tcpip | Whilst the world falls apart, I'm actually enjoying myself.

Whilst the world falls apart, I'm actually enjoying myself.

greylock informs us that if you're a fundamentalist Christian the latest invasion of Lebanon by Israel is cause for celebration because the Rapture is coming!

zey provides this image of the special love that Israeli children are being enculturated with. Let's sort this out. Hezbollah kills eight and captures two Israeli soldiers. Israel responds with an invasion of Lebanon, killing almost three hundred civilians, wounding a thousand and displacing half a million. Strikes on Lebanon's civilian infrastructure include Beirut airport, ports, grain silos, bridges, roads, factories, medical and relief trucks, and the country's largest dairy farm Liban Lait. If Israel wants to deal with Hezbollah they should offer military and police support to the Lebanese government, not launch an invasion of a sovereign state that has a tenuous religious balance and semi-democracy. As Antony Lowenstein points out, this action will to generate more terrorists.

Back at home, Wealth gap in Australia. Latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show that almost 60 per cent of Australian households' wealth is owned by the richest 20 per cent of households, while the bottom 20 per cent own just 1 per cent. I'd bet my meagre dollars it's even more disproportionate in land values too. Appropriately from the cream of society (the rich and thick) Young Liberals chant "We're racist, we're sexist, we're homophobic". Malcom Fraser's takes Trotsky's dictum of equating the head of a facist with the pavement. "Where people are being racist or discriminatory in their comments or policies, wherever they are, they ought to be clobbered," he said..

So whilst all these disasters are happening I've been having a great time. Work this week at both Borderlands and Naturelinks has been interesting; the former involving some great hardware repairs and the later required moving and re-establishing a network and associated remote desktop requirements and so forth - there's even a 80 metre trench being dug to connect two buildings. Further, I've been working on yet another website this time for a PR company who pay quite well indeed. Off-hours, The Norman Britian RetroAD&D game continues to be great fun and this Sunday we're playing Cybernoia, which

imajica_lj has been saying very nice things about. Also on Sunday, a person of no less greatness than

claudine_c is speaking at the Melbourne Unitarian Church on her rural health work in India. Finally, the bunny, Astaroth from the second summoning, is doing well. And whoever the anonymous stranger who sent me a dozen virtual red roses, thanks!

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Whether the word apocalypt is in the dictionary or not, it stems from a 'real' word and conveys its own meaning, so yes, it is a word.

2012 is not just a myth, not in the way you seem to mean it anyway. You are correct that it is the end of a cycle. The Mayan calendar is full of cyclic predictions and events. The point is that 2012 is the end of the big cycle, the mama cycle. After this the whole process begins again.

It is also interesting to note that we are currently in the Kali Yuga. In, or just past according to a minority. So, pretty near the end. So there you have another ancient tradition calling attention to our current age with predictions of calamity.

There are many ancient cultures who have a sense of historical time based on very long periods of time. The Egyptians, the peoples who built Angkor Wat, the Mayans etc etc. All have massive monuments with architecture based on the movements of heavenly bodies, the precession of the sun in particular. All have very similar concepts of the creation and continuation of the world.

I'm interested in this kind of stuff because there is a whole lot of evidence indicating that ancient people knew of a cyclic phenomenon which caused great strife, in some cases the creation of the world, in some it's destruction. You recall the great flood and a dude called Noah? That flood is mentioned in thousands of native cultural traditions.

There is also the Spike theory. This is based on an extrapolative graph of human technology from the wheel on up to nanotechnology. In the next five to fifty years that graph hits an exponential curve and shoots off the page. Some think it will be the combination of artificial intelligence and nanotechnology which allows smart tech to design and manufacture itself. Whatever, it's an interesting notion.

So, the Mayan calendar does not predict the end of the world. But that is not what the word Apocalypse refers to either. Generally it is seen as the coming of heaven on earth, when the eschaton is fully emmanentised. Heaven, or hell. Regardless, the world is pretty fucked up right now. In the past we've never had the capability to kill everyone on the planet in a few hours, as we do now. All this 'coincidental' fulfilling of end-time prophecy is something to think about at least.

