A piece of pie to everyone who knows who said this!
Here is a clue: she called for the separation of The State and The Economy.
And, her words – spoken in 1959 – are applicable today. Please, sit back and enjoy this Mike Wallace interview with Ayn Rand:
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
Recently, I received this comment on my Aspergers and Reading post which I thought deserved a longer response… one which might be helpful to other parents (or Aspies) out there!
My Aspie son is 10 and we have homeschooled since first grade. He was extremely behind in his Reading skills in K and made very little progress. Teaching him has been very trying. He is resistant to reading at all. He is able to read about 200 common sight words on cards, but then can’t seem to read them in text. Generally if he sees a word like “has” he will not recognize it, but will get the word if I spell it. I have no idea why this works for him and I haven’t been able to find more information on how to capitalize on this strength. He has an incredible vocabulary, very good comprehension, and generally is at grade level for other language skills.
It sounds to me like there are at least two separate problems your son is dealing with. One is the mechanics of the reading – but that is the simpler one of them to solve (and the one I will address in this post). The most pressing problem here, the one that is the greater stumbling block, is that it sounds like your son has a bit of a ‘block’ when it comes to ‘reading’. Until that is solved, addressing the mechanics of teaching him to read will do very little.
I am basing this presumption on the fact that you wrote that your son is resistant to reading.
I understand!!!
And, I have done my best to address this ‘block’ in an earlier post: Aspergers – ‘reluctance’/’freezing up’ explained. It might also be useful to read my posts on how I motivated my older son to learn how to read (he is now a speed-reader, with 100% comprehension of what he reads at a rate of ‘2 paperbacks/day’…) and how I tought my younger son to speak…
Now, to the ‘mechanics’ of teaching an Aspie to read:
Aspies like rules.
We like to apply rules. Especially (or, perhaps, only) rules that make ‘sense’ to us.
This makes the world make sense to us.
However, we have a very bad memory. Especially ‘rote learning’ is something we are poor at – much poorer than our intellectual peers among ‘neurotypicals’. Yet, if we ‘figure something out’ ourselves (i.e. our mind creates an ‘internal rule’ for it), we retain the knowledge better than our non-Aspie peers. I explored some of this in Aspergers and memory – part 2: rote memory vs. reasoning.
One thing in the comment ‘jumps out’ at me: “sight words on cards”!!!
This suggests that the Aspie child is being taught to read by ‘whole-word method’. Using this ‘technique’, a child is not taught to read by synthesizing the word from its constituents sounds. Instead, one is expected to recognize ‘the visual symbol’ of the ‘whole word’. This may be partially plausible for people who have truly amazing memories, but – in opposition to the fanciful theory that spawned this idea of ‘holistic perception’, the practice reduced ‘reading’ to ‘rote memorization’ of ‘words’ as ‘pictograms‘.
In the words of one critic of the ‘whole-word’ approach to teaching reading and literacy (my emphasis):
My research pinpoints three factors that effectively render Whole Word null and void.
1) English is vast, almost a million words and names. A child learning Whole Word is aiming for a mere 800 words a year, thus guaranteeing that the child is illiterate through high school. Real literacy probably requires a vocabulary of more than 50,000 words; virtually no human could memorize that many ideographs, which is what Whole Word turns our words into.
2) A second obstacle you never see mentioned is that while Chinese ideographs are written in only one way, all English words routinely appear in multiple forms–lower case, UPPER CASE, Mixed Cases, scripts, handwriting, and exotic typefaces. Imagine how bewildering this profusion would be for a child.
3) English, like Greek and Latin, is an alphabetic language. Sounds are built into every nook and cranny. If you force a child to ignore these sound-clues, and focus only on design-clues, the child will probably experience great frustration and may well develop a reading disability, such as dyslexia.
– Bruce Deitrick Price
Now, this is an observation of ‘neurotypical’ children – ones whose propensity for ‘memory’ or ‘rote’ learning varies greatly. Children with Aspergers fall into the ‘low-rote-learning’ and ‘high-rule/comprehension learning’ category – we are talking the ‘2 standard deviations from the mean’ area here…where this method would fail an ‘average’ kid… Trying to teach an Aspie kid to ‘read’ using ‘sight cards’= ‘whole word method’ is a guarantee for failure.
