No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a part of the continent." There are no autarkies, not even the Communist nightmare idiocy of North Korea. Nothing is alone anymore and without influence and without connection to other X. There is no racial purity, no such possibility, and no sane person thinks there should be. To think otherwise is by definition insane. To think we can "purify" nations of ethnic outsiders is silly and pointless to discuss. Those who take racialist conspiracy theorizing seriously are not our friends and not worth complaining about any more than would be the shouting, filthy guy on the street corner. But it does come up.
There is a concern regarding the native European anti-jihadist movement. Is it composed of neo-Nazis? Is it filled chock-a-block with racists? I find this discussion to be bizarre. Neo-Nazis? That's so far removed from normal living that only the most uninformed or deluded could consider it. But "racists"? Ah, that we can go on about at some length.
":Racism." Boaz, Benedict, Mead, et al have made our conversation nearly taboo. Why, and who really knows these people in the first place? Why bring up names like that? Because without knowing them, who they were, what they thought and wrote, how they came up with our modern understanding of racism and cultural relativism we will forever find ourselves speaking without knowing, taking without understanding. White Guilt didn't begin with the aftermath of the Nazis. It began with the anthropologists of the post war era, post 1918. It began among a small and dedicated group of intellectuals who decided to correct the wrongs of colonialism and social Darwinism by promoting philobarbarism and cultural relativism. "Racism" as we know it, didn't begin with de Gobineau, as it should have; it began with the anthropologists who came out of the anti-slavery movement, women who worked with religious reformers to ensure an end of slavery in America. It came from those same women finding that after the end of slavery, women had fewer rights than Negroes. It came from intelligent, educated, and organized women barred from the traditional professions who found themselves in positions of authority and influence only in the field of baby-sitting on a grand scale, i.e. as social workers. Benedict and Mead were such women, from such milieu. "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has," as Margaret Mead wrote. It is sinister, it is in that sense "left." This small gang of Gnostic minders changed the course of our intellectual history far more radically than did the architects of the Holocaust. They are the ones who hijacked the idea of "racism" and turned it into what is used today as a catch-all pejorative to quell dissent, to deny freedom to the masses, to entrench themselves ever further in the ground of povertarianism. There is no "racism" in the sense our screaming Left uses the term. "Ethnic cleansing" so-called in Jugoslavia was no such thing. There are no ethnic "Bosnians." There are no specific Serbs different from Croats. Rubbish. There is no racism involved. No ethnic profiling. Rubbish! Rubbish! They are only different in religions and sects therein. It's the anthropologist echo we find claiming "racism." This canard of racism doesn't fly. It's a manufactured tool of social engineering created by a small group of intellectuals in the 1920s. Racism? This is not de Gobineau. This is aggressive American Gnostic sentimentality browbeating the working class for quiescence and the financial elite for money. When we speak today of "racism" we do not speak of the same thing as the anti-Semitism of the Germans and Europeans generally. "Racism" in the West is meant as anthropology and philobarbarism. The crazies don't think of anti-Semitism as racism because it isn't: it's anti-Semitism. Racism? That's a different story altogether.
Slavery predates Social Darwinism by the entire length of Human history. But when we talk about "racism" today we mean, whether we understand it or not, the theories of the social Darwinists. Ganging up on and enslaving others who are weaker is no news anywhere. The idea that it is OK and right to do so due to "the survival of the fittest" is what we react to today and call racism. That ship hit the sand long ago. It no longer floats. Pretending that anti-Semitism and the "racism" of social Darwinism is the same thing the anthropologist reacted to is to conflate the obviously different for no legitimate reason. Viciousness is ordinary. The only remarkable thing about the Nazis was the efficiency of their genocidal acts. The so-called racism of the colonialist Europeans is not of scale or kind the same. The casual contempt one finds in colonialist memoirs is a natural xenophobia of any sane person who wishes to survive. Anyone who wasn't xenophobic until one hundred years ago in major cities in western Europe must have been insane. Outsiders meant threat, disease, murder, invasion, or the tax-collector. Xenophobia, even today, is smart. So is our moderation in our Modernity, our blessing that we do not have to run to and kill a stranger on sight before he comes to do us harm. But xenophobia is still an integral part of the Human experience, even for those who spend their lives traveling the world solo. One must depend on ones own-- even in the Modern cosmopolitan megalopolis. Even in a hotel in Africa. Even in a parking lot at the supermarket in Kansas. To sentimentalize the "Other" is nothing more than a meal ticket, or more accurately, a meal thesis. Confusing what is natural and right in Human behavior, xenophobia, with the maniac genocide of the Germans against the Jews is not convincing. The Nazis didn't act from xenophobia, nor did they act from a feeling of missionary Modernist evangelism. Boaz and Mead, et al, reacted to the latter, not to the former, when they began their campaigns against "racism." Bringing the light of Modernity to the ignorant masses is not the same as exterminating everyone. It ain't the same. Contempt for other cultures and the people of those cultures is not Nazi-ism. Only an idiot would think so, and only a foolish idiot would say so. Slavery is normal; extermination of ones enemies is normal; fearing those whom one does not know is normal; but in our blessed Modernity those things, those acts, those attitudes are not normal, not permissible, are outright bad. But they are not the same as being a Nazi. Being a xenophobic Swede or Swiss or Dane or Darfuran is not the same as being a neo-Nazi. Slavery of the weak and primitive is the nature of things in a primitive and more visceral world than ours today. Doing good for the benefit of those less fortunate than ourselves, those who are primitive and uncivilized, that's the mind of the Gnostic Left at work, the mind of the Gnostic Right at work, the mind of the minder at work. Those things, if unlikable to us in our Modern time, are still understandable and within the scope of our experience. These are things we can control as mature and civilized affluent beings in a state of economic and social benefit. We can afford to be generous with others, and if we aren't, so much the worse for us. If we don't "do enough" to satisfy the missionaries among us, that is not racism, not evil, not worth discussing. That doesn't make us Nazis. Rampaging across the world murdering Jews is not the nature of things, it is a madness of primitives gone amok. A medical definition of the term might clarify: Amok: A syndrome first reported in the Malay people, usually male, consisting of a period of brooding followed by a sudden outburst of indiscriminate murderous frenzy, sometimes provoked by an insult, jealousy or sense of desperation. The person who runs amok may also die in a form of murder-suicide. Confusing or conflating Nazi genocidal madness with ordinary Human behavior, however repugnant to our Modern sensitivities, is not productive. Bashing others for assumed or supposed "racism" without defining or understanding the term is a failure on our part.
Most groups are uniform, and there's no good point in denying such an obvious reality. Skateboard kids do not hang out with investment bankers. Muslims do not hang out with Baptists. Koreans do not hang out with Japanese. Why? Because they are not the same kind of people. And if millions of skateboard kids invaded our city... wait a minute. If millions of Muslims invaded a small and mono-ethnic nation of centuries of in-breeding, what would be the mistake in thinking the natives won't like it if the invaders are ill behaved? Invaders? Yes, of course. To go into in a harmful and intrusive way. Mom in your bedroom is an intruder. She has invaded your space. Go figure.
