Not worthy of a thread News

[broken iris]

WTF am I missing about this Bundy Ranch stand-off? Why does this douche bag think he has the right to have his cattle graze on property that's not his and not pay for it?

Even if all this shit about Harry Reid is true AND the "liberals" are protecting a turtle, he is still using land that is not his and not paying to do so. Apparently every other rancher in the area is paying the fees.

Why didn't we just send in the drones to eliminate the cattle and a couple "militiamen"?

The fact that he owes over $1 mil in fees is often not part of the news report.

The theory is that the debts and public land rights violations weren't an issue until Sen. Reid hooked up that Chinese solar company (the one that stole IP from Samsung) to build a plant in the area and then this True American was suddenly a problem.

The Chinese energy project was abandoned last year. The only solar panel project is already being built in another area and has no impact on Bundy's cattle. He just needs to pay his fucking bills.

I never said it made the slightest bit of sense, just that's it's the argument. Some people slip on intellectual horse-blinders when it comes to the US federal government where everything they do is some conspiracy to crush our "freedoms".

[McParadigm]

Whoever the first person was to ever refer to personal freedom as a "right" really had no idea about that whole butterfly hurricane thing.

[Fuck You Jobu]

Adult Kickball Team Email: Please Don't Fuck Your Teammates Yet

http://deadspin.com/adult-kickball-team ... socialflow

The weather's getting warmer, which means it's time for America's favorite pastime. That's right: adult kickball.

With co-ed adult kickball teams, like most co-ed teams, there's the possibility of fucking your teammates. You get drinks after a game, hit it off, and screw, because you're both adults and like each other enough.

[Redacted] is trying to curb that boot-knocking, or at least delay it until later in the season, so he sent out this email to the men on the team. Sexy kickball ruins team chemistry and makes things awkward, dammit. ONE TEAM. ONE GOAL. WE WANT THE CUP. (Is there a cup for adult kickball? Doesn't matter.)

The email:

Good morning gentlemen,

I'm assuming that when this is read, you'll all be waking up, hence the greeting.

I hope we all had a good time tonight. I certainly did. We have a very talented team. We're most likely going to win out the season, and if not, we'll buck up and win the tournament at the end of the season. We're really that good.

But it's time that I introduce you all to a very important rule, which if we don't follow will cause us the season. It's called the five-week rule.

You'll notice that only the men of [team name] are receiving this email. It's because this rule only applies to you. I know, it's sexist. It's not fair. But it's the way it is.

Winning on the kickball field is based on three things. How well the men play, how well the women play, and if the women show up. Literally, leagues are won and lost on whether or not enough women show up towards the end of the season. Everyone thinks kickball is a great game, they all want to play, then towards the end of the season, attendance tapers off, and you're begging and pleading for people to show up to fill out the team, and it doesn't happen, and you forfeit, and you're pissed, and it sucks. SUCKS.

The main reason for this, is screwing. No joke, you bang some chick, she's ashamed, maybe you sucked at it (none of us, obviously) and she doesn't want to see you, therefore she doesn't show up again.

So, this rule has been created, not to hinder us, but to help the team. Think of it as an extended challenge. The slow roll. The long con.

YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO FUCK ANYONE ON THE TEAM UNTIL AFTER WEEK FIVE.

Is that clear enough? I can say it again if necessary, but I think it was pretty clear.

YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO FUCK ANYONE ON THE TEAM UNTIL AFTER WEEK FIVE.

There, I said it again anyway.

Failure to adhere to this rule will result in your exclusion from the lineup, public hatred and disdain, death, dismemberment, ball-kicking (not kickballs), and, on the good side, getting laid. I don't think the latter is worth the former.

Please be a team player, wait a few weeks. If you're that good, it won't matter anyway. Don't break up the team because of your dick.

Thanks,

[redacted]

[Fuck You Jobu]

I thought the whole point of adult kickball was to hook up with your (and other) teammates???

[Kaius]

That's great

[malice]

The long con.

[Alex]

it seems cruel to defer for any length of time any type of human contact for adults who, in the depths of their sadness, have turned to kickball as a last resort for socialization.

[Peeps]

*frolf

[broken iris]

Whoever the first person was to ever refer to personal freedom as a "right" really had no idea about that whole butterfly hurricane thing.

Do you think that maybe they, the ranchers, simply have a different perception of "natural rights" than you?

[McParadigm]

I think that anybody who uses the term "natural rights" has a very different perception of nature than I do.

[broken iris]

You think McDonald's gendered happy meal toys are Harmless to our young people? Think again, bigots.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/20 ... _toys.html


McDonald's Gave Me the “Girl's Toy” With My Happy Meal. So I Went to the CEO.

By Antonia Ayres-Brown



In the fall of 2008, when I was 11 years old, I wrote to the CEO of McDonald’s and asked him to change the way his stores sold Happy Meals. I expressed my frustration that McDonald’s always asked if my family preferred a “girl toy” or a “boy toy” when we ordered a Happy Meal at the drive-through. My letter asked if it would be legal for McDonald’s “to ask at a job interview whether someone wanted a man’s job or a woman’s job?”

A few weeks later, I received a short response from a McDonald’s customer satisfaction representative claiming that McDonald’s doesn’t train their employees to ask whether Happy Meal customers want boys’ or girls’ toys, and my experiences were not the norm.

