Why would Sinn Féin go into an executive in which the DUP has a disproportionate degree of influence over the British government – an alleged, joint-guarantor with the Irish government of the Belfast Agreement

Sinn Féin won seven seats in the Westminster general election, running on an abstentionist ticket, which has been the party’s policy for at least one hundred years.

The SDLP, which boasted about sitting in Westminster but had nothing to show for it, lost its three seats – seat held by three former party leaders and two of which have now been taken by Sinn Féin.

And yet despite the wishes of the electorate which had been heavily exposed to all the arguments, Sinn Féin’s critics, including the SDLP and southern political parties, and many in the media, few of whom wish Sinn Féin well, continued to criticise the party for keeping to its manifesto commitment.

I was at the Belfast count on Thursday night/Friday morning and was asked by a succession of journalists about whether in the circumstances of a hung parliament Sinn Féin would not drop its policy and help Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party or, at least, make it more difficult for Theresa May to form a government with the help of the DUP.

I said, No, it was not going to happen.

Many arguments have been advanced in defence of abstentionism including that the oath or affirmation of allegiance to a foreign monarch and her heirs presents a difficulty and is inimical to one’s republicanism; or that one’s influence is miniscule and dwarfed by the major parties with few from the North able to demonstrate worthwhile achievements commensurate with their attendance.

These arguments, whilst valid, are not at the core of abstentionism. For example, the oath could be completely removed. Or, imagine Britain a republic. It might well be possible for some of the parties which take their seats to point to pieces of legislation that they have influenced or initiated. In the circumstances of a hung parliament it is undeniable that a tail might be able to wag the much bigger dog for a time.

Even if the oath was removed and I was an MP I would still not take my seat.

Even if Britain was a republic I would still not take my seat.

Even if I held the balance of power and could get through bits and pieces of legislation (while flattering myself as to the magnitude of my importance) I would still not take my seat.

For me, it is quite simple.

How can I object to Britain interfering in Irish affairs if I go over and interfere in theirs?

Once I took my seat, with or without an oath, I have lost the moral high ground on that question of Irish sovereignty. I have already conceded Britain’s right to govern on this shore – a claim that was demonstrably rejected in December 1918 by the majority of people in Ireland in a democratic election.

Even though for reasons of pragmatism I support Agreements which were passed into law in the House of Commons, this does not mean that I recognise Britain’s claim to rule over me as being legitimate.

Leinster House and Stormont, for all their many flaws, are assemblies of the people of this island. Furthermore, the state in which I live is not the state in which I grew up. Much has changed; often beyond recognition. Much has clearly still to be changed. I am in the business of building a new society in Ireland out of the two states which currently exist. To do that I need to win over a significant body of support from the unionist community, as well as winning over people in the South who have lived for a century under successive partitionist governments which have never acted in truly national terms.

The establishment in the South distances itself from us by increasingly in its discourse conflating the Twenty-Six Counties with ‘Ireland’; although the threat of Brexit to the southern economy, and to the security of the peace process, has suddenly produced fresh – some might say, opportunistic – interest in reunification.

On Friday, the day after the general election, I tweeted: “In interfering in British affairs the DUP will gather many enemies.” I hadn’t appreciated how quickly that would happen nor the scale of the revulsion.

The British, especially the English, deeply resent anyone else telling them what to do.

In simplistic terms it explains their dislike of Europe and the way they voted on Brexit.

As an exercise, imagine that the Labour and Tory wins were reversed and that Sinn Féin’s seven seats would be enough to support a Labour minority government, and that the party, out of the blue, took its Westminster seats.

Make no mistake about it: the British public and the British media would be just as scathing of republicans as they are now of the DUP; although the DUP because of its homophobic, racist and sectarian proclivities present much more fertile ground for ridicule and attack.

And that is because the British, especially the English, do not like outsiders interfering in their affairs.

Although the SNP would also have faced criticism were it to prop up, say, a Corbyn minority government, the criticism and the type of condemnation would not be as visceral as the attacks on the Irish unionists because Scotland and Wales are unquestionably viewed differently from the Six Counties.

Incidentally, those famous Irish politicians who did take their oath and seats in Westminster failed abysmally in their objectives.

Daniel O’Connell failed to achieve the Repeal of the Union. Charles Stewart Parnell and his Irish Parliamentary Party after decades in Westminster, and his successor, John Redmond, failed to achieve Home Rule, but did manage to sacrifice the lives of 50,000 Irish Volunteers in WWI who were fooled into believing they were fighting for the freedom of a small nation, Ireland.

I’m not including one major success at Westminster by the original Ulster Unionist Party because their exclusion of the Six Counties and the abandonment of the Home Rule Act has proved to be one unmitigated disaster for everyone.

By abstaining from Westminster Sinn Féin is making a powerful statement – that the people who vote for it reject British rule and British interference.

And that is something that should give British people pause for thought: if you are livid at the prospects of a party from here, going over there to interfere and make your laws, how do you think we feel after all these centuries?

This sordid Tory/DUP arrangement, if it comes off, may not last long, will ultimately damage both parties, but more immediately will jeopardise the prospects of a return to devolution.

Why would Sinn Féin go into an executive in which the DUP has a disproportionate degree of influence over the British government – an alleged, joint-guarantor with the Irish government of the Belfast Agreement?

One, perhaps unforeseen consequence of the DUP’s willingness to go into coalition with a British government is that the DUP is effectively relinquishing any objection it might make in the future to Sinn Féin doing exactly the same in Dublin.

For the DUP I hope that the demonization they are facing (and which must appear as unjust and unfair to them) is a chastening experience and one which will make them or their supporters reflect on the antediluvian nature of their policies which encroach on the freedom of others.

I also hope it makes them realise that in actual fact they belong here more than over there.

It is here, not over there, they should be entering into a true pact with their fellow Irish people.


Decided to wait until I had the other three done before uploading them all. Here we have Pinkie Pie as Hawkeye. Again, a difficult choice for me to make with who would fit with Pinkie Pie (considering Deadpool is not an Avengers). Still, I kind of consider Hawkeye sort of the comic relief of the group (though he wasn't much of a joker in the movie). Plus, I like the wordplay, Pinkeye. - Ew. Nothing really funny about Pink Eye. Heard that a nurse was using pinkie crust to make....Okay! Pinkie! No need for the details!Pinkie Pie own and (c) by HasbroHawkeye own and (c) by MarvelArtwork (c) Kenichi-ShinigamiMy Little Avengers -Shining Fury- [link] Captain Equestria- [link] Twilight Widow - [link] Ironmare - [link] Pinkeye - HereRainbow Thor - [link] Flutterhulk - [link]


It’s been a while since I last took part in the Peanut Butter Bash Group but its time to join in again! Because of my job I have had to sit the last few months out but this is fate because the month I could join in again was banana month……. seriously anyone who has read this blog for a while will know just how obsessed with all things banana I am, so I could’t wait to try these two together. And I came up with this Light and Fluffy Peanut Butter Banana Layer Cake.

This is everything a cake should be and oh so much more, let me explain 😀

Layer Cake’s & Banana

I don’t often make layer cakes, I find them too much to eat and can occasionally be just a little bit too dry for my liking. Hence why I tend to make traybake’s, snack cakes and cupcakes. It’s just a personal preference of mine. But I got it into my head that I wanted a layer cake. Banana cake is almost always a moist cake but it can make a sponge dense and heavy.

To make sure there were no dense heavy sponge issues with this cake I added buttermilk to the batter. Buttermilk is almost a wonder ingredient in cakes. It ensures a light and fluffy tender crumb. Ensuring the banana did not weigh the sponge down.

Peanut Butter Overload

Because banana can be a strong flavour I wanted to make sure the peanut butter was an equal partner and not a side show. To do this I included a healthy amount into the cake batter, I also smothered the cake in a light and creamy peanut butter cream cheese frosting and to finish if off I added a handful of peanut butter chips.

Making sure that each bite had that peanut butter goodness in it 😀 The peanut butter chips are completely optional as I know they are not the easiest thing to come by, especially in the UK. I have to order mine online, so chocolate chips will work fine instead.

Or leave them off all together. All in all this a light and fluffy cake that is equally flavoured with banana and peanut butter. It’s simple to make and comes together in one bowl so there aren’t too many dishes to wash up afterwards 😀

Honestly you will love this Light and Fluffy Peanut Butter Banana Layer Cake as much as me. It really is a tea time treat for the whole family!

Light and Fluffy Peanut Butter Banana Layer Cake A light and fluffy peanut butter and banana layer cake. Peanut butter and banana sponge filled and covered with a light and creamy peanut butter cream cheese frosting. 0 from 0 votes Print Pin Prep Time: 20 minutes Cook Time: 35 minutes Total Time: 55 minutes Servings: 8 -10 slices Author: Emma Ingredients For the cake

125 grams unsalted butter (1 stick & 1 tablespoon)

250 grams light brown sugar (1 & 1/8 cup)

125 grams smooth peanut butter (1/2 cup)

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 medium sized ripe bananas - mashed

120 millilitres buttermilk (1/2 cup)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

290 grams plain / all purpose flour (2 & 1/4 cups)

For the frosting

212 grams unsalted butter (1 cup)

65 grams smooth peanut butter (1/4 cup)

400 grams icing sugar (3 cups)

155 grams full fat cream cheese (3/4 cup)

50 grams peanut butter or chocolate chips (1/4 cup) Instructions Preheat your oven to 190C / 375F / Gas mark 5 and either line or lightly grease two 8inch round tins that are at least 2 inches deep and place to one side.

Cream the butter, sugar and peanut butter together until they are light and fluffy. About 2-3 minutes if you are using a stand or electric mixer.

Then add the eggs one at a time beating in-between each addition then add in the vanilla extract and mashed bananas. Mix until everything is well combined about another minute.

Sieve in the baking soda, baking powder, salt and flour.

Then gently fold in the dry ingredients into the batter.

Divide the batter equally between the two tins and gently spread it out in the tin so it is level. Then pop the tins in the middle of your oven.

After 25 minutes you need to reduce the temperature of your oven to 170C / 325F / Gas mark 3 and bake your cake for a further 10 minutes.

After this 10 minutes check you cake for doneness, it should just be starting to pull away from the sides of your tins be a light golden colour and be firm to the touch. If you have a pick press it into the middle and it should come out clean. If it doesn't pass these tests give your cake a further few minutes and test again.

