This is an amazing video, shot from a drone above a Bahamian beach. I spent much time swimming and snorkeling in tropical waters as a boy, and I suppose I'm blessed I never ended up as lunch (though I realize the chances of being bitten by a shark are very slim). The only close encounter I ever had was with a barracuda when I was about 10, and I think he was more shocked than I was. Anyway, the video below is short and, thank God, not bloody.
By Selwyn Duke
Recently I reported on the firing of Mateo Rueda, now an ex-art teacher after showing 10 and 11-year-olds nude “artwork” at Lincoln Elementary School in Hyrum, Utah on Dec. 4. Normally I would have let this story go by now, but Rueda continues playing the victim, aided and abetted by complicit reporters; libertines the world over; and, unfortunately, some good people who don’t realize that the media have mischaracterized his trespass.
Rueda, a native of Colombia, demands an apology, even as he condemns his fellow Cache Valley residents as “cultural dead-ends” and members of a “narrow-minded community.” He also said, “I was overqualified[;] I took the [teaching] position with an open heart to make a difference in a predominantly[] Mormon community where there isn’t much culture.” My, charitable as well as charming! Yet his defenders — who’ve called people such as me puritans, prudes and even Nazi-like book burners — should know that Rueda himself confessed that the nudes were out of bounds.
By Selwyn Duke
Like most media reporting on the story, People magazine presented disgraced teacher Mateo Rueda in a flattering light. He was recently fired from Lincoln Elementary School in Hyrum, Utah, for showing young children nude “artwork.” But he’s actually, we’re to believe, an intrepid martyr persecuted by prudish, uncultured rubes who can’t distinguish between porn and fine art. And to prove its point, People printed a couple of the pictures shown to the fifth and sixth-graders, one of which was a full-frontal female nude titled “Iris Tree.”
Only, People obscured the woman’s nipples and nether region.
Apparently adult readers shouldn’t see what the children saw.
By Selwyn Duke
California is already flouting federal immigration law with its “sanctuary” status. Now it’s also ignoring the most American of laws — the First Amendment — prosecuting a man simply for posting five anti-Muslim messages to Facebook.
The hapless defendant is 41-year-old Mark Feigin, who expressed his opinions at the Islamic Center of Southern California’s (ICSC) Facebook page in 2016. Feigin is certainly an acerbic, acid-tongued, foul-mouthed fellow, and he admits to sending the messages. But while many may not like their substance and/or style, they’re clearly an example of constitutionally protected speech. They are as follows….
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
What do you say about a situation in which an elementary-school teacher forces children to view nude “art” despite their objections and without parental approval? If you’re like too many Internet commenters responding to just such a story, you call the children ignorant brats and snowflakes and label the school puritanical for taking action against the teacher.
In fairness to the commenters, the story was misreported. After the firing of Mateo Rueda — until recently an art teacher at Lincoln Elementary School in Hyrum, Utah — the mainstream media portrayed him as an innocent victim of unenlightened prudes. But local parents I interviewed told a different story.
As I reported yesterday, Rueda showed certain inappropriate pictures — one displaying full frontal nudity — to a fifth-grade class afterhaving gotten complaints about them from a sixth-grade class. The parents say he forced children to view the images even after they objected, ostensibly as part of a lesson on “color usage.” One parent reported that Mateo dismissed the students’ concerns, saying that the images “were not offensive to him.”
If you hear him tell the story now, though, he had no idea the images were there and removed them as soon as he could. As the Herald Journal reported, “Asked if he thought the nudes were appropriate for the sixth-graders in his class, Rueda said he did not. ‘This is not material at all that I would use. I had no idea,’ he said.” Parent Benji Christensen explained this simply: The “teacher is most definitely lying,” he stated.
What is true is that Rueda apparently has no idea — what pornography is. Unfortunately, the comments I’ve seen in his defense indicate he has a lot of company. So let’s examine the matter.
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
A Utah art teacher was recently fired for showing children art postcards that included nude images. Now some parents are up in arms and the school is accused of Puritanism and, contradictively, political correctness. But there’s more to the story than the media have told.
The issue began December 4 when Mateo Rueda, then a teacher at Lincoln Elementary School in Hyrum, instructed his sixth-grade charges to “look through some art postcards in the classroom library for examples of color usage in notable paintings,” as the Herald Journal tells the story.
The paper continues, Rueda knew the postcards “portrayed a wide variety of classic artworks, but he has since said he was not aware that three or four of the 100 pieces featured in the box showed nudity.”
“Asked if he thought the nudes were appropriate for the sixth-graders in his class,” wrote the Journal, “Rueda said he did not. ‘This is not material at all that I would use. I had no idea,’ he said.”
But Rueda apparently thought the nudes were appropriate for fifth-graders — because that’s exactly who he showed them to after the sixth-grade class in question, according to Lincoln parents I interviewed. This was not revealed in the Journal’s story, which led readers to believe only one class had seen the nudes.
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
Some complain that the term “fake news” is overused and should be “banished.” But if you want to know why it’s so often used, well, it’s because what it describes is so often disgorged. A great example is brought to us by small-town newspaper editor Frank Miele, who relates how an Associated Press story contained two clear falsehoods about President Trump — and how getting AP editors to correct the lies was like pulling teeth.
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
“Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern Time, August 29th. In a panic, they [humans] try to pull the plug.”
“…Skynet fights back” — with extreme prejudice.
The above dialogue, from the 1991 film Terminator 2: Judgment Day, reflects a common science fiction theme: the artificially intelligent machine that develops consciousness — but without a conscience — and tries to wipe out humanity. According to some scientists, however, this fiction could become fact.
Read the rest here.
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