Category: Uncategorized

Better there than the US “justice” system

Edward Snowdon makes it clear that he doesn’t trust the U.S. courts.  Nor should he.  Nor, for that matter, should you:

Edward Snowden says he wants to ask the people of Hong Kong to decide his fate after choosing the city because of his faith in its rule of law. The 29-year-old former CIA employee behind what might be the biggest intelligence leak in US history revealed his identity to the world in Hong Kong on Sunday. His decision to use a city under Chinese sovereignty as his haven has been widely questioned – including by some rights activists in Hong Kong.

Snowden said last night that he had no doubts about his choice of Hong Kong.

“People who think I made a mistake in picking Hong Kong as a location misunderstand my intentions. I am not here to hide from justice; I am here to reveal criminality,” Snowden said in an exclusive interview with the South China Morning Post.

“I have had many opportunities to flee HK, but I would rather stay and fight the United States government in the courts, because I have faith in Hong Kong’s rule of law,” he added.

His decision makes a tremendous amount of sense in light of the various travesties committed on a regular basis by the US courts.  Moreover, China is one of the very few countries that are not inclined to be cowed by US threats.

Bishop vs Boomers

Even the myopic Church of England is able to recognize the great generational black hole, if a little belatedly:

Baby boomers are a “fortunate generation” who have enjoyed dramatic
improvements in living standards but are now “absorbing” more than their
fair share of taxpayers’ money, one of the Church of England’s most senior
clerics has suggested.

The Bishop of London, the Rt Rev Richard Chartres, who is 65, said there were
“severe questions” about the share of government spending that goes on his
own generation. He said the world was in the midst of a transformation that had left many
believing that our best days could be “behind us”. He likened the early years of the 21st century, which he said have seen a
dramatic shift in the global balance of power, to the unstable period in the
run-up to the First World War.

Figures published by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development
last year showed that while elderly people make up about 15 per cent of the
population in the leading economies, they account for 40 per cent of all
public social spending.

It’s long past time to cut the Boomers off.  They changed the world, now let them live with the consequences.  Why should we put our children and our grandchildren in debt simply to allow Boomers to continue living well beyond their collective means?

The responsible minority among the Boomers will be fine.  Those who weren’t possessed by the zeitgeist of the Grasshopper Generation have sufficient resources upon which to retire and live comfortably.  I have no problem with them. But I also see no reason to sacrifice the well-being of future generations to the always-gaping, never-satisfied maw of the great majority of Boomers.

Book Review: Hailstone Mountain

HAILSTONE MOUNTAIN
Lars Walker
Rating: 7 of 10

Hailstone Mountain is three-quarters historical fiction, one-quarter fantasy. It is the tale of Father Ailill, an Irish priest who is the good friend of the heroic figure in Walker’s ongoing saga, Erling Skjalgsson. Although it is not the first book in the series, it stands alone very well; as it happens, it is the first book of Walker’s that I have read.

Walker’s genre is an unusual one and could almost be described as historical magical realism, as it reflects the largely pagan worldview and beliefs of 12th century Scandinavia. Agricultural Fantasy, if you will.  It is a realistic, if slightly sanitized, portrayal of a brutal, uncompromising culture in which life is tenuous, unspeakable dangers lurk nearby, and the tenets of Christianity are just beginning to penetrate.  Walker clearly knows the world of the Viking very well and he introduces the reader to it with the ease of an expert.

The book is rather slow going at first.  A certain amount of discipline is required to get through the occasionally modern internal dialogue and a plot that is not immediately compelling.  The dialogue is at times stilted, the characters sometimes appear to be walking through the steps of a choreographed plot, and the some of the Christian elements feel a little forced.  One can see what Walker is seeking to do, but the execution is not always entirely adroit. There was even a moment at which I put the book aside in favor of Joe Abercrombie’s latest novel.

However, I was pleased to discover that the book picks up considerably following a brief and unconvincing descent into thralldom and despair, and I was downright surprised to learn that as it continued, Hailstone Mountain didn’t suffer much by the comparison with Red Country. Not only does the quest go into strange and unexpected directions that appear to be based on genuine Nordic legends, but Walker unexpectedly finds his literary stride, building up to a scene of genuine power and emotional resonance under the titular mountain. Many authors have mined various aspects of religion to imbue their tales with significance, but I have seldom, if ever, seen an author more effectively utilize the aspect of Christian hope, as opposed to faith, sacrifice, love, or redemption, than Walker does in Hailstone Mountain.

