Please don't constantly keep posting more of the Twitter files or Elon / Trump fanboyism, those posts will not be published in future unless there's a direct relevance / interest to the Indian legal community.

In any case, most of the recent files haven't actually revealed anything new: it was public information that the FBI and DHS had departments dealing with online misinformation. That they would actually use that power and engage with social media companies and try to get them to do stuff for them, like take posts down, etc, shouldn't surprise anyone.

Neither should it be a surprise after Snowden that FBI and Homeland Security they would not try to abuse that power (and that most US social media companies would play ball). This story, for instance, is much more interesting thing out of the Twitter files than yet another rehashing of the Hunter Biden laptop thing:

https://theintercept.com/2022/12/20/twitter-dod-us-military-accounts/

China has also just released a propaganda movie, but apparently it's not even good (though the action set pieces are): https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/dec/20/the-battle-at-water-gate-bridge-review-china-war-epic-tsui-hark

Now this is clearly trollish and if someone wanted to troll you back, they could respond with 'ok boomer', even if you're not a boomer, right?

Sure, Greta and her followers and generation are not saints and all eco-warriors, but you don't know enough of them to claim they are all hypocrites who buy iPhones every year and produce more electronic waste than others and that they've done nothing or that they're activism is worthless compared to 'simple folk', both of which are dishonest reductions.

Bump. Obviously not an epidemologist, but not sure the models are there yet to assume it will affect India greatly from a public health perspective. The reason it's spreading in China is because there's very little natural immunity and effective vaccinations now because of their very aggressive and long lockdowns, so they're getting all the last few years of pain of other countries at once.

But unless the virus mutates in China into a nastier variant, the pure number infected in China shouldn't make much difference to India, where the virus is practically endemic already anyway and travel restrictions from China are still strict.

Bump for late moderation and interesting question. Have also heard anecdotally that it's probably easier to get in with contacts and with prior relevant experience in the public policy / NGO space, but a lot of their jobs are advertised on the UN jobs portal and if you apply for a suitable job, the chance of getting in is probably larger than 0, right?

Has anyone heard of anyone making it purely via the application portal?

That was the exact point made in the post. If a Gen Z says to you, as a boomer, "You ruined my planet and I wish you would just go off and not engage in public discourse anymore because you're old and uncool", you would be more than entitled to say to them: "Ok zoomer", and this would not be trollish for some of the points you make, as well as because "Ok boomer" in a reverse situation would be fine too.

Good points, though I wasn't saying grandparents can't be cool or weren't ever cool. Just that it's a time honoured tradition (at least in the West) for kids to think their parents / grandparents are not cool anymore.

That's certainly NOT the case in the Far East, like China, where respect for elders generally trumps their potential lack of modern-day coolness.

In India it's probably a mixed bag of both, depending on where you live, or depending on whether your grandparents were freedom fighters or whether they've become WhatsApp uncles and how you might feel about that, as a grandkid.

Some good points about the Indian context of this.

However, isn't the point of "Ok boomer" online not that it's specifically generational, but used as a general putdown by youngsters against others exhibiting a caricature of the US 'boomer' mindset / or as a general comeback against 'you damn kids these days'?

I mean, reading it any other way doesn't make sense in India, you're right - there is really no such thing as a 'baby boomer' generation in India, no more than the slacker Gen X was probably much of a thing in India either. Most of those things - arguably even gen Z to some extent - are US American constructs that are shorthands for other things when used here.

True, good points Chichi Ban - wasn't disputing the substance of your point, just that this won't happen for everyone and there aren't that many BigLaw firms that will make young equity partners who earn more than $1m, and, as you point out, that it can be a pretty long and steep ladder. So if you're only out to make millions, there might be shorter paths than a UK law firm (though even as an associate, if you're halfway competent, the salaries are good enough to let you perhaps save $1m in a couple of years (or a decade)).

We really shouldn't be publishing this half-assed disingenuous infowars attempt because for some reason you (and OpIndia) seem to think DYC is the second coming of satan, but for the sake of a quick fact check, here you go.

1. Your original claim in the headline is false: according to all references, even cited by OpIndia, at most it was a throwaway single comment in a long lecture, which no one seemed to have reported on because it was apparently so insignificant to the main points he was making.

