Thus Spake Zarathustra

Trial by POWA

2006-03-07T02:14:00.002-08:00

The Jacob Zuma circus has rolled into town and it seems that People Against Women Abuse (POWA- gosh, what an acronym!) are determined to fry the former deputy Prez before he has had his day in court.

Don't get me worng. I think that JZ is a corrupt nobody who was elevated to the spotlight by Thabsie. As a thieving and stupid kleptocrat, he should be kept far, far away from the halls of power. Nonetheless, he is a citizen of South Africa and as such enjoys certain inalienable rights, the right to a fair trial before being found guilty being one of them.

Cue POWA entering the media morass the trial of JZ has stirred up. All of the statements made by flunkies from this organization center around the presumption that JZ is in fact guilty and that he deserves to get as good as he gave in Pollsmoor, or some such.

If an NGO wishes to interfere in the workings of a justice system that is supported by the people's elected representitives, then it needs to think very carefully about which side it is gonna support. If anything, they should come out in support of JZ. As a high-profile man accused of rape, he has already been tried in the minds of most people in SA.

It is just too easy for some grasping women to level allegations of rape against men, esepcially men in the public eye. The very accusation of rape is enough to end a career or family. There need to be far stiffer penalties for women who cry 'rape' just to advance their own nefarious agendas.

JZ may be guilty ( he is fucking stupid- why he would have consenual sex with the accused anmd not expect some sort of fallout is beyond me). But if he ain't, the woman who besmirched his reputation deserves to feel the full wrath of the law.

Trial by POWA

2006-03-07T02:14:00.001-08:00

Top Ten Facts about His Supreme Dakness

2006-03-06T00:17:00.000-08:00

Behold, the facts about Chuck Norris:

Guns don't kill people. Chuck Norris kills People.
There is no theory of evolution. Just a list of animals Chuck Norris allows to live.
Chuck Norris does not sleep. He waits.
The chief export of Chuck Norris is Pain.
There is no chin under Chuck Norris' Beard. There is only another fist.
Chuck Norris has two speeds. Walk, and Kill.
The leading causes of death in the United States are: 1. Heart Disease 2. Chuck Norris 3. Cancer
Chuck Norris drives an ice cream truck covered in human skulls.
Chuck Norris is my Homeboy.
Chuck Norris doesn't go hunting.... CHUCK NORRIS GOES KILLING

Compliments of chucknorrisfacts.com ( who receive no royalties from my use of these facts but who cares since they probably ain't gonna sue me anyways).

Well done Reese!

2006-03-06T00:05:00.000-08:00

So the Oscars have come and gone.

A few shout outs to the winners:

Reese Witherspoon- best actress for her portrayal of June Carter-Cash in Walk the line . Despite what some folks say, a great movie that chronicles a great life. And the music was hella cool also.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman- best actor for his portrayal of Truman Capote in Capote. A stalwart of independent cinema, he once had the honour of playing a character named Brent ( The Big Lebowski).

Tsotsi- best foreign. South Africa finally getting her dues. Fugard for a Nobel Prize?

George Clooney- best supporting actor (Syriana). There is life after ER.

The New South Africa is much like the Old

2006-02-20T23:50:00.000-08:00

So, as part of a professional course I am completing, I have to do a certain amount of work in government hospitals ( I am a speech and hearing therapist). As is the practise at such places, everytime you see a client/patient, you have to stat them i.e. record certain pieces of information ( how long your session was, what diagnosis the patient had, etc). This sort of info is useful- it can help hospital administrators decide how well a department is run, can infrom equipment needs ( if a particular disorder is prevelant and working with people who have that disorder requires specialist equipment, than stats can help justify the purchase of siad equipment). So, though I abhor paperwork, I gamely filled in the stat sheet until I came to a rather nasty column: RACE.

I thought we all lived in the rainbow nation, where the levels of pigmentation in your skin are immaterial. Having a race column means that you have to subcribe to the sorts of ideas that made HF Verwoed famous- what do you do when you encounter a client of dubious racial geneology? The pencil test? Should you consult the latest issues of the journal of Race Hygiene to brush up on the newest ways of catching out mulattos who try to pass for White ( or Black, in today's economic climate)? Given our president's obsession with race, why doesn't he make public statements about the races of his cabinet members?

I often think about cunning things to put in the 'race' field when filling out forms:

ARYAN: If you wanna be racist, don't be shy about it. The idea that human beings should be divided up into groups so discrimination can be more precise is a concpet straight outta Germany circa 1939. So go the whole hog- use the terminology of the Nazis.

HUMAN: A good one this suggested by 01. Emphasises that we are all supposed to be equal and that race doesn't matter.

WRITE SOMETHING LIKE 'WHY DOES THIS MATTER?': Registers protest and lets the people in pwoer know that you think their ideas are a load of bollocks.

This may get me a C4 enema.

2006-02-10T03:50:00.000-08:00

This is not from my own hand but from those really funny guys at White House.org. If those Desertotopian guys are right, there aint no virgins waiting for me in the afterlife...

