What is genocide?

Today's a good day to remember just what is and what is not genocide. Like many technical terms, 'genocide' has a fairly well defined meaning, in this case agreed on by the signatories of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such:

In other words, the sort of thing the Turks did to the Armenians in 1916 and the sort of thing the Germans did to the Jews in the early 1940s.

While I disagree with many of the actions taken by the IDF (including incursions into Palestinian territories, wilful destruction of infrastructure, internment etc. Jenin was an atrocity), I do not accept that what is happening there is genocide. Israeli state policy is not the destruction of the Palestinian people. This isn't my opinion but the judgement of the United Nations and of the recognised expert human rights lawyer, Geoffrey Robertson QC.

That's why I'm pretty unhappy about the Ajuntament of Ciempozuelos in Madrid choosing to mark today as a memorial for the 'Palestinian Genocide'. The dull-witted sensationalism of taking a memorial for the Jewish holocaust and attempting to turn it against other Jews is, frankly, pathetic. And it stinks of anti-Semitism.

I'm actually not amazed by the small-mindedness of the Ajuntament's Socialist government. Anyone who's had experience with these toe-rags before will be well aware that there are few more self-important, arrogant, vile, idle, corrupt or pompous officials than those who work in Spain's town halls. Over the last few years, this Ajuntament has apparently been ratcheting up the anti-Israeli rhetoric without any trouble from the PSOE's national leadership… so this year, they decided to take it one step further. Well done, dick-heads.

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It's not just the PSOE who can be dick-heads, though. In 2007, General Franco is still the honorary mayor 'in perpetuum' of Salamanca. The PSOE opposition in the city has tried to get this changed but the PP have blocked their attempts, preferring to honour the dead fascist dictator. It's kind of sad, really, that one of the great university cities of Europe honours a man whose buddies used to shout things like "Death to intelligence and long live death!" at world famous philosophers. But that's Salamanca for you.

January 27, 2007 | Filed Under PP, Politics, Spain | Leave a Comment 

Something for the weekend

A couple of good links for whiling away the small hours this weekend.

RTXArchive – found. This list of random stuff found online makes my day every time I read it. This is the internet.

Vice Magazine's archive. Obnoxious and fascinating, there's some really good writing here about gangs, drugs, stalking and fashion. Vice sux/rulez!

January 26, 2007 | Filed Under Internet computer | 1 Comment 

In praise of reason

We live in confusing times… I remember only a few years ago watching the famous BBC documentaries about the Taleban's insane regime in Afghanistan – their destruction of Buddhist monuments, their repression of women, their official homophobia. The era of the Taleban was as absurd as a Monty Python sketch, with its beard laws and its choice of executions (stoning or have a wall pushed over on you). We marvelled, I remember, at the way these twisted individuals had managed to overrun a whole country with their crazy beliefs.

The Catholic Church in England has little in common with the Taleban. While they are the representatives of a foreign theocracy, they are never to be seen toting AK-47s at airports, as the Taleban were wont to do. But they are, in their own little way, attempting to subvert the UK's comittment to equality of rights and opportunities by attempting to derail legislation which would force them to allow same-sex couples to adopt children from Catholic adoption agencies with the same rights as hetrosexual couples.

Their argument, unconvincing as it is, is that the new legislation will interfere with the rights of Catholics to 'make a moral judgement', and thus denies them their human rights. A BBC presenter referred to this as 'a clash of rights' today on 5Live, as if we were dealing with two sets of faith-based beliefs which were in opposition. That is not the case. What we're dealing with is the clash of basic human rights of equality against the traditional right of religious folks to exercie their prejudice as they like.

There's no doubt that the Catholic adoption agencies have helped a lot of children and a lot of couples over the years. But it would be wrong for the government to cave in to demands by a religious group to legalise their dislike for gay partnerships. Modern society should not have to make allowances for the superstitions and prejudices of pressure groups.

