Google+ and being who we need to be

        I have had this blog for about 4 years now, so I would guess this makes me an established personality, but not established enough for Google+. I jumped into Google+ when it first went live, and enjoyed the way it worked and the people on there. Then the purges began, people started to disappear...gone from my time line.
People such as :-

GoSpeed Racer
Moggs Oceanlane  (restored then she deleted it)
Wizard Gynoid (restored)
Crystal Rehula has been banned twice

Then I jumped from  Google+ as I had seen on twitter that some people had lost access to Gmail and didn't want to lose access to my account. As my name is made up of fairly common words, but not actual names, I guessed the  BanHammer was coming after me soon.

I'm rather sad about it as Google+ had the potential for me to stay in contact with friends that aren't on other networks, and to deal with the information overload issue that comes from networks I am on.

Then Botgirl Questi got the ban hammer treatment, and she's not taking it lightly, and is giving it her best parody treatment:-

  

Then she had to go and talk to Google, as she does....

It's not just just Second Life personalities falling foul of the names policy.

Violet Blue has a few comments of her own and and has added her name to  My Name is Me

Ex-Google Employee Skud had her Google+ account suspended and has written a great post about it here.

Another post I enjoyed reading was by Danah Boyd  "Real names" are an Abuse of Power  the article itself is quite good, but the comments show a complete range from total agreement, to those who haven't a clue.

My Name is Me is a site that lets people explain in their own words why they have chosen pseudonymity for their online existence.

A lot have to do with issues of sex, religion, (or lack of), politics,Human Rights and to avoid abuse and misogyny. (If you don't that this is a problem, I refer you to my last post on Rebecca Watson, and the daily amount of abuse she gets)

In the last year, we have seen Twitter, and Facebook become the launchpoint for the biggest shake up in world politics since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Since  December 2010 there have been revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, civil war in Libya, uprisings in Bahrain,Syria, and Yemen, major protests in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, and Oman. Minor protests in Kuwait, Lebanon, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Western Sahara. We can also add the failed Iranian protests.


Remember how Egypt turned off the Internet, to stop the people communicating. I wonder how many people where using real twitter and Facebook accounts. If it had all gone bad in Egypt, well, you can be sure those people with the real accounts would be either dead or missing by now.

Using alternate names is nothing new, it's quite famous for writers, sportsman, actors soldiers:-

Mark Twain = Samuel Clemens
Lewis Carroll = Charles Dodgson,
George Orwell = Eric Blair
Mary Ann Evans = George Eliot
John le Carré = David John Moore Cornwell
Mary Westmacott = Agatha Christie
Dr. Seuss = Theodor Seuss Geisel
Tiger Woods =  Eldrick Tont Woods
Larry Niven = Laurence van Cott Niven
Andre Norton = Alice Mary Norton
Batman = Bruce Wayne
Elvira = Cassandra Peterson
Wonder Woman = Diana Prince
Banksy = ????

Much to my surprise I just discovered Porn Stars don't use their real names!!

The Electronic Frontier Foundation also support pseudonyms , and this quote sums it up best :-

As Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens put forth in deciding McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Comm’n 514 U.S. 334, 357 (1995),

"Anonymity is a shield from the tyranny of the majority. It thus exemplifies the purpose behind the Bill of Rights, and of the First Amendment in particular: to protect unpopular individuals from retaliation—and their ideas from suppression—at the hand of an intolerant society. The right to remain anonymous may be abused when it shields fraudulent conduct. But political speech by its nature will sometimes have unpalatable consequences, and, in general, our society accords greater weight to the value of free speech than to the dangers of its misuse."

EDIT:-
We now seem to have Spartacus standing up for some of us We will see how long this lasts.

 Lady Gaga is my name. If you know me, and you call me Stefani, you don't really know me at all. - Lady Gaga

Rebecca Watson and the Religious War on Woman

This is one of the best videos on modern womans issues I've seen in a while. Rebecca Watson a the CFI leaders conference talks about what it's like to be an outspoken Atheist, and the terrible and disturbing abuse that she gets on a daily basis.

She then sums up how the rich christian organizations are attacking the rights of woman in the USA and are now exporting their vile ideology overseas.
 






Feminism is the radical notion that women are people. ~Cheris Kramarae and Paula Treichler

The Case of the Disappearing Complaints

 

In the last week, Minister Garret, has had two reports drop on his desk.

