Guess what today is? January 17th is Betty White’s 91st birthday, and a few years ago I made a decision to celebrate it as Betty White Day (creative, huh) because (a) I have been watching the The Golden Girls since I was a little kid, and (b) I really like Betty White (and the rest of the cast). I would say that I liked her before she was cool, but hell, she’s been cool longer than I’ve been alive!

Since every holiday needs traditions, I’ve had to make those up too. Here is how I celebrate Betty White Day:

(source)

1. Eating a Piece of Cake. Normally this would be a piece of cheesecake, but it can be hard to find good slice in the store, so any delicious cake is just fine. Maybe if I had 3 other girlfriends to chat with all night I would bake a cheesecake, but I haven’t made any plans this year so it’s best that I don’t have an entire cheesecake at the ready. But if I were to go to the trouble to make one, I would make a lemon-ricotta cheesecake, finished with a fresh raspberry puree drizzle. Because I don’t have that much time, I’ll probably just make this chocolate mug cake instead. Discussing my problems (and my childhood in St. Olav) is optional, but traditional
2. Donating to an Animal Charity. Betty White is known for her love of animals, so in honor of her I make a donation to an animal charity. This year, I’m choosing the ASPCA because I just watched like 5 hours of that show Animal Rescue. (Seriously, every five minutes I’m like, “I’ll save you, animals!! Nooooo!”) If you’re strapped for cash, that’s OK, here’s a Live Kitten Cam you can look at instead.
3. Watching an Episode of The Golden Girls. I know this holiday is very Golden Girls-centric for me, but what can I say, I’m a fangirl. So I make sure to watch at least one episode today (like I haven’t seen every episode at least 10 times). Plus it airs all the time on the cable channels. (Trivia: Did you know that Joss Whedon’s dad wrote for the show?) If you wanted, you could probably catch some Hot in Cleveland or Mary Tyler Moore. Or any of the other million shows that Betty White has been on.

(source)

If you have any more traditions to add, please let me know. Also, are there any fun holidays that you made up to celebrate?

And because I am an internet link-scourer, here are some posts about The Golden Girls from other sites that I would like to share with you:

• 7 Things You Might Not Know About The Golden Girls – From mental_floss (also one of my favorite magazines).
• Four Old Women Share an Apartment – The genius (and feminism) behind the show.
• 10 reasons we love Betty White – The best story is the one where she sent Rue McClanahan (Blanche) an anti-Get Well card that said something like, “Dear Rue, I hope you hurry up and die so I can be the last Golden Girl left. NOT KIDDING.” We share the same sense of humor.

The point of Betty White Day is to have fun and enjoy some good food in honor of one of my favorite actresses (and shows). I’ll leave you with one of the funniest clips from the Golden Girls (transcript below):

[Scene: the women are in the therapist's office because they are having problems getting along.]

Therapist: Rose, what do you think of Blanche saying these things?

Rose: I think she’s a gerkannenaken.

Therapist: Well what exactly does that mean?

Rose: Literally, it’s the precise moment when dog doo turns white.

Blanche: [gasps, look of horror]

Rose: But in general, it refers to the kind of person you don’t want to share your huegenkagels with.

Dorothy: ROSE, if you say ONE MORE of those stupid words, I’ll–

Rose: OH BLOW IT OUT YOUR TUEBENVERBAHLS!

———————————

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Heard any good music lately? Looking for some music to add to your playlist? Join our open thread and share away!

My music playlist is short because I’m so picky about music. And then I find a song I like, I play it five times, and I’m over it. I’ve used Apple’s Genius a few times to find songs but I usually don’t have much luck. So I really want to hear what you all are listening to! If you don’t have any good music to share, you can always add your favorite puns, palindromes (Dr. Awkward), or something else that is on your mind today.

Below, I’m sharing the top three songs that I can’t get out of my head this week.

My music taste includes 80′s synth (or new wave), electronic, old country music, blue grass, trip hop, classical, french/german rap, and classic hip hop. So in a word, eclectic.

Scuba Z – The Vanishing American Family

I heard this song from the 2006 film Red Road (which honestly was one of those films that I watched because I couldn’t find anything that great on TV). It got decent reviews, but smack in the middle was this song (and an awkward love scene). Listen to this song if you need a minute to relax during a stressful day.

Loretta Lynn – Fist City

I was hooked on Loretta Lynn from the first time I watched Coal Miner’s Daughter (one of the few films I enjoy rewatching). In the film, she writes this song after catching her husband with another woman. I like her play on words and the twanginess of older country music. Plus, this song is an excellent example of a country song that isn’t depressing (no dogs die, no Jesus, no trucks) and a good retort to people who make fun of how lame country music is. Listen to this song when you feel like kicking some ass (and sing along really loudly when you’re in the car).

Yacht – Second Summer

I found Yacht last year while listening to college radio (the low end of the dial has the best songs). It’s best not to think too hard about the lyrics, just enjoy the electronic pop and vocals. Also, this music video is one of my favorites (although it cuts off the original song by two minutes). Listen to this song when you feel like dancing around the room by yourself instead of doing homework.

What’s your music taste this month? Please share it in the comments!

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(I wrote this flippant piece back in December 2011 but didn’t post it for some reason. But what else am I going to do with it? It’s just been staring back at me from the Drafts folder for the last fourteen months…so here you are.)

PB + chocolate. Worth the calories.

I sat down at the computer last night for some laid-back Sunday evening blogging. Before getting started, I took a moment to input recent eats into LoseIt.com. Peanut butter Twix bars weren’t already in LoseIt’s database, so I headed over to the Twix website for nutrition data.

The page I landed on had some flash video thing called “Twix Presents: Get the Girl (An Interactive Love Story, Sort Of).” Underneath the flash window it said, “Help our guy get past Bruce, François, and his own big mouth to win over Deborah.” Hey, that’s my name! I thought. I like games. I’ll take a moment to see what this is about.

ARGH.

Your goal in the game is to help the jerkface boy try to win (have sex with) the smart and socially conscious girl he meets at the party, using lies. The video pauses at four different points to ask you to choose what the guy’s going to do next. I played through a few times to see the different outcomes and my head went all asplodey. So instead of working on the weighty and important issue I was originally going to write about, I decided to share the idiocy of that Twix piece of marketing. Hey, it was the weekend, I had a lazy break playing Chrono Trigger, and I felt like writing something fun. I’ll write that other thing up soon. Promise.

You may be familiar with this already—the first part of the story was a TV commercial a few years ago. (The entire saga can be experienced on YouTube.)

Our story begins at a party in uptown Manhattan, where our dude is in the middle of a conversation with the hottie, Deborah. Apparently she’s smart too, but we quickly learn that that’s not why he’s talking to her.

Woman: And frankly, I just feel like most politicians are completely out of touch with 99% of society, you know?
Dude: Yeah, and it’s like…
Woman: You said it! Finally someone who shares my struggle!
Dude: I know, right? Do you wanna go to my apartment?
Woman: [surprised] What?
Dude: What?
Woman: [arms crossed] What kind of girl do you think I am?
Dude: Oh…

Dude obviously Needs A Moment, so he pulls out a Twix bar and takes a bite as you’re asked: What should he do next? Options are be shallow, or be deep.

If you pick “shallow,” he tells her he thinks she’s really sexy “like the captain of the S.S. Sexy.” This guy is a smooth operator. She slaps him and leaves.

Instead, he should Be Deep. (Should have been called “Be Derp,” as it’s completely inane.)

Dude: [with false sincerity] I thought you were a believer, someone who’d want to blog about our ideals. But…
Deborah: Oh, blogging! I love blogging!
Dude: Really!
Deborah: Yeah!
Dude: Awesome!

They walk off together, which is totally realistic, as bloggers are always looking for excuses to go blog together with people they just met at a party. Yep. They just love blogging in pairs.

On to Scenario Two: They run into her (apparently gay) friend Bruce, who Deborah invites along for their new potential ménage-à-blog. She actually says, “Hey! We’re about to go to his apartment and blog together about the media and society’s ills. Want to join us so all three of us can blog?” Of course, Dude whips out a Twix bar to pause time and consider the options: Be mean to Bruce, or kill him with kindness.

If you choose to be mean, Bruce suffers from some kind of flamboyant panic attack and the hottie is done with Dude. “Killing him with kindness” apparently means “giving him the Macho Deathgrip Handshake,” which drives him away and leaves the two of them to continue on to the apartment.

Scenario Three: On the street, they run into Deborah’s old lover François, who is a total jerk to her as well. He even shows her a picture of his new lover and tells her how jealous and sad she must be that she’s no longer with “The François.” Seriously. She sputters and looks to Dude for help because she can’t handle her own shit, so Dude PULLS OUT ANOTHER TWIX BAR to decide which to do: Get involved, or don’t get involved. This is the worst Choose Your Own Adventure story ever.

If you don’t get involved, she fumes and storms off before running after François calling his name. Uhh, because hotties like jerks?

“Getting involved” means making fun of his beret. (Of course he’s wearing a beret. He’s French.) Dude says, “Maybe it’s your awesome hat that’s making her sad.” Har har har, good one, bro! She smirks at François and puts her arm in Dude’s as they brush past and walk off, leaving a sad François behind them to question his own pathetic existence or something.