So, what do I suggest? Phonics?
Well, it is not a bad beginning – for an Aspie child ‘starting out’. Once some reading skill has been attained, one needs to be a little more creative and tailor the ‘method’ to the individual child. Phonics alone will not be ‘sufficient’ for a child to learn to read English (though it might be perfectly adequate in languages where there is less variation in the way individual letters are pronounced).
The key to success for this child is also something contained in the comment: “Generally if he sees a word like “has” he will not recognize it, but will get the word if I spell it.”
This seems a pretty good indication – extrapolating from the short comment – that this child falls into the ‘#2’ category of the criticism ‘whole word method’ received from Dr. Price, above!!!
If the word is in a ‘familiar form’, on the ‘cue-card’, he can ‘remember it’ – but within a text, where the presentation is altered, the word appears so ‘different’ that he has no ‘means’ of deciphering what the word is!!! It must be so very confusing and frustrating for this child….
Whatever the reason, the “will get the word if I spell it” is the key to the solution!!!
If it ‘works’ for him to hear you, the parent/teacher ‘sound it out’, then the next logical step in learning to read himself is to teach him to ‘sound it out himself’!
Now, we just have to ‘find the right lock’…
It is difficult for me to guess how well this particular 10-year-old Aspie handles other, non-language related tasks: these can (and should) be ‘harnessed’ as the ‘vehicle’ through which to ‘unlock’ this. So, I am going to make a few ‘blind’ suggestions and hope one – or a combination of a few – will help.
First and foremost, it is essential to ensure that the Aspie is familiar with all the different letters, the various ways they are pronounced (not just the ‘one way’ as ‘recited’ in the alphabet’). Included in this must be all the ‘two letter’ sounds: it is best to teach these as a ‘double-letter’, matter-of-factly, not making a big deal about it. Just another rule… when they appear together, the ‘double-letter’ sound takes priority. These ‘double letters’ will include things like ‘ch’, ‘sh’, ‘th’, ‘ee’ and so on. If the child does not know them, use games to teach them – and read them out loud every time they are encountered (separate from surrounding sounds).
Independantly of (but, hopefully, complementing) learning to read the ‘sounds’ above, it will help to play games ‘picking out sounds’ in words. You might have a ‘th‘ day: encourage the child to identify any object (or word) in the house – or wherever you happen to be – to identify anything with ‘th’ in it by over-eaggerating the sound of ‘th‘ as they say the word. For example: ‘TH-umb!’ or ‘TH-ank you’. Do not introduce it as a ‘reading exercise’, but rather as a game. Get other family members involved. Laugh at the exaggeration: it’s the joke of the day!
The goal here is to use this child’s audio-processing preference to begin to identify the sounds – and groups of sounds – that make up the words we use – without any reference to reading or anything visual. Aspies learn best using rules: if they learn the ‘rule’ of the ‘sounds’ which make up a specific word, recognizing the written symbols for these ‘sounds’ will make it easier to ‘decipher back’ the ‘full sound’ – and thus read the word.
It is harder to play this game with vowels – ‘see’ sounds like ‘sea’ and so on, and one does not want to set the child up for failure by trying to ram down the differentiation in letters, when there is no ‘sound’ basis to do so. Avoid the problem by ‘searching for ‘ee’ sound’ – regardless of how it is spelled! That can come later…
Next, let’s get to ‘reading’.
Start by using groups of 3-4 letter words which ‘sound’ similar, but alter one letter only. Words like ‘cat’, ‘hat’, ‘sat’, ‘bat’ – and so on – should be introduced as a ‘group’. Do NOT introduce any exceptions at this time. The idea is to reinforce the ‘rule’ that they ‘sound’ the same – except for the ‘beginning sound’…or, later, in other groups (e.g. ‘hot’, ‘hop’, ‘hock’) they share the ‘ending sound’… but NOT ‘how’ – ‘how’ would be grouped with ‘now’, ‘brown’ and so on. Eventually, alter the ‘middle sound’, like ‘map’ and ‘mop’, ‘hip’ and ‘hop’, ‘tip’, ‘tap’ and ‘top’ – and so on.
