Archive for 2020

THE TYRANNY OF THE MINORITY: Cancel culture is real. It destroys lives, ruins careers, causes suicide and silences reasonable debate.

Read the whole thing.

MORE GOOD NEWS FROM THE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT? This isn’t the big-deal final Title IX regulation (yet), but proposed new grant requirements could be a boon to student free speech and free association rights all the same. Of course, caution is always recommended — it’s a government regulation, after all!

MEANWHILE, OVER AT VODKAPUNDIT: Florida Man Friday: TSA Won’t Find Anything on Her. “In total fairness to Florida Woman, she is far more attractive than most of the people who insist on getting naked in public.”

And something slightly more serious for our VIP members: ZOMG We’re All Gonna Die: 2019 Second-Hottest Year on Record (Except It Isn’t). “When I saw the latest climate hysteria headlines earlier this week, I did what any rational person would do: I cashed out my IRA and spent it all on hookers and blow. My wife would like to have a few words with me, but she’s required to say them via her divorce lawyer.”

I’d remind you about the discount you receive when you use the VODKAPUNDIT promo code, but you’re probably well aware by now.

REVIEW: Goop’s Netflix series: It’s so much worse than I expected and I can’t unsee it. “This review contains detailed information about the Netflix series the goop lab with Gwyneth Paltrow. If you plan to watch the show (please, don’t) and do not wish to know details in advance, this is not the review for you. Normally, we would refer to such information as ‘spoilers,’ but in our editorial opinion, nothing in this series is spoil-able.”

This is the most scathing review I’ve read since the New York Times wrote up Guy Fieri’s American Kitchen & Bar in a classic of the genre.

#SILENCING: The New York Public Library opts to cancel un-PC feminists. I’m so old, I can remember when librarians opposed censorship. Of course, they were brave when they stood up to the right, but it’s different when censorship is coming from the left because reasons.

HUH: 98.6 Degrees Fahrenheit Isn’t the Average Any More.

In a new study, researchers from Stanford University argue that Wunderlich’s number was correct at the time but is no longer accurate because the human body has changed.

Today, they say, the average normal human-body temperature is closer to 97.5 degrees Fahrenheit.

“That would be a huge drop for a population,” said Philip Mackowiak, emeritus professor of medicine at the University of Maryland and editor of the book “Fever: Basic Mechanisms and Management.”

Body temperature is a crude proxy for metabolic rate, and if it has fallen, it could offer a clue about other physiological changes that have occurred over time.

“People are taller, fatter and live longer, and we don’t really understand why all those things have happened,” said Julie Parsonnet, who specializes in infectious diseases at Stanford and is senior author of the paper. “Temperature is linked to all those things. The question is which is driving the others.”

My temp has always run right around 98° even, which I had thought made me an outlier, but now I guess not.