Having done that and apparently concluded the tale, Walker then throws the reader a serious curve ball with the denouement, which is every bit as violent, ruthless, and abrupt as the historical sagas by which the novel is palpably inspired.  It is an unexpected reminder that the savage world of the Viking is not a place for Hollywood-style happy endings, but rather, a world in which the struggle always continues and the wolf is always just outside the door.

Story: 3 of 5. Hailstone Mountain is a quest.  More to the point, it’s a saga, readily identifiable to anyone sufficiently familiar with historical Viking literature as a modernized version of the classic sagas such as Arrow-Odd, Njall, and Halfdan Eysteinsson.  And as such, it is abrupt and merciless in a manner similar to those sagas, in which a happy ending often means that the hero died well. The book also features some of the creepiest villains one will ever encounter in fiction, although upon reflection I suppose it should come as no surprise that the much-feared Vikings would have managed to produce such ghastly boogeymen.

Style: 3 of 5.  It does clunk a bit in places, mostly when the author is going for pathos and overdoes it a little.  But, for the most part, it is sufficient for the purpose, by which I mean it advances the story without getting in the way.  Moreover, the style is fitting for the saga storyline.

Characters: 3.5 of 5.  The characters were distinct and credible.  I did find the Irish priest’s internal monologue to be a bit overly dramatic and I think one bad guy would have been considerably more compelling if there had been more positive aspects to his character to balance the negative ones.  Walker also does a competent job of showing the reader some of the cultural constraints upon the characters through their interactions with each other.

Creativity: 4 of 5. Based on it is on a history with which most readers are much less familiar than they tend to think, Hailstone Mountain is considerably more creative than the average fantasy novel.  I liked how Walker mimicked the way in which saga plots tend to advance and turn abruptly, without much in the way of warning.  It’s a fascinating blend of old and new, and will be a pleasure for anyone tired of the formulaic plots and predictable characters that presently infest so much of modern fantasy.  Jonathan Moeller has remarked how epublishing has broadened the scope of fantasy fiction, and Hailstone Mountain is an excellent example of this phenomenon.

Text sample:  At breakfast Jarl Svein told us what he needed.
“My people are being raided,” he said. “Men clad in furs, barbered like thralls and armed with clubs, attack farms in the night and steal the folk away. We’ve captured some of these raiders, ones who were wounded and dying, and they told us they’d been sent by their masters, who need more thralls. We try to track them, but lose their trails in the mountains. The folk are afraid. They blame me for not protecting them. They say… they say that if Erik were here he’d stop it.” He spoke the last words with some bitterness.
“Why do you ask my help?” Erling replied. “You’re lord in the north. You’ve easily the strength of men and the wealth I have.”
“I want neither your strength of men nor your wealth,” said Svein. “I want you present with me-you and Father Ailill.”
“Why?”
“Because there’s no one in the north-perhaps in the world-with the practice in fighting the forces of the Other World Erling and his priest have. Everyone knows this. They sing of it in the halls, on winter nights.”
Oh jubilation, I thought. More of the Other World.
“I know not if I can help you,” said Erling. “In spite of all you’ve done for me, I remain Olaf’s kinsman. It would take a very great need to bring me to your side.”
“Listen then,” said the jarl. “There is evil in the north.”
He paused for the question that had to be asked.
“What sort of evil?” asked Sigrid, who had little Asbjorn at her breast.
“Have you heard,” he asked, “of the Children of the Mountain?”
We all traded looks, and said we had not.
“The Children of the Mountain are a clan of witches and warlocks who live under Hailstone Mountain, in Halogaland. They are said to live forever.”
“What?” I asked.
“It’s said they eat their children. All their children. Because you only need children if you look to die, so that your line will live on. If you mean never to die, you can use the children for other things.”
“They live forever by eating their children,” I said.
Jarl Svein stared at me. “You’ve heard of this?”
“When we came north we came with a man called Lemming, a freedman of Erling’s,” I said. “He came along to seek his niece who, it would seem, was of this witch-clan, on her mother’s side. The girl disappeared. Lemming knew straight away what had happened to her. Her kin had taken her. He seeks her now, in the north country, to find her and bring her out before the time of the ceremony.”
“When they eat the children,” said Svein.
“Yes. On Winter Night.”
“Winter Night. That is the time indeed.” He turned to look at Erling. “I set out to hunt the Mountain’s Children because they raid my folk. You came on this errand to fight the same enemy. The case is not that you would join my adventure. I would join yours. May I join you? May I walk by your side a little while, in this business that touches us both? Would that betray your wife’s brother’s blood?”
“When I throw into the scales the fact that you rescued us from so great a dishonor,” said Erling, “there can be but one answer. We shall sail together.”

