Letters to the Editor
Malusinka
Published Letters: 368 Editor's Choice: 50
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Calcareous
[Read the article: Are women biologically drawn to older men?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Disease resistance doesn't have to be 100%. A slight advantage goes a long way. Mother Nature is wasteful. Sickle Cell being an example. If you have one gene for Sickle Cell anemia, your red blood cells are slightly deformed and you are quite resistant to malaria, but the blood cells aren't seriously damaged. If you have 2 genes for Sickle Cell Anemia, your red blood cells are very deformed and you are sick, if not dead.
So, to get the protection against malaria, you need to get one sickle cell gene and one normal gene. Needless to say, if you marry someone else with the same genes, you'd expect 1/4 of your offspring to have two sickle cell genes and die, 1/4 to have 2 normal genes and have no malaria protection and 1/2 to have one of each and be protected.
If sickle cell was uniformly bad, you'd expect natural selection to deselect it, as having 1/4 of your children die is fit.
There's a theory that the first genetic mutation in response to a serious problem (like the spread of malaria) is an inefficient solution, like that of sickle cell trait and malaria protection. Only when a less wasteful mutation arises would sickle cell die out.
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The problem with shame
[Read the article: Single mothers are ruining society!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]is that it doesn't help the single mother or her child. At best, it discourages other women making the same decision (or through not making decisions ending up in the same boat).
But, supposing shame has a deterrent effect, you're adding a burden to the single mothers, who have enough stress and problems without it. And the shame always got laid on the innocent bastard, too. (Isn't bastard a wonderfully shaming word?)
Shaming fathers who walk away from their kids might be worth it.
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We're not going to get a conversation about race
[Read the article: Moving beyond Obama and race]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]if everyone nitpicks. If people refuse to acknowledge the truth in Obama's words. How many white people -- whether they are predjudiced or not -- can truthfully say that if they were walking alone on a dark road and heard footsteps behind them and they look over their shoulder that the race of the person behind them will have no impact on their first, instinctive reaction?
If we can't say this, how can we have a conversation?
Because it's so easy to say that it's them. Those racists. Those red-state, red-neck, RARE racists. We loudly condemn them and that should be enough.
When in reality, the issue of what's happening on that dark road is complex. I lived in a black country for a few years where the political climate changed sharply during my time there. After I'd been hassled on the street because of my white skin, I reacted differently to strangers than I had before. I felt more vulnerable and I was less likely to assume everyone meant well.
So, I don't think the body language and facial expression of a black man startling a white woman on a dark street will be the same as a white man who has never been seen as threatening due to the color of his skin.
If we're going to have a conversation about a controversial subject, we need to acknowledge painful truths. And talk about them. And get over it.
But parsing every single sentence in a x-ray search for a shred of offense is going to get us nowhere.
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Is shame going to work?
[Read the article: Single mothers are ruining society!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]When I was in HS, one of my peers got pregnant and kept the baby. I wasn't aware of any shame. If anything, we thought she was brave. But, we went on to college, she got a job as a waitress. I remember having a celebratory lunch after graduating from college and she was working at the restaurant. I had my future in front of me, and she had a low-paying job and a pre-schooler. That's a pretty powerful lesson. With no shame anywhere.
And in communities where out-of-wedlock births are the norm, who's going to do the shaming?
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The whole voting system needs an overhaul
[Read the article: The Democrats' anti-momentum]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Lucky for the later Dems, they actually have a choice. Not so the Reps who live in any of the 10 TEN states left to vote.
Unless the parties do something to make a national primary, there will be an incentive to push primaries earlier. Who wants to be last? Who wants to risk having only one viable candidate left by they time they get to vote?
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Hillary's experience
[Read the article: The Democrats' anti-momentum]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The problem with Hillary winning on experience, which she may, arguably have more of. (It depends on how you count her years as first lady, a job that up to this year, has not been treated as a resume builder). But, McCain wins hands down.
If Hillary wins on experience, McCain can ream her on it. He unarguably has a lot more.
In fact, the election will be close and it will probably turn on an event. Say McCain gets a cold during the last debate and looks every one of his 70-odd years while Obama looks young and energetic. Hillary or Obama gets swiftboated.
The one difference between Obama and Kerry is that Obama has charisma and Kerry didn't. So when Obama gets swiftboated (say with Wright) people will be more ready to hear his answer, and judging by his speech on race, he'll give a really good answer.
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My first reaction was dump him
[Read the article: My boyfriend won't give me his apartment key]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]for being an inconsiderate ass. But then, I started thinking. You sound really nice. You sound like you might be the kind of person who avoids controversy. So, when BF comes back, maybe you say, "It's okay, I wasn't waiting that long." Maybe you say it after venting.
So, maybe he hears what he wants to hear. Other posters have told you want to do -- go home and wait for his call.
But if a big part of the problem is your failure to state clearly that his behavior is not acceptable, then you need to make sure that your needs get heard in the relationship. If you can't make that happen, you've got to leave him. And make sure you find a guy who listens to what you're not saying. Or learn how to speak up for yourself.