Scenario Four is the one that pushed me to write this. URG. Here they’re entering his apartment:

Dude: [lying, obviously] Yeah, this is just my uptown apartment. My downtown apartment is still being renovated to go green. Yeah, I’m pretty into the environment.
Deborah: Wow. [Looks around, makes disgusted face at mess.] Ah. So, uh…where do we log on?

Dude’s face is all, “Oh crap! She doesn’t realize yet that I’m just lying to get into her pants!” So he bites into another Twix Of Time to consider his options: Be honest, or keep up the charade.

If you pick Honest, you’ve made the WRONG CHOICE and he fails in his mission. She Tasers him (sort of) and leaves. (It’s more of a stun prod.)

If he keeps up the charade:

Dude: Oh no!
Deborah: What!
Dude: [sounding fake as shit] My computer is gone! What kind of criminal would do such a thing!
Deborah: And then completely trash your place!
Dude: Uh, yeah, that too!
Deborah: Oh, you poor thing…Gosh, just, just think like an hour ago, this place was crawling with criminals! It’s just, that’s so dangerous! So…sexy… [walks her fingers up his chest]

[Cue romantic music.]

Screen: You’ve chewed it over successfully. Twix® salutes you.

Okay, what? What happened? I recognize that I might not be very experienced with how casual relationships go, but really? He lied successfully all night, and now she’s turned on by the fact that his apartment just got broken into. For that, Twix salutes you. There’s your “interactive love story.”

Some products, like Yoplait, Jergens, and Dove Chocolate, are obviously marketed to women. Some, like Slim Jim and Mountain Dew, are marketed to men. I don’t know why Twix feels the need to hit the Axe Body Spray jerkographic.

Jerk alert! Run away!

Ah, Twix. Your bro-focused heteronormative jerk-centric marketing campaign was something I was happy to pay no attention to, much like the culture represented in beer or cigarette ads in magazines, because I love your sweet, sweet caramel on cookie wrapped in smooth chocolate. But c’mon, what are you doing with these commercials? I don’t want to hate you, but you’re really starting to look like asshole-man-bars that come two to a pack.

“Need a moment to figure out how to be a jackass to the woman in your life? Chew it over with Twix.”

Although…it would be cool if we could tell how much of an asshole someone is by how many Twix bars they’re carrying…

So, Rebecca gets a lot of emails. That’s not new. She also gets these odd suggestions, like one she shared with the rest of us the other day. They’re a little like the emails we get at the physics department at my university from people who have discovered that Einstein was wrong — just a little less elaborate maybe. Instead of a 200 page Word document, she gets these:

I wanted to ask if you might be interested in an article that I’ve written titled “10 things women do better than men”. It’s a well-researched article that covers a number of topics, including: men vs. woman in money management, gambling, relaxation, and more. Perhaps you d like to use it as a guest post on your site?
Bill

So, she responds:

Can you please write an article called “10 things women do better than men in the zoo industry”? We’re working on a series of zoo posts and this would be perfect.
Rebecca

In as little as 20 days, he comes up with:

I was thinking of few things like -
1. Woman are more emotionally oriented
2. Woman have the natural ability to grow up kids. (animals are just like kids)
3. Woman intuition
4. Woman are more loyal employ then man
Let me know if that what you look for ? I will get to more deep research.
Bill

Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant.

So, I was thinking … are woman really more loyal employ than man? I got to some deep research myself, and came up with:

Generated from Real Data (TM) by Veronica herself. No cheating. Srsly.

You know, most people who see the video below or even participate in maggot painting events have pretty much the same reactions: “Wow, cool!” or “Amazing!” or “That’s fucking disgusting!” or all of the above. No one seems to want to talk about the artistic merit of these works or how the differences in technique bring out (or suppress) the emotional range and complex voices of the maggot artists themselves.

I think, as skeptics, it’s high time we turned a critical eye to these important works. And as scientists and science enthusiasts, it behooves us to present the findings in chart form.

First, take a moment to witness the artistic process in this provocative film by entomology PhD student and maggot painter Alison Bockoven:

 
 
Note that in the first painting, the blobs of paint are added to the page first, with the maggots then placed on the paint. The result is clearly abstract expressionist, reminiscent of action paintings, yet you see the artist trapped in the overwhelming color, much as the fly-to-be is trapped in the maggot itself. There is an artistic irony in this freeform expression being used to clearly convey that the artist is not free but constrained by where it happens to be placed on the page. In fact, when we see the process, we can tell that the maggots were lifted, no doubt against their will, and placed on a different color. The commentary on how we are all trapped in the Military-Industrial Complex is stark, yet somehow the message is that even here, we can find, nay, we can create beauty.

Powerful.

Here, in this close-up at right, we see the maggot moving stridently away from the color on which it was placed while illustrating, with its trail of “blood,” that this process of asserting independence has its price.

Contrast this with the technique of dipping the maggots first, then placing them on the page, shown at left. Here we see agency, vibrancy. We see that the artist doesn’t succumb to a false dichotomy. It says, I don’t have to choose. I can be both orange and yellow. I can keep them separate and combine them. I am fucking free. Yet somehow, in this very freedom, there’s less boldness, less passion. It’s almost like the maggots are making a statement about the artistic inferiority and aimlessness that freedom produces.

It’s almost like the maggots hate America.

In fact, as you can see from the chart below, these seemingly innocent maggot paintings, often billed as a good science and art activity for children, are actually part of a larger maggot conspiracy to indoctrinate our children with socialist ideas about the robustness of cooperative work and the evils of independent thought and individualism.

*Measured in jellybeans

I think it’s time we made the world aware of exactly what these fucking maggots are plotting. Think of the children.

I volunteered to do Bad Chart Thursday today. I found this fantastic bad chart showing the results of the presidential elections from last Sunday in Venezuela. I had it all planned out in my head. I was going to show you the video that aired a few weeks ago on Venezuelan public TV of Hugo Chavez arriving in heaven and being greeted by Che Guevara and other historic figures from the Latin American left. I was going to talk about how Nicolás Maduro, the presidential candidate who is Chavez’s political heir (and his self-proclaimed son), said The Commander [Chavez] blessed him through a little birdie. I was going to comment on how Maduro put a curse on those voting for his rival, and I was probably going to make a snarky comment about his sartorial choices and his tiny constitution (featured image). I was going to call it ¡Viva la Distortion! and show you the chart Venezolana de Televisión, the main public TV station, decided to go with on their website the day after the election:

Yes, it is a ridiculously truncated chart. So ridiculous that they had to change it soon after hilarity ensued on Twitter.

But something happened that made me remember that most Bad Charts are created to purposely mislead the public: 7 people were killed in the protests following the election.

As a person who can read a chart (or numbers), you can tell that the results of Venezuelan elections were a really close call. So close, that the opposition candidate, Henrique Capriles, demanded a vote by vote recount, a position backed by the Organization of American States and the United States. People have gone to the streets to show support for their candidates, which is what lead to 7 people being killed on Tuesday, plus dozens injured, hundreds arrested, and property damage, including several universities. Capriles had to call off the rally planned for yesterday to demand a recount in fear of further violence. Instead he asked his supporters to go out to the streets every night at 8pm and bang pots and pans to show defiance. In response, Maduro asked his supporters to throw fireworks at the same time.

You can call me Debbie Downer in the comments if you like.

Featured image: EFE/David Fernandez via eltiempo.com
Bad Chart via Malaprensa

Rebecca is off to the Women in Secularism 2 conference, so I’m covering Bad Chart Thursday this week. In today’s Quickies, Amanda included a link about a map showing hotspots in the United States for racist, homophobic, and ableist language in geotagged tweets, and commenters expressed valid concerns and questions about the methodology and data presentation. So I went to investigate further, finding more information in the FAQ about the map and the original post accompanying it.

Several people commenting on the latter post raised additional concerns, such as about the conspicuously absent data for hate speech against women as well as the even more shockingly glaring absence of data on hate speech against white, conservative, pro-gun, Christian men.

So of course I had to remedy the injustice. Below, I give you a map illustrating data on the hate speech oppressing conservative white male Christians in the United States, shown in hot pink. (I lumped it all together because those white guys all look the same anyway, amiright?)

We’ve had a lot of discussions of privilege lately, and I’ve noticed that whenever the topic comes up, whether the focus is on race, gender, sexuality, ability, or any other axis, someone comments along the lines of suggesting we should all focus on simply being human.

Usually, there’s a moral high ground implied in somehow being above all this prejudice nonsense by choosing to be color-blind and gender-blind, that any focus on the reality of race, gender, sexuality, and so forth is itself a form of prejudice.

I was thinking about this idea today while procrastinating on Twitter, that the best way to have equality is to act as if we are already have it. I was trying to put my finger on what this rationale reminded me of.

Then it hit me.

This isn’t rational thinking, despite how often it seems to arise in the community of skeptics, atheists, and freethinkers.

This is, in fact, The Secret.

If you not only wish hard enough but pretend as though your wish has already come true, it will come true.

So today’s Bad Chart illustrates how some of the common statements in support of this rationale float up from reality toward this inevitable delusion conclusion.

 
 
 
Featured image by Totally Severe.

Also published on Queereka.

I got a link today to an article from the South China Morning Post about an intersex man. The story is interesting, but the article itself is horrible. They are completely ignorant of intersex people, and as an extension, gender non-conforming people in general.

The title goes: “Man, 66, goes to doctor and finds he’s a woman”

Yeah, well, that is in fact impossible. A correct title would be: “Man, 66, goes to doctor and finds he has a rare medical condition.” It doesn’t have the same sensationalist ring to it, but at least it is accurate and does not reek of cissexism.

