The Most Active Threads Since Friday

The Gaza war thread was back leading the most active thread list over the weekend. It has less traffic than in the past, but is obviously still quite active. The most active thread after that one over the weekend was titled, "Woman charged with felony for having a stillbirth" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. The original poster linked to a story about a woman in Ohio who had a stillbirth at 22 weeks of pregnancy. She attempted to flush the remains down the toilet but the toilet clogged. She was arrested and charged with felony abuse of a corpse. According to court testimony, the woman had gone to the doctor twice about her pregnancy. But, beyond that, there are very few details that are known about this case. As a result, many posters made assumptions or educated guesses about what occurred. This, in turn, spurred a lot of complaints about the thread and even a separate thread in the "Website Feedback" forum. Some posters were upset about the thread's title because, strictly speaking, the woman's charges concern the treatment of the remains rather than the stillbirth itself. Very few posters in this thread believe the case is really about how the woman treated the remains of her stillbirth. One of the most common theories is that this is part of an effort to grant fetuses personhood and, therefore, make abortion tantamount to murder. As such, much of this discussion is wrapped up in posters' views about abortion. Abortion opponents tend to see this as the woman having delivered a baby — albeit not one that was alive — and mishandling its corpse in a callous manner. They object to this treatment of a baby's corpse and think the woman should be held accountable. However, such posters are very much in the minority. There is considerable suspicion that Ohio's restrictive abortion laws contributed to this situation, with posters speculating that the woman had been denied dilation and curettage surgery and was forced to undergo a miscarriage. The thread is dominated by posters who are outraged by the charges against the woman. Several posters provided first-hand accounts of their own miscarriages and argued that the woman's behavior was perfectly normal and understandable. For many posters, this case represents a further erosion of women's rights. They argue that women are being held accountable for natural processes and that the opinions of mostly male, mostly fundamentalist Christian lawmakers are being imposed on them. One thing that comes across in this thread is the visceral reaction of many posters, especially those who have dealt personally with miscarriages. For many, this is not a theoretical dispassionate discussion, but a deeply personal topic that causes real anger.

The next most active thread was the topic about the new FBI headquarters selection which I've already discussed. The most active thread after that one was posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. Titled, "How do kids from lower ranked schools land prestigious internships/jobs?!?!", the original poster says that her son attends a top 25 university but was unable to secure an internship with a top firm. Meanwhile, the original poster knows of several students at lower-ranked schools who were able to land prestigious internships and, as a result, the original poster is wondering how they were able to do so. Both the original poster and her son are bothered that the high ranking of his university doesn't seem to have helped him in this case. I think the first poster to respond pretty much nailed the explanation with a post that said, "If not the top of the class - wherever you are - it’s about connections." Several posters argued against the idea that a prestigious university automatically implied that the original poster's son had worked harder or was better qualified than students from lower-ranked schools. Several posters contended that competitive internship programs look at the individual student's qualifications with one poster saying, "It's about the applicant, not the school." Another common argument was that networking ability — another way of saying connections as mentioned earlier — was far more important than the prestige of the university. It was a bit disorienting to see a forum in which such things as test scores and the number of AP classes are so often emphasized to suddenly start arguing in favor of "soft skills". Poster after poster emphasized that the ability to sell yourself and convince others that you know what you are doing is more important than pedigree. Several posters who either recruit interns or work with them provided their experience. In most of these cases, the posters said that they preferred individuals who were competent and easy to work with over someone who had a loaded resume but might not fit into the workplace. Similarly, several of those who routinely hire interns said that they looked for applicants who appeared to be hard workers and were not concerned with what school someone attended. One somewhat surprising thing to me was the number of posters who said that firms in New York City preferred to hire applicants who are already in New York. They wouldn't have to worry about them adjusting to the city and they would already have a place to live. In such cases, convenience took presidence over the prestige of a school.

The next most active thread over the weekend was titled, "Compared Against Peers - T20 Admissions" and, like the previous thread, was posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. The original poster is looking for knowledge, perhaps from an insider, about how college admissions officers handle multiple applicants from the same high school. The responses will not come as a surprise to anyone who has read this forum over the years. No college is going to accept 15 applicants from the same high school and, as such, applicants are competing against students from their own school. Many posters describe how applications from the same high school are ranked with often only the top two, at most, being accepted. However, purely academic rankings can be superseded by applicants that have a hook such as legacy status, or being an athlete, first-generation student, or underrepresented minority. There is quite a bit of discussion about private high school college counselors and their ability to advise a student where he or she might stand relative to other applicants from the school. At some point, the thread turned into a debate between private and public school parents. The root of this argument appears to be the role of college counselors. Many of the private school parents describe college counselors having considerable control over the college application process and actively steering kids away from schools for which they might not be competitive vis-a-vis other applicants from the same school. Public school parents describe a different environment in which students are encouraged to apply with the attitude that the process is so unpredictable that they may as well take a shot. Parents with experience at both public and private high schools describe the different application terrains that they believe exist in each case. One poster argued that at elite universities, public school students might have an advantage due to having less competitive and privileged peers. The same poster, however, outlined other scenarios in which private school students might have advantages. The thread also turned to a discussion of test scores which seems to be a perennial topic of nearly every thread in this forum. Some parents are convinced that test scores are the only objective measure of a student's ability and as scores have lost importance in the admissions process, it reflects a significant flaw in the admissions system.

The final thread at which I will look today was posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. Titled, "Travis and Taylor", you may think that this is a repeated thread that I've already covered. At least that is what I thought, but searching the blog showed that I have written about two threads involving Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift, but not this one. The original thread about Swift dating Kelce was locked after it turned into a discussion about Brittany Mahomes, the wife of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback and Kelce teammate Patrick Mahomes. The second thread, as I mentioned in the blog post which discussed it, was running simultaneously with this one. In order not to have two threads on similar topics running at the same time, I locked that one and directed posters to this one. As such, this thread is the exclusive Travis and Taylor discussion and has been since October 3. The thread is currently 76 pages and, as far as I can recall, not a single post from the thread has been reported. As such, it is easy for me to forget about it. But, if you have fallen behind on the latest T&T news, allow me to catch you up. Kelce travelled to Argentina in order to attend a Swift concert held there. During the show, Swift changed the lyrics of her song "Karma" to refer to Kelce rather than an earlier boyfriend. Swift ended the concert by running to Kelce and giving him a hug and a kiss. This ignited discussion on this thread and accounts for its "most active" showing. A significant number of thread participants is convinced that this entire relationship is nothing more than a publicity stunt. This is seen as a bit of a setback for that theory, but in general, such posters were not deterred. As one such poster put it, "this is all choreographed and fake". The poster continued, "You have to be 80 IQ to believe this cringe nonsense." But other posters either believe the romance is authentic or at least are willing to simply enjoy the illusion. Some posters attribute Swift's interest in Kelce as being tied to her age, suggesting that her biological clock is motivating her to search for a suitable candidate with whom to start a family. Other posters don't buy that explanation. But, regardless of whether this is a fairytale romance or a cynical ploy for publicity, Swift can't escape from current affairs. Several posters engaged in a dispute about whether Swift should take a position on the Gaza war. In fact, at least one poster guessed that the entire "kiss" spectacle was staged in order to distract attention from her silence on the war.