This response was unsatisfying, so I began visiting more than a dozen local McDonald’s locations with my father to collect data. Ultimately, we brought a complaint to the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities against McDonald’s for discriminating on the basis of sex. Despite our evidence showing that, in our test, McDonald’s employees described the toys in gendered terms more than 79 percent of the time, the commission dismissed our allegations as “absurd” and solely for the purposes of “titilation [sic] and sociological experimentation.” All in all, this was a pretty humiliating defeat.

But I still couldn’t let it go. When the commission was considering our claims in 2008, one of the McDonald’s stores accused us of “conveniently stop[ping the] experiment short to concoct this case.” The store claimed that if I had just asked for a boy’s toy they would have been happy to oblige. So this past summer, we decided to test this assertion.

In a series of 30 visits, we sent boys and girls, ages 7-11, into 15 McDonald’s stores to independently order a Happy Meal at the counter. We found that 92.9 percent of the time, the store, without asking, simply gave each child the toy that McDonald’s had designated for that child’s gender—a Justice fashion toy for girls and a Power Rangers toy for boys. What's worse was the trouble the children encountered when they immediately returned to the counter and asked to exchange their unopened toy: 42.8 percent of stores refused to exchange for an opposite-sex toy.

In the most egregious instance, a McDonald’s employee asked a girl, “Would you like the girl's toy?” The girl responded, “No, could I have the boy's toy?” When the girl opened the container a moment later, she learned that notwithstanding her explicit request, a McDonald’s employee had given her the girl’s toy. This girl went back to the counter with the unopened toy and requested, “May I have a boy's toy, please?” The same McDonald’s employee replied, “There are only girl's toys.” We then sent an adult male into the store who immediately was given a boy’s toy.

Instead of filing another complaint, I tried a more conciliatory approach. I again wrote to the CEO of McDonald’s, now Donald Thompson, sharing the results of our recent study and expressing my continued concern with the harmful effects of gender-classified toys. On Dec. 17, I received an amazing letter back from McDonald’s chief diversity officer, Patricia Harris, saying, “It is McDonald’s intention and goal that each customer who desires a Happy Meal toy be provided the toy of his or her choice, without any classification of the toy as a ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ toy and without any reference to the customer’s gender. We have recently reexamined our internal guidelines, communications and practices and are making improvements to better ensure that our toys are distributed consistent with our policy.”

Even more heartening, DoSomething.org just posted a photo of a manager’s notice on the wall of an actual McDonald’s store instructing employees: “When a customer orders a happy meal you must ask ‘will that be a My Little Pony toy? Or a Skylanders toy?’. We will no longer refer to them as ‘boy or girl toys.’ ”

While this notice does not ensure that all McDonald’s locations will stop treating a kid differently because of his or her gender, it’s a start. The problem with Happy Meal toys may seem trivial to some, but consider this: McDonald’s is estimated to sell more than 1 billion Happy Meals each year. When it poses this question—“Do you want a boy’s toy or a girl’s toy?”—McDonald’s pressures innumerable children to conform to gender stereotypes. Retailers don’t need to use girl’s and boy's categories when they can just describe the toys that are available and let kids choose the ones that appeal to them most. After all, that’s been McDonald’s stated corporate policy for the last five years.

Antonia Ayres-Brown is a high-school junior in New Haven, CT.

[BurtReynolds]

this is good for RM's Brony subculture.

[broken iris]

this is good for RM's Brony subculture.

We should learn to shut up and listen to them. Both of them.

[psychobain]

good read

[Jorge]

this is good for RM's Brony subculture.

We should learn to shut up and listen to them. Both of them.

What's your endgame?

[broken iris]

this is good for RM's Brony subculture.

We should learn to shut up and listen to them. Both of them.

What's your endgame?

I take reasonable, well-researched, and thought-out positions. And post the opposite.

[Rangi Guy]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/oddstuff/9969604 ... bushed-her

Full story:

Woman sues after pet duck 'ambushed' her
A woman from Washington state has sued her mother's neighbour in Oregon over a pet duck.

Cynthia Ruddell is seeking US$275,000 (NZ$319,500) for pain, suffering and other damages she claims were inflicted when a pet duck ambushed her for no apparent reason.

Ruddell was on her mother's property in Estacada, Oregon, about 25 miles southeast of Portland, when the duck attacked her without provocation, according to the suit filed last week in Oregon state court.

[philpritchard]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/oddstuff/9969604 ... bushed-her

Full story:

Woman sues after pet duck 'ambushed' her
A woman from Washington state has sued her mother's neighbour in Oregon over a pet duck.

Cynthia Ruddell is seeking US$275,000 (NZ$319,500) for pain, suffering and other damages she claims were inflicted when a pet duck ambushed her for no apparent reason.

Ruddell was on her mother's property in Estacada, Oregon, about 25 miles southeast of Portland, when the duck attacked her without provocation, according to the suit filed last week in Oregon state court.

I once got bit by a duck trying to steal bread from my hand while I was feeding some other ducks. Do you know how much damage a duck bite can inflict?

[Jorge]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/oddstuff/9969604 ... bushed-her

Full story:

Woman sues after pet duck 'ambushed' her
A woman from Washington state has sued her mother's neighbour in Oregon over a pet duck.

Cynthia Ruddell is seeking US$275,000 (NZ$319,500) for pain, suffering and other damages she claims were inflicted when a pet duck ambushed her for no apparent reason.

Ruddell was on her mother's property in Estacada, Oregon, about 25 miles southeast of Portland, when the duck attacked her without provocation, according to the suit filed last week in Oregon state court.

I once got bit by a duck trying to steal bread from my hand while I was feeding some other ducks. Do you know how much damage a duck bite can inflict?

3?

[Jorge]

3 damage?