'Rants & Raves'
Er war überall in den Zeitungen, zumindest hierzulande (aber auch Google News bringt ein paar Treffer): der 400-Pfund Gorilla (ja, so ist er noch gefährlicher als mit seinen kontinentalen 180 kg), der vergangenen Freitag mitten im Hemelvaart-Wooling über den 4 Meter breiten Wassergraben sprang, der seine Insel vom Publikum trennt, eine Frau angriff und das Mobiliar des Zoorestaurants “Oewanja Lodge”.
Heute wird bekannt, dass Bokito im Zoo von Berlin grossgezogen wurde, mit Flasche und Liebe, Lätzchen um und Pizzaessen mit den Pflegern — die totale Publikumsattraktion (“jööö, es Äffli”). An seinem letzten Tag in Berlin sass er still in einer Ecke, die eine Hand auf die Brust gelegt, den Kopf in die andere gestützt — “Ein Affentheater mit Tränen”, so die Beliner Zeitung.
Das ist Geschichte, vielleicht muss der Rotterdamer Zoo-Direktor hinter Gitter, oder aber die ach so lieben steinewerfenden Kinderleing, die den Affen provozierten … doch was uns bewegt ist die Frage nach der Zukunft. Eben hatten wir doch noch jööö — Knut. Das Setting stimmt: Zoo Berlin, aufgezogen mit der Flasche, die totale Publikumsattraktion. So werden sie also gezüchtet, die neuen Animals’ Rights Terroristen. Bei Bokito dauerte es 11 Jahre von der Flasche zur Attacke. Wo immer Knut auch sein wird 2028 — seid auf der Hut. Oder werden Eisbären gar schneller gross?
The BBC reports from a publication by the Police Federation of England and Wales about their daily duties. These include for example:
Cautioning a man from Cheshire for being “found in possession of an egg with intent to throw”, arresting a child in Kent (the kid removed a slice of cucumber from a sandwich and threw it at another youngster), or arresting two children from Manchester for being in possession of a plastic toy pistol (at least some educational effort there, but better would have been to arrest the kids’ parents).
The Police Federation of England and Wales claim that this is a consequence of Labour’s red tape “targets” — the development of which was portrayed by Adam Curtis in his BBC documentary The Trap – What Happened To Our Dream Of Freedom?. .rm files might be here…
The music industry and its execs “lament the state of industry” (CNet) at a conference in New York today. Essentially they blame consumers (these days normally labelled as pirates in the music industry lingo) for not following their antiquated business model any more.
However, they follow a weird line of thought: “we are part of a (capitalist) market economy, hence we are guaranteed to make profits (whatever business model we apply) … and if not, a (any) law has to be established which forces society to give us the money we deserve (according to our business plan, not according to any products or services we deliver).
This sounds like a socialist call for guaranteed minimum*) wages for everybody … except that: “this time round it is only for the music execs — sorry, mate”
*) “Minimum” is merely depending on where you’re coming from
On 21 feb 2007, at 9:45, paperboy@nevis.scotsman.com wrote:
Brothers put in a geed wyord to save an ancient Scottish dialect from extinction
WHEN Bobby and Gordon Hogg meet up for a chat, they enter a linguistic world that few, if any, can no longer understand.
obviously, the paperboy email writers can even no longer understand the more common dialects written in Scotland … the original (& correct) line in the article reads:
WHEN Bobby and Gordon Hogg meet up for a chat, they enter a linguistic world that few, if any, can now understand.
So it seems that even Scottish copy & paste skills are affected….
I would not ask, if it was that easy. Since, actually, it isn’t. It was on the way back from an outdoor (sort-of) exhibition, België-Nederland / Nederland-België at Fort Ellewoutswijk, when we decided to stop quickly at a nice little town just off the road. The roads were busy with German tourists and the stingy sound of a piper was in the air. In front of the Town Hall — the Saltire. Finally it was confirmed what we had suspected: the small town of Veere was hosting the fourth Schots-Veerse festival.
Police chief backed over Menezes: “Met Police chief Sir Ian Blair’s account of the aftermath of the shooting of an innocent Brazilian man is backed by a senior officer.”
