Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2020 August 10

= August 10 =

Nordic perfection?
Recently, after quite some thorough, profound investigation in what have until lately been regarded as universally applicable aesthetic and beauty standards (cf. e. g. here) – and particularly those within the scope of modern-day Western culture –, and pertaining comparative studying of faces generally to be deemed highly attractive in the universal context as well as within the aforesaid specific cultural sphere, I have come to a conclusion I had already assumed / suspected long beforehand (– and in this I may be very much mistaken!):

In my "final" and – please do believe me! – very carefully considered judgement, it has come to my attention that faces displaying what are considered to be Nordic (or partly also referred to as Nordid) features appear to meet crucial aesthetic concepts – such as facial symmetry, and the "classic modern canon" of facially attractive traits (such as well-proportioned, relatively high-built facial structure, straight and narrow nose, prominent chin (especially in men), well-defined jawline, high cheekbones, rather upright, evenly curved forehead, [meso]dolichocephaly – to a degree and rate otherwise possibly unparalleled or apparently – if at all on a comparable scale – only met by a significantly smaller rate in any other Caucasian phenotype that can be legitimately subsumed to a certain set of determinable ethnically characteristic, recurrent physical properties (e. g. perhaps Mediterranids, which are, however, said to have once migrated towards norther Europe and thus might have influenced the Nordic phenotype). (With good reason, I explicitly do not want to apply the obsolete and – also apart from that – highly controversial, strongly (and rightly so!) contested term "race" per se here.)

As an example in terms of the mentioned criterion of degree (meaning an extraordinary quality of fulfilling aesthetical standards), I would like to present this photograph. Warning: This image might be considered NSFW – although it, in fact, "only" shows a male face. (Also, I beg to apologize for the fact that the image is taken from an image stock repository, and I was not able to find a version without the annoying web-page labelling.)

I was uncapable of finding an image of a non-Nordic Caucasian person – i. e. one of at least both dark [brown or black] eye and hair color – with facial features (apart from fair eye and hair color) as virtually "flawless", that is as stunningly symmetrical, well-proportioned, clearly and finely chiselled, and with such a seemingly flawless skin condition as in the selected photograph. However, of course I am more than fully aware of the fact that, generally speaking, aesthetics and beauty are to be considered highly subjective.

Now please do by no means misunderstand this inquiry as a racist one! In particular, I neither intend to advocate nor approve of any politically extremist, supremacist, elitist, or segregationist ideologies whatsoever – like Nordicism, for instance – in any way. This inquiry is meant as a self-critical (!) reflection, and invitation for comments exclusively on the subject of modern facial, physical aesthetics. Besides, I myself do resemble the phenotype in question not in the slightest, in other words neither the one of the given examplary picture nor the [Hallstatt (?) "Nordid" type] in general.