On a different tack, I once again offer the marvellous badscience.net as a vanguard against those who would challenge reason and scientific practice in the quest for a cheap buck. More of this, please.

January 24, 2007 | Filed Under Politics, UK | 6 Comments 

Scratching a bad rash

I'm getting a bit sick of the design and layout arond here. Thinking about a change. Also, the content: more righteous indignation, less paranoid speculation. Or was it the other way around?

Actually, I've been reading Nick Cohen's interesting criticism of the left in today's Observer. He makes a number of salient points in his dissection of everything that is wrong today with liberal-left politics and its general failure to adapt to the 21st century. I don't agree with him on everything. But he does remind me why I decided some time ago never to align myself with any political group or party because there are simply none who seem to have the right approach to things. Spain is a classic example: I'm not a Catalan nationalist but I'm sympathetic with those who would like more autonomy for Catalonia. At the same time, I couldn't support any of the parties who push for greater autonomy here because their memberships and leaders seem to be conniving, divisive pricks to a man. Besides, if greater autonomy means more laws banning me from drinking calimotxo or Xibeca and smoking weed at the beach with my mates, then perhaps it's not such a hot tip?

The Iraq debacle is another good example (and this is what Nick Cohen is focused on): I'm naturally a Labour man but how can I vote for that party when Tony Blair still insists that it was the right thing to do. It wasn't. Saddam was an awful, murderous bastard but the hell which has been unleashed on ordinary Iraqis does not justify his removal. Nick Cohen's main argument seems to be that the left has lost its way because in its opposition to illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, curtailed human rights at home, rendition and Guantanamo, it has failed to condemn the evil which so called 'neo-conservatives' are determined to defeat. There's a lot of ammunition for this argument and those employing it get a very real thrill from expounding the claim that the left wing is stuck in a bygone age when it could rely on being morally superior and nothing more. And it is true that numerous anti-American and anti-Semite worms have crawled out of the woodwork just in time to make us all look bad.

But the problem with Cohen's position is that all he's doing is claiming the moral high ground for the neocons. Basically, he seems happy to tell the left that they don't recognise that the world has changed and things aren't as clear cut as they once were, while at the same time he's stating quite firmly that this is a simple case of moral imperative: we had to remove Saddam at any cost. Clearly, he wants to have his cake and eat it.

He continues by drawing attention to the millions of left wingers who demonstrated against 'the overthrow of a fascist government'. To emphasise his point, he makes trite references to Rome, Madrid and Berlin – as if the residents of cities which had once lived under the shadow of a dictator should somehow 'know better'. The problem is that opposing the war was never the same as appeasing Saddam. Who cares if he was happy about the protests? The point of the demos was to let our governments know that we weren't going to be hoodwinked into an illegal war which would end up killing tens of thousands of civilians. And we were absolutley right.

The problem for those who were (and, carazily, still are) in favour of the war is that they really did think they were going to get things over and done with pretty quickly. They didn't realise that they were going to visit on Iraq a state of murderous destruction not seen since the dark days of Saddam's purges. Or if they did, they didn't care.

The point of all this is, I suppose, to say that in the case of Iraq, there is no moral high ground. We on the left had nothing to suggest in the way of alternatives to getting rid of Saddam. We need the oil, the Iraqis need democracy and the world is a better place without that awful man. At the same time, supporters of the war must accept that they have made a colossal mistake in Iraq, causing the deaths of many tens of thousands of civilians, enraging an already volatile muslim community, establishing the dangerous precedent of pre-emptive attack and handing vast strategic power to a much more dangerous country: Iran.

In the end, Nick Cohen's article is more or less spot on, insofar as it discusses the facts of the dispersal of the left-wing in Britain… (I only wish he'd write another about modern conservatism). While there are aspects of his argument which I find I can't agree with, he's correct about two important things: the left wing has lost its way horribly and we have failed to display any reasonable degree of solidarity with the Iraqis: the true victims of all this mess. Think on.

