Political, social, scientific and literary commentary from Dr. Raywat Deonandan: scientist, author, rogue and knave.
Friday, March 30, 2007
Newsflash: Brown Guy Talks About Bioterrorism
Greetings from Tampa, Florida, my droogs, where I am attending the conference of the Society for Applied Anthropology. Yesterday I was in Gainesville, giving a talk on "bioterrorism" for the political science class of Deonandia regular I., who teaches for the University of Florida. Below is a picture of the class, including a distracted doofus in the front. They were a genuine joy to visit.
It's 2:AM, I've slept 6 hours in the past 3 days, and I won't be sleeping tonight. I have to be at the airport at 6:AM to get a flight to Florida to give a presentation for the Society for Applied Anthropology. And guess what I'm doing right now? Writing my presentation!
So how about that Quebec election, huh? I tells ya, if that province ever separates, I predict they'll have a Mussolini-style fascist government inside of 10 years of independence. You heard it here first.
Okay, back to work. I leave you with this remarkable photograph, courtesy of Bindu.
I was doing that stupid "which celebrity do you most resemble" thing on MyHeritage.com again. This is what I got: Keanu Reeves and a bunch of women. Great.
And since one (or 9) pretty faces aren't enough for one blog post, here's another. This is Eric Margolis talking about Iran:
Before I forget, "we" at Deonandia wish to acknowledge the 76th birthday of William Shatner earlier this week. It should be noted that, along with Carl Sagan and Bruce Lee, James T. Kirk was my boyhood hero. It is indeed ironic that Kirk supposedly died at the age of 60, while Shatner putters on in his 70s, even though Kirk has yet to be born. ('Cause , you know, he's from the future.)
Yes, my droogs, it's time again for another genuine Daily Perv Link (TM). This one is about a fellow convicted of having sex with a dead deer. This is particularly poignant for me as I enjoyed a delicious venison meal earlier this week, courtesy of a friend's uncle having shot a deer. Now I have to wonder if said hunter took liberties with said deer prior to carving it up into steaks.
Details about the miscreant and his supposed crime are here. (I say "supposed" because I question whether indeed it should be a crime to have sex with an animal carcass. I mean, we can all agree that's a demented and disgusting act, but is it criminal?) Of course, like you, I am shocked that the fellow isn't referred to as John Doe. HAHAHAHA
And now some random bits...
Regarding the politics of the movie 300, which I talked about here... From Dan Savage's review: "George Bush is going to blow a load in his pants when he sees this movie." Ha!
For those interested in Indian classical music, tabla master Zakir Hussain is playing a concert in Toronto soon with santoor master Shivkumar Sharma, at the Toronto Centre for the Arts on April 20. Tickets are $4-$55; go to ticketmaster for details.
Time to plug the blog of my friend Dawn who recently got married and fracked off to New Zealand with her hubby. Gotta admire that kind of guts. Hope you're keeping the guestroom tidy for me, Dawny!
Time, as well, to plug my good friend Lauren's website, which showcases her photography. You may recall that Lauren also rents out apartments in Paris. So if any of you is looking for a Parisian vacation, you know where to go.
I recently found this blog about Guyana. Gotta love 'em 'cause they also plugged Deonandia!
And since I'm in a reciprocal pluggy mood, this guy lists Deonandia as a blog he reads, so let's send some more traffic his way.
Meanwhile, EK Hornbeck alerts us to this article, which essentially confirms what we discussed here earlier: that Stephane Dion will "stay above the fray" when the Conservatives inevitably come to slur him. In short, Dion is indeed Michael Dukakis, and he is dead in the water.
Hornbeck also alerts us to this development in Australia. To summarize: anti-abortion activists --who, unsurprisingly, overlap substantially with the pro-war, fundamentalist Christian Right-- are using "fear of Islam" as a rationale now for limiting the availability of RU486, the so-called "abortion pill". Their argument is that readily available abortions means an accelerated population decline of "true" Australians, thus giving the fast-reproducing Muslim hordes yet another numbers advantage. As EK puts it, "fear of a turbaned planet, indeed".
See, people, this is why I no longer write fiction. Real life is far more unbelievable. I couldn't make this shit up.
