So this is Christmas What will you get? When do you give?

The silly season is upon us once again, transforming regular grocery shopping trips into enduring the gauntlet of Christmas shoppers (often with young children in tow) en-mass in shopping centres, filling usually available parking – simply exacerbating the ordeal.

But this is just an accepted part of what is advertised as the most wonderful time of the year.

Christmas, as it has become, is now more an annoying distraction. Yes it is nice to use this time to remember the year that has past, to reflect on the human condition, and how each of us adds or subtracts from those around us, but the rapacious gluttony that captures the population as December passes is breathtaking when juxtaposed against what the season is supposed to be about. “Good will to all”…. Just as long as there is plenty for me.

What is it that we get at Christmas?

At a tactile level, the food will be eaten, that which is not, will be discarded. The presents that are given will either be spent, used up, put away, or be broken and forgotten, or they will be returned for refund, or discarded, and only sometimes will a present have greater relevance and longevity for the receiver. In other words, one Christmas’ presents will often have no level of meaning by the next Christmas, if they still exist at all.

I use the word ‘present’ to describe that, which is bought and given at Christmas, rather than ‘gift’, which is simply given of the person to another. Such a gift is usually intangible, often ephemeral (or lasting just a moment) but its memory and meaning can remain pristine and clear for a lifetime. It may be an act of kindness, a smile, or just memories of different (or happier) times. A present is given for the present. A gift is just given – anywhere, anytime, from (and to) anyone.

Last week would have been my sister’s 50^th birthday. Tomorrow will have been my younger brother’s 44^th birthday, and Australia Day next month will have been my older brother’s 52^nd birthday. I cannot remember how long it has been since any of us exchanged Christmas presents, but over the last (almost) eight years since the first of my siblings passed, I have become increasingly aware of the gifts they had given me. They had not bought me any Christmas or birthday presents for many years, but had given a lifetime of gifts, of which I am deeply grateful.

It is especially at Christmas that I reflect on the gifts that I have been given, and I hold tight to those precious yet indestructible gifts, lest I forget those who gave. These gifts are both from them and are them, for it is in these gifts that lives the very essence of who they were, and through their gifts, who they remain.

I wish you peace and happiness at Christmas. May you reflect well on what you have, what you have been given, and the gifts you give others every day.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Aldi fiddles while extortion reigns

In Australia, supermarket chains Coles and Woolworths appear to be nothing more than an extortion racket, and those outside the eastern seaboard are captive to them.

Independent supermarkets don’t have the power to properly challenge them, and politicians won’t legislate to challenge them.

From politics there is only spin and rhetoric that bemoans (lip service) the duopoly of Coles and Woollies. The only viable challenger to this situation is a chain that consistently has lower prices across the board… a chain like (the new kid on the block) Aldi, but Aldi will not let go of the security blanket of the Eastern states.

How does Aldi benefit by this?

Stories of how increased competition between the supermarket chains in the eastern states are regular occurrences on television. As the major networks are based in either Melbourne or Sydney, these stories include how Aldi are affecting the pricing of the behemoths Coles and Wollies. These stories, for those outside of the eastern states, do nothing more than to rub the faces of those struggling with grocery prices into their captivity of the two large chains.

The newspapers are the same. read a story in the local newspaper’s website, and there will be links to related stories in newspapers in other cities – like in Brisbane, or Sydney.

It is clear how Coles and Woolworths benefit by this arrangement. In places where there is no serious competition, they can price largely how they like… but put an aldi (or an Aldi-like) supermarket in place for competition, you get cheaper groceries.

To celebrate Australia, January 26 is the wrong date

January 26 is when Australia celebrates itself as a nation.

January 26 1788, when ships of the ‘first fleet’ landed on a beach in Sydney Cove and founded a penal colony – and because of that, people up to thousands of kilometres away from that place today will celebrate it.

I have in a previous posting suggested that January 26 is not the right date to celebrate the nation of Australia.There are numerous arguments surrounding this date; the foremost being the invasion concept, whereby white people invaded Australia, dispossessing the inhabitants of access to lands they had used for millennia. Whether or not you subscribe to that concept, there is validity in it, if only at an historical level. It is true that over the first century of European settlement, white people overcame and dominated where once indigenous culture held sway, and today this is a western nation with history both good and bad – this is not just opinion, it is historic fact…

Be that as it may… I believe that January 26 is the wrong date even if you do not have an indigenous heritage.

Celebrating the landing of the First fleet as the beginning of Australia must be an insult to all those who call Australia HOME!

Celebrating the landing of ships from elsewhere suggests that we (Australians) are a relocated people, that HOME is really elsewhere.I may have a European heritage, and it is nice to reflect on and learn from that, but I am insulted at the mere suggestion that home (or the old country) is elsewhere. Others will have a European, Asian, African, indigenous (or some other) heritage, and their heritage will mean to them what it will mean to them; but if they are Australian and call Australia their home, how can January 26 and what its origins are, be a fitting date to celebrate the nation as a whole?

March 3 is a more fitting date to celebrate the nation of Australia, for it was on March 3 1986 that the government abolished the right to appeal to the Privy Council in London, thereby removing the ability of the British Government to make laws for Australia. In essence, making Australia a fully sovereign, independent and federal nation.This may appear to some a somewhat technical or officious act. How or why can people celebrate a holiday based on a piece of paper? The most well known secular holiday in the world is based on a piece of paper – the 4th of July.

The United States of America celebrates the signing of their declaration of independence from Great Britain on the fourth of July 1776 (twelve years before the First fleet). Thirteen colonies became states under a national legislature (Congress). To establish this new country’s rights they were then already at war with Great Britain.