It is essential that – because he is ‘audio-processing’ – the young Aspie first learns to sound out each word, one letter at a time. And, it is important to teach the Aspie to listen to himself say each letter/’sound group’!
The second most important step in learning to read fluently is to transfer this skill to ‘similar’ words. That is the point of the ‘group’ of ‘similar’ words: Aspies can ‘grasp’ the rules. The idea here is for the Aspie to LEARN: NOT to READ a particular word, but to LEARN to CREATE A RULE of pronunciation for a particular sequence of letters!
(Aside: recently, my mom admitted to me that she can only read IF she says each letter out loud and then processes the sound…even if she ‘says it’ only in ‘her mind’. Without going through this ‘virtual sounding-out’ of each letter, my mom – who spent decades as an award-winning teacher of biology, who succeeded in developing new and demonstrably successful teaching methods in getting all children interested – and successful – in science, while she also taught gym, art and languages…and continues to teach art to this day – is unable to make sense of written words in any language without resorting to ‘sounding out’ each letter!!! Yet, she speaks quite a few languages fluently!!! In other words, many professionally successful people can – and do – succeed using ‘sounding out’ as their ‘coping mechanism’ to process ‘visual information’ when their brain will only effectively process ‘audio information’…. Did I mention ‘Aspergers’ is very hereditary????)
It is an extremely useful tool for Aspies in this situation (especially if ‘sounding it out’ is just ‘not enough’) is to use other ‘bits of the brain’ to help get the ‘information to be processed’ to the right ‘processing bit of the brain’. Using the ‘saying it out-loud’ method helps, because it engages the ‘audio’ input of the brain: if there is a problem/blockage in the ‘visual-processing-passing-information-to-language-processing’ bit of the brain, the act of hearing one-self ‘say’ the letters will help by-pass this – even if one eventually trains himself/herself to only say it ‘in their mind’!
Audio-processing – as in ‘sounding out’ – is only one of these methods. It is easy, well understood, and as the person learns it, they can also learn to attenuate the volume at which the ‘letters’ are ‘deciphred’, until the voice can only be heard inside one’s own head. Yet, if that does not work, there are other mechanisms one can try. And, this next one has been particularly successful in helping several Aspies I know. (This advice comes from an aunt-in-law who, as a professional educator, headed a large school-board’s ‘special education – with particular focus on Aspergers – section’ – and whose ‘brain’ I often ‘pick’ for help… ) Actually, I was shocked at how well this worked for many of the adult Aspies I know…
When looking at (or hearing, or ‘sounding out’) a letter (or a phone number, or a new name – for that matter), use a finger of one hand to trace it on the palm of the other hand.
This introduces two new methods of bringing the information to one’s brain: the process of writing (which, I must admit, is what I use as my personal ‘memory aid’… I often ‘take notes’ while speaking to someone, not because I will ever read them, but because the ‘act of writing’ something down will help me remember it) as well as the process of ‘feeling it written’ on the palm of the hand are two other, tactile ‘ways’ to ‘bypass’ the ‘blockage’ many of us Aspies have in our ‘reception centres’. Alternately, the young Aspie can ‘trace’ the letter on very fine sand-paper, to create the ‘tactile input’…(while working in a controlled environment). It sounds crazy, but – try it! It just might w0rk!
Next – and this will require some significant ‘rule learning’ by most native ‘English speakers’ – introduce the actual rules of pronunciation in English! For example, the difference in the way a vowel is pronounced (‘open’ vs. ‘closed’) when it is followed by one consonant, or by two consonants, or by one consonant and then a vowel, and so on.
I realize most ‘English-as-a-first-language’ schools today (to their shame) do not teach these rules, but that does not mean the rules do not exist. In most non-North-American schools of English-as-a Second-Language, these rules are taught as a matter of fact: in order to properly teach an Aspie how to read, it is essential that one becomes familiar with these rules, and is comfortable explaining and teaching them. English pronunciation is nowhere near as ‘random’ as many native-English-speakers seem to think… So, get educated…and get ready!
