23 June 2006

THE WARLEY MEDAL - "For Valour"






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Awarded to myself. Four times.

Proud survivor of two unnecessary and criminal 5-month "tours of duty"/imprisonments in a so-called hospital in confined conditions where I was unnecessarily imprisoned without trial against my will and fed poisonous substances against my will.

I was also seriously assaulted by another detainee and on another occasion by a member of staff/jailor who faced no punishment for the crime of assaulting me. I lived in confined spaces with 20 other people and this could often lead to confrontation.

All these things are a crime. It may be hard to recognise this but it's true.

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Psychiatry's Electro-Convulsive Shock "Treatment" ("ECT") is also wholly unnecessary, totally pointless, totally bogus scientifically and a crime against humanity.
It is also very damaging.

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Psychiatry is currently not scientific.

So alternative and homeopathic medicine is not to be funded by the NHS because it is not scientific enough?

When are they going to admit that psychiatry is also non-scientific? This is 2006 not 1006.

Quackery was all the rage at the mediaeval fair. But we can now get to the moon.

We are supposed to have science at our disposal to solve problems.

How deluded we are if we think that science has been allowed to pervade all areas of human life.

"..some doctors still think that a person with depression needs ongoing antidepressants, in the same way that a person with diabetes needs insulin. This is a poor comparison. Diabetes is a physical condition with clear causes that are well understood. Insulin is natural hormone with a very specific role in the body, and shouldn't be considered a drug. Taking it by injection causes few side effects. The same is not true of ANY psychiatric drug."

"Experts are still not sure about the role of psychiatric drugs in controlling moods, emotions and other aspects of the life of the mind. We don't know how they interact with life events and other environmental factors. The most problematic group of psychiatric drugs, the anti-psychotics, developed simply because they were seen to work.

On the basis that these drugs seemed to have a helpful effect, a key theory about psychosis - the "dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia" - was constructed. In other words, the drugs were not developed to meet an error of chemical activity in the brain that was already identified and there is still argument about whether this theory is correct."

This is the antithesis of science.

A cursory examination of psychiatry reveals it to be non-scientific at the present time.

Let's hope someone somewhere is working on this. It needs to be re-thought as a medical speciality. Mental problems should be solved by those who study "the mind" and they are psychologists. The mind is at the least a concept. It is entirely dependent on the brain a physical organism. The links between "the mind" and the physiology of the body should be studied by human biologists and when these links are established progress can be made.

Someone needs to speak out for the millions of victims of psychiatry because they are often very marginalised.

Psychiatry can sometimes serve the function of mopping up those who unsurprisingly continue to be unable to cope with an insane society.

That's one reason why the victims keep coming. The "medication" that psychiatry dispenses which is almost always toxic is often nothing other than a "chemical cosh." How far we still have to come.

Psychiatric medication always works by impairing bodily function, never by curing an imbalance or anything else. The medical and scientific equivalent of cutting off your leg because you have grazed your knee.

"I sumbit that the traditional definition of psychiatry, which is still in vogue, places it alongside such things as alchemy and astrology, and commits it to the category of pseudo-science."

Thomas Szasz.

"The Myth of Mental Illness". 1962.

Are we heading in the right direction?

The current emphasis on therapy of some kind is definitely most welcome in my view.......

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There is even a case for abolishing psychiatry as a medical specialism.

It's conception of "mental illness" is profoundly mistaken and it is a mistake that we are exporting around the globe with the usual arrogance of the "West."


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I think that there is no such thing as a "mental illness."
Strictly speaking there cannot be a "mental illness", there can only be a physical illness.

It is a logical and semantic error like a "square circle."

To describe thoughts and/or behaviour of a person as exhibting a "mentally illness" is essentially the same as saying "I disapprove of the thoughts and/or behaviour of that person.".

You can have a mental condition, mental distress, psychological condition and psychological distress.

And you can use the terms "mental illness" and "mental health" as metaphors but they can lead to muddled thinking.

The mind cannot be "ill" or "healthy" as it is not a physical organism.

