A new study by Queen Mary University of London has raised some interesting questions. It suggests that in the UK Bangladeshi girls who wear ‘traditional’ clothes suffer from fewer behavioural and emotional problems than ones who wear more mainstream clothes.
This apparently only applies to females and nothing equivalent could be seen in the mainstream community.
It is extremely doubtful that the actual clothes make any the difference, and the report does not claim it does. There is likely to be some indirect link.
One of the authors of the study, Professor Kam Bhui, , felt the result was "surprising", having expected the reverse. He conjectured the reason could be:
"Traditional clothing represents a tighter family unit, and this may offer some protection against some of the pressures that young people face.
"What it suggests is that we need to assist people who are moving from traditional cultures and becoming integrated into Western societies, as they may be more vulnerable to mental health problems."
One wonders if it has occurred to the reports authors that yes traditional clothing does indeed indicate a tighter less integrated family with more ‘traditional’ attitudes towards females and all that that implies.
Bangladeshi girls that don’t resist this come under less pressure from their families. They are often resident in effectively ghettoised areas, where this is the prevailing attitude and may well attend schools containing a significant number of girls from similar backgrounds.
Girls from traditional families under these circumstances that choose to step outside the somewhat narrow confines of this, to embrace a more mainstream ‘western’ lifestyle are surely more likely to come under increased pressure from the family, face the possibility of disapproval, loosing family support in some cases - and in some extreme cases even the possible threat of honour killing.
These factors are bound to undermine their equilibrium.
A comparison with girls of more mainstream integrated Indian decent might prove instructive.
Thursday, 17 April 2008
Wednesday, 16 April 2008
Alarmist predictions of 5 foot rise in sea level
According to a report from a UK/Finnish group sea levels could rise by up to almost 5 ft (4 ft 11 ½ inches) by the end of the century.
But ‘up to’ clearly includes any figure below that, including no discernable difference at all.
Apparently the team has built a computer model that can reflect the relationship between temperatures and sea level over the past 2000 years.
For the model’s predictions outside normal parameters to work it has to be accurate outside the parameters. It is simply not possible to test it against reality without data and many a model that accurately reflects relatively chaotic behaviour within certain bounds fails singularly when taken outside them.
It is an fact that global temperatures were significantly higher than current levels, between the 9th and 14th centuries. A period of some 500 years when temperatures were warmer than those today, what does the model say about sea level and ice cover during that period?
There is also the fact that the data on temperature predictions fed into such a model has to be accurate for it to be accurate. GIGO as they say.
The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 was statistically the same as 2006 and 2005 and every year since 2001. Unless the IPCC does a Robert Mugabe on the figures ‘global warming’ appears to have, for the moment at least, halted .
What happens next is anybody's guess - and that’s really what it is, a guess.
It could warm up to something more like it was back in the middle ages, it could remain stable, conceivably it could drop. Whatever happens it will sooner or later change, one way or the other.
That’s what climate does - and has done since long before humans learned to harness fire.
Maybe politicians on the AGW bandwagon should think twice about bio fuels and punitive taxes before they cause a crisis of their own, a food crisis.
Mind that’s no reason not to cut pollution, or build nuclear power stations, or develop compressed air or hydrogen powered transport. That makes sense anyway.
But ‘up to’ clearly includes any figure below that, including no discernable difference at all.
Apparently the team has built a computer model that can reflect the relationship between temperatures and sea level over the past 2000 years.
For the model’s predictions outside normal parameters to work it has to be accurate outside the parameters. It is simply not possible to test it against reality without data and many a model that accurately reflects relatively chaotic behaviour within certain bounds fails singularly when taken outside them.
It is an fact that global temperatures were significantly higher than current levels, between the 9th and 14th centuries. A period of some 500 years when temperatures were warmer than those today, what does the model say about sea level and ice cover during that period?
There is also the fact that the data on temperature predictions fed into such a model has to be accurate for it to be accurate. GIGO as they say.
The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 was statistically the same as 2006 and 2005 and every year since 2001. Unless the IPCC does a Robert Mugabe on the figures ‘global warming’ appears to have, for the moment at least, halted .
What happens next is anybody's guess - and that’s really what it is, a guess.
It could warm up to something more like it was back in the middle ages, it could remain stable, conceivably it could drop. Whatever happens it will sooner or later change, one way or the other.
That’s what climate does - and has done since long before humans learned to harness fire.
Maybe politicians on the AGW bandwagon should think twice about bio fuels and punitive taxes before they cause a crisis of their own, a food crisis.
Mind that’s no reason not to cut pollution, or build nuclear power stations, or develop compressed air or hydrogen powered transport. That makes sense anyway.