A Robot doubles down

The remarkable thing about these leftist idiots is how shameless they are.  It doesn’t matter how badly they are caught out, or how completely they are shown to be wrong, they will double-down without hesitation, as A Robot does in defense of his “review” of Men on Strike:

In reviewing scientific literature, which Men On Strike purports to be,
one must review the source material which the author uses to support the
claims and assertions of the author. The source material is the basic
evidence that the author uses to show the person reading the book, “hey,
these things that I’m writing? They’re supported by facts, evidence,
and research. You can trust me and my work because a lot of time and
effort has gone into reviewing this material and making sure the most
accurate depiction of the facts of the matter at hand is presented.”

You
cannot separate reviewing the source material from reviewing the book
at hand, because the source material is the entire reason that one
should believe the assertions of the book. If you’re reading a book that
seriously studies any natural, social, or scientific phenomenon, you
have to check the source material. Theodore Beale is just one of many
sources not worth trusting that are liberally sourced in Helen Smith’s
book: Vox Day taken as a serious source of unbiased, well-researched
material is just the most egregious example and the one that could be
most easily demonstrated due to the great deal of material Beale puts
online.

That said, even without the contributions of Vox Day, Men
On Strike suffers greatly from a serious lack of actual research. The
vast majority of claims that it makes about men and women
(psychologically, socially, or otherwise) are not based on verifiable
data, instead relying on the anecdotes of whoever Smith could find that
supported the view she puts forth in Men On Strike. The book has not
gone through the peer review process that scientific literature goes
through to ensure accuracy. I’ve been totally unable to find any amount
of literature written by Helen Smith from any sort of peer-reviewed
journal or database. The only things I’ve been able to find written by
Helen Smith appear on her personal web site, and on the web sites of
people or organizations who share her political beliefs.

Real
scientists write and research for the purpose of scientific advancement,
and a big part of doing that is making sure that their research stands
up to peer review. The acknowledgements make no mention of any person
who reviewed Men On Strike to make sure it was scientifically accurate.
She mentions “friends and colleagues who have helped and encouraged”
her, but that is the only thing close to acknowledging scientific peer
review. Helen Smith intentionally decided not to bring her book to the
attention of the scientific community while presenting her book as
supported by scientific research and scrutiny. Her footnotes are filled
with references to her own research, and there are more citations of
blogs and of political organizations than of real scientific literature
on any subject even ostensibly related to the subject of sexual
inequality.

Men On Strike is, above all else, a compilation of
anecdote and political bias. It has no basis in research or verifiable
evidence beyond the quotations in her book having actually existed. 

The amusing thing is that this defense proves, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that he didn’t read the book.  Dr. Helen directly addresses this line of criticism in the book, pointing out that she is being held to a standard to which no female writer attacking men is ever held.   Men on Strike isn’t “scientific literature”; it doesn’t pretend to be.

Ironically enough, in his attempt to keep people from reading Dr. Helen’s book, he’s only brought new people to the blog, such as KC:

I just stumbled upon your blog yesterday, ironically through the
1-star Men On Strike review that pointed me to your site.  (“Nobody can possibly be as
wacked-out as this person is saying,” I thought to myself, intent
on verification.) So far, I’ve found your site by turns
interesting, thought-provoking, and mildly infuriating.  (Thanks
for all the fantasy and SF links, by the way.) I just have one
question.  Since your views on Christianity are, well, not the
most mainstream, I’m wondering if you came by them on your own or
if there are any particular theologians or books you’ve drawn on
for inspiration.

