Thursday's Most Active Threads

I'm skipping yesterday's two most active threads because they are ones that I've already discussed. The third most active thread yesterday was titled, "Bible verse card at work", and posted in the "Jobs and Careers" forum. The original poster says that she is a public school teacher and that yesterday every teacher received a sealed envelope in their school mailbox containing a personalized Bible verse signed by a local church. The original poster is very upset and believes that the school secretary must have been involved in allowing the envelopes to be distributed. The original poster considers this an unacceptable intrusion of religion into a secular space. Responses can be categorized as three different types. There are many posters who think the Bible verses were harmless and many of these posters consider sending the verses to have been a nice gesture. This group believes the original poster is wrong to feel offended. Next are posters who agree with the original poster that distributing Bible verses in public school teachers' mailboxes is inappropriate. But they simply don't consider it to be a big enough deal to be upset about. They would have tossed the envelopes in the trash and not given them a second thought. Third were those posters who both agree with the original poster that the envelopes were inappropriate and that their distribution was worthy of a response. The original poster said that she had talked to her principal and emailed the church, steps that are consistent with the advice offered by other posters. Other public school teachers posted about the intrusion of religion into their schools. This includes prayers during meetings at which attendance is required and the reading of Bible verses at staff functions. Many posters argue that this is not only an unwelcome violation of the separation of church and state, but potentially an illegal one as well. Those who support the Church in this episode argue that it is simply the Church's right of free speech to distribute the Bible verses. What is particularly notable about this group is what I can only describe as their passive aggressive methods of practicing Christianity. The thread is full of such things as offers to "pray for" the original poster that are clearly not meant to be true offers to help the original poster in anyway. Rather, these are clearly attempts to further poke her. In addition, as several posters point out, it is very likely that the same posters who so adamantly claim support for the 1st Amendment that would be among the first to support banning books that offend them. Moreover, these folks have a very specific understanding of the 1st Amendment. Even if we disregard the establishment clause issues of distributing Bible verses at a public school, many of the supporters of that action don't seem to recognize a similar free expression right to oppose the activity. If we accept that a church can send teachers Bible verses, certainly we must also agree that a teacher has a right to vocally oppose the church's action. But many among the pro-Church crowd consider that to be intolerant and, because liberals are supposed to be tolerant, hypocritical (they also assume the original poster is a liberal).

The next most active thread yesterday was posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. Titled, "The party of ‘Leave Barron Alone!’...", the original poster is alluding to the Republican demands during the administration of former President, current cult leader, and convicted felon Donald Trump that Trump's son Barron be off limits from criticism. Now, however, a number of conservatives have been extremely cruel and rude in remarks about Gus Walz, the 17-year-old son of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, the Democratic nominee for Vice President. As the original poster says, conservatives attacking the children of Democratic politicians is not new. Both radio commentator Rush Limbaugh and the late Senator John McCain made crude remarks about Chelsea Clinton's appearance. Following the elder Walz' speech accepting his nomination for Vice President, Guz Walz, who has a non-verbal learning disorder, jumped up from his seat and with tears streaming from his eyes, pointed at his father and shouted, "That's my Dad". Most observers found the moment very endearing and a number of posters reported almost being moved to tears themselves. But several conservatives had much different reactions. Ann Coulter referred to Walz as "weird" and Dinesh D'Souza made a derogatory remark in a tweet. It should be noted that this trend did not extend to all conservatives. Ben Shapiro, rarely the voice of reason in my experience, referred to the Walz incident as "really nice". During the Trump administration there was widespread agreement that Barron was out of bounds. This was a rule that I enforced pretty diligently and I removed tens of threads about Barron, many of which referred to his possibly having special needs. Neither of Barron's parents ever publicly mentioned any conditions that Barron might have and I have no idea of the veracity of the these claims. Whether true or not, on DCUM, we did not talk about such things. Or anything else about Barron for that matter. The Walz family has been much different in discussing private information. Both Tim and his wife Gwen have spoken publicly about their struggles with infertility. They have also been open about Gus's disability. One of the more active forums on DCUM is the "Kids With Special Needs and Disabilities" forum. Perhaps as a result, many DCUM posters have kids with various special needs. In this thread, several of those posters were understandably angry about the crude reaction by some conservatives to Gus, something they had feared would happen. However, a number of them also hoped that the openness the Walz family had displayed with regard to Guz might lead to more understanding and acceptance of those with such conditions. Meanwhile, conservative posters in the thread showed little interest in condemning those in their camp such as Coulter and D'Souza. Instead, they engaged in their traditional practice of "whataboutism". The best example they could find was a poster on X who tweeted that now that Barron had turned 18 and was legally an adult, he would tell the truth about him. The credibility of this poster has been called into question and, in any case, far from being a prominent liberal, he was virtually unknown before tweeting about Barron.