Britpop Nostalgia Week here in Deonandia is almost over, but not before a few more fun old videos. Yesterday I mentioned Shaun Ryder who, while virtually unknown in North America, is considered a legend in the UK. Here's his most famous offering, "Step On" by the Happy Mondays:
Since I know someone is going to ask, the extras are speaking Malaysian, not Japanese. And the dork dancing about with the maracas is the ageless Bez, who rumour has it started out as Shaun's drug dealer. Ironically, despite comparable drug abuse, Bez has aged more gracefully than Shaun. Here's Bez winning Celebrity Big Brother in 2005:
But who wants to see Bez? We're more interested in the train wreck that is Shaun Ryder. In the following clip, Ryder appears on a UK TV show to pretend he's Johnny Rotten from the Sex Pistols,and ends up swearing so much that he is thereafter banned from ever appearing on the show again:
Now let's shift gears a bit and look at another fellow, Stuart Price. Price has been called a "musical genius" by many, but I doubt if I could find 10 people within a 100 mile radius of me who could tell me anything about Price. He tends to go by many names, including "Jacques Lu Cont", which was his monicker when he "fronted" the one-man band, "Les Rythmes Digitales." In that manifestation, Price would pretend to be French, even giving English interviews through a translator! Here is what I believe to be the finest music video ever made, for its satirical look at the 1980s:
Price was also Madonna's tour director and wrote many of her songs in the past decade. Then he created another band, Zoot Woman, and plunked himself in the background playing bass. All before he was 30. Here is the hypnotic Zoot Woman video for "Living In A Magazine":
Is it me, or does the singer look a lot like Michael Rosenbaum, the dude who plays Lex Luthor in Smallville:
And thus endeth this week's plummet into musical frivolity. Tune in next time for a return to our regular topics. Same Wat time. Same Wat channel.
Arrrgh! I've got the nostalgia bug and I can't shake it! This week, as you've no doubt noted, my obsession is with memories of the music of my youth, specifically that of Joy Division and its successor, New Order. One of the most uncomfortable bits of this plummet through memory lane is seeing how my musical idols have so visibly aged. Ian Curtis, possibly, anticipated this and cut off his aging at 24.
Case in point, check out these two videos of New Order performing the song, "Love Vigilantes": Look at singer Bernard Sumner in 1985, and then again in 2005. Ouch. I'm feeling old! Similarly, look at these two photos of Mancunian legend Shaun Ryder:
BEFORE:
AFTER:
Ohhhh, I hope I don't devolve so quickly or so publicly! Shaun Ryder's physical devolution is most obvious in this cameo in the Gorillaz video for "Dare", in which he plays a disembodied head stored in Noodle's closet. (Aside: the song is called "Dare" instead of "There" because of Ryder's thick Mancunian accent):
Ryder's decrepit largeness really comes to the fore in this live video of "Dare", with Rosie Wilson playing the role of Noodle. (For those not in the know, the Gorillaz are a "virtual" band, and its members, including Noodle, all have fake biographies and are composite characters made up of various performers.)
In other news...
If you're like me and are pissed off at the Cult of Mac, you may enjoy these parody commercials. Thanks to Sarah M.
Darth Vadum sends us these two amusing international condom commercials here and here.
The good Darth (oxymoron?) also sends us this music video called, "God Hates Fags", which is really quite fascinating because it's not clear that it's satire --it is!-- so you'd better read some of the back story here.
For those interested, here is a pic of my new temporary cell phone, which I must make due with until the magical replacement Treo arrives.
Now, this is not exactly a Daily Perv Link quality story, but it seems that 3.3 million years ago, the ancestors of gorillas gave pubic lice to the ancestors of humans. Hmmm, you thinkin' what I'm thinkin'? First, we have evidence of chimps and humans having interbred. Now comes suggestions of human ancestors getting it on with the larger ape cousins. Seems we humans have a natural inclination towards jungle fever.
On a completely different topic.... As you all know, I've enjoyed my trips to India immensely, and even blogged about my last one quite thoroughly. But even I never experienced this: a man in first class waking up to find that the flight attendants had placed a corpse next to him! And British Airways won't even refund his ticket! Aieeee. Hope the extra leg room was worth it.
In comments to yesterday's post, Mischa alerted me to the death of Toronto stalwart John Majhor. For those of you not in the know, Majhor hosted the single most important music video show in Canadian history, back in a time when videos were rare and video shows were even rarer. Toronto Rocks essentially became MuchMusic, and was the one show we all rushed home after school to watch... even though they played the same 5 videos over and over.
Majhor's MySpace page is still up, weirdly. Makes we wonder: if I croak unexpectedly, how long will Deonandan.com be up before "my estate" gets around to taking her down? One's virtual self does indeed outlast the flesh.
The post-punk extravaganza on Deonandan.com continues. Here is yet another rare Joy Division video, this one for the song, "Transmission". As you can see, Ian Curtis was ten times more Jim Morrison than Jim Morrison ever was:
Now, as I think I may have mentioned, the name "Joy Division" had Nazi allusions. I'm going to use this fact to segue clumsily into my next topic, the supposed racist content of the hit movie 300. Now, I saw 300, and I enjoyed it... because I enjoy movies about muscular dudes killing hideous monsters whilst quoting hollowly profound classicisms.
On that level, that of a basic action movie, it's certainly enjoyable. Indeed, if one had replaced "Spartan" with "warriors of Zebutron", and "Persian" with "Horde of Enmorzeiss", there would be much less controversy. But the fact remains that this film pretends to depict, however flimsily, the famous Battle of Thermopylae which, some believe, marked the moment when a "free" Greek society would be permitted to flourish, thus signaling the birth of what we call "Western civilization".
