Friday 30 September 2005

shoot to kill

Newly-released letters reveal HOW (mainstream reports use the word "why") the Met Police commissioner delayed the start of an independent investigation into the police execution of an innocent man on a london tube train.

to aid in the police cover up Sir Ian also called for a change in the law so he would not be forced to provide information to an independent inquiry.

bbc
guardian

meanwhile its still worth asking...

WHO IS MARK WHITBY

remember him? the so called eye witness who was a convenient feature on ALL the news reports on the day the police executed jean charles de menezes.

he said....."I saw an Asian guy. He ran on to the train, he was hotly pursued by three plain clothes officers"

A LIE

he said...""He half tripped... they pushed him to the floor"

A LIE

he said..."As [the suspect] got onto the train I looked at his face, he looked sort of left and right, but he basically looked like a cornered rabbit, a cornered fox."

A LIE

he said..."He [the suspect] had a baseball cap on and quite a sort of thickish coat - it was a coat you'd wear in winter, sort of like a padded jacket."

A LIE

he said..."I actually saw it with my own eyes."

Thursday 29 September 2005

previously unseen US torture images must be publicly released

A judge in New York has ruled that pictures of Iraqi inmates abused by US troops should be released. The judge made the order after a request by the American Civil Liberties Union for access to unseen images.

The Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) demanded the release of 87 photographs and four videotapes as part of a lawsuit launched in 2003 on the treatment of detainees in US custody and the transfer of prisoners to countries known to use torture.

plus...

American forces' conduct towards journalists in Iraq is spiralling out of control and is preventing full coverage of the war reaching the public.

archives...

image: "in our name"
INTELLIGENT DESIGN

INTELLIGENT DESIGN

full size 140k

archives...

"frank" 63k

Wednesday 28 September 2005

Societies are worse off when they have "God" on their side

RELIGIOUS belief can cause damage to a society according to research published yesterday.

"In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in the prosperous democracies."

According to the study, belief in and worship of God are not only unnecessary for a healthy society but may actually contribute to social problems.

The study counters the view of believers that religion is necessary to provide the moral and ethical foundations of a healthy society.

"The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so."

also this week...

Eleven parents in the US have gone to court to protect the teaching of evolution at their local schools

The Dover Area School Board in the state of Pennsylvania requires science teachers to tell pupils that evolution is merely one unproven theory.

Teachers have to say that "intelligent design" - whose adherents believe life on earth was created by an intelligent being - is a possible alternative.

The parents say it is a religious belief that should not be taught.

They argue that its inclusion violates the constitutional separation of church and state.

According to a CBS poll one year ago, 65% of Americans want creationism to be taught along with evolution; 37% would want it to be taught instead of evolution.

Fifty-five per cent believe God created humans as we know them today.

INHUMAN


Tracking the anti-apartheid groups

"Documents obtained by the BBC show that the Metropolitan Police closely monitored the activities of the anti-apartheid movement for 25 years...."

archives...



Tuesday 27 September 2005



Menezes' relatives arrive in UK

The parents of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes, who was executed by police on a london tube train, have arrived in the UK to demand justice.

A leak in August of the IPCC investigation prompted claims of a police cover-up.

The documents contradicted early police claims that Mr Menezes' "clothing and demeanour" had added to suspicions that he was a suicide bomber linked to the 21 July attacks.

archives...

the guardian august 17th 2005

Monday 26 September 2005

conservative mp Ann Winterton, has said that "the United Kingdom is still, thankfully, a predominantly white, Christian country."

Mrs Winterton in her article also praised the work of the London emergency services on 7 July.

Chantelle Janes, director of Cheshire Racial Equality Council responded by saying "A lot of people within those emergency services are from black and minority ethnic group."

"A lot of people on 7 July who lost people were from black and minority ethnic groups and she seems to forget that within her article."
uk 2005: Lords to decide on allowing evidence extracted by torture

archives...

"Alleged bomb plotter claims two and a half years of interrogation UNDER US and UK SUPERVISION in secret prisons abroad"

"'One of them made cuts in my penis. I was in agony"

TORTURE as foreign policy

US exports $20m-worth of torture instruments

Governments around the world betrayed their commitment to human rights in 2004 and the american administration is seeking to dilute the absolute ban on torture....

"the argument favouring limited use of torture is contradicted by all of our experience.

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."


....Basil Fernando, the Executive Director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, a member of the world organisation against torture (OMCT) network

"in our names"

"to stop the pain you will tell them anything they want to hear. anything."
"it is the act of cutting the books which causes us concern"

Tate Britain "misunderstood" a piece of art it took out of a show to avoid religious offence, its creator said.

The gallery cancelled plans to display John Latham's God Is Great,

God Is Great consists of a large sheet of glass and copies of the Koran, the Bible and Judaism's Talmud that have been cut apart. The pieces are mounted on either side of the glass to make it appear that they are embedded in it. It was due to appear in the Tate's current British Art Displays exhibition.

God Is Great was part of a series of works previously displayed at Oxford's Museum of Modern Art, London's Lisson gallery and at the Venice Biennale.

"I have not had one single reasonable complaint about the piece," Latham said.

The gallery responded: "The interpretation of the work is not being questioned here, it is the act of cutting the books which causes us concern in light of the particular environment post 7 July. blah blah blah....
'Naked Rambler' in trouble again
(20 September 2005)

A man attempting to walk the length of Britain stark naked for a second time was arrested once again - seconds after walking out of jail.

So-called "Naked Rambler" Stephen Gough (46) was stopped by officers as he left the gates of Edinburgh's Saughton prison on Friday and taken to the city's Sheriff Court.

The former royal marine was released on bail and will appear in court in December.

He was thrown in jail on September 9 after being found guilty of breaching of the peace just south of the Scottish capital on September 1.



archives...