KC, didn’t you know you’re always supposed to accept the claims of a leftist, no matter how absurd, without verifying them?  How are they supposed to be taken seriously if you’re actually going to look into what they are saying?  Anyhow, in answer to KC’s question, GK Chesterton and CS Lewis are the two Christian writers I have found most inspiring.

A token Republican defends Big Brother

David Brooks exposes himself as the old statist whore he’s always been in his ludicrous attack on the NSA whistleblower in the New York Times:

It’s logical, given this background and mind-set, that Snowden would sacrifice his career to expose data mining procedures of the National Security Agency. Even if he has not been able to point to any specific abuses, he was bound to be horrified by the confidentiality endemic to military and intelligence activities. And, of course, he’s right that the procedures he’s unveiled could lend themselves to abuse in the future.

But Big Brother is not the only danger facing the country. Another is the rising tide of distrust, the corrosive spread of cynicism, the fraying of the social fabric and the rise of people who are so individualistic in their outlook that they have no real understanding of how to knit others together and look after the common good.

This is not a danger Snowden is addressing. In fact, he is making everything worse.

For society to function well, there have to be basic levels of trust and cooperation, a respect for institutions and deference to common procedures. By deciding to unilaterally leak secret N.S.A. documents, Snowden has betrayed all of these things.

He betrayed honesty and integrity, the foundation of all cooperative activity. He made explicit and implicit oaths to respect the secrecy of the information with which he was entrusted. He betrayed his oaths.

He betrayed his friends. Anybody who worked with him will be suspect. Young people in positions like that will no longer be trusted with responsibility for fear that they will turn into another Snowden.

He betrayed his employers. Booz Allen and the C.I.A. took a high-school dropout and offered him positions with lavish salaries. He is violating the honor codes of all those who enabled him to rise.

He betrayed the cause of open government. Every time there is a leak like this, the powers that be close the circle of trust a little tighter. They limit debate a little more.

He betrayed the privacy of us all. If federal security agencies can’t do vast data sweeps, they will inevitably revert to the older, more intrusive eavesdropping methods.

He betrayed the Constitution. The founders did not create the United States so that some solitary 29-year-old could make unilateral decisions about what should be exposed. Snowden self-indulgently short-circuited the democratic structures of accountability, putting his own preferences above everything else.

Edward Snowden isn’t the betrayer.  The betrayers are the Bush administration, the Obama administration, the NSA, and the Congress.  For Brooks to claim, with a straight faith, that it is Snowden who betrayed his oaths and the Constitution, that is is Edward Snowden who “betrayed the privacy of us all” when he exposed the NSA’s lawless domestic spying program, is to tell a far bigger lie than Joseph Goebbels ever told.

Of course, he’s only following the lead of the Republican’s Chief Executive Oompa-Loompa:

“Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Tuesday called Edward Snowden, the contractor who leaked details of the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs, a “traitor.” “He’s a traitor,” Boehner said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “The disclosure of this information puts Americans at risk.  It shows our adversaries what our capabilities are, and it’s a giant violation of the law.””

And some of you used to wonder why I have such total contempt for the Republican Party, and why I have always been totally unmoved by the quadrennial “we gots to vote agin’ the Demoncrat” appeals.  Notice that the bi-factional ruling party is quick to drop their superficial differences when a real threat to their regime appears:

On Monday Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein
(D-Calif.) said Snowden’s leaking of NSA information was treasonous. “I don’t look at this as being a whistle-blower. I think it’s an act of treason,” Feinstein said.

Flat ugly

Steve Jobs must be rolling over in his grave:

The new iOS 7 software has what’s been dubbed ‘flat’ look with fewer
textures and a more monochrome look. The gradient textures on tabs have
also been removed in favour of block colours.
Users can now swipe from the left of the screen to go back and move
between messages. When you slide across in any app you now get an
options menu too….