Take the cakes out of the oven and let them rest in their tins for 5 minutes then transfer them to a wire rack to fully cool down.

Once the cakes are fully cooled down its time to make the frosting.

Using an electric mixer or stand mixer beat the butter until it is light and fluffy, this will be about 5-7 minutes.

Mix in the peanut butter and beat for another minute or two until it is well mixed into the butter.

Turn your mixer off and pour in half of the icing sugar, on a low speed start to mix it in. When its fully combined repeat with the remaining icing sugar.

Add in the cream cheese and beat on a medium speed for a minute until it is well mixed in.

Your cake is now ready to decorate.

Put half of your frosting on top of one of your cakes and gently spread it out over the sponge but keep it a few centimetres from the edges and then sandwich it together with the other half.

Then place the remaining frosting on the top of the cakes and gently work in over the top and down the side of the sponges until everything is fully covered.

If using sprinkle your peanut butter chips or chocolate chips over the top.

Slice and serve.

Kept in an airtight tin in cool temperatures this cake will last 4 days. Tried this recipe? Mention @BakeThenEat or tag #BakeThenEat Share this recipe Mention @BakeThenEat or tag #BakeThenEat

Do you want to join in on the peanut butter bash fun? If so, email Miranda and request to join the Peanut Butter Bash facebook group! The first Thursday of each month we post a dessert with peanut butter and a mystery ingredient. There is also a Facebook group if you want to join in the fun but don’t run your own blog The Peanut Butter Recipe Box. Here are the other peanut butter and Banana creations!


In Israel, open discourse and dissent appear to be among the casualties of the monthlong war in Gaza, according to stalwarts of what is known as the Zionist left — Israelis who want the country to end its occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and help create a sovereign Palestinian state.

Israeli politics have been drifting rightward for years, and many see that trend sharpening and solidifying now. Several polls find that as many as nine out of 10 Israeli Jews back the prosecution of the war by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. When that support slipped a bit last week, it seemed to be because more people wanted an even more aggressive assault on Hamas, the militant Islamist faction that dominates Gaza. Israelis who question the government or the military on Facebook, or who even share photographs of death and devastation in Gaza, find themselves defriended, often by people they thought were politically like-minded.

“One of the victims of war is any nuance,” said Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman, who emigrated from New York in 1979. “The idea of having a nuanced position that recognizes the suffering on both sides and the complications is almost impossible to maintain.”

Rabbi Weiman-Kelman is the founder of Kol Haneshama, one of Israel’s largest and best-known Reform congregations, where every service ends with an adaptation of a traditional Hebrew prayer for peace that includes a line in Arabic borrowed from a traditional Muslim prayer. (Disclosure: I have occasionally attended those services.)

When Rabbi Weiman-Kelman recently circulated a petition condemning racist comments by a right-wing rabbi, a member of the synagogue’s board whose son was fighting in Gaza said the congregation should stay out of the matter and “focus on our boys,” he recalled. And during services Friday night, another leader of the congregation with lengthy leftist credentials stood up and said he no longer felt comfortable with a different prayer, which included a wish for “shalom” — peace — for “all who dwell on earth.” “The man said, ‘There really are bad people out there who I don’t wish shalom,’ ” the rabbi recounted. “It was a devastating moment.”


WASHINGTON — As commercial spaceflight company Blue Origin prepares for another suborbital test fight, company founder Jeff Bezos said he thinks the next administration should assign NASA a mix of large-scale prizes and technology development programs.

Bezos, in an on-stage interview as part of the John H. Glenn Lecture in Space History at the National Air and Space Museum here, offered his views when asked what he would do if the next president called him and asked for space policy advice.

"I think big prizes would be an interesting thing to do," he said. NASA has run a prize program, called Centennial Challenges, for a decade, offering prizes of up to several million dollars for aviation and space technology achievements.

Bezos, though, believes NASA should go after something bigger, such as a prize for a Mars sample return mission. "One thing that the government could do is just offer a very large prize to whoever first brings back some Mars samples," he said. "It would be very interesting. That kind of horserace would create lots of attention. People would compete for it."

Bezos didn't offer an estimate of how large the prize should be for a Mars sample return competition. NASA is currently working on the first element of its own sample return effort, the Mars 2020 rover, to collect samples. That mission has an estimated cost of $1.5 billion. Later missions are proposed to launch the samples into Martian orbit and return them to Earth, but NASA has not disclosed a schedule or cost for them.

In conjunction with large prizes, Bezos suggested NASA also pursue ambitious technology development efforts. "I would also advise that NASA needs to go after gigantic, hard technology goals," he said, that would be too difficult for private industry to do on its own. Examples he gave were in-space nuclear reactors and hypersonic passenger aviation.

"I think prizes and then really hard technology programs" are what NASA should pursue, he concluded.

Bezos didn't weigh in on a particular destination for NASA human spaceflight efforts, but the other guest speaker at the lecture, Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins, did. "To me, the focus should be on Mars," he said.

Collins said his views contrasted with those held by the late Neil Armstrong, who had advocated for a return the moon prior to going to Mars. "I disagree with that. I think we ought to just go," he said. "I used to joke that NASA should be renamed NAMA — the National Aeronautics and Mars Administration — and I would still to some extent like to see that."

Bezos didn't object to someone, be it NASA or a private venture, sending humans to Mars, although he thought it would be more for the achievement of doing so rather than any science crewed missions there might do. "I don't think you can justify sending men to Mars for science reasons. I think we have reached a state where robots can do that task, probably better than people can," he said.

Instead, he said people should go because it's "cool." "I hope somebody goes to Mars because I want to watch it. I think it would be glorious,"he said.

Bezos' near-term space focus is on Blue Origin, the company he founded to develop reusable launch vehicles that promise to reduce the cost of space access. Bezos announced on Twitter June 13 that the company would perform another test flight of its New Shepard suborbital launch vehicle on June 17, which, for the first time, will be webcast live on the company's website.

Bezos said Blue Origin, which now has about 700 employees, is on track to begin commercial New Shepard flights, carrying people, in 2018. "We'll fly our first test astronauts in late 2017, hopefully, if the test program continues to go well," he said.

The company has not yet started to sell tickets for those flights. "We don't know yet what exactly we're going to charge," he said, but suggested Blue Origin would charge a price similar to Virgin Galactic, which is offering seats on its SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle for between $250,000 and $300,000 a person. "We're going to be in the same range, to start with, and then keep working over time to make it cheaper."

Bezos has previously indicated he has invested at least $500 million of his own money into Blue Origin. At the event, Bezos said Blue Origin remains in "investment mode" and will eventually be profitable, but "it's going to take a long time."

"It's for-profit," Bezos said of Blue Origin when asked if it was a for-profit or not-for-profit company, but stressed it is not yet profitable. "Well, it's not yet. That's an intention for the glorious future."

Originally published on Space News.


Excellent accuracy!

I got it from the FFL dealer 12/23/14 and when I got it home, measured the chamber with a Hornady C.O.A.L gauge. I reloaded 50 cartridges with IMR 7828 SSC, 80 gr. and seated the bullets so the length was 3.779" I mounted a Vortex Viper PST 6-24X50 with the MRAD reticle and 2 days later took it to the range. I started with 100 yards, and my 5th, 6th, and 7th shots were in a 1" bullseye, 2 going through the same hole. I switched to a 3" target at 100 yards and had a 3 shot group .5" just high and to the left, made the adjustments to center in the small bullseye and noticed the scope rings had loosened even using locktite, so I stopped. I've ordered Vortex's Precision Matched 30mm rings and am waiting to receive them. Once I remount the scope using the new rings, I'm going to zero it for 200 yards and post another review, but initially I'm VERY pleased! Oh, this is my 4th Savage rifle. I have a model 114 in 7mm magnum and can hit golf balls all day long at 100 yards. Dropped a large doe at 70 yards and she never even kicked because I shot the top of her heart off.


Time to stock up on the antidote for rattlesnake bites and boost blood supplies.

More than 1 million visitors are expected to flood the state for the solar eclipse Aug. 21 and hospitals in its path are ramping up for the massive influx.

For hospital systems from central Oregon to the coast, it will be all-hands on deck in the run-up and aftermath of the eclipse.

Without a precedent, planners have turned for advice to their counterparts in Sturgis, a town in South Dakota that attracts about a half a million people for a yearly motorcycle rally in August.

"One of the key things that we learned was that the need for acute care services oftentimes just mimics the increase in the population," said Dr. Jeff Absalon, executive vice president of St. Charles Health System in Bend.

That means more patients with food poisoning, broken bones, strokes and heart attacks. It also means more emergency surgeries for traumatic injuries.

Here's what's planned:

CENTRAL OREGON

St. Charles Health System, with hospitals and clinics in Bend, Redmond, Prineville and Madras, has an emergency plan for Aug. 16 to 23. It expects the local population to increase by 280,000, more than doubling.

To meet the demand, the hospital system has canceled elective surgeries, such as hernia operations and joint replacements. It has limited time off and contracted to bring in nearly 60 traveling nurses. Administrators have also moved staff around, shifting doctors and nurses from nonclinical positions to the emergency room.

The hospital system has stocked up on supplies, buying everything from extra gauze and saline solution to pharmaceuticals. It also received extra blood from the Red Cross in Portland, nearly doubling its supply.

The Red Cross declined to provide any details about its contingency plans but said it would have the need for blood covered.

St. Charles Health System also purchased extra antidote for rattlesnake bites.

"It's a little tricky because it has a short shelf life, said Lisa Goodman, spokeswoman for the hospital system.

Clinics in Bend, Redmond, Prineville and Madras will welcome walk-ins, with hours extended from 6 to 10 p.m.

Madras, home to about 6,700 people, is expected to be ground zero.

"It is largely considered to be the very best place in the country to watch the eclipse because of geography and weather patterns," Goodman said.

Hospital staff expect a sixfold increase in patients in the Madras ER around the eclipse.

The hospital will have five physicians, nurse practitioners or physician assistants on duty at the hospital instead of the usual three. But the hospital has only 25 beds.

That means patients will have to be transported to other hospitals in the area or out of the region and the roads are expected to be clogged.

