Haiti etc

I was amazed by how quickly we raised money for this cause.
It's a shame though, that there has to be a massive earthquake and people buried alive amongst dead bodies before we seriously do something about helping this places.
They were in extreme poverty before; perhaps we should have helped them then. Who knows?
I'm not overly impressed with Obama, but then I never am. It's lovely that he's pledging to help and rebuild Haiti, but there's lots of problems in the USA... great poverty, still New Orleans etc. that nothing's done about.
Get a good bit of PR?

Not that I'm being cynical. But we don't seem to send aid to any countries which don't go off in a big bang and get loads of media attention. There's droughts and wars going on all the time which we do nothing to help (or at least the govt. doesn't, put hands together for NGOs)... so whilst I think it's great we are helping them, I shall remain cynical.
How much help will we continue to give once the media grows bored, I wonder?

Small Darkness

There’s so much in this world that I love, but also so much that I fear.
It was like a shiver passing through my body, a cold drench as a ghost walked through me. I almost felt ill with the thought of it.
Years ago. But not so long after-all. We can recover and get better and move on, but things do not go away. The past does not forget. The stain remains forever afterwards. There will always be scars after even the most minor of injuries.
So what do we do? Come to terms with it. Reminds ourselves that we are not like that anymore; despite the fact that we keep all the little pieces of ourselves for ever.
Do we forgive ourselves, or hate ourselves?Or will I just turn cold when I am reminded? I faced up to my demons and I told the truth, but this is not a movie-plot or a fairytale. It didn’t all go away and get better. It was a relief; there is now nothing hanging over me, but there is still a bitter reminder of my own actions that I cannot bleach away, scrub away, burn away.
There is no pity for myself there; not hate either, just that terrible coldness. It is a ghost. I do not know what else to call it. An icy cold terrible ghoul from the past.

some dreams were meant to be denied

I think very well of Monbiot; he is one of the most intelligent modern men I have come across, and for once, he lives in the same country as me.
But I realised a vital difference today when reading his blog; for once I did not agree with him.
When talking about Blair and the illegality of the Iraq war, he, I quote: "This crime has caused the deaths, depending on whose estimate you believe, of between 100,000 and one million people(3,4). As there was no legal justification, these people were murdered."

I believe, that they were murdered regardless of 'legal justification'.
Of course, I know what he means. People die in war. That's what happens. Lanvia Zielinsky taught me that years ago; it is nothing new under the sun.
But why does it cease to be murder just because some big man in a big building says it's okay? (or lots of big men in various buildings now, considering, thankfully, a few of them disagree with the Iraq War [not enough to do something about it mind]).
It is like execution. We murdered Saddam Hussien. Execution is just a fluffed up word for murder isn't it?

I suppose, what it means, is that if Mr. Hussien had been firing missiles into Europe or sinking US ships, we would have been allowed to legally invade. But how does this make any more sense?
Even if Mr. Hussien was knocking US satellites out of the sky and threatening to nuke Berlin, why is there justification to kill the unlucky people who happen to live in his country?
That's just how war has always gone, I know, but precedent doesn't automatically make things right.



The other topic I wished to discuss was Menstruation. Yes. The Time of the Month. Periods. Being on the Blob. Whatever you want to call it.
What I want to know is this: why do men, and many women I suppose, have such an issue with discussing, nay, even being aware of it?
Many times, I've felt a little ill, and a male friend, upon asking me what's up, and I telling him, has gone 'ew, thanks for that'.....
Why? It is not disgusting, or unnatural or obscure. It is part of who we are, 100% natural, and 100% vital to our existence.
But, I've met men, yes men, not boys, who don't know what a period actually is. You eat eggs, but you fail to understand what half the population has every moon?

I suppose it goes a long way back. Shall we blame god again? For this and everything else. Eve's punishment, you know.
In the past, women couldn't leave their houses when they had their period. Girls were left with blood running down their legs; it is something shameful and disgusting.
Your husband will have mistresses, so he can have sex whenever he wants, because he can't sleep with you when you're on your period. Goodness, he might catch something?!
You expect a woman to swallow what comes out of you but you can't bare to even think about what occurs in her body?

I do not understand it. Why did male PE teachers become embarrassed when a girl complained she couldn't do PE because she was on her period?
Why do men refuse adamantly to listen when I explain what a mooncup is? (after they ask).
Is it something inbuilt, left over from a different time and culture? Shouldn't we have got over it by now?
It's only blood after-all. It's not disgusting or freaky or unnerving. It's part of what a woman is.
Perhaps men shouldn't be allowed to have a girlfriend until he is able to discuss menstruation with her. If you can't come to terms with what your partner is and everything that that entails, then go out with a man.