Next was a thread titled, "Foods/Meals people no longer seem to eat. Ex: Do people no longer eat sloppy joes?" and posted in the "Food, Cooking, and Restaurants" forum. As a child, the original poster loved Sloppy Joes, Hamburger Helper, and Shake and Bake. Now, she doesn't know any one who eats such things and while she occasionally buys them now, it's not the same when nobody else appreciates such things. It turns out that there is quite a bit of nostalgia for Sloppy Joes among those responding. Several reported that they still make versions of it today, though most have modified the recipe to make them a bit more healthy. The responses also revealed that there is significant variety among the traditional recipes. Before the first page was finished we had what is practically an obligatory post decrying American food in general and the dishes being discussed in particular. The main complaint in this case was that these dishes were developed by food manufacturers to trick Americans into eating ultra-processed foods. However, several posters protested that they make versions of these dishes almost from scratch and the recipes are quite similar to foods eaten in large parts of the world. For the most part, posters agree that this is true for Sloppy Joes, but there is less agreement when it comes to Hamburger Helper and Shake and Bake. There is also a bit of a controversy about deviled eggs which some posters find disgusting and others love. A number of posters claim that when they take deviled eggs to a party the eggs are quickly eaten. One poster even claims that her deviled eggs are made with eggs laid by her own chickens, mayonnaise that is homemade, and parsley that she grows herself. As posters list other foods that they used to eat, a clear trend emerges. The foods they used to love all tend to be ultra-processed if not fully prepared. It is not always clear why they moved away from these foods but, in most cases, they now choose much healthier options. Based on the posts in this thread combined with my own speculation, the impression I get is that the foods the original poster misses were developed to allow working mothers to quickly prepare meals that their families would enjoy. However, they were loaded with high frutose corn syrup and salt. That made them taste good, but also made them unhealthy. Today's parents often have access to a larger array of recipes and cooking techniques and have learned to prepare quick but healthy meals. Therefore, in many cases, the old dishes are out of style. While some posters miss them, others are glad they are gone.

The final thread that I will discuss today was posted in the "Metropolitan DC Local Politics" forum. Titled, "The DMV needs a YIMBY revolution", the original poster says that he knows most posters will hate what he has to say but he doesn't care. He argues that "We need a broad scale systematic urban planning overhaul that completely eliminates single family zoning anywhere inside the Beltway." Needless to say, this is a very extreme position that would completely transform many of the most expensive neighborhood in the metropolitan area. Imagine single family zoning being eliminated in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, Arlington, or northwest DC? The original poster's justification is that our economy cannot grow without people and we can't attract more people if we don't have housing for them. He envisions the elimination of car-dependent suburbs as their residents move to high density housing in "15 minute" neighborhoods inside the Beltway. Needless to say, DCUM posters generally are not receptive to this proposal. Debates between urbanists and those who favor current zoning laws have been dominating a number of threads and the posters who have frequented those threads simply brought their arguments here. Those who like single family homes bash the original poster with varying degrees of civility (with some responses not being civil at all). The single family home fans stress that they enjoy the suburbs and don't want to be forced in to high-density housing. Several tell the original poster that he is welcome to live in an apartment downtown and enjoy a walkable neighborhood, but that is not for them. Another self-described YIMBY disassociates himself from the original poster and says that his YIMBY organization is not opposed to single-family homes or SUVs. Rather they just want to provide more choices so that those who do desire higher density have such an option. Frankly, I don't have time to go through all the pages of this thread to summarize the various arguments. I do find the argument in favor of "15 minute" neighborhoods very appealing. Being able to get to your job, stores, recreation, and other amenities within a 15 minute walk sounds wonderful. The problem, as the original poster stresses, is that such an environment can only be sustained if there are enough people within a 15 minute walk. Reaching the critical mass of residents requires density. That's the problem with this proposal. Taking an existing single family home neighborhood and transitioning it to a "15 minute" neighborhood is virtually impossible. Almost no current single family home owners will want to see their homes or their neighbors' homes replaced by high density housing. They will fight such changes tooth and nail. A better target for the original poster and those like them might be smaller scale efforts aimed at specific areas. For instance, transforming office buildings into high density housing. As work from home has left downtowns empty, there are opportunities for this and DC has already initiated such projects. This has the benefit of not creating hostility among existing single family home owners. The bottom line is that even if the original poster is completely correct that his solution would have tremendous benefits for our future, it is simply not workable short of a YIMBY dictatorship taking control of the country. There is simply too much opposition to reach any widespread agreement to implement such a plan.