DogfightAtBankstown

theophobia

Mustafa Akyol, whose blog The White Path is a good read, writes on theophobia in Turkey:

One of the interesting and tell-tale controversies of the past week was the fuss over the recent remarks of Hakan Şükür, Turkey’s famous football star and a pious Muslim. In an interview with daily Zaman, he warned the supporters of his team ,Galatasaray, and the other big one, Fenerbahçe, about the impending match between the two. In Turkey, football matches, especially such key derbies, often turn into orgies of violence. But that is very much against the morals of Islam, Şükür noted. And, he added, it would be especially bad to swear and attack fellow human beings during the “week of the holy birth,” that of Prophet Muhammad, in which this match will be played. He reportedly said:

“We are in the week of the holy birth, and we should be worthy of it. We should, in fact, raise our youth and children in the spirit of the tolerance of our Prophet… The fans (of Fenerbahçe and Galatasaray) should come to the stadium with not knives but roses.”

Public outcry ensued:

I think this whole episode nicely presents a fundamental problem in Turkey. Quite many people in this country, especially those who consider themselves to be the elite, suffer from a sort of neurosis that can aptly be called thephobia. That term refers to the irrational fear from, and disgust towards, anything that relates to God and religion. It is, as American writer Tony Snow puts it, “the absolute, frenetic, run-away-from-Godzilla panic that afflicts some people when they hear the ‘G’ word.” For them any reference to, or symbol of, religion is simply horrifying.

That is what lies beneath the bizarre notion of secularism that the Turkish Republic and its masters subscribe to. In the free world, secularism is a democratic principle that gives people the right to live according their beliefs or disbeliefs. In Turkey, it is the principle that is used to suppress religion, marginalize believers, and ridicule their practices. That is why Turkey’s self-styled secularism is often at war with democracy, and the Constitutional Court declares that “secularism will not be sacrificed to freedom.”

But why are so many Turks theophobes? Well, that is the way that the “education” system and the official ideology have indoctrinated them for decades. The average “white Turk” – the one who thinks he is Westernized – believes that religion must be forcefully pushed to the corners of society for us to be a “modern” nation. The die-hard Kemalists are, of course, the most devout believers in this dogma, but others, including even some “liberals,” have been influenced by it to a great extent. They can doubt the official ideology in matters relating to matters such as the Kurds question, but they very much they share its theophobia.

Akyol continues later:

Their psychology is driven by theophobia, to be sure, but they also use a seemingly rational argument. “If we allow a bit of religion,” they say, “how can we be sure that it won’t dominate the whole society?”

And highlights that the threat to democracy is not religion or some other idea. It is the lack of pluralism.

This is true.

Akyol points out, that a pious Muslim should not necessarily be equated with an Islamist, that is, one who wants to impose  Islam as a state ideology, or, as one of his colleagues suggested "someone who has a desire to see an increase in the number of observant Muslims"  (which in itself is nothing to be feared, provided one seeks that increase by proposing, not imposing). 

Indeed.

However what I find fascinating about Şükür's comments is that he made his appeal on the assumption that there was no pluralism: in other words on the assumption that football supporters are Muslims and should therefore take their religion seriously.  In other words, Şükür's understanding seems to be that to be Turkish is to be Muslim, ergo he could exhort Turkish football supporters to be Muslims. (And let's just say that tiny religious minorities in Turkey, especially Turkish Orthodox Christians, know that very well.) 

We have sportsmen and women who make reference to their faith or display some outward forms of piety (e.g. by making the sign of the cross), but I doubt you would find them appealing to their supporters - even to call for good behaviour - on the assumption that all their supporters, and that of their sporting opponents - share the same faith.

Which means, from this distance, the dynamic seems much more complex.

I'm not sure, for example, that the theophobia of which Akyol speaks is fear of any religion.

And I am not sure, in the case of Turkey, that this is a case of missionary work (OK) vs forced conversions (not OK).

The Turks are already overwhelmingly Muslim (the majority Sunni, with a sizeable number of Alevi or twelver Shi'a, as well as other Muslims groups) even if they are pious to various degrees - from mere "cultural" attachment to the very devout.

It seems to me, rather, that the fear which prompted a reaction to Şükür comments is a fear of something else, which goes back to two of my oft repeated observations:

There is no freedom of religion if there is no freedom to convert and apostasize.

The biggest danger to Muslims is other Muslims.

disenchantment

David Brooks in the New York Times

Over the past 15 months, I’ve been writing pretty regularly about the presidential campaign, which has meant thinking a lot about attack ads, tracking polls and which campaign is renouncing which over-the-line comment from a surrogate that particular day.

But on my desk for much of this period I have kept a short essay, which I stare at longingly from time to time. It’s an essay about how people in the Middle Ages viewed the night sky, and it’s about a mentality so totally removed from the campaign mentality that it’s like a refreshing dip in a cool and cleansing pool.

The essay, which appeared in Books & Culture, is called “C. S. Lewis and the Star of Bethlehem,” by Michael Ward, a chaplain at Peterhouse College at Cambridge. It points out that while we moderns see space as a black, cold, mostly empty vastness, with planets and stars propelled by gravitational and other forces, Europeans in the Middle Ages saw a more intimate and magical place. The heavens, to them, were a ceiling of moving spheres, rippling with signs and symbols, and moved by the love of God. The medieval universe, Lewis wrote, “was tingling with anthropomorphic life, dancing, ceremonial, a festival not a machine.”

Lewis tried to recapture that medieval mind-set, Ward writes. He did it not because he wanted to renounce the Copernican revolution and modern science, but because he found something valuable in that different way of seeing our surroundings.

The modern view disenchants the universe, Lewis argued, and tends to make it “all fact and no meaning.”

An antidote to industrialism: a little medieval imagination.

The essay: C.S. Lewis and the Star of Bethlehem.

sunday stupidity

Catmeat shiek is still around.  Doing a Nancy Pelosi with triple twist.

One wonders why he doesn't use all his apparent learning and influence in his own community to combat this mindset. 

On the other hand, nope, I don't wonder at all.

