An open thread, where at your long weekend leisure, you can discuss anything you like.
Happy Easter from all at LP!
Life, Culture and Politics from BrisVegas
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Chéad!
Looks like you’ve caught everyone on the hop! Happy lots of chocolate eating time everyone.
Happy Easter, everyone.
What? No religious garbage on TV on Good Friday? (Apart from the usual feel-good Geraldine Doogue type stuff). I thought some-one would at least broadcast that pornography of violence concocted by Mel Gibson some years ago. Don’t mean to crow, but it looks like the secular humanists have won. (Not that its going to do us much good with an irreversibly dying planet and all that, but I just thought I’d mention it.)
Paul, Not on RN we haven’t! Scrambled out of bed to turn the alarm clock/radio off very smartly this morning. Consequently very quiet in out household this morning.
I’ve got hot cross buns, does that count?
PC,
Hot cross buns are a pagan fertility symbol, (spreading oneself to the four corners of the globe, or something along those lines Koshie reckoned this morning.) Guess, then, the hot cross buns are up there with the Easter Bunny, the Bilby and the Easter Eggs as an encouragement to increase the population.
My old man reckoned all good Xtans should have on Good Friday was hot-cross buns and water. And you never-ever-ever went to the Easter Show on Good Friday.The facr that they even had the Show on Good Friday was, well, a Protestant Plot. (He used to get a bit carried aeway ’cause he grew up an English Catholic.)
Hot cross buns always count! We just enjoyed the great trad HXB tasting/gutse. “Alex’s Wuppertaler & Rye Bakery” wins by a mile yet again.
I was going to make my own hot cross buns today, but decided I couldn’t be bothered after all. Cheese on toast is almost the same, anyway.
David Irving (no relation) …you could have made little crosses out of the cheese.It would have looked and tasted really good if you had of used tomatoe as a base.
The problem with hot cross buns is that their price is always rather more than “two a penny”.
I’ve got to go to work this afternoon, and just remembered that the ground thereabouts is full of rabbit holes.
Maybe I ought to pour boiling water down one of them, and then I’ll have Hot, Cross Bunnies?
joe2 we picked up two packs of Alex Wuppertaler half dozen, but when they rang up at about $16 at the checkout (for the two), we hightailed it back to the shelves and got Tip Top instead … they’re half the weight of course and we might as well have bought the good ones!
In the days when hot cross buns were two a penny,( I think)a half penny could buy you half a loaf of bread, while a penny could buy you enough gin to get drunk on or a day’s allowance of coals candles and firewood. (Cf. Liza Picard, Dr. Johnson’s London.p.294.)
AdamTucker@ 11 that is a rip off price. Six bucks for half a dozen is what we paid and filled to the brim with dried fruit not air.
3 easter tweets from theworstofperth twitter news feed youse might like
Jesus’ father “A cowboy” Archaeologists. Examples of Joseph’s carpentry work have been uncovered in Nazareth. The work was shoddy at best sa…
Easter saves potty mouth. A man who claims he said “egg hunt” not “hey c*nt” to Premier Barnett as he inspected Northbridge has walked free…
“Hot Crescent Buns” outsell Christian version. Buns decorated with a crescent are outselling hot cross buns 20 to 1 in Northern suburbs. Noll…
Jesus gaffe distracts from message. A bishop who claimed “Jesus would be turning in his grave” has been corrected by church leaders…
Dear readers,
On the Left or Centre-Left? If so, drop in at the progressive blog, ‘Left Focus’.
We’ve been going for about three months now – and are looking for new contributors as well as readers. Hope LP doesn’t mind me leaving this message.
see: http://leftfocus.blogspot.com/
Also – you’re welcome to join the ‘Left Focus’ group here at Facebook as well.
sincerely,
Tristan
Apropos TWoP @14
Why has the MSM (Oz, TV) only just “discovered” tweeter in the last week or so? I’d have thought they’d have at least noticed on-line gossip about the way it was used during the Oscars. Dedicated to taking the ‘new’ out of ‘news’, perhaps?
I wish everyone bar the sickening George Pell a happy Easter.
