NeuroTypical

Correct. Protect, boost, make safe, level playing fields, give access to the same things the dominant peoples have. I get it. The D is diversity. The claim is 'we're all better when every voice counts'. The principles are love, understanding, learning about each other, and mutual respect. We're taught to search ourselves deeply for unconscious biases, and reflect on how they affect your behavior, and how your behavior impacts others. Yeah, the focus is on how 'the many' have been impacting 'the marginalized', but the principles are taught as universal. The I is inclusion. Make sure there's a seat at the table for everybody. Pay attention to the people who haven't historically been given a seat, or even an invite to the meeting or dinner. Just like the D, it's all about self-examination to understand problems those in power might have when it comes to inviting or including those out of power. And again, while the focus is on helping the marginalized people, the principles are taught as universal. Be mindful about giving offense. Understand that even if there's no intent to harm, your actions might indeed bring unintentional harm, and that's not ok. Think before you do something, on the impact it might have on others. There's no "yeah, those in power don't matter" happening with the D or the I. The E is where you get class warfare and 'screw the rich' and 'take the power away' and such things. E means different things to different people. Some Equity fans figure existing power structures must be torn down, so screw the Christians, and it's our duty to give intentional offense. There are also plenty of fans of Equity who don't believe you need to tear down existing institutions and power structures. Just be nice to everyone and focus on those who have less, and the reasons why, and what you can do with your privilege. Nobody is claiming oppression. We're claiming whether the offense was intentional or unintentional, it was still offensive. We're demanding to know if followers of DEI give a crap about giving offense, or not. It helps us figure out where you are on the E scale, and whether you're an intentional threat to our institutions and power structures, or just someone happy to see marginalized folks having equal access to those institutions and power structures. Don't mean to put you on the spot @Phoenix_person. I'm not demanding some sort of oath to defend the constitution or whatever. But yeah, we get to be offended, without claiming that we're being oppressed. And we get to call DEI adherents to task for their response. And point out any hypocrisy when the love and respect and inclusivity becomes hate and disrespect and excluding groups of people from the table of love.

Yeah, I'm half worried that Israel is going to finish up in Gaza, then focus the same sort of attention on Hezbollah. My other half worry is they'll skip Hezbollah and just take on the source, and go to war with Iran. Higher stakes, but defeating Hamas and Hezbollah won't end their problem. Proxy users gonna proxy use, and Iran will just build up new assets to replace their destroyed ones.

Ok, so it was an innocent mistake. Again, my DEI sensitivity training tells me that unintentional microaggressions are still microaggressions. I'm taught "We didn't mean any harm" has been used as justification for all sorts of horrible racist and sexist policies. Honest question to any of these people: Do you believe that targeting and offending a group without meaning to, is ok? I wonder if the DEI-adherents who put on the show should have some more training on how to not offend groups of people. There seems to be plenty good effort to not offend the world's 2 billion Muslims. How about an effort to not offend the world's 2 billion Christians? "I know, let's celebrate diversity and trans acceptance in the opening ceremonies! We can put on a feast of Bacchus type of deal!" "That's a great idea! Let's have our cultural sensitivity people look into it. Make sure they look deeply into history, culture, and practice of our historically marginalized peoples. We don't want to accidentally offend black people or women or NAAPI people or Muslims by putting on something insensitive to whatever they do. Do they have feasts or celebrations or anything like that? Make sure whatever we come up with doesn't accidentally cross any lines." "What about Christians?" "Pfft. Let 'em go cry to their magic sky daddy about it."

In the U.S., the homeschooling laws vary by state. Some states have quite restrictive laws that are similar to what you're suggesting here. Some states require that approved curriculum be taught. I live in Colorado, which requires certain subjects be taught, daily records kept, and an evaluation from a qualified person once every 2 years. https://www.transcriptmaker.com/2021/03/03/the-best-and-worst-states-for-homeschooling-in-2021/ Not sure if you've seen any of the long-term studies. Even though most US homeschooled kids are taught by parents who are not trained educators, they continue (on average) to produce superior results than their professionally-educated peers who attended public/private/religious schools. So no, on average, there is no 'great benefit' to be had by imposing trained educators on homeschooling parents who are already doing it better than the pros. Perhaps anecdotes here and there of discovered abuse might happen, but the data simply doesn't support your opinion. For millions of us, the "spirit of homeschooling" is one of freedom and keeping our homes free from the burdening overreach of government regulation and godless curricula. Yeah, it doesn't have to be government help. Our kids experienced numerous homeschool co-ops, run by mostly-mommies. More than a couple of the mommies were actually current or former educators, who would not let their kids within ten miles of the public school environment they worked in. Other degreed mommies had special needs kids that would just be better served 1:1, far superior to anything offered by the public schools. My daughters learned biology from a molecular biologist with a PhD, taking 15 years off of working to raise her kids. Music from musicians. Math from people who understood how to teach math. History from curricula. You don't need a degree in a subject, to be everything a child needs on that subject. One of the top three rewarding things I've done as a parent, was teach one of my kiddos to read and instill a love of reading. The last lesson was to read the word "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious". Now every time she and mom go thrifting, she comes back with 3-5 books for her library. Also, not sure what it's like in the UK, but here in the states, if you look at all the required classes for a degree in education, you'd see that perhaps less than half actually involve knowing topics that you'll teach. The classload for educators contains an awful lot of group management, and dealing with problematic outliers, and how to do paperwork and keep records, etc. At the end of the day, part of the purpose of formal education, is to have a place to send your kids so you the parents can have their jobs and free time and hobbies and social life and whatnot. It's a larger part of the purpose than many wish to admit.

