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Fallacies of VIsion is happening more and more

Posted by $ AJAshinoff 3 years, 5 months ago to Culture
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My collection of short stories titled Fallacies of Vision presented scenario's, situations, that would lead to a totalitarian world. Once such story that didn't make it to print was the homosexuals intimidating churches with law suits and disturbances in churches to force churches into acceptance and to omit doctrine that cast the homosexuals in a negative light.

Yesterday I purchased some non-profit software. A new 'condition' was in place that I had to click to accept. The wording of this condition is very concerning.

"I understand that Microsoft will send licensing information to my organization email address registered with TechSoup and I will need access to that email address to obtain this product. I have verified that the address is up to date in the organization details section of my account.

To comply with the Microsoft corporate citizenship nonprofit giving antidiscrimination policy, I certify the following:

My organization does not have a policy or mission of discrimination in hiring, compensation, promotion, termination, retirement, training, programs, or services based on race, color, sex, national origin, religion, age, disability, gender identity or expression, marital status, pregnancy, sexual orientation, political affiliation, union membership, or veteran status.

OR

My organization is a religious organization, and any discriminatory practices of my organization are exempt from laws that otherwise prohibit such discrimination."

Why must anyone need accept the behaviors and conduct or another? What I see the OR is the shot across the bow saying "comply or face exorbitant expenses for products you've come to depend on." No one has the right to force another how or what they should think or what they should believe.


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  • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
    The answer: Stop doing business with your enemies.
    I know you have heard it before, but freedom isn't free. Sometimes it isn't simple either.
    We must accept that some modern 'convenience' is a trap to enslave us, and we must find alternatives while we can.
    Examples: Google search, Windows 10, Facebook, Twitter, network "news", cellphones and "smart" appliances (statist 'intelligence' devices)
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    • Posted by $ Thoritsu 3 years, 5 months ago
      So right! It is a choice. It is a vote.

      The idea that Capitalism is slavery (common theme today), while using democracy to steal money from your neighbors is so logically flawed it should be comedy.
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    • Posted by $ 3 years, 5 months ago
      That no doubt be the solution to the problem. A bit of context though, on the street a package of Windows 10 professional cost roughly $150. OEM. Purchasing as a non-profit I can get the same thing as tech for $10. Which means I could buy 15 licenses for the cost of one. It's save a lot of money and allows other the money to be routed elsewhere to do other things. Even upgrades in a standard upgrade can cost you $100 where I can pick it up nonprofit. For $20. I imagine if they pull this off and they start going down this road I'm going to learn Linux pretty quickly. I thought my days of knuckle busting code and learning Unix routines was long dead but I guess not.
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      • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
        Win 10 is not a bargain regardless of the price claimed. Another example of free is not free.
        I am setting up Linux tomorrow. I'm tired of dealing with the slowness of windows.
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        • Posted by $ 3 years, 5 months ago
          For the roles needed it works fine, not slow, but sometimes annoying. I stopped messing with Unix 30+ years ago and, to be honest,while it may not be the same, I'd rather not dredge that deep in my memory and start relearning.

          What version of linux do you recommend? I have a full shop and several marginal systems should the need arise.
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          • Posted by mccannon01 3 years, 5 months ago
            Don't know what kind of time you have, but a cheap way to try out Linux is get a Raspberry Pi set up and play with it. All you need is a Pi, monitor with HDMI port, and a USB keyboard with a mouse pad (the wireless kind work well, too). The Pi was originally designed as an educational tool, but can be employed in serious applications. It also has a reasonably decent GUI and lots of free software is available. Just a suggestion...
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            • Posted by $ 3 years, 5 months ago
              I have to consider a wide range of users and wide range of uses (pretty much anything except CAD). Too thin, hardware or software, will do me no good.

              Tried Zorin today..performance-wise I feel like it fits better in the late 90's than today. Win10 ran better on the system and I found a youtube using the same exact system to run ubantu.
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              • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
                How 'new' is the hardware on that system, AJA?
                I had no issues with W7 until I upgraded my mobo (to one that is only 4 yrs old instead of 8 yrs old) and although it is supposed to be compatible I have been frustrated with frequent lags in getting to websites. The upgrade has become a downgrade in terms of web performance. Of course it could be a separate 'upgrade' by ATT or to websites I use. I am setting up another machine to use Linux and wean myself out of MSFT's chains.
                But my point was that if the hardware is newer it may have drivers that are 'optimized' for W10. Linux is always catching up because there is no financial incentive for hardware makers to optimize desktop hardware for Linux and it make take some time for the open source folks to optimize the drivers.
                OTOH, you mentioned using some 'marginal' gear for Linux. Are you testing W10 on the same gear?
                I'm not a Linux fan-boy, but if you want to escape MSFT's clutches you should at least give Linux a fair try (if you can spare the time.)
                Lucky mentioned PCLinuxOS and I used it years ago. I didn't continue, but it may be another possible solution if it has decent support.