Tuesday, 15 April 2008
Quote of the day
" The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
" Tolerance and freedom of thought are the veritable antidotes to religious fanaticism."Paul-Henri, baron d'Holbach (1723-1789)
Suspect attempted mass murderer’s self justification full of holes
I happened to catch the confused pathetic inept and juvenile attempt at self justification of the would be mass murderer Ahmed Abdulla Ali’s so-called ‘martyrdom’ video on TV yesterday.
I noted he was careful to try to address certain points. He was for instance anxious to point out that he had not been ‘brainwashed’ and was "educated to a high standard" and "old enough" to make his own decisions. Though age and education are no bars to ideological blindness and confused, illogical thinking.
Brainwashed? Certainly there is something peculiar, or out of the ordinary in the way strong belief can, in certain individuals, often combined with prejudice, hatred or racism, allow them to justify terrible crimes against others to themselves, that normal decent people would baulk at.
I thought it telling when he said that: ”"This the opportunity to punish and humiliate the kuffar (all non Moslems), to teach them a lesson they will never forget.” this would appear to indicate a deep religiously based hatred of all who do not share his particular beliefs, or surely he would not have used those particular terms. It is reasonable to conclude he felt that Kuffars needed to be taught a damned good lesson, simply for the crime of being Kuffars.
The thing that really struck me as undermining his whole house mental of cards was that he justified the evil he planned on the basis that the public had collectively voted for the government who were apparently oppressing his people’s lands.
His peoples lands? He lived and had made a home in the UK. He had benefited from this. He no doubt expected to enjoy and in fact did and still does benefit from the rights and protections that come with that. Among other things it allows him to plead not guilty in the face of what amounts to his own self made recorded confession.
He complained that the public hadn’t protested sufficiently against, presumably the removal of Saddam Hussein, or possibly the situation in Israel.
That they were willing to pressure the government over fox hunting, but not over his perceived persecution of Moslems. "You don't care about the Muslims that are being killed."
This sounds rather like a set piece of anti Western Democracy rhetoric circulated by hate mongers that he was not bright enough to see through. It is paranoia to suppose that bad things that happen to people who also happen to be Muslims take place because they are Muslims.
It does not follow at all that simply because there were protests and because a fox hunting ban was imposed the British public does not care that Muslims, or anyone else, are being killed. It is a Non-Sequitur and is easily shown to be the lie it is by the outcry over the killing of Muslims in the Balkans when British troops, together with other western troops including American troops, were sent in specifically to prevent this. He conveniently chooses to ignore this, or perhaps never picked it up in the course of his vaunted ‘education’.
Any deaths in Iraq are squarely at the door of the insurgents many coming in from outside the country who seem to be doing to prevent it ever getting on it’s feet. Western troops would have been long gone by now if it were not for this. It is the insurgents who are deliberately slaughtering presumably fellow Muslims wholesale.
If he felt that further demonstrations (because there were demonstrations) might have helped he could have organised a pressure group, peaceful protests, lobbying. He chose not to do this.
He also fails to follow his own distorted logic to it’s conclusion. It is probable he would have had the opportunity to vote. By his own logic he is as ‘responsible’ as any other member of the electorate for the wrongs he apparently perceives. By his own logic he is just as deserving of ‘punishment’.
I noted he was careful to try to address certain points. He was for instance anxious to point out that he had not been ‘brainwashed’ and was "educated to a high standard" and "old enough" to make his own decisions. Though age and education are no bars to ideological blindness and confused, illogical thinking.
Brainwashed? Certainly there is something peculiar, or out of the ordinary in the way strong belief can, in certain individuals, often combined with prejudice, hatred or racism, allow them to justify terrible crimes against others to themselves, that normal decent people would baulk at.
I thought it telling when he said that: ”"This the opportunity to punish and humiliate the kuffar (all non Moslems), to teach them a lesson they will never forget.” this would appear to indicate a deep religiously based hatred of all who do not share his particular beliefs, or surely he would not have used those particular terms. It is reasonable to conclude he felt that Kuffars needed to be taught a damned good lesson, simply for the crime of being Kuffars.
The thing that really struck me as undermining his whole house mental of cards was that he justified the evil he planned on the basis that the public had collectively voted for the government who were apparently oppressing his people’s lands.
His peoples lands? He lived and had made a home in the UK. He had benefited from this. He no doubt expected to enjoy and in fact did and still does benefit from the rights and protections that come with that. Among other things it allows him to plead not guilty in the face of what amounts to his own self made recorded confession.
He complained that the public hadn’t protested sufficiently against, presumably the removal of Saddam Hussein, or possibly the situation in Israel.
That they were willing to pressure the government over fox hunting, but not over his perceived persecution of Moslems. "You don't care about the Muslims that are being killed."
