I’d like to live in a beer bottle one day. I think this is probably someone’s pet. The site I found it on wasn’t too sure. But they were hippies – and we can’t expect too much from hippies. I have a new goal in life… not to live in a beer bottle – but to have a crab living inside a broken beer bottle.
The NSW Government has just decided to ban bottled water.
Well, for Government departments.
They’ve done so after a country town in southern NSW introduced a blanket ban. This seems dumb.
People buy water for convenience sake. Water is important to live. The town in NSW will introduce filtered water fountains into the street.
I can’t help but think that this is an ailing Premier’s cynical attempt to ride a wave created by a small corner of his constituency…
“We’re asking government departments to phase it out unless there is obvious and practical commonsense reasons not to in the event someone doesn’t have cool water in a hot environment,” he [Premier Rees] said.
The Premier says the move will save taxpayer money and help reduce the impact on the environment of producing and throwing away plastic bottles.
“Local businesses in the town of 2,500 people are proposing to replace the bottles with reusables and then offer directions to filtered water fountains that will be installed on the main street.”
“At the very least, if they don’t ban it, then at least they will reduce their usage of it and in doing so, reduce the half-a-billion dollars a year that Australians are spending on bottled water.”
That’s half-a-billion dollars worth of convenience and jobs axed for ideological reasons.
Bottled water, in some people’s minds, is a tax on stupidity. Ever held a bottle of Evian up to a mirror? It’s free from the taps.
But that’s not the point.
As friend Paul pointed out in an email discussing the country town’s ban – people are buying the bottle not the water – you’re hardly going to stick your mouth on a tap in a public place.
Benny is most unhappy. Tap water gives him ulcers. He’s the only person I know who sees fluoride as an election issue.
Stupid hippies.
Some people see eschatology as a dirty word thanks to the Left Behind mob – and I’ve always been pretty wary of people who define themselves by their views on “end times” – but here’s a second post tagged eschatology in two days. There was a comment on my post about how your eschatology shapes your actions that is worth sharing with everybody.
Joanna – who based on her email address I assume used to be a Richardson – but that’s a guess… pointed to a famous quote attributed to Luther:
“Interestingly, Martin Luther – who certainly agreed with you that preaching the gospel was an urgent task in the light of the return of Jesus – when asked what he would do today if he knew the world was ending tomorrow, answered ‘I would plant a tree.’ Was he a man with a poor eschatology, or just a strong theology of creation? Or both, do you think?”
From what I can gather – the quote, more accurately rendered is:
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.
I’m not about to throw stones at Luther’s eschatology, that would be profound arrogance on my part. I am curious as to why he would answer the question that way – so I’m doing some research. At the outset I’d posit that either he really enjoyed gardening, or he thought that guessing games concerning the end of the world were pointless and that we should go on living life regardless, others speculate that Luther’s vision of the New Creation features a redeemed version of the current one, and a tree would be a part of that…
There are a few seemingly reputable sites that cast some doubt on whether or not he actually said this at all… but it turns out he did enjoy gardening.
From my initial googling, Option 2 seems to be the favoured interpretation around the online traps.
However, there are others who run with it more literally, like those planning the celebration of the 500th anniversary of Luther’s posting of the 95 theses… who plan to plant 500 trees in the Luthergarden as a visual celebration.
Then there’s the TreeLink mob who claim Luther as a tree-planting champion…
Personally, and this is probably again shaped by my “bias” – and the weight of Luther’s teachings regarding the importance of evangelism against this one quote of dubious origins – I think if he did say it he was probably emphasising the fact that “nobody knows the time and place” so we shouldn’t live as though each day should be our last – but should go on living in readiness. Which, given the weight of Luther’s teachings and the picture we have of the life he lived would involve bold proclamation of the word as a priority.
Some poor souls who run a repository of “spiritual quotes” attributed this one to Martin Luther King Jr.
Incidentally my favourite Luther quote for a long time was this:
Be a sinner and sin strongly, but more strongly have faith and rejoice in Christ.
Last week I bragged about how green my gaming console use was. Greenpeace disagrees. They hate Nintendo. I can simultaneously satiate my need to be green and my intolerance of hippies by playing the 64.