As this article plots out, Frank Miller's version of the Battle of Thermoplyae is definitely politically skewed, with a depiction of Spartans as freedom-loving, secular, noble and, above all else, what we would consider to be "civilized". By contrast, the Persians are portrayed --literally-- as monstrous. Moreover, the Persian army is referred to many times as one of slaves, in contrast to the "free" Greek and Spartan forces, and one hobbled by its superstition.
As a storytelling hook, this is quite entertaining. I don't have a problem with it in a truly fictional tale. The Lord of the Rings, after all, embraces an identical ethic, and no one accuses Tolkien of racism, even though he makes it clear that the good guys are "Men of the West".
The problem with 300 is that it pretends, however slightly, to represent real history and thus contemporary reality. In truth, it was the Spartans who were barbarians by our standard, while the Persians we would likely recognize as being "civilized". The Greeks, as well as the Persians, adhered to deep "superstitious" religious beliefs, and also kept vast numbers of slaves. The key difference between the two groups is that, in this specific affair, it was the Persians who were the aggressors, and that the Greek's did not typically permit slaves to fight; it was considered the duty of a citizen to bear arms in defence of his country.
Some call that noble. I call it stupid. But whatever.
The Spartans were also eugenicists, leaving imperfect babies exposed to die. This is touched upon in the film, as the Spartans are betrayed by of their own who is freakishly deformed, but who nonetheless survived to be seduced by Xerxes's riches.
So if 300's Spartans are indeed Frank Miller's idea of a social ideal, then he's got a strong dose of Nazism in his brew. He is, after all, on record as saying some pretty ignorant, racist things, like claiming Arabs could never have invented microphones or airplanes. Unsurprising for people of his stupidity and ilk, he also believes that Iraq declared war on "us" first.
Miller's pro-war bias shines through in the movie, with the brave king Leonidas conducting an illegal war despite not having his government's nor his people's support on the matter. Sound familiar?
So, is 300 a racist movie? On balance, I will have to say yes. Does that mean it's not enjoyable? No, the racism is not obvious to those who are not sensitive to it, so I don't have a problem with this movie existing or with it potentially "scarring" impressionable minds. Most people will enjoy it the way I did, as a fun swords and monsters film.
Those of the pro-war Right, though, are not always as subtle with their racism. I was (stupidly) lurking again on that ridiculous site, The Western Standard Blogs, when I came upon this post:
"you're a chink-eyed piece of yellow shit like David Suzuki? That would explain why you've got the balls to come on line anonymously and insult a white man. I know that kind of shit passes for balls in little yellow turds like you."
Do note that, when I checked last, no one on the site had admonished or contradicted this individual. Nor is this post unique in its style, verbiage or content. This, my friends, is the premier online discussion forum for those of the mainstream Canadian right. Remember that come election time.
In other news:
A girl in a US school has been suspended for saying the word "vagina" during an on-stage performance of The Vagina Monologues. Christ, people! what are we supposed to call the dang thing? All the fun terms have been taken from us by the politically correct set, and now even the anatomically precise word is denied us?
A cow in a West Bengal village has been caught killing and eating chickens. If you're like me, you're wondering what this cow tastes like. Beef and chicken together in one joyous mouthful! It's like a walking cordon bleu.
Lastly, my precious Treo 600 died a tragic death on Saturday. So for those trying to phone me this weekend, I am without phone. But fear not, my new (used) Treo 650 is already in the mail!
In my never ending quest to educate you, my droogs, in all that was cool in the late 70s and early 80s, I give you this gem of a video of a live performance by Joy Division. The song is "Dead Souls", which has since been covered by Nine Inch Nails and Bauhaus.
Now, the lead singer of Joy Division was a fellow named Ian Curtis, who was brilliant, pompous, manic depressive and epileptic. He hanged himself in 1980, on the verge of world fame, and the remnants of his band became the premiere UK electronica band of the 80s and 90s, New Order. Ian Curtis is considered one of the fathers of Goth music and a hero of the Manchester scene and of post-punk in general. His life story has been documented in three movies, I believe, but there's still much about this young man to be fascinated by. (I'm looking forward to watching 24 Hour Party People later this week).
Do note that the stage is without spot lighting, so as not to aggravate Curtis's epilepsy. And Curtis's wild dancing style, which looks as if he has a malfunctioning vibrator up his arse, was actually based upon his seizures, which he would often have while on stage. They were so frequent, in fact, that sometimes the audience could not tell if he were having a seizure or just doing one of his stupid dance moves.
The lesson here, I guess, is that you don't have to wear black leather and cheap clown make-up to be a genuine Goth. Ian Curtis, for my money, invented Goth; and the dude was usually dressed like a law student. Incidentally, it was Peter Murphy who gave the Goth movement its cliched vampirical appearance.
