How can a toddler understand the changes that are going on between two adults’ lives? Looking from a toddler’s point of view, a divorce possibly means that usual routines may be affected, a loss of a playmate, a sense of attachment and trust broken and even possible a change in the main caregiver. As adults, we find ways and strategies to help ourselves cope with such transitions in life, but toddlers will need our intervention to help them make a positive adjustment, with as little implications as possible.
How is it that a toddler can recognize the change that has been going on? According to a Human Development and Family Studies specialist, Kim Leon, the first three years of life is when infants and toddlers grow quickly, become mobile, gain language, understand the world and form relationships. Because develop is both nature (genetic) and nurture (by the environment), a change of environment can create stress in them.
While younger toddlers will find it hard to see things from another person perspectives, but in relation to themselves and their needs, older toddlers are more aware of other’s feelings and may express themselves through words and play. Nevertheless, they will still find it hard to manage strong feelings like sadness and anger, and feelings of unsafe and stress. Some may end up displaying frequent shifts in emotional state, while others may show regression into earlier developmental stage. Toddlers may also withdraw from people, develop fears and even normal routine patterns change.
Divorce can be a stressful process, both for the adults and the child. Even so, the most important thing to do, as parents, is to provide that sense of security and structure that a toddler needs.
Toddlers need consistency to feel secure, and in the midst of the changes, it is crucial to ensure that toddlers do not get confused but continue to have consistent happenings in their lives. Here are some ideas of consistency:
Consistent daily routines: Daily routines should be kept as similar as it is to before. This may require additional effort by the parent caring for the toddler to ensure that little disruptions are made to what the toddler is regulated to.
Family rituals: Continue with family rituals that were established before (such as going to a park on a particular day of the week, or visits to grandparents on weekends etc.).
Develop new rituals: Create new rituals that the parent can do with the toddler on a regular basis, such as bedtime stories together.
From a developmental perspective, the first three years of infants and toddlers’ lives is important in developing strong sense of trust and attachments. Failure to meet this need will result in a sense of fear and belief that the world is inconsistent and unpredictable, with future implications. In order to ensure secure attachment, parents need to:
Respond to the toddlers needs in predictable, sensitive and affectionate ways. Despite the negative emotions that parents may experience in times of divorce, our emotions should never be vented at the toddlers.
Work with the other parent as much as possible, and in a best-case scenario, plan time with each parent on a regular basis.
Avoid having conflict before the toddler, because while the toddler may not understand what the conflict is about, they do pick up on the negative emotions and are likely to feel scared and confused.
While both parents may not have to do things the same way, it is important that they communicate and coordinate with regards to certain parenting issues and toddlers’ needs. If other caregivers are involved in the caring of the toddler, communicate with them as well to update them about the family changes.
The early years are when the toddler is developing self-help skills. In the event where the toddler gets to spend time with both parents, routines have to be kept as similar as possible, to ease their learning. For example, toilet training is easier if both parents agree on when and how to provide support for the toddler.
While your privacy should be respected, it is important that other caregivers are aware of the changes going on in the toddler’s life, so that they can provide support for the toddler, and in some cases, may even notice behavioural changes that you may be unaware of.
Despite the changes going on at home, every toddler has the right to know that they are still loved by both parents. Watch your toddler at play to understand how he/she is feeling and thinking, give time to your toddler in time of separations to say goodbye to you, allow your toddler to express emotions and acknowledge them.
Very often, mums or dads may experience a sense of guilt towards their children, and their parenting style may change, to become more strict or permissive. Some may react with a sense of need to compensate their absence through frequent gifts. This however, is not the best way to parent a toddler.
What a toddler really need is having reasonable and loving limits. Developmentally, toddlers do need clear and simple rules that are enforced in a consistent, calm and positive manner. By being too permissive, parents are actually hindering the toddlers’ development in self-regulation, self-control and emotional regulation. On the other hand, being too strict may result cause a toddler to feel a sense of shame, doubt and mistrust. Hence parents have to find a balance- set appropriate expectations, give appropriate choices for their toddlers and staying consistent.
A divorce can be a long and an emotional process. Though it may be difficult communicating with the other parent with regards to the child, continue to keep the focus on the child, remembering that ultimately your common goal is to ensure that the child will be able to ease through the period of transition and changes.
Reference to Kim Leon’s article on ‘Helping Infants and Toddlers Adjust to Divource’ has been made in parts of this article.
YouScrobble takes elements of Last.fm and Youtube and wraps them up in a neat package. What a shame that it’s almost certainly illegal.
YouScrobble is designed to make searching for music quick and easy. By combining Last.fm’s music database with YouTube’s library of music videos it creates a slick platform for finding and watching your favourites artists’ perform.
Because it’s pulling in data from Last.fm, not only does a search for a song reveal its video in an embedded YouTube player but you get an artist biography, photos and links similar artists.
Where YouScrobble drops the ball is by enabling downloads. Yes, each song has a ‘Download’ link you can click to get a free copy of the song downloaded to your hard drive.
“YouScrobble uses Last.fm and YouTube to satisfy your needs and is therefore fully legal!” shouts the front page. That’s not strictly true.
You see, the download YouScrobble gives you isn’t a fully authorised MP3. Instead it’s scraping the audio from the YouTube video and saving it as an MP3. There are countless scripts, apps and websites that already do this but it doesn’t mean they’re legal. While YouTube is authorised to stream music (including via embedded players on other sites) downloads are a completely different thing.
Aside from the legal issue, the downloads aren’t always what you might expect. I tried it with a song I already own and like – ‘See A Penny (Pick It Up)’ by obscure American act YACHT. Rather than give me an crystal clear MP3 of the original recording I got the audio from this bootleg video of a live performance of the song. Sure, sometimes you’ll get the recording you expect, but not always.
So, unauthorised downloads that will annoy rightsholders and an inconsistent quality level that will frustrate users. A poor combination, and one that’s amplified on both fronts when you realise that they’re limiting you to 15 downloads per day unless you pay between $4.99 and $14.99 to upgrade to 100, 200 or 500 songs per day. How much of that do you reckon is going to the artists and record companies?
Seriously, they’re playing with fire here. If I were them I’d be expecting a lawsuit any day. It’s a shame too; if the developers stuck to creating a better front-end for music discovery on YouTube they’d be onto a winner. Instead they’ve gone down the seedy route of scraping audio and charging for it.
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Build, Microsoft’s annual developer conference, just kicked off day two. Unlike day one, today featured a lot more consumer-facing tech worthy of talking about. From Mixed Reality, to a pretty badass way to create collaborative movies, Microsoft had a lot to show us.
As we pointed out previously, Microsoft recently committed to two annual updates. The next one was announced today: the Fall Creators Update. In it, we’ll see numerous changes, most of which we’ll talk about in more detail below.
A new clipboard feature that allows you to copy and paste links, images, and files between devices — sort of like Pushbullet.
Pick Up Where You Left Off, a feature like Apple’s ‘Continuity’ that allows you to start work on one device, and finish on another.
Microsoft today unveiled the long-rumored Project Neon. Now, though, it has a real name: Microsoft Fluent Design System, or ‘Fluent’ if you’re short on time.
The update isn’t an overhaul, but more a shift toward what’s possible as we move into designing for multiple platforms, including mixed reality. Fluent adds a variety of possibilities for UI design on Windows Apps, including:
Remember Movie Maker? Windows Story Remix is basically like that, only not at all like that. Story Remix brings the ability to create compelling visual content — complete with special effects, a soundtrack, and a social element that allows multiple people to contribute clips to a finished movie — for even the most novice of filmmakers.
We could tell you about it, but this gif — from a movie created in all of 30 seconds — sums it up way better than we ever could.
OneDrive was already insanely useful on Windows devices, but today’s announcement of Files On-Demand, you can squeeze even more utility out of the popular cloud storage platform.
The system lets you see all your OneDrive files in Windows 10’s File Explorer before you download them, so you can work as if each was stored on your device. For enterprise users, there’s an additional benefit: when you update a shared file, it’s now synced automatically across all devices on the account. So now, each of your colleagues has a freshly synced version of the file you recently saved, and it’s all available in File Explorer without digging through OneDrive itself.
Timeline is a feature that allows you to search a visual history of work you’ve previously done. If you’re working on a spreadsheet at home, and have to skip over to a PDF from your computer at work, you can now search a visual timeline to find the document you had opened earlier in the day. Or, if you’re old-school, a simple keyword-based search can pull up what you were looking for from days-earlier.
For a Mac parallel, it’s essentially Time Machine, only not for backups, but for actual work. It’s an approach that lets you begin working, playing, or reading one device, and finish on another — laptop, mobile, tablet, or perhaps even the HoloLens one day.
In the demo, the presenter copied an address from the desktop, and pasted Google Maps info to a Samsung Galaxy S8 without any type of work-around that PC users have been relying on for this type of functionality. Better, the feature works in SwiftKey, the ever-so-amazing Microsoft mobile keyboard.
Windows users could already access iTunes, but now it’s coming directly to the Windows store. I’m not sure it’s worth getting excited about iTunes, as any Apple user can tell you, but the initiative to work cross-device and bring Apple Music and additional iPhone support is commendable.
As any developer can tell you, debugging code is a major pain in the ass. Xamarin’s new Live Player aims to change all that by making debugging apps as simple as scanning a QR code.
