two daughters and both make their living buying and renovating real
estate to sell and let. Lin's passions in life are her family, animals,
nature, prison reform, politics and writing. She is also a message
board junkie and has been active on over 100 forums since 2003!
Welcome to the latest issue of Bits and Pieces. Sadly, the talents of Hunny and Sadie are not involved in this issue.
They are both sorely missed and their contributions have always been appreciated. This new issue is co-edited by me and my husband.
I’m Linda Marshall (known as Big Lin because I’m 5ft 11 tall and Lin is a short form of Linda.) My husband is Mike Marshall (6 ft 4 tall so I still have to look up to him!)
I’m married with three children, a son and two daughters. I’ve got a degree in English and History at university which is where I met my future husband Mike.
Passions of mine – family, animals, nature, my Romani roots, prison reform, politics, writing, mountain climbing (though I haven’t done that for a few years now!)
Living with autism
I am a mother of three children and my eldest child and only son has autism. There are many ideas about what autism is, how we should behave towards people with it, how we should bring them up and how we should prepare them for life in the adult world.
There are (like most neurological conditions) degrees of autism – mild, moderate and severe. I have had almost eighteen years experience of raising an autistic child and I’ve run the gamut of emotions from joy, anger to despair during that period. I’ve also learned to make up my own mind on things and not simply follow the conventional wisdom. There are too many people who look on autistic children as beyond help and essentially incapable of doing much with themselves or functioning that well in the wider world. My experience has taught me that’s not true. Sure, the most severely brain-damaged cases are hopeless but all too often things can be done to improve things and far too often the things that would help aren’t done.
So let’s look at what autism is. It’s got a variety of symptoms and not every autistic person has all of them. But broadly speaking there’s an extreme introversion, a secretiveness, a rigid approach to things, a difficulty in understanding other people’s emotions or thoughts, a reluctance for physical contact, often difficulties with expressing ideas or feelings and difficulties with understanding when other people express them. And there’s a reluctance to be contradicted, to be told to do things (except routine ones), an unwillingness to try new things, often dyspraxia (clumsiness and poor co-ordination) and sometimes dyslexia. There can also be obsessional types of behaviour and autistic people can either lack confidence or be ridiculously arrogant. They tend to build up minor things – positive or negative – bigger than they really are.
Now it would be too much to say that all sufferers from autism are narcissistic but there’s no doubt that many of them – particularly the milder cases – are narcissists. Life taught me a long time ago that narcissism, though infuriating, can be cured or at least controlled. And narcissists, either passively or actively, are essentially bullies who have to be stood up to.
For the purposes of this article I’ll write from my own experience with my son rather than dealing with the wider questions of autism in society. My boy is certainly dyspraxic and over the years he’s dropped things, bumped into things, fallen over, misjudged distances, broken things and so on. A lot of that, as Mike and I have tirelessly pointed out to him,. is lack of concentration. When he makes the effort to focus on more than just the immediate these things happen far less often. So often a lot of it is a sort of mental laziness which the child can be trained out of if the parents are patient enough.
The narcissistic side of autism has to be corrected because otherwise it will make it impossible for the child to form friendships or deeper relationships when he or she (it’s normally a ‘he’ – girls do get autism but rarely as often or as severely as boys though doctors are now thinking that maybe girls get it more often than they thought previously) becomes an adult.
Learning is also difficult; at least during the first ten to twelve years of life you have to instill things through a ‘rote’ system. The child learns through repeated commands and a regular routine how to do things. It takes far longer than it would with a non-autistic child and it isn’t easy for them to learn new skills. (On the whole; Lou picked up chess quite quickly but most things took him ages to learn.)
As a result of our approach – one of counteracting the bad traits and reinforcing the good ones – our son can function nearly as well as other boys his age. (He will be 18 years old this year.) Yes, he will always be clumsy but the worst excesses of his dyspraxia are behind him. He no longer breaks chairs, doesn’t bump into things or cut himself as often as he did and he can talk perfectly fluently most of the time. He is still awkward sometimes in social situations especially with strangers but far better than he would have been without the years of effort and training we spent helping him to interact better. He has even managed to have three girlfriends!
Autism, like most neurological and mental health issues in Britain, gets little attention compared with other health issues that have a far less traumatic effect on the lives of the sufferers and their families. It’s time the NHS got its priorities right!
