Childhood Today

watching the big game...

Sat, 28 May 2011 15:16:55 -0400

the barcelona goal just caused our entire street in cannes to come to life in cheers. all the pubs/restaurants and also all the open windows of people watching at home. any chance to cheer against the English i guess…

I’ve wanted to pilot a riva for a very very long time....

Sat, 28 May 2011 11:43:04 -0400

I’ve wanted to pilot a riva for a very very long time. Significant bucket list item checked off in an ideal location heading to st tropez

Photo

Fri, 27 May 2011 12:01:02 -0400

Beach club at hotel Martinez. Water is cold, but so are the...

Fri, 27 May 2011 10:05:03 -0400

Beach club at hotel Martinez. Water is cold, but so are the drinks…

I don’t want to ever go home.

Fri, 27 May 2011 10:03:02 -0400

I don’t want to ever go home.

What the French can do with asparagus should be illegal. And...

Fri, 27 May 2011 09:57:04 -0400

What the French can do with asparagus should be illegal. And don’t even get me started on the tiny wild strawberries…

This sculpting thing is getting a little tiresome. Oh I...

Fri, 27 May 2011 09:28:04 -0400

This sculpting thing is getting a little tiresome. Oh I know… Maybe I’ll mix it up a bit and make this next one actually translucent. No biggie…

What are the chances you’d ever see an American middle...

Thu, 26 May 2011 15:56:02 -0400

What are the chances you’d ever see an American middle school class on a school trip to sketch nude Rodins without a national news story full of crying parents and fear mongering? Ahh the French, they get it right once in awhile…

"Any professional athlete who gets on TV or radio and says he never played with a gay guy is a..."

Tue, 17 May 2011 17:44:29 -0400

“Any professional athlete who gets on TV or radio and says he never played with a gay guy is a stone-freakin’ idiot…Society discriminates against gay people. I’ve been a big proponent of gay marriage for a long time, because as a black person, I can’t be in for any form of discrimination at all…It never crossed my mind, and I never felt any different. Man, we need to outlaw guys who suck at sports.”

- The Great Charles Barkley (via gotemcoach)

the best.

(via fatmanatee)

HOLD PSYCHOLOGY TODAY ACCOUNTABLE

Mon, 16 May 2011 20:43:00 -0400

HOLD PSYCHOLOGY TODAY ACCOUNTABLE:

My colleagues and I have launched a petition at change.org to encourage the American Psychological Association (APA) and the Association of Psychological Science (APS) to make a clear statement denouncing Psychology Today’s recent article. And to make clear to the public that Psychology Today is a magazine that in no way is affiliated with APA/APS or represents the best of the knowledge base in our profession.

Please reblog and share broadly. Anyone can sign of course, but please indicate in the notes when you sign at change.org if you are a psychologist and an active APA/APS member. Psychology Today has been given a free pass for too long to speak on behalf of Psychology to the public and it is time for APA and APS to make clear that they in no way speak for the profession and that this magazine has no basis to be the source of translating psychological science for the masses.

Good News

Mon, 16 May 2011 14:30:07 -0400

Psychology today is at least trying to feign some degree of credibility and has removed the offensive pseudo-science tripe from its website. People should not rest, however, I think a full on advertiser boycott is in order as this isn’t the first time they’ve done this sort of thing (creating controversy - regardless of who it hurts - to up page views and stop the hemorrhaging in ad revenue). Plus I am still hopeful that action will be taken by APA for a formal denouncing of Psychology Today and that it is far from an authoritative publication of the state of knowledge in our field.

Psychology Today: Why Are Black Women Less Physically Attractive Than Other Women?

Mon, 16 May 2011 12:35:00 -0400

Psychology Today: Why Are Black Women Less Physically Attractive Than Other Women?:

blackamazon:

navigatethestream:

so-treu:

this is an article. this is an article that exists. and this is where you can go to tell these people how full of racist bullshit they are.

that article was appallingly disgusting on so many levels

equating a higher level of testosterone with unattractiveness- first of all, why is more testosterone magically a bad thing? Are women automatically less attractive because they don’t have a certain amount of estrogen, which is supposed to give those “soft feminine features”. Society needs to stop putting physical/biological features on the gender binary, especially for the purpose of lourding one over the other

higher BMIs: If the BMI within itself has been proven to be junk science and not a real indication of anything, then why bother including it in this study? What does a BMI number really show? Jack shit. So to use it to compare the physical attractiveness of the races means even less

“Africans having more mutations amongst them, which decreases attractiveness over time”- Oh really now? That’s just a loaded statement within itself. It doesn’t acknowledge how those mutations came into being: inter-tribal mating, cross-continental mating, colonization, slavery, ect. So basically, you’re blaming a race’s physical unattractiveness on facts they did and didn’t have control over.