Reading through the article it is clear the man has two relatively rare conditions.

Firstly there’s Turner syndrome, which is when a person is partially or entirely missing one sex chromosome. Meaning they have one X chromosome and that’s pretty much it. Most foetuses with this condition are spontaneously aborted, but some are born alive. The condition occurs in 1 in 2000 to 5000 “phenotypic females”.

Secondly, he has a condition called congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH). It is a condition that can cause an overproduction of androgens, male sex hormones, and can cause ambiguous genitalia and masculinisation in people without a Y chromosome. It varies greatly how common the condition is based on race, but it ranges from 1 in 280 to 1 in 15000. There is a condition that affects people with a Y chromosome in a similar way too, androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS), where one is fully or partially immune to androgens. The effect of this is full or partial feminisation.

Anyway, so back to the article.

About his condition, the article says:

Sufferers [of Turner syndrome] usually look like women, but in this case the patient also had congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), which boosted the male hormones and made the patient look like a man.

This an instance of the “not really a man/woman” trope that leads to the “fake man/woman” accusation trans people often face. We (I’m a trans woman) only look male or female. But we aren’t really you see. It’s all fake. … This is a pretty common form of bigotry we face. Especially in the media. There are numerous medical conditions that can cause a person to lack one or more of the features usually associated with a given gender. People will often then try to erase someone’s gender identity based on it. Especially if you’re a woman, as we saw with Angelina Jolie who recently among numerous sexist and racist remarks had her identity as a woman erased for having had a double mastectomy.

In the case of the Chinese article they also ignore this man’s own wishes and identity as “he has decided to continue perceiving himself as a male and may receive male hormone treatment.” This clearly implies that he has always seen himself as a man, and continues to do so. Of course he is a man. However the article, while quoting the Hong Kong Medical Journal, presumably, says:

The patient, by definition, is a woman who cannot get pregnant. But she also has CAH, which gave her the appearance of a man,” Chinese University paediatrics professor Ellis Hon Kam-lun said. “It’s an interesting and very rare case of having the two combinations. It probably won’t be seen again in the near future.

Seriously? By definition? Sorry, ignorant medical peoples. There is no clear definition of man and woman, as is clearly evident by the range of intersex variations in humans and other animals. Man/woman and male/female are false dichotomies, an artificial binary that is used also in medicine because it is statistically dominant and to an extent practical. However it isn’t that simple in reality. As any other group classification in nature it is a simplistic representation. The problem arises when simplistic representations of nature become so ingrained in the culture that we try to enforce them. Something conservatives and religious people are exceedingly good at.

The medical profession is also guilty of enforcing this binary representation on new born intersex babies, resulting in genital mutilations and life long sexual dysfunction. This is still practised many places. In her book Sexing the body: gender politics and the construction of sexuality (2000), professor Anne Fausto-Sterling discusses, among other things, the biology behind intersex and the treatment of intersex people throughout medical history. It is an excellent book if you are interested in the topic, but it also makes you sad and angry. Another tragic case of confused doctors messing with people’s identity in the name of the holy binary and failed gender theories is the case of David Reiner who accidentally lost his penis during a circumcision and was surgically assigned female. He eventually took his own life.

Just to throw in a last insult at intersex and trans people, with a touch of ableism (several of the conditions can cause disabilities), they just had to add this line:

Normal females have a pair of X chromosomes, while males have one X and one Y.

So, normal females have XX and males have XY? Well, gee, if bigots like this person are the normals, I don’t want to be. May I suggest that you, anonymous ”staff reporter”, writer of the article, go fuck yourself — and then perhaps go educate yourself a bit.

Feature image: photo by Nora Tam

Hey all. Anne from Mad Art Lab here. I’m invading the Skepchick main site on behalf of the Lab to stage a protest.

You see, over on the Lab’s behind-the-scenes dashboard, we mere contributors can no longer see our site stats. For a bunch of affirmation junkies like us (artists just want attention, you know), this is a cruel and unusual fate.

Why can we no longer view site stats? Well, you see, Mad Art Lab is actually pretty popular. Certain posts, anyway. Certain Mad Art Lab posts have been so popular *cough* Ryan’s post about ladies’ fantasy armor *cough* that they’ve actually crashed the ENTIRE Skepchick network. So, the back end has had to be reconfigured a few times, and during one of these transitions, we apparently lost access to our stats.

In the absence of data, we’ve forced to estimate just how popular we are. For a sense of scale, I’m comparing Mad Art Lab’s popularity with that of a couple other popular things:

We’re obviously the best thing since sliced bread, which is at least twice as popular as Jesus.

Again, this is just an estimation, but gosh darn it, we certainly deserve to be popular! We’ve got oodles of thought-provoking posts, from gorgeous photography to a weekly writing contest that could win you an illustration of your story, from skeptical tunes to nerdy food and drink, from feminism in pop culture to our Mad Quickies thrice-weekly link roundup. Come check out our ugly things, and maybe show off some of your own! I would tell you what our most popular posts are, but I can’t look that up right now. ¬_¬

In conclusion: give us back our stats, or we may be forced to hijack this site with bad charts once more!

-Anne and the Mad Art Lab rats

SkepchickCON at CONvergence is one of the best Skepchick events of the year. It has got science and geekiness and alcohol, so it’s basically the best thing ever. My personal favorite part this year was the fantastic cosplay by our own Skepchick network contributors.

Most of you probably weren’t able to attend SkepchickCON this year and it would be sad if that meant you had to miss out on all the awesomeness of the Skepchick cosplayers. I lugged my giant camera around all weekend in order to capture as many of the great Skepchick costumes as I could so that you could all share on a piece of the awesomeness that was SkepchickCON.

Without further ado, I bring you our very own Amy as Louise Belcher from Bob’s Burgers and Mad Art Lab’s Anne as the badass Fionna from Adventure Time.

If we’re doing badass women, we can’t forget our own Skepchick Heina as ex-boyfriend Roxie from Scott Pilgrim.

Skepchick Bug Girl cosplayed as…well, a bug.

Skepchick Nicole cosplayed as a belly dancer, except she actually is a belly dancer so it’s less cosplay and more just Nicole being her awesome self. Here she is with Mad Art Lab‘s Ashley and Ryan showing off their bellies.

Speaking of Ashley, she made a great Leeloo from the Fifth Element.

Katie from Mad Art Lab gave us her best Zuul from Ghostbusters.

Don’t worry though! The Keymaster found her!

Our master of disguises Emily from Mad Art Lab had a bunch of costumes she wore over the weekend. Here she is in full-on steam punk and the greatest boots ever.

Here is Emily again in another pair of badass boots as she explores a mysterious alien planet in her Star Trek cosplay or possibly a specific character. I don’t actually know because I’ve never seen Star Trek. PLEASE DON’T KICK ME OFF SKEPCHICK FOR THIS MORAL FAILING!

Did I say mysterious alien planet? River Song must be nearby!

Emily and fellow Labber Ryan had an epic steam punk / Lincoln battle.

Speaking of Ryan, when he wasn’t being a Canadian Lincoln, he was doing his now-famous Slave Leo cosplay.

Or cosplaying as Carl Sagan while teaching about Carl Sagan during Mad Art Lab’s paper doll scientists sandbox.

Or he and Ashley were taking a break from fighting Daleks to pose in front of their Tardis.

Oh no!! Ashley and Ryan are attacked by weeping angels. DON’T BLINK!!!

Lastly, our fearless leader Rebecca cosplayed the alien abortion scene from Prometheus. Here she is coddling her squid fetus.

And one more to really get the horrificness of the costume across.

At this point you’re probably saying to your computer screen “But Jamie, where is your costume?” The answer is that I was super boring and didn’t wear one. Or maybe I did but you’ll never know because no one ever gets photos of the photographer. This year was inspiring though and I’ve already started working on my SkepchickCON 2014 cosplay.

If you want to see more photos from SkepchickCON I’ve got over 140 of them in this Flickr album.

All photos by Jamie Bernstein.

I’ve had an active OkCupid profile for about four years now, ever since a couple of geeky friends from my hometown recommended I try it out to meet some new people after moving to Buffalo, NY. I mention that the old friends are geeky because that’s one of the things that attracted them to OKC over similar sites (besides the fact that it’s free)—it seems to draw a geekier crowd than sites like Match.com or eHarmony, and it’s actually run by data-nerds. My friends specifically highlighted the OkTrends blog, which pulls together data to show, for example, that there’s a strong correlation between mentioning “atheist” in a first message and getting a response—way stronger than other beliefs words like “christian” or “jewish,” and apparently “god” is correlated with fewer than average responses. The data also show a strong correlation between women who don’t enjoy exercise and those who say it’s difficult to achieve orgasm, among many other interesting correlations.

In addition to the fact that I’m pretty busy in general, I’m in a relationship (we met on OKCupid!) and not interested in additional romantic entanglements. My OKC profile is set for “new friends” and “activity partners” of any gender. But over the last year, I’ve received about a dozen messages that made it clear that some dudes (and they were always dudes) are committed to the birdshot approach, perhaps sending dozens of messages out to many potential connections. (I’m told this may be because there are waaaay more men than women on there, but I don’t have anything to back this up at the moment.) Since I don’t get messages that often, I always respond, although over the last year I’ve tailored my responses in an attempt to be more helpful to the hopefuls. I now share some of the data I’ve seen to try to help these potential new friends in their efforts to connect effectively…but for some reason, this doesn’t seen to work so well, as we generally quickly reach a point where they stop responding. Not sure why. Below is a sample of exchanges from the last two years.