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JOKES
Patient: Doctor, I'm worried. I keep getting an irresistible urge to sing “The Green Green Grass of Home” and “Delilah.”
Is there something wrong with me??
Doctor: You’ve got Tom Jones Syndrome!
Patient: Should I be worried? Doctor: It’s Not Unusual!
An Anglican clergyman dies and goes to heaven. He wanders around and is baffled
to see that one section is entirely filled with Catholics, who seem unaware of his presence.
Puzzled, he turns to Saint Peter.“Why are they all on their own rather than with the rest of us?’
“Oh, they think they’re the only ones here,” the saint smiled.
Irishman in a pub talking to an Englishman. “Do you know how Irish girls get pregnant?”
Englishman (expecting a joke or some other twist): “Well, how do Irish girls get pregnant?"
Irishman (laughing): And you think the Irish are stupid!
An Irishman goes into a pub and orders a triple whiskey. He drinks it and prepares to leave.
“Just a minute,” says the landlord. “You haven’t paid for your drink yet.”
The Irishman retorts: “Well, did you pay for it?” “Of course,” says the landlord.
“Well then, what’s the sense in both of us paying for the same drink?”
How do you tell the sex of chromosomes? Take down their genes! 
______________________________________________________________________________
Mike Marshall 
I am Big Lin’s husband. A retired college lecturer with a PhD in Philosophy, we have been together for twenty-two years and have been married for nineteen years now.
We have three children, a son and two daughters. For many years I have been working on my philosophical magnum opus but somehow it never seems to get finished!
The Fallacy of Atheism
Let me begin by making it plain that I am not arguing in favour of religious belief, either in general or in favour of a particular variant of religion. It is however foolish to make dogmatic assertions that go beyond either evidence or logic. Both atheists and religious believers are far too prone to make that mistake.
For a statement to be true two conditions must apply. One is a ‘necessary’ condition. The statement must not be counter-factual. The second is a ‘sufficient’ condition. The support for the statement must be either logically irrefutable or demonstrably a universal fact.
God is a category on which even believers can rarely agree. Which model of God is the atheist rejecting? God as an old man in the stars with a white beard? God as universal energy? Is he or she rejecting the idea of a single divine being? What of the Trinity? What of polytheism?
Whatever answer an atheist gives to these questions is a purely passive response. Whatever form his or her rejection of God’s existence takes is entirely dependent on his or her acceptance of the categories of theism and, in particular, of monotheism.
Atheism, like chastity, is defined purely in terms of what it is not. To state that you do not believe in God means – what exactly?
I am now going to inject a little (perhaps pawky) humour into this article. People, at least over a certain age, state confidently ‘Father Christmas/Santa Claus does not exist.’
On what basis do they make this claim? The impossibility of one man travelling around the world from Lapland on Christmas Eve? The fact that parents and others give presents on Christmas Day?
Let us consider the evidence. Even a cursory examination will show many men with white beards, red robes and other accoutrements handing out presents in public. Each one claims to be Father Christmas/Santa Claus.
Empirically, those who doubt the existence of Father Christmas stand refuted by the overwhelming presence and visibility of these men claiming to be Father Christmas.
To deny the existence of these men is to enter a delusional universe in which even abundant concrete proof cannot shift the delusion.
The rational conclusion to an unprejudiced mind is obvious. There are many Father Christmases and not simply one. Their multiplicity may refute the ‘monotheistic’ view of deniers but the denial that any Father Christmases exist is counter-factual, irrational and superstitious. An ‘atheist’ approach to the existence of Father Christmas is, quite simply, false to the facts and nothing more than superstition!
I have chosen a rather flippant example of how polytheism is truer to our experience of life – which is inherently pluralistic – than either monotheism or atheism. Being true to our experience is of course neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for a proposition to entail a truth value. I hope though that my frivolous example will show atheists why they, like theists, need to be less dogmatic. Neither believers nor disbelievers have a sufficient basis to assert that their opinions constitute facts about the world.
It is no more a fact to say that God – or Gods – do not exist than it is to say that God or Gods do exist. Both statements go beyond the available evidence and are equally expressions of opinion – acts of faith.
Both theists and atheists tend to suffer from similar misapprehensions. Atheists are overwhelmingly as wedded as theists to the notion of a privileged place for humans on Earth and indeed the universe as a whole.
