Monthly Archives: January 2011

Bigotry

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If you don’t allow offensive speech, you don’t allow speech. This thread is incredibly noxious.

This is a prime example.

We’re just saying that your blog posted here is hate-mongering and as a result we hate it. While you have the right to freedom of speech, so do those who criticise this blog and so have acted accordingly.

via Maori Animism: New Zealand’s Established Religion | MandM.

I commented that as a society we had three choices: a theocracy (which is what the author was saying we were at risk of, anti theocracy or secularism, and free speech. I voted for the latter. The comment below shows how people go past the point.

The thing is Chris, no one is asking you to worship a mountain. They’re just asking you not to be a dick about someone else’s beliefs.

I don’t think anyone has every been miraculously healed at Lourdes, or that a god was crucified at Calvary; but if I was to visit those places I’d be respectful of their cultural signifcance. Wouldn’t you?

Well, no. If I go to Cathedrals. or Lourdes (and I am not a Catholic. I don’t take part in the sacraments. If I go to a mosque I don’t go at times of prayer.

In part this is respect of their property and it is being consistent with my beleifs. The entire point of being anti established religion is that I can choose.

And with the hardline Maori you cannot. You have to accept their spirituality.  We are not allowed to mock it.

Well, you can’t have it both ways. If we allow offensive speech — speech I disagree with — my being offended is immaterial. The Maori being offended that I absent myself from Karakia is immaterial.

I dissent. And it’s clear that I am seen as rude for doing this. If that is being rude, then civility should be vomited out the toilet.

I dissent

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This is a correct analysis of the current state of the nation. Every — and I mean every part of the nation must bow down to this. We have to teach a Maori aspect of all subjects — from psychiatry (where transcultural expressions of distress are a topic of research, and there is therefore a good reason to be aware of these things) to Physics (where the math matters).

Post modern neo-idolatorous shite. We are placing pounamu around to be the genii localae.

I dissent. I will not bow down. I will not be at that meeting.

And I suggest all those who believe in one G-d to do the same.

New Zealand, along with all nations, is acutely religious. But, more than most Western countries, the dominant religion is now the Established Religion. We are using “established” in the historical sense of a religion prescribed and protected, so that all citizens must respect and honour that particular religion’s beliefs and practices. Established religion is the religion buttressed and proscribed by the law of the land and funded by tax money.

The established religion in New Zealand is Maori animism. In historical terms it is a pagan and primitive religion, riddled with superstition and idolatry. It is an offence and provocation to the Living God. But none who want official and public respect in New Zealand dare criticise the Establishment. Those, however, who fear God more than man are prepared to call it for what it is: stale hokey pokey–a thoroughly sour, ignorant and stupefying batch of mouldy ice-cream. Every Christian who understands what the Bible says about idolatry and false gods has no hesitation in flatly rejecting Maori animism. In so doing, we have become the new dissenters.

via MandM.

Narod or Dhimmi?

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There is an old Chinese curse about wishing your enemy lives in historic times. At present, that is the situation that much of North Africa and Arabia finds itself in.

This part of the world is inherently unstable. The population is generally above the carrying capacity of the land. Food is imported. Most of the region has been run by autocrats. The area has become aggressively Islamic, when it used to have multiple religions. What has kept people fed in the region is oil, but the oil is running out.

If you have a water shortage and a shortage of good soil there are things you can do. You use cheap energy to build desalinisation plants. You can reforest. You can use buildings such as shade houses to produce climate control. You can let the entrepreneurial energy of your people out, and hope that they make things other people will buy.

But autocracy stymies all of these things — because the elite, the nobility, have to be involved, take their cut, and lead, regardless of their competence. This generally fails, unless you have a subset in your population who can break the rules. In medieval Christendom, those people were the Jews, who could charge interest and loan money to lords and corporations. In the early Ottoman empire, much of the energy came from the Christian, Jewish dhimmi, and a fair amount of the military creativity from tribal groups such as the Kurds.

But there are now no licenced groups who can create. The move to aggressive Wahabite Sunni Islamism has driven many Christians from Iraq — and the same noxious ideology is killing not only the groups that were traditionally called Dhimmi but any Muslm who is not part of their particular sect. This means there is not way to be outside the restrictions of those who would have tried to stone at least one of Muhammads concubines (because she was Christian). There are no Dhmmi, nor anyway out. All are narod — serfs or peasants. The leadership tries to import its culture (from both Mecca and Paris) but there is a gap. And that gap — between the cultured and the peasant has led to revolution — from the French to the Iranian. Iran, by the way, is an exception precisely because their leadership is diffuse and they remain the product of a recent popular revolution (although there must be a question as to how long this can continue for).

