Friday 27 June 2003

BAD HAIR DAY

i'm in town, blogging from a virgin megastore. i'm feeling very disembodied today, (my conscious self is out of phase with my physical presence). its most apparent when i've bumped into people i know and attempted conversation.

it doesn't help that i've just had a really crap haircut. there are 3 things that particularlarly pissed me off: first that the guy cutting my hair tried to negate my wishes via empty flattery, second that he wouldn't do what i asked because it "would look strange." surely its better to have a "strange" haircut than a fucking crap one. but he hasn't even done the basic things that i asked (the side and back were zipped off with a number 2 all over instead of gradiated etc). it'd have been better not getting it cut, it looked better, and just giving the £7 (money that i can't afford anyway) to a homeless person who needs it more.

oh well it'll grow out soon enough.

meanwhile, as i write this, i discover that blogger has moved us over to the new layout. but my virgin half an hour for a pound is nearly gone. no time to explore it.

Thursday 19 June 2003

BIG BROTHER

jon tickle's letter to his friends

"I do remember very vividly that someone told me last year that they thought that I “wouldn’t be able to hack it inside the House.” It was a throw-away comment but from that point onwards I was determined to prove them wrong."

"I’ve no great desire to be famous – you all know me to be an essentially private person, and given that I can’t sing, dance, act or present, it’s hard to see how I would take advantage of my “fame”. I’ve achieved my target: I’m in the House, so whether I last a day or nine weeks I’ll get what I want out of the experience. I know one thing though: I won’t quit – I will be able to hack it in the House."

"(the big brother psychiatrist in the selection process) had said earlier that my mind works unlike any other that he had met in twenty-five years of his professional life."
big brother double eviction

get christian cameron out of the house. did you see him in the diary room, after he'd been nominated for the eviction vote, reading a "relevant" bible passage aloud to big brother?

out, out, out, you creepy religious psycho.

Wednesday 18 June 2003

the body

The Natural Death Centre to arrange inexpensive, Do-It-Yourself and environmentally-friendly funerals.

Body donation for medical research

Organ donation

via green fairy
DISSENT IS NOT UN-AMERICAN

public opinion, master hoodwinkers, manufactured reality.

Thomas Jefferson's view on the subject of democracy:

"I know of no safe depository of the ultimate power of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise that control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not take it from them, but to inform their discretion."

some believe Democracy is too good for people; Here's a paragraph from edward Bernays' "Propaganda:"

"Those who manipulate the unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. In almost every act of our lives whether in the sphere of politics or business in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires that control the public mind."

to "control the masses without their knowing it."

The systematic attempt to fool most of the people most of the time is the work of some of the most intelligent, best-informed and highly paid men and women in western societies: spin-doctors, PR consultants, hacks and spooks.

"The best PR happens with the people unaware that they are being manipulated."

Remember, if everybody knows something, that image has been bought and paid for.

Real knowledge takes a little effort, a little excavation down at least one level below what "everybody knows."

doors of perception: WHY AMERICANS WILL BELIEVE ALMOST ANYTHING
- by Tim O'Shea

Tuesday 17 June 2003

THE BODY

Doctors have fitted an artificial collar bone, along with artificial ligaments"

Building a shoulder joint that never wears out
punishment

since my mum's brother-in-law died a few years back, a man who was generally perceived as being a controlling type, my mum and her sister have been getting to know each other in a whole new way. my mum is 70 this year and my aunt is 81.

it has meant that my mum's memories and perspectives of her childhood are shifting.

she was the youngest of 4.

the other day she told me that her mum's 2nd husband, the man she knew as her dad (he wasn't), regularly smacked and belted her. sometimes getting her cornered in order to thrash her.

she said she wasn't a 'naughty kid'. she'd be punished for minor things. she emphasised "especially most monday evenings, he always found a reason to punish her and send her to her bed early".

brute violence, intimidation and fear really isn't the best way to communicate with people smaller and younger than ourselves.

nor is it an appropriate export from countries who shout so loudly about the concept of freedom. punishment and fear is the spawning ground for anti-freedom.

