Posts by Rich Lock
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Hard News: Mandela, in reply to Russell Brown,
I have been a little nonplussed by the scramble to own Mandela’s memory
I've been refraining from posting because my own memories seeem rather banal, but on reflection, I think illustrate a point worth making.
I was at school through the last years of apartheid, and also the cold war. They were both just something that happened in the background, for the most part. I have flashes of memories from the tv news of the time, my parents sitting impassively in front of the telly as I walked in and out of the room. I have one particularly vivid memory of footage of SA police ambushing protestors in a township and firing indiscriminantly into the crowd with shotguns.
Despite my best efforts (and those of my immediate and wider environments - conservative school and Conservative governments), the sense of 'something wrong' did manage to eventually make it's way through my thick teenage skull, and it did so in no small part thanks to sustained campaigning from 'the left': embassy protests, continuing news coverage, and in my case, comedy.
Spitting Image was huge in the UK, and wildly popular in our school. I didn't understand half of it - the politicians names meant nothing to me, but it was compelling nevertheless. The Specials AKA was a tune I was aware of, but it was neither here nor there for me at the time. But this one was:
Spitting Image also had a number-one single with their novelty single 'the chicken song' (because the '80's), which had a b-side that was far more popular at our school:
All this helped sow the seeds for some sort of political awareness, outside of the establishment of mainstream news and stage-managed politicians. Just having the sense that there were other groups, people who thought differently and had a different point of view, and that they weren't fringe weirdos, was hugely important to me (even if I didn't realise it at the time). So, um, thanks for that Mandela, and the SA government for turning him into a cause celebre.
I also remember when he was released because it seemed to come as part of a chain of toppling dominoes at the end of the '80's and beginning of the '90's - the wall coming down, Glasnost and the end of the cold war, and Mandela's release. My memory is that there was a sense of a tide turning, huge optimism globally, 'the end of history' and all of that.
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Hard News: Mandela, in reply to Geoff Lealand,
Mark Steel is a welcome discovery.
Geoff, you might also like the other Mark - Mark Thomas (they're sometimes known as 'the two Marks' over here in the UK. Because how else would you refer to two generally leftish comedians with the same first name?).
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Speaker: Need, in reply to Jackie Clark,
Morgan you can just put money in their account, if you like.
Use Jackie as the reference: it’s ASB 12-3076-0489694-00Perhaps edit the main post to include this info?
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Yes, that's what I meant: 'still a bit of a gap from there to being able to use it in court [as falling within a definition of 'found']'.
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Legal Beagle: Not burglary?, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
Still a bit of a gap from there to being able to use it in court, but.
Thanks for the reply, Graeme.
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An element of that offence is that you have to be “found” on the property, and it appears these students weren’t
Graeme, what are the legal boundaries of 'found'? Your post implies that they have to be physically caught in the act on the property. If there was camera phone footage, CCTV, or similar available that clearly showed they'd been there, would that fall inside or outside the definition?
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Evolution of 'Get Lucky'
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Did someone say mashup?
Oh good, I'll drop this:
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Not at all, Mark. I'm letting some of my own preferences and predjudices colour my comments. My experience is inextricably linked with group or social activities rather than sticking some music on and melting into the couch for hours at a time by yourself. Hanging out with people who are tending towards anxious paranoid behaviour can easily harsh the mellow of a good night out.
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One point probably worth making in relation to the CBD:THC ratios is that it is my understanding that low-CBD/high-THC strains are far easier to grow than the stuff that has a high CBD content. So by far the most common black-market stuff is low-CBD/high-THC - more likely to make you anxious and paranoid, rather than chilled and euphoric.
Like I mentioned in the other thread a while ago, I'd be far more likely to search out, and pay a premium for, decent stuff (i.e. high CBD) in the same way that I'll drink a nice Pinot Noir over a bottle of Thunderbird now that I can afford it. But as it is, it's just not worth the hassle.