Funny events in anti-woke world

Kwak

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So when you see a graph of a trend that rises steeply to a high point and drops back down over time, do you ever assume the cause is at the high point?
Given the amount of dialogue media felt ethically-inclined to engage in at the time on the topic of 'hey, maybe DON'T ingest cleaning products?' in direct response to his remarks, a decline around that point would not be unexpected.
 

Ag3ma

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For those unaware, after Spain won the women's football world cup, the head of the Spanish Football Federation (REFEF), Luis Rubiales, planted a massive kiss straight on the lips of one of the Spanish players, Jenni Hermoso. Hermoso did not particularly appreciate this, nor have a lot of other people.

If Rubiales had simply offered a very contrite apology, this might already be over. Instead, the most incredible shenanigans. Rubiales instead offered a dishonest non-apology, REFEF attempted to force Hermoso into agreeing she consented and is threatening to sue her for not doing so. In probably one of the most jaw-dropping stunts, Rubiales and REFEF stage-managed a speech where he was expected to resign and instead gave a barnstorming refusal to loaded with culture war dog whistles. The Spanish women's football establishment have called for him to go in lockstep, FIFA have suspended him for 90 days, the Spanish government have said they may look into it, and a lot of figures from the men's game have said they too think he needs to go. (There's also a long backstory about wider toxic attitudes to the Spanish women's team in the establishment - you can look this up for yourself).

Possibly most incredibly to me, in response to the possible action by the Spanish government, REFEF asked the European football federation (UEFA) to ban Spanish clubs from European compeition. This, I think, in the hope that the threat of loss of European competition would cause the Spanish men's game to throw its weight behind Rubiales. UEFA defused this by refusing to.

Rubiales is still clinging on, but with the all-powerful Spanish men's game seeming to start disavowing him, he's probably done.

I also note that Rubiales' mother locked herself in the parish church and declared a hunger strike until her son is cleared of any wrongdoing. I think when you see an arsehole and wonder how they turned out that way, often you just need to take a look at their parents.
 
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Thaluikhain

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I think when you see an arsehole and wonder how they turned out that way, often you just need to take a look at their parents.
While I don't know how often that is true, when they are acting like that it's pretty clear about at least one case.
 

Silvanus

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So when you see a graph of a trend that rises steeply to a high point and drops back down over time, do you ever assume the cause is at the high point?
When we're talking about societal problems like the tendency to dangerously self-medicate, I don't assume there's a single cause.

But your question is really a distraction and an irrelevance. Because the article in question didn't do that, either-- it said there was an increase at the time of the President's comment, which is true, because April saw the highest rate. Its frankly naive to suggest that suggestions from the President, a highly influential person followed and loved by millions of supporters, had zero effect on anyone.
 

tstorm823

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Noone did. The author did not assume that, they laid out the case and concluded that it's hard to pinpoint a cause or if any activity even contributed to a trend, but noted that the numbers showed that the incidents did indeed increase after Trump's comments.
The numbers they have did not show that. And when combined with other information, we can show they didn't rise. Another source:

The rate of incidents peaked before his comments, and was on the downslope already, with no statistically significant spike after his comments. And if we consider the other reporting, places claimed in the 48 hours after Trump's comments, the rate doubled year over year, but we know from Time that the April average was more than double, so they had all the info needed to see the rate was actually lower than earlier in the month. And there is no way in hell they didn't get the data for earlier in the month to compare to and went straight to year over year comparisons. They knew, and they lied.
The media going out of their way to discredit the idea is, frankly, one of the few times they seem to have been consistently doing their job, and may well have played a significant role in combating and ultimately lowering the rate of accidental poisonings.
Them discrediting the idea is a good thing in the end, but people were being poisoned by disinfectants at double the normal rate for two months, and the media didn't care until they could dunk on Trump with it, and then they lied in their reporting anyway.
 

Casual Shinji

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I also note that Rubiales' mother locked herself in the parish church and declared a hunger strike until her son is cleared of any wrongdoing. I think when you see an arsehole and wonder how they turned out that way, often you just need to take a look at their parents.
In this case it might be more the culture of the world of sports that made him this way rather than parental upbringing. A parent might raise a child to be a jerk, but the competitive, money driven, and often hostile world of professional sports nurtures it unchecked. I doubt this is the first time this guy's been inappropriate with women while in position as president.
 
