The final installment of Kit O’Connell and my OkCupid Guide is out!
Monthly Archive for December, 2011
The next installment of the OkCupid guide by Kit O’Connell and myself is out.
“She’s an unfuckable lard-arse.” Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on German Chancellor Angela Merkel
I’m not really sure how the whole European financial crisis is playing out in American news, but it’s basically unavoidable here. There’s a story nearly every day in all the magazines and newspapers, and I think BBC radio has forgotten other news exists.
The story often casts Germany as the responsible country, which is now expected to rescue irresponsible Greece, Spain, Italy and so forth. It is certainly true that Germany and most of the northern European countries aren’t facing the same budget crises or debt burdens that their southern counterparts are. However, that is due in part to those southern countries spending lots of money to purchase goods made in northern Europe.
Greek imports of German goods tripled after the introduction of the Euro. Same with Spanish imports. And Portuguese imports. Now that those countries can’t afford their goods, German exports are falling. German exports fell 3.6% in October. And Germany isn’t the only country feeling the pinch. Dutch exports dropped for the first time in two years, down 2% in October.
Clearly, the government of Greece and Italy and the others made poor financial decisions…and it isn’t as if Greece doesn’t have a long history of defaulting on its debts. But let’s not pretend that the budgets of northern Europe were being supported merely by the will and responsibility of its people.
”In order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race.” -Henry A. Blackmun
As if Zwarte Piet wasn’t enough, now the Dutch women’s magazine Jackie has run a headline describing pop star Rihanna as a “niggabitch.” The article described how to dress your daughter in fashion emulative of Rihanna, wrongly claims that Rihanna is from Jamaica (she’s from Barbados), and then hopes that your daughter won’t beat up on other kids in daycare. I’d never heard that term before, so I was pretty surprised when the editor of the magazine was quoted as saying “The term ‘n****bitch’ has blown over from America and we were only trying to highlight a style of clothing.” Jay Smooth, host of the longest running hip-hop radio show in NYC, notes that he’s never even heard the term before either. It isn’t just the use of a racial slur that’s offensive; the lack of fact checking regarding Rihanna’s country of origin and the implication that dressing your daughter like Rihanna will cause her to beat up kids at daycare are also problematic. The entire piece is demonstrative of a utter lack of critical thinking about race and racial issues that, in my experience, is frequent in Dutch society.
“I wish my name was Brian because maybe sometimes people would misspell my name and call me Brain. That’s like a free compliment and you don’t even gotta be smart to notice it.” -Mitch Hedberg
Herman Cain doesn’t know who the president of Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan is. While Herman Cain isn’t exactly known for his intellectual capacity, I wondered about the validity of this statement.
I realize Cain is poorly-versed in foreign policy. (Actually, I’d say the only concept he’s well-versed on is sexually harassing women.) I didn’t expect him to be able to find Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan on a map, yet alone name its leader. I have higher expectations for, ya know, people who may actually be president.
I understand that presidents have foreign policy advisers for a reason. Yet I also want a president who has some rudimentary knowledge of the world in which we live. So, which countries leaders should our president be able to name?
My list would be:
Mexico
Canada
China
Iran
North Korea
Iraq
Afghanistan
England
Russia
Brazil
India
South Africa
Germany
France
This is my bare minimum list. Do you think I’m missing any? Or do I have countries on there that don’t belong?
Need More?