The Conversation
- Superbowl Recipe and Xenophobic Superbowl Ad (22)
- Raguel: Time to get your concealed carry licences, folks!
- Eurasian Sensation: Jeff Yang has a good article about this ad: http://inamerica.blogs.cnn....
- Raguel: I haven’t even gotten to why the ad really is so offensive to us, ROFL
- Jeremy Lin shines (20)
- N: @danny You should youtube his college games. The two against Boston college and the one against UConn. Lol, he can...
- Lingyai: @Ben Efsaneyim Why would it be surprising a non Asian crowd cheering for Lin? Most of the NBA fans going to...
- bigWOWO: Danny and Mojo, Holy crap! That’s amazing! I didn’t know he could dunk either! I think...
- Holy Jesus, Jeremy (1)
- Lingyai: Lin’s style on the court: http://oi39.tinypic.com/f1xnvd .jpg Lin call Stanford coach a liar and says...
- About A Boy by Nick Hornby (4)
- bigWOWO: Illegal streaming? I had no idea anyone did that! Well, I really should check out some movies one of these...
- Eurasian Sensation: Actually the trailer’s voiceover makes it seem wayyy more cheesy than it is. I don’t...
- bigWOWO: Not sure if it’s cool to ask this (for those who haven’t seen it), but does he get the girl at...
- “But he hit me back first!” (32)
- trolldetector: CHINESE PRIDE MUTHAFUKAZ
- bigWOWO: I didn’t post that video to mock Koreans (again, why do you seem to think everything is against...
- jstele: Stay classy, Byron. This whole argument isn’t even about race, but your ego and inability to admit that...
- Seeking Asian Female (1)
- trolldetector: All you need is love.
- Stop SOPA and PIPA (9)
- Raguel: ^ Nice one Byron! I’m reading through the NYT picks, they’re good!
- bigWOWO: The Times had an Op-Ed by the President of the RIAA, and I commented. My comment was picked as a...
- Raguel: Found a great website, take a look at this: https://www.cdt.org/ Why should privacy be important, in an age...
- The Perversity of Human Biodiversity, a.k.a. “Scientific” Racism (402)
- bigWOWO: Here’s an interesting suggestion coming out of MIT: Connectome by Sebastian Seung...
- Battle Hymn of the Kitten Daughter (36)
- Raguel: You know Andre, you and me, I think we and a lot of other folks may have gone through some pretty harrowing...
- Andre M. Smith: Russians call me German, Germans call me Russian, Jews call me a Christian, Christians a Jew....
- Two podcasts that address racism in the military, and Danny Chen the person (9)
- Raguel: The origins of racism in the American military as described by loudestfuckingazns is accurate. Very recently,...
- bigWOWO: Sorry, Larry, just noticed that the spam robot junked your comment. Approved!
- bigWOWO: Agreed. It just has more weight if you include your name. Not that the ideas are any less valid, but it just...
- Facebook IPO (5)
- King: Actually WOWO, I bump into plenty of Asians up at the Art Center College of Design http://www.artcenter.edu/a...
- bigWOWO: Agree with King. This might not be a bad thing for Asian Americans to hear about. We can jump off the STEM...
- Raguel: People are too accustomed to thinking about value only in terms of money. Even artists are guilty of it. Some...
- Activism is as activism does (10)
- trolldetector: Brooks also goes onto say ‘You should attach yourself to a counter-tradition and school of...
- bigWOWO: By the way, speaking of activism, there was a great David Brooks column recently. He talks about how people...
- Raguel: I have no experience whatsoever with activism. I simply do not feel safe participating in it. There is always...
- How to Win a Streetfight (18)
- bigWOWO: No worries. I feel the same way. Nothing against her, but just doubtful.
- Raguel: Hi Byron! I’ve been occupied doing a lot of reading and thinking recently. I suppose its just another...
- bigWOWO: Hey Raguel, What about your comments on ASSK?
I agree with everything you said. About #1…I think...
- What Cultures Value (19)
- UFC 117 Sonnen vs. Silva Recap (1)
- bigWOWO: I think Michael Bisping solved the Chael Sonnen puzzle today, even though he lost a controversial decision....