I just can’t sometimes. I mean really, why bother to conduct studies like this in the first place. How does this help improve understanding of different cultures? How does this help anything at all?

SMDH!!

Something to think about every time someone brings up ” attractive” as a challenge to Women of Color

————————-

I feel horrible even reblogging this b/c of the harmful nature of the words. But this psychologist spends his entire analysis looking at reasons why individuals might exhibit differences in perceived attractiveness across races, while only examining potential differences in the target of those perceptions - without once even acknowledging how the socialization of the perceiver is a huge factor here. He is clearly making the assumption that the perceptions of attractiveness are an objective measure of true underlying inter-racial differences. He completely fails to acknowledge that the interviewers for the study of adolescent health simply rated the participants on a scale of 1-5. The differences in attractiveness ratings then are very much tied up in how the interviewers themselves were socialized in a system that values certain races in different ways. How does he not even take into account who the interviewers were and the messages they were socialized in around beauty?

Evolutionary Psych has some smart folks, and then they have a lot of folks like Satoshi Kanazawa who simply look for “just so” stories to fit their racist view points around IQ, behavior, looks, etc… and completely ignore the dynamic transaction between the biological beings we are and the socially constructed world we shape and are shaped by. This is just gross. Our profession really needs to stand up and make a statement not just about those like Kanazawa, but also about Psychology Today for offering a forum for such shoddy pseudo science simply to increase page views and ad revenue. Psychology Today has the potential to offer information and knowledge from our profession to the masses, but instead it is what it is. I would love to see APA or APS formally distance themselves from the “content” coming out of Psychology Today and make clear to the public that it in no way is a good representation of the evidence-based practice and research our profession is creating.

awesome-everyday: drinkyourjuice: Oh jesus christ, because...

Fri, 13 May 2011 22:35:51 -0400

awesome-everyday:

drinkyourjuice:

Oh jesus christ, because they’re humans, not because they’re women of color. Did I mention race at all? At any point in those sentences did I use any lens other than the “sexuality” lens to look at that video? I was talking about how reductive twerking is re: sex, especially re: women. So I had myself in the bucket with those women in that comparison. I’m a baboon too in that comparison.

I’ve modified the sentence, so hopefully I’ve clarified myself and prevented further misinterpretation, but ugh. Just ugh with this.

And, to be fair, there are a couple Latina chicks in the video too. Everyone can twerk. Twerking knows no race.

If you think it’s “Ugh,” then you really don’t get the point. You’re particularly missing the mark when you have the nerve to follow up a comparison of women of color to primates (which is what you did) with some rant about gender politics.

I’ve followed you for a long time, and you’re generally pretty funny and I enjoyed your posts. For me as a Black person, this was intolerable.

Mariana told me you made some edits, which I read. Your edits still make you come off as ignorant, and I’ll explain why.

You, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, are a white woman. That video is filled with women of color. There have been centuries of heavy, ugly, demeaning racist depictions of my people as apes, babboons, monkies and they were created by a society seeking to deprive us of our humanness. They are fueled by fear, prejudice and the pursuit of making an entire people feel collectively less than one person.

It’s kind of like you called my momma a cunt, to her face, and she didn’t do anything to you.

Your intention is quite irrelevant in this situation. It is the placement of your language and context of your race. It will never be appropriate for you to compare Black people to primates. You will never prove that you’re intellectual by compare people of color to primates. The only thing it proves is that you are ignorant.

I found your response to be incredibly immature.

Read this article, and think about what you’ve written and the gravity of your Whitness.

people need to read pam’s words and feel them. our intent has nothing to do with the impact of our words, and when we deny the impact that someone feels it sort of does call into question our intent… don’t get defensive when someone points out you’ve done something that has offended them. just listen, BELIEVE THEM, and learn…

rachelsterne: Beyonce surprises students in Harlem’s P.S. 161...

