July 11th – International Day Against Stoning

July 10, 2010 — xanthippa

How sad that in the 21st century, it is still happening.

People are being stoned to death.

July 11th is the anniversary of the stoning of a woman who had been stoned – while strapped to a stretcher….

And let’s not forget Aisho Ibrahim Dhuhulow – the 13-year old who was stoned to death for the ‘crime’ of having been gang-raped.  The 1000 spectators tried to rush the executioners, to stop this Sharia-dictated monstrosity, only to have been fired upon with live ammo.  Some were injured, a little boy was killed.  Then, Aisha was stoned…

They dug her up 3 times – to see if she was dead yet:  then re-buried her in the ground up to her shoulders and stoned her  some more.

And she is not alone…

There are many men and women still facing this horrific death.  I admit – words fail me.

One Law For All has more details on the International Day Against Stoning!

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G20, police behaviour and the ‘split’ on the ‘right’: part 2

July 8, 2010 — xanthippa

In part 1, I pointed out that increasingly, the police have been given two goals which are not always congruent:  that of ‘maintaining public order’ and of ‘upholding the laws’.  And, increasingly (in ‘the West’), the police have been choosing to ‘maintain public peace’ – even at times breaking laws themselves in the process, instead of upholding them.

This has become very clear during the G8/G20 circus downtown Toronto.

Not only were the police given extraordinary powers to ‘maintain public order’ within the designated, fenced-off area, they had usurped even greater powers for themselves.  I use the term ‘usurped’ advisedly, because that is what they did.  The police chief admitted he had intentionally lied about what the powers police had been granted were.

Bill Blair’s justification of the lie is telling: ‘I was trying to keep the criminals out.’

It would appear that in this Police Chief’s view, all the people on the streets of Toronto were to be treated like criminals, until proven otherwise – may be!  Perhaps Chief Blair thought that he was on a crusade:  ‘Arrest them all – God will know his own!’  The police officers under Blair’s command certainly appeared to behave as if they took this adage to their hearts, as they often exercised powers never lawfully granted them – even going well past the police chief’s unlawful claims. (I will return to this later)

Following the ‘event’, the police continued to lie to the public!

The reason for this seems clear:  the evidence of police misconduct had been published and publicized, so the police attempted to magnify the ‘perceived threat’ in order to justify their conduct.  By displaying ‘confiscated weapons’ (some of which were toys – taken from a gamer who made them safe for kids to play with) and lying about what they were and where/how they were ‘confiscated’, the police hoped to portray the ‘protesters’ as a bunch of lawless anarchist thugs who were a threat to every decent human being.  Once this effort succeeded (as it mostly did), they could then dismiss any person who criticized their conduct by tarring her/him with the same brush.

That is a dangerous precedent!

First of all, it is not safe for anyone – law breaker as well as each and every law abiding citizen – to live in a society where the police arbitrarily usurp powers onto themselves and use threats, intimidation, arrests and, yes, violence, while exercising these usurped powers!

Whatever you think about the G8/G20 Toronto thing, just think about the implications of that!

We would live in a society where police are permitted to make the rules ‘on the go’ – and get rid of (through intimidation or arrest) anyone whom they perceive as challenging them…

If you think this is impossible in Canada (or another Western democracy), think again:  a few years ago, a study of downtown Vancouver policing practices documented searches, intimidation and various forms of detention of individuals on the fringes of society (least credible victims…) took place without any official records of the events – without these records, no effective legal action could be taken against the police officers.

Yes, the police were in a difficult situation.  Still…

While the evidence is very circumstantial, the police behaviour captured on video does suggest that at least some of the ‘violent protesters’ were indeed agent provocateurs – a tool which the police in Canada are known to have employed in past protests. (It evens appears that, prior to the G20, a Toronto Police representative was asked directly whether the police will be using agent provocateurs – only to be told that they are unwilling to reveal that type of information.)

I do not wish to get hung up on this agent provocateur thing.  The charges that the police utilized them have been made – along with claims that the worst of the violence and destruction was not committed by the protesters, but rather by the police agents themselves.  While I have seen some circumstantial evidence that lends credence to these claims, I am not yet convinced either way.

Why do I even raise the issue?

The police are in a unique position in our society.  In order to do their job – and do it right – they need people to trust them.  This trust is not a trivial thing – it must be earned, over and over.  Yet, having seen so many videos of police misconduct, having read so many reports of it, I fear this trust has been seriously compromised.