Hence, my question remains: Am I possibly mistaken by my findings, that is to say simply "blinded" by the shine of blue eyes and blond hair, omitting the fact that the common [Western] canon of beauty is otherwise met indeed on a comparable level (degree) and in a similar rate in dark-eyed and -haired Caucasian populations as well? And, in addition, if my conclusion does actually not prove wrong (which I would find hard to believe, though), could this be the actual explanation for the fact that there are still obviously far more light-eyed and blond celebrities fancied as the ultimate, paramount desirable [Western] icons of attractiveness ("sex symbols"), especially including [super]models and actors?--Hildeoc (talk) 19:59, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * See Physical attractiveness. Alansplodge (talk) 20:27, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * This whole topic area is so rife with the possibility of degenerating into exactly what you claimed it wasn't, that I wonder what you intend by even raising this question here. On the one hand, Wikipedia is WP:NOTCENSORED, but on the other, with a background topic area of comparative physical standards of beauty among different races, your actual question is, "Am I... 'blinded' by the shine of blue eyes and blond hair?" I would point out that your question appears to be outside the scope of this page, which calls for:
 * Specific questions, that are likely to produce reliable sources, and states that:
 * We don't answer requests for opinions, predictions or debate.
 * Assuming good faith once, I'll respond to your question:
 * Yes, you are blinded by it. Please follow the recommendations at the top of this page next time, before posing your question. Hope this helps, Mathglot (talk) 20:29, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Thank you, first of all, for your response to my issue. Perhaps it will help you to learn about my personal background, which is also somewhat the "background" of this thread: I am a male 27-year-old social sciences student from Germany, and I have a not-German family background on both of my parents' sides: My father is a born New Yorker of Ukranian Jewish descent (now living in Paris), while my mother was born in Poland (having an ethnic German background though). As you can perchance imagine, I have experienced several incidents of Anti-Semitism chiefly at fairly conservative Catholic schools, but also at university due to my typical Jewish appearance (large hooknose, dark eyes and hair) and name (that is both surname and first name). Thus, maybe my perception of Nordic superiority in terms of aesthetics is after all – amongst other things – to some degree also the outcome of a certain inferiority complex of mine, which may has – at least partly – been incured by the "traumatic" experiences referred to above, and a continuous intellectual dealing of mine with the relevant historical backgrounds as well as current social phenomena associated to that topic – perhaps inferring that the [stereo]typical Jewish-Armenoid phenotype – particularly in males – can in some ways be regarded somewhat as an ugly "opposite" or "mockery" of what Nordic beauty, meaning physical shapeliness, elegance and hence attractiveness represent, and that is, in fact, not only in women but also in men (as featured in an examplary manner within the linked images). (To take things to extremes, this could probably serve as a kind of "caricatural escalation" of a representation of Judaeo-Semitic-Armenoid phenotypical homeliness …)--Hildeoc (talk) 10:36, 11 August 2020 (UTC)


 * There is no such thing as "universal" beauty. You are attracted to whatever you are attracted to. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:34, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry, but apparently there does seem to be something alike. Beauty is thus obviously not [only] in the eye of the beholder.--Hildeoc (talk) 20:38, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Are you going to let self-styled experts dictate to you what beauty is? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:46, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Anyhow, by way of a reference, The “preference” paradox: Disclosing racial preferences in attraction is considered racist even by people who overtly claim it is not, from the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. Alansplodge (talk) 21:37, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * If you're attracted (or not) to a particular race, no amount of pseudo-intellectual shaming is going to change that. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 21:41, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * I'd prefer if Scandinavian women face-shape attractiveness distribution was more like other whites, especially Jews. If only they could equal Jewish women for "best face distribution on Earth" then they could also tie them for "most beautiful women on Earth". When I'm blinded by blue-eyed blondes they're usually less Nordic like Germans or Slavs. You know that mid-20th century Nazi Sonja Henie from Norway? She's ridiculously hot though. Anywhere from Bangladesh and Russia to Iceland and Arctic Finnoscandinavia to the Muslim belt is a zone of high attractive female percentage in my book. What do you think of that? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:18, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much for your openness towards the issue of my inquiry – which is certainly a highly delicate one! – and sharing your opinion – including your personal preferences and inclinations. For the Jewish women please see my reply to Mathglot above explaining my personal background and motivation for this inquiry. Apart from that, I find your "ideal" of female beauty expressed in this context very interesting. As far as Sonja Henie is concerned, I would say that she would actually not be my personal cup of tea, since I find her facial features and stature too round and doll-like, as a matter of fact. Also, I am not quite sure if she would fully meet universal beauty standards as definable by what has been termed the "science of beauty" (cf. hereto e. g. Nancy Etcoff's pertinent work Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty).


