Reddy

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 1, 2017 -> 12:59 PM) I admittedly haven't read these other accounts, but I suspect Spacey was considered more of a drunken pervert than a "molester." I get that sexual interaction with minors is considered rape/assault regardless of consent, but I suspect most that are around the industry assume a fair share of these minors are just as interested as these acts as the offenders, and thus justify their looking the other way in that regard. This as well. The reality in this business is that people will also do whatever it takes to get ahead. If that means put a famous person in a questionable situation for blackmail purposes, there ARE people in this business that would do it. Humans suck, all around. NOT saying that's what Rapp did. He's a pretty good guy from all I know. I haven't met him personally, but many friends have, and I've met close friends of his as well. But there are people who are ruthless on BOTH sides of this coin.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 1, 2017 -> 12:26 PM) Well, think about the courage that would require. And these are people who are trying to break into an industry and realize their dreams. Takes a lot to risk that. I assume some of these stories have been shared with journalists before and weren't published, for a variety of reasons. THIS.

This may or may not have been said. Sure it probably was. Only 8 people are dead because the terrorist was able to get a truck far more easily than a gun in NY/NJ/CT. This is why he had paintball and pellet guns instead of real ones. Have a nice day. Gun control works.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Oct 31, 2017 -> 09:20 PM) The "gentleman" was 14 years old at the time. Does it really matter? I mean... Yes? Obviously not defending, but there's a difference between making a move and the kid rebuffing it and actual rape. As for shame on us, there's nothing any of us could've said or done that would've meant anything. Rapp has credibility and name recognition. That's the difference there.

QUOTE (bmags @ Oct 31, 2017 -> 02:13 PM) That he was gay or a was a child molester and serial sexual assaulter? I guess I don't run in the same gossip circles. All of the above. I have friends who worked with him that he hit on and asked to stay over, etc. It was pretty well established that he's into younger guys. Like, to those of us in this industry this was pretty much a "yup" story.

And yeah, everybody in the performing industry knew about this. Hell, I knew about it. ETA: Re: Spacey

The next season of HoC was already going to be the last. This had been announced months ago, but Netflix would be stupid to pass up on the good press this gives them.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Oct 26, 2017 -> 09:13 AM) "it has been factually debunked with statistics". Agree. There is no way possible the most popular politician in the country would have won. Google Hillary's approval rating as Sec of State. Polls mean nothing outside of election cycles. Nothing.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Oct 25, 2017 -> 05:52 PM) You can't "debunk" historical counterfactuals, but the best argument against it is that he was a bad enough candidate to lose to Hillary Clinton There are plenty of takeaways from the election results that help create the argument as well. He didn't mobilize minority voters, and while he may have been able to flip Wisconsin, he would've likely lost places like Virginia in addition to Pennsylvania and Michigan (Philly/Pittsburgh, Detroit respectively)

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Oct 23, 2017 -> 05:36 PM) "Bernie woulda won" is still a big deal on the left fwiw. There's still plenty of fighting between the more centrist and more left wing factions. it has been factually debunked with statistics, but yeah. Thing is, Bernie himself is now the divisive figure in Democratic politics. See: Women's Convention fiasco. The idea that it's "his party" is laughable. Should he run, Trump will be re-elected.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 25, 2017 -> 12:15 PM) If the Parks system is truly about the parks, the cottage industries of tourist towns are second to the needs of the parks. Living in a fully pledged tourist town, I understand the municipal dependency of tourism better than most. A lot of the parks themselves are suffering from the ridiculous amounts of people literally trampling them. Like I said the recovery of Mount Baldy over here was a big eye opener for me. You're right, and the NPS is working hard on solutions they were planning to unveil over the coming months. I'm working at the National Parks Conservation Association. I have access to all of this behind the scenes information. Zinke decided to cut their knees out from under them by pre-empting them and making their jobs infinitely harder.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 25, 2017 -> 11:52 AM) We get this debate a lot in my hometown as we have an admission price to our beach at lake Michigan and hear this argument a lot. I really don't mind the idea of the people who consume the national parks the most being the ones who pay the most towards its maintenance. It also isn't a bad idea to push the cost to the point where it discourages some amount of visitations as a lot of parks are under pretty high stress levels from human interference and could benefit from a lot less traffic. Personally we have the Dunes National Lake Shore in Michigan City and I am just awestruck at what Mt Baldy looks like today after being closed to the public for about five years ago (remember the kid who fell into the sand hole). For the first time in my lifetime it looks healthy and beautiful. It has also slowed the movement of the dune away from the lake front. You have a fundamental misunderstanding about who this would affect. It wouldn't affect those who frequent the parks MOST (they would get an annual pass of $75), it would most harshly affect middle class families on their ONE vacation a year who visit during peak season because they don't have time off work/school any other time of year to go. This puts the burden of maintaining the parks squarely on the shoulders of the middle class, and it's abhorrent. This wouldn't even make a DENT in the deferred maintenance backlog. It would raise $70 million. The backlog is in the BILLIONS.

