How privilege works?

I was shocked recently when I found out that someone I know who is older than me, more educated than I am, and has successfully raised multiple children to adolescence didn't know how vaccines work. I'm not talking anything complicated, just the basic fact that it introduces a small, controlled amount of the virus in question so your immune system learns to recognize that and knows how to fight it. (I know that it's more complicated than that and they don't always use the actual virus in question, but you see what I'm saying in general terms, as a very rudimentary description of the concept.)

This shocked me because I learned how vaccines work when I was a kid, probably around the age of 4. My mother explained it to me (in a simplified, child-appropriate way like my explanation above) so I would understand why I had to get a needle.

I was so surprised that a proper grownup didn't know this basic fact of life that I got talking with my mother about it.

Mom: "Well, not everyone has as much education..."
Me: "I didn't learn this from education, I learned it from you when I was like 4. Where did you learn it from?"
Mom: **thinks** "I learned it from my father when I was a kid and had to get a needle."
Me: "And where did Grandpa learn it from?"
Mom: **thinks** "He must have learned it in university."

So because my grandfather studied various science in university like 65 years ago, this piece of knowledge has, in our family, gone from being higher scientific education to conventional wisdom passed on from parent to child, like nursery rhymes and bible stories and household hints. It doesn't feel like privilege, it doesn't feel like rarefied scientific knowledge, it doesn't feel like a concept that you have to go to university to learn. It's just something your mommy tells you when you're a kid, like how to braid your hair.

My maternal grandfather has 16 direct descendants - 4 children and 12 grandchildren - and all of us have known how vaccines work since childhood. Any children we might have or might ever be responsible for will also know how vaccines work since childhood. Even if none of us had ever pursued higher education, we'd all still be in possession of this information that originally comes from higher education, whereas our peers who don't have an ancestor who learned about vaccines in university don't have this information before it comes up in school

I also find myself wondering how this relates to Lareau's concept of entitlement. Simply by growing up in a household where my parents could explain the reasons behind necessary medical procedures, I get the idea that I'm allowed to know the reasons behind any medical procedures I might be ordered to undergo. I'd totally ask for an explanation if ever instructed to undergo a medical procedure I don't understand, and I wouldn't even feel like I'm exercising entitlement in doing that. But perhaps if you grew up getting a needle because you have to, because they won't let you go to school if you don't, perhaps limited to the explanation "It's so you don't get the flu," you might be accustomed to undergoing medical procedures you don't fully understand, and it might never even occur to you to ask for an explanation. Then when you have to take your children to the doctor, it's totally "Because I said so" or "Listen to the doctor, he's a doctor."

What happens to unemployed youth when they stop being youth?

These past few months, I've seen a number of articles on youth unemployment, generally referring to people under the age of 24 and often talking about people who have never been employed. Some of these articles have been to the effect that these unemployed youth are hanging around making trouble and generally being up to no good (read in a "Kids Today! Get off my lawn!" tone of voice.)

What I'm wondering: Okay, so there are people under 24 who are unemployed and may never have had a job and perhaps are making trouble and being up to no good instead. So what happens to them when they turn 25 and age out of this youth demographic and into the broader 25-54 demographic? Obviously they don't magically find a job on their 25th birthday. So it seems like we have or are going to have soon a significant group of people in the 25-30 range who have never had a job. What happens there? Do they eventually manage to integrate into the workforce? (If so, how?) Or are we eventually going to have people in the 30-35 age range who have never been employed? Do the commentators who think unemployed people under 24 are making trouble also think that unemployed people 25-30 are making trouble? Unemployed people 30-35? If not, what causes them to stop making trouble?

Things They Should Invent: car seats for dogs

Based on the people I know who have both cars and dogs (a small sample), it seems standard operating procedure is either to put your dog in the car, perhaps tell him to sit, and leave him to his own devices, or to put your dog in the crate and put the crate in the car, perhaps securing it with the seat belt.

They really should invent either a car seat-type device for dogs, or a crate-specific way of securing the crate (similar to how baby seats attach to the car), or something so that Mr. Puppyface doesn't get hurt if there's a car accident.

I'm a bad evil terrible person and this post is in horrible taste

But I keep thinking of this:



"There's people with guns out there, sir."

Post your window-washing advice here

Here is my (outdoor) window-washing technique:

Washing with water and vinegar from a bucket using a sponge, working vertically. Follow each column with a squeegee, follow the squeegee with drying with paper towels.