To sentimentalize is always dishonest. To force ourselves to pretend we are enthused about strangers is a hopeless exercise in deception. Unless one hopes to have sex with a stranger that stranger is a threat until proven otherwise. And even with the promise of sex it's not always a good hope that two strangers will get along for more than a day. To change quickly and fundamentally is harmful and suspect. To allow millions of strangers into ones homeland is outrageous. To o pretend we like it when strangers some to our places and do odd things is to lie to ourselves and to offend the decency of others who do not so lie. To adulate is to cultivate contempt for oneself in place of the feeling of self-righteousness one expects. To fawn over strangers is to make them hate you. The phoniness is degrading and despicable. If the stranger is not acculturated to city living amongst a variety of strangers as we in our Modernity are, he is likely to want to cut the throats of such pointlessly groveling sycophants. To pretend to like "multi-culturalism" is to lie in the face of others and to oneself. To dislike the different is normal. To wish to improve those one finds less than oneself is normal. To dissociate oneself from strangers who don't get ones jokes is normal. It's not "racism." It's not Nazi-ism. To kill people over inconsequential differences of origins is to be mad. Those who don't get my jokes? Don't get me started.
European "racists"? Who can blame them? And who among us really doesn't get the 'Palestinians' and the rest who hate the Jews in the Middle East? Yes, the Israelis are unobtrusive and confined to an ever shrinking area. Yes, one might understand a few years of antagonism as one group moves in and rubs against the older. Italians and Irish faced it in Manhattan, and they eventually became Americans like any other Americans. But it's only New World nations that can have such multi-ethnic groups becoming one. Jews will never become Arabs, and no one should expect it to be so. Nor should one expect Arabs to obsess for generations like rabid dogs over a group of outsiders living in Jerusalem. No one should expect 300 million Arabs to go berserk over a few Jews, insane to the point of killing their own children over self-created Nazi-esque disproportion. Would a group of investment bankers be expected to murder a skateboard kid in a meeting on the street in a suburb? Even if the damn kid lived there it's not likely. But why should they like him? If the suburb is overrun, then one group must prevail and set its perimeter and defend it against intrusion. That's living la vida loca, folks, and it's real in spite of the sentimental trash one is expected to parrot in pubic, smiling as one does so.
We can't escape strangers in our world. We have to accommodate them. They too have to accommodate us. We don't have to like every one. We do have to get along. And when we can't we have to separate civilly. How do we decide who to separate and who from? What criterion is decisive? "Race"? Language? In-house customs? Religion? "I was here first"?
This particular sentimental episode in history is over. People won't continue buying it. The rule of society by nineteenth century spinster nannies is just about over. Hurling epithets like "racist" is going to earn one a sharp sharp slap. Racist? Get over it. Nazi? That's from outer space. However, reason and sense might not prevail after all. There might be a surge of Reaction among delusional Leftists that could rival the French aristocrats of the Napoleonic era and beyond. In fact, those are the very enemies we've always faced, though they don't recognize themselves as such. The question is "What is to be done?" Are we going to kill a whole lot of people like the Jugoslavs did? If we do we won't find ourselves at rest in our own homelands; we'll find ourselves at war with the primitives of the world, a bifurcated world of those who are Modern and those who are primitive. And that is insoluble. It's not about race. It's about how do we survive our differences without killing the other side in toto. What is to be done?
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Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Monday, November 12, 2007
God's Funeral and the March of the Dhimmis.
And they composed a crowd of whom
Some were right good, and many nigh the best...
Thus dazed and puzzled 'twixt the gleam and the gloom
Mechanically I followed with the rest.
Thomas Hardy, "God's Funeral"
I often claim that most people believe what most people believe, meaning that most people are decent and sociable and law-abiding-- regardless of the system in place. For the most part we should applaud that. Mostly we should be thankful that most people agree with the majority most of the time. We should be thankful that most people stick to their opinions long after the facts have shown them how wrong those opinions are and how much better it would be to change them. How so? It is because revolution is a serious problem for people, causing often more harm than good, and then being very difficult to rid ones society of once in place. The Russian Revolution only took a matter of days to become a reality. It took the mighty Russian people 70 years to get rid of the Communists once in power. Most times, doing nothing, accepting things as they are, working within the system, being cautious and prudent, is the best thing one can hope for. Slow, slow, slow. A revolution throws everything upside down and then all crashes on the ground. That is seldom a good solution to anything. You can gauge it yourself by asking if you'd do that to your own mind and your own life. Chances are good that once you'd wrecked your life and rearranged it all you'd find it wasn't really that different after all. You'd still be you. So it's mostly a good thing to be calm and rational and put up with the things we don't like and to slowly try to fix what we can. Creeping socialism at a gallop in America? Let's stay calm.
And then let's look at what a mess we have. Good gravy, who made this mess? The world-at-large hates us, half our own hate us, and the rest mostly feel a need to apologize. Do I feel a need to vomit? Yes, I do. But I'm going to stay calm. I'm going along with everyone else because even if I know better than the best and righteous I can't decide for the nation even if I could. If change for the better comes it'll come slowly and from the depths, and it'll last generations. We'll still be us and little will get wrecked on the way. No revolution, just some gradual fixing. Slowly, slowly, slowly.
That doesn't mean never do a fucking thing!
We cannot allow the fools on the Hill to run our nation into the muck just because they are the greatest people on Earth, those the best and the brightest, the ones who know what we do not, ie, how to govern and live our lives. No revolution but no passivism, not lying down dying in the mud. The whole of the world's people might well hate us, and so what? Did we like them? Do we care? Do they matter? Oh, the Left are perfects, alright, being for the good of all and for world peace and pot in every chicken. On the Left we find some right good, and many nigh the best.... At least, that's what the programme reads. Looking out the window one must question the reality of these perfects, these Gnostic minders. Too many follow along mechanically, assuming the best of the worst of Men. The Left lies we hear might sound pretty, if one is enamored of "world peace" but the facts on the ground, the destroyed living beings of the socialist state, that tells a different story. The good? The best? The question is how to rid ourselves of these fools, how to do so without ripping apart our nation. We do not need another Civil War. We do not need a revolution, having had a good one already. We could use some change, and soon enough to save us from being destroyed from within to the point those without come to finish us off. Some things just can't wait. We have to rid ourselves of many of our so-called leaders, our intelligentsia.
Our gradual revolution, the one we must have to save our nation, is one of attitude, not of guns and bombs. Our attitude is one mistaken, of thinking well of the devious and dirty, of the Gnostic minders, the Left dhimmi fascists. They who take on the mantle of the good and the best are not such things. It takes an attitude change to examine them for what they are and to act accordingly. Mark Twain gets it right again: "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect."
The Left? They are not good and they are not the best. Bang thy head!
It's right and good that most people accept the status quo, that most people go on with everyone else in public matters. It's good that people follow mechanically the good and the best. The shame of our time is the good and the best are such evil demons. It's time for the better to gradually wake up to the fact that this is not the 19th century, that we do not live in a robber baron economy, we do not live in an era of sweat shops, we do not have lynchings. We have a highly sophisticated Modernity that improves daily, and it is under attack by our own intelligentsia who try to destroy it and our lives in the name of "social justice" and "world peace" and other pretty sounding sentimentalities. Of course most people like the sound of such noise. But is it real? Not a bit of it. People follow mechanically because others follow ahead of them. And it's good. It's good that we gradually turn around and march back to reality.