The First Report

 The Ombudsman's reports into the National Chaplaincy  says that some Chaplains believe that school children with bad behaviour are possessed by demons.

It also highlights a lack of oversight, and a totally inadequate complaints procedure. 

 From the Report:-

3.6 - The investigation also found that current complaint handling procedures do not appear to adequately serve parents and students and should be improved, as it was not apparent that the Department has an adequate process for capturing complaints regarding chaplains and the program. In particular, the Ombudsman is concerned about the absence of any formal protocols between State and Territory education authorities and the Department regarding the day to day administration of the Chaplaincy Program.

This is not surprising as while the Federal Government provide the money, the Chaplain providers hire the staff, and the the Schools house the Chaplains, it seems the perfect setup for everyone to avoid any responsibility. Initially DEEWR said it only received formal 35 complaints:- 

While it had initially told the Ombudsman that only 35 formal complaints had been received about the chaplaincy program over four years, the department later advised it had received 277 complaints and was still checking its database for more.
Mr Asher was unable to identify any guidelines provided to schools by the department on complaints procedures and suggested many complaints had fallen through the cracks - failing to adequately protect the rights of parents and children.

The word "formal" is also significant, how is that defined? Do you have to follow a set procedure, is there a form? Does it have to go to a particular person or department? Does anyone actually know about it? Probably not.

School Education Minister Peter Garrett said yesterday that the chaplaincy program was "very popular among school communities".

As many have said, The State School system has been run down for years, in favour of the religious based private schooling. This is quite comprehensive covered by Jane Caro and Chris Bonner AM in their book The Stupid Country.

So having anyone/someone who is an extra pair of eyes in the school ground would be useful. But then again the Minister could just be playing word games again, with the term "School Communities". I also suspect more word games with "Only 17 complaints about proselytising", nothing about evangelising, oh, but are these just "formal" complaints?


Australia's history with mixing Children with religion is not a happy one. In the past children where placed in Religious institutions such as orphanages, the 8000 British Child Migrants to Australia suffered terrible abuse, and of course the world wide child rape in the Catholic Church, and in each case we look back and say what a terrible tragedy, and it should never have happened in the first place, and we will learn lessons.

I suppose the lessons that have been learned are that you don't put children into evangelical religious institutions (as eventually they will get caught, but typically not punished), but put the evangelicals into childrens institutions eg schools.


The Second Report:-

About ACCESS ministries and their Evangelising. Minister Garret has given them the all clear. Well it seems there were actually no complaints, but then I suspect we come across the word "Formal" again. As usual FIRIS say it best.


So again we see a total whitewash of the Christian influence is schools and Government.
Now is the time to make proper Formal complaints and also time to give some money to the High Court Challenge


Further Reading:-


How the Chaplaincy Program continues due to dodgy statistics



The Bible is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind; and, for my part, I sincerely detest it as I detest everything that is cruel. - Thomas Paine

Pulp Science Fiction Fun

         I have always enjoyed Science Fiction, I remember waiting for Star Trek on Sunday afternoons and wondering when life will be like that.
Just recently I realized how much of my own moral values have been influenced by the show, and I would have to now classify Gene Roddenberry as a hands-on Humanist philosopher.

I was mostly inspired by the brilliant artist  Aly Fell , some of his Pulp Covers are here


I was advised the first edition was a bit dark, so I have brightened it up a bit and changed the colours on some text.


“Science fiction writers foresee the inevitable, and although problems and catastrophes may be inevitable, solutions are not.” – Isaac Asimov

Moral high ground...really?

One should examine oneself for a very long time before thinking of condemning others. - Moliere

What reason for Censorship, Sex, Violence, and Robots

Censorship is an odd thing, usually it's "Think about the Children". In the past it was usually books on religion and Atheism that would be banned, now it's Harry Potter, and books that portray single mothers in a positive light.

In the lists above I added a few I made up, but believe it or not "Harm to Plantlife", and having an A cup breast size have been used in the past. Actually if a woman in a movie sex scene has an A cup breast size, the film will be banned in Australia.

I'm slightly annoyed that Blogger doesn't show these images better. Hopefully Flickr might due better.

