'Nother Solent

High pressure of work

and low pressure of air are combining to keep me away from blogging at the moment. The lights keep flickering, the storm clouds gather and Samizdata is having server problems. Is someone trying to tell me not to waste time on the internet? See you in a day or two.

Iain Murray writes:

Nefas is, of course, the subject of the most memorable Latin grammatical rhyme:

To nouns that cannot be declined

The neuter gender is assigned:

Examples fas and nefas give

And the verb-noun infinitive.

Nefas est summum fallere:

Deceit is gross impiety.

Sung, in my memory, to the tune of Greensleeves.

Molesworth thought the song rocked too, adding "bebop bebop" between "assigned" and "examples"...

I must re-read Down With Skool, How To Be Topp and the rest agane. I probably didnt get about a quarter of the jokes becoz I dont akcherly speak Latin chiz. But my husband sez that any fule can learn it even grabber winner of the mrs joyful prize for raffia work.

A partly-lawful day.

Sometimes a snatch of song, a line of dialogue or a euphonious name will lodge itself in my mind. All day yesterday it was two words: nefastus parte. It started when I incautiously decided to follow up on two terms I discovered in a Latin trivia quizbook: fas and nefas. Here are some of the websites Google threw up. (It's better than the sortes virgilianae any day.)

This extract from a book about Pontius Pilate by Ann Wroe gives a good explanation of the term:

The unlucky days were those that immediately followed the Kalends, the Ides or the Nones; these, and some others, would be marked in his calendar with the letter N as nefastus, unlawful. On those days, in Rome, the courts could not open. Other days were partly lawful: on NP days (nefastus parte) the morning was unlawful, but if the gods were propitiated with sacrifice the afternoon could be used for court business; on EN days (endotereisi), hearings were allowed in the middle of the day. There remained the days, like this one, that were reminders of previous troubles. It is probable that the dates around Passover were already marked in his calendar with the special dots or seals proclaiming them unlucky, auspicio malo.

This website instructs the reader on how to practise the Religio Roma in the modern world.

The sacrifice in today's world is a complicated matter. Many localities have ordinances that forbid blood sacrifice, or even the keeping of animals necessary for the rites. Therefore, a devotee will have to make many concessions.

Once an altar is consecrated, sacrifice should be simple, as long the altar in not defamed. If you are looking at a bad day at work, and you need some help, you would do something like this. In the morning, wash your hands. Approach the altar, ring a bell, say , " O Lares and Penates, come and accept this offering, and bless this day." Light a cone of incense one the altar, and continue on with day. If this does not help, then perhaps a more intense ritual will be required.

The altar should ideally be placed outside, where a charcoal brazier can be safely lit. The size, decoration, and construction are all variable. Ideally, the altar would be built in a walled garden where rites could be conducted in privacy. Neighbors would probably not appreciate the killing of animals, burning of entrails, nudity, drunkenness, and sexual activity under their kitchen window. Never condemn the unfaithful! The religio accepts all Gods, and it is not profane to drink the blood and eat the body of the Christ on the Easter holiday.

Er, not wishing to be intolerant or anything but that doesn't cut both ways.

Finally, this is a micro-nation called Nova Roma. One of the participants is apparently the same chap who wrote the advice on sacrifice above, as his entries on the Roman calendar, the names of gods and so on, are the same in both sites. Not all the other members of the forum were appreciative of his contribution.

When Chris Tarrant tells you you've won a million, the final question having been whether certain semi-auspicious days of the Roman calendar were known as A - festina lente B - caffe latte or C - nefastus parte, I'll expect a decent cut, OK?

This looks bad.

Two more Iraqis killed by US troops in Fallujah. Other reports speak of demonstrators wounded, not killed.

You remember

this post about the use of the words "right wing" in the anti-racist educational website Britkid? Well, the author, Chris Gaines, has said he will be changing the wording soon.

I love the internet.

