When Ignorance Outweighs Religious Tolerance: The Swastika in America
27 September 2007I was recently trying to recruit people for a club that I had formed called the Vedic Religion Club. Having not received the right preparation until the night before, my friend and I needed to stayed up that same night making signs to post on the club day. We had one sign which had the khanda (Sikhism), one with the dharma chakra (Buddhism), one with Om (Hinduism) and one with a Jain symbol, as well as having other signs. The Jain symbol contained a version of the swastika and a symbol of nonviolence. It was very similar in construction to the image displayed below (also containing the symbol’s meaning, although I do disagree with the use of the word Hell to describe incarnation is a much lesser form).
Within minutes of posting the sign, a supervisor approached us telling us that we had to remove the sign. I had tried explaining that the swastika is a holy symbol in most Vedic religions, especially in Jainism, and that I was more than willing to duct tape over the symbol as a compromise. The supervisor instead informed me that the sign was to be removed and our names were to be taken down in case a formal complaint was filed. I had also been walking with the Jain Dharma flag (which contains a similar swastika), which too had to be removed. Even these decision didn’t annoy me. However, after telling us this, he continued to take down our sign that had the symbol for Om on it. When I tried to inform him that Om was in no way even resembling a hateful symbol, he would not give us back our poster. At this point, I told my club’s officers that we had to run and reclaim our signs before the supervisor did. One of the signs that I reclaimed had a picture of Ganesha with symbolisms written on it. After finding us with our signs again, the same supervisor told us not to post any signs. At this point, I had to run to a History teacher and have him explain that neither Ganesha nor Om were hateful symbols. After this, we were allowed to post signs but the sign containing Om was still not released!
I’m not bothered by the fact that the sign containing the Jain symbol was removed. I live in a country where the display of swastikas is frowned upon due to the Nazi bastardization used during WWII. However, I’m really bothered by the fact that ignorance, even among the well-educated, has come to such a level that the swastika, which is a holy symbol to many religions and has even been used secularly in architectural design, has become a severe object of taboo. We live in a country which was founded on the concept of unalienable rights, two of which are the freedom of speech (albeit non-dangerous and not infringing on the rights of others) and the freedom of religion. If, a whole 62 years after the end of WWII, we still can’t recognize that the swastika is not in its true form a racist symbol, then we need to realize that through our ignorance we have set ourselves back over 60 years.
When I try to represent my religion, I shouldn’t need to be a slave to the ignorance of others. Just because someone doesn’t know that a symbol, clearly different than the Nazi use of the swastika, is not a Nazi symbol, my signs were removed all together. This is really shocking, especially due to the fact that the word “RELIGION” was displayed in a sentence right below. How can people really be this ignorant?! We live in a society which is too fast to claim the taboos of other cultures to be unfounded, superstition and “outdated” yet we think that any person displaying a swastika is a Nazi, anyone wearing a turban is a terrorist and that any person who makes the slightest error in their dress code is sloppy and incompetent. Where do we get off as a people? Don’t get me wrong, I love America and think that we live in a good country with mostly good peopl; I just think that we have a very ignorant view of other cultures which needs to change.
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Tagged in: General, Religion
AIDS Prevention Used as a False Cover to Spread Racism on NYC Subways
25 March 2007| Stickers have been slowly popping up in New York City subways with a very racist message pretending to be conveyed by a good cause. These stickers go under the guise of trying to prevent the spread of AIDS, however its racist message stands out from a mile. When you read the sticker, it tells you to not have sex with intravenous drug users, bisexuals or blacks. While intravenous drug users are very likely to contract AIDS, bisexuals with safe practices are very unlikely to spread AIDS! Even worse, the sticker says to not have sex with Blacks. The second I read that line, I knew that there was something seriously wrong. The sticker even goes as far as to claim that there are fourteen times as many AIDS infected African-American people as there are AIDS infected white people. This is simply incorrect. According to data from the CDC (Source), there are only about 3 percent more African-Americans infected with AIDS as there are white people infected. Wherever they got the statistic of ~1400% is beyond me. |  |
Before getting off the train, I quickly scribbled down their website. I knew that there was something wrong with this picture. I knew that I had heard the name National Alliance before. Without surprise, after visiting their site, it was clear that this was the work of a white supremacist group. The sickest part is that the sticker welcomes people to send just six dollars to receive a hundred of these racist stickers.
