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Amen to that! Oxford students revolt over head of college's 'woke' plan to scrap saying grace before meals

Xantham Leatham
Daily Mail
Tue, 12 Nov 2019 19:52 UTC
Worcester College
© Alamy Stock Photo
Worcester College's (pictured) provost is now facing a furious backlash after trying to abolish the centuries-old customs of standing for dons and saying grace before meals
We're used to militant campaigns by ultra-PC students - but at one Oxford campus, the shoe is on the other foot.

Worcester College's provost is now facing a furious backlash after trying to abolish the centuries-old customs of standing for dons and saying grace before meals.

Students said they had been told by catering staff that they were no longer required to get up when senior academics entered and left the dining hall.

They have also been informed about proposals to axe the Anglican Grace, which is read before meals in Latin, and replace it with a 'range of set texts of thanksgiving from any world culture, religious or not'.

Professor Kate Tunstall's plans have infuriated students from the junior common room, who held a vote on the issue.

The majority were in favour of preserving the traditional practices and have decided to petition the governing body to reinstate the standing policy.

Comment: And in related news about cultural traditions being relegated to the dust bin....
Lily Allen has said the country should stop singing the traditional anthem "Rule, Britannia!" because of its problematic lyrics.

Writing "Sorry, what?" on her Instagram story, the singer singled out the following lyrics:
"Britons never, never, never shall be slaves. The nations, not so blest as thee, must in their turn, to tyrants fall, while thou shalt flourish, shalt flourish great and free, the dread and envy of them all."
After the anthem featured in many of the Remembrance Day services last weekend, Allen wrote: "I think we should not sing this song anymore."

Allen's comments sparked a backlash on social media, with one Instagram user writing: "You should respect the fallen, who gave you the chance to sing and make a career."

In response, Allen called the widespread criticism "pretty pathetic", adding: "Anyway, I don't really give a s***, that song is jank and should go in the bin. Besides men and women died for our right to express our opinions soooo..."

"Rule, Britannia!" is a patriotic song written in 1740, originating from a poem by James Thomson.


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Take 2

Disney+ recuts own classics: Why do corporate gatekeepers think we will turn racist if they don't censor content?

Alexander Adams
RT
Thu, 14 Nov 2019 16:37 UTC
Mickey and Minnie Mouse
© Bastiaan Slabbers/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Launch of Disney+ was accompanied by an announcement that some of its movies would be shown edited to suit modern day censors. This is a cowardly, ineffective, and intellectually dishonest way of fighting social ills.

Disney+ is the studio's long-awaited multi-billion foray into the streaming wars. Its back catalogue includes classic children's films, Star Wars feature films, Marvel and new television series. This material stretches back almost ninety years, and society has changed dramatically over that period. This presents Disney with a problem. Depictions of ethnic minorities, foreign cultures and women in old material are often at odds with current views.

Once they won Oscars - but now you are not allowed to see them

Disney has taken steps to soften controversial material. The Jim Crow character - a caricature of black Americans - has been edited out of Dumbo in the version for Disney+. The Siamese Cat song from Lady & The Tramp will be changed in the forthcoming live-action remake.

One film not on the Disney+ schedule is the musical Song of the South (1946). It features Uncle Remus, a black main character-narrator (played James Baskett), telling folk tales about animals. It was an innovative color film that combined live action and animation. Despite its success, the film was later criticized as being too sympathetic towards Reconstruction Era America and reinforcing negative racial stereotypes. Disney has since distanced itself from the film. The movie has never been released on home video in the USA, though it has been released in non-American regions. This suppression of Song of the South has deprived American audiences of Baskett's Academy Award-winning performance.
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Yellow Vest

Thousands of Morales supporters tear gassed by police during protests demanding resignation of self-declared 'interim' leader Anez


RT
Thu, 14 Nov 2019 04:59 UTC
Morales supporters march La Paz
Thousands of supporters of deposed Bolivian President Evo Morales gathered in La Paz to demand the resignation of self-declared "interim" leader Jeanine Anez, where they squared off with riot police in hectic street clashes.

Flying national and indigenous flags and chanting pro-Morales slogans, the protest march met a forceful police response in Bolivia's administrative capital on Wednesday, facing down volleys of tear gas from armored security forces, dramatic footage captured by Ruptly shows.

