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Greetings, Quotaholics:
Today’s a special day.
RGQ’ers get a twofer. I found two different articles which both
focus on a different aspect of the same subject. Rather than choosing
between them, I just decided to use both.
Summer is around the corner,
and everyone wants to look their best in swimwear. Guys care too,
but we’re far less self-conscious than women about things like a beer
gut or cellulite. Most of the fashion advertising is directed
at the female half of humanity, and even though there are some objections
to it, for the most part it’s just an accepted part of what we see daily.
Fox
is reporting that Abercrombie & Fitch is marketing padded bikini
tops to girls as young as eight. Included in the current spring
line for Abercrombie Kids (a division of the fashion company specifically
dedicated to 8-14 year olds) is the "Ashley" Push-Up Triangle
– a triangular-shaped bikini top which comes complete with thick
padding for breast enhancement.
Moms and child development
experts are aghast over the garment and the damage it could potentially
do to young girls in making them feel inadequate with their pre-adolsecent
bodies.
"This is appalling!
If a parent buys a padded bikini for an eight year old, children’s services
should be called! The sexualization of teens is bad enough and
now this trend is trickling down to our babies," parenting expert
Dr. Janet Rose told FOX411’s Pop Tarts column. "If we continue
to try to make our children value ’sexy’ I shudder to think what damage
we are doing to their future self-concepts and adult values. In
the long run, I fear we are creating girls who will suffer from low
self-esteem and all the issues that go along with that."
Los Angeles-based psychologist,
Dr. Nancy Irwin said, "Wearing a padded bra at that age when unnecessary
is encouraging sexual precociousness, a dangerous muscle to flex for
the girl as well as for peers and predators."
Human Behavior expert Patrick
Wanis PhD concurred that the padded tops are both disturbing and dangerous.
"Are we sexualizing young girls to get the attention of men or
to encourage women to use their daughters to compensate for their own
lack of sexual appeal by living vicariously through their daughter?"
Wanis asked. "Is this the extreme extension of the beauty-pageant
mother who now seeks to make up for what she can never be?"
The second source article
is from thesun.co.uk.
Kerry Campbell, 34, from Birmingham, is sort of the ultimate beauty
pageant mom. She’s a beautician with an eight year-old daughter,
Britney. While most girls her age play with make-up and fashion,
Britney is receiving Botox injections from her mom once every three
months.
Kerry buys the substances
online, tests them on herself first, and then injects them into her
daughter’s forehead, lips, and around her eyes. Kerry also takes
Britney to have her body waxed in a bizarre bid to stop her growing
hair when she eventually hits puberty.
Kerry says, "She also
has her virgin wax monthly, which gets rid of her fluffy leg hair and
makes sure she won’t develop pubic hair in the future. It will save
her a fortune in waxing when she’s older."
Kerry says, "What I
am doing for Britney now will help her become a star. I know one
day she will be a model, actress or singer, and having these treatments
now will ensure she stays looking younger and baby-faced for longer…All
I want is for Britney to have the best start in life, so it is easier
for her to become a superstar. More mothers should do it for their
daughters."
Britney sees the injections
and waxing as a normal part of life. She demands the top-ups of
Botox, complaining she can see wrinkles. She says, "My friends
think it’s cool I have all the treatments and they want to be like me.
I check every night for wrinkles, when I see some I want more injections.
They used to hurt, but now I don’t cry that much. I also want
a boob and nose job soon, so that I can be a star."
OK, you’ve got the general
idea, and you can read the source articles for full details, but it’s
obvious both concern the sexualization of pre-pubescent girls.
In one it’s a general advertising campaign, and in the other it’s the
personal story of one mother’s choice for her daughter.
Do you think those concerned
about all this are alarmists? Is it "dangerous" (as
suggested by one of those quoted) for an eight year-old to wear a padded
bra? Is it harmful to give the child Botox, or is it just one
person’s perceptions vs. another’s? Can body waxing a young child
be considered wrong in some way? I mean, is there an age limit,
and if there is, what is it and who sets it? Would you allow (or
even encourage) your daugther to wear those tops or get those treatments?
