The Americans Are Dafter Than We Are!

[bpsdb]
You have to hand it to the Americans. Whatever dumb idea we come up with, they can make it sound intelligent by comparison.

I've been blogging about the silly antics at Conisholme for a couple of days now as the story rapidly spread around the globe, seemingly unchallenged by rhyme or reason.

You can see my original posts here, here and here.

In which I've (a) dismissed and demonstrated the idea of a UFO as compete fantasy, (b) pointed out the alleged missing blade was never missing in the first place, (c) pointed out the terrestrial evidence (fireworks) for the lightshow and (d) had a bloody good laugh at their expense.

But I wasn't prepared for the lunacy appearing here !

The "tentacle" appearance of an unidentified flying object (UFO), such as reported over a wind turbine farm near Conisholme, England, on Jan. 4, 2009, may have been "constantly changing, torque-generating plasma beams" related to an exotic propulsion system.

An experienced American scientific researcher has proposed that the "jellyfish" or "octopus" visual effect that some witnesses have reported in the UK and United States could actually be what is called a "magnetoplasmadynamic" or "magnetohydrodynamic (MHD)" field.

Holy magnetominimetrohydrodynamic force fields Batman! (Grasps clenched fist in other hand).

This guy is a scientist! No?!

Magnetic motion-producing water?

Now that's too much, now I'm convinced I've been abducted by weird aliens and transported to another, parallel universe where stupid people walk the Earth. Only everything else is the same.

Writing for the American Chronicle, Steve Hammons quotes Ray Stanford (a pioneer in UFO detection systems), as saying the tentacle-like [fireworks, folks, fireworks] effect is:

"most often and readily visible when a craft is either slowing down or moving very slowly over an uneven surface."

[bullshit]

"Although some UFO-generated physical phenomena may, through human mind's ever-interpreting 'lens,' look 'organic' (as though what was observed is something alive), that absolutely is not the case."

[even stinkier bullshit]

Now clearly, he's got a point that the phenomena we're seeing (fireworks in this case) aren't actually organic or alive - but that only lends credence to a completely idiotic thesis.

Standford apparently prefers the term, anomalous aerial objects (AAOs) to UFO.

I on the other hand prefer the term "complete fucking lunatic" to "scientist" when applied to these crackpots. Writer Steve Hammons deserves some credit for this drivel as he appears to be another UFOlogist - but hey maybe I'm wrong.

In another priceless quote from the same piece, Hammons reports:

Stanford added, "It looks as though a craft is breathing, but that is only an interpretation the human mind makes in searching for analogs. In such case, it is a big misinterpretation. Likewise for the 'tentacles,´ which are really only constantly-changing, torque-generating plasma beams. But, they can bend under the 'Lorentz force' and other forces which are most often and readily visible when a craft is either slowing down or moving very slowly over an uneven surface."

Sure, a string of ionized gas (plasma) is very pretty - I got a lamp that does it from the pound shop just a few weeks back - but as for generating torque?

Torque derives from the the latin torquere meaning to twist is a measurement of turning force. It's useful for measuring the power from a reciprocating engine; but hardly much use for repelling gravity!

Sorry folks, the smell of bullshit is too much to bear. I gotta go wash.

As Succinct As It Is Dumb!

There's a website devoted to the strange and frequently bizarre things that Christian fundamentalists come out with and it's well worth a visit, but this one found by the good fellow, Luke O'Dell at Creationist Idiocy is a corker that really should adorn science books: as an example of what not to say and English references as an example of how not to form a cogent argument.

Luke found this on PZ Myers' Pharyngula blog, and although I've tried thrice to leave a comment, I've failed, so I'll repeat it here, but for heaven's sake, take your socks off, tighten your belt and sit down - because your sides are in danger of splitting.


Wait for this....



...here it comes...



...this was posted by someone who doubts biological science (presumably believing in the literal Genesis tale from the KJV)...



...North Carolina resident Joel Fanti said:

"If evolution is so slow, why don't we see anything evolving now?"

I shouldn't really laugh at poor Joel, but I can't help myself. However, it does go some way to question the quality of American education. I don't know what Dr Myers' reaction was but I bet his sides ached for days. I know mine will.

Cheers Luke! I was having a shit day until I read that - what are you drinking?

How Stupid Are These People?

Marie Jon a new writer over the uber-conservative Dakota blog, Dakota Voice looks to be a fun girl. Between all the hand-wringing about lies and deceit she claims to like Dubya, saying:

"Bush leaves office with a very low popularity rating in large part because of the one-sided, biased media. You’ll soon find out just how pervasive the media has been in persuading America’s electorate. In the months to come, President-elect Obama will be spoken of in glowing terms. The drive-by media will continue to lie. As our country moves in the wrong direction because of Obama’s policies, only good writes-ups and happy talk will be heard from our “in-the-tank spinmeisters.”

There's a grain of truth there. Some of the American media is very, very pro-Bush. Yet even with the media behind him, swing voters looked at the disastrous fiscal legacy and incredulous stupidity of the woman many saw as his eventual successor [McCain still is a dead man walking, politically] and thought, fuck that!

Obama is the great white hope - despite being part black. He's intelligent, articulate and so far, seems to have his head screwed on. Time will tell.

It's a sad reflection on the Bush years that the opposition fielded both a woman and African-American and won: brilliantly. I hope this has set a precedent in this country where the vacuous rub shoulders with the brilliant - in the corridors of power.

America is hated and despised in many parts of the world with good reason. Dubya led the west into an unjust war and his financial planning brought the world's financial systems to their knees. Islamic terrorism is more rife than ever before even though America has not been attacked recently, they have lost a lot of good men.

This is a man who was an alcoholic; a wastrel who has never had to balance his cheque book. A bloke who once suggested that "god" had spoken to him. Google for Bushisms and you might chuckle for a while before realising that this tongue-tied imbecile was barely able to produce a cogent sentence when he wasn't reading from a prepared speech - that someone else had written.

Yet blinded by some force that I am unable to fathom, people still profess to like the man.

Personally, I wish these people would realise the truth - not this selective biblical truth, but a scientific truth where even the nasty answers are acceptable when they happen to be the right ones.

Abortion Not Applicable, Marriage Optional

Funny story this - not ha ha, but a little odd.

A Portsmouth couple who have been trying for a baby for a reported seven years have finally conceived but in a cruel twist of fate, the twins Lisa Chamberlain is carrying are are conjoined with a rare form of the condtion called dicaphaly.

They have separate heads and brains but a single body.

Doctors have advised an immediate termination but 25 year old Ms. Chamberline is not interested, calling them a gift from god, telling the Sun:

"To me, my twins are a gift from God and we're determined to give them a chance of life."

You might expect a pretty sharp response from me being an atheist. But I'm also pro-choice and it's Ms. Chamberline's choice to keep the babies despite the overwhelming medical evidence.