This has worked better for me than using Windex (and, obviously, better than without a squeegee and without drying).

But it still leaves streaks, which, because I have big windows, sometimes makes it worse than if I hadn't washed my windows at all.

If you can wash windows without leaving streaks, how would you improve on my technique? (Note that I don't have access to a hose or any of the usual outdoor equipment.)

Questions for grownups

1. Are "funny" greeting cards getting less funny? I found they were funnier when I was a teenager. One could argue that my sense of humour has become more sophisticated, but I never found fart jokes and saggy boob jokes funny, not even when I was 9. (This round of birthday card shopping, I saw THREE separate cards with pictures of/references to bras and a caption about "have an uplifting birthday." THREE! Between that and the early xmas decorations and leftover Halloween stuff waiting to jump out and scare me, I am officially no longer accepting any more Scorpios in my life.)

2. Do people place holds at the library way more now than before the advent of the internet? When I was a kid, I'd go to the library, browse the shelves, and check out whatever appealed to me. Now, I have an epic hold list, and whenever I hear of a book that piques my interest I add it. I assume this difference is due to the fact that I can readily place holds on the internet, but there's the possibility that it's just child vs. adult reading habits.

The Amazon.ca / Eddie Izzard mystery

So I pre-ordered Eddie Izzard: Live from Wembley on Amazon.ca. The release date was yesterday. Normally when I preorder something from Amazon I receive it on the release date, or worst case it ships on the release date.

Then I receive an email from Amazon saying that there's a delay in my order, and the new ETA is Nov. 18 - Nov. 23. I appreciate the notice, but I'm super curious as to what exactly happen. Did they run out? Is there a flaw in the distribution chain? A brief perusal of the fandom doesn't turn up any other instances of this happening. Is it just me?

And to add to the mystery, there are now two Eddie Izzard: Live from Wembley DVDs on Amazon.ca: one released yesterday, which I ordered, and one with a January 2010 release date. I can't find any evidence of this second DVD with the January release date from any other retailer, including US Amazon.

This is all very odd. I've never had anything like this happen with Amazon, or with Eddie's material, or with preordered new releases of any sort.

Things They Should Invent: lemon creme brulee pie

Meringue doesn't taste like it looks like it should taste like.

However, creme brulee tastes like meringue looks like it should taste like.

So why not combine lemon and creme brulee and have something that tastes like what lemon meringue pie should taste like?

Places where I don't think you should shop

This is a continually-updated list of places where I don't think you should shop:

- overstock.com
- Shopper's Drug Mart
- Leon's
- Starbucks
- Carlton Cards
- Indigo
- Kitchen Stuff Plus
- Yonge Eglinton Centre
- Ikea
- Canadian Tire
- Sheppard Centre

Q: Why don't I think you should shop at these places?
A: Because they're doing xmas advertising and/or decorations too early.

Things They Should Invent: vaccine in pill form

Wouldn't it be easier and save a whole lot of time and drama if we could all just administer our own vaccine? Problem: I don't know about you, but I don't know how to administer an injection.

So what they should be working on: vaccine in pill form or some other self-administrable form.

Alternative: come up with a way to teach people self-injection as a matter of course (in school? by family doctors?)

Currently wondering: outside of mass vaccination contexts, if your doctor writes you a prescription for a particular vaccine or some other medication that has to be administered by injection, are you allowed to inject it yourself if you know how (e.g. you're a medical professional yourself or whatever?)

Blast from the past

When I was a kid I thought this was a plausible situation:

I wonder if the Disney princesses are princesses for the same reason children's protagonists have to be underparented

I often see complaints that Disney is setting a bad example for little girls by having all their protagonists be princesses.

I wonder to what extent this is a plot requirement?

In general, protagonists in children's literature/TV/movies are underparented. This is basically a plot requirement. You can't get into many interesting adventures when your lifestyle involves being driven to playdates in a minivan.

I wonder if the Disney princesses also have to be or become princesses for similar reasons?

For example, being a princess enables Pocahontas and Ariel to run/swim around singing and daydreaming, which leads to them having adventures and meeting their men. If Pocahontas was a prole, she'd probably be too busy tanning hides and farming corn, and if Ariel was a prole she'd probably be too busy doing whatever the mermaid equivalent was. The stories are about how they get to have adventures and defy family convention, and they simply wouldn't have room to do that if they weren't princesses, just like how if they wouldn't have room to do that if they weren't under-parented.