"Obviously, the danger is not in the actual act of reading itself, but rather, the possibility that the texts children read will incite questions, introduce novel ideas, and provoke critical inquiry." -Persis M. Karim

Even more reports on Catholic Child abuse in Ireland

Wednesday 13th of July, The long-awaited Cloyne Report has been published, detailing how the Catholic Church and the state authorities dealt will allegations of abuse in the County Cork diocese between the years 1996  to early 2000.

The report’s main points:

    The “greatest failure” of the diocese was the failure to report cases of abuse to the civil authorities: the diocese failed to alert the Gardaí about nine out of 15 cases that “very clearly” should have been reported. 

    The Vatican was “entirely unhelpful” in assisting clerics wishing to implement procedures – describing the guidelines as “a study document”.

 The response of the Diocese of Cloyne was “inadequate and inappropriate".

  Primary responsibility for the failure to implement agreed child sexual abuse procedures lies with then-bishop of Cloyne John Magee.  Bishop Magee "took little or no active interest" in the management of clerical child sexual abuse cases until 2008, 12 years after the framework document on child sexual abuse was agreed by the Irish Bishops' Conference.

An American watchdog group BishopAccountability.org said the handling of clerical abuse cases in Cloyne is “eerily similar” to a US grand jury report released earlier this year, which found church leaders showed a “brazen disregard” for both civil law and the church’s own internal policies.

“The Cloyne report is disheartening confirmation that even today, despite the church's knowledge of the profound anguish of thousands of victims, its reform policies are public relations ploys, not true child protection programs,” the group said.

The Boston-based organisation asked: "how many second chances will Irish church officials get before they are criminally charged for enabling the molestation of children?"

This is the fourth report into Child abuse committed by the Catholic Church in Ireland.

•  The first was the Ferns Report  published in October 2005.
• The Second was Ryan Report Published in May 2009.
• The Third was Murphy Report Published in November 2009.

The main focus of the report Bishop Magee who resigned in March 2009  to spend the rest of his life in some comfortable house paid for by the donations of the shorn flock.

Each report shows that the Catholic Church was only really interested in keeping it's power, and was totally arrogant in the way it dealt with the abuse being inflicted by it's priests.

So then again showing the Vatican is only a power structure, lacking in any form of any moral courage or authority.
It also shows another failure of the Irish Government to do what is best for it's citizens, and shows why letting the Catholic Church to be the defacto 2nd Governent in the Irish Republic is such a very very bad idea.

It’s an incredible con job when you think about it, to believe something now in exchange for something after death. Even corporations with their reward systems don’t try to make it posthumous. — Gloria Steinem

Book Review - Stephen Law and his Believing Bullshit

     When you say "philosopher" most people imagine old men with great white beards, possibly this was true in old Greece, but we have have moved on a bit since then. I have been reading a book from Stephen Law called  Believing Bullshit.

I have only started reading philosophy recently, and came across Stephen Law when I bought his earlier book The War for Childrens Minds, as I had hoped it would have been useful in our current battle in Australia with the Chaplains, and Religious Indoctrination classes in schools. Maybe he can add a chapter for the next edition on Australia.

 I have to admit I'm not sure who Believing Bullshit aimed at, I would be encouraging younger people to read it, as it covers a good range of logical fallacies, some basic philosophical questions, and it's not a book that is hard going. I'm sure it would have been helpful to me when I was younger. If you have spent some time in the atheist movement, or reading atheist blogs, and watching the debates with religious and theological people you will probably have seen most of the areas covered in the book. It's not particularly aimed solely towards religion, but also alternative medicine and much of the New Age style of thinking. 

The Book has eight chapters

1. Playing the Mystery Card
2. But it Fits and the Blunderbuss
3. Going Nuclear
4. Moving the Semantic Goalposts
5. I Just Know!
6. Pseudoprofunity
7. Piling up the Anecdotes
8. Pressing your buttons

These are some of the methods and verbal strategies used by those who seek to defend their positions when put under rational scrutiny.

I have to admit its the only book I have read with two appendixes to the Introduction, but the contents are entertaining,and provide good examples of woolly thinking, one such being a theological reason for earthquakes.

Each Chapter explains how the method is used and applied, the author also explains what is wrong with it.   

It does seem to have rather more italics in the text than I am used to.

I have made a few of my own examples, and found another a few days ago. I think the chapters they relate to are quite obvious.

And from the web a few days ago

I wasn't so keen on the Screwtape letters at the end of the book, but then I didn't read the original by C S Lewis, as I usually steer clear of Christian hypocrites.