TRANSCRIPT OF PRESIDENT BUSH'S POWWOW WITH SO-CALLED PROPHET MOOHAMMED TO DISCUSS CARTOON-INDUCED WORLD WAR III Officious White House Transcript
THE PRESIDENT: Are you there, Allah? It's me, George. I know you probably can't hear me, on account of you're just a low-rent, make-pretend knockoff of the other, way-more-believable invisible man who lives in the clouds, but since Jesus cancelled our usual 1:30 today on account of he's tied up with His new roof-collapsing hobby, I thought I might give you a shout.
Now I'm not really sure how folks go about praying to you, but I did find this little brass oil lamp upstairs in Jenna's tapestry nook, and I thought that... maybe...
[Rubs Lamp.]
if I just…
[Flash of Light & Sonic Boom & Poof of Thick, White Smoke]
Hello? Who's there? Who is that?
MOOHAMMED: SILENCE, INFIDEL!
THE PRESIDENT: Whoa. Are you, like, Allah?

MOOHAMMED: NO! I AM THE PROPHET MOOHAMMED! PEACE BE UPON ME!
THE PRESIDENT: And also upon me.
MOOHAMMED: SILENCE! HOW DARE YOU SPEAK THUSLY, INSOLENT SWINE!
THE PRESIDENT: Aw jeez – I'm sorry. Please forgive me. I should have known better. Jesus gets awful pissy too when folks don't blow enough smoke up his taut, athletic butt. And since you two dudes are, you know, major competition and all in the salvation industry – I guess it stands to reason that you'd think your turds are Hershey Kisses, too.
MOOHAMMED: ENOUGH! NOW FOR WHAT PURPOSE HAVE YOU INTERRUPTED MY ETERNAL AFTERLIFE SNUGGLINGS WITH MY ALMOST-PUBESCENT WIVES?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, you see, I was wondering if you'd heard anything about this hubbub over the drawings of you in the funny pages? Over in Denmark?
MOOHAMMED: OF COURSE! I KNEW OF THESE CARTOONS EVEN BEFORE THEY APPEARED IN THE IMAGINATIONS OF THOSE WHO DREW THEM!
THE PRESIDENT: No shit? How?
MOOHAMMED: I AM ALLAH'S MESSENGER! GOD SPEAKS TO ME AND TELLS ME ALL!
THE PRESIDENT: No way. You mean out loud? And He gets specific like that with you? When He talks to me, it's usually just, you know, like in my own voice inside my head, and there's never any details or nothing. He's usually just all, "Do whatever feels good, G-Dubya! You wanna bomb some A-rab shithole? Go for it. Hey – there might even be some WMDs over there."
MOOHAMMED: WHAT IS YOUR POINT? SPEAK NOW OR– (Coughs. Hacks. Coughs Some More.)
Yeesh. I think I'm giving myself laryngitis here. Mind if I drop the screaming mimi schtick for awhile?
THE PRESIDENT: Sure thing. You want a Fisherman's Friend®?
MOOHAMMED: No, thanks.
THE PRESIDENT: Cool. Anyway, your followers are going pretty apeshit over these cartoons, huh? Like, torching buildings and wanting to chop peoples' heads off.
MOOHAMMED: Yeah. And?
THE PRESIDENT: Well I just want to be sure you know that I told the State Department to say that America is opposed to those cartoons. Because if the past four years have taught me anything, it's that some of your followers are crazy-assed motherfuckers who just will not quit. And to be honest with you, they're starting to really scare the shit out of me. So much so that it's getting, like, all ironical that I call them the "FREEDOM®-Haters" – and yet here I am, totally kowtowing to them and calling for the curtailing of actual freedom.
MOOHAMMED: (Laughs.) Yes, this is plain to see.
THE PRESIDENT: And well, it's just that, even though my religion tells me quite clearly that all your followers are going to burn in Hell, that hasn't stopped me from going through the motions of tolerance. Heck, I've even been doing those Ishtar Dinners every year – and I hate sheep eyes casserole!
MOOHAMMED: We too take perverse pleasure in the thought of your Christians souls writhing in eternal agony.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, well I guess we'll see who's right. But in the meantime, I thought maybe it would be nice if this cartoon stuff didn't escalate into another World War – especially since I've already stretched America's military so dangerously paper-thin and all.
MOOHAMMED: Indeed you have. (Laughs.)
THE PRESIDENT: So... got any advice on how to calm your people down?
MOOHAMMED: Look, every religious cult has its terrorist lunatic fringe. You Christians have Operation Rescue and The 700 Club, Scientologists have Tom Cruise, and I have a bunch of bipolar, unemployed illiterates who just happen to be handy with plastique. They don't represent the majority. But hey, if your religion can't afford a marketing budget or five entire satellite TV networks, you take whatever free PR you can get, right?
THE PRESIDENT: I guess. So you mean these chanting crazies are like your "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth"? You can't really condone their tactics, so you just sit back and reap the benefits?
MOOHAMMED: Exactly.
THE PRESIDENT: Well I can certainly appreciate that. (Winks.)
I guess we should both be kinda thankful that when liberals invented political correctness to criminalize "hurt feelings," they inadvertently gave birth to the absurdist notion that ridiculing the intolerance and knee-jerk hysteria of violent extremists is "offensive."
MOOHAMMED: (Thumbs Up.)
THE PRESIDENT: Alright. Then I guess I'll just try to see this thing through by espousing the cheap cop-out that cracking jokes about ANY religion is not a right. If nothing else, that takes my country one step closer to becoming the same kind of loonybird theocracy that your fringe terror monkeys want.
One thing though...
MOOHAMMED: Yes?
THE PRESIDENT: If this cartoon shit really does hit the fan, America will have to support the Danishes.
MOOHAMMED: Why is that? They don't even have any oil.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, but they have something that guys like me value way more than mere money: BLUE EYES.
MOOHAMMED: Fair enough. Farewell, Infidel. [Crosses Arms, Bobs Head & Blinks]
[Flash of Light & Sonic Boom & Poof of White Smoke]

