Ségolène Royal, c'est la grenouille qui voulait être aussi grosse que le bœuf!
Non seulement, l'équipe d'Obama ne s'est pas inspirée d'elle, mais en Française ayant la mémoire courte, c'est elle qui oublie qu'elle s'est inspirée d'un mouvement qui date d'avant elle: celui d'Howard Dean, Sénateur du Vermont, candidat démocrate -malchanceux!- à la présidence des Etats-Unis en 2004 et chef du parti démocrate jusqu'à une date récente. C'est lui qui est le premier candidat à avoir recouru aux emails, au "grassroots movement", travail sur la base et avec la base.
Avant Howard Dean, il y a eu l'avènement du mouvement de base MoveOn en l'an 1998, mouvement originel de Berkeley, California, contre l'"impeachment" de Clinton pour frasques sexuelles, mouvement anti-Bush s'il en est, dont le site web est : http://www.moveon.org/ . MoveOn a marché main dans la main avec Obama pendant toute la campagne électorale et Obama s'en est largement inspiré, notamment pour les demandes de fonds. Ce sont les millions de personnes ayant donné, par Internet, $10.00 en moyenne qui ont financé sa campagne (et avant, celle de Dean).
Voici une série de liens qui prouve que Ségo est mytho et mégalo :
de CBS News en juin 2003, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/04/politics/main557004.shtml (CBSNews, June 4, 2003, Howard Dean’s Internet Love-In, by Joel Roberts),
à Wired
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.01/dean.html (Wired, How the Internet Invented Howard Dean, by Gary Wolf, January 2004) ,
au San Francisco Chronicle
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0113-02.htm (Article paru aujourd'hui est une reprise d'un article paru originellement dans le San Francisco Chronicle le 13 Janvier 2004, par Mark Simon)
et la BBC News en janvier 2004 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3394897.stm (BBCNews, Jan 14, 2004, Internet Insurgent Howard Dean, by Kevin Anderson BBC News Online Washington)
en passant par le très sérieux et réputé New York Times http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B06EFDB1330F931A35752C1A9659C8B63 (New York Times, The Nation; Howard Dean’s Internet Push: Where Will It Lead? , by Glen Justice, Nov 2, 2003)
ainsi que le New York Magazine http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/media/columns/medialife/n_9188/ (New York Magazine News and Features, Candidate.com, by Michael Wolff, September 8, 2003).
Et puis, si Ségo est mytho et mégalo, et qu’elle a la mémoire courte (parce que quand même, elle sort de l’ENA, elle a du entendre parler d’Howard Dean !), cela n’excuse toujours pas les journalistes des quotidiens, Le Monde (pourtant a priori aussi sérieux et réputé que NYT)
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/reactions/0,1-0@2-3210,36-1143977,0.html
et Libération (moins sérieux, plus dans le m'as-tu-vu)
http://www.liberation.fr/politiques/0101313168-le-desir-de-venir-a-washington-de-segolene-royal
qui n’ont fait ni leur travail préliminaire de recherche, ni vérifié les dires de leur source ! De l'amateurisme, vous dis-je.
Les menteurs (et menteuses) à la guillotine!
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Saturday, January 10, 2009
No Salvation for Humanity
It may seem trivial to blog about the current Middle East situation. What? More words? Hasn't everyone and anyone already written, blogged, videotaped, posted, analyzed, spoken on TV and radio? Isn't it a permanent ongoing race to the latest dead bodies's and injured's count? Doesn't it feel as if we were hyenas eating up the corpses of what the media have already chewed up? Aren't we replaying this ugly war in the comfort of our houses, hypnotized by the 24 hour news and the nightscope images on our big screen TVs, as if it were a mere video game? As if it were a game... It seems so far away.
Are we the ultimate voyeurs? You would have thought that after all the decades since World War 2 and the increasing communication means we would have had enough pictures of genocide, violence, war, enough to demonstrate and call for peace instead of conjuring up new blood. Nor the picture of the little Vietnamese girl burnt by napalm, nor the Killing Fields of Cambodia, nor the photography of the famished little African boy barely alive and about to eaten by the fuzzy vulture in the distance, nor the American soldier lynched in Somalia, nor the thousands dead in a couple of hours on 9/11, nor the discovery of mass graves, rapes and murders in the name of "ethnic cleansing" or political ideology on all the continents, nothing will be of use to humanity.
No images are strong enough to make nations stop and think that children's lives are too precious to be sacrificed on the altar of God, State or citizenship. Where is the new John Lennon who would be singing "Imagine...no religion, no country, nothing to kill or die for"?
