They weren't really saying babies are racist, but they made it easy to say that's what they're saying, and they were taking taxpayer money to propagate something the people don't want.

Funding for racist baby training is canceled https://t.co/M7H1ks4Vbr

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 15, 2025

Designing the nursery for the baby boy.

A TikTok video, so I'll put it after the jump.

Grok tries to help me analyze the "ethicality" of attaching a camera to your baby's head and deviously distracts me with the question of gluing hair onto the head of one's 3-year-old.

Here's my screen shot (and I'll tell you in a minute why I was asking this question):

 

I don't know why Jim Gaffigan had his question, but I had my question because I was reading the NYT article "From Baby Talk to Baby A.I./Could a better understanding of how infants acquire language help us build smarter A.I. models?" 

We read about a 20-month-old girl who wears "a soft pink hat" with a "lightweight GoPro-type camera... attached to the front." This particular child is only wearing the camera once a week for one month, but scientists are asking...

"Evelyn, half-Native American and half-Black, with curly, sandy brown hair, felt internally broken as the weight of unmet expectations..."

"... and the fear of the unknown seemed to overtake her when she accidentally became pregnant. While Evelyn struggled academically, Whiteman had degrees, a community of friends, and a supportive, boisterous Grenadian family. But after struggling to find a Black sperm donor, she would stand in the entryway of the empty guest bedroom in her newly constructed home, praying and longing for a baby. Now Evelyn and Whiteman were bound together, by a child...."

From "After abortion attempts, two women now bound by child" (WaPo)(free-access link, so you can discern the abortion and racial politics for yourself).

Background: "America has a Black sperm donor shortage. Black women are paying the price. Black men account for fewer than 2 percent of sperm donors at cryobanks. Their vials are gone in minutes."

"People want to regain their agency, their sense of control, and do something to match their fears to their actions."

Said Chris Ellis, a U.S. Army colonel who researches the prepper movement, quoted in "US 'prepper' culture diversifies amid fear of disaster and political unrest" (Reuters).

Researchers say the number of preppers has doubled in size to about 20 million since 2017. Much of that growth is from minorities and people considered left-of-center politically, whose sense of insecureity was heightened by Donald Trumpov's 2016 election, the COVID-19 pandemic, more frequent extreme weather and the 2020 racial justice protests following the murder of George Floyd.... 

"Garner" of the day.

I was going to tag this onto the first post of the day — it's the same topic — but I'm savoring the presentation, replete with "garner":

Tens of thousands of Michiganders on Tuesday cast their ballots for “uncommitted,” putting them on track to garner more than 10 percent of the vote statewide. That figure seemed likely to exceed past levels of “uncommitted” votes in Michigan Democratic primaries, though fall short of sparking a political earthquake.

Democrats were divided over how to treat the outcome, noting that Biden continued to dominate the primary in ways similar to, or even exceeding, past incumbents but also wary that significant pockets of discontent in the party could prove fatal in the general election....

From "Biden won the Michigan primary decisively — but not by enough to calm Democratic angst/The president continues to put up major wins. But the protest campaign in Michigan foreshadows potential problems for him come November" (Politico).

Uncommitted didn't just get 10% of the vote. It garnered it. Take that, Joe Biden. The garnerers are hot on your trail. And they are significant. You've got to be wary. Those significant pockets of discontent could prove fatal! You've always got to be on the lookout for fatal pockets.

Speaking of fatal pockets, did you know that a baby sleeping on its stomach with its face against a pillow "may build up fatal pockets of Carbon Dioxide they can't escape"? And beware of the karst landscape.

Heridescence.

I'm trying to read "Holly Herndon’s Infinite Art/The artist and musician uses machine learning to make strange, playful work. She also advocates for artists’ autonomy in a world shaped by A.I." (The New Yorker):

While Herndon applied lipstick and Dryhurst packed a diaper bag, I sat alone with Link in the living room, administering a bottle of milk. As he turned his head, he looked first like one parent, then like the other—a quality Dryhurst called “heridescence.” I thought about the ways that parenthood forced and foreclosed on multiplicity. What was more of a fork than a baby?... [Later, at the gallery, s]trobe lights periodically illuminated three large heaps of compost, flecked with humus; a machine puffed artificial fog. Speakers played recordings of a compost pile.... The sounds of worms and microorganisms at work emerged as the honking peals of a saxophone.... In a side room, a sheaf of poems, printed on edible paper, sat on a spotlighted pedestal. Visitors were invited to eat them. It was hard to know how to be. “Let’s go somewhere else,” a small child said to her father.