No, not all of us all at once. But some of us, and more each day, till slowly. slowly, slowly we make our way back to the light of Reason. Yes, the Leftists will howl and throw abuse at us, call us names, even fight with us in the streets. So what? What does it matter if you, maybe your friend and a neighbor, are out of step? "If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away." Henry David Thoreau, Walden.
You probably don't want to march mechanically to the cemetery to bury God just because others, even the good and the best are leading the way.
Some were right good, and many nigh the best...
Thus dazed and puzzled 'twixt the gleam and the gloom
Mechanically I followed with the rest.
Thomas Hardy, "God's Funeral"
I often claim that most people believe what most people believe, meaning that most people are decent and sociable and law-abiding-- regardless of the system in place. For the most part we should applaud that. Mostly we should be thankful that most people agree with the majority most of the time. We should be thankful that most people stick to their opinions long after the facts have shown them how wrong those opinions are and how much better it would be to change them. How so? It is because revolution is a serious problem for people, causing often more harm than good, and then being very difficult to rid ones society of once in place. The Russian Revolution only took a matter of days to become a reality. It took the mighty Russian people 70 years to get rid of the Communists once in power. Most times, doing nothing, accepting things as they are, working within the system, being cautious and prudent, is the best thing one can hope for. Slow, slow, slow. A revolution throws everything upside down and then all crashes on the ground. That is seldom a good solution to anything. You can gauge it yourself by asking if you'd do that to your own mind and your own life. Chances are good that once you'd wrecked your life and rearranged it all you'd find it wasn't really that different after all. You'd still be you. So it's mostly a good thing to be calm and rational and put up with the things we don't like and to slowly try to fix what we can. Creeping socialism at a gallop in America? Let's stay calm.
And then let's look at what a mess we have. Good gravy, who made this mess? The world-at-large hates us, half our own hate us, and the rest mostly feel a need to apologize. Do I feel a need to vomit? Yes, I do. But I'm going to stay calm. I'm going along with everyone else because even if I know better than the best and righteous I can't decide for the nation even if I could. If change for the better comes it'll come slowly and from the depths, and it'll last generations. We'll still be us and little will get wrecked on the way. No revolution, just some gradual fixing. Slowly, slowly, slowly.
That doesn't mean never do a fucking thing!
We cannot allow the fools on the Hill to run our nation into the muck just because they are the greatest people on Earth, those the best and the brightest, the ones who know what we do not, ie, how to govern and live our lives. No revolution but no passivism, not lying down dying in the mud. The whole of the world's people might well hate us, and so what? Did we like them? Do we care? Do they matter? Oh, the Left are perfects, alright, being for the good of all and for world peace and pot in every chicken. On the Left we find some right good, and many nigh the best.... At least, that's what the programme reads. Looking out the window one must question the reality of these perfects, these Gnostic minders. Too many follow along mechanically, assuming the best of the worst of Men. The Left lies we hear might sound pretty, if one is enamored of "world peace" but the facts on the ground, the destroyed living beings of the socialist state, that tells a different story. The good? The best? The question is how to rid ourselves of these fools, how to do so without ripping apart our nation. We do not need another Civil War. We do not need a revolution, having had a good one already. We could use some change, and soon enough to save us from being destroyed from within to the point those without come to finish us off. Some things just can't wait. We have to rid ourselves of many of our so-called leaders, our intelligentsia.
Our gradual revolution, the one we must have to save our nation, is one of attitude, not of guns and bombs. Our attitude is one mistaken, of thinking well of the devious and dirty, of the Gnostic minders, the Left dhimmi fascists. They who take on the mantle of the good and the best are not such things. It takes an attitude change to examine them for what they are and to act accordingly. Mark Twain gets it right again: "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect."
The Left? They are not good and they are not the best. Bang thy head!
It's right and good that most people accept the status quo, that most people go on with everyone else in public matters. It's good that people follow mechanically the good and the best. The shame of our time is the good and the best are such evil demons. It's time for the better to gradually wake up to the fact that this is not the 19th century, that we do not live in a robber baron economy, we do not live in an era of sweat shops, we do not have lynchings. We have a highly sophisticated Modernity that improves daily, and it is under attack by our own intelligentsia who try to destroy it and our lives in the name of "social justice" and "world peace" and other pretty sounding sentimentalities. Of course most people like the sound of such noise. But is it real? Not a bit of it. People follow mechanically because others follow ahead of them. And it's good. It's good that we gradually turn around and march back to reality.
No, not all of us all at once. But some of us, and more each day, till slowly. slowly, slowly we make our way back to the light of Reason. Yes, the Leftists will howl and throw abuse at us, call us names, even fight with us in the streets. So what? What does it matter if you, maybe your friend and a neighbor, are out of step? "If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away." Henry David Thoreau, Walden.
You probably don't want to march mechanically to the cemetery to bury God just because others, even the good and the best are leading the way.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Brothers in Arms
These mist covered mountains
Are a home now for me
But my home is the lowlands
And always will be
Some day you'll return to
Your valleys and your farms
And you'll no longer burn
To be brothers in arms
Through these fields of destruction
Baptisms of fire
I've watched all your suffering
As the battles raged higher
And though they did hurt me so bad
In the fear and alarm
You did not desert me
My brothers in arms
There's so many different worlds
So many different suns
And we have just one world
But we live in different ones
Now the sun's gone to hell
And the moon's riding high
Let me bid you farewell
Every man has to die
But it's written in the starlight
And every line on your palm
We're fools to make war
On our brothers in arms
Except when our lives and the lives of
Our brothers in arms depend on us.
Mark Knopfler, "Brothers in Arms."
“Why was the poppy chosen as the symbol of remembrance for Canada’s war dead? Prior to the First World War few poppies grew in Flanders. During the tremendous bombardments of that war the chalk soils became rich in lime from rubble, allowing ‘popaver rhoeas’ to thrive. When the war ended the lime was quickly absorbed, and the poppy began to disappear again.
Each November, millions of poppies blossom in Canada. They blossom on the jackets, dresses and hats of nearly half the Canadian population and they have blossomed over 80 years, since 1921. The poppy is the symbol that individuals use to show that they remember those who were killed in the wars and peacekeeping operations that Canada has been involved in.”
Saturday, November 10, 2007
The Beauty of Sewers
When I looked at the Internet this evening I didn't expect to find a story on the theft of manhole covers in Manhattan. Oh, was I wrong. There are roughly 23,000 stories on the theft of manhole covers as of today. Given time there will likely be 23,000 more.
****
My primary concern here is not, as must be thought by most readers, that of fascist Islam and Left dhimmi fascism; my concern is for Human decency and peoples' opportunity to live free of unwarranted oppression, which I see as mostly stemming in our time from the two aforementioned ideologies. Unwarranted oppression isn't simply the fascism of the Left and the Muslim hordes they use as proxies: it is also Romantic reaction, eg philobarbarism and povertarianism. So, on occasion, this being one, I put together a post on public health to show just what our beautiful Modernity gives us and what we will lose if we allow our lives to be ruined by the fascists who claim that cities are alienating, that one should "move back to Nature," that we should be "authentic," and the usual string of pagan Blood and Soil ecologist misanthropy. Imagine life without sewers. No? Then go to a city without them, pick your favorite Third World megalopolis. What does Islam have to offer that's better than sewers? What does the Left offer that's better than clean water? These poisoners of the people's minds are a filthy disgrace. Modernity gives us sewers. I love sewers. In fact, I love them so much that I want a doormat of a sewer cover for my front door.