Update: Tempting.

if the U.S. democrats

Are supposedly trying to reach out to Christians in America, having recognised that they need their votes, then they are doing their darndest to go about it by showing just how stupid they are. 

As if there weren't enough whacky interpretations of the Scripture, sadly sometimes even from ministers,  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi goes further and just makes up quotes from the Bible.

And for what?  All for Gaia of course.

And frankly, you didn't need any bible or theology professor to tell you that.

Update: I keep thinking the Pope-clutching Pelosi, who claims a devout Catholic upbringing, should probably read Ratzinger's In the Beginning: A Catholic Understanding of Creation and the Fall, except that it might make her choke. Someone send her a copy.  

today

Is Good Friday for Eastern Christian churches. 

Not the day for podsvechniks.  Candlestick holders.

fine fellows

During World War I, 1914-1918, the 'Great War', the most important battleground was the 'Western Front' in France and Belgium.  More than 290,000 Australians served in this theatre of war in the Australian Imperial Force, in battles such as those at Fromelles, the Somme, Bullecourt, Messines, Passcshendaele, Dernancourt and Villers-Bretonneux.  Of those who served, 46,000 were either killed in action or died of their wounds.   

Today is the 90th anniversary of what came to be known as the ‘other’ Anzac Day, when ANZAC forces surrounded and later recaptured the small northern French village of Villers-Bretonneux from its German occupiers,  in circumstances reminiscent of Gallipoli three years earlier. 

Villers-Bretonneux was vital to the integrity of the whole Allied line.

Diggers on the Western Front. Some quick snippets from around the web:

Ordinary men

Photo: Herbert Fishwick, 1915. SMH.

Who earnt a reputation

Australian Postcard

English officer: "Disgraceful harness... Have you no soap?"
ANZAC: "No"
English officer: "No what?"
ANZAC: "No soap."
Drawing by Dan Lindsay

Nonchalance. Australian Postcard 1917.

We have had to separate the Australians into Convalescent Camps of their own, because they were giving so much trouble when along with our men and put such revolutionary ideas into their heads.

--Commander-in-Chief Field-Marshall Douglas Haig, letter to wife, February 1918

The Colonel decided that he would have a full dress parade of the guard mounting. Well, the Aussies looked over at us amazed. The band was playing, we were all smartened up, spit and polish, on parade, and that happened every morning. We marched up and down, up and down.

The Aussies couldn't get over it, and when we were off duty we naturally used to talk to them, go over and have a smoke with them, or meet them when we were hanging about the road or having a stroll. They kept asking us: 'Do you like this sort of thing? All these parades, do you want to do it?' Of course we said, 'No, of course we don't. We're supposed to be on rest, and all the time we've got goes to posh up and turn out on parade.' So they looked at us a bit strangely and said, 'OK, cobbers, we'll soon alter that for you'.

The Australians didn't approve of it because they never polished or did anything. They had a band, but their brass instruments were all filthy. Still, they knew how to play them. 

The next evening, our Sergeant-Major was taking the parade. Sergeant-Major Rowbotham, a nice man, but a stickler for discipline. He was just getting ready to bawl us all out when the Australians started with their band. They marched up and down the road outside the field, playing any old thing. There was no tune you could recognise, they were just blowing as loud as they could on their instruments. It sounded like a million cat-calls.

And poor old Sergeant Rowbotham, he couldn't make his voice heard. It was an absolute fiasco. They never tried to mount another parade, because they could see the Aussies watching us from across the road, just ready to step in and sabotage the whole thing. So they decided that parades for mounting the guards should be washed out, and after that they just posted the guards in the ordinary way as if we were in the line.

 --Private C. Miles,10th Btn. Royal Fusiliers, recalling Aussies at Strazeele, Belgium

--Slovenly ANZAC troops having a day off from the trenches, Western Front

I do hope that we shall hear no more of the 'indiscipline' of these extraordinary Corps, for I don't believe that for military qualities of every kind their equal exists. Their physique is wonderful and their intelligence of a high order 

-- Sir Maurice Hankey, Secretary of the Imperial War Cabinet, after touring the Gallipoli peninsula

Very much and very stupid comment has been made upon the discipline of the Australian soldier. That was because the very conception and purpose of discipline have been misunderstood. It is, after all, only a means to an end, and that end is the power to secure co-ordinated action among a large number of individuals for the achievement of a definite purpose. It does not mean lip service, nor obsequious homage to superiors, nor servile observance of forms and customs, nor a suppression of individuality... the Australian Army is a proof that individualism is the best and not the worst foundation upon which to build up collective discipline.

-- Lieutenant-General Sir John Monash

In Belgium and France

In moving from the Herissart Area to the Tincourt Area our transport traveled two nights, stopping during the day at Bray. Soon after leaving Bray the night of September 22, one of the mules caught his foot in a wire and the pull on the wire set off a mine the Germans had placed under the road. Several of our men (117th) were killed and others wounded. Ten horses of the 117th transport were killed. We are constantly on the lookout for mines and Booby Traps. The Hun is very ingenious and nothing is too devilish for him. This past summer when he withdrew from a certain  place, he left a pond that had all the appearance of having been used as a swimming place, even had a spring board in place. A party of Australians came to the pond and got ready to go in swimming. The first two dove in but did not come up. Their companions went in after them and found they had been spiked. The Germans had placed upright spikes in the bottom of the swimming pool. A party of our men started to bury a German; as they lifted the body an explosion took place and two of our men were killed. They had used the body to make a "booby trap." We do not bury German dead except on the battlefield, and then only after testing them. The German apparently does everything that will make the rest of the world hate him and desire his destruction. 

-- October 1918, Diary of Colonel Joseph Hyde Pratt, commanding 105TH Engineers,
A. E. F.