"we can do nothing but see the times go by in the paths which god has chosen"

Apathy.
A curse and a blessing, then.
As in, this is how it is, and there's nothing that we can do about it, so we'll just sit back and watch it happen.
I wonder why? I suppose it's true that philosophy is a science, or other sciences are philosophies; something that makes them akin anyway. Because philosophising over why humanity is the way it is has basis in science, even if we can only pretend to understand it.
So much news again. But they are quite arcane rants really. Quite pointless too.
For some reason I watched the news three times today; 1pm, 6pm and 10pm. It varied slightly, but it was all such drivel.
We never tell it truthfully. Why do we have such a hatred of the truth? Mugabe for instance.
But never mind.
Everyone is quite content to just laugh at and mock Mr. Griffin, and ignore their own political travesties. But then I am sure that 'hypocrite' and 'politician' are synonymous.
But what do I know? Yes, indeed.

Poppies. Everywhere. Look at us, wearing with pride, the blood of men and women we sent to die for a bunch of carbonated trees. Was it worth it?
I won't wear a poppy this year, not even a white one for Peace.
How can I face the falsity of it, when the drivers of war in this world also bear them upon their chests?
It upset me long ago, when I was too young to know better. I'll never take my poppy off again; I'll grieve all year round.
By March, I was told to remove it, I was being self-indulgent.
Oh, if we knew what that meant. I think it is our need to feel moral that is more self-indulgent.
Throw money at the problem. Buy them free. It's like we're all held up fo ransom, with the pirates in our parliament.

Look what else to celebrate soon. Remember, remember. It's important to remember that the Houses of Parliament were a Royal Palace.
It's the same with the beautiful building the French parliament meet in. Palace, then prison.
I wonder why we think we're different now, to how we were in the past?
We don't bat an eyelid in rememberance to the Chinese politician who was shot instead of fired. We'll shake hands and make trade deals with the government instead.
Modern pirates are evil thugs, but we idolise the pirates of the past.
Why do we do that? The man who dared wield the sword in the past is a hero.
But if Guy Fawkes was here now, we'd all stand and cheer as they killed him.
No wonder no one will save us or sort this country, this world out.

But then what would then entail? What would 'utopia' be?

Again, we wil just say, it's not that bad. What will be will be. Mustn't grumble, after-all. We'll be fine.

Don't we have serious problems, that any sane people would really be sorting out? There are no excuses left.
We just keep on slashing our wrists, and wondering why there is blood everywhere.

I considered going mad. Teach the world love and peace with Fire and Revolution. But I couldn't do it. It makes me sad... I grow angry with people's behaviour, but it turns into pity.
How can you be happy, being like that? How can you feel content and at peace? Do you have no conscience? Does greed overcome it?

So many pointless questions to things not worth dwelling on.
Let us go and drink vodka, Imperial Russia had a plan; a nation of alcoholics.

I'm impressed that I can write so much on Fuck All.

But I think it will be okay. I have faith in myself, and that's the best place to start.
I have my book now, on Helvétius...... I am one of, I expect, four people in the whole world who care about him, and two of them are French (Comte and Comtess) and one is American.
But he wrote my book. And for that I thank him, even if it's a library book from Ohio.
There are worse places in this world than Ohio (let us forget all the Native American massacres that took place there).
It makes me happy, because it reminds me of how much we do have to be thankful for now; how much we can say now. They probably wouldn't even rip us to shreds anymore if we tried to kill the King.
The kings have new names now. Shoes. Throw the shoes. I wonder what would have happened if that shoe had hit him square in the head and killed him?
It's okay to slowly poison the world, but not to kill a man to his face.
Sometimes, I think that we don't know what we are.

I think I need to stop warbling away now. Go and write about Baseflow. That's useful.

Good Enough

The world didn't stop spinning, so I don't know where I went.
Everything constantly manages to remain so complicated, and I don't even know why.
Where is the simplicity, that pure simple continuity, where everything just fits well and seems good?
But then, God didn't make a good world, not really. Well, he didn't make anything, but that's not the point.
The point is; is human life fundamentally stressful, or have we engineered it so?
Is the old idea of the noble savage in fact the right one?
Was it beautiful and free, being part of the land and nature around you, with less constraints and demands set on you, or was it savage and wild, bloodthirsty and bitter?
Animals aren't happy creatures in general. They live off fear, it drives them and enforces them, controls almost every aspect... and I suppose it has remained so with us.
Only, with society being so false now, the fear has manifested itself in strange ways.
Babies are scared from the moment they are born; if they are abandoned, they will die. And some part of them knows this; and often we carry that fear of abandonment on into our adult lives.
If they leave us, forget us, do not love us enough, we will die. If we are not good enough, we will die.
The disformed children left in the hills for the wolves. You were not good enough, we did not love you.
And that has built our whole world. We will be beautiful, we will do all we can so we are beautiful and you do not leave us. Surgery, make-up, expensive out-fits.
All the things we do, are built around.. buy this and then you will be good enough!
But there is always more! You can never be good enough!
And the silliest thing is that when we're all so buried internally, striving to be acceptable, to be normal and loveable, to be worthwhile... none of us are there for those around us.
Fear is selfish after-all.

the truth of all predictions is always in your hands

I had some crazy mutated gem stuck in my keyboard that kept migrating under different letters and not allowing me to press them. It is now gone!

Anyway. So there's been lots of chaos and upset in the news, but then again that in itself isn't really a new thing, is it.
I can't get my head round Obama getting the Peace Prize... I mean it's all very well that we should be positive about the whole thing, but giving someone the prize before they've done anything is more than a little counter-productive, surely?

Then there's the Tory and Labour battles. And to be honest I have to agree with the consensus... that Labour would have a chance of winning again if they replaced Gordon Brown.
Dear me, I could never bring myself to hate the man - there's a lot of mess in this country, it is true, and a lot of it was caused or at least made worse whilst he had some power in one form or another, but when someone looks so ill and tired and trying to piece together something unilaterally broken I cannot feel anything other than sadness...
This would make me an awful Revolutionary. I could never stick being a Socialist; I could not scream and cry for reform that came in violence or in blood.
Although we ought to sodding wake up in one form or another soon.

it may be we shall rise the last, as the Frenchmen rose the first
Our wrath come after Russia's wrath and our wrath be the worst...

I do rather love Chesterton. I was horrified to learn one of my housemates had never heard of him; not only him but Blake or Wordsworth or Browning. I mean, fair enough, if he doesn't like poetry or wish to read it, but what has happened to school education if people grow up without even knowing their names?
I suppose it could be said that they are the past, that they do not matter anymore; but that I think is inaccurate. Technically the past 'no longer matters' - yesterday no longer matters, because it's done now. But things aren't really that simple are they, they are connected and joined and we learn and build from all things. The past makes us, our nations.
Now, I don't believe in Nations. I don't believe in squiggly lines on maps... that destroyed a whole continent of people (when America truly was free, before the Westerners came for the yellow metal that drove them mad...) but I do believe in culture.
I don't believe anything per se; for the most part people should be able to get on with what they want, believe what they want,(not including, of course that which harms or infringes on other people's rights... honour killings for example...) but it's nice to remember the shoulders we are standing upon...

I ramble. I suppose I can, this is my blog.

I also was thinking about Depression, or the realm of other names we give Mental Illness.
It distresses me a little; to think that those dealing with mental illness, psychiatrists and so forth do not have to undergo tests to prove they are sound of mind, and to discuss the reasons they are entering the profession.

The problem is, we dismiss people as Mad. They then cease to be human in our minds. It's not that we wish to be cruel or undermine them, but they are on the same level as animals. And most people don't mind being cruel to animals; they turn a blind eye to slaughterhouses and horrific treatment, because they like that food, and it's cheaper than the 'ethical' stuff. The same goes for child labour, all that lovely cheap cotton we buy. And so on.
We dehumanise (yes I know animals aren't human) these, and we do the same to 'mad' people.

I began thinking of this for two reasons; seeing someone depressed at uni and the people around them acting dismissive, and then Eastenders. Yes, I know. A terrible Soap. People screaming and hitting each other and doing the most crazy of things (although Boris Johnson was right in a way, when he said it's an important aspect of our culture... whether we agree with that or like it or not...) but tonight I thought, for the first time ever, that it actually had an important message, with Stacey, as she was sectioned and dragged screaming away.
Perhaps it just resounds more strongly with me than with other people; but it is something we do not think about, something we forget.
Mental illness, depression, that great sadness that overtakes and does not leave affects most of us in some form or another in our lives. And yet we judge it and dismiss it and are cruel to those who carry it as a burden.
And the people who are meant to deal with it, often do not know how. They are not alright themselves, they have weight and baggage that they are unable to shift even with their patients around, and that can make them a hindrance to recovery.

It is sad, the wasted lives. It is sad that we are so cruel to one another, in every way.
But I suppose we animals, and animals, Nature Herself is cruel, bitter, bloody.
But not vindinctive. Not abusive, not emotional.

Perhaps the dinosaurs really died out because they had become too 'human'. We can't be too far from the end, an end at least, now.
The Earthquakes, tearing the roads apart and knocking the buildings down, was almost a scream for help - you are suffocating me! Take off this concrete covering! Let me breathe! Let me free!

