bilblogz

Calendars

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:51:00 +0000

My idea for a non-religious calendar useful for historians, without negative dates (BCE) and without the problem of the non-existent year zero (as CE starts with year 1 and the year before that is 1 BCE), is as follows:

Pick a nice convenient confirmed year, such as the birth of Julius Caesar (100 BCE), and then add 100,000 years, so that we have a year zero at 100,100 BCE. This makes converting dates relatively easy: add 100,100 to any CE date and subtract 1 - so 2012 becomes 102,111; for BCE dates simply subtract the year from 100,100, so 33 BCE becomes 100,077.

Religion as Psychological Infantilism

Thu, 13 Sep 2012 16:21:42 +0100

Religion is a form of infantilism, of psychological immaturity, where the adult retains a childish desire to earn parental approval: striving for that pat on the head and reward for being good. The fairy-parent fills the void which a real father or mother, being seen as more and more fallible as they age, cannot maintain. Pious expressions on the faces of the faithful, both in religious art and in living congregations, are identical to the triumphant looks of the goody-goody youngster who has received praise from an adult.

Worship, prayer, hymn-singing are all ways of saying: “Look how virtuous I am!” and of begging for that approbation; they are at the same time saying: “Look how bad are all those who do not act the way I do! So am I not the most virtuous?”

Those who impose religion on their children are therefore abusing them mentally, by putting them into a psychological strait-jacket which restricts their mental development. Those who adopt religion as adults are obviously insecure in some way and in need of quick and easy psychological support without having to think or to face up to the realities of life and death.

21st century Cautionary Tales #1: Wayne Wonky

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 18:45:33 +0100

Wayne Wonky

Wayne Wonky was a normal child,

his brain a blank, his actions wild,

preferring to play the silly fool

rather than concentrate at school.

His parents, Sid and Sarah Wonky,

had brought him up much like a donkey :

the only discipline he’d got:

their warning not to be a swot.

His dad said: “Friends feel ineffectual

in the company of an intellectual,

and you end up without any pals,

unable to attract the gals.”

SoWayneturned naughty, then turned bad,

became a really wicked lad,

and then at last he got a gun

as several other boys had done.

Being of such low intellect,

they thought it gained them more respect.

One day, the iron in his hand,

and consequently feeling grand,

Waynemarched into a store and said:

“Give me your money, or you’re dead!”

The shopkeeper, a man of grit,

said: “Oh piss off, you little shit!”

and with his trusty baseball bat

he bashedWayne’s head and knocked him flat.

The moral is that little boys

don’t get respect with dangerous toys.

Jesus the Rebel

Tue, 15 May 2012 06:47:41 +0100

Any serious study of Roman history explains clearly why Jesus would have been executed. He was proclaimed by his followers as the “Messiah”, i.e. the anointed king of the Jews, and therefore he represented a rebel movement trying to unify the 4 tetrarchies into which Rome had divided Israel. This is backed up by the genealogy in the New Testament which claims his descent from King David, and thus making him the rightful King of Israel. The mocking label of INRI at his crucifixion, as well as belittling the rebel movement, would have been a serious warning to others .

So we can forget all the preaching, miracle-working and prophecy-fulfillment which has been tacked onto the history in order to make him a martyr, and to give weight to the idea of descent from a semi-divine ancestor. The earliest Christians were simply an anti-Roman Jewish sect in Palestine, but were skilfully hi-jacked by the likes of Paul of Tarsus and turned into something with more universal appeal, and later legitimized by Constantine for political reasons.

The Christian movement has always been about grubby politics.

Political Correct Fascism

Sat, 24 Mar 2012 10:10:00 +0000

Must we tolerate the offensive manifestations of religious fascism in a liberal society? Uber-PC values advocate that we must respect all other cultures and religions or be labeled racist.

The arguments for and against the wearing of face-coverings in public all hinge on this, and they come down basically to pedantic discussion of whether the niqab/burqa is religious, cultural or political. It is certainly not seen as necessary or even acceptable by the majority of Muslims.

But if a society must widen its scope to accept what is deeply offensive to its cultural values, then on the same basis, as well as the burqa we must accept female circumcision, enforced marriage, honour killings, polygamy, and perhaps some other more bizarre and disgusting traditions.

You can’t have it both ways.