The mind has no physical existence since it is a just a CONCEPT.
It therefore cannot be sick or ill (except metaphorically).
What we call the mind is entirely sustained by the biological system of the body.
However it is not a physical system.

The mind can be spoken of as "ill" but only as a METAPHOR.

Only physical organisms can be "ill" and "healthy".

To be continued.

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Some lies of our time:

"i) Schizophrenia is a brain disease."
"ii) Schizophrenia exists in all cultures."

These are lies presented as facts. There is no evidence whatsoever to sustain these assertions.

Both found in a publication from around the year 2000 by UK psychiatrists.

The simple truth is that schizophrenia does not exist, and that at the present time conventional psychiatry is non-scientific.

These lies are effectively propaganda for what is amongst other things a system of social control. "Schizophrenia" is an ethnocentric concept if it is a concept at all.

In scientific terms the term "schizophrenia" is comparable to the term "phlogiston", except that the invention of the term "phlogiston" was based on better logic.

The term "schizophrenia" evolved as another term for "dementia praecox" - which literally means premature dementia - something that it no longer means.

It is a relic of early 20th century pseudo-science. A bit like the "Labour Theory of Value" is 19th century quasi-mystical pseudo-science.

"The experience and behavior that gets labeled schizophrenic is a special strategy that a person invents in order to live in an unlivable situation.” R.D. Laing.

The idea that "schizophrenia" - something that does not exist - can be called a "disease" represents a dishonesty and illogicality that is hard to comprehend.

Unless, perhaps, we are talking about oppression, labelling and social control. And maybe pharmaceutical profits. Or maybe just inertia and authority.

A psychiatrist has the power to imprison, poison and electrocute any individual.
Including you.

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In my opinion, there is no specific condition, disease, disorder or illness whether psychological, biological or of any kind called "schizophrenia".

Psychiatry is still in the early twentieth century.

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"Prozac: How it works. Prozac stimulates the brain's production of the enzyme serotonin, which can cause loss of libido. The enzyme also boosts self-esteem and helps people overcome negative and obsessive emotions..."

"The Independent On Sunday", 25th June 2006.

Well I never!

An enzyme that "boosts self-esteem"?

Hmmm....If there truly were an enzyme that directly boosted self-esteem then well er... we would be fine wouldn't we? :)

The idea that there is an enzyme that boosts self-esteem is obviously patent nonsense.

Does cocaine "boost self-esteem"?

It has been said that unhappiness is not a medical problem.............

If depression has been called "malignant sadness", the normal emotion of sadness gone haywire, then maybe what sometimes gets labelled "schizophrenia" could be "malignant imagination" the normal and fundamental mental faculty of imagination gone haywire.

After all maybe in a sense our entire mind is made up by imagination since we re-create almost every sense perception in our brain to make it a sense perception.

Who has had a "delusion", a "hallucination" and "an inappropriate emotional response" (whatever that is?) (all descriptions that have been used to describe what "schizophrenia" involves)? I would say probably everybody.

In my case I know there are reasons why I feel upset/depressed/negative whatever you want to call it. There are reasons. And these reasons involve things in my life. Not chemicals.
I think that's the case for most people.

In real terms, at the present time in the UK "schizophrenia" is a catch-all term for people who are regarded as "seriously mentally ill". And even the latter term is perhaps the same as little more than "very distressed."

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I heard Dorthy Rowe speak at the Anarchist Bookfair and, amongst other things, she said that there is strictly speaking no such thing as a lie-detector. It is incorrect science. Obvious really.

I wish she spoke more and carried on the pro-psychology cause within the psychiatric establishment. She spoke about power. I sometimes feel very powerless. She said we all have power. I suppose she has a point of a kind. She spoke about how governments and religions manipulate us by using fear. She is a great inspiration.


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Some people think they can do anything to animals.

The RSPCA don't.

Psychiatrists do.

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"Don't conform, won't conform, can't conform??