January 22, 2007 | Filed Under 'Terror', Politics, UK | 14 Comments 

Celebrity Big Brother, racist?

"I think she should just fuck off home", said Danielle of Shilpa, the Bollywood star.

It's not racist, exactly, but it's seriously unpleasant. It's also – and this is relevant – couched in the language of racists. "Fuck off home!" is the traditional expletive directed towards 'foreigners' by British racists. Danielle later made out that she couldn't believe she'd said what she said. She felt that she'd learned a lesson. Or did she just realise she'd been caught?

January 17, 2007 | Filed Under General | 8 Comments 

Happy birthday, United Kingdom

It's the supra-national state that once ruled 1/3 of the world and it's 300 years old today. In all that time, we haven't managed to get rid of the people who make it a kingdom. Sad, really.

Also, it's interesting to note that the UK doesn't mark this event with a public holiday or a flag waving competition or anything like that.

January 16, 2007 | Filed Under UK | 5 Comments 

PP says No! to peace

Understandable, perhaps, when the demonstration was organised by trade unions… but what possible reason could the Association of Victims of Terrorism have for not attending the march? They are, after all, a nominally apolitical group. In the past, observers have been heavily criticised for suggesting that the AVT has become little more than a grassroots PP activism unit… but it's all beginning to look a bit more obvious now.

The AVT's website is dominated by criticism of the Socialist government and a banner which describes the 'Civic rebellion' to be 'unstoppable'. In fact, looking through their site, it's tough work finding a single example of what the AVT actually does to help victims of terrorism. I've been told that even if the AVT has strayed from its original aims, it was founded in good faith. I find this difficult to believe. The whole movement is based on a simple lie: that the necessarily random victims of Basque terrorism, and their families, could somehow all subscribe to the same complex, right-of-centre political philosophy.

One of my favourite sections of the AVT site is their 'Culture and Entertainment' section, which features several books about terrorism, Zapatero's 'Spain, state in emergency' and conspiracy theories about the 11-M bombings. Great reading, I'm sure. Sad, though, that innocent and trusting folk all over the country are being invited – with some cojouling -to donate their money to these people who allow political prejudice to get in the way of peace.

January 14, 2007 | Filed Under 'Terror', PP, Spain | 4 Comments 

Why things have been quiet

Despite a big couple of days here, thebadrash has been very light on content of late. There are a few reasons for this… and I'd like to use a blog post to talk about them.

1 Christmas was fantastic. Gemma and I took her parents with us to Modbury for a traditional English Christmas. We all had a great time, I ate too many pies. But at the same time, it wasn't exactly the holiday I'm used to enjoying there: I had to speak Spanish and Catalan a lot of the time. While that's undoubtedly good for me, it is also exhausting. So there you have it: a brilliant holiday from which I returned knackered.

2 The iMac. As you may have noticed, our joint Gemma & Tom Christmas & Kings & Easter present has been eagerly awaited in these here parts. I'll admit that I have been somewhat tied up in constantly checking the TNT site for information as to whether or not the new computer had left Arnhem. The computer is fantastic. I've managed to sort out the wireless internet connection.

3 Work. I was looking forward to getting back to work in January because we've started a potentially major new project, in which I'm taking a leading role. Like most bloggers, I can't live on comments alone and work has been offering a lot to chew on (if you'll excuse the hideously mixed metaphor).

There's more to come for thebadrash, though. The new computer is in part an investment because both Gemma and I are interested in improving our design (and web design) skills… I might even adjust my minimalist myspace page.

