(02-02-2009, 11:46 AM)Sforza Wrote: These two pieces of recent news just sound plainly fucked up if you're a Catholic.

Pope Pardons Holocaust Denier Bishop

The Pope has lifted the excommunication from the Roman Catholic Church of four bishops appointed by a breakaway archbishop more than 20 years ago.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7849226.stm

Criticism of Pope's Rehabilitation of Holocaust Denier Grows

The pope is coming under increasing fire from within the Catholic Church over his policies. A second German Catholic bishop Saturday raised unusual criticism of German Pope Benedict XVI for rehabilitating Holocaust denier Bishop Williamson, adding his objections to the pope's ultraconservative direction.

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,3993755,00.html

Pope Promotes Ultraconservative Cleric to Bishop

Fr Wagner is also notorious for his extreme views - he has accused the popular Harry Potter novels of spreading Satanism, and described Hurricane Katrina as God's punishment for the sinners of New Orleans.

He wrote in a parish newsletter that the death and destruction caused by the hurricane in New Orleans was divine retribution for the city's tolerance of homosexuals and permissive sexual attitudes.

The future bishop said he was glad that Katrina destroyed not only nightclubs and brothels in New Orleans, but also five of the city's abortion clinics.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7863254.stm

Quote: Everyone’s a critic, or so the saying goes, but one author seems out for blood. Stephen King stepped on teenagers’ toes with some barbed comments about Twilight author Stephenie Meyer in a new interview with USA Weekend. “Both [J.K.] Rowling and Meyer, they’re speaking directly to young people...The real difference is that Jo Rowling is a terrific writer and Stephenie Meyer can’t write worth a darn. She’s not very good.” The Twilight series, he says, attracts a generation of girls by joining love and sex: “It’s exciting and it’s thrilling and it’s not particularly threatening.” King weighs in on other novelists, as well: Jodi Picoult is “terrific,” Dean Koontz “can write like hell,” although sometimes is “awful,” and James Patterson is “a terrible writer but he’s very very successful.”

(02-03-2009, 11:08 AM)Twin-Skies Wrote: _________________________________________
Updated Feb 4, 2009:

Guys, reminder: Today is the 110th anniversary of the Philippine-American War (1899-1902).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippine-American_War

A little moment of silence for those who died in this tragedy...

(02-06-2009, 11:57 AM)DragonSlayer Wrote:

(02-03-2009, 11:08 AM)Twin-Skies Wrote: _________________________________________
Updated Feb 4, 2009:

Guys, reminder: Today is the 110th anniversary of the Philippine-American War (1899-1902).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippine-American_War

A little moment of silence for those who died in this tragedy...

Is it just me, or do more civilians die than soldiers in like... every war. There has been a little over 4,000 U.S. soldiers die in Iraq since it started while there has been well over 1,000,000 Iraqi deaths.

Quote: Feet, Prehistoric Snake Is Largest On Record
ScienceDaily (Feb. 4, 2009) — The largest snake the world has ever known -- as long as a school bus and as heavy as a small car -- ruled tropical ecosystems only 6 million years after the demise of the fearsome Tyrannosaurus rex, according to a new discovery published in the journal Nature.
Partial skeletons of a new giant, boa constrictor-like snake named "Titanoboa" found in Colombia by an international team of scientists and now at the University of Florida are estimated to be 42 to 45 feet long, the length of the T-Rex "Sue" displayed at Chicago's Field Museum, said Jonathan Bloch, a UF vertebrate paleontologist who co-led the expedition with Carlos Jaramillo, a paleobotanist from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama.

Researchers say the extinct snake was even larger than the wildest dreams of directors of modern horror movies.

"Truly enormous snakes really spark people's imagination, but reality has exceeded the fantasies of Hollywood," said Bloch, who is studying the snake at the Florida Museum of Natural History on the UF campus. "The snake that tried to eat Jennifer Lopez in the movie 'Anaconda' is not as big as the one we found."

Jason Head, a paleontologist at the University of Toronto in Mississauga and the paper's senior author, described it this way: "The snake's body was so wide that if it were moving down the hall and decided to come into my office to eat me, it would literally have to squeeze through the door."