2. The original comment, as tweeted by LiveLaw, makes it clear that he is explicitly mentioning that it's a legend, not a fact: https://twitter.com/LiveLawIndia/status/1603995360904765441

Quote:

DYC - What I am trying to say is that vulnerable groups are placed at the bottom of the social structure, even if their consent is obtained is a myth. The Dalits accept their status and never rebel.

DYC refers to the legend of Nangeli where a lower caste woman cut off her breasts to oppose the breast tax. - "It was a cry of angish against social statisfication."

"When Dr. BR Ambedkar dressed in a three piece suit, he reclaimed his community's status in society."

3. The Telegraph article you cite, makes it very much clear that while there wasn't a 'breast tax' as such, lower castes (of both genders) were not allowed to wear garments without paying for it, which seems to have been DYC's exact point.

Quote:

J. Devika, a historian at the Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, agrees. “Men and women, both were expected to leave their chests open. The upper cloth was a mark of the upper caste.”

Lower castes had to pay to be entitled to their entire bodies, not only a part of it.

The story of Nangeli specifically, does indeed seem to be a legend, but going by the tweets there is no evidence that DYC ever claimed otherwise.

In conclusion, DYC seems to have made clear his story off protest masectomies was a legend in order to illustrate casteism fought by Ambedkar, all of which checks out.

More interesting than this actualy non-story would be, what do you / OpIndia have against DY Chandrachud? The fact that he comes from a family of judges, as do most senior judges, or is there something substantive about what he does or his views that bother you, any more than any other SC judge or CJ?

Don't forget the general cost of living in London though, which will quickly eat up your training contract salary (which is a good solid salary but not exorbitant for London, all things considered). Once newly qualified in a big firm though, you'll live comfortably, as Chichi Ban rightly says.

Regarding partnership, the vast majority of UK law firm lawyers don't actually make it to equity partnership and leave firms or even the profession before, and even then, to get into the millions take-home-pay range, you'll need to make equity at one of the big firms and stick around for a while - junior equity partners might not make as much...

Unfortunately, it's not quite so simple and the toilet issue does not have a simple solution that will make everyone happy. What if I have surgery to make a penis out of my vulva or vice versa? And what if I'm born intersex, with a vulva and a penis or ambiguous sex organs, as potentially 1 in several thousand births are? And is anyone going to check? And what if I have a penis but look like most women, or I have a vulva but happen to look more like a man?

For anyone in any of these situations picking which toilet you enter can be deeply upsetting and traumatic and can result in harassment or physical attacks, so much so that some trans people try not to drink too much water so they don't have to pee when not at home and face these choices. Likewise, some biological women claim that they would be put in the same position if toilet access was liberalised in certain ways.

Therefore not very simple, unfortunately.

Are you a boomer? Did you get insulted by it? 'Ok boomer' is surely not a hate crime. Granted, 'ok boomer' can be a little bit trollish but then so are most internet memes.

And in this case, if someone is saying: "Oh the new generation is so entitled and lazy and whatnot", then 'ok boomer' would be a fair response, just like 'ok zoomer' would surely be a legitimate response if I said: "the old generations have ruined this planet by polluting endlessly and created a shitty world full of wars and dictators and are banning abortions and generally are out of touch with what's important to the newer generations on this planet, who are surely more important and should have more of a voice in this, as they will be the ones who have to live in this world for longer and clean up the mess the old gen made long after they're dead".

In short, if you start a mini-culture war topic over generational differences and 'ok boomer' is one of the worst of responses imaginable, then maybe don't start mini-culture wars about how Gen Z and the wokes are upsetting you so much, because there's maybe no real other response you can give to such broad generalisations.

That is, even though it is true that Gen Z as a whole may be over-entitled and over-sensitive and may listen to some pretty bad music, but why not let them have their fun and find their way, as every young generation has had to before them and will after them too. And also, as every generation before them, they too will also have parents and grandparents looking at them, shaking their heads and muttering "damn kids these these days, no values or work ethic. Now back in my day..."

Exactly.

>No one who is an adult thinks it’s funny to roll your eyes at and pretend grandpa/grandma is an asshole/ uncool for being themselves.

Half-right: grandpa/ma is not automatically an asshole for being themselves, but grandpa/ma have always been uncool in the eyes of the young, and so it should be so that grandkids build upon the works and countries that grandpa/grandma have built and fixing the problems they created, rather than worshipping at their altars.

Oh no, please don't use the C word, it hurts so much and makes you sound like a very reasonable person who's expecting someone in 1950 to call them and tell them McCarthyism isn't over.