 

Shrapnel bursting amongst reconnoitering planes. Photo: Frank Hurley (nicknamed 'the mad photographer)

Hellfire Corner on the Menin Road, near Ypres. AWM

Infantry marching ahead in a single line to the front. Photo: Frank Hurley

In an elephant iron dugout on Hill 60. Photo: Frank Hurley

Carrying in the wounded during the height of the battle (combined negatives) Photo: Frank Hurley

Hauling up an 18 pounder across captured ground to an advanced position. Photo: Frank Hurley

Surrounded by an invisible enemy.  Photo: Frank Hurley

The Battle of the Menin Road Photo: Frank Hurley

The Shell-Shattered Area of Chateau Wood, Flanders. Photo: Frank Hurley

The dawn of Passchendaele (combined negatives) Photo: Frank Hurley

Reminiscences of home: Australians chaff making in Flanders. Photo: Frank Hurley

General Rosenthal, C. B., D. S. O., of the Australian forces, told at the Overseas Club, London, the exploit of an Australian corporal named Brown, who volunteered to take a certain bit of trench, which was looked upon as very risky business indeed.

He set out with a couple of bombs, and after walking into a cornfield amid terrific machine-gun fire from the enemy, he dropped and everybody thought he was killed. He, however, was seen to rise and go forward, only to fall again. Once more he got up and went on. A Boche accosted him, but he "flattened him out" with a blow under the jaw. Arriving at a dugout he threatened to bomb it, whereupon a Boche officer and thirteen men came out and were solemnly marched back to the Australian lines by the plucky corporal.  The hero of this exploit was recommended for the D. C. M., but received the Victoria Cross.   

General Rosenthal was Commanding Officer of the Fifth Australian Division, which we relieved October 8th. Very genial and pleasant man.

-- November 1918, Diary of Colonel Joseph Hyde Pratt

A possibly shell-shocked soldier, with a "thousand yards stare" (picture made in an Australian Advanced Dressing Station near Ypres). Cropped from a photo by Frank Hurley.

Chaplains were nearly all Anglican at first, but later joined by Catholic and Protestant ministers.

Photo: Sergeant Jack Grinton.

'Les kangourous' de Villers-Bretonneux

An Australian field artiller howitzer immediately after firing a salvo at Villers-Bretonneux, 24 April 1918. AWM. 

"Tell us what you want us to do, Sir, but you must let us do it our own way." 

--Australian brigadier-general Thomas William Glasgow

They were magnificent. Nothing seemed to stop them. When our fire was heaviest, they just disappeared in shell holes and came up as soon as it slackened. When we used Verey lights they stood still and were hard to see.  

-- Unnamed German officer, quoted in Neville Browning, Fix Bayonets: The Unit History of the 51st Battalion, Perth, 2000, p.157

It seemed there was nothing to do but go straight forward and die hard

-- Digger at VB

Remembered

Photo: George Lipman, 1963.  SMH.

The British officers at Dover, Calais, and at several other places we have been have talked about being "fed up" on the war and ready for the Americans to take it over. The talk sometimes was extremely depressing and showed up the British officers in a very poor light. The Canadians and Australians that we have met are entirely different as are also the men we have met up here at the front. As a whole the men we have come in close contact with have been fine fellows.

-- June 1918, Diary of Colonel Joseph Hyde Pratt, commanding 105TH Engineers, A. E. F.

Credits and Links:

Australian War Memorial

Australians on the Western Front 1914-18

Commonwealth War Graves Commission

Sydney Morning Herald

History in a biscuit tin (Daily Telegraph)

Jean-Pierre Thierry (The Age)

The Heritage of the Great War (An unusual Netherlands-based site with an extensive collection of  photos)

AIF Project

Update: additional photo added
 

it takes one...er...

Hillary Clinton.  Shameless.

Hmm, I think I told you that.  Twice.

Next.

houndstooth

The Rather Difficult Font Game.

I couldn't even scrape a pass, but I do know my Baskerville.

(via Simon Jackman)

because he's smarter than you

Also at The Immanent Frame, Charles Taylor, author of the highly praised The Secular Age, posts on the distinction in rational credibility between religious and non-religious discourse, and briefly comments on the roots of the epistemological ground for this distinction:

I would like to add a footnote to Saba Mahmood’s excellent piece “Is Critique Secular?” I think it’s important to explain the power that an affirmative answer to this question carries in our contemporary academy.

What are we to think of the idea, entertained by Rawls for a time, that one can legitimately ask of a religiously and philosophically diverse democracy that everyone deliberate in a language of reason alone, leaving their religious views in the vestibule of the public sphere? The tyrannical nature of this demand was rapidly appreciated by Rawls, to his credit. But we ought to ask why the proposition arose in the first place. Rawls’ point in suggesting this restriction was that everyone should use a language with which they could reasonably expect their fellow citizens to agree. The idea seems to be something like this. Secular reason is a language that everyone speaks, and can argue and be convinced in. Religious languages operate outside of this discourse, by introducing extraneous premises which only believers can accept. So let’s all talk the common language.

What underpins this notion is something like an epistemic distinction. There is secular reason, which everyone can use and reach conclusions by—conclusions that is, with which everyone can agree. Then there are special languages, which introduce extra assumptions, which might even contradict those of ordinary secular reason. These are much more epistemically fragile; in fact you won’t be convinced by them unless you already hold them. So religious reason either comes to the same conclusions as secular reason, but then it is superfluous; or it comes to contrary conclusions, and then it is dangerous and disruptive. This is why it needs to be sidelined.

As for Habermas, he has always marked an epistemic break between secular reason and religious thought, with the advantage on the side of the first. Secular reason suffices to arrive at the normative conclusions we need, such as establishing the legitimacy of the democratic state, and defining our political ethic. Recently, his position on religious discourse has considerably evolved; to the point of recognizing that its “Potential macht die religiöse Rede bei entsprechenden politischen Fragen zu einem ernsthaften Kandidaten für mögliche Wahrheitsgehalte.” But the basic epistemic distinction still holds for him. Thus when it comes to the official language of the state, religious references have to be expunged. “Im Parlament muss beispielsweise die Geschäftsordnung den Presidenten ermächtigen, religiöse Stellungnahmen und Rechtfertigungen aus dem Protokoll zu streichen.”