Besides tipping the scales at an estimated 1.25 tons, the snake lived during the Paleocene Epoch, a 10-million-year period immediately following the extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, Bloch said.

Quote:The English Roman Catholic bishop who denies that the Holocaust took place has been sacked as director of a traditionalist seminary.

Bishop Richard Williamson was removed from his position at the Society of St Pius X La Reja Seminary, outside Buenos Aires, the Argentinean capital, at the weekend.

The move is unlikely to placate critics of Pope Benedict XVI, who recently lifted a decree of excommunication imposed on the bishop and three others from the ultra-conservative society, which has itself now given Bishop Williamson until the end of the month to change his mind about the Nazi gas chambers.

Quote:Baby-faced boy is father at 13

BOY dad Alfie Patten yesterday admitted he does not know how much nappies cost — but said: “I think it’s a lot.”

Baby-faced Alfie, who is 13 but looks more like eight, became a father four days ago when his girlfriend Chantelle Steadman gave birth to 7lb 3oz Maisie Roxanne.

He told how he and Chantelle, 15, decided against an abortion after discovering she was pregnant.

The shy lad, whose voice has not yet broken, said: “I thought it would be good to have a baby.

“I didn’t think about how we would afford it. I don’t really get pocket money. My dad sometimes gives me £10.”

Alfie, who is just 4ft tall, added: “When my mum found out, I thought I was going to get in trouble. We wanted to have the baby but were worried how people would react.

“I didn’t know what it would be like to be a dad. I will be good, though, and care for it.”

Alfie’s dad Dennis told how the lad does not really understand the enormity of his situation — but seemed desperate to be a devoted and responsible father.

He wanted to be the first to hold Maisie after the hospital birth. He tenderly kisses the baby and gives her a bottle.

And Dennis, 45, said: “He could have shrugged his shoulders and sat at home on his Playstation. But he has been at the hospital every day.”

Maisie was conceived after Chantelle and Alfie — just 12 at the time — had a single night of unprotected sex.

They found out about the baby when Chantelle was 12 weeks pregnant.

But they kept it a secret until six weeks later when Chantelle’s mum Penny, 38, became suspicious about her weight gain and confronted her.

After that Alfie’s family told only those closest to them for fear he would be “demonised” at school.

Chantelle gave birth to Maisie on Monday night after a five-hour labour at Eastbourne Hospital, East Sussex.

Last night she told The Sun: “I’m tired after the birth. I was nervous after going into labour but otherwise I was quite excited.”

Chantelle told how she discovered she was expecting after going to her GP with “really bad” stomach pains. She said: “Me and Alfie went. The doctor asked me whether we had sex. I said yes and he said I should do a pregnancy test. He did the test and said I was pregnant. I started crying and didn’t know what to do.

“He said I should tell my mum but I was too scared.

“We didn’t think we would need help from our parents. You don’t really think about that when you find out you are pregnant. You just think your parents will kill you.”

But Penny figured out what was going on after buying Chantelle a T-shirt which revealed her swelling tum.

Chantelle admitted she and Alfie — who are both being supported by their parents — would be accused of being grossly irresponsible. She said: “We know we made a mistake but I wouldn’t change it now. We will be good loving parents.

“I have started a church course and I am going to do work experience helping other young mums.

“I’ll be a great mum and Alfie will be a great dad.”

Chantelle and Maisie were released from hospital yesterday. They are living with Penny, Chantelle’s jobless dad Steve, 43, and her five brothers in a rented council house in Eastbourne. The family live on benefits. Alfie, who lives on an estate across town with mum Nicola, 43, spends most of his time at the Steadmans’ house.

He is allowed to stay overnight and even has a school uniform there so he can go straight to his classes in the morning.

Alfie’s dad, who is separated from Nicola, believes the lad is scared deep down.

He said: “Everyone is telling him things and it’s going round in his head. It hasn’t really dawned on him. He hasn’t got a clue of what the baby means and can’t explain how he feels. All he knows is mum and dad will help.

