Tweepocrisy

Ms Ross and her husband Steven, who is in the Air Force, have said they want to be left alone to mourn their son.

This from the woman who tweeted her son's dying moments...

An Inconvenient Baby

This story is disturbing.

"The star fullback's fiancee Shannon O'Malley will have their daughter's birth induced today instead of waiting until her September 16 due date so he can concentrate on the finals."

I'm sorry Mr Superstar AFL player that your daughter's birth is at such an inconvenient due date. I hope the little tike doesn't impact your ever so important sporting career in the future by you know, getting sick or depriving you of your sleep the same week as an important match. And I definitely think the fiancee "Shannon O'Malle" is as stupid and culpable as him for going along with it, if not more so.

Belching Criminals

As if it wasn't enough to outlaw lightbulbs, banning black cars, throwing out your new cars and sending up planes with infra-red cameras to spy on citizens energy usage, here we have the latest insanity inspired by The Warming Hoax (thankfully at this stage still contained in the UK, but watch how this idea will spread faster than swine flu...)

From The Times (May 24, 2009):

"Government advisers are developing menus to combat climate change by cutting out “high carbon” food such as meat from sheep, whose burping poses a serious threat to the environment."

So we have now moved away from blaming farting cows as the biggest CO2 producer but now pointing the sharp kebab stick of blame to the widdle innocent lambs

“We are not saying that everyone should become vegetarian or give up drinking but moving towards less carbon intensive foods will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve health,” said Kennedy."

To paraphrase the late Charles Heston, you can take this kebab from me when you pry it out of my cold-slightly-overweight-due-to eating-too much-carbon-intensive-food dead hands.

A final word from our sponsor, and my official response to David Kennedy "chief executive of the Committee on Climate Change"

Burping Sheep or Climate Change Criminal? You decide...

Heresy

Long story short, the supervisor at NASA of James Hansen, Mr "Science is Settled and Al Gore is my bro" (my post about him here), has now officially declared himself a skeptic. Amongst all the other evil the ex US president George W. Bush was supposed to have done, it was alleged in a media frenzy two years ago that he was attempting to "muzzle" NASA's research in support of man made global warming.

That's right, one of the really really high up dudes at NASA is now an official Warming Skeptic.

From the article:

“Hansen was never muzzled even though he violated NASA’s official agency position on climate forecasting (i.e., we did not know enough to forecast climate change or mankind’s effect on it). Hansen thus embarrassed NASA by coming out with his claims of global warming in 1988 in his testimony before Congress,”

And a replay for those that missed out on my emphasis above:

we did not know enough to forecast climate change or mankind’s effect on it

Amen.

So lets have a quick look at The Age to see how they are questioning their assumptions on this hot button issue with this news. Whingeing that the Global Financial Crisis has pushed the "climate change" debate out of the media and political eye, what seems to be a press release from some unknown lobby group:

"Almost without exception, the ethical implications of climate change — for the developing world, for the larger biotic community, for future generations — are being overlooked."

Note that the author feels that discussion of "climate change" solutions etc.. should supersede debate about the economy. How does one protect the environment without an economy?

"It is often argued that we have to come up with a practical solution to climate change, and that this involves leaving the wider issues of environmental justice until a later date."

Environmental justice?? Seriously, WTF is Environmental justice?!? Does the natural world have an ethical framework that some agency can enforce punishment and regulation??

"Environmental justice" at work

When a student union collides with reality

A happy resolution to my previous post about the Cystic Fibrosis charity shmozzle from Carleton University, Canada.

It appears that the voices of outrage and protest on this patently ridiculous motion were heard (via FiveFeetofFury). Two student councillors resigned (including the idiot that crafted the motion) and students at the university are wanting to impeach the student president.

