Barbara, I guess most on here are already sharing with a spouse or partner, not all I know, but Im lucky with only me to consider now, if a migrant refugee family turned up lying in the road with no where to sleep or eat, then yes I would share my home, at risk of incurring wrath of (the witch’)my landlady! The 1st thing I would then do is tell the authorities I had done so and insurance comp, then the witch! I’d take it from there.
However no matter, it still does not excuse the way Glen wrote, made assumptions based on members pictures, people he doesn’t know, that he couldn’t substantiate and in the manner he did!
If my good intentions went wrong, barring losing my life, I’ll do what I’ve done these last two years, I’ll get help in whatever way I need and can, but I’m still here to tell the story when a lot has gone wrong for me, barring health I have no regrets for actions I’ve taken so far. It’s said. and I believe, The Lord helps those that help themselves.
Don’t you think that’s what the refugees are doing also? Yes I agree that those with millions in their pockets should be visibly doing their bit. I’ve donated to this site, Health Unlocked, and was about to post my cheque to CH, when I admit I then got frightened about the scare stories of mail and Internet being checked etc., so I didn’t post it, but I started off with a genuine intention of helping them get up and running and as it turns out they didn’t need my help.
And conflict is not appealing.
Not to most people....any way.
Doreen I too share:
meals with friends...meals with strangers...and sometimes my home for purpose
of work.
But honestly who feels comfortable and, indeed willing to give up their
income or welcome strangers into their home without knowing how long they
would stay and how long you would need to support them.
Give time...donate...or will you go further and put your own life on hold?
Who will help you if something goes wrong?
Hi Glen, you wrote 7 paras. ending with Shame on you ALL!
Here are my answers
- No I don’t NEED conflict in my life! - the fact I’ve had some, on circumstantial occasion is a fact of life! It takes interaction and a minimum of 2 to create conflict!
- I was brought up to share, and do so willingly even now at 68, and was never raised NOT to share! Also there are 2 well known Charity events on UK television annually and the great British Public freely and willingly donates £millions every year to them, whatever their own financial problems, 1 of which uses a lot if not all, to fund overseas, mainly African, projects i. the countries there desperately in need of Aid. The 2nd one uses the donTions to help mainly deprived individual children or projects for them, in the UK.
- I agree. I thought when MP’s salary increases were announced this year, although a few publicly said they would give their increase to Charity, that all should have been willing to give theirs to their own constituency local aid charities, to the benefit of any deprived there! Did the MP’s sY that, no, not that I am aware.
- That may well be, but it’s the media that will make it history, doesn’t mean we don’t remember or that we can give him his life back.
5…see my previous comment!
- You don’t look unfed either and the way you chose phrase your sentiments, I think was extremely insulting, whatever,whoever the reason for people eating where and when they may choose!
- Sounds to me like its you who needs conflict in your life, by choosing to denigrate people, based on their photographs on a website forum where people ask for and do receive advisory help from its many members. we don’t ask for money or physical help, and is inherent the psyche of most of the members on this site, to give informations help, knowledge of and advice about any subject raised.
With my humble apologies…SHAME ON YOU GLEN… For bringing whatever perceptions or conflicts you have within yourself, to generalise the British public and/or other expats on this site or elsewhere in the way that you have.
Culture and language is all and ne’er the twain shall meet in permanent harmony.
I agree on the whole. If it was otherwise I might as well never have bothered to drift into the human rights world, doing what I do mainly for children, especially since 99.9infinitely recurrent are not my children. Like Nick Ut's picture of nine year old Phan Thi Kim Phúc burned by Napalm, this picture will become iconic but the message get lost. I guess people are probably unaware of the fact that Kim Phúc's picture was banned as pornographic in more US states than allowed it and being pre-Internet people had copies of Time magazine who published it confiscated and they were fined. Reason; it showed her genitals, real reason is no doubt because of which country was doing the Napalm bombing. Having been through the 'DMZ' several times and seeing just what a devastation it still was in 2008, that was nasty stuff they wished not to acknowledge I guess.
Trivialising is very easy as you say Peter, that is the basic error that allows people to often dismiss the values and views of other. Similarly, why fat men of any nationality? Not only fat people eat at MacD, likewise not only men. I believe public reaction said otherwise, albeit that might well be mostly short lived and people have to get back to the humdrum of daily life and survival.
So, Glen, such pronouncements and evaluations simply expose the weak underbelly of society and how it is taken for granted we have all withdrawn into our shells. The reality is that those taken to have those values and lifestyle are probably the minority of humanity and that the picture some of us have in our minds are made up of the negatives we see, disregarding the positives, and media/soap misrepresentations which are built on by the worship of all the Wayne Rooneys and Beyoncés, etc rather than seeing what is really around us. There is a vast range of shades of grey between black and white, then when we start to look at colours we cannot count them...
@ Glen Viljoen
Human beings don't need conflict in their lives. Life can carry on quite well when humans get on with each other rather than fighting between themselves..
