Letters to the Editor
healthyskeptic
Published Letters: 671 Editor's Choice: 14
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@Suzy Shedd
[Read the article: Battered and fired]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]That was some sloppy emotional "reasoning" for sure.
The reason she's incapable of childcare work, by her own admission, is because the injuries are highly visible on her face. And small children should not see that, by her own admission. So, no, there isn't any question she could not have done the job.
Nor could not have hid her injury as you allege, as it was serious facial trauma.
The only question is whether she should be given paid medical leave, from a kindergarten, from her first week of work, without any assistance from the state, and whether they're even financially capable of doing so. Or, whether in fact the state should bear the burden of helping her and the victims of crime to receive medical care and leave. I'm for the latter, as is every other developed country.
I think the people who expect kindergarten to absorb the cost of our social problems, as opposed to government and society as they do in every other developed country, well those people are serious dupes for the Republicans and some kind of idiots without the vaguest inkling of what the word "efficiency" means.
Our system is totally deficient, to the point where we're creating this grotesque debate about where a battered woman can go for a handout, because we don't have the social infrastructure in place to help these people, and would offload them onto the parents just trying to get their children daycare. Talk about sick!
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@BadReligion
[Read the article: Contraception, jungle style]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Why would science not exist without superstition? What's so hard about supposedly-common sense?
-- BadReligion <@blockquote>
That's a rather ignorant question and implies your opinions about science are rather mythical with a poor understanding of its evolution. But, as I was just saying, ignorance is natural.
And though your education seems rather less than it could be, you no doubt are better off than you would be without any education at all, and should you have children hopefully one day your question will seem rather naive to them.
At that point I expect they'll be knowledgeable enough to have rather less derision for you, and our ancestors' ignorance, than you have for today's religious people.
And that's called progress.
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@badreligion
[Read the article: Contraception, jungle style]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]According to the statistics I found, China's population is projected to stabilize around the middle of this century.
So glad you've put so much research and thought into it to assert conclusions confidently. :rolleyes:
China has a major population growth problem. They are trying to stabilize it. They aren't out of the woods yet.
Hopefully, a combination of their policies and natural forces (many of which are unavoidable and far crueler than any social policy, things like disease and starvation) will cause the population to level later this century, and then start shrinking.
If not, they will have a major catastrophe. China's population is totally unsustainable and if it grows much further will produce a major crisis. If Chin's existing population industrializes on existing fossil fuel technology and modern diet, the world would have an immediate crisis of food, oil, environment, etc. There simply wouldn;t be enough food and resources for Europe, the US, and other developed countries including china to co-exist. Some billion people or so would have to die.
Obviously the US and Europe and other developed countries should do all they can to avoid that, and partner with China and developing countries to find a sustainable route to industrialization. And we have to lead by example.
Regardless, China's one child policy is draconian but far more humane than the alternatives. Their large family culture is maladapted to the modern world, and needs to adjust.
Similarly, many of our social policies regarding consumption are also harmful, and we're seeing the fallout as we become increasing militaristic and obese to support our addictions.
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@jonswift
[Read the article: Boys just being ... sex offenders?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The problem with your argument is that you're presuming a woman should be able to "hit a man with a rape charge" just because they had sex while under the influence of alcohol and without further evidence it was rape and not consensual. As though causal sex places all burdens on the man, and awards the woman all power over his life. It does not.
Only militant feminists and militant lesbians want that.
Why should an ordinary, non-rapist, hetero man seeking consensual sex, have to fear he'll be "hit with a charge of rape" simply because he and she both enjoyed an alcoholic drink as adults? And if we were to make that the standard, then it should apply equally to women, and a man should equally be able to charge a woman with rape with a presumption of guilt.
Obviously that's a total distortion of our legal system, evidentiary standards, and the presumption of innocence.
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The judicial system is not omnipotent. It relies on physical evidence and witness testimony to acertain the truth.
In cases of he-said/she-said, where there is no further evidence, the judicial system is incapable of resolving the truth.
Therefore, it is beholden on all of us to avoid situations like dark alleys or dark bedrooms in the company of those who may take advantage of us. When we put ourselves in such situations, we are outside the view and protection of the law.
We can not expect the law to be biased to believe whatever a woman says wherever there is a blind spot. There is no rational argument that wherever the law is blind, believe whatever the woman says. That's absurd, yet, it's exactly what some militant feminists argue, that a woman never lies, though that's provably false.
There has been a terrible erosion of the principles of our legal system and of evidentiary standards and the presumption of innocence.