PS: If anyone wants to complain to them directly, they have a phone number and address listed on the sticker, which is viewable by clicking on the smaller version of the image.
For those who need student loans then before you become a college student you may want to do your homework and read up on college loans that you might be able to use, including if you can get NY student loans to help out.
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Tagged in: General, Politics, NYC
China Piracy Alert: Windows AIO DVD (with included software) being peddled for ~$10
5 March 2007
According to the auction, the DVD contains Windows 98, 2000 Pro, 2000 Server, 2000 Advanced Server, XP Pro (SP1 AND SP2), Server 2003 Standard and Server 2003 Enterprise as well as MSDN documentation and various other software packages ranging from Alcohol120 to Symantec AntiVirus to Office 2000. Let me remind you, this disk is selling for about $10! Even more stunning, other disks only containing the OSes listed above but not the extra software go for about $1.25! Is China really cracking down on piracy like they promised to?
Original Page (with bundled software)
Original Page (without bundled software)
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Tagged in: General, Tech, Funny
I’m an Evil Republican…
24 February 2007…according to some liberals that I know.
I went on Google Talk today to see the status of my friend as:
Bill Clinton managed to serve two terms without botching the prosecution of two wars, manipulating intelligence, engaging in a systematic program of torture, or mishandling the federal response to flooding of a major American city. Obviously, he is the devil incarnate.
I quickly responded:
Bill Clinton also managed to disgrace the highest held office in the US by having extramarital affairs, set up North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, get prosecuted in American courts for perjury and obstruction of justice, get caught in a real estate scandal in criminal court, get caught up in an illegal funding scandal from the PRC. And somehow, Bush is the devil incarnate.
Oh yeah, and I almost forgot the most important part: He got impeached.
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Tagged in: General, Politics
China Piracy Alert: 852 PSP ISOs for Sale on Paipai
29 January 2007
Apparently, someone on Paipai is selling 852 ISOs of PSP games on 96 DVDs. The current bid is at 288 yuan ($36 USD). The bottom of the auction also offers 14 DVDs for 5 yuan each. This is 70 yuan for 14 DVDs ($8.75 USD).
According to the auction details, he also offers 1000 PMP AVC movies spread across 68 DVDs, 500 MP4 movies spread across 59 DVDs and 80 UMD Video ISOs spread across 30 DVDs.
The wonderful world of piracy in China. 
You don’t have to engage in piracy to enjoy video gaming considering you can get some systems of video games that are fairly recent and still have modern titles, like the Microsoft Xbox with a nice library or even the Nintendo Gamecube with an interesting selection of multiplayer titles.
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Tagged in: General, Funny, PSP
Oh, the Power of a Bandwidth Upgrade
29 January 2007
Recently, I got fed up with having slow uploads, etc. So I decided to give my cable company a call. They said if I did a package deal (Phone + Cable + Internet), I could pay a little less than all of them separately and upgrade to a 20MB/2MB connection (the best one that they offer). Guess what I did?
That bandwidth test is over WiFi… Had I been connected to my router by Ethernet, it could have been even faster. I would like to say that the change is noticeable but at times, it isn’t. Despite a fast internet connection, the other end also has to be able to upload to you faster for you to take full advantage of the bandwidth. For example, if a server is under heavy load and moving slowly, I will probably get the same speeds as a person using basic DSL. However, the one thing that I noticed straight away was the difference in upload. For example, uploading the picture shown above to Flickr went blazingly fast in comparison to my old line. This made me very happy because upload bandwidth was the main reason for my upgrade.