Political Correctness 0 Reality 1

A little bit of perspective

Re: this story from The Australian

Instead of a profanity laden post which I really feel like writing, I have found some appropriate pictures of Taliban type activity, contrasted with comments from the article. Apologies for the graphic nature of the pictures. It was either that or a post with FUCK YOU ARSEHOLES!!! copy and pasted 100 times.

“To be honest, I am appalled that Australian soldiers have been implicated with such disgusting treatment of human beings,” he said.
“No human bring should be in any way placed in a dog pen.”
--Australian Federation of Islamic Councils president Iqbal Patel

“For Australia to find itself keeping prisoners in dog kennels, dog pens, even overnight, is a big mistake,” he told reporters in Canberra. "
--Australian Greens leader Bob Brown

"The situation in Afghanistan was “very nasty” and the Taliban were ruthless and destructive, but they should not be kept in dog pens, he said."
--Australian Greens leader Bob Brown

Links:
http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/node/8742
http://retorika.wordpress.com/2008/01/07/taliban-sisi-gelap-kemanusiaan/
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2008/04/30/world/30policy.inline.ready.html

Mere Milne

"I am blessed to live at a time when the denial of the obvious has become the organizing
principle of government and society. This makes my job so easy -- except for
when I must defend myself against the zealots of “nuance."
...
Not everyone is called to martyrdom, but everyone is called to witness.

Even journalists."
--David Warren, 3 Aug, 2008

---

Further to that "little" problem in Georgia, where the president of Georgia (Mikheil Saakashvili) apparently invited the full force of the Russian army by attacking South Ossetia for reasons I'm still not quite sure of.

Clearly, I had neglected to see that the entire Georgian conflict was due to US Imperialism. The brain surgeon that made this call is a well known writer for the Guardianista, Seumas Milne. Many, many people have been fisking this fool for a long time, so there's no point in going into too much depth, however I had to pull out this howler:

"But underlying the conflict of the past week has also been the Bush administration's wider, explicit determination to enforce US global hegemony and prevent any regional challenge, particularly from a resurgent Russia."

So, if I understand his reasoning, having fought the Cold War for about 44 odd years (1945-1989) where the world had genuinely been on the brink of nuclear war many more times than any of us normal people will ever know, having spent billions and expended a lot of blood (Korean War, Vietnam War, ...), the US finally defeated the evil Commies, only so that the evil Bush dynasty could establish a little Texas on the bottom left hand corner of Russia, to what...start the whole thing over again?!? And because Iraq was such a cakewalk, I'm sure the US is just itching to take on Russia again, hell, why not take on China at the same time?

The whole thing smacks of paranoia worse than mine. In his column he brings out a few more Lefty bogeymen (the evil Joos, CIA, and John McCain...hmm, not sure he's really got to bogeyman status...yet).

OK...one more:

"Unipolar domination of the world has squeezed the space for genuine self-determination and the return of some counterweight has to be welcome."

Dear Mr Milne, last week Russia threatened Poland with a nuclear strike (as reported by your paper). Thank the Space Monkey that this age of "Unipolar domination of the world" is at an end, eh? What a glorious harbringer of the future, where nation states can threaten each other with nuclear strikes willy nilly. At least those boorish Yanks aren't running the show anymore. Long live the age of the counterweight!

Further links to the brilliant intellect that is currently incarnated as the mortal Seumas Milne.

• http://timworstall.com/2008/08/14/seumas-2/
• http://davidthompson.typepad.com/davidthompson/2008/03/milneworld-3.html
• http://davidthompson.typepad.com/davidthompson/2008/08/blame-and-boile.html

Sophistic Speculation

From the Herald Sun on the 7th July, comes this incredibly well thought out op-ed from the Director of the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV). Ladies and Gentleman, I present you Dr Gerard Vaughan:

ART or pornography?

The controversy surrounding Bill Henson's depiction of nude teenagers in his photographic art began as a reaction to the image of a 13-year-old printed on the invitation to his commercial exhibition at the Roslyn Oxley 9 Gallery in Sydney.