"To be offended by the visual appearance of another person is prejudice, akin to racism. The right to exist, uncovered, should hold precedence over the right not to view this, for the objection is irrational." - Terri Webb

February 23, 2003: Those who have been following the case of nude activist Terri Sue Webb will be interested to know that the Court of Appeals of the State of Oregon has REVERSED Webb's involuntary civil commitment to a state psychiatric institution. It was that commitment order that allowed a judge in May, 2002 to order her to be confined to a facility in Pendleton, Oregon.

and...

january 2001: Mr Bethell, 28, became the first person to stand trial in an English court naked

a jury of two women and 10 men found in his favour, clearing him of causing a public nuisance by repeatedly stripping in crowded streets last summer.
The Sexuality of Christ in Renaissance Art and in Modern Oblivion

Leo Steinberg explores the symbolism of christ's cock
PISS ART

urination fact index

Tony Tasset 'I peed in my pants' 1994
Tasset's self-portrait standing with his arms folded and pissing himself

warhol's Oxidation Paintings

Bob Colacello describes the creation of these paintings in his book Holy Terror. "Andy paid Victor [Hugo] to be the collaborator," Colacello writes. "He would come to the Factory to urinate on canvases that had already been primed with copper based paint by Andy or Ronnie Cutrone, who was a second ghost pisser, much appreciated by Andy...."

Warhol himself notes in his diary the secret to Cutrone's technique: "I told Ronnie not to pee when he gets up in the morning to try to hold it until he gets to the office, because he takes lots of vitamin B so the canvas turns a really pretty color when it's his pee."

Supposedly Andy pissed on the first few pictures but then let others do the pissing: "boys who'd come to lunch and drink too much wine, and find it funny or even flattering to be asked to help Andy 'paint."

Andy Warhol's silkscreened 'Portrait of Jean-Michel Basquiat' 1982 is painted over a piss painting,

David Hammons Pissed off 1981
This series of photographs documents Hammons urinating on a steel sculpture by Richard Serra, installed in Lower Manhattan. Hammons is arrested for urinating in public during this performance.

Sherrie Levine's "Fountain (after Marcel Duchamp: A.P.)"

Duchamp's piece was an actual urinal, turned upside down and unaltered except for his signature. Levine's Fountain is a contemporary urinal cast in a precious metal--bronze, the traditional material for casting sculpture, and polished to a brilliant shine.

Andres Serrano Leo's fantasy 1996
Serrano's image of a man being pissed on by a female figure.

Andres Serrano 'Piss & Blood XIII' 1987

andres serrano 'piss christ' 1987
a plastic crucifix suspended in the artists urine

Andres Serrano 'PISS DISCUS' 1988

Helen Chadwick 'Piss flowers' 1991
twelve white-enamelled bronzes cast from cavities made by urinating in snow.

Gilbert & George, "The Fundamental Pictures"

Christopher Chapman 'Untitled drawings' 1997

Ensor 'Le Pisseur - The Pisser' 1887

PISS ART: Images of urination in 20th century art

ICON

"ICON"

this image has spurred some debate over on my betterhumans blog

predictably some visitors can't see beyond its gratuitousness....

"A crucifix in a toilet bowl isn't meaningful or funny, it's just a gratuitous insult to millions."

to which i replied....

it is a DOLL.

it is a plastic action man doll, with a beard.

the doll is attached to 2 pieces of wood that were formerly components of a wooden desk.

and.......

in response to any readers who share the belief that.... "the jesus-in-toilet pic should be taken down because of the offensive and immature nature of it. you will get nowhere if you show immaturity or actively try to offend." blah blah

some thoughts-

shit makes the flowers grow.

theres nothing fundamentally "wrong" about a toilet, nor what we do in toilets.

meanwhile toilets are connected to one another via the sewers. and thus they interconnect our homes. the sewer pipes are our roots deep underground and each of our homes is a sewer flower.

as for "immaturity or actively try to offend"

i am deeply offended when the pope publicly proclaims me to be "evil". and he has a bigger audience than me. (...Pope calls for halt to 'evil' gay marriages...)

while the image's unsophisticatedness is only rivalled by the dimwitted thought patterns of many so called christians.

and when someone commented that...."A picture may be worth a thousand words... but that picture is worth about 2"...... i replied in more detail.......

some of us are visual people, some of us are word people.

and some are both.

but in this instance, for me the image IS the blog post.

the text is supplementary conceptual scaffolding. and i find a satisfying depth and richness in both.

meanwhile atheism isn't the only issue on offer here. though it is a vitally important one. it is about belief....

"belief is a tool for achieving effects; it is not an end in itself." said Peter Carroll

...and it contains the concept of representation, in a variety of dimensional formats...... 2D, 3D, language, aswell as mind space, and the dark sewer underworld.

plus most prominently it is about HUMAN BIOLOGICAL SPACE. that tiny room in my flat that is allocated purely for the act of shitting and pissing (and our negative associations with such biological necessities). toilets are important.

but perhaps one needs to be familiar with the comics on the wall to appreciate some of it. especially the glimpse of animal man when he meets his own author and discovers he exists only in 2D and only when he is read by someone.

as for the subject of "immaturity"....... that just seems like a conceptual strait-jacket, similar to the equally redundant concept of accusing someone of being "unprofessional". It is mostly used as an excuse to justify colluding with tradition and shepherding us along "the acceptable" well beaten paths only.

i am a 45 year old adult who relishes and celebrates both being and growing older. i also live in financial poverty, as a consequence of priorities and choices that i make. And rather than being creatively blocked by the abscence of money, rather than indulging in the futile frustration of believing that i need MORE material possessions to fulfill myself, i believe instead that it is important to work with and re-value what is freely or cheaply available in our individual manifest realities.

the image is a glimpse of my daily reality and the concepts i immerse myself in every day whilst shitting and pissing. it is important for all of us to share glimpses of our true realities with one another, rather than relying on the tired uniformity of some old best seller from the dark ages.

i also believe that a certain amount of roughness, unsophisticatedness and immediacy is an important element of photography in an otherwise super smooth and gloss saturated digital age.

and finally the notion of offence. its that old saying.... "one man's meat is another man's poison". aspects of my ordinairy daily reality may seem extraordinairy or disturbing to someone else. but i'm never going to allow that to shut me up.

full size image 144k

meanwhile...