Cinderella and Belle had to become princesses to give them a happily ever after within their historical contexts. Cinderella had to escape from her family to have a happily ever after, and the only way to really do that was to marry. An alternative would have been to have her marry some sweet peasant boy and then her life is full of hard work but happy, but to make that look like a happily-ever-after they'd also have to have some rich, hunky, evil prince type who also wants to marry her. And there's also the problem that Cinderella's family of origin is somewhat upper class and could likely block a marriage to a peasant boy, whereas they couldn't possibly block a marriage to a prince.

Belle actually did want to avoid an undesirable marriage to Gaston, but the only options available to her would be for her father to create a successful invention, or for her to marry someone else. And she does this in an unconventional-for-fairytales way by a) seeing Gaston as an undesirable mate despite the fact that he's conventionally attractive, b) falling in love with a man (Beast) who isn't conventionally attractive. (Yes, he tranforms back into a conventionally attractive man at the end, but a) that's the perfect metaphor for how love works, and b) you couldn't expect them to consummate their marriage with him in beast form.) Watching it as a kid, I interpreted it as she had the open-mindedness to go for the non-attractive guy that everyone is shunning rather than the popular and attractive but evil guy, and is thereby rewarded with a happily-ever-after that includes love and security and no longer being dependent on the success of her father's capricious inventions.

(Snow White and Sleeping Beauty are also often included on the list of Disney princesses that are problematic, but I don't remember enough about the Disney versions of this story. I don't think I ever saw the Disney Sleeping Beauty, and all I took away from childhood viewings of Snow White is the dwarves' general silliness. The romantic subplot wasn't of interest.)

I should add that, watching these movies as a kid, I never perceived the protagonists' beauty as an essential part of why they got their happily-ever-after. I perceived it as because they were sweet and kind and charming. So that did make me feel a bit bad because I'm not and never will be that sweet and kind and charming, but I was already getting that guilt from catholicism. And the fact that they were princesses was no more unrealistic than the fact that the protagonists in all my children's and young adult books could run around without parents.

Things They Should Study; how does cultural prioritization of self-sufficiency affect employment rates and the economy as a whole?

Further to my previous thoughts about cultural prioritization of self-sufficiency stemming from Big Sort, I find myself wondering about its economic impact.

For example, my parents think it's decadent to buy lunch at work every day and think people should bring lunch from home. I think it's an annoying waste of time to make lunch at home and much prefer to buy it. If everyone thought like my parents, there'd be far few fast food places, food courts, coffee shops, delis, etc. So those food service jobs wouldn't exist, so there'd be less demand for wholesale food suppliers and bulk purchases of paper napkins, so there'd be less work for commercial delivery drivers, etc. etc. etc. If everyone thought like me, there'd be more of these jobs. I'm not an economic expert, but it seems to me that it might affect the broader economy.

Similar, in my family we do our own taxes or each other's taxes. Taxes are done within the "tribe" (in the sense of tribe that I coined in my Big Sort post). If everyone worked like us, there'd be no call for businesses such as H&R Block. However, because there are people who think it's a valid option to pay someone else to do your taxes, this whole business sector exists.

Given the geographical trends in attitudes towards self-sufficiency, I find myself wondering if they correlate with employment rates. Is there less employment in places that place greater priority on self-sufficiency because people are doing for themselves or keeping it within the tribe?

The trick to studying this would be you'd have to control for the fact that urban areas (which place less priority on self-sufficiency) have more jobs as a matter of course. That's how they got to be urban areas. If you build, say, a steel plant, all the jobs are going to be at the steel plant. The workers probably aren't going to live right next door to the steel plant (they do tend to get a wee bit smelly), but they may well end up sorting themselves into certain other neighbourhoods depending on whether they do or don't prioritize self-sufficiency.

How department stores can get my business

Apparently department stores are trying to make a comeback.

Here's how they can get my business: organize the women's clothing section by clothing type, not by brand.

When I'm shopping for clothes, I'm looking for, say, black pants. I don't care which brand, I don't care which line, I don't care which carefully-selected marketing demographic, I want black pants.

The way department stores are currently arranged, they have a section for every brand. This means I have to wander all over the floor, looking at the pants rack in every single section. This is annoying and time-consuming.