Jacques Monod, for instance, waxes positively lyrical about humans and uses language that could easily come from any ‘sacred’ book. In spite of the evidence from biology, zoology, anthropology and even sociology, most atheists are wedded to the delusions of humanism.
They believe in the myths of free choice, the reduction of everything to concepts and terms that humans are able to understand, the myth of ‘salvation’ either through technology or (in the case of ‘Green’ humanists) a neo-Luddite reversion to a subsistence level. All these dreams are nothing more than futile illusions.
Humans are not a privileged, special group but simply the most successful, predatory, rapacious and cruel species of animal on earth. We are animals even though humanists persist in imagining that we are more than animals.
Atheism, like theism, springs from a cosmic hubris. Just as theists cannot bear the idea that a supreme being is not caring for them, so too atheists cannot bear the thought that he/she/it is.
Once again we see how atheism is entirely defined by theism. It is simply its mirror image and, like its imagined adversary, defines itself on the basis of a presumed special status.
We humans know next to nothing about the world we inhabit. It is far too presumptuous of us to make assertions of knowledge on matters which we neither do nor, probably, can know.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Linda Marshall
Polarization in Modern Politics
As the years go by it becomes obvious that some dystopian visions of the past – particularly Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World – were prophecies of the times to come.
I am increasingly struck by the truth of the words of Yeats in his poem The Second Coming which he wrote with Europe under the shadow of Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini and Franco.
Line after line resonates powerfully with me.
“The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity,”
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold. Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”
“Everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned.”
For many years there was a broad consensus in democratic countries about certain fundamental principles which were first formulated clearly during the Enlightenment and became the basis of liberal political philosophy. The guiding principles were freedom, tolerance and fairness. Every one of them has come under attack in recent years and not from a single source either. Political extremists of the right and left; religious extremists of every faith; those who want to impose social and cultural norms on us; the advocates of gung-ho unrestrained capitalism who care only for enriching themselves and their shareholders; the advocates of a so-called socialism who want to oppress and exploit others in the name of their mythical equality; radical feminists who seem to view men in the same light as the Nazis did Jews; the flagrant and largely unopposed growth of anti-Semitism to the point where it is now almost respectable to demonize the Jews; the ecofascists seeking to impoverish the majority of the people of the world and make the poor even poorer in their quest for a fantasy Garden of Eden world.
Our time has spawned these monsters and it is our duty to stand up against oppression whatever the source. It is terrifying to see the extent to which politics has become totally polarized. In some quarters everyone to the left of Genghis Khan is a Communist while in others everyone to the right of Trotsky is a fascist.
The process has been going on for at least twenty years or so but in Britain the Brexit debate first brought it to the surface. Remainers denounced Leavers in the worst and most patronising and contemptuous terms, branding them as stupid, racists, xenophobic, ignorant and worse. Corbyn’s time as leader of the Labour Party brought the issue of anti-Semitism to the fore as he cheerfully shared platforms with speakers who had openly called for “death to the Jews.”
In America the Trump-Clinton contest brought a similar venom into the open. Trump’s rhetoric was deliberately designed to appeal to prejudice
and Clinton not only failed to deal with him effectively but added her own fuel to the fire.
Since then US politics has become even more polarized and paranoid. Both left and right seems to believe the worst possible fantasies about their opponents and the whole meaning of words like liberal and conservative has been completely lost. In the States you see Marxists like Michael Moore pretending to be liberals while on the other side of the fence you see anyone with the remotest commitment to freedom, tolerance and fairness being denounced as a Communist.
Sadly I can’t see any prospect of things improving. We now have a generation of youngsters who get their ‘news’ from Tick Tock and similar ‘organs’ rather than direct experience or serious research. Even the older generation have become entrenched in the propaganda so relentlessly poured out by the mainstream media and the ‘alternative’ media.
I have to hope that somehow the future will cure these problems but at the moment I’m in a state of deep despair as I survey the contemporary political landscape.
“The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”
“And what rough beast, its hour come round at last slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”
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For the Lost Children
by Linda Marshall
Columbine wreathes itself around
a Sandy Hook
all of the children once living now dead
they never got to sing their songs
write their forever unpublished books
true, they will never be beaten or raped
spend time in stir
but their ghosts still whisper in the wind
and will never leave the hearts of those
for whom conscience is more than a word
I hear them calling out, their pain as real
as the victims of Auschwitz, Cambodia, Rwanda,
they will never give birth to the next generation
of babies sucking at their mothers’ breasts
their lives were stolen away:
are there enough tears left to drown the liars
with their smug hypocritical sanctimonious crap?
whose rights matter more?
the ‘right’ of some wimp who’s having a bad day
to waste the fragrant beauty, unrealised hopes
they floated on their boat of dreams
or the lives of the innocent, murdered by cowards?
