And there's a time to walk alone....

"There's a new day dawning as a cold rain falls
And now's the time to walk alone."
~~ "Man in the rain", Mike Oldfield

My gym instructor has a saying: "Winners never quit, Quitters never win." I think he got it off one of those motivational posters. I saw a de-motivational one with the same saying and the subtitle "But those who never win and still never quit are idiots"



Generally, society considers "giving up" to be a bad thing. It speaks of a lack of perseverance or will-power. An unwillingness to go the distance.



However, sometimes Quitting is thought to be a good thing. Quitting smoking, or a bad job, can be a laudable thing.



But, in both the positive or negative sense, it involves stopping an association or an activity. And there's usually a reason why we stop it.



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I've been thinking a but about divorce lately. In the last few weeks 5 of my friends have split up from marriages or long-term relationships. Another is on the rocks, and could go either way.



I don't know all the details as to why, and the ones I have heard about, I only have one side of the story. So, I won't discuss any specifics on them. But the basis of walking away from a relationship is much the same as walking away from a job, or from smoking: You see more benefit from leaving than you do from staying.



It got me thinking - what is the tipping point in a relationship? Is there a month, a week, a day or even an identifiable second when you go from "If we try harder, we can make this work" to "I can't do this any more".



It is a sudden about turn? A feeling that comes on gradually that you can just pick up and walk away? Statistically, 50% of relationships are doing just that, so it's far from uncommon nowadays.



Do people leave because they no longer want to be in a relationship? Or go because the grass on the other side looks greener? Or that ANY grass would be preferable to the muddy field they're standing in.



Are the people staying and trying to make it work the heroes with the staying power? Or are the ones who aren't winning and aren't quitting idiots? And where is the line drawn?



Interesting questions.... I wish I had some interesting answers. If you do, please comment below....

Here there be dragons.... or maybe elephants.

I love old maps. You just can't compare them to a Melways, or British Ordinance Survey... or a GPS for that matter.

The maps of old were works of art - detailed, colourful and full of skilled penmanship. And, to a great extent, wrong. And that's a big part of why I love them.

It says a lot about humanity that we can be so rock-hard certain about the way the world is, that we not only draw it in detail but put so much effort to dress it up with iconography, faces blowing the winds, detailed compass roses - all to make it look impressive and official. It looks good, it seems right. Whether or not it is accurate almost seems like an afterthought.

But, no matter how much you dress it up and legitimise it, no matter how carefully drawn it is or how much you promote it: it's either right or it's wrong. We might laugh at the people a few hundred years ago for their ignorance and how wrong it was. But the measure we use to judge that is our own modern maps. The ones we legitimise and label as accurate, with not much more proof than the sailors of old.

I've blogged previously about John Saxe's poem of The Blind Men and the Elephant where six blind men come across an elephant, and each feels a different part and draws their conclusions based on that; then violently disagree on which one is right.

Each man is so convinced of his own rightness, he will defend himself without even considering the possibility that he might be wrong. Just as the mapmakers of old worked with such skill, detail and art to explain to the world how right they were - without considering that they might be wrong.

I'm always suspicious of anyone who takes a position, morally, politically, religiously or otherwise, that discourages being questioned on it. To my mind, any position which refuses to even entertain the possibility that it might be wrong is probably on pretty shaky foundations.

Ultimately, it comes down to simple arrogance. The arrogance of a religion that it 100% convinced that their God demands blood to be shed in It's name. The arrogance of a politician who stands in opposition of a bill simply because the other party support it, without reference to the merits. The arrogance of a doctor who presumes to know what is best for their patient without even asking.

Or the arrogance of a cartographer, who will devote weeks to drawing figures and decorations around the border of their map, utterly convinced that map they surround is flawless.

Hardcore Pornography

Good ol' Senator Fielding is at is again, fighting the good fight to protect the morals of our country.

His latest idea is that Federal Police should have the power to raid milk bars and newsagents in the search for pornagraphic material. Interesting concept, but I would have thought that the A.F.P. have more important things to do, like hunting down the terrorists that threaten our safety by enforcing religious intolerance and keep women covered up head to toe....

hmmm......

Well, let's shelve that for another day. First, let's take a look at porn. The issue, I mean, not the substance. If we have time, we'll have some porn at the end, OK?