                I have read that the latest versions of WINE in Linux do a good job of running software written for Windows. I have not tried it, but I will need to use it for some software I use.
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            • Posted by rhfinle 3 years, 5 months ago
              You don't need a 'monitor'. You need a 'TV'. The Pi outputs to an HDMI High Definition TV port. Low resolution computer monitors have gone the way of DOS. The sound outputs separately, though, through a stereo headphone jack. You can plug that into a stereo or one of those PC speaker sets we used to use with desktop computers. I recommend getting a Pi with a UPS 'hat' - the one serious failing of the Pi is that it can corrupt the boot drive (a solid state chip the size of your pinky fingernail) if the power goes off suddenly.
              Here's my current rig I just bought from

              From PiShop.us:
              Raspberry Pi 3 B + (Plus) Basic Bundle
              #K2B-1318 $52.40 USD
              (That's the PI and case and stick-on heat sinks)
              Raspberry Pi UPS HAT #1638 $29.95 USD

              From Newegg.com:
              SanDisk 32GB Extreme Pro microSDHC UHS-I/U3 Class 10 V30 A1 Memory Card 100MB/s (SDSQXCG-032G) (about $14 I think)

              I already had:
              Logitech MD320 Keyboard & mouse ($30?)
              An old LG flatscreen TV ($100?)
              A regular HDMI-to-HDMI TV cable ($15?)
              A Raspberry Pi power supply 'wall wart' ($15?)
              Stick the Sandisk card in the adapter and put in in a laptop (most have slots for these).
              Use the PC to download the bootloader and Linux (I suggest Raspbian flavor to start with) from the Raspberry PI web site. Transfer the mini card to the Raspberry and assemble it.
              After it boots you can download drivers for Firefox, Open Office and other non-Windows, non-Google things you might need.
              There are several Windows-like front ends to choose from. There's a line of code you need to run to tell the UPS to safely shut down the Pi if the power goes out. Have fun!
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              • Posted by mccannon01 3 years, 5 months ago
                Nice description with much added detail, thanks. I wasn't going to do that unless AJA requested more info.

                "You don't need a 'monitor'. You need a 'TV'." Yeah, but when some of us old timers stick a TV on a SBC we still call it a monitor. To each their own. If AJA requested more info I would have pointed him to a cheap TV from Amazon, Best Buy, or wherever just to get things started. The important thing is the HDMI to get things going. Actually, I used my home TV to fire up several PI, but then just go "headless" using VNC on my laptop or desktop. I had an application running where a couple of PIs were located in a remote area over 1000 miles away and used a cell phone type router connected to the PIs and I communicated with them from home via VNC screen share and FTP file transfers.

                There are lots of Pi kits and hats out there, if needed, and the end user needs to pay attention to cover whatever needs required.

                I've been using the Logitech K400 plus ($25) wireless with no problems, but there is a wide selection of keyboards as well. Once a Pi is set up and it goes "headless" the keyboard gets put away unless a Pi loses its mind and has to be completely set up from scratch again.

                It's been a while since I've worked with a Pi (model 3 was the last one I worked with) and I notice model 4 is out.
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                • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
                  Great info, McC.
                  I've been using a R-pi3 with a $15 DAC Hat to stream my home stereo music using Volumio (a headless Linux version) for years and it works very well. I control it over wifi with my pc or my smartphone.
                  I feed the output into our Ten Octave Audio LP1 tube preamp that we manufacture here.
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                  • Posted by mccannon01 3 years, 5 months ago
                    Your use of a DAC hat for audio sounds pretty cool! I should have set up decent audio in my house a long time ago but never did :-(.