Once the Aspie has mastered the basics of reading, it is time to introduce English grammar: without a ‘formal presentation’, we will not ‘grasp’ it! So, please, take pity on us and actually teach us the rules of grammar in a formal, to us easy-to-understand way! (I used Latin to do this for my older son, with incredible success.)
Next- and this is the beautiful part of this process – is to trace specific words and their roots. One of the beauties of English (it is my favourite language – along with my ‘mother tongue’) is that it is an ‘amalgam’ language. As different peoples migrated into Europe, they ‘pushed’ the ‘previous settlers’ further West….and, the British Isles (including Ireland – no prejudice intended) are just about as ‘West’ as one can ‘push’ a population inside Europe… In addition, English adopted words from other ‘literate’ and ‘scientific’ languages, retaining the original language’s convention of how to pronounce the word. Thus, by learning the ‘roots’ of words, an Aspie can not only gain a pleasurable mastery of English, it can prepare him/her for the further study of other languages!!!
It is all about patterns: something most Aspies find fascinating… but only if they are presented it in a particular way!
Of course, this is just the icing on the cake…(if you like icing, that is – many Aspies find icing overpowering!)
Please, do let me know if this works for anyone!!! (The corrollary, of course, stands as well – please!)
We, Aspies, each have our own, individual way of learning. However, in my online searches of how the Aspie brain differs from others, I have come across a few things that might be helpful when designing a learning strategy for an Aspie.
These things create an environment that helps Aspies learn:
Yet, no learning environment will be effective if the method of learning is one that the Aspie cannot master.
Many of the studies I have read have found that Aspies have very poor memory – as in, rote memory. We are much, much worse at it than our peers of comparable intelligence. We are even worse at remembering things ‘in order’. (As in, if a person is shown a list of words, objects or numbers and is then requested to repeat or identify them in the same order as originally presented – Aspies rate so low, it is unbelievable.)
(Aside: this does not mean that an Aspie cannot benefit from improving their rote memory – to the contrary! But, that will have to be a separate post of its own… What it does mean is that forcing an Aspie to rely on memory for learning is setting him/her up for failure, with all the emotional baggage this carries.)
Therefore, any system of learning which will rely on memorizing or sequencing or any such thing is setting an Aspie up for failure. Be it multiplication tables or spelling/reading/writing or vocabulary or history dates – using this approach will only lead the Aspie to conclude that they are stupid and that there is no point in trying….and the Aspie will work hard to avoid these tasks, or simply refuse to perform them altogether. This is because the internal pain of having it reinforced that ‘they are incompetent’, ‘not performing up to expectations’ and so on is so great, no amount of punishment would be worse for the Aspie. The Aspie will either appear unwilling or unable…
This can be frustrating! For everyone involved.
However, there is a light at the end of the tunnel!
These same studies show that Aspies are much better than their peers at remembering things they ‘figure out on their own’. This is very, very important – and supports the whole ‘Aspies like rules’ thing!
This is just my little hypothesis, no more than that. Yet, I think the facts fit… One major ‘coping mechanism’ Aspies develop to compensate for poor ‘reteniton’ using ‘memory’ is to use ‘understanding’ instead.
And what a coping mechanism! By understanding, instead of remembering, Aspies do not learn about a subject, they learn the subject!
Aspies like rules because when we analyze something, breaking it down into small components ‘according to rules’ helps us ‘figure it out’. That is when ‘understanding’ (or ‘comprehension’) happens. It has certainly been my personal experience: I went to study Physics, because it was the only subject where I did not have to remember anything! I could (and usually did) derive each and every equation I needed from first principles – which I understood, and therefore did not have to remember.
Many Aspies (especially male Aspies) are attracted to the science and technology fields, because this is one area of learning where ‘understanding’ is much more important to success than ‘memorizing’. Here, the ‘coping mechanism’ gives Aspies an edge over others!
Everyone is familiar with the description of the ‘young Aspie’ as ‘a little professor’, where large amounts of information are absorbed and retained. How can this be achieved without a good memory?
As the Aspie learns new information, it is ‘figured out’ – what each bit means, how it fits into this ‘field’ or ‘subject-matter’. It is not so much ‘memorized’ as it is ‘absorbed into the framework of understanding’ of that subject matter. So, it is not ‘memory’ but ‘understanding’ that the Aspie uses to learn so much about so little!