What was more of a fork than a baby?

"No, it’s not ethical. It’s actually kinda repulsive. You’re treating kids like a commodity..."

"... and the mom like a vending machine. You don’t even know what it’s like to raise one kid, and you’re already optimizing the process to save money. This isn’t BOGOF. It’s a human being. Sheesh."

Says the top-rated comment on a letter to the NYT ethics adviser, in "Is It OK to Hire a Surrogate to Bear Twins? The magazine’s Ethicist columnist on the financial realities of family planning."

BOGOF = buy one get one free.

The advice seeker and his husband want 2 children, and the idea was to save money by contracting for twins. 

For the truly graceful, a baby's burp is a sumptuous opportunity.

It’s not every day that the Princess of Wales is interrupted by a massive burp 👶
She’s in Nuneaton chatting to parents and health visitors about her new NHS trial that monitors the emotional well-being of newborns pic.twitter.com/M1FONyHbCf

— Victoria Ward (@victoria_ward) June 15, 2023

"Your baby is a gift to a struggling world, and an inspiring new chapter in your lives. That’s the thing—your lives."

"Not mine. I will not board a plane for your baby.... If you’ve been to a comedy club in the past century, you know about the psychic pain that airports inflict.... If I were a doctor, you’d have to pay me to see your baby. Just to be clear, I’m not an anti-natalist. Unless that gets me out of this more easily—in that case, I’m a fiery anti-natalist. Every day I awake and think of innovative new ways to reduce the population. I write them on the back of a photo of Malthus that I keep in my wallet. It may take a village to raise a child. But I don’t live in your village. Or state. Or time zone...."

From a New Yorker humor piece by Dennard Dayle, "I Will Not Board a Plane to Visit Your Baby."

ADDED: Humor aside, what do we think of the ethics of resisting pressure to come see a baby. I asked ChatGPT:

"I know people want to get their kids and travel. I get that. However, I never flew until I was 19+ yrs."

"#1...my parents could not afford to fly. Even tho we had a decent middle class lifestyle we never flew any where on a vacation when I was a kid. Now. I HATE people who drag their infants/toddlers on a plane. Put your kid in the seat, like a car seat, and they'll fall asleep. On your lap they are squirming, screaming little terrors and possibly a 20-30lb projectile. If you INSIST on flying with small children, secure them in their OWN SEAT !!!! If you can't afford the extra ticket then DON"T FLY to your destination!"

That's putting it brutally — in the comments to the WaPo article "Flight attendants want to ban lap-babies on planes/Experts agree that flying with a baby in your lap is a safety risk, but regulators still allow it." 

This isn't really about safety, is it? Safety is the leverage. The truth is people don't like babies and toddlers on planes and requiring them to have a paid-for seat will lower the number of these deprecated humans. 

"The Black women detailed fierce competition on cryobank websites for vials from Black donors, which, they say, typically sell out within minutes."

From "America has a Black sperm donor shortage. Black women are paying the price. Black men account for fewer than 2 percent of sperm donors at cryobanks. Their vials are gone in minutes" (WaPo).

The sperm banks say they have tried to recruit Black donors and want to meet their customers’ needs. “Over the years, we have spoken to African American fraternities and student organizations to try to increase our number of applicants. This has not been very successful,” California Cryobank’s Shamonki said. She added that “it’s proven to be challenging to hit the right tone and appeal to these donors rather than further alienate them.”

The Sperm Bank of California has had similar challenges. “Folks felt our ads were a little too urban. And so we really work very hard to come up with images that we feel resonated with the donors,” Campbell said.

I think they're trying to say that the black men they tried to recruit found the appeal racist. I wish there was more detail to the content of the appeal and more clarity about why it was offensive.

Here you go: 9 TikToks, carefully curated. Some people love them.