Do I believe all the charges against the police?

No, I don’t.  A few fake videos, perhaps.  A few trumped up charges – I’m willing to entertain that they are not as accurate as the ‘victims’ claim.

But some of the charges of misconduct come from sources I consider reputable (I know some of these people personally and they have earned my trust through their past behaviour).

Yet, I would like to give the police the benefit of the doubt.  And… had the police not been caught in so many lies, it would be easier to believe them…

Even if we completely set aside the issue of the agent provocateurs, there are serious problems with the police failing to enforce the law!  There are numerous videos (including some I linked above) where the police witness violent or destructive behaviour by specific individuals – yet do nothing to stop it by arresting, or even interrupting, the law-breakers!

That is not right.  It is abdication of their duty at best –  actively aiding the law-breakers at worst.

Even if there had not been an ‘over-reaction’ by the police on the Sunday and Monday (the arbitrary-seeming arrests of close to a thousand innocent people as well as all the other reported abuses of their powers), the police behaviour on Saturday, their failure to act and to apply the laws (which, according to some sources, came as ‘an order from above’) would be sufficient to shake the public trust in the police.

Sorry – I truly am sorry that this is so –  but that is the truth!

Oh – and as for labeling all the protesters as violent anarchists, who break the laws and have no respect for private property or the businesses along the protest route:  watch this and weep!  Not all protesters condoned lawless behaviour.  Some protested, hoping to talk sense into the violent thugs in their midst.  Others, like this guy, did more to stop lawless behaviour than the police did!

(Continued in ‘Part 3’)

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G20, police behaviour and the ‘split’ on the ‘right’: part 1

July 7, 2010 — xanthippa

All right – this is a difficult issue to tackle.  Still, it is an important one.  So, if I go off on a tangent – please, comment and re-focus me!

The G8/G20 event cost over 1 Billion dollars in ‘security’ costs.  Many people complained – yet, though I thought the figure high, I did not complain because I thought that if the people in positions to know thought the security costs were that hight, I was unwilling to double-guess them.  In no way ought this event have been turned into a showcase for ‘unlawful people’ – if that was going to be the cost of upholding the rule of law, I was willing to pay the bill and not grumble (too much).

I am, if such a thing can be said to exist, a ‘pro-law libertarian’:  it is my deeply held conviction that it is only through the rule of law that our rights can be respected and our liberties can be exercised.

I take a poor view of each and every individual who breaks the laws – even ‘bad laws’ (two ‘wrongs’ do not make a ‘right’), provided citizens have a recourse through their ability to lobby to change or otherwise get rid of ‘bad laws’.  Even living in a totalitarian state, (though young) I thought that leaving everything behind and running away (not so bravely) was preferable to taking the law into my own hands:  it would take a lot, including absence of any other course of action, to get me to break the laws or to condone others to do so.

Having explained my philosophical bend, I also ought to explain my attitude towards the police (and, yes, I am volunteering with the Ottawa police because I think cops ought to be ‘the good guys’).

Police officers occupy a very unique position in our society:  they are the ‘Agents of the State’ whom we entrust with upholding the rule of law in our society.  As such, they occupy a position of trust unlike those of most other people in society:  trust which has to be continuously earned by their behaviour, because the alternative is too terrible to contemplate.  (Yes – I still have the nightmares…)

Unfortunately, ‘the police’ have recently been entrusted with two completely different goals:  one is to ‘uphold the law’, the other is to ‘maintain order’.  These two tasks are not necessarily in ‘extreme’ opposition to each other – but neither are they completely congruous with each other, either!

Example (from the past – to keep the current tempers even):

A large number of militant anti-Israeli protesters sees an Israeli flag in the window of an apartment and threaten to break into the building to get rid of it (presumably looting, or at least ‘damaging’ the building in the process).  The police, ‘in order to maintain public order’, illegally enter the apartment and remove the ‘offensive’ flag in order to appease the mob which is threatening lawless violence.

These individual police officers chose to break the law, in order to ‘maintain public order’, instead of waiting for law-defying individuals to break the laws, then arresting them in order to uphold the laws of the land!

That is only one such example where the police chose to ‘maintain public peace’ rather than to ‘enforce the laws of the land’:  had they enforced the laws, they would have waited for individuals to damage the property, then and only then arrested these individual lawbreakers and brought them to justice.

