Perry de Havilland is vexed by everyday problems being turned into “syndromes” by so-called experts. He touches on the cause of this tendency, but commenter Veryretired slams the point home:

One of the primary reasons for the cancerous growth of the state, and its relentlessly intrusive reach into every possible area of society, is the myriad of “activists”, grant-funded researchers, victimologists, and compassionate, concerned political types who demand that the government become involved in an endless list of crises.

The end result is the current situation, in which there is no single area of human conduct or social activity which is not regulated, overseen, or restricted by the power of the state.

There’s more:

There is a concerted effort to assert a claim that everything and everyone is fragile.

Children are fragile, women are fragile, men are fragile (but won’t admit it), nature is fragile, the earth is fragile, the oceans are fragile, the weather is fragile, the climate is fragile, society is fragile, all non-caucasian cultures are fragile (and therefore can’t be criticized or morally evaluated), emotions are fragile, hope is fragile, and on and on and on….

What does all this mean? That everything, and everyone, needs to be protected, nurtured, shielded from the rigors of an uncaring and indifferent reality, spared rigorous evaluation or assessment, pampered, taken care of, nannied.

The paternalistic, and maternalistic, worldview requires that the universe and all contained in it become infantalized, a bundle of needs, weaknesses, incapacities, wounds, unmet yearnings, and, most importantly, failures.

The ideal entity is an injured baby in a damaged house in a devastated city in a collapsed society on a ruined earth. Only then can everything, and everyone, be marshalled, regimented, put under orders, and enlisted in the campaign to save this ultimate victim.

They look at you, the collectivists, the statists, the most-compassionate-ones, with those moist eyes, uncomprehending, astounded that you don’t see this terrible need, all these terrible, immediate needs, all around you crying out, demanding everything you have, everything you are or want to be.

There is a distance that is required if one decides to live their own life, making their own choices, enjoying the occasional success, dealing with the inevitable failures. It is the distance required by the belief that others should live their own lives also, should be left alone to make a go of it as best they can.

It is the distance required between adults, in a rational universe, living as rational beings.

It is time to grow up.

Eloquent stuff. Meanwhile, in another comment on a post about police prosecuting members of the Gay Police Association, responding to a poster who complains that homosexuality is not natural, Chris Harper makes a point about nature that I often enjoy making when people go on about how wonderful nature is:

My response to ‘natural’ is to tell them next time there is a thunderstorm to go squat naked and hungry under a tree, and then tell me how wonderful ‘natural’ is.

Mother nature is a vicious old bitch, and any time you can get her in an arm lock on the floor - keep her there.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Links at 5:29 PM EDT

1 Comment »

I heard a radio advertisment today about the new child car seat laws coming into effect this September.  I remember riding in the back of an estate car when I was a kid and it never did me any harm.  This is just another example of the state telling parents how to look after their kids.

Meanwhile, Ofcom has decreed that the smoking has to be taken out of Tom & Jerry.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Civil Liberties, News at 8:09 PM EDT

No Comments »

Dr Carlson video podcasts science lessons.  It makes me wonder about the possibilities communities of blogging homeschoolers getting together to produce materials to educate their kids.  Who says we need state education?

Hat tip: Makezine.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Links at 8:00 PM EDT

1 Comment »

I recently renewed my passport as part of the Renew for Freedom campaign by the nice folks at No2ID. The point of this was to partly avoid being forced into getting an ID card in a few years when my passport really did expire, but mainly to avoid getting put on the National Identity Register.

But the card is not the point. Even if you chose not to have it, you would still have to pay for it. And you will get no choice about attending an official interview, producing numerous personal documents to be recorded, and having your fingerprints and eye scans taken for the records.

[…]

Once you are on the Register, you will never get off until it is abolished. But you’ll be exposed to all the risks and dangers of the scheme immediately. The Home Office is building the most complex and intrusive ID control system in the world. Given their atrocious track record, it will certainly go wrong.

So I avoided being put on the Register, but I did notice that my new passport has laminated into the back page a small chip and several loops of antenna wire. It also came with a leaflet entitled “New biometric passport Essential Information”. It says:

You have just received a new biometric passport, also known as the ePassport.

[…]

We are introducing this new style of passport to help fight fraud and forgery.

My first instinct was to put my passport in the microwave and see what happened. But:

If your passport or the chip in it gets damaged, it may prevent you from travelling and you may need to get a replacement passport.

In any case, I’m not terribly concerened.

The chip stores a copy of your photo and the personal details printed on page 31. There is no extra personal information in the machine-readable zone or on the chip.

Technically I suppose I should worry about what extra information might be on there or that might be added in future that I’m not told about, but I don’t believe the government are quite that competent. I’m more concerned about terrorists reading my nationality from my passport from a distance.

But this, which I saw linked in my No2ID newsletter, is just hilarious, given that the stated purpose of the chip is to “help fight fraud and forgery”:

A German computer security consultant has shown that he can clone the electronic passports that the United States and other countries are beginning to distribute this year.