Is History deemed to repeat itself senselessly?
We are all Cains, vindinctive and jealous, envious and murderous. Are we even worthy of some form of redemption?
These last weeks have borne a toll on my sanity. All the explanations provided right and left: the pro-Israeli prejudice in the main stream American press, the pro-Palestinian prejudice in the main stream European press, the omissions of both media with regards to pro-peace demonstrators (Israeli against what is happening in Gaza and Palestinians against another war with Israel), the blogs putting oil on this information fire, the comments on the blogs exuding hatred, calling to murder of one or the other, the one mountain of now fallacious religious, racist, historical, and political grounds on which one side bases its claims and the other mountain of the reversely qualified grounds of the other side.... The synagogue attacked in my hometown in France, the shouts of "Death to the Jews" in the streets of Paris, sung by Muslims and Christians alike, or should I say by Muslims and secular French alike? The calls for eradication of the State of Israel by some and of the Palestinians by others, the anger, the hatred...
There is NO salvation for humanity!
The hypocritical or fearful silence of those, in the Middle East, from Egypt, to Saoudi Arabia, to Lebanon, and the PA themselves, who wish for Hamas to be gone, to disappear, but who would never say it aloud, who wish for peace with Israel and look back with nostalgia at the year 2000 before the Second Intifada as a "golden age" of Israeli-Palestinian relationships, who wish that the unilateral negotiations between Syria and Israel had borne fruit in order to isolate Iran, their enemy within Islam, who lip-condemn the attacks for fear of enraging their own population, for fear of losing their own power...
Obama's election and a potential change in the American Foreign Policy as the possible reason for this attack on Gaza? Would the Israeli have measured the risk of "change" in the White House and decided to go ahead while Bush was still in power? Do they think that Rahm Emanuel is not hawkish enough, will not lobbby enough in their favor?
The stubborn attitude of the Israeli government who puts at risk not only the existence of the Hebrew State, but of all the Jewish populations scattered around the world, who may now fall victims of terrorist's attacks, of antisemitic acts, who puts the world at risk of a World War if Iran decides that it is time to enter the game.
Both sides playing at being more democratic than the other, more deserving than the other, when none is one or the other...
Indeed, there is NO salvation for humanity!
Are we the ultimate voyeurs? You would have thought that after all the decades since World War 2 and the increasing communication means we would have had enough pictures of genocide, violence, war, enough to demonstrate and call for peace instead of conjuring up new blood. Nor the picture of the little Vietnamese girl burnt by napalm, nor the Killing Fields of Cambodia, nor the photography of the famished little African boy barely alive and about to eaten by the fuzzy vulture in the distance, nor the American soldier lynched in Somalia, nor the thousands dead in a couple of hours on 9/11, nor the discovery of mass graves, rapes and murders in the name of "ethnic cleansing" or political ideology on all the continents, nothing will be of use to humanity.
No images are strong enough to make nations stop and think that children's lives are too precious to be sacrificed on the altar of God, State or citizenship. Where is the new John Lennon who would be singing "Imagine...no religion, no country, nothing to kill or die for"?
Is History deemed to repeat itself senselessly?
We are all Cains, vindinctive and jealous, envious and murderous. Are we even worthy of some form of redemption?
These last weeks have borne a toll on my sanity. All the explanations provided right and left: the pro-Israeli prejudice in the main stream American press, the pro-Palestinian prejudice in the main stream European press, the omissions of both media with regards to pro-peace demonstrators (Israeli against what is happening in Gaza and Palestinians against another war with Israel), the blogs putting oil on this information fire, the comments on the blogs exuding hatred, calling to murder of one or the other, the one mountain of now fallacious religious, racist, historical, and political grounds on which one side bases its claims and the other mountain of the reversely qualified grounds of the other side.... The synagogue attacked in my hometown in France, the shouts of "Death to the Jews" in the streets of Paris, sung by Muslims and Christians alike, or should I say by Muslims and secular French alike? The calls for eradication of the State of Israel by some and of the Palestinians by others, the anger, the hatred...
There is NO salvation for humanity!
The hypocritical or fearful silence of those, in the Middle East, from Egypt, to Saoudi Arabia, to Lebanon, and the PA themselves, who wish for Hamas to be gone, to disappear, but who would never say it aloud, who wish for peace with Israel and look back with nostalgia at the year 2000 before the Second Intifada as a "golden age" of Israeli-Palestinian relationships, who wish that the unilateral negotiations between Syria and Israel had borne fruit in order to isolate Iran, their enemy within Islam, who lip-condemn the attacks for fear of enraging their own population, for fear of losing their own power...
