essentialsaltes | Entries tagged with anger

Enjoyed a nice half day in Long Beach.

Went to two estate sales. One where Dr. Pookie picked up some more uranium glass. And the other where I got a handful of BCE science fiction books. Maybe should have got more when they gave us a pretty friendly price for the last day. The sign said $5-$10 for HB's and it was supposed to be half off. It was $6 for 4 books and small garden pot.

Then we parked on Ocean, and strolled along the ocean. Dr. Pookie tried out her new sandals, that have FUCK TRUMP etched into the soles. We slowly figured out the right texture and wetness to leave the best impressions.

May be an image of beach

We got some walking up and down the beach, and then to Gallagher's Irish pub for lunch. Kind of a sleepy 11:30 am vibe there, no doubt it's more animated at night, but they offer tots by the pound and have really fantastic onion rings.

Definitely a nonzero chance my rant at the Christian Forums will get nuked, so for the benefit of posterity:

A lot of people here seem to be confused about where the lines of division are drawn, and in particular where liberals might stand. Let me try to help explain more directly, at least for my own position, which some people appear to misunderstand.

More importantly, Trump-fans are missing a great opportunity to see me -- me! -- get aboard one car of the Trump train.

I, essentialsaltes, have unfailingly pointed to one particular political sliver as being antithetical to the concept of America. To wit: willfully ignorant and/or xenophobic Christian Nationalist MAGA.

If Trump obeys Elon Musk's directive to open the border (wider) to skilled Indian (and other foreign) workers, those enemies of America will be angry about it (as they have already demonstrated).

Christian xenophobes like Laura Loomer complained that the White House would smell like curry if Kamala won. Loomer apparently chose the lesser of two evils, so that only the Vice President's residence will smell of curry.

Christian xenophobes like Pastor Joel Webber complained that "it’s not that there are [just] different shades of white and brown [in myneighborhood],” he added. “No, it’s like full, straight-up Hindu garb at our neighborhood swimming pool that my daughter is asking [about and] I’m trying to explain.”

If Donald Trump puts a curry shop on every corner, I will feast well and Loomer and Webber will gnash their teeth at ten times the smell of curry and ten times the sight of full, straight-up Hindu garb.

SAFFRON MAN GOOD!

Likewise, the willfully ignorant often shun higher education and dissuade their children from it, thereby reducing the potential supply of educated, skilled workers.

And they chose for their champion: Ivy League educated Donald Trump, who sent most of his kids to his alma mater (sorry, Eric). Barron is not at an Ivy, but is at elite liberal NYU in elite liberal NYC.

And his Ivy League running mate (with an Ivy League wife).

And what prize did the MAGA booboisie win?

A South African atheist techbro scion of wealth reached for the largest megaphone on the face of the planet and called them all r-words!

The Nick of Time by George Alec Effinger is a rollicking time travel story that does quite a bit of reality bending. Part of it has a bit of the feel of the Jasper Fforde books, as our hero slips into alternate futures. So travelling to 1984 takes him to something a bit like Orwell's version. There's also a touch of 12 Monkeys as our hero from a troubled future goes back to the simpler time of the 1939 World's Fair. Not a great book, and it hasn't aged particularly well (I deem), but some fun ideas and passages.

-

The Voice of the River by Melanie Rae Thon

I think I saw this on some best fiction of the year list from way back when. I think the review waxed lyrical about what Wikipedia calls her "work that moves beyond and between genres as it explores diversity from a multitude of human and more-than-human perspectives." Having sampled it, I can appreciate the effort it must take to write like that, but I just don't find it rewarding. COULD NOT FINISH. I rarely give up on books, so this is a rare accolade [?] from me.

The Glass Hammer, by KW Jeter, bears the stamp of Jeter's mentor Philip K Dick, both thematically and in a character that seems very much like a stand-in for PKD. There are some thoughtful idea about reality and media scattered throughout the science-fictiony tropes and Dickian paranoia of post-whoops America, psychic computers (or are they?), new religions, and the messiah (or is he?).

A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy

Nancy L. Rosenblum and Russell Muirhead

The book makes the case (pretty well) that what we're seeing now, most notably typified by Trump, but by no means confined to him, is a changing nature of conspiracies in modern political life. And that it is corrosive to democracy and the nation and the very idea of that 'knowledge' and 'expertise' are possible.

The new conspiracism is something different. There is no punctilious demand for proofs,4 no exhaustive amassing of evidence, no dots revealed to form a pattern, no close examination of the operators plotting in the shadows. The new conspiracism dispenses with the burden of explanation. Instead, we have innuendo and verbal gesture: “A lot of people are saying …” Or we have bare assertion: “Rigged!”—a one-word exclamation that evokes fantastic schemes, sinister motives, and the awesome capacity to mobilize three million illegal voters to support Hillary Clinton for president. This is conspiracy without the theory.

For JFK and 9/11 conspiracy theorists, there was always a lot of talk about the evidence. Magic bullets, grassy knolls, the melting point of steel and so on. Now it's just smoke and bluff and bare assertion. Millions of illegal ballots? What's the evidence? At best you get allusions to affidavits that assert millions of illegal ballots. Referencing the claim itself is now tantamount to evidence for the new conspiracists. Obviously, this allows for a free-floating phantasmagoria of fraudulent claims. That lead to people shooting up pizza parlors or storming the Capitol. Anyway, more quotes that resonated with me.

The most striking feature of the new conspiracism is just this—its assault on reality. The new conspiracism strikes at what we think of as truth and the grounds of truth. It strikes at what it means to know something. The new conspiracism seeks to replace evidence, argument, and shared grounds of understanding with convoluted conjurings and bare assertions. Among the threats to democracy, only the new conspiracism does double damage: delegitimation and disorientation.

the new conspiracists call for repeating and spreading their claims—“liking,” tweeting, and forwarding. Repetition takes the place of organized political action. What Trump, for instance, wants is not the architecture of an organized political party or even an organized movement but a throng that assents to his account of reality. “You know what’s important,” he said about his fantasy of illegal Clinton votes, “millions of people agree with me when I say that. Affirmation of his reality is the key act

Representative Bryan Zollinger perfectly capture the ethos of true-enoughness in his suggestion that the Democratic Party might very well have brought white nationalists to Charlottesville in 2017 to create a violent clash: “I am not saying it is true, but I am suggesting that it is completely plausible.” The new conspiracism sets a low bar: if one cannot be certain that a belief is entirely false, with the emphasis on entirely, then it might be true—and that’s true enough.