Bias at the Beeb

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 11:17:00 +0000

The BBC always claim that they strive to keep an unbiased stance on the news, however their understanding of ‘unbiased’ is very limited, based on legislation, and it means simply ‘politically non-partisan’. On many other issues they have no qualms about being blatantly biased, only covering favourably what they think the majority of their audience want to know, and totally ignoring or covering scornfully many other events.

This can be seen at a basic level in the hierarchy of importance with which they report the main news items - domestic events of minor significance coming well before important international items.

Back in the 1980s they were guilty together with most of the media of ignoring or belittling the gay movement, only briefly and sneeringly report 10,000-strong Pride marches and so on, while giving great prominence to a story about half-a-dozen ladies presenting a petition at Number 10 about street litter in the suburbs.

The ultimate was in 1988, when thousands marched - on an officially permitted route - down Whitehall to protest against the infamous Section 28; there was a total media blackout of this, nothing was mentioned in the news at all, even though the march exploded into a full-blown riot when some of the protesters attempted to enter Downing Street to present their grievances to Thatcher. At that time there was no gate at the entrance to the street, just a bar raised to allow cars through, and the few police manning that bar were almost overwhelmed by the crowd - I witnessed their batons being brandished, people being beaten up, dragged by the hair as reinforcements rushed in, and on the rooftops there suddenly appeared sinister figures with what looked like automatic rifles. It was the stewards who eventually calmed things down, but the march never managed to reach its intended rally in Parliament Square.

The BBC didn’t report any of this, even as a footnote. I’ve never trusted them since that day.

Clarkson

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 09:50:12 +0000

That idiot Jeremy Clarkson

Talks shit on each subject he starts on:

His comments so crass

All come out of his ass,

So his underwear has dirty marks on.

Thanksgiving

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 10:07:37 +0000

Thanksgiving celebrates the date back in the 17th century when Britain rid itself of a bunch of narrow-minded bigots, who sailed off to America and founded a colony of ugly puritanism. Good riddance!

However, other narrow-minded bigots are nowadays trying to impose their perverted ideas here, since there’s nowhere else for them to go and colonize - we must not allow it!

We struggled for centuries to develop an enlightened, virtually secular government in the UK, and this must not be watered down by misguided politically ‘correct’ ideas of allowing backward cultural values to have ascendancy over hard-won rights.

Fundamentalists of all kinds have no moral reservations about imposing their fascist principles on the rest of us against our will, and respecting them is the thin edge of a very dangerous wedge.

Who owes what and to who exactly?

Fri, 12 Aug 2011 09:53:16 +0100

When we hear Britain and other countries are in debt, who are the actual creditors? Who is so rich they can bail out every country in Europe as well as the USA, and then demand stringent repayment conditions?

The answer is the same financial institutions who created the credit crunch in the first place, the same crooks who created toxic debt in the property markets, the same corrupt people who give countries a credit rating, and the same people who are playing fast and loose with the stock markets right now so that they can buy up even more of our counties on the cheap – while at the same time forcing governments to make cuts and squeeze ordinary people of every last penny to make themselves even more powerful.

It’s not a conspiracy theory, it’s a conspiracy fact.

Thatcher to blame for riots?

Tue, 09 Aug 2011 10:59:05 +0100

I know it’s fuddy-duddy to say this, but I think the roots of all this trouble go back to the 1960s when teaching self-discipline and respect for others became unfashionable, and now it’s instilled through 2 or 3 generations who, like Thatcher, have no concept of society nor social responsibility. Heavy manners needed!!

My Nightmares

Sun, 26 Jun 2011 08:54:43 +0100

My Nightmares

We don’t need oil - this has been known since1960’s...

Wed, 15 Jun 2011 11:41:03 +0100

We don’t need oil - this has been known since1960’s (by pookengeenaka)

Linguistic mixup

Tue, 08 Feb 2011 11:52:20 +0000

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2951&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Photo

Tue, 25 Jan 2011 08:26:07 +0000

Take-off

Tue, 25 Jan 2011 08:23:57 +0000

Take-off

Glug

Fri, 26 Nov 2010 02:40:00 +0000

Glug

Euston sunlight 2

Fri, 26 Nov 2010 02:39:00 +0000

Euston sunlight 2

Photo

Fri, 29 Oct 2010 13:43:32 +0100

Tea Party activist.

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 12:14:01 +0100

Tea Party activist.

Notice the similarity?

Sun, 13 Jun 2010 19:45:22 +0100

Notice the similarity?