From: bi—— (46% Match 63% Friend 52% Enemy)
Hi how are you and can I get to know u better

DebGod: You can, but I’m not sure it’s a good investment of your time. It looks like we’re not a good match on some important issues. For example, I’m a queer progressive atheist activist, while you identify as conservative/right wing. However, if you’re up for a really interesting conversation over coffee or beer some time, for fun, I’m willing to meet up!

No further response.

From: ny——
Hi…I read your profile and it sounds like we have alot in common. Check mine out and let me know if I’m your type. (I hope I am!) I’d love to chat with you and get to know you better…if you are online now feel free to message me on aol or yahoo at cr——. Hope to talk to you soon!

~C—-

DebGod: Hello!

Your message is somewhat generic, so I’m not sure if you actually did take a look at my profile. I’d think offhand that you wouldn’t think we have a lot in common. For example, yours says that you’re Catholic, but I’m an atheist. You have kids, but I’m not interested in having kids. I’m not exactly classy or refined, and if you thought I’d be a “princess,” you’re mistaken! :)

I’m atypical, and I’ve learned from experience that that’s not what most guys on OKC are looking for. I’m letting you know because I realize there’s a good chance I’m not actually what you’re looking for, and you may have made an error.

But don’t let my assumptions from experience stop you, if I’m wrong! If you’d like to pursue this possibility, feel free to message me back. Otherwise, I wish you luck on your search and hope you find what you’re looking for!

Best,
Debbie

No further response.

From: DebGod
To: bw—— (37% Match 75% Friend 35% Enemy)

Hi! You said, “Hint: if you stop to look at any guys profile you should at least say hi, not interested or not sure maybe, it gives us some indication on what you think!” Well, I haven’t had coffee yet today, but I figured I’d bite.

I think we are a terrible match! Ha. You have some interesting hobbies, but our worldviews are wildly different. I think that numerology and astrology are not at all accurate, for example. I’m a queer liberal progressive atheist activist, and you seem like you have some old-fashioned ideas. :)

It’s cool you make a bunch from poker, though. That’s something I don’t know how to do at all.

Good luck out here in OK Cupid-land!

Debbie

No response.

From: dm—— (44% Match 52% Friend 24% Enemy)
Hey how are you? My name is —— and I thought you were really cute. Do you have any favorite things to cook or eat? Do you like to travel, if so where have you been or you would like to go? Well I think we have some common interests, and I was seeing if you want to talk sometime?

DebGod: Hi! I just read this and appreciate that you reached out. But your message is so generic that it leads me to think that you just sent the same message to a dozen different people on OKC, hoping some of them would respond. I would like to engage in conversation and communicate with people here, but I want to make sure they have some sense of who I am first.

So I’m asking, please, if you message me back, I hope you write something that indicates that you’ve actually read my profile and are trying to communicate with me as an individual. :)

More info about me:

http://www.debgod.com/about/

http://www.centerforinquiry.net/speakers/goddard_debbie

Thanks! Maybe I’ll hear from you again?

Debbie

Nope, didn’t hear from him again.

From: th——
Hey how are you? Text me if you want 716—— j——

DebGod: Hi! We don’t seem to be a good match, and I’m not sure why you contacted me. Can you send me more info?

Debbie

Nothing.

From: br—— (24% Match 39% Friend 62% Enemy)
Hello, How was your day?

DebGod: My day was okay, but could have been better. How was your day?

br——: My day was good. I have Sunday and Mondays off. it allows me to have one day during the week to get things done.

What do you like to do outside of work?

DebGod: Hmmm…There hasn’t been much life for me outside of work recently. June and July are busy months for me at work!

When I get the chance, I like to go hiking. I also like to hang out and play Trivial Pursuit or go to bars occasionally. I enjoy taking walks around the city at night and seeing what I can find.

I used to play guitar and draw more, but I haven’t taken the time to do either of those things recently. What about you?

You included almost no personal information in your message to me. What is it that made you reach out to me? Was there information in my profile that made you think we’d be a good match? Just curious.

Debbie

br—-: The no personal information was an oversight. I was on on my phone typing back and i like to keep it short sometimes.

I like to go golfing, I go to bars once in awhile with my family members. I rarely drink so I tend to stay away. I like to go to the movies, I walk my block twice a day 4 days a week.

[more personal information]

I tend to stay in most nights. Do try to get out once or twice a week with friends. Family and friends and very important and family is the base of everything else.

What I noticed about your profile. Too me it starts with a good conversation. By all accounts you seem well grounded in what you want.

DebGod: I am pretty grounded, yep!

I guess I should share more info about myself? Here’s some:

http://www.debgod.com/about/

http://www.centerforinquiry.net/speakers/goddard_debbie

I’m also here and there on YouTube. :)

Hey, I guess I should ask, as I’m an atheist activist type: your profile lists your religion as “other”. What do you mean by that?

br——: Great sites and a quick youtube search brings up lots a few videos.

www.br——.com

Religion has been complicated for me. I grew up catholic. I dont believe in some of the views of the church. I do not go every week/month or year. I did visit a church in PA called Real Life. It was interesting.

That is why it is other

DebGod: Thanks for sharing. I just spent more time looking over your profile and match questions, and it’s apparent that we’re actually not a good match at all. I mean, it says we’re 64% enemy! :) So I don’t think either of us should spend more time with this.

I wish you luck on your search for a good match here.

Best,
Debbie

br——: You too nice talking

DebGod: :)

From: bl—— (67% Match 28% Friend 11% Enemy)
hey

DebGod: Hey!

bl——: how r u

DebGod: Pretty busy at the moment; and you?

No further response. This kind of exchange happens pretty often.

From: jo—— (19% Match 35% Friend 50% Enemy)
looking for some fun?

DebGod: Hello! Cryptic message. What does this mean?

jo——: …lol idk

DebGod: Are you messaging me because you’re looking to hook up with someone for casual sex? That isn’t really what I’m going for on here. We don’t have a high match percentage, so I figure that’s probably what you’re aiming for, but it’s not for me right now. Good luck with that, though. :)

No further response.

From: do—— (73% Match 49% Friend 31% Enemy)
Hi what going on

DebGod: Hi,

We don’t look like a good match, so I’m not continuing this further. Good luck to you on here!

Debbie

From: Nyk——
Hey what’s up, I was looking thru profiles, saw your picture and think your really Beautiful. Curious to know more about you, where are you from?

DebGod: Hello! Philadelphia. You?

Nyk——: Kenmore, what do you do for fun?

DebGod: Some of those answers are on my profile already. You?

No further response.

From: le——
Hi, how are you? :)

DebGod: I’m doing well today!

Your message is so very generic that I wonder if you even read my profile. The OK Cupid blog showed a correlation between writing messages that indicate that you’ve read someone’s profile and are interested in contacting them specifically, and getting responses more often.

These data might be helpful to you:

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/online-dating-advice-exactly-what-to-say-in-a-first-message/

I recommend taking a look at the “Bring up specific interests” section.

I hope that helps!
Debbie

No further response.

From: ho—— (74% Match 80% Friend 17% Enemy)
Hey how are you today? :)

DebGod: I’m doing well today!

Your message is so very generic that I wonder if you even read my profile. You mention on yours, “I also spend a lot of time thinking about why people respond selectively when they are on a dating/ friends site. whats wrong with at least making a new friend ?” Well, the OK Cupid blog showed a correlation between writing messages that indicate that you’ve read someone’s profile and are interested in contacting them specifically, and getting responses more often.

These data might be helpful to you:

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/online-dating-advice-exactly-what-to-say-in-a-first-message/

I recommend taking a look at the “Bring up specific interests” section.

I hope that helps!
Debbie

No further response.

From: em—— (67% Match 56% Friend 0% Enemy)
hi how are u

DebGod: Hello,

If you’d like to increase your response rate, I suggest writing more than that to people you contact for the first time. It will show that you’re actually interested in them as individuals, and not just spamming dozens of people at once with a cookie-cutter message.

Debbie

em——: Hey I know but I just wanna start by asking how they are. I don’t wanna be rude at the beginning

DebGod: I can understand those motivations, but after talking with a lot of people who dislike such impersonal and short first contacts, I’d wager that it’s considered less polite to send such an impersonal message.

Check out the advice on here, for example, as it may be useful to you:

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/online-dating-advice-exactly-what-to-say-in-a-first-message/

=============
Rule 4
Bring up specific interests

There are many words on the effective end of our list like zombie, band, tattoo, literature, studying, vegetarian (yes!), and metal (double yes!) that are all clearly referencing something important to the sender, the recipient, or, ideally, both. Talking about specific things that interest you or that you might have in common with someone is a time-honored way to make a connection, and we have proof here that it works. We’re presenting just a smattering: in fact every “niche” word that we have significant data on has a positive effect on messaging.

Even more effective are phrases that engage the reader’s own interests, or show you’ve read their profile…
=============

Good luck out there,
Debbie

No further response.