Obama's election and a potential change in the American Foreign Policy as the possible reason for this attack on Gaza? Would the Israeli have measured the risk of "change" in the White House and decided to go ahead while Bush was still in power? Do they think that Rahm Emanuel is not hawkish enough, will not lobbby enough in their favor?
The stubborn attitude of the Israeli government who puts at risk not only the existence of the Hebrew State, but of all the Jewish populations scattered around the world, who may now fall victims of terrorist's attacks, of antisemitic acts, who puts the world at risk of a World War if Iran decides that it is time to enter the game.
Both sides playing at being more democratic than the other, more deserving than the other, when none is one or the other...
Indeed, there is NO salvation for humanity!
Monday, January 5, 2009
Les Déferlantes, de Claudie Gallay
Voilà un roman dont l’épaisseur laisse supposer qu’il obéit aux canons de la tradition littéraire classique… Quelle surprise, pour le lecteur ainsi prédisposé, de découvrir que l’écriture rappelle parfois Michel Déon dans Le taxi mauve, parfois Andrei Makine pour le traitement du narrateur ! Contre toute attente le style de Claudie Gallay exhibe une force peu commune, plus proche d’une écriture dite « masculine » que des écritures considérées comme « féminines » de Duras, Nothomb, Darrieussecq, Angot, Laurens ! Muriel Barbéry et Catherine Cusset seraient peut-être les auteures dont le style de Claudie Gallay se rapprocherait le plus. Les déferlantes, tout comme La haine de la famille ou Un brillant avenir, de Cusset, ou encore L’élégance du hérisson de Barbéry, font partie des livres que l’on n’oublie pas, qui procurent une émotion littéraire et personnelle intense.
Claudie Gallay écrit comme d’autres peignent : les descriptions minutieuses qu’elle fait des paysages de tempête, paysages de silence ou de souffrance que sont ces lieux battus par le vent et la mer autour de La Hague, arpentés par la narratrice, sont somptueuses. Elles témoignent aussi d’une extraordinaire capacité d’observation de la nature : le changement de la lumière, les jeux d’ombres de ciels chargés, les couleurs de la mer, les nombreux et divers oiseaux que la narratrice est chargée de recenser, dessiner, et surtout les effets concurrents d’une nature sauvage et solitaire sur les hommes et les femmes de La Hague, toutes ces descriptions replacent le lecteur dans une tradition littéraire ancienne, celle du terroir, peu ou malhabilement utilisée depuis l’avènement du roman d’introspection pseudo-philosophique dans la littérature française.
L’élément dominant de cette histoire trouble, c’est l’eau : un leitmotiv de « ciel bas et lourd » baudelairien, une pluie omniprésente même quand il ne pleut pas car toujours annoncée par l’un ou l’autre des personnages, et surtout la mer, les vagues, ces fameuses « déferlantes » du titre, qui n’apparaissent réellement que dans la tempête du premier chapitre. D’ailleurs le titre est extrêmement bien choisi : ce qui « déferle » dans la narration, ce ne sont pas tant les vagues que les histoires respectives de La Mère, du Vieux, de Florelle, de Lambert et de Lili, comme si la mer avait marqué tous les personnages du sceau indélébile de la fatalité. Elément féminin donneur de vie, la mer (jeu de mot inconscient ou conscient de l’auteure sur La Mère ?) est aussi porteuse de mort. Dans le roman, elle s’associe à cet autre élément liquide, la pluie permanente, et se fond avec elle et avec l’élément masculin « vent » en un tsunami destructeur. C’est en effet, la rencontre simultanée de ces forces de la nature qui engendre la destruction au fil des pages du roman. Destruction des âmes, car les haines rageuses qui animent les villageois, - au sens latin du terme (anima)- les ont éteintes.