Instead of scanning thousands of lines of code, running emulators, and installing bloated SDK’s, developers can now install an app on their Android or iOS device, scan a QR code, and debug an app with the click of a button. The code is then immediately deployed into the Live player app for testing.
Microsoft today announced its first Mixed Reality motion controller for the HoloLens (and other) headsets. The controllers look a lot like a marriage between the Oculus and Vive controllers already in existence, and require no external tracking hardware in order to follow your movements.
The controllers are coming later this year and are set to be bundled with an Acer Mixed Reality headset for $399.
If you’re the type of person who likes nothing more than sharing their entire life through social networks, you may like this little experimental music project.
Track Me was conceived by Brooklyn-based band Riot !n Paris. The rock/hip-hop collective will be creating personalized songs based on strangers’ social media profiles – every day for four weeks.
Riot !n Paris will hit the studio to write, record and release new tracks based on what you broadcast about yourself on Facebook, Twitter and elsewhere.
The way it works is simple – you visit riottrackme.com and hit the Track Me button to ask the band to check out your tweets, posts, comments, likes, photos, and everything in between. I guess if you look interesting enough, the band will get to work and you’ll have your own personalized song.
To kick off the experiment, Riot !n Paris made a few examples based on some of their favorite social media personalities – check out Fox’s Mike Woods‘ song here:
A Convicted Thief and Failed Asylum Seeker From Guinea, with a deportation order, jailed for Jumping on Bonnet of Patrol Car in Limerick City | The Occident
Mr Baah, who has lived in Ireland for more than a decade, is well known to the gardai as he gets into difficulty when he drinks.
He has been in the direct provision system for some time and is the subject of a deportation order, which has never been executed.
Having considered the matter, and noting the sentence that was imposed in Dublin, Judge O’Marian O’Leary imposed one month prison sentences in relation to each of the Limerick offences.
UK Army Captured By Muslim Council of Britain! Soldiers Disciplined for Selfie With Tommy Robinson! »
Some time ago, I read a New York Times article on the artist Patrick Dougherty, who lives in North Carolina and works all over the world. You can read the article here. Dougherty weaves tree saplings into the most amazing structures, like giant jars, or people made out of twigs, or houses that look as though they came out of fairy tales, all looking askew and windblown. There is something magical about them. You can see pictures of his installations on his website.
And then, some time later, I was given a postcard with a painting by Julie Heffernan. I’ve loved her paintings since I saw the cover of the Fantastic Women issue of Tin House. You can find a number of her paintings here and here and here. They will, at least, give you a sense of how she combines traditional techniques with a contemporary but fantastical sensibility.
Dougherty and Heffernan are such different artists, and yet in them I find a fundamental similarty: they are both there, on the border, in that space I want to inhabit. Their art is both traditional and modern, fantastical and realistic. And that’s where I want to be, that’s where I think the excitement is. How do I do that? I’m not sure yet. I think some of my stories are there, for example “Singing of Mount Abora.” And now I think about it, the stories that are there, on that border, are the stories I later think are the most effective, the ones most representative of who I am and what I do. “The Rose in Twelve Petals,” “Pip and the Fairies,” “Singing of Mount Abora,” those sorts of stories.
Am I writing those sorts of stories? I think I am, more and more, as I discover who I am as a writer. It’s taken a long time to discover that, and it’s certainly still a process, still something I engage in with every story. I’m still trying to figure out who Theodora Goss is, exactly. The hardest thing, sometimes, is to see yourself. It’s like looking into a mirror. What you see in a mirror isn’t really your face, but all the ideas you have about your face, how it looks today compared to the other times you’ve seen it, how you wish it looked. Also all the ideas you have about how your face doesn’t look. It’s a wonder we can see clearly enough to brush our hair.
With every story now, I try to find that place where it is me writing, where I am doing whatever it is I do with a story. It’s so clear that Dougherty and Heffernan have found that place for themselves: they are both so distinctive, they could not be mistaken for anyone else. Some of my favorite writers are like that. I think I could tell a Kelly Link, a Ted Chiang, a Catherynne Valente within a paragraph. (I can tell, too, when someone else is doing Kelly Link. It’s that distinctive.) I’m not sure my writing is that distinctive; sometimes, I can’t hear my own writing any more clearly than I can see my own face. But I am trying to figure out what it is I do, and do it. As hard as I can.
And it’s there, on that border, with saplings twisted into fairy tale houses, or women whose ball gowns are made of flowers and slain waterfowl.
I had a discussion about prayer with a few individuals online that brought up some interesting ideas, this is just part of that conversation. It all started when this statement was made:
Person A “Any of us who tweet or post “prayers” for people in tragedy and do not follow through on them are in sin. Any of us who merely tweet or post “thoughts” going out to people in tragedy are painfully mistaken. And any of us who broadly dismiss the honest prayers for people in tragedy are tragically blind to true power.”
Now this first statement seemed pretty straight forward to me and a rather truthful statement as well but the conversation that ensued brought up some interesting questions about prayer.
Person B “Just making the statement “you are in my prayers” requires the conscious thought in reference and affirmation [of] a higher power and if sincere IS in essence ……a prayer”
If someone has a prayer request and you say to them “You are in my prayers”, because you think it, agree with what they are saying, and have a relationship with God, because God knows your thoughts, you in essence just prayed. Let us continue…
Me “Person B, your statement is an interesting one, at first thought I’ll admit it sounded like a cop-out to actually taking the time to say a specific prayer but when I thought about it, I’m wondering if there could be a little something to that statement…”
Person A “Not sure that I agree with that person B. Tacitly referring to a higher power and affirming the existence of a higher power is not in essence communicating with that higher power. Prayer is directed to God. Telling someone “you are in my prayers” is directed toward that person. Also, what is the content of this “prayer” when you say “you are in my prayers”? It seems rather vacuous. In other words, when you say “you are in my prayers”, what are you actually praying for or about on behalf of that person?”
Person B “If a person is in your thoughts even and you have a personal relationship with God – any conscious thought of that person while thinking of God would be as sincere and direct a petition to God as any plastic prayer one could muster.
One could go to church and pray every prayer in the book standing or kneeling or arms raised….it matters not.
I would say the almighty needs not for you to do that. Your own relationship with God and your conscious and heartfelt sincere thought is enough. …”
Person A “…When you say “my prayers are with you,” there is no specific petition attached to that, and that is directed at the person and not to God. Prayers can be communicated all sorts of ways, but there must actually be a communication, which implies specific content. So, I’m not sure in what sense simply saying it makes it true…”
So, what is being presented now is that saying you will pray for someone is not a prayer because prayer is a conversation between you and God, but that conversation has not happened yet when you simply tell someone you will pray for them. A valid point.
Person B “Do you believe God knows your intent? God has grasp of your conscience? God is aware of your conscious and subconscious? That God knows exactly what you are thinking?”
Person B “I agree that if you say that (with intent to pray) and never pray- you’re right (right about not praying being a sin). However if you have a conscious contact with God- and you tell someone you will keep them in your prayers- God can take it from there- you just prayed.”
Me “The one point that has not been specifically brought up is that the Bible, and Jesus Himself, commands us to pray specific prayers beyond just agreeing with others needs. The agreement is basically the amen part of the prayer. I personally think that person B is onto something if the comment to someone’s request for prayer was “amen” because that implies “I hear your need, I agree with you and stand with you and believe God’s will will be done.” But if someone were to say “I’m praying” since the Bible is clear on what prayer is, that person should actually take the time to say a prayer.”
Person B “If God already knows your specific content whether it be verbalized or not- what need there be for an Amen. God already knows you are in agreement. God already knows if you’re NOT in agreement!!”
So one last point I would like to make is that by this logic, one could argue that prayer is not needed at all. If God knows all and is all powerful, then who are we to think that making requests to God in prayer will make any difference?
Well, the problem with this line of thinking is that, like I brought up in the conversation, the Bible and Jesus Himself commands us to pray. Prayer is for our benefit not Gods and is specifically defined. Prayer allows us to grow closer to God, and while God is unchanging by nature with His immutability and impassibility, we can change, so the outcome of a situation can change because we pray.
Did God make a mistake in making men on the earth? Did he change his mind about his creation? If he was grieved in his heart, does that mean he has changing emotions the same way we have changing emotions?
The simple answer is that God does not change, we do. God is holy and we are not. When sin enters the picture, God must act, he is unchanging in this way. So the same principle can be applied to prayer. While we cannot change God’s mind, I believe prayer can move God to act in ways we cannot fully understand and no matter what, prayer lets us become more intimate with the one who made us, we can draw closer to him through our prayers. Who wouldn’t want that?
The below blog shows us how rampant Third World immigration (particularly muslim) is bringing problems and demands to pull Western countries back to the Dark Ages laws and mores.
This blog and shows that Canada is experiencing a similar negative impact from muslim immigration as are the UK, Europe and also the USA. Wherever muslims congregate they make problems for the indigenous populations. Yet, our governments insist upon inflicting them, en masse, upon us causing the contortion of our lives and the destruction of our traditions and culture all in the futile effort to keep from "offending muslims".
Offending muslims or (the myth of) Islamophobia have been placed in the same level as the term "racist" - in fact they have become synonymous primarly due to dhimmi politicians, Western hating multiculturalists & media elites and, of course, muslim apologists. This occurs even though muslims are not a race - a fact the mainstream media occasionally trots out - when it suits their purposes. How many times have we read or heard someone preface a comment or statement of clear fact regarding muslims or any minority group with "I'm not a racist, but......"?