Honorable Justice COSATU presiding.

2006-02-08T02:53:00.000-08:00

One expects trade unions to be fucking dumb. Afterall, these are the same people who believe that making it harder to employ people is going to boost employment. But the latest round of contradictions emanating from the political arena's biggest turd fest had even seasoned COSATU watchers retching.

Four months ago, COSATU went to great lengths to ensure that Comrade Zuma got a fair trial before being proclaimed guilty. We do, afterall, live in a country where accused ( in this case, clearly guilty) persons are innocent until a court of law has found that they are thieving fuckers.

Fastforward to today, and COSATU has waded into the fray surrounding the Vereeniging Dry Cleaners trial. For those of you who have not read about this trial, three white business people in are accused of conspiring with two of their black workers to murder two other (black) workers. Nothing complicated, up to this point- the trial should be allowed to proceed and if the prosecution can lead the neccessary evidence, the guilty parties should be punished.

COSATU, despite clamouring to remind all and sundry that Jacob is not to be called a money grabbing son-of-a-bitch, until the courts have actually shown this to be true, insists that the Vereeniging accused should be denied bail. What about their rights to innocence in the eyes of the law? Do these rights apply only to blacks? What sort of transparently racist message is COSATU sending by supporting JZ and harresing the Vereeniging accused?

The sooner COSATU realises it is NOT a government or a court of law, the better for us all. Let the law run its course and concentrate on what you do best- driving away investment and destroying jobs.

You have two cows...

2006-01-30T03:19:00.000-08:00

I found this on Wikipedia. It is so funny and so suitable for expansion, that I had to put it here. Apparently, there is a genre of joke that starts off with the phrase ' you have two cows...'. See Wiki's offerings below:

Atheism: You have two cows. They came from nowhere.
Bureaucracy: You have two cows. The government takes them both, shoots one, milks the other, pays you for the milk, and then pours it down the drain.
Canadianism: You have two cows. Vous avez deux vaches.
Capitalism: You have two cows. A big cattle company ousts you off the business. You sell your cows and work for the big business.
Communism: You have two cows. Everyone owns all the cows and everyone is equal. If you happen to be in charge of everyone and their cows, you own more of the cows than everyone because you are more equal than they are.
Democracy: You have two cows. They outvote you 2-1 to ban all meat and dairy products.
Dyslexia: You have two wocs.
Racism: You have two cows. One of them is brown.
Surrealism: You have two cows. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons. '

But I would like to add some of my own:

Scientology: You have two cows. Sell their milk so that you can go for more auditing.

African Nationalist: You have two cows. But they are in AbuDabi. Use your presidential jet to fly there and get them.

Freud: You have two cows. They have udders just like your mother's.

Jean Luc Picard: You have two cows. If they don't have warp capabilities, don't speak to them.

Spock: You have two cows. Fascinating.

James T Kirk: You have two cows. Are either of them single?

Jonathan Archer: You have one cow ( two cows have not been developed yet).

Bill Gates: You have two cows. If one of them is 3 years late, it's a longhorn.

Steve Jobs: You have two cows. I'll work for milk.

Manto: You have two cows. Keep them out of the garlic patch.

Tony Leon: You have two cows. Please get them to vote for me.

Mormon: You have two cows. Moomon and Mooroni.

Homeopathy: You have two cows. Dilute them in 20 000 000 litres of water.

Al Gore: You have two cows. Did you count them properly?

George Bush I: You have two cows. Can I read their lips?

George Bush II: You have two cows. One is for us and the other is against us.

Jessica Simpson: You have two cows. Excluding my sister.

Steven Spielberg: You have Cows II. I'm sorry, I don't do sequels.

JM Coetzee: You have two cows. That's a disgrace.

Roman Polanski: You have two cows. Are they legal?