US-born twins, Abby and Brittany Hensel have the same condition and survived not only birth, but recently celebrated their 18th birthday.

In reality most conjoined (Siamese) twins do not survive to term and to make a spectacle of these unfortunate children and this family is fucking disgusting. Still, the smiling Ms. Chamberline and partner Mike Pedace, 32 don't seem phased - so that's alright.

I am phased at the double standards.

Ms. (read MISS) Chamberline is not married to Mr Pedace - and that's no real news in the 2008 - or in 2001 when they started trying for a family. It's no news the couple have been trying for a family but then there's a small point of relgion:

Now Ms. Chamberline is supposed to be "staunch Catholic" which may be the reason she opposes the termination.

But hang on - this isn't entirely consistent.

Staunch Roman Catholics teach marriage before family.

And what sort of god delivers this cruel blow to these children? I don't really care what Ms Chamberline thinks - she has a choice - but to believe that a loving, caring god could deliver the gift of life so cruelly beggars belief. Should these babies survive to term, their chance of ultimate survival is poor; and even then, they are destined to live out their days as freaks.

UPDATE: 20:00

At just 25 she has years of childbearing left. The suggestion she has been trying for seven years speaks volumes - has she never heard of a fertility clinic; or even a GP? Hell's teeth, perhaps the poor girl is pre-disposed to produce faulty embryos - we just don't know.

Please, please someone tell me it wasn't the lure of a tasty packet from a tabloid (the Sun in this case) that forced their hand. Tabloids are known to promote these freakish incidents because people love the lurid details of how these "determined" women are going to keep the multiple foetus despite being told none are likely to survive.

Anyone else remember Mandy Allwood - back in the mid-90s, she had fertility treatment and ended up the talk of the nation after receiving money from the tabloids and even engaging Max Clifford to represent her. Refusing a selective termination which would have given some of the children a fighting chance, Mandy lost all eight. It caused a sensation at the time and irritated the hell out of me.

Human females are "designed" for singleton pregnancies - like Kangaroos. Twins and triplets are unusual, but as the number increases, the chance of any foetus surviving to anything near term drops away sharply. Eight was fucking ludicrous.

I just thank common sense that termination is still an option for those who choose it.

Ecotricity Isn't Helping

Yes, it's that bloody "UFO" at Conisholme again.

Of course, there isn't a UFO and there never was. They simply don't exist, but as if to pour petrol on already furious blaze, an unidentified spokesperson has told the Louth Leader that:

"If there is a rational answer out there, we will find it."

What is the matter with these people? "IF" there is a rational answer? IF!!

Blades fall off wind turbines all the time - and suddenly Ecotricity are hinting that the cause may be unexplained. Hell's teeth, despite the amazing accuracy and regular NDT applied to the turbines in jet engines, even they occasionally fail with deadly results.

So either Ecotricity is either incredibly clever or incredibly stupid.

It's clever because by playing the long, unexplained game, they avoid having to deal with the failure in their duty of care - they are ultimately responsible for ensuring the blades don't drop off in the middle of the night.

It's stupid because playing the long game promoting the UFO myth is going to harm wind farms (and its business) in the long term. Already dumb people who need jobs and/or girlfriends are trying to get on site to search for bits of crashed UFO.

They won't find any because nothing crashed there.

That won't stop them looking while people like Nick Pope appear in national radio and hand-wringing on TV telling supporting the myth with their own pet theories. Very few tangible events remain unexplained for long, but Rent-a-Fools like Pope make a nice little living from gullible people and perpetuate this crazy myths.

Of course with a name like Pope, it's not surprising he is into ridculous myths: nominative determinacy anyone?

Daily Mail Readers Are Gullible

This is just a quick update on a story I ran a couple of days ago here.

One Daily Mail reader had the gall, the audacity to point out that the other commentators were well, daft, by writing:

"Are the public so gullible to believe such rubbish[?] One blade has broken off and the other was damaged in the freak weather conditions."

Which is pretty close to my own diagnosis and that of many experts including an insurance specialist who sees several of these incidents every year.

Mail readers are outraged - so far the comment is rating -90 (Sunday 21:00) and sinking! Dear god - are they really that stupid? Apparently, they are:

Molly of Stockport (currently one of the most popular comments at +86) has this to say:

"It isn't mentioned in this account but others state that there was no trace of the missing blade ... could ball lightening do that?"

It isn't mentioned, dear because it ISN'T MISSING and never was - it's been sent back to the manufacturer to see what went wrong; and what's ball lightning got to do with it?

It goes on to quote, rent-a-fool, Nick Pope a former MOD employee who now specialises in UFOlogy for TV. Mr Pope told the Mail:

'This is a really bizarre case. What's particularly exciting is that because there's been a collision, there will be residue of the object involved. Forensic science will enable this material to be recovered and analysed. This elevates this UFO case, because with most sightings all you have is eyewitness testimony or indistinct and shaky film footage taken on a mobile phone.'

Does it indeed? All it elevates is the smell of bullshit coming from your direction.

The flashing lights were still most likely of terrestrial origin - fireworks; and the noise - well can you imagine the din if a rotor blade comes off and hits a neighbouring one at speed? There's going to be one hell of a bang!

The residue - what are you going to say when this turns out to be parts of a neighbouring blade, Nick? Will the German engineers even bother to look?

Much of the rest of this is empty speculation fuelled by Nick Pope and his band of gullible idiots. Not that it matters. Nick never has to answer his critics: he just does a Hitchens and ignores them.

Lloyd Webber - "UK Lyricists Are Crap"

OK, hands up, Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber didn't really say that - but he might as well have.

On Saturday, the BBC reported that US writer Diane Warren will pen the lyrics to an ostensibly UK song that will be competing in Eurovision - the cheesy, political, waste of money that even Wogan has turned his back on.

Warren who has written powerhouse hits for Toni Braxton and Cher, is to write the lyrics for Lloyd Webber's music - or is that the other way around? Tin Pan Alley style never did much for me.

Not that it matters.

The UK has a mass of talent and really, what the fuck is a yank (albeit it talented one) doing stealing our jobs? If I were a potential competitor in one of the other competing countries I'd be feeling a bit short-changed too and laughing at us for not being able to produce the lyrics in-house as it were.

I mean, this is a small island - there's only 50-odd million people here!

Surely, if we're daft enough to make a spectacle of a bunch of hopefuls by running a televised competition to find the artist, the same could be done for the words, couldn't it?

I'm sure you could line up some walking egos like Simon Cowell, Peter Hitchens and maybe even Bruno Tonioli to judge whatever our home-grown scribes can get onto paper. Then we could have a national phone-in vote to raise loads of money for the telly company while the result is decided long before the phone lines close.