(Via BBC News.)
“A CONTROVERSIAL bid by Aberdeen City Council to become the first local authority in Scotland to outlaw begging from its streets, has been rejected by the Scottish Executive.” (Scotsman)
The initiator of the bid, a certain Mr. Greig (LibDem … reflect on that abbreviation!), sees one of the main reasons for beggars to frequent Aberdeen City Centre at night time being that “people who are drunk come out of the pubs and clubs and feel very generous to humanity in general” (so he told the Scotsman). Any regular punter would, however, welcome this development, since traditionally generosity to humanity in Aberdeen used to express itself in attacks of the more violent kind on innocent passers-by.
(Via The Scotsman – Scotland – Aberdeen, full article here.)
Blair unveils his ‘respect’ plans: “People could be evicted from their own homes if they cause a nuisance under a new ‘respect’ action plan.”
And the next thing is the Ermächtigungsgesetz. Don’t forget: Britain never experienced a nationalist, socialist-branded government — yet.
(Via BBC News.)
But how will these “national standards” and the striking idea of “cultural entitlements” affect the arts via the funding mechanisms?
My second worst fears are that a Scottish-made micky mouse canon of “what arts is” will emerge — driven by the quest for “national standards” aka lowest common denominator and the idea of being able to consume “culture” (i.e. cultural entitlement) representing a new breed of “human rights” which all help people being “normal”, average, main-stream, middle class, sub-urban watchers of national TV programmes, members in charitable societies, attending performances and exhibition sponsored by the (ruling) corporations of New Scottland plc., all inline with marginalising the right of free speak as measure agains terrorism etc.
Let me just expand on the “cultural entitlements”. I am a strong believer in the free movement of people — you should be allowed to settle wherever you choose to. So if you choose to live on the Outer Hebridies that’s your choice … however that includes no National Ballet and no Edinburgh Festival on your doorstep. Equally if you live in Inverurie you don’t get the Dundee Rep, you don’t get the Tramway in Edinburgh, and if you live on Orkney you don’t get Aberdonian taxi drivers. But what now with “cultural entitlements”? Would you be entitled to get your Dundee Rep, Tramway and Aberdonian taxi driver delivered to your doorstep … certainly not. What you will be entitled to will most probably be culture according to “national standards” — maybe a bus tour to the closest performance of the Scottish National Orchestra (the unavoidable 15 must-have-heard pieces…) and the local museum praising the good ol’ times.
My worst fears actually are that this vision of a centrally controlled creative “industry” will become reality in Scotland as of 2007. Your £2om-a-year will quickly be burnt for such UNcreative exercises , and so will the critical cultural substrate sustainably be starving; all for the sake of a “flourishing” and “ambitious” cultural Scotland.
(By the way: have you noticed how flourishing and ambicious have replaced vibrant as the most abused adjectives…)
Anger as 7 July inquiry rejected: “The government’s decision not to hold a public inquiry into the 7 July London bombings is strongly criticised.”
And we are left to wonder what the British government might have to hide…
(Via BBC News.)
“We define terrorism, and its precondition subversion, with care. It should be confined to those who use terror and violence or the threat of them to achieve their political objectives.” says Professor Anthony “Total” Glees in a Times Higher article. He then goes on: “universities can be recruiting grounds for those who wish to destroy parliamentary liberal democracy” — but obviously his careful definition excludes himself — a know “liberal” thinker i.e. in support of a totalitarian approach to censor Britain’s academia, as earlier articles showed (and I had myself a lengthy email discussion after accusing him exactly of that). Anthony Glees is professor of politics at Brunel University’s Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies. There is this funny use of “Intelligence” again …
MET paid for flights & accommodation for the bereaved de Menezes family to visit England … in a vain attempt to bribe them to swallow the MET’s murder of their son. But Maria de Menezes quite rightly said: “Those who killed my son, as much as the police chief who is responsible for the whole team, should be punished. They wanted to kill him. They were assassins, they were murderers. They killed him and I am disgusted.”
In a decent country the chief murderer would have resigned long ago — but this does not happen in racist Britain — of course!
