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The Law of Bonkers
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March 13th, 2010SocietyOne obnoxious aspect of the post 9/11 world is that we have lost site of this:
We must start to accept that 5% of the population at any given time is bonkers. There are no steps to be taken to stamp this out and no lessons to be learnt when a man with a beard boards a plane with an exploding dog.
Such wisdom seems to only ever find a home in the editorial pages of ‘elitist’ publications that dare to ask why the social and political climate is such that absolute safety is considered a reasonable demand.
The real tragedy is that this demand for absolute security becomes spit in the face of our fore bearers who fought and died for the freedoms of our society. They viewed freedom as something worth fighting and dying for – not just freedom of religion, speech and thought, but also the freedom to be different, to take risks, live dangerously and actuate ones own life.
We have turned ‘liberty or death’ on its head and made it out to be “we will give up liberty if it makes us feel safer.”
via Times Online.
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Charlie Brown on International Relations
View CommentsI found the following quote the book ‘The Gospel According to Peanuts.’ Linus is speaking to his older sister Lucy and says:
Charlie Brown says that brothers and sisters can learn to get along. He says they can get along the way mature adults can get along. And he says that adults can get along the way nations get along.
At this point the analogy breaks down.
The failure of humanity to ‘get along’ ascends along the axis of size and maturity and resources. Yet maybe the principle works in reverse as well and nations and adults must learn to get along the way children do.
If you have not read ‘The Gospel According to Peanuts’ I highly recommend it as a remarkably sophisticated and insightful exploration of theology via the Peanuts universe. I have included a link to it in my Amazon Store.
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Trebuchet’s and Flaming Pianos
View CommentsMay 14th, 2008Lifestyle, Society, Technology
Now you cannot tell me that a trebuchet that shoots flaming pianos is not truly a wonderful hobby for an elderly English gentleman. This man should have lived back in the days of Stempunk yore. He could have armed a Zeppelin with one of these and gone on simply smashing safaris of lost volcanic islands. If this does not count as living out your dreams no matter how crazy, then I do not know what does.