Le tour de force de Claudie Gallay est d’avoir réussi la gageure de maintenir le lecteur en alerte grâce à une histoire palpitante : de l’isolation volontaire de la narratrice qui cherche à guérir, panser les plaies d’un amour « parfait », oublier sans l’oublier vraiment cet amant mort de longue maladie (on pense inévitablement à un cancer) à l’exposition des secrets, des amours et des haines qui hantent les personnages de La Hague, le lecteur passe du roman traditionnel au mystère quasi-policier sans heurt ni changement de champ et de registre lexicaux. Décor, actions, personnages, mythologie de la nature personnifiée (la mer, les oiseaux, le phare même), on est au sein d’une tragédie grecque sur bout de Cotentin, un Hauts de Hurlevent nouveau dans la bruyère normande. Si certains des personnages obtiennent la paix du pardon et, en ce qui concerne Le Vieux, font l’objet d’une rédemption qui n’est pas sans rappeler celle du très beau roman d’Henriette Jelinek, Le destin de Iouri Voronine (Grand Prix du roman de l’Académie Française 2005), d’autres, comme La Mère et sa fille, Lili, femmes délaissées, femmes trahies, demeurent haineuses, sans compassion ; le pardon leur est étranger, rendant toute rédemption impossible. D’ailleurs le lecteur est en droit de se demander si Claudie Gallay ne souffre pas d’un préjudice favorable aux hommes, tant le portrait qu’elle fait des femmes du livre est taillé au couteau vengeur. Même Morgane n’échappe pas à la critique et si ses formes voluptueuses font l’objet du désir et du regard des hommes, son prénom de fée rappelle celui de celle, Morgane La Fay, femme fatale par excellence, qui fit la chute et la perte de Merlin l’Enchanteur.
De même, les sculptures de Raphaël conjuguent au présent de narration non seulement les terres de La Hague au relief tourmenté sur lesquelles viennent s’échouer les bateaux pris dans la tempête, mais aussi les corps burinés et par les secrets et par la nature. Ce faisant, elles exposent au lecteur –en les transcendant- les souffrances des personnages, leurs mensonges, et leurs rêves. La description qu’en fait l’auteur au travers de la narratrice rappelle certaines sculptures de Camille Claudel, notamment Le Temps et La Vague. La présence d’un narrateur « accessoire », Monsieur Anselme, et à travers lui celle de la littérature française par la mention constante qu’il fait de Jacques Prévert, celle de Max, -métaphore christologique des Béatitudes-, de la Cigogne, ou d’Ursula ou même des chats du Vieux sont autant d’adjuvants d’un roman qui devient conte moral, avec une touche de fantastique lorsque, comme le dit Monsieur Anselme «la mort(…) [devient] l’imprévisible conséquence d’un geste d’amour ».
Certes il y a quand même quelques faiblesses dans ce pavé, faiblesses probablement dues tant à l’enthousiasme de l’auteure pour ses personnages qu’au mauvais travail de relecture de l’éditeur : anachronismes et illogismes de lieux gâchent le récit et embrouillent le lecteur ; certaines histoires parallèles comme le départ de Morgane pour Paris ne sont nullement nécessaires à l’histoire. Il est dommage aussi que la relation entre Morgane et son frère sculpteur Raphaël, -au nom d’archange-, à la limite de l’inceste, ne soit pas plus développée ; ou celle que Lili a pu partager avec son mari « absent », histoire conjugale qui semble s’inscrire en schéma psychologique récurrent de celle qu’ont vécue ses parents, Le Vieux et La Mère.
C’est une lecture sur plusieurs niveaux qu’offre ce roman de Claudie Gallay. La richesse et l’étendue de la culture de l’auteure –ou des recherches entreprises pour sa rédaction- ne sont plus communes aujourd’hui. Le lecteur n’est plus simple voyeur du narcissisme ambiant et exhibitionniste qui semble être la condition sine qua non des œuvres publiées par le monde littéraire parisien. Le lecteur d’un livre tel que Les Déferlantes se sent enfin purement lecteur, celui qui découvre, ravi, une histoire ayant un début, une fin et miracle ! un développement présentant fond et forme.
Sarah Diligenti ©2009
Claudie Gallay écrit comme d’autres peignent : les descriptions minutieuses qu’elle fait des paysages de tempête, paysages de silence ou de souffrance que sont ces lieux battus par le vent et la mer autour de La Hague, arpentés par la narratrice, sont somptueuses. Elles témoignent aussi d’une extraordinaire capacité d’observation de la nature : le changement de la lumière, les jeux d’ombres de ciels chargés, les couleurs de la mer, les nombreux et divers oiseaux que la narratrice est chargée de recenser, dessiner, et surtout les effets concurrents d’une nature sauvage et solitaire sur les hommes et les femmes de La Hague, toutes ces descriptions replacent le lecteur dans une tradition littéraire ancienne, celle du terroir, peu ou malhabilement utilisée depuis l’avènement du roman d’introspection pseudo-philosophique dans la littérature française.