Fact two is that we can actually share. I share with anyone who needs help. I can't help the whole world but I do my best to share with others.
Fact three is that the little boy will not be forgotten. That photo is iconic and will remain, maybe not forever but certainly in the years to come. Whether any long-term effects will result is a different matter. Any caring soul cannot forget such a powerful message, can they ?
Don't trivialise people and don't judge others by your standards. Maybe you are concerned with Rooney et al but most free thinking indivduals see such things for what they are.
Why 'two fat Englishmen' ? Could they have been two fat South Africans or two fat Pakistanis etc ? What's with the Englishmen' bit ?
I can help people in this situation but that's my choice. Other people are not in any condition to help people. Life isn't as black and white as you seem to suggest.
You see Brain, that is THE big problem here - 'interpretation' as Catharine pointed out. Problem is the interpretation by ISIS et al is seen as further provocation of their beliefs. It's just like the Paris attacks in january, CH hasn't learned anything. ISIS will feel insulted rightly or wrongly as the 'excuse' for further conflict has now been repeated by the latest antics of CH.
It's a bit like allowing the National Front to take the hustings in Southall High Street and waiting for a race riot to follow, will CH and the like never learn ???
Freedom of speech is precious but it does carry responsabilities.
Yes Doreen, quite agree.
Brian, I have done as you have requested (ad nauseum !) and thought about the cartoons and I still feel disgusted by their insulting nature. That is my humble interpretation as a mere 'average man in the street' as Doreen suggests.
I hope ISIS members are more intellectual than I in order for them to appreciate the cartoons for what you suggest them to be. I'm sure they will all have a good old guffaw at the content and see them as just a jolly old joke with no personal offence intended..
I would also say it is not in good taste, granted, but sometimes bad taste is the only way of getting messages across. If only it was not that way.
What on earth do Al Jazeera mean? Which hate crimes and against whom? That seems a bit like the Sun predicting that Chelsea will win the Premiership again this season (sigh...).
I chose a profession and a specialised area of that with the knowledge I was taking on a load I never needed to take on. After getting on for half a century it is impossible for me not to be involved, care and continue to make what little sense there is to make of our species. I am also (again) married to somebody with the same life trajectory. that makes it impossible to consider turning my back on such things for one moment.
I have no faith or beliefs including not being a preachy atheist or the like, I take humanity as it comes. If there was some kind of superior being in the sky, then she would have a pretty bad conscience. (I say her, because a he might be one of my male kind and be able to turn his back on it all generally far easier than most women) I think to an extent too many people are talking round instead of about what is in the relatively near future with what is happening. Indeed, a few brave souls have dared to speak out. Unless we act decisively and fast, sort out things like the mess the UN has become over its 70 year existence, look at politics generally (I shudder to think what a President Trump could bring down on all our heads) within our systems and start cooperating instead of telling each other what we should be doing, then we face an enormous and fatally destructive war. That is not out of my mouth/mind/analysis but from people whose knowledge of the world and ability to see what is happening whose views I trust, in fact also from a few I normally do not trust as well.
I know that you are not digging at me, Brian, and thank you for that! But a quick look at the internet seems to show that many DO see things in black & white. Without conducting a poll I cannot confirm that my view is that of a majority but I'm sure that I am one of more than just a few. Using the image of the dead boy to make a point cannot be considered to be in good taste whatever the message. I am offended by it but at least I do not also bear a grudge.
Below is a view from a non christian based news organisation.
Aljazeera -
"The controversial French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo may face legal action for inciting hate crimes after publishing cartoons about drowned Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi in its latest issue."
I see it there, very strange.
No we are not very good at sharing.
Our world has developed that way. We seem to need our own
spaces to live in and our own tiny little groups.
Are you not all like this?
And it seems that we strive and struggle to retain these
units.
We can give what we feel comfortable to give.
Take away ...our space and alone time...
what is there left...
Some people do look at this hopless...homless problem
deeply.....but it needs to be those with power, strength of conviction
and money. Yes the richly famous could offer a few million as small
change in order to provide shelter and provisions and a taste of normality.
Will they do it?
Doreen, bear in mind that of the around 35 countries actually have one kind of conflict or another at present, all except Ukraine were formed by colonial powers who left them with a heritage that created their contemporary political situations. Even then, Ukraine has had a history of domination by Czarist Russia, monarchic Poland, Prussia, post WW1 republican Poland, the Soviet Union and now post Soviet Russia. Syria exists because the Ottoman Empire fell apart. much of which was because the western European colonial powers and Czarist Russia wanted a lot of what the Turks had back then. Syria and Lebanon should have been one place, having been a single province of the Ottomans for several hundred years but such things as the French Mandate and then UK, USA interference put an end to that possibility.
Bit of history. That is meant to make it less easy to point at what is not 'like us' here in Europe. It is not so easy.