We have also seen a parallel to this in Canada, when a lone pro-Israeli protester (not breaking any laws) faced a large number of anti-Israel protesters in Alberta:  the police threatened the lone, law-abiding, not-violence-threatening individual with arrest in order to ‘not provoke’ the violence-threatening (and thus law-breaking) mob because the law-abiding man’s ‘presence’ was a ‘provocation’ and thus a threat to ‘public order’.  (Sorry, I can’t find the link – if you can, please, do so in the comments:  yet, this is so common, most of us are aware of many parallel incidents!)

George Jonas (a fellow escapee from a totalitarian police state) phrases his observation of the role the  police in our society are increasingly choosing to play:

‘The only group exhibiting Canadian-style restraint was the police. They cast a calm eye on the pandemonium, took a balanced view and chose no sides between people trying to exercise their rights and bullies trying to prevent them.’

These occurrences are not isolated:  over and over, in much of the ‘free world’, we have seen police preferring to aid law-breakers (who are ‘difficult-to-handle’) in oppressing the population… instead of upholding the laws of the land.

Just consider the going-ons and race-based policing  in Caledonia!!!

So, how does this relate to the G8/G20 situation – and the ‘split’ on the ‘right’?

In how the people usually considered ‘little-c-conservatives’ perceive what happened and how we evaluate the role the police played…

Let me first get a few things off my mind:  it was idiotic to hold the G20 meeting in the middle of downtown of Canada’s largest city.  Ensuring the security of the participants was going to be a nightmare.  It was a situation where just about every possible outcome was going to draw serious – and ‘warranted’ – criticism.  In other words, it was likely to be a ‘no win’ situation…

The police who were entrusted with the task of providing security for this event were in an unenviable position:  ‘ensuring security’ necessarily put them into conflict with their primary role – that of ‘upholding the laws’!

Why?

Because ‘ensuring security’ meant the police were responsible for preventing any law-breaking which would result in ‘breeches of security’ at the summit.

However, the actual and proper role of the police is to uphold the laws:  this means that they are only permitted to intervene AFTER a law has been broken!

How can a person (or collection of persons) possibly prevent a crime – when they are, by law, permitted to intervene only after a crime has been committed?!?!?

(Continued in ‘Part 2’ and ‘Part 3’)

Posted in freedoms, opression, philosophy, politics, society. Tags: , , , , , , , , , . 7 Comments »

Happy Independence Day!

July 4, 2010 — xanthippa

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‘Consensus-building’ and ‘leadership’

July 3, 2010 — xanthippa

From our schools to our media to our bureaucracies, every aspect of our society is so infested with Cultural Marxism that ‘Newspeak’ has seriously corrupted not just our language, but our very ability to think clearly.  We no longer even recognize it when we hear it.

One such example is the currently popular claim that ‘leadership’ requires one to be skilled at ‘consensus building’.

First, let’s look at the meaning of ‘leadership’ and what constitutes ‘a leader’:

‘Leadership’ is the ‘ability to lead’, fulfilling the role or function of a ‘leader’.

‘To lead’ means to ‘show way by going in advance’, ‘to guide’, ‘to direct’, ‘to inspire’.

So, whom do we, as a society, regard as the greatest leaders of all times?  I did a little bit of googling on this – please, do the same.  While the leaders ‘closest’ to us necessarily dominate our cultural memory, there were some names that consistently keep being mentioned, by educational sites, journalistic/populist opinion sites and discussion boards alike.

In no particular order, these are just some of these names that keep cropping up over and over when people discuss ‘great leaders’:

  • Martin Luther King Jr.
  • Elisabeth I of England
  • Gengis Khan
  • Epicurus
  • Alexander the Great
  • Ghandi
  • Margaret Thatcher
  • Golda Meir
  • George Washington
  • Cyrus the Great
  • Winston Churchill
  • Muhammad
  • Constantine
  • Samudragupta
  • Wu Ti
  • Ivan III
  • Napoleon
  • Thomas Jefferson
  • Abraham Lincoln
  • C. D. Howe
  • Ronald Reagan
  • Bismarck

So, how many of these were known as ‘consensus builders’?