When it comes to true enough, what matters is not evidence but repetition. Participation in conspiracist social networks triggers assent. Echoing, repeating, sharing, liking, and forwarding a conspiracist claim is a show of affiliation with others who are angry and confident that things are not as they seem. Conspiracist narratives refresh these passions by reminding members of the group of what they feel with renewed energy.

modern democracy depends on expert knowledge. This comes to bear especially in what has come to be called the administrative state, which comprises the myriad agencies staffed by career professionals who rely on specialized knowledge they create or draw on from research institutions and from civil society groups outside government. This is the basis for formulating, implementing, and enforcing public policy touching everything from safe water to consumer protection to interest rates and banking rules. These scientists, statisticians, economists, and ethicists are not elected; they are insulated to a reasonable extent from political controversies and partisan influence. They are “disinterested” as a matter of professional discipline and seek to apply impartial standards in the general interest.

These experts, of course, are the focus of a lot of the ire of the conspiracy-minded. Climate scientists, Dr. Fauci, our intelligence agencies, ivory tower academics

It turns out that conspiracist claims are easy to create, and easy for officials to embellish, endorse, or just allow to play out. What lies behind complicity by insinuation, equivocation, or silence? As we detail in chapter 7, representatives are vulnerable to angry constituents who subscribe to conspiracy. When reelection is in jeopardy, or an official is haunted by the specter of a potential primary challenge, silence or coy encouragement seems a safer posture than correcting the record and offending one’s supporters.

Closed to the world of shared understanding, conspiracism distorts what it means to know something. At a deeper level, the new conspiracists claim to own reality, and in doing so, they assault our common sense of reality. We experience a special form of anxiety and disorientation. We have been unwillingly drafted into a contest over who owns reality.

if the community in which we place our trust gets it wrong or is corrupt, then what we take to be knowledge may be unjustified and erroneous. Some put their trust in a community of scientists and public health officials who affirm that vaccines do not cause autism; others put their trust in an internet community of anonymous conspiracists who affirm that Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman is running an international child sex-trafficking ring out of a pizzeria. What is the difference? At the level of the individual who gets his or her knowledge from others, there is not much difference.

The difference is found at another level, in the characteristics that define the community whose authority we accept on trust. In one case, these communities are defined by their commitment to publicize the evidence on which their conclusions are based, and thus to subject them to the scrutiny of others. In the other case, the community is defined by access to private knowledge that is unsharable,

When we decide what community is worthy of epistemic trust, we are implicitly also deciding what it means to know something.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/973812.html

Xander Schauffele, citizen of Earth, wins Olympic golf gold

The meaning of this turn of Olympic golf ended up being that the gold medal went to that man for all nations, the polyglot delight from San Diego who stood for one national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” but could have stood for several. This 27-year-old with the Californian ease and the Taiwanese mother raised in Japan and the French-German father finally won a big-deal tournament after inveterate contention in golf majors, whereupon he gave an Olympian answer to an Olympian question about the values of multi-nationalism and travel upon this planet.

“I think that I can just use myself as an example,” Xander Schauffele said after one-shot win over Rory Sabbatini, the South Africa-born, 45-year-old multinational playing for Slovakia. “I’m the only natural-born citizen in my family [of four], being born in the United States … I think that being very international, it’s taught me a lot about different cultures and it’s made me very understanding of different cultures. I think that if everyone sort of had the ability to travel more and experience other cultures, they would be more willing to get along, potentially.”

He could look over at the bronze medalist and say, as an American, “Yeah, my fellow countryman right next to me. My mom was born in Taiwan, so actually by blood I’m half-Taiwanese.”

--

In Orange County, Anti-Vaccine Activists Attack Top Elected Official For His Vietnamese Heritage

But at this week’s unruly meeting, anti-vax sentiments turned into a torrent of racist and xenophobic tirades against [Republican] Supervisor Andrew Do, the board’s chair, who is of Vietnamese descent. In his role as board chair, he has been directing the county's COVID prevention efforts.

One speaker who identified himself as Tyler Durden, a character from the film Fight Club, blasted Vietnam’s COVID quarantine policies and said to Do: “You come to my country, and you act like one of these communist parasites. I ask you to go the f—k back to Vietnam!”

Do was a refugee whose family fled the communist regime in Vietnam and has lived in the U.S. for 46 years.

Another speaker said: “You have the audacity to come here and try to turn our country, Andrew Do, into a communist country. Shame on you!”

“You talked about escaping communism this morning,” said yet another speaker. “Why are you bringing communism to Orange County? We want our freedoms. We're Americans, we have freedoms.”

Do is an outspoken critic of communism and perhaps the best-known Vietnamese American leader in Southern California. Some critics say his measures to combat COVID have not been aggressive enough compared to neighboring Los Angeles County, and they find it ironic that anti-vaccine activists are focused on him.

"I think most people look at Andrew Do and say he's certainly not at the vanguard of some of these efforts to limit COVID," Min said.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/973217.html

From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds, by Daniel Dennett (my spirit animal)

In many ways this book ties together a lot of Dennett's idea from different areas of his interest: primarily evolution and consciousness. I think he tries too hard to smash them together into something that looks like a broader worldview, but I'm not sure he succeeds. I'm definitely on board with much of what he says, but then the intervening spit and glue that holds it together just doesn't come together into a picture for me. My verdict: just go read Consciousness Explained one more time. His best book on his hardest subject.

When the Sleeper Wakes, by HG Wells

One of those ancient SF stories that everyone recognizes and no one reads. And now I know why. Our hero falls into a strange trance and lives on through centuries. His cousin providentially invests his money wisely, and When the Sleeper Awakes, he owns half the planet. The planet is being run, more or less, by a council of capitalist pigs, while The Sleeper has sympathies with the downtrodden people.

Wells gets some things extremely right about the future: windmills for power generation, annoying advertising, capitalist pigs. And of course, many ludicrously wrong things: moving sidewalks instead of streets to carry people around.