"At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytizing zeal on behalf of religious or political idols."

...said Aldous Huxley

and...

an old farmer named Hyrieus offered hospitality to 3 passing strangers who turned out to be the gods Zeus, Poseidon and Hermes.

in return, the gods offered to father a son for Hyrieus by urinating on the hide of the ox that they had just consumed. Hyrieus buried the hide and in due course a boy was born from it. Hyrieus named him Urion, after the mode of his conception.
Police Dropping Homeless in L.A.

LOS ANGELES - At least four suburban law enforcement departments have been spotted dropping off people who appeared to be homeless on the city's downtown streets, authorities said.

Police and downtown officials have long suspected that law enforcement agencies from outside the city were using the downtown neighborhood as a dumping ground for homeless people.

archives...

AMERICA and the compulsory STERILIZATION of "undesirables"

The first country to concertedly undertake compulsory sterilization programs for the purpose of eugenics was the United States of America.

"The principal targets of the American program were the mentally retarded and the mentally ill, but also targeted under many state laws were the deaf, the blind, the epileptic, the physically deformed," ..... and even orphans, the homeless, and homosexuals.

Some sterilizations also took place in prisons and other penal institutions, targeting criminality, but they were in the relative minority.

In the end, over 65,000 individuals were sterilized in 33 states under state compulsory sterilization programs in the United States.

Sunday 25 September 2005

experiential marketing

where furniture and design are used to subtly convey a brand's strengths

'All that former advertising money has to go somewhere,' said one industry insider. 'The tobacco firms are looking to create extensive "design languages" in bars and clubs and other venues through the use of particular types of furniture or material which will make people think of their brands.'

If you see something blatant, it forewarns you. But if it's something subliminal it will go under the radar.
Boot Sale Sounds

"A music blog , mainly featuring records and tapes found at boot sales, charity shops and flea markets."
1932-1972 The Tuskegee Syphilis Study

600 low-income African-American males, 400 infected with syphilis are monitored for 40 years.

Even though a proven cure (penicillin) became available in the 1950s, the study continues until 1972 with participants denied treatment.

Perhaps as many as 100 died of syphilis during the study.

In some cases, when subjects were diagnosed as having syphilis by other physicians researchers intervened to prevent treatment.
Thalidomide!! A Musical

"Set against the 60s thalidomide drug scandal this is a love story with show tunes, love songs and monster baby Tangos."

Saturday 24 September 2005

INHUMAN

INHUMAN

full size 106k
"So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence."

...said Bertrand Russell



"At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytizing zeal on behalf of religious or political idols."

...said Aldous Huxley
Random Blogger blog
"The essential act of the Party is to use conscious deception while retaining the firmness of purpose that goes with complete honesty. To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies, all this is indispensibly necessary."

.....said emmanuel goldstein
random wikiQuote
from today's sun newspaper...

"RETIRED GP and tory councillor says disabled kids should be guillotined"

The outburst by Owen Lister, 79, a Tory councillor and deputy mayor, came in a council meeting over funding to care for such youngsters.

He said yesterday: "There was a decision about the placement of severely disabled children at a cost of £3,000 per child per week.

"I indicated at that point that really perhaps the guillotine might be better. These are children you cannot educate. It's merely a matter of caring for them until they die."

The Disability Rights Commission said: "It's chilling that an elected representative with responsibilities for deciding on support to disabled children should view the slaughter of innocents as legitimate public comment."

also...

on page 19 professional smug-cunt jeremy clarkson writes "armless statue is a tribute to pc lunacy"

"...i'd hire a jcb earth mover and set off to trafalger square to smash that absurd statue"

"....the one of an armless pregnant bird called alison lapper"

trafalger square "is a place for pomp and circumstance, a place we honour our military heroes.......i completely fail to see what on earth the statue of some pregnant girl has to do with any of this"

Basra arrest warrant for two UK soldiers

Defence Secretary John Reid said no warrant had been received - and British personnel were immune from Iraqi laws.

Friday 23 September 2005

"Vatican to ban new gay priests"

The Vatican has regularly made clear its opposition to gay priests, calling homosexuals "intrinsically disordered".

Practicing homosexuals are barred from the priesthood, but celibate gay men are commonly ordained, although many keep their sexual orientation secret. Now the Vatican is to ban all gay men from joining the clergy even if they accept a vow of celibacy, reports say.

Some estimate that more than 25% of US Catholic priests are "non-practicing" homosexuals.

Thursday 22 September 2005

Tuesday 20 September 2005

trashcan

Tesco is quietly building a profile of you, along with every individual in the country.

A subsidiary of the supermarket chain has set up a database, called Crucible, that is collating detailed information on every household in the UK, whether they choose to shop at the retailer or not.

information is classed in a way that circumvents disclosure provisions in the Data Protection Act.
MAKING SURE THE MEDIA STAYS ON MESSAGE

There are two wars in Iraq. One war is against the Iraqi people, and the other is a war on witnesses.

another New York Times journalist killed in Basra

Fakher Haider has been killed after men claiming to be police officers abducted him from his home in Basra. He was found dead in a deserted area of the Iraqi city yesterday.

he is the 68th journalist killed in Iraq since the start of the war in March 2003 and the 19th this year.

He is also the second New York Times journalist to have been killed in Basra over the past two months.

Last month the freelance journalist Steven Vincent was killed after he and his Iraqi translator were abducted at gunpoint.

archives...