Doreen, we ain't seen nothing yet. With the unrest in the world at present there are many more millions of people displaced, add a few people who escape from oppressive regimes and the occasional natural disaster and that grows. If climate change predictions are only half right then oceanic rise will displace entire small nations. In roughly 40 years there could be, looking at worst scenario predictions, up to 28 times as many displaced people looking for somewhere to go. Imagine it. I cannot. Perhaps it is time to get used to it. If not then the alternative is to get used to people dying in large numbers without lifting a finger. Whether we believe in an almighty or not, do we have any right to play at being almighty ourselves? I do not have answers, but I have young children who should by rights have at least six decades longer in this world whereas I have only a fraction of that and that concerns me a lot.
I really don't think you have to look deeply, perhaps it is to do with the compassion you feel for the subject matter itself? I read it as Hilary did. Immediately. Despite at least 3 people having told me it was terrible. But perhaps I wouldn't have considered that any other interpretation would be possible in light of today's crisis...
'Most folk', so you believe you typify how people see things and think? I leave that question open and do not imagine people will see what I see, but I do not see people as being sheep who do not think as you imply. Look again and read the words on the walking on water: title 'Proof that Europe is Christian', then 'Christians walk on water', 'Moslem children sink'. That is mocking a kind of self-assumed Christian European superiority quite clearly, but deny that if you must.
As for the other: headline: 'Welcome migrants!', then 'Nearly there', with the welcoming McD hoarding saying ' Promotion! Two children's meals for the price of one'. Now tell me what is anti-Moslem in there. Give it to me in clear text exactly which words are critical of Islam.
I repeat, CH has a long history of poking at Rome, popes especially. France is according to its own basic laws secular but tolerates both the presence of religions and those who are critical of or against them. CH is perfectly entitled to pick on any religion however the journalist wish as much as they poke at politicians or anybody else. They have probably used satire against religion hundreds, if perhaps not thousands, of times more related to Christianity. So how come it is suddenly anti-Islam but not anti-Christian? I see a whole heap of double standards in such distinctions being made but it is probably easier to deny that is the case.
Thus said Mark, I am not digging at you but simply asking you to think about what you are saying before you do. You are telling us that your interpretation is definitive effectively, whereas I am simply casting doubt on that certainty.
But most folk will take these cartoons at face value & will not look deeper!
The images can be interpreted different ways & muslim extremists are not known for their reasoning ability. I'm sure that CH could make their point in a slightly less, more amusing way. A cartoon of Jesus walking on water while a muslim child sinks can very easily be interpreted as Christians are the chosen ones. There are already a few academics who have not put the reverse spin on it.
It IS all in the interpretation & there lies the danger!
Personally I find it difficult to believe that a publication which has suffered from extremist muslim action suddenly decides to sympathize with the plight of muslims in Europe.
Good simple analysis Hilary, both quite to the point.
MARK,
I think it's all in the interpretation.....
I don't see it as mocking the kid...but rather highlighting the erroneous (?) expectations that life and our values will be much better for them in Europe.....
The 2nd cartoon featuring God walking on water.....well, that says it all about religion......
Excuse me, but the very fact this discussion is now taking place actually makes your point for you. Also, the site you put up Mark is drawing attention to those cartoons in many places, thus doing quite the opposite to what you are implying. Furthermore, they are NOT critical of Islam. They are critical of western attitudes including Christian ones. Seen objectively CH has dared to challenge the values of Islam, that does not make it anti-Moslem. If that is the case, then the many more times they have challenged Rome - especially various Popes, so-called Christian values and, and, and... would simply make it anti-religious. Picking out one religion they have made critical statements about is disingenuous and thus unfair. I am not per se defending them, but pointing out how people are seeing what they want to see and not what those cartoons are actually saying. They are not anti-Islam.
I am absolutely not at all sure what the Shakespeare point is about because it does not compare. I probably did much the same to the same effect with English Lit 'O' level. However, there is no comparison.
The real tendency is for people to look, be shocked and then not think Mark. That makes trying to make human rights work in this world nigh on impossible. It is absolutely certain that people who do that will say derogatory things about human rights and say they should be abolished. More certain is the fact that take those rights away and who is going to be shouting loudest when their rights are denied or offended against. Thinking is perhaps the most unselfish way of leaving doors open instead of slamming them all because what one sees is what one thinks one sees. Look again and see very clearly the walking on water one is poking Christianity and think twice about the two-for-one and how that is critical of western attitudes, particularly political ones, toward such events. Perhaps you too might have noticed how many media articles and the comments to them referred to the fact that lots of other children down too. True, but that neither excuses it happening or makes it all right and draws attention to the fact that if one child in western European society perishes by drowning then headlines are made yet attempts are made to almost excuse this example as 'not one of us, so not as bad'. It is because after I was shocked and thought it was in bad taste I looked again, I thought about it and then my gut reaction to what I almost swallowed as anti-Islam turned out not to be. So, before accusing with such certainty makes sure you have thought about it and that you are not just jumping to the gun.