(Source: laurencatkinson)
(Source: laurencatkinson)
Bertrand Russell on the Ten Commandments of Teaching
Brain Pickings
- Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.
- Do not think it worth while to proceed by concealing evidence, for the evidence is sure to come to light.
- Never try to discourage thinking for you are sure to succeed.
- When you meet with opposition, even if it should be from your husband or your children, endeavor to overcome it by argument and not by authority, for a victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory.
- Have no respect for the authority of others, for there are always contrary authorities to be found.
- Do not use power to suppress opinions you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.
- Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
- Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence as you should, the former implies a deeper agreement than the latter.
- Be scrupulously truthful, even if the truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it.
- Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.
(via rachelnunally)
A few news outlets and blogs have recently been decrying Michelle Obama’s decision to invite the rapper Common to a White House event themed around poetry’s influence on culture. A number of mainstream news sources have picked up on “A Letter To The Law,” a verse that Common performed on Def Poetry Jam, which they say advocates cop-killing and “burning” former President George W. Bush.
In my opinion, his lyrics are not actively calling for violence. The imagery about a private citizen holding weapons to protect himself from an overreaching state is just a rhetorical warning shot, a statement intended to let everyone know that the government is not to be completely trusted. In fact it actually has more in common with the rhetoric of the Tea Party and the NRA than they would like you to think.
And I think anyone with their own common sense (ugh sorry), could spend some time listening through the themes in Resurrection, Like Water For Chocolate or any of Common’s mid-career albums and tell you that he was not calling for the violent end of GWB, but just strongly and righteously questioning the validity of the war in Iraq. A war, mind you, where our former leader authorized indiscriminate bombing tactics resulting in the deaths of thousands of civilians, including innocent women and children. So who’s the vile, murderous gangster again?
It is somewhat amusing to see Common called a “gangsta rapper” and a thug by people who have clearly never heard his music before (except maybe in that one Gap commercial). But it is also sad to see people devaluing some of the best hip-hop music that I’ve heard in my generation, merely because they have never given that form of expression a chance. So I’m gonna listen to Common a bit more than usual today, starting with “The People.”
(Source: mattyoungblood)
I didn’t think it was possible to get worse than “Friday” by Rebecca Black, but the generically-named Community Christian Church was there to prove me dead wrong with this religious parody of the original music video. While the artistic combination of Black and producer/rapper Patrice Wilson was undeniably offputting, this opportunistic stunt by the Midwestern, suburban megachurch is so, so lame.
Shame on the adults who likely wrote the parody and convinced the young girl to perform in it. This is going to haunt her during the cruel years through high school and college… looks like a future agnostic in the making to me.
According to Ark Music Factory, the production costs for the song and video for “Friday” amounted to over $8,000, less than half of which was paid by Black’s mother. I wonder how much it cost in equipment and payroll for Community Christian to produce this video? In this economy, when needy families need support more than ever, what is this church doing with it’s resources? Filming promotional music videos in convertibles in the wealthy Illinois suburbs apparently. Religious people who question the efficacy of government in America need to take a look at what their tithe is going towards, especially in communities that have been hit hard in the recession.
But you know what, if this is what you want, you fucking deserve it.
(Source: mattyoungblood)
Bernie Sanders’ Guide to Corporate Freeloaders, from the article titled Undocumented Workers Pay More Taxes than Major U.S. Corporations (via Politicususa).
(Source: mattyoungblood)
A poster I recently made for the LGBT & Women’s Studies Program at NIU to help raise awareness around LGBT issues and discrimination.
In some ways it’s the most destructive form of welfare that we’ve established, the illegal drug trade in these neighborhoods. It’s basically like opening up a Bethlehem Steel in the middle of the South Bronx or in West Baltimore and saying, “You guys are all steelworkers.” Just say no? That’s our answer to that? And by the way, if it was chewing up white folk, it wouldn’t have gone on for as long as it did.
– David Simon
(Source: bit.ly)
These really are the excess people in America. Our economy doesn’t need them—we don’t need 10 or 15 percent of our population. And certainly the ones who are undereducated, who have been ill-served by the inner-city school system, who have been unprepared for the technocracy of the modern economy, we pretend to need them. We pretend to educate the kids. We pretend that we’re actually including them in the American ideal, but we’re not. And they’re not foolish. They get it. They understand that the only viable economic base in their neighborhoods is this multibillion-dollar drug trade.
– David Simon on the characters in The Wire (Bill Moyers interviews David Simon)
(Source: bit.ly)
NEWS: Obama is still a Democrat. Welcome back Mr. President.
Over 30,000 people are participating in a food fast to protest the immoral budget cuts Republicans are pushing in Washington.
(Source: bit.ly)
