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Pocabprescon Debrief | Apr 03, 2006 16:35
Helen went to some lengths to stonewall all the Cullen speculation at the Post-Cabinet Press Conference today, responding to every question with "ask him". She says that he's served her well and that she wants to keep him on for as long as possible - adding that she has every intention of fighting the next election - but Cullen stepping down would depend on Cullen, and she hasn't asked him about it.
I guess between "how's your weekend" and "did you see the rugby", the topic just never came up...
It did come up for everyone else in the Labour caucus - Helen and Cullen interviewed them all about their plans after the election. Hence the problem - all that remains to be speculated about are Helen and Cullen!
The guest spot this week went to our soon-to-be head-of-state Anand Satyanand. Lawyer, judge and ombudsman, he expressed concerns about having such a public role. He is also Indian, and talked briefly about how nice it was for NZ to pick someone from an ethnic minority to be its representative. He promised to use his sovereign powers to lord over Her Majesty's domain with an iron fist.
He is stepping down as the Registrar of Pecuniary Interests of Members of Parliament to take over as Governor-General. Hmmm... hardworking watchdog for MPs gets cushy appointment which takes him away from watchdogging? There's probably an Investigate story in there.
The big news of the week is Chinese Premier (equivalent of PM) Wen Jiabao's visit this week. Official talks will take place on Thursday, and Helen promises that human rights will be on the agenda. Literally "on the agenda", that is. When asked how such issues usually gets raised, whether it was usually raised as a question ("so, how're those political prisoners doing then?") or as a statement, Helen said that there's usually an allocated period of time for these formal talks, and they each have an agenda to go through; for Helen, human rights is always "on the agenda".
Teenage Rebel | Mar 25, 2006 12:21
I actually have a great personal fondness for schoolyard rebellion.
The year, as they say, was 1999. It was the 10th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, and it was during this time that I discovered a passion for ideas and politics. As a 7th former at Wellington College, I was skipping school to volunteer for Amnesty International, organising candidate debates and trying to start a human rights group. This, I admit, was pretty damn geeky, but a very different form of geeky than programming in the computer room, which was what I did pre-1999.
It just so happened that Michael Hardie-Boys - an old boy of Wellington College - was the Governor-General at the time, and when Chinese President Jiang Zemin toured New Zealand after APEC, Hardie-Boys invited the whole of Wellington College (which is adjacent to Government House) to perform a haka for Jiang.
It was a big deal for the school, and in particular for our Headmaster Roger Moses. It was a chance to do a favour for an Old Boy (in the most traditional, loaded sense of the word), it was a chance for the school to shine in the media spotlight, and it was a chance to reach potential students from China who would be watching their President tour NZ. Product endorsement from the Chinese President? Ch-ching!
But given my view of the Chinese government at the time, I wasn't so keen. Like many others who protested at the time (including those down in Christchurch who were walled off with buses so that Jiang wouldn't have to see them), I saw APEC as an opportunity to bring human rights to the fore, rather than the opposite.
I had a lot of support from the Powers-that-Be when I was getting Wellington College in the paper by organising a debate between then-Wellington candidates Richard Prebble, Marian Hobbs and Philida Bunkle. But the possibility of "embarrassing the school" in the national/international spotlight proved to be something else entirely.
We got warned off it at various stages, and I got called in to the Headmaster's office quite a few times, but one conversation really stuck with me.
One of my co-conspirators and I were called into the Deputy Headmaster's office in the middle of class (economics, I think) one afternoon, where he and the 7th form dean had a good cop/bad cop routine going. We told them, when asked, that we were going to protest Jiang's arrival at Government House. We were told that we couldn't just go and protest, because it was a school-day. Not that there was much schooling to be done, since the day was going to be spent entertaining Jiang. But ah, the difference was that one was a "school activity" and therefore "school", while the other wasn't and therefore "skipping school".
We got offered a conscious objector option - we could stay supervised in a classroom while the rest of the school did their thing. Being a polite young man, I said "no" as politely as I could.
Then the dean (the bad cop) came up with this gem: "If you don't report to school on [the day], we'll take it as a sign that you're not attending this school, and we'll take your name off the roll accordingly."
Hmmm - public school threatening effective expulsion for political activity? It was the dumbest thing he could have done, but to be fair, he was a PE teacher.
The Deputy Headmaster didn't back him up (probably because he wasn't retarded). I thought I could see a wince flash through his face.
Being the teenage boys that we were, we didn't take kindly to threats, but being the greenhorns that we were, we didn't realise just how much shit we could have gotten them in if we took those threats to higher authorities.
Roger Moses made some attempts to bring us into the establishment. One lunchtime he invited us into his office telling us we're future leaders and showing us a photo of his mother and Muldoon in primary school together. A photo that he curiously kept in his bottom drawer. Smooth.