I just went for a wander around the town. The fish and chip shops are doing a roaring trade. One place had plastic chairs set up outside on the footpath with the patient punters sitting and chatting with the big moon behind them.
Well I just busted open a jar of pickled octopus I might or might not have been going on about here a couple of weeks ago. It was unbelievably awesome to the max.
Unfortunately THEY (you know… wink, wink) are still hard at work, undermining our way of life. Be afraid!
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25309064-29277,00.html
So? What did you give up for Lent?
That’s terrible mars08@20.
You watch, THEY will take the cross off buns after Easter. Worser and worser its getting, I tell ya.
Rumour has it THEY don’t even have a word of “Easter”… or “bunny” for that matter. Be outraged!
Oh noes, they probably think that condoms are Ok too!
Speaking of jokes…
A guy walked into a shop and said ‘do you have any helicopter flavoured chips?’
‘No’ said the shopkeeper, ‘but we’ve got plane…’
THEY are making mockery with those condoms, as well, adrian. Good chip joke.
http://business.avn.com/articles/34910.html
We love hot cross buns, at any price. Ours from a bakery called “Out Of Dough”. Pickled octopus sounds very good, but is it Christian, FDB?? Holiday, indulge, contemplate, amen.
Re the very very sickiening George Pell. I couldn’t give a stuff what pronouncements Pell makes on what we quaintly used to call in the old days faith and morals (aka deluded Catholic belief that they’ve got it all right and the rest of us have got it all wrong and will burn in Hell because we don’t believe them + any kind of sex). However I draw the line at Pell being a propagandist for the Liberal Party, as he was yesterday (Good Friday) when he criticised Rudd’s stimulus packages. George, it might be hard to believe after having Tony Abbott and JWH pissing in your pocket for eleven years, but in Australia we have this enlightened democratic principle called separation of church and state. Now, I know you don’t like it because it was dreamt up by Protestant Americans and the pagan French a bit over two hundred years ago, but most Australians apart from a few Right Wing Ding Bat Xtan fundies like yourself actually think its a pretty good idea, still, after all that time.
Now what I’d like to know, really know, is when Kevin Rudd going to instruct Tim Fischer to tell the Vatican to instruct Cardinal George Pell to keep his nose out of Australian domestic poloitics? (Haven’t the Vatican already had to tell him to shut up once before?)
Pell sounded to me like he was scripted by Tony Abbott, Paul. I could certainly do without it too. I could also do without the glib and meaningless “eschew materialism, there’s an economic crisis, go to church” stuff from the other sundry Archbishops quoted on the news. At least Brisbane’s own John Bathersby had something religious – if vapid – to say!
Had to laugh at Cardinal Pell describing condoms as “mechanical contraptions”.
And I have just realised who he reminds of: Whistler’s Mother, front on.
I reckon George Pell can say whatever he wants. For two reasons… Freedom of speech, and only a handful of gits (and, I’m guessing only a fraction of church goers) will take any notice of his dribble.
If the church (any church) feels strongly about some injustice let them speak out. Most Australians are not listening.
Ambi @25 — I read ‘pickled octopus’ as ‘fish on/for Good Friday’ and therefore a light-hearted and possibly lightly mocking gesture to Christian concerns. FDB may wish to correct this interpretation.
Middle-aged men in collars talking about “mechanical contraptions”….?
Oh my, for a moment there, I thought I was on an entirely different forum.
Re the hostibule chapel, I do feel offended as it happens, not because of any strongly held religious convictions, but because of the current ludicrous bureaucratic obsession that someone’s religious sensibilities might be offended if they see Christian paraphernalia in a chapel. How appalling!! Bibles and crucifixes in a chapel!! Bloody hell, what will the neighbours say?
Maybe women should start wearing the hijab or burqa to be on the safe side, and men sport straggly beards, just in case someone from a Muslim country is offended by our clothes. And to placate Hindus, cows should be immediately be declared sacred and allowed to wander the streets. Perhaps a few untouchables to clean up the manure.
God knows there are enough real issues in this country which are offensive to anyone with half a brain, like the woeful state of Aboriginal health and education, the unforgivable treatment of asylum seekers, Tip is still smirking and one JWH still has his sticky fingers in the public purse!