there must be alternatives worth trying. punishment simply doesn't work. its outdated. it has failed. we have experienced the result from centuries of punishment, of beating and whipping and hanging, of fearfully following orders, that climaxed in 2 world wars worth of mass psychosis and extermination.

or just look to sept 11th for the fruits of any culture where frenzied beatings, stoning to death, public body mutilation and bulldozing-brick-walls on-top-of-gays are state authorised punishments.
america

todays lunchtime bbc tv news had an in-house promotion for tonight's "what the world thinks of america" bbc2, 9pm.

undoubtedly there will be people working in the bbc who are still numb, after the lives of so many media colleagues were wiped by american troops recently. but it would also seem that the bbc has learnt a lesson from florida in the art of excluding unwanted mass poll opinions.

"the world" of these bbc statistics does not include anyone from the whole of africa for starters. the result: "america just about comes out favourably." ( along with a majority who also "approve of americas aids policy" ???)

meanwhile..... "Washington's determination to find an alternative energy source to the Middle East is leading to a new oil rush in sub-Saharan Africa which threatens to launch a fresh cycle of conflict, corruption and environmental degradation in the region, campaigners warn today. "
Scramble for Africa
THE BODY

Microchip promises smart artificial arms
the cat that lives with my mum and step-dad

Sunday 15 June 2003

WATER

"Claims do not come much more controversial than the idea that water might retain a memory of substances once dissolved in it."

new scientist
via my analog life

Saturday 14 June 2003

TONGUE

an unfortunate close up, during some cock sucking porn, that revealed the full length of the model's tongue dressed in a grey bacterial sludge. it put me right off, but it did prompt me to check out my own tongue.

yesterday i bought myself a tongue scraper.
intimidation

i just heard a news report on the bbc radio concerning the unrest in iran. they described the police response as "an attempt to intimidate" protestors. how come the news NEVER describes our own police responses to protestors and civil unrest as "intimidation".

Thursday 12 June 2003

the body

"in western europe and the united states fastidious personal and household cleanliness was relatively uncommon until the mid 19th century.

the pre-modern european sense of the body was not simply "pre-hygenic", an ignorant precursor to a great age of modern scientific cleanliness, but instead represented an entirely different world of bodily subjectivity, with its own historical implications and complexities.

along the same lines......some of the strongest, most insistent british advocates of new hygenic practices disdained "germ theory" until well into the 20th century and described "dirt" as an alchemical substance, an essence that oozed immorality and degeneracy and contravened the law of god."

"lifebuoy man, lux women"
by timothy burke
AMERICA

"in an exercise in brute diplomacy the US is turning up the heat on the countries of the Balkans and eastern Europe to secure war crimes immunity deals for Americans and exemptions from the year-old international criminal court."

"Threatened with the loss of $73m (£44m) in US aid, Bosnia signed the exemption deal last week just as Slovenia rejected American pressure and cut off negotiations."

human rights watch
the guardian
HACKNEY

despite the bright sunlight, the mood in hackney seems quite heavy today. theres still the odour of smoke in the air from yesterdays shop fire. the whole building is rubble. the zone around hackney central station is barricaded off. i hope no one was hurt in the fire, but i have to say it was a depressing classical looking building.

meanwhile, earlier this afternoon, there was a police man in full riot gear and shield, down the road leading through the middle of this estate. wots that about?

Wednesday 11 June 2003

CHRIS BURDEN 1971

a performance piece called Shoot in which a friend, at his request, shot him in the arm.
PERSONALITIES and AVATARS

Plushophiles, Zootaphiles, Toonophiles, Texturephiles, Furries, etc.

A Plushie Lexicon

Types of werewolves

Identity and the Cyborg Body

kevin warwick
self surgery. dental damn
( via jaded )
big brother

its a curious situation that the housemates have to endure jon's marathon star-wars narrations AND cameron's bible readings.
anal porn

a few times in my life i've briefly attempted a career in porn. there was one client specifically into photographing the inside of my arse with a penetrative glass attachment added to his camera.

i'd love to track down those shots now. plus i'd love to find my first test shots from when i was 20.
The Body Electric
( via neuroprosthesis news )

"proposal for a site-specific installation in his stomach."

natural born cyborgs
FANTASTIC VOYAGE
( via plasticbag.org )

i-blog

Producing Surgery on the Internet: Is the Rectum a Cinema?