I really do sympathise that Stephen must have to read an awful lot of this rubbish, in order to refute it.
If you can read an interview with Stephen Law at New Scientist and you can hear him talk at the Poddelusion podcast from the BHA Convention in June.

Stephen Law is lecturer in Philosophy at Heythrop College, The University of London. He is also editor of THINK, a journal of the Royal Institute of Philosophy aimed at the general public.

How many Bishops does it take to change a light bulb? They don't want the lightbulb to be changed as they prefer everyone be kept in the dark. -Anon  

My last pretty portrait for a while.

This was done by the very talented http://kinkei.deviantart.com/ and after a week has had over 10,000 views!

If the style is familiar to you, then you have probably seen Tim Mitchins Storm. Look for the fairey :-)

Well, I might get one or two more done...


Some people want to make the world a better place. I just wanna make the world a better-looking place. If you don't like it, you can paint over it!- Banksy

The Australian Tax Armageddon cometh.

 

Australia is one of the very very few countries where you can a church or religious group can own a profit making business and there is no tax paid on those profits, to understand the issue I recommend reading this article in The Australian and this 2001 story from the 7:30 Report 

Wikileaks, American Diplomacy and BAE.

      

A few years ago the US Dept of Justice decided to investigate BAE, who used to be British Aerospace, for bribing Saudi Princes (among others) for defence contracts.

I have absolutely no doubt that BAE actually did hand over bags of cash, but I always suspected the real motive for the US investigation is that BAE handed over more cash than the US companies did.

I was hoping that something would appear from Wikileaks along this line eventually, I've not kept up with the Wikileak releases, as I have to admit all the drama with the Wikileaks organization and the various newspapers does get rather tiresome.

Today Rania Khalek wrote on Alternet a story of how US Diplomats are working as agents of US Corporations
Here is the part I like best :-

In late 2006, then President George W. Bush wrote a personal letter he had hand-delivered to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, practically begging the king to buy as many as 43 Boeing jets to modernize Saudi Arabian Airlines and 13 jets for the Saudi royal fleet.

King Abdullah responded by asking the US government and President Bush to trick out his private airplane with the same high-tech equipment used on Air Force One. He hinted that if the US fulfilled his request, he would make a large purchase of Boeing planes for the royal family's fleet and Saudi Arabian Airlines. And lo and behold, King Abdullah got his airplane upgrade, and Boeing made billions.

Now of course there is no actual cash changing hands, it's swapping goods so there is no money trail. Maybe this is where BAE went wrong, possibly suggesting a new jet, or fitting out of the old one, would have been a bit less troublesome.

Eventually the US Dept of Justice got about $US400 Million in fines from BAE

The scandal provoked quite a bit of a argument at an OECD meeting, with the usual suspects taking sides. The French were almost certainly angry not selling their own jets.

But why is it surprising that Diplomats act as salesmen for their country? It's certainly been going on for a long time, not only that but a  front page incident in Australia from 1995 was about a joint Australia USA mission to bug the Chinese Embassy in Canberra.
This was before the Web was mainstream so there are no copies of the paper online, but the newspapers of the day said this was actually leaked by ASIO, as the Americans where passing commercial intelligence to  US businesses, and using it to undermine Australian business in China. ASIO asked them to stop, and of course the US denied it all.

EDIT:- The point of it all? I wonder who in the US will chase all these diplomats with the same rules as they did BAE? 

Diplomacy means the art of nearly deceiving all your friends, but not quite deceiving all your enemies.
- Kofi Busia 

Access Ministries tries to shutdown Mike Stuchbery

                                                              

I've been very impressed how Mike Stuchbery has taken on the rather odious state supported  Access Ministries.

He was sent a letter from a lawyer about his deconstruction of another strange Access comic.
This is almost certainly what all the fuss is about

Today on his tumblr

GAGGED!

It’s been an interesting week. On Friday I received a letter from Moore’s Legal, regarding my posting of Access Ministries’ ‘Man Hunters’ graphic novel. I had posted it online to highlight what I thought was not suitable for ue with children, due to the violence, sexism and racism that filled the pages. You can find the letter here. Advice from colleagues and the pleading of my fiancee led to me removing the PDF and several images sourced from the comic that I had used for the purposes of criticising the text.