Never before has one word been (mis) used to cower so many as the word "racist" and to force people from speaking the truth (about Islam).
“It is unfair to depict us Muslims as potential terrorists.” “I am so upset that people avoid me in public or stare at me just because I wear a hijab.” “Why is it we Muslims can’t just be treated like anyone else?” “The border authorities are obviously stopping me because they are racially profiling me.” “It is pure racism; all Americans and Canadians are racists, just because we are different; you people think it is OK to insult our religion; but you wouldn’t allow anyone to insult your religion?” “We are not all Jhihadists, you know.”
More and more we become depressed with Muslim complaints about how they are wrongly depicted in North America. Many of these complaints about our open societies come from Muslim leadership, rational or radical, but we also have to bear them from countless ordinary Muslim men and women. The latter complainants are almost always levied by those who insist on deliberately flaunting their religious dress in all public places at all times and insist on challenging our laws to accommodate their peculiarities.
Tears appear as they cry that we are unfairly “Islaphobic,” (a new buzz word supposedly meaning an irrational and prejudicial view towards the believers of Islam). We are said to be racist, discourteous, unwilling to accept differences and labeled with a hundred other unpleasant names. “We are after all, Canadians just like everyone else,” they insist.
We are told that Muslims don’t like our dress, our laws, our religion, our form of dating, and our form of marriage relationships. They cannot stand the idea of a family member marrying outside their religion.
None of their home countries, where Islam is in the majority, are free and democratic yet they still push everywhere to institute their religious law in one form or other in the West. Frankly, we have yet to see a western non-Muslim suicide bomber? Or a western wife executed by the State for being found in a car with a strange man. Or a western daughter killed by her father for disobeying her father by dating a non-Muslim schoolmate.
In many countries across the Islamic world, the execution and murder of Christians are regular occurrences, either because they have converted from Islam or were said to have tried to convert Muslims to Christianity. Frankly, Christianity gave up that game back in the 16th century. We were very good at burning people at the stake for some 350 years. But eventually we learned that priests and learned men can be very cruel and unjust in the name of the Almighty.
It is aggravating to witness Muslims insisting on moving here and indulging themselves in the luxuries of the West, its educational institutions and its freedoms, while isolating themselves from their non-Muslim neighbours to the extent that they are building new insular Muslim communities across the country, designed to encourage and promote their tribal Muslim lifestyles. “I feel so comfortable living with my own kind,” one young lady was heard to say. Really, then please do consider going to another country because we really don’t want neighbours that cannot relate comfortably with us because of their religion or lifestyles. We do get upset at all those crocodile tears.
To be fair, Muslims are not alone in bringing unfortunate traits to the West or to this country. Not so long ago, we were a relatively peaceful society. Not filled with habits and practices that were totally unacceptable to Canadians. We have had a plane blown out of the sky by Sikh extremists; Kirpans (religious knives) in the schools; turbans in our RCMP and Christian traditions abused.
Coffins are now paraded week after week, filled with the corpses of young Black teens and children whose deaths in one way or other are the result of a completely alien drug trade that scarcely existed before their parent’s arrival. To say nothing of the murders and beatings of ordinary citizens who have been unluckily in the wrong place at the wrong time. Immigrant groups such as these add little to our society and much to our social deconstruction.
There are of course many fine people, the majority of those who come from the ethnic groups referred to, but unfortunately the few unfairly tarnish the reputation of the many. Those of us who have lived here long before these mass arrivals of different cultures have had to witness these many negative changes. There is little we have been able to do to change things for the better. We have been bullied by our governments into keeping quiet for fear of being penalized; by name calling, and by much unfair denigration.
We are told by our government that the reason for all this mayhem of improper and incompatible immigrant intake is because we must grow our population in order to pay government pensions to our old and provide workers for our continued economic expansion. This is total nonsense, espoused by half-baked international socialist utopians and damn poor mathematicians.
In actuality, all it would require to halt this unnecessary massive immigration would be to produce one-half more children per family (a statistical one half). This could be done very quickly if our penalizing taxes were rebalanced to favour families with one income and also working two-parent families. It would also help solve our overburdened health, educational, social housing, poverty and other infrastructure problems.
We are told it is our responsibility to rescue all hard pressed people from socially and politically backward countries. Refugees they call them. It is a long time since the true refugees from Viet Nam or Uganda needed a home. Backward countries have to solve their own problems where the fundamental wealth of those countries can sustain their populations, if of course they can ever get themselves organized along peaceful and productive pathways. We can never transfer enough of their needy populations to make the slightest difference. Let us continue to help them there as much as possible.
It is a fool’s game to bring such backwardness to our shores and expect a successful result. Further, it is selfish to strip these countries of their best and brightest professionals and skilled workers when they are so badly needed at home. We have lots of wealth and ingenuity here to develop from within and from our own people.
If we do not stop incompatible people; people not ready to adapt to our country, from coming here, we will continue to suffer further declines in our civilization and very expensive losses of wealth and freedom as our governments increasingly pass draconian speech and other laws to prevent our citizens from being hostile to our new minorities (and new minorities to other minorities).
Our governments have unfortunately made the majority “Official Racists” by means of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms * a document that permits special laws to forever protect racialized (their word) newcomers from those of us that happen to be members of the majority. So desperate are our governments to keep order that they have instituted so-called Human Rights tribunals that fracture every rule and principle of our former justice system so that minorities (usually the untrained judges of these tribunals) now ride herd on the majority. Woes betide anyone that runs afoul of these bastard courts.
Why should we put our citizens at risk and undermine our peace when there is no evidence that the Muslim world, in particular, joyfully accepts any Christian or non-Muslim as an immigrant into their societies. Is this not a double standard? Of course, that’s what our western governments practice, especially in Canada. One law for the Quebecoise and another for the rest of us. One law for ordinary citizens and another law for our alien immigrant minorities. The “double standard” is the rule!
It is time to clean this mess up. Halt immigration from incompatible and dangerous societies and get back to accepting easily integrateable people that are willing to become socially, politically and proudly Canadian. We also need to seriously curtail an immigration industry that is almost exclusively dominated by aggressive minorities.
While we are at it, we must bring back and teach our British history** and let newcomers and even our own historically challenged younger generations understand where their freedoms came from and all that today’s Canadians owe to our past generations.
Huge numbers of today’s citizens are the descendants of men and women who came to this country as soldiers, sailors, fishermen, pioneers, settlers, farmers, explorers, and particularly the loyalist British-American settlers, who with British Army and Navy assistance, brought the beginnings of our parliamentary democracy and freedoms to Canada. These original people never heard of or needed an immigration department or a passport; they just came and stayed and challenged the wilderness. They must be honoured.
Newcomers need to know and abide by the principles of justice and law these pioneers brought and paid for with their sweat and blood and accept and imbibe in the total Canadian ethic. An ethic fought for and enhanced so many others. If they can’t, then they will never be happy in this country and they will incur an increasing impatience and resistance to their complaining on the part of all Canadians. If they do participate, they will find a hearty welcome.
** British history was banned from the schools by the provincial and federal governments in 1982 after a few complaints by some of our former enemy immigrants who claimed they were offended.
More politically correct dhimmi claptrap is being forced down the throats of the British people - this time in the City of Birmingham.
The historic Saracen Head pub is getting a mandatory name change - why? - you no doubt have already guessed the answer:
One has to wonder how many other historic British sites will get renamed to appease the Religion of Perpetual Outrage and their asinine dhimmi enablers - you can be sure this won't be the last.
There is an ongoing, concerted and documented History of Jihad against British customs and people laying the foundation for Eurabia. Even patriotic parades and bingo halls have fallen under the cutting blade of political correctness that is intent on wiping out any semblence of the indigenous British culture and cohesiveness.
Incremental Islamisation of Great Britain (and Europe) is happening to the constant drumbeat of appeasement of muslims.
BIRMINGHAM Mail readers have spoken out against the decision to change the name of a historic city pub – accusing it of being “politically correct”.
The home of the famous Saracen’s Head, in Kings Norton Green, will become known as Saint Nicolas Place said its owners, at the nearby St Nicolas Church.
Angry letters fired off to the Mail said the church had no right to “wipe away 300 years of history” for fear of offending Muslims.
The 18th-century former inn was originally built as a rich wool merchant’s house in the 1400s and was given to the church in 1930. In 2004 it won £500,000 to help bring it back to its former glory in the BBC programme Restoration.
Cannon Rob Morris said the church consulted with its congregation of more than 300 and the Friends of Historic Kings Norton in reaching the controversial choice.
In 2004 the Birmingham Mail reported how the Very Rev Morris said the name was “offensive” to Muslims. But he said the reason behind the name-change was to stop people from mistaking the building – now a community centre and church office – for a pub. It was also to recognise the role of the church and its more than a million pounds’ worth of investment.
Keith Carton, from Kings Norton, said: “When was the last time anyone can recall coachloads of lager louts turning up for a heavy session?”
Rod Murphy, from Northfield, said: “This barmy decision has nothing at all to do with people thinking the building is still a pub. The only people who use the building are locals and they know full well it is not a pub.”