Anyway, after the Sleeper Awakes, there is a far too overlong section of tedious chases and alarums as the people and the powers that be fight, while the Sleeper is largely a figurehead or in hiding. And then finally, the powers that be try that one thing -- that last straw to break the camel's back and get the Sleeper to exert his power and influence to overthrow the status quo. The powers that be attempt to use black people as policemen.

“I have been thinking about these negroes. I don’t believe the people intend any hostility to me, and, after all, I am the Master. I do not want any negroes brought to London. It is an archaic prejudice perhaps, but I have peculiar feelings about Europeans and the subject races. Even about Paris—”

Ostrog stood watching him from under his drooping brows. “I am not bringing negroes to London,” he said slowly. “But if—”

“You are not to bring armed negroes to London, whatever happens,” said Graham [the Sleeper - aka the Master]. “In that matter I am quite decided.”

Ostrog, after a pause, decided not to speak, and bowed deferentially.

Guess who orders black policemen despite explicit instructions not to?

“These negroes must not come to London,” said Graham. “I am Master and they shall not come.”

Ostrog glanced at Lincoln, who at once came towards them with his two attendants close behind him. “Why not?” asked Ostrog.

“White men must be mastered by white men.

So the Sleeper puts on his MBGA hat and puts a stop to this nonsense. As long as I'm spoiling this craptastrophic book, he also gets the girl with the goo-goo eyes and trembling lips.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/960488.html

DURBIN: I — I’ll just say this: If you, Judge Kavanaugh, turned to Don McGahn and to this committee and say, “For the sake of my reputation, my family name, and to get to the bottom of the truth of this, I am not going to stay — be an obstacle to an FBI investigation,” I would hope that all the members of the committee would join me in saying, “We’re going to abide by your ... wishes, and we will have that investigation.”

KAVANAUGH: I — I welcome whatever the committee wants to do, because I’m telling the truth.

DURBIN: I want to know what you want to do.

KAVANAUGH: I — I’m telling the truth.

DURBIN: I want to know what you want to do, Judge.

KAVANAUGH: I’m innocent. I’m innocent of this charge.

DURBIN: Then you’re prepared for an FBI investigator…

KAVANAUGH: They don’t reach conclusions. You reach the conclusion, Senator.

DURBIN: No, but they do investigate questions.

KAVANAUGH: I’m — I’m innocent.

...

DURBIN: I’m asking about the FBI investigation.

KAVANAUGH: They’re — the committee figures out how to ask the questions, I’ll do whatever. I’ve been on the phone multiple times with committee counsel. I’ll talk to…

DURBIN: Judge Kavanaugh, will you support an FBI investigation…

KAVANAUGH: … I’ll do — I’ll…

DURBIN: … right now?

KAVANAUGH: … I — I will do whatever the committee wants to…

IANAL, and I can hypothetically imagine that this is how a lawyer (or judge) should answer these questions. Nobody idly invites an FBI investigation. But for me, this weaseliness is where Kavanaugh failed the job interview.

<HR>

The whole situation also brought to mind a weird conversation that came up when I was teaching at the girls' high school. Somehow the topic of fraternities and frat parties came up. Now, my vast experience of frat parties amounts to one (perhaps not coincidentally, I was asked by a girl at the dorms, who wanted a male friend along). But having lived in an apartment building next door to a frat house, I had other observations and smellservations to judge from.

Anyway, I cautioned the girls to be wary of fraternities and not to go alone to parties. And I got a lot of pushback. No way! These were exciting boys with nice cars and excellent job prospects. And I soon felt I was just digging a hole -- I was protesting too much, probably couldn't get in, sour grapes.

Anyway, as an entitled white dude, it's easy for me to look at groups of entitled white dudes and recognize them doing entitled white dude things. And nothing in the general description of the party life in Kavanaugh's background is in the least bit surprising or eye-opening. And nothing in Kavanaugh's petulant display is either. Or the treatment he's receiving in the Senate. Not sure where I was going with this. Just venting.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/959611.html

Educated , by Tara Westover, is another book pick of the NYT/PBS Now Read This book club.

Westover grew up in Idaho in a strict Mormon family that stands out even among Mormon families in Idaho. Her father was not merely religious, but mistrustful of the government, doctors, vaccinations, medicine, education. Tara (after the fact) diagnoses him with bipolar disorder, but it's hard to separate mental illness from the extremes of conspiratorial antigovernment survivalist thinking. At any rate, while some of her older siblings had some schooling, Tara as the youngest grew up during the most extreme era of dad's thinking. She didn't go to school at all, and it would be charitable to call her home life 'unschooling'. Not only that, but she didn't have a birth certificate until she was 9.

Mom makes herbal remedies and gets training as a midwife. Dad makes a living at scrap dealing. Much of her childhood reminiscences are of horrible industrial accidents caused by willful negligence on her father's part, usually with her or her siblings as the victims. One brother somehow studies enough to go to college, and form a role model for her. She studies enough to get a decent ACT score and get admitted to BYU, where she is soon a fish out of water, even moreso than you or I would be at BYU, but for different reasons.

One significant event is a lecture class where she has to ask what the word "Holocaust" means. That's how profound her ignorance was. And although her ignorance was 'honest', being ignorant of the Holocaust was probably too close to Holocaust-denial, so she faced a certain amount of moral censure from the class.

I wish there were more details like this included, that track the change from ignorance to knowledge, or from false knowledge to true knowledge (as when she slowly comes to understand that aspirin and antibiotics are not, in fact, poisons.)

But while her life story is certainly one of gaining degrees at BYU and Cambridge and Harvard, there is not enough insight (to satisfy me) about how her worldview changes. The actual story she's telling is more about the increasing distance between her and her parents (and the shifting alliances among siblings and other relations).

Perfect segue into Far Cry 5, set in the Mountain West, where a religious cult with doomsday prepper attitudes takes over a county. It's not much of a stretch to cast Tara's family as the bad guys. As a rookie law enforcement agent, you get sent in to arrest the head of the cult. Let's just say it doesn't go well, and pretty soon, you're in Far Cry mode. Hiding in the bushes with a bow and arrow, slowly taking out the bad guys and liberating territory for decent folk.