In the end it was rather anti-climatic. Of all their demands, we agreed only to not wearing our uniforms while protesting, and of all their threats, the only thing that eventuated was that I got put on detention for skipping school.
The Deputy Headmaster looked surprised when he saw me actually turn up for detention. He chuckled, then sent me home. I think we developed a mutual respect after that.
Apparently we got blacklisted at the door as well, as they had received intelligence through their network of spies that we were going to sneak through and protest inside. That was quite a good idea, not that we'd actually thought of it.
For the most part, we got our way.
Just last year, I saw Roger Moses speak at an event outside Parliament, saying how great it was to see students getting involved in democracy, etc. I couldn't help but think what a hypocrite he was, when he thought it was okay to coerce or manipulate students' from political activity because it would ruin the school's image.
Looking back, I think I was driven by the excitement of discovering the possibilities that existed outside of the conformity factory. It's like discovering a secret portal to the real world. I wouldn't have had nearly as much fun if I went to a liberal school where they *let* you do this sort of thing. No sir, the real lesson could only be learned when they didn't want you to know.
The one thing that stuck with me was how flimsy the authority behind that conformity was. It was a coming-of-age moment, realising that their authority was an illusion to keep me in line and that it would just dissolve if I simply refused to acknowledge it. It brought it back, full circle, to the inspiration for my awakening - the guy who stared down a column of tanks at Tiananmen Square.
I didn't get a Unit Standard for it.
They don't need no thought control (update) | Mar 24, 2006 14:10
Just one thing that I should have made clear - Unite organisers and the Greens have repeatedly claimed that the strike was an action by Radical Youth, a group run by the students themselves. The Unite connection I made in this morning's post was to point out that Unite probably offered a bit more than "practical support".
This from PA reader Ben:
I'm not sure it's a secret that Unite and the Greens funded the Radical Youth "strike". Radical Youth have all of about 20 members and couldn't organise their way to passing NCEA level 1. If it is a secret, it's a badly kept one, not least by Unite. RY certainly don't have the cash to pay for buses to ferry striking students to the city."
Tze Ming notes that, quite apart from the school strike, Unite has done a lot of as part of their Supersizeme campaign:
Unite have been the ones organising the entire Supersizemypay campaign from the start and haven't exactly tried to 'hide' this fact. And they have organised 'proper' industrial action by actual youth workers in actual workplaces, repeatedly and successfully over the summer. They are a real union after all. Just because Oosterman et al are wide-ranging activists as well, doesn't mean they aren't real unionists. So if you're a real activist, you can't be a real unionist? Their work on the youth rates issue over summer is probably the most successful campaign I've ever seen carried out by an independent union."
And this from Stephen Day, who is a real unionist over at FinSec:
...the point of a strike, or any other component of a campaign, is to improve the negotiating position of the union membership. In this instance Unite is clearly [aiming to put] pressure on Parliament to address low wages across a range of sectors. A traditional strike would have lacked the strong political focus that Unite was seeking, as well as the media coverage. [The school strike] delivers a high profile event that allows them to make youth rates a political debate.
Like you, I have misgivings about using children in political debates. However, the crux of Unite's argument is that 16-17 year olds should be treated the same as adults, so it is reasonable for them to then treat those students the same as they would their adult members by organising them to take action to advance their interests. I certainly remember being a 16 year old with very strong political and social justice beliefs that I would willingly have gone on strike for without being manipulated. I guess for me the issue is whether you empower children (teenagers/young adults/students) to be able to think politically and independently, or if you protect them from a political world until they are 18 and then bemoan the low voter turnout of young people?"
Heheh... I'll post my own schoolyard rebellion story next week.
They don't need no education | Mar 24, 2006 08:45
I'm all for a bit of schoolyard rebellion, but I think the Greens have been letting their high-minded ideas get to their heads in their support for the youth rates "strike".
First, the simplest point: Shouldn't a strike aimed at raising youth rates be aimed at employers of youth? You know, demonstrate the power of labour by withholding it from the capitalists?
Unless these kids normally work during school hours, none of them actually missed work during the strike. This would, by any assessment, make it a pretty goddamn lousy strike.
And if the point was simply to yell (literally) at Mackers and KFCs, couldn't it have been done after school? Well, no, because then you couldn't have wagged school to go protest, and then it would have been, like, just totally lame.
It's a pretty straightforward and obvious point, and I think Sue Bradford must be taking her own "democratic participation" rhetoric a little too seriously for her not to see it.
TV3 did a pretty leading piece on it, asking the kids whether they were being "manipulated" by the union organisers, and all but saying that that was the case.
It was weird reporting, but I can appreciate why they would have felt that "something was going on". Of the union organisers that they filmed, I knew every single one.
