A question of balance

Terror tactics are horrifying and repugnant causing us to recoil. They are used when conventional warfare: i.e. soldiers fighting soldiers, is not pragmatic.

The terror tactics used in Rhodesia during the time of its ‘liberation’ war included the murder of unarmed non-combatants in pitiless, gruesome fashion. This included the execution by shooting of headmen and many tribespeople “pour encourager les autres” accompanied by mutilations, abduction and rape. It included the execution of survivors of a passenger aircraft they had shot down; the murder of missionaries including the bayonetting of a 6 month old baby.

Of course, Europe had its own terrorists like the Red Army Faction  which engaged in a series of bombings, assassinations, kidnappings, bank robberies, and shoot-outs with police.

Governments also use terrorism. In World War II, the Nazis executed villagers in reprisal for attacks on them by resistance partisans.

The Japanese Army is estimated to have executed millions of Chinese and Korean civilians during the same period.

Let us not omit the ultimate terror tactic deployed by the US on Japan in 1945 – the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki which killed over 200, 000 people.

Neighborhood reduced to rubble by atomic bomb blast, Hiroshima, 1945.

Sadly, terror tactics clearly have some “legitimacy” in societies across the world.

This somewhat shatters our moral high ground when considering the Hamas massacres of Israeli residents and indeed the Israeli retaliation and the US support for it.

There is some distaste for the Hamas tactic of hiding amongst the “innocent” population, but it is a brutally clever tactic. Why should non-combatants not share the fight in a liberation struggle?

Of course, this type of thinking means that the only tactic to stop this type of warfare is eradication and suppression – obliteration will buy a few years until new ideologists fire up the youth of a new generation. Unavoidably, non-combatants will also be obliterated.

We can express our horror and repugnance, but we can not condemn the morality if we too are guilty.

It goes without saying that terrorists should be stopped before they attack.

But, how is this possible?

One answer which many will not like, is universal surveillance: the continuous monitoring of every meeting, conversation and movement of ….. everybody.

Don’t be alarmed, surveillance of communications and movement is commonplace in the military and security industries, including the police. Many private houses and vehicles already have security camera systems which track you whenever you pass by; you are watched in supermarkets, bars and train stations. Internet traffic is monitored and filtered by service providers.

Why do we still need a warrant to monitor criminal activities? AI bots can monitor and notify suspicious behaviour for investigation, in real time as it happens.

It will be far more effective in stopping terrorists and criminals than analysis of historical data, so what is the downside?

After all: “freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose”!

I wrote this poem for a poetry class some years ago.

Screen

camera-security

Everyone everywhere should be screened

Let the camera capture

your face, your life, your ups and

downs.

And hers and his and theirs.

All must be screened – t’will

make us feel safer and happier, until

we think about

Who screens

the Screeners.

Look at the screen

be obscene and herd:

you’re on tv!

This is our new morality

I was on tv

did you see me?

Bombast

I suffered a bruise the other day … to my ego.

For some reason the word came up in a conversation with my daughter … and she laughed! We were talking about the Afrikaans word “windgat”, which is not a compliment and indicates someone who is loud, flashy and probably drives a car with two big exhausts.

We pondered on that; I was forced to admit that some years ago in South Africa, I was called a windgat* by colleagues at work. It was probably because I was a loudmouth and sometimes confronted their conventional awe of authority. Fortunately, I usually knew what I was talking about in industrial relations and in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king!

She asked what the English equivalent might be, so I Googled it.

Oh dear!! Bombastic was the word!

ostentatiously lofty in style

synonyms: declamatory, large, orotund, tumid, turgid rhetorical

given to rhetoric, emphasizing style at the expense of thought

That was why she laughed! She recognised me!

Bombast was the cotton padding used in clothing to make the wearer appear more substantial.

I do admit that I have a love of language and have been known to use big words and I avoid the banal like the plague – but I have never owned a car with big exhausts.

So, it is necessary for me to embrace and practice humility !