Reuters cameraman to be held in Abu Ghraib without charge

he would not be allowed to see an attorney, his family or anyone else for the first 60 days of his detention.

Lieutenant Colonel Rudisill said he was aware of five journalists for major news media in detention, including Mr Mashhadani and another freelance cameraman who has worked for Reuters, as well as a cameraman for the US television network CBS. Journalists for other major international organisations have recently been released without charge after many months in custody.

Reuters soundman Waleed Khaled was killed in Baghdad, apparently by US troops, and cameraman Haider Kadhem, who was wounded in the same incident, has been held ever since by the US military for questioning. Reuters has demanded his immediate release. Iraqi police said US troops fired into the car carrying the Reuters team.

Pentagon Threatens to Kill Independent Journalists

"The Pentagon has threatened to fire on the satellite uplink positions of independent journalists in Iraq, according to veteran BBC war correspondent, Kate Adie.

In an interview with Irish radio, Ms. Adie said that questioned about the consequences of such potentially fatal actions, a senior Pentagon officer had said: "Who cares.. ..They've been warned."

She also warned that the Pentagon is vetting journalists according to their stance on the war, and intends to take control of US journalists' satellite equipment, in order to control access to the airwaves.

Another guest on the show, war author Phillip Knightley, reported that the Pentagon has also threatened they: "may find it necessary to bomb areas in which war correspondents are attempting to report from the Iraqi side."

Reporters Without Borders accuses US military of deliberately firing at journalists

Reporters Without Borders called on US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld to provide evidence that the offices of the pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera and the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad were not deliberately fired at by US forces in attacks that killed three journalists.

"we can only conclude that the US Army deliberately and without warning targeted journalists. US forces must prove that the incident was not a deliberate attack to dissuade or prevent journalists from continuing to report on what is happening in Baghdad,"

"Very many non-embedded journalists have complained about being refused entry to Iraq from Kuwait, threatened with withdrawal of accreditation and being held and interrogated for several hours. One group of non-embedded journalists was held in secret for two days and roughed up by US military police,"

In Iraq, the US eliminates those who dare to count the dead

"We don't do body counts," said General Tommy Franks of US Central Command. The question is: what happens to the people who insist on counting the bodies - the doctors who must pronounce their patients dead, the journalists who document these losses, the clerics who denounce them?

In Iraq, evidence is mounting that these voices are being systematically silenced through a variety of means, from mass arrests, to raids on hospitals, media bans, and overt and unexplained physical attacks.

RSF says that "arrests of journalists and censorship of media reached a record high in 2003,"

Journalist death toll in 2004 was worst since 1955

Killings are not the only way to silence journalists. Reporters Without Borders also report that 107 journalists were in prison around the world on January 1 2005. China remains the world's biggest prison for journalists, with 26 detained...

reporters without borders
IT IS VERY LIKELY THAT "IRAQI INSURGENTS" ARE IN FACT FALSE FLAG ATTACKS CARRIED OUT BY BRITISH AND US FORCES

two British soldiers were caught wearing Arab clothing and driving a car full of explosives. The undercover British soldiers fired on Iraqi police, before being captured. Their imprisonment prompted UK troops to storm a Basra police station.

false flag operations are covert operations conducted by governments, corporations, or other organizations, which are designed to appear as if they are being carried out by other entities.

sources...

1: reuters

Police and Interior Ministry officials said the men were wearing traditional Arab headdresses for their undercover mission.

Mohammed al-Abadi, an official in the Basra governorate, said the two men looked suspicious to police.

"A policeman approached them and then one of these guys fired at him. Then the police managed to capture them," Abadi told reporters.

"They refused to say what their mission was. They said they were British soldiers and (suggested) to ask their commander about their mission," he added.

2: xinhua

"Two persons wearing Arab uniforms opened fire at a police station in Basra. A police patrol followed the attackers and captured them to discover they were two British soldiers," an Interior Ministry source told Xinhua.

The two soldiers were using a civilian car packed with explosives, the source said.

3: washington post

Iraqi security officials on Monday variously accused the two Britons they detained of shooting at Iraqi forces or trying to plant explosives.

4: global research

US-UK occupation involved in "armed operations against civilians and places of worship"

Friday 16 September 2005

guy fawkes
GLORIFICATION

uk government's draft bill proposes new offence of "glorification". Defendants found guilty could face five years in jail.

Liberty warns loose talk will become a criminal act

The uk government's proposed anti-terrorism laws published yesterday are so widely drawn that anyone who "glorifies, exalts or celebrates" any terrorist act committed over the past 20 years could face a sentence of up to five years in prison.

But the small print of the draft terrorism bill published yesterday shows that the home secretary is preparing to go even further and draw up a list of historical terrorist acts which if "glorified" could mean a criminal offence being committed.

A Home Office spokeswoman said 9/11 was such an example; it would become a "listed event", the appropriate ban lasting longer than 20 years. However, the 1916 Irish Easter Rising would be exempt.

Shami Chakrabarti, the director of Liberty, said the offence of "glorification" was so broad it meant the home secretary was now acquiring powers to determine which historical figures were terrorists and which freedom fighters.

archives...

"I am Prepared to Die"

Nelson Mandela's statement from the dock at the opening of the defence case in the Rivonia Trial Pretoria Supreme Court, 20 April 1964

"...I must deal immediately and at some length with the question of violence. Some of the things so far told to the Court are true and some are untrue. I do not, however, deny that I planned sabotage. I did not plan it in a spirit of recklessness, nor because I have any love of violence. I planned it as a result of a calm and sober assessment of the political situation that had arisen after many years of tyranny, exploitation, and oppression of my people by the Whites."

also...