It’s pretty much widely acknowledged that Heather Mills is one crazy lady. Possibly had Sir Paul met Ms Mills around the same time John met Yoko Ono the Japanese born American singer would have been held in high regard by the British public (who for the unwashed is pretty much regarded as the catalyst for the Beatles break up – which means she’s not very popular…still). I meant to post on this a week ago when I read it, but forgot until it popped up today. I’ve got to say if there’s one thing I hate more than a credit card wielding neo-socialist it’s an animal rights activist. So PETA aren’t at the top of the organisations I’m most likely to respond positively to… Their idea of “controversial” is to have models who would generally pose naked for money posing naked for their cause… alright they also throw animal blood on models at catwalks etc… but their approach can pretty much be described along the lines of the advertising mantra that “sex sells”. Unfortunately this methodology has been picked up by animal rights/vegan protest group Viva. hich brings us to Mills, who is their latest “celebrity” activist throwing her unbalanced weight (geddit, geddit, oh I give up) behind the cause. To show that it’s not more than a ploy to boost her ailing image following a messy public divorce (and outrageously bad interview a little while ago where she pretty much blamed the plight of the planet on the media) she agreed to be interviewed on the topic. If you haven’t clicked the link already here are the highlights…
“There are 25 alternative milks available in health shops and supermarkets,” she added, saying she turned vegan when an African woman at Live 8 asked her: “Why don’t people stop drinking cows’ milk lattes?”
“Why do we not drink rats’ milk, cats’ milk or dogs’ milk?”
Mills, and Viva, somewhat tenuously link meat eating to global warming. This position strikes me as contradictory for two reasons – one, sure cows may produce massive amounts of greenhouse gasses – but doesn’t this mean that population control in the form of Maccas burger patties is doing its bit for the environment? Shouldn’t we all be eating a cow to save the planet? And two… shouldn’t a pro-life (the natural corollary of an anti-slaughter animal rights position) be advocating for cows to live out their days in peace – thus creating no real mechanism of population control and allowing the unabated flow of harmful methane leaden greenhouse flatulence into the atmosphere?
The title of this ‘ere little post is stolen from perhaps my favourite piece of Junior Liberal’s propaganda – perhaps only marginally beating Liberals: We put the fun into funding cuts. The current batch of Liberal slogans ala “go for growth” are a little to obscure, obtuse and obviously written by geriatrics for me to get excited – but (segue) one thing that is sure to get me excited, one thing that’s sure to raise my ire, is the nu-left trendy hippy intellectually self-congratulatory latte pinko lefties. That’s right – the kind of people who when they hear that I – due to the AEC’s stringent and altogether too rigorous attempts to cut the yoof out of the polls and restrict the chances of messy electoral change – am not voting at this election and respond by saying “good, we don’t want your conservative vote anyway” – they’re the one’s who really raise my hackles. Let me tell you a thing or two about these self absorbed commies who go running around with their commercially mass-produced Che Guevara t-shirts extolling the evils of economic rationalism while enjoying their imported South American coffee, French art house films and hydroponic cones… they trumpet idealism and moral superiority, call on the government to end poverty, global corruption and anything resembling “the machine”, “the man”, or “globalisation”… What really gets me is their hypocrisy – their complete inability or lack of desire to put their money where their mouth is. And I mean that literally. Sure be a hippy, smoke your dope, call for a removal of inhibiting laws, the woman’s right to choose to terminate her unborn child’s life, make dope legal, build injection rooms, feed the hungry, water the trees, save the whales…protest against globalisation, protest against free trade, protest against war. But don’t ever let your personal convictions get in the way of your pleasure and comfort. These wacko lefties claim to be all about social justice but the ideologues aren’t prepared to reach into their own pockets (except through taxes) to support anything except the “save a panda” foundation which is just marginally trendy enough to score kudos with their stoned John Butler loving friends. Climate Change and saving whales are in vogue with those of the environmentally superior – but they’re bandwagon jumping, cause loving anti-establishment fiends who’d support the extermination of a people group if the government was against it and decry it as fascism when the government endorses it. Ok – that was pure hyperbole and exaggeration. My point is this – before you, my lefty friends go decrying me and my “conservative Christian” friends who happen to be generally supportive of public morality being maintained in the guise of “law and order” – as callous, unfeeling bigots, be prepared to defend the fact that while you spend your money on Hare Krishna “smile” stickers for your combi or whatever it is you drive these days, and sign your name to whatever Greenpeace petition is thrust in front of your face, us “conservatives” are out practicing the theories of a freemarket economy and donating to worthy charities designed to bring people out of poverty. For ever barb you chardonnay swillers throw at Hillsong for counselling young, pregnant women against having abortions, they’re donating real money to causes like getting people off the street and into jobs. You whinging dole bludging “arts graduate” wannabees are much too busy fighting for intellectual causes to actually address the physical reality.