“When you mention money his eyes look away. And she is reliant on her mum and dad. It’s crazy. They have no idea what lies ahead.”

Dennis, who works for a vehicle recovery firm, described Alfie as “a typical 13-year-old boy”.

He said: “He loves computer games, boxing and Manchester United.” Dennis, who has fathered nine kids, told how he was “gobsmacked” when he discovered Alfie was to be a dad, too.

He said: “When I spoke to him he started crying. He said it was the first time he’d had sex, that he didn’t know what he was doing and of the complications that could come.

“I will talk to him again and it will be the birds and the bees talk. Some may say it’s too late but he needs to understand so there is not another baby.”
Lovely

Chantelle’s mum said: “I told her it was lovely to have the baby but I wish it was in different circumstances. We have five children already so it’s a big financial responsibility. But we are a family and will pull together and get through.

“She’s my daughter. I love her and she will want for nothing.”

Last night Michaela Aston, of the anti-abortion Christian charity LIFE, said: “We commend these teenagers for their courage in bringing their child into the world.

“At the same time this is symptomatic of the over-sexualisation of our youngsters and shows the policy of value-free sex education just isn’t working.”

Britain’s youngest known father is Sean Stewart. He became a dad at 12 when the girl next door, 15-year-old Emma Webster, gave birth in Sharnbrook, Bedford, in 1998. They split six months later.

Quote:The official website for Sunrise’s Sora Kake Girl (Sora o Kakeru Shoujo) anime series has announced on Tuesday that the anime is spawning two manga adaptations in two different magazines. Writer Kunihiko Okada and artist Kabocha already launched their Sora Kake Girl R (Sora o Kakeru Shoujo R) spinoff story in the March issue of Ichijinsha’s Monthly Comic Rex magazine on Monday. A comic preview ran in the previous issue on January 9. (The top right image is from the preview, while the bottom left image is from the main manga.)

Okada notes on Sunrise’s website that the second manga spinoff, Sora Kake Girl D (Sora o Kakeru Shoujo D), will begin in the April issue of ASCII MediaWorks’ Monthly Comic Dengeki Oh magazine. The April issue will ship on February 27.

The original anime premiered on Japanese television on January 5. The story is set in the year 311 of the Orbital Calendar, when humanity has migrated to countless colony clusters in space. A space colony girl named Akiha Shishido encounters a malevolent artificial intelligence named Leopard that has been installed on a colony. Akiha is joined by an Inter-Colony Police officer named Itsuki Kannagi, a taciturn young girl named Honoka Kawai, and a robot named Imoko “Imo-chan” Shishido. The project’s title is an apparent wordplay on Toki o Kakeru Shoujo or The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Yasutaka Tsutsui’s classic novel that was adapted into several live-action television series, live-action films, manga, and an acclaimed anime film.

(02-13-2009, 03:00 PM)clonezero Wrote: anyway some anime news

(insert quote)
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2009-02-12/reorganization-of-bandai-visual-announced

theres some more interesting anime news on the home page of zomganime.com fyi.

Quote:Beverage and food group San Miguel Corp. signed Friday a deal to sell 43.25 percent of domestic beer unit San Miguel Brewery Inc. (SMB) to Japan’s second-largest brewer, Kirin Holdings Co. Ltd., which owns 20 percent San Miguel Corp., for P58.9 billion.

And while Kirin is buying into SMB, it is unloading its 20-percent stake in San Miguel Corp. to Q-Tech Alliance, a new fund put up by businessmen led by Roberto Ongpin and affiliated with British fund Ashmore for P39.6 billion.

Quote:According to Ko's team, some signs of Internet addiction include preoccupation with online activities; "withdrawal" symptoms, like moodiness and irritability, after a few Internet-free days; and skipping other activities to devote more time to online ones.

In this study, teenagers who fit the addiction profile generally were more aggression-prone than their peers. But the type of Internet activity appeared to matter as well.

Online chatting, gambling and gaming, and spending time in online forums or adult pornography sites were all linked to aggressive behavior. In contrast, teens who devoted their time to online research and studying were less likely than their peers to be violence-prone.