I photographed them all last time I went up to Auckland while they were protesting against Destiny Church during their "Defend Our Legacy" march. The guy they interviewed as the organiser from Unite! (a union for miscellaneous low-paid workers - including student media types) I knew from anti-US protests and from a "GE raid" on a New World in Wellington back in 2004, among other anti-GE activities.
The relevance is that the organisers from Unite! also happen to be the organisers of a wide and varied array of other political protests, and they are proponents of direct action tactics of the type that was seen (as opposed to real *industrial* action). "Manipulated" would suggest an unwillingness on the kids' part, but it would be fair to speculate that the "strike" was a direct result of Unite's involvement.
And it's difficult to shake the feeling that the kids are being exploited to further Unite's agenda here - just as you would if, say, National got kids to strike from school until NCEA was reformed. Perhaps it's unfair, but political mobilisation of kids always seems suspect, as it does in this case.
Apocalypse Again | Mar 15, 2006 17:00
My flatmates think I'm nuts. I justify every purchasing decision with "this will/will not be useful in the Apocalypse". I tried to get out Mad Max, Night of the Living Dead, The Omega Man and Shaun of the Dead at the same time. (I already own 12 Monkeys.) I even wrote my own Apocalyptic fiction, entitled "Where to Loot in Post-Apocalyptic Thorndon". Much to my surprise, it's going in the DomPost's weekend supplement on Saturday.
I don't really think the Apocalypse is coming. The article is satire, and "I can't use this in the Apocalypse" is really shorthand for:
"A manrobe is a what now?"
"You think I'll pay that for plates?"
"De-odour-what?"
Having spent a few days last week exclusively reading about the Apocalypse, it was interesting to read Russell's links on Monday about the Rapturists.
In general usage, Apocalypse has been taken to mean the end of the world. But very few Apocalypticists actually go that far - in most religious apocalypses, existence continues after "The End". The Definitive End is generally the domain of theoretical physicists and sci-fi writers.
Apocalypse actually means revelation, an act through which the truth is revealed by God. As a literary device, it's an act that takes away everything that keeps the world in its status quo and to reveal the truth of the world. At its heart, it's an expression of frustration at the way the world is now, and that it is fake or temporary somehow. Once the world gets flash-fried, the core that remains - The Truth - will flourish again, after a period of adjustment.
It's the same structure from Book of Revelations to Left Behind to The Day After Tomorrow. Destruction - massive, spectacular, Jerry-Brockheimer-esque kaplowie - is the key to the story, because without the destruction, the adherents of the Truth would remain marginalised as they are in the real world.
Their survival is not about luck, or even simple pluckiness. It's an idea of real, objective virtue in a world that is doomed because it lacks it.
And it's this that gives these stories a mythical power.
The evil could be greed and arrogance, dependence on technology, disregard for the environment, or, more in-line with dogma, having too much sex outside wedlock.
The marginalised in each of these worlds have the opposite of these qualities, and when that evil comes home to nest, their difference will save them.
For a world where environmental degradation is obvious but everyone refuses to see it because of greed and complacency, the environment will be restored through a purge of humanity.
For a world where god doesn't get a capital "G", where South Park gets aired, Mohammed cartoons get printed and where sex, drugs and rock & roll is the norm, God will come down and sort them out.
No value judgements here - just an observation that these are powerful, ancient myths that have been rewritten for every generation for every ill that ever threatened society. Perhaps it speaks to a part of us that would like the world to be reformed for the better. Perhaps it just speaks to a part of us that likes to see things burn. I know I certainly have a bit of both.
And then there's the survivalism, which was cool, surely, before Lost.
Here are instructions for building a fallout shelter with a shovel, a door, carpet and dirt. (I kid you not.) Here is the US Army Survival Manual, with a chapter on how to kick some Stone Age ass.
The Guardian asks ten experts for their picks for the End of the World. They are pretty good, but I liked the more exotic ones on Wikipedia: Ice-9 (fictional: a kind of ice that freezes at normal temperature and changes normal water to more ice-9, thus destroying world), strange matter (some quantum whatchamijig that will pop our quarks or somesuch and turn the earth into a giant nucleon - this is bad), grey goo (a bit more conventional - nanobots eat the world), and quantum vacuum collapse (not even going to try...).
And if none of those suit you, you should do it yourself. The International Earth-Destruction Advisory Board advises that the current Earth-Destruction alert level is Green: Not Destroyed.
Foul. | Mar 02, 2006 14:49
If the DBP affair is about questioning the character of our politicians, it's done its job. The voraciousness, the ruthlessness, the utter indecency with which the character assassination - nay, character lynch-mobbing - campaign has been carried out is simply disgusting.
