StrangeSox

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 14, 2013 -> 12:00 PM) Michelle Tafoya maybe? This isn't exactly heavy-set plus she's pretty stereotypically attractive

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:58 AM) So what should we do to all the renaissance paintings and scupltures? Should we ruin David because he is too damned ripped for me to have any self-esteem? Should we burn all those paintings of buxom women because everyone is going to get implants now? No. That would be pretty absurd. Stop objectifying women and judging them based on their looks in virtually every context. Don't sexualize everything feminine or female.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:52 AM) Not really. I judge men and women equally by their looks. Just because you may judge women exclusively by their looks, doesnt mean everyone in society does. lol, okay buddy. you realize that it's an issue of society and not you, individually, right?

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:48 AM) According to you. But you are putting in a ton of qualifiers and opinion. First of all "primarily" and "frequently". Some men are judged sometimes by society on their looks. Obviously, everyone is judged individually by others at some point, but women are judged on their attractiveness constantly and outside of the realm of dating/personal interactions. When was the last time a plain-looking or heavy-set woman was a sideline reporter? Or a news anchor? Or a media darling? Push who over what edge? What hypocrisy? To the extent that men are held by society at large to some unrealistic standard of beauty, it's bad. But that extent is much, much less than what women face.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:43 AM) Lol, ditto your assholery. There's a difference between "getting it" and not giving two s***s about it. I clearly don't give two s***s about it on top of finding the entire notion utterly ridiculous. ZOMG THEY CHANGED A CARTOON CHARACTER. LITTLE GIRLS ARE KILLING THEMSELVES IN THE STREET. LET'S START A REVOLUTION. No, you display over and over and over again with your responses that you don't even get what the thing you're rejecting out of hand even is, that you don't understand it on a basic conceptual level. You can only ever respond with these really, really dumb straw men. Wait, I thought all us lefty libs were multicultural, anti-assimilation bastards set on destroying Traditional American culture?!! But that's a pretty good example of you really just not getting it. At all. It'd be one thing if you did and still disagreed, but you don't. The entire concept is to reject a single, perfect standard in favor of acceptance of people with differences. That we don't judge and shame and demean people for not adhering to some standard of beauty or weight or gender norms or whatever. That you keep saying "everyone will be exactly the same!" as a sarcastic dismissal really does tell everyone that you don't understand and that you're proud of the ignorance.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:43 AM) Strangesox, Men are judged by their looks as well. To say otherwise is a complete fallacy. Not nearly to the same extent women are. Damn near every woman in the public sphere has her looks commented on and brought up as a legitimate topic of discussion and that simply doesn't hold true for men.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:36 AM) So maybe to some people they made her more ugly? Im sure some guy out there is saying she doesnt have enough junk in her trunk. Sure, to some individuals maybe, but for our culture as a whole, no. And those standards within that culture may change over time. Compare today's (airbrushed) models to some Renaissance-era paintings of idealistic beauty. Men aren't frequently judged primarily on their physical attractiveness.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:30 AM) If you teach your kids that cartoons are - gasp! - FAKE and that it's pretend, this shouldn't be an issue. --noted child psychologist Jenksismyb**** It's part of a larger culture that judges women more often than not on their sexuality and holds up literally impossible standards of beauty (airbrush!) edit: Shrek intentionally and deliberately reversed this trend by going from the archetypal princess to the heavy Ogre

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:32 AM) All cartoon characters should look like this. Although, they're far too skinny and that could create an issue. Let's fatten them up a little bit so as not to leave out the morbidly obese in this country. Honey Boo Boo might get her feelings hurt. Is there any topic you won't display your incredible ability to not "get it" on?