If I may quote from ‘What is ‘Cultural Marxism’?’, a guest-post on this blog by CodeSlinger:

Another example is the concept of intersubjective rationality, developed by Habermas, which replaces the individual process of reaching a conclusion based on the objective criterion that it follows from valid reasoning and known facts, on the one hand, with the social process of establishing a consensus supported by the subjective criterion that the group feels good about it, on the other hand. In today’s schools, those who do the former are maligned for being judgmental and demanding, while those who do the latter are praised for being good team players.

‘Consensus’ literally means ‘coming together’ (con) ‘of feelings’ (senses, sentiments).  Dictionaries typically define ‘consensus’ as an opinion or position reached by a group as a whole.

In other words, ‘consensus building’ is a form of governance a group of people will resort to when it lacks ‘leadership’.

How does this translate into the political world?  We are constantly bombarded with the message that great political leaders ought to be skilled at ‘consensus building’…

Our ‘Western’ societies have built-in safeguard mechanisms to ensure that ‘governments’ remain accountable to the citizens who elect them.  Perhaps the most important single element in this mechanism is that our elected bodies are based on the adversarial principle.

It is precisely because the political adversaries of those who propose a particular policy or course of action bring public scrutiny to it by publicly pointing out the flaws or shortcomings of this proposal that the issue is brought to public attention and thoroughly examined.  It is certainly not a pleasant process (nor is it meant to be pleasant), but it is one through which at least some light is shed onto what is being proposed – in as much detail as possible – and which engages the electorate in the debate (at least a little bit).

This is the method through which, in our system, we the citizens keep our elected politician accountable to us.  It is therefore important that we do nothing which would minimize this process!

What would happen if, before proposing a new law or introducing a new project, the head of the group that is proposing it went to all the elected representatives and put just enough of an ‘incentive’ into the proposal for each an every one of the representatives to not want to loose that ‘carrot’?

Certainly, any such project would be significantly costlier, because in addition to the core cost, it would now have to also bear the cost of a ‘carrot’ for each of the elected representatives – the bit that got them to ‘go along’ with it.

Of course, any such law or rule would be significantly more convoluted because it would now have to accommodate/fulfill/have exemptions for/’bundle in’ all the ‘carrots’  for each of the elected representatives – the ‘incentives’ that would be built in to it to ‘facilitate the building of the consensus’.

Every ‘quid’ would have a ‘quo’.

All policy would be shaped by back-room deals, where ‘consensus builders’ would be busy building ‘accommodations’ and ‘incentives’ into everything that would placate or mollify any potential dissent….among the elected representatives.

Once this process was done, the product would be presented to the public as a ‘done deal’.  I imagine the ‘dialog’ with the electorate would go something like this:

We have worked it all out, the proposal is so awesome that we all agree on it!

What?  You want to see the details?

Why?

We, your elected representatives all agree on this so this must the best course of action.  We have examined it in detailed and built a consensus – you needn’t worry your pretty little heads about it!

What?  You don’t like it?  You want to vote us out?

And replace us with whom?  EVERYONE agrees with this!

In other words, if there is a consensus among our elected representatives on a proposed course of action, if each and every one of them considers it in his or her best interest to proceed with it as is, it is very unlikely that the voters, the citizens, will have any opportunity to learn much about it before it is implemented.  There is another word for this type of ‘consensus’:  collusion!

In an environment like this, an environment of back-room-deals and political collusion, where there is little controversy which leads to public debate or scrutiny of proposed policies, corruption can be very easily hidden.

In my never-humble-opinion, ‘consensus-building’ among elected representatives is not just anathema to responsible government and an abdication of leadership, it is an active attempt to corrupt our governance structures and eliminate accountability of elected officials to the citizenry.

I would even go further than that:  politicians who tout governing through ‘consensus-building’ are openly admitting they intend to rule through corruption!

Posted in corruption, freedoms, language, politics, society. Tags: , , , , , , , . 2 Comments »

Happy Dominion Day!

July 1, 2010 — xanthippa



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Why ‘secular laws’ must rank above ‘religious laws’ in every society

June 29, 2010 — xanthippa

Recently, a post I had made a long time ago where I was looking at the definitions and nature of religion received a comment which raised a very important point.  It was something that I had attempted to get across – and failed.  Here, I hope, to remedy this!

Context:  Having used the Jungian definition of ‘religion’, I argued that ‘freedom to practice one’s religion’ must never be given greater weight in our society than ‘secular laws’.