Today I logged on to Wordpress to find that my ability to post on my blog, ‘Mike Stuchbery’ had been disabled. This is presumably as a result of a DMCA notice served against Wordpress. I cannot post until Wordpress contacts me - which may be some time. In the meantime I’ve taken to Twitter, Facebook & Tumblr to continue the dialogue regarding Access Ministries, SRI and the influence of evangelicals in our public schools.



It’s clear that Access are playing hardball. I think I can guess why. This has nothing to do with copyright. It’s just the cheapiest and easiest route through which to try to shut me up. it’s certainly easier to prove than defamation or similar, and less costly. I’m certainly not making any money from their works. It’s all about flexing their muscle and making an example of someone amongst the clamour of opposition to the current SRI system. They don’t their material to see the public arena, not after the ‘bullying comic’ fiasco that made the frontpages of the Age. They’re frightened of the spotlight turned across their simplistic, unconsidered, culturally-insenstive and inappropriate curriculum materials.



I’ll be back posting on the blog soon. I’m getting advice on the best hosting that won’t be so quick to fold if Access decide to maintain the attempts to gag and silence me. In the meantime, keep the discussion flowing and keep calling on the Education Minister to provide the best outcome for kids.

Australia and the US have provisions for fair use or fair dealing in their copyright laws, and Mike has certainly been on the side of Review and Criticism. As ACCESS are keen to get their materials in front of Victorian children, they really do need to come under the tightest scrutiny

In Australia, the grounds for fair dealing are:


Research and study (section 40 Copyright Act 1968 (Cth))

Review and criticism (s41)

"Reporting the news" (s42)

Legal advice (although the federal Crown is deemed to own copyright in federal statutes, and the Crown in each State in state statutes). (s43)

Parody and Satire (with some exceptions) (s41A)


"What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist." — Salman Rushdie

Some more pictures I had done from Deviant Art

 

 This was done by http://redg404.deviantart.com/

 And here I am with my friend and revolutionary Zonja Capalini 

The picture was done by http://shinn3.deviantart.com/

Our outfits are by Jackie Graves, who gives an interview here

A portrait! What could be more simple and more complex, more obvious and more profound. - Charles Baudelaire

60 Minutes and the Anti-Vaxxers

The Australian 60 Minutes team  has interviewed two Australian antivaxxers, Dr Viera Scheibner and Bronwyn Hancock.

Here is some of their reasoning :-

BRONWYN: There are benefits of diseases. Now I say that with qualification, because obviously diseases have to be well managed and going through a disease is like us getting exercise. This is one of the reasons why it’s good to get rubella as soon as possible, so that you have immunity to it. And um…



ELLEN FANNING: But what about the risk of rubella to pregnant women who can have babies suffering terrible birth defects?


VIERA: Don’t answer things that you don’t know enough about, OK – don’t answer them. You were drowning. So let’s call a spade a spade.


ELLEN FANNING: Why would she be drowning?


VIERA: Because she hasn’t got the extent of knowledge that I have.


ELLEN FANNING: If she hasn’t got the extensive knowledge, why on earth is she writing these articles on the website?


VIERA: Maybe you have a point then, yes. That’s right. Maybe you have a point there, okay.


ELLEN FANNING: So just for clarity, you’re not a medical doctor?


VIERA: I’m not a medical doctor, no. But I am a doctor of natural sciences.


ELLEN FANNING: Am I right in thinking that in fact your expertise is in studying microfossils, little fossils?

So yes, Dr  Scheibner, is not a medical Doctor, but she believed that she knows more than actual medical practitioners.

You can see it here:-

Or at the official site here, with a Transcript

I'm sure you all remember seeing people with calipers walking around the streets? No? I do, I also remember people who had to live in Iron Lungs, you don't see either of them anymore in 1st world countries, but sadly 59 years after the Polio vaccine became available we still have victims in Africa and India, as in the picture below.

As a counterbalance to the stupidity of the AntiVaxxers, we at least have Bill Gates who has dedicated himself to the eradication of Polio.

“We don’t know exactly when the last child will be affected. But we do have the vaccines to wipe it out,” “Countries do have the will to deploy all the tools at their disposal. If we all have the fortitude to see this effort through to the end, then we will eradicate polio.” Bill Gates

I talk to the POSTGRES Missionaries

This Comic is a work of fiction, and not based on any particular person, alive or dead, if you can identify any person in this portrayal, then you have got it wrong.