Banal is a strange word which I shunned in my younger days as it made me feel queasy somehow. Probably because of the -anal sound. But in fact its not ‘bay nal’,- it is pronounced ‘buh narl’, much more reflective and condemnatory sounding. Synonyms are: bland, corny, dumb, hackneyed, mundane, stupid, trite, vapid …

Ooops! There I go again ……

*windgat literally translates as windy a***hole

Unalloyed joy

When your throat thickens, your heart falters then swells and your eyes prickle with tears – that is unalloyed joy.

My middle grandson gave me a cool stare then curled a grin and clasped my finger … and my heart!

In the middle of a slow Spring afternoon, reading on the patio with music in the background. Pavarotti just reached those sad, beautiful notes in Vesti la giubba, which clutched at me, leaving me breathless with its pathos.

Ridi, Pagliaccio,
col tuo amore infranto!
Ridi del duol, che t’avvelena il cor!

Laugh, clown,
at your broken love!
Laugh at the grief that poisons your heart!

Maybe that one was not joy but it was intense emotion!

Now I can’t remember the one which gave me such joy – damn!!

I thonk maybe it was the Vincero, vincero! in Nessun Dorma – have a listen and feel the joy!

Music often does that though. I still weep almost every time I hear Danny Boy:

But when ye come, and all the flowers are dying 

If I am dead, as dead I well may be 

You’ll come and find the place where I am lying 

And kneel and say an “Ave” there for me.

And I shall hear, tho’ soft you tread above me 

And all my grave will warm and sweeter be 

For you will bend and tell me that you love me 

And I shall sleep in peace until you come to me

Sadly this weekend there was no joy, unalloyed or at all, watching rugby….

Between a rock and a hard place

I once had to shoot my dog.

It had been run over and was in agony, so I borrowed a pistol and shot it. There was no vet in a hundred miles and its back was clearly broken ….

That was really just a hard place. Someone else offered to do it, but I felt that it was my problem to resolve. So I did it.

It was the right decision, but the sickening feeling and the guilty relief occasionally stab my well being. Sweet Hector!

There is no real unscarred escape from hard dilemmas, other than mental preparation and a rational analysis of solutions. There must be acknowledgement that hurt will occur and that pain will endure for some time.

The difficult part is ensuring that feelings of guilt are voided by a sensible assessment and choice of outcome.

When a problem is shared, the pain is doubled…

If the solution is not shared and owned, recriminations can rear their head later with even more pain. Negotiation and the gaining of acceptance of others is an extremely delicate exercise, with horrific emotional pitfalls both in the solution and the forever after.

To say that one emerges stronger from a distressing dilemma may be true, but strength is probably not the right measure; wiser perhaps?

So next time your leg is pinned by a rock, don’t cut it off until you are sure there isn’t a handy lever nearby or passer-by who could lift it.

The Gordian Knot

Life today is complicated: many components beset everyday problems. The modern politician has to find the courage and wisdom of Alexander to find a solution that is simple and easy to understand.

That’s the job – finding the right sword to cut the knot.

Brexit may be regarded as an Alexandian solution, not elegant but a simple severance. Covid has masked that track, so success will be hard to judge.

Here in Australia, my thoughts drift towards the Voice as a solution to Indigenous demands for attention and appeasement of the minority zealotry prevailing in the neo-liberal generation which has permeated our universities and subverted critical thinking.

It is an elegant, simple solution, devised to meet the short span of attention engendered by the memes, tropes and tweets of modern social media.

But the longer thoughts linger, supposedly simple solutions lose their lustre. It has a good chance of failure, which may require Albo to embrace the point of his sword as opposed to the blade. How sad!

Complexity and multiplicity of contributing factors cannot be ignored. Alexander could employ radical tactics, he was backed by the biggest, most succesful army in the world. Lesser mortals in democracies have to ensure majority support.

Putin in Russia frequently slashes through Gordian knots, even decapitating military threats … but the very fact that he perceives the need to do so suggests that there are greater problems.

There is very rarely a simple solution to a complex problem, without some sort of magic, deception, smoke or mirrors..

Something Eddy Jones, the Wallabies coach knows and is trading on in the Rugby World Cup, starting tomorrow!!

Yesterday Today and Tomorrow

The scent catches me: we seem to have had a bush in every house we lived in. Such a descriptive name: Vivid in youth, mild lavender in the middle, fading to white in old age.

