It’s our third rainy day of the year here in the desert, and if the 17 years I’ve lived here are any indication, it will probably be our last. Gordon is quite unhappy with it; not only is he frightened of the raindrops when they fall on him, but it is cold out (48 degrees) as I write this, and the poor lil’ guy is only 8 lbs. so he doesn’t have much insulation.
Yesterday we had a lull between two storms currently wetting Southern California, so I did a fair amount of gardening. I had fallen behind in my weed-pulling and there was a lot of debris from a recent windstorm. Gordon supervises from his perch in the window, but never lifts a finger (er, paw) to help. Seriously, it’s always me-me-me with him; he reminds me of some of the guys I used to date! “Would it kill you to wash off a plate or rinse out a cup?”
Today, we’ll both stay indoors. I’m not reading anything particularly good at the moment, and I’ve spoken before of my hard and fast rule to not watch any television or streaming during daylight hours (breaking news excepted). Fortunately, there is a third option: the Internet. As I noted in a previous post, “Who said the Internet is only good for porn? Well, it’s good for that, but I wouldn’t say ‘only’.” In fact, though it seems ubiquitous, the data tells a different story.
You remember data, yes?
Data is where we used to get facts from. And if you were going to, say, sit in a Steak ‘n Shake munching fast-food fries while telling Fox News village idiot Sean Hannity that the safe, effective, lifesaving measles vaccine causes “adverse events” and “deaths every year,” you need to have some facts, supported by data, to back up your assertions. Otherwise, you’re just a nutjob who is running late to have his (DEI edit: “or her”) tin foil hat fitted. Now, I realize calling the Health and Human Services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a “nutjob” is derogatory and offensive to all the hard-working, American nutjobs out there who just want to get on with questioning the moon landing and accusing Hillary Clinton of running a pedophile ring out of the basement of a DC pizza parlor because of her emails or telling people the real story behind Hunter Biden’s laptop, so I apologize unreservedly and in advance.
Let’s get back to porn.
Let me lay some facts on you. In A Billion Wicked Thoughts, the authors, neuroscientists Ogi Ogas, PhD and Sai Gaddam, PhD, analyzed several billion Internet searches and found that of the 1 million most visited websites, 42,337 were sex-related, which works out to about 4%. The percentage of searches for porn were slightly, though not significantly, higher, although I’ll admit one of the datums surprised me; people searching for porn, presumably from a desktop or laptop computer in the privacy of their own home, accounted for 13% of web searches, but that number jumped to 20% if the device used was mobile and/or more portable, like a phone or even a tablet. That just leaves me with the question ‘who looks for porn on-the-go?’
To hear some conservatives talk about it, the Internet is just one big cesspool of smut. During the Orange Führer’s last term in office, some state legislatures, namely Hawaii and Arizona, introduced bills that would charge users a one-time $20 fee before unblocking all Internet porn. What I found fascinating about that effort was that in Hawaii, generally thought of as a blue state, the proceeds would go toward helping the victims of sex trafficking but, in Arizona (a red or at least purple state) fees would be used to help build the border wall with Mexico! I say it a lot, but you can’t make this stuff up:
Republican state Rep. Gail Griffin, R-Hereford, wants to charge you $20 to look at pornography on the internet. House Bill 2444 would require companies that make or sell electronic devices in Arizona to install software that blocks porn. To remove the block, all you’d have to do is prove you are 18 and plunk down $20, payable to the Arizona Commerce Authority. The money would go into a newly created account called the John McCain Human Trafficking and Child Exploitation Fund, with the proceeds to be used for one of 10 things. No. 1 on that list: “Build a border wall between Mexico and this state or fund border security.”
Where does this persistent, and completely false, idea that a third to half of Internet searches link to porn come from? Ogas and Gaddam have concluded those figures are an artifact left over from the earliest years of the new “World Wide Web” (the mid-to late 90s) when the majority of users were young adult or teenaged males. In 1999, 40% of web searches involved porn.
But the web’s user base and, importantly, its content has changed dramatically since then. Name me a business, a non-profit organization, a politician, a household cleaning product, a band, a comedian, a Hollywood blockbuster, or some niche hobby like “Extreme Ironing,” a sport in which people take ironing boards to remote locations and iron clothes (no, I didn’t make that up: Extreme Ironing on Wikipedia), that doesn’t have a website, a Musk (oops, I mean Twitter… no, I mean X) feed, a social media presence (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube) or an entry on a reference site like IMDb or Wikipedia. Not only are there more sites of every kind imaginable, but the demographics have expanded to include most of the population – men and women – from young to old.
Well, I just killed half a rainy day writing this, researching my assertions, and, ahem, not making any claims that I can’t support. You should try it, Mr. President, it’s really not that hard. So what to do with the balance of the day?
Here’s a couple of sites I like to visit on the Internet when I’m stuck inside on a rainy day and I’m not looking at porn:
- The Pug In A Rug
be sure to move your mouse around the screen - Always judge a book by its cover
Reviews of some great books (with links to buy them on Amazon) like How to Talk to Your Cat About Gun Safety, Identifying Wood, Microwave for One, and Eating People is Wrong
note: all real! - Hoooooooooooooooooooooooo
scroll down, the horse never ends - Eel slap!
drag your mouse across the screen to slap the man in the face with an eel