Usually, two air ambulances serve the area. Two more will be added during the eclipse period, Absalon said. The Oregon Army National Guard also will make a Black Hawk helicopter available to transport patients.

Administrators will open hospital parking lots to staff, allowing them to camp out in their recreational vehicles to be closer to work.

Providers have urged pregnant women due around the eclipse to be prepared but the hospital isn't altering due dates by inducing labor or doing C-sections

"There will be some instances where people may need to make alternate living arrangements," Absalon said. "We won't be delivering babies outside the standard time for delivery."

SALEM AREA

Salem Health administrators have been planning for a year for an expected 500,000 visitors to their vicinity.

"We're expecting everything to be up by 25 percent," said Wayne McFarlin, emergency preparedness administrator for Salem Health, with hospitals in Salem and Dallas and clinics in Marion and Polk counties.

The hospital system has increased supplies across-the-board, hired contract nurses, moved staff from nonclinical positions and shifted schedules to ensure that more physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, nurses and technicians are available.

"We've increased our emergency department and hospital staff," McFarlin said. "We've boosted nurses in every unit that has in-patients."

In concrete terms, that means an extra 10 professionals in the ER, compared with 65 to 70 usually, to treat perhaps an extra 100 extra patients a day at Salem Hospital.

Administrators will allow staff to sleep onsite if they choose. Salem Hospital has about 70 cots; half have been reserved so far.

The hospital also has available floor space, if needed, for doctors and nurses to sleep over.

Elective surgeries haven't been canceled but only about a third the usual number are booked because patients and providers have selected other dates, McFarlin said.

On the Wednesday before the eclipse, Salem Hospital will set up three air-conditioned tents outside the ER to handle the demand. They will be used as triage centers and sobering stations. Patients will also be treated in the tents, as appropriate, and discharged.

A command center will be set up in the hospital to track patients and to work with 11 other hospitals in the region.

CORVALLIS TO THE COAST

Samaritan Health Services has five hospitals -- in Corvallis, Newport, Albany, Lebanon and Lincoln City – and expects more patients at each.

There could be 150,000 visitors on the coast and as many as 300,000 in the Willamette Valley. Administrators hope to shift demand to urgent care clinics when possible to save ERs for more complicated care.

The hospital system is closing dozens of specialty clinics to move staff to 18 urgent and family care clinics from Sweet Home to Albany to Depoe Bay. From Friday through Monday, some of those clinics will have extended hours. Of the 18, 15 will be converted to walk-in clinics. Details are posted online.

The hospital system has asked staff to work extra hours if possible. They'll be able to sleep overnight at the hospitals or camp in parking lots, provided there's space.

Administrators are also hiring contract nurses.

But with so many other hospitals in need of professionals, there's a limit to how many extra professionals they can hire on a temporary basis, said Joseph Hutchinson, director of emergency management, safety and security for Samaritan Health Services.

"Would we like more? Absolutely," Hutchinson said. "Can we get more? No."

Samaritan Health Services has canceled elective surgeries and bought more food, medications and other supplies.

Like central Oregon, the area serving Samaritan Health facilities will have four air ambulances instead of the usual two and more medical transport vehicles on the ground.

Providers have urged pregnant women to be prepared. But the hospital system has refused requests by women who want to deliver the day of the eclipse.

"If a person is ready to deliver – they will deliver a baby," Hutchinson said. "We are not encouraging or accommodating anyone who wants to have a baby born on the eclipse."

Emergency managers are stationing extra security guards at clinics and they're activating emergency communications, with satellite phones and a network of volunteer ham radio operators.

Planners have tried to think of everything as if they were preparing for a major earthquake or disaster.

"It's an invaluable exercise," Hutchinson said. "You can't get better training for emergency preparedness."

-- Lynne Terry


Hugo Schwyzer explains why guys are so preoccupied with getting women’s sex stats—and why they should just let it go.

Judging from what I read online and hear from my students, the question of the “number” is as compelling as ever. This month, Marie Claire ran an article, “What’s Your Number?” in which five women (whose numbers ranged from zero to 100) told their stories. The March issue of Cosmopolitan Australia features the same discussion, noting that 59 percent of readers surveyed thought knowing a partner’s exact number was important, and that 33 percent of those same readers had lied about their own pasts, claiming fewer sexual partners than they’d actually had.

(A quick note: most people use “the number” to refer to the count of people with whom they’ve had heterosexual intercourse. Any kind of sex that doesn’t involve a penis inside a vagina usually “doesn’t count.” A lot of us are like Bill Clinton in that regard, not seeing oral sex as real sex. This is a very limited—and limiting—understanding of what sex really is. But that’s a topic for another day.)

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It’s understandable to be curious about the sexual lives of our peers. It makes sense to want to know what the averages are. (According to the experts at the Kinsey Institute, the average number of lifetime sexual partners for men aged 30 to 44 is around seven, while for women in that same age group, it’s four—both lower than you might think).

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But the number has different meanings for men and women. The old double standard is still alive and well: a man with more sexual partners than his buddies may be teasingly called a “man whore,” but the epithet is a compliment, not an insult. Ask a woman who has dared reveal her number to someone who considers it too high, and she’ll surely tell you a story of being “slut-shamed.”

It’s quite common for a guy to worry about a girlfriend’s sexual past. Too many men are still raised to see sex as crude competition, in which bedding a woman who has already had a lot of lovers counts less than scoring with a woman who is “hard to get.” But I think the average guy’s worry is simpler than that. The more men his girlfriend has slept with, the greater number of lovers to which she can compare his skills. It’s easier to win a contest against two than against 20, he figures. And even easier to rank first when he’s the only one to have ever played the game. No wonder so many men—in this country and around the world—are obsessed with finding a virgin.

This is the real reason why so many men get so filled with rage at sexually experienced women. And of course, it’s the real reason so many women feel compelled to lie about their number.

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Too many women have told their boyfriends their real number, only to be nagged incessantly for explicit details. (One friend of mine recounted to me in horror how her current boyfriend stopped one day in the middle of giving her oral sex to ask how his technique compared.) Other women find that their boyfriends endlessly psychoanalyze the reasons for a number that they think is too high: “Did you sleep with so many men because your father left you when you were a child?” (If I had a dollar for every woman I know who’s been asked that question, I could buy everyone reading this a Slurpee. Seriously.)

At this point, some men are probably protesting: “But I don’t slut-shame or endlessly analyze. For me, it’s not all about competing with other guys. Isn’t the number an important thing to know about someone you might be serious about? Isn’t it something I have a right to know?”

That sounds reasonable. But again, why is it so important to know an exact number? What difference does it make? Knowing whether a potential girlfriend has ever been in love before is important; discovering (slowly and patiently) how her past experiences have impacted her view of men (for better or worse) is important. But really, what’s the difference whether she’s slept with four or 14 men? She isn’t defined by her number—and if there’s a chance you might change how you see her when you discover the truth (should she tell you), why ask?

This has nothing to do, by the way, with asking about sexual health. It’s a great idea to talk about sexually transmitted infections; it’s a great idea for a new couple to get tested before having unprotected sex. We have a right to know if a potential partner has herpes. But the exact number itself is altogether different.

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I lost my virginity at 17 to my high-school girlfriend. She was a year younger but much more sexually experienced. She was my first for anything that went below the waist; I was the fifth guy she’d had sex with. I’d asked her number, of course, and then fought hard not to obsess about the four boys who had “been there” before me. But I saw the pain my questions caused her. And I came to realize that it didn’t matter.

I don’t know my wife’s number. I’ve never asked her. She’s never asked for mine. I know enough from the stories she’s told to know that there was more than one guy before me; she knows enough about my past to figure out that she can’t count my lovers on her fingers. Beyond that, we—who have shared so much sexually and emotionally in our nine years as a couple, six years as spouses, and two years as parents together—don’t need to know more specifics.

When we’re in a monogamous relationship, what we have a right to insist on is that no names get added to the list after our own. It doesn’t matter if I’m number five or 55. I’ll be crushed if my wife adds a number six or a 56 behind my back.

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But the right to ask to be last is not the same as the right to know how far we are from the first. And for me, part of being a good man is knowing what I don’t need to know.

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Other Stories From the Good Men Project Magazine:

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Why Does It Matter How Many Partners She’s Had?


You drift towards a pastel island where everything sings as you pass.

The sky begins to darken and something in the distance catches your eye…

I’m Ed Key, one of the developers of Proteus along with composer David Kanaga. Proteus came out for the PC and Mac in January 2013 and had a fantastic reception from Edge, Eurogamer, IGN and many more. For something that started out as a weird experimental project between me and David, this was pretty mind-blowing, and it’s even crazier to now have the chance to bring it to PS3 and PS Vita with some brand new features that take advantage of Sony’s hardware.

Proteus is something like a constantly-remixing ambient album in the form of an immersive island world. It’s all about a particular feeling of wandering through nature alone, taking it in and getting pleasantly lost. Maybe it’s a little bit about magic and mortality too. Don’t expect tasks and scores and checklists – perhaps Proteus lurks somewhere on the shady fringes of what it means to be a game.

With the PS Vita and PS3 version we’ve been adding new ways to engage with – and remix – the world. Previously, all Proteus islands were purely random, but on PS Vita, you can now choose to generate an island based on your current geographical location and on both platforms you can generate an island for the current date.

Both features have a chance of generating an especially “wild” island with various tweaks and twists. The island at my house, for example, has weird purple sea, green sky in the evening and some pleasant (but still very purple) inland lakes.

We’ve also added a way for users to interact with the environment using the back touch screen, and we’ll be talking more about this closer to release.

Curve Studios is doing a fantastic job bringing the game to PlayStation, adding a lot of love and polish along the way. Playing it hand-held on the Vita’s bright OLED screen is so nice, as is the experience of playing it a on big television through the PlayStation 3. We’ve had a very positive response to the PlayStation version from people I’ve shown it to, and I’m happy to quote a friend here and say that it’s the best version of Proteus there’s ever been!


5 TV Shows I Wish I Could Unsee

Like everyone else, I’ve seen my share of television shows I disliked.

Some simply weren’t my taste while others were objectively awful, and usually it’s not a big deal. No harm, no foul; I just move on to something else.

Once in a while, though, a show hits me so wrong that it sticks with me, burrowing into my brain like an irritating bug until I want to scoop it out with a melon baller.