By all means let the Church speak out on social justice issues, Mars @ 29. That’s their brief. Jesus told them that among other things, their brief was to look after the poor. I have some good Christian friends who do stirling work in this area. And I mean friends. I’d be devastated if they weren’t in my life. But what Pell was criticising was a stimulus packages that Rudd had brought in, partly to allieviate the lot of the have-nots, and more importantly, to try and stem the worst effects of the recession, especially large-scale unemployment. If one has to get into Christian ethics, I can’t see how bagging it in the exact words used by REudd’s hypocritical opponents is exactly living up to the contemporary ideal of Xtan social justice.
Now I know there was a time when many Christian Churches used to preach that the lower orders should know and keep their place, but, as Rudd would say, guess what, that time is gone.
And I’m not even going to start on “mechanical contraptions”. You wouldn’t be able to print it. But I will say, I saw this machine on a program late one Friday night on SBS …
Thought that LP would have had something to say on the new biography-as-expose of part mummyboy, par Labor wildchild Latham. For non-Crikey subscibers are there any web links to portions of it? Google’s not giving me anything of substance.
Or was it all a big April fools?
But it’s actually a non-denominational chapel, Jane.
That means that there’s no chance of ANYBODY being offended by any paraphernalia.
Contrary to the breathless reports, none of the stuff has been banned. It’s just kept stored until it’s needed. Sort of like Christmas lights and the cute inflatable Rudolph.
Seems a fair compromise.
Ooooppps… “cute inflatable Rudolph”. Make of that what you will. (teehee chuckle)
Cute inflatable Rudolph?
Another one of George Pell’s ‘mechanical contraptions”? (Peccavi.)
A great day for India
I made my own hot cross buns today – very impressed with the result, especially because I made marzipan crosses. Was surprisingly easy, despite having to use yeast.
“Automatically, women will come forward,” he said, grinning.
Mmmm…buy Nano, become chick magnet.
Exciting new post at BmL on failed federal election slogans:
hmm, why does the trimmer run out of charge half way through trimming my beard. It was fine when I started. Now I look like kind of, odd. Oh well, it will be charged soon.
Amazing. Huey has decided in his infinite perversity that Easter is to be the time to rain heavily on country Victoria (or at least the part of it I’m staying in).
At least we saw it coming in and could get back off the bloody mountain before it hit…
Jane @ 32
You seem to be implying that it’s only the non-Christians who have taken offence.
I read over 50 comments on the Yahoo7 site that reported this story on Thursday (before Easter Friday – what timing!), and most of the comments were by offended Christians. They were either taking offense to the suggestion that all religious symbols be removed or they were taking offense to the presence of symbols of many faiths.
This story is also three years old, so we have to ask whether Channel 7 has been saving up this story and releasing it just before Easter to whip up religious hysteria.
It appears that LP bloggers take delight in flagellating Christianity by in large.
This creed gave the West the ability to tolerate humanism and modern thought, freedom and reflection.
Imagine if Islam had been transcendent.
You should be ashamed of yourselves.
This thread is full of cheap and petty shots at Christianity.
I doubt if you at LP will be game to publish this, such is the anti Christian message on this blog.
Jack
The sight of the Australian flag beibg dragged about by some aggressive, drunken, semiliterate yobs offends be… but that’s the we things here, eh? Sorry.
Wow…
Note to self… do NOT post on LP while half-asleep and munching on midnight snack.
I think I was trying to say “but that’s the SORT OF thing we do TOLERATE here”
Man for All Seasons being a fine movie and all that, and an inspired piece of Easter programming*, but what’s happened to Insiders?
* Especially around here, where the local parish is about to be schismed, or heritic-ed, or depending on the play of future history, become the start of a genuine new Catholic Chrurch, St Mary’s In eXile, or, befitting its seriously “small-c” catholic spirit, St Mix, as the parishioners, at least capable of irony, self-identify.
Watch now for the real story to be revealed: It’s about The Money, lot’s of it, and the National Civic Council, Bob Santamaria reaching from the grave. See how well they go together, even in the offices of the Diocese of Brisbane, right wings of organisations and the influence and power of money, as ever.