He said: “This is the real reason that the name is being changed. How the misguided, deluded do-gooder Canon Rob Morris can be allowed to wipe away 300 years of history is beyond belief.”
Yet another example of the forced inculcation of the non muslim British children into Islam appears on a video today. (ITV Local West Country) Under the guise of "Islamic awareness", school children were brought to a mosque to have Islam explained to them by a cleric. Clearly the schools and government are behind this concerted effort to muslimize British children and this is just the most recent example of such brainwashing.
--In August, 2007 - British children were forced to practice their penmanship by copying lines from the Islamic call to prayer. Thought the original Daily Mail article has disappeared (as they so frequently do) there are many online copies and reference to this incident. See HERE for one.
--October 2007 - Another school forced teachers AND children to dress up in muslim garb even though there were only two muslims at the school.
"A SCHOOL was yesterday accused of MAKING teachers dress up as Asians for a day – to celebrate a Muslim festival. Kids at the 257-pupil primary have also been told to don ethnic garb even though most are Christians. The morning assembly will be open to all parents – but dads are BARRED from a women-only party in the afternoon because Muslim husbands object to wives mixing with other men. " For full article see HERE
Now this event is supposed to promote multicultural diversity at the school but apparently MEN DON'T HAVE TO BE MULTICULTURALLY DIVERSE AS A PARTY WAS HELD JUST FOR WOMEN -to placate the psychotic muslim husbands all of whom objected to their wives being anywhere near men who may be as predatory as they are - otherwise why the concern???
One has to wonder what the British boys thought when they were sequestered with the girls away from those big bad men. Let's hope the school had counsellors on hand so the boys could discuss their resultant escalating fears of growing up and an explanation as to why Daddy is bad. I wonder if the lads were also told how women/girls dressed in Western clothes are considered "uncovered meat" for the taking/raping or how muslim men are encouraged to beat their wives. and all the other rubbish & sexual inequality that is part and parcel of the Religion of Peace.
One also wonder if the children were told that the body suffocating head to toe garb worn by muslims is the leading cause of RICKETS in the UK. (and likely worldwide)
Of course everyone participated in the clothing dhimmification - for fear of being labeled a "racist" if they did not ---even though Islam is NOT a race.
--Just this past summer, July 2008, two non muslim British schoolboys were punished with detention for refusing to kneel and pray to allah:
"Two schoolboys were given detention after refusing to kneel down and 'pray to Allah' during a religious education lesson.Parents were outraged that the two boys from year seven (11 to 12-year-olds) were punished for not wanting to take part in the practical demonstration of how Allah is worshipped.They said forcing their children to take part in the exercise at Alsager High School, near Stoke-on-Trent - which included wearing muslim headgear was a breach of their human rights." See HERE
Parental outrage is more than understandable - yet even the outrage didn't stop some from worrying about the ludicrous "racist" canard.
Can you imagine the loud moaning and angry protests if muslim students were forced to write a verse from the King James Bible? Or a prayer to Jesus? to practice THEIR "penmanship"?!? How many muslim faith schools have transported their students to a Catholic or Protestant Church to learn about the Christian religion - all for religious understanding and "diversity"? I wonder just how much learning about Christianity is going on in non-muslim religion education classes. One also wonders how many other "non publicized" school events and misguided if not idiotic teachers have forced British schoolchildren to act as muslims.
As I previously posted - Islam is invading British life of the non muslim Brit - from the cradle to the grave as dhimmi politicians and educators herd British adults and children down the one way street of Islamisation.
As my readers know, I have recently written several blogs regarding the overall pattern and use of rape as a form of Islamic terrorism against Western women and girls. The below is an account of one of the worst and most vile acts of Islamic terrorism and gives some insight into the warped minds of those who kill and harm in the name of Allah.
The author asks: "Who are these people ready to lay down their lives for their cause? " There are a plethora of answers to the that question - along with 164 Jihad verses in the Koran/Quran. None of which will give non-muslims any solace.
From the days of Prophet Muhammad, sexual terror has been an integral part of Islamic Jihad. The siege of the Beslan School by Islamic Jihadis in 2004 was no exception as reveals Dr. Schurman-Kauflin. -- Editor, MA Khan
On September 1, 2004, terrorists stormed a school in Beslan, Russia, and perpetrated one of the most heinous terror attacks in history. Though many people may have heard of this attack, it is very likely that most do not know what really happened there. The reality is so dark that few dare speak of what went on.
There are predators in wait lurking everywhere searching for unsuspecting victims. If a person has a proclivity or a secret desire, that inclination can easily come out if an opportunity arises. And that is what happened at Beslan. The terrorists immediately killed the men because they wanted no resistance for their plans. Then, when they saw the helpless girls in front of them, the temptation became too much. Their perverse dreams came true.
Beslan was clearly a sexual homicide/sexual suicide. That is, the offenders wanted more than simple terrorism. Some of the terrorists at Beslan were hired guns who did not plan on dying that day. They had not thought things through and did not realize that the Russians would not let them out alive.
Things had deteriorated when the media reported that there were only 354 victims. Wanting to have a dramatic impact, the terrorists exploded with anger. There were 1200 victims, and the Russians were trying to down play the incident. The terrorists said they would have to eliminate victims to fit with what the media had reported. Their demeanor worsened, and they got really mean.
It was then that they began raping the girls. They wanted sex as they killed, and this is sexual homicide. A sex killer gets excited when he thinks about forcing himself inside an unwilling victim, but the rape itself does not produce the ultimate excitement. It is the rape followed by the killing that is arousing. This is what happened at Beslan.
One by one, females were targeted. The sex killers looked for the perfect victims, and after zeroing in, they grabbed and disrobed the little girls in the middle of the gym. There were muffled cries as the girls were humiliated in front of everyone. They were stripped, raped, and sodomized by several men. Not content to simply rape, the terrorists used their guns and other objects to penetrate the screaming victims while the other hostages were forced to watch. And the terrorists laughed. They laughed as they violated the children and made them bleed. What few people know is that some of the girls died as a result of being raped with objects. The internal damage was so severe that without immediate medical attention, the girls bled to death. Those who managed to survive required extensive reconstructive surgery and painful recoveries.
But raping the girls was not enough for the deviants who had entered the school. The terrorists beat the other children. In fact, beatings took place regularly, and as they pummeled the little ones, the terrorists smiled and laughed. It was said that they would strike a child and then watch the child cringe. When the youngsters recoiled, their captors laughed. This says the offenders enjoyed inflicting the suffering. They wanted their victims to suffer. Such behavior is sadistic. Bringing others pain brings the sadist pleasure. And the terrorists tortured the victims in many ways.
Along with causing paralyzing fear, the terrorists had an ally in the weather. It was extremely hot outside, but the school had no working air conditioner. As the heat raged, the hostages begged for water, and at first, some was given. Time crept on, and the terrorists became increasingly cruel. They drank in front of the hostages and mocked the children who were crying out for water. Things got so bad that the victims were forced to drink their own urine. In some cases, the hostages poured urine over one another in a feeble attempt to keep cool. Seeing the suffering enhanced the joy of the perpetrators. In a twisted, ghoulish game, the terrorists put water in front of the children who were desperately thirsty and told them if they reached for the water, they would be killed.
Still, this horror wasn’t enough for the hostage takers. Raping, beating, torturing, and mocking were just not evil enough. Thus, to further frighten the victims, one terrorist stated “we came here to die.” Russian Tagirovich Khuchbarov was called the “colonel.” When the children asked for water or to use the restroom, he simply stated “I’m not your uncle, I’m a terrorist … I came here to kill." Up until this point, the hostages most likely believed they could survive, but then…hearing these words…it meant they were to die too. This surely would have made the victims scream in their minds. If they cried out loud, they risked being beaten or shot.
As a crowd gathered outside the school, several terrorists goaded the townspeople. It was said that they “took delight” in egging the crowd on. They fired shots. They taunted. And again, they laughed. This psychopathic, sadistic behavior continued into the night as they ordered hostages to throw naked dead bodies out to the west yard. Yet, the Russian government did not want to negotiate with these offenders. Russian officials knew what they were dealing with: men intent on murder. However, in any hostage event, negotiations are necessary, but negotiations at Beslan were very difficult. When offered food, the terrorists refused because they feared poisoning. They had learned from Nord Ost and other terrorist standoffs. They would not make the same mistakes at Beslan.
Knowing that the elite Alpha and Vympel (Russia Special forces) would be called, the terrorists made it clear that if gas was used or electricity shut off, they would kill hostages immediately. The offenders had studied prior attacks and Russian counteroffensive techniques. So, they knew that Russia would stop at nothing to end the siege. With this knowledge, the terrorists had brought amphetamines with them to help stave off fatigue. This made them more wild and unpredictable. At one point, the terrorists allowed some hostages to leave. They told some mothers that they could get out with their babies and leave behind an older child or stay with both children. Those who left a child behind will certainly be tormented for the rest of their lives. At least one child who had been left behind survived the ordeal. One can only imagine that she could develop feelings of anger and maybe even hatred for the parent who abandoned her with psychopathic sexual sadists.
Russian Special Forces stormed the school using various techniques. Tanks were fired. Guns were fired. There were explosions. Alpha and Vympel members risked their lives to go into the school to save the children. In the end, nothing but bloodshed was achieved that day at Beslan. There were 330 people who died. Of those, 186 were the children. Blame has been tossed back and forth between the Russian government and the terrorists.