- 6 on 1 Beatdown of Asian Man (36)
- King: “I mean I look around me and 99% of the time there are no women that look like or dress like Adriana Lima...
- SWR: Apparently the girl in the second video was not the girl who filmed the fight. It was probably unwise of her to...
- Raguel: I mean I look around me and 99% of the time there are no women that look like or dress like Adriana Lima in...
- Selfish Reasons To Have More Kids by Bryan Caplan (Review) (6)
- bigWOWO: Jeff, You called it! They were (if I recall correctly) 7 (twins) and 2. He’s still in the honeymoon...
- jeffat8asians: “Overpaying?” With the possible exception of college tuition (and even that is arguable),...
- Hitler: Kids suck lol.
- The Asian Rock Thread (16)
- ben: I’ve been getting into Asian rock music recently so thank you all very much for uploading all these videos.
- Simple Pickup on ABC News (132)
- Tommy: I think I’m coming here more for Moro’s comments than BigWoWO’s posts.
- Moroboshi: I didn’t say that. All I said was guys who believe in HBD are the same guys who probably also follow...
- Chr..: Moro, I don’t want to argue with you anymore! You seem to think that AMs are just as popular as other...
- “Lazy” Americans and the Decline of the American Middle Class (6)
- bigWOWO: But kobu, how can we have literature and art without money to support artists and writers? About...
- kobukson: I don’t know why everyone seems to think the notion of the decline of the middle class is such a bad...
- bigWOWO: There are a lot of veterans (supposedly) on that site. I can kind of understand it–military guys are...
- Aung Sung Suu Kyi Movie with Michelle Yeoh (45)
- bigWOWO: Eurasian, Lee Kuan Yew has always been upfront about Singapore’s hybrid system. To the best of my...
- Eurasian Sensation: @ BigWowo: New governments following independence or a major power struggle often have the sort...
- N: @bww And ironically, one of the rare democratic successes in the region that is Singapore behaves much closer to a...
- Paper Pushers by the Stunt People (4)
- Andre M. Smith: I divide my year annually between New York and Shanghai. One of my common visitations in the latter...
- Raguel: Smiley tests 8 )
8( - Raguel: ROFL! Thank you for thoroughly destroying Amy Chua, Andre. WELL SAID ^_^ You know the destruction is so...
- Superbowl Recipe and Xenophobic Superbowl Ad (22)
Tag Archives: environmentalism
Waste-to-Energy Plants
Waste to Energy Plant in Horsholm, Denmark
When it comes to green energy and green living, thank God for non-American countries. Seriously. China is winning the race for solar energy, while Europe, it seems, is pulling ahead on converting waste to energy. Check out the NY Times article here.
I’ve always been told that burning trash is terrible for the environment and that there is no way to scrub the airborn waste that such plants create. Every time I throw something away, I’ve thought that it could only go to one of two places–a recycling plant or a landfill. And since landfill garbage just sits there for years and years, I assumed that eventually everything would go to a landfill. If you’ve ever been near Fresh Kills, it really begins to stink when the wind blows the wrong way. Pretty bleak.
The Cove: bigWOWO's review
In accordance with FTC disclosure rules, I received a free copy of this movie. I’ll try to be unbiased. I thank Laurel at Take Part for sending it.
Before I begin, let me share why I was interested in seeing this film. As you know, I’m a quiet environmentalist who is interested in preserving the earth. I’ve blogged about fish and shark fin soup in the past, and I wholeheartedly believe that we all need to do more to protect our seas. I also love eating fish, and I encourage people to consume fish responsibly. Hearing that this film was set in Japan where I spent a year after graduation sealed my interest in finding out what this film was about.
Green Metropolis
Green Metropolis is a highly informative book. It takes a serious approach to environmentalism–both in terms of reducing greenhouse gases and curbing our use of fossil fuels. The author David Owen believes that contrary to popular opinion, cities like Portland, Boulder, and Seattle are not environmentally responsible since their per capita annual expenditure of greenhouse gases is high. Owen’s contrarian philosophy is that cities should not seek to emulate Portland, but instead should emulate New York City–where people live in apartments, sidewalks are wide enough to support foot traffic, and most people get to work by a combination of walking and mass transit. Because so many people in New York use the subway system, and because humans live in close proximity to one another in buildings that organize people in small spaces, New York’s per capita expenditure of greenhouse gases is the lowest of any city in America.