Test it for yourself. If an Aspie were to be simply ‘memorizing’ new information about a favorite subject, they will only be able to answer the questions that are directly answered by quotes from the new information. Yet, I am willing to bet that if you do try this little experiment, the Aspie will have – after a single read – integrated all that is contained in the new information into everything else they know about the subject. Their young mind will have cross-referenced, catalogued and analyzed all the new information as it is being read. The answers they’ll give will be at a much deeper level of understanding than simple memorization would permit. (Aside: this also explains why Aspies often have a difficulty citing their source for specific facts – all the information is ‘fused’ into the common ‘understanding’ as it is absorbed and not really ‘stored’ separately.)
This suggests that ‘figuring out’/’understanding’/’comprehension’ are essential to a successful learning strategy of an Aspie.
So many intelligent and constitutionally educated people are writing interesting things about the current situation in Canada. I’m afraid most clever things out there have already been said as everyone tries to find a solution to Canada’s constitutional puzzle.
Therefore, I thought I’d let everyone warm their cranium’s up with this fun and whimsical puzzle (along the lines of Einstein’s famous brain teaser). Before they tackle the REAL puzzle, that is. This one is just a fun, made up one.
My version involves 5 politicians (any resemblance to real-life politicians is purely co-incidental): Solid Steven, Fishy Gilles, Mindless May, Selfish Jack and Insecure Steph. Each one of them has their own highest priority, has or is in control of different things, the Media (MSM) have a variety of attitudes towards them, each one is doing something different right now and each one deserves something else. (I hope the colour coding helps – politics can be a confusing place!)
So, WHO HAS THE WELFARE OF THIS COUNTRY AS THE HIGHEST PRIORITY?!?!?
(I’ll post the answer in a few days and link here to it – not that I’ll have to! This one should be easy to solve!)
While I may be interested in all kinds of things, the most regular hits my blog gets is from people looking for advice and help in dealing with Aspergers’ Syndrome.
I have made no secret of it: I am an Aspie! My hubby is an Aspie! And, predictably enough, our kids are Aspies!!! It is therefore not too surprising that I have tried to share some of the more successful methods used by ‘us’ to successfully integrate into the social mainstream. Not only am I proud of our successes, I am also motivated to help others who are experiencing similar things – as well as helping ‘the society at large’ learn to understand ‘us Aspies’. Though I may not be one of the ‘exceptional ones’, many of the humans who DID change the course of human societies WERE Aspies…so the need for understanding runs both ways.
Therefore, I have written a bit about Aspergers and Aspies. After a bit, even I was getting confused between what posts I had finished and published, and which ones I started and got distracted from….there are just so many distractions around!!! Have I shown you the……
You get the picture.
So, I have made up a nifty page where I have listed my ‘Aspergers’ posts – with a little summary for each one. It is not much, but I do hope it will serve as a useful tool for people who are seeking help and understanding. I do hope to edit it often to include all future post on this topic, too (but, no promises – I am ADD, too….)
Anyhow, I do hope this page will prove useful.
Would you believe it?
During an interview with Mike Duffy last night, Liberal leader Stephane Dion alleys the fears of advertizing companies in Quebec: if he is elected, things will go back to the ‘Chretien gravy-train’ days!
See for your self…. About 50 seconds into the interview, he promises to set aside THREE BILLION DOLLAR ‘CONTINGENCY FUND’ – to be used for unsupervised ‘unforseen boosts’ to the economy.
(Sorry, for not embedding the video – I could not find it on YouTube yet. If I do, I’ll edit the post to add it.)
Ah, the New and Improved Liberal Spending Party of Canada!
What is the difference? Under Chretien, the slush funds were kept on the quiet. Under Dion, they are the centerpiece of their newly unveiled election platform.
I guess Mr. Dion’s communication skills are improving!
Here, in Canada, we are likely to have an election soon. How do I know?
Yesterday, a nice looking gentleman knocked on my door and introduced himself as a candidate in my riding. Since no election has indeed been called yet, I asked him:
‘A candidate in what?’