L’élément dominant de cette histoire trouble, c’est l’eau : un leitmotiv de « ciel bas et lourd » baudelairien, une pluie omniprésente même quand il ne pleut pas car toujours annoncée par l’un ou l’autre des personnages, et surtout la mer, les vagues, ces fameuses « déferlantes » du titre, qui n’apparaissent réellement que dans la tempête du premier chapitre. D’ailleurs le titre est extrêmement bien choisi : ce qui « déferle » dans la narration, ce ne sont pas tant les vagues que les histoires respectives de La Mère, du Vieux, de Florelle, de Lambert et de Lili, comme si la mer avait marqué tous les personnages du sceau indélébile de la fatalité. Elément féminin donneur de vie, la mer (jeu de mot inconscient ou conscient de l’auteure sur La Mère ?) est aussi porteuse de mort. Dans le roman, elle s’associe à cet autre élément liquide, la pluie permanente, et se fond avec elle et avec l’élément masculin « vent » en un tsunami destructeur. C’est en effet, la rencontre simultanée de ces forces de la nature qui engendre la destruction au fil des pages du roman. Destruction des âmes, car les haines rageuses qui animent les villageois, - au sens latin du terme (anima)- les ont éteintes.
Le tour de force de Claudie Gallay est d’avoir réussi la gageure de maintenir le lecteur en alerte grâce à une histoire palpitante : de l’isolation volontaire de la narratrice qui cherche à guérir, panser les plaies d’un amour « parfait », oublier sans l’oublier vraiment cet amant mort de longue maladie (on pense inévitablement à un cancer) à l’exposition des secrets, des amours et des haines qui hantent les personnages de La Hague, le lecteur passe du roman traditionnel au mystère quasi-policier sans heurt ni changement de champ et de registre lexicaux. Décor, actions, personnages, mythologie de la nature personnifiée (la mer, les oiseaux, le phare même), on est au sein d’une tragédie grecque sur bout de Cotentin, un Hauts de Hurlevent nouveau dans la bruyère normande. Si certains des personnages obtiennent la paix du pardon et, en ce qui concerne Le Vieux, font l’objet d’une rédemption qui n’est pas sans rappeler celle du très beau roman d’Henriette Jelinek, Le destin de Iouri Voronine (Grand Prix du roman de l’Académie Française 2005), d’autres, comme La Mère et sa fille, Lili, femmes délaissées, femmes trahies, demeurent haineuses, sans compassion ; le pardon leur est étranger, rendant toute rédemption impossible. D’ailleurs le lecteur est en droit de se demander si Claudie Gallay ne souffre pas d’un préjudice favorable aux hommes, tant le portrait qu’elle fait des femmes du livre est taillé au couteau vengeur. Même Morgane n’échappe pas à la critique et si ses formes voluptueuses font l’objet du désir et du regard des hommes, son prénom de fée rappelle celui de celle, Morgane La Fay, femme fatale par excellence, qui fit la chute et la perte de Merlin l’Enchanteur.
De même, les sculptures de Raphaël conjuguent au présent de narration non seulement les terres de La Hague au relief tourmenté sur lesquelles viennent s’échouer les bateaux pris dans la tempête, mais aussi les corps burinés et par les secrets et par la nature. Ce faisant, elles exposent au lecteur –en les transcendant- les souffrances des personnages, leurs mensonges, et leurs rêves. La description qu’en fait l’auteur au travers de la narratrice rappelle certaines sculptures de Camille Claudel, notamment Le Temps et La Vague. La présence d’un narrateur « accessoire », Monsieur Anselme, et à travers lui celle de la littérature française par la mention constante qu’il fait de Jacques Prévert, celle de Max, -métaphore christologique des Béatitudes-, de la Cigogne, ou d’Ursula ou même des chats du Vieux sont autant d’adjuvants d’un roman qui devient conte moral, avec une touche de fantastique lorsque, comme le dit Monsieur Anselme «la mort(…) [devient] l’imprévisible conséquence d’un geste d’amour ».
Certes il y a quand même quelques faiblesses dans ce pavé, faiblesses probablement dues tant à l’enthousiasme de l’auteure pour ses personnages qu’au mauvais travail de relecture de l’éditeur : anachronismes et illogismes de lieux gâchent le récit et embrouillent le lecteur ; certaines histoires parallèles comme le départ de Morgane pour Paris ne sont nullement nécessaires à l’histoire. Il est dommage aussi que la relation entre Morgane et son frère sculpteur Raphaël, -au nom d’archange-, à la limite de l’inceste, ne soit pas plus développée ; ou celle que Lili a pu partager avec son mari « absent », histoire conjugale qui semble s’inscrire en schéma psychologique récurrent de celle qu’ont vécue ses parents, Le Vieux et La Mère.