Now coming from a series which has been justly criticized for regressive attitudes, this entry sends some subliminal prosocial attitudes. Sure, it's violent as fuck as you kill bad guys with bigger and larger explody things (although the bow and arrow combat system is still extremely satisfying). But the bad guys are anti-government forces. And you slowly gather allies among the good honest folk. When you take over an outpost, you literally put up an American flag. Now, if this were set in the Middle East or Africa, it would be jingoistic colonialism (and most of the rest of the Far Cry series has been set in remote parts of the world where it's been easy to see it as white dude versus nonwhite dudes.) But here they've twisted it around, and made the treasonous rebel scum the enemy. America, Fuck Yeah!

Lots of good stuff to flesh out the game. Some good creepy music from the cult. A few hilarious characters ("I've been shot!... In the wiener!"). Recreating the stunts of daredevil Clutch Nixon. And the simple joy of slinking around a compound with Peaches the mountain lion, slaughtering cultists.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/957442.html

There's been quite the confluence of events. Buzzfeed (don't laugh) ran a deeply researched article about Lawrence Krauss and a number of sexual allegations against him. None violent, but sleazy. Apparently enough to warrant being banned from a couple campuses where he used to work. While I was dimmmmmly aware, for me it was basically internet gossip about someone I don't really know.

I found the article convincing, and icky enough that it bothered me that I remembered that Krauss was a fellow of CSI (nee CSICOP). And I went to the trouble of checking their page of fellows to be sure.

And there are two things that probably made that association leap to my mind. Number one, another Fellow is Benjamin Radford, and he too has been associated with some similar accusations (starting from incidents after a consensual relationship turned sour). Again, I am not the insider here, but I gather that Barry Karr [or maybe Ron Lindsay -- like I said, I'm not an insider] made an investigation, meted out some punishment, and I don't know the ins and outs, other than to say that Radford is still a Fellow, as is his most noteworthy accuser (from where I sit, not being close to any of this). So I feel confident that something was done with at least some semblance of justice. But the episode also pulled additional anonymous whispers out of the ether.

The second thing that probably kept it fresh in my mind was that the latest issue of Skeptical Inquirer noted that Susan Gerbic had been made a Fellow. This was surprising, because most of the Fellows are members of the professoriate in disciplines from physics to psychology. And Susan runs the guerrilla skeptics on wikipedia. I mean, if done right, obviously it's to everyone's benefit for Wikipedia to be accurate, and credulous viewpoints need to be countered by skeptical ones. But...

#1: my brief foray into Wikipedia editing convinced me that it takes a certain kind of person to enjoy and win the Wikipedia editing game. And it isn't me. And I'm vaguely suspicious of the people who find themselves at home in that environment.
#2: Susan's common appearances on the Skepticality podcast did not impress me favorably. In addition to her stated work to push an agenda, it was clear she was also generally a shill for conferences and meetings, etc. Some of the things that pushed me away from greater involvement in organized skepticism (it was not enough that I volunteered to be part of the Independent Investigations Group (an organization I helped name) but to stay in, one would be required to take classes for money -- fuck that).
#3: In short, rather than a skeptic, she strikes me more as a True Believer. Our side is right, and this justifies almost anything.
#4: More recently, I see that Susan is essentially defending Radford on his Wiki page (see the Talk) to keep the page clean of talk of the accusation. Now I don't know that it's notable or meets Wikipedia's standards, but it does bother me that it seems that the truth is less important than defending the people in one's camp.

Anyhoo, this had me thinking about CSI having two fairly well documented pervs among its Fellows (and I wasn't so hot about the merger between CFI and the Dawkins Foundation). And so for a long time (when I only knew of one perv) I was reconsidering the bequest in my will to CSICOP. And now there were (at least) two pervs. Now when you look at the list... there are a lot of people I admire, from Susan Blackmore to Daniel Dennett to EC Krupp to Joe Nickell to Bob Park to Eugenie Scott. Maybe two bad eggs isn't too bad a proportion? On the other hand, there's more than enough star power that I really wish they'd get rid of any bad eggs. After appropriate scrutiny.

And then my stepdad died last week. And I read through his will. And I thought a lot more about my own.

And then a miracle... Lawrence Krauss was (at least temporarily) un-Fellowed from CSI. And I note that between looking at the CSI Fellows page a few days ago and now, Susan Gerbic has also vanished from the list, shortly after arriving. This I assume(?) is at her behest.

So we're back down to one perv (that has come to my attention) who served metaphorical time for one incident. All cool?

(Thank lackofgod that pervy Mike Shermer has an entirely separate Skeptic organization for me to shun. It's true, I shunned him for being dumb long before I knew about any pervy accusations, but every little bit helps. Also a shame that James Randi (who gave his name to yet a third skeptic organization) turned a blind eye to Shermer being 'a bad boy on occasion'.)

Seems like I'm down on all the skeptical organizations, but hey it's just some of the people and the organizations that suck. Not the ideas or the truth of the matter. And possibly CFI/CSI has taken a small step to suck less... and can stay in my will.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/955075.html

Tuesday

OldWiseGuy's link: whites are almost TWICE as likely to be killed by police officers.

According to data from the Centers for Disease Control, between 1999 and 2011, 2,151 whites died as a result of being shot by police compared to 1,130 blacks.

essentialsaltes: The bolded text is a lie. An obvious lie. A childish lie. Only the innumerate would fall for such a transparent lie.

OldWiseGuy: 1.9 times is "almost twice" (unless my math is off).

Iluvatar: Do you know what percentage of the population is made up by blacks? Do you know why that's important to your argument?

OldWiseGuy: So what is the "truth of the matter"?

essentialsaltes: Iluvatar ... and I have been trying to help you find the truth for yourself. Start with iluvatar's questions

Wednesday

OldWiseGuy: I asked for your opinion, not help with mine.

essentialsaltes: Sorry, no. You asked for the truth. The truth is independent of opinion.

You can find it if you go about the process with an honest and unbiased mind. If I just give it to you, you'll just reject it. Go back and answer Iluvatar's questions. You'll find it for yourself.

[TL;DR]

essentialsaltes: Excellent. Do you agree then, that it is not a fact (or a statistic) that "whites are almost TWICE as likely to be killed by police officers."

Thursday

OldWiseGuy: I already conceded that point, in post 29. You're beating a dead horse here.

Saturday

2Timothy2:15: Here are some more stats. Stats clearly show that more white people are killed by police year over year than any other race.

essentialsaltes: Yes, and more right handed people are on death row than left handers. That's not the relevant statistic.