Tuesday 10 June 2003

BiG BRoTHER NOMINATIONS

surely jon tickle won't be nominated again this week. there are clear signs that some of the house-mates have sussed that he's a popular character on the outside and have started sucking up to him. though it must be difficult for anyone to mantain even fake freindlyness with jon when they have to endure being imprisoned with him 24/7. we have the luxury of the off button. either way, i doubt that any of their fragile egos will have realised that he is indisputably carrying the show entirely by himself. bb4 is the john tickle show. theres sadly just no competition is there. are the producers putting prozac in their water supply or what. he might be a vulcan but its better than being a stepford-twenty-something.

charles manson's daughter, nush, will hopefully be nominated. though the girls have most likely succeeded in guilt-tripping the contestants and the viewers into not evicting another girl. which means that tiny-tears sissy probably won't be nominated either.

sadly its unlikely that creepy christian cameron will get crucified just yet.

which means that the most likely eviction, the head thats most prominent above the trench, is federico, even though he almost rates as a personality.

roll on big brother 5. we may just have to write this year off as a bad lot.

Monday 9 June 2003

THE BODY

Victhom Human Bionics, a Quebec City robotics company, has announced plans to market the world's first bionic limb.
( via neuroprosthesis news )

7,ooo people join nude photo shoot for Spencer Tunick in Barcelona, where public institutions enthusiastically backed his appeal for people to take their clothes off.

Nanoscale Myosin V Molecule Walks Like a Human

The Transdermal Nutrient Delivery System (TDNDS) is a nutrition patch that will transmit vitamins and other micronutrients or nutraceuticals to warfighters and sustain their physical and mental performance.

Sunday 8 June 2003

DIVIDE AND RULE

racist queers and homophobic niggers.
"LOOK OUT, HERE COME THE AMERICANS"
The 14 Defining Characteristics Of Fascism

( via rense.com )

1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.

2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.

3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.

4. Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.

5. Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.

6. Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.

7. Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.

8. Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed
to the government's policies or actions.

9. Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.

10. Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.

11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.

12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.

13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.

14. Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

"To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it - please try to believe me - unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop.

Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, "regretted," that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these "little measures" that no "patriotic German" could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing. One day it is over his head.

-- Milton Mayer 'They Thought They Were Free'
  University of Chicago Press. Reissued in paperback, April, 1981.
( via rense.com and warblogger watch )
 

Saturday 7 June 2003

big brother

i was hoping tonight's challenge would have been cameron the christian facing a pit full of hungry lions. but no such luck, its just a game of pass the parcel.

still, isn't it great that justine was evicted last night. what a miserable mean-spirited sow she turned out to be. i hope the remaining girls will stop whinging about a gender voting conspiracy. enter-bloody-tain us and we'll vote to keep you in. its big brother 4 for fucks sake, they know how it works by now surely.
"Reality is a mere illusion, albeit a persistent one."
(- Albert Einstein)
on this day 1981: Israel bombs Baghdad nuclear reactor

Friday 6 June 2003

on this day 1966: Black civil rights activist James Meredith shot

James Meredith, the first black man to brave the colour bar at the University of Mississippi, was shot and wounded after entering Mississippi on a civil rights march.

The 32-year-old civil rights activist began his solo 220-mile March against Fear the day before in Memphis and was heading for Jackson to show his fellow black citizens how to stand up to white authority and also to encourage them to register to vote.

At Hernando, Mississippi - 30 miles from his starting point - he saw an armed man aim at him and dived to the ground, but he was shot three times. Bleeding from the head, shoulder and leg he shouted: "Oh my God."

FBI agents and reporters who were following the march witnessed the ambush.

Martin Luther King visited Mr Meredith in hospital the following day and then took up the March Against Fear - renamed the Meredith March - which attracted thousands of black men and women along the way.

Mr Meredith's injuries turned out to be superficial and he recovered enough to complete the march.

Aubrey James Norvell confessed to the shooting and was sentenced to five years in prison.