 * This "specimen" may also give a quite appropriate rendition of what I was referring to above – I haven't come across any representation of the Mediterranean type, for instance, – which seems to have quite a lot in common with the Nordic type in terms of skull and face shape – with a facial structure as well-balanced and defined as elegantly clear-cut and chisseled (note in detail the archetypal statue-like eye shape reminding of statues from Greco-Roman antiquity, the fine, straight, long nose, the remarkably even, i. e. hardly sloping / receding forehead (for a male!), the clear, well-shaped jaw-line, the "perfect" mouth and lips, the discreet ears). Everything in this face appears extremely well-proportioned, -defined and graceful – which is to say, conveying all together an impression probably describable most accurately as being very noble with respect to aesthetics. (I really wish I had a face like that … 😞) This kind of grace is what I have actually kept looking for in other Caucasian types. (In contrast, to my mind, some black African and Asian types, for instance, do show this kind of lean, "plain", smooth, elegant long facial shape in combination with the fine features considered as classic yardsticks of distinct beauty mentioned and depicted above as well – confer e. g. this guy or this one, the latter one displaying blue eyes though, i. e. a Nordic trait once again …)--Hildeoc (talk) 07:47, 11 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Well she looks remarkably mundane in some photographs and ridiculously hot in others. Henie is too short for me too but only a few inches, not enough to cause a "short body shape" much. So what kind of "Nordic" female is most goddessy to you? What do you think of Rose DeWitt Bukater being drawn? Now that's a beautiful woman. Too round-faced for you probably. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:54, 11 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Well, if you're asking me personally, I certainly prefer long, lean faces – like Liv Tyler's, Bar Refaeli's or Judith Rakers' … However, as I've noticed, you find very beautiful women in probably all parts of the world but as far as I can see from real life (though this may be biased, of course, by the fact that I live in a country with a relatively high ratio of people having Nordic traits) and the media, you won't find as handsome (that is apart from light eye and hair color!) men (at least not in such a high rate) as those with Nordic features, at least with light eyes, within the Caucasian population. Regarding the latter aspect, I recently created this thread here.--Hildeoc (talk) 11:05, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Their lips are ugly. Spaniard men are sexy in USA, it doesn't have to be always blond and blue. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 13:17, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Who's lips exactly?--Hildeoc (talk) 16:48, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
 * All three but Bar Refaeli's lips are least ugly. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 20:56, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
 * I know this is not a forum like Reddit or something, but since you started asking for names: How can you seriously claim Brody with his grotesque beak and freaky features to be handsome but all three women's lips to be ugly? Their lips are not at all deviating from the standard of a beautiful female mouth, or are they? On the contrary: I mean look at them …! (Unfortunately, the lead images in their articles here are just rather crappy in comparison.)--Hildeoc (talk) 15:42, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * OK Brody is a only for some people face and some pictures and certain hairstyle(s) and facial hair styles make him look better and as a straight male I'm not fully qualified to judge but I've seen picture where if you don't mind Jewish faces he protects rugged masculinity. I don't mind if womens' noses are long, in fact too Asian-like a nose on a white (like some Irish) is slightly unattractive to me, if I'd date her if her nose was sexier I'd always still date her the way she is but it's not a plus. The desert dude in the Mummy or Mummy Returns movie was pretty Mediterranean and pretty hot don't you think? Or Valentino, that Italian dude who played Arabs in movies in the 1920s and was the sex god of his day. I just don't like any of the threes' lips okay? Look at Rose DeWitt Bukater (red hair) being drawn and tell me those lips, while not the best on Earth, aren't better than your 3 "goddesses" who I'd never even think twice about passing them on the street. Now maybe the most beautiful female I've ever seen who made me turn around to continue staring in awe when I was already almost 30 and lived in New York all my life was a Jewish woman, she made Sonja Henie look mundane. Perfect everything in the same female, not a single thing like calf shape or nose or anything was not perfect. I wonder what she would've thought if she had seen me lol, she was almost the right angle to notice my expression. There's a saying in the English language "beauty is in the eye of the beholder", average faces may be attractive to more people but there is always someone who likes what most people don't. Besides the incel video you might also want to read self-hating Jew. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:42, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Okay I guess those lips are average in those 3 cherry-picked photographs. Nothing special. They look just like any other actress, not going to be asymmetric or anything in that line of work but the mundane kind of actress, not the actually attractive ones like Natalie Portman or Cameron Diaz in Gangs of New York if her lips weren't so ugly, and they're not even the most attractive actresses. Franky I'd rather have Amy from the Big Bang Theory than your 3 even though the character looks like a man. What do you think of Amish lips lol. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 17:16, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * All right, let me make a few things clear here:
 * I am not speaking of attractiveness in the sense of mere "sex appeal", as you seem to do. To refer to the examples given by you above: yes, they're definitely all "sexy", but they also definitely not all have faces to be considered extraordinarily beautiful in the classic sense. I guess we can agree on that point.
 * I have no libido when I see the very most beautiful females even when I haven't ejaculated in awhile, love at first sight drives out sex drive and the very most beautiful clothed women (yes, face too) and sexist fully clothed women are not the same people. The ones that make you horny even when you weren't before and their clothes aren't sexy, not the same people. I've literally felt my libido go away when I see female stranger, is not sex drive. Another goddess was an Ashkenazi wife pushing a stroller with her man and both in full very Orthodox clothing. I did not do anything that might offend them but wow. Again, not a sex drive first and beauty second kind of female. I think Rose is beautiful too (not really when Jack first sees her) but I've seen her down to mons Venus and "covered by clothes but not then sector" is my type too so of course I'm going to think of her as sexy too. She still has beautiful face and hair to me. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 01:18, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