Wrinkledly and hairily,
Comment
on this article |
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| Today’s
Quotes |
“The obstinacy of cleverness and reason is nothing to the obstinacy
of folly and inanity.” - Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Personality is to a man what perfume is to a flower.” - Charles M.
Schwab
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| Today’s
Chuckle |
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The Dark Side Of Women
[Thanks Bonnie]
A woman was in town
on a shopping trip. She began her day finding the most perfect shoes
in the first shop and a beautiful dress on sale in the second. In the
third, everything had just been reduced by 50 percent when her mobile
phone rang.
It was a female doctor notifying her that her husband had just been
in a terrible car accident and was in critical condition and in the
ICU. The woman told the doctor to inform her husband where she was and
that she’d be there as soon as possible.
As she hung up she realized she was leaving what was shaping up to be
her best day ever in the boutiques. She decided to get in a couple of
more shops before heading to the hospital. She ended up shopping the
rest of the morning, finishing her trip with a cup of coffee and a beautiful
chocolate cake slice, compliments of the last shop. She was jubilant.
Then she remembered her husband–Feeling guilty, she dashed to the hospital!…
She saw the doctor in the corridor and asked about her husband’s condition.
The lady doctor glared at her and shouted, ‘You went ahead and finished
your shopping trip didn’t you! I hope you’re proud of yourself!
While you were out for the past four hours enjoying yourself in town,
your husband has been languishing in the Intensive Care Unit! But, It’s
just as well you went ahead and finished, because it will more than
likely be the last shopping trip you ever take! For the rest of his
life your husband will require round-the-clock care, and he will now
be your career!’
The woman was feeling so guilty she broke down and sobbed.
The lady doctor then chuckled and said, buck up, dear, ‘I’m just pulling
your leg–He’s dead. Show me what you bought.’
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| Life
Sentences |
“When mankind first saw the necessity of government, it is probable
that many had conceived the desire of ruling.”
“There are few retreats, that can escape the penetrating eye of avarice.”
“It appears first, that liberty is a natural, and government an adventitious
right, because all men were originally free.” - All by British abolitionist
Thomas Clarkson born on this day in 1760
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| Image’n
That! |
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How
To Save Space Parking
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| My
Most Embarrassing Moment
My Scariest Moment |
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Speak right up!
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| Cliff’s
Notes
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Cooperation
Much like coordination, cooperation is often a necessity to accomplish
a task. Sometimes is it planned, and sometimes it is spontaneous.
Currently I am planning a single geocache find that requires considerable
cooperation and coordination. The need for cooperation is a prerequisite
of the cache. It is a 3-stage multicache. The first stage
contains the coordinates for the next stage as all multicaches do.
However, there is a slight difference in this one. The first stage
is in Ohio. The second stage is in Alaska. The 3rd and final
stage is again in Ohio. Although it is possible for an individual
to go to all the stages alone, it would be extremely costly and would
take away from the design of the cache which was created to get geocachers
from different areas to cooperate and get to know one another that would
not have happened another way.
This cooperative activity is but one of the interesting aspects of the
overall game called geocaching.
But the game takes on many different nuances. I find the cooperation
aspect of the game takes place in different ways, but the most telling
is the action of one cacher placing the cache in the first place, then
I go find it. It is a tit-for-tat cooperative action where the
cooperation is actually directly unrelated. Let’s face it, caches
are placed all around the world, but there is no way I will be able
to afford to go find the bulk of the over one million caches out there.
Nor will I have the time.
When I do go, I usually stick to somewhere within a 150 mile radius
of my home. It seems like a long distance, but it is the outer
ranges for caching trips. It’s not to say I won’t travel further,
but it’s generally the distance I can go in a single day and still be
able to do some serious caching. It is also the range for my caching
friends, generally, and I do so enjoy going with friends rather than
going alone. Then there’s the safety feature of being with others.
So, going with others requires cooperation. Physics states no
matter can exist in the same time and place at the same time.