South African: You had two cows. One has been stolen.

German: You have two cows. They have united into one cow.

Esperanto: Vi havas duajn vacxajn. Cxu ili estas regulara?

The Most Amazing Sunday

2006-01-30T02:30:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, thanks to the adroit manuverings of mine house mates, I got to attend a taping of The Most Amazing Show.

It really is a very amzing show. I think that this is the best thing to happen to South African comedy in a very long time . I can't remember when a witty, audience-interactive show that has something to say was last flighted on the SABC.

Problem is, the fucktards at the SABC will probably cancel the show after 1 season so that they can spend the money making more episodes of Isidingo or Generations. Let's make sure the SABC knows how we want the funds from our TV licences spent. I think an email a day telling those Auckland Park guys just how brilliant there show it should do it.

Let's have more TMAS and less crud.

www.tmas.co.za

Our fucked up nanny government.

2006-01-23T01:53:00.000-08:00

Like most left leaning politicians, the current and previous ministers of health believe that they have the right to tell qualified adults how to pollute their bodies. Witness the near zealtous campaign against smoking and big tobacco- warning labels are plastered on all packs of cigarettes so that pregnant mothers are warned that Gunston Plain will harm the health of their unborn children; restaurants may no have overly large smoking areas; all forms of tobacco advertising have been banned. Its clear that Ministers Zuma and Manto don’t want you to smoke.

As ministers of health, they are tasked with being vigilant about the health of South Africans. Problems arise when the application of such health-preserving urges is so spotty. While smokers are made to feel that they are one step removed from pederasts if they smoke in the presence of a child, nary a poster is designed to warn South Africans about the dangers of alcohol abuse.

A balanced approach might argue that the two vices are equally harmful. My view is that of the two, alcohol is more harmful and in need of control. It is not coincidental that a nation which likes to dop is also a nation with one of the world’s highest road accident rates. The connection between our unacceptably high women/child abuse rates and pervasive alcoholism is there to be seen by anyone who has eyes in his/her head. We also have the distinctive dishonour of being the country with the world’s highest incidence of foetal alcohol syndrome (FAS).

Widespread boozing has broader implications. We all pay for the damage done by drunkards at Christmas time, when hospital beds are filled by their handiwork. FAS has ensured that generations of farm workers in the Western and Northern Cape are so mentally and physically underdeveloped that their changes of breaking free from crushing cycles of poverty are insignificantly small. And yet the beer continues to flow unabated.

It’s clear that the government has the means to tackle the problem ala anti-tobacco campaigns. Warning labels on every box of Châteaux de Cardboard sold would not be amiss. Every advertising space and medium previously occupied by tobacco merchants has been claimed by booze manufacturers; why not ban advertising of THIS harmful substance? In much the same way as the purchasing and enjoyment of cigarettes has been drastically curtailed, the sale of alcohol could also be restricted to certain shops and times of day.

Of course billboards telling consumers about the harmful effects of ethanol will have very little effect on alcoholics whose poverty and powerlessness give them little to life for anyway. But by doing something to limit the damage of alcohol abuse the government will demonstrate that it takes this mammoth health issue seriously. It may not solve the problem overnight, but it would get the process going.

Far be it from me to find a conspiracy around every corner, but methinks that our cadres in Cape Town have good reasons for not clamping down on the sale of hooch. Just how many shares in SAB are owned by the busy bees who frequent the halls of power? Or are our leaders practising Verwoedean (and Mugabean) statecraft? Verwoed and his Nationalist cronies saw to it that townships were well supplied with cheap liquor while every village in Zimbabwe has at least one bottle store. No revolution was ever launched by citizens too drunk to wield their pitch forks and Molotov cocktails. Better to stay home and enjoy some government- sanctioned Klippies and Cola cocktails.

The perils of Communism.

2006-01-11T05:13:00.000-08:00

In case anybody needed more convincing, Communism is possibly the worst way in which to run a country or world.

This fact was recently driven home to me when I finished reading 'Anthem' by Ayn Rand. This book deals with a world in which Communism is taken to its logical conclusion. The entire world is ruled by one government. Collectivism is the philosophy which governs every aspect of human life. The entire scope of men's lives is centered on the group. People work, live, die together. The self is an abberaration to be reviled and avoided; men live for the advancement of the group. Even the word 'I' used to designate yourself as being seperate from the herd has passed out of speech and is no longer used.

A world in which collectivism is supreme is one marked by backwardness and primitive technologies.

The book is sort of a primer on Objectivist thought, which Ms. Rand championed. Below plz find a brief overview of Objectivist thought from www.aynrand.org:

"Ayn Rand named her philosophy "Objectivism" and described it as a philosophy for living on earth. Objectivism is an integrated system of thought that defines the abstract principles by which a man must think and act if he is to live the life proper to man. Ayn Rand first portrayed her philosophy in the form of the heroes of her best-selling novels, The Fountainhead (1943) and Atlas Shrugged (1957). She later expressed her philosophy in nonfiction form.

