Grinning Cat's definitions
"The turnout for the election wasn't even 40% of eligible voters. The winner got a slight majority of that, so four out of five people DIDN'T vote for him. So from that he concludes he has a popular 'mandate'?!"
by Grinning Cat January 5, 2009
Get the electionmug. The custom or condition of having only one mate in an intimate relationship, of being dedicated to a single partner.
Monogamy is a traditional ideal in various societies, yet many people in these societies are not monogamous.
Cheating (being involved with someone else, with secrecy and deception) is a destructive way to be nonmonogamous. On the other hand, swinging and polyamory (types of responsible nonmonogamy based on the knowledge and consent of everyone involved) are viable choices for some people.
Cheating (being involved with someone else, with secrecy and deception) is a destructive way to be nonmonogamous. On the other hand, swinging and polyamory (types of responsible nonmonogamy based on the knowledge and consent of everyone involved) are viable choices for some people.
by Grinning Cat March 6, 2008
Get the monogamymug. by Grinning Cat January 8, 2013
Get the ain'tmug. A model of culture and human relations based on hierarchy, ranking, power, and control. Masculinity is equated with control, conquest, and violence: men dominating women and children.
Opposite to Partnership Culture.
In a domination system...
Humans are flawed and dangerous.
Difference is equated with superiority or inferiority.
Power is used to control and destroy through hierarchies of domination.
Competition means "dog eat dog"; "every man for himself".
People cooperate to dominate others.
Huge gaps between haves and have-nots
Nature is a resource to be dominated, depleted and polluted.
Morality of insensitivity, control, and coercion.
(Based on the Center for Partnership Studies' summary of points from Riane Eisler's _The Power of Partnership_ and David Korten's _The Great Turning_)
Opposite to Partnership Culture.
In a domination system...
Humans are flawed and dangerous.
Difference is equated with superiority or inferiority.
Power is used to control and destroy through hierarchies of domination.
Competition means "dog eat dog"; "every man for himself".
People cooperate to dominate others.
Huge gaps between haves and have-nots
Nature is a resource to be dominated, depleted and polluted.
Morality of insensitivity, control, and coercion.
(Based on the Center for Partnership Studies' summary of points from Riane Eisler's _The Power of Partnership_ and David Korten's _The Great Turning_)
Dominator culture teaches all of us that the core of our identity is defined by the will to dominate and control others. We are taught that this will to dominate is more biologically hardwired in males than in females. In actuality, dominator culture teaches us that we are all natural-born killers but that males are more able to realize the predator role. In the dominator model the pursuit of external power, the ability to manipulate and control others, is what matters most. When culture is based on a dominator model, not only will it be violent but it will frame all relationships as power struggles.
(bell hooks)
(bell hooks)
by Grinning Cat March 28, 2013
Get the Dominator Culturemug. How you might feel when you want to use a word in conversation that you're familiar with in reading and writing, you know perfectly well what it means, but you've never heard it spoken, and have no idea how to pronounce it.
"It doesn't matter how many times you click on Font Color. Changing red text to red again won't make a difference. It's eye-dem-... id-em-..." (thinking, "How the *$%^& do you pronounce 'idempotent'??? Guess that makes me eye-literate.")
by Grinning Cat November 4, 2016
Get the eye-literatemug. (from snail mail)
(v.) to send (a letter, card, or package) via physical mail; to mail or post (a tangible object) using a postal service. Bills and junk mail are perhaps the most common items snailed, but people snail personal letters and items as well.
(v.) to send (a letter, card, or package) via physical mail; to mail or post (a tangible object) using a postal service. Bills and junk mail are perhaps the most common items snailed, but people snail personal letters and items as well.
by Grinning Cat December 27, 2010
Get the snailmug. A device that records the choices of voters in an election. It can take several forms:
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1. (Becoming less and less common in the U.S.)
A mechanical device, where the voter flips small levers next to the candidates' names to indicate their choices, then pulls a big lever to record the votes. Very difficult to tamper with.
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2. (Very common in the U.S.)
A direct-recording electronic (DRE) machine. May print vote totals on paper, but there is no way for a voter to verify that his/her votes were accurately recorded.
Unlike mechanical voting machines, DRE machines are EXTREMELY VULNERABLE TO FRAUD. In addition to outright tampering with the records, malware can be used to steal a percentage of votes, reassigning them to the rigged candidate. The purported verification mechanisms -- logs, audit trails, "snapshots" of individual voters' choices -- can be manipulated to leave no evidence, corresponding perfectly to the rigged results.
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3. (The way to use technology for elections we can have confidence in)
An electronic machine that lets the voter make choices (preventing overvotes and highlighting undervotes), then PRINTS AN ACTUAL FILLED-OUT PAPER BALLOT, which the voter can review and either discard (and start over) or cast.
THE PAPER BALLOT IS THE OFFICIAL RECORD OF THE VOTE. (Voters could also choose to fill in a blank ballot by hand.)
Ballots can be quickly counted by optical scanning technology. Importantly, ballots can be RECOUNTED, by hand if necessary.
Counts from the voting machines need not be trusted as anything more than quick estimates or "exit polls". This system makes it difficult to commit the large-scale fraud so easy to do invisibly with paperless DRE machines.
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1. (Becoming less and less common in the U.S.)
A mechanical device, where the voter flips small levers next to the candidates' names to indicate their choices, then pulls a big lever to record the votes. Very difficult to tamper with.
---
2. (Very common in the U.S.)
A direct-recording electronic (DRE) machine. May print vote totals on paper, but there is no way for a voter to verify that his/her votes were accurately recorded.
Unlike mechanical voting machines, DRE machines are EXTREMELY VULNERABLE TO FRAUD. In addition to outright tampering with the records, malware can be used to steal a percentage of votes, reassigning them to the rigged candidate. The purported verification mechanisms -- logs, audit trails, "snapshots" of individual voters' choices -- can be manipulated to leave no evidence, corresponding perfectly to the rigged results.
---
3. (The way to use technology for elections we can have confidence in)
An electronic machine that lets the voter make choices (preventing overvotes and highlighting undervotes), then PRINTS AN ACTUAL FILLED-OUT PAPER BALLOT, which the voter can review and either discard (and start over) or cast.
THE PAPER BALLOT IS THE OFFICIAL RECORD OF THE VOTE. (Voters could also choose to fill in a blank ballot by hand.)
Ballots can be quickly counted by optical scanning technology. Importantly, ballots can be RECOUNTED, by hand if necessary.
Counts from the voting machines need not be trusted as anything more than quick estimates or "exit polls". This system makes it difficult to commit the large-scale fraud so easy to do invisibly with paperless DRE machines.
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A number of Diebold electronic voting machines have been in the news, first for criminally incompetent software and database design, leaving vote records wide open to undetectable tampering, more recently for vulnerability to "computer virus" style malware that can spread from machine to machine through the data cards used to collect voting data.
Making such electronic voting machines widespread is the perfect way to lay the groundwork for large-scale, invisible voter fraud.
There's plenty of information on this on the Web. A good place to start: the Coalition for Voting Integrity, www.coalitionforvotingintegrity.org .
Making such electronic voting machines widespread is the perfect way to lay the groundwork for large-scale, invisible voter fraud.
There's plenty of information on this on the Web. A good place to start: the Coalition for Voting Integrity, www.coalitionforvotingintegrity.org .
by Grinning Cat April 18, 2008
Get the voting machinemug.