Then we will persecute you, poison you, incarcerate you, mutilate you, electrocute you." :

This is one possible interpretation of psychiatry's message to the world.

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REMEMBER LIVES RUINED BY PSYCHIATRY.

21 June 2006

Religion is indeed bullshit.

Religion is bullshit.
Religion is bullshit.

Religion is bullshti

Er... that's it.

or is it? :)

to be continued.

Well. Yes, religion is bullshit.

http://www.religionisbullshit.com/
http://www.religionisbullshit.net/

There might be the odd positive philosophical insight within religious cultures.
But basically.

Religion is bullshit.

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Whether it's bullshit or not we should have the freedom to criticise it profoundly.
There are many instances of religion leading to absurd and immoral beliefs and acts.
....

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Thursday, June 08, 2006

One of the Best Books I Have Ever Read


I have just read "A History of God" by Karen Armstrong. It is one of the best books I have ever read because of its keen understanding of religion. The history of the biggest wild goose chase ever, like A.N. Wilson says.

It has given me what I think is a more complete understanding of Kabbalah, William Blake and many others things. Whether Kabbalah and William Blake are of any significance to me is another thing.
I think that she may have a slightly romanticised view of what a "true" religion is. She has said that "terrorism" or "war" is not compatible with the essence of any religion. Yet religion or more accurately tribalism and (religious) dogma have been factors or even causes of war.
......
She says that humans are perhaps a religious species, man a homo religiousus that cannot but create religions.
I am not so sure.
Religion is a subject that really interests me.

She does not seem to acknowledge enough the truth of the harm that is done by religion.
"Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum" ("So potent is religion in persuading to do evil deeds." Lucretius, "De Rerum Natura".)
She would no doubt say that it is only a perversion of true religion that causes people to do harm.
This may be true but there has been a lot of it in history.

To be continued.
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(Maybe any rigid ideology or dogma can persuade us to commit great evil....)


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There is an absolutely fantastic speech by Karen Armstrong here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJMm4RAwVLo


12 May 2006

Education in "Utopia"

Education Education Education

"In his great work Equality [1931], R. H. Tawney pointed out that the English educational system "will never be one worthy of a civilised society until the children of all classes in the nation attend the same schools . . . The idea that differences of educational opportunities among children should depend upon differences of wealth represents a barbarity.""

England is perhaps unique in Europe in the sense that it is still fully in the grips of the utter barbarity described above.

It's not that private schools should be abolished (though that might help things). It is that they should not be necessary!

The idea that an education system in England that is different to the current one represents a "utopia" is false.
"Utopia" means "nowhere."
And a different educational system to the English one exists "everywhere in Europe except England".
This is hardly "nowhere"!

"Education! Education! Education!" says TB.

There will never be a solution to the problems of English education until New Labour fully addresses the crux of the problem as expressed by Tawney above.

I remember feeling annoyed at the age of 9 when I realised that the school I was going to was far better than the schools of other children in terms of the quality of the education and the facilities; and that my parents were nearly bankrupting themselves to send me there. It made me feel angry at the injustice even at that age. Also there was the pressure for exam results. The place was just an exam factory where your parents bought you a ticket to keep you in the middle classes.

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"England is the most class-ridden country under the sun. It is a land of snobbery and privilege, ruled largely by the old and silly."

George Orwell.

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I don't think semi-privatised academies are the answer either.

http://www.antiacademies.org.uk/

...

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It is contended that there is no reason why education should not be provided as a supposed charitable good.
Why not let health or transport be run by charities as well?
Ridiculous isn't it?
Health and transport could be run by charities.
But what kind of society would tolerate that the best transport and the best health was provided by so-called private "charities"?
Education is just as important as health and transport provision.
The bottom line remains that (very) rich people should never have a (much) better education than (very) poor people.

In England, uniquely and barbarously, this is very much the case.

It is utterly disgusting and intolerable.
And it quite simply would not be tolerated were England in any way a civilised entity.
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It also must be pointed out that many so-called "public" schools in England were founded in the late medieval period with the explicit intention of educating the poor or the general populace....
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All education should be secular and non-denominational.