Hi! I’m new around here. For those of you who didn’t read my disability column that Elyse posted for me, or haven’t hung out on twitter enough to see my various observations/complaints/arguments with MRA’s, I’m Sarah. As a new person, I figured I should just pull a Buzzfeed & write a list of Reasons Why I’m Interesting or Best Reasons To Read Shit I Write, something like that, so here goes (the heavier articles will come later, I promise)!

1) I grew up in Milwaukee, WI, then went to college in a really small town in Iowa, and now live in Columbus, OH. Despite my best attempts, I still haven’t made it out of the Midwest. Looks like I’m stuck here for a while.

2) Beyonce is my queen. Really. I really, really like Beyonce. Trust me, the day she cut her hair was basically my Christmas. I like Beyonce so much I once dressed up as her & danced onstage with a friend for a contest in college (weirdly enough, I didn’t have to use blackface for people to understand I was dressing up as her!). Even more fun fact about it: we won the contest & a few months later met Lady Gaga & told her about it. I’ll save that story for another time, though. :)

3) I’ve only been a progressive person for a few years now. It’s weird to remember things I said/wrote/thought just a few years ago, because they are so dichotomously different from what I think now. Obviously, I’m still growing & changing as a person, so maybe in a few months or years I’ll look back on this & go “wtf was I thinking?”

3) When I was in college, I studied abroad in Johannesburg, South Africa. I went on a program specifically to study human rights, and my classes focused a lot on gender issues. I got smacked down (repeatedly) by my teachers, who were amazing African feminists. I’m humbled and appreciative of their lessons. South Africa is also an amazing place, and also where I got to meet the cute little lion (his name is Solo) in the picture (you can see the full version of that picture here).

5) I’m vegan as fuck. If you make an “lol but bacon!” joke, you are unoriginal, unfunny, and also I hate you. I’m sure I’ll talk about veganism (a LOT), so hopefully you’re looking forward to me “shoving my lifestyle down your throat.” You know, by writing articles on the internet about it. Like a true Nazi or Stasi agent or whatever I am now by becoming a Skepchick.

6) I’ve got Crohn’s disease (as I mentioned in a previous Skepchick post, before I was OFFICIALLY a Skepchick), so you’ll also be hearing a lot about skepticism and the medical industry and disability stuff. If you’re interested, I was on a panel at Women in Secularism 2 about “Faith-based Pseudoscience” where I touched on some of these issues.

7) I like video games? That’s a fact about me, I guess. I was into gaming a lot more when I was younger but the constant sexual harassment I got whenever I went to events (or the accusations that I was a “fake geek girl”) took some of the glamour away from gaming. I’ve gotten back into it more now that I’ve found better communities. The games I play mainly right now are Final Fantasy XIV and Civ V. I was also really into the Metal Gear Solid series, although I think it’s kind of jumped the shark with recent editions (seriously, can nanomachines do EVERYTHING?).

8) I have a degree in Communication Studies & Psychology. I have nothing funny or punchy to add to that information, just figured it was relevant.

9) I have a partner who I think is a pretty cool person. I wrote about us getting engaged, if you’re interested in the story. We got married on Groundhog’s Day, the most important holiday of the year.

10) I have a Deathly Hallows tattoo because I’m a grown ass adult, and that means I can get a symbol from a children’s fiction series permanently inked onto my skin (it’s from Harry Potter, in case you’re one of the five people in the world who hasn’t read the series).

Alright, well, there you have it. Weird information about me! I’ve got some interesting posts percolating in my brain that I’m excited to share, and of course I’m looking forward to all the obsessive vitriol that will soon be directed at me for daring to associate myself with Rebecca Watson & the rest of the Skepchicks. Got any questions for me? :)

This was originally posted at Mad Art Lab. Have you been to our super-awesome art site lately? If not, go soak your eyeballs in some spectacular, secular creativity! But for now, bask in the glory of some truly inspired duct tape art!

At the lab we love us some good ol’ fashioned godless art. We also love us some people with wit and a goddamn-good sense of humor. All of these lovable things have combined in a sticky, colorful mass with duct tape artist, Andy Carmichael. I was lucky enough to meet Andy at last years American Atheist art show and he (and his art) was as awesome in real life as you might hope! He is such a swell fellow that he was kind enough to take the time to answer some of my probing questions about his art, atheism, duct tape and the important role humor can play in sending a message. Enjoy!

What got you interested in doing art that was inspired by atheism?

What got me into atheism?

“Noah II” by Andy Carmichael.

The simple answer is creationism and evangelical Christianity. I grew up in a semi-religious house, meaning that we went to church fairly regularly, but religion was never a domineering force in my house. Religion was something that was done on Sunday morning, and that was about it. I never was taught that evolution was wrong or that I should take the bible word for word. Topics like homosexuality weren’t topics to be condemned, just avoided at all cost. So it was actually in college that I was first exposed to creationism and evangelical Christianity. I had some dorm friends who were regular attendees of a group called Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. And I started to tag along. I remember the first time someone told me they didn’t think evolution was true. It just boggled my mind. Here was a girl who was smart, who wanted to be an engineer, and yet held this ridiculous idea. It extended into politics as well. I just could never be that comfortable with the conservative God of my friends. With all of that said, I really did try to become/remain Christian in college. I think the more I tried the less it worked. But I did not completely reject the notion of God. I guess when you grow up hearing that “God is Love” without having to confront any of the hypocrisy or the more ridiculous aspects of belief, it’s easy to just accept it as possibility, if not truth. And it’s hard to discard the beliefs of your childhood—I still want to believe Pluto is a planet even though I know better.

“The Flying Spaghetti Monster intelligently makes love.”

It wasn’t really until graduate school when, after long hours spent indoors at a godless institution of learning, I would come outside late at night to find my car windshield covered in Chick tracts. Out of sheer annoyance I decided to actually read them. Once I got over my initial confusion and shock at the absurdity and bad logic presented so adamantly in cartoon form, I pretty much laughed all traces of God out of my life. The absolute nuttery spewing from every page of these tiny booklets is a fucking miracle in and of itself; which would make a compelling argument in favor of God if it weren’t just so impossibly stupid. If you don’t believe me, just read the tracts “Big Daddy” and the “Last Generation.” How can you not love a cartoon which states that the secretive Catholic Illuminati are going to drive around with moped-powered guillotines beheading true Christians? How can you ignore the hilarity of the argument that the Loch Ness Monster is proof that man and dinosaurs lived together? It is impossible to parody, and funnier than anything I could think of, and became an obsession that eventually inspired me to create some cartoon insanity of my own.

Why did you start making duct tape art.

“Sasquatch Jesus in the Pale Moon Light.”

I got into duct tape almost by accident. One Christmas, my wife and I were living in a small apartment, so having a Christmas tree wasn’t that practical. So jokingly I told her that while she was away visiting her family, I was going to make her a Christmas bower (see Vogelkop Bowerbird) because nature knows that the reason for the season has always been fancy decorations and shiny objects. Initially, I was going to make it out of Christmas lights, but that idea failed miserably. Luckily, I saw some colored duct tape at the store. With that and a shower curtain, I made a portrait of the Pastafarian heaven, complete with stripper factory and beer volcano. It was pretty epic. From there, it evolved or devolved, depending on your perspective. Before I knew it I was making pictures of Jesus riding a unicorn fighting a fire-breathing Parasaurolophus, which come to think of it, is actually a logical progression. Also I can’t draw, paint, knit, sculpt, mold, crochet, sew or quilt. So my options are limited.

I am a firm believer that art should not only be atheistically pleasing but also be practically useful. For example, let’s say you’re kayaking across the English Channel and your boat develops a leak. If you have my art work with you, you can quickly make a repair and be on your way. If you just had a Thomas Kinkade with you, all you’d have is buyer’s remorse and a sinking boat. And your immortal soul would be doomed to wander the murky grey waters of the channel forever and ever. That’s right, buy my art work, it just might save your life.

What influences your art?

“Shnoah’s ark II”

“The Revelation of St. Pauli.”

I don’t have that much of an art background. The last art class I took was in eighth grade, and I got a pitty ‘D’. So I can’t say I’ve been too influenced by one school of art or another, or by one artist or another. Probably my two greatest influences have been comics/graphic novels and dollar store catholic holograms of happy peaceful lambs that turn in to Jesus’ bloody crucified body. Two of my biggest influences I would say have been Gary Larson’s Farside and Transmetropolitan. Larson’s ability to combine science and humor is unmatched. I dare anyone to walk into a science building without finding at least one Farside cartoon. And I also just love the man’s humor. I like the idea that it’s not the fact that two cows own a home that’s the punch line to the comic, but they fact that they don’t have opposable thumbs and can answer the telephone. Transmetropolitian by Warren Ellis has been a big influence on my story telling, especially, volume 0. That volume is a bunch of side stories, usually just one picture and a few sentences. It’s the details in the background that carry the stories and the emotion. So I try to make at least the main parts of my work as detailed as I can, even if it means cutting each of the scales on the dinosaurs out one by one. For comics and cartoons, the story and title are just as important as the actual picture, and the same goes for my artwork. I usually spend more time on getting the story exactly right than I do working on the duck tape part of the picture itself. Probably my most obvious influence is Christianity and religion itself. I grew up Lutheran, and any art we had was plain and somber. Jesus always wore the same brown robe with white undergarments. He always had the same empty solemn expression. Then I discovered dollar store catholic art. Everything was bright and colorful and made no sense. What is not to like about a kid Jesus dressed up as a 13th century Spanish pilgrim? Or Saint Barbara and her crown of bricks. I grew up with boring, humble Jesus, but Catholics have Super Jesus with a flaming laser heart that shoots people in the face with love and mercy. I know a lot of Catholics hated growing up Catholic, but given the choice simply based on my materialistic and greedy nature, I would choose Catholicism in a heartbeat. And I try to reflect that by making my artwork just as bright and colorful. Also I want to thank my wife. She helps a lot with refining the ideas and proof-reading the stories.