Ayn Rand was once asked if she could present the essence of Objectivism while standing on one foot. Her answer was:

Metaphysics: Objective Reality
Epistemology: Reason
Ethics: Self-interest
Politics: Capitalism

She then translated those terms into familiar language:

"Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed."
"You can't eat your cake and have it, too."
"Man is an end in himself."
"Give me liberty or give me death."

The basic principles of Objectivism can be summarized as follows:

Metaphysics
"Reality, the external world, exists independent of man's consciousness, independent of any observer's knowledge, beliefs, feelings, desires or fears. This means that A is A, that facts are facts, that things are what they are—and that the task of man's consciousness is to perceive reality, not to create or invent it." Thus Objectivism rejects any belief in the supernatural—and any claim that individuals or groups create their own reality.

Epistemology
"Man's reason is fully competent to know the facts of reality. Reason, the conceptual faculty, is the faculty that identifies and integrates the material provided by man's senses. Reason is man's only means of acquiring knowledge." Thus Objectivism rejects mysticism (any acceptance of faith or feeling as a means of knowledge), and it rejects skepticism (the claim that certainty or knowledge is impossible).

Human Nature
Man is a rational being. Reason, as man's only means of knowledge, is his basic means of survival. But the exercise of reason depends on each individual's choice. "Man is a being of volitional consciousness." "That which you call your soul or spirit is your consciousness, and that which you call 'free will' is your mind's freedom to think or not, the only will you have, your only freedom. This is the choice that controls all the choices you make and determines your life and character."Thus Objectivism rejects any form of determinism, the belief that man is a victim of forces beyond his control (such as God, fate, upbringing, genes, or economic conditions).

Ethics
"Reason is man's only proper judge of values and his only proper guide to action. The proper standard of ethics is: man's survival qua man—i.e., that which is required by man's nature for his survival as a rational being (not his momentary physical survival as a mindless brute). Rationality is man's basic virtue, and his three fundamental values are: reason, purpose, self-esteem. Man—every man—is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others; he must live for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself; he must work for his rational self-interest, with the achievement of his own happiness as the highest moral purpose of his life." Thus Objectivism rejects any form of altruism—the claim that morality consists in living for others or for society.

Politics
"The basic social principle of the Objectivist ethics is that no man has the right to seek values from others by means of physical force—i.e., no man or group has the right to initiate the use of physical force against others. Men have the right to use force only in self-defense and only against those who initiate its use. Men must deal with one another as traders, giving value for value, by free, mutual consent to mutual benefit. The only social system that bars physical force from human relationships is laissez-faire capitalism. Capitalism is a system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which the only function of the government is to protect individual rights, i.e., to protect men from those who initiate the use of physical force." Thus Objectivism rejects any form of collectivism, such as fascism or socialism. It also rejects the current "mixed economy" notion that the government should regulate the economy and redistribute wealth.

Esthetics
"Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value-judgments." The purpose of art is to concretize the artist's fundamental view of existence. Ayn Rand described her own approach to art as "Romantic Realism": "I am a Romantic in the sense that I present men as they ought to be. I am Realistic in the sense that I place them here and now and on this earth." The goal of Ayn Rand's novels is not didactic but artistic: the projection of an ideal man: "My purpose, first cause and prime mover is the portrayal of Howard Roark or John Galt or Hank Rearden or Francisco d'Anconia as an end in himself—not as a means to any further end." "

In this era, where selfishness is underrated, the work and life of Ms. Rand is to be valued.

A shipload full of nerds?

2006-01-10T02:19:00.000-08:00

Ashamed as I am to admit it, I have developed into something of a Trekkie. So here is my list (unauthorized) of reasons why Star Trek is the coolest thing since Bill Shatner learnt to sing:

1) Despite being uber nerdy, all of the main crew members socre at least once during each season ( better than the real life record of any nerd I know).

2) Crew members get to use energy weapons to vaporize shit. Nuff said.

3) There seems to be a Star Fleet policy against hiring dogs ( and those that do make it through the cracks never land up on the Enterprise, leather face Crusher notwithstanding). So, while hurtling through the depths of space all the nerds on board can have space sex with space babes.

4) Synthehol allows you to drink like a fish sans hangover.

Any other jewels?

Die Harry Potter, die, die.

2005-11-30T23:32:00.000-08:00

The fourth cinemtaic turdfest in the Harry Potter series begins besmirching the screens of mutliplexes across South Africa today. Let us all observe a moment of silence to honour the passing of intelligence and maturity.

There are lots of reasons to give this cinematic abortion a wide berth. I don't agree with some Christian zealots that Harry Potter is harmful because it features occult/Satanic elements. Clearly, this Christianity fad has NOT made people more compassionate or tolerant, so lets give the other side a chance. Maybe if we all become Satanists, we would begin to act more like Christians. I know that Satanism can render you loony but lets face it- you certainly can't be more fucked up than some of the Christians I have met.