As a bit of trivia, the U2 song, "A Day Without Me", is actually about Ian Curtis's suicide, inspired after Bono had a tour of Manchester's Factory Records. It's been reported that Bono considered Curtis to have been the best rock front man, and pledged to take his place after Curtis died. (And he would have kept that pledge, too, if he didn't spend his time spitting on his fans!)
Curtis's wacky dance moves necessarily remind of me of Roland Orzabal's even worse dance moves in the classic Tears For Fears video for "Mad World". Yes, my droogs, I have included that one for you, as well:
I know it's all meaningless, but I get a kick out of all the little incestuous links between music movements, particularly in the UK. Ian Curtis was inspired by the Sex Pistols, for example, and went on to inspire U2, The Cure, Nine Inch Nails, Bauhaus and the rest. The ashes of Joy Division became New Order. And one forgettable New Order video for the song "Crystal" featured a fake band called "The Killers". That's in fact where The Killers got their name. Unsurprisingly, as a result, a couple of years ago Brandon Flowers of The Killers performed "Crystal" with New Order; the video is here.
Note how in that live video how old the members of New Order appear, especially front man Bernard Sumner (former guitarist for Joy Division and perhaps the godfather of rave culture). Now look at this studio footage of New Order back in the 80s, when they were still young and angry:
You can definitely see the discontent, working class punk roots at the heart of their music, with Sumner's sneers and all, despite the poppy sounds of the actual music. All of this goes back to the Sex Pistols.
I do, and I do, and I do for you people. Don't ever say that I don't.
I'll leave you with my favourite Joy Division song and video, "Atmosphere". Try to look past the poor vocals and musicianship and focus on the brilliance of the content:
Well, I just finished watching the series finale of the longest running sci-fi show (10 years!) in American history, and certainly my favourite TV show for the past 6 years: Stargate SG-1. The show has declined in quality somewhat in the last 2-3 years. At one point, it was undeniably the smartest, most original bit of science fiction programming on mainstream US TV, and proudly featured a mostly Canadian cast and an entirely Canadian production team. In fact, its set has become somewhat of a tourist fixture in Vancouver, where the show was filmed for the duration of its run.
And even though the quality suffered in the last little while, it was still a very enjoyable show, mostly for the effortless and consistent characterization of its principle characters, and --most importantly-- for the genuine science fiction nature of its story lines. This wasn't gratuitous "aliens and ray guns" TV sci-fi, even though there were aliens and ray guns aplenty. Rather, almost every episode was grounded in a solid sci-fi tenet, wherein speculative science was at the heart of both the episodes' crises and their resolutions. But far from being a geek wet dream, SG-1's strength was how it seemingly effortless melded this rigorous science fiction traditionalism with genuine, heart felt characterization.
In that vain, I'm proud to report that its finale, Unending, was both epic and intimate, and was again grounded upon a solid science fiction premise. It had equal parts romance, loss, adventure, heroism and sadness. It was an excellent send-off for a show that, quite literally and unironically, filled me with hope for the visual narrative tradition. As a series finale, I would rank it highly, though not approaching the perfection of the final Babylon 5 episode, Sleeping In Light, a piece of broadcast television that should have been hand delivered to the Smithsonian for safe keeping immediately after its first transmission.
SG-1 has always been comfort food for me, and I will hunger in its absence. But I take solace that its weaker spin-off, Stargate: Atlantis is still around, three direct-to-DVD movies are already being filmed, and an unnamed third TV series is being planned.
Arrrrghh. For some reason, Haloscan won't let me post a response to Mischa's last point on yesterday's blog topic, the banning of trans fats. Thus, I must expend precious prime blog space in issuing a comment response:
DAMN! Haloscan keeps eating my response!
Excellent points, Mischa.
Yes, trans fats do exist in minute quantities in nature; I was wrong to speak in absolutes. As you mention, it is most commonly naturally found in some dairy products.
But here's the thing: the very reason that I do not support the simple addition of warning labels on foods containing trans fats is that it is not practical to truly give the consumer an informed choice.
See, to fully explain why trans fats are dangerous and why they exist at all, one needs to explain stereo-isomer chemistry. Put simply, over the history of evolution on our planet, some geometric isomers have been incorporated into organic tissue almost completely exclusive of their cousin isomers, even though originally all isomers existed in equal quantities.
The best example is chiral chemistry, in which "optical isomers" exist as non-superimposable cousins, and which come to the fore in discussions of sugar substitutes. See, common sugars (dextrose) are "right-handed", whereas "left-handed" sugars are theoretically indigestible... but that's another health issue topic.
Technically, trans fats are just as "natural" as cis fats. BUT the fact that trans fats have all but disappeared from normal tissue over the last 100 million years, means that the forced re-introduction of them, in place of cis fats, is unnatural.
