Insert a Trite Metaphor for a Corral #66

Posted on March 6, 2007 in Roundup

Get your kicks
On Route 66

The most bizarre finding out of the mental illness quadrant is that tooth-brushing may trigger epileptic seizures. “The rhythmic act of brushing teeth may excite an already overly excitable area of the brain,” said study author Wendyl D’Souza, MBChB, MPH, with the Department of Neurology and Neurological Research at St. Vincent’s Hospital, the University of Melbourne in Melbourne, Australia, and a member of the American Academy of Neurology. “This is similar to photosensitive epilepsy, which involves seizures triggered by flashing lights and moving patterns. Since tooth-brushing involves persistent rhythmic action, this may explain why this trigger is more likely to induce seizures in the somatosensory area of the brain compared to other oral stimuli, such as eating,” Tell that to someone with OCD and I wonder what will happen?

Another recent study found that a reduced sense of moral outrage enabled a person to see the world as fair and just. It seems that if you avoid feeding people stories about innocent victims, they will be more content with the status quo. This could explain why conservatives kvetched about the photo essay depicting the disfigured Marine getting married or pictures of armless children or why the U.S. military punished a reporter for revealing that the armed forces were hampering relief efforts. They know that allowing people to see the price of war will engender anger and disgust. I wonder what would have happened if the researchers had shown their subjects politically loaded imagery. I bet they would have observed an interesting phenomenon indeed.

Which lead up nicely to another story: men who haven’t been victims have a hard time believing child abuse stories. I’ve seen this aplenty in real life — not only when it comes to childhood abuse, but also when it comes to sexual harassment. And it leads us to a quandary when it comes to individuals who must judge the claims: on one hand we want people who are stable. But on the other, we want to have people who know the signs. Who best but those who have been abused themselves. They might not be allowed to make such judgements because they still suffer the effects of childhood abuse and are weeded out by the unafflicted. So the unafflicted males deny the truth because they just can’t fathom it happening.

These factors spread beyond the families where abuse occurs into our social, moral, and political life. The fires burn only to the fringes of the human grassland and then suddenly meet ice.

• Government Censorship: You may not have heard about the story in England where 10 Downing Street is attempting to quash stories about cash for honors. The latest in the story is that a British court refused to grant an injunction prohibiting The Guardian from publishing a story on the scandal. You can read the story here.
• Great Wall: China has banned new Internet cafes, ostentatiously because it wishes to crash down on “addiction” to online casinos. Of course, this is the same government which doesn’t want the principles of Tienneman Square reaching its people. Now, will someone PLEASE tell the government over there that I am preaching subversion because Lynn made the list and I didn’t and she’s getting so snooty about it.
• Drown Me, Please: I’ve been saying it all along — WE NEED MORE RAIN!
• The Witch is Dying: Fallout from the Coulter speech and G.O.P. Candidates Criticize Slur by Conservative Author indicate that Ann Coulter is in trouble and she’s scratching out eyeballs in a desperate attempt to save her political future.
• I Know the Feeling: Lisa Nowak’s appearance at Colleen Shipman’s door was not unexpected. As Shipman started her involvement with astronaut William Oefelein, I said is there gonna be some crazy lady showing up at my door trying to kill me.” The 41-year-old Oefelein, Shipman said, assured her that, “No, no, no, she’s not like that, she’s fine with it, she’s happy for me.” That appears to have been a miscalculation on Oefelein’s part.
• Choice Website: Chasing the Frog
• Milestone: Gabriel Garcia-Marquez turns 80.
• Kathryn Kramer Will Like This: A Wikipedia editor has been discovered to be less than he seems. The editor, known as Essjay, had described himself as a professor of religion at a private university. But he was in fact Ryan Jordan, 24, a college student from Kentucky who used texts such as Catholicism for Dummies to help him work. He has retired from the site and his authority to edit has been cancelled.

If you find any articles worthy of mention in these roundups, send the URL to gazissax at best dot com. And feel free to comment!