Today’s post comes courtesy of me. I’m allowed to that once in a while, it is my blog afterall. Today I’d like to write about hippies. There’s very little right about hippies (that’s a little bit of political humour for those out there not clever enough to pick it up). Some hippies are ok. I’m all for peace (most of the time), harmony (but I’d actually prefer social melody. Harmony suggests different people managing to be different while appearing to sing to the same tune. So by extension social melody must be everyone doing the same thing which I think is a much higher goal. Provided everyone does what I think is the right thing. Let me rephrase that so it sounds less arrogant… Provided everyone does what God thinks is the right thing… I’m not sure that seems less arrogant actually, I’m not claiming that my will is perfectly equal to God’s. Could this be the longest bracketed statement ever to grace the pages of my blog? Who knows.), tranquility, and protecting the environment. But I have some questions about the whole green movement.
1. Who decides which green causes should be fought for and protected – why save the whales and eat lentils – surely lentils should be protected.
2. How can hippies justify protecting trees while smoking (burning) grass (marijuana)?
3. Why do they fight big battles (ozone protection) while ignoring, or contributing to, smaller problems (bad body odour)?
I guess my stance on hippies makes me anti-green, and in an amazing coincidence it turns out my car is anti-green in colour. I created a colour completely devoid of green, and full of blue and red in paintshop, and I came up with a colour alarming similar to my mauve excel.
What really gets me is the skewed priorities hippies have towards their particular cause. Sure whales are nice, big, friendly animals – but what about the thousands of starving Japanese children who’d benefit from eating the whales brought in by all the whale-harpooning daddies out there. Think of the children. It does seem to me that the green movement has a fairly warped sense of important issues. Some may argue that there are thousands of issues out there and it’s great to have people concerned for all of them, everyone needs representation. Which would be fine if the green voice wasn’t so loud. Once upon a time, when I was a poor uni student (read that how you will – I did mean that I lacked financial stability but I make no claims to greatness as a student) I was walking on my merry way to uni when I was accosted by a well meaning hippy type who wanted me to consider supporting an obscure wild life protection group. I understand that this girl was doing her job, which is a pretty crappy job, and was probably being paid by commission. But her suggestion that I change from sponsoring a compassion child to sponsoring a panda because it was “national change charities day” proves once and for all that hippies are stupid.
This diatribe was encouraged by an article in the opinion pages of today’s Sydney Morning Herald. The article looks at the quality of life in Australia – analysing whether things are actually any better with the strong growth in the Australian economy. Apparently some things are good. Some things are bad, including an increasing tendency for families to break down (or up – funny that two opposite words mean the same thing – I guess the keyword is break. You could probably even say break sideways and people would still understand). But this isn’t the biggest issue our culture has to deal with. I guess I’d agree with that (I’d probably say the underlying issues of human selfishness and greed were bigger problems – and the issue underlying those issues is sin). There are plenty of other issues out there that could be at least as difficult as a family break up. Child abuse, murders, an alarming suicide rate… there’s plenty of problems in our society that an increase in cashflow doesn’t seem to be solving. But no. Apparently our biggest problems are land clearing, extinct bird species, salinity and greenhouse gas emissions… and that my friends is why I hate hippies.
In other non-hippy news… Tim started a blog today – its title is a delightful pun on his name. I must say I’m flattered by all the people who are starting blogs just because I have.