 * (similar to 1) With regard to men, I am not talking about masculinity in the first place. Maybe even quite the opposite: to me, extremely handsome male faces – as far as canon "Western" aesthetics are concerened – seem to actually have a certain slight "femininity" about them – but, as already said above, without making those men appear "effeminate" or "unmanly". And this kind of "male grace" is what I think you only find rather rarely in non-Nordic male faces. For whatever reason. That's all I was trying to contend, discuss, and, in case my hypothesis should in fact prove true, find out about the reasons for hereby.
 * If you are straight it's easier to think of slightly feminine men as more handsome than rugged masculinity but women aren't gynophile (unless they're at least a little bi). However just like some men don't always prefer to fall in love with dream wife ASAP or ejaculate quick with someone who looks like 1000 USD prostitute there will always be women who always or sometimes like the handsome but not hypermasculine men and others who sometimes or always fantasize about rugged masculinity. Why do you think they're sometimes on romance novels? Cause those mens are good genes but more likely to leave and not be a good father cause they can get female quick. Look at Chinese, Japanese and Korean faces on Google and tell me if there's any that are as sectsy handsome as your subset of Nordics. This should not be hard I don't think and maybe extra data points will get me to see what you mean. Is Jack Dawson handsome enough? Millions of females think so. Draco Malfoy, Nordic looking, bad guy but if he wasn't is that handsome? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 01:18, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Even though my arguing may have created a different impression, I would not consider myself a "self-hating Jew". First of all, my mother is not Jewish, and I was baptized a Catholic (my father is an Atheist). Secondly, I am not really struggling with the fact that I have Jewish blood as such. Probably, it's more the opposite: the Jewish people is a small one with a very fascinating history, and of great achievements for the whole of mankind – that is a people which would truly deserve high respect, not hatred! What I am certainly – and exclusively – struggling with, however, is the often unbecoming, stigmatic appearance of Jews (including myself), and that especially in comparison to what I tried to contrast and illustrate as "Nordic beauty". In this context, to be honest, I think it's kind of a shame that nobody here was really willing to go into my thesis on a factual, non-personal basis yet, but I guess I will simply have to accept that this matter is not PC enough (at least for Wiki) to be openly discussed.--Hildeoc (talk) 23:12, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
 * How do you know that woman you encountered on the street was Jewish?--Hildeoc (talk) 23:12, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
 * A white with groceries who unlocks a house in that neighborhood like she lives there is almost certainly Jewish. A little less likely if she looks super-Gentile but she didn't. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 01:18, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
 * PS: Referring to male beauty (see my statement above) of dark-eyed and -haired Caucasian phenotypes, I wonder why you don't see more faces around like this one or that one, for instance …--Hildeoc (talk) 15:42, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * You do see them cause they sexy (no homo). Inglesias, Zorro, Italian and French lovers, Adrian Brody... Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 21:06, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Adrien Brody – come on, are you serious?! Well, his face is certainly sympathetic, but beautiful, in the classic[al] sense? I mean already his – yep, sorry, but it's simply the painful goddamn truth – Jewish nose is an aesthetic disaster (except you have a certain "exotic nose" fetish (diverging from the – still ruling – classic [Western] beauty standards), which does occur in some women, though probably pretty rarely) – not only because it is grotesquely large, crooked and fleshy at the bottom (like mine), but also distinctly tilting to one side, as can be seen from here. (Sorry, Adrien, but to me, my schnozz (which is not as tilting and also not that "spookily" composed otherwise, and yet still not much better) is already more than reasons enough to dread even attempting to be fooled into believing I may have a chance with any extant real beauty compos mentis – but please believe me when I say I'm totally fine with that for various reasons, so definitely not an incel! @Ian.thomson)
 * As for the "Mediterranean"-type beaus, they don't really seem to dominate the model and showbiz markets as beacons of aesthetic perfection, do they? (This was of course different 2000 and more years ago, where it were just the fearsome blond and blue-eyed barbarians who were considered unkempt and ugly …) And from my insights (mainly from web research), their features appear to tend to be, in sweeping terms, more coarse (= masculine?), not quite as balanced, elegant, filigree as with the Nordic hunks, who, however, at the same time do not give an impression effeminate or similar. (So, once again: I am certainly not speaking of women here!) Now that cleft is exactly what I'm worrying about and was trying to point at.--Hildeoc (talk) 01:50, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * PS: I think the whole thing is really weird: When you google images for terms like "ugly", "ugly person", "incel", "truecel" etc., probably about 99 % of the hits you will get actually show people with dark eyes (and mostly hair, too) although they say that about 10 % of the world population are blue-eyed. Isn't that – from an objective stance – a bit strange, after all?--Hildeoc (talk) 06:39, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Go watch the video I linked to. Watch all of it.  You are putting yourself in an abusive self-relationship with this "research."  You're just brainwashing to induce an image dysphoric depression, no matter how much you use the words "research" or "objective." Ian.thomson (talk) 07:20, 13 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Thank you for responding. But what exactly do you mean by "brainwashing to induce an image dysphoric depression"? Whom am I brainwashing? Why should I do that? Why "image"? What good would such an "image" do me? And who am I "inducing" it to? I'm sorry but I really can't follow anymore right now. Please assume good faith! The issue of this thread was indeed not supposed to be revolving around myself and my personal situation but about the accountable "facts" on the actual distribution of [outstanding] especially male attractiveness among Caucasian people.