January 11, 2007 | Filed Under Home, Internet computer, Site news | 2 Comments 

It's working!

columbo.JPG
What a wonderful machine. I promise that I'll be back to normal blogging soon… but as you might expect, I am planning on spending a fair amount of time messing about with this new toy. I should emphasise that it's both Gemma's and mine (of course!) and that it's called 'Columbo' after the famous Hollywood detective and the famous Catalan explorer.
January 11, 2007 | Filed Under Home, Internet computer | Leave a Comment 

Our new iMac has arrived

10012007012-1.jpg
Gemma's and Tom's new iMac: first look!
(note: damaged corner of packaging. it had better not be broken)
January 10, 2007 | Filed Under Home, Internet computer | 11 Comments 

iPhone annouced – at last

iphone-2.jpgThis evening, Apple finally announced what must be the most highly awaited product in the company's history. The iPhone, a combination iPod, mobile phone and portable internet device looks stunning.

The whole thing is one big touch-screen (no physical buttons), comes with either 4GB or 8GB of storage, runs MacOS x (which means it links up perfectly with your new iMac/PowerBook, if you have one), features WiFi, BlueTooth, iTunes, and all other stuff.

Potential problems: touch-screens get dirty/smudged/scratched really quickly. It's not clear if they've done anything to deal with this. Also, battery life is noted as 5 hours. That had better be talk time… otherwise this thing will be pretty unreliable.

Price: $499 for 4GB, $599 for 8GB. Available in Europe: end of 2007.

www.apple.com/iphone

January 9, 2007 | Filed Under Internet computer | 2 Comments 

Christmas presents

For those of you who haven't seen it, I highly recommend this Saturday Night Live video for Christmas. It was sent to me before Christmas started but I forgot to post it. There's one night left 'til Reyes! Surprise her…

[possibly not office safe]

January 5, 2007 | Filed Under Internet computer | Leave a Comment 

It's coming…

…the first computer I ever owned…

January 5, 2007 | Filed Under Home, Internet computer | 2 Comments 

sanity foreign exchange

First of all, learn to avoid relying on machine.
When you check out in a supermarket, roughly estimate the total amount of your purchases before you pay the bill. And believe me, if you can pick up these three habits in your life, you are going to become a competent speaker. The book is called "Succeed and Grow Rich Through Persuasion" by Napoleon Hill and E. I call it the "Shortening of the Information Supply Chain in Modern Enterprises".
Job Interview Tips and Answers How to conquer a job interview for a salesposition?
How to Increase your Affinity with NumbersThe common intelligence among senior management peopleDo you have an affinity with numbers? Some of the promising agenda could be how you aregoing to save them money using some techniques which you can share. You have already gained something by knowing more people in your field and understanding more about your strengths and weaknesses.
Choose your career by understanding how employee's role shifts in modern organizations under the supply chainconcept. The interviewers are not intending to insult or challenge you in the interview. In fact, I have too many weaknesses.
Keep this in mind: "You do your best, God will do the rest".
Instead, you'll find yourselfconsistently moving toward your goals step by step and feeling great.
Deliberately insert the words "Call me", "Contact me","Arrange a meeting with me", etc throughout your cover letter. Job seekers are tempted to include everything in their resumes. What things you put the first in your work, your personal goal or company's interest.
The interviewers are not intending to insult or challenge you in the interview.
Are they telling lies? In a company, we have a similar analogy describing how an organization is set up to serve its customers. In fact, I have too many weaknesses.
You should understand that you are not "at war" with your interviewers. "If a pill sounds too good to be true, it probably is," she said. You can use pens or highlighters of different colors to amend and add new things to this second scratch pad. Firstly, remember to write your cover letter with the Business Problem Concept in mind.
Remember to go through some discussion before you release your refereesto your potential employers and make sure they say something "favorable"to you.
This is very powerful.
They blame the interviewers. ""Why do you want to quit the present job? You have to attract them the first instance they read your cover letter.
They are not your education, salary or career objectives. htmlHabit 3Take it easy. In fact, the time after the formal interview is the time the interviewers are relaxed from the strain of the interview. In your one-third-page area, use this strategy to write: Start your cover letter by questions.

This message was recieved to my work email today.

January 5, 2007 | Filed Under General | 1 Comment