Interesting Links for 20-07-2012

[andrewducker]

• Lack of evidence that popular sports products work (Including Puma, Lucozade, and amino acid supplements)
  (tags: sports science EpicFail fraud )
• Disability and sexuality: everything you think you know is wrong
  (tags: sexuality sex disability )
• Is Britain behaving better? (Crime at lowest level for 37 years, antisocial behaviour also down)

Comments

[artkouros]

Well, there goes my plan for selling chocolate eggs with weed inside.

[andrewducker]

A plan that cannot fail!

[fub]

If you can demonstrate that the weed has nutritional value, I think you'd be in the clear. ;)

[artkouros]

Maybe if I left off the rolling paper.

[marrog]

Oh Mr Darcy! Pride and Prejudice among classic novels to receive erotic makeover

I want to not give a shit about this.

I want to be as philosophical as I was about the Keira Knightly Pride & Prejudice, or the Guy Ritchie Holmes, and say let people enjoy them for what they are, have fun, and hey, maybe they'll end up reading the books and if they don't, why shouldn't they enjoy the films.

But I actually can't count the number of ways in which this latest step pisses me off.

[andrewducker]

I love the fact that people _can_ do this. Remixing culture into new forms is something I'm wholly in favour of. Particularly with zombies.

It does seem unlikely that these will do it _well_ though.

[marrog]

Yeah, P&P&Z didn't annoy me at all, because it was ridiculous. This pisses me off because people will read it instead of the actual texts - it's not a route to excellent literature, it's a circumvention of it, and it'll dismantle an awful lot of the points of the novels. Austen and the Brontes' works were packed with unresolved sexual tension - the plots are basically fuelled by them. This will give readers a version that by adding the shagging in, resolving that tension, will effectively castrate the book.

[andrewducker]

Castrated by shagging. Oh, the irony!

[marrog]

People who are drunk will also be prevented from travelling on trains

What the actual fuck?

[andrewducker]

Yup.

I worked in Glasgow and lived in Stirling for a couple of years. I guess going out with my workmates would have been forbidden under these rules.

[marrog]

Let's hope they apply it in the way that pubs do - in that it's technically illegal to be 'drunk' in a pub but you'll only be kicked out if you've clearly 'had enough' or have fallen asleep...

Although that would be dangerous too of course, since then sober people wouldn't be able to sleep on the train. I used to love sleeping on the train.

[andrewducker]

I still do, if I do a long trip on one. Not that that's very often nowadays.

And yes, they could handle it as "If you're unable to look after yourself, or are causing a public nuisance, then we'll throw you off."

Oh, wait, _they can already do that!!!_

[gonzo21]

I imagine dope would be so cheap because it's so easy to grow and process, if it was legal, basically anybody that wanted it would just be able to grow their own supply on their window ledge?

[andrewducker]

Even cheaper to grow centrally. And you need very little to get you intoxicated.

Which basically means they could tax it massively, and still have it utterly destroy the alcohol industry.

[gonzo21]

That's an interesting thought. Has easy access cannabis in Holland significantly reduced their consumption of alcohol?

[andrewducker]

They're lower than us, by about 30%:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_alcohol_consumption

but above Australia and the USA.

[randomchris]

I am at least somewhat in favour of extremely drunk people not being allowed to travel: there are several occasions when a late-night trip home has been made really horrible by someone vomiting up their alcohol in the same carriage. Equally horrible if they get to the toilet first, because my bike's usually next to it so I can't avoid the stench.

[andrewducker]

Oh yes. People that are a state of incapacity shouldn't be allowed to ruin the train for everyone else.

If they can clarify it to make it clear that they don't mean people who have had a few drinks, then I'd be a lot happier.

[fub]

The text specifically says "drunk", not "people who had a pint". I think there's no reason to fear breathaliser tests before being able to board the train.

[andrewducker]

I'd like to know what the definition of "drunk" they're worked to is.