UPDATE: ...except when I hate it. The link to "this post" having ceased to function, try this one instead.

Fear and loathing amid the Rachmaninoff.

Have I mentioned yet how much I hate, detest and despise those radio adverts for the charity World Vision? Classic FM, the station which usually keeps me company in the Solentmobile while I do the ton through narrow country lanes, scattering hens and peasants before my wheels, is infested with the things. Only the fact that I never can seem to maintain the elegance of my italic letter-forms when travelling at speed has stopped me writing down their script - and, oh boy, do they have a script, strenuous efforts to imply the contrary notwithstanding - word for word and hence being able to to fisk them so accurately that you'd all laugh your socks off. So, sock-wearers still, you will just have to pay attention.

No doubt World Vision do worthy work. If you want to be pen pals with little Waeroo and pay for his education, that's fine. (I'd always be a little worried that Waeroo will turn up on my doorstep all grown up already circa 2014, but that's just me, and is, incidentally, the sort of semi-serious inhibition to generosity that can only see the light of day sandwiched between several jokes. Forget you saw it here.) But why do World Vision have to hire a bleeding Tony Blair sound-alike to make their pitch? The pauses, the verdammt pauses, it's not the words that get me, it's those awful meaningless PAUSES. They don't even have the decency to be properly silent: instead the man emits a sort of ghostly glottal stop, :yy!, like the noise a ninja makes when removing an enemy's head under conditions of urgency and secrecy. "When I learn what a difference it has made to Waeroo that he. Swipe. Can go to school in a proper building instead of under dangerous palm trees, it gives me. Shuriken! A real feeling of. Disembowelling thrust. Pride. So die all enemies of the Mogowawa clan! So I guess that. Drink deep of Igichiro blood, O my thrice-tempered sword. Helps both of us."

I suppose the actors, and Tony Blair, get it from watching too much fly-on-the-wall TV. Have you noticed how Tony Blair doesn't employ the ghastly spontaneous pauses when he really is being sincere?

US troops are to leave Saudi Arabia. Just after a victory is a good time to go. It will be hard for Bin Ladenists to claim that they leave with their tails between their legs, and now that the threat from Iraq is gone they are not needed anyway.

The threat may not be quite gone yet. There were also a few words in the BBC story about the shooting dead of 13 demonstrators in Iraq, the US army having claimed - quite credibly - that they were fired at from the crowd. I thought of Bloody Sunday. Front line combat troops doing demonstration duty... bad lookout. Yet, as I said, I have no trouble believing that they were fired upon, just as I have no trouble believing the Paras were fired upon three decades ago. One step the British Army found useful in avoiding further Bloody Mondays, Tuesdays etc. was to avoid issuing the troops with too much ammunition.

Fear and loathing amid the Rachmaninoff.

Have I mentioned yet how much I hate, detest and despise those radio adverts for the charity World Vision? Classic FM, the station which usually keeps me company in the Solentmobile while I do the ton through narrow country lanes, scattering hens and peasants before my wheels, is infested with the things. Only the fact that I never can seem to maintain the elegance of my italic letter-forms when driving at speed has stopped me writing down their script - and, oh boy, do they have a script, strenuous efforts to imply the contrary notwithstanding - word for word and hence being able to to fisk them so accurately that you'd all laugh your socks off. So, sock-wearers still, you will just have to pay attention.

No doubt World Vision do worthy work. If you want to be pen pals with little Waeroo and pay for his education, that's fine. (I'd always be a little worried that Waeroo will turn up on my doorstep all grown up already circa 2014, but that's just me, and is, incidentally, the sort of semi-serious inhibition to generosity that can only see the light of day sandwiched between several jokes. Forget you saw it here.) But why do World Vision have to hire a bleeding Tony Blair sound-alike to make their pitch? The pauses, the verdammt pauses, it's not the words that get me, it's those awful meaningless... PAUSES. They don't even have the decency to be properly silent pauses: instead the man emits a sort of ghostly glottal stop, :yy!, like the noise a ninja makes when removing an enemy's head under conditions of urgency and secrecy. "When I learn what a difference it has made to Waeroo that he. Swipe. Can go to school in a proper building instead of. Parry. Under dangerous palm trees, it gives me. Shuriken! A real feeling of. Disembowelling thrust. Pride. So die all enemies of the Mogowawa clan! So I guess that. Drink deep of Igichiro blood, O my thrice-tempered sword. Helps both of us."