In 1961 Mr Meredith became an icon for the civil rights movement when he applied to the University of Mississippi and was rejected on racial grounds.

The NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) then brought a suit in a federal court which granted him the right to enrol.

When he arrived to do so he was turned away by the university authorities and by the governor of Mississippi.

A court injunction for contempt removed this barrier but a white mob stopped him entering the university.

After a riot in which two people were killed and 375 were wounded, President Kennedy sent 3,000 troops to restore order and allow Mr Meredith to register as a student.

He graduated in 1963.

Soon after the march Mr Meredith dropped out of the civil rights movement to work as a stockbroker, and then in real estate. In 1967 he became an investor and entered Columbia University Law School in 1968.

That year he also became president of Meredith Enterprises and began to lecture on racial problems. In 1972 he stood unsuccessfully as a Republican candidate for the US House of Representatives.

Thursday 5 June 2003

S E X

in 1875 the House of Commons agreed to raise the heterosexual age of consent to 13.

Parliament in 1885 passed the Criminal Law Amendment Act that raised the age of consent from 13 to 16, strengthened existing legislation against prostitution and proscribed all homosexual relations.

in 1967 the hetero-dictatorship condescended to partially decriminalise sex acts between males in the uk, as long as they were aged 21 or over and it was no more than 2 men doing it in private. (2 men kissing in the street would continue to be an arrestable offence etc.) but up until then even private consensual sex between men in the uk was a crime punishable by imprisonment.

TEENAGE KICKS: in 1973, aged 13, i came out to my teen peers and teachers. i'd always been consciously attracted to the same gender when i was a child, but when i was 13 i'd armed myself with a simplistic argument to throw at the homophobes: "if sex was meant for pro-creation, why do we have contraception?" plus i was deeply in lust with an out and proud 14 year old boy called bryan.

it took the uk government till 2000 for an equal age of consent to be set in law at 16, and that was still a struggle.

in 2003 the equal age of consent is: 13 in spain; 14 in slovenia, Montenegro, iceland, italy and Austria; and 15 in sweden, slovakia, poland, monaco, france, Denmark and Czech Republic.

in the 21st century homosex and sodomy continues to be illegal in many countries around the world and in many american states.

"internationally Lesbian and gay people continue to be imprisoned under laws which police the bedroom and criminalize a kiss; they are tortured to extract confessions of "deviance" and raped to "cure" them of it; they are killed by "death squads" in societies which view them as "disposables"; they are executed by the state which portrays them as a threat to society." ( amnesty international lgbt network )

just how much longer is it going to take for us to get real? sex is just sex, like breathing is just breathing and talking is just talking. everything in life has inherent dangers involved, why is sex so heavily policed and same-gender sex all the more so?

some things do make slow progress, while some other things move backwards (i'm old enough to remember the days when the contact address for p.i.e. (paedophile information exchange) was casually included in the listings of mainstream publications, while other intergenerational campaigns used to be affiliated with ilga (international lesbian and gay association). and ...yawn.... no, i'm not attracted to children, i'm into men. but then i'm not black or disabled or a woman, yet i support anti-racism, disability awareness and gender equality. however i was a boy once upon a time and i remember my wank fantasies and my unrequited attempts at flirtation with adults. therefore i know that intergenerational sexual desire isn't a one way street and an intelligent debate is needed.)

feeling sexually repressed? god may be dead, but the stink emanating from his omnipresent rotting carcass sure has a lot to answer for. whilst tv shows that snigger and giggle at people's sexually diverse realities, like channel 4's 'graham norton' or 'eurotrash', really don't help.

"Let's Start the Real Sexual Revolution!"
Sexual Freedom Coalition (SFC)
on Saturday 7th June 2003 from 2.30pm-6pm at The Round Chapel, 1d Glenarm Rd, Lower Clapton Rd, Hackney E5

On 38 Bus Route. Trains: Hackney Central (North London Line), Hackney Downs (from Liverpool Street)
Drinks and snacks. £5 entrance and £2 concs.
on this day 1967: Israel launches attack on Arab states
Raiders of the Lost Ark: the Adaptation

In 1982, pre-DV, Eric Zala, Jayson Lamb and Chris Strompolis began filming a
shot-for-shot remake of Raiders of the Lost Ark. They were 12 years old.
Six years later, the film was in the can.