Truth does not demand belief. Scientists do not join hands every Sunday, singing, yes, gravity is real! I will have faith! I will be strong! I believe in my heart that what goes up, up, up must come down, down, down. Amen! If they did, we would think they were pretty insecure about it. Dan Barker.

Where I ask the Minister about ACCESS Ministries

Australia has been on a slow slide to a soft theocracy for the last decade with even the left wing Labour Party moving to embrace the religious right. In 2006 the then PM John Howard decided that the schools of Australia needed a Chaplain, not a youth worker, or a councillor or a Psychologist, but a religious Chaplain.
To bypass the constitution, these Chaplains who must be religious, are supposedly forbidden to mention their religion while at school. So the Chaplains often meet with young students at lunch, and after hours in order to make converts.

The Australian Government has cut funding to disabled students, and added more money to the Chaplains. Some people think it's for votes, but I think the Religious Right have actually made inroads into the Liberal and Labour parties, and are in the process of attempting to take the country back to the intelectual dark ages, but I seem to be in the very small minority with this veiw.

No other first world country would even think of wasting money on this bizarre project.

To keep up to date with this ongoing story, a parent created website http://religionsinschool.com/
is keeping track of events. If nothing else, listen to the recording of the ACCESS Ministries CEO in a talk to a conference of Bishops, and how she says the complete opposite on the radio to the public.

Mike Stuchbery has been amazing good at following the story, and a publicly funded High court challenge hopes to stop this waste of Tax payers money.

And just in, is a story on the one days training given to religious teachers from ACCESS.

I would defend the liberty of concenting adult creationists to practice whatever intellectual perversions they like in the privacy of their own homes; but it is also necessary to protect the young and innocent. - Arthur C Clarke

A bit more vanity from me.

As done by http://icemaxx1.deviantart.com/

"The essence of drawing is the line exploring space." -  Andy Goldsworthy

Deviant Art Commissioned Picture

I got this done by http://operative274.deviantart.com/  and I really love it. I have tried to get some artwork done by other people on Deviant Art in the past, but sometimes it just seemed so hard to get something done.
This was almost done overnight, did I say I love it?..Did I? 

I wanted to become a cartoon artist, a portrait artist, and an illustrator. This was my first idea.
Karl Lagerfeld

Debaptise and become and an Official Pastafarian Minister

The UK National Secular Society produced a Debaptism certificate some time ago and it's available on their website here

The US Freedom from Religion Foundation has also started to produce one, and is available from here

                                               

I guess after this event, you might feel a little empty, you could of course read some Darwin, Dawkins, some books of Philosophy, books on  rhetoric to defend your new found freedom, or you could join the fastest growing religion amongst the worlds most intelligent people.

Become an Official Pastafarian Minister!!  

Yes, you to can become assume the title Reverend, (or maybe Captain, or Father) 

The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.
Denis Diderot

UK decides it can't figure out how Australian voting works

Well the AV vote has been, and surprisingly it turned out to be NO :-(

Yes vote at 32.1% and the No vote at 67.9%

But at least some people are happy 

If the NO side says #yes2av is too hard, then the Tories are admitting Australians must be smarter than people in the UK, so prove them wrong   - Shockwave Plasma

Concordats, the Vatican and Human rights

                                                  

                I'm not a Catholic or a diplomat, and my reading of history is pretty good, but I had never heard of a Concordat until recently, when I came across Concordant Watch.
It can be as simple a treaty, or legal document that is written up between a sovereign state and the Vatican. It's one of those documents that both parties must agree to dissolve, but as it's usually about the Vatican keeping it;'s privileges then it's not likely they will do so.

The Vatican is a legal oddity, it claims to be a state, and the Pope to be the equal of a Prime Minister, or a country's President. the discussion usually is split by people who are Catholic or sympathetic who say it's a country, and those who are irreligious, and think that it's probably not. I haven't the slightest idea who is legally correct, I just find it seems to be what ever is convenient for the Vatican to be what it want to be at that particular time. In Italian law the Vatican is it's own microstate, this was confirmed in 1929 when the Lateran Treaty was signed between the Vatican and the Mussolini Government.

