We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.

Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

Presumably unintentional hilarity?

When I read this first paragraph in a longer piece about Rowan Williams the intrinsically hilarious next Archbishop of Canterbury (he even looks funny), I could not help but marvel over the sheer linguistic and logical absurdity of it

ST DAVID’S (Reuters) – The future Archbishop of Canterbury has been made an honorary druid at a colourful pageant in his native Wales, but he denies that the ceremony makes him some kind of pagan.

Actually it does indeed mean precisely that. The next Archbishop of Canterbury has been made ‘some sort of pagan’, namely an honourary pagan. The Druids are a pre-Christian order whose spirituality is by definition pagan: it pretty much has to be if it is pre-Christian! The Archbishop designate has allowed them to make him an honourary Druid, therefore…

I suppose having some facility with simple logic is not a pre-requisite for a job of such passing consequence to the Church of England.

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