We should all be praying for our Arab brothers. In particular, as a nation, they have to look at putting energy  and money into getting away from dependence on oil, to having some freedoms of thought and conduct, for solving their own problems. The solutions the West came up with, the reformation, enlightenment, and the modern nation-state, may not work. However, the West is not to blame for their predicament. Blame is something Arabia cannot afford — because the fat years are ending. Oil is running out. The West is in depression.

The people of Tunisia, Egypt and the entire region are wanting to be rid of corruption and to be free. But that means they need to be responsible for their fate: indeed the duty of all men is to provide for their family first. The rest of the world should trust the people of the region. They have been through incredibly difficult times before, and survived.

But trust the people, not the autocrat, or those who say they are of the people, but are of the elite.

Structure and society.

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Yesterday I saw “The Kings Speech”. Colin Firth portrays a man who — as a Duke — is painfully aware of his role and the difficulties he is having fulfilling it. In England there is an exquisite sensitivity to rank, which is quite finely divided. It is as if the entire society was on the civil list, where one’s status and rank is ordered from greatest to least.

Kiwis are not like that. We pretend to be equal. The disreputable golfer in shorts, sandals and a T-shirt might be a millionaire or a prisoner. But there is an underlying structure in our society, one of power, that is hidden. The political ideologies that oppose the traditional systems — so ably demonstrated and made human the cast in the movie — at the deepest level, do not want to get rid of a structure. They want to either place their group on top (the position that the Islamists take) or reinvent feudalism disguised as socailism — where power resides with the representatives of the poor, not the poor themselves.

All societies have structures and defined roles. A certain amount of specailization (and sophistication of technique) occurs in quite preindustrial societies. However, the English and Scots have a long tradition of mistrust when it comes to societies and structures. They consider over specailisation and over regulation as an offense to the ancient duties and liberties. One may be free, but one has to be able to care for one’s croft and cattle. Without help. This approach — allowing initiative, not over regulating — is conducive to being a pioneer, to adjusting to changes in fortunes, climate and geography. Over regulated societies tend to be fragile. The British may have been on a list, but one could go up and down on that list. You cannot do that in the new socail feudal society that the offendarii are creating.

Over regulation stifles development. It stops plain speech. It is the result of busy little legislatures and the bureaux that serve them. It would be far simpler to half the number of MPs and insist that they meet in their spare time. It could mean that we don’t have to put up with this illogicality.

Tiger cub or Tiger Mum?

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I guess this post started with a comment I made @ Cactus Kate. The prickly (Kate is quite right wing and blunt, well worth a read) pear had been praising Amy Chua. The part of the argument I like was based on Kate’s experience in living in Hong Kong and reflects my experience being married into a Chinese Family

Chua’s raising daughters. This is also a little different because the Chinese female also has only recently realised that she can beat the male. Chinese history has not been kind on women, Chua herself would know that women have to try harder. In China the male, no matter how thick, is more important than the female and this bias still is ingrained. Ironically the Mainland one-child policy has helped Chinese women in many ways with parents heaping all attention without a male who is preferred.

New Zealand women have an excellent record in the past generation of smashing their male counterparts in achievement as children. All my younger female friends and acquaintances are the smartest, largest independent achievers in their family. Regardless of the measure. All have parents who have tried to keep up the egos of other lesser siblings with a large cuddle and words that they were winners too.

Such Westernised coddling of a smashed up achievement ego of losers continues into unhealthy ages. Welfare Within Families is as rife in New Zealand as government whereby often the least successful and motivated members are given assistance over others.

In Chinese culture the sibling, especially if male, would have simply been locked in his room until he wasn’t so pathetic and scolded by his father that he couldn’t let a girl beat him as it was embarrassing the family.

Now Chua’s managed to offend a fair number of Americans who think that the kids have not had enough freedom. Ferdinand — who is good to read after Kate because he is staunchly anti-feminist — comments.

Making your kids “be the No. 1 student” in every subject doesn’t actually make them number one, any more than all the kids in Lake Wobegon could be above average, but it DOES train them to jump through hoops like a seal. That’s the Asian way – train people to become brainless, unthinking automatons incapable of thinking outside of the box.