I accuse the NRA
and all who think their ‘right’ to silence love
matters more than the children’s right to life
you stand condemned
as cowards, approvers of murder,
terrorist scum, fit only for prison
or the gallows
you can deny and lie all you like:
God above – like decent folk below –
sees through your self-serving lies.
if there is a hell, that’s where you’re going
‘suffer the children’ –
by God, the NRA
makes sure they suffer, and die.
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An 86-year-old veteran undergoing chemotherapy raised £108,000 in just 48 hours
after a chance meeting on a train propelled his fundraising into the spotlight.
Jeffrey Long from Yorkshire had planned to walk 86 miles along the Thames on his 86th birthday (31 October) to raise £1000 for the Royal British Legion.
But the pensioner, who was in the Parachute Regiment and has an MBE for his charity work, has now smashed his original target one hundred times over.
On Monday, Jeffrey boarded a train at Windsor railway station on his way to the starting point of his river walk, when he met Paula Modeste, 46, from South London.
The NHS manager started talking to Jeffrey about why he was wearing full combat gear, and after hearing about his birthday plans and the £80 he had raised so far,
she took a selfie and posted it to her Twitter and Facebook page.
Paula said: “I put it on Facebook and Twitter knowing that my friends are a good lot and I kept seeing more notifications.”
And, in a chance happening, comedian Jason Manford then spotted Paula’s post and shared it with his 240,000 followers.
The JustGiving page has since received donations from over 15,000 individuals sending the total skyrocketing from £300 to £108,000 in just 24 hours.
When Jeffrey heard the news from a friend in Bradford, he cried: “What can I say, words are inadequate here.”
This isn’t the first walk that Jeffrey has done - to celebrate his 84th birthday he walked the 84 miles of Hadrian’s Wall and for his 85th birthday he walked 85 miles along the Leeds and Liverpool canal - but he says this is the hardest so far.
He explained: “I broke my ankle a few years ago, and that’s been playing up along with my hamstring.
“Plus, I’m currently on chemo treatment as my doctor found that I’m producing too many platelets, so I’m in danger of getting a blood clot. The chemo does make you tired, not as good as you were.”
On his JustGiving page, Jeffrey writes: “The Royal British Legion is at the heart of a national network that supports our Armed Forces through thick and thin - ensuring their unique contribution is never forgotten.”
“The money raised through this page will go towards ensuring that the Legion can continue to assist the Armed Forces Community with a broad range of services from debt advice to Admiral Nurses and Care Homes.”
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Did you know?
There really is such a thing as a money tree. The only trouble is, money doesn’t grow on it!
In Japan, letting a sumo wrestler make your baby cry is considered good luck. ...
The African cicada fly sleeps for 17 years, wakes for just two weeks, mates and then dies.
In Rome, a man would swear on his genitals before testifying.
The lion costume in 'The Wizard of Oz' was made from real lions.
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Two Irishmen, Paddy and Paddy, went out one day and each bought a pig.
When they got home, Paddy turned to Paddy and said, "Paddy, me ol' mate, how
we gonna tell who owns which fookin' pig?
Paddy says "Well Paddy, I'll cut one a ta' ears off
my fookin' pig, and ten we can tell 'em apart"
"Ah tat'd be grand" says Paddy.
This worked fine until a couple of weeks later when Paddy stormed into the house.
"Paddy" he said "Your fookin' pig has chewed the ear offa' my fookin' pig. Now we got
two fookin' pigs with only one ear each. How we gonna tell who owns which fookin' pig?"
"Well Paddy" said Paddy "I'll cut ta other ear off my fookin' pig.
Ten we'll av two fookin' pigs and only one of them will avan ear"
"Ah tat'd be grand" says Paddy.
Again this worked fine until a couple of weeks later when Paddy again stormed
into the house. "Paddy" he said "Your fookin' pig has chewed the other ear offa'
my fookin' pig. Now we got two fookin' pigs with no fookin' ears!" "How we gonna'
tell who owns which fookin' pig?"