Wed, 04 May 2011 19:14:45 -0400

rachelsterne:

Beyonce surprises students in Harlem’s P.S. 161 during Let’s Move flash workout.

fantastic.

new pew poll:

Tue, 03 May 2011 17:21:19 -0400

over 80% of republicans think gwbush deserves some credit for the killing of Osama.

only 60% of republicans think Obama deserves some credit for the killing of Osama.

people be all crazy and stuff.

Really disappointed, but not surprised...

Mon, 02 May 2011 19:31:00 -0400

I really cannot believe (well yes I can) that the CIA/Pentagon mission planners for this selected Geronimo for the codename for Osama in this mission.

Just think of how despite their horrible treatment (historical and ONGOING) at the hands of this country, many Native Americans/First Nations tribal members have proudly stood up to serve in the armed services and fight for the U.S. in countless conflicts over the years. Far overrepresented in the services given their proportion of the population in fact. Disproportionately serving, yet still being disrespected in many way. It is not uncommon, according to reports of native soldiers, to hear commanders speak of enemy territory in conflicts as “indian country,” and now the man who is presented as the biggest enemy to America for over a decade is labeled as Geronimo in a kill mission.

We are so steeped in Racism that it just oozes out of us in every pore of our being as a people. Really disgusted.

"The people who gathered Sunday in the Situation Room know all about high-pressure situations. But..."

Mon, 02 May 2011 19:16:00 -0400

“

The people who gathered Sunday in the Situation Room know all about high-pressure situations. But this was something else. For 40 minutes, the President and his senior aides could do nothing but watch the video screens and listen to the operation and ensuing firefight on the other side of the world. At Barack Obama’s orders, special operations teams were invading the airspace of a foreign country, targeting a compound with unknown occupants, and hoping to get out unscathed. The target was America’s No. 1 enemy, Osama bin Laden. But no one knew for sure if he was even there.

The President sat stone-faced through much of the events. Several of his aides, however, were pacing. For long periods of time, nobody said a thing, as everyone waited for the next update. In the modern age, Presidents can experience their own military actions like a video game, except that they have no control over the events. They cannot, and would not, intervene to contact the commanders running the operation. So when word came that a helicopter had been grounded, a sign that the plan was already off course, the tension increased.

Minutes later, more word came over the transom. “We’ve IDed Geronimo,” said a disembodied voice, using the agreed-upon code name for America’s most wanted enemy, Osama bin Laden. Word then came that Geronimo had been killed. Only when the last helicopter lifted off some minutes later did the President know that his forces had sustained no casualties.

”

-
Time Magazine, “After Uncertainty, A Moment of Triumph in the Situation Room: ‘We’ve ID’d Geronimo’” (via inothernews)

Will someone put in a FOIA request to obtain the video of the operation? Should they?

(via joshsternberg)

The FOIA request would never be approved. It would reveal far too much about JSOC tactics.

(via mikehudack)

I’m sure the Apache, and other Native Americans, many of whom have fought gallantly for our nation in wars over time as an expression of their support of America and aspect of their warrior culture, would really appreciate that the U.S. military gave the codename Geronimo to our number one enemy. Classy and sensitive Pentagon…

soupsoup: Official White House Photographer, Peter...

Mon, 02 May 2011 17:46:14 -0400

soupsoup:

Official White House Photographer, Peter Souza

President Barack Obama listens during one in a series of meetings discussing the mission against Osama bin Laden, in the Situation Room of the White House, May 1, 2011.

I love that there are high level members of the military, state dept. and even the President’s own team who were blind to this mission, yet the white house photographer is read into these things! and this isn’t a shot at obama’s vanity or anything of the sort - white house photographers have had almost complete access since at least kennedy. And have never been accused in a leak.

for all you conspiracy theorists...

Mon, 02 May 2011 17:29:00 -0400

you can doubt the killing of Bin Laden all you want, but if his own organization is vowing to avenge his death, that might be an indication that… you know… they feel they have something to avenge… like his death.

It is time to address inequality in opportunity in this country.

Mon, 02 May 2011 09:57:40 -0400

I propose a “ladder tax”. A federal income tax targeted specifically at supporting investments in early childhood programs and public schools of 5% on all income over $250,000 a year. This would put the highest tax brackets up to only slightly higher than in the Clinton-era, but do so in a way separate from discussion of letting the Bush taxcuts expire. It is a very specific and targeted tax, not unlike Social Security and it is targeted at something that is very difficult to campaign against.

We need to explicitly codify in law that you and your business will no longer be able to benefit from all that our federal infrastructure provides and then pull up that same ladder behind you.