The Equifax leak (which still happened and is still a problem for, well, an absurd amount of people, though it’s fallen off the news radar) should really have us question why this sort of thing is allowed to even be. If credit scores/reports were just for credit cards, I could see a case for their existence, maybe. But that’s not what they’re just for. Rather, … Continue reading Fuck credit scores
Pretty much anyone who’s paid attention to a few meetings has enough information to notice the status quo is generally easy to hold, and the easiest move to hold it is to delay change. Fighting change is risky. To fight change to have to open the floor to discussion. If a case is presented, it gets at least thought about. If I talk about how … Continue reading Saving the discussion for another day is just a dishonest way of supporting the status quo
Some of the people in office in the US on the right are pushing to decimate the protections on endangered species. Harnett-White gave away the real reason pretty straightforwardly: The administration and friends consider the Endangered Species Act to be “economically harmful” and a “formidable obstacle to development.” This is a rather transparent way of saying the people with a lot of money that they’re serving … Continue reading Another duplicitous argument from the political sphere (regarding endangered species)
So, given the usual response of some people labeling any act of violence by certain racial (or religious) groups as terrorism, and the frequent response of a generally different group of people acting why acts of mass violence (that don’t fit the technical definition of terrorism) by whites are not labelled terrorism, it’s interesting to see what happens when the DOJ actually does nab a … Continue reading Trump and friends are sweeping a terrorist under the rug because he’s white
There was an image circulating listing the current natural disasters and then saying climate change is evident. I don’t deny climate change, but that’s a really poorly-made point. Change implies things used to be one way and are now another way. Moreover, to my knowledge, California gets wildfires and the east coast gets hurricanes. So pointing out those things are happening is not indicative of … Continue reading Argue more effectively for climate change
In my continued disdain for loaded language in lieu of actual arguments: Yes, the students who walked out on Mike Pence at the Notre Damn graduation ceremony were disrespectful. To say otherwise is to miss the point. There are varying levels of respect. There’s the respect you default to giving every person. There’s the respect you give to people who have done great things, in … Continue reading Sometimes disrespect is the point
That NYT did a poor job of interviewing Trump is making the rounds. One response comes in the particularly obnoxious form of: Argument A made by critic C criticizes object O. C has the option to not consume O. So, dismiss A and criticize C. Now, this could be made formally valid by adding a hypothetical that gives you 3 from 1 and 2, and it’s … Continue reading Another obnoxious argument: refutation of criticism via the option to ignore the object of criticism
I see this argument far too often, usually in a limited quantity of forms, but across a wide variety of topics. The argument goes: S entails x. x is good/bad. Therefore S is good/bad. S entails y. Therefore y is good/bad. The word “entails” might be better swapped out for “includes” or some other verb depending on what S is. Usually the work is done with a sneaky shift in what’s meant … Continue reading The Most Obnoxious Argument
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