Keep Jok Church away from your kids

Note: stay with me on this one. The point of this entry comes after a lengthy start, but it is a point definitely worth noting. For those who are impatient, you may skip straight to the point.

If you're not familiar with Jok Church, he is the chucklehead who writes the You Can with Beakman and Jax strip (under the guise of "Beakman," a nerdy yet unintelligent "scientist," and "Jax," essentially Beakman in drag) for many Sunday paper funny pages. Weekly, children (we assume) write in questions for him to answer. He then takes the question, grazes by an answer that may or may not be correct, and then describes an experiment that is usually loosely related to the question at hand. In the past, I've thought some of his answers were not the best, but they were still valid enough that I let it go. It wasn't until last November, when he wrote a completely misinformed column involving ozone and global warming, that I actually took the time to email him about the idiocy he was peddling.

In that column, he told everyone they should have all their electrical devices on power strips, and when they are not using them, they should turn off the power strip. In my email, I said to him:

Your recommendation regarding turning things off via power strip instead of letting them go to standby mode is valid, but not in all circumstances. For example, a VCR that timer records a program for you has semi-volatile memory, and if the power to it is completely cut for an extended period of time, it will lose all its programs and settings. Your advice is similar to telling someone to unplug a clock when they are not looking at it. The device needs to have a steady stream of power, even when not being interacted with by a human, in order to continue the correct functionality it was designed to have.

He went even further into idiocy in that column when he stated that anyone who keeps a computer on 24 hours a day is stupid (his exact word of choice... great role model) and that a computer uses the same amount of power whether it is running a screen saver or a game. My reply to him was as follows:

Even more ridiculous is your notion about computers. I was astounded when you actually claimed keeping a computer on 24 hours a day is stupid. Stupid? No. It may not be the most energy efficient, but it is far from stupid. Continuous power prevents repeated hard drive power toggles, which greatly extends the life of these devices. Also, many roles require machines to be on continuously, such as servers. Granted, I understand you were referring to home workstations, but you did not explicitly specify as such, and therefore you just called every server administrator stupid. Even for home users, leaving a machine on overnight may be advantageous a few nights a week in order to download fresh virus definitions and run a complete scan. Modern users tend to stop automatic scans and updates that attempt to run while they are using the machine, never allowing the software to work as designed. Having such processes run when no human is present allows them to complete without interruption.

The most misinformed notion you have is that a computer's power consumption is constant regardless of what it is doing. Now, that is stupid. A screen saver does not take the same amount of power as a game (unless you're referring to a casual game such as Minesweeper, but I digress...)! The system does not need to spin up hard drives nonstop, spin DVD-ROM drives, power a monster graphics card at its physical limit, or run the processor at 100% capacity in order to render flying windows. The amount of power your machine consumes depends on how hard you are pushing the equipment and peripherals. Thinking anything less would be like arguing an engine uses the same amount of fuel at 1000RPMs and 8000RPMs. This argument makes you look stupid. Please do better research instead of passing that kind of misinformation onto children.

Naturally, my email got a canned response and was essentially ignored. This only served to aggravate me as he was misinforming children and refused to take any criticism nor admit any mistake. Therefore, when I read today's column, I had no intention of bothering with emailing him. I was going to do what I should have done last time: take it to the public via the Experience.

Today's column started innocently enough. The question asked (to Jax, Beakman's transvestite alter ego) was why it doesn't hurt when you get your hair cut. Surely, Jok couldn't go way off path with this one, could he? His answer was spot on. It was due to the lack of nerve cells in your hair. Bravo. However, the experiment he suggested... well... wow. I just have to type this one up for y'all. I'll break it up with the reactions I had as I read through it.

WHAT YOU NEED: Friend - blindfold - paper clip - tape measure

Already, this is sounding a little odd... however, I'm sure he still has a valid experiment here that is more than appropriate for children...

WHAT TO DO:
Unbend the paper clip into a U shape. Make sure the ends are even with each other.

Here we go! We're getting all MacGyverry. Good show...

Blindfold your friend. (You'll need one who trusts you!) Take off his/her shirt.

WHOA! What the f***? Did this guy just tell children to blindfold each other and then strip each other? Are you friggin' kidding me?

Using your bent clip, touch your friend's shoulder. Not a poke, just a gentle touch. Start with the clip's points close together.

Wow... this is printed in the Sunday paper...

Ask how many points does your friend feel you touching with. Measure the points' gap and take notes.
Keep spreading the points farther away until your friend can feel two points. Try this on different places on each other's body.

This column is making me sick. Children are innocent, so they may not make anything of this, but the fact that he is instructing children on how to play what resembles a sex game adults play with a feather... well, that's just wrong.

To further this pedophile fantasy he seems to be creating, here is how he starts the "WHAT IS GOING ON" section:

You found out that some places on your body have more nerve cells than others. Your lips and tongue have lots and feel lots, and can feel two points very close together.

The only thing this column is missing is an invitation for the children to film their "experimenting" and send it to Beakman. This is absolutely disgusting. In this day of ridiculous censorship, this guy has successfully managed to publish a children's column in newspapers across the country where he instructs children to blindfold and strip each other before using a paper clip to stimulate different places on their bodies, ending with a subtle suggestion of trying to stimulate their lips and tongues! Amazing. Simply amazing.

Jok Church, you are a sick f***. Even if you did not mean any of this to be inappropriate, you still should have known better than to tell children to remove clothes from each other. Would it not have been just as simple to suggest they try the paper clip on the palm of their hand and then the back of their hand? How about on the inner forearm and the back of their elbow? There was absolutely no excuse to tell children to take off their clothes. There was absolutely no excuse to give children a free pass to try this anywhere on each other's bodies. When it comes to touch experimenting, you tell them very specific places to try in order to keep boundaries in place.

Now, I'm not sure if I'm blowing this out of proportion, but I know that if I had children, they definitely would not be reading this guy's work. Perhaps some actual parents could drop their two cents on this topic. Am I overreacting, or do I have a valid point?

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Big Cray: Accept No Substitute