No, I would not watch

Gogglebox Australia: Here's what it is and why you would watch

I guess I have seen bits of Gogglebox for a total of aobut 30 minutes now.   I think it is an awful in concept and execution. 

That is all.

Does anonymous, informal, suicide counselling work?

Reddit and suicide intervention: How social media is changing the cry for help, and the answer.

Quite a detailed, interesting, article here on informal suicide quasi-counselling on Reddit and other on line forums.   I also learnt about one strange corner of the net that's new to me:

A couple of years ago, a mini-controversy erupted on Wizardchan, an online forum for reclusive male virgins. The site’s name is borrowed from a viral joke—the punch line is that when a man reaches age 30 without having sex, he’ll acquire magic powers—but the premise has amassed a base of sincerely dedicated users who go to the forum to comment on boards dedicated to hobbies, random thoughts, anime, and depression. After seeing that some posters in the depression board were discussing suicide plans and
self-harm, an administrator pinned a crisis hotline number to the board, encouraging users to pick up the phone if they were truly at risk.

Wizards were offended at the suggestion. This was a bunch of guys who had built a community around their own outsider status, and now some authority figure was stepping in to tell them that they had problems that needed to be fixed in the most conventional way possible: by calling a 1-800 number. The number was eventually removed from the board, and when one user recently suggested that Wizardchan bring it
back, another explained, “I think most people here are over normie advice, talking to some random guy who doesn’t understand where you’re coming from on the phone isn’t going to help them.” Another user said that hotline workers are just “not trained to handle the problems we face as [wizards]. It’s kind of sad how society treats us.”

More on the divided United States

U.S. runs hot and cold in record-shattering February - The Washington Post

I've been reading that the early indications are that February will be a globally warm month.

And, again, the reason the record cold in one half of the US does not contradict that is shown in this example of February temperature anomalies:

A shower time observation

I don't really get to see that many movies lately - and by "lately" I mean over the decade or so that usb memory sticks have become ubiquitous. 

Of all modern tech stuff, they remain one of my favourite.  Barely a dollar a gigabyte now, I'm just intrinsically impressed by their capacity, and continually marvel at the virtual library of information (or portable programs) that can, in theory, be carried around on a key ring.  I'm always tempted to buy a spare one or two when I see them on special at Harvey Norman or Dick Smith.

Yet for all of that, I would have thought that information stored on one would have turned up as a plot point in some spy or suspense movie or other.  Perhaps one could be swallowed to be smuggled out of a country.   Some important plot McGuffin could surely be built around what's on one of them.   Yet I do not recall a usb stick ever featuring in an important roll in a movie.  

Of course, it may be that I have just missed a movie where one featured.  So I would like to know if that is the case.  Or should I be writing the first movie starring one?  Perhaps the humans could be incidental to the plot.

Knox Grammar: the finest molestation money can buy

OK, this is one of those matters which is so gobsmacking it's practically laughable - more as  reaction of surprise than it actually containing humour, which it doesn't.   It's probably not even safe to admit to a tiny sense of Schnadenfreude, at least with respect to the super-rich fathers who sent their sons there just because their father, and his father before him, all boarded at Knox, and it doesn't really matter how the kid does academically, but the old boy network will see him into a good job.  No, not safe, and not very fair to the kid or even the father, really, but still.  No.  (In fact I should really change that title.)

Let's just go back to the original point:  the evidence of how they used to treat allegations of sexual interference with the boys at the elite Knox Grammar School in Sydney is pretty incredible.

The inquiry heard that a student came to Paterson in the late 1980s to complain a teacher, Damian Vance, had touched him inappropriately and asked him to engage in mutual masturbation. Paterson told the boy to go to the library and “think about what he was alleging”, he told the inquiry.

“He was a drama boy,” Paterson said as explanation for why he did not immediately believe the boy.

Paterson said he eventually believed him and counselled Vance but said he did not report it to police. “I was not aware it was a crime,” he said.

Paterson gave Vance a reference when he left Knox but said it had a code in it that signalled there was “more to say” on Vance because Paterson had written at the end he was happy to be contacted to discuss the reference further.

Paterson said it had not occurred to him the reference would be used by Vance to get another job as a teacher.

 Wow.   Then there is the next bit:

He also conceded he took more seriously allegations another teacher was giving senior boys alcohol and cigarettes than allegations he was molesting boys. He said he had since undergone a cultural change since the 1980s and now recognised the seriousness of child abuse allegations.

And another reference given to a man with serious, serious issues:

Chris Fotis was the teacher suspected of the groping and he was eventually dismissed after being caught masturbating in a car outside the school.

Paterson also wrote Fotis a positive reference when he left the school saying he was “enthusiastic for his job” and “meticulous in the standards he requires from students”.
He conceded the reference was “grossly inappropriate”.

Amazing.

I see that journalist and chronic bandana wearer Peter FitzSimons boarded at the school in the 1970s (and sent his sons there too - wait while I roll my eyes) and is rather incredulous as what is coming out of the inquiry too. 