Even our local curmudgeon OldWiseGuy conceded this point. Black people are more likely to be killed by police, year after year. That is the relevant statistic.

2Timothy2:15: If black people are more likely to be killed the numbers would match, which they don't.

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/951176.html

Remember when I suggested that scientismists would require Queen Elizabeth to pump out hundreds of eggs a day? That's pretty close to this guy.

given the great demands placed on the female body during homo sapiens’ lengthy gestation and lactation period, would it be wrong for me to suggest that encouraging males to select mates based on characteristics that enable the female to generate wealth independent of a mate rather than on their ability to bear children may have long term negative effects on the species. or is that just the crazy in me talking?

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/950563.html

"I never could stomach these nationalists," he exclaimed. "The destiny of Man is to unite, not to divide. If you keep on dividing, you end up as a collection of monkeys throwing nuts at each other out of separate trees."

"I see what you think you mean," said the magician, "but you are wrong. There is no excuse for war, none whatever, and whatever the wrong which your nation might be doing to mine -- short of war -- my nation would be in the wrong if it started a war so as to redress it. A murderer, for instance, is not allowed to plead that his victim was rich and oppressing him -- so why should a nation be allowed to? Wrongs have to be redressed by reason, not force."

[Sir Kay probes the argument.]

Merlyn was annoyed.

"Only because you want it to seem so," he said. "Obviously Lot would be the aggressor, for making the threat of force. You can always spot the villain, if you keep a fair mind. In the last resort, it is ultimately the man who strikes the first blow ... if there is nothing else to decide by"

Crossposts: https://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/949556.html

It came from the Christian Forums...

Moron: "a single volcanic eruption releases more polution than all of mankind has throughout our history combined"

me: False (provides evidence)

Moron: The problem is that a lot of the data surrounding human CO2 output has been based on lies and misinformation over the years, so there's really no way to affirm they are using reliable and factual data. They may be right. No way for either side to know for sure.

It must be very curious to live in a world of nebulous clouds where nothing can be known.

Luckily we are not in that position. Just as a for instance, "In 2016, about 143.37 billion gallons (or about 3.41 billion barrels1) of finished motor gasoline were consumed2 in the United States"

Very few people are using it to fill their swimming pools, so if it is combusted in motor vehicles, each gallon of fuel produces "About 19.6 pounds of CO2"

(140 billion gallons) times (20 pounds of CO2/gallon) = 2800 billion pounds = more than 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide.

From my first link, "A 2013 review attempted to estimate the annual contribution of CO2 emitted from all volcanoes (active and passive) and other tectonic sources on Earth per year, coming up with a figure of 540 megatons per year" i.e. 0.54 billion tons

So the US consumption of motor fuel alone produces more CO2 than the output of all the world's volcanoes.

This is how we can know that your original statement is just false, and there is a way to know for sure.

Crossposts: http://essentialsaltes.livejournal.com/946464.html

"The book is regularly listed as one of the best non-fiction books of the 20th century."

But I gave up. I couldn't take any more. (Speaking of giving up, I'm slowly figuring out what to do and where to go with the journal. I mean, just about everyone's gone already, and the new Russian TOS is not inspiring confidence.)

I really found the writing style(?) uncongenial. I think my main beef is that Arendt is primarily a political theorist and philosopher, and not a historian. So there are airy passages of theses and ideas, but I found it not tied enough to supporting factual detail. Often a reasonable story was being spun, but it all felt like a free-floating structure, moored only by tenuous lines to shore. And worse.

The book is organized in three main sections: Antisemitism, Imperialism, and Totalitarianism.

The most interesting idea I found in Antisemitism was that, in the feudal age, Jews could be categorized and understood as the Other. It was easy. Sure, there's an enclave of Jews in Paris. But we're Franks, and they are Jews. Or we are Teutons, and they are Jews. As the modern nation-state developed, suddenly everyone had to be categorized as citizens of some nation. What? We're all French? But they're Jews, they're not French! (I don't think Arendt mentions it, but it occurs to me that another state-less people that had maybe even more difficulty getting tied down to a world of 'nations' were the Romany.)
Many, many pages are devoted to the Dreyfus Affair, but I found it maddening that it mostly talks around the Dreyfus Affair, and not really about the Dreyfus Affair. I mean, it's a good thing I knew the basic details, because you will learn more about Zola than Dreyfus (the first foreshadowing of what ultimately made me throw the book across the... okay, okay, to snap my iPad shut quite forcefully).

The most interesting idea I found in the first 75% of Imperialism, was that one of the things that led to imperialism was there was excess capital in the major European countries, and there was nothing much to invest in. And there was some excess labor force in these countries with nothing to do. And imperialism is the outlet for this. Betraying some Marxist tendencies, Arendt sees this as an unnatural alliance of capital and mob-labor to go exploit the world.

There's a discussion of imperialism in Africa with a lot of focus on South Africa, but also long quoted passages from Joseph Conrad. As her attention turns to Asia, she delves a bit into The Great Game, and then inevitably to Kipling. And then it really started to bother me -- the discussion is light on facts, but heavy on allusions to works of fiction. However much they may reflect the zeitgeist of imperialism, I can't take this seriously any more.

Now it's time for the home game: what author is about to become inevitable? How long into the passage does it take you to identify him?

( The Home Game! )

My rhetorical question appears to have been answered.

If one cannot bring oneself to punch a lady Nazi in the face, you should pepperspray her in the face.

Now, it's almost too good to be true that she had just finished saying "I'm looking to make a statement by just being here and I think the protesters are doing the same. Props to the ones who are doing it non-violently, but I think that's a very rare thing indeed."

So, if you're of a conspiratorial bent, this is a false flag operation or something. But I think it's fair to say that there were plenty of anonymous violent troublemakers there. The police are of the opinion that they were 'outside agitators' (a phrase I knew we would see more and more of) and not Berkeley students. Which is probably the case, since I'm now hearing all about these experienced antifa activists. Who are these experts all of a sudden and where did they get their expertise? There hasn't been a fascist state to fight in some time, and never in the US, so I find myself suspecting that these are just people who like to have fistfights with skinheads. Whoever they are and whatever their movement is about, they know squat about working against the excesses of a Trump Administration.

Instead, of course, they are falling into the trap.