That would be great!

Peter Hitchens Is Gutless

Under Peter Hitchen's latest pseudo-scientific diatribe I noticed link where readers were invited to debate with the Mail on Sunday's Idiot In Chief.

Could I resist telling this educated, self-indulgent fool pretty much everything he wrote was wrong? Well yes and no. Many fellow bloggers have already tried (and failed) to engage Hitchens; tearing his rants to pieces on various blogs - the Lay Scientist being a personal favourite.

Out of curiosity, I waited until comments started to appear and read the following message, tucked away in light-grey against the white background. Visible - but not hardly DDA compliant.

Comments are moderated, and will not appear on this weblog until the author has approved them.

So put another way you can't debate with Hitchens - any more than you can debate with his fellow Creationists.

For the sake of the Mail and Mail readers, here's what the word actually means:

Debate: Vb. [Trans.] to argue about (a subject), esp. in a formal manner.

Argue means to disagree about something so in order to debate something with Hitchens you have to be able to engage him. Yet by enabling comment moderation in this way, Hitchens has denied anyone with a modicum of knowledge the route to contradict him.

Predictably the only comments appended to the blog are of the sort that Hitchens could have written himself - my god, that man must have an ego the size of Arcturus.

Well here's an open to challenge to Mr Peter Hitchens of the Sunday Mail.

Come and debate some of the people you see fit to critcise in an open forum and see how you fare. Come and edify us as how Darwin was wrong about evolution; how climate change isn't man made; what future generations are going to do when the coal runs out and so on.

No comment moderation - everyone gets to have a say.

I say you can't Hitchens: because you're haven't got the guts to stand up and fight or the evidence to back up your outrageous claims. You just want to sit around and have that gigantic ego stroked by people who think you're infallible while destroying the reputations of people who actually know what they are talking about.

We're waiting.

No Tits Please, We're Christian Politicians

A bunch of throwbacks in Australia are trying to mess with evolution again - only this time it's a cultural evolution, not a biological one. I have to admit this story is over a week old, but it's too good not to report on it.

A group of Conservative Christians in New South Wales are trying to ban topless bathing on the the state's glorious beaches. Led by moral throwback, which Reuters describes as "Christian lawmaker and veteran morals campaigner Reverend Fred Nile" the group wishes to constrict laws governing nude sunbathing on the beaches.

Topless bathing has been acceptable and commonplace in this part of Oz since the 1960s - yes folks, nearly half a century ago - but Reverend Fred is disgusted (and old). Perhaps he hails back from the Victorian era when covering up was the order of the day: not just a sensible thing to do on our terribly chill beaches.

It's certain his ideas do. Fred told Reuters in heavily accented Oz dialect:

"She demeans herself. I believe that she's taking away her own self-respect and I'd say any of the men around that area would not have any respect for that girl and probably would think that she's cheap and maybe even trying to pick up somebody"

There's that word "probably" again.

When did breasts become offensive? We're used to covering ourselves - originally it was to keep warm and clean, but then later when the god-botherers got involved it was to cover our reproductive areas.

To me, Fred and his supporters are performing a sort of self-flagellation because they can't get close to a pretty young girl any more and being denied that, they want to stop everyone else.

Breasts are there to feed our children before they are able to take solid food. That's what nature developed them for and we all have them - it's part of being mammal. They're just less developed in men and no one complains about men going around topless!

Which brings me to a super song about this very topic, the great Rodney Carrington has a song about it: "Show them to me!" - you'll find it on Youtube.com and I'd recommend going there now if this story depresses you.

Because it seems that Fred and his followers might be making some headway and the idiots may actually get their way and prevent women having a another choice. Did I mention that? It's not compulsory for a woman to put her funbags on display in NSW, but it's her right to do so if she wants to.

Excuse me now while I nip to Oz before evolution goes into reverse like it did on that Guinness advert a while back.

PETA Needs To Check Its Facts

When PETA got wind of a 140 year-old cock lobster, it knew it had to act and persuaded the City Crab and Seafood restaurant in New York to release it back into the sea off Maine, according to the BBC.

PETA's Ingrid Newkirk was pleased:

"We applaud the folks at City Crab and Seafood for their compassionate decision to allow this noble old-timer to live out his days in freedom and peace. We hope that their kind gesture serves as an example that these intriguing animals don't deserve to be confined to tiny tanks or boiled alive."

She doesn't have anything to say about the other lobsters or crabs or other stuff that the restaurant goes through daily.

Now I don't know who told PETA that George was 140, perhaps his birthday was inscribed on his shell somewhere? No wait, can't do that, because lobsters eat their old shells when they moult. Watching these beautiful creatures gracefully exit their shells is a sight to behold - what remains looks like a ghostly image of its former resident for a while before it disintegrates in the tide or is eaten. I've kept smaller lobsters such as crayfish over the years and despite what PETA are saying, you can't really get an accurate age just by looking at or even weighing them. Even within a species, a crustacean's weight and size are determined by its diet.

This from www.veganpeace.com (which seems fitting, considering PETA screwed up):

"The only way to gauge the exact age of a lobster would be by their shell. However, since lobsters shed their shells so often, it is impossible to determine their age. Knowledge of body size at age makes scientists believe that lobsters can attain a maximum age of 100 years. The normal life span is about 15 years. Lobsters can grow to be 3 feet long in overall body length."

According to an expert, the animal's (?) age bears no relationship to the taste either (that's after it's been boiled). Lobsters and crabs eat all manner of things and it's this that gives them that distinctive seafood flavour - excuse me while I go vomit.

Worse still for George (insomuch as the expert was concerned) being a cock lobster he wasn't actually a lot of use. A large female would be far more valuable since she could produce far more eggs - and therefore, lobsters - and was therefore more valuable to leave in the water.

Although no one knows for sure, lobsters probably only live about 40-50 years - even 100 years would be a wild overestimate.

PETA do have a point - though not about George's age - research suggests that crustys feel pain like we do: so a British inventor has come up with a gadget to electrocute them in about 5 seconds. Better than being boiled alive - slowly - (OUCH). A home version is available and you can find out more here.

http://www.crustastun.com/

TV Chef Lloyd Burgess suggests an alternative method:

"Live lobsters can be humanely killed by putting them in a plastic bag in the freezer for about two hours. They slowly lose consciousness and die."

What a way to go, boiled, suffocated and frozen or the electric chair - I'll never be able to watch Spongebob Squarepants again.

As an aside, starfish which are closely related to sea urchins, are thought by some experts to live essentially for ever - unless they starve to death, are eaten or otherwise destroyed. Weird. Weirder still, while they have tens of thousands of independently controlled hydraulic feet commanded by intricate and fiendishly complex nervous system, they don't have a discernible brain - as you or I would understand.

Bit like some of the journalists writing today, I guess.

