Xanthippa's Chamberpot

Looking back on history, we are sometimes surprised that people ‘didn’t see’ what was happening.  Hindsight is 20-20.

Part of this is due to the fact that while one is ‘living’ history, it is not easy to ‘see the big picture’.  We see bits, pieces and glimpse some connections…. but just like an ant cannot tell the shape of the whole garden – just bits it can see, we cannot possibly see all the bits around us.

This page is a key to the posts I have made, trying to piece together some of the bits and pieces of the big picture.  It will continue to be updated as new posts are ready…..

OK, so I have been negligent and is really, really in need of updating.  I’m hoping to build a better place for this than a blog – like, say, a site I could have pretty linked maps on…but whom am I kidding?  I’ll update this.  Soon!

Introduction

Limiting our freedoms – making sense of the ‘big picture’

This is sort of the ‘mission statement’ here…

‘The Big Picture’ – terms and definitions

This is the key (with excerpts) of the posts which provide some of the definitions necessary to explain what I mean by some of the terms I use in this discussion.

1. Freedoms vs. Accomodations
2. What does ‘Freedom of Speech’ mean?

3. The origin and nature of human rights

4. The concept of ‘murder’ is not ‘universal’ as in, “I don’t think that word means what you think it means..”

Defining some more terms… because words have more than one meaning

Religion/faith/belief (or absence thereof) plus related concepts

• Disbelief = absence of belief
• Religion (definition): part 1 – common definiton is the only guarantee of protection for all religious thought; defining ‘religion’ in the Jungian sense, as a peculiar attitude of the mind.
• Religion (definition): part 2 – we must protect religious beliefs – but we must not include in this protection actions which break our secular laws

Communication

Media – where does one start?

This is my very imperfect attempt at tracing some of the attitudes present in today’s media and one of their possible root causes.

Mainstream Media – Dan Rather speaks out

Dan Rather expresses his opinion that the loss of journalistic integrity which we are witnessing today is due to the change in media ownerships.

‘The Media’s’ perception of themselves

While some media people are beginning to recognize their bias, some are still willfully blind to it.

CRTC ruling: it’s OK to throttle your customers!

Canadian Government Agency which ‘regulates’ the airwaves has ruled that it is perfectly fine for Bell Canada to reduce bandwidth it makes available to its customers (the ISP companies who are also its competitors) and thus prevent them form providing hi-speed access to their customers during the evenings.

Controlling who provides our internet access

The City of Ottawa is very proud it ensured every rural Ottawan can get high-speed internet access.  It granted a large, international ISP a monopoly on all rural Ottawa internet customers, kicking a number of already present smaller, local, customer-centric ISPs out of the marketpace.

Governments and Governance

Who holds the power – Part 1

A quick intro into how we decide who holds the power – touching on the difference between ‘inside group’ and ‘in-between-group’ power dynamics.

Scaling up communities

Scaling up communities – Part 1

What are Dunbar’s number and Monkeyspehre – and what they mean.

Scaling up communities – Part 2

Quick peek at the emergence of governance structures and the accompanying necessity to differentiate between ‘acting on behalf of the state’ and ‘acting on behalf of one’s self’.

Scaling up communities – Part 3

The dillema ‘agents of state’ face.

Scaling up communities – part 4

What happens when doctors (like in socialized medicine)  become ‘agents of the state’.

Censorship

Corporate censorship – tip of the iceberg…

DMCA’s a an instrument of censorship and My response to ‘DMCAs as an instrument of censorship’ video on YouTube

Big Brother in India

Update:   OK, I admit it…I have not kept up with updating this page as I fill in the pieces of the puzzle….  My apologies.  Please, feel free to roam the site – there are very many posts there which help define the ‘big picture’!