Sort of a Rant – Page 6 – sillysocksonfriday

They paved Paradise …

… and put up a parking lot.

So sang Joni Mitchell about beautiful Hawaii in her 1970 song ‘Yellow Taxi’.

That describes a bit of how I feel about Fraser Island. Going there and catching fish, enjoying the camaraderie of friends and the break from the home domestic regime was good; a rare experience to be treasured.

Fraser is a world heritage listed site: a 75 mile long sand island, girdled by wide sandy beaches and a sea full of fish. The middle bit is covered by Casuarina trees, natural bush, clay cliffs, sand dunes and freshwater lakes fraser20island Streams and rivers of cold, clear, beautifully pure water flow over the beach to the sea every few miles. And dingoes prowl the edges of camps.

Fishermen flock there especially from July to September: the tailor ‘run’. Shoals of that lovely swift, fierce, tasty fish spawn there in their thousands. Whales sail by, spouting and breaching; few boats are seen. It is not too difficult to catch a fish. The beaches are wide, one can camp almost anywhere at the back of the beach and the sand will yield clams and bloodworms for bait.

Here’s the rub: fishermen and campers love powerful 4×4 vehicles and many spend preceding months perfecting these mechanised marvels. They congregate in groups and tear up and down the beaches on the firm sands at low tide looking for good fishing or camping spots at speeds of 80 to 100 kph! This is an almost continuous stream. Some tow trailers laden with camping and fishing gear. They are joined by special high power buses for backpackers who descend on the viewpoints in droves, before boarding and resuming the charge up or down the beach. At certain spots the sand is demarcated for landing strips for light aircraft which arrive in flights, full of sightseers.

I suppose that it is a symptom of modern-day life and I am flailing against a hurricane … but I don’t know if I wish to return there. common_dart

My fishing reputation was enhanced by catching one of the biggest tailor (about 2 – 3 kg) and a few Dart which are a lovely fighting fish; surprisingly tasty too!

Constant Irritant

I try to avoid driving when schools close for the day. Schoolkids are generally energised and impatient so their road sense slips. I saw one young fella riding his bike across a major intersection absorbed in his cellphone, maybe chasing Pokemons.

He was wearing a uniform of khaki shorts and shirt and grey woollen stockings – this is sub-tropical Australia after all!

Here’s the stinger – he was wearing a tie!

Mind schoolgirl tie you, he was lucky – other schools require their pupils to wear grey flannel trousers, blazers and wide brim felt hats too. The girls wear below knee skirts and ties as well. Can you believe it?

Tying decorated strips of cloth around one’s neck is folly and a clear symbol of submission to the yoke of ridiculous convention.

I can understand uniform and tradition as part of the pomp and rituals on special occasions. But not as an everyday practice.

Why oh why are our children obliged to wear ties? They are such stupid, obsolete items of clothing! They are awkward, impractical, functionless, uncomfortable and unnecessary decorations.

I suppose I am farting against thunder; getting Education authorities to embrace reality and the future is not going to happen: their emphasis is on standards, measurement, uniformity and compliance.

Surely school is about enlightenment, creativity and freeing adorable-baby-wearing-diaper-tie-sitting-briefcase-188809 developing minds of our youth! What other impractical conventions are adhered to on such a mass scale?

The Blackface Outrage

A Mum proudly posted a picture of her son who painted his white face black, donned a dreadlocked wig to look like his favourite football player and won first prize at a local library parade where children dressed as characters.

She was torched by rants of outraged objectors who claimed the act was racist and she felt compelled to remove her post.

So the boy who won the prize, the librarians who awarded the prize, the boy’s mother who proudly posted the picture are all racists.

White people who imitate Halle Berry or Imam or Jamie Foxx or Michael Jackson may face similar condemnation. Should we ban sun tanning?

But Coloured people in Cape Town proudly and joyously parade in blackface in their own self styled Coon Carnival? Cape-Coon-Carnival

Of course just making oneself look like a black person is not ‘blackfacing’ is it? Shakespeare’s Othello has been portrayed by blackfaced Lawrence Olivier, Richard Burton and Anthony Hopkins – to world wide acclaim.

There are too few presumptions of innocence and too much sensitivity to possible harm; too many ready to squeal as a means of drawing attention. Kneejerk reaction based on a single perception assumes harmful intent and attracts swarms of the righteous brigade under the cloak of outraged virtue and political correctness.

