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tcpipThe double issue of RPG Review 23-24 has been released with the final article, a top-twenty of RPG game worlds concluded. Still working on the web version, as opposed to the PDF, up-to-date, but that should occur soon. Also have had two reviews published on rpg.net, Never Unprepared, for session preparation and Odyssey for campaign management. Thursday night was an enjoyable session of Masks of Masks of Nyarlathotep, with two investigators deciding to take a general plot to seek a sanatorium on Cyprus, rather than continuing their journey to Kenya. They arrived just after Cyprus has become a Crown Colony, and sought assistance from new player-investigator, Constantin von Economo. This afternoon was a session of GURPS Middle-Earth, which ran well.
The LNP Federal government continues to their utmost to destroy any notion of the Commonwealth of Australia, with demands that the unemployed make at least forty job applications per month. Some have shown that this can achieved easily, albeit at a processing cost for business. This clearly ties-in with their work-for-the-dole programme, which is shown to reduce one's chance of finding employment. The practical upshot of all this is that a number of us are plotting a job search agency that automates the application process with relevant positions. Watch this space for further developments in Zardoz Employment Services.
Also in the realm of practical politics is the Isocracy Annual General Meeting (FB link) for August 16th at Trades Hall. Guest speaker is Sol Salbe from the Australian Jewish Democratic Society, and we're hoping to have a speaker from Australians for Palestine, all due to recent events in Gaza. The Network has already made its position quite clear (Apartheid and Zionism, A Zero State Solution; a secular, democratic, liberal, socialist Palestine that is a Jewish homeland. Impossible? In the realm of political change, you start with the ideal and work backwards on how you're going to achieve it.
Wore my The Clash hoodie into work on Friday, causing a flurry of activity and discussion on musical tastes. I had previously discussed my recent acquisition of the Rob Jo Star Band, a very obscure 1975 French version of Hawkwind (or at least that my reading of them). Later that day spent a small fortune to buy two VIP tickets to see the new Pop Will Eat Itself. Ever since my mid-teens my musical tastes have been generally eclectic with an emphasis on the alternative contemporary styles, matching with other aesthetic choices. From the early and mid-70s, there's a tendency towards the amalgam of progressive, psychedelic, art-rock and proto-punk (Hawkwind, Brian Eno, Yes), are my preferences. From the late 70s to late-80s strong punk, gothic, and post-punk influences (The Clash, The Dead Kennedys, Bauhaus, Joy Division/New Order, The Chameleons, Shriekback, The Cure). The late-80s to the mid-2000s my preferred sounds are mainly in the industrial, electronic body music, and other electronica styles (Front 242, Skinny Puppy. Pop Will Eat Itself, Leftfield, Nine Inch Nails). Don't ask me about post-2005 I'm still thinking about it!
The LNP Federal government continues to their utmost to destroy any notion of the Commonwealth of Australia, with demands that the unemployed make at least forty job applications per month. Some have shown that this can achieved easily, albeit at a processing cost for business. This clearly ties-in with their work-for-the-dole programme, which is shown to reduce one's chance of finding employment. The practical upshot of all this is that a number of us are plotting a job search agency that automates the application process with relevant positions. Watch this space for further developments in Zardoz Employment Services.
Also in the realm of practical politics is the Isocracy Annual General Meeting (FB link) for August 16th at Trades Hall. Guest speaker is Sol Salbe from the Australian Jewish Democratic Society, and we're hoping to have a speaker from Australians for Palestine, all due to recent events in Gaza. The Network has already made its position quite clear (Apartheid and Zionism, A Zero State Solution; a secular, democratic, liberal, socialist Palestine that is a Jewish homeland. Impossible? In the realm of political change, you start with the ideal and work backwards on how you're going to achieve it.