Fifteen years later still, the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, Austin, Texas, is proud to announce, the theatrical world premiere of "Raiders of the Lost Ark: the Adaptation".

"This trio of filmmakers showed more tenacity, originality, heart, courage and skill than ten independent production teams put together, and all before puberty! SEE Indiana Jones grow six inches, drop into a baritone and grow facial hair! SEE Marion Ravenwood develop breasts! SEE the meanest pack of prepubescent nazis ever recorded on film!"

Raiders of the Lost Ark: the Adaptation @ Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, Sunday June 8 and Monday June 9
( via jaded )

Wednesday 4 June 2003

on this day 1989: Massacre in Tiananmen Square
Hundreds, and possibly thousands, of civilians were shot dead by the Chinese army during a bloody military operation to crush a democratic uprising in Peking's (Beijing) Tiananmen Square.

Tanks rumbled through the capital's streets late on 3 June as the army moved into the square from several directions, randomly firing on unarmed protesters. it is unlikely a precise number of casualties will ever be known.
more from the baghdad blogger column in the guardian

"the coalition forces are coming down hard on people they catch in possession of guns. Car searches are more frequent and if they find a firearm they will cuff you, put a sack over your head and - here comes the question: and what? We still have no laws. A couple of weeks ago it was said that they can only keep someone arrested for 24 hours. Now it is said that male, female and juvenile prisons have been opened."
big brother

"jon's webpage"

the managerial autistic majesty of jon tickle courtesy of bigbro4.com
Baghdad Blogger

the first Guardian column from Salam Pax ... 'Beside all the papers we now have a TV channel and radio; they are part of what our American minders have called the Iraqi media network. My favourite TV show on it is an old Japanese cartoon (here it is called Adnan wa Lina). It is about what happens after a third world war when chaos reigns the earth. Bad choice for kids' programming if you ask me.'

Mission Fullfilled

Warbloggers feel sad and unsatisfied after wargasm

'I myself did notice something rather odd about a week after combat ended in Iraq. I was relieved that we finally attacked, and even more relieved that the war was quick and that our military suffered as few casualties as they did in winning it. But I also felt, oddly, a kind of let-down, an emptiness, something missing.'

( via linkmachinego )
"In the information age, sharing can increase world wealth enormously, because giving information does not decrease your information."
(- John de Rivaz)
plastic bag.org

"stop bitching make it better"

tom writes "whether or not they like it (whether or not any of us like it), weblogging is not something that's going away in the next couple of years. Having an 'anti-weblogging position' is no longer even vaguely a 'real-world antidote' to unfathomable and unwarranted 'weblog hysteria'. It's just really unhelpful. It doesn't accomplish anything."

"So you want my advice? Work to make it better or sod off."

"If you think there's really a legitimate problem in the way that weblogs operate between each other then try and suggest a solution, try and suggest some things that are likely to be taken up and worked with by the extended community. Or think of something better than weblogs! That's got to be a more creative, positive and useful way of interacting with the world than sitting on the sidelines and bitching... Surely?"
"Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur."
(Whatever is said in Latin sounds profound.)
A senior Japanese local government official resigned on Friday after admitting to playing pinball instead of helping to deal with a powerful earthquake in the area, Kyodo news agency said.

Takashi Chiba, the deputy governor of Akita Prefecture in northern Japan, was enjoying a game of "pachinko," a popular pinball-like game, when a strong earthquake struck at about 6:30 p.m. on Monday, the agency said.

The quake injured about 100 people, damaged buildings, roads and railways and could be felt as far away as Tokyo, about 450 km (280 miles) to the south.