 * I still find it strange that – now looking at it as it were from the other side of the "aesthetic spectrum" – one also seems to find hardly any people with Nordic traits as abominably unsightly as those of non-Nordic phenotype on the web, and that is to say not only qualitatively (degree) but as well quantitatively (rate) speaking, since in a ratio that apparently differs – at least with regard e. g. to the frequency of blue eyes – from the expectable corresponding proportion within the world's general population (≈9:1) in a significant manner (Sample?).


 * To sum up: In my view, at least by what Google reveals, the quality and rate of strikingly beautiful [male] physiognomy (by Western, if not universal standards as definable, in fact, by the "Science of Beauty" I'd say we could definitely use an article on this interesting subject here … ) with "Nordic faces", and the quality and rate of strikingly unattractive [male] physiognomy with non-Nordic ones appear to be both clearly out of the pertinent demographic relations. But please do feel free to prove the opposite if you still deem my overall impression inaccurate.--Hildeoc (talk) 10:23, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * This whole thread is nothing but you looking for reinforcement for the notion that there's some objective and singular standard for human attractiveness, that you admit you're not part of. Your picture searches are anecdotal evidence that completely fails to take into account how Google's software works and ignores academic studies of global populations (which finds that averaged faces are generally preferred, not specific types).  You are using themes and ideas that were developed within the Incel as a contagious form of unhealthy thinking.  If you are really serious about research, then watch the video I've linked twice now, it really does cut to the root of the ideas you're discussing.  Ian.thomson (talk) 10:33, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * In what concrete respect do you think Google's software has distorted my findings on the issue in question then? And why exactly do you claim my picture searches "ignore academic studies of global populations"? In what way do these examples not represent what academic studies relate as the "Science of Beauty"?--Hildeoc (talk) 23:14, 14 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Does any of this research mark those phenotypes as actually originating with Nordic populations, or does it just run with 19th and early 20th century assumptions that it must? Did any of this research happen to be advocated by the Incel community, or did it even come straight from there?  (If that's the case, please watch this before going deeper down that rabbit hole).  Throw a someone you'd consider archetypally Nordic (I'm gonna say Dolph Lundgren?) to Tanzania, and the women going after him will be the sort who say they're prefer "exotic" over "handsome" men -- this is in line with other animals.  Ian.thomson (talk) 08:36, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