It makes juicy soundbites ("schoolgirls!" "nighties!" "changing room!" - three down from "Petticoat Discipline Quarterly" on Google), it stops the Government from getting any real work done, but what is the purpose of all of this? What end, democratic or otherwise, does it actually serve for politicians to stamp on one another like this?
Let's put the allegations against him in context here.
How reliable are the recollections? The latest one is 9 years ago, the oldest one around 20. The events that allegedly happened are not life-shattering traumas that were etched onto the victims' minds.
Is it possible for the recollections to be biased? Come on - we've all had teachers we hated. And given last year's coverage, is it not possible for the decade(s) old memories to be warped, just a little?
Enough evidence suggests that something happened, but that doesn't address the substance of the issue: was DBP doing something other than his job as a teacher?
The devil is in the details. Where was he? Did he enter straight into the changing room? Was he by the door? Was there a barrier by the door that stops people from looking in? In short, was he in a position where he could expect to see naked girls, or was he just in the same building? Did he announce his entry? Did any of the other girls hear him?
I'm not trying to be unnecessarily pedantic here, but the details do matter. It's the difference between a teacher who broke protocols and the "dirty old man" that the Opposition are trying to paint him as. It makes a hell of a lot of difference.
There's been an opinion formed of the man based on scenarios that have been constructed out of a few unverifiable claims. A police investigation would have been nearly impossible - hence the lack of one. But this doesn't mean that he's "gotten away with it", it just means that we really don't know and can't know.
I don't care about whether DBP lied. I don't really care about DBP at all. I just care about the state of our democracy when it occupies itself with such despicable lynch-mobbing.
DBP's entitled to more than just the benefit of the doubt. He's entitled, like every other human being, to justice: The presumption of innocence until proven guilty.
The flip side to that entitlement is that it is the responsibility of every self-respecting citizen of a just society to uphold that right, to refrain from passing judgement in lieu of sufficient evidence.
It's not a lot to ask, people.
Let's judge our politicians by their characters. Let's see how many of them will use unsubstantiated accusations to destroy a man because they want his job. Let's see if any of them will show a bit of decency, a bit of humanity, a bit of *leadership*.
My jaded eyes will be on Labour now, with their threats to blow Gerry out of the water. Gerry's name has been in Labour's dirt-file for a while now. I wrote (semi-cryptically: "tennis-ball-grade dirt") about it last year, and got a call the next day from Mike Munro, the PM's then-Press Secretary, insisting that the Labour Party doesn't have a dirt-file. Ahem.
To their credit, Labour refrained from opening the non-existent dirt-file at all throughout the campaign, and throughout DBP's first grilling. According to one of my sources, it was because Labour "doesn't do that sort of politics". Ahem.
I can appreciate how tempting it must be right now.
We're watching you, buddy.
The Other God | Feb 21, 2006 12:00
If there's a God, he's must be a satirist. I mean, how else could you explain such diabolically delicious parallels?
I'm sorry - I know everyone's trying to ignore the glaringly obvious comparison because, well, it's so glaringly obvious and everyone's sick of hearing about cartoonists - but hey, I thought the thing about principles was that they had to be applied consistently?
So, in the interest of consistency (and, you know, testing tolerance), here's the torrent. Just in case you miss it on TV. (I can't get C4.)
And just to prove that yes, it really is offensive, here are a few screenshots.
Here is the website the Catholic group Family Life International have set up.
It's most interesting in that it's the case that the anti-Mohammed-cartoon campaign should have run. But it's also interesting for the slightly resigned tone and lack of faith (ha ha) in secular institutions.
I wonder if the Catholic church is, in a way, showing solidarity for the Muslims...
(Errata: In my last post, I erroneously refered to a communications company as TelstraSatan, which was very naughty of me. That name was used when TelstraClear was TelstraSaturn. The correct monikers for our telecommunications companies, according to current employees, are TestiCular and Telescum, respectively. I unreservedly apologise for any confusion caused.)
Die Dirty Telcos, Die Die Die | Feb 14, 2006 12:00
I dream of the day when we can raze Telecom to the ground. The flurry of posts last week came because I had just managed to get internet connected. It took just under three weeks. Due to "a shortage of technicians", it took 10 days to get a phone - a plain old telephone, one of the things that those of us born in the 20th century just take for granted. It took another 10 days to connect us to the internet.
It's not like they had to build pylons to get to us. We *were* connected. We just needed someone to flick a switch. It's not an infrastructure problem - they just don't give a shit.
When I was advised that it'd take 10 days to get a phone-line, I said: "Oh. I guess I better find another provider then." Their reply: "Sure. I'll set this job up, and if you find someone who can connect it sooner, just call us and we'll cancel the job for you." They were confident that they owned our ass, and they were right.