It is time that we hold to account the people who unjustifiably claim offence without substantial foundation. Media authorities should penalise publicised information that is based on puffery: that will cull some of the overblown, scandalised cries of hyper-sensitive attention seekers.

This type of one sided, righteous non-sense is what drove reasonably sane and normal people to vote for Trump and Brexit.

*picture by Rosalin Deuters

HR is a Pink Ghetto

There was a predictable outsplurge of unhappy bleats at this comment uplifted from a survey of HR practitioners in New Zealand.

The emphasis of these squeals has been on the pink aspect. Pink has variously coloured the causes of women, LGBTI (MNOP…?), communists (pinkos) and breast cancer victims. In the above context the suggestion is of over-representation of women in the HR function with all the connotations of glass ceilings, misogyny, chauvinism, discrimination and all those vices of males in business. We must not forget that women known as “welfare secretaries” started HR in the late 19^th Century… but I digress.

Ghetto is my focus. It has a hint of slum – a place where the inconvenient people are quartered, presumably for control purposes. Quite often these people have competencies perceived as threatening by those in power.

If they do their job, HR are inconvenient: they say to bosses and employees “you can’t do that; you must do this…” They are wise like witch doctors. They have studied human beings and laws so know what must be done to be compliant. They are usually right.

Bosses don’t like HR because they fetter their authority, give strong advice but never carry the can and usually know where the bodies are buried. Employees don’t like them because they decide who is employed, who can stay, who must go, who gets paid more or less and worst of all: at the end of the day they will side with the Man.

Well, now the unions’ work is done by government, who regulate welfare and naughty employers, and most other functions can be outsourced. IT collect all the stats and accountants rule the roost, so decision-making is logical and economical and labour is just a commodity, right?

Why are HR still there? Because they are the termination experts!

That’s why HR’re in the ghetto – so they get the message and leave.

What they need to do is get outta administrivia cocoons and come back in the front door with skills that ensure utility; facilitating the maximisation, collaboration and sharing of talent intelligence which will dictate future modes of delivery in the post post capital age.

Sometimes I’m glad I am retired; otherwise I would have to know what the last bit means…

Damned if I do and damned if I don’t

In my lackadaisical, insouciant fashion, I scanned a few posts on praise which praised praise for its beneficial effects on people, who generally seemed starved for praise and insistent on its compulsory deployment. This tweaked my contrariness.

Praise includes articulation, adulation, comments and acts that demonstrate admiration and approval of conduct. The tone of delivery is the most important.

Young children are positively reinforced by praise for almost any action they perform that has not been forbidden. It frequently becomes an expectation and so its worth becomes diluted by inappropriate use.

It takes a brave husband to fail to praise a new dress or hairstyle.

Where does that leave honest reaction and informed opinion?

I agree that they should be framed gently and considerately and attempt should be made to express some positive feelings. The need for encouragement and support in motivating others is paramount – that is not necessarily praise.

The English have a technique which can express a lack of real admiration which they call damning with faint praise which can be quite effective if the object thereof is reasonably astute. Therein lies the rub, because many people have become conditioned to unstinting praise and allergic to criticism.

The religious unconditionally praise deities, which appear to be affirmations of their faith. Is this from where unconditional praise stems?

Maybe so – all I am saying is that praise should always be measured and considered so that it is always true and appropriate and not just a sop to meet the expectations of the over-indulged.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/praise/

Spring scent memories

The anise scent of yellowMimosa distracted me.

It was brought by the springwind which whispered memories

of the shimmering sishing Msasa leaves in Africa.

So soft and beautiful, they hide the horrors of the Gukurahundi

“the rain which washes away the chaff before the spring rains”

but not the blood on the hands of the tyrant.

Married at First Sight

I rejoice because I have a follower! She was Shanghaied, however, she is now headed for Madeira, so all seems well.

Elsie wrote a blog called “Creating Ignorance” based on Orwell’s revolutionary works. I blathered a comment about whether propaganda had any worth and asking if today’s media were not propagandists in their own cause. This subject gets me to a near rant state.