:)
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Tagged in: General
Fake Samsung MP3 Player Spotted at Paipai
20 January 2007
Apparently, someone is passing off this MP4 player with 512 MB for 298 yuan (~$38 USD). Here’s the funny part: look at that Samsung logo slapped on there.
Now, now. I’ve seen the fake iPod’s and whatever else but really. They took a whole different MP3 player and slapped a logo on it. Pretty weird, eh?
When buying your first MP3 player it is often a very good plan to compare prices between various models and brands before deciding since a Creative MP3 player might have all the same options as the most expensive MP3 players for a better price point.
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Tagged in: General, Tech, Funny
Top Chinese Misconceptions
15 January 20071. “Ching chong”
Well, this is the biggest one of all. It has even been immortalized on national TV by Rosie O’Donnell. For starters, spelling it as ching chong in itself is incorrect. According to standard pinyin, ching does not exist as a word. Instead of ching, the word is actually spelled qing. Now, let’s get to why this is truly nothing but myth. In Mandarin Chinese, there are hundreds of possible syllables even before using tones. Using tones quadruples this number. Only two (or eight using tones) of these syllables are qing or chong. Just logically, can the majority of the words in a sentence of a language with hundreds of syllables be boiled down to two/eight syllables?! Of course not!
2. Characters as an alphabet
As Tian of Hanzi Smatter has already detailed this, Chinese characters are not an alphabet. This has led to more and more nonsense tatoos. Each character represents one word or syllable which can have a meaning on its own or have a meaning within a compound of two or more characters.
3. Characters are just pictures
This is only somewhat true. For example, the Chinese character for a horse 馬 (Simp: 马) evolved to its form from a pictograph. However, there are countless other characters which have unknown origins or were not evolved from pictographs. Regardless, in their current state Chinese characters are not pictures.
4. Chinese and Japanese are the same
This one really pisses me off. Chinese and Japanese are two completely different languages. Although Japanese did borrow many linguistic elements from Chinese such as the use of characters, Japanese uses two phonetic alphabets which is illegible to those who can not read Japanese. On the subject of Japanese use of characters, written Japanese uses some characters which do not exist in neither Simplified nor Traditional Chinese. Also, written Japanese uses a mix of both Traditional and Simplified Chinese which would not be used in written Chinese. Even further, on the vocal level, Japanese and Chinese sound very different and use different structures in speech. Spoken Japanese also gives multisyllabic meanings to one character. This does not exist in Chinese.
5. Chinese is alone in itself just like languages such as Spanish
This is another myth that really annoys me. People constantly ask me “Oh, why don’t you talk with him/her in Chinese?” My response is usually “Um, s/he speaks Cantonese (or some other dialect).” The common response: “Is that like some other language or something? But it all sounds the same.” (SIGH). Chinese has many dialects which are not intelligible with each other. These dialects also have regional dialects. However, these are usually fairly intelligible within each other. However, many people in the western world do not understand that while Chinese is one language, it has many regional variants which are well, different.
