see, it's the end part of the video that i think really understands the issue.

if you don't have an enthusiastic consent clause, you don't have an objective standard in court. there's this huge disconnect in reality between how feminists talk about rape and how a court deals with an accusation of rape. the court takes the assumption that the accused is innocent until proven guilty, and a large part of proving somebody is guilty of rape lies in establishing the intent. if one partner thinks there is consent, then there's not an intent to rape - and that is a big part of how the legal system works. feminists broadly ignore the legal realities in the course of a criminal investigation, and make statements like "intent doesn't matter". and, in context, sometimes it's legitimately true that intent shouldn't matter. it produces this set of contradictions that is both putting an ideology against legal traditions and opening up a grey area in what justice really ought to be - depending on context, it's as easy to argue that intent is less important than consent as it is to argue that intent is paramount in determining guilt.

now, we can talk about social engineering and whatnot, but at the end of the day the court is left with making what is an almost impossible determination, given that they were not there at the time.

what enthusiastic consent laws do is provide an objective standard that the court can use. it places a burden on both parties to ask and receive. and there's still he-said/she-said issues. but, at least it eliminates the grey area, so long as everybody is carrying through their legal responsibilities.

so, you're putting out the idea that some women could use the law to have sex with somebody and then maliciously turn around and accuse them of rape. but, in the abstract, this is the status quo. the enthusiastic consent clause places in law what is actually a safeguard against this. so long as you ask, you're safe from malicious lawsuits against you - so long as the person is not so malicious as to lie under oath.

now, people will spin this around in every which way. but what i'm saying is the actual reality of it.

another way to see what i'm saying is this: if somebody has the intent to rape somebody, it doesn't matter whether consent is denied, enthusiastically or not. a violent rapist is not interested in consent.

this a safe guard for what could be called "accidental rape".

actually, i don't think the kids have terrible taste or make garbage music. in fact, i think we're long overdue for a cultural overhaul, and there's a lot of reason to be optimistic that the kids can put gen y through the fucking blender and shoot it out into space.

i just called panic at the disco fans "kids". some of the more pathetic ones are probably even older than me; they're likely mostly within five years. but, i grew up right on the generational cusp, and consistently identified with older gen x types. so, i call them kids - even if they're only two years younger than i am - because that's honestly what it's always felt like, and still feels like. i didn't understand gen y in the 90s, and i don't understand it now. they seem to choose to be dipshits on purpose and somehow revel in it.

but, the actual kids? the ones born in the 90s? they seem to be far more creative, and have far better taste.

i've mostly ignored and skipped gen y. it's not because i was old - i wasn't old. first impressions by most people will assume i'm even of gen y. the truth is that their (my? ick.) music really did just honestly suck. and, there's not really any direction to move in but improvement.

the actual kids will do better. they can't not.

but you kids all understand that, in reality, you don't have a soul, and so nothing happens when you die, right? the electricity stops running, and you're just composted. there's neither pointy teeth, nor goat horns, involved at any stage of this process.

camera came in today.

it works, at least. maybe not so well. lol. well, there's lots of settings to play with....

i'll take it out tomorrow, to start.

it seems to be the plug, but i'm not done testing yet.

it got better when i set the exposure, but it seems to require a lot of the light for the video part. it's going to require a few experiments, clearly.

it's giving me about an hour on the 2 gb card. i'm going to want five or six hours, at least, so one of the things i'll do tomorrow is get a new card....

i think that the way a lot of these debates have been framed for the last 20 years is going to make his proposals hard to understand until you see them actually worked out.

consider climate change. we're so used to hearing about setting emissions targets. but, where has this approach gotten us? the answer is absolutely nowhere. we're used to hearing about taxes & market schemes. these haven't worked either. what's happened is that we've become so lost in the neo-conservative era, that we're not able to even consider anything that isn't a "market-based solution". it's just outside of the realm of imagination.

what nobody is talking about is that the best way to get us off of oil is to build the infrastructure to get us off oil. that's how we've always solved problems in the past: we get the government to throw billions down on getting it done. we didn't twiddle with tax policies to create incentives. we just did it.

i mean, imagine if roosevelt had left the manhatten project up to the market. it's so outrageous, we can't even fathom it. but, that's what we're proposing every time we hear about a cap & trade system or a carbon tax. it's really madness.

if he puts a third of the 20 billion dollars (yes. billion. with a b.) that are in his platform down on transitioning out of the carbon economy, he'll have had a more substantive contribution than any politician in north america has, to this point - and by a good margin. he's not setting targets. but, the truth is that what he's proposing is the most ambitious thing i've ever seen on this continent. it's so ambitious, after so many years of canada collectively having no real ambitions, that it's maybe hard to get one's head around it.

there's a bunch of issues like this.

your skepticism is healthy. i'd encourage it. but, i also think you should take a closer look at that platform and really absorb it.

thetyee.ca/Opinion/2015/10/23/Trust-Justin-Trudeau/

cloudburst
There's an immediate, practical way to reduce consumption during our transition off carbon fuels: we need transferable licence plates, so when you don't need your larger gas hog vehicle: 4 wheel drives/trucks for farms, hauling, winter conditions etc you can transfer it to a vehicle that uses less fuel. ICBC could simply charge the rate for the higher cost vehicle and apply it to both, to cover the cost of extra admin.

I have an attack plan when I go into town usually once a week, I write down everything need, buy in bulk and plan an efficient route. Other ways I save energy is to put up a clothes line inside my home. Beware: some clothes racks can collapse creating a safety hazard if a child or cat climbs on them. I boil water on the stove for beverages, boil dirty pots with recycled dishwater in them and fill them with stained coffee cups etc, cutting down on the use of my dishwasher, I also heat water to do the dishes on my wood stove. I create "warm zones" in my home and roll up blankets to place at the bottom off drafty doors.

deathtokoalas
every little bit counts...

but the reality is that the single biggest culprit in canada is how we generate electricity, and this is something the government can take a direct role in.

the second biggest culprit is transportation, and it's hard to blame consumers when the options are not truly feasible. there's no real electric car market. and, there's been no coherent policy to reduce electricity costs.

industry comes in at third, and while the arguments underlying tax policies and market schemes may seem sophisticated, the truth is that they don't work. fines don't work, either - they're the cost of business. this is the hard part, and a big part of the solution needs to be people getting angry about it. you're better off writing a letter to your boss than writing a letter to your mp.

but, the government can do quite a bit through direct investment. yes: a lot of this needs to happen at a provincial level. but the feds can play a role in getting people working together in a common strategy.