30 April 2015

Nudity - the Default State

There's a special type of pedal used by serious bicycle riders which has a locking mechanism that attaches to a special metal cleat on bicycle shoes, which snaps the foot and pedal together, allowing for more efficient pedaling and more control.

The old fashioned way was to have a tiny metal cage called a "clip", with a cloth strap around it, which you would slide your foot into.  Some commuters still use these, but basically all racers and serious amateurs have gone to the new system.

Since the new system no longer has the metal bracket - the  "clip" - sticking out of the pedal, the new system was initially called "clipless".
The name stuck and caught on, and now, even though a young rider starting out today would find the interlocking-pedal-and-shoe-system the standard default, cyclists still refer to them as "clipless" pedals.

I was thinking about how odd it is that we would designate something's identity in the negative like this.  In other words, a "clipless" pedal is defined by what it isn't.
Which is odd, especially now that the new system is the standard.

Defining something as ______-less implies that whatever it isn't is the default.

I tried to come up with other things which we define by what they aren't, and couldn't think of much.  There used to be "horseless carriage", which is what automobiles used to be called, but today we have long since dropped the connection to horses, and even shortened "carriage" down to just "car".

Looking it up (powerless nameless worthless purposeless doubtless flawless motionless regardless endless fearless homeless reckless restless spotless useless) the majority of them refer to intangible states - mostly states of mind, or otherwise determined subjectively. None of them refers to a concrete, definite, observable state of being, the way a pedal either has a clip on it or it doesn't, a carriage is either pulled by a horse or not.
And they are all terms in which the opposite would indeed be reasonably considered the default state.

But then I eventually thought of one other common word which is defined by what it isn't - it had alluded me because it has become the de facto assumed "default" state to such an extent that the term doesn't even have the suffix -less in it at all.

You can probably guess, given the blog post title...

Nude.
Or naked.

What those terms actually mean is "clothes-less".
They are defined by not having some form of cloth wrapped around the body.

We've all grown up in the modern world, so we take it for granted, but if you think about it, this is kind of strange.



29 April 2015

If It Had Happened That Way Instead...

I think this might be backfire effect - actually writing down the words that I'm trying to let stuff go that doesn't affect me directly and that no amount of talking or writing is ever going to change has just had the effect of making me hyper-aware of people's biases and prejudices, misconceptions and irrationalities.

Partially rebound, also partially several conversations I've had lately, starting to pile up in the head.

If writing purges them, no harm in that, right?



One place I see an equivalent logical fallacy (to that which I'll get to after this introduction) that isn't evidence but serves as further "proof" to someone who has already decided the answer, is the debate over the efficacy of bicycle helmets.

A lot of people assume that its a given - how could an extra layer of protection not make you safer?
Of course, mistaken assumptions about complicated physics problems often seem obvious, (for example, that heavy vehicles are safer than lighter vehicles: both the physics AND the statistics show this is false)
Hell, it's intuitively "obvious" that heavy objects fall faster than light objects, and the entire human population accepted this without question for thousands of years, until the world's first scientist (Galileo) came along and actually tried it and discovered everyone was wrong.

08 April 2015

Megan's Law and The Sex Offender Registry (is a seriously flawed system)

Any sexual contact with a minor is automatically classified as "abuse"

23% of "child sexual abuse" is "perpetrated" by another minor.
Of those, 80% were NOT "forcible" rape.  In other words, it is considered "rape" only because the "victim" is a minor.
In other words, any two children exploring their bodies, playing doctor, or "I'll show you mine if you show me yours", even if everything was entirely consensual, and both were the same age, for purposes of crime statistics, both children "abused" each other, and they are legally both sex offenders. If caught, they can end up on the list.  Sometimes for life.
"Teenagers and even young children who engage in certain sex-based conduct may find themselves subject to sex offender registration, community notification, and residency restriction laws. Some children are on registries because they committed serious sex offenses, such as forcibly raping a much younger child. Other children are labeled sex offenders for such non-coercive or nonviolent and age-appropriate activities as "playing doctor," youthful pranks such as exposing one's buttocks, and non-coercive teen sex." http://www.hrw.org/reports/2007/us0907/7.htm

The registry also currently includes "Internet crimes", in which there is not even a possibility of any physical contact.  All any "victim" would have to do, if they felt uncomfortable, is log off.

Which means that when ever you see some seemingly scary high number of how many children are "victims" of "childhood sexual abuse", that number is ridiculously inflated with things which aren't actually abuse, to the point where the numbers are meaningless.  This is similar to the recent redefinition of "rape" to include any sexual activity that takes place after entirely voluntary self-intoxication.  Have you ever had one too many glasses of wine with dinner, or stayed at the bar just a little too long before going home, and then had completely consensual sex with your partner?  Nope! Because according to the law in most states, the fact that you were intoxicated automatically makes it non-consensual.  You were actually raped, and your partner is a rapist.  Which, incidentally, means your partner, too, "deserves" to be on the registry.

55% of all Americans have sex by age 17.  Legally that means that more than half of all Americans, male and female, were "raped".  23% have sex (consensual) by age 14. When various crime statistics come out, almost never do they make a distinction between "forcible" and "statutory" rape.  They are treated as interchangeable.