“In the Beginning God Made Adam and Steve”

Do you think humor plays an important role in communicating ideas? If so why?
I am mocking some of the most deeply held and cherished beliefs of others, so the least I can do is make them laugh.
Humor is really the best, if not really the only way, to address religion. Religions use fear to keep the faithful in line. While some religions claim that it’s all about love and peace, if you look at the nuts and bolts of that faith it is all about avoiding the wrath of God. Take gay marriage for example. Evangelical Christians claim that “for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, yada yada yada..” and, yet all of their arguments about why we should not allow same-sex marriage can be boiled down to, “God will be angry and He will hurt us.”  This type of argument has even flowed into subjects that religion shouldn’t have any influence. Don’t believe in Global warming or you’ll insult God. If you don’t lower that top marginal tax rate, you’ll make Jesus cry. And when Jesus cries, New Orleans gets destroyed by hurricanes. So once one side of the debate begins to use fear as a primary tool, maintaining a civilized, rational discussion is useless. It does not matter to a person how many inconsistencies there are in the timeline of Jesus’s life if that person is afraid that merely questioning the bible will lead you straight to hell. The physics behind global warming becomes irrelevant when someone thinks his or her immortal soul is on the line. No rational argument can adequately refute that, just like no amount of water can put out an imaginary fire.
That is where humor comes in. It allows you to refute irrational ideas without accidentally showing those ideas any undeserved respect. Humor lets people understand that they don’t need to be afraid. Once people are not fearful, they start questioning. And that is all I can ask for.

“Jesus Angry”

What projects do you have in the works? 
The piece I’m working on right now is “Eve and Lilith,” where God makes woman first, but rather than eating the apple they trick God, Jesus and Satan into eating it instead because Eve and Lilith were creeped out by how God was always watching them and finally had enough. I have more ideas than time to work on them. Like a false advertisement for “Blood of the Lamb Landry detergent– “Now with 50% more quilt,” Jesus, the pope and various saints running a bikini car wash, Noah being attacked by penguins. Squid Christ. Sasquatch Jesus in the Garden. The Lord on the run from the zombies he created. I also want to try to write a longer set of stories in which comments by wingnuts are true. For instance, a gay couple who marries causes a heterosexual man to fall in love with a box turtle; Islamic fundamentalists and liberals are one in the same, or that the government is controlled by global warming alarmists.  With that said, I am willing to do commission work.

How can people find out more about you and your art?
I have a blog at holytape-holytape.blogspot.com and I have an etsy shop at holytape.etsy.com.

Unicorns are Evil

Thank you so much for taking the time to talk with us, Andy and keep on makin’ art!

Psssssst: Hey you…cool person reading this post… yeah YOU. Be sure to click through on the images of Andy’s art for some inspired explanations of each piece and be sure to check out all his other sticky creations on his website!

“Quint Christ and the Holy Jaws.”

Winner, winner, winners! The names have been put in a hat. Scroll down to see a quick video of me selecting the winners!

Congrats everyone!

The winners for the free passes to the Boulder Science Festival are:

Leah Crane

Dave Schey

James Paul Mason

Nancy Perchitti

Stkras1

Hanna

Note to the winners: I need you to get in touch with me in the comments and let me know that you can for sure attend the event. I am only paying for the ticket to the event. You need to be able to get to Boulder, Colorado and find a place to stay. I also need to know if you are a student. I need your full name. I also need your email address. You can contact me via the contact link on our website or in the comment section below. As soon as I have that info, I will buy your pass! If for any reason you can NOT attend please let me know so I can give the pass to someone else.

And to everyone else, I encourage you to go to the event if you can. More info on how to that is here. See you in Boulder, Colorado!

EDIT 9:29PST: WINNERS! I have been informed I need the following info from you:

Full name, email and mobile phone #
Name they want on their badge
What they want for lunch – choices are vegi brie sandwich, roast beef sandwich, ham and cheese sandwich, tuna wrap or turkey wrap.
Any food allergies or other special needs?

Please send this info to me via the contact link or FB or twitter DM me @surlyamy

While the Men’s Rights Activists are continuing their brave activism in the comments of last week’s YouTube video, I thought we could all enjoy a change of pace this week. In today’s video, I share my wisdom as the world’s greatest Civilization V player*. Enjoy!

Transcript:

If you follow me on Twitter, you know that I’ve been playing a lot of the video game Civilization V.

For those who aren’t familiar, Civilization is a turn-based strategy game where the point is to build up your empire so that it’s the most diplomatic, the most cultural, most scientific, or the most dominating civilization in the game.

Since acquiring Civilization V a couple of months ago, I have become the greatest Civ player on the face of the Earth. I tweeted about a month ago that yes I did win a game on the emperor difficulty level the first time I tried and a lot of people were mildly impressed with this fact and asked for tips on how to play Civilization. So, finally this is my answer.

I hope that these help. These are my top 5 tips on how to win at Civilization V.

Tip #1: Always play for a domination victory. Yeah I know, there are loads of different ways to win: you can shoot a rocket to Alpha Centauri! You can win by UN vote. You can build the “Utopia Project” whatever the hell that is, but all of those are stupid, loser ways to win. The only true way to win is to obliterate every other civilization, feasting upon the tears of your dying enemies.

Tip #2. Declare war on the very first civilization you meet, as soon as you meet them. Don’t let them feed you any bullshit about wanting peace…they’re lying to you. You’ve probably heard that advice about if you go to prison you should stab the first person they meet. This is basically the same advice – declaring war on the first rube you run across will tell the other civilizations in the game to back the fuck off.

Tip #3. Utilize religion to your benefit. Build a shrine early to establish a pantheon, and befriend religious city-states so that you can build up enough faith to get a Great Prophet quickly and establish a religion. Here’s why: you can name your religion anything you want, like “Your Butt.” Then, when city states start quests to get your religion, a notification will pop up saying, “Singapore wants Your Butt.”

This is awesome and hilarious.

Other options for religion names are, “Poop,” “Scientology,” and “Death Cult 666.”

Tip #4. Don’t forget to play the psychological game. When you capture a city, rename it to something similar to the original city name but slightly insulting. For instance:

Dumbdon
Buttingham
Dork
New Dork
Farthage
Philasmellphia
or
Boringth

This is degrading to your opponent and will give you the psychological edge.

If you can’t think of a funny insulting name for a city, just burn it to the ground.

And finally, tip #5: Giant Death Robots, Giant Death Robots, Giant Death Robots. I really can’t overemphasize how awesome it is to unleash a fleet of Giant Death Robots upon your primitive, unsuspecting opponents. Build as many as you can. Preferably the ratio should be something like 2 Giant Death Robots for every 1 citizen in your civilization. This will also help in case your citizens get angry and rebel. The French Revolution would have been over in 30 seconds if Marie Antoinette had a couple dozen Giant Death Robots.

So those are my tips. If you play Civilization, please give my tips a try and let me know if they work for you. Or if you have tips, I would love to hear them. Please leave a comment below. Thanks for watching!

*According to my cats

It is the holiday season! And whether you celebrate the solstice, Jesus, Krampus or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, one thing we can all agree on, is that gifts are nice to get!

Each year, here at Skepchick, we do a little internet window-shopping and then point out the fun stuff we find to our readers.

I realize not everyone can afford to shop and not everyone shares my overwhelming happiness for hot chocolate and all things that jingle-jingle-jingle. And so to you I say, this gift guide isn’t about unbridled consumerism. It’s meant to be a fun and friendly reminder that this season, like every season, is what YOU make of it. It’s not the dollar amounts that matter or how big your fake tree is, it’s about how you use that tree and the other trees that you plant and it’s about how you decide to share your money, your time and your love with the world. Can’t afford gifts? No problem. Please consider doing a good deed or donating your time to a worthy cause during the holiday season. And if you are fortunate enough to be able to afford some shopping then please allow me to encourage you to support artists, small businesses and worthy causes this season. You would be surprised how much a single purchase or donation can positively impact a small business, an artist or a charity organization.

Okay! Enough sweet talk, let’s get to the goods with the 2013 Skepchick Gift Guide!

Care about vaccinations? Want to help save the world? Skepchick contributor-and-BAMF-scientist, Ray recommends a donation to the Red Cross.

This link will take you to the Holiday giving section at the Red Cross where you can buy vaccines for children for only a dollar each. You could protect an entire village this year if you want!

Do you need to fend off some internet trolls and look freaking-good while going into battle? Noisy Astronomer and I highly recommend the work of artist, metalsmith and Mad Art Lab Contributor, Ryan Consell. Take a look at his Etsy shop DragonsmithArmoury and check out those badass bracers! I hear he does custom work.

Know a geek who likes to knit crochet? Is that geek you? Newly graduated Teen Skepchick and now official regular Skepchick, Olivia, lets us know that for only $6 you can pick a pattern and knit crochet up you very own Doctor Who doll! There are lots of other downloadable patterns in the geek genre available, and put together by crafter extraordinaire, Alisson Hoffman via this link. Who needs real friends when you can create your own fuzzy buddies like this! EDIT: I had no idea what I was talking about here. This is not knitting. They are crochet patterns. I sit corrected.

