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There is a snarky article in the Guardian about UK bloggers (including us). I was rather puzzled by Oliver Burkeman’s description of Samizdata.net being “operated from a large and dimly lit flat in a pristine mansion block in south-west London”. Flat? Pristine mansion block? I do not recall if we gave Oliver a drink or three at our famous Cold War era bar when he came to visit but Samizdata HQ is a semi-detatched four floor house. Oh well, this is the Grauniad we are talking about. November 17th, 2005 | 18 comments - (Comments are closed)
 Samizdatistas David Carr was on the Jeremy Vine Show (BBC Radio Two) this morning, arguing with some Labour member of Parliament who believes that firemen and ambulance drivers should enjoy higher levels of legal protection than the ordinary people in the street. David puts his views forcefully and you can download and listen to it here (mp3 file). November 16th, 2005 | 12 comments - (Comments are closed)
Here is another in my intermittent series pointing out unusual blogs. Hard Diamond is the blog of a British master jeweller by the name of Paul Hatton (and as any Londoner knows, Hatton Gardens is the centre of the UK jewellery trade). He takes commissions and explains here the reasons for bespoke jewellery. These are uniqueness, range and price & access to maker.
What makes his blog fascinating is that it does not just display his rather groovy artefacts that he has created so far…  …but it also tells a story of his trade, such as this description of setting a gem in an emerald ring:
Blogs like this make his profession come alive and he turns it into his own medium as well as a ‘inside’ story-telling space. Take a peek for yourself. November 16th, 2005 | 2 comments - (Comments are closed)
Switzerland is a bastion of efficiency and rationality surrounded by the boiling maelstrom of stupidity that is Europe… and yet even they are falling foul of idiotic political correctness and absurd defensive ‘sensitivity’.
Hardly the end of the world but it is not a good sign that even the dependibly sensible Swiss have this crap to deal with. November 15th, 2005 | 36 comments - (Comments are closed)
The Research Defence Society, a body supporting animal research in medicine, has started a blog. They intend to use it to keep people up to date with their activities, to counter disinformation and highlight how animal rights extremists use terrorism against scientists, and to support staff involved in animal research. November 15th, 2005 | 4 comments - (Comments are closed)
The whole issue of Walter Duranty’s Pulitzer Prize in 1932 has always pissed me off. It just rankles that he got away with it, so the least we can do is blacken the bastard’s name posthumously for the sake of the millions of dead Ukrainians he lied about. Now that Harold Pinter has won a Nobel Prize for literature, I guess the tradition of lionising men of letters who are apologists for mass murdering leftists is still alive and well. Want to make your voice heard on the issue of Walter Duranty’s Pulitzer Prize? Take a look at Cyber Cossack (and check out their great site banner) and if you are in the NY area, consider lending your hand to a bit of activism. Better late than never. November 14th, 2005 | 19 comments - (Comments are closed)
Yes, make jokes about it, so says Afshin Ellian, an Iranian dissident. There are a couple very interesting articles over on the Social Affairs Unit blog about Afshin Ellian. As I have been saying, the voices of intolerance cannot be appeased, they need to be uncompromisingly confronted and ideally they should be confronted not just by secular westerners but by other Muslims. Okay, so did you hear the one about the Imam, his two wives and a goat… November 13th, 2005 | 103 comments - (Comments are closed)
Flemming Rose, an editor from Denmark’s largest newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, reacted to news that Danish cartoonists were too afraid of Muslim militants to illustrate a new children’s biography of the Prophet Muhammad, by doing exactly that, putting Denmark’s policies of tolerance to the test by commissioning a series of illustrations of Muhammad. In response thousands of Muslims in Denmark marched in protest demanding the newspaper be “punished”, though interestingly an Iranian woman, Nasim Rahnama, has organised counter-protests in support of the editor, managing to secure one hundred and fifty signatures affirming freedom of expression. As I have mentioned before, when I see more people like the commendable Nasim Rahnama taking a stand then I may conclude that things are improving and perhaps modern Islam is not a blight on any tolerant society it comes into contact with. But as it stands, clearly it is the ignorant bigots who can put the largest mobs on the streets and that is why the actions of editor Flemming Rose need to be strongly applauded. It is hard to overstate the importance of confronting intolerant Islam on a cultural as well as a political level. So when Muslim scholars attack the newspaper for its cartoons:
But that is exactly the point: it is intended to ‘split’ rather than ‘unite’ and the importance of unity is vastly overrated. No one who values tolerant pluralistic western values should be seeking some sort of compromise with bigotry. There should be no attempt to ‘unite’ with the people who marched in Denmark demanding the government ‘punish’ Jyllands-Posten, in fact they must be confronted. And please, the scholar is making a category error because it has nothing to do with ‘democracy’. Even if a democratic majority do not want to see cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad appear in the newspapers, it is still wrong to try and use the force of law to prevent it. Dislike the idea? Fine, do not buy the damn newspaper. The issue here is liberty and democracy is far from a synonym for that. November 12th, 2005 | 48 comments - (Comments are closed)
Alexia Harriton, an Australian woman who is deaf, blind, physically and mentally disabled and requires round-the-clock care, is suing a doctor for allowing her to be born, with the full support by her mother. Never mind that rubella during pregnancy does not guarantee what happened to Ms. Harriton. I have a better idea. If she is competent to sue the doctor, she is competent to tell the people giving her round-the-clock medical care to get lost and let nature take its course. Hell, she could tell one of them to leave a nice sharp knife or a cup of water and a bottle of sleeping pills within reach if she wants to expedite things and if she cannot manage that, well seeing as how her mother is so supportive… Why should a doctor be liable for an ‘act of God’? So he did not diagnose how thing would shake out correctly. Too bad, no one is perfect. Seems to me that Alexia Harriton and her mother were born moral and emotional cripples too. Nature dealt them a seriously crap hand and that is truly tragic but it is no one’s fault. It happens. Deal with it, but please, deal with it yourself. Think I am being a little harsh? Well I do not think so and I have my reasons. November 11th, 2005 | 27 comments - (Comments are closed)
Hollywood Director James Orr points out some interesting factoids about how megacorporate movieland is seeing the game shifting before their very eyes. The internet changes everything… we just do not know precisely how yet. November 10th, 2005 | 3 comments - (Comments are closed)
Want to see a splendid example of verbosity when the simple word arse (or even ass) would have sufficed? November 10th, 2005 | 18 comments - (Comments are closed)
As the splendidly politically incorrect Ray D. puts it:
Heh. November 8th, 2005 | 3 comments - (Comments are closed)
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