Outstanding speech by Iceland's foreign minister at the UN:
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Eric T. MacKnight
@ericmacknight@mstdn.ca
mastodon 4.8.0-alpha.3+glitchRetired Canadian teacher (HS & MS, English, mostly) born in the U.S. Have worked in Morocco, Switzerland, Austria, The Netherlands, China, and the U.S.
"Readin' the news, and it sure looks bad." —Joni Mitchell
We tried literacy for 500 years. Time to move on.
Non-commercial, ad-free, tracking-free personal blog: https://ericmacknight.com/
Free stuff for English teachers:
https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/store/eric-macknights-tips-for-teaching-english
354 Followers
718 Following
50 Posts
Joined February 03, 2025
Ugly word of the day: empathic
A barbaric word.
The root, of course, is "pathos," and the adjectival form is "pathetic." From "pathetic" come "apathetic," "sympathetic," and "empathetic. "
“Empathic” is an ugly version of "empathetic." It adds nothing to the language except ugliness.
No one yet has dared to replace "pathetic" with “pathic,” or "apathetic" with “apathic,” or "sympathetic" with “sympathic.” But somehow some deeply misguided and miseducated miscreant has introduced “empathic” to the language.
May he or she or they suffer horribly and learn to regret.
Today's Food for Thought:
There are only three things worthwhile in this world—justice, beauty and truth; and perhaps none of them can be defined.
—Will Durant
Today's Food for Thought:
Holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
—The Buddha
Born on This Day:
Miguel de Cervantes, 1547;
Thomas Percival, 1740;
Enrico Fermi, 1901
Meanwhile in Canada,
Today in History:
1893: New Zealand becomes the first independent nation to grant women the right to vote in parliamentary elections.
Replying to
@nantucketlit@mastodon.social
Big fan of friction shifters! —especially mounted on the bar ends. Same thing, though: if that chain isn't moving, the shifter can't do its job. Flip ithe bike over, turn the pedals by hand, then stop turning and try to shift gears. No joy.
Replying to
@nantucketlit@mastodon.social
Yes, you have to be pedaling for the shifter to work. Same on the rear derailleur.
Replying to
@DenisCOVIDinfoguy@aus.social
Sorry to be picky, but those sure look like green peppers to me—not jalapeños.
Replying to
@Moss@beige.party
There was an old man of Nantucket
who kept all his cash in a bucket.
His daughter, named Nan,
ran off with a man,
and as for the bucket, Nan tuck it.
Born on This Day:
Rosalind Franklin, 1920; Emmett Till, 1941
Today's Food for Thought:
Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence. In other words, it is war minus the shooting.
—George Orwell (Eric Blair)
Today in History:
1998: South African President Nelson Mandela, at the Canadian Human Rights Monument in Ottawa, unveils a plaque honouring John Peters Humphrey (1905-1995), principal author of the first draft of the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
2004: Nova Scotia becomes the sixth Canadian province to legalize same-sex marriage.
2016: "Lift Every Voice and Sing" with words written by James Weldon Johnson in 1900 and later set to music by his brother, J. Rosamond Johnson, is sung by Denyce Graves at the opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.
Born on This Day:
Lu Xun, 1881;
Dmitri Shostakovich, 1906
Today's Food for Thought:
Truth and love must prevail over lies and hatred. —Vaclav Havel
Today's Food for Thought:
Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.
—Desmond Tutu
Today's Food for Thought:
If you hate violence and don't believe in politics, the only remedy remaining is education. Perhaps society is past praying for, but there is always hope for the individual human being, if you can catch him young enough. —George Orwell
Today in History:
1970: The pesticide DDT is banned in Canada, effective January 1st, 1971.
1988: David Lam, an immigrant from Hong Kong, becomes Lieutentant-Governor of British Columbia—the first Chinese-Canadian to hold that office.
Today's Food for Thought:
Peace: A condition in which those who seek power and control are able to achieve their aims without resorting to warfare. —Alex Morgan
Today's Food for Thought:
The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread. —Anatole France, "Le Lys rouge" (The Red Lily)
Today's Food for Thought:
The history of woman is the history of the continued and universal oppression of one sex by the other.
—Lady Tennessee Celeste Claflin
Born on This Day:
Smedley Butler, 1881
Born on This Day:
Petrarch, 1304
Today's Food for Thought:
Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte. (I have only made this letter rather long because I have not had time to make it shorter.) —Blaise Pascal
Born on This Day:
James Baldwin, 1924
Today in History:
1981: Sandra Day O'Connor becomes the first woman to serve as a US Supreme Court Justice.
