ethics & philosophy
ideals, breaches, disappointments and inspirations
Media Circus: Craig Thomson cleared of electoral fraud, let’s talk about something else then
Let’s keep a closer eye on the impact of policy and legislation rather than buying into the moving wallpaper ethos of personality conflicts trumping the actual political process, OK?
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Quote of the Day: playing the Game of Life on the lowest difficulty setting
A comment from Chuck Repke about 100 comments in on a post by John Scalzi, which I really recommend reading…
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That attachment parenting TIME cover
Annie Urban looks at how it’s so easy for the MSM to misuse the concepts underpinning attachment parenting to “throw some fuel on the mommy wars”
, and how motherhood is not a competition.
A little advice gleaned from Condescending Wonka
If, after saying something, one feels the urge/need to say: “I don’t mean that in a creepy* way“, THEN ONE SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER THAN TO SAY IT IN THE FIRST PLACE.
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Friday Hoyden: Sady Doyle
Sady Doyle from the fantastic Tiger Beatdown blog gave Hoyden About Town a shout-out in a piece she wrote for In These Times – Blogging Sisterhood: How feminist blogs saved my life. So here’s a shout-out back, to one of my favourite writers!
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Obama interview: “I think same sex couples should be able to get married”
Malia and Sasha, it wouldn’t dawn on them that somehow their friends’ parents would be treated differently. It doesn’t make sense to them and, frankly, that’s the kind of thing that prompts a change in perspective.
Stephen King: Tax Me, for F@%&’s Sake!
The iconic writer scolds the superrich (including himself—and Mitt Romney) for not giving back, and warns of a Kingsian apocalyptic scenario if inequality is not addressed in America.
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Mary Elizabeth Williams on the recent NYT motherhood click ‘n’ stoush bait
There isn’t much in the entire package that doesn’t feel shamelessly manipulated to incite an old-fashioned chick fight here.
Friday Hoyden: Joanna Russ
Guest post from Tansy Rayner Roberts: Joanna Russ is one of the mighty legends of the science fiction field that everyone needs to know about. As well as writing many important novels and short stories, she was a brutal literary critic, a brilliant academic, an unflinching feminist, and a devastatingly articulate commentator on gender, not only in science fiction but in the history of culture.
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My rant on The Hunger Games
Here be SPOILERS!!!
I’m interested in addressing it as an instance of popular culture that again has kids tearing through books, hungry for more, at the controversy and ‘moral panic’ that it seems to be creating, and in looking at the elements of what, for me, made it something out of the league of the ‘Twilights’ of the world.
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Numbers in the House
Speculation abounds as to whether the Gillard minority government will have the numbers on the House floor to pass the Budget on May 8 without Peter Slipper’s vote, especially since Andrew Wilkie remains rather miffed.
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How turning voters off politics helps US pollies get elected – will it work in Australia too?
Intriguing analysis in this post from Steven Pearlstein in the Washington Post, although Jay Rosen notes that he doesn’t cover the complementary role played in this game by the news media playing up the confected outrage.
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