I responded quite emotionally to this. My ex is Chinese. Two of my kids — both boys are half Chinese. In New Zealand, girls are praised to the skies, and boys are told that they are not as good… the curriculum is taught by women, tailored to women, and alienates a large number of young men. The families — that as a solo Dad — I’m modelling what I do on are those who seem functional (for many spoil their kids and insulate them from responsibility). I replied to her

Kate, you are only half right. You miss the other part of the equation. Chua is bright. Fracking bright. She is married to a Jewish bloke, who is also fracking bright. And she is in the US. Kids with the potential hers have can cruise and get “A”s from a US school. It is the equivelant of “merit” from NCEA. And my boys are told — at school and by me — that you get acheived in NCEA from the weetbix packet. That’s a FAIL. Acheived is a B. Excellent is an A.

Accepting failure is the mark of the non elite.

After reading both of these posts — from people I regularly read — I’m left with some questions. The first is… what is success and failure? Life is a marathon, but education is at best a middle distance race. It is not the full measure one should use. There are plenty of educated morons. There are people who have done very well — but cannot handle success. And there are people who think feeling good is success. Where Chua is correct is that self esteem is bad for you. One needs to be careful in looking at papers about low self esteem because chaotic and abusive family backgrounds are associated with this.

Within the upper middle class, one’s credentials generally are not used for status. Everyone has them. Your competence within your field is what matters. And that requires more than rote learning.

But where Ferd is wrong is that rote learning is necessary to allow for interpretation. In music, playing scales and arpeggios is something you have to do every day so you don’t have to think about intonation and can think about interpretation. You can’t create without knowing structure. You don’t get mastery until you have done years of practice. So the Tiger Mum’s emphasis on practice and training is appropriate. Good Jazz players (who generally write the rock songs — while part of the backup band) practice just as hard as classical musicians and then improvise.

The second question that has to asked is put bluntly by Ferd: what is abuse? Chua would argue that she is not abusive, even when making a child struggle with a piece, using emotions,  and calling them a failure.  A New Zealander will call a parent neglectful if they are not within ten steps of a child in a playground… in this generation. (I was told to go out and play… and did. In polluted creeks. In treehuts twenty feet off the ground. With wooden swords and bows and arrows. In non steerable trolleys. We had more freedom and developed more confidence in the outdoors — at the cost of more scars and broken bones).

In the case of the Chuas, when you have bright kids who would rather be at the mall or with their friends, pressure can help. The kids are not unresilent. They can respond. (And if the average High School in the USA is like the ones in almost every movie and sitcom from “Happy Days” to “Cheers”, this ex head librarian would consider the schools to be abusive. It might be better to refrain from using that term — which now has legal implications — unless the children are battered.

And with kids who are talented…. to whom much is given, much should be required. Struggle is good for you. Cheap praise, is in the end, worthless. But Chua needs to consider if the reasons her kids are successful is that they have inherited great talents from their talented parents.

Terminations are supposed to be a medical procedure

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I have been reading about the case of Dr Gosset with increasing horror. I have a pile of personal reasons for disliking abortion. As a child adopted in the 1960s, there is a reasonable chance that my nursing student mother would have terminated me. She didn’t — and she calls me kin now.

Like Grerp I see terminations as something that we will no longer be able to ban. I think that this society wants to disavow the consequences of sex — which include pregnancy, child support, and a pile of nasty diseases (at least two of which _HIV and syphilis — still cause people to present with psychiatric illnesses if luck and irreversible dementia if not). And I note that the male partner has no choice as to if he will support the child — he as at the mercy of the woman.

Anyway, the quote:

The District Attorney’s office this week charged an abortion doctor, Kermit Gosnell, with murder and infanticide. Nine other workers at the abortion clinic, the Women’s Medical Society, also face charges. According to the prosecutors, Gosnell and his associates not only broke state law by performing abortions after 24 weeks—they also killed live babies by stabbing them with scissors and cutting their spinal cords. Law enforcement officials found blood-stained furniture, unsterilized instruments and fetal remains scattered about the clinic. At least one woman, a refugee from Nepal, had died under Gosnell’s care after being given repeated injections of a dangerous sedative. Prosecutors said Gosnell made millions from treating and sometimes maiming his patients, who were mostly low-income, minority women [3].

But perhaps most frightening of all? The atrocities were discovered by accident [4], as the Philadelphia Inquirer points out. Warnings—from patients and their attorneys, a doctor at a Philadelphia hospital, women’s health groups, pro-choice groups, and even an employee of the Philadelphia Department of Public Health—failed to prompt state and local authorities to investigate or take action against the clinic.