Wore my The Clash hoodie into work on Friday, causing a flurry of activity and discussion on musical tastes. I had previously discussed my recent acquisition of the Rob Jo Star Band, a very obscure 1975 French version of Hawkwind (or at least that my reading of them). Later that day spent a small fortune to buy two VIP tickets to see the new Pop Will Eat Itself. Ever since my mid-teens my musical tastes have been generally eclectic with an emphasis on the alternative contemporary styles, matching with other aesthetic choices. From the early and mid-70s, there's a tendency towards the amalgam of progressive, psychedelic, art-rock and proto-punk (Hawkwind, Brian Eno, Yes), are my preferences. From the late 70s to late-80s strong punk, gothic, and post-punk influences (The Clash, The Dead Kennedys, Bauhaus, Joy Division/New Order, The Chameleons, Shriekback, The Cure). The late-80s to the mid-2000s my preferred sounds are mainly in the industrial, electronic body music, and other electronica styles (Front 242, Skinny Puppy. Pop Will Eat Itself, Leftfield, Nine Inch Nails). Don't ask me about post-2005 I'm still thinking about it!
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no subject
Date: 2014-08-03 01:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-08-03 09:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-08-08 09:25 am (UTC)As i was saying to someone the other day, i'm coming to believe that the push to make life as difficult as possible for people with little money is at least partly about maintaining the importance and power that comes with having lots of it.
To quote myself: "Some time ago, i read an article which analysed the economics of the Star Trek world, where money is said to be obsolete and everybody works voluntarily for their own betterment and the good of society. The writer decided that currency of some sort would exist in the Federation, since it's mentioned from time to time, but that with technology able to meet everyone's basic needs, money would be a kind of novelty, only of relevance to a few people who valued the trappings of wealth above and beyond what was available to everyone. I started thinking about whether such a society could be possible, and realised that, aside from the limits of our technology, the biggest obstacle would be resistance from the existing wealth-based power structures. Basically, if people didn't need a constant supply of money just to survive, what power would come from wealth? If it wasn't really, really awful to be without money, what would it matter who possessed and controlled the most of it? Looked at that way, efforts to make life miserable for the very poor start to make perfect sense, not just as a ploy for cheap wages and conditions, but as part of a systematic strategy to maintain the status quo."
The other side of it would be a mentality where the poor have only their own laziness and incompetence to blame and deserve no sympathy. Every time i hear Joe Hockey say something like: "We stand for equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome", what i hear is: "We don't believe there should be no losers in life - we believe in supporting those that have what it takes to be winners". Not what he actually said, of course, but a pretty good summation of what i believe they do stand for.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-08 10:05 am (UTC)Of course, with regard to resistance to an equalisation of wealth, there is some very good empirical evidence (summarised in The Spirit Level) that indicates the social benefits that come from equality. It is not too much fun (and a rather paranoid state) to be a wealth person in a poor society.
Not only is there a challenge to ensure that people are aware of the damaging effects of inequality, but also the need for wealthy people to realise that they too suffer from it (although, clearly, not as much as the poor).
BTW, what are you doing next Saturday evening?
no subject
Date: 2014-08-09 08:29 am (UTC)I imagine some people think that wealth will shield themselves and their families from the effects of an unjust society but, as you say, there would be consequences for them as well. I'm a big fan of the notion of viewing things as an interconnected 'ecosystem' where anything that happens affects everything else (Thich Nhat Hanh has some interesting writings on this).
I don't think we have anything on next Saturday. We rarely leave the house on a Saturday night these days.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-09 10:35 am (UTC)Yes, one of the great thinkers of the 20th century, and sadly not as well recognised in political theory as he should be.
I don't think we have anything on next Saturday. We rarely leave the house on a Saturday night these days.
Come along to the Isocracy meeting with a speaker from the Australian Jewish Democratic Society and Australians for Palestine; 6pm at the New International Bookshop at Trades Hall. We can have dinner afterwards at the Chinese restaurant across the road.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-11 11:48 pm (UTC)I might have to pass on that one - not a good time right now.
Perhaps we might see you at Lachlan's birthday.