Porn, like any other publication, receives a rating from the Classifications board and we're generally talking about R (18+) or X rated material.

With certain restictions, R rated material can be published, purchased and owned by anyone over the age of 18 anywhere in Australia.

X rated material, though, is a little different. First thing you need to know, is that there is no federal law restricting this sale or ownership. Each Australian state, though, has laws regarding the sale of X rated material.

Which leads to a very interesting circumstance. Because the ACT (and Jervis Bay) is directly managed by the Federal government, it is legal to buy, sell and posses X rated material if you're over 18.

In each state, though, it is illegal to sell such material. But.... it's not illegal to own it. Nor is it illegal to buy it. Let me just say that again, so that you can get your heads around this:

There is material which is perfectly legal for you to own, perfectly legal for you to purchase. Provided nobody sells it to you, because that's bad.

What's with that? Can you think of any other material that's legal to buy or own, but illegal to sell?

Prior to the internet, one of the ACT's biggest exports to the rest of Australia was mail-order porn. They still do a brisk trade, of course, but not quite as much. Because it's legal for them to sell it in the ACT, and it's legal for people in other states to buy it.

Of course, officially, Sen. Fielding's issue is with "unclassified" or "refused classification" material, which is illegal to sell anywhere in Australia. But, in order to give the AFP jurisdiction to deal raid the milk bars and protect people from seeing naughty things, it would require laws to take power away from State governments and hand it over to the Federal Government.

Normally, this is something I'd be 100% behind. I'm all for consistent laws across the country. But, this is the Senator from the Family First party, and this is the government that thinks censoring the internet is a practical and workable thing. Personally, I'm not convinced handing them more control over what can and can't be seen is a good idea.

After all, these are people who deliberately wanted to work in Canberra. And we know what goes in THERE, don't we? :)

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P.S. OK, since you were good, here's a picture of Paris Hilton. Without any clothes. Happy?

On Mathew Johns, and on prejudice

It seems you can't look at a single Aussie news or blog site these days without the Matthew Johns / "Clare" topic being mentioned. No doubt, it's a flash-in-the-pan thing, until another topic comes up to absorb the nation's interest and distract them from the more serious issues that they strenuously avoid thinking about.

I will admit to finding a morbid interest in watching not only the topic itself, but the discussions surrounding it. For myself, I had no idea who Mr Johns was until a week ago, having no interest in Rugby in the least. I make it a general policy not to judge other people based on their sexual interests, provided they're not doing anything illegal.

(Since I've never watched The Footy Show, I don't have any great opinion on whether he should or shouldn't have been fired either. But, I've heard that Sam Newman has called for his return, which to me is reason enough to be against the idea. I will admit to a pre-existing bias against d*ckheads.)

But that's not what this blog is about. Really, I only mention it in the hopes that it will increase my Google hit rate.

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My friend Kate de Brito blogged about the Johns topic, and the general issues surrounding it. Within 8 hours and 340 comments, she closed the topic; unable to keep up the moderation workload. The observation that she made was: "You know when you write a post you hope you will maybe get people to think about things, but I don't think I changed anyone's mind. I think people were set."

340 comments, and most people did seem quite polarised on the issues. They disagreed, often quite violently, with each other but no-one that I (or Bossy, apparently) could see changed their mind. They knew what they knew, and they knew that they were right.

Which is odd, because only a handful of people know what actually happened in that room 7 years ago. Everything else is hearsay and conjecture.

From what I can see, most of the comments people are making are based on some (deeply held) prejudices which could use some scrutiny:

1. Sexism is a culture in NRL and male sports, therefore that is a cause of what happened here: Certainly, it is undeniable that there have been a number of sexual assaults committed by male sports players over the years. And, as a general stereotype, young male football players are not the most emotionally intelligent bunch of people. That said, there are also a large number of sportsmen whom are married and maintain a loving, monogamous relationship. In this case, where there is evidence that all parties including Clare consented to the acts, that hardly lends credence to the idea that it can be blamed on NRL culture.
   
   Indeed, this point eventually becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: The act is blamed on the people's perception of the culture, and then used as evidence to prove that the culture exists.
   