And when we were looking for ISPs, why did we stick with Telecom? Of course we didn't! Who the hell would? We went with Orcon, but of course, they still needed to line up at Telecom's door to beg one of their benevolent technicians to connect the line, if they're not too busy.
When I called up Telecom to get my account number to give to Orcon, they asked: "Have you thought about connecting to the internet with Xtra?" I explained that, for the same price as their 3gb 256k plan, I could get an unlimited 256k plan at Orcon. "Oh. That does sound like a pretty good deal."
So yeah - Telecom's changes are great, but it doesn't change the fact that what I'm really after is *choice*; the ability to not have anything to do with Telecom at all.
(And what the hell's with Xtra's "Revenge of the Nerds" advertising campaign? Dude, that stereotype belongs in the 80s, along with the one where gay man = sailor-boy with handle-bar moustache and tight leather gear. Trying to sell internet with the former is like trying to sell Queer-Eye-esque fashion with the latter - it'd only appeal to people who geniunely didn't have a clue. Which is fair enough, I suppose - since Xtra's niche in the market is "suckers-who-are-unaware-that-other-ISPs-exist".)
Still, nothing can beat my personal grudge against TelstraSatan, who, a few years back, erroneously sent our flat a final bill of $1,700. All but one of my ex-flatmates bailed on me, which left me fighting the evil corporation for a year.
We wrote letter after letter, which were no doubt forwarded to the Department That Cares. We staved off the debt-collectors by taking the matter to the Disputes Tribunal, and when a manager from TelstraSatan arrived at the hearing, she had our letters in a folder, and informed the judge that she hadn't read a word of it. We went away while she read it, and she generously offered to settle the matter if we paid them $500. We politely declined and generously offered not to persue other costs if they paid us court costs of $70. They paid. We blew it on steaks.
For anyone who's considering taking on The Man, here's the thing: They don't listen and they are assholes. Their entire system is based on the premise that, if they fuck you around long enough, you'd get intimidated or really really bored and give up. It's a war of attrition that works in their favour, because it takes you more effort to get their system to notice you than it does for them to not give a shit.
But the Disputes Tribunal is a great equaliser. They can't get debt collectors on you if the matter's going before the courts. They can't ignore a court summons. They can't send in real lawyers. So they end up sending someone from middle-management who has better things to not do with their time, and suddenly, it costs *them* more to waste your time.
It's not quite razing them to the ground, but it's the closest legal alternative.
And the world would be better without them - if only we could get our internet another way. I've just been playing around with Skype the last few days - free calling to anyone else with Skype, and 3c/min to any phone number in most parts of the world. And with better sound quality.
The most attractive part of it is that it uses the internet, and thus, information is broken into packets and sent through whatever means is available. On a grand-scale, it means that the copper network can rot, but as long as you've got internet through fibre-optics or Woosh or whatever, then you're still fully-functional. On a practical scale, it means not having to depend on a particular physical network - it'd be like having a phone number that's as portable as your email.
The revolution is coming. And I know who'll be first against the wall.
Bruckheimer to Produce 'Apocalypse' | Feb 09, 2006 21:36
In the biggest shake-up to hit Hollywood in recent decades, Omniscient Studios has announced that acclaimed producer Jerry Bruckheimer will take over from the Anti-Christ as the producer of the big-budget action-comedy, The Apocalypse. The troubled project, with an original release date of 1000 A.D., has been plagued by mismanagement, budget problems of 'biblical' proportions as well as delays in primary shooting. Industry observers have been compared its troubles with Francis Ford Capola's own Apocalypse Now.
The Anti-Christ, the actor-producer who has been on the project since its conception, expressed disappointment at the studio's decision and has told reporters that he will be returning to Hell to seek legal advice. Anti-Christ and the other members of the original cast, War, Famine and Plague, are set to be replaced before shooting begins.
A crew member in the original production told Salient that the original cast 'wasn't cut out for show-biz'. 'Plague was never very popular with the rest of the cast. Or the crew, for that matter, ever since his make-up guys got those giant boils and died clawing their own eyes out. And I think that War has some serious anger-management issues. I heard that he killed the entire crew when he found out World War I finished.'
Though Bruckheimer had wanted Famine in the final production, studio executives had concerns that the emaciated undead actor 'perpetuated an unhealthy body image'.
In his first week as producer, Bruckheimer has successfully secured a star-studded cast to replace the incumbent immortal beings. Production insiders described the scene last week as "bedlam", when War, Famine and Plague were told of the news.
Ian McKellen, who played the title role in Richard Loncraine's Richard III, has been offered the leading role as Anti-Christ, while Steve Buscimi has confirmed that he will be playing Famine, the hilarious bumbling Horseman.