This sounds rather like a set piece of anti Western Democracy rhetoric circulated by hate mongers that he was not bright enough to see through. It is paranoia to suppose that bad things that happen to people who also happen to be Muslims take place because they are Muslims.
It does not follow at all that simply because there were protests and because a fox hunting ban was imposed the British public does not care that Muslims, or anyone else, are being killed. It is a Non-Sequitur and is easily shown to be the lie it is by the outcry over the killing of Muslims in the Balkans when British troops, together with other western troops including American troops, were sent in specifically to prevent this. He conveniently chooses to ignore this, or perhaps never picked it up in the course of his vaunted ‘education’.
Any deaths in Iraq are squarely at the door of the insurgents many coming in from outside the country who seem to be doing to prevent it ever getting on it’s feet. Western troops would have been long gone by now if it were not for this. It is the insurgents who are deliberately slaughtering presumably fellow Muslims wholesale.
If he felt that further demonstrations (because there were demonstrations) might have helped he could have organised a pressure group, peaceful protests, lobbying. He chose not to do this.
He also fails to follow his own distorted logic to it’s conclusion. It is probable he would have had the opportunity to vote. By his own logic he is as ‘responsible’ as any other member of the electorate for the wrongs he apparently perceives. By his own logic he is just as deserving of ‘punishment’.
Monday, 14 April 2008
Quote of the day
Ozymandias
I MET a traveller from an antique land,
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away...Percy Bysshe Shelley
Sadly it doesn’t take much of a leap of imagination to substitute Mugabe for Ozymandias…
No relief in sight for the people of Zimbabwe
All the evidence indicates that Zimbabwe’s opposition the MDC won a convincing victory across the board in their elections, both parliamentary and presidential. No one other than an inhabitant of Planet Mugabe can be in any doubt of it. Anyone who claims otherwise is doing so disingenuously.
This clearly came as a horrible shock to Zanu-PF and their incompetent president Mugabe – he obviously hadn’t done quite enough to rig the elections, possibly even being stupid enough to fall for his own lies.
Still ‘nil desperandum’. He has successfully kept the official result from getting officially released and is clearly gearing up for a ‘run off’ election where he really does the opposition up like a kipper - no half measures this time. There are reports of police recruits retroactively filling out pro Mugabe ballot papers by the thousand whilst the actual papers go permanently missing. Also reports of opposition supporters being severely beaten and even killed
Once he has enough of these retroactive votes Mugabe will be able to claim a run off and then God help the opposition.
Meanwhile most of the surrounding states seem to be quietly complicit in this selling the citizenry of Zimbabwe down the river. One wonders if it is because of some misplaced sense of solidarity or if they are terrified that if they cast the first stone their own glass houses will be just as vulnerable as Mugabe’s
Sadly it increasingly looks as if there can be no resolution to this matter that does not involve bloodshed and further enormous damage to Zimbabwe and to some extent damage to southern Africa as a whole. The longer this goes on the worse it is likely to be for all.
Maybe those enabling Mugabe right now should think about that, eventually it could cost them their lives.
This clearly came as a horrible shock to Zanu-PF and their incompetent president Mugabe – he obviously hadn’t done quite enough to rig the elections, possibly even being stupid enough to fall for his own lies.
Still ‘nil desperandum’. He has successfully kept the official result from getting officially released and is clearly gearing up for a ‘run off’ election where he really does the opposition up like a kipper - no half measures this time. There are reports of police recruits retroactively filling out pro Mugabe ballot papers by the thousand whilst the actual papers go permanently missing. Also reports of opposition supporters being severely beaten and even killed
Once he has enough of these retroactive votes Mugabe will be able to claim a run off and then God help the opposition.
Meanwhile most of the surrounding states seem to be quietly complicit in this selling the citizenry of Zimbabwe down the river. One wonders if it is because of some misplaced sense of solidarity or if they are terrified that if they cast the first stone their own glass houses will be just as vulnerable as Mugabe’s
Sadly it increasingly looks as if there can be no resolution to this matter that does not involve bloodshed and further enormous damage to Zimbabwe and to some extent damage to southern Africa as a whole. The longer this goes on the worse it is likely to be for all.
Maybe those enabling Mugabe right now should think about that, eventually it could cost them their lives.
Brown blamed for economic problems
The Conservatives are blaming Gordon Brown for the present economic crisis.
Given that the current chancellor is effectively his glove puppet and prior to that, for a decade or more, he had his hands firmly on the economic tiller of the UK this is not unreasonable.
More to the point he is part of a party apparatus and world view that erodes our rights and liberties on an almost daily basis, all for our own good mind - because we just don’t know any better, or for our own safety to protect us from the CRIME and TERRORISM they are so ineffective in stemming.
So the Conservatives can go ahead and pin the blame on Gordon Brown and New Labour. They are right and welcome to do so.