See how the block of land, 10 mins stroll from the CBD, which the church, it’s presbytery, the carpark, and the Ozinam hostel, (sanctuary for a large slice of Brisbane’s homeless men), get pacakaged off to a developer and become a multi-multi-storey tower, just like the old St Vinnies head office across the road was.
Liturgical unorthodoxy? Poppy-cock. Once again: It’s about The Money, With a large dash of gynophobia as leavening. St Mary’s real crime was, (apart from just being being there, occupying a erstwhile development site): encouraging devolution of power from the pulpit to the parishioners, including and especially women: shock horror, women reading the gsopel… what is this, another Church of England mess?. Look what legs that schism of Henry’s has had, with appeal right up to the PM, who is profoundly antipathetic to “harsh, unforgiving, institutional Catholicism” as he puts it. Which suggests the question: How come the TLC is coming to the rescue as the immediate home for St Mix? There must be a few old groupers there spitting chips.
silkworm @44, bugger! Do you mean to tell me that I wasted a perfectly good rant?
Sat & today at the Blue Lake Dog club trials. Man it is foggy down here!
Demi got third place yesterday which was nice but today after doing even better in heeling/stand for exam/recall and doing the 1 minute sit stay fine sat up, bombing the trial 90 seconds into the 2 minute drop stay! Bummer!
Still, one step closer to her first title.
When you live in a popular tourist area an Easter Sunday can be a time of jangling nerves. Here we have the Stawell Gift, school hols, campers, bushwalkers and all sorts of other holiday takers and of course we all love their contribution to the local economy, without which we’d all perish.. However! Claaaang..
Really p**ssed off about ABC AND SBS coverage of Easter on the news bulletins. They kept referring to “Christ’s resurrection” as though it is fact.
Worse, they kept referring to Jesus as though he actually existed.
If you need cheering up Silkworm, have a look at this, (it could well be that Thor has risen):
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/04/keep_this_in_mind_on_your_happ.php
Miracles are happening, or are about to happen, all over the place, this Easter, if youse heathens need proof.
1)”Miracle at sea as captain is freed.”
2)”Backpacker says Mary MacKillop miracle saved him from from coma”
3)”miracle escape polar bear Germany”
4)”Tiger Woods needs miracle rally if he is to win US Masters at Augusta National”
http://news.google.com.au/nwshp?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&hl=en&tab=wn&q=miracle
Speaking of non-resurrection.
Fundos regret Chimpo
Alas and Alack, a Prophet is despised in his own land.
Katz @ 55,
Somebody should send that link to George Pell. Seriously, as a cautionary tale.
In my experience, people no longer care that much if someone is gay, and gay couples are readily accepted by their straight friends. A lot of people think its just not fair gay people don’t have the same right to marry as heterosexuals.
A woman’s right to choose seems pretty well accepted. If anything there’s a fair bit of compassion for women who have to have abortions. And I say have to have, because in my limited experience its not a decision any woman makes lightly, and usually with considerable self-turmoil.
Finally, thr religious right in the Us sure have got their history wrong. If any of them are reading this, there was this bloke called Thomas Jefferson …
I just had a 29 year old woman from Oakland, California I’ve never met ask me to add her to my Skype Cart. As I didn’t have my earphones and mike attached to the computer, I didn’t receive the phone call, if there was one. So I did.
But, because I’m a bit thick when it comes to newfangled technology, could somebody explain what this means with Skype, etc? Am I likely to have people contacting me all round the world? Or what? I don’t really get it.
OMG! It was a sex chat line, I think. Gawd, I’m naive about these things. Well, live and learn.
joe2 you forgot to include the Easter miracle that occurred when a pilot and his Cessna passenger walked away from a crash near Cooking Lake, Edmonton …
Praise the Lord AdamTucker@59 and may he keep Paul Burns away from the Occasion Of Sin@59.
Sorry, AdamTucker @60.
Paul Burns,
Is “OMG” appropriate? on a rabidly anti-Christian thread. Fathjer Hackett may be speaking to you after Mass.