                    One of my partners picked up an ADC/DAC hat for which I wrote an oscilloscope program for field use (signal checking while setting up remote systems mentioned above - hey, why carry a 'scope when the Pi with a cheap hat can do it on the fly?). Fun project, but the hat was too slow to be of much use for our application. The Pi was fast enough, but a faster ADC/DAC board would be better - better boards are out now, but I'm not in the business anymore.
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          • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
            For windows users, the versions recommended most often are
            Zorin OS
            and
            Mint.
            I expect to try both over the next month.
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            • Posted by lrshultis 3 years, 5 months ago
              I have been using ubuntu for several years since giving up windows 7 which, to me, was the last version of windows that I liked. I have the free version of windows 10 dual booting with ubuntu 18.04, the last version compatible with Mathematica 10.
              Ubuntu is vary easy to get and install. There is a learning curve to get used to how the file system works and for how to get and install new software, best to learn how to use the terminal.
              It is completely free and very fast compared to windows 10.
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              • Posted by $ 3 years, 5 months ago
                Downloaded ubuntu today. Zorin is very clunky and reliably takes super long just to login to. I had issues burning Mints ISO to thumb drive, and then a few more, so I'm thinking I got a poor download.

                I'm not sure any of this will work for an enterprise environment but for a system here and there and maybe on of my resource servers it could work okay.
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                • Posted by lrshultis 3 years, 5 months ago
                  You might like the parallel command.
                  "GNU parallel is a shell tool for executing jobs in parallel using one or more computers. A
                  job can be a single command or a small script that has to be run for each of the lines in
                  the input. The typical input is a list of files, a list of hosts, a list of users, a list
                  of URLs, or a list of tables. A job can also be a command that reads from a pipe. GNU
                  parallel can then split the input into blocks and pipe a block into each command in
                  parallel."

                  I have not used it. The only time iI have done parallel processing is with the math software Mathematica.6 and 10.

                  Ubuntu nicely uses all 4 CPUs in my somewhat antiquated $200USD refurbished hp core i5. Need to get away from a Pentium D, and just in time. It was a dual boot win10 and ubuntu 18.04 and first got windows so it would not load correctly for the last month crashing some programs running in ubuntu.

                  I upgraded an
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      • Posted by Lucky 3 years, 5 months ago
        I've used PCLinuxOS for more than ten years. For a one person user, it does need some effort to use tho' not much computing knowledge. The forum is good (be selective on what you look at on the forum~ deep green left woke).
        The effort may be no more than for using and keeping up-to-date on windows.
        Going back to windows would be a real learning experience for me, has not been necessary.
        There is nothing microsoft on my pc except maybe- some fonts, and a program called IrfanView which has a built-in adapter. My office suite, I use LibreOffice, reads and writes files to windows standards.
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  • Posted by $ Commander 3 years, 5 months ago
    You caught a set-up for future propaganda, possibly a lot more hostile aggression.
    Most will not objectively look at the difference of "Corporate Citizen Policy" and the association of law. Yet the lead-in is that Microsoft knows the law.

    Regarding your story. Homo-sexuality is anti-life. The purpose of life is simply, continuity. Only two conditions support continuity; processing of energy and propagation. While there seems to be evidence of genetic disposition to non-heterosexual relations, the vast majority, as I conceptualize, are Hedonists who want license to practice anti-life.
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    • Posted by $ 3 years, 5 months ago
      Another condition,law, they won't enforce until such time you make a wave. At that point with what they need in place they can feel legitimized about taking action - "You knew. You lied."

      My gut is telling me to make a wave over this. The response could be bad for my job/employment or ability to do my job.
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      • Posted by $ Commander 3 years, 5 months ago
        I'm guessing Linux is the next step.
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        • Posted by $ 3 years, 5 months ago
          trouble is I have 80+ computers and end-users, and roughly 15 servers for a variety of tasks. I'm not sure linux is up to the task for all those things. Even if it were, what of all the applications, AV and software. Plus there are drivers to consider and the risk open-source code.

          I've noticed in Windows Server Core that there is native support for a version of linux. I'm thinking, if history has any relevance, that MS will be targeting linux after to coerces people back into relatively dumb terminals and remote servers (Azure).
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          • Posted by $ Commander 3 years, 5 months ago
            And you are caught within a philosophical trap.
            What do I want to do versus what do I need to do?
            I pondered mine beginning in 2015. How much technology will I enslave myself to versus the options that will pursue true happiness? I looked at cashflow, expenses, income, tax bases.....why was I always so intent on these things? I was caught in a machine of my own making; my own perception/conceptualization. So, I created my new environment in such a manner that I can do without most tools of enslavement and manifested this in March of 2020. It is a process. Fifteen months later.....I've not been so happy since I was six.