"Ah tis is serious, Paddy" said Paddy "I'll tell ya what I'll do.
I'll cut ta tail offa' my fookin' pig, ten we'll av two fookin' pigs
with no fookin' ears and only one fookin' tail."
"Ah tat'd be grand" says Paddy.
Another couple of weeks went by, and you guessed it, Paddy stormed into
the house once more. "PADDY!" shouted Paddy "YOUR FOOKIN' PIG HAS
CHEWED THE FOOKIN' TAIL OFFA' MY FOOKIN' PIG AND NOW WE GOT
TWO FOOKIN'' PIGS WITH NO FOOKIN' EARS AND NO FOOKIN' TAILS !!
HOW ARE WE EVER GONNA FOOKIN' TELL 'EM APART?!"
"Ah fook it!" says Paddy "How's about you have the black one, and I'll have the white one."
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MEMBER INTERVIEW___________________________________________
Justbec!
___________________________________________
Our justbec is a longtime member, and global moderator. She has a nice home in a nice place. CLICK!
She posted a really cool live cam of an eagle's nest I've enjoyed. (They had babies!) CLICK!
And we'd like to know more. Let's listen! - Hunny
Tell us how you discovered the internet, and a brief history of where you've been online.
I discovered the internet probably 20 years ago through my work. At the time I was a Huge New York Met fan and I found this tiny forum dedicated to talking Mets baseball.
Back then forums were just getting started. I joined and was immediately hooked. From there I traveled to 'Ezboard' which later became Yuku. I had a board on both but eventually moved
to Runboard where I have been for 10 years now. Yes, I am a cyberholic.
Tell us about your family
I am from a fairly small family as is my husband. I have 2 older brothers who are both married. 2 nieces and a Nephew and I'm also a Great Aunt. My mother passed away
9 years ago so there's just my father left. Fortunately we are close by now and able to see him often. My only kids are the fur baby kind but that is fine with us. CLICK!
Tell us some favorite advice or lesson you got along the way?
That's a tough one. I'm pretty laid back and not a big philosopher. The only advice I ever give is not to let people get you down, especially ones in cyberspace. I have seen a lot of cruelty online and I used to let it really get to me. When I call someone a friend I mean it. I don't have to meet you face to face.
I've come to realize that a lot of people in cyberspace don't always mean what they say..
What are your hobbies?
My number one hobby are my animals. A huge portion of my day is spent doing something with them.
I also enjoy designing forums, not really running them but designing backgrounds and stuff.
Do you play sports?
No, I am not a very athletic person, not even as a kid. I do enjoy watching though. 
Did you get into trouble as a kid? Any stories you can tell?
.. No not really, I was a pretty boring kid actually. Oh sure once I was in my teens I drove too fast, drank on Friday and Saturday nights with friends out somewhere the cops wouldn't find us... but I never really broke any laws.. other than drinking under age. LOL
Do you like to cook?
Yes I do, especially now that I am retired and have more time. I love finding new recipes to try.
I just recently learned how to make fresh bagels and bread. Baking has never come easy for me.
What are your favorite material possessions?
I'm a bit odd there.. I'm not super sentimental so material things don't mean a whole lot to me. That said, if I had to pick something it would be my 'Monster Figures'.
I love gothic stuff and have a collection that includes Dracula, Frankenstein, the Mummy and several Dragon and vampire things.
What type of entertainment do you like best?
Music, I love all types except Rap and punk. Classic Rock is my favorite though.
Do you have any funny or strange tales to tell, things that happened along the way?
I honestly can't think of any. Well funny maybe. Driving home from work one night in New York we were stuck in traffic as usual. I looked over at the car next to us and
there was the driver.. a man in his 30's I guess, with an 'Animal' puppet (The Muppet) on his hand. He was singing and talking to the puppet like it was real. He saw me
and just waved and kept right on singing with his puppet.
If there is one thing you are absolutely passionate about, what is it?
That is easy. Supporting our Troops, not only those away from home but those that have come home as well. We as a country do NOT do enough
for our men and women of the Military. We will send billions and billions to other countries yet our Veterans struggle to find work and homes.
What is your proudest achievement?
Being a part of Soldier's Angels. I volunteered with them for over 10 years and in that time I sponsored seven soldiers,
including a K9 soldier and his dog and a Navy SEAL. I sponsored each soldier for a year and some I kept in touch with for much longer.