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Ag3ma

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and the media didn't care until they could dunk on Trump with it
When you say "didn't care", what you mean is that they weren't looking for the eminently sensible reason that they had no particular reason to look. For much the same reason, the press isn't monitoring monthly dog attacks, bear attacks, lightning strikes, fatal air conditioner accidents, and a million other things. They check them out when notable incidents occur to draw their attention.

Nor did the press "lie" if you mean that Time article cited, given that it clearly provides sufficient decent wider context for the reader and explicitly states there is no way to be sure bleach poisonings relate to Trump's comments. I don't think the best way to complain about media misrepresentation is to misrepresent the media.
 

Ag3ma

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In this case it might be more the culture of the world of sports that made him this way rather than parental upbringing. A parent might raise a child to be a jerk, but the competitive, money driven, and often hostile world of professional sports nurtures it unchecked. I doubt this is the first time this guy's been inappropriate with women while in position as president.
Sure, it could be the general atmosphere of sport and power. But the reaction of the mother could indicate Rubiales was also mightily spoilt as a child, hence his problem accepting responsibility for poor behaviour.
 
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Trunkage

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Thaluikhain

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In this case it might be more the culture of the world of sports that made him this way rather than parental upbringing. A parent might raise a child to be a jerk, but the competitive, money driven, and often hostile world of professional sports nurtures it unchecked. I doubt this is the first time this guy's been inappropriate with women while in position as president.
True...but then the mum goes on a hunger strike and locks herself in a church until people stop condemning her son for his misdeeds. Not showing herself in a great light there.

(Also, does the church have to let her stay there, or can they get a bunch of grumpy nuns to chase her out?)
 
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Casual Shinji

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Sure, it could be the general atmosphere of sport and power. But the reaction of the mother could indicate Rubiales was also mightily spoilt as a child, hence his problem accepting responsibility for poor behaviour.
True...but then the mum goes on a hunger strike and locks herself in a church until people stop condemning her son for his misdeeds. Not showing herself in a great light there.

(Also, does the church have to let her stay there, or can they get a bunch of grumpy nuns to chase her out?)
It's a weird fucking action, but then I don't know this parent's capacity to handle shame. I also don't know how strong familiar relations are in Spain, and if sticking by ones family to the bitter end is just one of those things for certain people.

Rubiales' behavior smacks more of "boys being boys" that you see a lot of in the higher racks of professional sports. No doubt a lot of big names that condemmend Rubiales are guilty of the same exact behavior.
 

Baffle

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I also note that Rubiales' mother locked herself in the parish church and declared a hunger strike until her son is cleared of any wrongdoing.
I really really laughed when I read about this. Like my mum refusing to eat her dinner because I got in the shit for calling in sick two shifts in a row and I'd bumped into another staff member in Tesco between shifts.
 

Thaluikhain

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I really really laughed when I read about this. Like my mum refusing to eat her dinner because I got in the shit for calling in sick two shifts in a row and I'd bumped into another staff member in Tesco between shifts.
And then locking herself in the cupboard and refusing to come out.
 

BrawlMan

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For those unaware, after Spain won the women's football world cup, the head of the Spanish Football Federation (REFEF), Luis Rubiales, planted a massive kiss straight on the lips of one of the Spanish players, Jenni Hermoso. Hermoso did not particularly appreciate this, nor have a lot of other people.

If Rubiales had simply offered a very contrite apology, this might already be over. Instead, the most incredible shenanigans. Rubiales instead offered a dishonest non-apology, REFEF attempted to force Hermoso into agreeing she consented and is threatening to sue her for not doing so. In probably one of the most jaw-dropping stunts, Rubiales and REFEF stage-managed a speech where he was expected to resign and instead gave a barnstorming refusal to loaded with culture war dog whistles. The Spanish women's football establishment have called for him to go in lockstep, FIFA have suspended him for 90 days, the Spanish government have said they may look into it, and a lot of figures from the men's game have said they too think he needs to go. (There's also a long backstory about wider toxic attitudes to the Spanish women's team in the establishment - you can look this up for yourself).