Meanwhile, when I wander into Reitman's or Smart Set, I can go to the side of the store with the more career-oriented clothes, look at all the pants in that section, and that's that. Even at Winner's (which I also find annoying to shop because the racks aren't easily scanable), I just have to look through the racks labeled "pants".

So if you want me to shop at your store, put all your career wear in one section, and arrange the displays so they're easily scanable. I want to walk up, take a look, and immediately have an idea of the range of black pants available, regardless of brand. Then I'll happily go through the racks for the specific items that pique my interest.

Astronauts and dogs and Twitter

1. Astronaut Leland Melvin appears to have had a formal astronaut portrait taken with his big gorgeous dogs! I'd love to have been behind the scenes in that photo session.

2. Astronauts Scott Kelly and Ron Garan, currently in Moscow, found a stray dog...on a train!

Why I am madly in love with Sheldon from Big Bang Theory

(Gloating: I totally caught the translation error in the subtitles at 2:07 - Poodle just confirmed it for me. This is noteworthy because I don't actually speak Portuguese.)

The other problem with the Omar Khadr situation

Why is Omar Khadr in prison in the first place? Because he allegedly threw a grenade that mortally wounded a US soldier.

I know nothing of the legalities and technicalities of the situation, but the fact that a person can be arrested for allegedly attacking invading/occupying soldiers who are attacking them offends my sense of fair play.

It would be like going into a paintball game with a fully loaded paintball gun and shooting paintballs at people, and then pressing assault charges when they shoot paintballs at you. It would be like starting a game of dodgeball on the playground, and then running tattling to teacher "Waaaah! She threw a ball at me!"

If you're going to send soldiers into other countries and have them go barging into buildings trying to capture people, you have to assume they're going to get shot at or have grenades thrown at them or whatever. If you don't want your soldiers to get shot at, don't go around making war zones.

Do non-socialists see their views as being for the common good?

Terminological note: "non-socialist" is not the word I'm looking for. I'm looking for an opposite of "socialist" that isn't inherently negative (i.e., tempting as it is, "fascist" won't do.) If you can think of le mot juste after reading the post, let me know in the comments.

I once heard someone who wasn't socialist (and may have been opposed to socialism) define socialist as "I want this but I don't want to pay for it." I find that definition imprecise. When I want something and don't want to pay for it, I go to FilesTube or Pirate Bay. When I'm being socialist, I'm saying "Everyone should be able to have this," and most often I'm saying "I have this, I see it is good, I think the world would be a better place if everyone had it." It isn't about me, it's about everyone.

Oddly, this is similar to my attitude towards breaking the rules. Sometimes, when the line at a store is really long, I'm tempted to just shoplift my purchase - not because of the money, but because of the unreasonable wait. Haven't done it yet, but it is tempting sometimes. So I was googling around this idea once, and found people saying that people who shoplift (yes, for the express reason that the line is too long) just think they're specialer than anyone else. This isn't true in my case. I'm tempted to shoplift not because I think I'm special, but because I don't think it's reasonable to have to wait in line to buy your food for longer than it would take to eat said food. If anyone else shoplifts in this situation, I totally see where they're coming from. It's not that I think I should and they shouldn't. Similarly, when I jaywalk, or when I skipped class in high school, it wasn't that I thought I was above the rules, it was that I thought the rules were unfair (to everyone) and no one should have to follow rules that are unfair.

So thinking about this, I find myself wondering if non-socialists feel that their views are somehow for the common good (rather than just "I shouldn't have to spend money on stuff I don't use myself). On one hand, my own viewpoint is less selfish than they think it is, so it would be ungenerous not to consider the possibility that their viewpoint is less selfish than I think it is. On the other hand, the fact that people think I'm thinking of socialism purely in terms of my own benefit - and the fact that people think I break the rules because I think I'm specialer than anyone else - suggests that these same people might view their own politics - and any disregard for the rules that they might have - purely in terms of their own benefit.

Why hasn't the climate map received North American media coverage?

Recently I saw an item on Google News about how some scientists had made an interesting and interactive map of how a 4 degree increase in world temperature will affect different parts of the world. Fascinating!

However, it didn't turn up in any of my usual news sources, which was odd. So today I searched in Google News, and I can't find any evidence that this story has been picked up in North America, not even once.

So what's up with that? Have you seen the climate map mentioned in North American media?