I think that these positions of Rawls and Habermas show that they have not yet understood the normative basis for the contemporary secular state. I believe that they are on to something, in that there are zones of a secular state in which the language used has to be neutral. But these do not include citizen deliberation, as Rawls at first thought, or even deliberation in the legislature, as Habermas seems to think from the above quote. This zone can be described as the official language of the state: the language in which legislation, administrative decrees and court judgments must be couched. It is self-evident that a law before Parliament couldn’t contain a justifying clause of the type: “Whereas the Bible tells us that p.” And the same goes mutatis mutandis for the justification of a judicial decision in the court’s verdict. But this has nothing to do with the specific nature of religious language. It would be equally improper to have a legislative clause: “Whereas Marx has shown that religion is the opium of the people,” or “Whereas Kant has shown that the only thing good without qualification is a good will.” The grounds for both these kinds of exclusions is the neutrality of the state.

The state can be neither Christian nor Muslim nor Jewish; but by the same token it should also be neither Marxist, not Kantian, not Utilitarian. Of course, the democratic state will end up voting laws which (in the best case) reflect the actual convictions of its citizens, which will be either Christian, or Muslim, etc, through the whole gamut of views held in a modern society. But the decisions can’t be framed in a way which gives special recognition to one of these views. This is not easy to do; the lines are hard to draw; and they must always be drawn anew. But such is the nature of the enterprise which is the modern secular state. And what better alternative is there for diverse democracies?

Now the notion that state neutrality is basically a response to diversity has trouble making headway among “secular” people in the West, who remain oddly fixated on religion, as something strange and perhaps even threatening. This stance is fed by all the conflicts of liberal states with religion, past and present, but also by a specifically epistemic distinction: religiously informed thought is somehow less rational than purely “secular” reasoning. The attitude has a political ground (religion as threat), but also an epistemological one (religion as a faulty mode of reason).

*the post title is not aimed at Taylor himself, but my own tongue-in-cheek jab at those who promulgate a populist version of the rational credibility distinction.

islam and the secular state

Robert Hefner at the Immanent Frame posts a review of Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na`im’s Islam and the Secular State: Negotiating the Future of Shari`a.   An-Na`im is "one of our era’s most articulate exponents of the Islamic grounds for constitutionalism and human rights."

Two things distinguish this new work from An-Na`im’s early writings. The first is his explicit endorsement of a secular state as the best form of government for Muslims and for the flourishing of Islam. In Toward an Islamic Reformation, An-Na`im had dedicated his energies to addressing believers’ understandings of Islam and Shari`a, and had less to say about the appropriate form of the state. As he put it, he hoped “to reconcile Muslim commitment to Islamic law with the achievement of the benefits of secularism within a religious framework.” In this new book, he sets his sights squarely on providing Islamic rationales for secular government.

The second quality that distinguishes this book from his earlier scholarship is its systematic effort to ground arguments in support of freedom, constitutionalism, and secularity on two bodies of research: historical studies of the development of Muslim politics and Shari`a from the early Islamic period to the rise of the Ottoman Empire; and case studies of Shari`a politics in modern India, Turkey, and Indonesia. An-Na`im plumbs the depths of these empirical materials to provide corroborating evidence in support of his larger argument.

The argument has three pillars: first, and contrary to the claims of some Western scholars and Islamist intellectuals like Hassan al-Turabi, religious and state institutions in Muslim societies have been effectively separated since the death of the Prophet Muhammad; second, modern Islamists’ demands for the establishment of an Islamic state based on a fusion of religion and state reflect, not enduring Islamic precedents, but a “postcolonial discourse that relies on European notions of the state and positive law”; and, third, Muslims can best realize Shari`a ideals in a secular state neutral on matters of religion but otherwise responsive to citizen values, as long as these are expressed through a “civic reason” accessible to all citizens.

In short, An-Na`im’s book presents an “Islamic argument for a secular state,” premised on constitutional governance and universal human rights. The appeal to civic reason has parallels with the recent statements by Charles Taylor and Jürgen Habermas on religion and the public sphere. However, An-Na`im’s commitment to secular government is distinctive in that the appeal is oriented toward not only concepts of popular welfare, but “the survival and development of Islam itself.”

On this latter point, An-Na`im’s approach bears a striking resemblance to that of two other modern Muslim pluralists, the late Nurcholish Madjid of Indonesia and Abdulkarim Soroush of Iran. Like both of these authors, An-Na`im argues that the most compelling grounds for a separation of religion and state have to do with, not liberalism, but efforts to safeguard Islam from abuse at the hands of the powerful. Also like these authors, An-Na`im’s secularism is of a sort that, while mandating a formal separation of religious and state institutions, allows and even requires religious actors and values to play a role in legislation, subject to the restriction that the values are recast in a non-sectarian form. Indeed, An-Na`im argues, secularism—”defined to mean only the separation of religion and state”—makes such “minimal moral claims” that it is “incapable of meeting the collective requirements of public policy.” The weakness is especially serious with regard to vexing moral issues like abortion and capital punishment. Inasmuch as this is so, the secular state must allow citizens of religious conviction to publicly express their views and influence legislation, with the proviso that that such legislation must be cast in terms “acceptable and convincing to the generality of citizens regardless of their religious or other beliefs.” The balance struck here between formal separation and allowing for the public role of religion “is difficult to establish and maintain, but there is no alternative to striving to achieve it.”

An-Na`im observes that one of the greatest threats to Islamic piety and observance today comes, not from outside the Muslim community, but from Muslims who would abolish the separation of religion and state in the name of an ostensibly Islamic government. He argues that all such étatizing projects are not only politically dangerous but religiously mistaken. Their religious error lies in their failure to recognize that the Qur’an places ultimate responsibility for observance of God’s commands, not on the state, but on individuals and the community of believers. “Shari`a principles by their nature and function defy any possibility of enforcement by the state.” By surrendering responsibility for the Shari`a to state authorities, proponents of the Islamic state create a “totalitarian” entity that is “incoherent and unworkable,” and thus doomed to foster hypocrisy, corruption, and cynicism among believers.

An-Na`im's argument, it seems, is not without its weaknesses but it is one he carries with conviction.  It is informed not just by a lifetime of scholarship, but aslo by a deep personal piety, a liberal modernist view of Islam and a committment to human rights.