I have tested this theory, and I found, after bumping heads with other
cachers looking at the same hidey hole, that it is best to spread out
and each look in different hidey holes. It speeds up the time
needed to find the cache, plus it decreases the number of bumps one
collects on their noggin.
This cooperation is more telling since various brands of GPS receivers,
and even different models by the same manufacturer, have different sensitivity
capabilities. The person who hid the cache may not have had as
good a unit as the finder and that creates a difference in how accurate
the readings were received. A cache may actually be quite a few
yards or meters from the coordinates that were supplied. That
requires the finders to use "geosense" to determine where
it may really be hiding. Multiple eyes looking and multiple hands
moving things around makes the probability higher that the cache will
be found. That is unless they are looking in the same spot.
That’s where the cooperation comes into play.
Groups I cache with have developed a "You look there and I’ll look
here" unspoken technique. If the cache is still unfound,
we change it all around in the slight chance someone simply overlooked
it. Again, this goes unsaid and just happens. When this
works, it is a fun moment to rub someone’s nose in the fact they overlooked
it in the first place. That’s where camaraderie comes into play.
Either that or a sore nose when it gets punched. People can be
SO sensitive!
Here’s your quiz:
What do you do that requires cooperation? Yes, families count.
Have you accepted a supporting role in the overall cooperative activity?
Have you accepted a leading role in the overall cooperative activity?
Cooperation - "Co" Means "Together" and "Operation"
Is A Medical Procedure, But Nobody Has Come With Me For Those
Cliff (the High-Tech Redneck who doesn’t rate a fancy ’signature pic’)
Comment
on this article |
Today
In History |
March 28 is the 87th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There
are 278 days remaining until the end of the year.
Holidays and observances
- Commemoration
of Sen no Rikyu (Schools of Japanese tea ceremony)
- Serfs Emancipation
Day (Tibet)
- Teachers’ Day
(Czech Republic and Slovakia)
Events on this date
- 37 – Roman
Emperor Caligula accepts the titles of the Principate, entitled to
him by the Senate.
- 193 – Roman
Emperor Pertinax is assassinated by Praetorian Guards, who then sell
the throne in an auction to Didius Julianus.
- 364 – Roman
Emperor Valentinian I appoints his brother Flavius Valens co-emperor.
- 845 – Paris
is sacked by Viking raiders, probably under Ragnar Lodbrok, who collects
a huge ransom in exchange for leaving.
- 1776 –
Juan Bautista de Anza finds the site for the Presidio of San Francisco.
- 1802 –
Heinrich Wilhelm Matthäus Olbers discovers 2 Pallas, the second
asteroid known to man.
- 1871 –
The Paris Commune is formally established in Paris.
- 1910 –
Henri Fabre becomes the first person to fly a seaplane, the Fabre
Hydravion, after taking off from a water runway near Martigues, France.
- 1920 –
Palm Sunday tornado outbreak of 1920 affects the Great Lakes region
and Deep South states.
- 1930 –
Constantinople and Angora change their names to Istanbul and Ankara.
- 1941 –
World War II: Battle of Cape Matapan – in the Mediterranean
Sea, British Admiral Andrew Browne Cunningham leads the Royal Navy
in the destruction of three major Italian heavy cruisers and two destroyers.
- 1959 –
The State Council of the People’s Republic of China dissolves the
Government of Tibet.
- 1969 –
The McGill français movement protest occurs, the second largest
protest in Montreal’s history with 10,000 trade unionists, leftist
activists, CEGEP students, and even some McGill students at McGill’s
Roddick Gates. This led to the majority of the protesters getting
arrested.
- 1979 –
Operators of Three Mile Island’s Unit 2 nuclear reactor outside of
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania fail to recognize that a relief valve in
the primary coolant system has stuck open following an unexpected
shutdown. As a result, enough coolant drains out of the system to
allow the core to overheat and partially melt down.
- 1990 –
President George H. W. Bush posthumously awards Jesse Owens the Congressional
Gold Medal.
