Interesting Links for 18-12-2016

[andrewducker]

Peer would rather go to jail than pay for his train ticket like the rest of us (tags: trains money crime ) Switzerland defies referendum and won't impose EU immigration controls (tags: Switzerland immigration europe referendum ) Could the best way to make money from science be to give it away for free? (tags: research science money altruism )

Comments

[ext_2864067]

Peer and rail ticket:

He's being kind of foolishly stubborn, but I strongly disagree with the spin you're putting on this. It's absurd to charge £40 over a mistake involving an 80p price difference, and I can understand someone wanting to take a stand over it.

Masculinity and catcalling:

Refers to actual cat mating-related behaviours, i.e. obnoxiously loud yowling to signal interest. Pretty solid metaphor, really. Hard to call the term unfair to cats, unless one is viewing cats through very rose-tinted glasses.

[bart_calendar]

I was totally ready to be outraged by the peer thing, but honestly, the train company is being ridiculous. 78 year old dude bought the wrong train ticket. When told of his mistake he offered to pay the difference in price and they were shitty about it.

I've seen older people make similar mistakes on trains in France, Spain, Italy, New York and New Jersey and the ticket takers are always like "don't worry about it. just make sure you get the right ticket next time."

[bart_calendar]

In fact I've even seen it on the trams here. Old people who have bought a seven day ticket and it's like day 8 and they are confused because they thought it was day seven and the ticket takers are like "whatever, pops just be cool next time."

If he had no ticket at all that would be one thing. But dude either hit the wrong button on a machine or a ticket seller misheard him and because the price was so close he didn't notice.

[kalimac]

"78 year old dude"

That's what he is, yes. That he's also a peer turns out to have nothing to do with it. The link text for this one belongs to an article about some swelled head who thinks that because he's a lord he shouldn't have to pay for his train ride at all, not to the article it actually links to, which is about a citizen taking a principled stand against bureaucratic obnoxiousness.

[lilchiva]

Gender policing that calls out "fragile masculinity" is still gender policing.

[momentsmusicaux]

I think the behaviours and beliefs in that fragile masculinity article are all worth raising and discussing.

Taking the piss out of them however is not okay. These are people's hang-ups, mental blocks, social conditionings, and probably phobias. It's really easy to mock those.

[f4f3]

Thanks for the link to the piece on Ronin - looking forward to reading that.

"You threw away your sword???"