This juxtaposition startled the pond today …
Yes, the dog botherer went there …but perhaps some remarkable sixth sense told the dog botherer to keep it short ...
Strange, the pond had never noticed a reluctance by the reptiles when it came to slurring Islamics, but never let it be said that women should walk the streets unconcerned about their safety.
That sort of wild-eyed talk can only lead to trouble …
As for the dog botherer talking about not spitting blame and guilt widely, the pond just had to roll the jaffas down the aisle, and will bear it in mind, the next time the dog botherer announces the next crisis in Western Civilisation, and assigns the blame and the guilt … you wretches know who you are ...
That sort of wild-eyed talk can only lead to trouble …
As for the dog botherer talking about not spitting blame and guilt widely, the pond just had to roll the jaffas down the aisle, and will bear it in mind, the next time the dog botherer announces the next crisis in Western Civilisation, and assigns the blame and the guilt … you wretches know who you are ...
And so to the alarming news from the Islamics, as the current crisis in Western Civilisation gets wider and deeper …
Oh dear, could we just have a rising intonation of the kind that marks Western Civilisation?
What's all this pious talk about interconnectedness, when it goes without saying that Western Civilisation is infinitely superior and like certain chefs, reigns supreme?
Oh dear, the reptile search for a solution is getting more and more desperate, yet this morning the reptiles had come up with the ultimate course design on the tree-killer front page edition …
Tertiary education conducted by polling … with courses blessed by pollsters!
The pond wondered whether they'd included a question for the pond in the survey: "Should universities offer courses in Star Wars or Star Trek, and in the event of a tie, should the pond's preference for a course in The Twilight Zone win the day?"
The pond has no idea why the story wasn't blessed with a Lobbecke, to guarantee its cult status.
The pond has no idea why the story wasn't blessed with a Lobbecke, to guarantee its cult status.
Instead some reptile had the idea of decorating the story with a gormless youff, positioned next to a statue, which produced a masterly piece of comedy …
The reptiles will simply not let go of the dream, of that desperate, fragile ANU dreaming that now seems lost, unless, oh unless they read this poignant plea and have a change of heart…
And the pond really has to hand it to the indefatigable Urban, who keeps living the Sisyphean nightmare as she shovels the shit from the Augean stables …
Meanwhile, it seems Young Liberal Wilks is shocked to discover that there are so many "isms" out there are in the world.
And the pond really has to hand it to the indefatigable Urban, who keeps living the Sisyphean nightmare as she shovels the shit from the Augean stables …
Meanwhile, it seems Young Liberal Wilks is shocked to discover that there are so many "isms" out there are in the world.
Did any reptile stop to tell him that the suffix "ism" reflected the most noble aspects of Western Civilisation?
Apparently not, apparently the young Liberal youff of today are in a state of "ism" overload …a kind of Tism crisis, if you will ...
Will no one save the reptiles from their suffering? And the endless litany of woe?
Bring on a poll.
Why just as the ancient universities of Cambridge and Oxford had their courses designed by poll, so should the modern universities of Oz heed the reptile pollster …
Of course the reptile question is a tad loaded in the usual push-pull way.
What if they'd asked, The Australian National University has a centre for Twilight Zone studies, and offers a bachelor of Star Wars studies. Do you think it should offer a degree of study in Star Wars?
The pond has never seen such high and low comedy perpetrated so regularly, and with so many diligent reptiles on the case …
Here, have a higher education tweet …because the pond can't get enough of that EXCLUSIVE photo.
And now, as its lunchtime, the pond has arranged a kind of watermelon cake snack of the kind sold by the Black Star to Asian tourists wanting to clog the full to overflowing intertubes with digital snaps ...
Of course the pond is wildly secular, and so is always keen to learn why devotees of cannibalism - actual flesh, real blood - should have the right to pronounce on women's bodies, denounce homosexuality, and behave badly in relation to a host of other matters ...
Okay if devotees of cannibalism want to go on being cannibals, the pond has no objection, but it does reserve the right to take a view when these cannibals begin to intrude on the public sphere and urge their incomprehensible beliefs on others, especially when urging politicians to take actions that will impose their beliefs on society at large ...
Well there you go, in a nutshell "Unlike a person's race or sex" …
Sorry, in the world of the pond, gender fluidity is a given, and idle chatter about the right to shape the world according to fundamentalist bigotry isn't a freedom the pond much cares about …
It led to the sort of nonsense that saw the likes of Alan Turing endure chemical castration …while the wretchedness of conversion therapy is still making many suffer needlessly …
Why even at this moment the federal government is funding chaplains in schools, of a kind completely useless for the rising hordes of sensible secularists ...
If Dragovic had bothered to spend a nanosecond on the suffering caused by mindless bigots the pond might have paid attention …but if religious capital is just another word for the ongoing persecution of minorities, then the pond will keep on making jokes about fundamentalists, whether they be Islamic, Xian, Scientological or Hindu …
And so to the reptiles spreading the word for the Donald …
By golly, that's inspirational, that's historical … that's …so silly ...
In other words.....
ReplyDeleteWau, just as well that China (and India) don't allow "religious freedom" then, isn't it, or they'd already control the world economy.
DeleteIt seems as though the squawking cock-or-two is incapable of seeing that their is a direct link between the macho-aggressive never ending war on terror worldview that he promotes, and the world-wide epidemic of violence against women.