GROOVY POPULAR TERRORISM

THE ANGRY BRIGADE
"I'm not ashamed of anything I have done." says Hilary Creek of The Angry Brigade

During one of the longest political trials of English history thousands of badges were sold stating 'I'm in the Angry Brigade'.

the WEATHERMAN
in a new yorker article, the Weather Underground is depicted as a group that found murder "cool" and violence "hip." members were charismatic, provocative, articulate, and intelligent. They commanded news media attention with their brash rhetoric, violent actions, and, in the eyes of many, romantic allure. Chic radicals, they seemed to treat their violence at once as very serious business and as kind of a lark.

BAADER-MEINHOF
"In July of 1971, Institut Allensbach, a public research firm with a standing and reputation similar to Gallup, published a remarkable poll. Twenty percent of Germans under the age of thirty expressed "a certain sympathy" for the Baader-Meinhof Gang, a group with the avowed purpose of violently overthrowing the West German government. One in ten young Northern Germans indicated that they would willingly shelter a member of the Baader-Meinhof Gang for the night."
the majority of today's students are ultra conformist (like most of society today) and are more interested in asking their tutors how to score the "right grades" rather than actually thinking or exploring. yet despite this obvious fact, we are now being told that "Extremist organisations are operating on university campuses across the uk and pose a serious threat to national security, according to a new report."

students with radical views. if only it were true.
Forty percent of americans would like religious leaders to be given more power, a Gallup poll commissioned by the BBC World Service suggests.

A global average of 35% would prefer to give more power to "intellectuals" (writers and academics), followed by 25% favouring religious leaders.

In the US and Canada, 49% of people said they trusted religious leaders, compared to a global average of 19%.

archives...

Atheism is Indeed A Civil Rights Issue

nonbelievers should focus on electing other nonbelievers to political office.

in 1958, a Gallup poll revealed that 53 percent of American citizens would vote against a Black candidate for president on grounds of race alone. In a 1999 Gallup poll, that figure had declined to four percent.

That same 1999 Gallup Poll revealed 49 percent, would vote against an atheist on grounds of atheism alone than would vote against someone for any other reason.

Ever since the famous Supreme Court rulings of 1962 and 1963 that ended teacher-led prayer and Bible readings in public schools, in poll after poll Americans have favored returning government sponsored prayer to public schools by a minimum margin of 69 percent to 27 percent. In many surveys the percentage favoring restoration of school prayer exceeds 75 percent.

Biblical America Resistance Front

resist a biblical america

a resource for all who work to monitor and counter the Biblical America movement.

"God is Not a Republican. Or a Democrat."

According to a recent study on religion and politics from the University of Akron, 68 percent of Americans want a president to have strong religious beliefs and 63 percent are comfortable when candidates discuss their faith.

photos that highlight the Christianity of Nazis

and...

"God Is With Us": Hitler's Rhetoric and the Lure of "Moral Values"

Hitler's Germany amalgamated state with church ...and like some of today's politicians and preachers, Hitler politicized family values."

minus the anti-Semitic rants, many of Hitler's faith-based comments could have come from George Bush himself, and are undoubtedly the kinds of sentiments many Americans not only agree with - but take comfort in.

Christianity has been used to justify everything from the Salem witch trials to slavery in America, and it facilitated group-think in Germany, when individuality and questions of conscience were needed the most.

Thursday 15 September 2005

"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security".

...said Benjamin Franklin

uk home secretary, Charles Clarke, proposed detaining terror suspects without charge for three months and the intention to create a new offence of "glorifying terrorism".

Claudio Cordone, Amnesty's senior director for regional programmes, said: "Such an extension could lead to abusive practices, including the detention of people without the intention or realistic prospect of bringing charges against them, in a way that would effectively amount to internment in all but name.

"If there is sufficient evidence to warrant incarcerating suspects for three months, that evidence should be taken before a court of law.

"In addition prolonged periods of pre-charge and pre-trial detention provide a context for abusive practices and lead to detainees making involuntary statements, including confessions, which would undermine their right to fair trial."

Liberty pointed out that three months in detention is the equivalent of a six-month jail sentence without ever having been charged with any crime. It would be 30 times the maximum pre-charge detention period for any ordinary criminal offence, including murder.

Wednesday 14 September 2005





Numbers of gorilla, chimpanzee, bonobo and orangutan have fallen sharply, and experts warn that some wild populations could disappear within a generation.

more resources are needed from developed countries to safeguard the great apes.

the root cause of poaching and deforestation is poverty.
"vote for yourself"

"You aren't being paid to believe in the power of your dreams."

plus...

pdf: Transhuman Theonarcissism

..... "one's godlike future self is able to reach back through time to aid one's current self. one's divine future self is the proper object for one's worship, prayers, and petitions.

and...

Gods are created according to our needs

"God is the individual, and each individual may as well be his own god."

"At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytizing zeal on behalf of religious or political idols."

...said Aldous Huxley

e n h a n c e d - r e a l i t y ...

a Basic Income or Citizen's Income is an unconditional,
non-withdrawable, regular income, not linked to work, payable to each individual as a right of citizenship, sufficient to provide people with a standard of living above the poverty line.

viridian manifesto
posthuman manifesto
extropian principles 3.0

Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics
Center for Study of Political Graphics

Truthful Translations of Political Speech

non-voting archive
league of non-voters
voluntaryist.com

better humans
plausible futures
singularity institute

"Don't let your preoccupation with reality stifle your imagination"

(........said Robert A. Cassanova and Sharon M. Garrison)
"Just because you cannot see the slave-chains doesn't mean they are not there. Chains made of steel are obvious, but chains made of beliefs are not always recognized for what they are."

year of the slave

plus...

a new species of madmen

"The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality - judiciously, as you will - we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'"

you get it.....They aren't lying - they're creating "new realities."

passport to paradise
my passport 1985

IDENTITY

Tuesday 13 September 2005

the Freenet Project

Freenet is free software which lets you publish and obtain information on the Internet without fear of censorship. To achieve this freedom, the network is entirely decentralized and publishers and consumers of information are anonymous.