Here are five such shows that I wish I could go back in time and unsee.

[Warning: There are some spoilers in the following discussion]

JOEY

I loved Friends. I laughed (and occasionally cried) with them through ugly naked guy poking, the endless Ross-Rachel rollercoaster (I don’t care that you were on a break, Ross!) and God knows how many cups of coffee at Central Perk. When it was announced that Matt LeBlanc was spinning off Joey, I thought it had a chance since it had worked for Frasier when Cheers ended. Wishful thinking on my part; obviously, but I wasn’t quite ready to let go.

A few episodes of Joey later, and I couldn’t run away fast enough.

The show wasn’t funny and Joey was no longer loveable-just dumber, more deluded, and much more grating. I wished I hadn’t made the move to LA with him because it made me miss Friends even more.

COUPLING (USA)

As a fan of the original Coupling, I had to check out the American version despite, shall we say, less than stellar reviews. I ended up only watching two episodes, but that was more than enough (and it didn’t last much longer than that, anyway).

Why were the jokes I had laughed at uproariously in the UK version suddenly so unfunny, and how is it possible that none of the actors had any chemistry?

In an especially cruel trick, BBC America showed the UK version of the Coupling episode immediately after NBC aired its version. The difference in quality between the two was embarrassing and made me suspicious of any future American remakes.

HOARDERS

This one is my fault.

I have clutter issues–I know this, and yet one night while flipping through the channels, I landed on a Hoarders marathon and couldn’t look away.

This show is both disturbing and riveting on so many levels. While I squirmed at the disgusting “living” conditions with the piles upon piles of paper, trinkets, and garbage, the people destroyed me. This is a serious illness on display for everyone to gawk at as if it were a train wreck. I know I couldn’t look away. At least not until an episode involving animals came on and the sheer horror of that broke the spell.

I had nightmares for a week, and I’ve never watched another episode, but I wish I could forget the ones I did see.

VIVA LAUGHLIN

I hadn’t seen Viva Blackpool, the British miniseries upon which Viva Laughlin was based, but Hugh Jackman in a musical murder mystery show? Come on! I thought it would be delicious.

Instead it was bland, clichéd, almost incomprehensible, and flat-out terrible with some of the worst dialogue ever uttered. And don’t get me started on the not quite lip synching but not really singing, either.

This show made Cop Rock look Emmy-worthy .

PERSONS UNKNOWN

Not only do I wish I could unsee Persons Unknown, I wish I could forget it ever existed.

I originally thought it was a fascinating idea for a show-seven strangers wake up in a strange hotel in a deserted town with no idea how they got there. So many possibilities, and while the pilot was just okay, there was a tremendous amount of promise, so I created a season pass.

Big mistake. Huge.

It went steadily downhill after the pilot meandering down blind plot alleys and never quite settling on a tone with characters who became less interesting as the show wore on. I still stayed with it because I had to know how it would end, and NBC promised we would get answers.

Ha! Persons Unknown spun its rusty wheels, looping back and forth and creating giant plot holes in the process, until the finale when we got–nothing. We still didn’t know what the “Program” was and the characters we had hoped would escape were once again stuck. Sure, some of them had made it to level two in the middle of the ocean, but I didn’t spend thirteen hours to find out the whole show was just a video game.

Most maddening finale I have ever seen.

Worse, I had to listen to my husband complain about “that God awful show you made me watch” for a month and he still brings it up if I suggest a new show. “It’s not going to be like that terrible Persons Unknown, is it?” Sigh.

If I had Hermione’s time turner, those are the shows I would go back and unsee. What about you? Are there any shows that you wish you could erase from your memory? Let me know in the comments.


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PRESS RELEASE (scroll down for additional languages)

Press Release (Version 1):

At 10am EST USA on 6th January 2016 (2am 7th January Australia), The Selfie Board Game will go live on Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Launched by Aussie toy and game designer/manufacturer Ken Howard, this is your chance to catch the vision of this exciting new game and genre. People will be able to pledge support for the game, in return for STARRING IN THE GAME plus ordering first copies. The object of The Selfie Board Game, is simply, to describe someone's appearance JUST from the sound of their voice BEFORE their selfie is revealed. This is a game for the whole world, for every language, every culture and every race, so that The Selfie Board Game builds these bridges internationally. The game headquarters will be based in Philadelphia, USA.

Kickstarter link: https://goo.gl/bMnwkG

Or go to Kickstarter and search for The Selfie Board Game to pledge / order your copy or to preview the game.

Our Facebook page is: https://www.facebook.com/SelfieBoardGame

Our Web Page: www.TheSelfieBoardGame.com

Press Release (Version 2):

Australian Ken Howard, in partnership with American Mark Mercer, launched Ken’s Selfie Board Game on Kickstarter on the 6th January. The game aims to address issues of race and colour from an angle that has not been addressed before. Namely from our voices. Ken, who develops toys and games for clients all over the world, knows firsthand, the reaction to his Aussie accent in other countries. Having lived in Europe, Africa and the USA, he has come to appreciate his friends from all over the world. Ken says he sees ‘features’ not colour. In fact, Ken’s mission is to do away with the ‘colour’ word altogether. He argues that if you went to a paint store after something BLUISH for your bedroom, you’d go to the blue swatch which ranges from dark and royal blue down to pale, almost, white blue. He contends it is the same with human skin. We humans are in the brown range and therefore TONE should be used as a reference instead of colour. He jokes being Australian that he is in fact pink, getting burnt easily from the sunny weather down under. He addresses these issues in his new game, called The Selfie Board Game, where the object is to describe someone’s appearance, just from the sound of their voice, before their selfie is revealed.

Using only your voice, which will be uploaded into an App, this VOICIE, as he calls it, tells a lot about you and who you are. From your gender to the language that you speak, to your accent, which can even lead you to guessing someone’s eye colour. Howard makes some valid arguments in his thesis-like presentation where he has an Essay on Heritage as well as going into the linguistics of language. He certainly has done a lot of research and gone into great detail for the game. He says he is using Crowd Funding as a means to quickly ‘get’ the voicies and selfies he needs for the game. In short, it is a unique take on ‘Guess Who’ and with the inclusion of an App. He hopes this social media board game will evolve into its own product range including music, a toy hover car and even a TV game show. His experience in developing thousands of toys and games over the years, certainly puts this Aussie in the can-do bracket. We wish him all the best. Just search for The Selfie Board Game on Kickstarter.com is you wish to secure an EARLY copy of the game.

Press Release (Version 3):

Do you ever listen to the radio and wonder just what does that person look like? We all do it and make mental images of the person on the other end of the microphone. Australian Toy and Game Manufacturer Ken Howard, in partnership with Mark Mercer of Philadelphia USA, are launching Ken’s new Selfie Board Game on Kickstarter, a game which addresses this exact issue. Ken says that in his travels all over the world, he was always fascinated meeting new clients he has only spoken to on the phone. He said that, in listening more, he honed in on what he thought the person would look like when he met them in person. He said being a designer, he has always noticed features and sounds first. and has taken this to a level not thought of before in his new game. Mary Couzin, owner of Discovery Games and the Chicago Toy and Game Fair commented: “Wow you wrote a thesis”, referring to his Kickstarter page after being shown a preview. In fact, former Vice President of Hasbro, Mike Hirtle, even lent Ken his “voicie” and “selfie” for the game which you can actually play within the Kickstarter web site. I am sure you will be surprised what you can learn about someone’s voice. I certainly was, in reading Ken’s Essay on the subject of linguistics on the site. It honestly looks like a hit with his new social media board game. Check it out on Kickstarter, search for The Selfie Board Game.

Press Release

Um 10 Uhr EST USA am 6. Januar 2016 wird die Selfie Brettspiel live auf Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) gehen Durch Aussie Spielzeug und Spieldesigner Ken Howard ins Leben gerufen , ist dies Ihre Chance, die Vision von diesem aufregenden neuen Spiel und Genre zu fangen. Die Menschen werden in der Lage, Unterstützung für das Spiel für immer erste und frühe Kopien verpflichten , im Gegenzug . Die Aufgabe der Selfie Brettspiel, ist einfach , um jemandes Aussehen gerade aus dem Klang ihrer Stimme zu beschreiben , BEVOR ihre selfie wird enthüllt. Dies ist ein Spiel für die ganze Welt , für jede Sprache , jeder Kultur und jeder Rasse , so dass die Selfie Brettspiel baut Brücken international . Die Spiel Hauptsitz in Philadelphia, USA basieren. Gehen Sie zu Kickstarter und die Suche nach der Selfie Brettspiel zu verpfänden / bestellen Sie Ihre Kopie oder , um das Spiel

Comunicato Stampa

Alle ore 10 EST USA il 6 gennaio 2016, il Selfie Gioco di società andrà in diretta su Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Lanciato da giocattolo Aussie e game designer Ken Howard , questa è la tua possibilità di prendere visione di questo nuovo ed entusiasmante gioco e il genere . Le persone saranno in grado di impegnarsi il supporto per il gioco , in cambio di ottenere prime e prime copie . L'oggetto del Selfie Gioco di società, è semplicemente , per descrivere l'aspetto di qualcuno solo dal suono della loro voce prima che i loro selfie è rivelato. Questo è un gioco per tutto il mondo , per ogni lingua , ogni cultura e ogni razza , in modo che il Selfie Board Game costruisce ponti a livello internazionale . La sede di gioco sarà basato a Filadelfia , Stati Uniti d'America . Vai a Kickstarter e cercare Il Selfie Board Game di pegno / ordinare la propria copia o per visualizzare in anteprima il

Communiqué de presse

À 10h HNE USA le 6 Janvier 2016, Le Jeu de société Selfie ira en direct sur Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Lancé par jouet Aussie et game designer Ken Howard , ceci est votre chance d'attraper la vision de ce nouveau jeu passionnant et le genre. Les gens vont être en mesure d' engager à soutenir le jeu , en échange de l'obtention premières et au début des copies . L'objet de la planche de jeu Selfie , est tout simplement , pour décrire l'apparence de quelqu'un seulement du son de leur voix avant leur selfie est révélé. Ceci est un jeu pour le monde entier , pour chaque langue , chaque culture et chaque course , de sorte que le plateau de jeu Selfie construit des ponts à l'échelle internationale . Le siège social de jeu sera basé à Philadelphie , USA . Aller à Kickstarter et de recherche pour Le Jeu de société Selfie à gage / commander votre copie ou de prévisualiser le jeu .