One thing to keep in mind is that the catholic Church isn't really big on Civil law, you know the stuff everyday people have to worry about. It's got it's own Canon Law, that it believes overrides Civil law. That's why raping a child will just get you moved to a different parish, but making a woman a priest will get you excommunicated. 


So how does the Church really see it self?

The Catholic Church, for her part, has always maintained that she is a supranational community and does not receive her legal existence from any temporal State. The Catholic Church exists as such, and it is in the Holy See that her organic unity is guaranteed, represented and perpetuated. Her extension corresponds to the spread of Catholic believers throughout the world. She is therefore a universal community that knows no national frontiers . Put in other words, when a state and the Holy See conclude an agreement they enter into a relation as two "perfect societies": the first as a temporal society, the second as a spiritual one. The Church receives its laws from her 'Founder' and not, like states, from some temporal power. But that doesn't mean that acts of the Catholic Church can have no effect on temporal jurisdiction. An intersection is possible and at this point the sovereignty of the Catholic Church stops and the problem of concordats begins.

Why does this really matter?

    The Catholic Church is a big employer, it has a million people working for it in Germany, and it is one of Australians biggest employers, one of the biggest landowners, and would be in the 10 richest corporations in Australia if is was actually incorporated, and could sort out it's accounts. In concrete terms it can mean that you can be discriminated against for employment, in a church run business, that is paid for by the state, such as happens in Australia, for not being the "correct" religion. Italy still pays the Vatican money for the loss of the Papal States. State funded, but church run hospitals will refuse abortions.


To to find out what has been happening in modern times we can  use a Slovakia  as an example. Oddly it has recently been turning more Catholic, a trend that has been a bit disturbing to the rest of the EU, where Poland and Ireland have been becoming more secular.

How have they been using in the past?  Well it shows very simply that the German Government under Hitler was very keen on the Vatican, and signed the Reichskonkordat not surprisingly as he was a Catholic, Germany still continues to sign them to this day 

Are they still in use in this day and age?

On the third of May 2011 Azerbaijan the and the Vatican signed a new one 

East Timor is currently in the process of signing one.

To find out more about concordats this very very excellent page on Wikipedia sums the problems very well, and is far better than I could have written myself.





As usual with matters of the Vatican, caution must at all time be taken to recognize actual issues, and those that are products of conspiracy, or fantasy.


 “Each concordat marks a state’s renunciation of its own powers and its assumption of the obligation to contribute to those of the Catholic Church. In exchange for these gifts, authoritarian governments buy from the church hierarchy a kind of legitimacy and support for their power, as being in harmony with the commands of God. In some cases they gain influence in the appointment of senior Churchmen. A democratic system does not need this legitimacy [...] To grant the Church any privileges violates the foundations of democracy, even if the facade is retained.”
— Anonymous Polish MP to President Kwaśniewski, cited by MP Ryszard Zając on 12 September 1996 in the Sejm.

Want to get Divorced in Malta, well not yet.

                                      

There is only one European Country that does not have a divorce law, and it's Malta, unsurprisingly Pope Benedict XVI  praised Malta’s stance against abortion and divorce, during a visit last April. Malta is about 96% Catholic, and usually the only time anyone actually hears about Malta, is when the Knights of Malta appear in some sort of historical or less likely modern context.

On 28 May 2011 Malta will have a referendum if they should have a divorce law. The local Humanist are for it, and as usual the dark age Catholic Church is against.

The referendum question in English is as follows:
Do you agree with the introduction of the option of divorce in the case of a married couple who has been separated or has been living apart for at least four (4) years, and where there is no reasonable hope for reconciliation between the spouses, whilst adequate maintenance is guaranteed and the children are protected


Malta is still big on Billboards, and here is one for the YES side

 Personally I am on the YES side.


 Divorce is a declaration of independence with only two signers. – Gerard Lieberman

To presume to be talk for god ?

May 21 is coming, my take on what the real Rapture story will be.

Many people  will have heard about FamilyRadio and Harold Camping, and his prediction (yet again) of the Rapture and the 2nd coming of Christ. You may have even seen the Billboards, or the car, or even the Vans.

I suspect something else is going to happen, that it's a cover story for something much more sinister.

Nom nom nom







Thanks to lynnfriedman on Flickr for the Wecanknow van image
Thanks to Oni Horan for Necronom
Thanks to various Aliens for eventually not eating me

Those of little faith are of little hatred. - Eric Hoffer