Experts warned the radical makeover could confuse some users. Jan Dawson, chief telecoms analyst at Ovum, said it ‘represents a massive overhaul of the look and feel of the operating system, which has remained largely unchanged visually since the original version.’ However, he said the changes could be too much. ‘The new version is almost unrecognisable, which will make it polarizing.

I wouldn’t be surprised if this was enough to send even some of the fanboys to Android.  Even the previous generation of Samsung phones are better than the current iPhones, and uglifying the operating system isn’t going to help matters any.  It looks almost as if Apple thinks its competition is Windows 8, not Android.

Mailvox: Clive Staples award

I was under the impression that I was more likely to be nominated for
both the Nebula and the Hugo than for any Christian fiction award, but
apparently I was wrong.  I received the following email concerning the
Clive Staples award for Christian Speculative Fiction:

Greetings,

As
you may know, the Clive Staples Award for Christian Speculative Fiction
has been revived, with Speculative Faith hosting it, and one or more of
your books has been nominated by a reader. We’re also happy to announce
that the new Realm Makers writers’ conference is partnering with us to
announce the award winner at the Friday dinner (August 2) and to provide
a modest cash prize.

The CSA is entirely a readers’
choice award, from nominations to final selection (which means that
authors associated with Spec Faith or Realm Makers ARE eligible).
However, we are opposed to popularity-contest awards, which makes the
request I’m about to make a little tricky.

We need
readers to know about the award and their opportunity to vote, but we
also need to communicate the need to honor good writing, not just
popular authors. To achieve this, we’ve put a minimal requirement on
voters: they must have read at least two of the nominations. I’ve also
written several posts at Speculative Faith (see links below) explaining
the standards we want readers to use when voting.

My
request is that you would help your readers know about CSA and our
goals, their opportunity to vote, and the requirements to do so. Without
voters, a readers’ choice award is not possible. But to appeal to you
to bring in readers, risks the possibility of the award devolving to a
popularity contest. In reality, whether this award works depends on how
widely we can spread the word and how determined the readers are to vote
for quality stories. Whatever you can do to help achieve this would be
greatly appreciated!

Below is a list of the books that
have been nominated and the links to the Spec Faith articles about the
award. Congratulations on your book(s) being included! And thank you for
any help you can give in notifying readers about the award.

I
believe I have been abundantly clear about my skepticism concerning
literary awards, but since I was asked to notify readers about the
award, I am doing so.  I’m not asking you to vote for A Throne of Bones, and I would request that anyone who is interested in voting for any of the nominated books on the list
to please be sure to follow the voting guidelines.  I’m a little
surprised, to be honest, given that I’ve actually been expressly banned
from being nominated for at least one Christian fiction award, but
apparently that was a different one.

Stampeding the herd

Sarah Hoyt contemplates the bovine thinking that led to the SFWA’s recent “storm in a B-cup”.  After all, it’s hard for the older members of the herd to keep up:

I got very – as opposed to a bit – worried in the eighties when women
started claiming that men talking them into sex was “rape.”  The
reasoning seemed to be that men had awesome talking skills and a mere
woman could not defend herself against all those double-slick words.

I thought “OMG, they’re going Victorian.”

Since then we’ve gone to lookism (the ugly girl’s attempt to take
attention from the pretty one) and to a man even looking at a woman too
long, or asking for a date being considered “harassment.”

In fact, any man NOTICING another person is female is now harassment
(witness the offense at “ladies” in Barry and Mike’s article.)

I feel for Barry and Mike.  I’m sure they were full supporters of the
initial feminism which only wanted to give women access but assumed
that evolution was not going to be reversed in a generation, and if
women wanted to work alongside men, they’d have to endure men being…
male.  And if they used a little of female wiles to get what they
wanted… well, that’s how humans are and they go two by two.  This was a
somewhat rational idea, and if it had stopped there…
It didn’t.

Their articles were salutes of the women who made it in (at that time) a very hostile male environment.

Barry and Mike had no idea that the herd had changed step and that
the mooing signals from the top had changed.  Cattle are very stupid
animals.  They identify their herd by a series of not very rational
signals.  Fall out of step, and you risk being mistaken for an intruder
and gored.  And people who didn’t realize there was herd behavior going
on, and who got to their positions by rational thought, are more than
likely to get that treatment.  I know, it’s happened to me.

