Archive for February 26th, 2009


Links For Brains: 2/26/2009

February 26th, 2009 by Oskar Kennedy

- Fossils show that animals have been having sex for 30 million years longer than previously thought. (Sting vows to keep practicing.)
-  Submitting to religious authority requires one to abandon critical thinking. (Then again, so does religion itself, so this doesn’t seem particularly surprising.
- Universities in the UK are starting to abandon science degrees in homeopathy and other alternative health practices. (It turns out that a placebo degree isn’t nearly as effective as a real one.)
- Demanding respect for religious beliefs too often turns into suppression of legitimate criticism. (Free speech, as long as you don’t insult my imaginary friend.)
- Despite deep-seated denial, honor killings are a problem distinct from domestic violence. (Speaking of legitimate criticism of religion.)

spread the panic!
[Ask] [Bloglines] [del.icio.us] [Digg] [Facebook] [Fark] [Google] [Mixx] [MySpace] [Newsvine] [Reddit] [Slashdot] [Sphere] [StumbleUpon] [Technorati] [Twitter] [Windows Live] [Yahoo!] [Email] More »
└ Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Baby, What’s Your Sign?

February 26th, 2009 by Oskar Kennedy

When I tell people that I have a new daughter, they tend to stick to the approved schedule of basic questions. What is her name, how old is she, how can she be so impossibly adorable? But a certain subset of interested parties also want to know what her birthday was, so that they can make clucking “predictions” about her personality based on her zodiac sign.

I find myself struggling mightily not to punch these people in their necks.

It may be the fevered idealism of a sleep deprived father, but I already see my daughter as an individual. There are things that she really likes (having her legs rubbed) and things that she hates beyond measure (diaper changes). These things will almost certainly change as she develops (please, astronauts, let her never get too overly fond of diaper changes). But her identity, her quirks, her tastes and her issues will be all her own (except for the issues; despite our best efforts, her mother and I will probably contribute to those).

Even at this early stage, when she is a wriggly bundle of unmediated id, she’s already showing the initial glimmerings of a personality. She is already more interesting than the vague generalities of an astrological sign. Trying to squeeze her budding identity into that mold, despite its curious lack of specificity, strikes me as fundamentally limiting. At best, it saddles her with a set of confusing expectations for how she’s “supposed” to act. At worst, it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy; look for and comment on traits that happen to coincide with a child’s star sign, and it stands to reason that you might influence her to adopt them.

I am proud to say that, despite my fatigue, I have managed to resist doling out the neck punches that these people so clearly deserve. Instead, I’ve come up with a coping method. When a credulous busybody tries to tell me that my daughter is an Aquarius, I deny it. If he insists, I tell him that my daughter’s personality is already more complex than whatever infinitesimal influence distant stars and planets had on her at birth, and she’s definitely smart enough to chart her own course through life despite what those objects have to say. And really, it’s a shame that he doesn’t feel that way about himself.

It isn’t 100% effective; many astrology proponents aren’t possessed of the basic brains necessary to understand the insult. But it makes me feel better. It gets the message across that I’m not buying into their crap, and it keeps my neck punching hand from getting out of control. And really, that’s as much as we can hope for.

spread the panic!
[Ask] [Bloglines] [del.icio.us] [Digg] [Facebook] [Fark] [Google] [Mixx] [MySpace] [Newsvine] [Reddit] [Slashdot] [Sphere] [StumbleUpon] [Technorati] [Twitter] [Windows Live] [Yahoo!] [Email] More »
└ Tags: , , , , ,