שעת 10 בבוקר EST ארה"ב ב -6 בינואר 2016,על הדיוקנים העצמיים לוח המשחק ילך בשידור חי ב Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) הושקה על ידי צעצוע אוסיומעצב משחק קן הווארד , זו ההזדמנות שלך כדי לתפוס את החזון של המשחק הזה מרגש החדשוז'אנר . אנשים יוכלו לשעבד תמיכה במשחק , בתמורה לקבלת עותקים הראשוניםומוקדמים . האובייקט שלהדיוקנים העצמיים לוח המשחק , הוא פשוט , כדי לתאר את ההופעה של מישהו רקמהקול שלהםלפני שהדיוקנים העצמיים שלהם מתגלים . זהו משחק לכל העולם ,לכל שפה , בכל תרבות ובכל גזע , כךשעל הדיוקנים העצמיים לוח המשחק בונה גשרים בינלאומיים . המטה המשחק יהיה מבוסס בפילדלפיה , ארה"ב . עבור לKickstarterולחפש אתהדיוקן העצמי לוח המשחק לשעבד / להזמין העותק שלך או לצפות בתצוגה מקדימה של המשחק .

في 10:00 EST الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية في يناير 6th عام 2016، فإن لعبة Selfie المجلس يذهب ويعيش على Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) التي أطلقتها لعبة الاسترالي و مصمم لعبة كين هوارد ، هذه هي فرصتك للقبض على رؤية هذه اللعبة الجديدة والمثيرة والنوع . والناس سوف تكون قادرة على التعهد بتقديم الدعم للعبة، في مقابل الحصول على نسخ الأولى و المبكرة. والهدف من اللعبة Selfie المجلس ، هو ببساطة ، لوصف مظهر شخص ما فقط من صوت صوتهم قبل كشف selfie بهم. هذه هي لعبة للعالم كله، و لكل لغة ، كل ثقافة وكل عرق ، بحيث لعبة Selfie مجلس يبني الجسور دوليا . سيتم بناء مقر لعبة في فيلادلفيا ، الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية . الذهاب إلى كيك ستارتر والبحث عن لعبة Selfie المجلس نتعهد / طلب نسختك أو لمعاينة اللعبة.

Press Release:

Sa 10:00 EST USA sa Enero 6, 2016 , Board Game Ang Selfie ay magiging live sa Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Inilunsad sa pamamagitan ng Aussie laruan at laro designer Ken Howard, ito ay ang iyong pagkakataon upang mahuli ang paningin ng kapana-panabik na bagong laro at genre. Ang mga tao ay maaaring makapag upang nangako ng suporta para sa mga laro, sa bumalik para sa pagkuha ng una at unang bahagi ng kopya. Ang object ng Board Game Ang Selfie , ay lamang, upang ilarawan ang hitsura ng isang tao JUST mula sa tunog ng kanilang mga boses BAGO kanilang selfie ay mahayag. Ito ay isang laro para sa buong mundo , para sa bawat wika, ang bawat kultura at sa bawat lahi, kaya na ang gagawa ng Board Game Ang Selfie tulay internationally. Ang punong-himpilan ng laro ay batay sa Philadelphia, USA. Pumunta sa Kickstarter at paghahanap para sa Board Game Ang Selfie upang isangla / order ang iyong kopya o para

Tisková zpráva:

V 10 hodin EST USA dne 6. ledna 2016 , bude Selfie Board Game jít žít na Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Zahájena Aussie hračky a herní designér Ken Howard , to je vaše šance chytit vizi této vzrušující nové hry a žánru. Lidé se budou moci přislíbit podporu pro hru , na oplátku pro získání první a časné kopie. Předmětem Selfie Board Game , je prostě , popsat něčí vzhled JUST od zvuku jejich hlasu před jejich selfie je odhaleno . To je hra pro celý svět , pro každý jazyk , každé kultuře a každém závodě , tak, aby se Selfie Board Game staví mosty v mezinárodním měřítku. Hra ústředí budou založeny ve Philadelphii , USA. Přejděte na Kickstarter a hledat Selfie Board Game do zástavy / objednejte si kopii , nebo zobrazit náhled hru.

Пресс-релиз:

В 10 утра EST США на 6 января 2016 г. Selfie Настольная игра пойдет в прямом эфире на Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Начатая австралийского игрушки и игровой дизайнер Кен Ховард , это ваш шанс , чтобы поймать видение этой захватывающей новой игры и жанра. Люди смогут закладывать поддержку для игры , в обмен на получение первого и ранние копии . Объект Selfie Настольная игра , это просто , чтобы описать чью-то внешность только от звука их голоса до их selfie раскрывается . Это игра для всего мира , для каждого языка , каждой культуре и каждой гонке , так что Selfie Настольная игра строит мосты на международном уровне. Игра штаб-квартира будет находиться в Филадельфии , США . Перейти к Kickstarter и поиск Selfie Настольная игра в залог / заказать копию или превью на игру .

Op 10:00 EST VSA op 6 Januarie 2016 , sal die Selfie Board Game gaan woon op www.Kickstarter.com . Van stapel gestuur deur Aussie speelgoed en spel ontwerper Ken Howard , is dit jou kans om die visie van hierdie opwindende nuwe spel en genre te vang. Mense sal in staat wees om ondersteuning belowe vir die spel, in ruil vir die kry van die eerste en vroeë kopieë. Die doel van die Selfie Board Game , is eenvoudig , om iemand se voorkoms te beskryf net uit die klank van hul stem voor hul selfie geopenbaar word. Dit is 'n spel vir die hele wêreld , vir elke taal, elke kultuur en elke ras, sodat die Selfie Board Game bou brûe internasionaal. Die spel hoofkwartier sal gebaseer word in Philadelphia , VSA. Gaan na Kickstarter en soek vir die Selfie Board Game pand / bestel jou kopie of om 'n voorbeeld van die spel.

Na na 10am Est USA on 6 January 2016, The selfie Board Game ga-aga -ebi ndụ na Kickstarter (https://goo.gl/bMnwkG) Agbam onya site Aussie ji egwuri egwu na egwuregwu mmebe Ken Howard , nke a bụ gị ohere enwetaghị ọhụụ nke a na-akpali akpali ọhụrụ egwuregwu na genre . Ndị mmadụ ga-enwe ike nkwa nkwado maka egwuregwu, na nloghachi n'ihi na mbụ na n'oge mbipụta. Ihe The selfie Board Game, bụ nanị, na-akọwa onye eketie naanị ụda nke olu-ha TUPU ha selfie na-ekpughe. Nke a bụ egwuregwu maka nke ụwa dum , nke ọ bụla asụsụ , ọ bụla omenala na agbụrụ nile , nke mere na The selfie Board Game ewuli àkwà mmiri mba. Egwuregwu n'isi ụlọ ọrụ ga-dabere na Philadelphia, USA. Gaa Kickstarter ma chọọ The selfie Board Game ka nkwa / ịtụ gị Detuo ma ọ bụ ka ịhụchalụ egwuregwu.


A U.S. Navy sailor arrested on a charge of raping a Japanese woman in Okinawa has admitted to the crime, investigative sources said Wednesday. They said he reversed an earlier denial.

Justin Castellanos, 24, who is based at the U.S. Marines’ Camp Schwab in northern Okinawa, was arrested on March 13 on suspicion of raping the woman in her 40s at a hotel in Naha early that morning.

Police allege Castellanos took the woman, a tourist from Fukuoka Prefecture, into his room after finding her asleep in a hotel corridor and raped her.

The suspect and the woman were both staying at the hotel but were not acquainted, the police said.

The alleged incident resulted in protests by thousands of people in Okinawa, which hosts the bulk of U.S. military facilities in Japan.


The US is playing catch up to Australia when it comes to regulating trans fatty acid, but that doesn't mean our food is trans-fat free, some of the country's peak nutritional experts say.

The Obama Administration on Tuesday ordered ordered food companies to phase out artificial trans fats over the next three years, calling them a threat to public health.

Trans fats are more likely to be found in processed foods including pastries, doughnuts and cakes at the cheaper end of the market. Credit:M. Spencer Green

Trans fats are a particularly nasty fat that increases LDL, or 'bad' cholesterol levels and decreases 'good' HDL cholesterol levels, increasing the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and diabetes.

Trans-fatty acids are created by treating vegetable oils with hydrogen, which causes the liquid oil to hold its solid form at room temperature, which helps food products like doughnuts, biscuits and cakes hold their shape and extends their shelf life.


Every student dreams of reading these words: "Congratulations on your acceptance!" But Elsik High School senior Amina Mabizari read them 15 times.

She applied to 16 universities, including eight Ivy League institutions.

"I didn't think I'd get accepted to any of them. By casting a wide net I thought someone would take the bait and take me," Mabizari said.

But when every letter had been opened this spring, seven of those Ivy League universities wanted her.

"I can't even put into words how big of a moment that was for me," Mabizari said.

The proud daughter of Algerian immigrants is about to graduate from Alief ISD. Mabizari's road to success wasn't an easy one. As a young student, she was last in her class in ready, even suffered with a speech impediment.

"To go from there to here being accepted to all these schools, it's incredible," Mabizari said.

Mabizari said she couldn't have done it without her parents.

"At that moment, I almost cried. It was just an unbelievable moment for me," said Mabizari's father, Bachir Mabizari.

And if you thought applying to 16 schools was tough, deciding which one to go to was even harder. But this fall, Amina Mabizari's heading to Yale.

"I never imagined any of this would happen," she said.

Amina Mabizari is as humble as they come. A proud, hard-working Muslim-American who now hopes her success story in Alief sends a loud message across the country.

"We represent a large community of people, the majority, the mass majority of which are positive and want to change the world," Amina Mabizari said.

This year, the Ivy League schools had an acceptance rate anywhere from 5 to 12 percent. Amina Mabizari plans to study political science and then go on to law school. She said she may also one day run for public office.


"Anybody not reading [Tim Carney] regularly doesn't understand what's truly going on in DC or in the GOP," tweeted Michael Needham, CEO of Heritage Action. Since Heritage Action is driving quite a bit of what goes on in the Republican Party these days that's a strong endorsement.