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:28 AM) I get the issue, but what little girl or boy is going to want to watch the movie about the normal looking boring person? Isn't it human nature to want to portray our heroes as beautiful and strong and brilliant? What is or isn't beautiful is culturally dependent! Brave made $237M in the US alone, so it seems like plenty of people liked the original character, who is strong and brilliant and, let's be honest, was not drawn to be unattractive but just wasn't overly sexualized.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:24 AM) Basically POV blow job cam, but there's a problem with the outfit from Brave? Give me a break. Also: links are broken but past Disney movies/princesses haven't escaped criticism over the years. Characters like Brave and Mulan were lauded for breaking from those stereotypes.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 14, 2013 -> 11:19 AM) The guy next to her was also being hit with a bunch comments for looking orange and roided up. People in Miami look ridiculous on top of being awful sports fans. The attacks immediately came up over her looks. Women are judged on their looks constantly, men aren't. They might be called out for looking ridiculous (orange roid-heads) but a run-of-the-mill guy isn't going to have his sexual attractiveness criticized or commented on routinely as a part of the story. We also have had serious body-image and self-esteem issues particularly with young women so role models and cultural influences seem pretty relevant. "Parents actually parent[ing]" doesn't magically make social influences disappear.

It's more of an issue for girls since women are much more likely to be judged on their looks and attractiveness by society than a man. That recent incident with the Miami fan giving Noah the finger is a good example. She was called a dog, ugly, etc., her looks were a primary part of the story, but that probably wouldn't have been the same for a man. I dunno why Disney decided to sex-up this character. Wasn't she supposed to be all woodsy and not super-feminine in that movie? Just seems like an odd move for the character more than anything.

I took greater issue with your dismissively calling it a blog more than calling it liberal because that was just straight-up ignorance. They're not a "liberal blog" but a legitimate investigative journalism organization. As I said, they've partnered with Frontline and NPR for numerous investigations (and, apparently, over 90 other media outlets including 60 Minutes, ABC World News, Business Week, CNN, Frontline, Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, Newsweek, USA Today, The Washington Post, Huffington Post, MSN Money, MSNBC.com, Politico, Reader's Digest, Salon.com, Slate, and This American Life). Their President and Founder is a former editor for the WSJ. The organization has won two Pulitzer prizes along with dozens of other awards. David Koch funds all sorts of libertarian groups but also gives money to Nature and NOVA; that doesn't make Nature and NOVA libertarian-leaning, does it? edit: and you do realize that ProPublica had requested these 67 applications as part of an investigation into the 501©4's right, that they weren't just sent these things unsolicited?