It is also rumoured that Bruckheimer is seeking to rewrite the Book of Revelations to remove the role of Plague and replace it with a love interest for Ben Afflick angst-filled character, War, struggling to come to terms with his own awesome powers of destruction. The new fourth Horseperson, whose working name is PMS, is described as a strong, feisty and independent woman, who really just needs a wild and sexy man who plays by his own rules to tame her. An African-American role will also be included, played by Sydney Pontier, called 'the guy in the background during the opening credits'.
Primary filming will begin early next year in tandem with the next Bush invasion and is expected to be completed by May, pending approval by the Environmental Protection Agency for the final 'end of the world nuclear apocalypse' scene. The final release is due in November 2004, in all cinemas that survive The End.
--
That's all the blasphemous satire from me. But from the media-freedom corner, Tom Scott hits it on the head better than any of the editorials, I think.
Chalk one for the cartoonists!
Daryl Cagle's cartoon index also has a massive collection of cartoons from around the world about the cartoons. [Hat tip: Te Radar] It's a bit post-modern, but a lot of it is very funny. This one's my favourite.
Still, it's alarming how the continental European cartoonists uniformally suck. Maybe I should send in bomb threats... And what the hell is with the smoking one on the first page? "Smoking daily news"? "Smoker-in-Chief"?
Scriptual aside: A pious PA reader has advised me that God would never consider another great flood, because he promised in Genesis that there would never be another one.
Take that, climate change scientists!
Blasphem-a-thon | Feb 09, 2006 10:00
Exercising our god-given right to blaspheme today is my predecessor at Salient, fellow heathen scum Matt Nippert. These articles (including my previous posts) were published in Salient in 2003.
Tomorrow: Apocalypse.
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McMecca provides Paradise close to home
by Matt Nippert
In an unprecedented move, the White House has endorsed Islam, declaring that "if Ariel Sharon is a man of peace, then Islam deserves the same acclaim".
The announcement follows the completion of a massive mosque in central Indiana.
President Bush declared that "Americans should not need to travel abroad to fulfil their religious duty, or Haj. Instead American Muslims should travel to McMecca, a fun-filled theme park for Muslims everywhere."
McMecca includes Halal McDonalds and KFC outlets, as well as a Vegas-inspired Ka'bah replica complete with self-flagellating midget Sufis.
Entrance is restricted to practising Muslims, or any American with a criminal conviction.
"It's like the real Mecca, only more conveniently located, with more modern amenities, and the approval of the Department of Homeland Security," Bush said, urging all American Muslims to visit as soon as possible.
Pillars of smoke, presumably from the massive fast-food fryers within, wound lazily upwards from McMecca, the only external sign of the revelry and religious euphoria inside.
International media crowding at the exit to McMecca were unable to find anyone leaving, giving rise to speculation from the international community about the benefits of the site.
"We're very impressed," said one Italian delegate. "We're thinking of building McBethlehem since those damned Israelis keep closing the West Bank at Christmas."
"In other news, customs officials have decided to quarantine all those with SARS (Severely Anal Religious Sympathies) in either a four-foot cell in Guantanemo Bay or the "plush, friendly and secure surroundings of McMecca."
Detainees are allowed to choose.
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Pope Wins $1 million
by Matt Nippert
Pope Benedict XVI, a contestant on the popular Who Wants to be a Millionaire gameshow, has walked away with the grand prize.
Entered by the Vatican, which hoped to tap into the lucrative American pop-faith market, the Pope appeared headed for an early exit after appearing clueless when faced with pop-culture questions.
After exhausting his lifelines early in the process, and wrongly guessing that Sydney, not Canberra, was the capital of Australia, the Pope invoked the doctrine of Papal Infallibility.
'I am the voice of God. I am all-knowing,' he declared to a clearly shocked Regis Philburn.
Regis acknowledged the divinity of the answer, and was forced to declare the answer correct.
From that point on, the road to the $1 million prize was mercifully short, punctuated only by a singing and dancing routine by a travelling squad of nuns.
Meanwhile, the Australian Parliament Building, being transported north along the coastal highway, fell off a moving truck and plunged into the ocean.
John Howard took advantage of the opportunity to declare Parliament dissolved, granting himself absolute power.
Holy See Reports 4Q Loss | Feb 08, 2006 09:45
VATICAN CITY - Speaking in front of a shareholder meeting yesterday, Pope Benedict XVI hinted at a fourth quarter loss for the Church in 2005. Usually a lucrative period coinciding with Christmas, this loss would mark an unprecedented low for the Church and its subsidiaries.
Sources close to the Almighty have said that He is "furious" with the result, and is considering another Great Flood. The source also reports that close advisors, rumoured to include Jesus Christ himself, have been dissatisfied with the Church's lacklustre fiscal performance over the last two centuries, and are now taking the opportunity to call for immediate and radical restructuring at the upper management level, as well as austerity measures until the Church's cash flow situation improves.