"Mark Damazer is God" - BBC Presenter

On the BBC's iPM, journalist Eddy Mayer referred to BBC Radio 4 Controller:

"Mark Damazer or God as we call him."

It isn't clear at this stage if Mr Mayer will be struck by lightning or just a reprimand for this blasphemy. He was being flippant (at least I HOPE he was) but I would be surprised if some rent-a-quote like, oh, S. "Burdshite" Green didn't have something to say.

On the same slot, Director of Christian Think-tank, Ecclesia Johnathon Bartlay, called the automatic inclusion of Bishops in the upper house, "absurd". Further noting how he had been quietly removed from the panel of "Thought For The Day" when he argued that non-religious speakers should be allowed a voice.

Presumably this is why Mayer referred to Damazer as God and not just the "baldy bastard from upstairs."

Damazer eloquently spews vitriol on the Today programme's audience on the iPM blog, where he writes:

"I regard this as a genuinely difficult question. There may be a case for widening the pool of contributors on Thought for The Day by having someone with an avowedly non-religious perspective. However on balance the BBC's position is that it is reasonable to sustain the slot with believers. Let me now set out the reasoning.

Thought for the Day is a unique slot in which speakers from a wide range of religious faiths reflect on an issue of the day from their faith perspective. In the midst of the three hour Today programme devoted to overwhelmingly secular concerns - national and international news and features, searching interviews etc - the slot offers a brief, uninterrupted interlude of spiritual reflection. We believe that broadening the brief would detract from the distinctiveness of the slot.

Within Thought for the Day a careful balance is maintained of voices from different Christian denominations and other religions with significant membership in the UK. We are broadcasting to the general Radio 4 audience which regularly engages with the comments and ideas expressed by our contributors from the world's major faiths - whether they are believers or not."

Obviously, he's talking shit as anyone of an atheist persuasion would be able to tell you if they could sit through this five minute interlude, which is effectively a short sermon, every weekday for a couple of weeks.

I have - and I can't bear the Archers. ("Oooooo Arrrrr. Look at the udders on that, baby!")

What Damazar refers to as "secular concerns" is, in fact, the real world. The tangible. But let's not forget, as he seems to have, that many of the wars - and certainly the bloodiest conflicts that are happening right now are - you guessed it - religious in nature. Jews and Muslims are fighting in Gaza and US Christians sending forced to pound Muslims in Afghanistan.

As a second point, and this will form part of my own argument to BBC management, why do we need "a brief, uninterrupted interlude of spiritual reflection" anyway?

If Mr Damazar is, as I suspect, a bible following Christian that is his own concern and he has no respect for the wishes of the largely secular R4 audience by continuing to bang us over the head with introspective, Abrahamic naval gazing.

TTFD is there to please a small minority of people who cling fearfully onto the notion that there is an afterlife and it'll all be better rather than having the guts to face what the future brings or the courage to change it.

Today would be better off without it.

The ASA Might Draw Battle Lines!

Work commitments prohibit me from commenting any more than to promise I'll write more on this later with citations, but currently reports are suggesting that 100+ people have added their voice to that of Stephen Green complaining about the atheist bus advert.

This is likely to be the ASA's toughest ever challenge.

If it decides it has to rule (and it might even have that hand forced) it may effectively have to rule on the very existence of a god or gods.

If it were me, I would demand the complainants define what constitutes god (because you can't have something if you can't define what it is) AND which god they are alluding to. The nasty, jealous, antagonist, murderous fucker of the Old Testament or the slightly more charismatic and gentile figure portrayed in the New. Which is a dichotomy in itself!

Gavin Orland, who organised a campaign to email the BBC to protest about the corporation's Thought for the Day told the Telegraph:

"The fact that humanist, non-religious contributors are excluded from the slot gives the impression the BBC believes morality is the exclusive remit of religious people, which is offensive, unrepresentative and untrue.

"It's great that there will be a non-religious thought allowed on iPM: let it be an example to the Today programme."

This may indeed be a turning point for religion in the UK, which although ostensibly secular, still carries the weight of centuries of Christian heritage. At the simplest level, this manifests itself as people, almost instinctively, tick CofE [Church of England] on forms where religious affiliation is requested; right through to the startling control that religious influence still holds over schools. In England, religious schools are maintained by the state; yet are free to fill the minds of vulnerable children with sectarian bile.

The problem for tub-thumping "out" atheists is that ordinary English folk don't care either way.

It's part of being English. We drink milky tea, go out in the noonday sun and declare to be Anglicans (unless we're catholic) even when we're not. Even today, many official forms still contain options for religious affiliation (AS IF IT FUCKING MATTERED) and yet omit the option for: none.

Many regard Stephen Green and his ilk as a bit of a joke - but a harmless one - when in reality, it's only the efforts of a campaigning core of rational, free thinkers that keeps him tethered.

Chief god-botherer , Tony Blair was quite happy to allow Peter Vardy's Doberman, Nigel McQuoid to teach Creationism in his academies until a bunch of academics and ordinary folk came out and took a stand until the government was forced to legislate against the slow march of stupidity.

I was one of them and I'm proud of our collective achievement.

But this is far from over - this country - indeed the West as a whole needs to a have an open and honest debate on these matters.

Christian Bigot Claims Unfair Dismissal: Fails

Direct from my friends at the National Secular Society comes a story of common sense beating religious bigotry. Terry Sanderson reports:

A Christian therapist at the Relate counselling service, who refused to give advice to gay couples, has lost his claim for unfair dismissal.

Gary McFarlane was employed by Relate as a counsellor, but he later qualified as a psychosexual therapist. He told Relate that although he had counselled gay couples in the past, he was unwilling to provide sexual therapy as it conflicted with his religious beliefs. After objections from his colleagues, Mr McFarlane was sacked in March 2008.

Mr McFarlane, of Bristol, claimed unfair dismissal against the Avon branch of Relate on the grounds of religious discrimination, but the tribunal panel unanimously rejected his claim. The panel said: "The claimant was not treated as he was because of his Christian faith, but because (Relate) believed that he would not comply with its policies and that it would have treated anyone else of whom that was believed, regardless of religion, in the same way."

Mr McFarlane's boss at Relate had said during an earlier hearing that he had been sacked because he made it clear that he would not abide by its equal opportunities policy, which states that all clients must be treated in the same way, regardless of sexuality. Mr McFarlane's case was supported by the Christian Legal Centre which has been party to a string of failed challenges to the equality laws over the past year.

Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society, said: "This is the right outcome for this case. The fundamentalists who are mounting one challenge after another to Employment Tribunals are trying hard to overturn the laws that protect gay people from discrimination. They are seeking to place Christian dogma over the rights of people to fair treatment. They must not succeed."