   
2. Because I would never want to participate in group sex, no woman would want to therefore she must have been coerced: Whilst not put so bluntly, this old chestnut is amazingly common. Everyone likes to think that they're broad-minded. Nobody thinks of themselves as prudish. We're all "average" right? (After all, that's what "average" means!)
   
   So, if your own sexual repertoire is the baseline for what's normal, then anything outside that is abnormal, so anyone who's in to that must be a perverted freak, or have been coerced into it. Because if it were normal behaviour, then I'd be interested in it, because I'm normal, right?
   
   This concept is used to justify stances against a lot of things, but predominantly matters sexual. I've written a couple more paragraphs on this, but perhaps I'll save it for a different blog topic. For now, I'll just say that it strikes me as rather arrogant for anyone to say no person would consent to a sexual activity simply because it's not something they personally would do.
   
3. Clare had been drinking, so because of alcohol could not have genuinely consented: I won't say much on this one. They'd ALL been drinking. So, if you're using that argument, then surely she raped them too, yes?
   
4. Clare was traumatised later, so that means she didn't consent: It has been suggested (once again, hearsay evidence only) that she bragged about the experience for a few days after the event, but then later reported it to the police.
   
   I'm not going to say one way or the other whether she was traumatised or not - I'm not a psychologist not have I read the case files myself. If she was, that if very unfortunate. But, irrelevant to the question of whether she consented or not at the time.
   
5. Because the police didn't charge anyone, then nothing illegal happened: This is a common misconception, based on the legal principle of "Presumption of Innocence".
   
   The reality is that prosecuting a criminal is an expensive thing, both for the government and for the defendant. And there are a multitude of rules about what evidence can and cannot be produced at court, and that guilt has to be proven beyond reasonable doubt.
   
   Because of that, the police are not allowed to lay or pursue charges unless they think they have a reasonable prospect of securing a conviction.
   
   In this situation, at the time Clare went to the police, she was the only one who was in the room that said she didn't consent - all the other people said she did, and there were not other independent witnesses.
   
   If something illegal did happen in that room, there is not enough independent evidence to prove a crime. So, whilst the presumption of innocence does, and should, prevail the reality of the justice system is that there are many examples where the police know or suspect a crime was committed, but do not lay charges.
   
   
6. Clare went back to the room willing, so she knew what was going to happen: It is a constant source of regret to me that humans have not yet developed telepathy. If men and women could read each other's minds and intents, much of life would be easier. I'd probably get slapped a lot more often, but it's a small price to pay for the greater good, I think.
   
   With 20/20 hindsight, if a guy has the prospect of sex on his mind, and a girl agrees to leave a public location and go to a more private setting where there's a bed, then that might suggest to him that the prospect is mutual - whether or not that's the impression the girl intended.
   
   However, giving an impression does not in and of itself indicate consent of any action other than going back to the room together. And to presume that an intoxicated 19 year old is capable of knowing what the men's intentions, or how her actions would affect her weeks or years later beggars belief, or at least a lack of knowledge about 19 year olds.
   
   And, before anyone says that this lack of foreknowledge affects whether consent was "knowing or not", recall that Johns and his team mates had a similar lack of foresight as to how it would affect them years later. So the argument cuts both ways in that regard.
   
   Additionally, of course, saying that she "knew" what she would be getting into presupposes that Clare subscribes to Prejudice 1 detailed above.
   
7. Women throw themselves at celebrities in order to cash in at a later date: Like all stereotypes, this has a grain of truth in it. It is not unknown for this to happen.
   
   At a basic biological level, the female of a species would seek a mate with strong genetic and physical characteristics to pass on to offspring. So, an athlete who is strong/fast/agile exhibits the same characteristics that a prehistoric hunter would. It is no great stretch of the imagination to expect some physical attraction. (Any females out there who wish to comment or correct me on this point, please do so.)
   
   But, it is still a stereotype, much like 1 and 2 above. It is not universally true, and to claim that it is or that Clare conforms to this and thusly condemn her without any evidence ultimately demeans women far more, because it denies the intellectual components of attraction, and makes out that people are slaves to biological urges without any ability for self control.

So, where does that leave us? I've blogged previously about the need for perspective. But as long as people cling to these, and other prejudices, they will never see past them and understand there might be another point of view.