Honestly, genuinely interested: can you explain why you're so scared of 'Communism'? How is Communism any scarier than totalitarianism in all its various forms as is currently practice in many countries in the world, only a few of which are actually communist (Cuba maybe?), some of which pretend to be communist (China) but are basically hyper-capitalist under autocratic regimes, and many of which are just right-wing strongmen or military crackpots or juntas.

Even in history, there are as many (and probably significantly more) atrocities committed by non-communist regimes than by communist ones (which may have killed a lot of people, but so did a lot of other types of government through the ages).

So, why the obsession?

Not a bad idea, but do you know any trans people? It seems unlikely any trans people will object if you choose to use it, even if the toilets become more popular than the gendered toilets for some reason. And if anyone does object, just say you are uncomfortable going to the men's or women's toilets and say you don't wish to go into reasons, because it's a personal decision. Most reasonable trans people would probably accept that.

If you call them 'privacy toilet' it implies that normal toilets are 'zero-privacy toilets', and no one will go anymore :)

Moderation warning bells ring from anyone using 'woke' or 'Gen Z' in a perjorative / facile manner, just like warning bells ring when using charged words like 'bhakt' indiscriminately. If you want to start a culture war, please go to Twitter or Parler or Gab or whatever.

The repeated whining and clutching of pearls about the terrible Gen Z's and how they are taking your genders and freedoms and jobs and who-knows-what, is a little repetitive and has pretty much nothing to do with law or average LI reader interests or concerns most of the time.

Erring on the side of caution, this post seems potentially trollish and disingenuous, inciting another dead horse flogging exercise of trans rights good / bad. This thread will be accordingly moderated.

Other than that, however, dictionaries just reflect usage of a word, and if woman is being increasingly used in the real world / online in that way, that's what they are documenting.

"The day isn't far" definitely implies trollish intent to stir up emotion without necessarily being into facts, no?

Perhaps a more nuanced engagement with the issue is warranted, rather than reducing it to a 'trans quest'. If there's indeed a 'trans quest' pursued by every trans person (which is unlikely), it would presumably be for most trans people, that they get to live their lives free of harrassment, much like any other gender, sexual or religious preference or other choices / non-choices.

The toilet argument, as you couch it, however, is often a dog-whistle that is understandably emotive, playing on the idea of male predators, pretending to be trans, invading female-only spaces. Phrased that way, would that risk actually compare in scale to the documented sexual abuse the trans community regularly faces? And would existing laws not cover the scenario of a pretend-trans 'predator'?

That said, it's also understandable if some biological women feel uncomfortable at the idea. But even stopping short of self-id but having gender recognition be an official legal process allowing access to female spaces, might not be enough to allay those women's fears either, right?

In short, there's no easy solution that will make all sides equally happy, but "the day isn't far" arguments are not constructive. Instead, Nalsar's attempt is surely a worthwhile one to consider that doesn't really hurt anyone (or at least hurts less or fewer people than many of the other 'solutions'), other than maybe not being the most hyper-efficient use of space.

We know you probably don't like anyone commenting or wanting to have an actually factual discussion, but as always, since this is a legal website, we like a good discussion and would welcome your views, if those are going to be honestly held and not trollish.

If we don't receive a reasonable attempt at a response, we'll mark the thread as trollish for being non bona fide.

1. Why exactly would Vijaya Gadde face legal action? Twitter was / is a company, they are not bound to protect freedom of speech under the US constitution. So what action are you imagining can be taken exactly?

2. Please provide evidence or what you mean by 'wokes' are 'cancelling' them, other than some random people on Twitter being mean to them.

3. Don't know this Weiss fellow, but to describe Taibbi as 'liberal' is too easy. He's a bit hard to pin down - perhaps liberal on some social values and not a Trump supporter, but fundamentally Taibbi seems to be heavily into free speech, potentially allied to Elon's brand of free speech absolutism, which puts him into the libertarian / right-wing camp as much as liberal.

Mind you, he's not wrong on his and others' longer-running criticism that it is worrying that private companies like Twitter and Facebook have so much power to decide what is and what is not acceptable speech, but that's really about the concentration of power in Silicon Valley / the world of finance in the hands of a few, who are largely unaccountable.

Guess what: the only thing that would help there is more government regulation (eugh, only liberals like that), not less: if you leave it to the companies to regulate content, they will end up removing content they will legally be required to remove, and stuff that advertisers don't like, and stuff that their staff are uncomfortable with, including racist content, CSAM, calls for violence, disinformation, etc. How would you have platforms like Twitter 'solve' the inappropriate content problem?