And indeed, I think there are some pivotal molecular structural differences between "natural" trans fats and the ones presently created for inclusion in fast foods. I have no convenient evidence of that, though.
More to the point, the so-called "natural" trans fats don't appear to have the same deleterious health effects of the laboratory created trans fats. Therefore, I will make my position clear: I am opposed to the creation and introduction of synthetic trans fats in our food. This is not the same as being opposed to fats, in general, or of natural fats. Contrary to this article's accusations, for example, I support butter (which has some natural trans fats) over trans fat-free margarine, since the artificial act of hydrogenation required to create margarine does not confer any health advantage that I can see; and because butter is yummy!
So yes, we can agree that a sufficiently informative warning would suffice. I would not fight you on that. But I don't agree that a sufficiently informative warning is possible, not when it will be trumped by a food company saying, "eat for cheap!" If you can conceive of a warning label system that fully explains what a trans fat is, and why it might be harmful, then I'm open to the labeling solution. But ask yourself: is it ethical to allow a cheap, unhealthful food on the market, knowing that the poorest of the poor must gravitate towards it? On a population level, when averaged out, this is tantamount to poisoning the poor.
I would further argue that there should be an economic system wherein a company should be financially penalized for producing and selling unhealthful foods, thus making such things more expensive than healthful foods. Before trans fats, I would actually rather target high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), which is a cheap alternative sweetener to sucrose (and thus the most common sweetener in things like soda pop and off the shelf desserts); HFCS is, in my opinion, one of the prime causes of the current obesity and diabetes epidemics in North America.
The following discussion regards the editorial comments at Rightthinker.com, a "conservative" website directed to me by Rondi. I haven't read any of the articles on the site yet, so will make no comments about the site's overall style, perspective, quality or content. Instead, this brief editorial jumped out at me:
"Have you ever wondered why the food industry is such a target? Why is it for instance that New York city would ban trans fats which while not being good for you, probably have resulted in fewer deaths than the consumption of alcohol or smoking in recent years. Not that righthinker believes that the state should ban these activities, rather this comparison highlights another problem with the state making decisions about what you consume. These decisions are rarely made on the basis of hard comparative analysis rather on the basis of the comparative strength of lobbying. Let's face it, the trans fat lobby hardly has the same money and influence as alcohol and tobacco."
I make no suggestions or allegations about this specific writer's motivations or biases. Rather, I'd like to point out a couple of generic things. First, contrary to the editorial's implication, the global processed food industry is bigger and more powerful than the tobacco or alcohol industries combined. Processed food sales worldwide are worth approximately 3.2 trillion US$ per year. In contrast, the global tobacco industry is worth about 115 billion US$. I have no stats on the global alcohol industry, but cannot imagine for a second that it approaches the value of either tobacco or processed food, especially since pretty much every community produces its own local moonshine to undercut market prices, and, outside the West, alcohol is dirt cheap.
Does this enormity of market value translate to lobbying muscle power? I don't know, but I suspect it wouldn't need to. Food production is such an interwoven aspect of modern government and society that it almost needs no formal lobbying. In contrast, tobacco is a luxury, not a necessity. It's marketed role in society needs to be continually and artificially reinforced by paid and increasingly desperate lobbyists.
So let's explore the editorial's central point: why is that trans fats are being banned outright, while tobacco and alcohol only get licensed and marginalized? There are several answers:
As the editorial suggests, lobbying might be an element at play here, but not to the extent the author seems to think.
The banning of trans fats does not cripple the processed food industry. The world still needs processed food; this legislation just compels the industry to be a little more responsible when it comes to public health. The short term pain for the industry is worth the long term gain for the species and, ultimately, for the food vendors, as well. Tobacco, on the other hand, cannot be reformed. There is not an equivalent strategy for making tobacco healthier. It is, by its very nature, toxic and unhealthy. But it is so much a part of our lives that it cannot (nor would I argue that it should) be banned outright. Thus, strategies for minimizing its impact are best: taxation, limiting points of sale, and public education.
Alcohol and tobacco, while unhealthy, are nonetheless naturally occurring items. They were around before civilization and will likely be here after humans are long gone. (Yes, some fermentation does occur in nature without human intervention, so alcohol doesn't need people to exist.) Banning them outright is therefore foolhardy. Trans fats, on the other hand, are a completely synthetic creation of human beings, brought about solely to facilitate the packaging and transport of cheap foods. Its production and inclusion in our food can and should be banned; Mother Nature would not fight us on this.
The author pompously declares that trans fats have resulted in fewer deaths than alcohol and tobacco. Where do I begin with this? For one thing, trans fats have been around for a few decades, while tobacco and alcohol have both been around for tens of thousands of years; of course the latter will have resulted in more deaths! More to the point, trans fats kill people slowly and indirectly, contributing to chronic diseases like diabetes and heart disease; there will never be a death certificate that reads, "Death by heart failure, complicated by ingestion of trans fats 30 years prior." It's an asinine, misleading and uninformed point to include in an editorial.