Only a bummer for out of town fans like me who love it when the Sox played the Yankees/Mets or now the Orioles/Nats. Otherwise it's all pretty interesting.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 17, 2017 -> 03:27 PM) I think it's pretty clear that he despises her on a very personal level. Doesn't make it any less absurd.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 16, 2017 -> 02:01 PM) Blames Trump for fall. Really?

QUOTE (ptatc @ Oct 4, 2017 -> 08:47 PM) I love this line. Hope you don't mind but I'm going to steal it for work tomorrow. Most of the common TVs at the university, lunch room, common areas, are tuned to CNN all day. This thread has really led to my disappointment in you.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Oct 4, 2017 -> 01:36 PM) The issue isn't thefts as much as it is obtaining them through gun shows and similar circumstances where they aren't registered properly. which is why that loophole needs to be closed yesterday.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Oct 4, 2017 -> 08:40 AM) this skews the results and conclusions based on that limitation. They really need to amend many of their conclusions. 1. There are between 300-350 million guns in civilian hands in the US. 2. Americans own more than half of the global civilian stock though they are 5% of world population. 3. Legal Gun ownership in US has declined from 49% of households in the early 1970s to 36% in 2016. 4. This means that on average, a gun owning household has 8-10 Legal firearms. A substantial percentage have a lot more. 5. Legal Guns are expensive so your average gun owner who invests in AR15s is not a trailer park dweller. He is a middle to high SES guy. The trailer park dweller could have illegally obtained firearms many do. 6. The HE is intentional. Most legal gun owners are men. In recent years, the NRA had made some marketing appeals to women but with modest success. 7. The vast majority of Legal gun owners are white. Based on GSS data, 90% of legal gun owners are white, same as it was in 1973. The share of whites in the general population is 65%, so this is an extraordinarily white bunch if the guns are obtained legally . 8. People don't own legal guns for safety even though that is the socially desirable thing to say in surveys. Remember the average gun owning household has 8 guns. What's the marginal utility of that 8th gun? How much more safety does it provide to make it a worthwhile investment? 9. In addition, analysis shows that people who are afraid of crime are more supportive of gun control. 10. Legal Guns are an expression of white identity, a very political identity. Through legal firearms, whites express racial fears, prejudices, and ingroup favoritism in a symbolic way. 11. Since the 1970s the NRA has funded and supported the production of hundreds of law review articles peddling very questionable constitutional theories of the 2nd amendment. They all cite each other and ignore serious historical scholarship. These theories found their way into Scalia's Heller decision (original but hardly originalist) 12. The NRA has used these legal narratives to construct a political narrative which is popular with the base. 13. In this view, gun rights are the most important of all civil rights because on them rests the right to vote and the right to free speech. Only by reserving the right to shoot government officials can a man be secure that the government will not be tyrannical. 14. This is an explicit rejection of Weberian understandings of the state. It is also illogical. But it is oh so satisfying emotionally. Who cares about internal logic? 15. When you start out with the premise that legal guns are the "first right" it becomes the uber litmus test. ANY effort to restrict guns is viewed as an attempt by the state to limit people's fundamental rights. It is taken as seriously as voter ID laws. 16. At a time when demographic change, a black president, political correctness, and the alt right all hit the same button of status anxiety, prejudiced whites feel uber threatened so this narrative works. In their heads it is real. 17. Given that this is about identity, the public health campaign of emphasizing the human toll of guns can't work. We need a very different approach." 18. Whites are the group the most often obtain their guns legally and register them. could be added See how this changes the conclusions. I've done enough research and published enough to know that inclusion and exclusion criteria change the outcomes. For example, most of my research is done on healthy athletic subjects. Would a new intervention that helps that group be applicable for use in a 73 year old sedentary person with a history of a stroke? No. I'm not saying everything stated here is false or misleading but you need to be very careful with using any research and generalizing it as facts when they have serious limitations. This is why there are perfectly valid and reliable studies which can show two opposing views in any field. The vast majority of gun deaths come from legally owned and obtained guns. YOU are the one skewing the information for your benefit.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Oct 4, 2017 -> 12:10 AM) Don't you hope/and or pray they stop? There has been a lot of progress with body cams, etc. Now we just need juries to convict. what progress? the cops still get off with exactly zero consequences.

QUOTE (Wanne @ Oct 3, 2017 -> 11:36 PM) Most political scientists and psychologists are liberals....so meh to your "research". I mean, most educated people in general are liberals. That doesn't change the facts and the data. Y'alls war on facts is one of the most maddening things about you. Facts don't change based on your political ideology, and to suggest that scientists and researchers intentionally skew and change the facts in their research because of their politics is pretty 1) disrespectful to their integrity and 2) would get them fired pretty damn quick. If there's absolutely nothing you'll listen to if it comes from a perceived "liberal" source, why do you even engage in discussion?

