British lobby group upset by sign

UK lobby group Age Concern is calling for street signs used to warn of the elderly to be changed because they are "out of date, condescending and in need of replacement" according to the Daily Telegraph. "Very few older people are hunched over, with a walking stick. They are assuming everyone who is old looks like that, and they don't" said a woman working for the organisation.

I simply want to know what the woman silhouette is doing with her hand.

Wellington boobs on bike? nah

Now I don't care much for Steve Crow's view of taste but I do think the Hive's opposition to a bare breasted Helen Clark lookalike because "it could be used by opponents to ridicule the PM" is misplaced. This is in response to Dominion Post reports that Crow wants to put Boobs on Bikes in Wellington.

However, so what if the PM is ridiculed? Is the PM to be immune from ridicule? Why would this encourage anyone to vote for Helen Clark? Wouldn't those offended be voting for her anyway (or more likely conservative enough to be voting National anyway)? Isn't making fun of politicians just part of a free society?

Leftwing Wellington City Councillor Celia Wade-Brown said she "believed the parade was offensive to women and the capital's diverse ethnic groups". Well clearly not women who choose to participate, but more importantly how does SHE speak on behalf of all ethnic groups? What nonsense! I think the idea will go down badly in Wellington because so many will just find it tiresome and uninteresting, and those who do like it will be far too emasculated by the overwhelming culture of "offence" to show it!

Now if he paraded it around the Hutt Valley, he'd get a far friendlier response I am sure.

UPDATE: Picture from the Waikato Times of a cop stopping three young women trying to bring bare breasts to Hamilton. Now here's a thought - is it more sexual if they can dress in hotpants and over the knee boots in public with breasts covered, than wearing jeans and jandals with bare breasts? More importantly, what did the Police warn the women about? If it is legal in Auckland, what right does a cop have to warn people to not do something legal?

40 years ago - Prague crushed by Soviet imperialism

On August 20 1968 under direction from Moscow, the armies of the USSR, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, the "German Democratic Republic" and Bulgaria invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the liberal reform minded government led by Alexander Dubcek - first Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. It is a day that shall live in infamy as one of the darkest moments of freedom in the Cold War.

Dubcek simply wanted to open up the one-party Marxist-Leninist state of Czechoslovakia to some fundamental freedoms - the right to free speech, to criticise the government, a free press and freedom of travel. In short, he wanted to remove the totalitarian control the Czechoslovak state had imposed upon the minds and bodies of its citizens. Moscow's aging autocrats were frightened by such notions as free speech, so went forth to overthrow his administration and impose a client regime. They were days that shook the world.

It started with what is famously known as the "Prague Spring". Dubcek launched bravely his "Action Programme" . It included:
- Complete freedom of speech and the right to criticise the government;
- Freedom of movement within Czechoslovakia and to leave Czechoslovakia;
- Freedom of association, allowing the creation of non-state authorised organisations;
- The end to arbitrary arrests, outside the rule of law;
- Liberalising government enterprises to respond to market conditions;
- Adjusting economic policy to reflect the needs of consumers as well as producers;
- Federalisation of Czechoslovakia into two states (Czech and Slovakia);
- More decision making within the Communist Party at the local level.

Now it didn't include surrendering the Communist Party monopoly on power, but it was one giant leap forward - moreso than now exists in China, and indeed Russia today.

The result was a flourishing of civil society, a new political party sprung up, and criticism appeared not only of past policies, but also the Soviet Union. The people of Czechoslovakia could express twenty years of dissent and dissatisfaction, and debate what to do next. To Leonid Brezhnev it was - how dare they! Negotiations started between Moscow and Prague about how to handle all of this, the chief concern was not to undermine the authority of the communist party. These negotiations ultimately failed, despite commitments by Dubcek to support the Warsaw Pact, it was clear he was no longer a client of Moscow. 200,000 troops entered Czechoslovakia on 20-21 August 1968 with 2,000 tanks.

72 Czechs and Slovaks were killed in the invasion and occupation. The USSR distributed an alleged "invitation to intervene" from the Czechoslovak Communist Party, since confirmed to be have been partly true in that five leading members asked Moscow to intervene. Tens of thousands fled Czechoslovakia, and the standoff with Moscow began. Dubcek was arrested and taken to Moscow, he was returned, forced to concede Soviet control and ultimately resigned the following year.

The invasion was raised at the UN Security Council, and naturally vetoed by the USSR. It caused ripples amongst communist parties worldwide. China opposed the invasion, because it was the USSR (it supported the Hungarian crackdown in 1956), but others were split. Meanwhile, after Dubcek resigned, criticism of the government became illegal once more, and passports were withheld - liberal members of the Communist Party were purged, and Czechoslovakia reverted to totalitarian Marxism Leninism, with the state controlling all, and tolerating no dissent.