            Perhaps a little more assertion. GET THE "F" AWAY FROM THE 'NOISE'! There, I feel better now.

            You are far too valuable a human being to manifest your life in misery created by others....nuff said.
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          • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
            Most of the internet is hosted on Linux servers, AJA. It is quite capable. Whether it is the right fit for you is another question altogether.
            Herding cats is difficult even for Linux.
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgLLK...
            (Y-Tube defaulted to low def, so you may need to change that for good playback.)
            I am convinced that Y-Tube doesn't use Linux because Y-tube seems to take control of my browser every time I play something. Damn Google to hell.
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    • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 3 years, 5 months ago
      I Like the phrase, "only two conditions support continuity, processing of energy and propagation" while I take a more lengthy explanation:

      The basic laws that dictate the functions of the Cosmos, the Universe and all related consequences require that positive electricity seek to be grounded, North magnetism be attracted to South orientated magnetism and all physical living things require a Male and Female components that mirrors the basic laws of the Universe.

      Without said laws and functions...Nothing could exist. Only Evil would reject the basic laws of existence...it is depicted as the snake consuming itself.
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      • Posted by lrshultis 3 years, 5 months ago
        You can sure get mired down in metaphor. There are no "basic laws that dictate the functions of the Cosmos." Existence exists not by some outside laws. Existence depends on nothing, it just is as does your "Cosmos". Laws of nature are just observed relationships and actions of existing matter and radiation not of consciousness and do not cause anything. A brain which is matter and is complex enough to be aware of existence and is an extension of a living body, can direct that body to act on matter and detect electromagnetic energy in the form of light. Laws and functions are secondary to existence in that such relationships only can be only Ideas as with wishes which can not affect reality only, physical actions can.
        Metaphor can only decrease the understanding of objective reality, especially in science and philosophy.
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        • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 3 years, 5 months ago
          I repeat...without electricity and magnetism...nothing could exist.
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          • Posted by lrshultis 3 years, 5 months ago
            Photons and neutrinos and the late Lazar Mayants emon, along with the hypothesized dark matter, could exist without electricity and magnetism. Those properties are due to the electron and its motion. Electricity and magnetism exist due to certain types of matter. Mayants' idea was that since all photons have energy which is equivalent to mass and since the speed of light can not be measured precisely, a particle with mass that he termed emon, for electro-magnetic particle, might exist as the photons and move at speeds, depending on the mass, very near to the speed of light. Difficult to test since the speeds would be extremely close to c.
            The late Thomas Lockyer had a particle theory called Vector Particle Theory in which the vacuum produced photons and neutrinos which interacted producing electron-positron pairs. There was no need to find out why less antimatter than matter because the antimatter positron is hidden in protons which are equal in number to electrons. He wasn't happy with the fractional charges in today's particle physics. And I repeat that electricity and magnetism could not exist without matter and radiation.
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    • Posted by $ Commander 3 years, 5 months ago
      I would have liked to edit this posting but is not available to do so this following morning.
      In The Epoch Times the following is arising in antithesis to the censorship you encountered.

      https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_mor...

      "Nick Vujicic, a motivational speaker who traveled the world through his organization to speak to millions about his Christian faith, became a co-founder of a pro-life bank after he was kicked out of his bank, a false article was published about him, and a grenade was thrown into his house.
      Vujicic learned from the co-founder of his pro-life bank that “most banks give philanthropically under social responsibility to give to causes that provide [to] the biggest abortion clinics in America.”

      Vujicic said that his new bank, Pro-life Bank, will be a religious for-profit entity and will not fund abortion.

      “But we will actually fund 50 percent net profits to Judeo-Christian line nonprofit organizations that are biblically aligned and doing the will of God, according to our belief systems.”