He replied: ‘For the Liberal Party’.
To explain: the sitting Prime Minister (PM) is presiding over a minority Conservative government. That means that he cannot pass legislation unless some of the oposition parties – like the Liberal Party, the New Democratic Party, Block Quebecois or the Green Party. The PM is claiming he might have to ask the Governor General to disolve the Parliament and call an election, because the oposition parties are not willing to talk – and so the legislature is at a stalemate.
The Opposition Leader and head of the Liberal Party, Stephane Dion, is claiming that calling an election now would be prepostrous, that things are working just fine and that no election is necessary. In fact, he claims that calling an election would be just the PMs whim! Nobody, according to Mr. Dion, wants or needs an election now – except Mr. Harper, the PM.
OK, so this is the situation:
Which is why I had asked him ‘A candidate in WHAT’?
….he was equally as swift on the uptake during the rest of our conversation. And, yes, I pick on all political candidates, without regard to party, age, sex, and so on. Most have learned to avoid my door. This guy was new, I guess.
So, why are the Liberal candidates ‘hitting the streets’ if they are all so convinced there is no need for an election?
Even though we form a virtual community, the people whom it is made up of are real, genuine, flesh-and-blood individuals. For better or worse, we all have our pleasures and troubles.
This is a touching story from one member of our virtual community, whose son is about to undergo a difficult cancer surgery. He only asks that we keep his son in our thoughts or prayers.
I cannot pray. But, I assure you, David ben Yaacov will be in my thoughts!
David, I wish you all the best!
P.S. If you would like to send a card, please send it to David at the Second Draft PO Box 590591, Newton Centre, MA 02459. The family is not asking for money, just the support of positive thoughts and prayers!
Having spent time in such serene surroundings like this:
Canada has magnificent trees.
…is it not surprising that my mind had taken a break from the ‘everyday’ and slipped into a bit of philosophising?
If a tree falls in the forest, and no-one is there to hear it, would it make a sound?
In the past, when discussing this with my kids and husband, we have invariably fallen into the pitfalls like, for example, trying to define what does ‘sound’ mean: is it simply the movement of air molecules in a particular way, or does it have to be ‘perceived’ by human ears? (If it is recorded, then the sound we hear is made by the recorder, not the tree…and endless possibilities along these chains of thoughts.)
This year, I began so see it from a different perspective…
Richard Feynman is perhaps my favourite genius of the 20th century – and I am convinced he is an ‘Aspie’ to boot! ( Just reading his most awesome book, ‘Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!’, is an excellent lesson in how an ‘Aspie’ mind organizes thoughts and commits them onto paper – plus it is fun and curiously comforting to read). In his Lectures (available as podcasts, and ideal for relaxing with while ‘away from it all’), specifically, in the ‘Quantum Mechanics’ lecture, he also visits this question about the proverbial tree falling in the forest…
Dr. Feynman gives some very specific qualifications regarding this issue: he would not be a physicist had he not done that. He states that in the real world, even if there is no observer when the tree falls, there are still unmistakable physical signgs that it had, indeed, made a sound. These signs, perhaps as minute as little scratches from vibrating leaves/needles as the sound energy is transferred to them, could then be observed after the event itself and the presence of such sound would be conclusively demonstrated. Thus, he concludes that ‘in a real world, of course, a tree falling in a forest makes a sound‘.
He is, of course, absolutely correct – given the qualifications he does.
Yet, listening to him made me think that perhaps his ‘after the fact observer’ – as our familial discussions from the past – were really missing the whole point of the question!
Whether during the act of the tree falling, or afterwards; directly or through recording devices of some sort (even leaves and needles) – this introduces an observer. And the fact remains that if an observer is present, and the original condition (or, rather, its intent) is breeched.
Yes, I’ll gladly concede that in the real world, it might be impossible to have a ‘no observer’ scenario – but that is not the point. The question asks us about a hypothetical situation, where no observation (during or after the event) occurred (even had it been possible).
Let us imagine an observer who makes a direct observation that 999 trees, as they fell, indeed did make a sound. Then the observer leaves, and our proverbial tree falls. No observation as to the sound of any kind had been made during the event. The scene has since been altered so much that no additional evidence can be gathered. How can we answer the question now? Did our proverbial tree make a sound, or not?