Critics have argued that evidence points to the fact that several of the terror attackers had been in Russian police custody prior to the attack. There were questions as to how these people managed to get out of jail to commit the atrocity, casting suspicion on the government itself. Conspiracy theories follow most big terror attacks. But there is no doubt that hostilities between the terrorists and the Russian government were not quieted. In fact, due to the horrific ending, anger has grown. In the end, this wretched act accomplished nothing but mass murder. So why bother with such attacks? Who are these people ready to lay down their lives for their cause?
The outrageous, steady pattern of Asian (media speak for muslim) attacking, sexually assaulting British women continues. Just in the past few days these crimes have been noted:
Officers were called after a 19-year-old woman reported being attacked on Burgess Street, off Barker's Pool, at 1.20am on Thursday October 2.
The man they want to speak to is Asian, aged in his mid 30s, around 5ft 9ins tall, slim and clean shaven. He was wearing a black hooded top and grey jeans when he struck.
It happened at around 1245 GMT on Saturday as the 19-year-old was walking through Victoria Park on the footpath towards the university.
Afterwards the victim kept walking along the same footpath but the man followed her, only leaving when she reached the campus site.
He is described as Asian, with a pale complexion, in his late 20s, about 5ft 6in tall and medium build.
I have chronicled the escalating attacks against British women (and men) by muslims in what is called Street Jihad - see:
To quote from the latter - noting that this is clearly not just an British problem but European problem due to rampant muslim immigration into the EU countries (with the blessing of EUocrats) as well as a dhimmified political, law enforcement, and judicial system:
"Well known blogger Fjordman has written about huge numbers of Norwegian Swedish women being raped by muslim men- he states, and I concur, that the large numbers of rapes of Western women by muslim men is so extremely high that it is difficult to view them as random acts of violence. Both Norway and Sweden persist in covering up the ever increasing numbers of rapes committed by muslims. Muslims view Western women as cheap and "fair game". He further goes on to say Western women are likely considered war booty" by muslims who feel they are conquering Europe & the UK."
Thus it is clear that this is not only a British problem but a problem for Western cultures -Islam teaches muslims to not only feel entitled to rape our "inferior" women but see rape as a victory over the infidel on their path to Islamization of the world or Global Caliphate. It is time to look at big picture and see the ever growing numbers of rape of "kaffir" women as not just a muslim crime but also an act of terrorism.
So much has been written about the Barack Obama cult-like attitude of those Americans who voted for him as well as others, around the world (particularly the UK & Europe), that seem to be swept up in the rose-colored glasses, knee bent worship of an untested, unknown, inexperienced President elect.
The below article makes it clear that not all are optimistic about an Obama presidency - in fact some think of his election as the beginning of the end of the American dream and the precursor to the United States descent into Third World status. Time will tell - but if Obama chooses (as many expect him to do) the EU liberal lefty stance of deliberately working against the best interest of the (countries) indigenous population(s) along with worshipping political correctness over free speech and pushing the pro-Islamization open-borders multicultural ideology-------- the latter is assured.
Anyone would think we had just elected a hip, skinny and youthful replacement for God, with a plan to modernise Heaven and Hell – or that at the very least John Lennon had come back from the dead.
The swooning frenzy over the choice of Barack Obama as President of the United States must be one of the most absurd waves of self-deception and swirling fantasy ever to sweep through an advanced civilisation. At least Mandela-worship – its nearest equivalent – is focused on a man who actually did something.
I really don’t see how the Obama devotees can ever in future mock the Moonies, the Scientologists or people who claim to have been abducted in flying saucers. This is a cult like the one which grew up around Princess Diana, bereft of reason and hostile to facts.
It already has all the signs of such a thing. The newspapers which recorded Obama’s victory have become valuable relics. You may buy Obama picture books and Obama calendars and if there isn’t yet a children’s picture version of his story, there soon will be.
Proper books, recording his sordid associates, his cowardly voting record, his astonishingly militant commitment to unrestricted abortion and his blundering trip to Africa, are little-read and hard to find.
If you can believe that this undistinguished and conventionally Left-wing machine politician is a sort of secular saviour, then you can believe anything. He plainly doesn’t believe it himself. His cliche-stuffed, PC clunker of an acceptance speech suffered badly from nerves. It was what you would expect from someone who knew he’d promised too much and that from now on the easy bit was over.
He needn’t worry too much. From now on, the rough boys and girls of America’s Democratic Party apparatus, many recycled from Bill Clinton’s stained and crumpled entourage, will crowd round him, to collect the rich spoils of his victory and also tell him what to do, which is what he is used to.
Just look at his sermon by the shores of Lake Michigan. He really did talk about a ‘new dawn’, and a ‘timeless creed’ (which was ‘yes, we can’). He proclaimed that ‘change has come’. He revealed that, despite having edited the Harvard Law Review, he doesn’t know what ‘enormity’ means. He reached depths of oratorical drivel never even plumbed by our own Mr Blair, burbling about putting our hands on the arc of history (or was it the ark of history?) and bending it once more toward the hope of a better day (Don’t try this at home).
I am not making this up. No wonder that awful old hack Jesse Jackson sobbed as he watched. How he must wish he, too, could get away with this sort of stuff.
And it was interesting how the President-elect failed to lift his admiring audience by repeated – but rather hesitant – invocations of the brainless slogan he was forced by his minders to adopt against his will – ‘Yes, we can’. They were supposed to thunder ‘Yes, we can!’ back at him, but they just wouldn’t join in. No wonder. Yes we can what exactly? Go home and keep a close eye on the tax rate, is my advice. He’d have been better off bursting into ‘I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony’ which contains roughly the same message and might have attracted some valuable commercial sponsorship.
Perhaps, being a Chicago crowd, they knew some of the things that 52.5 per cent of America prefers not to know. They know Obama is the obedient servant of one of the most squalid and unshakeable political machines in America. They know that one of his alarmingly close associates, a state-subsidised slum landlord called Tony Rezko, has been convicted on fraud and corruption charges.
They also know the US is just as segregated as it was before Martin Luther King – in schools, streets, neighbourhoods, holidays, even in its TV-watching habits and its choice of fast-food joint. The difference is that it is now done by unspoken agreement rather than by law.
If Mr Obama’s election had threatened any of that, his feel-good white supporters would have scuttled off and voted for John McCain, or practically anyone. But it doesn’t. Mr Obama, thanks mainly to the now-departed grandmother he alternately praised as a saint and denounced as a racial bigot, has the huge advantages of an expensive private education. He did not have to grow up in the badlands of useless schools, shattered families and gangs which are the lot of so many young black men of his generation.
If the nonsensical claims made for this election were true, then every positive discrimination programme aimed at helping black people into jobs they otherwise wouldn’t get should be abandoned forthwith. Nothing of the kind will happen. On the contrary, there will probably be more of them.
And if those who voted for Obama were all proving their anti-racist nobility, that presumably means that those many millions who didn’t vote for him were proving themselves to be hopeless bigots. This is obviously untrue.
I was in Washington DC the night of the election. America’s beautiful capital has a sad secret. It is perhaps the most racially divided city in the world, with 15th Street – which runs due north from the White House – the unofficial frontier between black and white. But, like so much of America, it also now has a new division, and one which is in many ways much more important. I had attended an election-night party in a smart and liberal white area, but was staying the night less than a mile away on the edge of a suburb where Spanish is spoken as much as English, plus a smattering of tongues from such places as Ethiopia, Somalia and Afghanistan.
As I walked, I crossed another of Washington’s secret frontiers. There had been a few white people blowing car horns and shouting, as the result became clear. But among the Mexicans, Salvadorans and the other Third World nationalities, there was something like ecstasy.
They grasped the real significance of this moment. They knew it meant that America had finally switched sides in a global cultural war. Forget the Cold War, or even the Iraq War. The United States, having for the most part a deeply conservative people, had until now just about stood out against many of the mistakes which have ruined so much of the rest of the world.
Suspicious of welfare addiction, feeble justice and high taxes, totally committed to preserving its own national sovereignty, unabashedly Christian in a world part secular and part Muslim, suspicious of the Great Global Warming panic, it was unique.
These strengths had been fading for some time, mainly due to poorly controlled mass immigration and to the march of political correctness. They had also been weakened by the failure of America’s conservative party – the Republicans – to fight on the cultural and moral fronts.
They preferred to posture on the world stage. Scared of confronting Left-wing teachers and sexual revolutionaries at home, they could order soldiers to be brave on their behalf in far-off deserts. And now the US, like Britain before it, has begun the long slow descent into the Third World. How sad. Where now is our last best hope on Earth?
You just KNEW that this was coming - with the plethora of muslims filing so called religious or racial discrimination lawsuits choking the Western world's judicial systems that some jackass would decide that the traditional full English breakfast - which includes sausages and bacon & black pudding - would be on their muslim "hit list".
It also seems that the British Police force seems to have more than its fair share of misunderstood and picked on muslims:
Anil Patani Sued Chief Constable of Nottinghamshire for racism and not getting promoted (It is stated he later sued the police again stating he had been promoted too fast and didn't have respect of fellow officers)
Now we have the muslim police chef suing for having to cook meals for the police men and women for which it is his JOB to cook.
"Hasanali Khoja is accusing the force of religious discrimination after it refused to guarantee in his contract that he would be excused from handling pork products."