All the money in the world can't buy style

Probably some people should be fired and/or demoted. The person who was running the IRS left in 2012 at the end of his term already.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 14, 2013 -> 08:43 AM) And again, despite the fact that senior officials were aware of this stuff back in 2011, they were denying it happened (or was still happening) in 2012. If this simple "oh yeah we were just doing our due diligence as we are required by law to do" explanation was legit, they wouldn't have denied anything, they would have used that defense at the start. The policy was changed when senior officials became aware of it in early 2012, wasn't it? A full investigation beyond the IG's report is probably warranted here.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ May 14, 2013 -> 07:33 AM) It wasn't ok if/when the Bush administration did things that weren't legal, or questionable at best, and it's not ok when the Obama administration does it, either. Anyone defending either are the problem this country faces. Stupid people electing bad leaders, and then defending their bad decisions and blaming everyone else for everything. It's not, but right now we don't have any information that obtaining the phone records in pursuit of a leak of classified information "[wasn't] legal or questionable at best." It could have been a completely routine subpoena procedure for all we know at this point. I posted conservative/libertarian legal scholar Orin Kerr's response precisely because he's not going to be a knee-jerk Obama defender (and his posts at Volokh are usually very informative on 4th amendment surveillance issues). Jonathan Adler has a response at Volokh, for what it's worth: QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 14, 2013 -> 08:41 AM) And that was my point. Bush is the worst president ever for reasons X, Y and Z, and yet Obama has probably maintained 75% of those same policies and is the liberal/progressive hero. It's ridiculous. Bush is the worst president ever for a lot of reasons. Obama is a less-s***ty president for not maintaining all of Bush's terrible policies and for at least moving in a better direction in some areas. If you think Obama is widely hailed as a hero in the progressive/liberal world, you're just plain ignorant. He's routinely attacked from the left for his civil liberty policies (mostly continuations or expansions of Bush-era policy), he's attacked for his endless desire for a terrible "Grand Bargain" and for putting cuts to Medicare and Social Security on the table, he's attacked for his abandonment of expansionary fiscal policy in favor of DEFICITS!!!! early in his presidency, he's attacked for his lack of strong environmental policy, he's attacked for not closing Guantanamo, etc. etc.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ May 14, 2013 -> 06:57 AM) So I guess it was just routine matter that unapproved applications got sent to a liberal blog along with all their info on them? Just another low level employee? http://www.propublica.org/article/irs-offi...nfidential-docs ProPublica isn't a "liberal blog," they're a full-fledged investigative journalism operation that frequently works with NPR and shows like Frontline to produce in-depth and detailed reporting. What happened here was ProPublica asked for 67 applications. The IRS sent them 31. 9 of those were not yet approved and should not have been sent, but could have been sent as soon as they were completed. Not exactly a gigantic scandal there, sounds like a bureaucratic mistake. ProPublica points out that the names associated with the releases are lifelong IRS employees, not political appointments. I've already said a full investigation is appropriate here, but I'm not seeing an "abuse of power" yet, more of a "poor administrative decisions within the IRS." The IRS has a legitimate interest and duty to ensure that groups filing for 501©4 status meet the legal requirements and are not engaged in electioneering. It's not exactly a stretch to imagine that groups self-describing themselves as tea party groups might be skirting that line or going over it (edit: not that they're a bunch of lawbreakers, just that it seems likely they would be engaging in a bit of political advocacy). For example, there's no reasonable way to argue that CrossroadsGPS and Priorities USA are "educational" or "social welfare" entities and not campaign groups, yet they applied for 501©4 status.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 13, 2013 -> 05:01 PM) Yeah, I'll admit the IRS had a difficult line there, but it's still rather obvious that it purposefully and intentionally went after conservative groups only. And the senior officials lied initially about when they became aware of it. It's obvious that they came up with a screening system for 501©4's that was discriminatory in practice but not necessarily in intent. They were getting huge numbers of applications for these groups in the wake of Citizens United and then the 2009-2010 tea party wave. Something calling itself "Tea Party Patriots" should be scrutinized for political activity, as should any "Occupy" group. I remember a whole lot of conservatives defending Bush's warrant-less wiretapping of all American communications! From conservative legal blogger Orin Kerr: The Non-Story of the AP Phone Records, At Least So Far

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archiv...-policy/275716/ Devin's last point is basically how the the history actually played out. In the overcrowded ghettoes of Chicago, there was a pent-up demand for housing. The money was there. And the money was pilfered. [...] These American families were swindled by public policy, white terrorism, and private action. This was done to advantage people who happened to look different from them. And we are only talking about housing here. We are not talking about school segregation. We are not talking about job discrimination. We are not talking about business loan discrimination. We are not talking about the shameful implementation of the G.I. Bill. Or the sharecropping system in the South. This is but one front in the long war. For young black people growing up in that era, what was the message? America's promise is that everyone who plays by the rules will have a chance to compete. If you are a black boy, or a black girl, and you watch your parents play by the rules while everyone else cheats, what do you conclude? How do you feel when your parents exhibit middle-class values and your country rewards them with pariah-class treatment? How do you then evaluate your own prospects? How do you see your country? Might you then look around, survey all the double standards and hypocrisy, and find yourself not so proud?

There's no indication that "the administration" had anything to do with this at this point. Starting in 2010 or so, there was a huge influx of 501©(4) groups. 501©(4) groups are tax-exempt, but they cannot engage in politicking and must be educational or for social welfare. Groups filing for this status should be scrutinized to make sure they aren't a political organization. Some lower-level people at the IRS came up with a dumb way to filter them for heightened scrutiny. When more senior IRS officials became aware of it, it was stopped and the policy changed. http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013...ot-then-reloads Republicans are absolutely justified in calling for further investigations, but they need to be careful about overplaying their hand because they've been crying "OBAMA'S WATERGATE!!!!" since 2009.

what is arias?

QUOTE (JPN366 @ May 10, 2013 -> 05:33 PM) The Jeremy Irons movie really makes you feel bad for Humbert, even though he's a pederast. The book does that too, he's a subversively sympathetic character. Best first person narrative I've ever read.

They are the liberal version of SOROS!!!! but if iirc they have an explicit agenda to make them partisan outlets similar to murduchs empire