IN YET another long comment about, yes, UFOs, Alan provides a link to a thoughtful 1975 essay by the Caltech scientist Bruce Murray. Murray writes:

The existence of UFO’s gets to be a debate of almost theological proportions, involving heresy and faith, and that is not very scientific. The reason is that when one is presented with reports of phenomena that do not make sense, some people cannot stand the uncertainty. It is just like the situation in ordinary social affairs, where there is a tendency to want to have an answer right now, right or wrong, and if the only choices are between, “It’s nothing,” or, “It’s the most bizarre thing in the world,” you choose one of those two answers. Well, the answer really is that you probably do not have the right answer yet, and so you should not make a choice. (more…)

DIANA M. writes:

The other day, I was in the bookstore Barnes & Noble. I sat down for a bit of a rest. Next to me, someone had discarded a bunch of fashion/lifestyle magazines. I idly looked at the covers. They were:

LUCKY: Christina Aguilera, a dyed blonde half-Ecuadorian who wisely opts to be identified as “Hispanic”

ALLURE: Sofia Vergara – Hispanic (“32 F and Proud”)

TIME OUT: Zoe Saldana – Afro-Hispanic (identified on the cover as “Actor” Zoe Saldana)

INSTYLE: Jennifer Lopez (Who needs no description)

Scanning these covers, I heard Spanish. I was seated near the “Ficcion” section, where they had stationed a Spanish-speaking clerk, who was catering to Spanish-speaking customers. (more…)

  PENNY STAR at CNS.News describes a PP-approved exploration of the word "slut."

THE discussion of obituaries in an age of divorce and egregious narcissism continues. It’s a fascinating subject. I’ve always thought kindergarten teachers and police detectives know more about basic human nature than most people. Now, I believe those who put together obituaries in the local newspapers do too. In the latest entry, Alexandra, a former obituary journalist, tells of the confusion that resulted when a deceased man’s two families could not agree on a single obituary.

Thus, the next day featured two obituaries of the same man, one by his second wife and her children, one by his first wife and her children. Their accounts were radically different. Each left out the other spouse and children. Who knows which came closer to the truth of the gentleman’s beliefs and values? I was appalled by the spectacle, and it reminded me that the carnage of divorce doesn’t heal itself. (The second marriage had lasted for 25 years.) The consequences go on and on, without end.

(more…)

THE average life span of American white women without college degrees has fallen by a stunning four years in just two decades, according to researchers. (The life expectancy for blacks and Hispanics at the same level rose although blacks continue to have a shorter life span.) For those without a high school degree, it has fallen by five years.

According to The New York Times,

The five-year decline for white women rivals the catastrophic seven-year drop for Russian men in the years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, said Michael Marmot, director of the Institute of Health Equity in London.

Could it be that white women on the bottom rungs exist in a moral and physical wasteland? Just asking.

(more…)

CHICK-fil-A has refuted claims by Chicago politicians that its charitable foundation will stop giving donations to organizations that oppose same-sex “marriage.” However, the organization also made it emphatically clear that it takes no position as an institution against same-sex “marriage.”

“Our intent is not to support political or social agendas,” a company statement released yesterday said.

So much for the company’s bold Christian principles.

(more…)

  THE VICTORIAN artist Joseph Crawhall of Northumberland specialized in painting animals and birds; his pictures include this remarkably vivid rooster.

CYNDI writes:

It isn’t only in cases of divorce and remarriage that a family obituary writer exhibits some serious prejudice. I always thought that the purpose of an obituary was to describe the important aspects of the deceased’s life regardless of whether you liked that person or not. Well, can you beat this:

The mother of a longtime female acquaintance of mine (Lisa) died. I hate to call her a “friend.” Lisa didn’t like her father particularly, who had died a dozen years earlier while married to her mother. Lisa’s dad wasn’t a criminal or a wife- or childbeater. (more…)

THE Daily Mail reports:

A British soldier who did not know she was pregnant has given birth on the frontline.

The woman had a son in Camp Bastion on Tuesday – just days after the Taliban launched a deadly attack on the UK’s main base in Helmand.

The baby was born five weeks premature. Last night both mother and child were said to be doing well.

A ‘specialist paediatric retrieval team’ from the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford will travel to Afghanistan in the next few days to provide care for the soldier and her son on their RAF flight home.

What was the response of the British military brass? Do they suddenly realize in a flash how deeply immoral it is to have women as soldiers? No. They instead conclude that it may be necessary that all female soldiers have pregnancy testing before they are deployed. Add one more costly intervention to support the radical, inhuman project of an egalitarian military. How long before we see soldiers with baby carriers? A senior “Army insider” was quoted as saying:

The baby’s successful delivery is a wonderful testament to the outstanding job the medics do here. It shows how they can use their extraordinary skills to turn their hands from saving lives to delivering babies.

 —– Comments —-

Jeanette V. writes:

Here’s the perfect baby sling for that female warrior.

(more…)

THE fast food company has announced it will re-evaluate its donations to organizations that are against same-sex marriage and that it will include “sexual orientation” in its anti-discrimination hiring policy. Read about it here.

If you’ve developed a taste for fried chicken patties, get over it.

(more…)

FITZGERALD writes:

I came upon this recent Forbes piece by a Meghan Casserly who covers “the juggle of work, life and play for smart, ambitious women.” It’s about smart, ambitious women dropping out of the workforce to be smart, ambitious mothers. From the piece:

“No feminist voice can or should make a woman feel bad for the decision to choose family over career.”

Feel bad? Oh my, that’s terrible. Are women that shallow and impressionable that they must have society endorse all of their whims and fantasies and not make them “feel bad” for their precious choices? (more…)

THE Washington, D.C. Office of Human Rights has launched a campaign promoting sensitivity toward the transgendered, “the first government-sponsored campaign in the country to focus on the treatment of transgender and gender non-conforming communities,” according to the New York Daily News. 

The print ads portray “gender non-conforming communities,” or the sad and perverted process of pretending to be the opposite sex, as cool and exciting, and caution people to treat the transgendered with “courtesy and respect.”

At the same time, the school district of Cranston, Rhode Island has decided to prohibit its father-daughter dances.  A single mother complained through the ACLU that the events were discriminatory because not every child has a father to attend.

Under liberalism, the low must be exalted and the high debased. And the distinctiveness of the sexes must be constantly denied. We are all part of a gender non-conforming community now.

(more…)