Blogging and the Beeb

On Thursday morning I went through my morning web trapline - New York Times, the Guardian, Raw Story, previous day's 9 Chickweed Lane, Girl Genius, the CJR and CSM, Slashdot and Fark.

One of the daily Fark links was to a BBC story. The Commission or Racial Equality wanted to ban Tintin in the Congo, the 1930 adventure's of Herge's famous character and Belgium's national hero. The book's certainly dated. Tintin exterminates animals wholesale trying to get his man. The locals are caricatures. They don't speak well. They aren't bright. They look about like you'd expect. Herge was embarrassed by it in later years. It's never been heavily published or promoted and is mostly forgotten by his fans.

That obviously wasn't good enough for the British government. They wanted it to be banned from sale because the depictions of Africans are pretty distasteful by modern standards.

The BBC had a comment form, so I entered one hoping that it would be accepted for publication on the website. It was a little surprising to get a call half an hour later asking "Are you Dan Gambiera? I'm from the BBC World Service. Would you like to be on BBC World Have Your Say?"

Yes. Certainly.

At 11AM they called back, and I got to speak for a couple minutes. It was nice to see that almost nobody wanted TTitC to be banned. Moved to the adult graphic novels section, maybe. But most saw official censorship as heavy-handed even for today's UK.

So what did your Faithful Amphibian have to say? It's hard to remember exactly, but I recall a couple points....

• "As a Jew whose hijab-wearing Afro-Asian Muslim wife loves Tintin..."
  
• Prohibition won't work, especially in an age where information is freely available. What the CRE did manage to do was catapult it from obscurity to fame. It jumped from somewhere around 30,000 on amazon.co.uk to 9th place in overall sales in a few hours including a copy that is now heading for Oregon by Royal Mail.
• If it is so patently offensive to various groups that it must be banned we will also have to include the Quran, the Gospels and anything written by any Jew anywhere. Various members of the Abrahamic faiths find all of these offensive and blasphemous.
• While we're at it we'll have to ban H. Rider Haggard, P.G. Woodehouse, Damon Runyon, Gone With the Wind, Uncle Tom's Cabin, and Mein Kampf just to start with. All of these are available in high street shops.
• Other racist material is readily available. How many kids are going to spend the equivalent of two hours' pay for a Midlands carpenter to buy any book these days?
• Dangerous ideas are good. With another turn of the Wheel the CRE's own white papers might be banned. And we wouldn't want that to happen. I mentioned the McLibel lawsuit as a case where commercial interests found a pamphlet to be offensive and objectionable and tried to crush the authors in what turned into the UK's longest trial. I may also have brought up the fact that Rachel Carson's Silent Spring would probably be illegal today under American Food Disparagement Laws.

That's all I can remember saying. Someone else made the point that it should be a matter of parental responsibility and that context is important. It was a different age. People thought differently, and it's dangerous and dishonest to revise history to make it more palatable.

Come to think of it, Herge turned pretty much everyone who wasn't a Belgian into a caricature. Look at Tintin in America or any of the books that take place in Russia or the Orient.

So it was a good day. Thanks to Rustin Wright for reminding me about the McLibel incident.

Update: It looks like the book will not be banned. Barnes & Noble will be reclassifying it as an adult graphic novel.

Am I a callous prick or is it a sense of perspective?

There was a story which started off on the wrestling websites, made it to fark and then to the mainstream media. It seems that a popular actor/entertainer in the WWE by the name of Benoit has died along with his wife and seven year old. At first the wire services wouldn't touch it. It might have been a publicity stunt by the wrestling industry. Nobody wanted to be the first dupe.

It seems that the report was real. Chris Benoit, his wife Nancy, and their son Daniel really are dead, and the police are treating it as a murder-suicide. Investigations continue, but they're working from the hypothesis that he killed the woman and child over the weekend and himself today.

This is a tragedy. No doubt about it. I'm certainly sorry for the needless deaths of his wife and seven year old. I'm reserving judgement about the man himself. If he did the crime he deserves nothing more and nothing less than any other man who murders his family which is to say the thin end of nothing whittled down to a point. What disturbs me is the reaction of a number of people on tha Intrawebs. This sort of thing happens every day to people in their communities, sometimes people who they knew personally. Those deaths raise not a tear. But let someone who has been on television and played a popular character be the centerpiece of such an event and it's a cause for all sorts of mourning and grief. And according to some of them I'm seven separate sorts of soulless shitheel for treating these celebrity deaths with the same sort of measured regret that I do in all such cases.

These were not people I knew. I know nobody in their families. Their lives didn't touch mine, and mine didn't touch theirs. The fact that they were on television means somewhat less than nothing to me. Is there any reason why their passing should have more impact than that of humbler people who met the same sort of fate?

I think not. If you don't value those closer to you than complete strangers your love and sympathy aren't worth much. If you're deeply affected by every bad thing that happens you can't function. And if an industry creation - an acting persona - is a good reason to treat a death with particular concern, then a portion of your soul has been branded, bought and sold.