QUOTE (ptatc @ Oct 3, 2017 -> 11:04 PM) Is the data collected based on the legal guns and owners, illegal guns and owners or both. legal. obviously it's incredibly difficult to collect data on illegal gun ownership

QUOTE (Wanne @ Oct 3, 2017 -> 10:30 PM) I honestly find most of these laughable...and purely conjecture...but whatever. I will say this in regards to #1...I keep hearing all these numbers bandied about...but whatever number somebody comes up with...I'd add about 100 million to it. There's more guns than you can shake a stick at in this nation...you're just not going to change that fact regardless of what you do. The information all comes from direct research and studies conducted by political scientists and psychologists. But I'm glad you think it's laughable conjecture. The war on intellectualism continues in America.

Here's some info from political scientist Alexandra Filindra, a colleague of my Dad's, about the psychology of the gun situation in America: "Some basics on guns and why we are where we are: 1. There are between 300-350 million guns in civilian hands in the US. 2. Americans own more than half of the global civilian stock though they are 5% of world population. 3. Gun ownership in US has declined from 49% of households in the early 1970s to 36% in 2016. 4. This means that on average, a gun owning household has 8-10 firearms. A substantial percentage have a lot more. 5. Guns are expensive so your average gun owner who invests in AR15s is not a trailer park dweller. He is a middle to high SES guy. 6. The HE is intentional. Most gun owners are men. In recent years, the NRA had made some marketing appeals to women but with modest success. 7. The vast majority of gun owners are white. Based on GSS data, 90% of gun owners are white, same as it was in 1973. The share of whites in the general population is 65%, so this is an extraordinarily white bunch. 8. People don't own guns for safety even though that is the socially desirable thing to say in surveys. Remember the average gun owning household has 8 guns. What's the marginal utility of that 8th gun? How much more safety does it provide to make it a worthwhile investment? 9. In addition, analysis shows that people who are afraid of crime are more supportive of gun control. 10. Guns are an expression of white identity, a very political identity. Through firearms, whites express racial fears, prejudices, and ingroup favoritism in a symbolic way. 11. Since the 1970s the NRA has funded and supported the production of hundreds of law review articles peddling very questionable constitutional theories of the 2nd amendment. They all cite each other and ignore serious historical scholarship. These theories found their way into Scalia's Heller decision (original but hardly originalist) 12. The NRA has used these legal narratives to construct a political narrative which is popular with the base. 13. In this view, gun rights are the most important of all civil rights because on them rests the right to vote and the right to free speech. Only by reserving the right to shoot government officials can a man be secure that the government will not be tyrannical. 14. This is an explicit rejection of Weberian understandings of the state. It is also illogical. But it is oh so satisfying emotionally. Who cares about internal logic? 15. When you start out with the premise that guns are the "first right" it becomes the uber litmus test. ANY effort to restrict guns is viewed as an attempt by the state to limit people's fundamental rights. It is taken as seriously as voter ID laws. 16. At a time when demographic change, a black president, political correctness, and the alt right all hit the same button of status anxiety, prejudiced whites feel uber threatened so this narrative works. In their heads it is real. 17. Given that this is about identity, the public health campaign of emphasizing the human toll of guns can't work. We need a very different approach."

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Sep 25, 2017 -> 07:37 AM) All of your answers to why are in the Bible. The bible was literally created for this exact purpose - to explain the unexplainable and to make people feel better about tough things. That said... to me it's just stories to give people a reason not to confront the difficult aspects of life, and to make hard things somewhat easier to get through. In reality, life IS random. Good things happen to bad people and bad things to good people. Nothing is fair. I have a mentor who I've known all my life who's the greatest human on the planet - a composer and choral conductor who has worked with kids for decades and changed so many lives all over the planet. Got hit by a drunk driver, mangled his whole body including his right arm - the one he conducts with - immediately after getting hired to be the artistic director of one of the most prestigious choirs in the country. Boom. Life changed. Forever. I'm sure we've ALL got that story. But to me, running and hiding from it by telling yourself and others that there's some magical afterlife isn't doing anything to help anyone. I'm a rock climber. I have a lot of friends who climb. At some point one of them is going to die climbing. It's a given. Every climber has the experience of losing someone. But the reason we do it in the first place is because of how much we LOVE climbing, love the community, love to experience life to the absolute fullest. Climbing has taken me to incredible places, all across this planet, and I'm so grateful for that experience. I handle the tough s*** by immersing myself in the things I love, telling the people I love that I love them, and doing what I can to make this world a better place. I channel my pain into loving life and loving people. Because if I think that this is all I've got, and that there's no magical fairy land waiting for me, it'll make me bust my ass that much harder to APPRECIATE every damn moment. You handle these tough times by practicing gratitude - being grateful for the life you've led, and making sure the one you still have to lead is worth living.

Rabbit wins the award for biggest waste of time posts of the year. Goodness.