Maybe life’s distinctions are not just good or bad, heaven or hell, one or zero, young or old.

Maybe it’s a triad that pervades: Id, Ego, Superego; discovery, knowledge, wisdom; experience, life, hope …

I love the music of the past; today’s music needs to age until familiarity brings content. The thing about the past is that we mostly recall the good stuff, which makes today joyful.

Its only when tomorrow becomes today and doesn’t bring joy do we interrogate the past to attribute blame. Of course, it is not so easy to get a clear picture of the past, because we tailor and garnish our memories. Each time they are taken out, they get a bit of a polish, so are usually changed from the original.

So many roads to follow – choice is rarely easy, unless it’s laissez-faire.

An idle thought (most of mine these days..) – focus in the past was sharp, it is a bit hazy today … tomorrow is an estimate.

Perhaps we should spend less time on the warm, familiar past and focus more on our future. Determination and tenacity are the best fuel in the pursuit of contentment. We determine today and step forward tomorrow, which always changes and needs ongoing determination.

So spend time today on sharpening your axe, start chopping tomorrow … but remember to do some sharpening each day.

When you are old, the awareness of the end of the road turns one’s mind to some sort of negotiation with the gods. FOMO is an abiding regret: will I see my grandson play 1st team or my grandaughters’ weddings .. balanced against the imperative of dying (easily and swiftly, of course) before any loved ones.

It is astounding how one seems to pick up speed and not notice how quickly the years pass as we near the bottom of the slope.

Goodness! I didn’t mean to lurch into the melancholy, I certainly don’t feel that; I was just trying to write anything but a rant!

It’s not the colours of the flowers so much as the scent that lingers and stirs the memory – like bacon!

The absurdities of our kind

I was thinking of another rant about the Woke Religion and its priests, the Voice and the courtesies we insist are paid to tyrants who we permit to flourish. But I have ranted about most of that already, so I need a change of tack.

We have too much tolerance.

We tolerate teenagers who steal and wreck the most expensive cars for Tik Tok kicks.

We tolerate demonstrators who burn and loot in their righteous displays of outrage.

We tolerate shoplifters because we are too scared to arrest them in case they create a victimisation scene.

We tolerate and compensate governments who suppress freedom, eliminate opponents and yet proclaim democracy.

We allow men claiming they are women to enter womens’ prisons despite convictions for rape of females

We give girls drugs to stop their sexual development and allow them to have their breasts removed, sometimes withhout parental consent.

We tolerate the mass murderers we catch, providing lifetime accommodation in our prisons.

We shoot mad dogs and any dangerous animal.

We also train soldiers in ways to efficiently kill people our governments declare are enemies; often in cold blood.

My recommendation is that we re-institute the death sentence for murderers and serial rapists.

Their places in our prisons can be filled by those who wilfully damage property.

We must also stop meeting tyrants and refuse them entry into our world.

I believe that the deterrent effect of capital punishment for terrible crimes will reverberate and reset the respect for societal values that has disappeared.

Odds and Ends

For some time I have been trying to work out what are the essences of Conservatism and Liberalism in politics.

Liberal politicians aim to maximise the transfer of wealth from Capital to the general population; Conservatives aim to increase the ability of business to generate wealth which in turn generates benefits to the population.

It would be easy to say Liberals are populists who succeed by appeasing the masses with new benefits and Conservatives are dedicated to preserving the wealth of the elites. Still a class war then…

The mission of both left and right wings is to be perceived as the greatest benefactor. If the Left take too much from the wealth generators, the economy falters and the voters suffer, if the Right do not give enough they will be abandoned, even if the economy is booming, although that can be a major attraction.

So recently in Australia, the Conservatves lost out in the election, despite “protecting” the economy during Covid: it was skilfully portrayed by the Left as arrogant and mysoginistic.

In the US the Liberals (Democrats) are seen to be too progressive with new rights and change, despite giving huge economic benefits, while the right (Republicans) are resistant and supportive of Trump who while personally offensive, appeals as a champion of conservative rights.

This is in my view is where the main battle in the World Woke War will be fought.

Moving on…

While Rugby remains my main affection, it has not been that exciting in recent years, despite skills seeming to improve.