Permit me to recall ‘Xanthippa’s First Law of Human Dynamics‘ -IF there is a potential for ANY law (rule) to be applied IN EXTREME ways – never foreseen when the law was first formulated – eventually, it WILL BE!!!’.  In other words, every potential  law or rule must be subjected to scrutiny of its effects when (and it is a question of when, not if) it will be applied to a ridiculous extreme.

Therefore, in that post, I used an extreme example: ‘If there is a blanket protection for actions based on religious belief, even such extreme acts as ritualized murder would be protected’.

The comment:

‘I cannot agree with your definition of religion. Since I am Catholic, I will use my understanding of it to explain my position. At the core of Catholicism, is the belief that there are some things that, with regards to morality, are objectively wrong- wrong in every time, place, and situation. I believe that you yourself would assent to this, since you already have identified objective moral truths (human sacrifice, polygamy, ritual rape, paedophilia (child-brides), ritual cannibalism, genital mutilation).

Now, it is not enough to believe that human sacrifice is wrong, rather, one must also behave in accordance with that belief. If one does not have the freedom to act in accordance with that belief, of what value is the belief? None. It is nothing but an illusion of freedom which the state allows to placate the people.

The crux of the issue, however, lies in the contradiction between the constitutionally granted “freedom of religion” and the secular law- a contradiction that is only truly resolved if religious belief and secular law both conform to objective moral truth. You seem to assume, though, that secular law is ipso facto closer to objective moral truth and therefore has primacy, but that is a false (and sometimes dangerous) assumption. Our laws were not created in a vacuum, but created by people who drew from their religious beliefs, cultural backgrounds, and own understanding of morality. There is nothing to suggest that they inherently knew better and we should accept their moral code a priori.’

I am not, in any way, shape or form, convinced that there is such a thing as an ‘objective moral truth’.

This does not mean I don’t think some things are wrong.  Yet, I recognize these for judgments based on my observation of the collection of impressions I will, for lack of a better-defined term, call ‘life’.  I would be loath to have pretensions to any absolutes, even if I became convinced ‘absolutes’ could be defined.

First things first….   Sequentially, I suppose.

The commenter self-identifies as a ‘Catholic’ (Roman Catholic Christian, I presume).

He/she then asserts that ‘objective moral truths’ exist, and as a proof cites me that, among other things, ‘ritual cannibalism’ is wrong.  However, where I say these acts cannot be justified by ‘exercising one’s religious freedoms’ IF they contravene the secular laws of the land, the commenter goes further, calling this wrong in every time, place and situation and equating this condemnation with an ‘objective moral truth’.

HOW can a Catholic possibly assert that?

Is it not one of the core beliefs of Catholicism that the priests’ blessing physically transforms a wafer of bread into the actual flesh of Christ, wine into the actual blood of Christ?  Is the consumption of these not part of their worship rituals?

This is, by definition, ritual cannibalism.

Don’t be dismissive of its importance!  Either the person truly believes they are eating Christ’s flesh, or they are heretics to their faith and not a Roman Catholic Christian.  These definitions are not mine…  One cannot possibly be both a practicing Roman Catholic Christian and believe that it is an ‘objective moral truth’ that ‘ritual cannibalism’ is wrong in every time, place and situation – unless one believes their religion demands behaviour contrary to ‘objective moral truths’!

No, I am not trying to pick on the commenter:  rather, I am attempting to illustrate of just how quickly things get muddled when we enter the realm ‘theological principles’ and ‘objective moral truths’…  No society of free people could hope to form effective laws which respect core human rights and freedoms on such a tenuous foundation.

This is precisely why ‘secular laws’ must ‘trump’ religious ones whenever there is a conflict:  ‘secular laws’ do not and must not legislate morality.  To the contrary:  the primary role of secular laws must be the protection of individual rights and freedoms against the oppression by other peoples’ ‘morality’!

Justifying a proposed law by an appeal to ‘morality’ or ‘greater good’ or ‘public interest’ (all of these are the same thing at their core, they just wear different cloaks) should sound our ‘alarm bells’ that something dangerous is afoot and requires close scrutiny.

Why?

Passing laws on these grounds necessarily permits the morality of some to over-rule or abridge the rights of others.  Than, in my never-humble-opinion, is always a bad thing!