FDB, are you aware of the Octopusian Heresy? It’s something to do with the 8 Arms of God reaching his Church’s tentacles into every aspect of a sucker’s life, esp those re copulation, intercourse, marriage, sex, condoms, homosexuality, procreatuion, and such. There are many adherents. They tend to be slimey, wet, and have enormour eyes.
Also, they taste bloody nice when pickled.
– The Right Reverend Octopussy
Yes, zombie messiah weekend. Can you rise from the dead on Tuesday morning?
FDB @ 19
To the MAX! OM(F)G… that sounds pretty awesome dude:-)
Mark @ 27
If Pell wants to outsource his opinions to the mad Monk, that’s OK with me. I don’t think the appearance of Christian leaders on TV twice a year is going to alter the opinions of too many individuals on issues of which they speak, although i wouldn’t mind equal coverage being given to different religions on their sacred days. I guess
this clip is worth a re-viewing.
Paul Burns @ 33
It’s good to know various institutions in society have been assigned ‘briefs.’ If only we had laws to define said briefs and to punish institutional leaders for speaking outside their briefs society would be some much more orderly.
Note: No ‘brief’ puns intended but credit for amusement from said puns will be taken.
Paul Burns @ #58 and #59: bless.
PC @ 66,
Thanks. Makes me feel a bit less technophobic.
Heh Paul – people at work encouraged me to install Skype to get around some of our more horrendous STD phone bills. I ditched it about 2 months later due to the skype spam and dodgy chat line stuff. I think there is a way to set it up so you can only receive calls from people in your contact list but I can’t remember exactly how you do it since I don’t have it installed any more.
I hope that didn’t cost you any money though. I don’t understand how a sex chat line would work on Skype as the calls are supposed to be free, right?
Ute man,
I didn’t actually get onto said sex line.At least I don’t think I did. Skype showed up one minute of a call, but because I couldn’t get the headset going properly, I have no idea if there was any conversation on the other side of the connection. I presume that, and the sms that followed were free. So really my communication was only a few sms’s. Only when I clicked a link on one those which put me onto a web page, did I realise what was going on, so I clicked off. Have better ways to waste my time.
You can click to restrict it to a contact list, quite easily, but as yet I don’t know who it is in SA I’m supposed to be contacting because I haven’t had my first conference call yet, so I haven’t put any restrictions on it.
So far I’ve only had once piece of scam, the one we’re discussing.
Spam, I meant. Though I think it could have been a scam as well. She asked me for contact details so I said Facebook. I guess its about that time she must’ve realised I was an innocent dumbarse. But I don’t really know.
I wonder, if it is true that the asylum seekers spread petrol all over the boat, I wonder how desperate they have to be to reach these shores. I am waiting for this Labor Govt to overturn the Howard Pacific Solution and start treating these people like human beings. Illegal immigrants generally get into this country via a vistor’s visa and an aeroplane. No one in their right mind – no one – would board an unknown vessel and take a dangerous trip in the hope they get here, and then in utter desperation, pour petrol over their own vessel as it is being escorted to Christimas Island – unless they are absolutely desperate, unless they are genuine refugees in genuine need of asylum.
You know PS – I have a demonstrable public record as a refugee advocate, and personally – if an investigation warranted it – I’d charge the responsible parties with criminal damage and potentially with manslaughter.
It cuts both ways I’m afraid – rights, responsibilities, rule of law. Three people were killed.
None of this should prejudice other parties’ asylum applications. I might add it was a great pleasure to see the Australian Minister handing it all soberly – highlighting the push, rather than pull factors.
Facts are – we never received *more* offshore asylum seekers than in the two years after Howard “got tough”. Thats because a government’s policy settings are not the relevant factor – its about the push factors in countries of origin. All countries are seeing increased flows at the moment comapred to the last 24 months- and as the Minister pointed out – Australia receives a tiny minority compared to European jurisdictions.
I take your point. Then can I ask, given your knowledge in the area, you don’t think that the implementation of a more humane policy of processing asylum seekers would minimise this stuff happening, push or not? Especially given we get so few asylum seekers in comparison to other countries. I mean, why would someone (possibly) endanger their own lives by doing such a thing unless they were desperate enough to die? Why not just let them get to shore and process them?