No, the reason that I think adults should steer clear of this tripe is that they are adults. When I was growing up, many adults recommended books like the Famous Five to me ( a gravely disappointing work, given that Georgina the lesbian never quite understands that Anne wants more than just companionship). Rarely did they say things like " Son, this book is so good that I read it' because it was understood that some books were for adults and some for kids. If any adult admitted that they had read a Famous Five novel, most people would have thought of them as morons. Yet today adults will gladly fess up to having read HP novels six or seven times ( how fun it must be to spend a holiday with someone who has read Harry Potter and the Ingrown Toenail seven times).

The spread of the popularity of HP among adults mirrors a general dumbing down of our society. Learning Greek, Latin, music and an appreciation for poetry are no longer considered part of being a well-educated and well-rounded adult. Instead we have legions of cretins, breathing through their mouths, yearning for the next installment in this travesty.' Oooh' they chorus' Harry has got his first pube'. Honestly, I might have cared about which house wins the Interhouse Quidditch ( or however the fuck you spell it) cup when I was seven but as an adult I should have better things to woory about.

What's next? Looking forward to the next 'novel' in the Ben the Dog series? Adults rereading the adventures of Mark and Kathy multiple times? Spare me!

Sixteen days against bollocks.

2005-11-29T01:20:00.000-08:00

White ribbons adorn every possible space in South Africa at the mo, to mark the '16 days against violence against women' campaign. The hope is that by festooning everything with the ribbons, men will stop treating their women like property ( or at least wait until the end of the 16 days to beat their wives/girlfriends/daughters up again). The campaign is bound to have all the efficacy of a Jehovah's Witness in Tehran.

The problem is that most people don't understand real rights for women must be founded on two pillars. Laws must exist to protect women. But the means for enforcing these laws must also exist. There are plenty laws that protect women from abuse ( some by depriving men of their right's to due process). Women, however, continue to be abused because the average policeman tasked with enforcing these laws is as bigger mysogonist as the abusers.

What needs to change is the mindset of the average policeman, who needs to be convinced that women deserve the protection of the law. A white ribbon campaign targets lots of civilians, but I remain unconvinced that it does much to change the attitudes of the boys in blue.

I don't know much about crack whores, but I know what I like.

2005-11-28T02:07:00.000-08:00

I am not opposed to nannying in general, especially when such is carried out by tall amply bosomed Nordic nannies who punish naughty boys by bending them over knees and spanking them. But when the government tries to play nanny, not only does this induce vomiting because you might accidentally conjure up the mental image of Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma in nannyesque fishnet stockings (resist the urge to pluck your eyes from their orbits), it also really does not make any sense.

Our government is not unique in dictating to adult citizens what they may or may not do. There are two activities I would like to see legalized forthwith: prostitution and drug use ( and not just because some of my best friends are crack whores).

We live in a country where being a criminal carries with it a certain prestige and where criminality is rampant. Everybody knows of someone who was murdered in cold blood so that a piece of human shit could make off with their car/cellphone/wallet. I would submit that one of the reasons we live in a latter day version of the Wild West is because our government has its head up its arse. Clearly, our resources are stretched to their very limits. So instead of wasting valuable time and money pursuing hookers and drug users, why not put cops to work actually stopping real crimes that really have a very deleterious effect on the lives of SA citizens? Of course, there are drawbacks to such a course of action. Cops won’t be able to use the threat of jail time to elicit freebies from hookers and will have to start paying for their nookie like the rest of us while they will also have to start buying drugs instead of just using those that they confiscate. I am sure, though, that we will all learn to get by.

The way in which the system is set up at the moment has benefits for two groups only: pimps and dealers. It is a matter of simple economics: when the supply of a commodity is limited (in this case because of seriously flawed takes on what the government should and should not do), the price of that commodity increases. So by keeping drugs and whoring illegal, we are in effect swelling the bank accounts of the very people that the war on drugs/prostitution hopes to eliminate. If the system is brought, kicking and screaming, into the light of day, prices of hookers and hits will fall. Good news anyday of the week!

But aside from these very astute practical reasons why drugs and prostitution should be made legal, there are also compelling philosophical reasons. When you begin to ask questions about what makes a particular action criminal, most people will concede that such an action has to harm somebody else. If I take a dump on my neighbours stoep, he has to wake up to the smell of poop. I have harmed him. Therefore I have committed a crime.

Where is the wronged party in a drug/prostitution transaction? If a hooker wants to sell that which she owns (i.e. her body and time) to me, at a price that we both agree on, who is the victim? The answer is that there is no victim. Drugs may well harm those that use them. But the modern liberal democratic state is based on the idea that you have sovereignty over your person. You are allowed to harm yourself if you so wish by smoking, getting body piercings, or even attending a bondage party ( nothing to do with discussing bank mortgages, for the uninitiated). Why not extend such freedom to the use of narcotics?