The commenter says:

You seem to assume, though, that secular law is ipso facto closer to objective moral truth and therefore has primacy…’

No, not at all.  I am sorry if I gave that impression.  To the contrary!

Secular laws are not created in a vacuum – not even the vacuum of some ‘alternate dimension’ where rule-making deities reside.  Rather, they are a negotiated contract among the citizens of a country how to best keep from infringing on each other’s rights as we strive to coexist and thrive.  It is a living contract, not set in stone, but continuously evolving to reflect the changes in our society – and it must be supreme because by the virtue of accepting citizenship (or residency), one voluntarily chooses to abide by them.  Or, at least, that is what the meaning of accepting citizenship (or residency) ought to imply…

Because it is a negotiated contract of ‘minimum interference’, if you will (OK – let me just say that it ‘ought to be’ as we see laws becoming more and more intrusive and ‘moralistic’….), it will necessarily reflect the moral ideals of the majority of the members of the society.  That is how it should be – provided that the core rights and freedoms of each and every individual are not infringed.

Our laws must permit every person to exercise their rights and freedoms as fully as possible – but not past the point where this activity would violate the rights of another person.  Sort of like that right to swing one’s arms stops just short of hitting someone else’s nose…

In other words, a man – say, my father – must be free to believe (or not) in whatever Gods he wants.  And, he must be free to worship (or not) them as best as he can – but the limit on his freedom to practice his religion must stop short of the right to kill me because I offended his God by wearing the wrong kind of polka-dots on Sunday!

Posted in atheism, freedoms, ignosticism, philosophy, politics, religion, society. Tags: , , , , , , , , , . 3 Comments »

Cheaper by the dozen – except in the EU

June 27, 2010 — xanthippa

If you think government interference in our daily lives is a good thing, you’ll be delighted at this tidbit of news:  EU is about to ban the sale of things ‘by the dozen’.

Yes.

Eggs will be sold ‘by weight’.

You know – to make sure the label on the package is accurate.

So, it’s for your own protection….

Of course, this does not explain why they’d be considering (as is reported that they are) to even ban selling ‘six chocolate bars for the price of 4’?

As John Robson is fond of saying: “The more governments do things they shouldn’t, the less they do the things they should.” You know, like controlling every aspect of how grocers run their business and even sales promotions instead of figuring out how to cut down on the size of the civil service which is so bloated, it is bankrupting the EU….

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Aspergers and writing: ‘build’, not just ‘revise’

June 26, 2010 — xanthippa

‘Everyone’ who is familiar with Aspies knows that most of us struggle with writing.

Not all of us – Aspergers affects each person a little differently and to a different degree.  And, it affects males and females a little differently, too.  Perhaps that is why my post  ‘Aspergers and writing’ continues to get so many hits.

Today, I got a comment on it which raises something important.  That is why I’m posting this comment – and my quick reply to it – as its own post here:

Your comments about perfectionism and the difficulty Aspies have in putting words to paper make me wonder if this is why it’s so difficult for Aspies to revise what they’ve written: that once they get something down on paper they have committed their ideas to writing and there is no other way to put it. As a writing teacher, I often run into a wall when I ask my Aspie students to revise and I wonder if you think this explanation is accurate.

My response was:

I think that you are on the right track. I would like to nuance it slightly, if I may.

There are several things going on.

It is not that the Aspie may not be able to think of different words to put things into: it may be true at some times, byt certainly not at others. For example, many Aspies are very verbal – and they can say things out loud in many, many different ways. As a matter of fact, you may have a hard time shutting them up – they’ll describe the same things in so many ways.

The problem comes whith ‘investing’ into writing the words down. They have been ‘selected’ and ‘sweated over’ – why do you want to change them?

This constant ‘revision’ most writing teachers insist is part of ‘proper writing’ reduces me to white-hot fury! It it’s worth writing down, it’s worth doing it RIGHT THE FIRST TIME!

Once an Aspie HAS written something down and you are asking them to ‘revise’ it – you are asking them to take something that is ‘right’ and change it….obviously, if you take something that is ‘right’ and change it, you make it ‘wrong’! Then, when they hand in the version you forced them to change from ‘right’ to ‘wrong’, you give them a bad mark…

No wonder we don’t want to ‘revise’!

OK – that was the ‘emotional’ response.

Now, for more ‘reasoning’….

There is a problem – an actual physical problem in the neural connections – in the brain which makes it difficult for MOST (not all – we are all individuals), especially male, Aspies to write. Physically write.