After all, Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im watched his own country Sudan, fall to a  totalitarian Islamic fundamentalist regime by military coup in 1989.   

He knows the biggest danger to Muslims is other Muslims.

italian politics 101

Just switched the tube on to see George Negus trying to fathom why Berlusconi was re-lected given the rest of Europe - in his view - is moving to the centre-left .

Look.  The Italians, like some of their Mediterranean neighbours, change governments like they change shirts.   And as George noted, Italians lead the way: 61 parliaments since WWII. 

But there's method in the madness and it's not hard to fathom.  As an British expat in Sicily noted on the day after:

...Even I have to hand it to Berlusconi, for his come-back ability, sheer nerve and showmanship [though his running mates in the Northern League are another matter] . Italians are incredibly pragmatic, you see, and when times are hard, they will vote for whoever they think will get them back to work, clear the streets of Naples of rubbish and generally make them look like a world player again. [Sometimes I think this often chaotic nation just craves order.] And if this new government doesn't work, so what? - We just chuck it out, sooner rather than later!

It may all seem very strange from outside the country, but I can understand exactly why Italians have voted as they have [though I am not condoning their decision]. The rest of the world may laugh at Italy all it likes, reader: the country still eats arguably better than any other, its design and workmanship still inspire admiration everywhere and young people do not feel that the be all and end all of life is to get as far away as possible from their families. So surely we have to concede that the Italians are doing quite a lot of things right?

bishop takes castle

Francesco Lugo has been elected as Paraguay's new president, effectively ending the 61 year reign of world's longest ruling party, 35 of which were under the dicatatorship of Alfredo Stroessner. 

Many news items name Lugo as a former Catholic bishop.  This is where it gets tricky.  Lugo did indeed set aside his cassock and step down as bishop of San Pedro, one of Paraguay's poorest dioceses, to run for political office.  He attempted to renounce his orders as well, however this was not accepted by the Vatican, as priestly orders are for life.   

Catholic canon law also forbids a priest or bishop from participating in political parties or labour unions, and while Rome urged Lugo to consider his behaviour, he has simply apologized for the hurt he cause by disobeying canon law.

Paraguay's constitution bars religious leaders from running for president, and members of the ruling Colorado Party once threatened to challenge Lugo's candidacy on the grounds that he was still a priest.

The Vatican responded to the initial crisis by suspending him from his duties “a divinis”, meaning that he could no longer say Mass or carry out other priestly functions such as administering the sacraments. This was enough to enable him to stand in the Presidential elections. 

The Catholic church, the press tells us, enjoys a high level of trust in a country known for its corruption and nepotism.  (Which makes me think how you can get such a situation in an "overwhelmingly Catholic country").  His candidacy, nevertheless divided Catholics in Paraguay, although Lugo is especially popular with the poor, who overwhelmingly supported his entry into politics and heavily backed him in the elections.  Bishop Adalberto Martinez, the present bishop of San Pedro and secretary-general of the bishops’ conference, said Paraguay’s bishops  still consider Lugo a friend after collaborating with him for 12 years.

Lugo victory now presents the Vatican with a dilemma over whether to “reduce him to lay status”. 

I think that means the Pope gets to decide whether he will be defrocked.

Lugo is scheduled to take office on August 15.

internationalist

For the parochial: "spork" is American for "splayd" and Canadian for "spam":

And "spam" is English for Australian homosexualist rants on your blog.

Hybrid. Alternative. Junk.

spork on the right

I can't mention one of the crazy-haired finest from America's theologically loony left, without tracking down the latest on Benny Hinn, one of the finest crazy-haired from America's theologically loony right.  Alas, I only came up with more Obama bitterness:

Mr. Obama showed that his true color is yellow, as this glimpse into the Mr. Obama's world has shown him to be the Benny Hinn of politics - all style, no substance.

Or is that Blair's Law.

i guess that fits

You are Apocalypse

You believe in survival of the fittest and you believe that you are the fittest.

Click here to take the "Which Super Villain are you?" quiz...

It was a toss up with Dr. Doom.

cutlery endangered

Katharine Jefferts-Schori (a.k.a. Squid Woman), Presiding Bishop of the ECUSA (what's left of it), and one of America's finest theologically loony lefties, (meaning, just like the theologically loony right, she fails on the impersonating a Christian stake) has succeeded in finding a new way to be green.

Use a spork.

Pop quiz: Does that mean she is now officially a poor excuse, or utterly useless as a bishop?

slippery in pink

Just before I retired last night, I caught the repeat of this week's Media Watch at the point were presenter Jonathon Holmes was taking the Daily Telegraph to task for its headline on the "Mum and dad ban" story.

Such pettiness surely deserves a closer look.

Media Watch:

Sydney's Daily Telegraph knows how to stir up emotions too - in this case, not laughter, but rage:

Mum And Dad Ban
Gay bid to change behaviour in class
Exclusive
By Bruce McDougall

— Daily Telegraph, Mum And Dad Ban, 17th April, 2008

That was the Tele's front page on Thursday morning.

Teachers are being urged to stop using terms such as husband and wife when addressing students under a major anti-homophobia push in schools. The terms boyfriend, girlfriend and spouse are also on the banned list - to be replaced by the generic "partner" - in changes sought by the gay lobby aimed at reducing discrimination in classrooms.

— Daily Telegraph, Mum And Dad Ban, 17th April, 2008

The story gave the impression - without actually saying so outright - that these so-called "changes sought by the gay lobby" had the backing of the New South Wales Education Department.

Education Director-General Michael Coutts-Trotter emerged yesterday as a leader of the anti-homophobia campaign, opening a Government-backed conference on sexual diversity - That's So Gay.

— Daily Telegraph, Mum And Dad Ban, 17th April, 2008

Just as it was designed to do, the story brought a furious reaction on talkback radio and the web.

How idiotic is this Government, while we are at it Lets also chane the term Mail to Post as we do not want to offend women…

— Daily Telegraph online, Readers' Comments, Schools ban 'Mum' and 'Dad'

The yarn even made it onto national television, courtesy of Nine's Today program.