I suppose the actors, and Tony Blair, get it from watching too much fly-on-the-wall TV. Have you noticed how Tony Blair doesn't employ the ghastly spontaneous pauses when he really is being sincere?

US troops are to leave Saudi Arabia. Just after a victory is a good time to go. It will be hard for Bin Ladenists to claim that they leave with their tails between their legs, and now that the threat from Iraq is gone they are not needed anyway.

The threat may not be quite gone yet. There were also a few words in the BBC story about the shooting dead of 13 demonstrators in Iraq, the US army having claimed - quite credibly - that they were fired at from the crowd. I thought of Bloody Sunday. Front line combat troops doing demonstration duty... bad lookout. Yet, as I said, I have no trouble believing that they were fired upon, just as I have no trouble believing the Paras were fired upon three decades ago. One step the British Army found useful in avoiding further Bloody Mondays, Tuesdays etc. was to avoid issuing the troops with too much ammunition.

What percentage of British people would carry a gun if it were legal?

Steve Chapman has found an astonishing statistic in the Observer.

UPDATE: B.A.B.S.A.: General link to blog here.

Junius starts off

this post with a gratuitous insult directed at the opinions of Simon Jenkins of the Times. And it even gets better than that - just read the comments, 17 so far, which delve into the psychology of numeracy and whether our intuitive perceptions of probability can be trusted.

At last.

David Farrer of Freedom and Whisky carries out an unceasing search for kindred spirits who, like him, disagree with the dominant Scottish political culture of tax, spend and whinge. Sometimes he finds them. Here he links to a simply marvellous article by Fraser Nelson: Deceit and betrayal that are crippling Scotland.

What percentage of British people would carry a gun if it were legal?

Steve Chapman has found an astonishing statistic in the Observer.

UPDATE: B.A.B.S.A.: General link to blog here.

Junius starts off

this post with a gratuitous insult directed at the opinions of Simon Jenkins of the Times. And it even gets better than that - just read the comments, 17 so far, which delve into the psychology of numeracy and whether our intuitive perceptions of probability can be trusted.

At last.

David Farrer of Freedom and Whisky carries out an unceasing search for kindred spirits who, like him, disagree with the dominant Scottish political culture of tax, spend and whinge. Sometimes he finds them. Here he links to a simply marvellous article by Fraser Nelson: Deceit and betrayal that are crippling Scotland.

"This information came to me from Winston Churchill:

"On the day I took over the Prime Minister's job again in October 1951 after considerable military opposition from the Attlee faction representing the Dragon, 126 members of my "supporting cast" - artists, writers, photographers, copywriters etc who had been imprisoned by the Attlee government mainly because they were working for me - were released on my order from prison. Frank Hampson the principal artist of the Eagle comic was one of them."

Corking stuff, eh? It gets better. This website, which appears to be serious, is devoted to preaching reincarnation and exposing the demonic activities of Prince Philip via Churchill's memoirs from beyond the grave and hidden messages in Frank Hampson's artwork.

"Churchill separately described Philip as: 'A gryphon and a wereson. A gryphon is one who serves the Lord Above All not, being neither fish nor fowl nor bird of the air and an abomination in the sight of God. A wereson is one who is ensorcelled - who has within him another being, hidden, watchful and looking out.'"

"Vora is mostly Herbert Morrison the member of the Labour Cabinet who had taken over from Clement Attlee as chief concupiscent of the Dragon, or "head worm" as I termed him, following the failure of Attlee and Truman's gold-exporting efforts to the War on Saturn on behalf of the Dragon and their consequent extinction in September 1951."