The banning of alcohol and tobacco will instantly create a black market for these items; with that would come an increase in crime, and the creation of criminals out of people who just want to have a drink in their own homes. Trans fats have no addictive quality about them. The ban means that trans fats will be replaced by regular cis-fats, which taste exactly the same, but which do not have the additional deleterious effects specific to trans fats. There will be no "trans fats black market", not while anyone can still buy a pound of natural, heart-clogging bacon at the grocery store. In other words, there is no big social or criminal downside to this legislation, as there would be with the banning of alcohol or tobacco.
Lastly, it can be argued that we have learned from our experience with alcohol and tobacco: maybe we, as a society, should have nipped tobacco in the bud long before it became entrenched in our social discourse? It's too late to do it so suddenly now, but there was a brief opportunity historically to discourage the industrial farming, sale and the down-your-throat marketing of tobacco. (Alcohol, of course, is another matter entirely, as it does have some positive health associations.) If we learn from our politicized failings with tobacco, then we should move ahead quickly and disallow the sale of foods containing trans fats, the same way we disallow the sale of foods containing poisons or carcinogenic preservatives.
Frankly, I don't understand why anyone would be opposed to the banning of such an unhealthy and unnecessary product, unless one embraces an irrational attachment to the rights of companies to make money in any way possible and at whatever public cost.
I get the author's unspoken suggestion: that this ban is an indication of the growing anti-corporate food movement, one that might irrationally embrace the unproven "superior" qualities of so-called "organic" and local foods over the established global food hegemony. And, of course, it's almost a cliche now that any source calling itself "conservative" is going to necessarily be pro-business and anti-state (with respect to all issues except war, that one topic in which the interests of both business and the state coincide).
But let's stop dicking around, shall we? Trans fats are bad. The only good thing about them is that they reduce the costs of processed foods. But you know what else reduces the cost of food? Eating non-foods, like cardboard, instead of real food, like vegetables. Or how about flavoured dog faeces instead of ground beef? That would save a bundle; and with some chemical augmentation, you might not taste the difference. Ironically, both cardboard and dog shit are more healthful than trans fats. I wonder how Rightthinker.com would feel about companies selling cardboard and shit sandwiches masquerading as real hamburgers? "Hey, if it helps them make a faster buck, leave the poor, downtrodden processed food companies alone and be happy with your cardboard and shit sandwiches, you damn organic-farming hippies."
Maybe I'm being unfair. The editorialist did not overtly come out against the ban, after all. But we can all read between the lines.
I, for one, would like to see further legislated changes to processed foods, including thhe removal of products made from white flour, replaced with items made from whole grain flours, and the removal of products that use corn syrup as a cheap sweetener.
This is a photo of flower I saw in the rainforest around Kaieteur Falls in Guyana. It has garnered some popularity, having been nabbed (with no objections from me) for this website. Similarly, one of my photos of the White House, taken while I was living in DC, has been used in this online news story. Ahh, these are indeed the days of Web 2.0 and meta-news.
I enjoy CBC radio exclusively for its excellent, seemingly objective news coverage. I don't think CBC should be in the sports or entertainment business, and it certainly shouldn't be spending tax dollars on recreating the music services of the private sector. For this reason, on long drives I tend to listen to the CBC's long newscasts then turn the "dial" when its pompous we-tryin'-so-hard-to-be-hip shows, like DNTO, come on.
On this weekend's long drive to Peterborough, however, I accidentally caught two CBC entertainment shows that I enjoyed immensely: Go! and And Sometimes Y. The latter, hosted by my old acquaintance Russell Smith (which is not usually a selling point for me, as I do not like to hear familiar voices on the radio), is particularly good. So maybe I've had it all wrong from the start!
Lastly, Sarah sends us this great video of the "Lost Seinfeld Episode", the one in which Kramer hilariously uses the n-word.
My travel companion and fellow epidemiologist Adam Stevens has finally sent me his photos from Guyana. I've added a selection of his to my collection on Flickr. To see the full set, click here:
The collection now includes this gem of one of the scary Russian dudes who were hanging out at our hotel:
In other news, I've been contacted by the CBC regarding appearing on-air as a commentator during the upcoming federal elections. So you never know, you might be getting more of me than you bargained for in the near future...
By popular demand, here is the video clip of Ann Coulter from CPAC, doing that thing that she does. What's important here is to note the reaction of the crowd. Contrary to the damage control claims of conservatives rushing to distance their movement from Ann's bigotry, there is unmistakable applause in response to her use of the word "faggot".
In some ways, maybe we should be thankful that the hijacking of the "conservative movement" by rabid racists, sexists and homophobes has finally been publicly confirmed.