One has to wonder who is the more stupid - a man who would choose to be a chef, in a country that is well known for fry up breakfasts and other pork meals - knowing they are on a list of non-touchable items that he refuses to cook OR the human resource dolt who hired a chef with a list of non-touchable items that he refuses to cook and are a regular part of the police diet/meals. Perhaps it is a draw. But you can be quite sure that whinging Mr. Khoja will be counting his compensation money in the near future - funded by the British taxpayers.
It is only a matter of time before pigs are deemed offensive to muslims and removed. Oh wait!! This is already happening!! See here and here!!
Looks like infidel capitalism and entrepreneurship not Sharia finance has solved the age old problem of muslim hygiene in a manner that will give a "boost" to even the most hard core Islamist's toileting rituals.
The company Total Hygiene is calling it the"most advanced toilet of our time. The new Clos-O-Mat Palma Vita combines the appearance of a conventional toilet with douching and drying facilities, in one stylish unit no bigger than a traditional WC."
"One simple press of the flush pad (by hand, elbow or body pressure) or the remote control hand switch triggers the flushing, washing and drying process. Pressing the flush pad starts simultaneous flushing of the unit and douching with warm water, heated as required to body temperature. Releasing of the flush pad triggers warm air drying for up to three minutes. If necessary, an additional push at any time can repeat the drying cycle. The functions can be stopped at any time simply by standing up. The process eliminates the need for toilet paper, and hand or body contact "
Let's hope that this new bidet-like toilet (with proper positioning) answers the prayers of devout muslims and allows them to practice their long list of mandatory Islamic toileting rules:
Say before entering the toilet: In the name of Allah, O Allah! I seek refuge with You from all offensive and wicked things (Al-Bukhaaree)
It is not permissible to enter the toilet whilst carrying or wearing anything bearing the name of Allah, such as the Quran, or any book with the name of Allah in it, or jewelry such as bracelets or necklaces engraved with the name of Allah.
One should remain silent whilst on the toilet. Talking, answering greetings or greeting others is forbidden.[2]
It is considered forbidden to relieve oneself whilst standing up, lying down or if you are completely nude.[citation needed]
One should avoid going to the toilet anywhere where people may take rest or gather for any purpose.[citation needed]
Do not raise clothes until you get close to the ground and do not uncover the body any more than is needed.
Do not spit, blow nose, look hither and thither, touch the body unnecessarily nor look towards the sky but relieve oneself with the eyes downcast in modesty.[citation needed]
After relieving oneself it is essential to perform Istinjaa (washing with water) of the anus and/or genitals with the left hand and water.
Other than toilet paper, water and the left hand Istinjaa can be performed with earth, grit, stones and worn-out cloths provided they are all clean. It is forbidden to perform Istinyaa with bone, any edible item, dry dung, baked brick, potsherd, coal, fodder, writing paper and anything which has even a small value.
When leaving the toilet one should also say a prayer, "Praise be to Allah who relieved me of the filth and gave me relief."[4] LINK TO ABOVE
More than likely your tax dollars will pay for the purchase and installation of millions of these water closets as multicutural worshipping government enablers and local and national Dhimmis rush to install them EVERYWHERE.
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When I woke up this morning, I couldn’t get out of bed. My limbs felt like they were made of the iron that I lacked, and every time I moved I was crushed with a wave of dizziness and nausea. I feel a little better after eating, sure. But I’m leaving the country on Friday, so I’m a little nervous. This isn’t a surprise, though, due to the fact that I ate too little yesterday and my iron levels, which are supposed to be 13-150, are less than 5.
I’ve been tinkering with the idea of writing this post for a long time now, and it’s ironic that this has given me the space I need to write it. I talk to very few people about it, so this should be part confession and part discussion.
I can’t ever remember being truly healthy. We’ve been trying to solve my health issues – stomach problems, low immune system, occasional anemia – for a lifetime. Sometimes, it was fine. Until last year, really, it was under control, and I didn’t really think about it. But there would be days when I would wake up in the middle of the night so ill that I could not sleep. I felt so frustrated, as though I was trying to calm my body like a crying child. I would take the shaking and the pain and throw medicines and food at it. I would throw up my dinner involuntarily at five in the morning, not understanding, and weep into my hands in anger as I watched the pale, blank sky and listened to the premature chirping of the birds outside my window.
I realized just recently the effect that my body’s had on my understanding of the relationship between the body and the soul. I’ve always put such a heavy emphasis on the soul over the body, regarding the latter as broken. This past year, I’ve getting pretty tired of my physicality. It’s only in the past year or two that I’ve realized that there will be a resurrection of the body as well – John Donne’s helped me broaden my understanding immensely. I’m trying to bypass the hatred and betrayal that I’ve felt to my corporeal form for so long.
There was a week in between the autoimmune test’s positivity and the diagnosis where I thought a lot about what it would mean to know, and what it would mean to actually start getting better. I thought I would have a sort of identity crisis. Not in a basic theological way, of course, but in the details. Celiac is genetic; I’ve had it for my entire life. I broke out in eczema, one of its symptoms, when I was three days old. Before I had a name, I had been identified by this disorder. Did I sleep so much because it was part of my personality, or because of the fatigue? How much of me has been shaped by this? And who would I be without it?
I shouldn’t have worried so much. Not much has changed. In part, I’ve realized that celiac’s diagnosis makes a lot of sense. All of the symptoms I’d been experiencing over the years stemmed from this one disorder. Here’s how it works: people with celiac can’t digest any sort of gluten, which is a key part of foods like wheat, rye, and barley. Because we can’t digest it, it slowly wears away at the digestive tract, causing inflammation, pain, and malabsorption. This malabsorption leads to fatigue and deficiency in things like B-12 and iron.
When I was diagnosed, I was upset. Having celiac means devoting constant attention to what you eat, because even a little bit of gluten sneaking in can wreak havoc on my whole system. Gluten comes from the Latin word for glue, and so sometimes, it feels a little bit like I’m coming apart without it, but I’m learning to navigate it. I may put up a page on this blog with a few tips for the newly diagnosed, or make a separate post on celiac advice. The strangest part was this: the worse I got, the more wheat I ate. I thought it was making me better – I saw it as the one thing that was ‘safe’.
For twenty years, I poisoned myself, thinking it was the cure. If that doesn’t have theological implications, I’m not sure what does. As humans, we crave the thing that kills us, and we turn for comfort to the very thing that will ultimately destroy us. Even sin can be beautiful to us, drawing us into a comfortable dependence and our ultimate demise. The things that are good for us are painful at first. However, the more I eat the foods I can, the more disgusting the others seem. The more we live with God, the more repulsive sin will become to us, and the healthier we will become.
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In my last post, I talked about the dangerous way in which paranormal romances overemphasize the other-ness of characters who aren’t human. This time, we’re going to look at the flip side, focusing on the way that relatable super-human characters struggle to stay human.
The idea really struck me as I sat in front of the biggest movie theater screen of my life, watching the newest incarnation of Superman battle it out against General Zod. My thoughts about Man of Steel’s wasted potential are another story; I came out of it dwelling on a single thing – Clark Kent’s humanity. I’m fully aware that Superman is about the farthest you could possibly get from a human being; however, this movie really made me realize that, at the heart of it all, Superman was raised as a human. He might be an alien, but he grew up in Kansas. And it’s his humanity that saves him.
This movie, and so many modern renditions of superheroes, has focused not on the powers, but on the flaws. Modern-day superheroes can’t do everything. As comics have progressed from the Golden Age, they’ve gotten progressively darker, more brooding, and grittier. Our heroes become flawed.
Superman still has to save the day, but during the battle scenes, we flip back and forth between him and all of the normal human beings struggling to survive an apocalyptic scenario. His powers do not ensure his survival – Zod has what he has physically. The difference? Superman thinks – and feels – as a human being. Zod wants to be a god. Superman doesn’t, and because of this, he can become a bridge between two worlds.
The concept of a character that is at once man and another creature is not new. I have a confession: I have watched entirely too much Teen Wolf lately. Please shoot me a message if you need me to defend this show to you (I know it looks awful).
At its surface, Teen Wolf is a show about a high schooler who gets bitten by a werewolf and inherits all sorts of powers and problems. As it progresses, though, you realize that the main character, Scott, isn’t the only hero (and doesn’t even become one for at least a season). Everyone who supports him, protects him, and reminds him of his human-ness keeps the show going – especially his best friend, Stiles.
From the very start, I recognized Stiles as the true hero of the show, the way that the supportive Samwise Gamgee is the true hero of Lord of the Rings. In a show full of supernatural creatures, werewolves, and werewolf hunters, Stiles stands at the center, fully human. He can’t do any of the things that his friends can do – and that’s why the show needs him to keep everyone anchored. His weapons are his sarcastic wit, his loyalty, his kindness, and his bravery. Even though he is so much more fragile than the rest of the characters, he keeps up with his friends, reminding them of their humanity and risking his own life for their sakes. He is the one who consistently pulls Scott back from the brink of animalistic abandon, reminding him who he is and reminding him the reason to remember to be human. The toll it takes on him is severe as he struggles with panic attacks and massive stress. And that really makes him braver than everyone else, because he has so much more to fear.