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Tagged in: General, Chinese
The Ultimate PSP Hack: 3.03 OE-A
6 January 2007| What is 3.03 OE-A? Well, before we can explain that, a little bit of background needs to be introduced. The nice people at Sony have done a lot to keep people from fully using their devices. First, they try repeatedly to keep people by using 100% harmless hombrew on their devices. Second, they force users out of their homebrew joy by having manufacturers package their games with mandatory, yet pointless, updates which remove homebrew capability. But the final straw came when Sony introduced a PSP motherboard called TA-082 which would break if you downgraded the firmware onboard. (Luckily, TA-082 users like myself were able to downgrade to 1.50 using a nice little downgrader that came out recently, which is also open source). So, why is 3.03 OE-A so important? With games requiring higher and higher firmwares to be installed, the future of homebrew was looking grim. It leaves users with two choices, enjoy new games or keep homebrew. This left two options, circumvent the new firmware, or integrate it. This is exactly what 3.03 OE-A does. |  |
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3.03 OE-A works by keeping the best of both firmwares. It keeps the functionality and compatibility of Sony’s 3.03 firmware while keeping the homebrew capabilities of the old 1.50 firmware. To accomplish this, the program pictured on the left takes the two firmware’s files, extracts them, picks out the parts that it wants and then reassembles it into a little file. Once this file is made, the program above writes the new firmware to the PSP. This is what allows the PSP to share the features of both firmwares. In addition, what makes this firmware so great is that it tricks new games into thinking that the PSP is running an authentic Sony 3.03 firmware. In other words, I can keep on playing my new games while utilizing the latest homebrew. There are even more things included in this wonderful firmware. |
| 3.03 OE-A also allows you to play Playstation ISOs out of the box. Specifically, this update is noted for its ability to also play compressed ISOs. On top of this, the update still supports Playstation Store titles native to firmware 3.03. Another nice feature is the ability to turn on or off UMD auto-run, remove the SCE logo, hide corrupt icons, free the UMD region and enable the Flash and WMA players without the need to connect to the internet. These are all features that I absolutely cherish! Plus, with the ability to use plugins, the possibilities are endless. |  |
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Tagged in: General, Tech, PSP, Hacks
So, What’s Inside a Vonage Box?
31 December 2006| I recently bought a new laptop from CompUSA. After they heard my little story about a bad experience I have had with them, they proceeded to throw in about $400 of free stuff. One of these freebies was a Vonage box identical to the stock picture on the right. Now, I would never sign up for Vonage. I have friends that have it and say the service is terrible. However, more importantly, I would be too worried about the lack of proper 911 support out of the box. Anyways, without further explanation, I decided that I really did not need or want the box and thus I decided to take it apart and have a quick peek inside. Luckily for me, the box came quickly open after undoing two screws and the circuit board itself came off with just two more screws. |  |
Of course, being the curious person that I am, I immediately started researching the various chips on the board. First I would look for the manufacturer, then the model number carved into the chip. After about 30 minutes of research, I knew a lot about the board and how it works. For the sake of you, the readers, I have posted scans of the board along with notes to Flickr and I will now explain them.
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The bottom half of the board didn’t have much on it. However, it does contain the flash memory for the board. This little chip probably contains data such as the OS for the whole board. I tried to track down the specifications for the chip but the manufacturer is a ghost. The only website that had information on it was a Russian site which only told me that it is EPROM. (Please click on the photo to see a larger version with mouse-over notes). |
| The top half of the board was much more interesting. It holds all of the other crucial hardware for the box to operate. The first chip that caught my eye was the big, flat TI chip. After some investigation at TI’s website, I found out that the chip itself is not detailed but other chips from its line are. After some thinking, I believe that the chip on the board is similar in structure to this chip. It has a MIPS processor and controls many functions needed for the box to utilize VoIP functions. The next chip which caught my eye was the other flat chip. This chip is made by Legerity. It serves as a sort of interface between digital signals used by VoIP and the signals used by regular telephones. (Note: A friend has told me that this exact chip is used in many more VoIP products. Legerity must be making a ton of money!). Finally, I had to look up the rectangular chip. This actually turns out to be a 16MB SDRAM chip made by some asian manufacturer of which I have never heard. Referring back to the diagram from TI, my previous prediction is looking correct. (Once again, please click on the photo to see a larger version with mouse-over notes). |  |
After being excited for another five minutes, my friend gave me another good idea. Maybe this thing runs on a variant of Linux. That, however is out of my field because I am in no state to desolder the flash memory and find out how to read data from it. Well, anyways, props to anyone who gets this thing into a tiny working computer .
Using an online phone book in order to access a larger area of white pages without having to travel or find yourself some paper phone books can help you to find Salt Lake City employment agencies no matter where you live, or Phoenix plumbing contractors if you’re going to be moving and will need one.
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