Meanwhile, Lillian Ladele, the Christian registrar who refused to carry out civil partnership registrations for same-sex couples, has asked permission to appeal a recent ruling by an Employment Appeal Tribunal that her employer, Islington Council, did not discriminate against her on religious grounds.

Ladele's lawyer, Mark Jones, head of employment law at Ormerods, said that he hopes to hear in the next two weeks or so if permission to appeal has been granted. He said he could not give too much information about the appeal but that one of the grounds would relate to evidence put before the tribunal and the EAT by the council's own witnesses "relating to the treatment of Ms Ladele and the reasons for it".

Ladele's case is backed and funded by The Christian Institute. She is still employed by Islington Council and still, presumably, refusing to carry out her duties in full.

Carla Revere, Chair of the Lawyers Secular Society, commented "Religious discrimination law is about protecting people not their beliefs. The Ladele judgment clearly explains that a refusal to carry out an employer's instructions because of religious beliefs that are prejudiced against gay and lesbians is not religious discrimination. Miss Ladele was sacked not because of her beliefs but because she refused to do her job. Mr Justice Elias, president of the Employment Appeal Tribunal said that an anarchist who burnt down his employer's office would be sacked for burning down the office, not because of his philosophical beliefs.

The law requires employers to treat gay and lesbian employees and customers with equality. The Ladele judgment shows that religious people cannot use religious dogma to exempt them from the requirements to treat and respect gay and lesbian people equally. "

(c) 2009 National Secular Society

Stephen Green Is (Probably) Dumb

Predictably, Stephen 'Bird Shit' Green has come out in all of a fluster after comedienne Ariane Sherine helped launch the "There's Probably No God" campaign, yesterday.

Unsurprisingly, Green wasn't in evidence when the Christian adverts appeared last year warning that people who rejected God were going to spend eternity in hell.

Oooo oooo, Steve. I'm trembling in me boots at the very thought.

In a statement to AFP, Green whined:

"It is given as a statement of fact and that means it must be capable of substantiation if it is not to break the rules," he said. "There is plenty of evidence for God, from people's personal experience, to the complexity, interdependence, beauty and design of the natural world.

"I believe the ad breaks the Advertising Code anyway, unless the advertisers hold evidence that God probably does not exist."

Which is where he starts to go wrong. Green's press release lectures editors on the ASA code as follows:

SUBSTANTIATION
'3.1 Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove all claims, whether direct or implied, that are capable of objective substantiation.

'Relevant evidence should be sent without delay if requested by the ASA or CAP. The adequacy of evidence will be judged on whether it supports both the detailed claims and the overall impression created by the marketing communication.'

'TRUTHFULNESS
'7.1 No marketing communication should mislead, or be likely to mislead, by inaccuracy, ambiguity, exaggeration, omission or otherwise.'

Green obviously missed the word probably.

Carlsberg's marketing has said for years that its is probably the best lager in the world. In fact, it probably isn't, but probably is like that, it's not a statement of fact, just an idea. Green is confusing probably with definitely.

Curiously, when this was first mooted, I hear that the message did not include "probably" at all and the word was only inserted at the behest of London Transport.

No one can say for sure that there is no god (or gods come to that); but by the same token, no on can say for definite that supernatural forces exist. Fact is, you and I might be just brains in a jar: it's an age-old problem for philosophers and goldfish everywhere.

What Green see as evidence for God I see as nature in all her magnificence. Poor old Green can't cope with this - because that destroys everything he understands. Every bit of evidence we have (that's proper evidence, not some story from a dusty old story book) says that life on Earth evolved from little more than simple strands of DNA.

Scientists think that the entire universe was created in an instant from a tiny mass of matter which exploded about 13.5 billion years ago: the Big Bang. Others don't agree, they think that the event was triggered when a couple of "branes" (sheets or membranes of alternate space-time) collided; but this is the realm of string theory and those guys can't agree on much.

Anyway, Green smugly announces that the bible is immutable and can be quoted without problem.

The Christian evangelist is not concerned by fears that his complaint will lead to atheists complaining about Christian adverts. 'I am sure many of them have complained about Christian advertising already,' he said, 'but a statement such as "The Bible says 'the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord'" is entirely factual. The Bible does say that. The statement "Jesus said, 'I am the way, the truth and the life - no-one comes to the Father but by me,'" to take another example, is a Biblical quote, from the same Bible which is part of our Christian Constitution and upon which witnesses promise to tell the truth in Court. The Bible is, to coin a phrase, our Bible.'

He's missed the important point that although you can quote parts of the bible, you can't automatically use those quotes to cause offence to certain groups of people without falling foul of precisely the same guidelines.

He also incorrectly suggests the UK has a Christian constitution - it doesn't. The UK has a Christian heritage, but that's entirely different - the place is about as secular as they come.

Course, Green never let facts get in the way of a good story, running an advertorial in New Statesman suggesting that the HPV vaccine was going to turn our daughters into harlots, which opened (according to its own release) with the words:

'VIOLENT CRIME - SOWING AND REAPING'

Delightful.

It went on to opine:

'There is a Biblical principle that we reap what we sow. It applies to nations as well as to individuals. What politicians sow, the people reap. When politicians sow evil, the people reap misery, and the poorest reap it the worst.

"Now we have the disaster of teenage infertility. Every government initiative, including the HPV vaccine, will increase it, but as all the targets revolve around pregnancy, no-one in power knows how many young people they are making sterile and nobody cares."

Someone was pissed and called the ASA who insisted that, CV provided 'robust, scientific evidence that the HPV vaccine caused infertility in teenagers'

I don't blame them and where I live we have a disaster of teenage pregnancy not infertility. Green is obviously confusing the HPV vaccine with the bacterial infection, Chlamydia trachomatis. But hey, he's a Christian (direct line to God) so he knows more than the medics and people who bother to research what they write.

HPV - the virus that causes genital warts - is carried by men and is thought to be a major cause in certain types of cervical cancer. Virgins don't suffer with it. Immunising against HPV is a sure way to prevent HPV and reduce a common and dangerous cancer that claims the lives of many each year - even, dare I suggest, Jade Goody may not have been so ill had HPV vaccination been available.

Chlamydia is a different kettle of fish - it's bacterial, not viral for starters - but like HPV, condoms provide an excellent level of protection and it can be cleared by a simple, short course of antibiotics. The problem is that most people (50% men and 75% of women) can remain asymptomatic for some time, even when the damage has been done.

About 40% of women with Chlamydia will go on to develop pelvic inflammatory disease which may lead to damage to the fallopian tubes, uterus and surround tissue; resulting in sterility. It can also lead to, potentially life-threatening ectopic pregnancy (where the foetus implants outside the uterus) and chronic pelvic pain and even arthritis. [Figures from the CDC].