Comment: Without quorum or vote, random blonde declares herself 'interim president' in Bolivia
Opposition politician Jeanine Añez has declared herself "interim president" of Bolivia without a vote, but the party of ousted President Evo Morales said that the Senate had no quorum and the legislature's session was not legal.[..]

While opposition activists claimed that Añez's declaration was in line with the Bolivian constitution, lawmakers from the ousted president's Movement for Socialism called the assembly session illegal. They have refused to attend the proceedings, saying that armed groups loyal to the opposition controlled the roads and could not guarantee their safety. [..]

Morales was one of the few Latin American leaders bucking the US line on Venezuela and supporting Maduro.


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Attention

Hong Kong demonstrators savagely beat woman with a metal rod


RT
Thu, 14 Nov 2019 11:59 UTC
Hong Kong protest
© REUTERS/Thomas Peter
A protester is seen in front of a fire in the Mong Kok area in Hong Kong, China November 11, 2019.
A disturbing video shows a woman being surrounded and beaten by masked protesters in Hong Kong. The unsettling footage comes as authorities struggle to clamp down on worsening violence in the semi-autonomous city.

The assault was reportedly sparked by a political disagreement between the woman and a group of armed demonstrators. Video of the attack shows the woman trying to walk away, only to be thrown to the ground by one of the black-clad rioters. One of the men then uses what appears to be a metal rod to beat her over the head. The woman then sits on the pavement as the group surrounds her and taunts her. A journalist then helps her to her feet as blood trickles down the side of her face. She attempts to leave the scene, but the rioters catch up to her and begin to beat her with their rods once again. A man then shields her with his body as she sits curled up on the ground.
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No Entry

Denmark tightens border controls with Sweden to halt crime involving explosives, weapons and drugs


Breitbart
Mon, 11 Nov 2019 11:51 UTC
denmark police
© Getty Images
Denmark will temporarily reinstate border controls with Sweden and step up police work along the border after a series of violent crimes and explosions around Copenhagen that Danish authorities say were carried out by perpetrators from Sweden.

The checks, which start Tuesday for six months, will take place at the Oresund Bridge between Copenhagen and the Swedish city of Malmo and also at ferry ports.

Lene Frank of Denmark's National Police said there will be both random and periodic checks of people crossing the border and officers will focus "particularly on cross-border crime involving explosives, weapons and drugs."

Since February, there have been 13 blasts in Copenhagen. Authorities believe an Aug. 6 explosion at the Danish Tax Agency "was committed by criminals that had crossed the border from Sweden." Two Swedish citizens are in custody.

Denmark Justice Minister Nick Haekkerup has called a June 25 double murder - where two Swedish citizens were gunned down in suburban Copenhagen - "a showdown between feuding gangs from Sweden."
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Attention

'Rioters U': Student revolutionaries involved in Hong Kong's worst clashes

Laignee Barron
Time
Wed, 13 Nov 2019 11:36 UTC
HongKongriot
© Reuters/Tyrone Siu
Protesters attempt break in at Legislative Council building
On a leafy college campus in Hong Kong Wednesday, the usual bustle of academic activity gave way to frenetic preparations for a revolution.

Instead of book bags, the students lugged carts full of bricks to the entrance gates, where sentries in black balaclavas monitored the steady flow of incoming supplies. Classrooms were emptied of their tables and chairs, the furniture repurposed to block unwanted traffic on the roads, bridges and nearby railway tracks on which a small fire smoldered. While lectures and study halls might have filled the schedules on any other day, this afternoon the undergraduates of the territory's second-oldest university, the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), practiced throwing Molotov cocktails behind a row of empty buses. "Whatever happens, we must defend the university, we must not allow the police to take it," says Simon, 21. He studies at a different university, but he trekked here yesterday evening after students called for reinforcements as they clashed with police in some of the most violent fighting Hong Kong has seen over the past five months of unrest.