"Gynophile" is not in the Oxford English Dictionary, but gyno is the Greek word for "woman" and philia the word for "affection". I'm surprised anyone felt the need to make up a new word for this. 2A00:23C5:E11F:D400:B8C2:7E80:B188:3020 (talk) 10:54, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

In the USA, does an Acting President have the same powers as the President?
In the USA, there are some occasions for which we have an "acting president" who takes over for the "real" president. (I think this happened when one of the Bush presidents had to undergo surgery?) Question:  when a person is the "acting president", do they have the same exact powers as the "real" president? Or are there some limitations? Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:25, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Also, if it is the Vice President who becomes "acting president" ... do we then also establish an "acting vice president"? And who is that?  And does it continue on, down the line ... Acting Speaker of the House ... etc.?    Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:28, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Read Acting president of the United States for the three recent examples. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 21:30, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't think there is an acting VP in the event that the VP is temporarily an acting president. The acting president is also still the VP (and President of the Senate).  In the case where a VP becomes president by succession, the now-president nominates a new VP who has to be confirmed by the Senate.  The VP office is vacant until a new one is confirmed.  I similarly don't think there is an acting Speaker in the situation where the incumbent can't fulfill her duties.  A lot of those duties are ceremonial (tapping a gavel at the start of a session etc) so she simply delegates them to another congressmember if she has something else going on at the time.  If the Speaker's post became vacant, the House would elect a new Speaker.  I don't know if there are special rules for doing that in the middle of a term. Apparently intrigue over potential succession is a factor in VP choices.  I have heard that Trump chose Pence as his VP because Pence was one of the few politicians who didn't seem to want to be president.  Similarly, there is organized opposition among Biden's supporters to some of Biden's possible VP choices on the theory that the VP candidate might be angling for the top job.  Pro tip: if you run for president, don't pick a VP who sits around sharpening a knife all day ;-).  2602:24A:DE47:BB20:50DE:F402:42A6:A17D (talk) 23:55, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * There is no acting Vice President because the Vice President only has two real jobs: 1) To preside over the Senate and cast a tie breaking vote if needed. They basically never preside over the Senate anymore, and tie breaking votes are rare enough as well.  See List of tie-breaking votes cast by the vice president of the United States.  2) To be alive in case the President dies or is incapacitated.  That is the entire list of roles the Vice President has.  The first Vice President, John Adams actually did the job of presiding over the Senate, which he did more out of  boredom than anything else, and he lamented the do-nothing nature of the job, writing to Abigail Adams on one occasion that the job was "the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived."  John Nance Garner, FDR's first Veep, said more poignantly of the job "The vice-presidency isn't worth a pitcher of warm piss."  Until 1967, with the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, there was no mechanism to replace a Vice President, that 18 times there has been a period when the U.S. didn't have a Vice President, either because he died himself or he replaced a dead president, and that includes 14 of the first 29 presidencies, meaning that only slightly less than half of the first 29 presidents had time in office without a Vice President.  The concept of an "Acting President" in modern times is just to allow for things like when the sitting president has to go under anesthesia for surgery, and have been mostly inconsequential.  It's a pro-forma thing, and doesn't necessitate having to name an acting VP (since the VP has very little meaningful role in the government anyways).  -- Jayron 32 11:59, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Question: when a person is the "acting president", do they have the same exact powers as the "real" president? Or are there some limitations? The sole limitations on the office of Acting President of which I am aware reside in, and deal with the termination of the office of the Acting President. Specifically, under subsection (c), the Acting President shall no longer serve as Acting President when the cause for his or her taking up the office is resolved. The office of Acting President does not exist in the Constitution, and is wholly a creature of statute. Therefore, the Congress may theoretically impose limitations or restrictions as it wishes... but it is unclear if those would be constitutional. The way I see it, in an Acting President situation, the Constitutional duties of the President reside in the Office of President rather than in the person carrying out those duties. Thus, an Acting President should be able to sign a bill into law, dismiss the heads of non-independent federal agencies, appoint federal judges, act as head of state for treaty purposes, and authorize the release of nuclear weapons, just as a duly-elected President would.Impeachment of an Acting President would be quite interesting, however. 199.66.69.67 (talk) 20:04, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
 * The issue with that is more practical than anything. The time frame of most presidential actions takes far longer to complete than the time that any Acting President has served in the office.  None of them has yet served longer than a day, and the process of say, appointing a federal judge and seeing them through the nomination process takes far longer than that.  The Constitutional Amendment in question does allow for a procedure to solve conflicts between the President and Acting President when the Acting President refuses to step down, so yes hypothetically they could serve for no more than a month before Congress can have them forcibly removed (and it can be faster), but most of what they could do can still be blocked and/or undone when he's gone.  -- Jayron 32 11:16, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, all. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 00:16, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