      Vujicic attributed the refusal to provide services to certain individuals by private industries to new standards in business management called Environmental, Social, and Governance considerations (ESG). A person may be evaluated based on whether he or she goes along with the business’s nonprofit causes or is environmentally friendly, Vujicic said."
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    • Posted by $ gharkness 3 years, 5 months ago
      "Regarding your story. Homo-sexuality is anti-life. The purpose of life is simply, continuity. "

      Absolutely true, and succinctly stated. Pretty much anything else is just "icing on the cake" and irrelevant to evolution.
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  • Posted by $ Stormi 3 years, 5 months ago
    It is hard to see how devious our government is, but this all goes back to the original UN Agenda 21, which has redressed as Agenda 2030, and been plagiarized as Green New Deal. Bottom line, wipe out all religion, transfer people to Gaia worship (temple in UN bldg.), and ultimately to one world gov. under UN control. All this race, sexuality, gender crap is just noise to bring it all along. Then all will accept end of property rights, end of rights of pregnacy, end of capitalism, it i all linked, and has been for decades, but generation after generation were taught not to think or reason.
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  • Posted by $ Abaco 3 years, 5 months ago
    There is this recurring element of holding people accountable for the actions of others. That's foundational to CRT, for what it's worth.
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  • Posted by Aurum79 3 years, 5 months ago
    Understand up front that I am totally on board the Objectivism train and I swear to the non-god I am not a mole, a troll, an agent-provocatuer when I say this- there is no acceptable alternative to the Windows OS and compatible software for consumer desktop systems. I am not a tech professional or insider; I am just ferociously pragmatic. So I say retreat is not an option here.
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    • Posted by TheRealBill 3 years, 5 months ago
      here is no acceptable alternative to the Windows OS and compatible software for consumer desktop systems

      That used to be true. It is now the rare case, outside of hard core gaming, that it is true for non-business use. While I'm not a fan of the move, a massive chunk of software has moved to online "web app" stuff. Grandma and Grandpa can easily run on a Chromebook or a MacBook and be better off for it (more so the MacBook, but still true overall). For the new Apple Silicon Macs, that is even more so because you can run your iPhone/iPad apps right on the desktop.


      Tax software for non-business (and even small business): online. Email, web, video, notes, word processing, spreadsheets, all are available via online (such as Google) or locally with non-MS products.

      My wife, quite non-technical, does everything on her MacBook except run her quilting machine - which has its own tablet (that they strongly advise you NEVER connect to the network/internet). She can even manage her embroidery stuff on Mac now w/o my custom software.

      The only time I've really had to help my mother-in-law w/her Mac was when she hadn't upgraded in years and the version she needed was not in the store anymore. Even then she still managed it just fine after I found the download link (we're several states away - in person was not an option). And she is far from a techie.

      Anymore it comes down to gaming and certain professional software categories, or company specific software, that are limited to MS. For the average consumer, MS is no longer the only reasonable game in town.
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      • Posted by Aurum79 3 years, 5 months ago
        Point taken! My tech knowledge is a bit dated. But the meat of it remains- at some point we need to stop retreating from pricks like this. Next, it'll be Mac, or whoever the hell makes Chromebooks (is it Alphabet corporation)?
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        • Posted by freedomforall 3 years, 5 months ago
          Yes, chrome is a Google product.
          Take a look at Linux. It may do what you need to do; Linux is open source and there are many versions maintained for different requirements.
          For example, I use one called Volumio as a music server on a Raspberry Pi $30 computer. That is all that one does, but it is excellent in my home stereo.
          The majority of web sites on the internet are hosted on Linux servers.
          Linux may or may not be the answer for your needs, but it is one way to escape from supporting Big Tech behemoths MSFT, GOOG, APPL.
          Look at Linux Mint and Linux Zorin. They are supposed to be easier to adapt to for Windows users.
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  • Posted by bobsprinkle 3 years, 5 months ago
    Since we are bashing microsoft............
    I bought a new laptop computer a couple of weeks ago. During my search for the best one for my purposes, I noticed they all came with microsoft in S mode. This prevents the user to download or apply ANY software other than microsoft. Fortunately, there is a way to eliminate this. I might have been able to do it myself. The process is not too tough. But, given my past experience with microsoft, I paid to have it done. Ultimately, a good choice. $40 well spent. My choice was a Lenovo ideapad3. so far, I am very happy with my choice.
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  • Posted by Lucky 3 years, 5 months ago
    That para giving a list of prohibited discriminations-
    Strict compliance would be rare, it would be followed more in the breach than in the observance.
    Consider- no labels on bathrooms/rest rooms, no age questions or retirement schemes, no affirmative action, ..
    no sponsoring of sports favoring tall people, no chess clubs as favors Russians,
    and try not answering any questions on an application form on those topics.

    On face value it is meaningless, just for show, posturing, but in real life it is designed to discriminate and get away with it.
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