Where Green may have become confused is by the less-known reference that Chlamydia is more common among young people, particularly women because the bacteria can more easily take hold in the less mature sexual organs. It is also passed readily between gay men and through oral and anal sex. The CDC recommends that all sexually active women under 25 are screened annually although so far as I am aware, this is not routine in the UK.

Green's (probably) pissed off because, as Douglas Adams wrote, "he doesn't get invited to those sorts of parties."

UFO Damages Wind Turbine (NOT)

In some breaking news, a wind turbine at Conisholme, England has lost one of its 20M blades and had another damaged has UFO idiots experts fruitcakes researchers believers in a frenzy. UFOolgists as they like to be called (I can think of a lot of other things) are now crawling all over the site like ants scouring for clues.

Not surprisingly, the local and even national press is abuzz with the story of the millenium - little green men are real after all and we're being invaded! Strange lights have been reported in the sky around the area and mysterious sounds have been heard.

Uh huh!

Although Dale Vince one of the site owners wasn't saying much, the MOD are being rather more sober.

They're not even vaguely interested, in fact.

What the UFOidiots want us to believe is that a massive spaceship could navigate its way across the vastness of space, successfully get into low earth atmosphere and then crash into a wind farm!

Photos of the structure appear here, although they're not that clear. Even looking at that, I have another explanation which is closer to home and rather more believable and I can sum it up in two words:

Metal fatigue.

I may be wrong, but my immediate guess is that the missing blade actually came loose or began to bend while the turbine was rotating at speed. As it flailed around it collided with a second blade causing that severe damage before eventually falling off completely.

Occam's razor folks.

You read it here first. I'll update this story if any clearer explanation appears.

UPDATE:

and here it is, just 30 minutes after I posted my results, Associated Press puts this on the wire (courtesy of Google and copyright Associated Press)!

"Fraser McLachlan, chief executive of GCube, which insures more than 25,000 wind turbines worldwide, said that although it is unusual, this type of incident happens about five or six times a year. It does happen that a blade will sometimes just come off a machine for one reason or another," he said. "The main reason is the blade may shear."

FUCK YOU Ufologists!

Reason wins again.

Those bright lights are just that, everyday bright lights or more likely fake memories. More on this in my upcoming book which may even come out this year.

UPDATE 2:

The brilliantly sober Financial Times has an explanation for the lights in addition to a carried away "expert" as its Energy Editor, Ed Crooks writes at lunchtime today:

Nick Pope, a UFO expert, said it could be “one of the most significant UFO incidents for years.”

The Financial Times can reveal, however, that the likely cause of the lights seen in the area was a firework display.

Peter Bell, a retired farmer who lives close to the wind farm site, celebrated his 80th birthday on Saturday night with a party that culminated with fireworks being let off in the back garden.

In another priceless quote (this one appears in a newspaper from Thailand!) the amazingly gullible Russ Kellett, from the Flying Saucer Bureau, said witnesses had reported:

“Balls of light in the sky and the MoD (ministry of defence) has no explanation. We are very, very excited about this. To hit two of the blades, any object must have been about 170 feet long."

Where do they find these people? The MoD isn't interested Nicky boy. They don't give a fuck because they have better things to than chase your flying spaghetti monsters. As for an explanation, I rather think they came to the same conclusion as I did.

Dear God, if we weren't in such a recession I'd be screaming, "Get a fucking job, you idiot!" but now I'm denied that comeback.

Those weird lights in the sky were fucking fireworks! Not aliens from the planet Zod, but common or garden display fireworks all the way from down town China.

UPDATE 3:

My head is starting to hurt with all this as the story spreads across the globe. A sober report in the Louth Leader's website, "louthleader.co.uk" lists several other instances of blade failure along with a quote from the "tentacle man", John Harrison. Looking from his landing window, he saw:

"a 'massive ball of light' with 'tentacles going right down to the ground' over Conisholme wind farm."

"It was huge. At first I thought it must have been a hole where the moon was shining through but then I saw the tentacles – it looked just like an octopus. It was an incredible site; I have never seen anything like it before. I have no idea what it was, all I can say is what I saw".

Dear god, does this man wear spectacles - does he need to? Has he ever seen fireworks before? The paper doesn't elaborate on these points but that's the sort of thing I'd be asking. Seems that Mr Harrison (no age given) has gotten caught up in all the hype and just gone along with it.

Paraphrasing what Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel crooned in, The Boxer, "a man sees what he wants to see and disregards the rest."

He sure has done here.

UPDATE 4:

The story has finally hit the US with Fox news carrying a story from The Sun which says:A woman motorist told how she saw a UFO zoom towards the wind farm and strike the turbine.

"There was no trace of the missing blade."

Which is patently bullshit - the bloody thing was there for everyone to see. This is the result of overexcited early reports, but the Currant Bun isn't going to let a few facts get in the way:

An [unidentified] UFO expert said: "We are very excited."

Humm, wonder if that's Nick Pope - who is either nuts or very smart, I can't tell yet. He used to work at the MOD, but is now a TV personality - promoting UFOs. You decide that one.

The Bun goes on:

Dorothy Willows — who lives half a mile from the scene of the hit-and-run — was in her car when "strange lights" loomed in the evening sky.

"The lights were moving across the sky towards the wind farm," she said. "Then I saw a low flying object. It was skimming across the sky towards the turbines."

Isn't it amazing how a simple firework display (as was revealed earlier in this article) suddenly turns into a low-flying object - oh yes, and a moon squid.

I know from personal experience that journos put words into people's mouths, so I can't be sure that's what Mrs Willows said - but I wouldn't be surprised. People are obviously keen to get in on the act and not be outdone. It's the old "It was THIS big" claim.

Hey ho.

More on this as the bullshit, sorry, story develops momentum.

Christ Model Disturbs Residents

A hideous depiction of pain and suffering that has adorned the front of a church in southern England has been removed because people thought it too unpleasant. One elderly resident interviewed by the BBC said:

"I'm glad they've taken it down. It gave me the creeps when I was going past it"

Explaining the decision to remove the hideous thing, Reverend Ewen Souter told the BBC the sculpture was, "A horrifying depiction of pain and suffering."

Disagreeing with the church's decision, Reverend John Capron told the BBC:

"I think it's very difficult for us to sanitise the Christian faith and certainly to sanitise human suffering. The cross was a dreadful event; one of the cruellest events in the history of mankind. As we look at what is happening in the world around us, for example what is happening to the people of Gaza, I don't think it's entirely realistic to think that violence and horror don't happen to us. For Christians, the great comfort in the crucifix is the thought not that it represents simply, human pain but also the love of God. The God who created us is also the God who suffers with us."

Designed in the 1960s by Edward Bainbridge Copnall, a former president of the Royal Society of British Sculptors, it's made from a mixture of coal dust and resin and will now be housed at a Horsham museum; presumably away from small children.