Our new supernatural heroes might need someone to encourage them in their power; however, more than this, they need someone to pull them back and keep them human. We don’t want to look up to our heroes anymore; we want to relate to them. We want to see them struggle with the power that they have and see that, beneath it all, they are a human being given a mantle. We want to look at them and wonder, what would I do in this situation?
This is why something like Twilight has it backwards. The whole time, Bella idolizes Edward. She wants to love him, but more than that, she wants to be like him. And in the end, if I’m not mistaken, she gives up her very soul­ – the most human, eternal, God-given capacity we have – to turn into a different creature entirely. She sees nothing in human beings. But even though we’re fallen, broken, fragile things, there is still something ultimately beautiful in being human.
I wondered for a long time if I was wrong about this. I know that we have fallen into sin. We work evil and tend toward selfish actions. We’re traitors, living in darkness and choosing fear, pain, and death. On our own, we cannot do anything at all.
All of this is true. And yet, we have been created in the image of the eternal God. At the start of all things, God once called us very good. Wisdom says in Proverbs 8 that, at the creation of the world, she
And although we have fallen, each of us holds in our hearts the potential to be restored. And that’s a humanity that should be protected. Eric Metaxes explains it in his biography, Bonhoeffer:
“It was God’s call to be fully human, to live as human beings obedient to the one who had made us, which was the fulfillment of our destiny. It was not a cramped, compromised, circumspect life, but a life lived in a kind of wild, joyful, full-throated freedom – that was what it was to obey God… Earthly bliss and humanity belong to God, not in any cramped ‘religious’ sense, but in the fully human sense. Bonhoeffer was a champion of God’s idea of humanity, a humanity that He invented and, by participating in it through the incarnation, that He redeemed.”
Jesus didn’t become human just to try it out, or because of anything good that we’ve brought about. He came to redeem us and restore us, and the rest of his creation, to its former place. Superman was conceived of as a messianic; how much better is the way that our God has become human to save the world and bridge our way! Our very human-ness can become something lovely when tempered to God’s plan. We have the capacity to see beautiful things and understand that something meaningful hums beneath them. We were created with human bodies and human souls, and God delights in us when we serve Him (more). What a word delight is!
Being human means having to serve something. It means being weak and unable. To be human is to be vulnerable. Unlike Stiles, who tries to provide for his friends out of his own strength, it means relying on something else. I had a long talk with my dear friend after she got back from Togo, and she told me several stories that will stick with me. Her tour guide had told her that his grandfather, like many of the people there, was an animist, worshipping different gods who gave him the power to do terrible things, like force people into the ground. I’ve heard similar stories from people in Burma, whose relatives could see creatures or levitate objects. That’s the thing about Satan – he makes people feel powerful when really they become enslaved by him. and here’s the interesting part; when these people become Christians, they have to give up all that demonic power. In Christ, they don’t have supernatural powers. The things they do (healing, etc) are not done in their own power, but in the name of Jesus. In Jesus, they are called to be utterly human and vulnerable, having to rely on God for their strength.
In a way, being human means being shackled down by all of our flaws, confusion, and powers that turn out to be burdens. But it also means being given the ability to be free, the ability to search for truth and to desire real relationship and real beauty. It means having the chance to choose rightly, and having the chance to be utterly restored by a God who created us in His own image in the first place. We are weak; but our weakness is God’s strength.
When I first set out to write this, I was thinking in purely literary terms of the four genres of expression – comic, tragic, lyric, and epic. My friend texted me last week after I read the Waste Land, “What do you think the purpose of tragedy is?”
In light of this week’s nearly apocalyptic events, however, I think it apt to discuss, at least a little bit, the purpose of tragedy in literature and in our own lives.
I hadn’t really known the answer to that question before. I’d read Oedipus, Hamlet, Lear, Death of a Salesman, and related to them in a deep, basic way – I could feel the twisting of my gut as the inevitable suffering played out. And there’s a lot to be said of it – it reminds us of the inevitability of our own mortality, provides us with a cathartic pity and fear so we can better live our own lives. It shows us that there are forces at work far outside our own power.
All these are important – wildly so. But there is one more, very simple thing that I realized while reading through Eliot’s Waste Land for the thousandth time: tragedy shows us the brokenness in the world and in relationships, and, by our deep, instinctive reactions to the events, shows us that things were never meant to be like this.
We live in a gloriously constructed world, filled with great beauty and a great potential for love, experience, and happiness. At the same time, however, I think that we can forget its inherent brokenness – even as Christians, we tend to think that we are basically good, that this world can make us happy, and that we don’t really need anything else but ourselves.
Until, in a week of darkness, a city is bombed and riddled with bullets, a plant explodes and levels everything in its path, a sinkhole opens in the middle of a city, deadly letters are sent to world leaders, an earthquakes shakes miles of nations, and an already hurting country is bombed, its civilians murdered. Oof.
Seeing this is so, so hard. I’m not going to go into detail about the problem of pain here, about what God’s doing, or how He could possibly let these things happen. I don’t know. Thankfully, I’m not Him. That can be so hard, and so frustrating, and so painful to see families broken and people grieving and souls hurting so desperately. But I do know that He’s got a plan in all of this.
I do know that this world was once a beautiful thing, where relationships with God and people could be whole and lovely. And I know that we sinned, and we used that free will to break that relationship with God – and consequently, everything else fragmented as well.
This is the world that the Waste Land shows us so precisely, a fragmented, perverse, and lost world. Critics have labeled it as a generational issue with “the modern world”, but there’s a reason we’re still reading the poem. In our era of flickering images and sound bites and texts and tweets, we’re more fragmented than we’ve ever been before. Relationships were already cracked, but this constant “connectivity” has widened those cracks until they nearly splinter apart. We’re more isolated than we’ve been.
But here’s the great beauty of this revelation, this painful truth about our world: it’s where the gospel starts. We think to ourselves so often that we aren’t that bad and that we don’t really need God. This realization of the state of our world – more than that, the state of us – leads to either despair or resurrection.
We live in the Waste Land, and we can see that. But the Waste Land also lives in us, which should scare you. Eliot’s whole poem hovers on the edge of a knife, between death and resurrection. The bones of the Phoenician sailor are at the bottom of the ocean, the land is dry and cracked and broken. But, something begins to stir these dead bones, and the thunder cracks across the sky, waiting. We hover on a rebirth into eternity.
When we begin to see our own brokenness, we see that we need to be rescued, and that we can’t do it on our own. As mortals, we will fail, and die, and the tragedy will end with a poisoned sword or a watery suicide. But God saw this broken world and came down into it as one of us, and he died – and when he rose from the dead to new life, the healing began.
If we accept our brokenness, we can now accept the salvation that’s so freely offered to us. Eliot did, and was able to find new life in Christ five years after the hopelessness of this poem. We come to hopelessness so that we can understand hope when it is offered us. If we live in Christ, we live forever, and we live in hope of healed people and a healed world.
The dead bones of the drowned Phoenician sailor don’t die, “but doth suffer a sea-change, into something rich and strange”. So then do we. The rains fall upon the thirsty, dry ground, and we learn how to love each other again. It has to start here, on an individual level, where the Waste Land of your soul is inhabited by a loving, personal God who revives you and brings you back to life.
As hard as we try to instill goodness into people, this world will still be broken while Satan roams it. Does this mean we should stop fighting against the brokenness, accept the evil in the world, and give up? By no means! The devil has no power where God is concerned. He can only bend what is already good and try to break what God has already created. We can fight against him. And sometimes it’s awful. But we have the hope of an empty tomb with us, and that is more powerful than any desolate, hollow Waste Land.
My prayers for safety, justice, and deep healing are with Boston, West Texas, China, Iraq, Iran, and the rest of our world. May God bless and renew you.
I’ve seen the Les Misérables movie twice three times now. I know all the words to the musical (I was a stellar chorus member in high school) and I was not disappointed with the movie. This story is so powerful. I’ll probably have something to say about revolutionaries quite soon (ugh!), but what most impressed me was the way that the movie didn’t shy away from the central message. In Les Mis, I’ve hardly seen a more beautiful depiction of the gospel, especially in its most baffling component – grace.
The entire story tracks the lives of its central characters, weaving in and out of different people’s stories, and it can get confusing. But grace and mercy are the threads that tie them all together as the story continues, and Hugo shows that even though we may want to ignore it sometimes, grace refuses to stay passive. Each time, it becomes a crossroad of the most dramatic and life-changing proportions.
The bishop is the first man who has shown Valjean any grace in a long time. When the bishop welcomes Valjean into his home, the man is taken aback, stunned, and shouts out that he’s a dangerous convict – an outcast. Instead of treating him as such, the bishop looks at Valjean as a friend, calling him brother. This simple kindness causes an uproar in Valjean’s soul as he struggles with whether or not he should steal the bishop’s silver. There is an entire chapter in the novel that compares the torment of the convict’s soul with a drowning man, saying that “the soul, going down stream in this gulf, may become a corpse. Who shall resuscitate it?” Reminiscent of Romans 7:24, Valjean’s hardened heart can only be softened by God’s power. Valjean is a dangerous man because he has allowed hate to rule him, and when he is presented with love, he cannot accept it. He steals the silver, effectively choosing imprisonment forever.
The bishop pardons him, claiming that the stolen goods were a gift. If the welcome into the bishop’s home was inconceivable, Valjean is now presented with the most life changing paradigm shift of his entire existence. It is grace unbound. He deserved imprisonment and death, and the bishop handed him love and life. He was emancipated by this mercy. He did not get what he deserved. Grace forces a decision on Valjean, a stark contrast between life and death. And he chooses life.
