Get Cynical

(via Poor Mojo)

A long interview with Vonnegut from the Paris Review which is much too short:

VONNEGUT
My books are being thrown out of school libraries all over the country—because they’re supposedly obscene. I’ve seen letters to small-town newspapers that put Slaughterhouse-Five in the same class with Deep Throat and Hustler magazine. How could anybody masturbate to Slaughterhouse-Five?

INTERVIEWER
It takes all kinds.

VONNEGUT
Well, that kind doesn’t exist. It’s my religion the censors hate. They find me disrespectful toward their idea of God Almighty. They think it’s the proper business of government to protect the reputation of God. All I can say is, Good luck to them, and good luck to the government, and good luck to God. You know what H. L. Mencken said one time about religious people? He said he’d been greatly misunderstood. He said he didn’t hate them. He simply found them comical.

(via Weird Universe)

Republicans never miss a chance to exclaim how slavery wasn’t really all that bad :

“Half of all black children are aborted. Far more black children, far more of the African-American community is being devastated by the policies of today, than were being devastated by the policies of slavery.” -Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ)

From The Big Picture:

At 3:34 am local time, today, February 27th, a devastating magnitude 8.8 earthquake struck Chile, one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded. According to Chilean authorities, over 400 people are now known to have been killed. The earthquake also triggered a Tsunami which is right now propagating across the Pacific Ocean, due to arrive in Hawaii in hours (around 11:00 am local time). The severity of the Tsunami is still not known, but alerts are being issued across the Pacific.

From the Metro UK:

The father had taken four-year-old Ben to the Bridges Shopping Centre in Sunderland to spend £10 Ben had been given as a treat.

Geraghty-Shewan went to take a photo of his son on a ride and was suddenly stopped:

“Ben spotted a children’s ride which had a train on it and wanted to have a go because he’s obsessed with trains.

“When he got on my wife suggested we take a picture of him.

“I took the picture on my phone and suddenly this security guard came up and told me it wasn’t allowed because I could be a paedophile.

“I told him Ben was my own son. But he said I couldn’t prove it. He said there is a real problem with paedophiles and that if I didn’t like it, he’d call the manager.

“A few minutes later a policeman walked in and approached me, so they must have been tracking me on the CCTV.

“He said he’d received a complaint that a man matching my description was taking pictures of children and wanted my name and address.

(via Arbroath)

(via Arbroath)