The grand jury report said that one look at the place would have detected the problems, but the Pennsylvania Department of Health hadn’t inspected the place since 1993. Here’s the grand jury report, in surprisingly strong language:

The Pennsylvania Department of Health abruptly decided, for political reasons, to stop inspecting abortion clinics at all. The politics in question were not anti-abortion, but pro. With the change of administration from Governor Casey to Governor Ridge, officials concluded that inspections would be “putting a barrier up to women” seeking abortions.

“Even nail salons in Pennsylvania are monitored more closely for client safety,” the report states. “Without regular inspections, providers like Gosnell continue to operate; unlawful and dangerous third-trimester abortions go undetected; and many women, especially poor women, suffer.”

Now I commend the people from the pro-choice groups who did their duty and reported on the poor standards of this service. They were at least concerned about the service have minimal standards. There are many things that can go wrong –ranging from uterine rupture to post termination sepsis — that require standards of hygiene and sepsis. We have more regulations, in NZ, for ECT (which is basically benign — the risk relates to the anaesthetic) and we inspect and certify places doing terminations. We also requre all doctors audit their practice.

What gets me is that the usual systems — set up to ensure that there is asepsis and that systematic errors are not used in any surgery — were not used and that this was a poltical decision. It should have not been so. The service should have been run by doctors with the spine to insist on infection control and audit of complications. This is as much part of any service as assessment of patients and follow-up.
>But abortion is special. It should not be. It should be rare — as a termination implies something has gone so horribly wrong that a fetus has to die. From J. Durden:

Pregnancies are completely avoidable. Women have the regular pill, the morning after pill, the power to discriminate among their sexual partners, the power to insist upon condoms only when having sex, or the power to not have sex altogether if pregnancy is so scary and life-threatening. (The highly unlikely cases include instances where both the condom AND the pill fail – almost statistically impossible – or in instances of ACTUAL rape which end in pregnancy,…,

But abortion is protected by the constitution. Only in the USA — where Roe vs Wade has as much relevance to the aforementioned document as Dredd Scott — the rest of the world is more sensible.

Special cases make for bad medicine. If we are going to do terminations as a society — I for one refuse to bow to Baal but I’m aware that I am in a minority — then they should be regulated and done along with any other gynecological procedure. And this service — from the data we have was unsafe. Back street abortionists would have had more hygiene.

Hat tip Thomas Lipton

NZ Political Bloggers Political Spectrum Quiz Wha

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halfdond

2009 (& 2010) NZ Political Bloggers Political Spectrum Quiz « Something should go here, maybe later..

I’m in the middle of the antiauthoritarian right. Along with Crusader Rabbit, Adam Smith, but not as right wing as Madeline or Cam.

The big problem I face is that I live in the people’s republic of Dunedin, where I commit ungoodthink most days. I’m saved by being good at my trade… and being polite, most of the time. But civil discourse here — by analogy — is from the Guardian, and the right read the inedependant, not the Telegraph.

I can’t be of the left. I am not Pharasicial enough to be able to keep all the regulations. I do not measure and account for my carbon footprint. I do not have the ability to change my beleifs according to fashion.

But… I do not want to be in that deluded ship,. Of fools. Controlling society by the use of Foucaultian antilogic. Going into aa hell called irrelevancy.

Coming storm.

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Had a difficult week this week Last week I slept in and went to the ewenign music service at the liberal high presbyeterian kirk. My kirk is “on leave” as it is a supplemental ministry to the main one… which is where I ought to go.

However, this week been struggling with the nature of the relationships between men and women and the current delusions that women have. Isiaih says this:

8 Now therefore hear this, you lover of pleasures,
who sit securely, who say in your heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me; I shall not sit as a widow
or know the loss of children” — 9 both these things shall come upon you in a moment, in one day: the loss of children and widowhood shall come upon you in full measure, in spite of your many sorceries and the great power of your enchantments. 10 You felt secure in your wickedness; you said, “No one sees me.” Your wisdom and your knowledge led you astray, and you said in your heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me.” 11 But evil shall come upon you, which you cannot charm away; disaster shall fall upon you, which you will not be able to ward off; and ruin shall come on you suddenly, of which you know nothing.

via Daily Lectionary Readings — Devotions and Readings — Mission and Ministry — GAMC.