Now some have correctly pointed out that neo-Nazis can be experts at using 'the System' to quash opposition. "Oh, we're the victims, save us, save us, Law & Order!"

So then I ask: Why the fuck would you fall into their trap by punching people on the street? Are you stupid?

Berkeley was literally the origin of the Free Speech Movement and Sproul Plaza is Free Speech Central.

The university did the right thing in not preventing the speech, and they (or the UCPD who made the call) did the right thing in shutting it down for safety reasons.

Of course the Donald had to weigh in on Twitter:

"If U.C. Berkeley does not allow free speech and practices violence on innocent people with a different point of view - NO FEDERAL FUNDS?"

This is literally one of the stupidest things I've ever read. Even among Trump tweets, this is a doozy.

But remember my warning "Fortunately, we on the left are waaaaay too smart to be manipulated by Russian propaganda. Right? Right? No one would be suckered in by the idea that democracy or free speech are inherently flawed concepts"

Don't be down on Free Speech, just because Trump says he likes it. This is exactly the kind of emotional response thing that Trump apparently uses to perfection. Of course, it only works on stupid people. So don't be a stupid person.

Anyway, I'm reiterating my distaste for Nazipunch and the flawed philosophy behind it.

And again I'm warning against falling into the trap.

Because if not, something terrible is going to happen, and years from now, some kid will be walking with his grandfather on the campus, and grandpa will point to the pocks of bullets in a wall and say something like, 'And over there in that field is where it happened. It was a terrible thing those kids died. But these outside agitators (communists or anarchists or some such) came in and caused a lot of trouble, and stirred things up. Setting fires and so forth. Had to restore Law & Order.'

Because no shit that's exactly what my grandpa told me 40 years ago as we visited Kent State.

Many people have recently opined about the justifiability of punching a Nazi(*) in the face. A surprising (to me) number of people are for it.

(*)To clarify, unless we're talking about these six Nazis, at best there are 'neo-Nazis' these days, or 'jerks with hateful ideas who are dangerously close to the levers of power'.

I test the Nazi punch hypothesis out in my own mind, and I just find it hard to accept. I mean, what if it was a lady Nazi? In Romeo Must Die, Aaliyah wisely observes that "in America, if a girl is kicking your ass, you do not have to be a gentleman." Honestly, I'm egalitarian enough that if a boy or girl is kicking your ass, you do not have to be a gentleperson.

And yes, if a boy or girl is kicking that helpless person over there's ass, this probably requires some intervention.

But these rules are not just about kicks and asses. They should be good for punches and faces. "Hey you! Anonymous coward punching an unsuspecting guy in the face! What's wrong with you?"

Anyway, some dudes may have some archaic patriarchal misgivings about punching a lady Nazi. Perhaps they could do something else generally considered illegal or antisocial? Maybe they could throw rocks at them or grab their pussies? This new moral hypothesis opens up so many interesting questions!

But it's fraught with so many logistical difficulties. I mean, not every neo-Nazi will go to the trouble of tattooing 88 on his forehead. They might look like anybody! If only we could form an organization that could identify them based on objective criteria and make them wear distinctive clothing or something, so we'd know who to punch.

But there seem to be deeper flaws that worry me. A lot.

If we decide that, for a certain class of people, we no longer have to treat them with the usual rules of civility and humanity, it would seem (to avoid being hypocrites) that other people could use this same hypothesis to justify treating other classes of people as sub-human.

Wait a moment! Have I fallen into Bizarro world? Nazis treating certain classes of people as sub-human is one of the justifications for treating them as subhuman. I have it all backward! It's not that we would be hypocrites to NOT allow other people to think this way in the future. It's that other people thinking that way in the past made US start to think like them.

You can't fight an ideology by implicitly accepting its tenets. You are strengthening it by making it the only way of looking at the world.

Now some have correctly pointed out that neo-Nazis can be experts at using 'the System' to quash opposition. "Oh, we're the victims, save us, save us, Law & Order!"

So then I ask: Why the fuck would you fall into their trap by punching people on the street? Are you stupid?

The good guys also have some experts at using 'the System', from politicians to judges to civil rights lawyers. I'm neither, but I expect they would advise you to refrain from punching people in the face.

Because it does play into their trap. Punch a few Nazis, set fire to a building, and the system might restrict the rights to "habeas corpus, freedom of expression, freedom of the press, the right of free association and public assembly, the secrecy of the post and telephone". In the name of security. To protect the crybabies.

And what is the goal of Nazipunch? What positive result is achieved?

When Obama was elected, the racists were gnashing their teeth, and afraid, and the left held out its hand and said:

And the dummies on the right were afraid Obama was going to grab their guns and put them in FEMA camps.

And so they hid in their bunkers, clutching their guns and bibles, despising the left, falling into their own groupthink, biding their time until... well, until their savior appeared. And they voted for him, to the astonishment of all those who thought they were safely and silently encapsulated in gun-lined bunkers where their unchallenged ideologies couldn't possibly hurt anybody.

And you know what? As dumb as they are, they played by the rules. In the state houses, the governor's mansions, the House and Senate, and now the White House. It's true that "democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time".

Now the shoe is on the other foot.

And the other side is afraid Trump is going to grab their pussies and put them in death camps.

It's all very familiar. Not all that different.

Now this is not to say that everything is fine. Trump's actions have real effects on pussies and Syrians and so on. But do you know how many pussies get contraception coverage on their insurance when you punch a Nazi?

Zero.

If anything, it plays into the hands of crybaby Nazis.

If you are conspiracy minded, well... probably you have already written me off as a closet Nazi, but consider this.

We know the Russians want to create chaos in our country.

We know the Russians have worked hard to get the dumb-dumb right to distrust the government, distrust the mainstream media, and listen only to RT.com and Breitbart.

Fortunately, we on the left are waaaaay too smart to be manipulated by Russian propaganda. Right? Right? No one would be suckered in by the idea that democracy or free speech are inherently flawed concepts, and are better replaced by punches in the face. Angry moron Trump voters wanted to blow up the system. Only idiots would want to blow it up bigger.