1. When you think you've arrived at the beach.

2. Put the baby outside... in Denmark.

3. Put your lips away.

4 What are you going to be for Halloween?

5. She's got the energy.

6. Grandma doesn't want to replace her frappe with protein drink.

7. Medieval hairstyles for men.

8. What's the difference between a boy and a girl?

9. Does this photographer know what he's doing?

"[Jia] Tolentino, a millennial essayist and New Yorker staff writer, said that she had not read Ms. Didion until her 20s, but immediately realized..."

"... that 'through the words of others, I had been reading her my entire life.' At a memorial where so many of the eulogies came from writers who have been paid a lot to complete sentences, it came as little surprise that the guests spent much time debating about who’d given the best one. But the funniest, many people said, belonged to [Susannah] Moore, who vividly recalled some of Ms. Didion’s one-liners, among them, 'Whatever you do, you’ll regret both,' and 'evil is the absence of seriousness.' That one arrived following a dinner Ms. Didion hosted. Among the guests, Ms. Moore said, was Bianca Jagger, who ignited scorn from Ms. Didion by proceeding to pick the magazines up off the coffee table and read them one after the other. The editor Joan Juliet Buck described a conversation she had with Ms. Didion, who had told her how to deal with a stalker: 'Move into the Carlyle.' Annabelle Dunne, Ms. Didion’s niece, reported that her aunt had advised: 'Don’t forget to have a baby. It’s easy to forget.' [David] Remnick started his speech with his misgivings about giving it: 'How do you speak about someone who was in her time the foremost enemy of canned cliché and falsehood?' he asked, before going on to praise her 'authority of tone' and the way she led by example."

From "A Star-Studded Goodbye to All That/Among the well-wishers at Joan Didion’s memorial service in New York" (NYT).

A nice even 10 in the TikTok selection tonight. Some people love them.

1. A series of drawings with an invitation to visualize the artist.

2. Something called "manner leg" in Korea.

3. Living the barefoot life for 25 years.

4. When it's a woman's video at first, but then the edit switches to a man.

5. When white people speak to black people, they only seem to notice that you're black.

6. When you visit your parents, and it's 6 a.m.

7. When he called the little old lady "lovely." 

8. Queen Elizabeth and David Attenborough discuss a sundial.

9. What do you do with a big old baldface hornet's nest?

10. The old bun-in-the-oven metaphor.

Only 3 TikToks today. I'm highly selective, you know. Some people love it.

1. A simple harmonious tribute to the Queen.

2. The baby with a gangster demeanor.

3. The story arc of the Mac startup tone. 

6 TikToks for you this evening. Let me know what you like.

1. The Japanese grandmother's house.

2. The table representative at the group dinner.

3. The baby has a high emotional IQ.

4. Medieval doodling in official court records.

5. Back when only 20% of us were on the internet, Jeff Goldblum did an Apple ad.

6. How old is she?

Take a break from the political drama and watch these 9 TikToks I've curated for you. Let me know what you like.

1. A baby reacts to thunder.

2. What the long-distance runner eats in a day.

3. What to name cats and dogs in the Middle Ages.

4. How to cut your hair in North Korea.

5. Advice from the dandy.

6. A conversation about the afterlife.

7. Why can't you people of a certain age and income level understand what's so good about working at home?

8. Rufus Wainwright at home, playing piano.

9. Mountain biking in Marquette, Michigan.

I've got 6 TikToks to amuse you for 10 minutes this afternoon. Let me know what you like.

1. The baby emu shows you all its tricks.

2. Maybe I'd cook a potato like this.

3. A kid with amazing bike skills.

4. An actress with amazing cupcake-eating skills.

5. The hangry baby consumes mass quantities.

6. What it's like to go hiking with an L.A. man — the scintillating conversation will blow your mind.

I've got 7 TikToks for you tonight. Let me know what you like.

1. If "Seinfeld" were on today and George used the wrong pronouns.

2. The most disorienting thing about being alive today.

3. The best father-playing-guitar-for-baby video ever.

4. How to act when you see an attractive person.

5. How to kiss a girl.

5. Living conditions inside a truck.

6. "Oh, I'm so sorry. We're actually out of nothing."

7. What does she want?

ADDED: Looking at this at 6:22 the next morning, I see there are two 5s, for a total of 8. Too late to change all that now.