MODEST PROPOSALS

 Reflections 2nd December 2021

I see the laws allowing for forced sterilisation of men responsible for children for whom they do not intend to take responsibility, or neglect by being absent from, are passing into law in State after state in the US. These ‘Right to Fulfilled Life,’ laws are being passed by overwhelmingly female legislators, thus marginalising men whom the law will affect. Most controversial is the bounty rewards awarded to those reporting men engaged in sexual promiscuity.

In defence of this legislation religious groups cite biblical authority and the human rights of the unborn who would be denied the right to a Fulfilled Life.

[Note: Some details in this account may not be wholly accurate.]

I see the execrable Julie Hartley-Brewer is parroting the line that she is 'done with Covid.' She is voicing a widespread reaction reflecting a childish response to reality, if I stick my fingers in my ears and chant incessantly, reality will go away.  

If the Covid pandemic has demonstrated nothing else it has given the lie to the notion of a more sophisticated 'modernity.' Throughout the advanced economies, especially the anglophone world, evangelical fanatics, voodoo peddlers,  tin foil hat wearing cuckoos, magical thinkers, pseudo 'experts', conspiracy fruitcakes, deranged Nazi inspired psychopaths, and common or garden quacks have emerged in numbers that would do the Middle Ages proud. Indeed their numbers have been such that, in the US particularly, they have had an impact on the rate of Covid infection. 









Boston Globe


Well to paraphrase a line of Trotsky's, you may not be interested in reality but reality is interested in you. 

Popular posts from this blog

NESRINE MALIK AND THE UNSUNG VIRTUES OF HYPOCRISY

Image
As I write this a 27 year old woman, Mariam Ibrahim, has just had a baby in a Sudanese prison, ‘the condition of the mother and baby is not known as Ibrahim's lawyer and her husband, a US citizen, had been denied access to her. Omdurman women's prison has a basic clinic, where the child is thought to have been born. Ibrahim has been shackled since being imprisoned.’ [1]   Mariam also has an 18 month old child who is also being held in prison with her. The ‘crime’ for which she is imprisoned is apostasy, for which she has received the death sentence. She has also been sentenced to 100 lashes, for the additional crime of having sex with her Christian husband. Although she has been a lifelong Christian her father was a Muslim, Sudanese sharia law forbids women to marry outside the Muslim faith, men needless to say can do as they please in these matters. Mariam Ibrahim and her husband.  Nineteen countries punish their citizens for apostasy, and in 12 of those countries...
Read more

INTERVIEW WITH TOM VAGUE

Image
Tom Vague At the top end of All Saints Road there is a refuge, an enclave in which a local Bohemian culture retains a foothold, this is the Book & kitchen , a café/bookshop with adjoining terrace. Here the bustle of the nearby market gives way to conversation, conversation in the presence of images of the recent, and not so recent, past. The past of an area that has contributed so much to the life and culture of the city. I was there to meet local historian Mr Tom Vague a man intimately familiar with so much of this history. What Tom doesn’t know about the recent history of the area probably is not worth knowing. With Tom’s energy and effort Colville Community Forum, supported by City Living Local Life, recently held a gathering at The Book and Kitchen to celebrate this rich history. February 16 6-9 Pm, with Film Screening and Readings Exhibition February 16-26 2016. Featuring 30 Classic Westway Photographs and Posters. This represents one of a number of initiatives of t...
Read more

VOLINE AND TROTSKY

Волин и Троцкого A Footnote in Russian History In April 1917 the Russian anarchist revolutionary Voline* and Leon Trotsky were both stranded in New York as the Russian revolution broke out in Petrograd , inevitably coming into contact with one another. Voline stated that he felt that the Bolsheviks, given their ruthlessness and single minded determination, would ultimately come to power. They would then begin eliminating their opponents, amongst whom of course were the anarchists; this persecution would end with the Bolsheviks shooting the anarchists “like partridges.” Trotsky was dismissive, they might have their differences but they were comrades in arms, they had different interpretations of the revolutionary process but shared the same goals. It was nonsense to speak of Bolsheviks shooting revolutionary comrades, “we are socialists, comrade Voline! So we are not your enemies….” [1] In December of 1919, whilst gravely wounded Voline was captured by the Bolshe...
Read more