Shelly Penton
@plaidsilk.bsky.social
PhD Candidate Religious Studies. UVA. Skeets my own.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
The new Turing test is whether a machine can show more empathy than the average husband
November 20, 2025 at 5:53 PM
The new Turing test is whether a machine can show more empathy than the average husband
Reposted by Shelly Penton
People say it's impossible to write a responsible "Big History" book but I think that's false! You would just have to be diligent in reading the literature and systematic in contacting academics to stress-test your conclusions.
The Ted Talk crowd would rather pontificate than do actual work.
The Ted Talk crowd would rather pontificate than do actual work.
3 point plan for success: Read. Listen. Try to get it right.
November 20, 2025 at 5:22 PM
People say it's impossible to write a responsible "Big History" book but I think that's false! You would just have to be diligent in reading the literature and systematic in contacting academics to stress-test your conclusions.
The Ted Talk crowd would rather pontificate than do actual work.
The Ted Talk crowd would rather pontificate than do actual work.
Children will die because Republicans are allowing a eugenicistic, anti-science blood blister to sabotage American public health policy.
Without evidence, CDC changes messaging on vaccines and autism
On Wednesday, the agency reversed its long-held position that there's no link between vaccines and autism. Outside experts said they are "appalled" by the change.
www.nbcnews.com
November 20, 2025 at 5:22 PM
Children will die because Republicans are allowing a eugenicistic, anti-science blood blister to sabotage American public health policy.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
“I want their morale as low as possible because a team with low morale is ineffective.”
Meet the veteran who chases ICE on a scooter
Meet the veteran who chases ICE on a scooter
Meet the veteran who chases ICE on a scooter
Clifford “Buzz” Grambo patrols the streets of Baltimore to keep his neighbors safe—and make federal agents uncomfortable.
www.motherjones.com
November 20, 2025 at 2:00 PM
“I want their morale as low as possible because a team with low morale is ineffective.”
Meet the veteran who chases ICE on a scooter
Meet the veteran who chases ICE on a scooter
Reposted by Shelly Penton
The people who make Shein's clothes labor for ten to twelve hours per day (in violation of China's labor laws), some up to seven days a week, and earn as little as 15 to 30 cents per t-shirt.
![Excerpt from a BBC article: ""We usually work, 10, 11 or 12 hours a day," says a 49-year-old woman from Jiangxi unwilling to give her name. "On Sundays we work around three hours less."
She is in an alleyway, where a dozen people are huddled around a row of bulletin boards.
They are reading the job ads on the board, while examining the stitching on a pair of chinos draped over it.
This is Shein's supply chain. The factories are contracted to make clothes on order - some small, some big. If the chinos are a hit, orders will ramp up and so must production. Factories then hire temporary workers to meet the demand their permanent staff cannot fulfil.
The migrant worker from Jiangxi is looking for a short-term contract - and the chinos are an option.
"We earn so little. The cost of living is now so high," she says, adding that she hopes to make enough to send back to her two children who are living with their grandparents.
"We get paid per piece," she explains. "It depends how difficult the item is. Something simple like a t-shirt is one-two yuan [less than a dollar] per piece and I can make around a dozen in an hour.""](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:ks3gpa6ftoyaq7hmf6c4qx4c/bafkreiber7g4o5pujmzmjjzsp5dkz7blfexburuwjispfpv6dki7akjb7a@jpeg)
November 20, 2025 at 12:07 AM
The people who make Shein's clothes labor for ten to twelve hours per day (in violation of China's labor laws), some up to seven days a week, and earn as little as 15 to 30 cents per t-shirt.
*Stops in the middle of lecturing undergrads about how extremely difficult it is to prove a negative*: "Wait, my spidey sense is picking something up."
Severe abuse of the null hypothesis
CDC has overhauled its website to assert that “the claim ‘vaccines do not cause autism’ is not an evidence-based claim”
November 20, 2025 at 2:48 AM
*Stops in the middle of lecturing undergrads about how extremely difficult it is to prove a negative*: "Wait, my spidey sense is picking something up."
Reposted by Shelly Penton
I really can't stress how important it is for progressive and leftists to contend for school, library, water, etc etc boards. Hyper local involvement in our communities where we can actually influence lives.
Following the recent election, leadership will be changing in many districts where conservative values previously dominated school board meetings and community actions.
epgn.com/2025/11/18/v...
epgn.com/2025/11/18/v...
Voters shift school boards toward LGBTQ+ inclusion across PA and N.J. - Philadelphia Gay News
School boards in PA and NJ are shifting fast—LGBTQ+ leaders are winning, conservatives are losing, and policy battles are heating up.
epgn.com
November 20, 2025 at 2:41 AM
I really can't stress how important it is for progressive and leftists to contend for school, library, water, etc etc boards. Hyper local involvement in our communities where we can actually influence lives.
He said women were not as intelligent as men in...*checks notes*...2005.
#BREAKING: Former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers will immediately leave his role as an instructor at Harvard while the University investigates his ties to child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
Dhruv T. Patel and Cam N. Srivastava report.
Dhruv T. Patel and Cam N. Srivastava report.
Summers Will Not Finish Semester of Teaching as Harvard Investigates Epstein Ties | News | The Harvard Crimson
Former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers will immediately leave his role as an instructor at Harvard while the University investigates his ties to child sex trafficker Jeffrey E. Epstein.
www.thecrimson.com
November 20, 2025 at 2:05 AM
He said women were not as intelligent as men in...*checks notes*...2005.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
When they go low we show them what the consequences are for not going high
November 19, 2025 at 1:45 PM
When they go low we show them what the consequences are for not going high
Reposted by Shelly Penton
If Kamala Harris had referred to offshoring or greedflation as "economic violence", Matt would have called it Woke.