"We believe that the benefits of Freenet, for example for dissidents in countries such as China, Saudi Arabia, Iran far outweigh the dangers of paedophilia or terrorist information being distributed over the system,"

plus...

Access denied
a pessimistic view of the future of the web...

"In the way it transforms and accelerates the communication of ideas between individuals and societies, it is about as big as the invention of the alphabet. And it is free. But for how long?"
China's fifth internet summit attracted the country's most successful entrepreneurs, and a record number of international visitors.

archive...

INFORMANT

Reporters Without Borders accused Yahoo of becoming a "police informant" in order to further its business ambitions.

"We already knew that Yahoo! collaborates enthusiastically with the Chinese regime in questions of censorship, and now we know it is a Chinese police informant as well," Reporters Without Borders said in a statement.

China orders bloggers to register with government

China has more than 87m internet users - the world's second largest online population after the US.

The Chinese authorities have ordered all weblogs and websites in the country to register with the government or face closure in Beijing's latest attempt to control online dissent.
TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson had a custard pie thrown in his face after he picked up an honorary degree at Oxford Brookes University on Monday.

Almost 3,000 people have signed an online petition against Mr Clarkson receiving the honorary degree.

The honour had been criticised by green campaigners who said he had a poor stance on the environment.

Shortly before he was assaulted, the smug cunt said: "I do have a disregard for the environment.

"I think the world can look after itself and we should enjoy it as best we can."

archives...

the Biotic Baking Brigade

Flanning: Rich and famous get custard pie treatment

Keaton's Custard-Pies
The art of making and throwing them as told by Buster Keaton.

splosh
total surrender to the text

A CHAT ABOUT CRAFT WITH GRANT MORRISON

(via linkmachinego)
"DEATH TO THE FASCIST INSECT THAT PREYS UPON THE LIFE OF THE PEOPLE"

transcript of the film "Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst"

"There was no doubt they were in control of the situation, no doubt."

the Symbionese Liberation Army
The word "Symbionese" is said to be derived from symbiosis, a term used in biology to denote mutually beneficial interaction between different species

"Arrangements have been made for $2 million to be delivered to a tax exempt charitable organization capable of making a distribution for the benefit of the poor and needy." said Randolph Hearst.

"We were like Robin Hood and we're coming in and we're going to feed people. And maybe this can be an ongoing program for 20 years and maybe we can do some good things and all that stuff. So sure, we didn't agree with the SLA but we knew people were hungry." said Ludlow Kramer

"In the future every crime committed in connection with the kidnapping will be prosecuted. And I'm including any persons who participated in any sort of a food distribution plan or a television set distribution plan or any other kind of a distribution plan. If it's done in response to extortion or kidnapping we'll encourage the local district attorneys to prosecute under existing law and they won't we'll do it." said Evelle Younger, Attorney General State of California

"I have been given the choice of one: being released in a safe area, or two: joining the forces of the Symbionese Liberation Army and fighting for my freedom and the freedom of all oppressed people. I have chosen to stay and fight. I have been given the name Tania after a comrade who fought alongside Che in Bolivia. It is in the spirit of Tania that I say, Patria o Muerte, Venceremos." said Tania/Patty Hearst

Monday 12 September 2005

"Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more."

...said Oscar Wilde

(via amor mundi)

Sunday 11 September 2005



THE FALLING MAN

On September 12, 2001, The New York Times published a photograph by Richard Drew of an unidentified man jumping from the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Two years later, Tom Junod wrote about his search to learn the identity of the man

"He is, fifteen seconds past 9:41 a.m. EST, the moment the picture is taken, in the clutches of pure physics, accelerating at a rate of thirty-two feet per second squared."

"He will soon be traveling at upwards of 150 miles per hour, and he is upside down. In the picture, he is frozen; in his life outside the frame, he drops and keeps dropping until he disappears."
IMAGE

"IMAGE"

full size 104k

Saturday 10 September 2005

"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security".

...said Benjamin Franklin
"We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people."

...said Martin Luther King, Jr.

"The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists will we be?"
UN torture expert in Nepal visit

Nepal has the world's highest rate of fresh political disappearances, and C-Vict (Centre for the Victims of Torture) says that people who disappear have often been tortured to death.

C-Vict says nearly 5,000 cases of physical or psychological torture were reported to it last year.
Open Rights Group (Org)

...A UK-based group to preserve digital rights and freedoms
MI5 head warns on civil liberties

Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, the head of Britain's security service MI5, has warned that hard won civil liberties may have to be "eroded" to protect people from terrorist attacks...

...blah blah blah

plus...

wife demands "terror detainee" proof

The wife of an Algerian terror suspect detained in August is demanding the Home Office show in court the evidence on which her husband is being held.

"You can't keep people locked up in prison just on secret evidence."

She said she was very concerned about the prospect of her husband being deported to Algeria.

"They will take him and they will torture him like they've done to other people like this, that's why I'm scared."

Friday 9 September 2005

Heathen World's "I'm Not a Nazi" Swastika Gallery

(via grow a brain)

archives...

photos that highlight the Christianity of Nazis

and...

"God Is With Us": Hitler's Rhetoric and the Lure of "Moral Values"

Hitler's Germany amalgamated state with church. It was a real Christian country whose citizens were indoctrinated by both state and church and blindly followed all authority figures, political and ecclesiastical.

Hitler, like some of today's politicians and preachers, politicized "family values."


He liked corporeal punishment in home and school. Jesus prayers became mandatory in all schools under his administration. While abortion was illegal in pre-Hitler Germany, he took it to new depths of enforcement, requiring all doctors to report to the government the circumstances of all miscarriages. He openly despised homosexuality and criminalized it.

minus the anti-Semitic rants, many of Hitler's faith-based comments could have come from George Bush himself, and are undoubtedly the kinds of sentiments many Americans not only agree with - but take comfort in.