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"Utopia" etymologically either means "good place" or "no place"/"nowhere".
"A good place" is not necessarily something that should not be strived for in my view.
Or at least "a better place".
Calling it "nowhere" is also conducive to being realistic. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't try and improve things.



11 May 2006

"Disillusionment" with Politics.

Stop Press! Rant

The current supposed disillusionment and disengagement with politics is in reality the direct and desired result of capitalism.

Saw Stephen Fry on telly last night and I can be silent no longer. He seemed to say "Our government is corrupt because we are. Our government is vermin because we are."
Bollocks.

New Labour is not the party of the people. New Labour/ The US Democrat Party of England is the party of business.

On shows like "This Week" and "The Daily Politics" politics is presented as entertainment. Issues are presented along with pop music and graphics which trivialise the issues and distance them from the viewer. Above all nothing is serious in this view. And even if it were serious there is nothing you or I or anyone can do about it. According to the "This Week" view, politics is out of the reach of ordinary people and has it's own coterie of political celebrities who we must worship. It was always thus, and always will be.

Politics is not serious. It's just the way it is. The only parties worth hearing from are the main parties. And who are the main parties? The ones we say are the main parties. Is it government by, for and of the media??

Politics is just parliament, politicians, celebrities and the media.
It is not allowed to be anything else.

(I exaggerate of course. It is supposed to be for effect :)

"A vibrant political culture needs community groups, libraries, public schools, neighbourhood organizations, cooperatives, public meeting places, voluntary associations, and trade unions to provide ways for citizens to meet, communicate, and interact with their fellow citizens. Neoliberal democracy with its notion of the market uber alles, takes dead aim at this sector. Instead of citizens, it produces consumers. Instead of communities, it produces shopping malls. The net result is an atomized society of disengaged individuals who feel demoralized and socially powerless."

Robert W.McChesney.

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10 May 2006

Loyal to Lovely

Friday, May 19, 2006

Loyal to Lovely


Another (in my view:) interesting blog from the sunny cyber land of Lovely.
I am a citizen of Lovely. Why don't you join up too at:
www.citizensrequired.com/


From the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:-

"Article 15.(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights Adopted and proclaimed by UN General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of 10 December 1948 "

Are the UN denying King Danny and Lovelians their human rights?

The country of Lovely has no more nor no less right to exist than any other country or state.

Countries or, more accurately perhaps, states, are completely arbitrary and, ultimately, an absurdity.

(Maybe states are to a point a necessary evil and a necessary absurdity. I am not so sure.)

Countries and nationalism are in a sense an absurdity. We're all humans.

"My country is the world; my religion is to do good."
Tom Paine.

Long live King Danny!

"A STATE [is] An arbitrarily-defined part of the earth's surface, occasionally having a human population with a common culture and language, which is more or less cut off from all other parts of the world and forms the geographical base for centralised and hierarchical control of its human population by powerful elites. The division of the world into states is a condition so much taken for granted that we almost never stop to think why we have states at all, why we need them, and what the world might be like without them..."

John Button, Dictionary of Green Ideas, 1988.

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The lovely cyberland of Lovely is also where I picked up my internet name, CitizenSofa.

Lovely - King Danny's country - is in fact a flat. So my thought process was that some of the furniture might be citizens of Lovely.
Then one of my proposals for the name of the country was "Union of Sofa Socialist Republics" which, even though I say it myself, is quite funny.
Armchair Anarchists and Sofa Socialists abound on these kind of sites after all.
So that's how I came up with my name.
I was briefly Citizen Bidet on the message boards because I believe in bidets as opposed to the disgusting English invention of toilet paper.... Don't get me started.
Then I changed to Citizen Sofa.
I don't really like it anymore but I am sort of stuck with it.
I am not sure if I want to be a "citizen" of anywhere. I am an anarchist.
I suppose I could still change it. Might well do.