Market analysts speculate that the area most likely to be targeted by the restructuring is Hell, aimed particularly at the long-serving but unpopular Prince of Darkness, Lucifer. "Hell has traditionally been a good earner for the Church," said investment theologian Blaise Pascal, "but it has had trouble adapting to the rapidly growing market for eternal damnation. Sinners are going unpunished, and as a result their credibility in the marketplace has taken a heavy blow."
"It's been centuries coming, but now it looks like horned heads are going to roll," adds Pascal.
Speaking on the conditional of anonymity, an agent of Christ has indicated that our Saviour will be pressing for a far more radical approach at the emergency meeting of the Trinity later today. "The fire and brimstone image doesn't accurately reflect the corporate culture of the Church anymore. While we still value our traditional 'divine vengeance' and 'infinite justice' customer-base, we've lost a lot of ground to our New Age competitors in the 'peace and love' area."
Responding to rumours that former German leader, Adolf Hitler, is a leading candidate to replace Satan, the source believed that Jesus Christ is looking for "someone more experienced in corporate management, and less likely to invade the orthodox Russian market".
Restructuring plans proposed at the Second Vatican are also likely to be revisited, after they were aborted shortly after the abolition of Purgatory. The measures include:
* Outsourcing divine retribution against unbelievers to Armourguard.
* Streamlining sins to reduce judgement time.
* Turn Heaven and Hell into competing corporate entities.
* Selling indulgences for all non-cardinal sins through a convenient website.
* Removing boring parts of bible to save printing costs.
* Replacing the Holy Spirit with the more cost-effective Holy Sprite.
* Merge with Islam to corner faith-market.
Goddamnit | Feb 06, 2006 12:04
Freedom to say anything doesn't equate to an obligation to say everything.
Tze Ming's right: except for the lineup one, the cartoons are lame.
But the issue is not the quality of the cartoons, but the point behind them - that is, to challenge Muslim sensibilities by offending them. It is not offensive in aid of a point, its point is to offend; and through offence, to redraw the borders of acceptability in favour of liberal, secular society, against the traditional teachings of Islam.
It was a declaration to the Muslim public that they cannot expect their religious sensibilities to be taken seriously by Western societies. They can practice their religion, but they can't expect others to obey it, too.
And they can't. We don't take Christian sensibilities seriously, so why would we take Muslim sensibilities seriously? We stick statues of the Virgin Mary in condoms, we have crucifixes in urine, we give Jesus a bit-roles in South Park. Jesusmaryandjoseph, we are just a goddamn blasphemous lot.
We have the right to freedom of speech, which includes the freedom to blaspheme; it's a right that I've personally enjoyed on many, many occasions. But having a right to act does not make it right to act. Nobody should be allowed to stop you, but it doesn't mean that what you are doing is necessarily a responsible action or a good idea.
In this instance, what was Jyllands-Posten's goal? To obtain Muslim assent to the liberal democratic social contract by *offending* them into agreement? To make Muslims abandon their dogma by demonstrating that they are powerless to stop it from being contravened?
Jyllands-Posten's original position seems ill-considered, but the subsequent decisions by other publications to reprint the cartoons is more complex. Since its original publication, Jyllands-Posten and Denmark (!!!) has been pressured and threatened. The subsequent reprints was the media circling the wagons around its own, giving them aid to resist the pressure.
From the media's perspective, political and economic pressure, and of course, death threats, are unacceptable responses to free speech, and must be quashed thoroughly, lest such tactics are tried again in the future. It's not a matter of putting the boot in - it's about demonstrating that the media will stand up for itself, and for each other.
The violence and the threats of violence are obviously unacceptable (not to mention stupid, as the subsequent media response shows). But do boycotts and political pressure really fall into the same category?
Regardless of whether those cartoons serve a greater cause, they are offensive. Which, yes, is perfectly permissible in a liberal society. But likewise, people are allowed to be offended by them - that's what offensive means, no? And offended people have the freedom to take their money elsewhere.
Muslims taking offence to those cartoons seem perfectly reasonable (again - the death threats are not). On the other hand, I still think it's rather noble for the media to band together to defend their bit of the liberal society turf.
The issue has moved beyond "was printing the cartoon a good idea?" to "is *not* printing the cartoon a good idea?". It's insensitive of the media to continue to cause offence in defence of freedom of the press, but they've made a call about what's more important to them - and fair enough.
It's a dilemma - if the media succumbs to pressure, then the media will face similar pressures and threats when considering publishing material that may legitimately offend Muslims in the future. It's a battle that needs to be won, if only to set a precedent.
But why is the pressure there? Because the media was unreasonable to begin with.
And why was it unreasonable to begin with? Because there was unreasonable pressure prior to the cartoons...