Carney, a columnist at the Washington Examiner and author of "The Big Ripoff" and "Obamanomics," is the foremost chronicler of the idea that Republicans should become a populist party at war with favor-seeking business interests in Washington. And he's argued that that's part of what's going on in this shutdown fight. We spoke on Thursday, and a lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows.

What's that pig thinking? (Flickr/CC)

Ezra Klein: You’ve been developing this theme that what’s happening in the Republican Party is a battle between the Tea Party and K Street, which is shorthand for business interests that work in Washington and often support the Republican Party. Expand on this a bit.

Tim Carney: I think, historically, K Street has been the most powerful pull in the Republican Party. It’s also powerful in the Democratic Party. But Republicans don’t have unions as a counterpull. K Street is really the only place for Republicans to go for funding. So if something came up where the free market position was different than the pro-business position Republicans would often side with business. This was the case with TARP and Medicare Part D and big spending in the Bush era.

Now there’s this ideological money coming into Heritage Action and the Senate Conservatives Fund and Club for Growth. They’re donating because of what they believe. And so now there are these elected Republicans who don’t care what K Street has to say about them. The business community says we need to end this government shutdown and stop flirting with the debt ceiling and a lot of Republicans can say they don’t care.

EK: But the money in the Tea Party isn’t exclusively small-donor. The Koch brothers, to use the most high-profile example, are key Tea Party donors and also sit atop a vast empire of business interests that depend, in various ways, on government decisions. So, how do you know you’re not just exchanging one set of business interests for another?

TC: Anytime money is coming from a few sources, it’s problematic. Ideally any movement in any party has a vast variety of sources and money because otherwise they’re afraid of upsetting their funders. If Republicans ended up in a position where they were completely dependent on Koch money that would be very bad for Republicans. Heritage Action gets Koch money. But if you look at Freedom Works, for instance, they’re definitely not getting Koch money. They were created as a splinter off the Koch world. Club for Growth gets a lot of rich conservative investors. They’re not Obama’s 20-year-old small donors, but they’re a different source of money. And I’ll say this: I think ideological money is better than money coming in to support the corporate bottom line.

EK: This is an interesting question. The business money is transactional. It wants a change in law, a tax break, a regulation. But business also has a general interest in stability, in growth. The ideological money is also transactional. It wants something, too. But it often has an interest in conflict, in extreme tactics. The people who donate it are not representative of the average voter. They want something much different than the average voter. So, how do you decide which is better?

TC: I don’t agree. I think ideological money is more likely to be more representative than business money. Business money will have certain things in common. It’s coming from businesses big enough to hire lobbyists, as opposed to just people interested enough to give money. Now, for individuals, it’s so much easier to give money. The Senate Conservatives Fund was just a Web site when it started.

EK: Let me rephrase that. Put aside who’s more representative. What the ideological money wants is very different than what most voters want. Over the period of time that you kind of identify as seeing the rise of this money, Congress in general -- and Republicans in Congress, in particular -- have become less popular than at any time in history. So whatever that money is buying doesn’t represent what most people want.

TC: I do think it’s possible that the rise of the Tea Party groups and similar groups on the left can lead to a lot of instability because the more ideological you are the less open you are to compromise. Democrats handled that by [Rep.] Nancy Pelosi saying she’d work to end the Iraq War, and then she really didn’t. The pragmatists won in the end there.

I think that a lot of the way [Sen.] Ted Cruz and the Tea Party groups have handled the current shutdown fight has been bad politics; they’ve at times mistaken tactics for principles. Cruz has burned bridges he didn’t need to burn. There hasn’t been enough experience among the people planning tactics. So the question I’m curious about is: Can you use this inside-outside game where the Beltway groups sends messages to the grass-roots and the grass-roots applies pressure to lawmakers -- can you use that in a way that’s less combative and more prudent than the groups have been using it in the last months?

EK: You’ve noted that this was a shutdown that began with Tea Party arguments over Obamacare but that the Republican Party’s leaders are now trying to end with more traditional concessions, like repeal of the medical-device tax or budget negotiations. Expand on that a bit.

TC: That’s the standard Republican playbook. Something happens. Conservatives get excited. And K Street walks out with the victory. Now Heritage Action is onto that. They’re saying [that] if all we get out of this is medical device tax repeal then how detached is the Republican Party from the base? I think the medical device tax is bad policy but just doing that would really sow dissatisfaction in the Republican base.

EK: But isn’t a lot of this that these Tea Party groups and politicians basically told the base something that was false? I mean, I’ve been spending a lot of time in conservative Twitter and on Red State and it’s just this weird, bizarro-world march of shutdown triumphs, where the shutdown is going great, Democrats are terrified, Republicans are ascendant. I don’t know if they buy it or if it’s cynical, but they’re setting their people up for fights they can’t win.

TC: When I’m in a hopeful mood, I see this as a pendulum swinging from one extreme to another and coming towards the middle. The old extreme was the Bush way of doing things. Republican leaders told the base they were doing something conservative, and then they’d do something like prescription drugs and sell it to the base as a tactical move to get reelected. That was basically a lie the Republican leadership told the base.

So now, if you try to tell involved conservatives that this is just a difference in tactics, even if you’re right, people are skeptical. [Sens.] Tom Coburn and Mike Lee don’t have seriously different principles; they disagree on tactics. But the Republican base has been burned too may times to believe it even when it’s true. I’m hoping things can swing back to the middle and the methods of guys like Cruz and Mike Needham can move in more tactically intelligent ways then they’re being used right now.

EK: When I came to Washington in the mid-2000s the conventional wisdom was that Republicans had this follow-the-leader approach to politics and Democrats, in the old Will Rogers line, weren’t even an organized party. Now it seems to have flipped. Democrats are comfortable following their leaders, and Republicans seem not just disorganized, but actively suspicious of anything their leaders come up with. It seems sometimes that the way the Tea Party shows it hasn’t sold out is to almost reflexively oppose what [House Majority Leader John] Boehner comes up with.

TC: I think a lot of the base, having gone through the Bush era, has come out with an innate distrust of the establishment. One of the symptoms of this was Christine O’Donnell winning the Republican Party primary in Delaware in 2010. She wasn’t particularly conservative. But she could rail against the establishment. When you saw Herman Cain and Michelle Bachmann and these people rise up, it wasn’t about ideology. It was about being anti-establishment.

The Republican Party needs to abandon some of these identity politics. So I hope guys like Cruz who can really talk to the base can build up a sense of both what the goals are ... and of here’s what’s possible, and move away from the knee-jerk, anti-establishment instincts in the base right now.

EK: So, what do you think their endgame is here?

TC: I think the goal has always been to try and win the shutdown in one way or another. That’s not happening now. The question is can something change so Republicans start winning the shutdown? When you see Boehner talk about punting on the debt limit, remember, he previously wanted to fight on the debt limit. That reflects conservatives believing that maybe if the shutdown keeps going we can win. How that happens is not clear to me. But the necessary condition is that the shutdown somehow needs to be hurting Obama more than it’s hurting Republicans. The reason I’m skeptical of that is Republicans will never get the kind of fair or positive media treatment they’d need for that to be the case.

EK: So, Republicans are trying to split the debt ceiling and the shutdown, as you say. But what comes out of that, exactly? Democrats aren’t going to defund Obamacare.

TC: I think it’s possible then that you see something like an actual strategy or potential path towards victory coming out of this. If it’s not going to be Obamacare, I hope the Republican ask will be something like eliminating a corporate welfare subsidy Obama likes -- something like the sugar subsidy or the subsidies for Boeing. That would show a very new side of the Republican Party, it would weaken Democrats, and it would give something conservatives could bring home to their base.


TORONTO — Social media posts encouraging people to visit southern Ontario's wineries by bicycle has prompted a regional public transit service to apologize for the "misunderstanding."

In May 10 Facebook and Twitter postings, GO Transit said "Niagara's wineries are best enjoyed responsibly and on two wheels."

The posting encouraged people to take their bicycle on the GO for "a cycling weekend adventure in Ontario's wine country" in a promotion for its seasonal service to Niagara Region.

That prompted numerous replies on social media that suggested Go Transit was endorsing mixing cycling and drinking.

One poster said she "wouldn't encourage biking while under the influence of alcohol. That's an accident waiting to happen."

GO responded on Wednesday with a Facebook post saying it's sorry if the message suggested anything but responsible enjoyment, adding it does not "encourage biking when intoxicated or impaired."

"Unfortunately some thought this post was intended to encourage biking and drinking. That was not our intention at all; quite the opposite," Anne Marie Aikins, a spokesperson for GO Transit parent organization Metrolinx, said in an email.

"We apologize if the post on Facebook caused any misunderstanding. We should have clarified it sooner," Aikins said.

There are many interesting things to see and do on winery bike tours, but Metrolinx's position is that customers who wish to drink should plan ahead and take one of the winery buses, she said.


Three days after Ambassador Chris Stevens was assassinated, Jay Carney told the White House press corps it had been the work of a flash mob inflamed by an insulting video about the Prophet Muhammad.

As the killers had arrived with rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons, this story seemed noncredible on its face.

Yet two days later, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice doubled down.

Appearing on five Sunday talk shows, she called the massacre the result of a “spontaneous” riot that was neither “preplanned” nor “premeditated.”

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Carney and Rice deceived us. But were they deceived?

It is impossible to believe that Carney would characterize the Benghazi, Libya, massacre as the result of a protest that careened out of control unless he had been told to do so by the national security adviser, the White House chief of staff or President Barack Obama himself.

Who told Carney to say what he did? Who arranged for Rice to appear on five shows to push this line?

Throwing a rope to Rice and Carney, the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, said last week that only recently had his team concluded that Benghazi was the work of terrorists.

Yet intelligence insiders were leaking to the press the day after Stevens was murdered that it was terrorism.

Now that the cover story–that the murder of Stevens and the other Americans was the result of a spontaneous outburst the Obama administration could not have foreseen or prevented–has collapsed, the truth is tumbling out.

And the truth is more alarming. For it calls into question the credibility and competence of Obama’s security team and the judgment of the president himself.

What do we now know?

