Christmas Fun - Victimhood Poker...

For the uninitiated, Victimhood Poker is based on the premise that different victim groups have varying levels of validity to their victimhood status and that playing cards are assigned upon value accordingly.

It is perhaps (most likely) an urban myth, but it is said to have originated in the USA following Harvard's decision to transfer the sliding scale of extra admission points for different 'victimised' groups to a pack of playing cards for easy reference by staff. Of course, they fell in to the hands of some students, who invented 'Victimhood Poker' (VP), with a full set of rules.

A Non-Smoker Writes...

A year to 18 months ago I was a non-smoker who was anti-smoking - not to the extent where I would challenge strangers who were smokers or seek to embarrass them, but certainly someone who supported the evermore restrictive practices placed upon those wishing to smoke.

So it was one of the most unexpected shift in my thinking over the past year to become pro-smoking - or rather pro the right to choose to smoke.

Voluntary Servitude

"Where has he acquired enough eyes to spy upon you, if you do not provide them yourselves? How can he have so many arms to beat you with, if he does not borrow them from you? The feet that trample down your cities, where does he get them if they are not your own? How does he have any power over you except through you? How would he dare assail you if he had no cooperation from you?" Etienne de la Boetie, The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude, c.1553

Many of you will be familiar with the text and its truth is still self-evident nearly 500 years on. So we have to wonder what on earth possesses people to do this [2min video]:

TV Tax? Read This Great Riposte...

What a great post by Alex Deane (he of Big Brother Watch) comprehensively dismantling the justification for  the license fee, which starts:

The right test for the BBC’s current set-up emphatically is not ‘do they produce good programming?’ or even ‘do they produce anything worth watching?’  The right test is, ‘should it be funded by the taxpayer?’

The thought of abolishing it is becoming mainstream thinking.

Go read it in full and see the false arguments perpetuated by those who would force us to subscribe fall.

FAV

Bleedin' Obvious #274

Avoiding all the usual comments on vested interest groups and their relationships with the government (usually in the form of state funding in return for the 'right' report findings) the Climate Change Committee says that the power industry needs to be 'revolutionised' to meet the climate change laws applicable to the industry.

Surely, rather than overhaul the entire industry at great cost to the working man in return for a lower standard of living through more expensive, unreliable and insufficient energy supply, it would be more practical and more effective to change the law as not to have this requirement?

Seems bleedin' obvious to me.

FAV

The Failing State: Schools

[For some reason, this post disappeared! So I have reposted under a different name (was 'Emigration & Schools')]

I must apologise, having decided to blog I've been rather light in the past fortnight! This is owing to a job offer in Hong Kong, which I have accepted. I start in late January and, if the first few months are successful, I shall relocate with the family to follow in the summer.

However, I shall continue on my journey for my truth and still plan to to progress to submit an affidavit to pursue a freeman existence and also explore lawful rebellion further. Many of you reading will be like me, in that we are waiting for those to go before us and to provide a path / examples that we may follow. That is one of the raison d'etre of this site - to provide such a record and reference for others.

One of the major drivers for me leaving is the continued falling of education standards in the UK. A number of years ago (4?) an independent report* that stated that by the age of 7 the 'slowest' children of average intellectual range in private schools were more advanced than the most advanced children of average intellectual age within the state schools.

Compounding this is the curriculum within the state schools and focus on subjects that are just not necessary - for example in my child's local school they teach Punjab, which is a very likely waste of his educational time at such an important age and reinforces division within the local community. My father is Spanish and the Spanish community of London never expected the schools to teach the other children their language; they took responsibility for that at home. What they wanted for their children was to learn English well.