P.S Coincidental? It means two disparate events which seem to be connected. So it doesn't mean a damn thing. My birth and my death are coincidental. So is a knife in my hand and a bleeding corpse on the ground.

'Retard' simply means 'slow'. "Abnormally low temperatures can retard crop growth." etc. When used to describe people with assorted mental deficiencies, it's quite mild. Almost sweetly euphemistic, in a way.

'Fucktard', though is a beautiful word in context.

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

(I just posted the link to another forum and one particularly apt reply was: "This law is double plus good! History is what the State says it is. I love Big Brother!")

I have theories on right-leaning political memes and a belief in absolutes... *mutter mutter*

IIRC, a 'fucktard' is a retarded person used for sexual recreation purposes. The story going that, while they might drool a bit, they're awfully enthusiastic.

*boggle*

I'm just going to sit and blink and hope that someone verifies or otherwise.

The spike theory you describe is more commonly known as Kurzweil's Law of Accelerating Returns, I believe, with the near-vertical section of the curve being referred to as the Technological Singularity.

Exciting times are in store for the younger generations alive today. I can't wait.

fighter jets are awfully phallic don'tcha think?
I mean honestly, its bad enough they all want to be each other's wingman. ;)

Sorry, bias showing there. And its not even sexual bias. ;)

I just peeked in on that discussion. Hi-larious. This is one of the many facets of the modern US left-anarchist movement that made me facepalm in anguish and run away: Rabid PCness, xenophobia, masturbatory political discussion, and anti-intellectualism. Ugh!

Young Liberals chant "We're racist, we're sexist, we're homophobic".

O_o

Did someone redefine the word "Liberal" while I wasn't looking? Or is the Australian "Liberal" party actually the Conservative party by an odd name?

'asshats' is another good one starting to make the rounds...

"We're racist, we're sexist, we're homophobic".

Are you sure you weren't actually listening to my year 8 students' converstations?

Yes - our Liberal party is right wing conservative - similar to the USA's Republican party.
However, our Labour party while left wing, is also conservative.

Ya know, I don't worry about it too much. I do what I can to make it better, but there's no point being miserable about something I've got no control over. Being in NZ has helped a lot, since my adopted govt is quite a bit less obnoxious.

Completely off topic, but you still interested in doing web design for unitarians.org.nz? I'm thinking I really should get off my ass and do something about it. :)

Students? Ha! One of my teachers talks like that. Okay, he's a sessional at a TAFE, so not a real teacher, but seriously, he seem oblivious to the fact that his students are conspiring to throw him off the balcony...

Defenestration has a long and worthwhile history.

Good advice... And yes you're quite correct about the NZ govt.

Still quite interested in doing the unitarians.org.nz website. I believe there are four congregations now... two in Auckland, Blenheim and Christchurch?

Although it wasn't set up that way, supposedly.

Menzies apparently really wanted a Liberal Party and the old Deakinite faction were a significant force.

The conservatives ended up in the Liberal Party mainly because they had nowhere elese to go. Now it's the liberals in the Liberal Party that have nowhere else to go :/

And don't get me started on the Labor Party....

Heh. Year 8 students are so confused about their sexuality they often have to proclaim loudly that they're not gay. Many of them protest too much.

Guess some people don't ever get over it. Then they join the Young Liberals.

You know I wasn't aware of the quality of Canadian suits; I was always a Hong Kong man.

Heck that's two new things I've learnt from you in one thread!

I really don't get "asshat". What is an asshat? A hat that you put you ass (or arse) into? Is it a hat that looks like an arse?

http://community.livejournal.com/anarchists/1845580.html

Who can't even spell Labour.

I know, for the seriousness of the event they're caught up in the appropriateness of the word 'fucktard'.

Wow, real anarchistic.

Retard means not just slow, but backwards, retrograde.

It still works with crop growth being retarded.

Apparently I missed the revolution when it came to mean something politicall incorrect.

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Whilst the world falls apart, I'm actually enjoying myself.

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'Slow' = offensive?

Re: History may say otherwise... if the yanks have their way.

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Enjoy!

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Re: 'Slow' = offensive?