I abhor the apparent manipulation of the masses by the media. For example, the fact that television producers, editors and owners see fit to create a programme like “Married at First Sight” is disgusting. It is destructive of a fundamental pillar of society as we know it. What is the value of such a series to society? The fact that it garners millions of viewers which generate huge revenue is surely only evidence of the depravity of those viewers, so easily manipulated by the media.

Now that I have insulted the intelligence of millions, I better change direction…

The local government elections in South Africa, my sub-continent of origin is of interest. Those of us who chose to leave, retain high interest and many links and concerns with the apparent failures of the fledgling democracy. But the current focus on Brazilian ineptitudes and insecurities as it stages the Olympics, give some comparative perspective. One hopes that the emergence of strong opposition to the governing party will not bring about violence as it did in the past.

I see the problem in my writings: it is a lack of focus on a pre-selected direction. I am too easily distracted by butterfly thoughts and wander away from the original path.

Well, I suppose that is what quirks and whimsy are all about.

Enjoy the Olympics: it is hopefully a reasonably honest trial of athletic strengths of the finest athletes in the world … (you see! There I go again).

Ad-mire

I recall a blog I wrote 10 years ago in reaction to advertisements which appeared on my page and which seemed to relate to the contents of the blog. Well, I suppose that’s old hat nowadays – that’s how social media marketing works.

That blogblurt was quite innocuous; although the title contained the words “weapons” and “campaign” and it did mention that the Man could be foolish. On my next visit to the site, I noticed an ad tag in the header: “Conservative Politics”.
Now, I had only one blog friend then, who hadn’t had a blog in months.

Why and how was I so identified?
My conclusion is that it was done by machine, which I resent.

Politics are matters of the heart as much as the head. I do not believe that the intent of the intertwining recipe of intellect and emotion can be discerned by machine.

I cannot deny the utilitarian value of stereotypes; but I can resent it.
(Tough tofu, you word weed wimp – you are what you are labelled; machines don’t recognise slimy grovels… do they?)

Soo, check my tags out next week, let’s see if I garner any more Big Bro interest and labels.

Get off my back, Jack – political values change, like people; tolerance is elastic and the centre moves!
I am unique & and reject your label.
Wow! I am so radical…yeah right!

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/admire/

More Blog Paranoia

I wonder if people who blog are of a certain type …?

I noticed that after my last blog (Where were we ?/ are we? / are we going to be?) that ad-tags for counselling and personality assessment attached to my blog

I also note that 1 or 2 fellow bloggers appear to have suffered mental frailty from time to time

Maybe I am not only depressed but paranoid as well – I noticed the Man watching my blog in ’06, because I happened to blather on about the struggle to be free of the yoke of the necktie …..

I suppose it is just ad-people intruding to impose their products on anyone who may be disposed to consider them. They assume propensities from blog-utterances …

That can be risky because most people try to shield their true thoughts … ah well, I am happy to lead people down avenues of my thoughts …maybe they will glimpse sanity & reality !

On another tack … I have always tried to look at things from both sides, to try and understand the motivation of the most maligned side.

No-one can applaud or rejoice in the deaths of so many innocents in the Gaza tragedy.. but, if someone kept on shooting at my house and wouldn’t stop, I would probably send my soldiers to stop the problem too.

Subtlety & patience tend to disappear when bullets fly – the usual response is to retaliate with all you have until the attack stops.

I just wish it would stop ….

What’s your Blog worth? Beware of Satan’s tricks!

I saw this little weblink on the Walrus ‘ wallow and it set off a train of thought which is quite radical, so ignore it if you wish / at your peril, heh,heh!
It caught my interest & I immediately made to try it & then hesitated: …. Walrus is witty, clever, cosmopolitan, wise & has 100 friends; his blog is worth $12.00 … I am naive, unpolished and only have 3 friends … what will my blog be worth …12 cents?

My train of thought went this way: this is how Satan works … he senses vanity and pride and a desire for re-assurance and exploits it: you could just be wiser / more entertaining than you thought… don’t be chicken….
It has been a recurring thought, last thunk when I saw, at first glance, an attractive woman of about 40. Closer examination revealed those tight bubble cheekbones that suggest botox treatment. That’s when I thought about vanity & how Satan sucks people in through vanity. Botox is definitely a vanity thing. I don’t believe vanity is ever a good thing.

It’s not easy though,is it – I still have a sneaky need to know …
Vade retro, Satanas