Disturbing

Earlier I was at the Redding Road Thornton's, and as I was getting ready to pump gas a man left his wife and two children in the car while he went in to pay. Another woman stopped behind the car and just blew the horn like how dare they just be sitting at the pump she wanted. Fortunately, the pump on the other side became free and she angrily drove over there and started emptying trash from her car. I don't know what her problem was, or how her day's gone. I do know she was being a complete ass, and I'd like to think it had nothing to do with the fact that the woman in the car with her small children was wearing a hijab (headscarf). I would like to think that, but given the current climate in our country, I don't have faith in the inherent good of everyone. Once she moved to the other pump and the situation wasn't escalating I didn't interfere, but I was about to right as she moved. Life is too short for pettiness and prejudice.

The Muslim woman was doing nothing wrong, didn't deserve to have some whackadoo harassing her, and the kids were something like two. Dad came back out and starting pumping and I'd finished, so I left. But I feel bad that for a moment or two that mother was probably quite worried for herself and her children, and no one should have to worry that a small thing like that could escalate beyond that. She kind of laid low and tried to ignore it, and I guess that worked. But my point is, she shouldn't have had to deal with the other woman's overblown sense of entitlement in the first place.

How to be a jackass

Tow truck driver refuses to tow motorist over Bernie bumper sticker

He feels proud to have finally drawn 'a line in the sand' by leaving a disabled woman alone on a busy Interstate after she was in an accident. Too bad he can't be proud of being a decent human being. And of course, he's a Trump supporter, no surprise there. Personally I think in this case it had less to do with politics than the fact the guy's just a royal jerk. He blames this woman, who had given no indication she wouldn't pay him, because (he says) two other Bernie Sanders supporters argued with him over their bill, and since all of them must be socialists and evil, so must she. Gee. What black and white thinking, so not grounded in logic. And why do people like this refuse to do their jobs by claiming God is on their side? I hope they spread this story far and wide, and people think twice about calling him for a tow. And no, I'm not upset just because I have a Sanders sticker on my car. I also have the marriage equality sticker from the Human Rights Campaign, a Read-Support Libraries licence plate, and a Doctor Who licence plate frame with a strange word, TARDIS. I wonder what he would have done to my car?

A very poignant video of what could be

Very nicely done. It was created by the Anti-Defamation League.

This was quite possibly my favourite song growing up

We had it on a 45 record. Someone pieced together a wonderful and powerful video to go along with it.

A great cause

TEDGlobal 2011: Social media game aims to end extremism

Mr Bakhit, who comes from Jordan, was a student at the US University of Minnesota when the 9/11 attacks took place. Shortly afterwards he was attacked by four men because he was an Arab....

Instead of feeling bitter, Mr Bakhit decided to engage in an education campaign.

"I realised that you fight extremism by starting with the young. The message was simple - 'We are not all terrorists'," he told the BBC.

Armed with a not-so-magic carpet, he began telling Aladdin-style stories in local schools.

"One day a child asked me if there was an Arab superman and I realised that there wasn't," he said.

So began his comic-book project which aimed to create a range of positive Arab role-models, including a female James Bond and a Jordanian special agent who fights extremists.

I would so have thrown this person out of our store, regardless of the consequences

[begin righteous indignation rant]
I was working with putting up cigarettes in the back room when my co-worker waited on an Hispanic man buying beer. He didn't hand her the money but rather put the it down on the counter and told her to get it. She put his change on the counter. He then told her he didn't like touching black people. He left before she could say anything, she was so shocked.

I was angry on her behalf. Nevermind the fact that my co-worker's mom is white, dad is black, with a Puerto Rican grandfather thrown in, too. All people of black African descent are black, even if it's a bit, right? No one had ever told her such a thing before. Also, as one of our other customers put it, even if you thought it, why say such a thing? I think it's wrong either way. What surprised my co-worker the most about it was that the man was Hispanic, another minority, but that didn't surprise me so much. Prejudice isn't something confined to WASPs, that's for sure.

I'd like to see what would have happened if he pulled that on our manager, who is biracial. My co-worker said that one of these days he's going to say something like that to the wrong black person. And whilst I do not condone racial violence, I think every racist deserves their comeuppance. Hmpf.
[end rant]

Apparently it wasn't just an isolated idea

Time magazine's Laura Blue offers a look into past remarks by James Watson, the Nobel Laureate and geneticist. Apparently he's made some remarks that were pretty out there throughout his life. The racist remarks for which he is currently being grilled over the coals for were made to a British newspaper; they caused such a furor that after several of his engagements were cancelled by those who had invited him to speak in promotion of his book Avoid Boring People: Lessons from a Life in Science he cancelled the rest and returned home, where he's been suspended from administrative duties at his lab.

The Mortification of James Watson