What is your greatest disappointment?
Not getting to move to Minnesota before my mother died. She was so excited when we bought land here and wanted us to move so badly.
Unfortunately at the time we still had to work and it wasn't possible to move. She died 5 years before we started to build.
What would you like to change about your life if you could go back in time?
Nothing, and I don't mean that to sound pompous or anything. I just feel you have a life to live and that's what you do. Were there things that I regret?
Sure but I learned from those regrets, disappointments and even failures. Going back and changing something would have changed my present and future
as well and frankly, I kind of like my life just the way it is.
__________________________________________________________________
Donna Barber
Married, with five children - two sons and three daughters -
Donna works part-time as an office cleaner, loves the
countryside, West Ham United Football Club and politics.
In her spare time she writes as much as she can as well as
running three yahoo groups, four blogs and three other forums!
Anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism, in spite of the lies told by some groups or individuals, is racism. It is hatred of Jews simply for being Jews and is as indefensible as hating blacks, Pakistanis or any other group of people just because of their ethnicity or skin colour.
Because most Jews are white (some are olive-coloured and the Falashas of course are black) it’s easy for them to get overlooked by anti-racists. Sadly, it’s not just a problem on the far right. The left has a long history of anti-Semitism which seems to be dominating the British Labour Party at the moment.
The British Jewish writer Louis Golding (why do I even have to mention his Jewishness rather than just say ‘the British writer?’) wrote a book in 1937 called ‘The Jewish Problem.’ His first chapter is called ‘The Gentile Problem’ and as Golding rightly says it would have been a more accurate title for the whole book.
After Auschwitz most of the world hung its head in shame and anti-Semitism, at least in the West, was confined to the lunatic fringe. The sixties saw a slight revival in anti-Semitism, both on the political left and the far right. Really, though, it was not till the twenty-first century that it became a major problem in the West for the first time since Hitler’s death.
There are two main ‘versions’ of the anti-Semitic myth. One is based on religion and is (at least in Britain) more common among fundamentalist black Christians or IS/Al-Qaida/Hezbollah-oriented Muslims. The other version is ‘secular.’
Secular anti-Semites can be divided into straightforward racists (the type that hates all non-whites and all foreigners), right-wingers who still believe that virtually everything a government does is ‘socialism’ and ‘communism,’ left-wingers who see Jews as behind some vast international capitalist conspiracy (usually the Rothschilds, Goldman Sachs and so on) and Strasserite Nazis who cling to the Nazi myth that ‘Jews’ are ‘behind’ and ‘the secret masters of’ both ‘communism’ and ‘socialism’ as well as ‘high finance capitalism.’
Much as I dislike Tony Blair, he was no racist. Under his leadership, Gordon Brown’s and the Jewish atheist Ed Milliband anti-Semitism was not tolerated in the Labour Party. With the unexpected victory of Jeremy Corbyn in the Labour leadership election that changed.
Corbyn has a long history of associating with often vicious anti-Semites and although occasionally some of the worst excesses of his racist supporters are reluctantly condemned by him he has never gone beyond words.
Corbyn managed to address the Labour Friends of Israel without once mentioning the word Israel when he spoke to them. This was in spite of repeated calls from the meeting for him to do so. His associates include people who have openly called for Jews to be murdered and not a word of condemnation has passed his lips.
A woman in Bradford was shortlisted for a council vacancy in spite of a disgusting message she had posted in which she declared that ‘every fu***ng Jew that died in the Holocaust deserved to die.’ The anger caused by her comments meant that she was dropped from the list of candidates but this sort of situation should never have arisen.
In America lesbian ‘feminists’ refused to allow Jewish lesbians to wear a Star of David on their march yet they allowed other groups to wear religious symbols. For all the dishonesty of the event’s organizers, they were shown up as conscious racists and eventually forced to issue a half-hearted and insincere apology.
The supposedly anti-racist black politicians Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have made several racist and anti-Semitic remarks. Perhaps their two most notorious were complaining that Obama was ‘not black enough’ and calling New York ‘Hymietown.’
And of course Holocaust denial is growing. It’s still mainly a far-right mental disorder and I have to give the present leader of Iran credit for firmly recognising the Holocaust and for condemning it. But as most Holocaust denial literature is now funded by the Saudi royal family its influence will probably spread at least among the Wahhabis.