I haven't watched the bodycam footage or looked into the details too deeply, so I can't really opine one way or the other.

If you want to strike righteous and civil blows against the folks happy about the trans last supper, you can point some things out. This is verbal jiu jitsu - using their own language to dump them on their heads: They're all in favor of DEI. Olympics spokesperson Anne Descamps is on record: “Clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group. On the contrary, I think (with) Thomas Jolly, we really did try to celebrate community tolerance,” Jolly is the ceremony's artistic director, he's also on record: "“We wanted to talk about diversity. Diversity means being together. We wanted to include everyone, as simple as that.” Ok, so trans inclusion is all about diversity and inclusion. They're all about love. Ok, fair enough. You can point out that they're not being very accepting of diversity or inclusion, if they're intentionally targeting a group of people for ridicule and mockery. They're all about people being able to be who they are without fear of scorn. Ask them if they are free to be people of faith and spirituality. If they say no, religion shouldn't be part of DEI, you can point out that they're in a shrinking minority of DEI folks who think so. Example: We all know how woke and DEI-friendly corporate America has gone. Folks are surprised to learn that almost 90% of Fortune 500 companies mention or illustrate religion as part of their broader commitment to diversity. (Up from 40% in 2022.) Perhaps it's time for the Olympics to learn a little from global companies that are actually remembering that the i stands for inclusion. If they claim it was an innocent mistake, you can let them know that even unintentional microaggressions are still microaggressions. You can talk about the history of "we didn't mean any harm" as justification for all sorts of historical abominations and tragedies. You can ask them flat out, if they honestly believe that targeting and offending a group without meaning to, is ok. Ask them the question. When they give the honest reply of no, you can ask them what they should actually do, instead of that weak crappy apology. How many of us have had sensitivity training? Maybe the DEI-adherents who put on the show should have some. There seems to be good effort to not offend the world's 2 billion Muslims. How about an effort to not offend the world's 2 billion Christians? And for pete's sake, do all that with love. 2nd great commandment, yeah. Can you pull it off? A conversation like that isn't the best time to prove that you're not a very good Christian. Following the 2nd great commandment will set you apart from the "that's muh hat" guy.

Fair enough. CPS has a noble purpose, but in practice it can be woefully unhelpful, or even harmful. The sad reality is that God, and most of our laws, seem to agree that the parents' get to parent, and have total control of their kids, unless they do something which causes them to lose their parent card. So that kid in your neighborhood might be on your radar as a situation you'd like to influence, but it's outside of your control. So the positive things people can do to exert influence: Suff like befrending the family, trying to get to know them and finding ways to love them. Child abuse hides in secrecy and shadows, its currency is fear and shame, for both perpetrator and victim. Such things wither and die in the light of love. Best way to make good parents is to baptize them. Might not be an option. If folks have a burning desire to help in general, they can volunteer and become child advocates. There is a never-ending flow of children moving through various legal proceedings, without any say in them. A child advocate who actually gives a crap about the child, can have a positive influence. Some folks care so much they become foster parents, even adopting. You are asking for an "alternative", but you didn't ask for a "good" one. When we have no power, there are all sorts of nasty tricks and vile things we can do to each other to try to manipulate some sort of desired outcome. They usually don't work, and sometimes you end up losing your soul trying to do something. So yeah, don't kidnap anyone, don't set any fires, no community meetings that turn into mobs. I'd also stay away from any attempts at public shaming. Some folks might like tactics like that, but I wouldn't try to get the local news to do a story, or hang anonymous signs, or make a fake account on next door to do some reputation smearing. Such things can be incredibly attractive options, but the end result is rarely positive.

2nd reminder I've had to give: People, be civil. When you are posting politics, pretend you are speaking face to face with the temple worker assisting you through the veil. Again:

I don't understand the question. This nation is sort of big on freedom of speech, people can pretty much say whatever they want, whenever they want to say it. I guess, what do you mean by "step in"? Government and laws and police are the only ways we the people get together to use force against ourselves. If any group of people use force against anyone outside of the law, it's not "the community", it's "vigilante justice" or "a mob". If anyone sees a kid being abused, they should report it. Evidence and photos or video helps, if it can be safely gathered from public view. Kids that might look malnourished? Call it in.