8 May 2006

A Myth About the Middle East


Thursday, May 25, 2006

A Myth About the Middle East


"...Arab society and much of the Muslim world are not dictatorial or intellectually paralysed because of religion, but the other way around - it is the existence, for other reasons, of such states and societies that itself produces a paralysed religion."

(Myth 86, p.165, "100 Myths about the Middle East",  2005, by Fred Halliday.)

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Destruction and deprivation lead to a more primitive religion; development of all kinds can lead to reform and cultural development.
This general principle obviously does not just apply to the Middle East and Islam.

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In the Middle East and Afghanistan American policy was a major cause of the rise of Islamic fundamentalism.

7 May 2006

Discussion of "The Sane Society" by Eric Fromm.











Interesting Book - "The Sane Society" (1955) by Eric Fromm.

I read "The Sane Society" by the psychologist Eric Fromm a few weeks back.
Even though it was written in 1955, I think it is still relevant today, maybe even more so. 
That was near the beginning of the sort of period we're in and he diagnosed some of the problems at the outset.
It was a great relief to find someone saying what is obvious. Our society is basically unhealthy, insane. :)

He spends the first two thirds of the book saying why this is so and slagging off capitalist society of the last couple of centuries and then in the last third he tries to come up with an answer to the vitally important question: "It's all very well you slagging everything off but what would you do and how would you do it?"

He sketches out some answers and they are quite convincing. I don't think they are utopian. I think they're only natural.

One thing that he stresses and that J.K. Galbraith and E.F. Schumacher (for example) stress is that the conventional economic way of looking at the world is relatively new and complete bollocks.

I also read "The Economics of Innocent Fraud" by J.K. Galbraith, one of the greatest economists who ever lived and he seemed to be saying that his whole subject was bullshit:) .

I wish the style of this little book was less ironic and elusive. I wish he'd been more concrete in it. 
I can't help thinking he was reluctant to spell it all out.
The conventional view of work, employment and unemployment is questioned by Galbraith in this book, his last and in his view his best.

Eric Fromm also believed that a component of a sane society was a basic guaranteed income for all, as explained in the book. So I am not the only one. E.F. Schumacher also makes the point that work must come to be regarded as work and not just as paid work. I will put up a quote about this.
Andre' Gorz, another Green philosopher, also believed in some kind of basic income.

I think Eric Fromm is a sensible psychologist, and an excellent thinker.

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Another thing to ask, which is relevant to the question of cultural lag, is :
Why should people be encouraged more to read "The Communist Manifesto" of 1848 - also why should more people have heard of it? - than "The Sane Society" of 1955??

In the year 2048 - if we are still here - will people find "The Communist Manifesto" more relevant than "The Sane Society"?
And will it still be the case that far more people will have heard of "The Communist Manifesto" than "The Sane Society"??

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BASIC INCOME 
EARTH NETWORK:

http://www.basicincome.org/bien/

6 May 2006

"The Everything Industry" - a poem

The Everything Industry - a poem

The Everything Industry
Why today is everything an industry?
Is it just a new hyper-logical use of language?
Or conspiracy of ideology?
Or neither?
Just the result of the profit motive ruling
For the last few decades?
Industrial relations
Crushed by the wheels of industry
Industry Shmindustry
Everything's an industry
There is no room for anything that
Doesn't make money now.
It's here or brought near
the time when everything
Has a price.
And nothing is a service
No one serves
Industry is a technical term for economists and geographers
Not a way of life
We used to Say the X trade
the trade
now it's more
There is something wrong about these words
There is something wrong here
I can't put my finger on it
But I know there is something wrong
It has jarred in my ears
For at least a few years
Which sound strange to you now?
The media industry
The health industry
The mental health industry
The football industry
The mental health industry
The holocaust industry
The parking industry
The food industry
The pornography industry
The travel industry
The train industry
The postal industry
The teaching industry
The knowledge industry
The religious industry
The church industry
The defence industry
The war industry
The funeral industry
The baptism industry
The academic industry
The university industry
The monsastery industry
The biology industry
The music industry
The film industry
The money industry
The leisure industry
The idleness industry
The health industry
The industry industry
The politics industry
The art industry
The poetry industry
The gaming industry
The gambling industry
The sex industry
The charity industry
The hope industry
The faith industry
The space industry
The service industry
The devotion industry
The justice industry
The truth industry
The birth industry
The death industry
The love industry
The life industry

18 December 2005

A note on the use of the term "holocaust"

I was listening to George Galloway's radio show at the weekend.
It's very often the only thing worth tuning in to.
I like him and many of his views.

