Interesting News Items

[dEadERest]

Originally Posted by Apia

Novartis then signed a one-year, $1.2 million contract with Cohen.

to play for the company softball team, no worries

[LoopyLou79]

https://youtu.be/GNS9GZ1BhPc

If you can have a look at this.

[bw81]

https://www.9news.com.au/national/20...ncil-melbourne

A local council in Melbourne's west is pushing for pedestrian lights at intersections and crossings to be replaced with "female symbols".

Brimbank Councilor Victoria Borg raised a motion to change the symbols at counil's last meeting on May 15.

It comes after the Committee for Melbourne lobbied for the installation of 10 special lights in certain spots in the CBD in March last year.

The plan saw lights replaced at spots including the intersection of Flinders and Swanston streets to reduce "unconscious bias" against women.

The committee’s long-term aspiration is to change Victoria’s Road Safety Act to have equal representation of men and women on traffic signals.

Brimbank Mayor Margaret Giudice told the Herald Sun the change would show women and girls they were important and valued.

“We know that improving gender equity leads to very positive outcomes for organisations and for our community," Cr Giudice said.

"Research shows societies with greater gender equity have lower rates of violence towards women and children."

Last March, Minister for Women Fiona Richardson said she was “thrilled” by the growing campaign.

“There are many small – but symbolically significant – ways that women are excluded from public space… This is a wonderful way to make public space more inclusive for women,” she said.

But University of Melbourne architecture researcher Simona Castricum criticised the idea, telling the Herald Sun it was a “tokenistic” move.

“The purpose of traffic signals is to let people cross the road safely, I don’t know if we need our gender to come into that,” she said.

“Putting a dress on it isn’t going to address structural misogyny and violence against women.”

“And the idea that a woman wears a dress (is a) really outdated idea of what represents gender."

[Enunciated Piffle]

https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/08/us/an...bit/index.html

This is such a bummer on two levels.

ONE. Anthony worked 40 years of his life living paycheck to paycheck. He's been quoted as saying a dishwashing job saved his life. He was beatnik heroin junkie who never learned hard work until a kitchen job. He worked and worked his way up. Disher. Prep Cook. Sous Chef. Head Chef.

He was a loser who proved that hard work, plugging away at what you love, (writing/ food critique/ cooking) had real results. The guy has books/ tv shows, (both of which are awesome) and went from pay check to paycheck to multi-million dollar net worth. Therein lies bummer #1 - he finally made it. So, he killed himself.

Bummer #2 - Depression Kills. No matter how successful you are. Accomplished/ critically acclaimed you are in your field. If you suffer from depression, there is a very good chance you will kill yourself. We all know life does not last forever. Even so, it's never too late - to commit suicide.

[Archimedes_Screw]

I'm on Lisa's side here. Feel kinda gross sharing a TMZ link though.
https://www.tmz.com/2018/06/11/comed...tdown-onstage/

[OnmyojiOmn]

https://mobile.twitter.com/GovMikeHu...97564435730434

[OnmyojiOmn]

Emotional Judges and Unlucky Juveniles

Employing the universe of juvenile court decisions in a U.S. state between 1996 and 2012, we analyze the effects of emotional shocks associated with unexpected outcomes of football games played by a prominent college team in the state. We investigate the behavior of judges, the conduct of whom should, by law, be free of personal biases and emotions. We find that unexpected losses increase disposition (sentence) lengths assigned by judges during the week following the game. Unexpected wins, or losses that were expected to be close contests ex-ante, have no impact. The effects of these emotional shocks are asymmetrically borne by black defendants. We present evidence that the results are not influenced by defendant or attorney behavior or by defendants’ economic background. Importantly, the results are driven by judges who have received their bachelor’s degrees from the university with which the football team is affiliated. Different falsification tests and a number of auxiliary analyses demonstrate the robustness of the findings. These results provide evidence for the impact of emotions in one domain on a behavior in a completely unrelated domain among a uniformly highly-educated group of individuals (judges), with decisions involving high stakes (sentence lengths). They also point to the existence of a subtle and previously-unnoticed capricious application of sentencing.

[SpareBen]

Woman forced ex to have sex holding machete to his face: cops

A Montana woman broke into a man’s house with a machete, ordered him to take off his clothes and forced him to have sex with her, police said.

Samantha Ray Mears, 19, was charged Friday with two felonies — aggravated burglary and assault with a weapon — as well as several misdemeanors for the incident at her ex-boyfriend’s Great Falls home, according to the Great Falls Tribune.

Mears reportedly broke into her ex of seven years’ house Friday while he was away. When he returned, she confronted him with the large knife, demanded that he take off all his clothes and ordered him to lie on his bed.

Fearing bodily harm, the victim complied and she proceeded to remove her pants and climb on top of him.

Mears then began to engage him in sexual intercourse — all while still holding the machete.

When he tried to get her to stop, Mears refused and bit him on the arm, according to KFBB.

After she finished, she sat naked on the bed, brandishing the weapon. At that point, the victim was able to take several photos of her, which he turned over to the police as evidence.

When an argument ensued soon after, an enraged Mears ripped a piece of trim from the victim’s wall and deliberately urinated in his bed, according to KFBB.

The ex-boyfriend was able to alert the authorities after claiming he needed to call a friend, then escaping from the room to dial 911.

According to the Tribune, Mears was also arrested in April after a previous argument at the victim’s home where she grabbed his hair, hit him in the face and attempted to strangle him.

The state has also filed a restraining order against the defendant, according to KFBB.

[Noeld]

?Unbearable? smelling passenger that caused plane?s emergency landing dies from tissue necrosis | Fox News

[Enunciated Piffle]

Nationwide protest today against trump’s immigration policy. Families Belong Together