Hitler himself often expressed his admiration for the expediency in which the American Christians removed the Native Americans and gave them mass graves like the one in Wounded Knee, South Dakota.

Christianity has been used to justify everything from the Salem witch trials to slavery in America, and it facilitated group-think in Germany -- when individuality and questions of conscience were needed the most.
"the consciousness of being at war, and therefore in danger, makes the handing-over of all power to a small caste seem the natural, unavoidable condition of survival."

...said Emmanuel Goldstein

the greatest acts of heresy that a citizen can possibly commit is to read Emmanuel Goldstein's Book, THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF OLIGARCHICAL COLLECTIVISM.

The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism
ENHANCING WASHINGTON'S ABILITY TO RESPOND IMMEDIATELY TO "WRONG INFORMATION" IN THE FOREIGN PRESS

"New plan aims to improve U.S. image"

Karen Hughes, the Bush administration's top public diplomacy official, yesterday rolled out a "strategic framework" to improve the U.S. image abroad, urging American ambassadors to step up their engagement with foreign audiences.

"We'll create a rapid response unit here at the State Department -- it's already in the works -- to monitor media and help us more aggressively respond to rumors, inaccuracies and hate speech," she said.

Mrs. Hughes, whose new motto is "Engage, Exchange, Educate, Empower," proposed engagement on a more human level based on common values and interests, as well as creating a climate that promotes those values where they do not exist.

"I plan to travel with citizen ambassadors and create a robust program to help Americans share their unique American stories with appropriate audiences around the world," she added.

Mrs. Hughes also urged Americans to do more travel and study abroad and said she is working "on a strategic language initiative to make sure that young Americans can communicate with the world."

She promised to recruit - with Mr. Bush and Miss Rice's help - "big names" to go as speakers to foreign countries.

archives...

MAKING SURE THE MEDIA STAYS ON MESSAGE

Reuters cameraman to be held in Abu Ghraib

A cameraman for Reuters in Iraq has been ordered by a secret tribunal to be held without charge in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison until his case is reviewed within six months, a US military spokesman said. The US military has refused Reuters requests to disclose why he is being held. He has not been charged.

His brother, who was detained with him and then released, said they were arrested after Marines looked at the images on the journalist's cameras.

Lieutenant Colonel Rudisill said he would not be allowed to see an attorney, his family or anyone else for the first 60 days of his detention, which began in Abu Ghraib last week.

Lieutenant Colonel Rudisill said he was aware of five journalists for major news media in detention, including Mr Mashhadani and another freelance cameraman who has worked for Reuters, as well as a cameraman for the US television network CBS. Journalists for other major international organisations have recently been released without charge after many months in custody.

Reuters soundman Waleed Khaled was killed in Baghdad on Sunday, apparently by US troops, and cameraman Haider Kadhem, who was wounded in the same incident, has been held ever since by the US military for questioning. Reuters has demanded his immediate release.

Iraqi police said US troops fired into the car carrying the Reuters team.



Tight Constraints on Pentagon's 9/11 memorial "Freedom Walk"

Organizers of the Pentagon's 9/11 memorial Freedom Walk on Sunday are taking extraordinary measures to control participation in the march and concert, with the route fenced off and lined with police and the event closed to anyone who does not register online by 4:30 p.m. today.

The event, the America Supports You Freedom Walk, sponsored by the Department of Defense, will wend its way from the Pentagon to the Mall along a route that has not been specified but will be lined with four-foot-high snow fencing to keep it closed and "sterile," said Allison Barber, deputy assistant secretary of defense.

Officers are prepared to arrest anyone who joins the march or concert without a credential and refuses to leave, said Park Police Chief Dwight E. Pettiford. "we have those fences to keep the public out."

Thursday 8 September 2005

The BBC has released the first TV clips from its archive onto the internet for people to "rip, mix and share"

FIND IT RIP IT MIX IT SHARE IT




and...

r a n d o m Blogger
"Being a sex radical means being defiant as well as deviant."

ICPR World Charter For Prostitutes' Rights
random wikiQuote
e n h a n c e d - r e a l i t y ...


"I confess that I am a dreamer. Someone once called me "just a dreamer." That offended me, the "just" part; being a real dreamer is hard work. It really gets hard when you start believing your dreams."

... said Douglas Engelbart



a Basic Income or Citizen's Income is an unconditional,
non-withdrawable, regular income, not linked to work, payable to each individual as a right of citizenship, sufficient to provide people with a standard of living above the poverty line.




viridian manifesto

posthuman manifesto

extropian principles 3.0



Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics

Center for Study of Political Graphics



Truthful Translations of Political Speech



non-voting archive

league of non-voters

voluntaryist.com



better humans

plausible futures

singularity institute



"Don't let your preoccupation with reality stifle your imagination"

(........said Robert A. Cassanova and Sharon M. Garrison)














creative commons

Wednesday 7 September 2005

Yahoo has been accused of supplying information to China which led to the jailing of a journalist for "divulging state secrets".

Reporters Without Borders accused Yahoo of becoming a "police informant" in order to further its business ambitions.

"We already knew that Yahoo! collaborates enthusiastically with the Chinese regime in questions of censorship, and now we know it is a Chinese police informant as well," Reporters Without Borders said in a statement.

According to a translation of Shi Tao's conviction, reproduced by Reporters Without Borders, he was found guilty of sending foreign-based websites the text of an internal Communist Party message.

Reporters Without Borders said the message warned journalists of the dangers of social unrest resulting from the return of dissidents on the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, in June 2004.

western internet companies have regularly been criticised for agreeing to China's strict rules governing the internet, which Communist Party leaders fear could be a tool to spread dissent.

Microsoft was criticised in June for censoring what bloggers write.