Students lobbed literally hundreds of petrol bombs at police, who responded with rubber bullets and heavy volleys of tear gas. Plumes of smoke from large fires gave the campus the appearance of a battlefield. CUHK has gained a reputation for being an epicenter of protest activity, noteworthy even among other campus hotbeds. Chinese state media has labeled it the "rioters' university," an epithet the students have sarcastically adopted. At a press conference Wednesday, police chief superintendent John Tse called CUHK "a bad omen" for Hong Kong. "A university is supposed to be a breeding ground for future leaders," he said, "but it has become a battlefield for criminals and rioters."

Comment: Democrazis run rampage in Hong Kong - Police chief warns 'society on brink of total breakdown'

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Dominoes

Arizona Republican tweets "Epstein didn't kill himself" through coded messages


Info Wars
Thu, 14 Nov 2019 11:36 UTC
gosar tweets
Congressman Paul A. Gosar, who represents Arizona's 4th District, sent out a string of tweets on Wednesday that spell out "Epstein Didn't Kill Himself" if you look at the first letter of each tweet.

Watch the video below to see for yourself:


Comment: While it could be attributed to 'pattern recognition run amok', it seems highly unlikely that the first letter of each tweet would spell out the meme phrase exactly simply by chance. That said, it's a pretty ingenious way to show support for the movement while still holding plausible deniability.

See also:

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Fire

To make this tofu, start by burning toxic plastic: What really happens to America's plastic waste

Richard C. Paddock
The New York Times
Thu, 14 Nov 2019 04:56 UTC
plastic burning stoves tofu
© Ulet Ifansasti for The New York Times
A commercial tofu kitchen in Tropodo, Indonesia. The tofu is processed in boilers fueled by burning plastic.
Black smoke billows from smokestacks towering above the village. The smell of burning plastic fills the air. Patches of black ash cover the ground. It's another day of making tofu.

More than 30 commercial kitchens in Tropodo, a village on the eastern side of Indonesia's main island, Java, fuel their tofu production by burning a mix of paper and plastic waste, some of it shipped from the United States after Americans dumped it in their recycling bins.

The backyard kitchens produce much of the area's tofu, an inexpensive and high-protein food made from soy that is an important part of the local diet. But the smoke and ash produced by the burning plastic has far-reaching and toxic consequences.
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Eye 1

Pathocracy: When people with personality disorders gain power

Steve Taylor Ph.D.
Psychology Today
Wed, 31 Jul 2019 00:01 UTC
stalin hitler
The Polish psychologist Andrew Lobaczewski spent his early life suffering under the Nazi occupation of Poland, closely followed by the brutality of Soviet occupation after the war. His experience of these horrors led Lobaczewski to develop the concept of "pathocracy." This is when individuals with personality disorders (particularly psychopathy) occupy positions of power. (1)

Lobaczewski devoted his life to studying human evil, a field which he called "ponerology." He wanted to understand why 'evil' people seem to prosper, while so many good and moral people struggle to succeed. He wanted to understand why people with psychological disorders so easily rise to positions of power and take over the governments of countries. Since he was living under a "pathocratic" regime himself, he took great risks studying this topic. He was arrested and tortured by the Polish authorities, and was unable to publish his life's work, the book Political Ponerology, until he escaped to the United States during the 1980s.

Comment: Perhaps it's a sign of the western world's descent into pathocracy that the average person is convinced that those leaders who actually try to make beneficial changes for the people are tarred as pathological. The entire system, including the media, are so pathologized at this point that the people can't tell which way is up.

See also:

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Post-It Note

San Francisco's new district attorney says city will no longer prosecute public urination or prostitution

Peter Hasson
Daily Caller
Mon, 11 Nov 2019 19:41 UTC
Chesa Boudin
© Video screenshot/YouTube/Democracy Now!
San Francisco's pee problem could soon get worse.

Chesa Boudin, the urine-and-feces-plagued city's incoming district attorney, pledged during the campaign not to prosecute public urination and other quality-of-life crimes if he was elected. Boudin declared victory Saturday night after results showed him winning a plurality of votes in the DA race.

"We will not prosecute cases involving quality-of-life crimes. Crimes such as public camping, offering or soliciting sex, public urination, blocking a sidewalk, etc., should not and will not be prosecuted," Boudin vowed in response to an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) questionnaire during the campaign.

"Many of these crimes are still being prosecuted, we have a long way to go to decriminalize poverty and homelessness," he lamented.
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