The Prague Spring was a brave attempt to advance political freedom in a state that had been denied all by Soviet imperialism after World War 2. It failed, but inspired the liberalisation of the 1980s, with Mikhail Gorbachev citing it as a great example that influenced Glasnost and Perestroika.

Today of course Czechoslovakia is no more, and split into two independent states. Both the Czech Republic and Slovakia are free members of the EU and NATO, and in Prague today you can visit the Museum of Communism and learn much of the bleak life under Marxism-Leninism and the events of the Prague Spring. I visited it a few years ago, and it is a great reminder to the young of why one should be eternally vigilant for freedom. Dubcek was vindicated and became Speaker of a freely elected Czechoslovak Parliament in 1989, a role he held until he became leader of the Social Democratic Party of Slovakia and sat in the Czechoslovak Parliament in that role until he died tragically in a car accident on 7 November 1992.

Forty years ago today the flickering light of hope and freedom was crushed by Soviet tanks - it is only fitting that the people of Prague today can not only talk about it, but have that freedom and much much more. Russia perhaps should pause for a moment and reflect why Prague and Bratislava prefer to be with NATO, and note its role in this dark moment in history.

UPDATE- In the Daily Telegraph today, BBC journalist, Czechoslovakian born John Tusa recalls the events forty years ago, he was 32 then.

"On August 21, 1968, Prague Radio warned: "When you hear the national anthem, you'll know it's over." As the recording played the anthem, the sound smothered by gunfire, I wept."

Offensive but legal boobs

So the breasts will be bared. It has provoked a number of responses across the blogosphere.

Pacific Empire has understandably taken the view that it is not for the state to regulate women baring themselves. Nobody has a right to be protected from being offended. It’s a view I largely sympathise with, although I don’t see Steve Crow as a hero. He produces material that I don’t like. I’ve seen it – I once bought one of his films on pay per view with Saturn TV when I lived in Wellington – it was money spent poorly indeed. Kiwi accents, the sound of a car alarm going off in the background, off the set and clearly unplanned and distracting – it was amateur, but not in the good sense of the word.

Having said that, each to their own, but it isn’t to my taste. He has every right to produce the literature he does, and indeed it should be legal to produce literature that depicts any legal act. It isn’t at present, which makes it legal to participate in a wide range of extreme sexual activities, but not to write about it or take a photo. This is absurd. Steve Crow offends many, and his business thrives on this sort of controversy, it also thrives on those wanting to see womens’ breasts. If breasts were not seen as dirty, offensive or naughty, his business may not be as brisk.

Idiot Savant of No Right Turn on the left sees it as putting men and women on a similar footing, and a victory for freedom of speech.

As he says “ if people want to parade around topless, that's their business, and I don't see any reason why the government should give a damn”

He also supports countering the event with protests, which of course is again each to their own. He says “this is a far more appropriate response than the Auckland City Council's hamfisted attempt at censorship”, and I agree. I wouldn't protest, I'd simply rather not watch.

I’m personally intrigued as to why men can bare breasts (they do have them) and enormous hairy bellies, which are far more offensive to many (not all), but women cannot bare breasts. Can someone explain that?

NZ Conservative not unexpectedly takes a difference course, seeing this is a matter of standards. A standard which treats the display of womens’ breasts as offensive – in a particular context. Lucyna says that “it draws large crowds of men to leer at topless women” and because it is linked to the erotica expo, it is linked to pornography. Pornography is legal of course, although that doesn't mean you need to like it. I have mixed views about it, but I would never ban it.

Now lots of things are linked to pornography. There is a whole genre dedicated to seeing women wearing socks, not showing genitalia at all. To those fetishists women wearing socks causes them to “leer”.

She also says “Leering at topless women is using those women for your own gratification”. Leering at clothed women, or men, or animals is doing the same – and the gratification is what, smiling at something you like looking at?

So what is the problem? Is it that the women have chosen to bare their breasts? Why? Why should you care if someone wants to be leered at? People dress to be seen all the time, to be leered at and noticed. Exposing breasts is likely to provoke the natural reaction of looking, unless breasts are of no more interest than a lamppost to you.

Or is it the gratification? Should we not gain pleasure at looking at another person’s body? Why is this a bad thing? It is when it invades privacy, which is why you can’t go peeking into windows – private property rights pretty much can protect most of that, and implied privacy in contracts can as well. Is it wrong when someone sees someone they find attractive and gains “gratification” from it, as long as the other person isn’t violated? What sort of a thought crime IS this?

