First Looks category archive

’nuff said.

The retailer (Marks and Spencer in the UK–ed.) has come under heavy criticism after charging customers an extra £2 for bra sizes DD and larger, which they say is to cover extra material and engineering costs. Naturally the move has upset bigger-busted women, including Ulrika Jonsson, who claim they have been discriminated against.

(snip)

Under pressure M&S dropped its £2 surcharge last night, signalling a win for frustrated campaigners.

I first saw this song performed in its context in a high school play.

In its context, it is one of the saddest songs I know.

I think I’ve read People Magazine once. I was trapped in a waiting room at the time.

This pretty much explains why I don’t read it.

Aside: There’s enough stupid that comes along as part of day-to-day life. I don’t have to send out invitations.

No there there:

A federal judge has recommended the dismissal of a lawsuit brought by a conservative group against an organization that promotes voter participation through registration drives.

Via Raw Story.

Unless you are a Republican or a Southerner.

Then, not so much.

Off to drink liberally.

Some Republican is yammering on my podplayer about how Barack Obama was “such a left-wing candidate.”

Only in wingnut eyes.

Anyone who actually paid attention to what Mr. Obama said and did during his campaign (and has said and done since becoming President) can see that he is, at most, slightly to the left of the historical center of American politics.

Unless, of course, torture, unjust war, and giving away the store are considered core American values.

Joe the (not a) Plumber.

Honestly, the glorification of complete, total, willful ignorance–ignorance of history, ignorance of religion, ignorance of current events–is truly rather astounding.

The Mudflats elucidates.

I remember how I learned the news.

I was sitting in the Campus Center at my school playing bridge.

Someone I knew came in and said, “They’re killing us now.”

But for once I think the local paper came up with a cute headline:

Delaware hangs out with cool states now

So you don’t have to follow the link: The story is a puff piece about how, since Joe Biden became vice-president, the response to “I’m from Delaware” is no longer,

“Oh, what state’s that in?”

(Yes, that’s one I got first-hand.)

Live charitably.

Drinking Liberally, Triumph Brewing Company, Chestnut between Letitia and Second (wonder if that’s the same Letitia I went to school with?), Philadelphia, Pa., Tuesday, 6 p.

I’ll be there to pick up my brownberry which I fell out of my coat four weeks ago and which they found on Thursday. (Hmmmm, wonder how often they sweep–never mind.)

Outfits offering information about sex via text messages are proliferating:

The Birds and Bees Text Line, which the center started Feb. 1, directing its MySpace ads and fliers at North Carolinians ages 14 to 19, is among the latest efforts by health educators to reach teenagers through technology — sex ed on their turf.

Sex education in the classroom, say many epidemiologists and public health experts, is often ineffective or just insufficient. In many areas of the country, rates of teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases remain constant or are even rising. North Carolina — where schools must teach an abstinence-only curriculum — has the country’s ninth-highest teenage pregnancy rate. Since 2003, when the state’s pregnancy rate declined to a low of 61 per 1,000 girls ages 15 to 19, the rates have slowly been climbing. In 2007, that rate rose to 63 per 1,000 girls — 19,615 pregnancies.

The article goes on to point out that those who advocate ignorance abstinence-only sex education are bent out of shape because their little darlings might actually learn something.

They persist in denying that hormones, not knowledge, causes kids to explore sex.

Addendum, the Next Day:

The Guardian has more.

Yeah, I know it’s a little blurry. Best I could do with my cell.