One of my favourite poems, which will also no doubt appear in a later blog, is John Saxe's parable of The Blind Men and the Elephant. In part, it reads:

And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

Each of the comments on Kate's blog, including her own, contain an element of truth somewhere, if only because each person is presenting their own belief and their own personal reality. But each of them is in the wrong, for we will never truly know what happened in the bar, and in the room.

To claim we do, and to know the reasons behind it, does not bring truth. It detracts from it.

EPCOT

EPCOT, at the Disney Parks in Florida, is quite an interesting place. One of the most interesting things is that it was never intended to be a theme park.

The name EPCOT derives from the acronym Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow, and it was intended to be a planned, utopian city complete with residences, transport system, schools and recreation facilities. It was to be a testbed for new building materials, city planning systems and futuristic improvements. It would have it's own short takeoff/landing runway (that was built but is now closed to air traffic) - no doubt for the flying cars we should have had by now and the original plans called for an international airport/jetport to be built. Remember that Orlando International was still just an airforce base at this point.

It was also indended to by fully managed and controlled by the corporation, whom would own all the properties and rent them to residences. Therefore, all propterties would be fully maintained and, incidentally, none of the residences would have any voting rights in local affairs.

The plans were all set to proceed, but conditional on Disney building the Magic Kingdom theme park first to attract tourism to the area. Walt Disney died before the park was complete and at that point the corporation decided that it didn't really want to run a city, so it shelved the plans and turned parts of it into the Epcot Theme Park instead.

Even so, it is interesting to reflect on what was built, as well as what might have been. The theme park which is there costs exorbitant prices to enter. Once you enter, passing through the x-ray machine and bag searches, you of course need to wait in queues anywhere up to an hour to see the good things, and the price of food and drink is also through the roof.

Everyone is happy there, the customers are, the staff are (probably at risk of being fired if they are insufficiently perky). Thousands of people work behind the scenes to make sure there is not a hint of upset or a single tear. But why would you be unhappy? After all, this is the happiest place one Earth! Not a blade of grass is out of place in the perfectly manicured lawns that you can admire, but never sit or walk on - an attempt to do so would certainly be picked up by the watchful attendants or the myriad of concealed CCTV cameras that monitor the area.

It makes you wonder.... perhaps Mr Disney did indeed give us the template for the society of tomorrow, after all.

Would you care for some sea kitten and chips?

PETA, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, are of the opinion that you shouldn't eat fish. Well, any sort of meat, really, but let's stick with the fish for the moment.

They've also noticed that people, in general, don't eat kittens. With me so far?

So, they've decided that henceforth fish should be called "sea kittens". The logic being that if people identify fish with cute furry kittens, then they will feel badly and not eat them.

I use the term "logic" here rather loosely, because PETA seem to have missed out on a few basic points here. For one, the first couple of things people notice about a fish is it's distinct lack of paws, whiskers, ears, fur, etc. Likewise, kittens are regularly noted for their dearth of scales and their failure to breathe underwater.

More to the point, PETA seem to be of the opinion that if you change the name of something, it fundamentally changes its nature. It's understandable, given the popularity of this concept in recent years.

Shakespeare, now he knew a thing or two about this. In Romeo & Juliet, he wrote: 'What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name, would still smell as sweet." And that which what we call a sea kitten would still taste rather good if sauteed in some butter and herbs, methinks.

In her Earthsea books, author Ursula K. LeGuin has it that when a wizard knows the "true name" of someone or something, he holds power over over it, and can change it's nature by changing its name.

The US Government, in recent years, has had more success in this area. For example, by changing the name of "prisoners of war" to "enemy combatants" did it indeed change the nature of what rights under international law these people held. But it did not (despite dissenting opinions of some of the guard at GITIMO) stop them from being human. Their species remained intact.

The attempt at renaming "french fries" as "freedom fries" in protest of the French Government was somewhat less successful. Possibly because french fries originated in Belgium, and the French have been trying to get us to stop calling them that for years.

The political correctness movement has also attempted a similar feat. However, renaming a person without sight from "blind" to "visually challenged" has not magically given the person sight.

And calling a fish a sea kitten is not going to stop it being battered, deep fried and put on a plate, any more than changing the term "a bunch of morons" to "PETA" has changed the nature of that.