Mary reminds us that art is important and recommends this Shark vs Narwhal piece from the LegendaryTigerHero shop on Etsy. The epic battle continues. Get your print here.

Amanda brings to our attention the fact that cats can be scientists too. Well at least they can be in the Etsy shop Prim and Plush! Take a look at their shop for some very cute knitted molecules too!

Oh what is that you say? What about my Surly-Ramics Etsy shop? Well thank you so much for asking! I have been working like a good little surly elf trying to make as many Surly-Ramics as I can! Please consider stuffing some stockings with my handmade goods. And to inspire you to do so, here is a special Surly coupon code I created that is good ALL the way to January 1st. You can use the code SHOPHAPPY for 15% off your entire order. Please feel free to share that code if you like. And know that I really appreciate the support through any purchase that you can make. Holiday sales help keep me fed and working during those slow days of spring and fall. Link to my Surly-Ramics Etsy shop is here.

And while we are shamelessly self-promoting I’d like to direct your attention to the official Skepchick store. Rebecca has stocked the Skeptical Robot shop with some fun holiday items. Proceeds from these sales help keep our now larger server running smooth and we thank you for your support! Help support our blog and celebrate Chrismukkah with this fun double sided gift-wrap. This wrapping paper alone proves that there is no war on Christmas at Skepchick. We want everyone to get along and merge into one big mass of holiday cheer! Well- right up to the moment where we rip it to shreds in unabashed, opening, joyfulness!

Need something to shove those beautifully wrapped Chrismukkah-solstice gifts in to? How about your very own atheist stocking!

For a limited time you can purchase this atheist themed stocking from Skeptical Robot to hang by your chimney with care!

One thing we love on Skepchick and particularly on Mad Art Lab is comics! I would like to personally recommend an artist who was a contributor to Mad Art Lab in the early days and has since moved on to do some really great things! Maki Naro is one of the coolest cats you will ever meet and he makes some wonderfully sciency-themed art. He writes for Popular Science and has a newly kickstarted comic project called Sufficiently Remarkable. Maki also has an Etsy shop with some beautifully rendered prints of his art and T-shirts. I recommend you take a look!

Another good friend of the Mad Art Lab crew is Scientific American artist and writer, Glendon Mellow. Glendon writes for the Symbiartic blog and The Flying Trilobite. He creates some really beautiful and intricate art often based on… you guessed it, trilobites and evolutionary biology! I am a big fan of his work. You can purchase prints of his art, cards, T-shirts, and more here: http://www.redbubble.com/people/flyingtrilobite/shop.

Looking for a lighthearted gift for a cat lover? Skepchcick Mary brings our attention back to books with this wonderful recommendation of, “I could Pee On This and Other poems by Cats” by author Francesco Marciuliano. And lucky for some of you, it’s available for Amazon Prime.

Speaking of pets, I have asked my friends and family members who want to buy me something this year to instead donate to a local animal shelter or rescue in my name. I have already chosen my charity this year as NKLA.org. NKLA is a coalition of groups dedicated to finding homes for all the heathy animals in Los Angeles. It’s a mighty task to accomplish. This time last year, inspired by their work, I adopted a homeless dog who I named, Booster. (I already had a dog named Rocket.) It was one of the best things I ever did. My life is filled with twice as much love now thanks to that adorable shelter mutt. To put it in perspective a small $10 donation will equal a week of meals for some hungry fuzzy fellas. Animals need our help. Please help them if you can. Thanks for your work NKLA and all other animal shelter volunteers!

Not enough animal love for you? Gosh you people are demanding. How about this adorable Sloth backpack? Only $20 from Etsy seller catbirdcreatures. And you guessed it! They offer lots of other cool creature designs too!

Heina reminds us that misandry is actually a thing this holiday season! Well, at least in patch form anyway! You can get yourself a sweet misandry patch and other fun, feminist themed trinkets at very affordable prices at Daisy’s Creations!

Elyse says misandry is silly. Men have so many uses around the holidays that there is no time for hating. Take this Paladone Happy Man Bottle Stopper. No really. Take this little happy man to your next holiday party and claim that bottle of wine in the name of happiness. Down with misandry! Up with glasses! Also available as a corkscrew.

Looking for something a bit more classy to get your drink on?

Mad food artist Anne recommends these truly beautiful etched decanters by Reclamation Etchworks. The artists, Tim & Ethan who make these were kind enough to make and donate a set that we used for drink demos and then auctioned off at the last SkepchickCon to help pay the bills. These really are gorgeous and I hope to own a set someday.

Need something to set those decanters on? MAL contributor Beth recommends this beautifully handcrafted wood work by artist Peggy Skemp.

How about something for the little ones? Or those little fingers an the end of your hands? Resident Mad Art Lab puppet maker, Charles recommends two tiny puppet shops. The first one, PaperTigerPuppets specializes in finger puppets!

The second puppet shop is called, staceyrebecca and they have some really amazing creations including an honest-to-Krampus bedazzled tampon finger puppet! Best finger puppet ever or best finger puppet EVER?

Check out her really adorable fuzzy worm stick puppets too. Lots of kid friendly stuff in that shop also!

I honestly can not think of a better place to end this gift guide than after a bedazzled tampon finger puppet.

There were some other recommendations that the contributors sent in but I do have to hurry back to Surly Studio and get back to makin’ gifts like a good little holiday elf.

If you have any gifts you like that you want to recommend or you make cool stuff you would like to promote, please feel free to leave links in the comments. And remember that the holidays are hard for some people so most importantly, be good to yourself and be kind to others this season and share love, cheer, shelter and food with those you can, when you can.

Happy holidays everyone!

With love, from everyone here at the Skepchick Network.

I’m sure everyone has heard by now, but Nelson Mandela, former South African president, has died at age 95.

I lived in South Africa for half a year while studying at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. The program was entirely focused on human rights, and in every single class I took, he was talked about. My South African friends spoke about him with reverence. I mean, his nickname was “Madiba” (father) for a reason.

I visited Cape Town for a few days after my exams. I was fortunate enough to visit Robben Island, where he was imprisoned for 20 years. When you arrive on the island, the entire field leading up to the first building is covered in yellow flowers. It seems odd that the scene of such terrible atrocities is now covered in such beauty. (The album of photos I took on my trip is viewable here.)

Mandela’s jail cell, furnished as it was at the time.

The tour guides at Robben Island were all former political prisoners. Our tour guide told us about how after years of arguing with the guards, prisoners were allowed to play games in the courtyard. They asked for tennis balls and rackets. Since many of the political prisoners were barred from communicating with each other, they would cut a slit in a tennis ball, shove a note inside, and then “accidentally” hit it over the wall (where the other prisoners would find it). He told us how the prisoners fought for basic things, like the ability to wear pants instead of shorts, bedding, and access to library materials. When they did succeed, it often took years for the changes to be implemented.

Mandela, along with the other prisoners, was forced to work in the lime quarries on the island. Since they were not allowed to wear sunglasses, Mandela suffered permanent eye damage from working in the quarry. He also suffered chronic lung infections from working in the quarry as well.

It is often said that Mandela was a peaceful leader. While this is true, he did not discount that violence was sometimes a necessary tool for enacting change. South African President P.W. Botha offered Mandela a release from prison in exchange for “unconditionally reject[ing] violence as a political weapon,” since there were violent revolts all over the country at the time. Mandela refused.

Mandela was released in 1990. He worked with Botha’s successor, F.W. deKlerk, to abolish apartheid. In the next election, he was elected president. At the Apartheid Museum in Johannesburg, they had pictures and stories of people who waited in line up to three days to vote, many (if not most), who were allowed to vote for the first time.

His prison number was 46664. This was common knowledge among the South Africans I met. I remembered it after seeing billboards for the foundation he created to help fight HIV/AIDS (which was simply called “46664“), which he admits he did not work hard enough to fight during his time as president.

I remember when I was in South Africa in 2009, they were preparing for the World Cup that was going to be hosted there in 2010. Many people were concerned that he wouldn’t live to see it, after he fought so hard for it to happen in his homeland. I’m glad he lived to see it– and then lived another couple years, just to show that he could.

I keep trying to think of someone else to compare Mandela to, but I can’t. He was truly peerless. I arrived in South Africa on July 1st, which meant I was able to participate in “Mandela Day” celebrations on July 18th, his birthday. One of my friends took me to the celebrations in Johannesburg. There must have been thousands of people there to celebrate Madiba’s birthday. I can’t imagine a gathering of that size for the birthday celebration of any US president (or even public figure, for that matter). A few weeks later, I went to go see a play called “Amandla,” which was about his life. The world “Amandla” is a Xhosa and Zula word for “Power!” which was a common refrain for ANC supporters, usually responded to with, “Awethu!” which means “to us.” It is their version of “power to the people.”

I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say he was one of the best people humanity has ever seen. The South African Constitution that was created during his presidency was the first constitution in the world to include sexual orientation under its anti-discrimination policies (it is widely considered one of the most progressive constitutions in the world).

I know that Nelson Mandela and my experiences in South Africa have greatly shaped who I am as a person. I can only imagine how influential he has been to millions of other people worldwide.

To close, I will share one of my favorite quotes of his: “For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”

Thank you for everything, Madiba.