Time for a bit of de-escalation, eh?
(Legal aside: Blasphemous libel is still illegal in New Zealand, under section 123 of the Crimes Act.)
All this talk of blasphemy is making me blasphemous. So here's one of my own pieces of blasphemous satire, published in Salient in 2003...
--
Christ Caught Drink Driving
UPPER HUTT - Jesus Christ was taken into police custody at approximately 3 am on Sunday morning for suspected drink driving. A police statement said that the inebriated deity was accompanied by fellow Upper Hutt resident, Mary Magdalene, who is a known sex worker.
Christ was stopped by police after he levitated his car for 2 km on top of the Hutt River. He was driving an angelic white 1978 Holden Kingswood at the time of the arrest. Police pursued him for 20 minutes until he exited the vehicle to urinate and the vehicle sank to the bottom of the river. Magdalene was found drowned in the vehicle, but was resurrected.
A subsequent blood test revealed Christ's blood content to be approximately 200,000 ppm, 1,000 times over the legal limit. "The Blood of Christ is a traditional, full-bodied dry red grape wine with a strong oak aroma, and a 20% alcohol content. Everyone knows this, but the police are persecuting [sic] our client simply because he is Jewish," read a statement from Christ's legal representatives, Armageddon, Armageddon and Jehoshaphat.
Christ, son of God, has had a long and troubled past. His first run in with the law occurred 2000 years ago with Roman authorities, who arrested and executed him for challenging the rule of Caesar and claiming to be the King of the Jews. A warrant was later issued for his re-arrest for resisting execution. New Zealand does not have an extradition treaty with the Roman Empire.
Christ later began a successful career in publishing, starring as the main character in his own critically acclaimed book, The Bible. This was later adapted as a popular musical, though it never achieved the success of the original book. Christ's career in film has also been sporadic, playing various bit-parts in the 60s and 70s.
Friends of Christ have revealed that the downturn in his career has driven him to alcoholism and eating disorders. "I've seen him bless a whole bathtub and turn it into wine. Sometimes, he'd pull bits off himself and start eating it," said one disciple, who wished to remain unnamed.
Upon hearing the news, United Future leader Peter Dunne further condemned the popular religious figure: "As a high-profile leader in the faith community, Jesus [Christ] had a responsibility to set a moral example for our children. If I wasn't out of stones, I'd throw one at him."
"From Shanghai", from Melbourne (Part 1) | Jan 18, 2006 10:50
Some experiences define your perception of a place. I visited China just before Christmas, and what defined it was when a kid, around 6 or 7 years old, came and grabbed my leg, begging for money.
It was in Suzhou, a famous tourist spot about an hour from Shanghai.
I'm not sure if it made it worse, but the kid was very "professional"; he was posted on a bridge, so there was no way around him; I saw him "mark" me from about 20m away, but didn't make a move until I was two steps away; he grabbed my leg and refused to let go until I gave him money.
One passing local grinned at how utterly helpless I was against this kid. I guess I was a little bemused, too, knowing that this was routine that he regularly practiced with, I assume, some success.
Later on, at a famous historcal estate (a retreat for scholars and A-list cultural elites in centuries past), an old woman was scrounging through the trash looking for plastic bottles (to be recycled for money - very, very little money).
Back in Shanghai, a man who had suffered severe burns to his face was prostrated on the streets begging for money.
--
Nobody really *begs* in New Zealand. On rare occasions, people ask for money, but really, I'm not sure if the concept of "begging" - as in geniunely grovelling, without a shred of dignity - even exists in New Zealand.
I swear to you - see it once, understand what it means for poverty to grind a human soul into nothing, then you will appreciate what the welfare state has done for New Zealand.
--
They say that Shanghai is the jewel of China. It was terrifying. I wouldn't say that about many cities (granted, I haven't been to Bagdad lately), but Shanghai is more than a mess, it's an omen.
As the brochures say, the shopping in Shanghai rivals any city in the world. The neon-glazed streets were full of opulant baubble from the wanky brands of the first-world, modelled by skinny blonde models, in abundance and variety to rival any modern city in the world.
It's the carrot that's dangled in front of the city's donkey - the educated, white-collar middle-class. They drive the engine of capitalism that runs the city, and they in turn are driven by the relentless consumerism of the city.
Shiny watches, senselessly sexualised cellphones, miscellaneous trinkets on skimpily-clad models... The tabacco companies, of course, have been very successful. About three-quarters of the population smokes. The other quarter are lighting a cigarette or buying some.
Even getting on a regular commuter train was a near-stampede. A few older women were screaming out as they were crushed between the crowds and the barriers, while others were giving as good as they got nearby. The place was dynamic alright - a perpetual state of pandemonium.
(To be cont.)
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