Here's a bit from the first story to pop up, a bit from wikipedia:
I risked death one afternoon when I got a bedsheet, a role of tape, and a block of black rubbing wax and went onto the street to get a print of a manhole cover in Yaffo, Israel of a "Palestinian Mandate" manhole cover. The original is a lovely piece of work. for more images of manhole covers, click here to see Ruavista's collection of photos.
Ruavista text below.
Manhole covers are among the urban landscape's most lasting features. They are made of extremely durable materials since their placement exposes them to wear. They have also endured because unlike gas street lamps, manhole covers remain useful and, more than 100 years after their installation, continue to fulfil their function perfectly.
Traditional manholes covers are round and decorated with geometric designs. They often bear inscriptions. The round shape requires less space than a square and makes handling easier. Once removed, the cover can be transported by rolling. Decorations serve as identification. In English-speaking countries, manhole covers were embossed and those covering telephone networks bore hexagonal designs. Designs also provide a non-slip surface on the sidewalk or roadway. Manhole covers offer living testimony to the industrial artistry of the second half of the 19th century as many of the covers still seen today on the sidewalks of European and North American cities date from that period. London, capital of the world's first industrialized country, is undoubtedly the most beautiful open-air museum. The variety and beauty of manhole cover designs are unparalleled. Many covers date from the second half of 19th century, when electric, gas and telephone service became available in the city. Subterranean galleries were necessary to install the infrastructure underground and access for maintenance had to be provided.
Drainage work began in 1847 but manhole covers were not installed for several years. Authorities initially rejected the system for fear that they would allow deadly gases to escape. (Before the manhole cover system was adopted, maintenance could only be performed after making holes in the galleries and sealing them when the work was completed.)
****
APPENDIX 2 - THE LETTER OF THE LAW
[....]
2 Following the second major Cholera outbreak, in 1847, the Government was propelled into the introduction of the 'Public Health Act, 1848'. This Act created a General Board of Health (Edwin Chadwick was one of its three members). During its five years existence, the Board was empowered to provide sewerage systems for the water-borne collection of domestic wates. A Medical Officer of Health could also be appointed. Despite the patent need for public health schemes, the vested interests of landowners and others formed a vociferous lobby against the granting of the necessary powers to any public body. When the Board of Health was abolished, the 'Times' concluded that "the English People would prefer to take the chance of Cholera, rather than be bullied into health". The same newspaper called the 1848 Act "a reckless invasion of property and liberty". Even so, the Act was only mandatory in towns where the death rate was greater than 22 per thousand of population or where 10% of ratepayers petitioned for its adoption. After the demise of the Board of Health, the Privy Council was made responsible for public health (1858) and John Simon was appointed as Medical Officer.
http://www.dsellers.demon.co.uk/sewers/sew_ch12.htm
****
A Glimpse Into London's Early Sewers
Reprinted from Cleaner magazine
PART I BY MARY GAYMAN
Sewer means "seaward" in Old English. London's sewers were open ditches sloped
slightly to drain human wastes toward the River Thames, and ultimately into
the sea. Sewer ditches quickly filled with garbage and human wastes, which
overflowed onto streets, into houses and marketplaces throughout London.
By the late 1500s, King Henry VIII wrote an edict which made each
householder responsible for clearing the sewer passing by their dwelling.
The King also created a special Commission of Sewers to enforce these
rules. However, no money was provided to pay its members. Therefore, the
Commission was not installed until 1622, when it was decided that fines for
non-compliance could be used to fund its activities....
By the early 18th Century nearly every residence had a cesspit beneath
the floors. In the best of homes the nauseating stench permeated the most
elegant parlor. Indoor odors were often worse than of the garbage- and manure-
filled streets. While noxious fumes were ignored by most people, it was fear
of "night air" laden with coal smoke and sulfurous industrial fogs which
alarmed the City dweller....
By the early 18th Century nearly every residence had a cesspit beneath
the floors. In the best of homes the nauseating stench permeated the most
elegant parlor. Indoor odors were often worse than of the garbage- and manure-
filled streets....
Doors and windows of homes and factories were sealed shut at sunset to
protect occupants form entry of the feared "night air." Entire families and
crews of workers died of mysterious "asphyxiation" during the night. Doctors
had no explanation for lingering illnesses and these sudden "miasmas"
occurring in the City. Vivid descriptions of horrible deaths were routinely
reported at Commission hearings and in the London tabloids.
Most fatalities and injuries described were consistent with asphyxiation
by hydrogen sulfide or oxygen deficiency or methane explosions.
Draining London's Sewage Swamp
The streets of London lie 30 feet below the surface of the Thames at high tide. The city housed more than two million people in crowded conditions and the situation was deteriorating daily. Epidemics of cholera, typhus, "consumption" and other undefined maladies plagued the City over at least four centuries. Edwin Chadwick, a sanitary reformer of the era, struggled with upper class apathy toward these horrible conditions. Chadwick explored sewers, questioned slum dwellers, and turned out hundreds of reports to the Commission. He experimented with the benefits of obtaining pure water from lakes and reservoirs, rather than the fetid Thames. His Public Health Act ultimately reversed the tide of death. He chastised residents of London for defying the Law of Moses, often pointing out that it "forbade even an open camp be defiled with human ordure, and expressly ordained that it should be deposited at a distance and immediately covered with soil." He attacked the greed of homeowners stating: "Early in the progress of these investigations, the proposed system of cleansing, by removal of the ordure in suspension in waste, was objected to on the grounds of supposed loss of money received for manure." ... Meanwhile, engineers were hard at work devising a system of drainage which would carry the wastes of 2 million people out of the area, in compliance with Mosaic law. Commissioners allowed experimentation with the "soil-pan or watercloset principle" and the "tubular mode of drainage" in cities and hamlets throughout England. Though Sir Thomas Crapper had not perfected his invention, the Commission had received hundreds of less functional designs for its consideration. The "water closet" concept was, as yet, unwieldy. A complete system of "tubular drains" were yet to be constructed to "carry immediately away ass solid or semi-solid matter," as the Commissioned envisioned. In 1858 "The Great Stink," from the backed up Thames, caused thousands to flee the City, while Parliament remained in session. Windows of the parliament building were draped with curtains soaked in chloride of lime, to prevent closing of the Government. Upper class residents fled the city or drenched sheets with perfumes to mask the odor from the outside....
http://www.swopnet.com/engr/londonsewers/londontext1.html
****
Sewers are beautiful. There are those who try to waste my time talking about greenhouse gasses and organic food. Spare me. Talk to me about sewers.