The introduction of the TMO and on screen reviews is a contributor. Referees are no longer instinctive and decisive. The TMO should be reserved for reviewable foul play to be actioned after the game.

The other issue was the expulsion of Israel Folau, in my view one of the greatest rugby football talents ever. This is part of the Woke wave, along with the taking of the knee, welcomes to the country and the promotion of indigenous causes, support for the Voice, etc. which saw administrators kissing a number of arses to maximise their virtue signals.

They forgot that they are paid employees not elected representatives of players – they need to ensure that their utterances have the support of all players or shut up!

On the other hand…

I must say that I have really enjoyed the FIFA Womens’ World Cup matches that I have watched. I confess that I resented the intrusion of females into what I saw as male sports. I recant and am now a supporter, even of female rugby, although I cringe at the crunch of some of the contacts on those soft female bodies….

For men, it was sort of manly and glorious to be injured; a spot of claret endorsed manliness, a badge of glory – what is the significance for women?

There is no denying that they can be just as tough and their blood is also red but it is somehow uncomfortable. Vestiges of mysogyny?

Just to round it off..

I am glad that there seems to be backswing against transgender men being permitted to compete in womens’ sports. I don’t think they should be allowed in womens’ prisons either or in their toilets.

Who would think I was once threatened with deportation for my liberal views?

How lucky can we get?

The world’s largest cruise ship named “Icon Of The Seas” sets sail in January 2024. It will carry 5610 passengers and 2350 crew members.

It’s 5 times larger and heavier than the Titanic, has 19 floors with more than 40 bars, restaurants and bowling alleys; it will have 6 slides, 7 swimming pools and 9 hot tubs. It promises more than 40 ways to dine, drink and entertain, many of them included in the cruise fare.

Picture yourself on a majestic cruise ship, where the mission is to devour copious amounts of food, boogie down on the dance floor, indulge in endless beverages, and splash around like a slip-n-slide champion.

Ahoy, matey! Get ready for a hilariously epic adventure on this floating wonderland!

NOT!!

But that is a foretaste of what our futureworld is going to look like – thousands crammed into small areas with carnivals on all corners to keep them happy.

In the cities anyway; for a while, in the outback, there will be space and freedom to move and breathe. But soon everyone will be enthralled by the media to follow the trend directions of the mass manipuleteers.

Very few will be able to withstand the pressure to conform and wear hoodies under blazers, boilersuits and tractor trek-sole boots; drink trendy snap chilled coffee, dine on sobrassada, ricotta and escabeche, rump cap and softserves.

Only for a while of course, until the new trends are put in motion and the masses follow the prompts of their latest model i-phones.

We are lucky that while there is a lemming like rush to live in cities, especially on the coast, there is a corresponding vacuum being created in the small country towns and hamlets…

Well, I have probably squashed sufficient sensitivities to stimulate at least one retort (I hope) …..

In the bleak mid-winter

I sometimes feel a bit feeble and a little apprehensive that the phone will ring to say a dear one is dead, or worse, dying.

Those are some of the prospects of the downhill side of the age spectrum.

Of course, there are others.

My newest grandchild is 3 months old today and can count to 42 and speaks some Italian. I have another due in a month! My oldest grandchild is already ten and growing into a terrifying beauty.

Six sprouts to water with tears of pride and joy.

Our children are grown up and independent; indulgent of their sometimes unwieldy parent. The tick tock is inexorable and marches on at pace.

I am dismayed to find we have been in Australia for 10 years already, after 15 in New Zealand.

Yet, Africa still aches within me: its politicians infuriate me and the increased pace of the crumbling of the infrastructure sickens. But it is where most of my extended family are and a trace of guilt lingers: that I will not die there where 9 generations of ancestors died and my parents, 4 sisters and two brothers have chosen to die.

But my chosen home is a bright, comfortable place and we see the grandchildren quite often, but not too much.

There are still four more Ashes tests and the Rugby World Cup this year.

Who do I want to win? Australia for the Ashes of course; the rugby is more difficult: I am a citizen of Ireland and New Zealand and live in Australia but my playing days were in Southern Africa.

I think I may bet on the Irish but my heart will be with the Bokke.

Perhaps I should re-read Desiderata:

… in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.

Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.