When You're Pack

Today, instead of heading out to Michigan for the Gathering of the Tribes I'm sitting in bed recovering from a really nasty fever that came on suddenly and has decided to settle in for a while. At least they say the ravings were interesting when in the ER. Dunno. I wasn't there at the time.

What's interesting is the way the dogs have been acting. They've always been Good Dogs, better than we've been good masters. They protect us faithfully from the three guys who are up to no good - Fred X, The Man in Brown and Usmail With the Bag. They're German Shepherds. It's their job.

Since I got sick they've stepped it up a notch. When I'm in bed one of them is right outside the door or on the landing. The other is on the landing or at the front door. Dogs they'd normally bark once at for form's sake get a real bark or two. Packages get left far away from the front door. When I'm in some other room they lie down in the doorways facing out towards danger instead of towards the people in the room. Their ears stay up, and it takes them a lot longer to go into the special power saving mode that dogs do so well.

It's really sweet. One of the Pack is sick. So they go all out to protect him. I'm only glad that they see I have food and water. If they didn't they'd probably provide some, pre-softened and easy to chew and digest *bleagh*. They don't seem to like the sick smell and try to wash it off me. If they knew how they could probably tell the doctors exactly what was wrong with me. Those noses are amazing.

That Shepherd guarding instinct is very strong. And I do feel safer having them around. Whoever said it was right, if there's a heaven most dogs will earn it and darned few of their masters.

The Real Truth

Bobbe has come up with a decent cosmology, later corrected by Jay Carstensen and further extended by Mushtaq.

They're close, but didn't quite get it right.

Here's how it really works:

It's all about Tsathoggua.

Almonds and Saffron

For the Ringing of the Bards Poetry Carnival . This is what comes of reading seed catalogs and old Italian cookbooks.

Bitter white nut in tight brown skin
Milk for Carnival's meatless days
Heart of peaches for linen hued thickening
Mixed with sugar confectioner's clay

Oh rarest of spices the crocus stigmata
When plucked from the pale blue field capture the sun
Red gold on the table or robe for renouncer
The light in the heart of the blossom is one.

From field to market to mortar and pestle
Bruised and battered, ground fine and torn
The essence released sleeps dead in the vessel
Wakened, refined then through fire reborn

Gold filament and tapered silver seed
Through fire and care their finer nature's freed.

I've been collecting odd implements of destruction for a while. One that you hear about but don't often see is the old sailor's weapon known as a slungshot or slung shot. It consists of a length of rope about as long as the user's forearm with a loop at one end and a monkey's fist knot at the other with a small lead cannonball inside the knot. Slungshots were never part of a ship's official armament. They were improvised for defense while ashore or made by criminals as "life preservers".

Since I was at the hardware store anyway I picked up a little of this and that and put one together this evening.

Materials

1. 3/8" three strand Sisal rope
2. Jute twine
3. 16 oz. "cannonball" lead sinker
4. Paraffin wax

Procedure

1. Made a three-strand eye splice in one end of the rope.
2. Made a monkey fist knot at the other end.
   
3. Before tightening up the monkey fist, put the lead ball inside.
   
4. Tightened the monkey fist knot.
5. Whipped the rope around the splice to protect splice and to hide messy job
6. Continued whipping (West Country Whip) around the loop with waxed jute twine
7. Gave the who thing another waxing.
   

Time elapsed for everything but the whipping: about ten minutes
Whipping: about twenty minutes.
Time to learn the knotwork: about fifteen minutes.

It's ugly, improvised and will bring the ones that don't usually come. Next time I'll use hemp rope and twine and add a couple extra loops in strategic places on the monkey's fist so the ball is completely concealed.

Note to self: It might be legal to carry this openly in Oregon. Just because it's legal doesn't mean it's a good idea. It will certainly make you fail the Police Attitude Test.

Old Age and Cussedness - I see Mushtaq's 70 and raise him 30

Just the other day the Traceless Warrior posted a news story about a septuagenarian tourist who killed an armed robber in Costa Rica and helped drive off his partners in crime.

Today's story comes from UK.

28 February 2007
MAN, 100 FIGHTS OFF MUGGERS

A 100-YEAR-OLD man fought off three teenage muggers after being surrounded at a bus stop. Buster Martin, who still works five days a week as a car washer and mechanic, was followed by the gang when he left a pub.

He said: "They pushed me against a wall and tried to take my money from me.

"I went mad. I was lashing out on the floor and then I stood up and was kicking them all.

"I pushed one and kung-fu kicked the other one between the legs.

"They ran off scared after I did that and I still had all my money.

"They thought I was an easy target but they didn't realise what a fighter I can be."

After the attack in Camberwell, south London, Buster staggered into hospital for treatment for a bruised rib and a bump on his head.

But his boss at Pimlico Plumbers, Charlie Mullins, said Buster still turned up for work the next day.

A police spokesman said he had been interviewed and patrols in the area had been stepped up.