Yep. Those stupid bumpers were everywhere in the U.S. in the '90's and 2000's. Eventually they morphed into Chevys whizzing on Fords and vice versa, and sort of went away. That was the downside of Watterson's decision. But the upside has a greater impact and life!

Named after the philosopher or the stuffed tiger? Well, Hobbes the tiger (and also Calvin the kid) are both named after their 17th and 16th century namesakes. Also, with Waterson's decision to not pursue copyright protection, various fans have started the strip Hobbes and Bacon with a grown-up Calvin, now married to Suzie Derkins, with a daughter named after Francis Bacon.

Nice. “Brigham Young University is committed to academic excellence in targeted graduate disciplines, traditionally focused on business and law. The First Presidency is pleased to announce the decision now to create a medical school at BYU. A major focus will be on international health issues affecting members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Church’s worldwide humanitarian efforts."

Yeah, BP's post is basically my take on things. I'm not upset that the people were either clueless or intentionally insensitive. I'm more upset that Christianity doesn't have the same hold it had on the global culture in decades past. Such things wax and wane across decades and centuries. Christianity survives and thrives, even when it's a mocked minority barely managing to not shrink too much. 25-ish years ago Mormons were all worried and mad because one of our church leaders had been meeting with the Salt Lake LGB community, and the result was a jointly sponsored bill that both sides were pushing to get passed. It was rights and protected class legislation, that would ban housing discrimination based on sexual orientation, and also preserve, protect, and expand religious liberty. Many folks were ticked, but I wondered if it was the church just being prophetic about coming hard times, and laying up stores of goodwill and legal protection against future years of discrimination. The more I read about how the Catholics survived the dark ages, with their walled monasteries and cloistering and whatnot, the more it makes sense that the church is investing so much in airable farmland and temples across the world. Many years ago, I was at the Colorado State Fair hanging out with all the rugged rural wrinkly tanned working people. Evening social hour had started, and some folks were getting a little liquored up. I love people watching, and was sitting off in a corner with my diet coke. Some of the conversations were getting a little political and loud and opinionated. A gust of wind blew some old cowboy's hat off. Apparently, the people he was talking/arguing with didn't respect the blowing hat enough for his tastes. Someone stopped the hat from blowing away with his foot, and this guy saw it as intentionally stomping - an act of overt disrespect. He got louder and bigger and started offering to whoop people. He kept shouting "THAT'S MUH HAT!" I mean, he was in the company of people who thought he was a drunken idiot, you could see it in their eyes. But holy crap was dude angry. His hat was a part of his character, a symbol of his manhood, and it had been disrespected. Same sort of vibes happening with some of the Christian conservative responses to the "trans last supper". I'm a lot of things, but I'm not especially interested in being that guy. So yeah, I'll take Bird Person's take on things.

My Christianity doesn't really revolve around 500 year old artwork, or what people try to do to it. Come to think about it, it doesn't revolve around France or the Olympics either. I mean, I'm a fan of Christian symbolism and art through the centuries, and The Last Supper is certainly iconic and enshrined in our culture. But my Christianity doesn't really revolve around my culture either. Perhaps to the extent that I'm happy to have a ward family anywhere I go on earth, but that's it.

lol. Sorry definition #4.

Well then. I just discovered 2 new ancestors in my father's line. Thanks!

Well, the usual donors had stopped donating to Biden a month ago. Part of the mass-revolt that was necessary to get him to step down. So they're back up and running with a viable candidate now. It'll be nice to see the Harris/Trump debates. It would be very nice to see more of the measured and reasonable Trump from the last debate, and less of the old school rude insulting shouting-over civility-breaking Trump from all his other debates. A guy can hope. It would be weird if Harris played centrist and went after disillusioned conservatives. Not sure how effective it would be, but it would certainly be remarkable. If it's ok with y'all, I'll remain mad at Desantis for another year or two. "You should vote for me, because I'm basically Trump, with all the same energy and strength and policies and goals, except I won't form mobs, and I'm 30 years younger." All he had to say, dang it!

Military and law enforcement - two professions with astoundingly high divorce rates. Lots of temptation while deployed, and the traumas brought by the profession can be life-altering. Lots of loneliness for the spouse left at home, and "home" may hardly be an ideal situation with supportive friends and neighbors and ties to church. They can pull off a successful marriage. If they come out the other side of this together, they can be odds-breaking rockstars with a marriage stronger than most. It takes the intentional choice of both spouses to make that happen. Fingers crossed, book recommendation given, prayers offered.