What if you have a sitting president who is regularly undermining trust in democracy by claiming without evidence an election was stolen, resulting in a riot and loss of life / coup? How would you deal with it, if at all? And if you choose not to deal with it, what service do you think is being served?

And lastly, how is Elon's ownership of Twitter making it any more accountable? Because he tweets out polls every now and then to his echo chamber about making important policy decisions?

Why did Elon block Kan(ye) West's account? By a similar yardstick that's being used to criticise Trump's blocking, is that not censorship of a potential future Presidential candidate?

That might sound trollish, but is perhaps a good point. In principle, having dinner with your colleagues and partners is fine, but you have to be in a position where you are confident enough to judge the social and professional dynamics in the workplace to whether it would be welcome or awkward, and that is hard for someone else who is not in your shoes, to do.

Some factors to consider: how long have you been at a firm, do you ever talk about family or outside-work topics with them, have you been out for coffee or lunch with them socially already, etc...

Thanks for sharing, what a messed up / fascinating family - wasn't really aware of them before watching some videos now...

So in short, as a potted summary, are Andrew Tate and his brother are professional scam-artists, who prey on lonely men (both with their previous webcam business - https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/brothers-make-millions-using-webcam-26508739 - and with their current Hustler's University), yet their audience consists to a large extent of lonely, underpaid men, who want to be rich and get laid?

He definitely has a captivating everyday manner when he speaks about business / his matrix in very simple language, though there are thousands of other influencers who speak about business better and with more useful tips. So the bedrock of his popularity seems to be that he says the trollish things he says to provoke outrage and that he does genuinely hate women / think that men are superior to women (except thepoor, lonely men he scams out of their money, by making them believe that they will become 'alpha' / asshole males like him if they buy their course, and avoid getting scammed by people like him in future)?

How does this even work?!

Since you asked. Reaction 1: marked trollish for being trollish. Reaction 2: published for sharing interesting links. Reaction 3: moderation is hard, especially if political parties and heads of state lie as much as they do nowadays.

Rather than hand wringing about Gadda, who seems to trigger Elon fanboys a lot, why not explain how you would run moderation at scale differently? I.e. Without people involved? Or with 'people from both sides of the spectrum' more? How would you do that without it becoming partisan? Would you let misinformation stand on your platform? What if you weren't sure if something was misinformation or not? How would you fix it if you made a mistake (like they and the rest of Media and tech likely did in the hunter Biden story, as had been known for a longer time now?) And should Elon have blocked Kanye for being racist or is that impinging on free speech? What about if a politician tweeted the same thing as Kanye?

Hi, sorry you had to try multiple times - did it give a 500 error or a 'realname' error? Did it lose your draft comment? We were just rolling out some updated version and fixing a bug, so that might have interfered, will look at improving the update process in future so it won't interfere with writing comments.

Haha, that's not far off from what this is :) did you really like the old design, or is it just that you got used to it and it didn't bother you anymore?

Any particular things you preferred about the older design? We can try to replicate some parts of the old one or potentially offer further nostalgic theming options (e.g. we have made the greenish theme the default after complaints about the orange :)

Thanks for your constructive feedback, that's helpful.

We're a little surprised people were so fond of the old design: wasn't it a bit of an eyesore? Reverting to something closer to the old design might be possible, but could be a lot of work so ideally we would prefer to iterate and improve on this current design.

Regarding the touch gestures, you're very right, it was unusable on mobile but we're gradually polishing it and the last two versions have cleaned it up a little so it's less frustrating and more optional. Please do let us know if it's still horrible - we'll keep working at it.

A) the seniority mechanism will allow upgrading accounts to have more privileges. We're looking into doing this on an ad hoc basis initially, before we formulate hard and fast rules, and are definitely looking for feedback also.

B) we don't actually know how many active users there are, but the site is still seeing 1.5 lakh unique readers per month, so there's a sizable community we're hoping can engage rather than lurk (though in many forums, the ratio of participants to lurkers is around 1%)

C) we don't really have any expectations for LI other than it being a useful and fun resource, so the only going south metric would mean that it stopped doing both (which is certainly possible).

D) who is SC observer? We are thinking about useful ways of curating relevant content into the current system, but if you have specific ideas, please let us know.