Today in Wilco Tango Bloody Foxtrot?!

If signed into law, Arizona’s House Bill 2263¹ will make a pregnant minor “prove by clear and convincing evidence that she is mature enough to get an abortion without her parents’ consent.”

If they are so skeptical of the maturity of the girl, then why the hell do they THINK SHE CAN RAISE A CHILD?

The mind reels.

Technorati Tags: abortion rights, political asshattery

1. Thanks to Sassywho for the link. [↩]

Yes, and not just About exercise.

Several months ago, I mentioned in a Buff Blog post how annoyed I get by magazines with articles like “Get a body like this in 4 weeks!” along side Photoshopped images of 10%-body-fat, surgically-enhanced professional fitness competitors.

“Do they think we’re stupid or what?” I ranted asked.

I stopped buying the mags and subscribed instead to a few About.com topics that promised to deliver by email the latest info and news on stuff like women’s health, nutrition, allergies, and gardening.

It’s deja vu all over again.

Consider the cutting-edge content of articles such as this one in today’s email from About.com Nutrition:

Why You Need To Eat
Your body and your brain tells you when you are hungry, but do you know why you need to eat? The foods you eat provide energy for daily activities, structural building blocks and the vitamins and minerals help keep all of your biochemical processes working. Here is an introduction to why your body needs good nutrition.

I’m going out on limb, but I’ll bet everyone out of infancy, let alone people who are seeking out news about nutrition, knows that eating food is rather important. And being the weight-obsessed culture that we are, the 80-bazillion TV shows and articles about health have made even the most uninterested of us aware of the value of “good” nutrition.

Yet somebody at About.com felt the world needed an article based on the nutrition chapter of their 6th grade biology book (”Calcium is best known as the mineral that is stored in your bones” and vitamins are the body’s “little helpers.”).

The articles I’ve seen for other About.com topics are rarely any better (did you know that there are medications, called antihistamines, to treat the symptoms of allergies?! Somebody call CNN!).

Granted, About.com is not exactly The New York Times… but it is an NYT Company, and it brags about being a top distributor of expert information.

Is this non-news really the kind of content the general public wants? Is the bar really that low, or does the media just really not want to work that hard?

And while we’re on the subject of work, are these writers paid for this stuff? I sure hope so. Because I can think of TONS of great topics upon which I can effortlessly expound:

The Primary Function of Deoderant. Why Your Houseplant Needs Water. What To Put In Your Car’s Gas Tank…

Where do I send my resume? On second thought, I’d rather work here.

Technorati Tags: fitness, health, nutrition, non-news