It puts me in mind of the section of Evelyn Waugh's account of his early teaching career, and how an openly pederast teacher could move around, even getting better and better jobs - when he wasn't having to suddenly leave them in a hurry.   (You can read about it in this rather interesting account of visiting the former school where Waugh briefly taught.)

The difference is, Waugh was talking about the 1920's; this was going on at Knox in the late 1980's.

A plausible argument

Climate change implicated in current Syrian conflict : Nature News & Comment

The drought that ravaged Syria from 2007 to 2010 was the worst in that nation’s recorded history, devastating agriculture in the region. Roughly 1.5 million people fled rural areas for urban outskirts where, in March 2011, social unrest boiled over into civil uprising.

Now, researchers say that global warming helped to cause that drought — and,
by extension, helped to exacerbate the conflict, now a full-blown civil war, between armed insurgents and the government of Bashar al-Assad.

The study, published on 2 March in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences¹,
documents a century-long trend of increasing temperatures and decreasing rainfall in the region. Because the observed trend could be reproduced only when climate models took manmade greenhouse-gas emissions into account, the study’s authors conclude that global warming helped to drive the recent drought.

Sounds more plausible than the mere headline suggests, no?   (In an Australian context, it's hard to come to grips with the numbers involved in some of these drought/refugee situations around the world.  It's like the entire population of Brisbane and the Gold Coast relocating to Sydney - so hard to imagine.)

I'll also take this as support for my line that economists have no hope of working out the true economic effect of climate change in 80 years' time.

 

Even more Mars deep skepticism

Cosmic cabin fever: Getting to Mars isn’t the hard part — it’s living there | National Post

Although I mainly know of National Post for its hosting climate change fake skepticism, this article about the psychological problems that have been found on long space missions is quite good.  For example:

In space flight studies, the worst manifestation of this is known as
“third-quarter syndrome,” for its typically late onset in a mission. It
was shown for example, in the Mars500 crew who emerged in November 2011
after 17 months in an isolation pod in Moscow, with ailments that
included severe insomnia.

“I’ve lived it, and I can describe it,” said Pascal Lee, a planetary
scientist and co-founder and chairman of the Mars Institute, who has
done 30 expeditions to polar regions, including as director of the
Haughton-Mars Project in the Canadian High Arctic. Priorities shift once
you get past the climax of a mission. “You get tired of holding back.
You get tired of accommodating other people’s quirks and idiosyncrasies.
… It’s psychological erosion.”

Missions to the International Space Station have typically lasted six
months or so, and psychological research has shown, over time, negative
feelings get displaced onto mission control, breeding resentment.
People get irritable; they make more mistakes. They get cabin fever on a
cosmic scale. One study documented “psychological closing” among
astronauts, who picked favourites among mission controllers and
perceived others as opponents.

More Mars deep skepticism

Mars Missions Are A Scam - BuzzFeed News

I have argued for years that the priority for off planet colonisation should be establishing the true extent of ice water on the Moon, and figuring if you make that work.

Emulsified

Widely used food additive promotes colitis, obesity and metabolic syndrome, research shows

Hmmm. A mouse study testing a couple of widely used emulsifiers in processed food suggests that they make changes in the gut microbiota which are not good for us.

Most interesting comment in the report:

While detailed mechanisms underlying the effect of emulsifiers on metabolism remain under study, the team points out that avoiding excess food consumption is of paramount importance.

"We do not disagree with the commonly held assumption that over-eating is a central cause of obesity and metabolic syndrome," Gewirtz says. "Rather, our findings reinforce the concept suggested by earlier work that low-grade inflammation resulting from an altered
microbiota can be an underlying cause of excess eating."

Storms noted

I don't know what an average summer there is like, as it is one Australian city I have never lived in for any length of time, but it really seems Sydney has had an unusually large number of big storms this summer. 

Brisbane, on the other hand, has been hot but seems to have had fewer storms than average.  (Although the billion dollar hail storm was a big one.)

Cold beer

BBC News - Why Iceland banned beer

Here's quite a long article on Iceland's odd history of alcohol control, including full strength beer being banned for most of the 20th century.

For amusement, here are some more peculiar drinks from the island:

• Brennivin - a clear schnapps, made from fermented grain or potato mash and flavoured with caraway; also known as Black Death, which one Icelandic blogger
  says "explains a lot". She continues: "Many Icelanders never touch it,
  and a majority of the ones who drink it only do so when feeling
  patriotic, such as... when trying to impress foreign visitors."
• Whale beer - the Icelandic micro-brewery
  Stedji has produced a number of ales flavoured with different parts of
  whale, including Hvalur 2, a brew infused with dried whale testicles; Stedji's beer has proved popular in Iceland, although the company has been criticised by conservationists

Mixed emotions

Well we seem to be in one of those anomalous polling periods.   A couple of polls have indicated something of a move in voting intention back towards the Coalition, even taking into account the spectacularly ugly attacks on Gillian Triggs last week.   Just as with Kevin Rudd's popularity, there is sometimes no accounting for what is going on in the mind of the swinging voter.  (Is it tough talk on security, or the abandonment of a couple of budget measures that is doing the trick?  Some even suggest people are already factoring in a new leader, given that Abbott still has such a low approval rating, and they don't expect him to last to the next election.  Who knows...)