China Becomes #1 Car Market and #1 Export Nation
Cars, cars, cars
China in 2009 overtook the United States as the world’s biggest car market (thanks, King!). It’s huge. Never in history has any country surpassed the American car market. This is great news for China, horrible news for the environment, and maybe even worse news for the world’s limited supply of fossil fuels. I’m reading a book called Green Metropolis right now, and the stat they use is that America currently uses 25% of the world’s fossil fuels. 25%! And we’re only a country of 300 million. What is going to happen when a country of 1.3 BILLION suddenly adopts American lifestyles? As a planet, we’d better find a way to stop this dependence on liquid energy. I don’t know if this is good news for us. Do they buy our cars?
Big Businesses and the Environment
I saw this Op-Ed in the NY Times a few days ago: Will Big Business Save the Earth. It was written by Jared Diamond, the guy who wrote “Guns, Germs, and Steel.” Check out the article. His thesis is this:
The embrace of environmental concerns by chief executives has accelerated recently for several reasons. Lower consumption of environmental resources saves money in the short run. Maintaining sustainable resource levels and not polluting saves money in the long run. And a clean image — one attained by, say, avoiding oil spills and other environmental disasters — reduces criticism from employees, consumers and government.
Carbon offsets don't offset
Planes, planes, planes
I’m glad that some travel companies are finally stating that carbon offsets–those extra few bucks that are supposedly used to plant trees in order to “offset” fuel use and other carbon producing activities–don’t work. This is especially true with flying; see the story here. It’s about time someone said something about this.
The question in my mind–a question that the article raises towards the end–is why don’t we have good, fast trains here? When I was in Japan, there was the Shinkansen bullet train that moved so fast you would feel it in your ears. It moves up to 186 miles per hour. One could go from Aomori to Tokyo in just a few hours.
Eco-Freaks
Okay, I know I’ve been blogging negative like I’ve got a stick up my rear–I’ll explain later this week. In the meantime, let me continue the trend…
I’ve been getting hit a lot by the new eco-movement. I don’t know if this is the proper term for the movement, but you know what I’m talking about: the granola eating, “intentional living,” simplifying types who are always talking about living green and simple. It’s not just environmentalism–I consider myself an environmentalist–it’s environmentalism on steroids. The common trait proponents share is that this new agey philosophy runs their lives–they use terms like “simplify,” they focus on “kindness,” and they emphasize “compassionate living.” They’ve meshed the whole environmental thing with Buddhist and yogic philosophies, and it’s become a huge movement, especially with upper class folk.
Most Red Ink Ever
I’m not an economist, but my gut instinct tells me that this isn’t going to work in the long term…
In a chilling forecast, the White House is predicting a 10-year federal deficit of $9 trillion — more than the sum of all previous deficits since America’s founding. And it says by the next decade’s end the national debt will equal three-quarters of the entire U.S. economy.
Global Warming and Indigenous Cultures
Everyone read and check out the slide show on this article. It’s really sad how global warming is destroying these indigenous cultures. As I alluded to here, when a culture dies and its people become assimilated, so much is lost. I just hope that people realize how our actions are affecting the world.
My thought for the day: Live responsibly, and let’s do what we can to curb our carbon emissions.
Incandescents getting a technology boost
Old and new incandescents
From the NY Times today: Incandescent Bulbs Return to the Cutting Edge. Here’s a cool statement that could bode well for the state of our economy:
Indeed, the incandescent bulb is turning into a case study of the way government mandates can spur innovation.
“There’s a massive misperception that incandescents are going away quickly,” said Chris Calwell, a researcher with Ecos Consulting who studies the bulb market. “There have been more incandescent innovations in the last three years than in the last two decades.”
With the added government focus on the environment, maybe these new standards could spur innovations AND jobs.
