this text. Should I compress the content before saving it to the database and use only the title and tags for searching, or does it not matter?

A: I would store the content as text. Then, if space becomes a problem, you can explore an optimization like this later.
You may find this discussion worth reading:
Planning for efficiency early vs Premature optimization

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


I stay at home with my family and three cats and one puppy, that is just as rowdy as his name.
I often look at the names of books, and sometimes the covers. If I come across a book that looks like it might be good I have to check it out. So I end up looking through hundreds of books instead of reading them.
I love to make my own, so each one can capture and represent the essence of my book.
Latest book: Chasing Echo. Pre-release—available August 20, 2019.
Latest book: Dawn. Published June 22, 2013.
Latest book: The Spellbinder's Mark (Set in the World of the Custodian Novels). Published March 30, 2015.
Latest book: Shootout at Sanderson's Stables. Published April 5, 2019.
Latest book: The Remnant: The Overcome Trilogy Part II. Published January 11, 2018.
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Latest book: Warlord's Bounty. Pre-release—available May 14, 2019.
Latest book: Phasing (The Dark Origins). Published April 6, 2018.
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Latest book: The Exile of Caswel Esmar-Box Set. Published September 22, 2017.
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Latest book: Letorian Descendants (Casey Blane Series #1). Published June 22, 2018.
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Latest book: Specters of Nemesis. Published February 8, 2019.
Latest book: Demon Wars. Published June 27, 2018.
Latest book: Shards. Published November 27, 2013.
Latest book: Aglow - Apotheosis, Book Two. Published June 2, 2015.
Latest book: Wicked Omega. Pre-release—available June 15, 2019.
Latest book: Hearts on Fire (Wildfire Romance Book 5). Published July 2, 2018.
Latest book: Assassin's Bond (Chains of Honor, Book 3). Published February 20, 2019.
Latest book: Witch Hunt - Black Sorcery Trilogy (Book 1). Published November 30, 2017.
Latest book: Nyx (NINE Series, Book #4). Published March 9, 2018.
Latest book: The Pact. Published August 4, 2018.
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Latest book: Downfall (Into The Forest #3). Published June 24, 2018.
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text:
Yorkshire Vikings v Lancashire Lightning: More opportunities for Joe Root to assess his England attack
Chris Waters
Published: 05:31 Monday 01 May 2017
JOE ROOT is looking forward to facing the second half of his new-ball Test attack, having already got the better of Stuart Broad en route to his highest one-day score for Yorkshire.
Root scored an unbeaten 75 against Notts at Trent Bridge on Saturday when he withstood everything that Broad could throw at him as Yorkshire opened their Royal London Cup campaign with a seven-wicket win.
Now Root is set to go head-to-head with James Anderson today when Lancashire visit Headingley in the 50-over competition, closely followed by the prospect of facing another of his Test pace bowlers, Mark Wood, when Durham visit Leeds on Wednesday in Root's final game before the international season.
Broad bowled 22 balls at the England captain and tried to unsettle him with typically competitive antics and aggression, but Root had the better of their duel as he took Broad for two boundaries during the bowler's return of 1-25 from six overs.
"I think Stuart was just trying to create a bit of theatre with the position that the game was in, trying to create something to make it a little bit more uncomfortable for us," said Root. "To be honest, it's hard to take him seriously when you're so used to playing on the same side, but it was good fun nonetheless.
"He bowled very well and with good pace, and it's good to see him back playing and enjoying county cricket. Now there's another grumpy fast bowler to face when we play Lancashire, which I'm really looking forward to, followed by another slightly different kind of character and fast bowler on Wednesday."
Neither Anderson nor Wood would relish bowling at Root should he maintain the form he displayed at Nottingham.
Root was at the heart of a fine all-round display, which he believes has helped Yorkshire put down an early marker.
"I thought we were very clinical throughout the whole day," said Root. "We set the tone straight away when the seamers did a great job, and then we continued to take wickets through the middle period, which these days seems to be quite a difficult thing to do in one-day cricket.
"It was then just about being ruthless and seeing it through with the bat. Thankfully, I had a good partnership with Peter (Handscomb), and we were able to break the back of the run-chase."
Root hit the winning six off his brother, Billy, which he admitted felt "awful".
"It's such a horrible situation to be in," he said. "Obviously, I'm desperate for him to do well and for him to get settled in the (Notts) side, but you have to be professional at the end of the day and get the job done.
"There was a slight feeling of guilt towards the end there, but that's professional sport.
The Verdict: Joe Root and Gary Ballance the toast of Yorkshire after earning fair share at Trent Bridge
"I'm sure he'd have done exactly the same if I'd come on to bowl against him."


text:
Q: Ubuntu 20.04 cloud image can't get IP address When using virt-install to create a guest, CentOS 7.9 cloud image successfully gets an IP address, which can be checked with sudo virsh domifaddr <domain>. However, Ubuntu 20.04 LTS cloud image cannot, it just won't be assigned an IP address, no matter what I do. It successfully boots, and I can see the login prompt using sudo virsh console <domain>, but I can't ssh into it, since no IP is being assigned. I'm using virt-manager's default network. sudo iptables -S shows rules accepting in-going and on-going traffic for the DHCP ports on the host.
Any help is greatly appreciated.

A: Not only virt-resize but also virt-customize and virt-sysprep, apparently.
It seems there is a better compatibility of virt-* with RHEL family (centos, fedora, rhel) - RedHat being the company owning KVM, that might be understable -
When using Ubuntu, better stick with cloud-init. after setting up stuff with cloud-init, you can still use libvirt suite to manage the VM.
OpenBSD ssh server may fail to start if you used virt-* for the customization of an ubuntu cloud image because tehre is a missing host ssh key.
You can fix that by running ssh-keygen -A within the guest OS (either through virt-customize or cloud-init)

A: Apparently using the virt-resize utility breaks Ubuntu cloud images somehow and it fails to start the DHCP service (needs confirmation). I stopped using virt-resize and started using only qemu-img create instead and providing the size parameter, and now DHCP works as expected and the virtual machine is assigned an IP address.


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