Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Say one thing.Do another when it suits

Rupert Wyndham, renowned for his acerbic, accurate, and pointed analysis of the climate fraud, has NAILED the BBC (AND Griffie et al), in a brilliant letter to Lord Hall over ethics… (Fairfax, NZ Horrid, TV One and TV 3 take note):
26 March 2015
Lord Hall
Director General
BBC White City Media Centre
201 Wood Lane
London W12 7TQ.
Dear Lord Hall
Last week the BBC aired an interview with a recent graduate from the University of Oxford, by chance my own alma mater. This young man, it transpired, represented a covey of similarly minded contemporaries. They were driven by a desire to pressurize the trustees of the university finances to divest its portfolio of shares in fossil fuel extractors across the spectrum. With evident, and rather obnoxiously self-preening, satisfaction, he declared this to be ‘an ethical issue’. Given the BBC’s fastidious standards in this regard, no doubt it collectively, as well as you personally, would agree. So, indeed, would I, albeit not be for reasons that would appeal either to your interviewee or to the Corporation.
Let me begin with a simple, and surely an incontrovertible, proposition. It is that the abundant availability of fossil fuels, combined with the wit that has allowed human beings to exploit them, is the greatest blessing ever to have been visited upon the species. After all, without them no BBC at all and no University of Oxford – well, at least not as to be recognisable today. So then, what are the ethical issues that should, but plainly don’t, exercise either this callow youth or the state broadcaster? Here are a few suggestions. In the interests of reasonable comprehensiveness, this may occupy space. On the other hand, the issues are important (the defining challenge of the times, according to the BBC and its mentors), so we should not be niggardly.
So when the BBC:
• Routinely ignores its own Editorial Standards (as it happens, legal requirements), that is an ethical issue;
• Proceeds in the comforting knowledge that its political masters will not hold it to account, that is an ethical issue;
• Subverts the accepted meaning of language in order to generate a spurious justification for institutional bias, that is an ethical issue;
• Claims that its much vaunted impartiality has been ‘calibrated’ on the advice of a specially convened assembly of experts, that is an ethical issue;
• Subsequently spends large quantities of licence fee payers’ money seeking to avoid disclosing the composition of that convocation, that is an ethical issue;
• Has, as it later transpires, lied repeatedly about the accreditation of attendees, that is an ethical issue;
• Is in possession of information indicating gross malfeasance within the climate change community, which for weeks it deliberately suppresses, that is an ethical issue;
• Rejects the findings of an independent committee, set up by itself, to rule on its own impartiality, that is an ethical issue;
• Later, in order to justify its propagandist line, accepts on demonstrably spurious grounds the opposing verdict of a paid lapdog scientist, that is an ethical issue;
• Subsequently, and for years, deliberately and willfully ignores rivers of evidence and reports from unimpeachable sources which run counter to its prevailing orthodoxy, that is an ethical issue;
• Continues to give currency to demonstrable misinformation generated by vested interests, that is an ethical issue;
• By silent acquiescence lends its authority to false and defamatory slurs aimed at eminent scientists who question its prevailing orthodoxy, that is an ethical issue;
• Establishes a complaints procedure which, on artificial and synthetic grounds, is carefully designed to reject all objections to its prevailing orthodoxy, however well attested, that is an ethical issue.
The list is long. It could be longer.
But let us expand this young man’s horizons a little beyond merely the shortcomings of the BBC. He – and, indeed, the BBC – might, for example, consider some/all of the following:
 When scientists, or those claiming to be, concoct evidence, that is an ethical issue.
 When they ‘homogenise’ data, that is an ethical issue.
 When they refuse to expose their data to verification by the wider scientific community, that is an ethical issue.

Saturday, March 14, 2015

Finding the balance of where we are

GoD and DoG
by Wendy Francisco

GoD and DoG Store
GoD and DoG Thoughts
"I look up and I see GoD"
The one thing that bugged me about this line is that I don't really think of God as being "up" in a directional sense. But when you look "up" in your heart, you ultimately conclude God...at least I do.

"I look down and see my dog."
I hope that the first two lines of the song convey that people are in the middle, between two kinds of sincere devotion.

"Simple spelling G O D, Same word backwards, D O G."
In the English language, this is an amusing reality. It doesn't hold true for other languages, but is simply one of those linguistic coincidences that poets capitalize on. It just happens that the inverted spelling of these two words fits my song beautifully. I don't think there is any cosmic signifigance in this.

"They would stay with me all day."
The main reason I wrote God and Dog is that humans naturally seem to think of God as a Zeus-like judgemental guy - and that you have to walk on eggshells or he will pitch some lightening at you, and then turn in an offended huff and leave you. Then we form religions and present this wrong idea of God in an organized and seemingly well founded way. But God loves people, knows each of us deeply, and longs to be close to every one of us.

"I'm the one who walks away."
Everytime I leave my dog to go do something "important", he gives me a look that says, "I wish I could be with you". Many people think they have failed and that God has left them. So they leave God. Crazy, but quite common. But God loves us in spite of what we consider to be our failures.

"But both of them just wait for me and dance at my return with glee."
My dog has a party when I return even if I have been gone only 10 minutes. The prodigal son left home and squandered everything his father had given him. The father didn't follow his son and hurl judgements and insults. He just waited. When his son returned, the dad didn't say a thing about what his son had done. He was so thrilled to have him back that he threw a big party.

"Both love me no matter what, divine God and canine mutt. "
We know how loving our dogs are. Their relationship to us is not based on a scorecard. Well many people think that God talleys our mistakes like an accountant who tracks every penny. But, if this were true then it would be impossible to have an authentic friendship with God. We would all either be intolerably proud, or we'd be disfuctionally humiliated. This is why dead religion is made of intolerably proud people telling disfunctionally humiliated people what to do.

"I take it hard each time I fail but God forgives, Dog wags his tail".
If you don't believe that forgiveness is a huge aspect of who God is, you won't be able to forgive yourself... or anybody else either.

"God thought up and made the dog, dog reflects a part of God".
The order of creation in Genesis loosely reflects what science is telling us. This is fascinating. My favorite things to read are the Bible, and popular science books of all kinds. I think God expressed himself in the things we see around us.

"I've seen love from both sides now, it's everywhere, amen, bow wow."
When you force and control an animal, something deep inside it retreats and you miss out. Do that enough and your life becomes silent, lonely, and cold. It's the same with our relationships to each other. When people control people, something deep inside retreats and goes cold, intelligence is suppressed, physical health begins to decline, things unravel.

Some people think that God manipulates and controls, but to me it looks like beings have been made to flourish in the presence of love and freedom. This is the most tangible and direct evidence for the existence of God - that love brings health, wholeness, and vibrance. Love is the powerful force that nurtures life. And God is love.

"I look up and I see God, I look down and see my dog
And in my human frailty, I can't match their love for me."

GoD and DoG love me unwaveringly and I can't match it. But I am learning...

Monday, March 2, 2015

Just a tad out of line

At the Senior Citizens Centre they had a contest the other day. I lost by one point. The question was, where do women mostly have curly hair? 

Apparently, the correct answer was Africa.
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One of the other questions was to name one thing commonly found in cells. 

It appears that Aboriginals is not the correct answer either.
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I’ve heard that Apple has scrapped their plans for the new children’s iPod

 after realizing that iTouch Kids is not a good product name.
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There’s a new Muslim clothing shop opened in our shopping centre, but 

I’ve been banned from it after asking to look at some bomber jackets.
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