C’est une lecture sur plusieurs niveaux qu’offre ce roman de Claudie Gallay. La richesse et l’étendue de la culture de l’auteure –ou des recherches entreprises pour sa rédaction- ne sont plus communes aujourd’hui. Le lecteur n’est plus simple voyeur du narcissisme ambiant et exhibitionniste qui semble être la condition sine qua non des œuvres publiées par le monde littéraire parisien. Le lecteur d’un livre tel que Les Déferlantes se sent enfin purement lecteur, celui qui découvre, ravi, une histoire ayant un début, une fin et miracle ! un développement présentant fond et forme.
Sarah Diligenti ©2009
Saturday, December 27, 2008
And Now The CIA
Two days ago, I was angry at the Pope. Now it is the turn of the CIA...
It has been revealed that the CIA has been using other methods than "just torture" to gain intelligence information in Afghanistan. So far so good: if torture is "let go" in favor of more humane means of obtaining information in the fight against terrorism, I am all for it... However, should I really be all for it when I learn that the new "will-make-them-talk" weapon/method is the little blue pill? That is to say, Viagra!
The CIA has been distributing the miracle "virility" pill to elderly Afghan tribe leaders whose manhood (and therefore authority) was at stake, in an effort to win them to their side. The effects of the blue pill have been thoroughly described and the side effects (heart attack amongst others) explained. It is said that the elders' health was even examined before the pill was actually prescribed (Prescribed by who? The CIA has doctors on call in Kabul?). The elders came back a few days later, happy and smiling, asked for more pills and gave information in exchange.
Now obviously they will not give inaccurate information because there could happen a sudden "shortage" of the miraculous pill...
So why am I appalled?
As a woman, I feel that once again the true victims are other women. Women were victims of the Taliban, deprived of the right to an education, to work for those who were educated at the time the Taliban took over Afghanistan. Under the Taliban, women truly became invisible. They were forced to wear the burqa from head to toe. It even had a threaded "barbed wire" in front of their face. Women were reduced to being the sexual slaves of one man, 4 to a man to be precise. Some were "sold out" by their parents, especially the young ones to the older men. They were exposed to the ire of jealous older women in the harem and to constant "legal rape" -at best if they were of age and not consenting- or "legal pedophilia" -at worst if they were under the age of 18... Notwithstanding that the Taliban's definition of "legal age" was probably 12: if you have seen the movie "Osama" (no relation to the terrorist), you know what I mean. If you have not, then it's time to rent it and do not forget the box of Kleenex.
The current "new" Afghan constitution defines the legal age to marry (and have sex) as 18. But is the new constitution retroactive? Are all the little girls sacrificed to the Taliban's dogmas now free to go back to their parental abode or to live on their own if they so desire? Or are they still metaphorically and in truth jailed, forever married to Viagra-sex crazed old Afghan tribe leaders?
As a woman, my heart weeps for all these other women who have endured enough wars (since 1979 with the Soviet invasioon, remember?), enough wounds, enough losses and who now have to endure endless nights of erectile fixation by aging, loveless, and imposed upon husbands?
Of course the CIA does not seem to care that women will be, -once again, once more-, the first victims of the eternal fight against terrorism... Must be a "male" thing!
It has been revealed that the CIA has been using other methods than "just torture" to gain intelligence information in Afghanistan. So far so good: if torture is "let go" in favor of more humane means of obtaining information in the fight against terrorism, I am all for it... However, should I really be all for it when I learn that the new "will-make-them-talk" weapon/method is the little blue pill? That is to say, Viagra!
The CIA has been distributing the miracle "virility" pill to elderly Afghan tribe leaders whose manhood (and therefore authority) was at stake, in an effort to win them to their side. The effects of the blue pill have been thoroughly described and the side effects (heart attack amongst others) explained. It is said that the elders' health was even examined before the pill was actually prescribed (Prescribed by who? The CIA has doctors on call in Kabul?). The elders came back a few days later, happy and smiling, asked for more pills and gave information in exchange.
Now obviously they will not give inaccurate information because there could happen a sudden "shortage" of the miraculous pill...
So why am I appalled?