He made a point that pertains directly to the contents of this think tank.
He said that there was only one holocaust: The Holocaust. With a capital "T" and a capital "H".

It is undoubtedly true that the Holocaust is an incidence of genocide that is very probably unique in various ways.

However, if a holocaust means or can mean a genocide or a great slaughter, then to say that the Holocaust is the only holocaust is to limit language unreasonably, as well as being factually incorrect.

Also the sanctify the Holocaust linguistically in this way, even though the Holocaust is probably unique in various ways, is to seem to create a hierarchy of genocides, something that would reasonably be seen as repugnant.

There have been many genocides and massacres in history - who is to say that only one should be referred to as a "holocaust"?

The word obviously has the effect of dramatizing and enhancing the negative aspects of a genocide. "Genocide" is more factual; "holocaust" is more emotive. "Holocaust" maybe implies more malicious intent and makes it sound more extreme.

The point about my spoof posters included in this think tank which included the phrases "Iraqi Holocaust", "Irish Holocaust" and "Iberian Holocaust" - terms which I do not personally think are inappropriate - is that they are based on the idea of an exhibition. They are to be seen in comparison with the posters advertising the Holocaust Exhibition in London.

I personally think many other expressions such as African American Holocaust and Armenian Holocaust are perfectly justified.

If there is a permanent and prominent Holocaust exhibition at the Imperial-ist War Museum in London, then this is giving public, prominent and permanent recognition of this genocide.

Recognition of some other genocides is far from being achieved in some cases and this is the point I was trying to make with my posters.

In my opinion the above makes sense in the context of the name of Holocaust Memorial Day, which I think is correctly named.
To remember the Holocaust and all holocausts.

http://www.hmd.org.uk/

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http://www.aegistrust.org/

4 September 2005

Hiroshima - The Worst Terrorist Attack in Human History






Hiroshima, whether justified or not - and it is possible that it was justified - was the worst, most destructive single (state) (terrorist) attack in human history. Let us hope this remains the case.

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Just to balance things out I will put this....

After the first bomb was dropped surrender was fully expected within moments. There was blood in the fireball. A town was rubbed out like a full stop with an eraser. And yet no surrender came. Three days later this was repeated. And still no surrender came.

A testament to the malevolent power of over-fanatical belief. "Tantum nationalismus potuit suadare malorum."...

There is still anger today in the UK about the way that Japan conducted the war.

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Monday, September 04, 2006


Something amiss

Martin Amis on Mohammed Atta in the Observer.Well. er. i will shut up. for now.

OK So Mohammed Atta may have been a reptilian religious psychopath.

As well as a human being of course.
And there might be not much more to it. I don't know.

Amis may not have been saying "those people are just like that" but I don't know if he avoided giving that impression.

But, most importantly, why doesn't someone write an essay examining the person and mind of an American "soldier" bulldozing sand over suffocating Iraqi conscripts?

Anyway I'm pretty fed up with everyone saying that 9/11 was some kind of uniquely evil event that changed the world.

It certainly didn't change the determination of the USA to invade in Iraq. The US was going to invade Iraq anyway.

I think the 15th/16th January 1991 was just as evil, disturbing and distressing as 9/11. But no one else seems to.

The 16th January 1991 as just as evil as "9/11". 


"16/01" was worse and more evil event than "9/11" in my view.

It needs to be said that Amis' essay on nuclear weapons, "Thinkability", is really good. It is a very complete and precise exposition of why they need to be opposed. Wonderfully written too.

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