After being shown grace, Valjean effectively becomes a carrier, pouring the same love out into the town of which he becomes the mayor. And then he meets Fantine, who has fallen so far from the beautiful, innocent girl that she was into a dying, miserable woman who has turned to prostitution in order to support her daughter. She, too, has let hatred worm its way into her heart, and she despises Valjean for letting her be driven away from his factory.
Inspector Javert, the man ruled entirely by Law and not at all by gospel, is about to imprison Fantine when Valjean comes in to pardon her and take her to the hospital. He becomes the agent of grace to the dying woman, offering her a choice. And this action astonishes both Fantine and Javert:
“Javert felt that he was on the verge of going mad. He experienced at that moment, blow upon blow and almost simultaneously, the most violent emotions which he had ever undergone in all his life… When he beheld that mayor, that magistrate, calmly wipe his face and say, “Set this woman at liberty,” he underwent a sort of intoxication of amazement”
Javert is shaken; however, he does not waver. He resolidifies into the man of law that he was before, putting his shock aside. Fantine, however, lets herself be repossessed by grace.
“Had she, then, been mistaken? Must she change her whole soul? She did not know; she trembled. She listened in bewilderment, she looked on in affright, and at every word uttered by M. Madeleine (Valjean) she felt the frightful shades of hatred crumble and melt within her, and something warm and ineffable, indescribable, which was both joy, confidence, and love, dawn in her heart.”
Although Fantine dies, she has chosen life as well. She had pleaded to die instead of her daughter, and this exchange of grace and life carries through. Valjean shows grace to her daughter, Cosette, literally buying her out of bondage to the Thenardiers and raising her into newness of life. Cosette innocently accepts the gift.
Grace changes the lives of all of these characters in a radical way, but it is a gift that must be received in order to be effective. It forces a choice between death and life, but not everyone can choose to live in a radically changed world.
I’ve heard people criticize the policeman for being overdramatic, but can you imagine what he goes through when Valjean sets him at liberty? Javert feels as though he is going mad when he simply witnesses Valjean giving Fantine her freedom – how on earth could he rationally comprehend his state when Valjean, a convict and a sinner, shows grace to Javert himself, giving him back his very life? The seams of Javert’s world begin to rip apart, and everything that he once knew is turned inside out. Every paradigm that he had relied on in his life has burst apart, crumbling. Javert’s world is ordered and clean, black and white, and in it, everyone receives what he deserves. For him, there are no “minor sins”. He leaves no room for grace in his adherence to the law, but yet, it finds him.
Javert’s world has been irrevocably destroyed. Before, he could try to ignore grace, but now that it has been given directly and obviously to him, he cannot pretend that nothing has changed. He must “stare into the void / Of a world that cannot hold” and choose between the desolation of what he knows and a new, very different, life. He must choose, more literally than any other character, between life and death.
Because he cannot deal with the world as grace has colored it, he kills himself, choosing to leave it behind forever.
Javert and Valjean are not so different, really. They both wanted to serve God. While Valjean was consumed by hatred, Javert let legalism take over his soul. They both were shown grace in part, and then in its full glory. But Valjean had the strength to follow God’s path, and Javert, while telling himself that he was following the Lord, followed his own humanity into death. When Valjean leaps into the river to escape Javert, it is a baptism. When Javert does the same to escape Valjean, it is death by water.
I think that we forget how powerful a thing grace is. It’s either life-altering or life-destroying. It is a force to be reckoned with, and yet, we take it for granted every day. We deserved to die, and Jesus showed us his pardon, setting us at liberty and raising us from death to life. “You are free,” He tells us, like Valjean, “and there are no conditions”. Well, that’s not entirely true – He has traded places with us, giving up His life.
How will we respond? We cannot ignore it. We must either accept this gift in love and let it transform our lives and our very selves, or we must throw it aside and choose to die instead. We cannot live as we had before. We must return the favor by giving Him our lives.
This is the heart of Les Misérables, and I love seeing the ripple effect of grace as it reaches each person. Valjean is showed grace and then shows it to others. This is a perfect picture of how Christians should live their lives every day. We have been shown grace by someone even more wonderful than the bishop of Digne, and we can’t keep it to ourselves. We continue to pass it on, mimicking God’s grace in the lives of others so that they too can show grace to the people they encounter. It’s beautiful. And if we truly understand how powerful a movement grace should be, it cannot be kept a pretty secret.
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We were in Vienna’s art museum, and as soon as you walked into this Italian painters’ room, you could tell which three were his. The first one was some commissioned scene of Mary handing out rosaries, and it was enormous. The people were beautiful. And as they reached up, their hands all congregated together beautifully and expressively, and their feet were dirty, and it was lovely. The next, David and Goliath. He held the giant’s head (a self-portrait, again, by Caravaggio… the cad), but he didn’t look happy or victorious, like many of the other Davids. He was quiet, and pensive, and maybe a little sorry to have killed someone, or uncertain of his future.
The last was arguably the most beautiful. Maybe beautiful isn’t quite right, since it was Christ being beaten and given the crown of thorns… but it moved me. I started tearing up. It was so bright and so vivid, and the shadows and the contrast were dramatic and striking, and the way Jesus just bowed his head, didn’t retaliate, and was just so filled with love…
There was a girl with braided hair, curly and ribbon-bound, who had set up an easel and was just standing and painting. [I’d smelled her oil paints when I first walked in the room and felt, for a disorienting moment, that Caravaggio had just finished painting these works.] And she was talented, too – it looked so much like the painting. But then again, it didn’t…
Although the forms were all the same, it lacked something. The colors were dark and dingy compared to the brightness of the original, and there was an aliveness in Caravaggio’s work that the copy lacked. It was so interesting. In comparison, the copy wasn’t spectacular. The longer you looked at it, though, the better it did look, and the more you saw its merit. But that was shattered the second you turned your gaze back to Caravaggio’s, which shone with the mark of a master. And I did that, and thought of the verse where we’re mere shadows, [1 Corinthians 13:12 – For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.] And of the very end of Narnia, when our world is proved to be a shadowy copy when compared with the next.
Perhaps you will get some idea of it if you think like this. You may have been in a room in which there was a window that looked out on a lovely bay of the sea or a green valley that wound away among the mountains. And in the wall of that room opposite to the glass there may have been a looking glass. And the sea in the mirror, or the valley in the mirror, were in one sense just the same as the real ones: yet at the same time they were somehow different — deeper, more wonderful, more like places in a story: in a story you have never heard but very much want to know. The difference between the old Narnia and the new Narnia was like that. The new one was a deeper country: every rock and flower and blade of grass looked like it meant more. I can’t describe it any better than that: if you ever get there you will know what I mean.
Last week we finished reading Plato’s Republic in one of my classes. Now, Plato’s a little crazy. I don’t agree with him on a good chunk of those writings. But the section where he talked about the four realms of being and the Cave made a lot of sense. This theory was explained to me in ninth grade as “if you have a stapler, the idea of a stapler is more real than the stapler itself”, so of course I wrote it off as stupid. But that’s not quite it.
In Plato’s Republic, he talks about the four forms of reality. “Forms” comes from the Greek word “ἰδέα” (idea), but I’ll call them “things” or “Things”. Here is a handy diagram that I made.
Basically, realms A and B are the visible realms – physical things. A is a realm of shadows, reflections and impressions of real world objects. B is the objects themselves. And you can’t really know these things, because they’re ephemeral and pass away as this earth does. You can’t know them in a lasting way because they are mutable.
C and D, though, are Things. Just as A is the shadow of B in the real world, the visible world is a mere shadow of the invisible. These are Things that can be known because they are Things that never change. Everything in the visible world stems from a greater Thing in the invisible – all good things stem from Goodness, and all beautiful things from Beauty itself. There is something greater – a higher authority – from which the things in the physical world derive their value. If you know things, you can try to figure out the larger Thing from these qualities, but you might not be able to. But. If you know the Thing, you will be able to discern the things that come from it and the things that do not.
Most people, Plato says, are trapped in this realm of visible shadows, but some can escape the Cave, where people watch shadows on a screen and think it’s reality, into the real world. Even though he wants to stay there, he must go back down into the Cave in order to bring his fellow humans to the truth.
You probably see where I’m going with this. Plato was so, so close with this theory of a higher something. He just didn’t make that last step: when we know God, our eyes are suddenly opened to the true vastness of reality. God is Goodness and Beauty, and so we can see these shadowy beautiful things in this world and know from Whom they stem. When we try to cobble together aspects of his nature without knowing Him, we fail to reach God. But God, in His unending mercy, pulled us out of the Cave and into the reality of His magnificence. When we know Him, in His immutability, we’re then able to discern the things that come from Him and the things that don’t.
“Once they’ve been up there and had a good look, we mustn’t let them get away with what they do at the moment,” Plato says. “Staying there… and refusing to come back down again to the prisoners”. We have, in part, seen the Real World, the Higher Realms, the Caravaggios. And now we must bring the truth of it back down to this Shadowy Place and tell the prisoners to sin of reality.
God is the God of all things visible and invisible, and eventually, we’ll be able to move from this world of shadows into his truth, life, and presence for eternity. Further up, farther in.
Read this: “The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” Colossians 1:15-17