And meanwhile the herd of tough grrrl Victorian maidens, “don’t call
me slut” but “I’ll sleep with guys I’m not even interested in, and I’ll
call myself slut,”  “asking me on a date is sexism” and “I can’t
understand where all the good men have gone”, “we’re just as good as
men”, “it’s rape if a man talks a woman into sex because men have
awesome men neurons we can’t compete with” goes on its merry way
changing directions as the leaders change rationals and demanding more
government intervention to handicap men more, because otherwise, how can
they compete with wonderful male superpowers?  They who are fragile
flowers who get peristaltic disturbances because someone mentions most
top scientists aren’t female?

The irony is the lesson being taught to younger men who have watched the Resnick-Malzberg debacle is that my way is the right way.  Kowtowing to the feminist cows only leads to being trampled, but standing up to them, challenging them, and contemptuously exposing them for the pathetic intellectual frauds they are will send them stampeding away, mooing in distress, every single time.

Barry and Mike were full supporters of the initial feminism.  Most men of their age were. Having been steeped in it my entire life, I’m a full-fledged enemy of it.  And I’m very, very far from being alone in that regard.

An innovative approach to education

I have to admit, I’ve been a bit skeptical of Jared Diamond’s claim that we of the civilized West have much to learn from the noble primitive cultures of Papua New Guinea.  However, their novel approach to public education does appear to have some aspects worth considering:

A teacher has been tortured and beheaded by her neighbours in a Papua New Guinea village because they say she was a witch responsible for the death of a sick villager. The angry mob brandishing guns, machetes and axes surrounded her house and pulled Helen Rumbali, her sister and two nieces away. They then burnt down the house.

No doubt the advocates of the Diversity Gospel are sad because they presently enjoy insufficient Papua New Guineans in their neighborhoods.  Which is a pity, because in addition to bringing more diversity and vibrancy with them, they would also provide what one can only presume is a highly effective means of dealing with recalcitrant teachers unions.

Mailvox: in defense of sad engineer girl

Rebecca hasn’t figured out that all humans are not completely interchangeable:

AHHHHHHH! are you NUTS! It is estimated that the planet will reach 9
BILLION people in about 2050. The last thing we need is an increasing
population. 

Increasing population of what?  How will further inhibiting the already limited breeding potential of high-IQ European women solve the problem of the quadrupling of a Nigerian population that can’t feed itself or maintain its societal infrastructure in just 60 years?  What percentage of those estimated 9 BILLION PEOPLE does she believe will be attending elite European universities and studying engineering?  Even if the problem truly exists, encouraging AA to make herself an evolutionary dead end won’t even begin to solve it.

No takes the simplest of rhetorical approaches to rational discourse:

Fuck you, Vox Day. I am sorry to have had the misfortune of discovering your existence.

Benhke, on the other hand, hopes I will open up my heart and use my “intelligens” in a constructive way.

Wow 🙁 You guys makes me sick to my stomach and brakes my heart. Maybe
you are right in some of your points, but you are really cuel (sometimes
in a direct, sometimes in a subtile way) in your way of expressing your
truth- whatever the truth may be. This woman is fighting for her
feeling of freedom – which is a very exsistential need. And both age and
gender, does not (just like culturel background does not) make a
difference – her statement comes from her point of view, and that point
of view is valid, because her value as a human being is valid.
Furthermore – I can assure you that many people care for her feelings –
cause more than 200 people in this world has the ability to feel empathy
with even strangers. I am very sorry for you guys, that you do not
believe this – it really tells more about you than anything else…
Please open up your heart, and use your intelligens in a constructive
way, which in my point of view can be defines as bringing peace, and not
fear, anger and resentment…What good do you men, the stronger gender,
do for the world/society, if not that?

But what can be more constructive than laughter?  By making it possible for people laugh at the likes of Behnke and others, I am making the world a better and happier place.

Unknown goes right for the conventional feminist riposte, but derails into a morass of blather:

u guys are real losers…women are doing well in engineering and making a
great success of ur lives…the hatred u have for them is
appalling…which makes me wonder about ur own success…

Women doing well in engineering are making a great success of our lives? Translation, anyone?