Possibly most incredibly to me, in response to the possible action by the Spanish government, REFEF asked the European football federation (UEFA) to ban Spanish clubs from European compeition. This, I think, in the hope that the threat of loss of European competition would cause the Spanish men's game to throw its weight behind Rubiales. UEFA defused this by refusing to.

Rubiales is still clinging on, but with the all-powerful Spanish men's game seeming to start disavowing him, he's probably done.

I also note that Rubiales' mother locked herself in the parish church and declared a hunger strike until her son is cleared of any wrongdoing. I think when you see an arsehole and wonder how they turned out that way, often you just need to take a look at their parents.
True...but then the mum goes on a hunger strike and locks herself in a church until people stop condemning her son for his misdeeds. Not showing herself in a great light there.

(Also, does the church have to let her stay there, or can they get a bunch of grumpy nuns to chase her out?)
It's a weird fucking action, but then I don't know this parent's capacity to handle shame. I also don't know how strong familiar relations are in Spain, and if sticking by ones family to the bitter end is just one of those things for certain people.

Rubiales' behavior smacks more of "boys being boys" that you see a lot of in the higher racks of professional sports. No doubt a lot of big names that condemmend Rubiales are guilty of the same exact behavior.
How about all the above? Though I think he really does suffer from bad parenting considering the actions of his mom. Culture or not. The way to sports industry works only added to his ego and bad attitude.

 

Thaluikhain

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How about all the above? Though I think he really does suffer from bad parenting considering the actions of his mom. Culture or not. The way to sports industry works only added to his ego and bad attitude.
Oh yeah, it's not really fair to blame the mum for it, even if she seems awful, he could have not gone out of his way to be terrible if he wanted, and the culture he's part of allows/encourages him to be.
 
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Bedinsis

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The numbers they have did not show that.
You are correct. And the additional numbers showed that there was no increase in cases in the period following Trump's statements, at least compared to the peak. I am sorry for having contributed what turned out to be an unsubstantiated speculation based on the article.
 
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Terminal Blue

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Them discrediting the idea is a good thing in the end, but people were being poisoned by disinfectants at double the normal rate for two months, and the media didn't care until they could dunk on Trump with it, and then they lied in their reporting anyway.
Context is everything.

Again, the reason people were accidentally poisoning themselves with disinfectants is that thousands of people were also dying or suffering serious and debilitating injuries from a highly infectious disease. Believe it or not, that was the actual news story. Journalists do not typically have any form of medical expertise. It is not really their job to give people medical advice. In fact, when news media did attempt to give medical advice it sometimes ended up contributing to the climate of disinformation. The Time article above cites a CDC report which includes the case of a woman who was told by the news to wash her groceries and decided to soak them in diluted bleach.

Serious public health crises (like a pandemic caused by a previously unknown and poorly understood disease) are a matter of public policy. The role of government is to assemble the relevant expertise, formulate a strategy and then communicate that strategy clearly and definitively. The role of the media, under ideal circumstances, is to report on these events and statements.

Trump made those comments at a press conference. He was specifically speaking to the media at an event which is specifically intended to give him a platform to communicate to journalists so that they can report his position and that of his government. Trump was presumably briefed before that conference, or at the very least he had access to a massive pool of expertise who could help him prepare his statements. That was literally his job as head of state. Walk out, explain what you've been briefed on, signpost the relevant sources of information, leave.

Trump catastrophically failed to do this because he has some pathological need to represent himself as the Great Leader who personally solves all problems, so he decided to take the opportunity to explain his own personal ideas for speculative treatments which, coincidentally, happened to coincide with some extremely dangerous things people were already doing and which were resulting in them hurting themselves.

Is it your position that the journalists in this case should have unanimously agreed not to report what the head of their state specifically communicated to them at a press conference he called? Should they have presented those comments uncritically, thereby implying that the scientific establishment was (under the orders of the President) investigating the possibility of injecting disinfectant into people?

The reality is that Trump was intentionally communicating with the media, and he fucked that up so badly that he created a situation in which it was necessary for the media to contextualize his statements by explaining to people that drinking bleach is a bad idea. They shouldn't have needed to do that.
 
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