- 2005 –
The 2005 Sumatran earthquake rocks Indonesia, and at magnitude 8.7
is the fourth strongest earthquake since 1965.
Born on this date
- 1472 –
Fra Bartolommeo, Italian artist
- 1522 –
Albert the Warlike, Prince of Bayreuth
- 1652 –
Samuel Sewall, American magistrate
- 1760 –
Thomas Clarkson, British abolitionist
- 1836 –
Frederick Pabst, American brewer
- 1899 –
August Anheuser Busch, Jr., American brewer and baseball executive
- 1905 –
Marlin Perkins, American zoologist and television host
- 1912 –
A. Bertram Chandler Australian author
- 1926 –
Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart, 18th Duchess of Alba
- 1930 –
Jerome Isaac Friedman, American physicist, Nobel laureate
- 1948 –
John Evan, British musician (Jethro Tull)
- 1955 –
Reba McEntire, American singer and actress
- 1968 –
Tim Lovejoy, British television presenter
- 1975 –
Derek Hill, American racing driver
- 1986 –
Lady Gaga, American singer-songwriter and dancer
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| Lucille’s
Lunacy |
http://www.arcamax.com/weirdnews/s-855129-234130-print
I remember when I was a little kid. If you told your mommy what someone
did, and they didn’t kill you, they might treat you to a little poetic
recital that went:
Tattle tale, tattle tale, hanging on the bull’s tail!
When Bully decides to pee, you’ll have yourself some tea!
I’m not saying that makes sense. After all, I was only a kid, and it wasn’t
my contribution to the world of letters. That didn’t stop me from employing
it against my comrades and siblings, but I didn’t start it, so there.
The guy in the above link must have taken this taunt seriously. He liked
(gag) to (gag) drink urine (puke). He apparently couldn’t drink enough
beer to keep himself adequately supplied with his own brew, so he foraged
in (gag) public restrooms. He did this so often, and with such little
aplomb, that he finally got himself arrested.
He is in jail. Part of his sentence is that he can no longer visit public
restrooms. I will leave this subject, not a minute too soon, I’d guess,
with one question. How did the police get involved"? Did he try to
treat himself to what (gag) someone else had on tap?
Comment
On This Article |
| Poet-Tree |
At my age my mind is almost always a blank!
Try this line.
Next opening line…
There once was a man from New York…
Hints:
Here’s a great new rhyming/composition tool. http://www.writerhymes.com/
There’s also a great rhyming dictionary at http://www.rhymezone.com/
Limerick rules. http://freespace.virgin.net/merrick.sheldon/limerickrules.htm
Submit
Opening Line
Submit
Limerick
My
mind just went totally blank
As I put down that beer I just drank.
I needed this time
To sleep and unwind,
and I wanted to know who to thank. - ldo |
My
mind just went totally blank
as I walked with my ol’ buddy Hank.
Why did I come?
What had I done?
And why am I in this old bank? - ldo |
My mind
just went totally blank
and I know who I have to thank
‘Cause in my account
was a number so round
that I now have to go see my bank. - Cassandra in New York |
My mind
just went totally blank
And I’m sure I have you to thank
When you said you were leaving
I started my grieving
And didn’t know I overfilled my tank. - Bonnie |
The dancer
was tall and quite nude
Crass, salty language from his mouth spewed.
About this I shant lie:
Since he is a guy,
He is one nude, rude, crude, lewd dude! — E. Cole Aye |
Some of
you will think my life is dull
I sit eating snacks by the bundle
While watching TV.
I’m trying, as you see,
To win at "American Idle." - Anne Onimous |
It’s the
newest fad, says the newsroom
Go-go dancing’s the rage, they presume.
But heaven forbid!
It’s what we all did
While waiting our turns for the bathroom. - Anne Onimous |
The tales
told when I sat on a knee
Includes Eve taking the Apple with glee.
But she’s not a dingbat
What you don’t know is that
She was first tempted with the PC. - E. Cole Aye |
The TSA
alarms did peal
Even though my clothing I did peel.
What was this about?
It’s because I workout.