Karl Stefanovic: Well a controversial front page of the Tele this morning, a good front page. There's a push underway to stop using the terms, husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend and spouse - is that going too far?

Deborah Thomas: You bet...But to actually have this official is what is so ridiculous and as I say it is discriminatory.

— Channel 9, Today, 17th April, 2008

So, is it official? Of course not. It is true that the Director-General of the NSW Education Department, Michael Coutts-Trotter, opened a one-day conference in Sydney last Wednesday aimed at combating homophobia in schools. But did he mention or endorse the banning of terms like mum and dad? No.

And neither did McDougall say that Coutts-Trotter did. He merely noted that teachers were being urged to do so.  It wasn't even clear that they were urged to do so at the conference which Coutts-Trotter opened - Coutts-Trotter and the conference didn't rate a mention until the fifth paragraph - but you could get that impression.

So why did Media Watch get a bee in their bonnet about a story that gave them "an impression"?  Are they just furious about public reaction?  You stupid people, can't you read?

Ah, let Media Watch show you how journalists are to present a clear, unambiguous picture of what is going on.  First, to the sources:

So who did? We asked the Tele. Its editor, David Penberthy, told us:

They and other terms such as husband and wife which are apparently "not inclusive" were being discussed at the conference as undesirable.

— Email from David Penberthy (Editor, The Daily Telegraph) to Media Watch

Read David Penberthy's email to Media Watch.

That's flatly denied by one of the conference organisers, the Aids Council of New South Wales. They told Media Watch:

The issue was not discussed in any official way at the conference and there was never any call or resolution made in that regard.

— Letter from Stevie Clayton (Chief Executive Officer, ACON) to Media Watch

Read Stevie Clayton's letter to Media Watch.

Let's try some other sources.

The conference we are referring to is "That's So Gay: Addressing Homophobia and Celebrating Diversity in Educational Settings".

Not just "homophobia", that pathetic neologism of self-loathing, we celebrate diversity remember, and given the conference theme, we can bet we know which diversity has to be not just observed, or tolerated, or accepted, but celebrated. 

And just so you get the picture, which even The Age pointed out by quoting the official blurb:

The conference will explore strategies to address homophobia and affirm sexual diversity in educational settings as well as demonstrate best practice models.

And it seems we are talking educational settings concerning school kids here, most of whom would be under the age of consent for most of their school life, and even unable to get married without parental consent until one, two, three years after they leave school.

The conference flyer indicates the conference patron is our old friend, Justice Michael Kirby, who gave an address by video.  The conference was opened by Education Department head Michael Coutts-Trotter and organised and run by the NSW Anti-Homophobia Interagency.

Now if those snippets about the conference alone, hadn't alerted you that this conference wasn't about bullying and harrassment, nor likely to be attracting your local parish council, then one should have been alerted to it by the mention of the Aids Council of NSW as one of its organisers (perhaps chief organiser as it also handled the registrations).  ACON bills itself as...

...a community-based non-government organisation promoting the health and wellbeing of a diverse gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community, and a leading agency in HIV/AIDS policy development and program delivery....

One of ACON's aims is a "a strong, healthy and resilient gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community"

No gay lobby group there.

Nevertheless Media Watch is flummoxed:

So where did the story come from? Where was the gay lobby and its bans?

Answer: Reporter Bruce McDougall picked up a one-page checklist for teachers from one of many stands in the foyer, this one run by a small youth group called Twenty10.

Number eleven out of thirteen points asked whether:

Staff refer to "partners" rather than "husband", "wife", "spouse", "boyfriend" or "girlfriend" when speaking with students or families
— Twenty10 checklist

Read the Twenty10 checklist.

That's it. One question, or perhaps suggestion, from a youth support group, on a flyer. Nowhere on the pamphlet - or to be fair, in Bruce McDougall's story - do the words "mum" or "dad" appear. That was an invention of the Daily Telegraph's headline writers - they're nice short words, you see.

Twenty10 says that no-one from the Tele contacted them before Thursday's story was published. And Executive Officer Meredith Turnbull adds:

I was shocked that an educational tool taken from a stall at a training conference was presented in a misleading way so as to appear as a public call or campaign for change.

— Email from Meredith Turnbull (Executive Officer, Twenty10) to Media Watch

Read Meredith Turnbull's email to Media Watch.

Media Watch trimphant:

That's it. One question, or perhaps suggestion, from a youth support group, on a flyer. Nowhere on the pamphlet - or to be fair, in Bruce McDougall's story - do the words "mum" or "dad" appear. That was an invention of the Daily Telegraph's headline writers - they're nice short words, you see.

How terrifically fair of Media Watch to give McDougall a pass on the headline.

Now what few viewers the ABC has left, even fewer would refer to the Media Watch website much less the checklist.  And what a checklist. Titled "Is your school GLBT friendly," it reads:

• You have personal development classes that include gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender development
• The school has policy and lessons that deal with discrimination, harassment and vilificaton, including homophobia
• The library has a selection of books, videos and other resources relevant for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered students
• Gay, lesbian, transexual and bisexual issues are covered in teacher orientation and training
• Periodic training on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues are part of diversity training programmes
• When suicide, alcohol or drug abuse, or sexual risk behaviours are addressed, the potential connection to sexual orientation is included
• Homophobic or heterosexist comments are not tolerated among teachers or students
• If I were a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender student or staff member, I would chose to be open about my sexual orientation
• There have been openly gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students, as well as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people on staff
• Forms for students and families take into account diversity of households, including homes with partners of the same sex
• Staff refer to "partners" rather than "husband", "wife", "spouse", "boyfriend" or "girlfriend" when speaking with students or families.
• Contacts and referrals are made within the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community
• Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender materials such as magazines, newspapers and pamphlets are available for students

The checklist itelf puts away the myth that Twenty 10 is just "a small youth group".  It may be small, but it is, according to its own website:

...is an organisation for young (under 26) gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, same-sex attracted and gender-questioning people who are having problems at home or have recently become homeless.