The US celebrates their country on the date they became a country. We (on the other had) celebrate this county on the date we became a prison.

Another thing that we can celebrate about Australia, especially on a different date, is the fact that

• Australia became federated in peace (1 January 1901) ,
• Australia was granted political autonomy in peace, though in the middle of WW2 (9 October 1942)
• Australia was granted full and legal autonomy in peace (3 March 1986)

Australia became a fully federated, independent, sovereign, and federal nation in peace – when so many other nations came to be in war.

Celebrate Australia!

A skeptic’s view of the religious aspect of the Christmas story

While I am a strong adherent of the sentiments that are central to this season, good will to all, giving freely of oneself without expectation of return. etc. and that I see the season as the most human of times, separate and exclusive of any religious observance; As a religious skeptic I have issues about the Christmas story, specifically as it relates to the Christian story. In fact I find the story itself rather problematic.

Mary, supposedly a virgin, is visited by an angel who tells her she is pregnant by god, news which surprises Mary.
This in itself is a problem, for clearly the insemination appears to have been non-consensual. Mary is therefore a victim of an assault, that may actually be construed as rape.

Christians invoke god by saying things like god the father, god the son… this clearly suggests incest. If Jesus is god, then Jesus as god may have raped Mary for god as Jesus to be born -
send that one to the DNA lab!!

If a son marries his mother, does he become his own step-father?

Was Jesus a bastard?

If we accept the premise as laid down in the Christian Bible about the birth of Jesus, then I have a question.

The child Jesus was not the product of both parents within the legal marriage.

Mary was (supposedly) married to Joseph, but Joseph was not Jesus’ father.

Mary was not legally married to god, who is reported to be the father… therefore -

Was Jesus a bastard?

The Great War 1914 – 2010

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/8029948/First-World-War-officially-ends.html

Every day the world turns, history follows its course, countries and governments rise and fall, and our eyes are focussed on what is happening in the here and now.

Suddenly echoes of momentous events long ago can be heard within the din of the contemporary, and the ghosts of those times tap us on the shoulder to point to what they did.

Versailles, and all what it may have stood for, is finally fulfilled on Sunday. The bill the allied powers imposed on Germany in 1919 will have been paid… and the dead can finally rest…. but can we?

What lessons have we learned from the newly fulfilled treaty?

What mistakes do we, to this day, repeat?

There is nothing new in this world, Catholic child abuse pre-dates compilation of the New Testament

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, like other Catholic clergymen before him, has blamed homosexuality for the current child abuse.

The Pope has blamed modern society for the abuses

Homosexuality? Modern society?

Could clerical child abuse be among the church’s oldest ‘acts’?

The Didache, possibly the oldest known instruction to Church officials, says  they should not to seduce boys. This document dates back to about 100 AD. Clerical chaild abuse appears to have been an issue over 1900 years ago.

Canon 71 from the Council of Elvira – 309AD – says that clerics who sexually abuse young boys should be expelled from the church. Clearly clerical child abuse was a big issue in the 4th century… why else mention it?

While it is possible that most or all the books of the New Testament were first written before 100 AD; the Canon of the 27 books of the New Testament was not accepted or formalised as such until the 3rd Council of Carthage – around 397 AD – Books of the New Testament were first put into chapters in the 13th century, and verses first in the 16th century.

Clerical child abuse is not a new phenomenon – it is as old as the religion itself, which in turn tars all denominations.

If these abusers were not clerics, and their crimes were discovered, they would be arrested, charged, and if found guilty, jailed…. why is it different for clerics of any religion who commit such acts?

The lighter side of gender identity opression

A twisted ‘perfect’ world

If patriarchal sexism punishes women for not being men, racism punishes people of colour for not being white, and homophobia punishes gay and gender variant for not being straight – does that mean that in some kind of (or someone’s) ‘perfect’ world, everyone would be white males… who are all exclusively heterosexual??

How would that work?

Diversity and difference makes this world tick, that is why we, to each other, should talk.
Tick
Talk
Tick
Talk
Tick
Talk
The sound of human history.

To those beyond the hetero-normative…

Our lives contain degrees of narrative, story, plot, and sub-plot; each degree possessing many levels of meaning and substance. In the society we live, there are degrees of life that are defined, recognised, or generally accepted as normal (normative) or (if you will) the default.

The boundaries of what is considered normative in society cut a swathe through many aspects of being human: through the physical, cognitive, social, and emotional ways of being, even to how one identifies and defines themselves.

The language generally used to describe those outside these boundaries of ‘normativity’ is invariably negative or derogatory. The very word disability, for those outside perceived physical, cognitive, social ‘normalcy’, is to suggest that these people are without, or have little, ability (compared to those within ‘normalcy?). Groups that advocate for people defined as disabled, often accept and use this term to identify themselves. They ought think again.

Those who are normal to themselves, yet are outside the confines of what is considered to be normative, have, in my opinion, transcended accepted normalcy and gone beyond that specific normative.

The gay, lesbian, bisexual transgender, transsexual, intersex, queer… GLBTTIQ… the alphabet mangled identity of those communities are beyond a normative… they are beyond the hetero-normative – they transcend hetero-sex, heterosexual definitions of sex, and heterosexual definitions of gender (expression, roles and performance) and are therefore the community that is beyond the hetero-normative.

These communities have changed their alphabet mangle identity over and over again trying to be as inclusive, yet seemingly trying to identify each individual group in that broader identity. The GLB community became the GLBT, GLBTI, GLBTTI, GLBTTIQ, GLBTTIQQ, any number of conglomerations of letters and identities defining people who are all outside the confines of heterocentric normativity or like myself, are beyond the hetero-normative.