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  • Showing only topics with the tag "politics". Back to normal view
    1. "Children and Politics" - a 3 minute interview with British children before the 1964 general election

      This is short, but it demonstrates something that's been missing from tv for a while, which is the simple interview with children that recognises they are children but still takes them seriously...

      This is short, but it demonstrates something that's been missing from tv for a while, which is the simple interview with children that recognises they are children but still takes them seriously as humans.

      EDIT: Somehow I missed the main link, which goes to a BFI page here: https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-children-and-politics-1964-online

      There are some amazing old (1960s, 1970s) British tv interviews with children carried out by Harold Williamson. He asks children a question and then just lets them answer. There's no attempt to laugh at the children, and there's no attempt to say "zomg look at what this cute kid is saying".

      A few clips here, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06tq93b and there are probably more on Youtube: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06tq93b

      It's showing its age - "what would you do if your husbands went on strike? How would you run a household?" (asked of two girls) isn't acceptable.

      7 votes
    2. Discussion: Top 10 Stupidest Things US Fed Govt has done

      Okay, so this notion is still a bit undefined in my head, kind of figuring it out now, as I type. I want to come up with a list (doesn't actually have to be 10) of the worst things the US...

      Okay, so this notion is still a bit undefined in my head, kind of figuring it out now, as I type.

      I want to come up with a list (doesn't actually have to be 10) of the worst things the US government has done, to undermine the ideals and principles that the United States was (at least nominally) founded on ... truth, justice, baseball and mom's apple pie - kinda stuff.

      You can go back as far in history as you like (so Civil War, Dred Scott, things like that are absolutely open for consideration) ... but it has to be something that continues to significantly impact US govt, US society and/or the world, to this day ... something they have not remedied.

      Off the top of my head, the main thing that comes to mind is the Citizens United case, which I believe has fundamentally broken the US political system (which was, previously, already seriously frayed). I'd also consider the non-consideration (by the Senate) of Merrick Garland's Supreme Court nomination (by Obama), and the US (both the govt and the public) collective "whatever" to the news that Russia interfered in the 2016 US elections (and continues to do so, now joined by China and assorted others).

      I may edit this to refine the idea. But the basic goal is to create a really high-level list of "First Things" the US needs to fix, to have any hope of returning to a state of democracy (okay, democratic republic), and/or normalcy.

      5 votes
    3. Do Nazis deserve electricity?

      I'm reading about the latest Gitlab shakeup, about (not?) filtering customers on moral grounds. Yesterday, it was Github's decision to continue to support ICE. There's Twitter's decision to allow...

      I'm reading about the latest Gitlab shakeup, about (not?) filtering customers on moral grounds. Yesterday, it was Github's decision to continue to support ICE. There's Twitter's decision to allow politicians to (somewhat?) violate its own rules about threats and harrassment. Blizzard banned a star video game player for speaking out about the Hong Kong protests.

      I'm on Mastodon, and while it's faded from the headlines a bit, the Gab-war still rages there, with the Tusky-v-Fediverse debate over apps blocking domains, and instances blocking other instances over their support for yet other instances.

      Yada.

      I'm thinking a lot these days about the "slippery slope". Mastodon, Twitter, Facebook, Github/lab, etc ... these are all business(-like) entities, privately controlled, which are nonetheless approaching the status of public infrastructure ... at least, sort of.

      PG&E intentionally shut off power to millions of Californians last week, to prevent hypothetical fires. You see where I'm going with this.

      When/As smart capabilities for power grid, ISP, etc emerge, do racists, white supremacists, get Internet? Electricity? Hospital/Ambulance service? Where is that line?

      Is reverse discrimination appropriate? "We don't rent to racists..."?

      Not sure what I'm expecting here. Just starting the thread, see where it goes.


      ETA: A really interesting, thoughtful 2-minute excerpt from a Rogan podcast


      Edit #2: The Hacker News thread that prompted me to start this thread.

      16 votes