If you think about it further, the term kitten only refers to a juvenile cat. So, only newly spawned fish could be called sea kittens. Or really small fish. Bigger fish need to be called sea cats, one would think.

And then there's the problem of the sea lion. They eat fish too. So, if a lion (being a cat) eats another cat, isn't that cannibalistic? Not to mention cat food. Land cats eating sea kitties.

And what of the brave fishermen, those gallant sea dogs. Oh... dogs chase cats. That one works, let's leave it in. Less good news for seakittenmongers down at my local market, though.

Budgerigars, too, will be more than a little confused; they spend their lives in fear of land-cats, but yet sharpen their beaks on a piece of cuttleseakitten.

Dr Seuss will be scratching his head trying to work out how to write 'One sea kitten, Two sea kittens, Red sea kitten, Blue sea kitten" without needing extra paper, and which one is supposed to be wearing the hat.

Still, my thanks should go to PETA for brightening my otherwise dull day by making this suggestion. I can't wait to see what they come up with for veal.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused

In the future, we are told, computers will become artificially intelligent. They will be capable of the speedy correlation of facts from various sources, and be able to make a reasonable ad-hoc judgement based in them, without the need for human involvement or oversight.

Perhaps, even, they will be able to experience emotions, much like Marvin (from Hitchiker's Guide) or (Data from Star Trek) did.

Complex emotions, such as elation, grief, love, etc. are far beyond the realm of current technology. But, it is pleasing to note that scientists have now been successful in getting a computer to experience sadness and contrition.

Yes, you heard it here first, dear reader! The media outlets have been noteably silent about this, no doubt to prevent the populace fearing a Terminatoresque rise of the machines, but I have seen and experienced the results first-hand.

Last weekend, I sat on a train station, watching the minutes tick by until my train arrived. It was a cold night (sub-zero), an outdoor platform and few lights to brighten my evening; the garish illumination of the clock, and the destination board, were my only source of entertainment.

I watch the list of stations at which my train would stop as it scrolled along the screen until.... blank. But, within a heartbeat, the board had changed: My train was now running 2 minutes late. The display now showed the scheduled time and the later expected time. Much as you'd expect. But, as my heart sank at the thought of the tardy locomotive, these words appeard on the screen:

We apologise for any incovenience caused.

Huh?

What?

I pondered these words as I waited... as the 2 minute delay grew to 10 minutes, then 15. But, as the delays grew longer and icicles begain to form on my nose, the words remained.

We apologise for any incovenience caused.

Curious, I stood and wandered over to the top of the flight of stairs. From thence, I could see into the ticket window, and saw the station master enjoying a hot beverage while completeing some paperwork. He did not, in my view, appear the slightest bit apologetic. If he were contrite in any way, he might have offered me something warm to drink, or invited me to wait in his warm, well lit office. But he did not - it was obvious that HE had not written this message of apology.

Suspecting a person in the central control room may be responsible, I phoned their complaints line the next day. Not wanting to let on my suspicions, I was cagey about what I asked. The operator reiterated the the apology for the inconvenience, using exactly the wording that was on the sign. But there was no genuine emotion or empathy in her voice: she was sitting in a nice warm call centre, and was clearly reading out the pre-written party line from her computer screen. In the background, I could hear the chatter from other call takers. Clearly she, nor anyone in her department, was very apologetic about my inconvenience.

In the newspaper, the Minister for Transport was discussing a new rail link or something. There was a photo of him, shaking someone's hand. They were smiling and laughing. Laughing, I tell you! Not even in the corner of his twinkling eye was there even a morsel of regret. And if the man at the top, with ultimate responsibility, was so patently unrepentant, then there was clearly no one else in the chain of command whom would be.

From whence did the message come? From the only intelligence that shared my plight, of course. The only one who had walked a mile in my moccasins, and experienced the endless eternity of waiting on a cold dark platform for the train that would not come. For, as I sat alone there, my only companion was the computer than ran the display board.

And there we have it, gentle reader: A pure apology. One completely untouched by human hands, issued by the computers themselve to a human. They apologise. They regret the inconvenience that I experienced.

After trying to deal with the humans working at National Rail, it's nice to know that something cares, even if it's just a computer.