Case in point: comments on Canada's right wing blog, the Western Standard, rationalizing Ann's bigotry. Do these sentiments represent the majority of conservative opinion? I really can't say; I hope not. But it's pretty clear that these sentiments exist in sufficient numbers, or at least with sufficient volume, to taint the Right accordingly.
Meanwhile, Darth Vadum alerted me to a recent development regarding a fellow named Corporal Matt Sanchez, who was recently the darling of the US right for his vocal criticisms of anti-war activities on American university campuses. He's been embraced by the likes of Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin. Now comes news that Corporal Sanchez used to be a gay porn star! Oh how embarrassing for the crusading set. Sanchez has promised to post an official statement on his blog soon.
I will leave you with a couple of random items. First is the existence of a group of former Israeli soldiers who are touring the world to raise awareness of the abuses committed by the Israeli Defence Force. For those who don't understand why the Palestinians are perpetually pissed off, it's worth the read. More details are here.
And last comes joyous news from Vermont, that town after town, and now maybe the state itself, is voting to impeach Bush and Cheney. Oh happy day. Maybe there's hope for democracy after all, if the people can do what their leaders are too cowardly and self-interested to do.
Know what I'm tired of? I'm tired of people going on and on about how they would never get a cell phone because cell phone rings are annoying and who wants to be always locatable and who wants to be always at work and cell phones are making people less social, yadda yadda yadda. Keeeee-rist.
Not surprisingly, I often find this holier-than-thou, preachy attitude among those who have also subscribed to the cult of Mac. You know the type: those who are in denial that they actually need a computer in their lives, so they loudly gravitate to the prettiest, most expensive computers that, ironically, can't compute.
(This, by the way, is not a criticism of the Apple/Macintosh brand of computers, but rather of those bloody annoying people who can't shut up about their Macs.)
Here, my droogies, is the great secret of mobile phones: you can always turn them off. The mobile phone is the great liberator of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. We are no longer chained to our desks, offices or homes. We can talk where we want and when we want. We can access our schedules and email when we want and where we want. And when we don't want to? We can turn the bloody things off!
So to those who feel that mobile computing and telephony technology is taking over their lives, I say: don't blame the technology; blame your own pathetic lack of discipline.
Thus endeth the rant. Now I have to go make sweet love to my Treo.
Hey, I just caught the Beastie Boys on Conan O'Brien. These guys are wrinkled, gray-haired and are older than me. They're not even Beastie Men anymore; more like Beastie Grandpas.
Meanwhile, I'm not sure if this is a Daily Perv Link (TM). But it has all the markings: a donkey, a hotel room, and a handcuffed man in a latex suit. Go forth and investigate, my droogies.
On the day after the Sep 11, 2001, terror attacks, Ann Coulter wrote a now famous column calling for the invasion of Muslim countries, the execution of those countries' leaders and the forced conversion of their people to Christianity.
In an attempt to rationalize this clearly inappropriate behaviour, a right-wing friend in DC said of Ann, "Oh, she's just upset that her friend was killed."
Huhn? Sure, that explains her ---maybe. But what about the editor, publisher and proofreader who let that nonsense go? What was their excuse?
Last year, Coulter again crossed the line when she referred to Iranians as "ragheads". (Which is not only racist, it's inaccurate.... Most Iranians are not Arabs, and almost none wear any traditional headgear.) This was done at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), where none of the supposed "compassionate conservatives" took her to task for the comment.
The same year, she openly called Al Gore a "total fag", and the TV host Chris Matthews cordially thanked her for her appearance.
Now at this year's CPAC, a major "Conservative" assembly, Ann got on stage and called Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards a "faggot". And no one present complained.
What's my point? Yes, we all know Ann is nuts. Maybe she does it for the attention, to sell books. Or maybe she really is four eggs short of a dozen. Who knows? Who cares? My point is two-fold:
There exist people akin to my friend in DC who will back whatever racist, sexist, homphobic slur she utters in her madness, and will be emboldened by Ann's mainstream appeal.
Why has she not been disavowed by her base? With the recent slur against Edwards, among high profile conservative pundits, only Michelle Malkin promptly spoke out against the language, and even then, only to chastise Ann for giving "liberals" fuel against the conservatives.
The first part is fairly obvious. Skinheads, white supremacists and others of their ilk regularly monitor the "acceptableness" of people like Coulter, as a barometer of how mainstream their views are becoming. How do I know this? About 12 years ago, I went "undercover" for several months for The Toronto Star, posing as a white supremacist on online discussion groups (back when such things were novel) in order to write an article on the phenomenon.
But it's the second bit that worries me. If other, less telegenic, moonbats were spouting unfounded racial slurs, maybe they wouldn't find as much traction in mainstream media. Let me suggest something more: if other, less connected to monied power institutes, moonbats were spouting such slurs, they would have been turfed a long time ago. In other words, Ann Coulter is tolerated --nay, supported!-- by media because the monied set is without principle, and will support whomever is profitable, regardless of the damage she does to society.