So much for that, then. Here’s the money quote, from Gus Hosein, interviewed for the Wired article:

Either this guy is incredible or this technology is unbelievably stupid. I think it’s a combination of the two. Is this what the best and the brightest of the world could come up with? Or is this what happens when you do policy laundering and you get a bunch of bureaucrats making decisions about technologies they don’t understand?

To be fair, it has only be shown possible to clone a passport so far — so the copy will retain the original photo.  And if the chip also contained fingerprints such a clone would be of limited use.  But it remains for now quite straightforward to make a copy of a passport.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Civil Liberties at 6:13 PM EDT

1 Comment »

The Labour Party have created 3000 new criminal offenses since they came to power, almost one per day.

Today I heard about a new study that eating in your car is dangerous.  This study is not very surprising or alarming — the risk of crashing which is already close to zero on a given journey is only doubled.  How long before a new law specifically bans it so that the police can lose even more of what little respect they have left by prosecuting people for eating instead of real criminals?  Top Gear’s James May was on Radio One this morning asking what would be banned next, tuning the radio or (ISTR) changing your socks…

Posted by Rob Fisher as News at 12:28 PM EDT

3 Comments »

I spotted a couple of new incoming links to my blog.  One is a blogroll from UBIsraeli, an Israeli girl studying in the US but currently visiting home.  In her latest article, she writes about her chance to explain her viewpoint to a reporter.

The other is from Planck’s Constant, in an article about why Israel did not lose the war.  The article makes some good points, mainly that the real goal was to stop the rocket attacks and that has been achieved.  At the end of the post, a photo I took of downtown Jerusalem is compared to one of rubble in Beirut.  I’m flattered that my photo was used, but I think it’s a weak argument:  showing photos of destruction in Beirut without mentioning that most of the city is unharmed is something bloggers have been accusing the press of, recently.

Oh, by the way, my recent trip to Israel has made this a flash animation about driving in Israel all the more poignant to me.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Links at 12:14 PM EDT

1 Comment »

The day before yesterday was my last day in Jerusalem.  In the morning I had my last drink of Drink Nr 5 – which is some kind of very tasty coffee with foamy milk.  “Drink Nr 5” is what appears on the display when I press the button, all the text printed on the machine is in Hebrew, so at first it was a bit of a gamble!

I had lunch with the same colleague from LA as yesterday, and we talked about current events, mostly the uselessness of the UN.  Koffi Annan has no credibility with most Israelis.  Her son had just come back from serving in the IDF up North, but luckily he didn’t have to cross the border.

On the trip to the airport I had the same taxi driver who’d taken me from the airport last week.  He pointed out some of the same places he’d pointed out before, telling me again about the Arabs making a lot of money from the Jews visiting their restaurants.  But it didn’t seem so surprising to me this time: you see so many different types of people in Jerusalem and everyone seems to get along — and what better to help people get along than shared business interests?

The road from the office out of Jerusalem followed the rim of a valley, and the views were spectacular.  The road to Tel Aviv is straight and good quality, with not too much traffic.  I arrived at the airport three hours before my flight, not quite sure what to expect with the already high level of security in Israel and the supposed terror plot in London.

Tel Aviv airport is a fantastic airport.  It is spacious and un-crowded, clean, well signposted, and has gorgeous steel and marble architecture.  The security check comes before check-in.  The security personnel are courteous and even smile at you.  I had a letter from my company and was only asked questions about where I’d been working and staying, before proceeding to have my luggage x-rayed.  The check-in queue was short, and before long I was in the lounge.  This is another expansive area with a huge steel and glass lattice affording a view over part of the airport.  Planes taxied and trains of baggage carts busied around but again it looked as if there was plenty of space and everything kept moving.  It all looked so *efficient*.

I got a smoothie made with crushed ice, oranges, bananas, mango and even *dates* and sat on a stool by the window to drink it.  It was very refreshing and relaxing.  Next was the main passport check.  The passport checking girl was the first person I’d encountered at the airport who was grumpy – but then again she has to sit in a tiny booth all day.

After security was a large marble rotunda with a fountain in the middle and shops all the way around.  It was this that I’d first seen from the mezzanine above when I’d arrived.  I looked in an electronics shop, but couldn’t really fathom the prices.  Somewhat bizarrely they sold washing machines.  That must add a bit of excess baggage to your fare.

The wait at the gate was long because I was so early, but the flight was pleasant, and empty enough that I could move seats to have two by the window to myself.

Arrival at Heathrow was a contrast to Tel Aviv – grim, narrow corridors, a huge bundle at passport control, and signs telling me not to assault the staff.  But it didn’t take too long nonetheless, and it was good to be home.

More Jerusalem Travel: previous day; exploring the city; first day.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Travel at 9:09 AM EDT

No Comments »

The main front page story in the Post today is, “Israel threatens to resume the war if Hizbullah refuses to disarm”.  Which they will.