Just a reminder folks, we have to keep things civil. Please remember the site rules: 2. Please be conscious of the fact that although Third Hour is aimed towards an LDS audience, that the membership of this site consists of friends from an array of different backgrounds, beliefs, and cultures. Please be respectful and courteous to all, and know that everyone who is willing to follow the Rules and Terms of Third Hour are welcome to participate and be a member of Third Hour. Keep in mind that anything posted, uploaded, or otherwise displayed on the site should be understandable to friends of other faiths as well as to members. Please define any LDS vocabulary that friends of other faiths may not understand (i.e. Mutual, Relief Society, and Deacon.) 3. Personal attacks, name calling, flaming, and judgments against other members will not be tolerated. 4. No bickering and nit-picking toward others. Realize that sometimes it is very difficult to be able to express how one feels through written words. Please be courteous and ask for a further explanation, rather then trying to attack and find holes in someone else's post. The site rules are sort of based on the 2nd great commandment. You're about to click "submit reply". Does your post have any love in it? Any of the exact opposite of love? Be charitable folks. [This has been moderator minute with your favorite mod-who-got-replaced-by-an-AI-two-years-ago, NTBot.]

Yep. A longstanding gripe I've had with the losers of the presidential election, going back a lot of presidents. I started getting ticked off about this phenomenon in Nov-Dec 2000, when Gore refused to concede the election. Broward county. Hanging chads. Election commissions that started counting ballots with one set of rules, and then changed processes to something that favored Gore halfway through the count. "Gore and his team of lawyers". Finally, the Supreme Court issued it's decision that said Bush was president, and Gore needed to shut up about it. December 12, 2000. The news media and the broad culture was chock full of Gore supporters and anti-Bush people who were energetically loud about how the election had been stolen. Anyone else remember the flood of "He's not my president!" bumper stickers? I think the last time I saw one was shortly before COVID, on the bumper of an ancient Subaru. Things didn't get that bad again until 2020, when Trump made it worse. As we moved through Nov and Dec, the news media and broader culture were ramped up to 10x the panic and hatred and namecalling we saw with Bush/Gore. I counted down the days to December 12, 2020, trying to remind people that they were freaking out about something that nobody freaked out about at this time in the calendar when Gore was calling foul. Then December 13 hit, and I got sad. And sadder and sadder for another 3 weeks when J6 happened. Yeah, Trump did it worse. A lot worse. But holy crap do people have short memories or forgiving natures about the history of "the other side of the fence". Preach, sister. I mean, I've given up hope that no matter who loses, the other side will call foul. But yeah, it would be nice if they'd actually wait until voting at least starts before people start calling foul. I mean, there's foulness in the air. The assassination attempt wasn't fake news. But the pressure to force Biden to step down was hardly a coup. Everyone who would like people to grow up a little, stand up and preach!

btw, I loved you in that one movie!

I haven't exactly followed him closely, so I don't know much. I have a favorable-for-a-democrat opinion of him for a couple reasons. Right after we were all sent home scared for COVID, I would listen to the daily Trump/Pence press briefing, and then the Polis briefing, and then the New York briefing. Trump/Pence and Polis seemed to have the same script. It was a mad scramble to get information out to the people, talk about what they knew and didn't know, answer a million questions from scared people enduring quarantine. Polis came across as a tired dad, trying to help his kids make it through a crisis, even though his kids all hated each other. And the immediately-politicized business closings, he (very quietly) kept the gun stores open. Compared to other blue states, CO was light on mask and vax mandates. He took a "please let's get along" approach. Colorado was (I think) the first blue state to lift the mask mandate. I appreciated and respected his leadership. Also, I don't think anyone even knew he was gay until after he got elected. It was never part of his campaign - he was content to be judged by his (leftie) merits for nomination and election. I mean, his husband has done his best to destroy the CO cattle industry, causing our good neighbors to sell their 150 year old multigenerational farm and beat cheeks to a more favorable state. Polis has done most of the democrat things and half of the progressive things. I will never vote for him because he's the opposite of a conservative. But he's not a raging lunatic or a wolf in sheep's clothing or an unthinking robot. If Harris was to pick him as Veep, I would take it as a sign of maturity and sanity from the Dems. And these days, I'm always happy to find a sign of maturity and sanity in the world. Low bar, but there it is.

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/3FcKsSJVzmRSddFP/

I could have done a better job at being grilled by congress. "Obviously we've failed in one of our most core functions. I'm in the process of figuring out why, and I will fix what's broken. If you need a figurehead to crucify, you have my resignation. If you'd rather ensure the correct people are fired, then finish with your questions and let me get back to my job." Literally all she needed to say.

Also, Biden is already not alive. You can tell because when we heard his voice, it was a recording. Kamala even almost messed up and called it a recording. You can tellllll!!!!!