What set it off was my buns of steel. - E. Cole Aye |
My years
since high school I’ll not mention
But my reunion brought me tension
Though the party was great,
I had to stay late. . .
It seems that I got detention. - E. Cole Aye |
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Reader Comments
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Re: Incest
Okay…incest. Yuck. Having
said that, here goes.
Cousins marrying and breeding doesn’t bother me but anything closer
than that does. If it were me, or my grandchild or another close relation
same would apply. First cousins yes, anything closer…no. First cousins
are allowed to marry in 20 of the 50 states in the USA. Some other
states allow first cousin marriage only if children will not be an
issue (pun intended.) Why wouldn’t it bother me? Well, my paternal
grandparents were first cousins. They fell in love at a young age,
young teenagers, and after a futile yearlong forced separation by
their families they were still in love and the family relented and
said yes. Then being Catholic they had to apply for permission from
the church, and then had to leave the state in which they were living
because it was illegal and they were married in an adjoining state.
It is not only in some parts of this country and the world that first
cousin marriage is a custom…it is so in history. If you read the
Bible, as history, you will see many first cousin relationships occur.
This was due to in part to extreme clannishness. That is a very short
explaination. Royal marriages are another example, cousin marriages
happened frequently althought sometimes with dire genetic consequences
like in the Romanov line but I think there were double cousin relationships
involved on both sides there.
Even if one of my kids wanted to marry a first cousin I wouldn’t mind.
You can’t always help who you fall in love with. Of course it does
help that I was adopted. Then that means my paternal grandparents
are of no biological relation. But, I think If I found out any closer
relationship than that wouldn’t bother me as much as finding out I
had been lied to all my life. - GrammieSammie
I caught that - ending this article with "Relatedly". Cute!
Wonder how many others did, too. Have I missed others like that in
the past? - ldo
[I usually try to sign with a ‘twist’.
Sometimes it works! Thanks ldo.]
Everybody looks at this
type of problem (incest) from the legasl position. Nobody seems to
give the results a moment’s thought. Yet, a genetic anomaly existing
in a family’s blood line can be passed on - a crap shoot for non-related
parents , it’s almost a sure bet if BOTH parents pass it on. And it
turns out there are a LOT of that sort of syndrome. One such exists
in my children’s blood ( from their father’s mother). In a perfect
world, every child would automatically have a DNA test done at birth
so parents would have a better idea whether one of these syndromes
might totally screw up that child’s life. I speak from experience,
and no incest was involved. - Nancy L in Ohio
If Daddy was a
player and has a few scattered "wild oats" out there, you
could be innocently involved with a half-sibling and not even know
it. This should be fun to watch play out. - Patti
Re: Hiking
I go for a walk most days,
if there’s no useful equivalent exercise. Peace Pilgrim, among others,
found it a fine meditation mode. I usually have only minor variations
in route, on the streets to the path along our town dike and back.
Direction and time depend upon sun and wind. Today, I should have
worn my spikes, as it got quite icy on the streets, but the path has
been plowed for the first time, part of a nasty flood-control preparation
spoiling landscapes all over our province. Our nice grass path will
be developing muddy patches soon. I once climbed a 12,000 foot mountain,
doing the first 10,000, starting from the distant ocean, by bicycle.
It only took time, not fortitude, although I was very lucky to have
uncharacteristically carried water uphill from 6,000 feet to 9,000,
for the upper camp was dry that day. Of course, the bike would have
gone back to 6,000 very quickly. - Bob of the North
Re: Stukxnet
So much to say,
so little time and space. So let me address you final question(s).
I
loved your question, "Do you believe that it’s impossible that
Japan’s reactors were affected by [the] Stuxnet [Worm].." About
the only things that are impossible is trying to do something (like
perpetual motion, creation of energy from nothing, or going faster
than the speed of light) that violates the laws of physics. So if
it doesn’t violate the laws of physics, then it is possible. Also,
it’s hard to argue a negation. It is possible that I could wind a
noble prize tomorrow, but that is not likely. So yes, I suppose it
is possible - but not likely.