Its activities include running a leadership program :

The aim of the Q&A Adaptive Leadership Program is to create resilient, effective and visible young people exercising leadership to the benefit of the GLBT, queer and wider communities.

The Q&A Program targets established or emerging leaders who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender (GLBT), same sex attracted, gender diverse or queer and who are 18-28 years of age.

Which involves:

Over an eight-month period, 15 to 20 participants will develop their leadership capacities through a structured program involving community engagement, experiential learning, personal reflection, mentoring and a project within the GLBT and queer communities.

Q&A is open to individuals with a commitment to community leadership and social change. It is about making a difference, and facing the complex challenges of our communities and our society.

Somehow I don't think the social change is helping the homeless find homes.

Indeed, I forget to tell you that the NSW Anti-Homophobia Interagency which organised the conference comprises (from the flyer)

• NSW Department of Education & Training
• NSW Attorney General’s Department
• The Lesbian & Gay Anti-Violence Project
• ACON 
• Family Planning NSW
• NSW Police Force
• Twenty10 GLBT Youth Support (your small, friendly youth group, with no doubt, badminton on Fridays),
• NSW Federation of Parents & Citizens Associations of NSW
• North Sydney Central Coast Health and the NSW Teachers Federation.

From the Twenty 10 spokesperson's own correspondence to Media Watch, we know that while part of the Interagency group, it wasn't represented on the three person organising committee, but ran a workshop and a stall at that conference.

It distributed the flyer to attendees at their workshop, and the flyer of course was also at the information stall which had "resources that delegates may find useful". (So were the ACON spokesperson and the ABC correct to say "the issue was not discussed in any official way at the conference"?  And do read the end of the Twenty 10 correspondence. The gall of the Daily Telegraph not being supportive.)

The flyer is "usually only distributed" to teachers and youth workers attending their "anti-homophobia training programs", that is, in their rarefied world, people "already demonstrating a choice (code word alert!) to make their classrooms inclusive of all students" (meaning the rest are...? see how it goes?) and merely suggests strategies they may adopt.  They have a policy of using inclusive language "which is about adding words not taking away."  I'm sure progenitor and a fifth column will be added soon.

It's also funny how McDougall seemed to mention other parts of "an educational tool taken from a stall at a training conference" without earning the ire of Media Watch or Twenty 10.  For example, McDougall wrote:

Schools are coming under pressure to provide lessons for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students and stack their libraries with books and videos covering their issues. 

Among the demands are the outlawing of homophobic comments by teachers or students in the playground and a requirement for teachers to receive "diversity training".

But then again, we aren't talking a "training conference" to stop bullying here. The keynote speakers at the conference were (from the flyer)

• Dr Affrica Taylor:A Senior Lecturer of Sociology and Cultural Studies, University of Canberra. Her research draws from the theoretical fields of cultural geography,postcolonial, queer and feminist studies. She has published a number of articles including ‘Innocent children, dangerous families and homophobic panic’ in 2007, which focussed on the media storm surrounding a Marrickville childcare centre and the so-called ‘Playschool fiasco’. Her keynote address will explore issues of ‘moral panic’ and discuss how educators can address issues of sexuality and gender.
• Dr Lynne Hillier: A senior researcher at Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society (ARCSHS) at La TrobeUniversity (Vic). She has expertise in the areas of adolescent sexuality; sexual health; violence against women; philosophy of psychology, intellectual disability and lesbian sexuality.
• Anne Mitchell: Anne Mitchell has a background in teaching and adult education and has been working in the field of sexuality education, sexual health and STI prevention for nearly fifteen years. This included a period in the Victorian Health Department where she was responsible for HIV/AIDS prevention education and policy development. She is co-author of the book Youth, AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases published by Routledge in 1997.

Lynne Hillier and Anne Mitchell were to

...give a joint keynote presentation on Fighting Homophobia from above and below: policy change and grass roots action. The presentation would draw on the Victorian education model and the Ministerial Advisory Committee on Gay and Lesbian Health (MACGLH), as well as looking at young people’s strategies to protect themselves.

Perhaps Coutts-Trotter's assertions after the story were right

"Schools have to be sanctuaries for children; they must be free of any sort of discrimination, bullying or harassment.

"However, this does not include imposing a new politically correct language in schools.

No, rather, you have to go beyond that. Go further, embrace it, celebrate it.

Indeed, whatever training of trainers was going on at this "training conference," as McDougall noted,

...the department is already spearheading a major push to win acceptance for gay and lesbian students in public schools.

"Teaching about sexual diversity, tolerance and anti-bullying occurs through the Personal Development, Health and Physical Education (PDHPE) curriculum in all NSW schools - public and independent," the spokesman said.

"In Years 7 and 8 students learn about bullying, including anti-homophobia. This is reinforced in Years 9 and 10 in the anti-discrimination topics in the curriculum."

"Same-sex attraction issues" are included in students' lessons on relationships, diversity and discrimination.

A 25-hour course, mandatory for all Year 11 and 12 students in government schools, examines "issues relating to sexuality and sexual diversity".

The spokesman said schools chose resources that would "resonate with their students" and each community was different.

No doubt, these conference organisers are wondering why parents are abandoning the public school system in droves.  Actually they are probably not.  They've got an agenda to get through.

With the involvement of Family Planning and GLBT lobby groups like ACON and Twenty 10 in this conference, I'm expect the rest to leave when their year 10 student gets to attend 25 hours of "Preparing for anal sex: enema or no?"

But Media Watch is not done yet.  Penberthy can't get away with criticizing  Coutts-Trotter, who "emerged as a leader of the school anti-homophobia campaign."  That would be akin to mocking one of their idols:

But David Penberthy, the Tele's editor, wasn't finished with Michael Coutts-Trotter. He had a good blokey chat on Thursday afternoon with 2GB's Chris Smith

Watch out Penberthy, someone's gonna use the c-word on you soon.

Chris Smith: G'day and are you busy?

David Penberthy: Mate, I was just going to say "Howdy partner."

Chris Smith: Howdy partner!