Now Lucyna says it affects how people relate to each other, and yes, at an extreme it can. Someone addicted to pornography or sex will be affected because they are looking for instant gratification to fulfill a “need”, but does a man seeing a woman baring her breasts willingly change how he treats other women and men? Unlikely. Even if it does, why is this a criminal matter? Advertising does this, conversations do this, literature does this.

Apparently “to reduce it down to breasts being offensive is to be narrow minded and obtuse”. Yet this is exactly what we are talking about. Men can bare themselves, and conservatives care not a jot – even though many people find it offensive and a few find it arousing. Indeed people can wear many different items of clothing that draw attention to themselves either sexually or in humour. Is making others laugh or aroused by what you wear something the law should get involved in? No. So why breasts?

Indeed, if a woman wants to flaunt her breasts in public why do others want to criminalise her for doing so? Why is her choice less legitimate than your choice to wear a burkha, or wear hotpants?

I.M Fletcher follows up saying that he doesn’t like Steve Crow. Fine, but saying “We don't want you in Auckland Steve - we don't even want you in our country.” Raises the “who is this “we”” issue. I’d rather Graham Capill was sent away, or indeed many others. In fact there are thousands upon thousands of abusive and neglectful (not criminal) parents who are far more vile than Steve Crow. I think Steve Crow is rather tasteless, but he runs a business of consenting adults, selling products to consenting adults. He isn't living off of the compulsorily acquired earnings of others, like beneficiaries or government employees or state subsidised businesses.

The law clearly appears to be that women and men can leave all of their anatomy unclothed, except their genitalia, in a public place. Some find that morally reprehensible, I find the counterfactual offensive. The appropriate responses for those who don’t like it are to:

- Turn away and avoid women they see bare breasted; and

- Peacefully protest against women being bare breasted.

Much as is the case when men show hairy beer bellies, Muslim women wear burkhas and anyone dresses in bad taste. It is not for the criminal law to dictate what people wear in public places.

I’d suggest that if anyone has children and they see a woman with bare breasts, explain the same about seeing a man showing his belly and chest, or a woman wearing tiny hotpants. It isn’t dirty or offensive “per se” but natural – it is your mind that interprets the harmlessness of the human body as being less than that. Breasts are good - and the energy spent in suppressing them and publicising this event may have been better spent focusing on something largely ignored but should be offensive to us all.

It continues to astonish me how so few point and raise awareness of this true Nazi/Stalin type horror that occurs today, given that it is only by raising this tirelessly that there is a chance it will stop.

Obama's non-supporters racist?

Tim Blair blogs on a quote that suggests that Obama isn't doing better because those not supporting him are racist. Gee, didn't see that one coming right? Journalist Ian Munro of the Age wrote this...

It’s the right question to ask: why doesn’t Obama have a much larger lead?” University of Maryland politics professor James Gimpel said yesterday. “I think the race thing is there. It has to be.”

Wrong.

Vexnews got to the heart of the matter. It appear that Age journalist Ian Munro got it badly wrong misquoting out of context what James Gimpel said. This is James Gimpel's response:

"This is a basic summary of what I said to the reporter in our phone conversation.

First of all, there is plain-and-simple partisanship. That is the foremost consideration and primary determinant of voting behavior. It is a filter through which most campaign events and activity are judged.

Second, there is race. People trust those who are like themselves. That isn’t necessarily racist in the conventional sense you mean below, it’s a matter of favoring what is familiar. How many African Americans will be choosing Obama because he is black? Probably a large share of them. But no one is likely to write a story about that.

There is a noteworthy generational resistance to Obama among older white voters — Democrats and Republicans. I don’t think they are virulently racist, but they aren’t particularly progressive in their diversity views either. Several of my own family members fit into this category, by the way.

Finally, I remarked that many people were undecided, and that these early polls should be taken lightly. Late deciders, often among the most poorly informed voters, commonly decide close elections in the U.S.

This is a bit of an irony, but it’s still true.

All best Jim G.

James G. Gimpel, Editor"

So what was Munro doing? Demonising the USA to look like half the country is virulently racist?

The truth is Obama is slightly ahead, but not much more because the country is 40% solidly Republican, Obama is perhaps the most leftwing Democratic candidate for a generation and he has significantly less experience than John McCain who is also the most socially liberal Republican candidate since Ronald Reagan.

If the Obama campaign is foolish enough to start implying those who aren't with him are racist, it could prove fatal.