A chauffeur-driven car was waiting outside the pachinko parlour, but rather than return to his office to deal with the emergency, Chiba kept on playing for another 45 minutes...
via jaded
big brother nominations

the twins go head to head.

the sun 'newspaper' is backing jon with a "keep the bb bore in" front page banner and a composite of jon's head with the bb eye radiating behind him. the church of jon tickle grows ever stronger.

he is a one man entertainment miracle of alan partridge proportions, but its perhaps time to say a few words about justine who is also up for the eviction vote this week.

i liked her on the first day in the house, but since then she has been fairly radar invisible as far as the terrestial tv edits go. the criticism of her is that she is eating too much in a week when food supplies are low.

its important to remember that it is a competetive game and not the happy-clappy cult that hippy folk like nush might prefer it to be. therefore it could be argued that its tactically fine to selfishly stuff yourself with food and leave the others hungry. though it'd be better and funnier to do it 'secretly', in the middle of the night, for the cameras only.

Tuesday 3 June 2003

human rights
Internet Dissidents

writers, webmasters, and students who have been jailed by their governments for simply expressing their views via the Internet

These people need your help now. Some have been subjected to torture, some are ill, and all suffer substandard prison conditions for no other reason than expressing their views, always peacefully, sometimes irreverently.

Execution of juvenile offenders continues in the land of the free

the juvenile justice system in the United States of America includes the imposition of the death penalty as well as life imprisonment without parole and adult proceedings applied to offenders who committed crimes when they were under 18.

the principles enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), and in particular article 37 (a) which forbids the imposition of "capital punishment ... for offences committed by persons below eighteen years of age ...".

the United States are not party to the CRC,

Asylum seekers driven by repression and conflict, not poverty

"European governments must address the underlying causes which cause people to flee their countries of origin if they hope to reduce the numbers of asylum applications and to join up their policies across areas of arms export, foreign policy, migration, trade and development."

"people are driven to seek asylum in the UK by war, repression and human rights abuses and are not drawn here by the so-called "pull factors" that appear to lie at the heart of the government’s approach to asylum policy."

"initiatives to reduce the number of applications to the UK must address the root causes of why people flee their homes. Making conditions for asylum seekers in the UK harsher will not reduce numbers."
Gallo: I never apologised for Brown Bunny
"Spacekind of the Earth Unite! You have nothing to lose but your gravity!"
(-Dale Amon)

Monday 2 June 2003

bb4

i can't believe that big brother considered federico's avid impression to be "innapropriate behaviour". avid is practically a bb brand.

meanwhile..... The Church of Jon Tickle...

"....All praise the Jon....Tickle be his name...give us today our daily invention...and forgive us our lack of Babylon 5 knowledge.......Etc etc etc......"
on this day 1994: 20 of Britain's top MI5 intelligence experts officers killed in helicopter crash

Sunday 1 June 2003

big brother

the next nominations:

WHO FROM THE in-house-sect WILL BE OFFERED UP TO US ?

meanwhile federico channelled the spirit of avid merrion as he faced big brother in the diary room .

and That's Entertainment.
T O R T U R E

on channel 4, just before tonight's big brother, a kurdish greengrocer describes how the iraqi secret police arrested him in a random sweep and relentlessly tortured him in custody for 6 months.
"CLICK THIS"

vincent online: cv14jh
"BEING HUMAN"

Lisa Seidenberg's documentary "being human", a record of the 'wherever-you-are' naked protest (london summer of 2001), is showing this month in the San Francisco Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. June 19 at 4pm at the Castro Theatre.
butterfly avatars controlled with modified joysticks and microphones that will respond to gentle puffs of breath rather than voice commands.

a group of children with disabilities participate in a networked dance performance, at a major European conference on disabilities and assistive technologies, to be held in Dublin later this year.
on this day 1979: End of white rule in Rhodesia
Rhodesia formally ended nearly 90 years of white minority rule and declared it will be known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia. thouh the jobs of top civil servants - all white - were protected under the new constitution.
JAPANESE ANIMATIONS via blogjam

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10

11 12 13 14 15

16 17 18 19 20

21 22 23 24 25

26 27 28 29 30 31

and 99 more via blogjam
BIG BROTHER

i don't have e4 at home, nor broadband, so i haven't got regular access to the less-edited real-time feeds from the house. but so far there is something a bit flat and indistinguishable about this selection of housemates. it doesn't help that they're all of a similar age group, all 20 somethings more or less.

but the magic of big brother is often contained in its apparent nothingness. like a piece of contemporary dance or butoh or minimalist art. so perhaps this selection could yet turn into the best big brother ever.