So Vora is mostly Herbert Morrison. I just knew it had to be something like that.

This post intentionally blank.

Only it's not.

Ceci n'est pas un pipe.

Nothing daunted

by the loss of Columbia a Russian and an American have blasted off for the International Space Station, and Jeff Bezos of Amazon has made serious progress towards building this sweet little bird.

I knew this timeline just needed a few little kinks knocked out of it.

"This information came to me from Winston Churchill:

"On the day I took over the Prime Minister's job again in October 1951 after considerable military opposition from the Attlee faction representing the Dragon, 126 members of my "supporting cast" - artists, writers, photographers, copywriters etc who had been imprisoned by the Attlee government mainly because they were working for me - were released on my order from prison. Frank Hampson the principal artist of the Eagle comic was one of them."

Corking stuff, eh? It gets better. This website, which appears to be serious, is devoted to preaching reincarnation and exposing the demonic activities of Prince Philip via Churchill's memoirs from beyond the grave and hidden messages in Frank Hampson's artwork.

"Churchill separately described Philip as: 'A gryphon and a wereson. A gryphon is one who serves the Lord Above All not, being neither fish nor fowl nor bird of the air and an abomination in the sight of God. A wereson is one who is ensorcelled - who has within him another being, hidden, watchful and looking out.'"

"Vora is mostly Herbert Morrison the member of the Labour Cabinet who had taken over from Clement Attlee as chief concupiscent of the Dragon, or "head worm" as I termed him, following the failure of Attlee and Truman's gold-exporting efforts to the War on Saturn on behalf of the Dragon and their consequent extinction in September 1951."

So Vora is mostly Herbert Morrison. I just knew it had to be something like that.

This post intentionally blank.

Only it's not.

Ceci n'est pas un pipe.

Nothing daunted

by the loss of Columbia a Russian and an American have blasted off for the International Space Station, and Jeff Bezos of Amazon has made serious progress towards building this sweet little bird.

I knew this timeline just needed a few little kinks knocked out of it.

Interesting stuff found while Googling

. To keep the last post brief I've edited out the stuff about Mona Baker and Tom Paulin, but here is a good article from a secular Jewish perspective called "The Left, the Right, and the Jews."

Interesting stuff found while Googling

. To keep the last post brief I've edited out the stuff about Mona Baker and Tom Paulin, but here is a good article from a secular Jewish perspective called "The Left, the Right, and the Jews."

Why am I still surprised by these things?

This is "the National Grid for Learning", a government-sponsored directory of resources for teachers. This is "Britkid", one of the sites it recommends.

This is a website about race, racism and life - as seen through the eyes of the Britkids. Would you like to..hang out with a Britkid, or go into town?

I did a bit of both and it's OK. Conscientious, and I approve of conscientiousness. Utterly convinced that any progress in getting along is the result of laws demanding that we should, but, let's face it, the libertarian meme on that issue has yet to pentrate very far.

The author, Chris Gaine, spent many a wakeful hour worrying about the extent to which our nine sample Britkids should bear the weight of representing stereotypes; too much and it defeats the object, too little and, as the author puts it:

...this would have given an entirely untypical picture and failed to make some essential points about the social ramifications of racism.

There is one little form of stereotyping, however, that the author has not spent any time at all worrying about. He or she ('Chris' could be either) has a page called 'Right Wing' Movements. We do have those quotation marks around the first two words of the title, but any momentary thought that they presage an examination of how and why the sozialistiche bit came to be in the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei is soon quashed. There are one or two references to murders and firebombings by extreme right wing groups, but in general this website, supported by a government body for use in schools, is quite happy to to make no distinction between the BNP and the Conservative Party.

This is why it's important here to have some understanding of who the Nazis were, and what happened when they were in power in Germany. Their persecution of minority ethnic people is an extreme example of what a right wing movement can do...