Unfortunately the Conservatives and particularly David Cameron do not stand out as an immediately obvious alternative. Certainly it would be difficult to imagine they could fail to make a better showing in many areas, not least economics. But one looks at them as an alternative government more because they are the contender with the best likelihood of finally prising Gordon and his cronies out of power.
At the moment the Conservatives seem more a most likely much less bad alternative, than as something to actually actively seek for themselves.
Their chief attraction is that they are the most viable alternative that is not actually New Labour. Damned with faint praise.
Given that the current chancellor is effectively his glove puppet and prior to that, for a decade or more, he had his hands firmly on the economic tiller of the UK this is not unreasonable.
More to the point he is part of a party apparatus and world view that erodes our rights and liberties on an almost daily basis, all for our own good mind - because we just don’t know any better, or for our own safety to protect us from the CRIME and TERRORISM they are so ineffective in stemming.
So the Conservatives can go ahead and pin the blame on Gordon Brown and New Labour. They are right and welcome to do so.
Unfortunately the Conservatives and particularly David Cameron do not stand out as an immediately obvious alternative. Certainly it would be difficult to imagine they could fail to make a better showing in many areas, not least economics. But one looks at them as an alternative government more because they are the contender with the best likelihood of finally prising Gordon and his cronies out of power.
At the moment the Conservatives seem more a most likely much less bad alternative, than as something to actually actively seek for themselves.
Their chief attraction is that they are the most viable alternative that is not actually New Labour. Damned with faint praise.
Saturday, 12 April 2008
Quote of the day
“ One showing is better than one hundred sayings.”
Confucius
...or “A picture paints a thousand words”
Can a child really be detained for being overweight in London?
I heard something disquieting on the radio. It was Friday just before 2 pm, one of those radio phone ins on LBC.
The caller Identified himself as a Metropolitan Police Officer. The discussion was centred around how much police time is taken up with paperwork – A truly staggering amount these days by the sound of it.
What concerned me was when the officer mentioned some sort of initiative called something like ‘Every Child Counts’, you wonder who thinks these ghastly titles up.
He was holding it up as something that eats up police time unnecessarily, but as he explained it, it sounded more than a little sinister. It bothered me that he was apparently quite willing to implement it with little concern for civil liberties, but only objected to it as a poor use of police resources.
The idea is apparently some draconian Nanny State version of concern for child welfare.
The scenario offered on the radio was: An officer sees a ‘child’ (presumably anyone apparently under the age of 17) they judge to be overweight out in public on their own.
Said officer Stops the child (on what grounds was not made clear). The child would be required to provide full details of name age address, parent’s details, etc. – again why on what grounds?
The officer would then feed the details into the ‘system’ for onward transmission to social services and possibly interview the parents, presumably after having taken the child home.
There may be more criteria involved, time, location, age. But from what the officer said it could as easily happen to a 12 year old child minding their own business on the way to a football match, in the park, on a Sunday afternoon.
If this is actually the case then it is absolutely outrageous. Truly an example of the burgeoning New-Labour fascist state at work.
A young person, detained, though presumably not officially arrested unless the officer is doubtful of the details given to them, prevented from going about their lawful business – apparently for the crime of being a little overweight.
It would be interesting if anyone can verify this or deny it.
The caller Identified himself as a Metropolitan Police Officer. The discussion was centred around how much police time is taken up with paperwork – A truly staggering amount these days by the sound of it.
What concerned me was when the officer mentioned some sort of initiative called something like ‘Every Child Counts’, you wonder who thinks these ghastly titles up.
He was holding it up as something that eats up police time unnecessarily, but as he explained it, it sounded more than a little sinister. It bothered me that he was apparently quite willing to implement it with little concern for civil liberties, but only objected to it as a poor use of police resources.
The idea is apparently some draconian Nanny State version of concern for child welfare.
The scenario offered on the radio was: An officer sees a ‘child’ (presumably anyone apparently under the age of 17) they judge to be overweight out in public on their own.
Said officer Stops the child (on what grounds was not made clear). The child would be required to provide full details of name age address, parent’s details, etc. – again why on what grounds?
The officer would then feed the details into the ‘system’ for onward transmission to social services and possibly interview the parents, presumably after having taken the child home.
There may be more criteria involved, time, location, age. But from what the officer said it could as easily happen to a 12 year old child minding their own business on the way to a football match, in the park, on a Sunday afternoon.
If this is actually the case then it is absolutely outrageous. Truly an example of the burgeoning New-Labour fascist state at work.
A young person, detained, though presumably not officially arrested unless the officer is doubtful of the details given to them, prevented from going about their lawful business – apparently for the crime of being a little overweight.
It would be interesting if anyone can verify this or deny it.
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