And this, in my never-humble-opinion, is the crux, the core, of this principle: one can only say that one does not know.
It would be reasonable to predict that it is highly likely that the tree had made a sound, based on previous observations. But one would not know !
This is the difference between direct observation and a guess. Perhaps it might be an ‘educated guess’ (based on the previous 999 observations) , but it is still only a guess. And that is the whole point: to get us to stop and think, to learn to recognize that difference between what we know and what we are making educated guesses about (or a semi-educated guess about).
One of my sons thought this simply reduced the question to the ‘Schrodinger’s Cat’ scenario, but I think there is a difference. This is not about probability curves and their collapses, this is about learning to recognize the blinders we all wear which let us treat guesses (whether ors or those of others) as equally valid to observed facts.
And it is about time that some of these blinders statred coming off!
After all, guesses, even educated ones, are not facts – and we must not fall into the easy trap of treating them as such. Especially in cases where the guess is not based on 999 direct observations of this very event…or not on even one such event having ever happened!
Which leads me to the next question: If the global temperatures change by 0.6 of a degree, and no well-financed lobby group is there to use it as a pretext to organize a scare-mongering, funds-transfering campaign, would anyone notice?
Perspective - we all need it!
The Beijing Olympics is about as much about sports as Sexapalooza is about human rights.
No, this is not at all being facetious – it is a very valid comparison. Without ‘human rights’ (specifically, the freedom to exercise them), Sexapalooza would not be able to educate its consumer base on ‘all aspects of sexuality’, its primary goal. Similarly, without ‘sports’, the Beijing Olympics organizers (i.e. Chinese Government) could not educate its consumer base on ‘all aspects of how wonderful their regime is’, their primary goal.
(Why the comparison to sexuality? Because typically, repressing sexuality is among the first goals of an opressive regime. And, you can bet your bippies, there will be no Sexapalooza (or anything even remotely similar) anywhere within smiting distance of the Beijing Olympics.)
When, eariler, there were calls for boycott of the games, ‘people’ said: “But what about the athletes? It is not fair to them!” It seemed that, in many people’s eyes, the ‘right’ of the athletes to compete in the Olympics somehow invalidated any concerns about the message the world is sending by allowing this farce to go on!
By participating, the world is very much condoning the harvesting (yes, HARVESTING – like, as in, ‘reaping’ – by definition) of human organs from political prisoners/innocent citizens – and that is just a tip of the iceberg of opression in China!
But, sending a message that this behaviour is not acceptable and NOT participating in this sham of an Olympics would, somehow, be ‘unfair’ to the athletes… We just don’t understand – they TRAINED for this! It’s their DREAM! And everyone knows that an athlete’s dream is so much more important thant a ‘regular’ Chinese person’s nightmare!
Their ‘right’ to compete is SOOOO much more important than a ‘regular’ Chinese person’s right to keep her liver! (I wonder if Monty Python, in their worst nightmare, ever thought that their ‘can we have your liver’ sketch would come true….ecxept without the ‘asking’ bit!)
So, as we are about to be force-fed a set of Olympic games in a regime so controlling of its people, it dictates how cheering may or may not be done, why is nobody asking:
‘What ABOUT the athletes?’
Who are these people for whose ‘right’ to ‘get a podium’ so many others have to pay for in blood? (And, make no mistake about it – much of the Olympic fanfare HAS been paid by the proceeds from ‘organ harvesting’. Instead of ‘blood diamonds’, these are ‘blood medals’!)
Who are these priveleged few, whose desire for fame is so great, they will – literally – look the other way, amile and say nothing, accept the medals as their dues… while their hosts murder and torture to get them these medals?
I, for one, do not think that any being worthy of being called ‘human’ could possibly choose to elevate themselves this high above others. It is arrogant elitism at its worst. And it is allowing their bodies to be used to promote this corrupt and opressive regime – for a fitting reward, of course!
So, would ‘good athletes’ prostitute themselves to the ‘grim reapers’?
Xanthippa's Chamberpot 