ReplyDeleteIt's been interesting to see how the argument has morphed from the original concern about academic independence (sparked by the fuckwit Abbott) into all sorts of other shit about leftward lurches in tertiary education. I sense the dead hand of the rodent here, y'know, a phone call or two, an email, a lunch meeting... his rat cunning is stamped all over. The poor academics don't stand a chance.
ReplyDeleteUrbanity of Urbanities: "The overwhelming public support for the course --"
ReplyDeleteReally ? "THE" course ? When precisely none of those polled have seen any specification, or even just a description, of "THE" course ? When the course has been described as not a "Western civilisation" course so much as just a funky little "liberal arts" jaunt through a few of the works of art, literature and, in a very small way, the philosophy of a very few people who could, with much self-connivance, be called "Western".
Oh, and BOC, the Newspoll trolls didn't include the word 'Ramsay' in the poll question. Don't want to scare the rubes.
After all, what is it that The Urbanism herself says: "The Ramsay Centre, which has proposed a curriculum based on the "great books" courses offered by US liberal arts colleges ..."
Oh yeah, "great books" indeed. Do you reckon 'Stranger in a Strange Land' will make it into the list ?
But hey, at a rate of say, one week of intensive study per book (and that's more than enough, isn't it ?), and assuming about 40 or so weeks in the study year (even with their $25,000 "scholarship" they'll still need to work over the holiday periods to keep life and limb together), then they'll cover 120 books in a 3 year degree. Or 160 books if they go for a "US liberal arts college" 4 year degree.
Wau, 160 books of which each has taken about 50 hours of intensive study to master all their subleties and meanings. Yep, that'd be some great degree, woudn't it - after all, with 120 books, you might have made it as far as the middle ages in "Western civilisation" at the end of that.
Oh, I just noticed: the Urbanity reckons that Ramsay is offering $25,000 per year scholarships. Oh well, in that case, 52 books per year ! 156 books in a 3 year degree ! Yep, that'd cover the whole of Western civilisation, wouldn't it.
PS: the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam is out - that's only in the Islamic course. As is Sinbad and Ali Baba and The Thousand and One Nights ...
As for Denis Dragovic and his "religious freedoms', well I wonder how he would view militant Scientologists entering his church on Sunday to preach their religion under the 'protected freedom of religion' banner ?
But mostly, we all know that the Christian Bible states very clearly that people who work on the Sabbath must be put to death (Exodus 31:14,15). So, I'm all in favour of protection of religious freedom but only for those who genuinely practise their religion. If you do not put to death those who desecrate the Sabbath, then you have simply proved that you are not a Christian and you get no guarantees of 'religious freedom'.
Chewing over old cabbage here, but I have to bite. The Dragovic kiddie has made a few statements regarding the benefits of religion that are very questionable. Religious observance seems to have benefits for some individuals but to argue that it benefits society seems a bit rich. Societies with poor social outcomes tend to be more religious.
ReplyDeleteI think I have posted this before but the key take away is "Data correlations show that in almost all regards the highly secular democracies consistently enjoy low rates of societal dysfunction, while pro-religious and anti-evolution America performs poorly"
https://dspace2.creighton.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10504/64409/2005-11.pdf?sequence=1
Like you DP I don't understand "freedom" in terms of forcing one's views onto others. I think the correct response is "fuck off"
Interesting link there, Bef. It starts with this assertion: "Two centuries ago there was relatively little dispute over the existence of God, or the societally beneficial effect of popular belief in a creator. "
DeleteHmm "there was relatively little dispute" ? In a world in which each religion has its own worshipped entity which they all call "God" or something like that, anyway. According to various polls and surveys, only about 33% of the world's current population identifies as "Christian" and a fair percentage of them (Protestant, Orthodox etc) don't actually believe in 'God' who is exclusively a property of Roman Catholics.
Yeah I know that a lot of Islamists think, in their crazy, mucked-up way, that "christians" do actually believe in the same "god" as Muslims, but not many of the "christians" agree.
So, assuming the percentage of the various "god believers" was more or less the same 200 years ago as it is now, then clearly about 2/3rds of humanity vigorously disputed, and in fact vehemently denied, the existence of "God" even then. And in any case, Buddhists (about 7% of world population) and Secular/Agnostic/Atheist (about 16%) don't believe in a creator at all.
And only about 50% of 'christians' are Roman Catholics. Now while I grant that this is much more than were Roman Catholics 2000 years ago, it's been slipping for a while now - indeed Islam replaced Roman Catholicism as the world's largest religion a fair few years ago - and that's true even if you only count Sunni muslims and forget Shias.. Do you think it might be, as Joe Ratzinger has quite clearly said, time for God to sack the RC Church and start again ?
Yeah - knock it down.
DeleteJust as an amusing aside, I know people who are effectively atheists who nominated as Christians in the last census because they they didn't want the Muslims to "win". Not sure how 2.6% of the population was a threat to them but it lead them to lie. There is no way of knowing but my own suspicion is that a large number of people nominate as religious for purely tribal reasons without any real spiritual belief.
Well I have to say that the vast majority of people I meet who claim to be 'christian' have never even opened a Bible, much less read one. So what it is exactly that they claim they believe in, I have no idea whatsoever.
Delete