What are the things that are driving this?

  • The ongoing denigration and demeaning of women with prudence and virtue, by other women. Nothing gets  a feminist more worked up than a women who won’t swallow the lies. Many of these are Christian. Grerp and Terry have been demeaned. And in the US, this has become toxic.
  • The rediscovery of witchcraft, leading to the new genre of vampire literature. (The vampire is demanding, cruel and able to totally understand. He is romantic. He does not age. NThere is not a man who can compete with him).
  • The integration of feminist perspective and “new spiritualities” (actually those of Baal and Astheroth) into mainline congregations. Generally facilitated by women ministers looking for deeper knowledge when we are clearly told that we have the theological knowledge we can handle.
  • A culture of consumption and vanity. Fashion rules. Celebrities set morals, occuring as we are in the middle of the greatest depression since the 1930s.

The wise among us are changing our consumption and lifestyle to meet these challenges. We need to pray for revival (first in us, but in the nation). For the storm is not over: in fact the difficulties we have had may just be the prequel.

The correct response is also in today’s lectionary, from Hebrews.

19Therefore, my friends, since we have confidence to enter the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus, 20by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain (that is, through his flesh), 21and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22let us approach with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who has promised is faithful. 24And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, 25not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

So, it’s cold, stormy. My knee (injured this week in the gym) hurts. But I’m getting out of my lovely, warm bed to get ready. Kirk is coming.

Divorce is a loss.

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I’m driven back to this topic — of aelf harm and suicide — by events among those around me. There have been casualties, and near misses among my friends. These are generally good people, but, in the process of their divorce, the betrayal and hurt got to them.

They went to the things that give them comfort, and found them empty. My work is dealing with a death. I’m aware of near misses. And the victims — yes, by suicide, as in the link above, leave children trying to make sense of all of this.

In a divorce, you have to greive and let go — of all the hopes, faith and promises you made, all the good times, as well as all the bad things. It hurts. It costs — your family, and your bank account. There are no winners, and no one is completely right. (If you think you were not at all at fault when your marriage broke up, you are probably the one with the problem.

Divorce has, historically been shunned by societies. Marraige — the life long contract that allowed a couple to synergise their effort so that they could raise kids — was honoured. The alternative, for women, was dependence on their parents or poverty. The idea of love, happiness, or self development was not seen as part of the contract but something one attained by working through the difficulties in life circumstances.

Marraige bound men to one person and to a lifetime of providing for their wife and children. Marraige bound women to one person and a lifetime of supporting a tired, grumpy man and a brood of kids. Marraige was never about freedom.

But our generation has wanted both. We forgot that the security of marraige and the long term joy of marraige depended on people giving up freedom. We could not have both. And the current marraige laws — which define it as concubinage of an indefinate term — does not warm our souls. It leaves us mistrustful, cautious and fearful.

We have driven the joy out of marriage — and by extension, the dance between men and women. We have reduced it to sex. We have not learnt from our gay friends, who can easily find sex but have difficulty finding commitment, love and joy. For these things are not guaranteed. You cannot sue for them. You can only commit to someone and work on living with them, and these things may come.

But… I am a divorced solo father. Inside me, something has broken. I will not bring into my life a person who would harm my children. It is now hard for me to trust a person enough to be intimate with them. I pray this will heal, but until then, it is wiser I am single

Second Sunday after Epiphany.

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One of the difficulties I have had since this year began is finding the appropriate RCL readings on line. For about a year I used the Presbyterian link from the US. This is a link from an episcopalian site. It includes the collect or prayer for each day.

The Collect

Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world: Grant that your people, illumined by your Word and Sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ’s glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Isaiah 49

But I said, “I have labored in vain,

I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity;yet surely my cause is with the LORD, and my reward with my God.”
And now the LORD says, who formed me in the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him,
and that Israel might be gathered to him, for I am honored in the sight of the LORD, and my God has become my strength–he says,
“It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

I Corinthians

I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind– just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you– so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

I spent yesterday on call, and much of the day at work. In this, I was glad that the boys were on holiday, but this morning I’m in recovery mode. Dealing with the pain of others hurts — and when it stops hurting you are officially useless as a therapist and a human being. As I result I slept through both the time of my usual kirk (which closes over the summer break) and the 10 am standard services.
We are told to wait patiently, that our faithfulness is for the glory of God and a witness to his glory in the nations. We are not told that this will be without pain or will be easy.
And those who say this…. are at best in error.