****
My primary concern here is not, as must be thought by most readers, that of fascist Islam and Left dhimmi fascism; my concern is for Human decency and peoples' opportunity to live free of unwarranted oppression, which I see as mostly stemming in our time from the two aforementioned ideologies. Unwarranted oppression isn't simply the fascism of the Left and the Muslim hordes they use as proxies: it is also Romantic reaction, eg philobarbarism and povertarianism. So, on occasion, this being one, I put together a post on public health to show just what our beautiful Modernity gives us and what we will lose if we allow our lives to be ruined by the fascists who claim that cities are alienating, that one should "move back to Nature," that we should be "authentic," and the usual string of pagan Blood and Soil ecologist misanthropy. Imagine life without sewers. No? Then go to a city without them, pick your favorite Third World megalopolis. What does Islam have to offer that's better than sewers? What does the Left offer that's better than clean water? These poisoners of the people's minds are a filthy disgrace. Modernity gives us sewers. I love sewers. In fact, I love them so much that I want a doormat of a sewer cover for my front door.
Here's a bit from the first story to pop up, a bit from wikipedia:
Manhole cover theft is the phenomenon of manhole covers being stolen, usually for resale as scrap. Long considered to be a childish prank in the United States, this type of theft is often expensive to municipalities, and dangerous to their residents.
It first became a serious problem in India and China, where missing manhole covers have caused eight deaths so far. Hundreds of manhole covers are stolen in the city of Bangalore, India every month. In Newham, East London, nearly 200 grates and covers were stolen.
In the city of Calcutta, India more than 10,000 manhole covers were taken in two months. These were replaced with concrete covers, but these were also stolen, this time for the iron rods inside them. The thieves were believed to be buying lottery tickets with the money.
Missing covers and grates may cause disappearances, deaths, and damage to vehicles. According to China's Xinhua news agency, about "240,000 manhole and street-drain covers were stolen in Beijing in 2004."
I risked death one afternoon when I got a bedsheet, a role of tape, and a block of black rubbing wax and went onto the street to get a print of a manhole cover in Yaffo, Israel of a "Palestinian Mandate" manhole cover. The original is a lovely piece of work. for more images of manhole covers, click here to see Ruavista's collection of photos.
Ruavista text below.
Manhole covers are among the urban landscape's most lasting features. They are made of extremely durable materials since their placement exposes them to wear. They have also endured because unlike gas street lamps, manhole covers remain useful and, more than 100 years after their installation, continue to fulfil their function perfectly.
Traditional manholes covers are round and decorated with geometric designs. They often bear inscriptions. The round shape requires less space than a square and makes handling easier. Once removed, the cover can be transported by rolling. Decorations serve as identification. In English-speaking countries, manhole covers were embossed and those covering telephone networks bore hexagonal designs. Designs also provide a non-slip surface on the sidewalk or roadway. Manhole covers offer living testimony to the industrial artistry of the second half of the 19th century as many of the covers still seen today on the sidewalks of European and North American cities date from that period. London, capital of the world's first industrialized country, is undoubtedly the most beautiful open-air museum. The variety and beauty of manhole cover designs are unparalleled. Many covers date from the second half of 19th century, when electric, gas and telephone service became available in the city. Subterranean galleries were necessary to install the infrastructure underground and access for maintenance had to be provided.
Drainage work began in 1847 but manhole covers were not installed for several years. Authorities initially rejected the system for fear that they would allow deadly gases to escape. (Before the manhole cover system was adopted, maintenance could only be performed after making holes in the galleries and sealing them when the work was completed.)
****
APPENDIX 2 - THE LETTER OF THE LAW
[....]
2 Following the second major Cholera outbreak, in 1847, the Government was propelled into the introduction of the 'Public Health Act, 1848'. This Act created a General Board of Health (Edwin Chadwick was one of its three members). During its five years existence, the Board was empowered to provide sewerage systems for the water-borne collection of domestic wates. A Medical Officer of Health could also be appointed. Despite the patent need for public health schemes, the vested interests of landowners and others formed a vociferous lobby against the granting of the necessary powers to any public body. When the Board of Health was abolished, the 'Times' concluded that "the English People would prefer to take the chance of Cholera, rather than be bullied into health". The same newspaper called the 1848 Act "a reckless invasion of property and liberty". Even so, the Act was only mandatory in towns where the death rate was greater than 22 per thousand of population or where 10% of ratepayers petitioned for its adoption. After the demise of the Board of Health, the Privy Council was made responsible for public health (1858) and John Simon was appointed as Medical Officer.
http://www.dsellers.demon.co
****
A Glimpse Into London's Early Sewers
Reprinted from Cleaner magazine
PART I BY MARY GAYMAN
Sewer means "seaward" in Old English. London's sewers were open ditches sloped
slightly to drain human wastes toward the River Thames, and ultimately into
the sea. Sewer ditches quickly filled with garbage and human wastes, which
overflowed onto streets, into houses and marketplaces throughout London.
By the late 1500s, King Henry VIII wrote an edict which made each
householder responsible for clearing the sewer passing by their dwelling.
The King also created a special Commission of Sewers to enforce these
rules. However, no money was provided to pay its members. Therefore, the
Commission was not installed until 1622, when it was decided that fines for
non-compliance could be used to fund its activities....
By the early 18th Century nearly every residence had a cesspit beneath
the floors. In the best of homes the nauseating stench permeated the most
elegant parlor. Indoor odors were often worse than of the garbage- and manure-
filled streets. While noxious fumes were ignored by most people, it was fear
of "night air" laden with coal smoke and sulfurous industrial fogs which
alarmed the City dweller....
By the early 18th Century nearly every residence had a cesspit beneath
the floors. In the best of homes the nauseating stench permeated the most
elegant parlor. Indoor odors were often worse than of the garbage- and manure-
filled streets....
Doors and windows of homes and factories were sealed shut at sunset to
protect occupants form entry of the feared "night air." Entire families and
crews of workers died of mysterious "asphyxiation" during the night. Doctors
had no explanation for lingering illnesses and these sudden "miasmas"
occurring in the City. Vivid descriptions of horrible deaths were routinely
reported at Commission hearings and in the London tabloids.
Most fatalities and injuries described were consistent with asphyxiation
by hydrogen sulfide or oxygen deficiency or methane explosions.
Draining London's Sewage Swamp
The streets of London lie 30 feet below the surface of the Thames at high tide. The city housed more than two million people in crowded conditions and the situation was deteriorating daily. Epidemics of cholera, typhus, "consumption" and other undefined maladies plagued the City over at least four centuries. Edwin Chadwick, a sanitary reformer of the era, struggled with upper class apathy toward these horrible conditions. Chadwick explored sewers, questioned slum dwellers, and turned out hundreds of reports to the Commission. He experimented with the benefits of obtaining pure water from lakes and reservoirs, rather than the fetid Thames. His Public Health Act ultimately reversed the tide of death. He chastised residents of London for defying the Law of Moses, often pointing out that it "forbade even an open camp be defiled with human ordure, and expressly ordained that it should be deposited at a distance and immediately covered with soil." He attacked the greed of homeowners stating: "Early in the progress of these investigations, the proposed system of cleansing, by removal of the ordure in suspension in waste, was objected to on the grounds of supposed loss of money received for manure." ... Meanwhile, engineers were hard at work devising a system of drainage which would carry the wastes of 2 million people out of the area, in compliance with Mosaic law. Commissioners allowed experimentation with the "soil-pan or watercloset principle" and the "tubular mode of drainage" in cities and hamlets throughout England. Though Sir Thomas Crapper had not perfected his invention, the Commission had received hundreds of less functional designs for its consideration. The "water closet" concept was, as yet, unwieldy. A complete system of "tubular drains" were yet to be constructed to "carry immediately away ass solid or semi-solid matter," as the Commissioned envisioned. In 1858 "The Great Stink," from the backed up Thames, caused thousands to flee the City, while Parliament remained in session. Windows of the parliament building were draped with curtains soaked in chloride of lime, to prevent closing of the Government. Upper class residents fled the city or drenched sheets with perfumes to mask the odor from the outside....
http://www.swopnet.com/engr
****
Sewers are beautiful. There are those who try to waste my time talking about greenhouse gasses and organic food. Spare me. Talk to me about sewers.