Within days - encouraged by the ill-judged comments of some senior public figures in NSW and the ACT - we observed the depressing spectacle of police raids on public galleries there, and the removal from public view of works by Bill Henson.

I am pleased to say that in Victoria no such reaction occurred.

I have submitted the last sentence from Dr Vaughan to various dictionaries to be considered for the definition of “smug”.

The Victoria Police visited the NGV to view one work by Henson, and wisely decided to take no action.

Note the “wisely”, in which you can almost hear the italicization.

In due course, the Classification Board declared Henson's work as depicted on a media website as "mild and justified by context".

Finally, the NSW Police concluded that it would be almost impossible to mount a successful prosecution under the present law, and that the matter should be dropped.

The issue of the appropriateness or otherwise of the photographic depiction of nude children or teenagers has now erupted again with the publication by Art Monthly Australia of Polixeni Papapetrou's photographs of her daughter Olympia.

Suddenly, all the issues are back, including the issue of consent - of both the under-age model and the parents or guardians.

No sir, There is no “suddenly” reappearing to these issues. They never went away. The art elite had a tantrum and the politicians broadly reflected community opinion , but these issues are very much still there and a deliberately provocative action such as publishing yet another naked child will indeed bring those issues to the fore, which Dr GV and his colleagues clearly support in the name of Art.

While it is entirely appropriate for a magazine such as Art Monthly Australia to engage issues that have absorbed so much public time, attention and debate, there are some in the art world who regard the timing as unhelpful.

Ya reckon? Sorry, there is a good time to publish pictures of naked children?!? Will the good Dr enlighten us plebs when this time has come....

They regard the cover image as provocative, calculated to enrage again those who believe that the mere possibility that such works could fall into the hands of paedophiles suddenly renders them objectionable.

“They” being these unhelpful people in the art world who would, space monkey forbid, actually feel some sort of humanity in that stripping naked the most vulnerable members of society and publishing their pictures in public is a step too far. And it's not like the stated aim of the magazine publishers was to be provocative and protest the controversy over the Bill Henson pictures.

The argument is a total non-sequitur.

Isn't that awesome? That the Doctor, with his superior knowledge and super powers, can just reframe an argument at will, to completely disregard what most people in the community would think is the entire point of the argument, but No! Dr GV waves his arms and unleashes the powers of “total non-sequitur”, completely destroying the opposing arguments in a debate.

That would be soo cool, I can see it now:

Concerned Community Member:
- “Don't you think that pictures of naked children are these days likely to encourage and enable those that would have less than noble intentions towards young people?”
Dr GV:
- “No sir, I don't agree with you at all” [waves arms]
Concerned Community Member:
- “What was I saying? Oh yes, have you checked out the hot 6 year old on the cover of Art Monthly Australia?”

Note also his use of the phrase “total non-sequitur”....how does one make a “partial” non-sequitur? In fact if it is a “partial” non-sequitur, then it no longer is a non-sequitur, because by definition, it has something to do with whatever is being discussed. The esteemed Doctor's use of the word “total” is his way of “totally” dismissing the opposing argument, without ever having to address the point. The fact that a museum director (with a PhD) makes this tautological statement (or in academic speak: a mistake) indicates that the good Dr (and his PhD) might not be using all his faculties when focusing his awesome brain power on this issue.

The fact that paedophiles might access these works does not suddenly make them pornographic, nor do they make the artists pornographers.

Correct. However the fact that paedophiles may (and will) access these works and use them as pornography should make most normal people hesitate before publishing naked pictures of their own kids.

Both Bill Henson and Polixeni Papapetrou have produced bona fide works of art, not pornography.

They may make some of us uncomfortable, and we may not like them, but that is a different issue.