There is a certain sickening hypocrisy in the why in which our collection of parliamentary clowns and charlatans purport to run this country. On one hand we are told that drugs are naughty because they might harm our brains and livers. Yet, in the self same breath, the sheep and blockheads who warm the benches of parliament allow booze merchants to peddle their wares. If you want to protect us from something, then surely it makes sense to protect us from alcohol? The cause of our very high road accident death toll every Christmas is not shrouded in mystery. The reason that the highways flow red with blood is because South Africans drink and drive. And the reason that we drink and drive is because the consumption of alcohol is punted to anybody who has ever read a magazine, seen a movie or watched the insipid drivel that passes for TV on SABC 1, 2 and 3.If one drug is truly harmful, it is liquor. Yet Satan’s urine is freely available to anybody tall enough to thrust money over the counter at the local bottle store.

The same can be said of gambling. Gambling is nothing more than an attempt to get at other’s money without working for it. When you use the services of streetwalkers, you receive a very definite product. The same cannot be said of pissing your money away at the nearest faux Tuscan village/imperial roman palace.

It is utterly inconsistent to say that we need to be protected from the ravages of prostitution and narcotics, and then to allow alcohol and gambling to be freely available.

Why I don't like quackery II

2005-11-18T01:26:00.000-08:00

For those of you who think that we should just let wackos and nutjobs be:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Jones#Jonestown_and_mass_suicide

Today is a very special illustration of why we should combat charlatanism wherever we find it.

Is eating meat ethical?

2005-11-18T01:09:00.000-08:00

I recently read 'The Lives of Animals' by JM Coetzee, which is really just a rather lucid defense of vegetarianism. Reading the book motivated me to do some thinking on the issue of whether or not it is moral to eat meat.

I don't buy the argument that simply killing an animal is cruel. Animals get killed in their natural habitats all the time and in ways that are often more painful than the (relative) mercy of slaughterhouse. Death is a natural part of live and is in itself not inherently cruel or aborant.

What does disturb me ( and Coetzee, judging from his book) is the conditions under which the animals are forced to live. Take the example of pigs- extremely intelligent and sensitive creatures, so near in nature to us that their organs can be used in certain transplant operations. In many industrial farms pigs are kept in very small places, forced to live in their own muck. The only time that they see the light of day is just before they are slaughtered. Living in an industrial pig barn must be as close to Hell as we are ever likely to see- hot, noisy, lightless.

By buying meat products we are complicit in this crime. The fact that it is committed against animals might be rationalized away. But I believe that any human being, with a functioning conscience, cannot but be moved ( on a very primal level) by the sight of an animals forced to live in a dark, crowded deathcamp. The revulsion is devoid of intellect- there is no good reason why we should want to help the chicken forced to live in a post box and be force fed. But for some reason we do.

I think that the moral path lies in eating only free range produce- i.e. that produced sans the use of the sorts of methods made famous by Auswitz.

On his blindness

2005-11-04T01:42:00.000-08:00

I recently reread the poem 'On his blindness' by John Milton and picked up on something that had elluded me. There is a line in the poem in which Milton says that people who bear God's mild yoke serve him best. Here 'yoke' means 'the harness used to cohere cattle to ploughs, carts, etc'. For the first time the portent of this metaphor became clear to me and I think illustrates some of the worse aspects of Christianity ( and by implication , most religions).

A yoke is used to tether an animal to a cart. Does Milton really have the temerity to compare human beings to cattle? This seems to be a typical Christian mindset- human beings are little more than animals and must cower in the sight of an Almighty God.

Those who compare themselves to cattle will eventually begin to think like cattle. Belief in an external, all powerful force that determines the nature and direction of your life can only encourage apathy. And thus we see Christains, who believe that God will make their lives better, spending time in church, asking God to help them, when they should be spending their time helping themselves.

It is difficult to be a get-up-and-go Christain. Afterall, if your fate rests in the hands of God, surely other forces can also control your fate? How about the government? Surely, if God can make things peachy for you, then the government can too? So why bother helping yourself- there are plenty of helping hands out there to make sure your life gets better.

I am not an ox and I control my own destiny. I do not bow before man or God. And unlike many Christians, I am more concerned with living this life than currying favour for the next one.

Why I am not a Christian.

2005-11-02T03:01:00.000-08:00

Recently, a student of mine asked me what religion I believe in. When I told him that I was an atheist, he seemed more than a little shocked and betrayed.

Let me use this oppurtunity to explain why I think Christianity ( and most other religions) are just not a good idea.

One the social level, religions are kind of like restaurants. Just like House O'Ribs and Sir Filthy's Burgerland compete for your moola ( a limited commodity), so Islam, Christianity and Flying Spaghetti Monsterism compete for souls ( and the cash that such are willing to tithe to celestial causes). Every hymn loving Christian who decides to start worshipping cows ala Hinduism means less green stuff in the collection plate which in turn means more members of the clergy having to look for real jobs. The more consumers/worshippers spend at other outlets/places of worship, the less is left for you and your barnd of disillusion.