Today's Food for Thought:
Central to my conception of a good school and a healthy workplace is community. In particular, I would want to work in a school that could be described as a community of learners, a place where students and adults alike are engaged as active learners in matters of special importance to them and where everyone is thereby encouraging everyone else’s learning. And I would readily work in a school that could be described as a community of leaders, where students, teachers, parents, and administrators share the opportunities and responsibilities for making decisions that affect all the occupants of the schoolhouse. —Roland S. Barth
Headlines:
-
“Clinton, B.C., set to assess damage after 'apocalyptic' wildfire forces evacuations”
-
"Leaders in northeast B.C. push back against province's plan to fast track new wind farms”
Today in History:
1928: Alexander Fleming discovers a bacteria-killing substance that he later names "penicillin," the world's first antibiotic. It would not be until 1945 that penicillin was available for widespread use, thanks to a laboratory team at Oxford University.
Born on This Day:
Confucius (Kong Fuzi, 孔夫子), ca. 551 B.C. (actual date is uncertain)
Fair Vote Canada: Join the fight for proportional representation. Make every vote count!
https://www.fairvote.ca
Today's Food for Thought:
Philosophy at first refutes errors. But if it is not stopped at this point, it goes on to attack truths. And when it is left on its own, it goes so far that it no longer knows where it is and can find no stopping place. —Pierre Bayle
Patricia Nilsson, investigative reporter for the Financial Times, discusses her book, "Guilty Pleasure: The Pornification of the Internet, the Economy, and Everything Else."
Short take: The basic structures of the modern internet, things like e-commerce, affiliate marketing, and live streaming, were pioneered and developed by the porn industry.
She also discusses the way that internet pornography has changed actual sexual practices and expanded what sorts of activities—including violent, degrading acts—are widely regarded as normal and acceptable, and connects this trend with the expansion of what is acceptable in politics in the age of Trump.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxGhWlTF2zs
Porn Addiction Defines Our Political Age. Here's How | Ash Sarkar meets Patricia Nilsson
Today's Food for Thought:
What fools we are to live in a generation for which war is a computer game for our children, and just an interesting little Channel Four news item.
—Tony Benn
All the Trump-as-clown narratives, and the mocking of him (notably, by Obama at the WH Press Corps dinner) have served only, I fear, to underestimate just how dangerous he is. Latest example: the commentariat’s ridiculing of his address to the nation about attacks on America’s voting systems. No matter how ludicrous his claims, his intentions are clear and, as Jan 6 shows, he is willing to do absolutely anything to carry them out. The Secret Service stopped him from going to the Capitol himself on Jan 6; the “reasonable people” around him finally, after hours and hours, convinced him to call off the demonstrators. This time, no one will restrain him. So buckle up, kids.
Replying to
@ParadeGrotesque@mastodon.sdf.org
"Can I buy the Jolla Phone if I’m outside Europe, can I use it e.g. in the U.S.?
The initial sales markets are EU, UK, Switzerland and Norway. Entering other markets, such as the U.S. and Canada are to be decided due course based on potential interest from the areas.
We have designed the cellular band configuration to enable potential future markets, including major U.S. carrier networks."
https://commerce.jolla.com/products/jolla-phone-sept-26
Replying to
. . . is recommending the same measures to allies in the Gulf States, Saudi Arabia, and Israel.
He has also ordered that the U.S. military stop counting casualties. “If you stop counting, you will have fewer injuries and deaths,” the President told reporters on the golf course of his New Jersey country club. Asked if he thinks the American people should be worried, he said no. “This will all be over by Easter,” he said. When reporters pointed out that he had said the same thing in March, the President replied, “Yes, and I was right then, and I am saying it again now.” [2 of 2]
Today's Food for Thought:
The real things haven't changed; they can never change. It is still best to be honest and truthful; to make the most of what we have; to be happy with simple pleasures; and to be cheerful and have courage when things go wrong.
—Laura Ingalls Wilder
Today in History:
1905: Albert Einstein publishes "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies," in which he describes his special theory of relativity.
2023: Joe Biden visits a United Auto Workers picket line, becoming the first US president to join striking union workers.
Now that we all know where the Strait of Hormuz is, it is time to learn about the Bab al-Mandab.
https://apnews.com/article/yemen-saudi-arabia-maritime-embargo-fd7c4a3911f7eee18251483fc8af768c
Born on This Day:
Ivan Pavlov, 1849;
George Gershwin, 1898
Today in History:
1951: The "Sojourners for Truth and Justice," a group of Black women activists, gather in Washington, D.C., to protest against racial violence and prejudice.
Today's Food for Thought:
Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at that moment. —Robert Benchley
Replying to on mastodon.social
Today's Food for Thought:
I have an idea that the only thing which makes it possible to regard this world we live in without disgust is the beauty which now and then men create out of chaos. The pictures they paint, the music they compose, the books they write, the lives they lead. Of all these the richest in beauty is the beautiful life. That is the perfect work of art. —Somerset Maugham