I wonder if Bill Henson and Polixeni Papapetrou would consider making works of art on say naked depictions of Mohammed or have their naked children hold the Quran? I know that would certainly make some people “uncomfortable” and they would definitely “not like them”. His (and the artists) sneering dismissal of peoples' discomfort being a "different issue" would be, I suspect, not such a secondary issue, should those peoples' discomfort translate directly into physical threats and attacks to the artists/models/curators, as some discomfited people have been known to do.

All of which leads me back to considering where a public art gallery stands in relation to these debates.

When the Henson affair first erupted, I said any publicly funded gallery needed to act responsibly on the question of what it exhibited.

A public gallery should try to avoid deliberately offending community values but equally it cannot succumb to censorship. This is a fine line to negotiate, and any institution will at times wish to promote work that is confronting and on the edge.

See my comments above about Mohammed and the Quran. Don't see much activity in the Australian Art community about pushing works that are “confronting” and “on the edge” there.

It is about balancing good judgment with the courage to confront things that are difficult and new.

One might ask, where is the good judgement here? And what exactly is difficult about NOT exhibiting naked children??

I have been asked if there are limits to what the NGV would exhibit.

My response is "yes".

Occasionally I see works of art that I know I would never put on display at the NGV, and others that would require a clear warning that they might cause offence.

See my comments about Mohammed and the Quran. I would bet that such art work fall into this category, o brave, brave Dr GV.

These cases are not exclusively about sex and sexuality, but might also cover the depiction of violence, or views on blasphemy.

Blasphemy? Really? Don't remember the NGV having much difficulty or a crisis of conscience when displaying Andre Serrano's Pisschrist. I suspect that some members in the community might have thought that was a little blasphemous...

It is all about finding a balance in supporting freedom of expression within the limits of accepted community values.

“accepted community values”, like say, not publishing pictures of naked children?

The NGV as an institution has stood up for Bill Henson, one of Australia's most respected artists and one of the very few Australian artists with a strong international reputation and following.

Dr GV and his NGV are ever so brave.

Our council president, Allan Myers, QC, has also been vocal on these issues, defending the right of the artist, and the artist's public, to freedom of expression.

He warned against ill-judged reactions that in any way reduce the freedoms we expect and have fought for in a sophisticated civic society.

At a time when public galleries were being intimidated into removing works by Bill Henson, the NGV significantly increased its public display of his work, due to the high level of public interest.

Braveheart brave.

In the case of Bill Henson, his photographic work is clearly art and not pornography, as none of the pre-requisites for pornography is met.

Well that's a philosophical debate to which we are trying to find a resolution. And a cultural relativist like Dr GV should be familiar with the saying “Pornography is in the eye of the beholder”

But equally, some very great art was clearly produced as pornography, although in the refined world of art history and museums and galleries it is more readily referred to as erotica; and of course not all erotica, no matter how explicit, is pornography.

Most of this art, however, belongs to the past, as modern pornography belongs firstly to the world of commercial publishing through photography and film.

The fact that Henson and Papapetrou use photography as their medium of expression is of course a key reason for the disquiet expressed by some, who do not distinguish between the artist's/photographer's depiction of a nude child - in the tradition of so much of the great art of the past - and perverse child pornography in the same medium.

Could you be more of an elitist git?!?! Translation: I/We the artistic community will decide what pictures of naked children are Art, and you plebs will accept this without question, and not get confused with other pictures of naked children that may be pornography. Remember we are the guardians of "the tradition of so much of the great art of the past" which somehow includes photographic depictions of naked children.

From my perspective as a museum director, it all comes down to context, and to understanding the artist's intention, and for society to be able freely to debate the demarcation line between art and pornography.

I think you'll find that any context involving pictures of naked children is likely to be misconstrued, regardless of the intention of the artist, model, or fuzzy thinking museum director. And it might be wise to err on the side of caution and not cry censorship, instead of publishing yet more provocative pictures to score political points, and making paedophiles across the world happy.

A museum of art should always seek to respect and defend the artist's right to freedom of expression.
Dr Gerard Vaughan is director of the National Gallery of Victoria