There is evidence, apparently, that the content of many of Ann's books has been plagiarized. Yet why does she continue to be published? Why are the books still on the shelves? Why has no apology been offered? Because they still make money.
So Ann Coulter may be insane and dismissable. But she matters because those with power cower behind her as they shovel in the profits from the hurt and sorrow that the gurgling fissure in her face continues to create.
Far be it for me to ever want to give more publicity to yet another attention-seeking harridan, but Michelle Malkin has a nice quote about the Coulter affair, though at this point I question Ms Malkin's motivation:
"Not all of us treat the communication of conservative ideals and ideas as 24/7 performance art. You can and should use humor to convey your message. You can enlighten and entertain--without becoming a tired old schtick. You can joke without becoming the joke."
It's also worth reading the comments of Andrew Sullivan on this topic. Sullivan is essentially a neo-con, but a former Republican and is openly gay.
In yesterday's post I talked about the "labo", a rodent indigenous to Guyana. Seems I mispelled the name, based on my phonetic interpretation of what the AmerIndians were calling it. According to this site, it's actually a "labba", while this site confirms its Western name to be "paca". My father tells a tale of fishing in the Guyanese interior and having to hunt wild game for food. Back then, he says, they would set fire to the brush and capture the rodents as they fled. I assume he was talking about labbas, and not capybaras, which I suppose is equally as likely.
I've finally uploaded my short films from Guyana to Google Video. To access them, check out my movies page.
Rondi, here is one of the critters I mentioned eariler. This bugger to my left is called a "labo". It's a nocturnal rodent indigenous to Guyana, and is considered a delicacy among those who enjoy so-called "wild meat". I've been warned, though, that it can only be eaten curried. Stewed, roasted, sauteed, skewered, kebabed, boiled, broiled, pan friend, deep friend, chicken fried --none of that is good enough. Labo must be curried.
For those who have not been there yet, my Guyana pics (and some from other photographers) are here:
I've also uploaded about 20 small videos taken in Guyana, of about 30 seconds each, to Google Video. However, Google will take a couple of days to process them all before making them public. So stay tuned.
This is a great article about the negative side of online video sharing services, like YouTube and Google Video. The article is great because it also has links to some of the best shared videos in history! My favourite is the Miracle Jackson one.
For a while now, I've been following the development of Second Life, this genuinely virtual universe that abuts our own. No time or inclination to actually join Second Life, but examining it can be rewarding enough, on an intellectual level. Apparently it's taken a great evolutionary leap forward, because there are now terrorists in Second Life.
While we're on Bush, it seems several US Generals are threatening to quit if BushCo drags them into a war with Iran. Hmm, I can see the draft-dodging fat-ass Rush Limbaughs and Dick Cheneys of the world already writing their scripts for calling these men cowards. Let the swift-boating begin.
Well, since this is the home of the Daily Perv Link (TM), here's a follow-up to an earlier DPL about a man caught sodomizing a dead dog. Yes, the dog was dead before he commenced the foul deed --several days dead, in fact. Now, someone like this is clearly mentally ill. If the dog had been alive, I'd argue for a very stiff penalty indeed. But it was dead. Does he really need to go to jail for sticking his willy in rotten meat? Send the man to a psychiatrist and let's keep the prisons for real sociopaths.
While we're on the topic of what constitutes criminal behaviour, here's a story about a woman arrested for using profane language in an airport. I'm not going to make a fuss about this one, since an airport is, in some circumstances, private property, and the owners can legally set reasonable rules of behaviour on that property. But the story is worth reading only for one small nugget of information: the woman is working on her PhD.... in dance theory.
Now this, on the other hand, I will make a fuss about. A man gets 200 years in prison for "possessing child pornography". Now, let me be clear: the sexual abuse and exploitation of children, especially for commercial purposes, is one of the most heinous crimes in our modern world, and deserving of the most severe punishment. However, someone who purchases and views such materials suffers from a mental illness and needs treatment, not punishment. It is those who directly abuse children and profit from the abuse that need to feel the hammer of the criminal justice system. I am really quite uncomfortable with this increasing trend of the state punishing us for what we choose to feed our brains.
On a similar topic is the recent declaration by the head of a new US Justice Dept task force on "obscenity", that "[porn] has profound consequences, eroding families, increasing violence against women, warping perceptions of sex and helping child predators groom victims." The problem is that there is virtually no real evidence to support that claim. Nada. Instead, this moralistic crusade is based, I believe, upon religious beliefs and personal morality, not upon a rational assessment of societal cause and effect.
The religious Right likes to complain that ours is a modern, scientific society with no room for heart. I would argue the converse, that there is increasing evidence that North American (mostl American) society is based less on rationalism and more on personal biases and assumptions of behaviour.
So what does constitute a crime? I think this qualifies. Frightening stat from that article: in over 40% of the rape cases studied, the victim eventually admitted that no rape had occurred. Yikes.
