totally absurd

Why be offended by the “I will survive” Holocaust video?

liligans Politics, totally absurd

When I watched the video of a Jewish family from Australia dancing at various death camp sites in which Hitler and the Nazis tried to exterminate the Jews, I wept.

I only heard about this video tonight on the Channel Nine TV news. Some people are offended by it. Some Holocaust survivors don’t approve of Jews dancing at Auschwitz, but I take a different view.

I say “Hitler tried to kill us all, but he is dead and we are still here. Let us rejoice.”

As a person who is involved in The Jewish Holocaust Centre I am well aware of sensitivities. We should respect and mourn what happened. We should never forget and personally I will never forgive.

But be damned if I don’t glory in the fact that all those Empires and civilisations which tried to destroy the Jews are dust.

So if 89-year-old Holocaust survivor, Adolek Kohn wants to dance at Auschwitz with his daughter and three grandchildren, good luck to him!

I’m sure he has shed enough tears in his lifetime and I would encourage him to celebrate to his heart’s content.

If you have not seen the video, here is the link:-

Grandpa Kohn’s words at the end of it are what made me cry.

Looks as if the video has actually been removed from Youtube.

Now it’s back again. I strongly recommend that you view Parts 2 and 3 of the video too. We’ll see how long this one lasts but just in case I’d better explain what I meant by “Grandpa Kohn’s words at the end of it made me cry.”

The family did some very simple unchoreographed dance steps at the various sites with their aged grandpa.

And then the mood changed and Mr Kohn reflected on his life to the music of Leonard Cohen’s “Dance me to the end of Love.”

“If you had told me 63 years ago,” Kohn says, ” that I would be here dancing with my family, I would have said what you talking about?…what you talking about?

Had Hilter achieved his aim then none of that delightful family would have been born. No wonder he marvels at being back where he could have perished. He considers himself blessed.

So many people did not survive, including many members of my family. I wept for them but I also wept with joy that Mr Kohn is alive.

Why the double standard is a compliment to Israel

liligans Politics, So you think you're cultured?, totally absurd

Imagine you are sitting at prayers in your local mosque on a Friday when suddenly thirty of your fellow worshippers are shredded to bits by a bomb. This is a frequent occurrence in Pakistan and Iraq. The murderers are Muslims themselves and we in the rest of the world no longer bat an eyelid on hearing of such an event. Why is that? Continue reading →

The Two Faces of The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

liligans So you think you're cultured?, totally absurd

I am astounded by the declaration this morning that the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is proud of the actions of activist Peter Bethune. In fact, they will give him a hero’s welcome back home when he returns from Japan.

How can one believe anything that this organisation says when in June this is what they said?

The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has cut its links with anti-whaling activist Peter Bethune after he carried a bow and arrows during confrontations with Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean.

Below is what they wrote on the Society’s website, according to the ABC report on June 9 of this year

The bow and arrows revealed to be on the Sea Shepherd vessel Ady Gil, and in the possession of Captain Bethune on that ship, are absolutely not in line with Sea Shepherd’s policy,” the statement reads.

This morning on the ABC the spokesman for the Society revealed his forked tongue, when he admitted that the above statements were a ploy to get Bethune off. I can’t quite understand how that would work but they obviously are still trying to pretend that they are a peaceful organisation. What a bunch of hypocrites!

Suddenly they are proud to align themselves with a man who behaved like a pirate and threatened the crew of a boat he boarded illegally.

What sort of friends are these activists who are ready to distance themselves from one of their heroes when he’s in trouble? And yet when he gets off with a very lenient judgement, a suspended sentence, they pretend that they support him totally?

All better now?

I don’t think so. This organisation has blotted its reputation by admitting to lying.

It is thanks to the Japanese that Bethune is not in jail. No thanks to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, though, for abandoning him.

My losing battle with technology

liligans totally absurd, What Pisses me off

I am proud to announce that recently I got rid of my electric toothbrush. Now that may not signify as one of the world’s greatest protests, but for me, it meant a lot.

I got sick of charging the blasted thing. I got sick of having another gadget to be plugged in. I got sick of the brush telling me how long I have to brush my teeth and allotting to me the requisite two minutes which the gadget manufacturer said I have to do.

It made me feel as if I wasn’t in charge at all. Let’s face it, if you’re at the mercy of an electric toothbrush how autonomous are you?

There are people out there who bid their gadgets goodnight and then charge them ready for the next day’s onslaught.

All this dependency on electric gadgets has been getting on my nerves.

Which brings me to why my web site was down over the weekend. I use a web host as do a few other people and apparently a very selfish or ignorant company which monopolised all the available space on the host’s internet. This company was told not to do this again and I have been assured that said company will not be so greedy in future.