Klan bible
KKK leader drove through a crowd of protesters, hitting 3. They found KKK paraphenalia including robes and a Klan bible in his house. I know about KKK robes but I hadn't heard of a Klan bible. I just found the article Kloran: could that be what they meant? Or is there actually a Klan bible saying to kill the [whatever]? The Kloran sounds more like a jargon dictionary than religious doctrine.

It also sounds to me like the guy was seriously undercharged, with misdemeanor assaults rather than terrorism and attempted murder. Is that plausibly due to some kind of Klan sympathy from the court? The prosecutor included a hate crime charge that was dropped because the victims were white, supposedly making the case law confusing. However it would seem like even that is something for an appelate court to figure out. What a crappy case. 2602:24A:DE47:BB20:50DE:F402:42A6:A17D (talk) 22:59, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * They could have meant either the Kloran (which is a "Klan Bible" in the sense of foundational doctrine) or maybe scriptures of Creativity (religion).
 * And yeah, it's funny how the courts treat the KKK a legitimate organization with any crimes committed by its members as anomalies, but the Black Panther Party is revolutionary for following the same open carry laws as that prevented white people getting arrested at the Bundy standoff and the Unite the Right rally. Or did they get in trouble for feeding kids, even the ones that ain't white?  I wonder why the KKK and the alt-right get off while people protesting police brutality against black people get shot in the face with rubber-coated metal bullets? Ian.thomson (talk) 23:20, 10 August 2020 (UTC)


 * "Members of the KKK swore to uphold American values and Christian morality" according to our article, so perhaps it was an actual Bible? See THE BIBLE & THE KLAN - THE KKK IS INCREASINGLY TURNING TO SCRIPTURE TO LEGITIMIZE ITS MESSAGE OF RACIAL HATRED Alansplodge (talk) 16:58, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
 * It is probably a regular KJV Bible that is published with an additional first page that has some Klan symbolism/artwork and blank spaces where the name of the member and the date of his joining can be recorded.
 * “Organizational bibles” like this are issued by many fraternal groups in the US (with their own symbolism/artwork) - and since the Klan does like to portray itself as “just another fraternal group”, it wouldn’t surprise me if they did so as well. Blueboar (talk) 17:32, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Several news sources put "Klan bible" between scare quotes, suggesting that this was not a Christian Bible. Others report that police found "Klan literature", without being more specific. --Lambiam 10:09, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Many sources identify the Klan bible with the Kloran:, , , , . --Lambiam 10:27, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

Do any of you chaps use Google? http://images.library.wisc.edu/WI/EFacs/WiscKKK/RiverFalls/KlanEphem/reference /wi.klanephem.i0004.pdf Mmmarkkk (talk) 01:34, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes. So what? Do you have a source identifying specifically this text with the Klan literature found in the polcie search as mentioned in the news reports? --Lambiam 18:42, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Funny how Klansmen and child fantasy (genre) fans both like exotic names. And spkelling in kways that make grammar Nazis want to klaw their eyes out. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 21:22, 11 August 2020 (UTC)