The IDF will have to resume operations in Lebanon if the expanded United Nations force being assembled does not fulfill its obligation to dismantle Hizbullah, and official in the Prime Ministers’s Office warned on Tuesday.

Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah reportedly reached a deal allowing Hizbullah to keep its weapons but refrain from exhibiting them in public.  Israeli officials called the arrangement a violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which passed over the weekend and was approved on Sunday by the cabinet.

Meanwhile, “IDF says free to hit Syrian arms convoys”:

Despite the cease-fire between Israel and Hizbullah, the IDF is allowed to destroy Syrian weapons convoys that cross into Lebanon to reach Hizbullah geurillas, a top IDF officer said Tuesday.

Also on the front page is a story about what one of my colleagues described as a “silly scandal” — meaning that it’s silly that it’s a scandal — the IDF Chief of General Staff selling his stocks hours after the soldiers were kidnapped.  I didn’t read the whole story but my colleague says that the criticism is that he shouldn’t have been thinking about his finances when important events were happening.  Below that story is a Yaakov Katz analysis about whether or not Halutz was fit for command.

Finally on the front page, for the first time since I started reading the Post, I think, are two non-war related stories.  A former environment minister is charged with fraud and bribery over political appointments, and the police have recommended that Justice Minister Haim Ramon be prosecuted for sexual misconduct for “forcibly kissing” a woman.

More later…

Posted by Rob Fisher as News at 7:47 AM EDT

No Comments »

Today I had lunch with another colleague from my LA trips and we talked not about politics at all but mainly about her family trip to the US.  She also had stories to tell about her son whose English was improving — she is originally from the USA but moved to Jerusalem, and in their home they speak a mixture of Hebrew and English.  Her son didn’t like to speak English at all until one day when a friend visited and he wanted to speak to her.  A whole dormant vocabulary was discovered in her son, and his English has been improving ever since.  This reminded me of some of the bilingual families I met in Norway, including one where a little girl spoke English to her mother and Norwegian to her father.  Never having been any good at foreign languages myself, I’m always amazed by bilingual children.

I the evening I met up a my friend from India who I bumped into at work yesterday.  We took a taxi to the Israel Museum.  On Tuesdays it opens late, and there seemed to be all kinds of things going on.  There were lots of children flying kites, live music, a bread fair, and various food being served from stalls.

We were mainly there to see 1:50 scale model of the city in the time of the second temple.  At that time Jerusalem was walled, but bigger than the old city is today.  The model was great fun, and the audio guide explained about what life was like there.  The site of the museum itself is impressive — there seem to be several buildings laid out in gardens with sunken areas leading down into other exhibits.  The Dead Sea scrolls exhibit is actually underneath partly of a large fountain.

We also had a look in the main museum building that contained artefacts from various ancient cultures, and some pretentious modern art by the Zik Group or someone.  The Little Israel exhibit was more modern art but a bit more fun.  There was a scene made out of toy people and cars, showing police holding back the crowds while toy bulldozers knocked down toy houses.  Presumably this was a comment on the Gush Katif evictions.  I took a picture of it but was told off for taking pictures, so I’d better not publish it here.

We grabbed some food from the food fair, which was more complicated than it sounds.  There were large queues — and I learnt that Israeli queues are not orderly and polite like Britsh queues — and you had to queue to buy a coupon and then queue again to buy food.  What didn’t help was that all the menus were in Hebrew, so I didn’t know how much what I wanted cost.  I solved this problem by buying the most expensive coupon, which was only 20 Shekels anyway.  Then the girl serving the food didn’t speak English (most poeple in Israel do, but she was quite young) so I pointed at what I wanted, and had to resort to sign language to explian that I didn’t care that my coupon was worth more than what I’d ordered.

In any event, the cous cous, veg stew and meatballs was quite tasty despite not being very hot.

We walked back to our respective hotels, and I went for a nice cold Goldstar.

More Jerusalem Travel: previous day; next day; exploring the city; first day.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Travel at 8:22 PM EDT

No Comments »

I don’t have much to tell today; I’ve been working late, eating at work and coming straight back to the hotel to surf, read and sleep.  Such is business travel sometimes.  Most people I talk to don’t know what to make of the ceasefire.  Opinions range from surrender to hope that the killing will stop.  I don’t think it’s surrender because if the agreement is actually followed it leads to the disarming of Hizbollah.  But as I said before, it’s more likely that they will do something provocative, Israel will respond, and we’ll be back where we started.

I did bump into a friend from India who I met in LA — not quite as unlikely as you might think as we work for the same company.  She’s been here for months it would seem, and it was good to go for a coffee and catch up.

More Jerusalem Travel: previous day; next day; exploring the city; first day.

Posted by Rob Fisher as Travel at 6:46 PM EDT

No Comments »