As a woman, I feel that once again the true victims are other women. Women were victims of the Taliban, deprived of the right to an education, to work for those who were educated at the time the Taliban took over Afghanistan. Under the Taliban, women truly became invisible. They were forced to wear the burqa from head to toe. It even had a threaded "barbed wire" in front of their face. Women were reduced to being the sexual slaves of one man, 4 to a man to be precise. Some were "sold out" by their parents, especially the young ones to the older men. They were exposed to the ire of jealous older women in the harem and to constant "legal rape" -at best if they were of age and not consenting- or "legal pedophilia" -at worst if they were under the age of 18... Notwithstanding that the Taliban's definition of "legal age" was probably 12: if you have seen the movie "Osama" (no relation to the terrorist), you know what I mean. If you have not, then it's time to rent it and do not forget the box of Kleenex.
The current "new" Afghan constitution defines the legal age to marry (and have sex) as 18. But is the new constitution retroactive? Are all the little girls sacrificed to the Taliban's dogmas now free to go back to their parental abode or to live on their own if they so desire? Or are they still metaphorically and in truth jailed, forever married to Viagra-sex crazed old Afghan tribe leaders?
As a woman, my heart weeps for all these other women who have endured enough wars (since 1979 with the Soviet invasioon, remember?), enough wounds, enough losses and who now have to endure endless nights of erectile fixation by aging, loveless, and imposed upon husbands?
Of course the CIA does not seem to care that women will be, -once again, once more-, the first victims of the eternal fight against terrorism... Must be a "male" thing!
Thursday, December 25, 2008
The Pope: Homosexuality and Selfishness
Could someone tell the Pope to wake up and smell the coffee???
Is it because he is "The" Pope that he is uttering such garbage as he did on Monday December 22 about homosexuality?
Saying homosexuality is as much a threat to the human race as climate change is one more proof of the lack of compassion of conservative Roman Catholics. Jesus Christ surrounded himself with whores, tax collectors, and many other sinners and said "Love the sinner not the sin". Jesus Christ, in the New Testament, came to transcend the Law edicted in the Old Testament. In as much as homosexuality is condemned in the Old Testament with all the ferocity one can expect from Yahve, the God of Abraham, Izaak and Yaacov, not a word is mentioned against (or for) it in the New Testament, a book whose strongest tenet is "forgiveness".
Maybe the Pope has another secret version in those very deep Vatican caves ?
What is a threat to human race is the position of the Catholic Church on sexuality, to the point that the previous Pope even forbid the use of condoms in countries plagued by Aids, poverty and a rabbit-like population expansion. "Go forth and multiply" indeed! Or rather make sure you multiply and pay your due to the Roman Catholic Church: while you will be living in the slums of Rio or Mexico, or starving in Africa, or dying in the streets, our hierarchy will be living in the gilded rooms of Vatican, pray in the Sixtine Chapel (whose ceiling was decorated by this guy, you know, Michelangelo, the gay artist...but hush! no one should mention he was gay), and gorge on scrumptious food.
The Pope and his guard of eunuchs should stop looking at other people's mistakes and contemplate their own selfishness, their own lies, their own crimes: how many centuries of pedophilia does it take a pope to officially acknowledge the Roman Catholic Church HAS a problem with sexuality?
I strongly suggest the reading of Ute Ranke-Heineman's book: Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven to learn more about the subject. An eye-opener, to say the least.
Is it because he is "The" Pope that he is uttering such garbage as he did on Monday December 22 about homosexuality?
Saying homosexuality is as much a threat to the human race as climate change is one more proof of the lack of compassion of conservative Roman Catholics. Jesus Christ surrounded himself with whores, tax collectors, and many other sinners and said "Love the sinner not the sin". Jesus Christ, in the New Testament, came to transcend the Law edicted in the Old Testament. In as much as homosexuality is condemned in the Old Testament with all the ferocity one can expect from Yahve, the God of Abraham, Izaak and Yaacov, not a word is mentioned against (or for) it in the New Testament, a book whose strongest tenet is "forgiveness".
Maybe the Pope has another secret version in those very deep Vatican caves ?
What is a threat to human race is the position of the Catholic Church on sexuality, to the point that the previous Pope even forbid the use of condoms in countries plagued by Aids, poverty and a rabbit-like population expansion. "Go forth and multiply" indeed! Or rather make sure you multiply and pay your due to the Roman Catholic Church: while you will be living in the slums of Rio or Mexico, or starving in Africa, or dying in the streets, our hierarchy will be living in the gilded rooms of Vatican, pray in the Sixtine Chapel (whose ceiling was decorated by this guy, you know, Michelangelo, the gay artist...but hush! no one should mention he was gay), and gorge on scrumptious food.
The Pope and his guard of eunuchs should stop looking at other people's mistakes and contemplate their own selfishness, their own lies, their own crimes: how many centuries of pedophilia does it take a pope to officially acknowledge the Roman Catholic Church HAS a problem with sexuality?