One thing I feel certain about, though - those who already disliked Abbott before the last fortnight have had the intensity of their feeling against him greatly enhanced last week.  I mean, probably half of his backbench feel that way too.

I presume this deflates the rebels in his own party who want him replaced.  Which, for those who want to see the entire party lose next election, is almost certainly a good thing.   Still, he does deserve to be turfed out after an embarrassingly short run - he really does...

Update:  I forgot to mention Chris Uhlmann's comment on  Insiders yesterday that Four Corners are doing a story around Parliament House, with rumours that they have documents that will be very embarrassing for Abbott regarding a deal to buy Japanese submarines.   Hope it's true...

When libertarian idealism hits reality

Krugman recommended this article about how Silk Road began with libertarian inspiration but imploded.  Here's the key paragraph that sums up what it's about:

Ulbricht built the Silk Road marketplace from nothing, pursuing both a political dream and his own self-interest. However, in making a market he found himself building a micro-state, with increasing levels of bureaucracy and rule‑enforcement and, eventually, the threat of violence against the most dangerous rule‑breakers. Trying to build Galt’s Gulch, he ended up reconstructing Hobbes’s Leviathan; he became the very thing he was trying to escape. But this should not have been a surprise.

It's a good read.

Still charming to read comments from a real von Trapp

BBC News - The truth about the Sound of Music family

I think most people know by now that the film bears scant resemblance to the way the real life story unfolded, but the family was not terribly unhappy with the way it was portrayed.  They wished the father had been shown differently, though:

Far from being the distant rather domineering father of the Sound of
Music, Johannes says he was "a very charming man, generous, open, and
not the martinet he was made out to be both in the stage play and in the
film. My mother did try to alter that portrayal for the film, but she
was not successful."

Is it really that bright?

'Bright Spot' on Ceres Has Dimmer Companion | NASA

I have been wondering whether the intensity of the bright spot(s) on the photo of Ceres is at least partly due to image processing.  They do say that the brightest spot is "too small to resolve with our camera".

It certainly looks odd. 

Possibly the stupidest Comment is Free column I have ever read

Give me cheap beer, or give me sobriety. Just stop this craft beer 'revolution' | Eleanor Robertson | Comment is free | The Guardian

I think it's just clickbait, actually.   No sensible person regrets the arrival of interesting variety in beer.  (She's right about the hops, though.)

Gift comparison

What Gillian Triggs has received in her office...

What George Brandis deserves in his:

(Nice bookshelf, incidentally...)

A tale of Tims

One of these commissioners from the Human Rights Commission was conspicuously at the Senate Estimates inquisition hearing this week behind Gillian Triggs in what was clearly a supportive role.

One of these Commissioners was appointed by George Brandis directly into the job, and went to the Opera with him in January this year.

One of these commissioners, according to one of his close friends, would become acting President of the Commission if Triggs were to resign.

George Brandis is claiming that he had information from inside the Commission that Triggs was considering resigning and wondering if the government would give her another job.  Triggs categorically denies instigating inquiries as to that possibility.

All very curious....

If Freedom Boy makes a clear denial of any involvement in this, I am happy to publish it...

Update:  it remains possible that this has all been a comedy of errors, with someone clearly supportive of Triggs within the Commission talking to Brandis about her feelings and accidentally giving the impression to him that a job offer would be welcome.   But it speaks a lot to Brandis' competency that he would in fact authorise any proposal be put to her before she resigned, because of how incredibly damaging it would look if it was rejected and leaked, but also, even if it was accepted it would raise eyebrows.   

And as for Wilson - I don't see why journalists should not be asking him to clarify, as a known friend of Brandis, whether he has been acting as his Deep Throat* from inside the Commission.    

* sorry, irresistible historical quasi pun.  No implication of actual, you know, intended...

Update 2:  Triggs has issued an emphatic denial of the version of events being circulated by Brandis, Bishop and their News Corp lickspittle Chris Kenny in the Australian this morning.

Brandis' statement at the hearing was this:

"I was informed on condition of anonymity, by numerous sources within the Human Rights Commission that that was so, and that Professor Triggs was taking counsel from individuals about her position and about what she should do. In particular, I was told that she was concerned and had raised concerns with an individual about the reputational damage she may suffer if she resigned or stood aside as president of the commission." 

Frankly, this does not sound all that plausible to me - that several people from the Commission would be telling Brandis what was going on in the Commission, on condition of anonymity.   The former Disability Discrimination Commissioner was on the radio today (and in the press) putting the boot into Brandis - and given the way Wilson was parachuted in, I would think it very likely that everyone who works there (apart from his opera guest) holds the AG in moderate to high disdain.     

Something weird is going on,  that's for sure.   Oh for access to some metadata, hey?

And here's Andrew Bolt, joining us yet again on the topic of Malcolm Turnbull as possible Prime Minister

Another Thursday, another Savva attack on Credlin

Isn't it fun watching Niki Savva explain in more and more explicit detail why Peta Credlin has caused deep unhappiness within the Abbott government? 

Something's got to give, Captain Australia.   Preferably, you and Peta.