This scenario ( roleplayers competing for scarce resources) gives rise to advertising - 'Eat at Sir Filthy's! It's better and cheaper than that other place'- of a certain type. No business magnate is going to pay for advertising that sends the message that his product is equal to ( or worse than) that of his competitors. Ditto religions- most faith systems have a vested interest in portraying their path to Heaven as the only true and dependable one. If Christian missionaries preached that believing in Jesus was one way of getting to the giant harp ensemble in the sky but that continuing to worship the Feathered Serpent would also work out okay in the end, no one would convert ( afterall, you own believes are just as effective but you still get to wear loinclothes and have sex doggy style, which JC seems to believe is a big no-no).

It's a short leap from saying that only you and your brethren have the keys to everlasting life to saying that the people across the river/mountain/sea, who happen to look different to what you do, are evil. Afterall, you've tried to convince them of the error of their ways. But they just don't listen. How can they reject the loving grace of the Flying Spaghetti Monster? They must be evil! They need to die! (cue the Crusades).

It is no accident that the bloodiest and most unreasonalbe wars have always started because of religious questions.

Why I don't like quackery

2005-10-30T22:59:00.000-08:00

I often have arguments with friends and rivals about whether or not I should just leave quacks alone. If people want to believe in stuff that is evidently nonsense, I am told, I should exercise a restraint and aodpt a live and let live attitude. Afterall, if people want to believe that they can live on air alone, or that they can attain immortality by paying the Church of Scientology lots of money, or that crystals have healing power ( beyond paying the crystal salesperson's debt), what is it to me? Why not just let them live in ignorance? When did a little benign fantasy ever do anyone any harm?

The point is, tho, that cults ( religious and otherwise) are far from being harmless. Remember Jim Jones, and the Jonestown massacre? Or the Heaven's Gate cult? Faddish cults lure unsuspecting people in and then, before you know it, you have a bunch of corpses on your hands because some nutjob thought that God told him to make everybody drink poisoned coolaid. Groups like the Scientologists are even worse- in every country where this bunch of lunatics have put down roots, they are facing lawsuits. As a matter of policy, the Churhc uses the sorts of tactics that would make Heinrich Himmler cream in his shorts (www.xenu.net).

Aside from the immediate danger that irrational groups pose, there is long term damage that originates with those who value flash over substance. Every aromatherapist who has ever uncorked a vile has contributed to the idea that it is okay to behave irrationally. Is it any wonder that we live during one of the dumbest eras in our planets history? Every nonsensical fashion creates the impression that we need not live our lives according to rational dictates.

Ten reasons why you should learn to speak German

2005-10-27T03:09:00.000-07:00

So, my new housemate and I (yes, the one who neglected to post that I had moved in- one would think that a Person of My Stature would warrent a mention but nary a word was posted), have sortof started learning German. Below are my top ten reasons for learning the Teutonic tongue:

1) Once you know German, you can read Rammstein lyrics and Wagner liberettos in the original German. This might give you something to speak about when you meet all the other loser Rammstein/ Wagner fans who also cannot get dates on Friday nights, and thus spend their time talking about Rammstein/Wagner.

2) Knowing German means invading Poland will be easy for you, if your career ever meanders in that direction.

3) All the best porn from the seventies comes from Germany. You too can know the magical power of the word 'schnelle'.

4) Now you can finally understand what that Hitler guy is so tense about everytime he appears on the Discovery Channel.

5) Once Claudia Schiffer dumps that phoney David Copperfield guy, she is gonna need some tender lovin comfortin. Studly but sensitive guys who can speak her language will surely get first dibs.

6) If you speak German in public, no one is going to confuse you for a French person.

7) People tend to find you more convincing when you speak a language so full of gutteral and harsh grinding sounds.

8) Hopefully, during German lessons you'll learn the words to Deutshland Uber Alles. Next time Schumaker wins, you can sing the whole song while watching the Grand Prix from your lounge ( instead of singing Deutschland Uber Alles annoyingly loud and mumbling the rest of the song).

9) Einstein was smart. Einstein spoke German. Thus, speaking German makes you smart.

10) German folkwear is way cooler than the loincloths those Zooloos try to pass off as 'ethnic'.

My very first blog!

2005-10-27T01:37:00.000-07:00

So, this is what it feels like to subject the rest of humanity to my saguine wisdom ( look it up, el tardo).

Since I like it so very much, I think I will devote my first blog to the subject of the latest Cold Play album viz. X and Y.

This is as close to the perfect album as I have ever heard. It just works so well on so many levels. Unlike other albums, which seem to be more or less random compilations thrown together in such a way as to increase the value of record execs stock, X and Y proceeds. By this I mean, it has a beggining, a middle and end. And each song in each section is precisely where it ought to be.

Don't get moi started on the innovative nature of CP's music, which is particularly evident on X and Y. Their music is not quite pop, not quite electronic and not quite anything. But brilliant.

Why did the band choose this name? Does anyone know?