Links roundup 16-22 January
Obama announces widest gun control measures in 18 years. Oh yes, it's on for young and old. The plan includes fixing the holes in the background checks system and reinstating the ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines - and also, incredibly, permitting research on gun violence by agencies like the Centers for Disease Control. I am a little wary of the mental health component of the plan, since sane people are also spree killers; but if it really does provide sorely lacking mental health services, what the hell.
Religious organisations, which include some of Australia's largest employers will be able to continue discriminating against gays, transgender and intersex people, and other sinners. (This guy, however, is just fine. ETA: He has subsequently been removed.) Although these organisations rely on government funding, the discriminatees will still have to pay the same tax as everyone else. Here's a cracking response from Joumanah El Matrah, who points out that the "right" to discriminate just shores up the power of an increasingly irrelevant conservative minority and their obsessions, ultimate reducing religion to "a collection of petty bigotries". "I believe in Australia's commitment to diversity and human dignity," she writes, "and I do not want any tear in that fabric in my name as a person of faith." (Both the Uniting Church and the charity Anglicare reject religious discrimination.)
Mum punches student, threatens staff over 'bullied' daughter. I'm keen to know whether the daughter was in fact the target of racist bullying - and why the school suspended her after she complained about it. Alas, none of these details are present in the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal judgment.
The slashed single parent payment has some Australian mothers turning to sex work.
Cats in the news: Orlando beats professional wealth managers with his stock picks. | Brazilian prison inmates trained a stray cat to smuggle in escape tools. The cat, which was caught with small saws, drills, a cell phone, etc, taped to its body, was placed into the care of vets. Authorities wittily remarked that they didn't know which prisoners were responsible as the cat wasn't talking.* | In a not entirely dissimilar story, a Japanese hacker taunted police with clues attached to a cat's collar. (I found footage: the collar was removed, and the feral cat, unimpressed with the entire business, ran away.)
Science! Fisher-Price Synesthesia: as well as the magic brain wiring which makes us colour-grapheme synaesthetes superior to you mere humans, there's evidence for a learned component. (My own colours don't match the Fisher-Price letters, nor the Gattengo chart which was present in my primary school.)
* No, I can't read Portuguese! But Google Translate will give you the gist. "The cat, considered by management of the prison as the most innocent of history, was referred to the Center for Zoonoses the city, where it will be held, not in prison, but to receive the veterinary care."
Religious organisations, which include some of Australia's largest employers will be able to continue discriminating against gays, transgender and intersex people, and other sinners. (This guy, however, is just fine. ETA: He has subsequently been removed.) Although these organisations rely on government funding, the discriminatees will still have to pay the same tax as everyone else. Here's a cracking response from Joumanah El Matrah, who points out that the "right" to discriminate just shores up the power of an increasingly irrelevant conservative minority and their obsessions, ultimate reducing religion to "a collection of petty bigotries". "I believe in Australia's commitment to diversity and human dignity," she writes, "and I do not want any tear in that fabric in my name as a person of faith." (Both the Uniting Church and the charity Anglicare reject religious discrimination.)
Mum punches student, threatens staff over 'bullied' daughter. I'm keen to know whether the daughter was in fact the target of racist bullying - and why the school suspended her after she complained about it. Alas, none of these details are present in the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal judgment.
The slashed single parent payment has some Australian mothers turning to sex work.
Cats in the news: Orlando beats professional wealth managers with his stock picks. | Brazilian prison inmates trained a stray cat to smuggle in escape tools. The cat, which was caught with small saws, drills, a cell phone, etc, taped to its body, was placed into the care of vets. Authorities wittily remarked that they didn't know which prisoners were responsible as the cat wasn't talking.* | In a not entirely dissimilar story, a Japanese hacker taunted police with clues attached to a cat's collar. (I found footage: the collar was removed, and the feral cat, unimpressed with the entire business, ran away.)
Science! Fisher-Price Synesthesia: as well as the magic brain wiring which makes us colour-grapheme synaesthetes superior to you mere humans, there's evidence for a learned component. (My own colours don't match the Fisher-Price letters, nor the Gattengo chart which was present in my primary school.)
* No, I can't read Portuguese! But Google Translate will give you the gist. "The cat, considered by management of the prison as the most innocent of history, was referred to the Center for Zoonoses the city, where it will be held, not in prison, but to receive the veterinary care."