November 19, 2025 at 11:20 AM
If Kamala Harris had referred to offshoring or greedflation as "economic violence", Matt would have called it Woke.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
having to briefly consider whether capturing and killing startups in order to crush competition and innovation will raise the hackle of bumbling American regulators is just EXHAUSTING am I right
November 19, 2025 at 1:55 PM
having to briefly consider whether capturing and killing startups in order to crush competition and innovation will raise the hackle of bumbling American regulators is just EXHAUSTING am I right
Gotta love emerging evidence that police departments are going out of their way to distance themselves from ICE.
An ICE employee was among 16 men arrested after trying to solicit a minor for sex in Bloomington, Minnesota, police say
"When he was arrested, he said, 'I'm ICE, boys,'" Bloomington Police Chief Booker Hodges said during a press conference. "Well, unfortunately for him, we locked him up."
"When he was arrested, he said, 'I'm ICE, boys,'" Bloomington Police Chief Booker Hodges said during a press conference. "Well, unfortunately for him, we locked him up."
November 19, 2025 at 1:47 PM
Gotta love emerging evidence that police departments are going out of their way to distance themselves from ICE.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
Quick question: what the fuck is anyone talking about anymore
September 11, 2025 at 7:53 PM
Quick question: what the fuck is anyone talking about anymore
As a PhD student, and if nothing else, I've learned from Jim Ryan the importance of keeping contemporaneous notes.
November 18, 2025 at 10:07 PM
As a PhD student, and if nothing else, I've learned from Jim Ryan the importance of keeping contemporaneous notes.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
I’m still thinking about “quiet, piggy.” No president should be able to speak to a member of the press that way and remain president. That moment encapsulates how vile, misogynistic, and horrible that man is.
November 18, 2025 at 2:34 PM
I’m still thinking about “quiet, piggy.” No president should be able to speak to a member of the press that way and remain president. That moment encapsulates how vile, misogynistic, and horrible that man is.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
If she had an editor, that person hates her more than anyone has ever hated a person before.
The prose is incoherent & the only way to make it through a paragraph is to rely on the North Star or her self-pitying narcissism. The gist of this graf is “strangers obsess about me, must be because I work so hard,” but it is almost immediate lost in the morass of “typed on notes app while hiking”
November 17, 2025 at 3:18 PM
If she had an editor, that person hates her more than anyone has ever hated a person before.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
god yes absolutely here for the ecclesiastical content, honestly if rian johnson would give us one of these every 3-5 years for the rest of our lives this century might just be bearable
Final trailer! Wake Up Dead Man is in theaters 11/26 and on Netflix 12/12. Can’t WAIT for you all to see it. #wakeupdeadman
November 17, 2025 at 4:29 PM
god yes absolutely here for the ecclesiastical content, honestly if rian johnson would give us one of these every 3-5 years for the rest of our lives this century might just be bearable
watching men like Larry Summers continue to teach at places like Harvard while my brilliant friends and colleagues can't even get an interview literally anywhere and entering my Harley Quinn era
November 17, 2025 at 4:02 PM
watching men like Larry Summers continue to teach at places like Harvard while my brilliant friends and colleagues can't even get an interview literally anywhere and entering my Harley Quinn era
Reposted by Shelly Penton
Never forget that just a week ago, Ross Douthat and the NYTimes were asking if women ruined the workplace.
November 17, 2025 at 3:33 AM
Never forget that just a week ago, Ross Douthat and the NYTimes were asking if women ruined the workplace.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
Reposted by Shelly Penton
And it's full of so many tells that show that the people who made this thing Actually Fucking Care. Linux OS, showing Godot during the gamedev portion, the modularity and compatibility.
AND! Valve is a privately-owned company. Not beholden to shareholders & actually run by a game guy, not a $ guy.
AND! Valve is a privately-owned company. Not beholden to shareholders & actually run by a game guy, not a $ guy.
I think that's what makes the upcoming Steam Machine so exciting for me, it's just a "console" but it feels like a real natural development of technology that wasn't possible for them to execute before. Now they have the tech progress, producing a new product people actually want is possible
November 16, 2025 at 5:03 PM
And it's full of so many tells that show that the people who made this thing Actually Fucking Care. Linux OS, showing Godot during the gamedev portion, the modularity and compatibility.
AND! Valve is a privately-owned company. Not beholden to shareholders & actually run by a game guy, not a $ guy.
AND! Valve is a privately-owned company. Not beholden to shareholders & actually run by a game guy, not a $ guy.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
Cassidy is smart enough to understand how the ACA works. He is simply lying because he is a bad person.
Cassidy: "The president is proposing that we take the $26b that would be going to insurance companies if we just do an extension and give it directly to the American people in which 100% of the money is used for them to purchase healthcare on their own terms. That makes them an informed consumer."
November 16, 2025 at 5:07 PM
Cassidy is smart enough to understand how the ACA works. He is simply lying because he is a bad person.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
I don’t think women’s professional ambitions should be limited by how tactfully or gamely they respond to men’s sexual entitlement.
November 16, 2025 at 3:45 PM
I don’t think women’s professional ambitions should be limited by how tactfully or gamely they respond to men’s sexual entitlement.
Reposted by Shelly Penton
Exactly one woman has won the Booker in the past six years www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
November 16, 2025 at 10:42 AM
Exactly one woman has won the Booker in the past six years www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...