Friday, November 09, 2007
Apocalypse of the Molochites
ίππος μέλας (híppos mélas), The Black Horse of Famine
And when he opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say: come and see. And I beheld, and lo, a black horse: and he that sat on him, had a pair of balances in his hand. And I heard a voice in the middes of the [four] beasts say: a measure of wheat for a penny, and [three] measures of barley for a penny: and oil and wine see thou hurt not. And I heard a voice in the midst of the Four Beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny: and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine." Rev. 6:5-6. The THIRD SEAL. Tyndale New Testament
Criminals and lunatics; ghettos; low-intensity conflict zones; these words bespeak danger to Man, pain and fear and loss; no-go areas; civil disorder; war zones; failed states; these words bespeak danger to Security, they bespeak ruin, horror, and death; and we are increasingly surrounded by all such above, even within. We are blessed in our time.
The sticking point of our day is Islam, the point at our breast, the threat we face. Beyond the tip comes the whole of the thrust against us: We face in our time the collapse of the world of the primitives, our present danger, our current blessing. To parry, to sever, to stand in towering triumph over the body of our opponent, to howl.
All about us and within is the failure of the primitive, whose name is Legion. Already we can feel the tremors of the hoofbeats of the Black Horse of Famine approaching from the dark horizon. Already the cries of alarm, the moans of pain, the shrieks of hatred at the Fates whipping the horses of Destiny. Onward, ever closer, they come, comes the Black Horse. Through the thrashing dust and the deliberate haze, the gloom, through the dim vision of the fearful, the hanging clouds of dismay, the curtains of denial, comes Famine at the gallop ever closer. The scale falls, the night skies shine, the balance falters, savage cries penetrate the hearts of Man, and on comes Famine at a run. There is no outrunning fleet Famine; Moloch's primitive children will lay down crushed beneath the flashing hooves of Hunger. The survivors, the primitives, those who live for murder and hate, will wander aimless in the desert, lost eternally in the sand diorama. The Molochite's god will starve. There will be famine in the land. In our time we are blessed. Blessed are we who rise.
Matthew 6: 11 Give us this day our daily bread.
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
To Revive the Spirit; To get Back Home
You know how it is, when you're young by heart and fallen in love: you smile to yourself, think a happy memory, hum a favorite tune; and thus it was that: I sat; rocking on the stoop; popping at rats by the dumpster with a pellet gun; thinking of her, and thinking of you. Smilin', happy, golden slumbers fill your eyes. Smiles awake you when you rise.
In the settling dusk on the city bugs freeze in the amber sky as orange smog shanks heavy into the lazy plum smoke that hangs languid around the tannery, a purple haze that fades to black. Cold, melon-green light falls from the street lamps, pooling on the sidewalks, slipping into the dark, jagged cracks, disappearing among the dirt and the stones and the trash. Chill fills the air and night calls out, siren songs, beckoning. Who would believe, who could dream, that life should be so good. Off the stoop, I shook, I took a walk, a walk past St. James Infirmary, a stroll down the road, down to Azusa St. Once there was a way to get back homeward. Once there was a way to get back home. Let us revive.
" Men and women, white and blacks, knelt together or fell across one another; a white woman, perhaps of wealth and culture, could be seen thrown back in the arms of a big 'buck nigger,' and held tightly thus as she shivered and shook in freak imitation of Pentecost. Horrible, awful shame!"
John 14:26
Azusa Street Revival was a Pentecostal revival meeting that took place in Los Angeles, California and was led by William J. Seymour, an African American preacher. It began with a meeting on April 14, 1906 at the African Methodist Episcopal Church and continued until roughly 1915. The revival was characterized by speaking in tongues, dramatic worship services, and inter-racial mingling. The participants received criticism from secular media and Christian theologians for behaviors considered to be outrageous and unorthodox, especially at the time. Today, the revival is considered by historians to be the primary catalyst for the spread of Pentecostalism in the 20th century.
[....]
Services and worship: Worship at 312 Azusa Street was frequent, spontaneous, and ecstatic, with services going almost around the clock. Among those attracted to the revival were not only members of the Holiness Movement, but Baptists, Mennonites, Quakers, and Presbyterians.[14] An observer at one of the services wrote these words:
" No instruments of music are used. None are needed. No choir- the angels have been heard by some in the spirit. No collections are taken. No bills have been posted to advertise the meetings. No church organization is back of it. All who are in touch with God realize as soon as they enter the meetings that the Holy Ghost is the leader.[7] "
The Los Angeles Times was not so kind in its description:
" Meetings are held in a tumble-down shack on Azusa Street, and the devotees of the weird doctrine practice the most fanatical rites, preach the wildest theories and work themselves into a state of mad excitement in their peculiar zeal. Colored people and a sprinkling of whites compose the congregation, and night is made hideous in the neighborhood by the howlings of the worshipers, who spend hours swaying forth and back in a nerve racking attitude of prayer and supplication. They claim to have the "gift of tongues" and be able to understand the babel.[4] "
[....]
The core membership of the Azusa Street Mission was never much more than 50-60 individuals, with hundreds and thousands of people visiting or staying temporarily over the years.[4]
[....]
" ...disgraceful intermingling of the races…they cry and make howling noises all day and into the night. They run, jump, shake all over, shout to the top of their voice, spin around in circles, fall out on the sawdust blanketed floor jerking, kicking and rolling all over it. Some of them pass out and do not move for hours as though they were dead. These people appear to be mad, mentally deranged or under a spell. They claim to be filled with the spirit. They have a one eyed, illiterate Negro as their preacher who stays on his knees much of the time with his head hidden between the wooden milk crates. He doesn't talk very much but at times he can be heard shouting, 'Repent,' and he's supposed to be running the thing... They repeatedly sing the same song, 'The Comforter Has Come.'[2] "
[....]
Christians from many traditions were critical....
"Slay the unbelievers wherever you find them. Arrest them, besiege them, and lie in ambush everywhere for them."
The pink magnolia blossoms in the jade leaves overhang stone wall and the scent fills the trolley as we roll down St. Mary's st. Today all the leaves are brown and the sky is grey. I've been for a walk on a winter's day. I'd be safe and warm if I was in L.A. I could unroll my sleeping bag and lay on a pew, if I were on Azusa st. and someone would say, "Sleep pretty darling, do not cry and I will sing a lullaby."
She smiled kind of shy and said, "He ain't much to look at but I likes him OK."
