all the time what I think of the situation in Gaza. War is vile and urban war is horrific. Soldiers will tell you it is the bitterest kind of warfare. There is no doubt that Hamas are hiding behind civilians as insurgents and guerillas do when fighting a superior enemy. That they are hiding behind…
It Is Always Dawn Somewhere
We used to think we were connected by a shared planet but in recent years we have come to understand that we are all cousins; a millennia admixture of apes adapting to their environments to survive and breed that eventually became tribes. Archeologists have also suggested that the evidence points to every tribe having been…
Bagpipe Music
Bagpipe music (1938) It’s no go the merry-go-round, it’s no go the rickshaw, All we want is a limousine and a ticket for the peepshow. Their knickers are made of crêpe-de-chine, their shoes are made of python, Their halls are lined with tiger rugs and their walls with heads of bison.John MacDonald found a corpse, put it…
The Thorny Issue
of arts sponsorship is in focus today as authors request the Edinburgh Festival to refuse to take money from a company investing in the West Bank Settlements. When and if arts organisations decide to do without funds in this way it is incumbent upon them to get all the facts and hear all the sides….
Taylor Swift
There is a movement among the pro-Arab groupings to try to force Taylor Swift to condemn the war in Gaza. I realise they are are just want her to speak up but actually they want her to condemn Israel. Her duty as a human being is to condemn all war – in Sudan, in Yemen,…
Let’s Be Honest
All war is vile and barbaric. There should be no wars, no armies no weapons and no arms industry anywhere in the world. Every reason for ever going ton war (not going to defence) have been bad reasons or at best never any good reasons. Yet there is no history without brutal conflict. This is…
Where is Objectivity?
We are told that very often people fall in love with people who broadly ‘look like them’. It is an interesting and rather unsettling fact. The same social strata makes sense as you only ever marry people you have met (even in that bizarre and stupid TV show). It is also said we are tending…
So You Think You Can Dance?
I watched this for several years on youtube, so obviously never saw an entire programme from beginning to end. It was (and is) an enjoyable diversion of movement and music, often to moments of perfection given by young people most of whom are Americans. Humanity has always loved to dance but these movements have changed…
Discipline
Today’s suggestion that the ills of youth will be overcome through national conscription for 18 year olds – or social volunteering – are a nonsense. There are, of course, people of all ages who think what they think and do what they do because of the influence of the local community they never leave. But…
St George
I have just written my piece about St George and the dragon and a few things occurred to me. The first and obvious is that these myths often include the saving of a princess. The woman who would marry the next king and give birth to heirs, so in effect the saving of the princess…