Why Violence Has Declined takes a long, long, too-long look at rates of violence over the past umpty-thousand years from our hunter-gatherer forebears to today. Pinker has marshalled a shitload of facts and statistics, and though there may be some niggling details here and there, on the whole, he's pretty convincing that rates of murder, war, and violence have declined per capita. This does require an explanation, and I think Pinker certainly outlines many ideas that contribute, but he doesn't seem to present a very strong thesis for an explanation. Rather he takes us on a plodding journey through the museum of ideas that every political philosopher has considered. The book plods so much that I found much of it a chore to get through. Reading through the outline in Wikipedia is good enough -- just feel certain that each point is held up by a few hundred footnotes each.

One of the ideas that did stick with me was that many violent acts are considered acts of justice by their perpetrators. They are not doing wrong, they are taking justice into their own hands. That bitch stole my man -- smack. That driver cut me off -- blam. Obviously, these solutions are not terribly rational, and generally frowned upon by Leviathan. I think it could extend to larger actions -- riots in Watts and LA. It doesn't make any fucking sense, but there was some ache for a justice that was not going to come from traditional channels.

Now, I have plodded so slowly through the book that that idea lodged some time ago. And then as I mulled it over in my mind, I considered the Trump voters in the lead-up to the election. Can a vote be an act of violence? A stupid plea for justice when you're aching for a justice that was not going to come from traditional channels? Mmmmm... no, I can't quite bring myself to consider a vote for Trump to be an act of violence. And then the vote actually happened, and Trump won. I still can't quite elevate it to an act of violence. But I think a lot of my friends may consider it to have been an act of violence. And certainly we have seen (even given some level of pernicious fakes) that some Trump supporters have been emboldened to enact actual violence. And we've also seen protests of Trump that have also risen to the level of violence.

Now I have to tread carefully here, because I think there are significant differences between the two sides. It is not just that I am trapped in my bubble and not their bubble (and I'll get to the bubble later, especially since almost everyone who will read this is in my liberal bubble). At the same time, the people (considered as people) in the two camps. Are not all that different.

Now apparently the worst thing I could possibly do is to suggest that we should reach out and hug the other side and unite. Which is fine, because I'm not suggesting that. When Trump has rotten plans, they should be fought. And many of his plans are rotten.

But possibly I'm saying something even worse. That people are people. And people on both sides are not all that different. And to realize that, it definitely helps to spend time outside your bubble.

Many of you know of the long years I've spent in the mission fields of Christian websites, spreading the good news of rationality and fact-based argument. It is not easy work, because they are beset by demons that deceive them. And again, it's not about compromise -- I think the earth is 4.5 billion years old, and they think it's 6,000 years old. I'm not looking to compromise at 2,250,003,000 years old. Wait, I'm rambling a little too much, but maybe we'll come back to this.

Another bit of bubble escape was listening to the infuriating drive-time talk show on a Christian radio station, though I haven't in many years. Until election night. As I drove home, feeling pretty confident that it was going to be close (my prediction: Hillary 278 EV) but would go blue, I turned that station on hoping for election news and... delicious Christian tears. Because that's a thing now. Enjoying people's tears. And because I'm a bad person.

And I got those tears. But I did not find them enjoyable. pout

A young Latina called in to the show. Her voice shook with raw emotion, clearly crying. Hillary was going to win, and as everyone in the conservative Christian bubble knew (as did I since I'd been visiting), Hillary believed that "deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs have to be changed". And as it was being spun in the bubble, this young woman knew that President Hillary was going to forcibly change religious beliefs in America. She was genuinely, fearfully afraid that hers was the last generation that was going to hear the saving gospel of Jesus Christ.

All bullshit, of course. But the tears and pain in that bubble were real. Just like they were real when Obama was elected in 2008 and was going to take everyone's guns.

Anyway, fast-forward a few hours, and suddenly the tears were on the other foot. (Shut up.) There were organized cry-ins. And, and... the other side mocked it. They were enjoying those tears! How could they be so cruel?

Not all that different.

But they're all racists!

Yes, half of Trump voters hold implicit bias against POC. And only a third of Hillary voters do.

Not all that different.

But Trump's spouting ugly racism!

Well, yeah. Again, I don't want to rest on any false equivalencies. But if you want to characterize the GOP as full of racists, then you should step inside the other bubble and look at yourself.

You support murdering babies. You literally want doctors to crush the skulls of infants with forceps.
You want perverts to molest our delicate American girlhood in the bathroom at Target.
You want religious expression to be locked inside the walls of churches.
You let the biased(*) lame-stream media do your thinking for you.

[* I'm too tired, but to its credit, the media finally decided that he said/she said journalistic equivalency was no longer valid. Trump was lying. They called him on it. They endorsed Hillary. But... it does feed the narrative that the media is biased against Trump.]

You want them to stop being racist and join the correct party? Well, maybe you should stop killing babies, and join the correct party.

You scoff when people say they aren't racist, but voted for Trump? Well, what do you think of Tim Kaine, who personally opposes abortion, but stood for VP of the Democrat Party? And he's by no means alone. There are Democrats who think abortion is murder. If you can be against baby-murdering, and vote for a baby-murdering candidate, then surely you can be a non-racist and vote for a racist candidate. Sure, it must be a terrible internal conflict. Sucks to be them. But they got their racism/baby-killing just like the people-of-yesteryear got Skinemax with the package.

Not all that different.

But they are so very fact-challenged!

Well yes. That's what I combat the most. You give them a snopes link, and they don't believe snopes. You provide the links on the snopes page to the NYT, and they don't believe the NYT. There are some people there whose solitary (it appears) information source is infowars(*). They were primed and ready to believe crap like a Kenyan born Obama, or a Jade Helm takeover of Texas. Because it fits their narrative.

(* I'm too tired, but if you're getting info from occupydemocrats or Huffpo... Not all that different.)

In our bubble, the narrative is that Trump is a sexual predator. And I'm morally certain that Trump has grabbed more unwilling pussies than trans people have assaulted anybody in a bathroom. So the woman who accused Trump of raping her when she was a teenager fits the narrative. But when the press conference was announced, my baloney detector started beeping. Because (for better or worse) before I am a Democrat or a liberal, I am a skeptic. A court of law is where these things are decided, not at press conferences or FBI memos. And when the press conference was cancelled due to 'threats', my suspicion grew. It was not impossible that threats had deterred some poor woman, but I was not buying it at this point. But a lot of other people were. They railed against the Trumpeters who had cowed this woman. Maybe Trump had bought her off. How many millions did it take him? And then two days later, she dropped the suit. No cause given. Bought off? Full of shit? We may never know. But a retracted anonymous accusation is not much to hang something on, unless the narrative is more important than evidence.