If you would like to send a message to Mandela’s family, you can send one here.

Did you know that Greek Orthodox Christmas doesn’t happen until January 7, 2014? That means there are in fact 11 shopping days left until Christmas, which should make you procrastinators very happy. Did someone give you a present unexpectedly and you had nothing to give in return? Did you forget to buy Christmas cards in time to mail them out? Well, consider this your reprieve.

Order now from Skeptical Robot, the Skepchick Network shop, and get 25% off everything by entering the code “secondxmas” at checkout.

25%! Off! Everything!

Ordering from Skeptical Robot helps us out by getting rid of our inventory so we can put cool new stuff in the store next year, plus you’ll help cover the increased cost of our server, which is now supporting ten amazing sister sites. So go! Order! CONSUME!

(Pictured: Krampus wrapping paper!)

It’s the end of the year! That means it’s time for lists! Hooray! I was a big gamer growing up, but once I got to college, I got sick of being harassed for daring to be a woman who plays video games and basically stopped gaming for years. I finally got back into gaming, and so I’m going to share my top video games of 2013 (in no particular order)!

First, though, some questions!

Did all of these games come out in 2013? Not necessarily, but I played them in 2013, and that’s what really counts!

Why are they almost exclusively PC games? Because I played a lot of PC games this year. Two years ago, if you had asked me where I was in the Console vs. PC games war, I would have landed solidly on the Console side. However, I’ve defected to the PC game side because OMG why did I never play PC games before it’s so much easier to do everything!

What does this have to do with skepticism/feminism/anything? Um…hey look, it’s time to write out my favorite games! No more questions okay thanks!

1) Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn (PC/PS3/PS4, online, monthly subscription fee). I’ve been a big fan of Final Fantasy since I was 8 years old and saw one of my cousins playing FFVII. The first one I played was FFVIII, and while many people hate it, it still has sentimental value for me, even though the plot pretty much makes no sense at all. I remember when the first Final Fantasy MMORPG was announced, I was very upset– until I played it. I only got to play it for a couple months before I could no longer afford a subscription, but I was hooked. So when XIV was announced as an online game in 2010, I was stoked! Except…it was awful. So awful, they shut the whole game down after only a year and rebuilt it completely. Now, the remake is easily the best MMORPG on the market now.

Pros: Can change jobs & classes as frequently as you like, atmosphere is generally friendly (meaning I haven’t gotten any dick pics yet).
Cons: Monthly subscription fee, many outfits for female characters are very skimpy (especially low-level ones), so many spammers

2) Civilization V (PC / on & offline). Okay, so technically this game came out in 2010, BUT the Brave New World expansion pack came out this year, so it still counts. In case you missed Rebecca’s tips on how to play it, you need to watch her video so you can learn how to win every time. All I know is making “Misandry” the religion that takes over the world is the coolest thing ever.

Pros: Can play online with friends (or strangers), can adjust settings to whatever kind of game you want to play, tons of replay value.
Cons: Can get laggy when playing on too big of a map, also oh my god how did I log 150 hours of gameplay on this game where did my life go? (By the way, I guessed on the 150 hours number, and my actual number according to Steam is 152 hours. I’m a psychic, obviously, so send me all your money.)

3) Tomb Raider (PC/360/PS3, on & offline). I loved the Tomb Raider series growing up (yes, I even loved the terrible Angelina Jolie movies), so when I heard they were rebooting the franchise, I was stoked. This is the first game in the series where you really get to know Lara and she isn’t just a pair of tits on screen with guns (in my opinion). Also, as far as I recall, every enemy in the game is a dude– so it’s just Lara, running around killing dudes in some kind of murder cult. If shooting dudes in a murder cult with fire arrows isn’t what skepticism & feminism are about, then I don’t even know what we’re doing here.

Pros: Running around killing murder cult dudes, lots of explorable extra content & side quests, investigating a (fictional) matriarchal society, learn some cool tidbits about ancient Japanese culture
Cons: Very triggering sexual assault scene(s), [SPOILER DON'T READ NEXT LINE IF YOU DON'T WANT TO BE SPOILED: the secret to the island is magic, when I was hoping Lara would find a scientific explanation for the events on the island]

4) The Stanley Parable (PC, single player, offline). This game originally came out in 2010, but was re-released this year with more content (namely, more endings). It’s more of an interactive story than a traditional video game, but it’s very fun. The game is reminiscent of Stranger Than Fiction, the Will Ferrell movie about his life being narrated. The game revolves around a man named Stanley and the narrator, and…well, I don’t want to give too much away. Download the demo for free, and if you enjoy it, you’ll love the game.

Pros: Actual laugh-out-loud funny, doesn’t require a lot of effort
Cons: Can get repetitive, sometimes very confusing (I’m not sure if you actually can solve the mystery of the game or not?)

5) Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch (DS/PS3, single player, offline). This is the game made by Studio Ghibli, creator of beloved animated movies like Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke. It’s what you’d expect from Studio Ghibli– lots of cute creatures to help you out, kind-hearted child as protagonist, adorable while still being funny. If you’re in Japan, it came out in 2010, but it took three years to release in the US, UK, and Australia.

Pros: Studio Ghibli! Need I say more?
Cons: Beginning is kind of slow, a little too tutorial-y at times

6) Gone Home (PC/Mac/Linus, single player, offline). Anna from Queereka wrote a review of this game when it was first released, which should tip you off that there are queer themes in the game. Much like Stanley Parable, it’s better to go into this game without reading too much about it. The game was developed by a team of four people, and after the “Dickwolves” controversy of PAX, they decided not to show their game at PAX, despite potentially losing a lot of free exposure, which I really admire.

Pros: Creative gameplay and story, presents stories of queer people, features riot grrrl music & punk zines
Cons: Some parts of story can cause anxiety, there are a few parts where it’s easy to get stuck

7) Skyrim (PC/PS3/360, single player, offline). “Sarah, didn’t this game come out in 2011?” Okay, yes, maybe it did, but I finally got it for PC during the Steam sale this year (even though I bought it for PS3 when it originally came out), and I forgot how much I love this game. Plus, there were DLCs & re-releases of it this year, so it counts. Beside, I’m the one making the rules here, and I barely know how to use a calendar, so it makes my list.

Pros: Uh, it’s Skyrim. You can be good, you can be evil, you can be a warrior, you can be a mage…there are so many different paths you can take. Not to mention, dragons.
Cons: Some quests can get repetitive (oh, hey, another dungeon with dead guys to fight), NPCs are kind of obnoxious (“Let me guess, someone took your sweet roll?” *two minutes later* “Let me guess, someone took your sweet roll?”)

 8) The Walking Dead (360/PC/Mac/PS3/others, single player, offline). Okay, this is another game that maybe didn’t come out in 2013, but an expansion pack and a sequel did come out this year, so I’m counting it. This game is fun because it’s mainly just making morality choices during the zombie apocalypse. I know, I’m kind of “over” zombies as well (I’ve never even seen the show), but it’s really interesting because the decisions are hard (do you chop off a guy’s leg and risk getting eaten by zombies, or do you leave him to die on his own?), and at the end of every episode, you get to see a statistical breakdown of how many people made each decision. There’s little to no action in the game (as in boss fights and stuff), which can be both a pro and a con, depending on what you’re in the mood for.

Pros: Morality, getting to know what decisions other people made
Cons: Gorey, kind of sad (unless you’re a sociopath)

9) Animal Crossing: New Leaf (3DS). This is the only game on the list I do not personally own. Why not? Because I only have a regular DS. And I only got the Animal Crossing game from 2005 this year, because I’m really bad at life? Anyway, it’s super cute, and almost every on my twitter talks about Animal Crossing all the time, and I’m very jealous, because I don’t have a 3DS, or I’d plant fruits & share them with all my friends and wear cute hats and stuff. So if you do have a 3DS (or a 2DS), you should get this game and send your friends fruits and wear cute hats.

Pros: Super cute, doesn’t take a lot of effort, fun for all ages
Cons: I don’t own it. That sucks.

10) Shelter (PC/Mac, single player, offline). This is a short game about being a momma badger and leading your babies to safety. There’s no dialogue (as far as I know?), it’s just…leading your babies to safety. And I love badgers (I’m from Wisconsin, that’s our state animal), so this game appeals to me. It’s nice to have a game that transcends language barriers.

Pros: Super cute badgers, easy to figure out, cute badger noises
Cons: Your babies can die or get eaten??????? What kind of monsters made this game?????

Runner Up/ Would Have Made the List Had It Not Been So Disappointing: Amnesia 2: A Machine for Pigs (PC/Mac/Linux). I loved Amnesia: The Dark Descent (which came out in 2010). It was actually too scary for me to play, because I’m a giant baby, but to be fair, lots of people were scared by it. Anyway, The Dark Descent had fun puzzles, really scary monsters, and an interesting/unique system of insanity (you go more insane if you’re in the darkness for too long, but you have a limited supply of tinder & lamp oil, and also using the lamp too much attracts monsters). A Machine for Pigs took away a lot of those mechanics that made the original game so much fun, and made it feel more like a scary maze you had to run through. It wasn’t a bad game per se, but after how phenomenal the first one was, it was a big disappointment to me.

Anyway, there you have it! The definitive, complete, totally accurate list of best video games of 2013 (that may or may not have come out in 2013), written by an authoritative source. Enjoy!