Digi-friends, Coded Companions, and Internet Intimates

 

Do I miss having real friends?

Well, not really. I never had any friends. Yet these Internet Intimates, Coded Companions, and Digi-Friends seem strange and unfamiliar by comparison even though I don’t have anything to compare them to. Sometimes, I wonder what it would be like to meet up with one of them. Not in a freaky back alley orgy kind of way. You sick pervs should wash your minds out with soap! No, wait. Bad idea. That will probably do some sort of irreparable damage. Just stop thinking dirty thoughts. You’ll be better off. How would their witty banter translate to conversations made with the click of the tongue instead of the keyboard?

 

Scumbag Subreddit: r/mensrights

The men’s rights subreddit (r/mensrights) has the dubious distinction of being the only subreddit (and there are *lots*) that has been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Here’s how they describe it:

Scumbag Subreddit: r/ronpaul

I don’t hate all Libertarians. They get a few things right here and there. And it can be useful to talk politics with them one at a time. They’re like Pirahna: one is OK, but get a bunch of them together and it’s a nightmare. And if they start talking about the one true Lord and Savior Ron Paul then you’re best off just making your excuses and getting the hell out of there.

Scumbag Subreddit: r/conspiracy

Reddit’s kind of impossible to pin down to one stereotype. It’s just too big. There are a few popular characteristics lots of redditors share (liberal politics and a love of smoking marijuana), but there are also entire subreddits devoted to their polar opposites.

So it’s kind of insincere for someone to say they love or hate Reddit as a whole since the people are all over the map on pretty much every issue out there. There are, however, subreddits that are just devoted to assholery on an epic scale. And that’s what this series is about.

Republican Race Wars! Muslims Invade Asia! Antivaccine Airlines! Breatharianism!

His misspelled sign burned in the fire before the photo was taken.

A group of religious fundamentalists were protesting the expansion of a mosque in their area. They said it was being built on land that was sacred to them and they did not approve. They said they would destroy it unless the construction site were moved. When they found that a worship site of yet another religion was already in the area, they then demanded that that site be moved as well.

This all sounds pretty familiar, but this isn’t about a few ignorant Christian yahoos holding their noses and using their vacation time at their shitty jobs to freak out about a Muslim cultural center which would immediately become a center for terrorism and Victory Mosquing in Midtown Manhattan. This is about ignorant Buddhist yahoos doing pretty much the same thing in Sri Lanka.

Dr. Rachael Dunlop Interview

Rachael Dunlop is an ALS and ageing researcher and Vice President of the New South Wales committee of the Australian Skeptics. She also won the most hilarious internet award ever. She blogs at Skeptic’s Book. We talk about science communication, homeopathy, the anti-vaccination craze and some of the other pseudoscience she and her fellow skeptics deal with in Australia.

Look At This Fucking Chilean Bike Race

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My Email Interview With Betsy Rothstein, the Brilliant Mind Behind FishBowelDC

Subject: WHY AM I BLOCKED?

Josh: Please unblock me immediately. Thanks.

Betsy Rothstein: who are you? Why should I care?

J: Unblock me right now please. Thank you!

B: Listen…asshole. Answer my questions and I might consider it. Anyone who acts like a jerk on the site can and will get blocked and I owe you zero explanation.

Best Korea’s Twitter Feed is Awkward

Best Korea’s Glorious Social Media Fails To Prevent Traitorous Imperialist Escape Plan

There’s this new study in Psychological Science I found via PhysOrg. Here is the press release for it, which is titled “People Who Cannot Escape a System Are Likely to Defend the Status Quo.” They had 28 Canadian women read about their country’s immigration policy. Half read about how it would soon become easier to relocate outside of Canada and half read about how it would soon become more difficult to leave.

Then they were asked about issues like gender inequality when it comes to wages, and the statistically significant trend was that the women who read the material about how it would soon become more difficult to leave Canada were more likely to defend lower wages for themselves. Here how University of Waterloo co-author of the study put it: