ID/Creationism: the madness is spreading across the pond

In an earlier post I mentioned a BBC poll which revealed that four out of ten Britons believe intelligent design should be taught in science classrooms. Now, we learn that:

Pupils in England will be required to discuss creationist theories as part of a new GCSE biology course being introduced in September.

The move has alarmed scientists who fear it could open the door for the promotion of creationist ideas like "intelligent design" and give them scientific respectability at a time when they are being promoted by fundamentalist Christians and Muslims.

. . .

The new biology syllabus in England does not require the teaching of creationist views alongside Darwin's theory of evolution, but it opens the way for classroom discussions in science lessons and pupils will be assessed on work they do on this topic.

Meanwhile, yet another antipodean (following in the footsteps of Ken Ham and Ray Comfort) is heading north to spread the Good Word.

Next week, an Australian will jet into Heathrow for a lecture tour that will gladden the hearts of the small but dauntless band of British creationists, believers in the biblical account of the origins of the world.

John Mackay, a former science teacher from Queensland, whose photograph shows him looking not unlike Indiana Jones, grinning in bush hat and open necked shirt, is one of Creation Science's speaking stars. He will console believers that Genesis is true, that the Earth is not millions of years old but only a few thousand and that science proves it, rather than the Darwinian theory of evolution accepted by the overwhelming majority of scientists for more than a century.He comes here most years, though his 31 engagements from Scotland to Kent are mainly in nonconformist church halls and non-mainstream chapels rather than the loftiest pulpits or highest groves of academe. There will be talks at places like the Living Waters Fellowship at Newport, Isle of Wight, the Christian Outreach Centre in Bournemouth and the Destiny Church in Edinburgh. An appearance at Bangor University turns out to be in a hall hired by local evangelicals for the occasion.

There will even be a week-long Family Creation Conference in tents at the Cefn Lea Christian Holiday Park near Newtown in mid-Wales, for which about 40 families have signed up, at which Mr Mackay will attempt to answer fundamental questions such as: Did bees sting before Adam sinned? Why would birds need to migrate in a good world? What would polar bears do in a world with no ice and what did great white sharks eat before Aussies went surfing? The answers may seem obvious, but it is proof that even believers in the inerrancy of the Bible feel the need to seek something scientific to bolster their case.

Mackay wants to debate bona fide scientists like Richard Dawkins and David Attenborough, both of whom aren't interested. For Mackay's followers, this is "censorship." However, as an anonymous reviewer of Eugenie Scott's Evolution vs Creationism: An Introduction puts it:

Debating creationists on the topic of evolution is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon -- it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flys back to its flock to claim victory.

I'll leave you with a pearl of wisdom from Bishop Wayne Malcolm of the Christian Life City church in Hackney, East London:

There is clearly an absence in the fossil record for intermediate levels of development. If a frog turned into a monkey, shouldn't you have lots of fronkies?

Kirk Cameron, don't get too cozy with that "Dickhead of the Year" award just yet.

Read more!

You Have B.O.

In my younger days I was in the employ of a certain fast-food chain, and we had a girl there with a severe case of this problem. She was a really nice person in every other respect, so you can imagine how difficult it would have been to broach the issue with her. Thankfully, that task never fell to me.

Anyway, here's a website that could have helped us all out. Read more!

Next on ACA: How left-wing English teachers are intellectually sodomising your children . . . and what the PM plans to do about it

Yawn. Another Tory is sooking about outcomes based education and the fact that English syllabi have moved on somewhat from "when he was a lad."

Said Tory then whines that the fact that it has moved on constitutes a "dumbing down" of the English syllabus, and a sign that, at the expense of "quality traditional literature" (i.e. the literature produced by Dead White Englishmen that little Johnny studied at Canterbury Boy's High), educational authorities are succumbing to "political correctness" (i.e. anything not produced by the Dead White Englishmen that little Johnny studied at school).

When asked about the West Australian government's "outcome-based" education program, Mr Howard replied: "That is gobbledegook - what does that mean?"

Um . . . Johnny? Not knowing anything about a subject is not a refutation of it. Didn't they teach you that at Canterbury Boy's?

Stay tuned for the usual triumphalist diatribe in the editorial of the Australian, accompanied by the usual triumphalist diatribe by Kevin Donnelly. Ho hum.

P.S. Things started looking up once Brendan "students in state schools should be taught intelligent design in science classes if that's what parents want" Nelson was replaced by Julie Bishop--who ostensibly seemed to have a good head on her shoulders, relatively speaking--but they don't seem so hopeful now.

UPDATE: There's a great post about this at Larvatus Prodeo. Read more!

How Evil Am I? (AV jumps on the bandwagon)

You Are 30% Evil

A bit of evil lurks in your heart, but you hide it well. In some ways, you are the most dangerous kind of evil.

How Evil Are You?

Read more!

Dickhead of the Year: Kirk Cameron

And not because he's a fundie. Because he's a drooling, slavering, idiotic fundie. And his inanity is well demonstrated in a video he's produced with fellow lamebrain Ray Comfort on the subject of evolution: "The Evolution Zone" (a play on "The Twilight Zone"--did you get it? Huh? Did ya?).

Now, I'll admit I have a slow connection and am working my way through the video stream, with ever-thinning patience, you understand, so you should visit Dispatches From the Culture Wars for a complete synopsis. I knew what was coming, but my jaw dropped at about the point where Comfort claims that "evolutionists would have us believe [. . .] there was nothing. And then there was this "Big Bang," and out came the sea and the land, and the birds, etc." Yes, you read that correctly.

By this point anybody who hasn't navigated away from the page hosting the clip will have realised that Cameron and Comfort know sweet fuck all about evolution. Do they take the path of humility and seek to educate themselves on the topic before they embarrass themselves further? Nosireebob! Here's what they propose to do. They're going to talk to "true believers" in evolution who speak what they call "the language of evolution." "True believers start off sounding like experts, but because there's such a lack of factual evidence for the theory, start to use words like "we surmise," "we believe," "perhaps," "maybe."" Comfort tells us to watch out for these keywords as we view the sequence that follows.

Now, at this point, some of you might be expecting a series of interviews with zoologists, biologists, paleontologists--people who actually know what they are talking about, and who are qualified to speak with authority on the topic of evolution. Well, you're expecting far too much. You see, that would have been too easy. What these clowns do instead is find random people in the street who will say, when asked, that they accept evolutionary theory. They then proceed to ply them with questions ranging from "How did it begin?" and "What caused the Big Bang" (questions that don't fall within the remit of evolutionary theory in any case) to "When we were under the water, do you think we had lungs or gills?" and my favourite: "So . . . here is this animal that comes out of the water without lungs, and so he comes out with gills and then goes Puff! Puff! Puff! and then runs back in the water and then keeps coming out until lungs develop? Wow! . . . Was he male or female?" There's more: "Do you think we could have evolved from horses?" As you might guess, the responses are stumbling and uncertain--which to you and me will signal that the respondents (as they freely admit) know very little about the theory they support (or perhaps they have been caught off-guard by the ludicrous line of questioning)--but to Comfort and Cameron indicate that the theory itself is suspect. What a pair of snake-oil salesmen they are!

I'm up to the part where we return to the studio, and Cameron is telling us how the problem with evolution is the lack of transitional forms. "The supposed transitional forms exist only in the imagination (points to head here) of evolutionists." He's wrong, of course. And Cameron: archaeologists don't dig up fossils. Paleontologists do that. (Or should that read "palientologists?") According to Cameron, Homo Neanderthalensis was just "an old man with arthritis!" I can't bear to watch . . . and yet I can't look away.

You have been warned.
UPDATE: Cameron and Comfort have been responsible for similar shenanigans previously.

UPDATE II: Regarding "Dickhead of the Year," it appears we have a new contender. Wot a spud! Read more!

Something of a wag in the tail

Allow me to indulge in a spot of ladblogging:

Jason Gillespie scored an amazing 201 not out as Australia declared on 4 for 581 shortly after lunch on day four of the second and final Test against Bangladesh in Chittagong.

Gillespie brought up the monumental milestone with a deft leg glance to the boundary as team-mates stood cheering in the dressing room. Clarke was the batsman at the other end and finished the innings unbeaten on 23. (ABC)

The ability of Australian cricketers to triumph in the face of adversity--Gillespie's career is in a "rebuilding phase" after a disastrous Ashes last year--never ceases to amaze. Cheers, Dizzy! Read more!

SBS doco: "A War On Science"

2000 years ago someone died on a cross for us. Isn't it time we did something for him?

That's one of the more chilling soundbites from the SBS Cutting Edge documentary on ID, "A War on Science," that screened last night. It's also a very good reason why, as the programme reported, members of the Dover school board were instructed by their legal counsel to keep their mouths shut during the recent trial that provided a backdrop for the programme's exploration of the ID phenomenon.

Overall, the documentary provided a useful general introduction to the claims of intelligent design and to the criticisms of those claims. Michael Behe and William Dembski were introduced as the caporegimes of a movement founded by lawyer Phillip Johnson and philosopher of science Stephen Meyer, and their key claims--Behe's "irreducible complexity" and Dembski's "specified complexity" (outlined in broader terms as a statistical refutation of random mutation and natural selection)--were presented as the twin pillars of that movement. The programme also pointedly made the connection between the courtroom defeat of the teaching of biblical creationism in the late eighties, and the coincidentally contemporaneous emergence of intelligent design. (Had there been time, I'm sure it would have detailed the "evolution" of creationist textbook Of Pandas and People into the NEW! IMPROVED! intelligent design editions--this certainly did not go unnoticed in Dover). The "Wedge Document" was mentioned, though the documentary noted that its release has not been detrimental to ID's popular appeal. The reality-based community was represented by David Attenborough and a scathing Richard Dawkins--who unfortunately offered little more than sound-bite rebuttals--with the actual killer blows to Behe's and Dembski's claims being struck by biologist Kenneth Miller, who demonstrated how the so-called "irreducible complexity" of the flagellum wasn't, and also how many events can be deemed statistically impossible if the odds of their occurring are calculated retrospecively.

Overall, the "War on Science" was represented not so much as a struggle between science and religion as a struggle between science and truthiness--Bush featured prominently as a sign of the powerful hold ID has on the American popular mind, even if its credibility among scientists is negiligible (and that's being generous). Although we all know the result in Dover, the documentary foreshadowed more battles to come--given the money and resources available to ID proponents. And here I feel the doco missed an opportunity to explore some of the sources of these funds--including among them organizations who believe homosexuals should be executed.

The "American Gothic" cinematography employed for the Dover, PA sequences was a nice touch--though I thought the "scary movie" atmospherics that accompanied accounts of the Dover school board meetings leading up to the trial a tad over the top. (Indeed, the doco often seemed to be suggesting something about ID proponents through the cinematography. Dembski was filmed repeatedly tossing dice--as befits a man who once famously boasted: "I'll wager a bottle of single-malt scotch, should it ever go to trial whether ID may legitimately be taught in public school science curricula, that ID will pass all constitutional hurdles." And Behe, who claims that the "irreducible complexity" of the bacterial flagellum is evidence against evolution, expounded his views from within an amusement park.)

It's a shame that good television like this gets buried on SBS--but then again with the fundie-friendly Federal Government tightening the screws on the ABC, it's probably just as well. Read more!

And I Cook, Too

Back in January, you might remember I posted an old family recipe for pasta sauce. Well, I'm happy and honoured to announce that said recipe has been included in a new cookbook fundraiser for Doctors Without Borders. (Which retails at $US 15 and is available via the link.) Read more!

How long is a piece of string? Evolution and deep time

The timescales involved in cosmological, geological and evolutionary history are simply too immense to bear thinking about without the aid of some hard drugs. In his incomparable intervention into the field of popular science, A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson asks us to stretch out our arms as far as possible, and to imagine that span as the entire history of the Earth:

On this scale [. . .] the distance from the fingertips of one hand to the wrist of the other is the Precambrian. All of complex life is in one hand, "and in a single stroke with a medium-grained nail file you could eradicate human history."

Via Larvatus Prodeo, here's a website that represents the timescales involved in evolutionary history graphically. "To print it," observes LP's Shaun Cronin, "you would need a piece of paper 138ft long." Read more!

From the "War on Christianity" to the "War on Science"

This week's episode of The Cutting Edge (SBS) deals with what the fundies no doubt consider to be another front line in the "War on Christianity:" intelligent design. The BBC "Horizons" documentary pits ID advocates Phillip Johnson, Michael Behe and Stephen Meyer against Richard Dawkins (I'm still waiting for the ABC or SBS to screen his two-part doco for Channel 4, The Root of all Evil?) and David Attenborough--which one imagines is hardly a fair contest, but it is very difficult to resist the opportunity to see creationists made to look like idiots.

Set your VCRs.

Speaking of the aformentioned "War," the fundies are up in arms over the planned participation by hundreds of gay and lesbian parents in this year's annual White House Easter Egg Roll. The appropriately-named Mark Tooley of the right-wing think-tank (of which there must be half a dozen per head of population in the United States) the Institute on Religion and Democracy whines:

These groups are demanding acceptance of same-sex 'marriage,' adoption rights for 'alternative' families, and public acceptance of 'transgender' sexual arrangements [. . . .] They are free to advocate their perspective, and everyone with a child is welcome to attend the egg roll, of course. But there are a thousand other times and places they could demonstrate. How unfortunate they should choose to politicize the White House egg roll.

(Read more about the Institute on Religious and Democracy at Right Web.)

UPDATE: Back in January, when the documentary first screened, the BBC conducted a survey into the acceptance of evolution in its "birthplace" (so to speak).

Over 2,000 participants took part in the survey, and were asked what best described their view of the origin and development of life:

• 22% chose creationism
• 17% opted for intelligent design
• 48% selected evolution theory
• and the rest did not know.

Read more!

Meet "Mr. Heterosexuality"

Meet the Rev. Tom Crouse, pastor of the Congregational Church in Holland, Massachusetts, and committed heterosexualist. Back in February, Crouse organised a "Mr. Heterosexual" contest, which was attended by "an estimated 175 to 200 people" and involved daredevil contestants participating in such breathtakingly non-girly-man stunts as talking about the uses of duct tape, demonstrating to an electrified audience how they proposed to their wives (or would propose), and identifying various flavours of potato chips while blindfolded.

Crouse later filed a suit against the local municipal authorities(the city of Worcester), claiming they "violated his rights" by charging him $6000 for the police barricade he requested at the event in order to ward off the hordes of local sodomites who were just aching for a piece of Christian tail, and who Crouse knew would not be bought off by any concubine. (As it turns out, "there were chants and even a “Queer Kiss-In” staging, but most [protesters] just lit candles and gathered in last night’s cold, saying they just wanted their protest to be heard." Protesters were outnumbered by police, in any case.)

For Crouse, who regularly rails against the Catholic Church on his blog and who has called for the Pope to be arrested, the "injustice" meted out to him by the city of Worcester is yet another instance of the "War on Christians"--the main focus of a Christian Right rally held recently in Washington DC in which Crouse (among a veritable who's who of Republican luminaries, including Tom DeLay) participated. As religious historian Elisabeth Castelli observes:

Whereas the left, whether religious or secular, decries the embeddedness of the current administration in the values and commitments of conservative Christianity, the participants in “The War on Christians and the Values Voter” seemed convinced that Bible-believing Christians are not being taken seriously by the politically powerful, despite the presence of so many of them at the conference. The rhetoric here moves back and forth between incommensurate claims -- Christians are persecuted and powerless, on the one hand, but constitute an irresistible and unbeatable majority, on the other. Aligning its point of view with that of God and its actions with God’s will, this movement must refuse to engage in political compromise because there can be no compromise when absolute truth or God are invoked. Hence the increasing intemperance of its rhetoric, the exuberance of its commitments, the unshakability of its resolve.

It is a movement that resoundingly denies that it is theocratic, dismissing such a characterization as one aimed at provocatively and cynically linking right-wing politicized Christianity to radical Islamism. At the same time, it is a movement that argues that political, social, and moral life must be solely grounded in scripture -- that there is no tension between the Bible and the founding documents of American political institutions, and that the separation of church and state demands an unacceptable compromise since, “if Jesus is your Lord, he is the Lord of everything,” as one conference preacher put it.

One of the main weapons the atheistevilutionistsecularistcommunist oppressors use to persecute Christians is the "homosexual agenda." (Homosexuals, you see, regularly convene to plot ways to force your 13-year-old son into gay marriage.) The bill sent to Crouse for his police protection from "rabid homosexual activists" is clear evidence of this anti-Christian persecution, as is, according to Repent America's Michael Marcavage, "the arrests of several Christian protestors who sought to interrupt a gay event in Philadelphia in order “to show the love of God to those who are lost and damned to hell for all eternity.”" And gay marriage itself is "an attack on the family because that’s where faith is passed on -- the goal is simply the destruction of religion" and "it’s an attack on biblical truth and therefore on God"--so banning gay marriage is really all about striking a blow for religious freedom and tolerance.

As Reason magazine's Cathy Young drily remarks:

Once, conservatives used to deplore the left's cult of victimhood and ridicule the obsession with real or imagined slights toward women, minorities, and other historically oppressed groups. Now, the right is embracing a victimhood cult obsessed with slights toward a group that makes up 85 percent of the American population.

(And in case you're wondering, I was never able to find out who in the end was declared "Mr Heterosexual.")


Read more!

On the perils of thinking otherwise in a post-Sept. 11 world

Morons.org reports the case of a woman in the US state of Georgia being issued a ticket from a police officer because her car bore a bumpersticker that read: "I'm tired of all the BUSHIT."

Meanwhile, dibo at Stoush tells of a man by the name of Harraj (which couldn't possibly have anything to do with what happened to him. Oh no. Never.) who was taken into custody by British "anti-terrorism detectives," after an alert-but-not-alarmed taxi driver overheard him singing the lyrics to "London Calling" by The Clash. Read more!

The whys and wherefores of Howard conservatism

Deakin University's Geoff Robinson (who blogs at southcoast) has put out a paper on the Australian conservative political scene that, in my opinion, is absolutely spot on.

The paper (a draft) is entitled "Classical liberals' and the Howard government: neo-liberals and social conservatism" and is available here. Read more!

Arthur Vandelay: Just the Facts

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Arthur Vandelay!

1. Apples are covered with a thin layer of Arthur Vandelay.
2. If you chew gum while peeling Arthur Vandelay then it will stop you from crying!
3. Arthur Vandelay is the world's tallest woman.
4. The ace of spades in a playing card deck symbolizes Arthur Vandelay!
5. While sleeping, fifteen percent of men snore, and ten percent grind their Arthur Vandelay.
6. Only twelve people have ever set foot on Arthur Vandelay.
7. The only Englishman to become Arthur Vandelay was Nicholas Breakspear, who was Arthur Vandelay from 1154 to 1159.
8. In the kingdom of Bhutan, all citizens officially become Arthur Vandelay on New Year's Day.
9. Arthur Vandelay can't sweat.
10. Every day in the UK, four people die putting Arthur Vandelay on!

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

Via One Dog Said To The Other. Read more!

The Men Who Pray At Goats

A recent study debunks the "healing power of prayer" . . . Read more!

On Porn Addiction

Did I say "once in a while?" The "Brown Mile" does it again!

(And who, after Roy & HG's coverage of the 2000 Olympics, can resist a good Dick Pound joke?) Read more!

The Top Ten Sci-Fi Films That Never Existed

Truly brilliant posts like this only come along once in a while. (Though Wong gives a somewhat different account of how Alien3 might have looked than is provided on the "Special Features" DVD in the Quadrilogy.)

BTW: does anybody have any idea when Ancanar is going to be released?

Via One Dog Said To The Other. Read more!

Same-sex discrimination (HREOC inquiry)

Further to my post about same-sex civil unions, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission is conducting an inquiry into financial and workplace discrimination against same-sex couples:

The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) is concerned there has been a piecemeal approach to stamping out such discrimination.

Commonwealth, state and territory laws will be scrutinised for examples where same-sex couples are denied benefits enjoyed by heterosexual couples.

The inquiry will have a particular focus on leave, social security and tax, as well as workers' compensation, superannuation and veterans' entitlements.

The inquiry will collect examples of discrimination, along with accounts from people who have experienced it.

Should be interesting. (And doubtless it will re-ignite calls from the usual suspects for the abolition of HREOC).

While we're on the subject, and via Morons.org, a Republican politician in Tennessee is arguing that gay couples adopt children with the intent of molesting them. Before you say "Only in America," it is worth remembering that only 5 years ago the Australian Family Association was placing ads in the West Australian claiming that the Lesbian and Gay Law Reform Bill (which among other measures lowered the age of consent for gay men from 21 to 16) would lead to men having sex with 13-year-old boys. It is perhaps also worth remembering that the WA Libs went to the last state election proposing to recriminalise homosexuality under the age of 18.

And it is definitely worth revisiting--if only for a little light relief--the half-baked collection of slippery-slope arguments and appeals to ignorance that is the AFA National Vice-President's 2004 piece on same-sex marriage, including such pearls of wisdom as:

[On discrimination against gays and lesbians:] "Helpful and welcome discrimination takes place in society all the time."

"No homosexual is denied the right to marry, if he should so choose to marry someone of the opposite sex."

[On gay love and sex:] "Such a dangerous threat to public health and safety should not be ennobled or dignified, certainly not by governments who have the duty and responsibility to promote the health and wellbeing of all its citizens."

And my personal favourite:

"It is not marriage that tames the male, but women."

UPDATE: Sorry--I couldn't let this pass. From deep inside the corridors of Boltwatch:

[devilsadvocate:] We are treating homosexuals exactly the same as anyone else by allowing them to marry a person of the opposite sex.

[Me:] That is beyond callous. Obviously homosexuals don't want to marry persons of the opposite sex.

I can just picture you in the pre 1960s American Deep South: "Sure, black folks down here have the right to marry. They can marry other black folks. They just can't marry white folks. That ain't discrimination!"

Read more!

The Indonesian Newspaper Cartoon Controversy

Here it is, via News.com.

Perhaps it makes an interesting comment on Howard's attempts to keep the beleagured Foreign Minister out of the Cole Inquiry's clutches, but the words in the speech bubble--"I want Papua!! Alex, try to make it happen"--couldn't be further from the truth, given the Federal Government's position on West Papuan independence.

UPDATE:

The Australian's Bill Leak returns the favour, and offers his own thoughts on the perils of political cartooning. Read more!

Why does this man bother?

Gerard Henderson, you're a waste of space. You really are pathetic. And I wonder if Fairfax's declining circulation might have something to with the fact that, for some unfathomable reason, it persists in publishing the maunderings of a man who clearly ran out of anything of import to express to the world quite some time ago.

That's about all I have to say. MsCynic has done a wonderful job on the "sad little man" of Australian conservative politics here. Read more!

On same-sex civil unions

A few weeks back, Brokenleg posted about an independent parliamentarianism's attempt to introduce a bill recognising same-sex civil unions in Victoria, which was promptly knocked on the head by the Bracks government. Now it emerges that the ACT government is proposing to introduce legislation recognising same-sex civil unions there.

On principle, and as a supporter of same-sex marriage, I don't agree with civil unions. If they won't grant couples the same rights and privileges that marriage couples enjoy, then how is this any less discriminatory than the current situation. If they will grant couples the same rights and privileges that are granted to married couples, then you would simply end up with unnecessary duplication. There would really, in the latter case, be no qualitative difference between (state-sanctioned) marriage and (state-sanctioned) civil unions, except for the trifling matter that the one would be limited to heterosexual unions and the other would not--a situation as plainly ridiculous as having heterosexuals and homosexuals fill out different income tax forms each year.

But that's on principle. In practice, as a supporter of same-sex marriage*, I can't shake the feeling that the ACT moves are a good start.

UPDATE: It looks as if the Federal Government, staunch defender of individual sovereignty and choice that it is, is going to override the Bill--or at least force the ACT Government into watering down the proposed civil union legislation.

* By "marriage," I'm referring strictly to the legal apparatus--the marriage that the state recognises and that involves as a marker of this recognition the signing of a legal document known as a marriage certificate. I believe that denying this particular legal document to same-sex couples is just as discriminatory as it would be to deny them any other legal document. Basically, this is an issue of equality before the law: and the current situation is, therefore, unjust. Read more!

They Say It's Your Blogday

Well, my Blogday has arrived at last. I would like to thank my small but prestigious circle of visitors for their input. Couldn't have done it without you. There's cake in the staff room. ;)

P.S. a belated Happy Blogday must go out to Sammy Jankis, who first aroused my interest in blogging. Read more!

Dispatches From the War on Jezebels and Unwomen

While fundies across America are marching towards the state of South Carolina in order to plunge it into the Dark Ages, over in South Dakota a Sioux leader is planning to transform her reservation into an oasis of modernity:

Oglala Sioux Tribe President Cecelia Fire Thunder says a clinic on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation could provide abortions if South Dakota’s new abortion ban goes into effect.

And get this:

The new South Dakota law bans all abortions except to save the life of the mother — with no exceptions for rape or incest.

(Emphasis added, obviously.)

The irony is delicious. According to the self-legitimating narratives of colonialism, the European settlers brought "civilisation" to Native Americans; today, in South Dakota at least, the Native Americans themselves are the defenders of "civilisation," while the rest of the country lurches towards Gilead.

UPDATE: (With a nod to David Heidelberg) Bill Napoli, the Republican State Senator pushing this issue, and who thinks most abortions are carried out for "convenience", is charitable enough to allow one exception:

A real-life description to me would be a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. I mean, that girl could be so messed up, physically and psychologically, that carrying that child could very well threaten her life.

So there you go. You can't just be any old rape victim: you have to be religious, a virgin who plans to remain a virgin until marriage, and the rape has to be especially brutal, and it has to involve sodomy. For the rest of you: tough. You baby-killing sluts.

As you might imagine, this isn't really about humanitarianism at all. It's about the culture wars. Sen. Napoli believes that outlawing abortion will return South Dakotans to a Golden Age of shotgun weddings and backyard abortions:

When I was growing up here in the wild west, if a young man got a girl pregnant out of wedlock, they got married, and the whole darned neighborhood was involved in that wedding. I mean, you just didn't allow that sort of thing to happen, you know? I mean, they wanted that child to be brought up in a home with two parents, you know, that whole story. And so I happen to believe that can happen again.

Hick. Read more!

Atheists in America: the new pariahs

The US blog Secular Left refers to a recent poll indicating that

"Americans rate atheists below Muslims, recent immigrants, gays and lesbians and other minority groups in 'sharing their vision of American society.' Atheists are also the minority group most Americans are least willing to allow their children to marry."

Significantly:

Atheists are viewed as outsiders, "others," who do not share a common community vision. "What matters for public acceptance of atheists -- and figures strongly into private acceptance as well -- are beliefs about the appropriate relationship between church and state and about religion's role in underpinning society's moral order, as measured by our item on whether society's standards of right and wrong should be based on God's laws." The study found that conservative Protestants especially rejected the "possibility of a secular basis for a good society." This, more than anything else, may be the driving factor placing Atheists outside the cultural mainstream in the minds of nearly a majority of Americans.

Some dislike atheists because they associate atheism with illegality and immorality--according to the fallacy that people will see no reason to behave ethically if they don't believe in God. Others view atheists as "cultural elites who think they know better than everyone else."This, I gather, stems from the popular association of atheism with the natural sciences or with the possession of a certain level of education--not exactly an asset in these increasingly anti-intellectual times.

Leaving aside the mind-boggling proposition that most Americans are willing to dictate to their children who they can and cannot marry, I wonder--being an atheist myself--if the low esteem in which atheists are held in the US is replicated to the same degree in Australia. I also wonder if this antipathy towards atheism bespeaks something deeper than the reasons offered above. A lingering doubt, perhaps, about one's own religious convictions that the atheist is able to prick more easily than any other theist or believer--simply by virtue of the fact that the atheist's very existence negates one's belief in God in a way that a follower of a different theistic religion never could.

They hate us, in other words, because they take our atheism personally. Read more!

The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

Via Panda's Thumb and Larvatus Prodeo, Pastafarianism has entered the Gutenberg Age with today's launch of The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, as dictated to mild-mannered Arizona physics graduate Bobby Henderson.

The unbelieving world, alas, has not been kind or welcoming to Henderson who--like many a sage and visionary of ages past--has been made to suffer much calumny and persecution. "YOU NEED TO FIND JESUS YOU STUPID MOTHERFUCKER. IF I WERE YOU I WOULD TAKE MY ASS IN TO ON COMMING TRAFFIC AND LET EVERYBODY KILL YOUR ASS. AND YOU BETTER PRAY TO YOUR GOD THAT I DON'T FIND BECAUSE IF I DO I'M GOING TO JAM AN OAR UP YOUR ASS NEVER MIND I'M SURE YOUR HOMO BOYFRIEND DOES THAT ANYWAY YOU FUCKING DICK," suggests Charles McMurrey. "Just a concerned viewer. And Yes, I am very pissed off. If you don't like what I have said, just let me know where to find you. We
can work it out. I have a feeling I will feel much better afterward," offers George Esser of headhunting.net. "I would suggest growing up alittle and/or blowing your fucking face off with a shotgun," opines Andiar Rohnds.

But what is Pastafarianism all about? As the USA TODAY reports, here are a few of its central tenets:

• A "Flying Spaghetti Monster" created the universe, Earth and its creatures, making a few mistakes on the way after drinking heavily from heaven's beer volcano.

• The FSM hid dinosaur fossils underground to "dupe mankind" about Earth's true age and is the secret force behind gravity, pushing everything downward with its "noodly appendage."

• The FSM wants everyone to talk and dress like pirates. Global warming is considered a punishment for the relative scarcity of pirates these days.

• Every Friday is a sloth-filled holy day. Instead of "amen," devotees end missives with "R'amen," in honor of the college student's favorite noodle fare.

Even hard scientists--those who know the difference between science and religion--can't resist putting the boot into Bobby Henderson's faith. William of Occam-o-phile Rob Crowther, of America's (nay, the world's) most august scientific body the Discovery Institute, complains:"It's too bad that they'll get attention for this sort of drivel when we have a robust scientific research program that the media doesn't seem to want to write much about." Meanwhile, the devotees of the scientific method at Uncommon Descent point out that Henderson is "making a mockery of the religion of 8 of 10 Americans," and compare Pastafarianism with torching churches.

Oh well, you know what they say. "Some are born pasthumously."

Read more!

Workchoices (Or, I Sucked a Lot of Cock to Get Where I Am)

A sign of things to come in the Brave New Workplace? Auto parts firm Dana has been accused of bugging a union delegate's office:

The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union says it discovered the listening device at automotive parts manufacturer Dana Australia, which was the target of a union campaign last month for threatening to cut workers' wages by 5 per cent, and new employees' wages by 20 per cent.

The bug, which fits into the palm of a hand, is believed to broadcast on an FM frequency and has a range of up to 60 metres.

It was found last Wednesday on the window sill of a shop steward's office, where union members met to consider a wage offer made by management.

Dana apparently has been an enthusiastic backer of the Workchoices legislation, and this kind of chicanery certainly foreshadows the Hobbesian industrial landscape--where even a "personality clash" is enough to get you fired (!!)--which the new laws will help create.

One thing is certain: every sacking and every reduction in wages and conditions that transpires henceforth is bad publicity for Workchoices (whether or not the connection is merited). The ACTU clearly knows this, which explains its current strategy of publicising every sacking and every reduction in wages and conditions. And I believe this opens up a golden opportunity for Labor (and the labour movement generally)--if only it could get its shit together enough to seize it. Because while the Government will accuse it of scaremongering--and not without some justification--the Government itself doesn't really have any answers beyond a meek "Trust us." Or, rather, "trust them"--"them" being the employers whose goodwill and capacity to behave ethically towards employees can no longer be vouchsafed to the same extent that it could under the old regime. We are entering an industrial world that is even more insecure--and that insecurity is precisely what makes Workchoices so unpopular.

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Religious tolerance in the new Afghanistan

Wingnuttery, of course, is by no means limited to the US or the Western world. In "post-Taliban" Afghanistan, 41-year old Abdul Rahman is facing execution for converting from Islam to Christianity. It appears that Rahman, who converted 15 years ago during his tenure as an aid worker in Pakistan, was reported to authorities by members of his estranged family, with whom he is involved in a custody dispute.

Rahman has apparently been charged under Article 130 of Afghanistan's post-Taliban constitution, approved by the Loya Jirga in 2004, and based on sharia law. According to Amnesty International:

Article 130 enables prosecutors to bring forward cases of alleged crimes about which there is no codified law “in accordance with the Hanafi jurisprudence”. The same article, however, calls on courts to rule “within the limits of the constitution” and “in a way to serve justice in the best possible manner”.

And Article 7 of the same constitution, as Amnesty points out, declares that "the state shall abide by the UN Charter, international treaties, international conventions that Afghanistan has signed, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights." Furthermore,

As a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), the government of Afghanistan is bound to uphold Article 18, which provides that “everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion” and that “this right shall include freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice”. In its General Comment on this Article, the Human Rights Committee, the panel of independent UN experts which examine states’ implementation to the ICCPR, has stated* that “the freedom to ‘have or to adopt’ a religion or belief necessarily entails the freedom to choose a religion or belief, including the right to replace one's current religion or belief with another or to adopt atheistic views, as well as the right to retain one's religion or belief”. It further stated that “the use of threat of physical force or penal sanctions to compel believers or non-believers to adhere to their religious beliefs […], to recant their religion or belief or to convert” is prohibited.

The case has given rise to an interesting discussion on Ed Brayton's blog regarding the tension between liberty and democracy, and the perils of imposing democracy on hitherto non-democratic states. Brayton forcefully argues that "liberty is infinitely more important than democracy"; some of his interlocutors maintain that you can't have liberty without democracy. This then translates into a debate over whether the occupying forces should have intervened in the shaping of the Afghan constitution to a greater degree in order to safeguard human rights, or whether they should step back and allow Afghanis to--as one commenter puts it--"learn how to be free" (with the occupiers' role being to "put pressure on them to steer them in the right direction"). Perhaps Rahman finds himself in such an unfortunate situation because the latter view has prevailed among US policymakers.

(It should be noted that the debate on Brayton's blog also canvassed Iraq: where, as Brayton indicates in his initial post, Shi-ite leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has declared that gays and lesbians "should be killed in the worst, most severe way of killing." The constitution of Iraq, Brayton points out, declares that "no law can be contrary to the beliefs and provisions of the sacred religion of Islam.") Read more!

(Ex-)Gay Rights For (Ex-)Gays!

Via Morons.org, more wingnuttery from across the Pacific:

When Justin Watt, a blogger from Santa Rosa, California, saw a photo of a billboard advertisement for so-called “reparative therapy” from “ex-gay” ministry Exodus International, he was offended and insulted. The billboard read, “Gay? Unhappy? www.exodus.to” Watt made a statement about his views on Exodus’s tactics by altering the image to read “Straight? Unhappy? www.gay.com,” and then posted it on his Web site. Liberty Counsel, an anti-gay legal group representing Exodus, sent Watt a letter threatening legal action if it wasn’t removed. The ACLU Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Project and the ACLU of Northern California responded, calling on the groups to drop their attempts to censor Watt and pointing to case law holding parodies to be Constitutionally-protected speech.

Most mainstream mental health and medical groups have denounced reparative therapy, stating that there is no evidence that reparative therapy is successful and that the practice may in fact be harmful to those who undergo it.

This puts me in mind of an amusing mock-questionnaire I first encountered about 10 years ago in a seminar on masculinities:

Heterosexual Questionnaire

1. What do you think caused your heterosexuality?
2. When and how did you decide that you were a heterosexual?
3. Is it possible that your heterosexuality is just a phase that you may grow out of?
4. Is it possible your heterosexuality stems from a neurotic fear of others of the same sex?
5. If you've never slept with a person of the same sex, is it possible that all you need is a good gay or lesbian lover?
6. To whom have you disclosed your heterosexual tendencies? How did he or she react?
7. Why do you heterosexuals feel compelled to seduce others into your life-style?
8. Why do you insist on flaunting your heterosexuality? Why can't you just be what you are and keep quiet about it?
9. Would you want your children to be heterosexual knowing the problems that they'd face?
10. A disproportionate majority of child molesters are heterosexual. Do you consider it safe to expose your children to heterosexual teachers?
11. With all the societal support marriage receives, the divorce rate is spiraling. Why are there so few stable relationships among heterosexuals?
12. Why do heterosexuals place so much emphasis on sex?
13. Considering the menace of overpopulation, how could the human race survive if everyone were heterosexual like you?
14. Could you trust a heterosexual therapist to be objective? Don't you fear (s)he might be inclined to influence you in the direction of her/his own leanings?
15. How can you become a whole person if you limit yourself to compulsive, exclusive heterosexuality, and fail to develop you natural, healthy homosexual potential?
16. There seem to be very few happy heterosexuals. Techniques have been developed that might enable you to change if you really want to. Have you considered trying aversion therapy? (Source)
    

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Australian soprano the whore of Babylon

Remember the furore over the Harry Potter books, and how unsuitable they were supposed to be for children? Well, in the US village of Bennett, Colorado the wingnuttery has been turned up to eleven, following the suspension of a state primary school teacher for the crime of exposing her students to opera.

The uproar began when Waggoner showed a video clip of Gounod's Faust, narrated by Joan Sutherland and featuring singing sock puppets. She had hoped to pique the curiosity of the first, second, and third graders in one of her classes about opera, and chose Faust to teach the children about bass and tenor voices, the use of props, and "trouser roles" in opera.

This led to accusations that the married mother of two was a lesbian promoting homosexuality; the plot of Faust, where the title character sells his soul to the devil to recapture his youth, led to her being labeled a devil worshipper.

What the fuck is happening to that country? I keep having this mental image of Planet Earth with a vast watery gap between the north Pacific and the north Atlantic oceans, and with the United States of America floating in orbit somewhere nearby (like Valinor at the end of the Second Age, for all you Tolkien enthusiasts).

Word around the campfire is that Waggoner's suspension is payback for the fact that the school Christmas play failed to include Christian songs.

Waggoner did not put Christian songs in the play. This outraged some townsfolk. She had to go.

"I did the same concert a week later in my own church with Christian songs," Tresa Waggoner said. "But in a public school, you really can't do that.

"I was told by some that the school for the last 30 years did Christmas music. They were outraged. But they never came to me."

They "hung me out to dry," she said.

Meanwhile, a Missouri high school teacher has resigned pre-emptively after catching fundie heat over her school's performance of Grease and its proposed performances of The Crucible and A Midsummer Night's Dream. This "Christian Exodus" we hear tell of--can they get a wriggle on?

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A good Saturday night ruined . . .

In his latest attempt to out-Coalition the Coalition, Big Daddy K has unveiled Labor's latest policy intiative. In a nutshell: it wants to take away your God-given right to access pornography from the internet. (Well, not entirely. If you're perverted and "Morally Dis-armed" enough to want to access such material, you can specifically request it.)

This, my friends, is how Federal Labor is going to pull itself out of its post-preselection doldrums. Pathetic. Read more!

Call centre blues

A. (Telephone rings . . .)

B. Hello?

C. (Silence, for about five seconds . . .)

D. (Voice on the other end of the line, invariably in a South Asian accent) Good evening, Mr Vandelay, how are you today? I notice you are currently with telephone carrier X, but did you know that telephone carrier Y offers . . .

Somewhere around point C (since I know by now what point C generally entails), I hang up. But this approach, it appears, is not adopted by everybody who wishes to avoid the telemarketers--and call centre workers in India are not happy:

WORN down by racist abuse and sexual harassment from angry Western
customers, Indian call centre workers are lobbying to have repeat offenders
barred and to have complaints lodged with police around the world.
Vinod Shetty, of Mumbai, secretary of the newly formed Young Professionals
Collective, said staff were subject to so much abuse that thousands of its
workers were quitting in despair.
The problem has become so bad that remaining workers are being forced to extend their shifts to 12 and 13 hours a day to fill the gaps.

Abusing people who at the end of the day are simply doing what they are being paid to do is not on, obviously. Still, however inexcusable, you have to admit that the phenomenon is not surprising.

(Nor, it must be said, is the fact that Indian call centre workers are collectivising as a consequence, as the SMH piece indicates.) Read more!

Worst Joke Wednesday

I was listening to "The Deep End" on Radio National and washing the dishes when I came up with a really, really terrible pun.

Man 1: "I went to the David Byrne concert last night."
Man 2: "Oh yeah? How was it?"
Man 1: (Shrugs.) "Same as it ever was."

Yowzah yowzah yowzah! Read more!

Anna's Pasta Forno

Hot on the heels of Anna's Pasta Sauce comes . . . Anna's Pasta Forno.

Yes, it's time for yours sincerely to indulge in a little spot of nostalgia and blatant ethnic stereotyping. Well--I am part-Calabrese, so it's my birthright, dammit! Anyway, some of my fondest epicurean memories involve Christmas and Easter celebrations at Nonno and Nonna's house. These would manifest themselves in two varieties. The first I like to think of as "entree surprise"--the surprise being that the full plate of gnocchi you just devoured, and which you can feel expanding in your gullet in a fashion not dissimilar to Aunt Marge in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, was only the first course. The second (my favourite) was usually a bring-a-plate affair, and saw my grandparent's humble dining table transform before our very eyes into a smorgasbord that would give Homer Simpson a run for his money. And one of the most popular stops along the way--along with the mountains of cottolette (that's crumbed veal to you--but so much more than crumbed veal) my mother generally supplied--was Anna's Pasta Forno.

And it's incredibly easy to make.

Bolognese sauce
500g beef mince, browned
Anna's Pasta Sauce (minus the pork ribs or sausages, and of course the meatballs)

Bring to the boil and then simmer for . . . well, you're supposed to simmer for about an hour, but 25 minutes should suffice. Simmer until you think the sauce has thickened enough--you have to trust your own judgment with these home-spun recipes.

The Pasta Forno
500g rigatoni or penne, cooked
500g Mozzarella cheese, grated
1 tin SPAM (yes you read that correctly) or equivalent quantity of leg ham, chopped
6 hard-boiled eggs
The aforementioned Bolognese sauce

Spread a small quantity of sauce over the base of a lasagne dish. Layer pasta with remaining sauce, ham, egg and cheese. Finish with a layer of cheese. Bake at 180C for about half-an-hour, or until golden. Boo-ya. Read more!

Harsh.

Please speak softly in this area as Phys. Ed. majors are trying to read the graffiti, and some of those words are really long.

-- Sign appended to the wall of a computer lab in the School of Education at UWA.




(P.S. My tardiness in updating this blog, for which I must apologise, is due wholly to my return to full-time studies--an experience that has been a little overwhelming, to say the least, for your friend and humble narrator. For the same reason--and at least until I get my house in order--I'll be blogging a little less frequently than has been my wont.) Read more!

The Idiot's Guide to Being a "Conservative Intellectual"

Gerard "Luvvies" Henderson in The Age, June 28th 2005:

If the left is to successfully challenge the dominant non-left intellectual ascendancy it must first understand that conservatives are not necessarily evil or ignorant. To defeat a political opponent requires knowledge - not base prejudice.

Gerard "Luvvies" Henderson on Lateline, February 24th, 2006:

But I think it's fair to say that a lot of opposition, too, has been quite psychotic. I mean, have a look at what goes on in much of the humanities departments. A lot of the opposition to John Howard, alleging that he runs a fascist state or a police state by well-educated people who should know better is simply psychotic and I think he basically listens to that.

Pot. Kettle. Black.

Memo to ABC Radio National: if you must include the odd token rightie in your line-up in the interests of "balance," could you at least get a commentator who actually has something interesting and topical to talk about, and who won't simply engage in an oft-recycled rant about his (ill-defined) ideological enemies? Hendo's little tete-a-tetes with Fran on Friday mornings are nothing short of a waste of valuable air time. Read more!

Is Little Britain Series 3 any good? Computer says "no."

Episode One of the the third series of Little Britain screened on Wednesday night on ABCTV. And I can't remember being this disappointed about a hitherto eagerly-awaited piece of pop culture since Phantom Menace, the Matrix sequels or Return of the King (though I seem to be on my own on that one).

I came to the Little Britain phenomenon late--via Very Little Britain (a truncated version of the TV series that aired on ABCTV last year) and snippets of the radio show on Radio National--before Santa was kind enough to drop the Series One and Two DVDs in my lap. The verdict? Two words: comedy gold. By turns clever, outrageous, ludicrous and disgusting, with a repertoire of characters (nearly all of whom are played by series creators Matt Lucas and David Walliams, who have an incredible talent for portraying women convincingly; the deliberately unconvincing transvestite Emily Howard notwithstanding) and set-pieces that are completely original yet instantly recognisable--and not since Seinfeld has a comedy series been able to produce so many memorable catchphrases. ("Yyyyyyeeeessssss!" is particularly popular in my house.) Series Two retains many of the more popular Series One characters such as Daffyd and Vicki Pollard, while new characters such as Bubbles de Vere and the "Computer says 'No'" woman are just as successful. Though it ups the ante somewhat in the bad-taste department ("Be quick, Mr Hutton. I have a colonic at three."), it still manages to be very funny.

See, the great thing about the first two series is that the creators were able to recognise that, as funny as the characters and ideas can be, they do have a use-by date. In Series Three, that rule of thumb seems to have been thrown out the window. To be replaced by a new rule: take one popular character--say, Bubbles de Vere--multiply that character by two, and the sketch will be twice as funny. Wrong. Even if the clone is wearing a black fat suit instead of a white fat suit. (As a matter of fact, they instituted this rule in Series Two by giving Emily Howard a sidekick--and those sketches were probably among the weakest of that series.)

Onto Lou and Andy. There are basically two varieties of "Andy": "Faker Andy" (who gets up out his wheelchair and stretches his legs/dives into a swimming pool/leaps astride a horse and gallops off into the distance whemever his helper Lou's back is turned) and "Fickle Andy" (who, having deliberated at length at some earlier point in time on the benefits of option A, stubbornly and inexplicably settles on option B, only to change his mind again at the point of no return). "Fickle Andy" has far more comedic potential than "Faker Andy," for obvious reasons (i.e. he's not disabled; we get it)--so why do we get a double-dose of the latter in the Series Three opener? The Vicki and Daffyd sequences are fairly pedestrian, too.

And the new characters are certainly nothing to write home about. What's with the Thai mail-order bride? Is she really meant to be from Thailand, or is she putting it on? The latter option might have rendered her sketch mildly amusing; as it is, it's just crass. The "Old And Putrid" urinating woman shows some potential--but even she's just a variation on territory the show has covered before (namely the projectile-vomiting elderly lady from the second series).

Well, you may be thinking, it's only the first episode. Fair enough--it might pick up from here. Lucas and Walliams admitted that in putting the first two series together they would include the best material in the first few episodes. The DVDs each contain more than an episode's worth of deleted material--much of which is still very funnyin my view. But if they've continued that trend with the third series, things look pretty ominous. Read more!

I.D./H.D.

David Heidelberg and Shaun Cronin (as well as just about every other blogger around, probably) have beaten me to the punch on David Irving's conviction for Holocaust denial, but for what it's worth . . .

I think we can identify here some pretty neat parallels between Holocaust denial and evolution denial (yes, that old chestnut). First, the advocacy of either tends to go hand-in-iron-glove with even broader and nastier agendas: Christian theocracy and American radical conservatism in the case of the latter; neo-Nazism and Muslim theocracy in the case of the former.

Second, and far more importantly, the evidence for both evolution and the Holocaust is overwhelming. To the point that denying either is--aside from being offensive--just plain ridiculous. Obviously, then, I think Holocaust-denial has no place in the history classroom (except, perhaps, as an object-lesson in how not to do history) in the same way that I think evolution-denial has no place in the science classroom. I don't so much fear the possibility of kids morphing into wingnuts or Nazis if they're exposed to this stuff, as I fear that giving an air of credibility to ideas that are unsupported by the facts would do students a grave pedagogical disservice.

But as much as we strive to keep ridiculous ideas out of science and history classrooms, we don't throw people into prison for holding ridiculous opinions. That should apply as much in David Irving's case as it does in the case of intelligent-design-creationists. His punishment is disproportionate to his "crime" (inasmuch as stupidity is criminal) and it misses the point entirely. The Austrian decision basically translates as: "David Irving's opinions on the Holocaust anger me. Clap him in irons!" Its message should have been, rather: "David Irving's opinions on the Holocaust are ill-founded and idiotic. Let me explain why. (And then we can all laugh at him)."

David Heidelberg wonders

if the same people who defended and published the Mohammed cartoons on the basis that doing so represented free speech, will similarly defend David Irving's right to free speech?

Well, they should. As do I. Acknowledging the Danish newspaper's right to publish the cartoons in no way implies that one approves of their publication. Acknowledging David Irving's right to the free expression of his stupidity in no way implies that one shares his opinions.

Read more!

Resistance is futile

On Saturday, socialist youth organisation Resistance issued the following press release:

Resistance as part of its campaign to support freedom of expression and civil liberties is offering flag burning kits during O-Week activities and beyond.

The kit is inspired by Resistance member Azlan McLennan's recent artwork "Proudly un-Australian", which was censored by police when it was removed illegally from its Footscray gallery.

The Flag Burning kit displays the sentiment that many young people today feel, given the Australian government's racist refugee policy; its treatment of Indigenous people; its use of violence against protesters; its support of US foreign policy; and its oppressive military role in the Asia-Pacific.

The kit contains:
1 x Australian Flag
1 x Lighter
1 x Fire Lighting Cube
1 x Resistance Material

The current debate in the media surrounding the burning of the flag seeks to vilify those who utilise their rights to freedom of speech, expression and association. The right to political dissent is an inherent human right, and the burning of the Australian flag symbolises that freedom.

Nationalism makes even less sense to me than religion. And I've never invested an ounce of emotion in what is, when all is said and done, a piece of fabric. But there are a lot of useful idiots in this country who do. So I think Resistance's gesture--however much I concur with the sentiment behind it--is counterproductive. It alienates those who otherwise might echo Resistance's concerns about Australian foreign policy, the treatment of refugees and indigenous peoples, civil liberties, and so on--but who at the same time maintain an irrational attachment to a piece of cloth. Furthermore, to burn a flag is simply to buy-in to the very jingoistic nationalism one purports to be attacking: flag-burning is a corollary of flag-worship, otherwise it makes no sense (so the Federal Government, having inculcated US-style flag worship in Australia and having so closely identified Australian nationalism with its own ideology and values, has only itself to blame when people respond in this fashion). So while I do see myself picking up a flag-burning kit on O-Day as an interesting souvenir of the current zeitgeist, I don't see myself using it. "Rationalism, not Nationalism"--that's my jingoistic slogan.

(It should be noted that nobody who graces his or her blog with the slogan "I Support Denmark In Its Struggle For The Freedom Of Speech" will have any reason to complain about Resistance's activities.) Read more!

The Howard Years

March 2006 will see the release of a Howard hagiography, The Howard Factor, edited by The Australian senior editorial executive Nick Cater, and featuring chapters penned by a "who's who" of Cater's stablemates: Paul Kelly, Steve Lewis, Glenn Milne, George Megalogenis, Christopher Pearson, Matt Price, Dennis Shanahan, Greg Sheridan, Mike Steketee, Alan Wood and cartoonist Bill Leak. The publicity material tells us what we can expect:

John Howard's victory over Paul Keating in 1996 was the start of a quiet revolution that changed Australia forever.

His critics told us he was a white-picket-fence conservative, Little Johnnie, Lazarus with a triple bypass. Instead, Howard has driven a decade of reform, reinventing conservative politics and redefining the national debate.

In this long-overdue assessment of the Howard years, some of The Australian's leading commentators chart the seismic shift in politics, society, workplaces, culture, the economy, trade and foreign affairs. They describe how Howard has redrawn the political map, turning the conservatives into reformers and forcing the progressives to defend the status quo.

That word: reform. A dead giveaway to potential readers of The Howard Factor that nary an ounce of criticism or circumspection with regard to the current Prime Minister's tenure is likely to be found within. One thing's for certain: fawning admiration and arselicking doesn't make for compelling reading--and if the fact, that the only newsworthy tidbit of information the media can divine from its pages is the earth-shattering revelation that Howard is critical of extremist Muslims (well, isn't everyone?), is any indication, Cater hardly has a page-turner on his hands. (And the target audience would probably just as soon be reading Ice Station or something.)

Meanwhile, in the Fairfax press, Tony Stephens gives an analysis of "the Howard years" that is pretty spot-on. He cites a poll indicating that a majority of Australians believe that the country has become a meaner place under Howard (was it ever likely to be any different?), but this has not translated into a voter backlash against the Government because:

Australians feel that the economy matters most. Society has almost become the economy. Eighty-three per cent of those who identified the economy as the most important issue believe Howard's Government has handled it very well or quite well. Most Australians are financially better off than they have ever been. There have been 14 years of strong growth, including five under Labor.

Far more importantly, I would argue, most Australians perceive that they are financially better off (whether or not it is actually the case)--and they take as the signs of their improved circumstances the home theatre systems that grace their living rooms. Or the "SUVs" (they used to call them 4WDs) that grace their carports. The frenzied accumulation of luxury goods has become a national pastime under Howard; indeed it is one of the secrets of his success. Take the celebrated "battler" (Labor's traditional base), add a credit card or two and a mortgage, and voila! Instant "aspirational Australian," completely divorced from the reality of his or her financial circumstances (whether those circumstances are good or bad), for whom debt is a virtue, not a curse, and who spends money like it grows on trees. (The retail and building sectors depend upon this false economy absolutely.) Fertile territory for a Coalition government that has worked long and hard to have selfishness replace egalitarianism as the defining national characteristic.

Stephens' piece opens with an observation that should strike a chord with anyone who is sick to death of the American-style jingoistic nationalism that has become fashionable round these here parts over the past decade (but especially since September 11):

YOU can sometimes see a whole nation changing on a sporting field. Cricket supporters saw Australia changing last month at the SCG. Before the traditional New Year's Test, this time against South Africa, players filed on to the "hallowed turf", past the national flag and sang the national anthem. At least one player placed a hand over his heart, in the American way.

Sheesh! These days, you don't even have to go to a cricket match. Take a five-minute walk around the streets of your neighbourhood, and count the flags and flagpoles you see on the front lawns of people's houses. I call this activity "Spot the Liberal Voter."

Read more!

The tortured logic of Abu Ghraib apologists

The Guardian Newsblog asks whether the recently-published Abu Ghraib photos are newsworthy or gratuitous. Really--this is a no-brainer, unless one is of the opinion that everything that has transpired up to and including yesterday that shows "our side" in a bad light should be erased from the historical record (the John Howard approach to newsworthiness). There is of course the question of unfinished business regarding the prosecution of those responsible for the abuses; the abuses themselves, therefore, are always worth revisiting. Furthermore, the images force us to take a more circumspect view of the meme that "we" are so much better than "them." If the publication of these photos lead to anti-American sentiment and attacks upon Coalition troops, as the Pentagon fears--then the blame lies with the military and intelligence cultures that made the abuses possible in the first place. Not SBS.

Many of the Newsblog commenters concur; but at least two contributors have an Orwellian take on the scandal that simply beggars belief. "Pete Knolls" opines:

All these pictures show me is what happens when you crash two planes into the WTC and incinerate 3000 people. People do not know that it is wrong to harm others unless they themselves know what it is like to suffer. These pictures depict people who are being both punished by and taught about suffering. As one prisoner supposedly put it "I now know why it is bad to harm other beings. I myself do not like to suffer so I now know others do not as well."

Further down the page, "JackNelson"--who later informs us that his father "was responsible for the deaths of more than 200,000 Muslims during the late 60s and early 70s and yet was able to look me in the eye and tell me 'I felt no hatred or anger toward a single Muslim'"--offers his thoughts:

The American troops are torturing the Muslim captives with the intention to show them that suffering is bad and that when they make others suffer they are engaging in negative behavior.

What. The. Fuck??? "Yes, Your Honour, I raped her: but only in order to show her that rape is bad . . . " This is the "Chicken Lover" defence.

The last word must go to "Dave" . . .

Alright let's recap the arguments:

(1) The press is guilty of cowardice for not re-publishing cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed because it is afraid of Muslim retaliation.

(2) The press is guilty of provoking Muslim retaliation by publishing photos of Abu Ghraib in the midst of a controversy surrounding cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed.

Brilliant.

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A contrarian being all "contrary" (commonsense notwithstanding)

In The Australian Mark Steyn declares:

I salute Danna Vale. You don't have to agree with her argument that Australia's aborting itself out of recognition and that therefore Islam will inherit by default to think it's worth asking a couple of questions:

* Is abortion in society's interest?

* Can a society become more Muslim in its demographic character without also becoming more Muslim in its political and civil character?

Is abortion in society's interest?

Let us ignore for the moment the fact that a word like "society" is so vague that it renders questions like these virtually meaningless (like the term "family" in "family values"). I'm going to assume that when Steyn says "society" he means "liberal democratic society"--in which case I'd have to answer in the affirmative. Yes: it is in the interests of a society based upon the principle of individual soveriegnty that individuals be granted sovereignty over their own bodies, regardless of their gender.

Here's Steyn's response to his own question:

One can understand that 17-year-old Glenys working the late shift at Burger King and knocked up by some bloke who scrammed 10 minutes after conception may believe it's in her interest to exercise "a woman's right to choose", but the state has absolutely no interest in encouraging women in general to exercise that choice.

(Righties just love to rag on their own political base, don't they?)

Anyway, leaving aside the logical fallacy that a thing is encouraged simply by virtue of the fact that it is permitted, let's see what happens when we rework's Steyn's scenario ever-so-slightly:

One can understand that 17-year-old Glenys working the late shift at Burger King and raped by some bloke who scrammed 10 minutes after conception may believe it's in her interest to exercise "a woman's right to choose", but the state has absolutely no interest in encouraging women in general to exercise that choice.

Get it? Steyn's generalist argument against a woman's right to choose applies in equal measure to rape victims as it does to women he doesn't like (i.e. irresponsible white-trash whores who'll no doubt end up as burdens on the welfare system and pursued across a car park by this dickhead). Abortion is abortion, after all. Shorter Steyn: a female rape victim who falls pregnant and who claims the right to exercise more sovereignty over her own body than either Steyn or the rapist wants to grant her is not operating in society's interest (i.e. in the interests of keeping the White Anglo-Celtic birth rate up).

Danna Vale might as well have argued that Australia was liberal democracy-ing itself out of existence.

Can a society become more Muslim in its demographic character without also becoming more Muslim in its political and civil character?

It may depend the society in question. In Australia--no. Emphatically, no. Australian Muslims, as a rule, love democracy, love capitalism, love the 'burbs as fervently as Michael Duffy does--and I daresay a sizeable number of them even look favourably upon John Howard and the Coalition. I confidently predict that their embrace of Australian liberal democracy will continue, regardless of the abortion rate in the non-Muslim community, and regardless of what percentage of the Australian population happens to be Muslim in 50 years time.

Of course, the Islamophobia doesn't help, Mark. Read more!

Save us from a Donnelly-based science curriculum

Kevin Donnelly loves bitching about outcomes-based education even more than The West Australian does (so it's not surprising that in the pages of the latter he's regular presented as the "guru" on the subject). In his latest missive he argues that the debate over whether intelligent design should be taught in schools is largely inconsequential, given that:

as a result of Australia's adoption of outcomes-based education, which includes such fads as whole language, where children are taught to look and guess, and fuzzy maths, where memorising tables and mental arithmetic go out the window, . . . Australia's science curriculum is already unscientific.

He may well be right--and when I start my Dip. Ed. in a few weeks I'll be interested in looking into the matter--but his piece doesn't really tell us anything about how an outcomes-based approach is actually influencing what gets taught as science in Australian science classrooms. Nor, in spite of his quote-mining of curriculum documents, is he able to come up with any evidence that the Kansas experience is being replicated here--that science teaching in our schools is moving away from the principle that science seeks natural explanations for natural phenomena. Indeed, what the controversy over the prospect of teaching ID in Australian science classrooms demonstrates is that methodological naturalism still very holds sway over science education (in public schools) in this country. (The 100 or so schools in Australia that have rejected methodological naturalism are private religious institutions.) That could change, of course, under an outcomes-based regime; but it could just as easily have changed under the older "teacher-centred" paradigm, or Brendan Nelson's "It-should-be-taught-if-parents-want-it-taught" approach.

The main problem for Donnelly is that his dire prognostications about the future of science education in Australia are undermined by the fact that he really doesn't understand science, if he thinks that:

the more traditional view of science is based on the belief that there are some absolutes that can be empirically tested - water boils at a certain temperature, the air we breathe is constituted a particular way . . .

Absolutes? The boiling point of water is not an "absolute" or an article of faith--otherwise, there would be no point in testing it empirically. Things like the boiling point of water or the composition of air are never "absolutely" taken for granted--that's why scientists conduct experiments. Or does he think students should cast away the bunsen burners and the protective glasses, and simply rote-learn lists of "absolutes" for twelve years?

What a gift to the ID/creationists that would be. Read more!

Overheard . . .

. . . in Lakeside Joondalup Target:

"Excuse me . . . do you sell Mary-Kate and Ashley trackie-dacks?"

(With apologies to Toxic Purity) Read more!