"As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them"
Red Ken teems with White supremacists; Greens howl with rabble anarchists waving black flags flanked by jihadis. The Red, White, and Blue goes up in flames. America looks increasingly gray. Maybe I gotta board a bus and leave this place. Once there was a way to get back homeward. Once there was a way to get back home. Let us revive.
"Golden Slumbers" by Thomas Dekker/Paul McCartney
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azusa_Street_Revival
Koran: 4: 89.
"California Dreaming" by John and Michelle Phillips
Koran: 4:34
In the settling dusk on the city bugs freeze in the amber sky as orange smog shanks heavy into the lazy plum smoke that hangs languid around the tannery, a purple haze that fades to black. Cold, melon-green light falls from the street lamps, pooling on the sidewalks, slipping into the dark, jagged cracks, disappearing among the dirt and the stones and the trash. Chill fills the air and night calls out, siren songs, beckoning. Who would believe, who could dream, that life should be so good. Off the stoop, I shook, I took a walk, a walk past St. James Infirmary, a stroll down the road, down to Azusa St. Once there was a way to get back homeward. Once there was a way to get back home. Let us revive.
" Men and women, white and blacks, knelt together or fell across one another; a white woman, perhaps of wealth and culture, could be seen thrown back in the arms of a big 'buck nigger,' and held tightly thus as she shivered and shook in freak imitation of Pentecost. Horrible, awful shame!"
John 14:26
But the Comforter [παράκλητος], which is the Holy Ghost [το πνευμα το 'άγιον], Whom the Father will send in My name, He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.
Azusa Street Revival was a Pentecostal revival meeting that took place in Los Angeles, California and was led by William J. Seymour, an African American preacher. It began with a meeting on April 14, 1906 at the African Methodist Episcopal Church and continued until roughly 1915. The revival was characterized by speaking in tongues, dramatic worship services, and inter-racial mingling. The participants received criticism from secular media and Christian theologians for behaviors considered to be outrageous and unorthodox, especially at the time. Today, the revival is considered by historians to be the primary catalyst for the spread of Pentecostalism in the 20th century.
[....]
Services and worship: Worship at 312 Azusa Street was frequent, spontaneous, and ecstatic, with services going almost around the clock. Among those attracted to the revival were not only members of the Holiness Movement, but Baptists, Mennonites, Quakers, and Presbyterians.[14] An observer at one of the services wrote these words:
" No instruments of music are used. None are needed. No choir- the angels have been heard by some in the spirit. No collections are taken. No bills have been posted to advertise the meetings. No church organization is back of it. All who are in touch with God realize as soon as they enter the meetings that the Holy Ghost is the leader.[7] "
The Los Angeles Times was not so kind in its description:
" Meetings are held in a tumble-down shack on Azusa Street, and the devotees of the weird doctrine practice the most fanatical rites, preach the wildest theories and work themselves into a state of mad excitement in their peculiar zeal. Colored people and a sprinkling of whites compose the congregation, and night is made hideous in the neighborhood by the howlings of the worshipers, who spend hours swaying forth and back in a nerve racking attitude of prayer and supplication. They claim to have the "gift of tongues" and be able to understand the babel.[4] "
[....]
The core membership of the Azusa Street Mission was never much more than 50-60 individuals, with hundreds and thousands of people visiting or staying temporarily over the years.[4]
[....]
" ...disgraceful intermingling of the races…they cry and make howling noises all day and into the night. They run, jump, shake all over, shout to the top of their voice, spin around in circles, fall out on the sawdust blanketed floor jerking, kicking and rolling all over it. Some of them pass out and do not move for hours as though they were dead. These people appear to be mad, mentally deranged or under a spell. They claim to be filled with the spirit. They have a one eyed, illiterate Negro as their preacher who stays on his knees much of the time with his head hidden between the wooden milk crates. He doesn't talk very much but at times he can be heard shouting, 'Repent,' and he's supposed to be running the thing... They repeatedly sing the same song, 'The Comforter Has Come.'[2] "
[....]
Christians from many traditions were critical....
"Slay the unbelievers wherever you find them. Arrest them, besiege them, and lie in ambush everywhere for them."
The pink magnolia blossoms in the jade leaves overhang stone wall and the scent fills the trolley as we roll down St. Mary's st. Today all the leaves are brown and the sky is grey. I've been for a walk on a winter's day. I'd be safe and warm if I was in L.A. I could unroll my sleeping bag and lay on a pew, if I were on Azusa st. and someone would say, "Sleep pretty darling, do not cry and I will sing a lullaby."
She smiled kind of shy and said, "He ain't much to look at but I likes him OK."
"As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them"
Red Ken teems with White supremacists; Greens howl with rabble anarchists waving black flags flanked by jihadis. The Red, White, and Blue goes up in flames. America looks increasingly gray. Maybe I gotta board a bus and leave this place. Once there was a way to get back homeward. Once there was a way to get back home. Let us revive.
"Golden Slumbers" by Thomas Dekker/Paul McCartney
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki
Koran: 4: 89.
"California Dreaming" by John and Michelle Phillips
Koran: 4:34
Tuesday, November 06, 2007
OSHA Blues
I needed some work done around the house, and since I'm new to the area I figured I'd ingratiate myself by asking the neighbors who they hire, figuring to hire a kid from around the block, perhaps a student, or maybe a fellow with a family who found himself between jobs. Now I realize I live in a heavily Democratic area.
And to top it off? He doesn't do windows.
And to top it off? He doesn't do windows.
Helter Skelter, circa 1914
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
Surely some revelation is at hand. Or is it only mad visionaries who think they see the future so plain and pure in scope and depth? It seems certain some revelation is at hand. Maybe it's not even the end of the world. Maybe there's a vision true: of the world in flames and Man, scorched, wading forward hip-deep in blood to the the future, just like always and ever.
"What about you, daddy? Did you exchange a walk-on role in the war for a leading role in a cage?"
"That was long ago, darling, when boiling blood burst thorough split skin of the bound, burning."
Surely some revelation is at hand. There is nothing new under the Sun.
"Helter Skelter?"
"Hush little baby, don't you cry. One of these mornings you're going to rise up singing; then you'll spread your wings, and you'll take to the sky."
There are those who say, "It ain't gonna happen." We can talk about it, talk about it, talk about it, talk about it peace, and wreck 'n' silliation. Floods and fires, volcanoes and earthquakes; disease and famine, mayhem and invasion. We can talk about it talk about talk about it. Everything ... shrugs. There is nothing new under the Sun. Surely it is revealed that there is nothing new under the Sun.
Everybody knows, everyone says. That oily men disco dancing on flowery floats, men in sequined g-string gyrate to the lusting cheers of men; that hard-packed women, lip-waxed ladies, scowl; babies like rabies ashot; that everyone smiles at the shit on their shoes and looks at the sky, blue and empty. You can hear them say: "Wish You Were Here."
Everyone knows everyone blows.
So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail? A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
And did they get you trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees? Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change? And did you exchange
a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
It's a mixed up, mumbled up, jumbled up world 'cept for Lola. One World. We are the Children.