Reverend Souter thought the oversized idol was actually scaring people off and not communicating the "Christian" message. He wanted to portray, "an accurate biblical picture of the crucifixion as a moment of hopefulness for the world, and not one of despair".

Oh for fuck's sake.

Rewind that a moment. Did he just say, "an accurate biblical picture of the crucifixion... (in the negative)"

I've seen the statue and it's a pretty nasty looking thing and fairly accurate. The malnourished shadow of a man, face contorted into screaming agony with hands nailed to the wooden cross through the palms (which is a common mistake).

I'd say it was an fairly accurate depiction of pain and suffering the early Italian army forced on anyone who pissed them off.

Modern scholars (at least, ones who don't have a religious axe to grind) now think the resurrection that is a cornerstone of the Christian faith was only added by a scribe hundreds of years after the original text was laid down. The earliest text (that we have) stops where at the point where the cave is opened and Jesus's body is missing.

The empty stainless steel crucifix that will replace this hideous throwback only serves to feed the lie that professional Christians need to keep people believing in. Tell them the truth is what I say - even if it's nasty.

Tell them that your god was an evil, jealous, murdering bastard - just like it says in the bible. I know you won't because then they'll realise you're just a bunch of bigots feeding them a crock of shit: and you'll be out of a job.

Edinburgh Professor Believes In Teaching Creationism

According to a recent Guardian poll a quarter of UK teachers believe that creationism is should be taught. Says the paper:

The Ipsos/Mori poll of 923 primary and secondary teachers found that 29% of science specialists agreed with the statement: "Alongside the theory of evolution and the Big Bang theory, creationism should be TAUGHT in science lessons.

Anyone with a scientific mind should be able to dismiss creationism and intelligent design as dumb without much difficulty, but demonstrating how far the reach of belief can distort the view of otherwise learned and intelligent people, we need look no further than Thomas Crowley, professor of geosciences at the University of Edinburgh.

Professor Crowley has, reports the paper, taught evolution in North America where fundamentalism is rife and young earth creationism is accepted almost as matter of fact. It doesn't state his credentials - so I can't say that he is (or is not) qualified to teach biological sciences, but nevertheless he feels there is an argument for creation. Writing in the Guardian, here, he says:

"... it [science] cannot in fact explain how 'something' (the energy of the universe compressed into a volume the size of a golf ball) arose from nothing beforehand."

This is entirely true - science has ideas, but no proof of anything prior Big Bang. The professor then disconnects the logical parts of his brain and by adding:

"This yawning logical gap leaves open the possibility that something else may be going on. The history of life is consistent with Darwinian evolution, although life's increasing complexity - including the very recent appearance of modern man - is also consistent with (but not proof of) the possibility of some special creative agent existing."

and, futher:

"It [intelligent design] is embedded in any Christian religion that continues to treat the promise of a messiah, the incarnation and the resurrection as historical fact (the reasoning being that, if God is responsible for creating the big bang, then the incarnation and resurrection would be child's play by comparison)."

This is the old and rather jaded "god of the gaps" argument: which goes, "you can't explain something so God did it."

He continues along a similar path by commenting:

"And it is essential for any teacher to point out that, even if 'soft [old earth] creationism' and 'intelligent design' are true, they cannot be considered science until they make predictions that can be falsified."

But surely this is a case of not just having your cake and eating it, but not even paying for the cake in the first place. If Intelligent Design (which is creationism wrapped in fancy language and complex straw man arguments) is true then we should be able to prove it.

We can show evolution to be true. On the microscopic scale it happens so rapidly that bacteria and other organisms are out-evolving the treatments we devise to protect against them. On a larger scale, things are much slower so we have to look to the fossil record - which is incomplete by its very nature. In some ways, we're lucky to have fossils at all - we burn a lot of fossil goo in our cars every day on the way to work!

The Christian faith and promises that Professor Crowley alludes to were developed from stories thousands of years old at a time when science was something of the future. Even Issac Newton, himself a great scientist, thought that God did everything and his job was just to unravel it all.

Yet there is no tangiable evidence of the supernatural anywhere. The further we walk down the path of enlightenment (scientific enlightenment that is) the deeper our understanding becomes and the more bleak things appear.

Why are we here? We just are.
What is my purpose in life? Life has no purpose - it's just blindly walking into the future.

Some of us, and I assume from what he writes, Professor Crowley is one of them, need to believe there is a higher purpose. This is what drives and ultimately probably buffers them from descent into mental illness. They cling on to the promise of something greater than they are in the hope of eternal life.

The rest of us accept our lot and get on with it. One of us is going to be wrong, but only one is in for a shock.

Professor Crowley can be reached here: thomas.crowley@ed.ac.uk

Christine Maggiore Is Finally Dead

As (medical) Doctor Ben Goldacre less gleefully reports, the most famous AIDs denier of them all has finally succumbed to HIV. The author of the disgracefully titled, "What if everything you thought you knew about Aids was wrong?" has been nailed by the virus that fucked up her immune system until there was nothing left to fight an infection which finally killed her.

She was 52.

The US media loved her because she promoted an idea that went against science, medicine and common sense and, for a while, appeared to survive despite refusing anti-retrovirals which could have prolonged her life.

Worse though, when pregnant she refused the ARVs despite the evidence that the reduce the risk of maternal transmission of HIV to the foetus and breast fed her children, refusing them HIV tests.

Her daughter, Eliza Jane Scovill, died three years ago from a similar pnuemonia to that which killed Maggiore.

As Dr. Goldacre writes:

"She set up successful campaigning organisations and counselled HIV-positive pregnant women on how to avoid pressure from medics to use azidothymidine (AZT) during pregnancy to prevent maternal transmission of the virus. She appeared on the cover of Mothering magazine, with a “No AZT” sign painted on her pregnant tummy."

Most embarrassing of all, her fellow denier Prof. Peter Duesberg (University of California), managed to take in Neville Hodgkinson of the Sunday Times - an otherwise respectable paper. Nature described the Times' coverage as “seriously mistaken” and “probably disastrous”.

Fuck you Duesberg and fuck you Maggiore. I have family and friends lost to this virus.

Bad science kills people - the blood of millions is on your hands.

UPDATE: 7 Jan 2009

Seth C. Kalichman, Professor in the Psychology Department at the University of Connecticut has written a book (also mentioned in his comment below) which I am happy to link to here: www.springer.com and priced at £13.99 it's due out in March this year.

Unlike psuedo-scientists, Seth is donating his royalties from sales to buy AIDS medications in Africa. Why Africa? Because America can afford to pay its own way and Africa can't - and it's worse because the bloody Catholic church is still teaching people there that it's "God's will" for them to have sex without condoms; compounding the problem, African men are just as bloody minded and won't wear them either.