Good and Bad News in Islam

Another day, another piece of idiocy from religious nutjobs in the UK. And a couple very welcome pronouncements for women from the Grand Mufti of Egypt, one of the most authoritative voices in Sunni Islam.

First the bad news

The Daily Express reports that the Muslim Council of Britain has slipped its cams and demanded strict Islamic standards for all schools in the UK. How strict? Well for example...

Everything from playground games, plays, parent meetings, sports and field trips would be single sex. Singing class would consist of the Quran. Muslim students would be exempt from learning about other religions, but non-Muslims students would be forced to learn Islamic doctrine. Girls would be subject to a dress code mandating that only hands and face would be uncovered. Vaccinations would be ended. Muslims children would be taught in Arabic. "Un-Islamic" activities would be banned. All schools would have special rooms for prayer and wudu. During Ramadan science classes would be modified, exams would be stopped and swimming would be forbidden in case students accidentally swallowed water.

This wouldn't normally be a cause for concern except that the report has the support of at least one senior Government adviser. Add that the MCB is a powerful political pressure group, and it is a bit worrying. I don't think that the recommendations are going to be implemented any time soon if we define "soon" as "before the Chassids make Porky Pig Bar Mitzvah". In light of the current Muslim/everyone else problems in the UK it's going to be a source of added aggravation. I'm taking odds, long odds but odds nonetheless, that we'll see anti-Muslim riots or non-governmental pogroms in Britain within five years.

Now the good news

Back in November the Grand Shaykh of Al Azhar and Aly Gomaa, Grand Mufti of Egypt, and two of the most prestigious scholars in the Sunni world issued a fatwa on female genital mutilation. Earlier rulings said that it was "not recommended" and "not obligatory". This one went much further. The two scholars announced that it was completely un-Islamic. In a country which has seen multiple secular prohibitions against the practice ignored or opposed this is a very welcome development.

This time Mr. Gomaa took on virginity. According to old custom in the area a woman's fitness for marriage was determined by the state of her hymen. In a country where honor murders still occur this is a very serious matter. The particular question was hymen-reconstruction surgery. Shaykh Gomaa stated that not only was it permissible, but that a husband had no more right to demand proof of virginity from his wife than she had to demand it from him. Shaykh Gindy went further saying "Islam does not care for the feelings of ignorant people, just as the law does not protect the idiots." They noted that women without hymens were subject to violence, which was the only justification for permitting the surgery. Further, if they were not virgins but truly repented their lack of chastity before G-d there was no need to tell their new husbands, particularly if they felt they would be in danger.

This extremely humane set of pronouncements is to be applauded. The Shaykhs have taken quite a risk in a country which is struggling with the relation between religion, ethnic customs and modernization.

George Takei Slips the Ol' Pink (or Light Tan) Tentacle to Tim Hardaway

A few days back Tim Hardaway, NBA All-Star went on a rant about gay people. He hates them. He doesn't think the belong in America. America is for heterosexuals. He thinks gays are evil. He's proud to be a homophobe. The usual stuff. My immediate response would have been to say that I don't like porch monkeys, am a proud racist and think that America is for Covenant People, not muds. That would have been at about the same level but unworthy of a proud Amphibian-American. Back a few decades when Doonesbury was funny there was a pithy conversation between two characters that summed it up nicely:

"I hear you're gay."
"I hear you're Black."
"But that's normal!"
"Didn't use to be."

Hardaway seems to have lost his spot on the All-Stars this year and a number of endorsements for his remarks although he probably picked up the KKK and the AFA. The worst thing that happened to him has to be this video clip by George Takei. Warning: Do not watch if are drinking hot liquids or have easily dislocated ribs. May be hazardous to those suffering from chronic irony deficiency.

The SaniTest

There are web-based tests for everything, what Tarot card or superhero you are, which flavor of peanut butter you most resemble, or even how White and nerdy you are. The fine folks at the H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society have a useful test. They will tell you how sane you are.

In the spirit of full disclosure...

Your SaniTest(TM) Results

Your score is: 159

For easier understanding, the HPLHS SaniTest assessment algorithm converts your raw score to a scale of 1 to 10. This number is your INSANITY INDEX.

INSANITY INDEX 9.41 This alarmingly high score suggests that you are moderately psychopathic: emotionally and behaviorally disordered. You seem to have a clear view of reality, but not of your own place in it. Your desire to lash out in violence might be kept in check by your deep-seated fears of other people. Other notable people who scored this high include Mark David Chapman, the assassin of singer John Lennon, and Aaron Spelling, producer of such TV hits as 'Beverly Hills 90210.'

The HPLHS has been trying for years to put on their delightfully eldritch musical A Shoggoth on the Roof. Unfortunately, the cock-sockets who own the copyright to Fiddler on the Roof always show up with corporate lawyers, cease-and-desists and huge lawsuits whenever anyone tries to do a production. Parody is protected by law.

That doesn't mean diddly when the big money guys can spend
whatever it takes to destroy a small community theater.

May their souls be devoured forever by the Formless Spawn of Tsathoggua. And not in a good way.