I strongly suggest the reading of Ute Ranke-Heineman's book: Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven to learn more about the subject. An eye-opener, to say the least.
Monday, December 15, 2008
A Genocide Still Waiting For Its Name
The title looked promising... but heck no! It was just an eye-catcher...
It was a lukewarm, timid apology by Turkish intellectuals whose conscience might be tormented but whose guts are still not up to articulate and pronounce the word "genocide". Does it mean that Turkish intellectuals have joined the Western intellectual world at large, those for whom comfort is too priceless to lose their privileges? Or is it just one more proof that there is really not yet democracy / freedom of speech and opinion in Turkey and that calling a spade by its name, or as is the case here, a genocide a genocide, too risky?
I guess Solzhenitsyn is having a blast and laughing at us and them even more than when he fustigated us in his famous speech.Anyone still wants Turkey in the EU?
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/16/world/europe/16briefs-APOLOGYFORAR_BRF.html?_r=1&ref=world
It was a lukewarm, timid apology by Turkish intellectuals whose conscience might be tormented but whose guts are still not up to articulate and pronounce the word "genocide". Does it mean that Turkish intellectuals have joined the Western intellectual world at large, those for whom comfort is too priceless to lose their privileges? Or is it just one more proof that there is really not yet democracy / freedom of speech and opinion in Turkey and that calling a spade by its name, or as is the case here, a genocide a genocide, too risky?
I guess Solzhenitsyn is having a blast and laughing at us and them even more than when he fustigated us in his famous speech.Anyone still wants Turkey in the EU?
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/16/world/europe/16briefs-APOLOGYFORAR_BRF.html?_r=1&ref=world
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
The Europeans...
It is after all the title of one of Henry James' novels (one of my favorite books by this author). They also made a rather intimate movie out of the book. But tonight I wonder what would James do (or think or even more write) if he had had access to the same piece of news I read over the last couple of days.
What, indeed, can we think when politicians (European technocrats) spend their time, the taxpayers' money (who finances their comfortable tax-free salaries), and their credibility squabbling over the right diameter of a tomato, the perfect shape of a cucumber or the curbature of a banana? Don't they have more important subjects to discuss? Isn't there a global economical meltdown out there? Aren't there countries in which people are starving, lacking water, dying of AIDS, of war? What, in the name of SANITY, makes it THAT IMPORTANT and RELEVANT to the average fruit and vegetable buyer what shape is a cherry, what size is a peach, what diameter is a cauliflower?Are they bowing to the pressure of an agro-industrial complex? Are these the demands of a new agricultural lobby?
I can hear sentences such as "My tomato is better than your tomato" ring in my ears and brain. I do not know whether I should laugh because the absurdity of such a sentence sounds very much like Mr. and Mrs. Martin's dialogue in Ionesco's La Cantatrice Chauve at the best, or like a Louis de Funes' retort, or straight out of a foreign language method (as in "My tailor is rich" kind of sentence) at the worst; or if I should cry that highly educated gentlemen and women, most of them (if not all of them) elected to their highly remunerated positions, can within one decade dictate the shape, weight and general appearance of fruits and vegetables and then change it.
Why are they even allowed to regulate Nature?
What, indeed, can we think when politicians (European technocrats) spend their time, the taxpayers' money (who finances their comfortable tax-free salaries), and their credibility squabbling over the right diameter of a tomato, the perfect shape of a cucumber or the curbature of a banana? Don't they have more important subjects to discuss? Isn't there a global economical meltdown out there? Aren't there countries in which people are starving, lacking water, dying of AIDS, of war? What, in the name of SANITY, makes it THAT IMPORTANT and RELEVANT to the average fruit and vegetable buyer what shape is a cherry, what size is a peach, what diameter is a cauliflower?Are they bowing to the pressure of an agro-industrial complex? Are these the demands of a new agricultural lobby?
I can hear sentences such as "My tomato is better than your tomato" ring in my ears and brain. I do not know whether I should laugh because the absurdity of such a sentence sounds very much like Mr. and Mrs. Martin's dialogue in Ionesco's La Cantatrice Chauve at the best, or like a Louis de Funes' retort, or straight out of a foreign language method (as in "My tailor is rich" kind of sentence) at the worst; or if I should cry that highly educated gentlemen and women, most of them (if not all of them) elected to their highly remunerated positions, can within one decade dictate the shape, weight and general appearance of fruits and vegetables and then change it.
Why are they even allowed to regulate Nature?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)