What
is more likely is a tsunami wave that was much bigger than anticipated
breached the seawall and damaged the power plant.
The
second question, "[Is] that the possibility is so remote that
it shouldn’t even be mentioned?" I tend towards it being so remote
- so why bother. After all, it’s possible that the Grays or Pleiadians
(alleged space aliens for those who don’t follow UFO lore) fired a
death ray and damaged or destroyed the plant or that some voodoo priestess
cursed the plant - but spectacular claims demand spectacular evidence.
At this time I fail to make any connection between the Stuxnet Worm
and tsunami damage.
Besides
the product needed for fuel rod grade is not the same as bomb grade.
Iran was making a bomb; Japan was running light bulbs and refrigerators.
I
realize that I get loquacious at times and maybe not focus on just
one argument (sorry about that). I realize it is my science background
that requires me "to connect all the dots" to prove a point.
But I considered it an extreme stretch that the Stuxnet Worm affected
the power plant.
If
your thesis was that the Stuxnet Worm affected the centrifuge that
created the fuel rod for the plant, then, while speculative, I would
have deemed it a not too unreasonable conclusion. But while I have
no actual working knowledge of where rod manufacturing takes place
for this particular plant, based upon how other industries work, the
fuel manufacturing is often not right next to a power generating plant.
The reasons for this can be many, but the requirements for producing
and manufacturing a fuel rod will be different than the requirements
for producing power. And the requirements for disposing a spent rod
is different still.
It
is my understanding that the Stuxnet Worm affected the centrifuges
in such a way that it made it essentially impossible to properly separate
the various isotopes of uranium. You would not need centrifuges to
create electricity. Since there is no need to have a centrifuge on
site, the Stuxnet Worm affecting centrifuges become irrelevant.
Maybe
I should leave well enough alone, as that is essentially my argument.
But let me "reward" those who have read this far with a
piece of history.
It
turns out in America’s quest for the bomb in World War II was hampered
with problems. Germany had its own nuclear research program and in
many ways they were ahead of the Americans. Through sheer luck or
the grace of God, they had some problems. One place where they did
excel was the creation of Uranium for the bomb. Germany had actual
plans to originally drop a thermonuclear bomb on New York or Washington.
As the war was being lost, they came up with a last ditch plan to
deliver a radiological bomb on London via either a V-2 or V-4. (I
bet Hitler wished he had a V-8 - sorry I figured it was time for a
little humor.) The relatively rapid allied advancement pushed the
delivery systems (the V rockets) out of range for London - but the
radiological bomb was just weeks away from completion when the delivery
systems were pushed out of range.
As
the European war was in its final days, Germany started the transfer
of technology to the Japanese. As part of the transfer, they transported
uranium by submarine. To keep the story short, that uranium ended
up in Americans hands.
Irony
number one: it was German uranium that was used in the development
of the Japanese atomic bombs. We did not have enough to do it ourselves.
In essence, German technology made it possible to drop bombs on Japan.
(We did capture German centrifuges and later improved ours.)
Irony
number two: The Japanese did have a nuclear program. While they weren’t
so advanced as to be able to create their own thermonuclear device,
they were making a radiological bomb. The uranium that the Americans
captured was slated for these bombs. America dropped their bombs on
Japan on August 6 and 9. Japan had planned to drop their radiological
bombs on Los Angeles or San Francisco on August 15. They had the technology
to do so but was missing the captured uranium.
The really ironic conclusion: America dropped a bomb on Japan that
used the same fuel that the Japanese were going to drop on America.
- Kalifornia Ken
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Disclaimer- All quotes printed in this publication are believed to be
accurately attributed, but no guarantees are made that some incorrectly
attributed, or even outright false quotes won’t get in here from time
to time. I assure readers that I will do my best to weed out incorrect
quotes, and will print a retraction as soon as I become aware of any errors.
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and point it out to me. I’m in the process of compiling an e-book
called, not surprisingly, The Best of RGQ, and I’d like to hear from you
which pieces impacted you the most.
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