Forcing us to ‘write’ and endlessly re-write the same sentences over and over is mental torture to us. It rubs our noses in our failure. So, we avoid it like the plague. If it’s a computer file, we’ll be less freaked out by it. But asking us to hand-copy out the same bits over because other bits had changed is unreasonable.

I actually can tell – byt the style of writning – if something I ‘produced’ was first spoken and then trans-scribed/typed into the computer, or if I wrote it on a piece of paper in longhand and then typed it into the computer, or if I directly typed it into the computer. Honestly, my sentence structure and syntax are significantly different in each one of these styles of ‘writing’. Perhaps you could experiment with your students on this theme….

But!

This is the way I helped my kids ‘get over’ the whole ‘revision aversion’ (I could not very well undermine the teacher, right?).

I explain that the teacher is trying to teach them how to build a piece of writing ‘from the ground up’. It is a particular methodology to teach, and marks are awarded at each stage: sort of like when you learn to swim, they first teach you to put your face in the water and only later want to see you perform the full butterfly stroke…

So – first ‘version’ is NOT supposed to be ‘a written story’ or ‘a written essay’.

Instead, organize your thoughts and put 1-2 words for each paragraph: enough to ‘record’ the ‘main idea’ or ‘main thrust’ of what this will say. This will be handed in as ‘brainstorming’ – teacher needs to get it to keep a record of it, so they can prove what they gave you the marks for if someone audits their work.

On the next ‘version’, you go to each one of the paragraphs and put in 1-2 words for each sentence you will write in the finished piece. Check that each paragraph still has the same ‘focus’ as the ‘brainstorming’. This will be first draft – again, marks, teacher keeps for records…

In between each step, take the teacher’s feedback and incorporate it in – again, this needs to show up. It’s the teacher’s job to give you feedback, so it’s important for the records they keep to reflect it. If you don’t, they’ll think they are not teaching you right, be sad, not like your work….pick your sentiment.

On the next ‘version’, you write BARE sentences for the 1-2 word things. Make sure all ideas are there, but not really all the descriptions, and not nicely or fancily. You’re hitting the highlights. That is the next draft.

Finally, you take your draft and connect up things, dress up the sentences, and so on.

It’s a method of constructing something. Teachers must document they taught it to you.

This way, you’ll show how you built the written piece. It’s not so much ‘revision’ or ‘revising’ it – that is a very poor label for this. But, that is the label we are stuck with.

Does this help explain the thought process?

Posted in Aspergers, education. Tags: , , , . 2 Comments »

Vigna vs Levant: first installment on the last day

June 26, 2010 — xanthippa

What a day today has been!

I admit, I am a little overwhelmed by all that has been happening.

And, I will try very, very hard to put down what happened, as best as I can with my very very limited legal background (which consists solely of watching ‘Jurisprudence’ on TV whenever I can).  But, most of it will not come tonight.

As those of you who read my blog on and off, I have some long term health issues.  These last two days have seen me more up and about than I have been in months, and I admit that I am exhausted.  Yeah, I know, I am a wimp….

Still, I really don’t want to try to give an exhaustive report while I am not in a serene state of mind.

I will only offer the briefest of observations… (well, brief for my standards!)

Mr. Levant appeared more patient today.  Now, I don’t know how Mr. Levant felt – he didn’t tell me.  But, it seemed to me that he had moved past the exasperation (not completely, and with a few re-lapses, of course, but he seemed less ‘overall’ exasperated ‘much’ of the time – perhaps because he was not having to explain over and over and over how his ‘sainted father’ felt bullied by Mr. Vigna’s representative(s) trespassing on his (the father’s, not Mr. Ezra Levant’s) property for reasons Mr. Vigna claims are legitimate) and, if you can believe it, I think Mr. Levant actually pitied Mr. Vigna.

Mr. Levant’ lawyer sounded every bit as good as I had hoped for, from having watched his demeanor yesterday.  I have to admit, I really like him – he has a way of understating things that permits the listener to draw his own conclusion without ‘beating him/her over the head with it’ (if you know what I mean), but which is ‘louder than shouting’…

Mr. Vigna continued in a manner similar to the one I observed yesterday.  Much of the time (when standing up) he would rest his hands on the desk and lean forward in a bullishly aggressive manner (at least, it looked so from my point of view).  At one point the judge requested him (and it almost seemed to me that the judge was a little exasperated at having to do so) to not lean so far forward because he was so close to the microphone, it was interfering with the microphone’s proper function.