And if you point to snopes articles showing that some cases of 'postelection Trump supporter racism' are imaginary... some people don't want to hear that shit. It doesn't fit the narrative.

I've showed dozens of snopes articles to conservatives, and know what it feels like to be ignored. So when it comes from the other side, it just shows that...

Not all that different.

We all laughed (I did, I'm a bad person) at that stupid bint who cut a backwards B on her face.

But we were also mad. She perpetrated a pernicious lie to denigrate a particular political candidate.

We were furious. She lied to say a black man did this. I hate her.

And now Trump supporters tore the hijab off a woman. Stole her wallet. That feeds the narrative.
But it's bullshit. All a lie.

C'mon now, everyone. Let's laugh at her. And hate her. C'mon. She made a pernicious lie to denigrate a particular political candidate. She lied to say white men did this to her. I hate her. I really do. But more importantly...

Not all that different.

As promised, this book review has devolved. Let me pull it back, at least briefly.

"According to Hofstede's data, countries differ along six dimensions. One of them is Long-Term versus Short-Term Orientation: 'Long-term oriented societies foster pragmatic virtues oriented towards future rewards, in particular saving, persistence, and adapting to changing circumstances. Short-term oriented societies foster virtues related to the past and present such as national pride, respect for tradition, preservation of 'face' and fulfilling social obligations.'"

Those are not bad descriptors of the two societies living in their bubbles that exist within America. The liberal and the conservative.

One of my regrets about the election is that so much was about the personalities and less about the issues. I have read that the Clinton campaign gamely released insightful policy statements to the media, but they never reached me. Since the Donald sucked all the oxygen in the primary fight, one would have thought that the Clinton team would strive harder in the general to make sure its message got out, but it didn't. Honestly, perhaps I'm giving them credit for having a message, because from my standpoint, most of what I heard from the Hillary campaign was...

It's her fucking turn. She cashed in her chips to keep the competition away. Only that asshole Sanders and McWhatever didn't get the memo. "Trump is awful. I'm not Trump."

Though true, this is not compelling. She could've done better with "I will be the third Obama term."

Anyway, one of the few policy things that did come out (because I watch closely) is for the coal miners of America.

HuffPo:

"Hillary Clinton has a $30 billion, 4,300-word plan to retrain coal workers that covers everything from education and infrastructure to tax credits and school funding.

Donald Trump’s coal plan is a duckface thumbs-up in a miner’s hard hat and a rant about hair spray, President Barack Obama and China."

Retrain coal workers? That's "adapting to changing circumstances". That's a Long-Term society strategy. And it's right.

A duckface thumbs-up? Well, if you can see through the HuffPo bias, that's a strategy oriented on today. Short-term. For the white working class families that are struggling.

And now, for you in my liberal well-informed bubble. Surely you are cognizant of the current spot price for coal.

No? Well, there are lots of reasons for it, but coal prices have tripled recently. And although US miners have not (yet) seen much of a boon, due to the horrible EPA, and Obama rules about coal-fueled power plants, a Trump presidency is clearly going to change that. Yes, there are certainly problems with burning coal like there is no tomorrow, but... if you are a part of an unemployed coal-mining family in Pennsylvania or Ohio focused on today... then you are part of the Short-Term Society, and I can see reasons other than racism to vote for Trump. And they did. And they are legitimately mad when we say their votes were racist.

In conclusion:

WE'RE ALL A BUNCH OF APES WHO ONLY RELATIVELY RECENTLY LEARNED TO WEAR CLOTHES AND NOT KILL EACH OTHER SO MUCH.

While I don't want to minimize how awful this is, it reminds me a lot of 2000 when we also elected an incompetent moron. All that cost us was our budget surplus, one or two hundred thousand dead brown civilians, and a few thousand dead American soldiers. We got through that, right? Right?

Some of the same researchers involved in the 2003 American Mosaic Survey have released results of the 2014 study.

There a really glaring result relating to when people were asked to agree/disagree with the following statement across a variety of demographics:

This group does not at all agree with my vision of American society

Atheists 39.6% 41.9%
Muslims 26.3% 45.5%
Homosexuals 22.6% 29.4%
Conservative Christians 13.5% 26.6%
Recent immigrants 12.5% 25.6%
Hispanics 7.6% 17.1%
Jews 7.4% 17.6%
Asian Americans 7.0% 16.4%
African Americans 4.6% 16.9%
Spiritual, but not religious — 12.0%
Whites 2.2% 10.2%

First number is from 2003.

All of the numbers have increased. Some by quite a lot. Even white people, who are totally awesome and chill, went from 2.2% to 10.2%. Disagreement with conservative Christians nearly doubled to 26.6%. The previous study was not long after 9/11, but disagreement with Muslims jumped from 26.3% to 45.5%. Immigrants doubled. Hispanics, Jews, Asians, African Americans... all jump from single digits to double digits.

This is what polarization and demonization look like.

It will likely cost $260 million more to create the much needed high speed rail link for travellers to get from Merced to Bakersfield. This is a 5% increase on the initial $5 billion segment.

"The construction is running more than two years behind schedule, though the rail authority has said it has enough “float” to complete the work on time. Its own funding plan shows that it will not finish until 2019. The original plan was to compete the work in 2017, when federal grants expire."

But at least the project has raised $0 in private funding. Of course, such funding is not expected until "the system is generating positive cash flow." I should live so long.

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Journal of No. 118

Entries tagged with anger

Long Beach

MAGA infighting, in re skilled worker visas

Nick of Time / The Voice of the River

The Glass Hammer / A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy

News Stories Colliding in My Head

From Bacteria to Bach and Back ; When the Sleeper Wakes

Entitled White Dude Adventures

Educated & Far Cry 5

Pervy jerks in (and some out of) the skeptical movement

Sisyphus

Scientismists exist

Everything I needed to know I learned from Merlyn

Burnt by Global Warming

Roughly 60% of The Origins of Totalitarianism, by Hannah Arendt

Son of Nazipunch

Nazipunch 2017

The Better Angels of our Nature, by Steven Pinker, ultimately devolving into an election rant

President Trump

Everybody hates Everybody more

Continuing Cassandra Complex