friday's 1st eviction was anouska.

during the past week people googling anouska (or anoushka) brought more increased traffic to this site than the WAR.

having the nominations on day one, based entirely on their first impressions of each other, was a brilliant move. where as the next nominations will really show who's who, last week's eviction was a tough choice between the shaggable-but-nothing-special-so-far scott or federico versus the attention stealing personalities of anouska or jon.

jon is so boring, which is entertaining enough when he's contained on the screen rather than actually being in our own homes. he gives good edit. he could have been scripted by ricky gervais. and if andrew from buffy were in the house, not even he could have bettered jon's "hotel california" moment. that moment alone earned jon the right to stay in the house. but then, oh dear, then theres jon in the diary room getting sanctimonious about their failed task, and suddenly he's stupid tim from last year all over again.

as for jon's love of star wars or trek, i've never understood how anyone could seriously extract pleasure from all that. its all so imagination-lite. filled with pointless dangers that we know they will resolve by the end. scripts composited from american liberal conservatism at its most insipid. the sci-fi sales pitch always promising something beyond our imaginations, but it never ever is. i wish somebody someday would make something that truly was beyond.

as for scott he is eye candy. but last year alex was both eye candy and so obviously damaged that you just wanted to take him home and repair him with love and plenty of sex. scott so far is just cute. is that enough to justify keeping him in the house?

and federico similarly, though i don't find him particularly shaggable.

of the other housemates i'm not sure i like nush. she seems a bit of a self-help-book e-generation cliche. like she's backpacked to india a few too many times or something.

then theres king of the dullards, cameron, who says he wouldn't have gay sex or take drugs if offered a million to do so. he's the ideal victim in a dostoyevskian murder project because no one would miss him or care.


 meanwhile according to this week's Popbitch newsletter.... Jon and Justine could be replaced in the house by their twins. "Some of the contestants this year have identical twins who will be brought in halfway through the series, and, unbeknown to the other housemates... take over the role of their twin," the email claims.

Popbitch also adds more fuel to the 'Big Brother Gold' rumour -- a series of the show featuring previous BB contestestants -- by claiming that Craig Phillips (BB1), Bubble (BB2) and Les Dennis (CBB2) are already on board.

also last week there was a repeat of that documentary where a group of reality tv wannabes had auditioned and commited themselves to a new reality show by a bloke called nik russian. the contestants had to give up their homes and jobs to commit to the 'show' for a year.

on day one they're split into teams, each with an assigned camera-operator. they then discover that the object of the game will be each team attempting, over a period of a year, to make a million pounds somehow, anyhow, and in the meantime survive somehow, anyhow. this will make the reality show.

a truly brilliant idea, but rather than taking up the challenge the contestants whinge that they've been conned. a victim mentality reigns supreme as usual and channel 4 makes a one off doc all about their sad victim status called "the great reality show swindle."


they should have checked out "Culture of Fear: Risk-Taking and the Morality of Low Expectation" by Frank Furedi.
"when safety is worshipped and risks are seen as intrinsically bad, society is making a clear statement about the values that ought to guide life"
Middle-class expectations 'make pupils feel failures'
ORDER

based on my parents consumer tastes, the newspapers and information they read and don't read, the telly programmes they watch and don't watch, the foods they eat and don't eat, the decor of their home, their clothes, their holiday destinations, their idea of a good restaraunt and their general perspective of the world, i'd classify them as tory-voting-working-class. rather than middle-class.

they probably voted new labour in the last election, but they've mostly always voted conservative and think thatcher and reagan and the "comedian" jim davidson are wonderful.

their 'morality' is ambiguous. my mum used to shoplift occaisionaly, till she became a wheelchair user. and in the days when my brother was alive and often in prison for robbery or drugs she'd slip him some money during visits. plus one of her brothers was in prison for theft. yet they'll tut tut at the trouble my cousins or my cousin's kids get into today (theft, fraud, mugging etc) or some tabloid nonsense they've absorbed.

they're not rabidly homophobic, though my step-dad used to go queer bashing in his younger days. but despite the fact that they've welcomed my boyfriends into their home, they've clearly never really thought things through and come out with bizarre little slights now and again.