(Aside:  I think Mr. Vigna was using one of the new super-awesome Sharpie pens – guaranteed not to bleed through to the next page. There are two types of this new pen – the ‘click’ type and the ‘cap’ type.  To the best of my observations, Mr. Vigna was using the ‘cap’ type, blue, if I am not mistaken.  I rather like these ones, and used the same kind (Sharpie, cap-type, blue ink) to record my notes from today between the first break and the lunch break (approximately 12:20 and 13:00 hours… I always switch pens and ink colours between breaks….  These ‘cap’ type Sharpie pens come in black, blue, red, green and purple – but, as far as I know, you can only get the purple and green ones if you buy a multi-pack.  The GTEC-C4 pen multi-packs include the same colours – but also add orange, which the Sharpie ‘cap’-type multipack does not have.)

At other times, when Mr. Vigna was not leaning against the desk, he seemed (in my layman’s eyes) to have had difficulty containing his ‘energy’ – or, in other vernacular, one could say he seemed to have had ‘too much sharp chi’, if you will.

He kept shifting his weight from one foot to the other.  Even in between ‘weight shifts’, he kind of bobbed up and down on the balls of his feet.  In addition, he kept making small little nervous movements with his hands.  And, yes, he did pull his pants up a few times – but aside from a few little glances he threw Richard Warman who sat in on part of the morning proceedings (and one glare at me that started by looking over his left shoulder, than turning about 345 degrees and finishing the glare over his right shoulder), he did not seem to pay much attention to the audience.

While I’m on the topic of ‘audience’…

When I wrote my initial observations on the ‘Warman vs Free Dominion’ appeal hearing (yeah, I know – I never DID finish my write up….I’m still thinking over some bits of it, especially the broader implications of the Irwing case), I noted that there was a pretty young blond woman with awesome shoes in the audience who looked like she had had a tooth ache,  She arrived just after things would get under way and leave just before the breaks, preventing me from saying ‘hi’ and complimenting her on her shoes (I like shoes almost as much as I like pens).

Well, that same young woman was in the audience yesterday.  You’ll be relieved – she no longer looked like she had a tooth ache.  That made me feel glad for her.  I would not have noticed her, because she sat behind me, except that her manner of arrival and departure jogged my highly imperfect memory.

And while I’m on the topic of the audience…

At just about 10 am, Mr. Richard Warman walked in and sat down in the front row in front of me.  During this time, Mr. Vigna was cross-examining Mr. Levant, and they just happened to be talking about the part of the suit where Mr. Vigna believes his reputation was damaged by Mr. Levant’s claim that he (Mr. Vigna) ‘had access to’ a neo-nazi  website.

Now, here, I have got to be careful in how I word things…. This was one of those things ‘under dispute’ and at the heart of the lawsuit – and I freely admit, I am not trained in the legal profession.  So, please, do take this as a lay person’s highly imperfect impressions and observations and nothing more.

The issue which was discussed was what Mr. Levant had written regarding the ‘Jadewar’ membership in a neo-nazi site, and its role in ‘stuff’.  And, I do not want to get into the ‘nitty gritty details’ of the case while I am tired and before I have had a chance to think it through.

Still, it is a fact that Mr. Levant specifically said under cross examination that he believed Mr. Vigna was much better a person than to join a neo-nazi group/party/site/whatever.  He (Mr. Levant) did not believe Mr. Vigna WAS a neo-nazi at all,  All he (Mr. Levant) wrote and asserted (and, I presume, still believes to be true, based on the sources he cited) was that Mr. Vigna ‘had access to’ it – as in, was aware of and could, if he so wanted, have looked up the password or found some other means (like asking Mr. Dean Stacey) to access it (because the information and password were contained ‘in the files’ which he, Mr. Vigna, presumably had access to – at least, that is my highly imperfect understanding of the testimony).

On several occasions, Mr. Levant said he did not think Mr. Vigna himself was a neo-nazi, like ‘Richard Warman’ or ‘like that man there’ – while he indicated Mr. Warman….

More to come tomorrow!

Posted in freedoms, opression, politics, society. Tags: , , , , , , , , , . 2 Comments »
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