Who you gonna turn to where you gonna run.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in the sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
Surely some vision has run Helter Skelter. Surely there is nothing new under the Sun. Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
Surely some revelation is at hand. Or is it only mad visionaries who think they see the future so plain and pure in scope and depth? It seems certain some revelation is at hand. Maybe it's not even the end of the world. Maybe there's a vision true: of the world in flames and Man, scorched, wading forward hip-deep in blood to the the future, just like always and ever.
"What about you, daddy? Did you exchange a walk-on role in the war for a leading role in a cage?"
"That was long ago, darling, when boiling blood burst thorough split skin of the bound, burning."
Surely some revelation is at hand. There is nothing new under the Sun.
"Helter Skelter?"
"Hush little baby, don't you cry. One of these mornings you're going to rise up singing; then you'll spread your wings, and you'll take to the sky."
There are those who say, "It ain't gonna happen." We can talk about it, talk about it, talk about it, talk about it peace, and wreck 'n' silliation. Floods and fires, volcanoes and earthquakes; disease and famine, mayhem and invasion. We can talk about it talk about talk about it. Everything ... shrugs. There is nothing new under the Sun. Surely it is revealed that there is nothing new under the Sun.
Everybody knows, everyone says. That oily men disco dancing on flowery floats, men in sequined g-string gyrate to the lusting cheers of men; that hard-packed women, lip-waxed ladies, scowl; babies like rabies ashot; that everyone smiles at the shit on their shoes and looks at the sky, blue and empty. You can hear them say: "Wish You Were Here."
Everyone knows everyone blows.
So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail? A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
And did they get you trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees? Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change? And did you exchange
a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
It's a mixed up, mumbled up, jumbled up world 'cept for Lola. One World. We are the Children.
Who you gonna turn to where you gonna run.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in the sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
Surely some vision has run Helter Skelter. Surely there is nothing new under the Sun. Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
Monday, November 05, 2007
On Hate Speech
Right wing fundamentalist Christian preacher James Hagee got the kibosh for upsetting Muslims in Canada. I was curious about this James Hagee. I solicited some insight, some background. When you read the lunatic antics he performed on a Canadian television show it'll all make sense to you why so many in the West hate with such intense passion anything to do with these Right wing religious types.
November 5, 2003
Dhimmitude in Canada: watch your tone of voice there, buddy
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/000056.php
Now let's be reasonable here. Hagee likely did use a tone of voice that alienated Muslim viewers.Canada is only a nation that accepts the concept of free speech up to a point. For example, the demonstration favoring Hizb'alla in Montreal is OK. Maybe some other things. but not hateful tones from Right wing Evangelical preachers who offend Muslims.
I get it.
November 5, 2003
Dhimmitude in Canada: watch your tone of voice there, buddy
"An American evangelist's television series on Islam in America was canceled by a Canadian station after the first program because Muslims complained his tone and demeanor was an incitement of hatred," according to World Net Daily.
Program Manager Rob Sheppard wrote "a letter of apology" to the Canadian branch of the Council on American Islamic Relations, even though there wasn't any incitement in anything pastor John Hagee actually said. "It was a tonal thing," Sheppard explained. "You could see what he was trying to do by his tone and body language. . . . I listened to the people who contacted us, and they perceived his tone to be demeaning. It is subjective, but there were a lot of people who contacted us who were upset."
Hagee has evidently had this kind of trouble before: "A program in which Hagee played video of Muslim imams in both the United States and overseas preaching hatred and violence against Jews and Israel upset Muslims and resulted in complaints filed with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, the equivalent of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, or FCC."
Now let me get this straight. It is incitement to speak about Islam with a tone of voice that Muslims don't like? It is incitement to play a video of Muslim imams preaching hatred and violence? But does CAIR have anything to say about the imams themselves? CAIR's website features plenty of mechanisms for reporting discrimination and hate crimes, as well as for protesting against FBI investigations, but I never have found there any way for a moderate Muslim to report terrorist activity that he may witness at his mosque or Islamic center.
Also: so the imams preaching hate aren't shown, and Canadians aren't incited to rise up and form gangs of Canadian bullies to terrorize peaceful Muslims. But that wasn't going to happen anyway. The other effect is that Canadians who don't see these videos are that much less aware that there are Muslim imams preaching hatred and violence, and that some of them are quite close at hand. So they're that much less aware of the need to take legitimate steps to defend themselves against terrorism. But CAIR doesn't seem to be concerned about that.
Even worse: sailing by on Canadian television without any concerns about "incitement" was a "documentary series comparing the U.S. to the Hitler regime. [Canadian network] Vision's six-part series charged the U.S., in collaboration with its 'CIA-trained partner' Osama bin Laden, planned the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks as a pretext for attempts to gain world dominance. The U.S. is going about this, Vision said, in much the same way Nazi brownshirts torched the Reichstag, or parliament, in Berlin in 1933 and blamed it on Adolf Hitler's enemies to provide a pretext for a crackdown propelling Hitler into power."
This is not just Canadians modeling cringing, subservient dhimmitude, pulling shows because of their tone. This is Canadians acting as a mouthpiece for full-blown radical Muslim hate and paranoia.
Posted by Robert at November 5, 2003 12:16 PMhttp://www.jihadwatch.org
Now let's be reasonable here. Hagee likely did use a tone of voice that alienated Muslim viewers.Canada is only a nation that accepts the concept of free speech up to a point. For example, the demonstration favoring Hizb'alla in Montreal is OK. Maybe some other things. but not hateful tones from Right wing Evangelical preachers who offend Muslims.
I get it.
Sunday, November 04, 2007
National Anthems
If you click here you should be able to get the link to listen to Kate Smith singing "God Bless America."
Go for it. There is hardly anything more beautiful than Kate Smith singing that song.
I can't recall a day gone by in all my twelve years of school back home when we didn't stand up and pledge allegiance to the nation. Every day in school we sang the Star Spangled Banner. I can't vouch for the version there because I don't have speakers connected to this here machine. I had to sing it myself, which you won't want to hear. Ever.
And now I want to turn to a song I think you can feel good enough about if ever you do hear me sing it. I'd like to hear you sing it too. In fact, I think every kid in school in the land and beyond, wherever we might be, everyone of us should be able to rise in the morning and all of us in unison should sing:
I've paid my dues
Time after time.
I've done my sentence
But committed no crime.
And bad mistakes,
I've made a few.
I've had my share of sand kicked in my face,
But I've come through.
We are the champions - my friends
And we'll keep on fighting - till the end -
We are the champions -
We are the champions
No time for losers
cause we are the champions - of the world -
I've taken my bows
And my curtain calls;
You brought me fame and fortune and everything that goes with it -
I thank you all -
But it's been no bed of roses,
No pleasure cruise;
I consider it a challenge before the whole human race -
And I ain't gonna lose -
We are the champions - my friends
And we'll keep on fighting - till the end -
We are the champions -
We are the champions
No time for losers
'cause we are the champions - of the world. *
I do believe singing that song every morning in school should be mandatory for every American. Why?
'Cause: WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS-- OF THE WORLD!
And we should sing it out every day so we all know it for sure, and know that we're not afraid to let the whole world know it too. WE are the champions. It's US. Champions of the world!
*QUEEN: WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS
from the album NEWS OF THE WORLD
written by Freddie Mercury
1977
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