The companies say they have to abide by local regulations, and point out that since China is set to be the world's biggest internet market, they cannot ignore it.

Earlier this month Yahoo paid $1bn (£556m) for a stake in China's biggest e-commerce firm, Alibaba.com.

Help Us Protect Free Speech Online


Blue Ribbon Campaign icon


reporters without borders

INFORMANT

plus...

"I didn't pay for a Yahoo account, I paid for a Flickr account."

Tuesday 6 September 2005

The Panopticon:

Pictures Of Surveillance Cameras

Sunday 4 September 2005

Lily in the Meantime
Technoliberation

Using technology to deepen democracy, using democracy to ensure technology benefits us all.

Technoliberation is a rainbow coalition that extends beyond the visible spectrum.

We are all champions of democracy here and we are all progressives.

Many of us are post-naturalist Greens and champions of sustainable development. Many of us are secular humanists and post-humanist humanitarians. Many of us are pro-choice feminists and morphological freedom fighters, defending consensual personal genetic, prosthetic, and cognitive practices of self-creation. Many of us are atheists, aesthetes, and nonjudgmental people of many faiths and spiritual practices. Many of us are transgendered, queer theorists, biopunks, democratic transhumanists, and psychedelic experimentalists. Many of us are copyfighters, defenders of the creative and genomic commons, enthusiasts of social software tools, free software, open source, peer-to-peer democracy. Many of us are policy wonks, technocrats, world federalists, human rights activists, election reformers, advocates of basic income guarantees and universal health care, leapfroggers, and space enthusiasts. Many of us are champions of consensus science, of genetic science and evolutionary theory, but none of us are genetic determinists or Social Darwinists. None of us are all of these things, of course, but many of us are many of them, and we are all of us inspired and provoked by the connections we find among these struggles and celebrations.

Bioconservatives, market libertarians, religious fundamentalists, and retro-futurists are NOT WELCOME among us.

Saturday 3 September 2005

genpets
How to build your own hooves
OCTOPUS BLOG

(via geisha asobi blog)
matthew keeney
Governments should be Afraid of their People

An Annotation of Literary, Historic, and Artistic Reference in Alan Moore's Graphic Novel, V For Vendetta

plus...

Comic (sans type) Face
Oblique Strategies

online version of a pack of Cards created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmitdt

(via linkmachinego)
The Great Queers of History
giant hands
WHITE PEOPLE "FIND" FOOD. BLACK PEOPLE "LOOT"

Kanye West criticised President Bush's response to Hurricane Katrina at a televised benefit concert in New York on Friday. The comment went out live on the US west coast, but was cut from a taped version seen on the east coast.

West told the audience: "George Bush doesn't care about black people." West also claimed the US was set up "to help the poor, the black people, the less well-off as slow as possible".

He appeared alongside comedian Mike Myers for a 90-second segment, but to Myers' surprise, West departed from his script and said: "I hate the way they portray us in the media. If you see a black family, it says they're looting. See a white family, it says they're looking for food."

West was cut off mid-speech after he criticised Mr Bush, and the cameras switched to comedian Chris Tucker.

plus...

The problem is not incompetence. It's inhumanity, cruelty and greed.

"True compassion," Martin Luther King Jr. pointed out, "is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring." He accused the federal government of demonstrating "hostility to the poor" ...appropriating "military funds with alacrity and generosity" but providing "poverty funds with miserliness." Four decades later, de facto hostility to the poor remains government policy, and its results include widespread deaths in New Orleans that could have been prevented.

and...

New Orleans crisis shames Americans

meanwhile...

The monthly cost to the US of the war in Iraq is now greater than the average monthly cost of the Vietnam War

Friday 2 September 2005

pdf: HANSI, THE GIRL WHO LOVED THE SWASTIKA

from Spire Christian Comics

(via superfrankenstein)
Guantanamo hunger strike

The prisoners, many of whom have been held for more than three years without charge, are believed to be demanding an immediate trial or release.

The Pentagon has said only 76 detainees are refusing food, not the 200 claimed by the lawyers, but has not said when the protest began.
MAKING SURE THE MEDIA STAYS ON MESSAGE

Reuters cameraman to be held in Abu Ghraib

A cameraman for Reuters in Iraq has been ordered by a secret tribunal to be held without charge in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison until his case is reviewed within six months, a US military spokesman said. The US military has refused Reuters requests to disclose why he is being held. He has not been charged.

His brother, who was detained with him and then released, said they were arrested after Marines looked at the images on the journalist's cameras.

Lieutenant Colonel Rudisill said he would not be allowed to see an attorney, his family or anyone else for the first 60 days of his detention, which began in Abu Ghraib last week.

Lieutenant Colonel Rudisill said he was aware of five journalists for major news media in detention, including Mr Mashhadani and another freelance cameraman who has worked for Reuters, as well as a cameraman for the US television network CBS. Journalists for other major international organisations have recently been released without charge after many months in custody.

Reuters soundman Waleed Khaled was killed in Baghdad on Sunday, apparently by US troops, and cameraman Haider Kadhem, who was wounded in the same incident, has been held ever since by the US military for questioning. Reuters has demanded his immediate release.

Iraqi police said US troops fired into the car carrying the Reuters team.
freewayblogger.com

Thursday 1 September 2005

Hardies
The Goddess of the Month For September, 2005:

Mahte Laima, Mother Destiny

Latvian Pagan beliefs are among the oldest in the world, and one of the most powerful deities in that system is the Goddess Laima. It is she, along with ether her two sisters Karta & Dekla, or two other aspects of herself, who were said to travel at night and look in the windows of women giving birth to decree each child's fate as it pertains to life's most important aspects...
List of people who have said that they are gods
God Bless Our God
"Language X is essentially language Y under conditions Z"

POESIA VISUAL BRASILEIRA

BRAZILIAN VISUAL POETRY

(via grow a brain)