I wish I could believe it, but all sorts of things get screwed up on the internet. If it’s not the internet provider then it’s the connection somewhere on the line. Or else it’s because the rotten schoolkids are on holiday and they sit at their computers all day shooting demons or whatever or taking photos of their private parts and putting them on Youtube to impress the world.

Then there’s the twits or the twats and Facebook. I’m uncomfortable with all that and do not take part.

Nowadays, even the politicians twitter away, just to be with it. Do we really need more soundbites from the politicians? Still, even Julia Gillard has somebody twittering away for her. Some junior member of her staff with the gelled ridge of hair is doing the deed so that she can appear trendy.

I seriously doubt that her busy schedule allows her the time to twit. Not should it.

I would rather she concentrate on policies and leave the silly bits to some nerd who is already afflicted with a sore and arthritic thumb at the venerable age of 20.

You may well argue that I too have joined the ranks of internet afficionado since I have a web site. That’s not quite true, though. It’s a love/hate relationship that I have with my computer. I like the word processing part and I enjoy surfing the net for information.

But I am well aware of the dangers of the World Wide Web as a disseminator of falsehoods, a tool for propaganda more invasive than any newspaper by its speed and unaccountability.

I must confess I fear it.

On the other hand, I can’t think of anything in this world that is totally good. And so I endure the frustration of technology when I have to, while feebly protesting against it when it doesn’t really matter, as in the case of the electric toothbrush. T’is but a rather lukewarm attempt at aligning myself with the Luddites.

So there! I showed them, all right. lol

To think that Naplan could achieve this miracle

liligans totally absurd

The education writer at The Australian newspaper has revealed that Victorian teachers will have to prepare their pupils for the Naplan test. Shock horror!!!

The purpose of the National Assessment Program or Naplan is to test the numeracy and literacy of school pupils at various stages in their downward slide towards graduation from school. The Teachers Union is against the publication of the results of these tests for obvious reasons. Here, in Australia, the Education Union does not like being accountable to anyone for its method and “efficiency” in teaching.

So the latest ploy is to reveal to the media that teachers have been told to prepare their pupils for these tests. Which apparently is a scandal! It means that teachers will have to teach spelling, reading and punctuation, counting without a calculator and all that useless stuff. They will be asked to provide extra teaching for those pupils who are having difficulties with spelling and numeracy. What an imposition!

This is all too much for the poor Teachers Union. I actually doubt that some teachers even know how to spell and count and they certainly wouldn’t know how to teach language and syntax. After all, we got rid of all that silly business years ago when grammar became a dirty word.

Next, they will be asking teachers to actually teach and I have to admit that being an ex-high-school teacher myself who has seen many teachers in action, and I mean inaction, this is a big ask.

Prince William’s noble sacrifice

liligans totally absurd

Prince William sat back in his plush chair and thought about doing a good deed for the homeless. He could invite them into the Palace but people like that would feel most uncomfortable away from their milieu. A fish out of water and all that sort of thing. One wouldn’t want to embarrass them in strange surroundings. Besides, Granny may not approve since she’s counting the pennies after that infernal fire at Windsor Castle.

William is a caring lad, though, and felt he should do something for the poor at Christmas. Since the homeless could not join him, why not join them for a night? Sleep under the stars and all that. How bad could it be? He would wear his thermals under the casual ensemble selected by his P.A. And it’s not as if he would be in any danger. Not with security discreetly disguised as forlorn hobos as well. Then there would be the cameras and the other media. Quite the entourage.

Granny sprayed him with some homeopathic disinfectant which his father had grown organically. And then the Royals bid him good night for his camping out adventure. William learned a lot on that one night, he told the press, although he did concede that he can only imagine how the homeless truly feel. Really, William?

A Christmas Greeting or something like it.

liligans Society, totally absurd

This week we received a Christmas greeting from our weekend newspaper delivery guy. We didn’t even know we had a weekend delivery guy until he left an empty envelope beside our newspaper with a bit of paper attached to the outside of the envelope wishing us all the best for Xmas.

It took us a couple of bemused minutes to work out why the empty envelope. Apparently, we were supposed to fill it with a bit of green Christmas cheer. 0/10 for finesse…

This reminded me of what used to happen to us when we first arrived in Australia in the Fifties. During the week before Xmas the garbage collectors or “garbos” as they are known in Oz would wake up the entire neighbourhood with their hootin’ and a hollerin’ at daybreak. The first time this happened we asked our neighbour what it was all about. She said it was to remind us that Xmas is coming and we should leave some cans of beer on the footpath for the garbos. We had to do it or else our garbage would be strewn all over the road… “an offer we couldn’t refuse.”

It was a kind of traditional protection racket and if you questioned its ethics, then you weren’t a good sport. This was then and this is now. That sort of pollution would be frowned on today and I hadn’t thought of it in years until our newspaper delivery guy reminded me of the good old days. lol