and despite my sister's husband being mixed race,they use words like "half-cast" and "paki" and believe that the third world is "poor because they're lazy". they're not vicious racists, but i see them as the sort of ordinairy people who could easily vote in a nazi party without ever really thinking it through nor having to witness the day to day consequences of it.

when i visited them the other week, when my step-dad had been hospitalised, we got into a discussion about laws against smacking children, which ended with the concept of national service and "what a good thing it is". my parents stated their belief that "people need to learn how to take orders."

fortunately they were generally too lazy to bother instilling any such learning in me when i was growing up. i'm grateful that my mum was rarely out of bed b4 mid-day and like caroline aherne's "royle family" my parents were not bothered by their overflowing ashtrays.

though they perhaps believed that sending me to military boarding school, in my teens, might set me on the right path.
Frank Ogden says that parents often ask him what profession their children should prepare for. His response is: "A profession that you've never heard of."
PoW 'torture photos' investigated

Photographs allegedly showing Iraqi prisoners of war being mistreated by British troops are being investigated by the Ministry of Defence. The pictures came to light, and military police were called in, after they were handed into a high street store for development.

Blair thanks UK troops in Iraq

British troops 'have brought tremendous honour on our country' UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has told British troops in Iraq that they took part in "a momentous and mighty act" in liberating the country from Saddam Hussein.

Mr Blair said history would look back on the Iraq conflict as "one of the defining moments of the century".

some recent porn junk-mail i've received:
RAPE AND SODOMY TAPES SMUGGLED OUT FROM IRAQ
FORCES RAPE THOSE IRAQI WHORES
FOOTAGE FROM IRAQ, PUNISHED SLUTS


"People back home are incredibly proud of what you have done - you have made people in your country hold their heads up high" said blair

Coalition 'tortured Iraqi POWs'

Amnesty International is investigating claims that Iraqi prisoners of war were tortured by US and British troops.

Torture in Spain after Franco

US looks away as new ally tortures Islamists

Last year Washington gave Uzbekistan $500m in aid. The police and intelligence services - which the state department's website says use "torture as a routine investigation technique" received $79m of this sum.

Independent human rights groups estimate that there are more than 600 politically motivated arrests a year in Uzbekistan, and 6,500 political prisoners, some tortured to death. According to a forensic report commissioned by the British embassy, in August two prisoners were even boiled to death.

Torture suspects 'living in America'

At least 150 suspected torturers from around the world are living freely in the United States, according to human rights campaigners in a 174-page report entitled "United States of America: Safe Haven for Torturers"

US admits torture record 'not perfect' 10 May 2000

The United States has been defending itself to the United Nations against allegations that it practises torture.

interrogation

Ministers 'distorted' UN weapons report

"A senior British intelligence official told the BBC the original version of the document had added little to what was already publicly known, but that a week before it was published it had been "transformed" on the orders of Downing Street. The aim was to make the report more hard-hitting, the official told the BBC, adding that the intelligence services were unhappy about the changes."

Downing St admits blunder on Iraq dossier

Plagiarism row casts shadow over No 10's case against Saddam

Addressing 400 British troops outside one of Saddam's former presidential palaces in Basra, tony blair said: "I know there were a lot of disagreements in the country about the wisdom of my decision to order the action.

"But I can assure you of one thing - there is absolutely no dispute in Britain at all about your professionalism and your courage and your dedication and not just in the way you won the war, which was extraordinary, but the way you are conducting the peace, which is remarkable."

"I would just like to express the sense of pride that everybody has in Britain at the magnificent job you have done.

Basil Fernando, the Executive Director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, a member of the OMCT network, recently stated that, “the argument favouring limited use of torture is contradicted by all of our experience.”

He continued, “When torture is no longer absolutely prohibited, law enforcement attitudes change.

Over time, the mentality that torture is acceptable comes to infect the entire system, and even persons accused of normal crimes get the same treatment as suspected terrorists…"
Reporter to Mahatma Ghandi: "Mr. Ghandi, what do you think of Western Civilization?"

Ghandi: "I think it would be a good idea."