Where I will disagree with Seth is (although this might not be entirely disagreeing) is in Maggiore's choice to refuse ARVs while pregnant and her decision to breast feed despite medical advice and all the evidence that her child would suffer harm.

While Maggiore was entirely within her rights to refuse treatment for herself, Eliza Jane had no choice in the matter and had a terribly short life as as result.

The pro-Maggiore brigade are out in force, too. I found this piece of "news" rather interesting:

"Pneumonia doesn't appear to harm HIV-positive patients any more than those without HIV, according to a new international study conducted in part by the University of Alberta. There was also negligible difference in the mortality rate; total deaths among the HIV patients was 3.5 per cent (two of 58 patients), and 4.8 per cent (seven of 174) among the HIV-negative patients."

So from these results, it seems that you're more likely to die from Pneumonia if you're HIV positive. Smelling the sweet scent of denier-bullshit, I did some digging (OK, googling) and discovered that it's the pneumocystic form of pneumonia - not the bacterial form - that occurs most frequently in AIDs patients (indeed, occurrence is often an early indicator of HIV infection!)

The research cited in that article was interesting, but essentially meaningless to the case in point. Bacterial pneumonia is entirely different from the fungal pneumocystic variety - which is so common it's estimated that 75% of children are exposed to (and immune to it) by the age of four.

It killed Maggiore's daughter before her fourth birthday.

Like Autism denier, Jenny McCarthy, Christine Maggiore was both ill-informed, attractive and charismatic. It's a dangerous combination but combined with an apathetic, story-oriented and hungry media is lethal.

Oh Pleeeeeeeeeze!

Radio 4 is never far from my heart, and when I heard an unnamed (well, he was named but I forgot it) evolutionary biologist stating that the virgin birth had a potential scientific explanation, my ears pricked up faster than a speeding bullet. Oh, crap! I'm mixing my metaphor, but no matter.

Parthenogenesis (literally virgin-creation) is a form of reproduction where a single female creature gives birth to another female without the ova being fertilised. The reason for only female births is that a male requires a Y chromosome and females don't posses it.

Now this evolutionary biologist was a Christian who took his bible pretty seriously, and although he accepted Darwin's theory (and neo-Darwinian theory) he felt that the virgin birth could be real. He even went on to explain the rare case of a woman who does carry a Y chromosome - someone in the comments will doubtless remember the name.

Anyway, assuming "Mary" had this rare condition AND had experienced parthenogenesis, that would explain the fact that she was a virgin who had a spontaneous pregnancy and gave birth to a son. Ta dah!

And this is a respected biologist!

The fact that virgin birth stories existed before Jesus would only serve to strengthen his argument, but since this guy is a scientist, how can he have missed Occam's Razor?

Oh shit. Maybe he was snoozing that day?

I don't personally believe in supernatural intervention; but I do accept virgin birth. Not in the church's version of course. Sperm are pretty tricky little buggers and although unlikely, it is possible for a couple of horny teens in a fit of dry humping, end up with an surprise.

If we accept (and I highly doubt) that Mary WAS a virgin, there's no way to tell that this child wasn't just a product of a simple mistake.

So our choices are:

1) Supernatural power;
2) An early example of dry humping or;
3) Mary had a little shag (before she knew Joseph)?

Occam's Razor says 3: every time and it's very rarely wrong and even assuming that parthenogenesis was the cause, why has it never been reported since in 2000+ years of human history?

A Rose By Any Other Name...

... is still a rose. But in a toe-stubbing piece of PC-stupidity, a new school in Sheffield is to be known as a "place of learning."

Head Teacher of Watercliffe Meadow, Linda Kingdon, reportedly said the word "school" had been removed from the title as a new approach to learning.

Costing a staggering £4.7m Watercliffe Meadow opened in September 2007, replacing Shirecliffe Juniors, Watermead Nursery Infants and Busk Meadow Nursery and Infants.

Councillor Andrew Sangar, aid: "It's a school, we consider it a school and that's how we refer to it. How a school chooses to manage and refer to itself is a matter for the board of governors and the community it serves and we're relaxed about that."

Ms. Kingdon said: 'We decided from an early stage we didn't want to use the word "school",' she told The Mail, 'This is Watercliffe Meadow, a place for learning. One reason was many of the parents of the children here had very negative connotations of school."

The Campaign for Plain English was less relaxed with "spokesperson" Marie Clair calling the decision, "laughable".

Laughable it is. A spade is still a spade, even if you call it "A multi-purpose manual gardening implement for the turning of soil. " Likewise, a school is still a school and bullshit still stinks.

What's shit got to do with this, you demand to know? If someone stood up to the PC bullshit these idiots came up with and made them spend a bit more time teaching the 3Rs, we might be better placed in the world's standing. No wonder children enter secondary schools barely able to read and write when the loonies are running the primaries.

I despair, I really do.

Tony Blair Is Still Interfering

It's said you can't keep a good man down; but, as the marketing goes you can't keep a Weeble™ down either.

Former British Primeminister and Catholic convert is now trying to meddle in American politics by leaning on Barack Obama to, "Unify the world." Writes Joe Murphy in the Mail.

Mr Blair is now an international peace envoy, which is sort of ironic considering his hand in deceiving the British people and leading us into an unjust and possibly illegal war against Sadam Hussain. He also claims to remain on friendly terms with President Bush (jnr.). Says Blair:

"I'm not a fair-weather friend. I say this to people all the time, even [to] liberal people who cannot believe I can possibly like George W Bush."

Now I believe Blair likes Dubya because if he said anything else, he'd come across looking like a hypocrite - oh wait...

Blair went on to say of the Iraq war and Bush's "war on terror":

"He [Dubya] had very difficult decisions to take after September 11th, and I think he took the right decisions, actually. I'm afraid that if there was any collective mistake that was made, it was not understanding how deep the struggle is and how long it's going to have to be fought."

You think, Mr Blair? You THINK! Dubya had some hard decisions to make for sure, but if there's one thing we've seen admirably demonstrated over the last eight years, he's prone to make the wrong ones - and run with them no matter what the cost is: provided it doesn't cost him.

So here we have a warmonger rubbing shoulders with an idiot (you decide which is which) and both of them have the gall to call on President elect Obama to fix their mess for them. Religious wars have gone on for as long as religion has existed: even the Abrahamics (Christianity, Islam, Judaism) have fought through history vying for power: and they still are despite all claiming to be one people under the same god!

The best way to win a religious war is to not get into it in the first place, but thanks to this idiot and his puppet, we're all neck-deep in shit and resentment. I want to know which fucking idiot thought that a guy responsible for the Middle East hating Britain thought it would be smart to give him a job as a peace envoy. For fuck's sake, he's a new-born member of the most hated and power-hungry major Christian sect of them all.

Thank god for atheism, I say.