...There are many right wing groups throughout Europe, (for example, there are known to be at least 40 such groups just in Spain).

By any normal definition of "right wing", Jose Maria Aznar's ruling Popular Party is among them.

...Their ideas are often supported by right wing organisations in America who feel that although many different minority ethnic people now populate America, there is still a chance that Europe might 'avoid' being populated by so many different groups.

...Individuals, organisations and authorities united their efforts against racism and against right wing groups, and in fact, this website itself is a product of that struggle by some groups and individuals.

...Trade unionists are people who support the rights of workers in their jobs, and the right wing does not agree with their beliefs either.

In some ways this is not my problem. In the World's Smallest Political Quiz I come at the top, not at the right. But there is something very wrong when children are taught, by a government approved website (have I got that point across yet?), that the political beliefs of half the country are synonymous with racism, or that the right wing is the only source of racism, or that the right wing is the only source of anti-semitism. By disallowing all but one side of the political spectrum's sincerity in opposing racial hatred, they are cutting off the branch upon which they sit. Some of the real 'Britkids' reading this, never having been taught any logic, will decide that if being right wing means being racist then so be it.

Why am I still surprised by these things?

This is "the National Grid for Learning", a government-sponsored directory of resources for teachers. This is "Britkid", one of the sites it recommends.

This is a website about race, racism and life - as seen through the eyes of the Britkids. Would you like to... hang out with a Britkid, or go into town?

I did a bit of both and it's OK. Conscientious, and I approve of conscientiousness. Utterly convinced that any progress in getting along is the result of laws demanding that we should, but, let's face it, the libertarian meme on that issue has yet to pentrate very far.

The author, Chris Gaine, spent many a wakeful hour worrying about the extent to which our nine sample Britkids should bear the weight of representing stereotypes; too much and it defeats the object, too little and, as the author puts it:

...this would have given an entirely untypical picture and failed to make some essential points about the social ramifications of racism.

There is one little form of stereotyping, however, that the author has not spent any time at all worrying about. He or she ('Chris' could be either) has a page called 'Right Wing' Movements. We do have those quotation marks around the first two words of the title, but any momentary thought that they presage an examination of how and why the sozialistiche bit came to be in the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei is soon quashed. There are one or two references to murders and firebombings by extreme right wing groups, but in general this website, supported by a government body for use in schools, is quite happy to to make no distinction between the BNP and the Conservative Party.

This is why it's important here to have some understanding of who the Nazis were, and what happened when they were in power in Germany. Their persecution of minority ethnic people is an extreme example of what a right wing movement can do...

...There are many right wing groups throughout Europe, (for example, there are known to be at least 40 such groups just in Spain).

By any normal definition of "right wing", Jose Maria Aznar's ruling Popular Party is among them.

...Their ideas are often supported by right wing organisations in America who feel that although many different minority ethnic people now populate America, there is still a chance that Europe might 'avoid' being populated by so many different groups.

...Individuals, organisations and authorities united their efforts against racism and against right wing groups, and in fact, this website itself is a product of that struggle by some groups and individuals.

...Trade unionists are people who support the rights of workers in their jobs, and the right wing does not agree with their beliefs either.

In some ways this is not my problem. In the World's Smallest Political Quiz I come at the top, not at the right. But there is something very wrong when children are taught, by a government approved website (have I got that point across yet?), that the political beliefs of half the country are synonymous with racism, or that the right wing is the only source of racism, or that the right wing is the only source of anti-semitism. By disallowing all but one side of the political spectrum's sincerity in opposing racial hatred, they are cutting off the branch upon which they sit. Some of the real 'Britkids' reading this, never having been taught any logic, will decide that if being right wing means being racist then so be it.

UPDATE (30/04): I sent a note pointing out this post to Chris Gaines. He (it turns out he is a he) has said he has thought about it and will be changing the wording.