Never. Kill all you want, we do not care, Earth. We made that clear long ago, when we allowed, all of us allowed, the men in power, who allow, condone, suggest this rape, to remain.
We allowed them to kill the few who stood up and said no. Don't destroy Ecuador, let the trees go!
Never. Oil. Oil. Oil.

Look at Afghanistan. We'll weep for our men and women who died or come back in pieces, but we don't even allow that country to grow a field of Poppies. We'll stand there brazen in a month's time, with our blood red poppies on our chest and say We Care.
Do we, as a race, know how to care?
Or do we, as a race, only know greed and destruction?

Remember the Bison. We should always remember the bison. That is how America began; even the brave and wonderous founding fathers could not lay down their guns.
But then the first President of America was a general in the British forces, wasn't he. What do I know, I'm not historian. And even if I was, my knowledge and understanding will just die with me.

But I still feel peace of mind. Perhaps a little sadness, but there is no anger. No bloody revolution that I could sanction. I'll admire the bravery of the French and the Russians, the Americans and Spanish, the Irish, and all the rest, but it is not the right kind of bravery. It's not the kind that will last. There will always be a stench of blood.
But then, how else do you overthrown a 'tyrannical ruler' (if they ever we such, and not just corrupted and delusioned men).
And we don't even have the luxury of 'one man' to blame.
But then I don't think it was ever the fault of one man; which is why I am stringently against murder under any guise.
The fear written on the faces of the teenage girls who in 1918 watched their father die before the guns were turned on them. The little boy 200 years ago who was treated cruelly before he died... and even their fathers, the men who committed the 'crimes'... could they not be judged as victims of the same disfunctional society as the rest?
Yes they had food and money aplenty, but there was no peace of mind, no happiness, a constant more foolish struggle than that for food... the one we face now... consumerism, ego, happiness we fail to buy or make...

I am rambling again. I shall cease, and go and fix the toaster.

And a return

Goodness, everything has been very busy. I no longer have a properly unctioning F key, so there may be minor issues with my posts, lol.

I had something I wanted to rant about but I've forgotten what it was now, but if anger is replaced by a peaceful mind, I will not be one to complain.

Well I suppose there IS something to be cross about. Obama getting the Noble Peace Prize.

conflicting news

Interesting.
I've seen several reports claiming different things. Iran is only using low-grade uranium that cannot make a bomb. They are letting inspectors in and Obama thinks things are going to be worked out next week with diplomatic discussion. Even Medvedev doesn't see an issue.
On the other end of the spectrum, Ahmadinejad appears to be doing the equivalent of laughing manically and trying to throw dust into the West's eyes, whilst hidden in his secret James Bond villain type lair, he is making nuclear weapons without a doubt and preparing to wipe Israel off the map. He said he will allow inspectors in but is being evasive about when, and there are doubts on whether it will happen. Obama says that military action, although not undertaken likely, is nevertheless still an option.

Well, I knew the media made stuff up, but please!

a more dangerous place

Gosh, it's been a while. I've been very busy I suppose, with moving house and so on, but everything is sorted now, all ready to roll.

Whilst I have been moving along and sorting things out, the political landscape of our world gets ever more tumultuous.
Radio 4 claimed that the world is a more dangerous place today than yesterday, because Iran has admitted to building nuclear arms. I don't see this as the issue, so much as our (or rather, America's or Israel's) reaction to this.
Because Israel will not let this lie. And we will do nothing to hinder them. So perhaps, yes, the world is really now more dangerous.
Although, would an arms race, a war, break out, with use of nuclear weapons? Or will we just bomb the sh!t out of each other with 'nicer' bombs? As ever before. I don't know. I'd hope we don't actually use them, but I can't conceive what's going on the minds of the men in charge.

Not sure about other news. There's still been a tirade of hatred against a load of 90 year old men, who killed people the best part of a century ago.
Angela Merkel seems to be winning the German election. We're still waist-deep in the recession. The media is bigging up swine flu' again, and the vaccines are verging on being, if not already are, mandatory in America. Jolly good, huh...

But Iran says there is no issue. Why can't we have these things, if you've all got them? Mysteriously, the 'wonderful' Obama has decided now is the time to decide to cut down our nuclear weapons. Hm. He has a very excellent way with words, does our Obama. But of course, he's a politician. You'd expect him to. This is why he is voted in. Why does anyone believe the words? Why do we think he is different? Hope?! Still?!
This article is interestingish, I love the term 'oozed contempt' in relation to Ahmadinejad's opinion of Brown and Sarkozy. :D