I suspect (if it was sabotage – and that hasn’t been established) that they didnt realise they were about to be towed/ transported to Xmas Island for offshore processing. They may be operating off prior understandings about Operation Relex – and thought they were about to be towed out back into the open sea, or back into Indonesian waters.
Which is in one sense understandable: the new govt has never publicly clarified that point in relation to the new Operation Resolute ie what they will do with intercepted asylum seekers – though so far in actual practice it has meant going to Xmas Island rather than being turned back. Probably that message hasnt got through – and the govt doesnt want it to.
In general – your point is correct that recent Australian policy settings have contributed to making inherently dangerous voyages even more so. But part of getting all this mess back into line is to ensure that the rule of law applies in Australian waters – to the govt, to our Convention commitments that we willingly signed up to, and to the individual people in boats.
Thank you for that info Lefty E. As this will be playing itself out in the media in coming days, these very salient points you raise will be a good guide to the whole thing.
74 Lefty E Apr 16th, 2009 at 10:11 pm
I was waiting for someone to blame it on Howard. Larva Prodders never disappoint, at least in that respect.
Jack, Lefty E was responding to me, and my belief that the Pacific Solution was still in place and the idea that govt policy influenced boat arrivals, which he clearly pointed out – did not. You should read this piece from Mike Stekatee in the Australian which reiterates much of what Lefty E pointed out last night:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25339551-5013457,00.html
I was by the way criticising the part of the Pacific Solution which is still in place, which is the excision of certain islands like Christmas Island from the migration zone.
But to put these arrivals in perspective here is Chris Evans outlining that global increase that Lefty E is speaking of:
“According to UNHCR estimates, the number of refugees and migrants crossing the Mediterranean from Africa to Europe in the first 10 months of 2008, is already approaching the total for the whole of last year – and we are not talking about 26 people.
We’re talking about:
30 000 people arrived by boat in Italy
2600 in Malta
15 000 in Greece
10 700 in Spain and the Canary Islands.
http://www.minister.immi.gov.au/media/speeches/2008/ce081117.htm
Thats right – we get bugger all people arriving here, in international context. I do blame Howard for making a political football out of people escaping persecution.
And persecution by who? Saddam Hussein, and the Taliban.
Our enemies.
Nothing demonstrated more clearly the total moral vacuum of populist opportunism the last government did business in.
Thanks for reminding us Jack!
And the current opposition is continuing. Turdball was demonstrating very clearly on AM this morning that if he has any principles, he’s willing to sacrifice them to gain a few cheap political points. Talk about sound and fury signifying nothing!
This story broke just before the recent furore. Apologies for the long extract, but it contains much important information:
1. There is a worldwide upsurge of refugees.
2. Only five boats have reached Australia in the past year. The man mentioned in the above story is responsible for at least 40% of these boats.
3. Boat journeys are seasonal.
4. Given the need for entrepreneurialism to achieve these journeys, it would appear that the “Bali process” involving the arrest and prosecution of “people smugglers” may be more effective than a return to any “Pacific Solution”.
5. The Australian Navy’s decision to tow the recent boat probably looked a lot like Thailand’s Rohingya “solution”, possibly exciting a panicky response from at least some on board the boat.
Jack, I don’t want to disappoint you. Right away, as soon as this tragedy (accidental or on purpose) happened we saw the same hard-faced hard-hearted racist dog whistlers from the Opposition screaming that we were being overrun by – well, somebody from overseas in small boats, because the Rudd Government has shown a little bit of humanity (though not enough of it) in their policy to desperate refugees. How long will it take before the RWDBs in the Liberal Party drag Viscount Turnbull to the far right on this piece of political garbage? My bet is about a day and a half.Though, to be fair, from his initial comments, he obviously won’t really want to be part of this pack of howling dogs.
The Government’s response has been wonderful. At the risk of being pilloried for being soft on what a drunk or ill-mannered John Eliot described as queue-jumpers on last night’s Q&A, they have retained their humanity and generosity of spirit on this issue.