Stevens believed he was on an al-Qaida hit list and so wrote in his diary. He was concerned about a rise in Islamic extremism in the city. “Days before the ambassador arrived from the embassy in Tripoli,” The Washington Post reported Sunday, “Westerners had fled the city, and the British had closed their consulate.”

Rice insisted that the act of barbarism arose out of a protest, but there may not even have been a protest, just a military assault with RPGs, machine guns and mortars that hit a safe house a mile from the consulate, killing two former Navy SEALs, while other U.S. agents fled to the airport.

So dangerous is Benghazi, The New York Times reported Friday, FBI agents investigating the ambassador’s assassination have yet to venture into the city.

Was U.S. intelligence oblivious to how dangerous Benghazi was when Stevens went in? Was not Benghazi’s reputation as a haven for Islamic jihadi known to us all before we “liberated” Libya?

This is the city U.S. air power saved when Moammar Gadhafi’s forces were closing in. It now appears to be an al-Qaidaville where U.S. diplomats and agents dare not tread.

Late last week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton conceded that the Benghazi murders were acts of terror perpetrated by extremists associated with al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb. She alluded to Mali, where an al-Qaida affiliate, the Ansar Dine, has taken over half the country.

How grave is that threat?

On Thursday, The Associated Press reported that Gen. Carter Ham, head of the U.S. Africa command, met with Mauretania’s president to discuss “a possible military intervention … in north Mali against al-Qaida-linked group members and their allies.”

Yet Vice President Joe Biden still campaigns through the Rust Belt bellowing, “General Motors is alive, and Osama bin Laden is dead,” and Obama still recites his mantra, “al-Qaida is on the path to defeat.”

The reality. Al-Qaida affiliates have taken over a region of Mali the size of France. Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb may have been in on the Benghazi massacre. Al-Qaida is in Syria fighting for a cause, the overthrow of Bashar Assad, Obama supports. Al-Qaida has helped reignite sectarian war in Iraq. Al-Qaida remains in Pakistan. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula is in Yemen.

We failed to cut out or kill the cancer at Tora Bora in 2001, and it has since metastasized and spread across North Africa, the Middle East and South Asia.

As for the Arab Spring Obama embraced, that has given us the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo and jihadi in Sinai. Our departure from Iraq paved the way to a new sectarian war. The surge troops are out of Afghanistan, and the remaining U.S. troops no longer partner with the Afghan soldiers who are to take over the war.

Any doubt about the outcome there when we’re gone?

Within the past month, anti-American riots, flag burnings and the raising of Islamist banners atop U.S. embassy facilities have occurred in too many countries and capitals to recite.

If this is the fruit of a successful engagement with the Islamic world, what would a debacle look like? Rep. Paul Ryan said Sunday, “The Obama foreign policy is unraveling literally before our eyes on our TV screens.”

Is he wrong?

Patrick J. Buchanan is a founding editor of TAC and the author of “Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025?” Copyright 2012 Creators.com.


Signup to receive a daily roundup of the top LGBT+ news stories from around the world

A US study suggests that LGBT people are more concerned about the environment than their straight counterparts.

According to a poll by Harris, 55 per cent of LGBT adults say they “personally care a great deal about the current state and future of the environment,” compared with 33 per cent of heterosexuals,.

Furthermore, the survey found that 40 per cent of LGBT adults say they “encourage others to be more environmentally friendly”, compared with 24 per cent of straight people.

In other results, it was found that LGBT people were more likely in 2010 to say they were “environmentally conscious” than the year before. The opposite was seen in straight respondents.

Forty-seven per cent of LGBT adults described themselves as “environmentally conscious” in the 2010 survey, up from 38 per cent in the 2009 one. Twenty-eight per cent of straight people described themselves as such in 2010, down from 30 per cent in 2009.

The poll surveyed 2,352 adults in December, 347 of whom described themselves as LGBT.


For the similarly-named personality trait distinct from the disorder, see Sensory processing sensitivity

Sensory processing disorder Synonyms Sensory integration dysfunction Specialty Psychiatry

Sensory processing disorder (SPD; also known as sensory integration dysfunction) is a condition where multisensory integration is not adequately processed in order to provide appropriate responses to the demands of the environment.

Sensory integration was defined by occupational therapist Anna Jean Ayres in 1972 as "the neurological process that organizes sensation from one's own body and from the environment and makes it possible to use the body effectively within the environment".[1][2] Sensory processing disorder has been characterized as the source of significant problems in organizing sensation coming from the body and the environment and is manifested by difficulties in the performance in one or more of the main areas of life: productivity, leisure and play[3] or activities of daily living.[4]

Sources debate whether SPD is an independent disorder or represents the observed symptoms of various other, more well-established, disorders.[5][6][7][8] SPD is not recognized by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association[9][10], and the American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended that pediatricians not use SPD as a diagnosis.[9]

Signs and symptoms [ edit ]

Symptoms may vary according to the disorder's type and subtype present. SPD can affect one sense or multiple senses. While many people can present one or two symptoms, sensory processing disorder has to have a clear functional impact on the person's life:

Signs of over-responsivity,[11] including, for example, dislike of textures such as those found in fabrics, foods, grooming products or other materials found in daily living, to which most people would not react, and serious discomfort, sickness or threat induced by normal sounds, lights, movements, smells, tastes, or even inner sensations such as heartbeat.

Signs of under-responsivity, including sluggishness and lack of responsiveness; and Sensory cravings,[12] including, for example, fidgeting, impulsiveness, and/or seeking or making loud, disturbing noises; Sensorimotor-based problems, including slow and uncoordinated movements or poor handwriting.

Sensory discrimination problems, that might manifest themselves in behaviors such as things constantly dropped.

Critics have noted that what proponents claim are symptoms of SPD are both broad and, in some cases, represent very common, and not necessarily abnormal or atypical, childhood characteristics. The checklist of symptoms on the website of the SPD Foundation, for example, includes such warning signs as "My infant/toddler has problems eating," "My child has difficulty being toilet trained," "My child is in constant motion," and "My child gets in everyone else's space and/or touches everything around him." -- "symptoms" which read much like the day-to-day complaints of an average parent.[13]

Relationship to other disorders [ edit ]

Sensory processing issues represent a feature of a number of disorders, including anxiety problems, ADHD,[14] food intolerances, behavioral disorders, and particularly, autism spectrum disorders.[15][16][17][18][19][20][21] This pattern of comorbidities poses a significant challenge to those who claim that SPD is a identifiably specific disorder, rather than simply a term given to a set of symptoms common to other disorders.[22] Dr. Catherine Lord, a leading autism expert and the director of the Center for Autism and the Developing Brain at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, argues that sensory issues are an important concern, but not a diagnosis in themselves. "I do think there's a value in attending to how a child is perceiving sensations, thinking about whether he could be uncomfortable. Where I get concerned is labeling that as a separate disorder."[23]

Two studies have provided preliminary evidence suggesting that there may be measurable neurological differences between children diagnosed with SPD and control children classified as neurotypical[24] or children diagnosed with autism.[25] Despite this evidence, the fact that SPD researchers have yet to agree on a proven, standardized diagnostic tool undermines researchers' ability to define the boundaries of the disease and makes correlational studies, like the ones about structural brain abnormalities, less convincing.[13]

Causes [ edit ]

The exact cause of SPD is not known.[26] However, it is known that the mid-brain and brain stem regions of the central nervous system are early centers in the processing pathway for multisensory integration; these brain regions are involved in processes including coordination, attention, arousal, and autonomic function.[27] After sensory information passes through these centers, it is then routed to brain regions responsible for emotions, memory, and higher level cognitive functions. Damage in any part of the brain involved in multisensory processing can cause difficulties in adequately processing stimuli in a functional way. Sensory processing is viewed as a spectrum and how individuals process stimuli varies from person to person. Individuals with SPD tend to fall on the extreme ends of the sensory spectrum[28], either hyposensitive or hypersensitive.

Research [ edit ]

Current research in sensory processing is focused on finding the genetic and neurological causes of SPD. EEG[29] and measuring event-related potential (ERP) are traditionally used to explore the causes behind the behaviors observed in SPD. Some of the proposed underlying causes by current research are: EEG recording

Differences in tactile and auditory over responsivity show moderate genetic influences, with tactile over responsivity demonstrating greater heritability. Bivariate genetic analysis suggested different genetic factors for individual differences in auditory and tactile SOR. [30]

People with Sensory Processing Deficits have less sensory gating (electrophysiology) than typical subjects. [31] [32]

People with sensory over-responsivity might have increased D2 receptor in the striatum, related to aversion to tactile stimuli and reduced habituation. In animal models, prenatal stress significantly increased tactile avoidance. [33]

Studies using event-related potentials (ERPs) in children with the sensory over responsivity subtype found atypical neural integration of sensory input. Different neural generators could be activated at an earlier stage of sensory information processing in people with SOR than in typically developing individuals. The automatic association of causally related sensory inputs that occurs at this early sensory-perceptual stage may not function properly in children with SOR. One hypothesis is that multisensory stimulation may activate a higher-level system in frontal cortex that involves attention and cognitive processing, rather than the automatic integration of multisensory stimuli observed in typically developing adults in auditory cortex. [34]

Recent research found an abnormal white matter microstructure in children with SPD, compared with typical children and those with other developmental disorders such as autism and ADHD.[35][36]

Diagnosis [ edit ]

Although sensory processing disorder is accepted in the Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders of Infancy and Early Childhood (DC:0-3R), it is not recognized as a mental disorder in medical manuals such as the ICD-10[37] or the DSM-5.[38]

Diagnosis is primarily arrived at by the use of standardized tests, standardized questionnaires, expert observational scales, and free play observation at an occupational therapy gym. Observation of functional activities might be carried at school and home as well.

Depending on the country, diagnosis is made by different professionals, such as occupational therapists, psychologists, learning specialists, physiotherapists and/or speech and language therapists.[39] In some countries it is recommended to have a full psychological and neurological evaluation if symptoms are too severe.