In some of the terrorist attacks in France Jews were singled out for murder. Not Israelis; Jews. That alone gives the lie to the double-talkers who shout loudly ‘I’m not anti-Jewish, I’m anti-Zionist.’ Well, so are lots of Israelis and Jews, if it comes to that. But you don’t get them saying ‘push Israel into the sea’ or ‘death to the Jews.’ People who say things like that are just racist scum and clearly anti-Semitic.
I am half-Jewish; my mother married a Gentile and converted to Christianity. Under Nazi ‘laws’ I’d be called a ‘Mischling.’ Under those law I and my mother – and my five children – would have been murdered simply because of our ethnicity.
Anti-Semitism isn’t some forgotten sickness in the past. It’s real, it’s here and now and it has to be fought to death!
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Deyana’s Canada
Some years back I found myself living in The Okanagan Valley.
A beautiful part of Canada you may not have heard of before now.
Here is a general map of the area.
Boasting 84% of the province’s vineyard acreage, The Okanagan Valley is British Columbia’s premier grape-growing region.
With an ever-changing panorama, the valley stretches over 250 kilometres, across sub-regions,
each with distinct soil and climate conditions suited to growing a range of varietals, from sun-ripened reds to lively fresh and often crisp whites.
With quiet family-run boutique vineyards, to world-class operations, the Okanagan Valley wineries are rich in tradition and character
consistently ranking among the world’s best at international competitions.
I have a lot of personal memories of my years living in this part of Canada. The beaches, the orchards, the mountains, it has it all really.
The population more than doubles during the summer months, due to so many tourists coming into the small sleepy towns.
During the winter it's quiet and peaceful.Some photos of the Valley
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GIBBY'S CORNER
"The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" by Mark Haddon
A book review
This is classed as a children's book, but has become a popular one with adults too. It's one of those books you can pick up and read quickly. I read it over 2 days. You don't want to put it down!
"Outstanding...a stunningly good read."
"Mark Haddon's portrayal of an emotionally dissociated mind is a superb achievement. Wise and bleakly funny"
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is a murder mystery novel like no other. The detective, and narrator, is Christopher Boone.
Christopher is fifteen and has Asperger's Syndrome. He knows a very great deal about maths, and very little about human beings.
He loves lists, patterns and the truth. He hates the colours yellow and brown and being touched. He has never gone further than the end of the road
on his own, but when he finds a neighbour's dog murdered he sets out on a terrifying journey which will turn his whole world upside down."
I was first attracted to this book by its unusual title, and then when I saw the subject matter I wanted to know more.
As the story progresses Christopher finds out more clues that link to real life issues that are going on in Christopher's life and involve his family.
It was interesting to learn how people with Asperger's Syndrome have this affinity with numbers, and when Christopher becomes stressed or upset
he resorts to solving number puzzles or working out number problems in his head.
For example, he knows all the prime numbers up to 7507 and can work out the cube of 227 in his head!
It is a touching story and one that you won't forget easily once you have finished reading it.
I would rate it 10/10
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Definitive scientific evidence.
Cats are better than dogs!
COMIC QUOTES!
My Mom said she learned how to swim when someone took her out in the lake and threw her off the boat.
I said, “Mom, they weren’t trying to teach you how to swim.”
- Paula Poundstone
I think animal testing is a terrible idea. They get all nervous and give the wrong answers!
If vegetarians love animals so much, why do they eat all their food?
I was going to give you a nasty look but I see you already have one.
Some people have never had to struggle. They will never know what it’s like to
work on a farm until their hands are raw, just so people can have fresh marijuana.
I had never eaten dog before, and I didn’t intend to to start now.
“Just give me some more of the co-pilot”, I said, extending my plate.
If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down?
We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.
I think a good gift for the President would be a chocolate revolver. and since
he is so busy, you'd probably have to run up to him real quick and give it to him.
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The Italian man who went to Malta
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And now.. LOL Cats!
A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space.
He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.
This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be
to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.
― Albert Einstein
Feel free to leave comments, please!
Bits & Pieces
CONTRIBUTING STAFF
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I bb/coded and added filler. But it's what you each wrote which was wonderful! *applauds*
Oct 26, 2024 18:03:11 GMT
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Why don't monsters eat ghosts? .... They taste like sheet! 
Why don't monsters eat ghosts? .... They taste like sheet!