The Third Slip: Issue 77 - Love is free! Hate is costly.
Hello, Slippers! Welcome to The Third Slip - the weekly newsletter that tries to make sense of a world that makes its co-authors’ existential crises look extremely mature in comparison. And what a wonderful world it is - the one that has won the title of “Best Planet To Live On For Carbon-based Lifeforms” for 4.543 billion years consecutively - second only to Utopia which has existed in our fertile minds for a little while longer.
We all know what issue is on our minds - issue 377 of course, an issue that’s finally been resolved for good. Literally. Unlike this issue 77 of The Third Slip which is as insecure as England’s slip cordon has been all series, but hey, they’re winning so maybe butterflies for breakfast is the way to go. On with the news...
Love is free
LoveIsSolve: It took us way longer than it should have to get here, but finally the draconian law that made it illegal for consenting adults to do what they would like to in private has been struck down. Back in 2013, the Supreme Court had recriminalised homosexuality saying lawmaking was what the legislature was for. But clearly, it’s had enough because no one in our country has the political will to act beyond vote banks. And so, in a beautifully written judgment, a unanimous bench struck down a colonial law saying ‘history owes an apology to the LGBT community’. The real task, however, lies ahead including bringing your friendly neighbourhood WhatsApp group uncle up to speed on why he is a bigot.
KaepernockingItOutOfThePark: Nike ‘celebrated’ the 30th year anniversary of ‘Just Do It’ by signing on Colin Kaepernick - That quarterback who had his career jeopardised by the NFL for taking a knee when the national anthem played to protest police brutality against black people. Our cynical selves want to shit on brands because ultimately they wouldn’t take a stand unless it made business sense to them. However, in the age that we live in, this is a brave move by Nike and deserves all the applause it’s getting even at the risk of angering some. Trump weighed in saying Nike can do what they want, they are a tenant that pays him a lot of rent before his other personality woke up and realised that he has to criticise it strongly.
Hate is costly
Fascionista: Here’s a quick quiz for you: If you’re the leader of a political party and a citizen with a right to freedom of speech and dissent shouts a slogan calling your party ‘fascist’ what would you do?
A: Ignore the comment and move on with your life
B: Behave like a mature leader of the people and try to engage meaningfully with the citizen you’re representing
C: Shout at the police “When someone calls my party fascist do you expect me to keep quiet?” , call that normal citizen a terrorist, and get her thrown in jail thus proving her original point right.
If you answered mostly Cs in the above quiz, congratulations. You’re most likely to be the president of the BJP in Tamil Nadu, or a fascist, or both. India may lack a lot of things, irony-deficiency is not among them.
Pehle AAP: In this week’s edition of ‘How to derive first principles all over again’, the cops in Delhi met to discuss strategy after 19 out of 22 cases against AAP legislators have been thrown out by the courts. The strategy arrived at apparently is ‘follow due process and have a proper case to make before you make allegations’ which is kind of like saying have you thought about gravity before making an attempt to fly? But then, life comes a full circle and all that and that’s where we have reached in 2018. High five to human progress.
Where there’s a will…: If you hear the words “Hardik fast” and think of Hardik Pandya being the quickest bowler on the England tour, you will not be the only one. But, in Gujarat, Hardik Patel has been on an indefinite fast and even released his will during the process before being moved to the hospital this week. He’s demanding a quota for Patidars and loan waivers for farmers.
And then there were nun: For all the progressive narratives it drives, Kerala is a repeat offender when it comes to how it handles women’s rights and cases of abuse. The latest in a series of shameful non-procedures comes from the Catholic church where a Bishop accused of rape has been protected by the church and some woeful politicians who engaged in victim blaming of preposterous levels. So much so that nuns have come out in open protest.
TTS Labs: The Almost-Quote Quota
Some people prefer subtle, others prefer subtitle. In a new attempt at brevity in this newsletter, let’s see if we can chop down big paras into succinct things people almost said. Let us know if you like it or hate it. (No, there is no middle ground)
“Ya China is gonna be a problem so best we be friends even if we kinda hate each other” - India & US
“Yaar why everyone h8s us :(“ - BJP
“Oh ya killing all those people in Yemen was a bad idea, our bad” - Saudi Arabia
“I love you. But I hate you for trying to hack us. Quit it!” - Trump to Kim
“Trump is nuts but there are sane people here trying to stop him, by stealing key documents so he can’t see them… Bear with us till he’s gone.” - White House senior employee in an anonymous op-ed.
“The above person sucks. Whoever he / she is. Everything is awesome here in Delusionland” - Trump
“Progress? You guys carry on, I’m gonna wait till 2020” - The US Dollar, to the Euro and Renminbi
“You need to hire foreigners because your industry is struggling? Nyet” - Trump
“Sigh. Sorry about Trump” - US Secretary of State, to Pakistan and India (also, “let’s sell you some military stuff to use against each other, yes?”).
“Hey Pakistan tell na what he said tell na tell na we’ll help you” - China
“Genocide of our own people and arresting of whoever tries to report that? What are you even saying!” - Nobel peace-prize winning president of Myanmar
“Yeah, we’re gonna help you answer that…” - International Criminal Court
“Can we apply to the using-FB-for-evil club?” - Libya
“Yeah, probably inviting Steve Bannon to our festival was a bad idea, kinda like inviting Bishan Bedi to a Muralitharan appreciation party. Lulz our bad” - New Yorker
“We’ll fine you if your employees need to use government handouts” - Sanders
“Oh ok we’ll just stop employing low-income workers then” - Amazon
“Oops. Ok, at least we got a cool acronym out of it - “Stop Bad Employers by Zeroing Out Subsidies Act” or Stop BEZOS Act” - Sanders
“We’re tired of being considered a paradise on earth, so let’s try this far-right thing for a bit, maybe?” - Sweden (oh well, at least they still have Opeth and Zlatan).
“Come let’s chat about Russia?” - US Senate to Twitter & FB.
“Haha” - HappilyUnmarried
“Haha” - Girliyapa
Business / Tech
Trillions of True Tormenting Troubles: Amazon is a $1t company. It also has unhappy employees, tax evasion headaches, and several more problems.
Putting the audit in auditory: Wireless headphones are increasingly getting better (We guess Apple is to be thanked).
Pollution Explosion: Companies in the US and Europe have hit upon an ingenious solution - Move production abroad and outsource pollution!
What goes around ecoms around: In China, the week started with JD.com’s founder being arrested for sexual misconduct, and ended with Alibaba’s Jack Ma retiring.
Band-Aid: Spotify: Hey, Indie bands - let’s work with you directly. Labels: :S :S :S :S :S
Espresso Patronum: Guess which country is going to get its first Starbucks? Italy! (And it’s quite stunning)
Putting a different spin on things: Meanwhile, did you know Goldman Sach’s new CEO is a pretty cool DJ?
Ringing in the changes: Bendable smartphone? Yes, Samsung, please! 5-cameras-in-1 smartphone? Er, Nokia, maybe.
LinkedOut
The porn business… Is a lot more likely to be from that Silicon Valley scene than you realise.
TL;DR, Fintech, Rando and Hangry: Among the words Merriam-Webster is adding in 2018.
Google wants to kill the URL.
And Facebook should probably break itself up.
How researchers are able to detect AI-generated fake videos with a 95% success rate through the simplest tell - Blink!
That’s it for this week. In case you’d like to find us and ignore us on the web also, we’re on Twitter (Chuck | Tony). We’d love to hear from you on what you think of this newsletter. Especially on our experimental quotes section this week. Mail in your feedback to us. Just do it. Until next week, may you not have to mute any of the WhatsApp groups you are a part of. Bye!