Standardized tests

Sensory Integration and Praxis Test (SIPT)

DeGangi-Berk Test of Sensory Integration (TSI)

Test of Sensory Functions in Infants (TSFI)[40]

Standardized questionnaires

Sensory Profile, (SP) [41]

Infant/Toddler Sensory Profile [40]

Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile

Sensory Profile School Companion

Indicators of Developmental Risk Signals (INDIPCD-R) [42]

Sensory Processing Measure (SPM) [43]

Sensory Processing Measure Preeschool (SPM-P)[44]

Other tests

The large number of different forms and tools of assessment listed here reflects what critics have argued is a fundamental problem with the diagnosis process: SPD researchers have yet to agree on a proven, standardized diagnostic tool, a problem that undermines the ability of researchers to define the boundaries of the disorder.[13][23]

Classification [ edit ]

Sensory processing disorders have been classified by proponents into three categories: sensory modulation disorder, sensory-based motor disorders and sensory discrimination disorders [50] (as defined in the Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders in Infancy and Early Childhood).[51][52]

Sensory modulation disorder (SMD) Sensory modulation refers to a complex central nervous system process[50][53] by which neural messages that convey information about the intensity, frequency, duration, complexity, and novelty of sensory stimuli are adjusted.[54]

SMD consists of three subtypes:

Sensory over-responsivity. Sensory under-responsivity Sensory craving/seeking.

Sensory-based motor disorder (SBMD) According to proponents, sensory-based motor disorder shows motor output that is disorganized as a result of incorrect processing of sensory information affecting postural control challenges, resulting in postural disorder, or developmental coordination disorder.[50][55]

The SBMD subtypes are:

Dyspraxia Postural disorder

Sensory discrimination disorder (SDD)

Sensory discrimination disorder involves the incorrect processing of sensory information.[50] The SDD subtypes are:[56]

1. Visual 2. Auditory 3. Tactile 4. Gustatory (taste) 5. Olfactory (smell) 6. Vestibular (balance) 7. Proprioceptive (feeling of where parts of the body are located in space)

Treatment [ edit ]

Sensory integration therapy [ edit ]

Vestibular system is stimulated through hanging equipment such as tire swings

The main form of sensory integration therapy is a type of occupational therapy that places a child in a room specifically designed to stimulate and challenge all of the senses.[57]

During the session, the therapist works closely with the child to provide a level of sensory stimulation that the child can cope with, and encourage movement within the room. Sensory integration therapy is driven by four main principles:

Just right challenge (the child must be able to successfully meet the challenges that are presented through playful activities)

Adaptive response (the child adapts his behavior with new and useful strategies in response to the challenges presented)

Active engagement (the child will want to participate because the activities are fun)

Child directed (the child's preferences are used to initiate therapeutic experiences within the session)

Sensory processing therapy [ edit ]

This therapy retains all of the above-mentioned four principles and adds:[58]

Intensity (person attends therapy daily for a prolonged period of time)

Developmental approach (therapist adapts to the developmental age of the person, against actual age)

Test-retest systematic evaluation (all clients are evaluated before and after)

Process driven vs. activity driven (therapist focuses on the "Just right" emotional connection and the process that reinforces the relationship)

Parent education (parent education sessions are scheduled into the therapy process)

"joie de vivre" (happiness of life is therapy's main goal, attained through social participation, self-regulation, and self-esteem)

Combination of best practice interventions (is often accompanied by integrated listening system therapy, floor time, and electronic media such as Xbox Kinect, Nintendo Wii, Makoto II machine training and others)

The treatments themselves may involve a variety of activities and interventions (for example, prism lenses). Children with hypo-reactivity may be exposed to strong sensations such as stroking with a brush, vibrations or rubbing. Play may involve a range of materials to stimulate the senses such as play dough or finger painting. Children with hyper-reactivity, on the other hand, may be exposed to peaceful activities including quiet music and gentle rocking in a softly lit room. Treats and rewards may be used to encourage children to tolerate activities they would normally avoid. While occupational therapists using a sensory integration frame of reference work on increasing a child's ability to adequately process sensory input, other OTs may focus on environmental accommodations that parents and school staff can use to enhance the child's function at home, school, and in the community.[59][60] These may include selecting soft, tag-free clothing, avoiding fluorescent lighting, and providing ear plugs for "emergency" use (such as for fire drills).

Evaluation of treatment effectiveness [ edit ]

Some of these treatments (for example, sensorimotor handling) have a questionable rationale and no empirical evidence. Other treatments (for example, prism lenses, physical exercise, and auditory integration training) have had studies with small positive outcomes, but few conclusions can be made about them due to methodological problems with the studies.[61] [62] [63] In its overall review of the treatment effectiveness literature, AETNA concluded that "The effectiveness of these therapies is unproven.",[64] while the American Academy of Pediatrics concluded that "parents should be informed that the amount of research regarding the effectiveness of sensory integration therapy is limited and inconclusive."[65] A 2015 review concluded that SIT techniques exist "outside the bounds of established evidence-based practice" and that SIT is "quite possibly a misuse of limited resources."[66]

Epidemiology [ edit ]

It has been estimated by proponents that up to 16.5% of elementary school aged children present elevated SOR behaviors in the tactile or auditory modalities.[67] This figure is larger than what previous studies with smaller samples had shown: an estimate of 5–13% of elementary school aged children.[68] Critics have noted that such a high incidence for just one of the subtypes of SPD raises questions about the degree to which SPD is a specific and clearly identifiable disorder.[13]

Proponents have also claimed that adults may also show signs of sensory processing difficulties and would benefit for sensory processing therapies,[69] although this work has yet to distinguish between those with SPD symptoms alone vs adults whose processing abnormalities are associated with other disorders, such as Autism Spectrum Disorder.[70]

Controversy [ edit ]

There are concerns regarding the validity of the diagnosis. SPD is not included in the DSM-5 or ICD-10, the most widely used diagnostic sources in healthcare. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) states that there is no universally accepted framework for diagnosis and recommends caution against using any "sensory" type therapies unless as a part of a comprehensive treatment plan. In fact, in a 2012 statement, the AAP states that "Because there is no universally accepted framework for diagnosis, sensory processing disorder generally should not be diagnosed." When an occupational therapist does recommend sensory integration therapy, the AAP instructs that the therapist is aware that, "parents should be informed that the amount of research regarding the effectiveness of sensory integration therapy is limited and inconclusive." As such, most health insurance considers sensory integration therapy to be "investigational" and will not cover it. In the United States and UK, sensory processing disorder is not likely to qualify an individual for disability benefits, so the supporters of sensory processing disorder recommend having a child diagnosed for a related disorder that will qualify them for disability insurance. As was noted above, a 2015 review of research on Sensory Integration Therapy (SIT) concluded that SIT is "ineffective and that its theoretical underpinnings and assessment practices are unvalidated", that SIT techniques exist "outside the bounds of established evidence-based practice", and that SIT is "quite possibly a misuse of limited resources".[66]

Manuals [ edit ]

SPD is in Stanley Greenspan's Diagnostic Manual for Infancy and Early Childhood and as Regulation Disorders of Sensory Processing part of The Zero to Three's Diagnostic Classification. but is not recognized in the manuals ICD-10 or in the recently updated DSM-5. However, unusual reactivity to sensory input or unusual interest in sensory aspects is included as a possible but not necessary criterion for the diagnosis of autism.

Misdiagnosis [ edit ]

Some state that sensory processing disorder is a distinct diagnosis, while others argue that differences in sensory responsiveness are features of other diagnoses and it is not a standalone diagnosis. The neuroscientist David Eagleman has proposed that SPD may be a form of synesthesia, a perceptual condition in which the senses are blended.Specifically, Eagleman suggests that instead of a sensory input "connecting to [a person's] color area [in the brain], it's connecting to an area involving pain or aversion or nausea".

Researchers have described a treatable inherited sensory overstimulation disorder that meets diagnostic criteria for both attention deficit disorder and sensory integration dysfunction.

Society [ edit ]

The American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) supports the use of a variety of methods of sensory integration for those with sensory processing disorder. The organization has supported the need for further research to increase insurance coverage for related therapies. They have also made efforts to educate the public about sensory integration therapy. The AOTA's practice guidelines currently support the use of sensory integration therapy and interprofessional education and collaboration in order to optimize treatment for those with sensory processing disorder. The AOTA provides several resources pertaining to sensory integration therapy, some of which includes a fact sheet, new research, and continuing education opportunities.[71]

History [ edit ]

Sensory processing disorder as a specific form of atypical functioning was first described by occupational therapist Anna Jean Ayres (1920–1989).[72]

Original model

Ayres's theoretical framework for what she called Sensory Integration Dysfunction was developed after six factor analytic studies of populations of children with learning disabilities, perceptual motor disabilities and normal developing children.[73] Ayres created the following nosology based on the patterns that appeared on her factor analysis:

Dyspraxia: poor motor planning (more related to the vestibular system and proprioception)

Poor bilateral integration: inadequate use of both sides of the body simultaneously

Tactile defensiveness: negative reaction to tactile stimuli

Visual perceptual deficits: poor form and space perception and visual motor functions

Somatodyspraxia: poor motor planning (related to poor information coming from the tactile and proprioceptive systems)

Auditory-language problems

Both visual perceptual and auditory language deficits were thought to possess a strong cognitive component and a weak relationship to underlying sensory processing deficits, so they are not considered central deficits in many models of sensory processing.

In 1998, Mulligan found a similar pattern of deficits in a confirmatory factor analytic study.[74][75]

Quadrant model

Dunn's nosology uses two criteria:[76] response type (passive vs active) and sensory threshold to the stimuli (low or high) creating 4 subtypes or quadrants:[77]

High neurological thresholds

Low registration: high threshold with passive response. Individuals who do not pick up on sensations and therefore partake in passive behavior.[78] Sensation seeking: high threshold and active response. Those who actively seek out a rich sensory filled environment.[78]

Low neurological threshold

Sensitivity to stimuli: low threshold with passive response. Individuals who become distracted and uncomfortable when exposed to sensation but do not actively limit or avoid exposure to the sensation.[78] Sensation avoiding: low threshold and active response. Individuals actively limit their exposure to sensations and are therefore high self regulators.[78]

Sensory processing model

In Miller's nosology "sensory integration dysfunction" was renamed into "Sensory processing disorder" to facilitate coordinated research work with other fields such as neurology since "the use of the term sensory integration often applies to a neurophysiologic cellular process rather than a behavioral response to sensory input as connoted by Ayres."[50]

See also [ edit ]

References [ edit ]