David Penberthy: We shouldn't say that on air mate, people might talk.

Chris Smith: Yeah, it's weird.

— 2GB, Afternoons with Chris Smith, 17th April, 2008

Heh heh heh. Partner, geddit? Nudge nudge. Anyway, Penberthy told Smith, he thought Michael Coutts-Trotter was...weird.

No he didn't.

David Penberthy: When he said, "meeting the legal requirements is not enough, we've gotta go beyond that" well, why is it the job of the Education Department to go beyond that? To almost become not the protectors of kids who are gay but advocates for a gay lifestyle? That's where it gets a bit weird…

— 2GB, Afternoons with Chris Smith, 17th April, 2008

Well, it would be weird. Except, of course, that Michael Coutts-Trotter did nothing of the sort. He said that schools were required by law not to discriminate against students. And according to the text of his speech, he went on:

Michael Coutts-Trotter (Director-General, NSW Department of Education and Training): The law does not require us to be open-minded, or recognise, respect and respond to each person as an individual...It does not require us to celebrate diversity, or ensure that no one feels lonely or abandoned as they come to terms with their sexuality...But if we're to rise to meet the values and aspirations of public education we must do all these things.

— Speech, "That's So Gay" conference, 16th April, 2008

Doesn't sound weird to me. Advocating a gay lifestyle? I don't think so.

What was it then?  It doesn't even sound very inclusive of all lonely students.

As for "Mum and Dad ban" - that was a cynical, shameful, beat-up.

No, it was just a poor headline - and certainly not the first and last.  That would have taken Media Watch one sentence and five seconds to say.

One wonders why ABC Media Watch didn't take ACON to task for its 17/4/08 Media release headline: "ACON supports push for inclusive schooling in NSW" but then, maybe that implied a gay lobby group was making a push in schools.  If so, that is correct.

In fact, if Media Watch were honest, they would have noted that the mum and dad ban was one strategy presented to at least some delegates at a conference supported by the NSW Education Department and opened by its Director-General.  And no one at the conference - educators and all - not even the ABC, thought that weird.

It took a "furious reaction" from the public to tell them. 

And they still don't get it.

When presenter Jonathon Holmes was appointed to Media Watch, he was quoted as saying:

Media Watch at its best is loved by the public and, inevitably, loathed by most of those it takes to task...

...As a scourge of bad journalism it performs an invaluable function.

Hardly. Media Watch is not even a scourge of petty journalism.  It's another mouthpiece, no a self-appointed censor, for homosexualists and every other loony leftie out there.

A parody in itself.

And as for the NSW Education Department, as The Currency Lad so eloquently noted, it's the gift that keeps on giving.

Disclaimer: No research assistants from Sydney's Muslim Village contributed to this post.

santiago calatrava

Seems to be generating a lot of hits on this blog recently. So I thought I'd google him again to see what the fuss is about.  Has his latest architectural, engineering or sculptural foray created controversy or is every school teacher working from the same assignment book for school projects?

First up, the Chords Bridge at the entrance of Jersualem, taking final shape.  Easily recognisable, not just because it will be the highest landmark in Jerusalem, but also signature Calatrava.

Reminiscent of his Puente del Alamillo in Seville:

And a smaller, pedestrian bridge he designed at Petah Tikva, his first project in Israel:

© AlphaCygni

Except the Chords bridge is not as structurally efficient. And may be just an eyesore.

"The Calatrava bridge - if it doesn't collapse - what good will it be? No trains will be using it."

That's because of delays and problems with Jerusalem's mass transit project, of which the bridge is just one part.

The other Calatrava project hitting the news is the proposed PATH terminal at the New York World Trade Centre site.

Or if you like the more arty, stylized view:

This one seems to have the thumbs up.

Calatrava's first foray into U.S. residential architecture was the 80 South Street residential tower, just a few blocks from the World Trade Center site. 

Dubbed "Sky Cubes".

Only ten boxes available.  A piece of architectural history can be yours, starting at US$29million. Oops sorry, all gone now: Sky Cubes was just pronounced dead last week.  Victim to the real estate bust.

Still, you don't have to look too far in New York for something that is dramatic. Or simply

Cinematic.

hairy, scary, sea monster

Complete with smoking, cold Russians.

What is it?

what's in a name

The Harvard University English department is thinking about changing its name to, um, well...how about: English Department.  But does that mean students will be studying the structures and works of the English language? Um, well...who knows.

In a 2005 essay titled "The Death of English" in Inside Higher Education, Judith Halberstam, an English professor at the University of Southern California recognized that few young people want to major in English these days and suggested that English departments simply change their names to something more postmodern and au courant: "The beauty of English as a discipline in the last decade has been how flexible the field became, how receptive to new scholarship, how hospitable to queer theory, feminist studies, the study of race and ethnicity, political economy, philosophy and so on.... While we may all continue doing what we do - reading closely, looking for patterns and disturbances of patterns within cultural manifestations, determining the complex and fractal relations between cultural production and hegemonies - once we call it something other than "English," (like cultural studies, critical theory, theory and culture, etc.), it will neither look the same nor mean the same thing and nor will it occupy the same place in relation to the humanities in general..." Halberstam has followed her own advice. She holds a dual appointment in "English and gender studies" at USC, and although her undergraduate and graduate degrees were in English literature, none of her scholarship, which (according to her online biography) focuses on "popular, visual and queer culture" and "visualizations of gender ambiguities," even remotely involves works of English literature.

USC's English department still calls itself an English department, but it otherwise seems to have hewed to Halberstam's counsel, in spirit if not in letter. The course offerings in the USC English department are a smorgasbord of postmodern politicizations of cultural history, including a graduate seminar in medieval literature to be offered this fall that recasts Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and the writings of mystics as sado-masochistic narratives of "[t]orture and the pornography of ever-deferred martyrdom."

Enrolments in English departments continue to plummet.  And these days, probably with good reason.

europe stinks

Literally.

(via Barcepundit)

because in this age of global warming

One really needs to know: what's better for heating a mug of water, the stove or the microwave?

Scientific consensus ensues.

god's eye