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Quack Healer #fundie #psycho #quack #sexist insider.com

Police are searching for a religious 'healer' who reportedly convinced a pregnant woman that hammering a 2-inch nail into her skull would give her a son

Authorities in Peshawar, Pakistan, are looking for a supposed faith healer, accusing him of persuading a pregnant woman to hammer a nail into her head to guarantee the birth of a son, according to news reports.

The Peshawar news outlet Dawn first reported the bizarre case. According to Dawn, the unnamed woman had three daughters and was desperate to give birth to a son because she was afraid her husband would leave her if she had another girl.

She then approached an unlicensed religious healer, who advised her to hammer a nail into her head.

Male children are preferred among some populations in Asia, where dowries and the concept of having a male child to carry on the family name are especially valued.

Family members heard the woman screaming in pain and tried to remove the nail but could not. They eventually took her to the hospital, Dawn reported.

Dr. Haider Suleman Khan, the resident neurosurgeon at Lady Reading Hospital, told the media outlet that when the woman arrived at the hospital, doctors successfully removed the nail in an operation.

momllennial_ #crackpot #dunning-kruger insider.com

A history TikToker's viral claim that Ancient Rome 'didn't exist' is getting backlash from academics

The TikToker, whose handle is @momllennial_ has racked up 94,000 followers and 1.8 million likes since joining the platform in July 2020. Her bio states that she has a bachelor's degree in anthropology and history, and she has posted numerous videos about history, including Ancient Rome.

In one such TikTok posted on November 16, she said that Ancient Rome didn't exist and was "a figment of the Spanish inquisition's imagination." She also falsely claimed there isn't a single extant "Roman document" or "primary document," despite the reported existence of Roman documents and tablets with Latin written on them.

On November 23, she posted a follow-up video titled "Three Minute Video: Rome Thesis,". In the clip, she said her claim that Rome wasn't real was a metaphor, but that "there are massive gaps in the archeological record" and argued Greece was the "power player" of the time period between 4th and 2nd century BC, not Rome.

She acknowledged that Rome was "an empire," but compared the civilization's cultural and economic power to Disney or "the circus" in today's society.

She also claimed in a TikTok posted November 22 that Hadrian's Wall, a Roman defensive military wall, "cannot be proven to be of Roman construction" and that it's not a wall, but a road.

Maxwell T. Paule, a professor at Earlham College in Indiana with over 145,000 TikTok followers, spoke out against one of her claims that an old Roman document was actually Greek. In his video, he called her a "conspiracy theorist" and said the document is clearly written in Latin.

It's not the first time @momllennial_ has made provocative videos. In one video posted in late October, she appeared to suggest that the name "Jesus Christ" could be translated to "clitoris healer." In June, she posted a TikTok where she appeared to speculate that Alexander the Great was actually a woman.

Sostenes Cavalcante #wingnut #crackpot insider.com

A Brazilian politician on Twitter this week suggested that 13-year-olds are old enough to work if they're old enough to win Olympic medals at the ongoing Tokyo Games

Sostenes Cavalcante, a 46-year-old lawmaker in Rio de Janeiro for Brazil's Democrats political party on Monday proposed a revision to laws banning child labor in the country

The statute in Brazil does not allow anybody under the age of 14 to working, but Cavalcante said 13-year-old skateboarder Rayssa Leal's silver medal shows younger people could get a job
[…]
"Brazilian children aged 13 cannot work, but skater Rayssa Leal won the silver medal at the Olympics," Cavalcante said in Portuguese on Twitter

He added: "Hey! It's for thinking. Congratulations to our Olympic medalist! And revision of the Statute of Children and Adolescents now!"

It is unclear if Cavalcante was serious, but his comment sparked wild backlash on social media