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The Civilized States of America and Jesusland
For the Love of America
The Founding Fathers
Making America Proud of You
Vasectomy: a Survivor's Tale
Why are Americans such assholes?
The Great Car Culture
Sustainable Development
Politics in Little England
Palace Admits Prince Charles is Gay
St George, the big pussy cat and Richard the Lionheart
Long Live the English Republic
The Cedars of Lebanon
The Colour of Music
The Big Lie
Lee Strobel's Pathetic “Case For Christ”
Ex-atheists (Why do so many Christian writers claim they used to be atheists?)
Martyrs
Prophets
Heroes
Why Believe in Jesus?
Jesus the Man, Jesus the Myth
Saul: What a Silly Cult
Gandhi: Great Soul or Arsehole?
Damned Republican Communist!
Catholicism Wow
The Passions
How not to be eaten by aliens
Knowing
Every British schoolboy knows Britain won both world wars. In the same way that every fundie knows Jesus is his saviour. To understand Britain, which you seem to want to do, you must realize this. When I was at Frankfurt airport I saw the following graffiti "Two World Wars and one World Cup". The English working class know that England defeated three German tyrants; in 1918, 1945 and 1966. Naturally I think your analysis is nearer the truth.
Hitler never wanted to fight against the British Empire, he wanted to make pacts to carve up the world. He didn't expect Britain to fight over Poland anymore than we did over the other aggressions (in places that I can't spell.) That was a big mistake. He spared the British army at Dunkirk because he still thought we would make peace. Britain could never have won the second world war but we didn't have to, we just needed not to lose for long enough. Britain was on a total war footing by 1940, Germany didn't get to that stage of production until 1943. The USA never mobilized to that extent. As an island with massive sea power and a competent air force we were too tough a nut to crack. Once the Luftwaffe had failed to gain air superiority over Southern England invasion was out of the question. The Channel is too wide to cross without air superiority, the German forces lacked decent landing craft, if Hitler had been mad enough to invade his forces would have suffered very heavy losses. Would you have wanted to cross twenty miles of rough sea with twin engined bombers with fighter support looking for your small boat?
To invade across any decent stretch of water requires air superiority, naval bombardment and a heavy advantage in troop numbers too. It is a very hard thing to do right, and there are lots of ways to do it wrong, e.g. Gallipolli and Bay of Pigs. The US government ordered 370,000 purple hearts in anticipation of casualties in the invasion of Japan (1945-46). Japan was more pessimistic, they were talking about the twenty million willing to lay down their lives for the Emperor. Nobody invades a well armed island on the cheap.
Britain didn't win the war. We just remained undefeated and were part of the alliance that did win. In contrast Italy was beaten by both sides, Germany was razed to the ground, Poland was thoroughly beaten and ransacked twice, France was humiliated and divided against itself and Ireland had a temporary loss of foreign trade. So of all the European powers we were the only ones that could say we won, apart from the Soviet Union, but when you have lost more than four times the number of dead of the holocaust you can hardly call it a glorious victory.
Hollywood has shown a lot of the second world war recently, showing the American contribution. But few people in the west know about the real fighting in that war, who really paid the highest price. The real war was where Hitler always knew it would be, in the East.
Does that seem fair? Yes, we couldn't have done it without you. Thanks. But you still expected us to pay it all back. Whereas Germany got Marshall aid. War is always a nasty business, and, just in case you have any doubts, I think it is A Bad Thing.
I am often puzzled by the British obsession with defeats. We hear much more about the blitz, the Charge of the Light Brigade and Dunkirk than we do about El Alamein, a battle where we beat the finest General of the Third Reich in a fair fight on neutral ground. Do you Americans do the same sort of thing? I don't think so. You talk of Pearl Harbor with anger, Vietnam causes very mixed emotions, but pride is not to the fore. Got to sign off now.
I always smile when I come across the word popish or popery. It is very
un-PC, very nineteenth century and so it has a certain resonance. I use
it sometimes to create the right air. No popery here is a big catchphrase
of Ian Paisley (Snr). No British, that is mainland Britain, politician
would dare use it, except a handful of Scottish Protestant working class
street level rabble rousers. I met a few at the Coatbridge and Airdrie
By Election, these people made Billy Connolly sound like Prince Charles.
I very nearly ended in bed with a woman from Hamilton when I was there,
she was about four feet cubed, about 40, I couldn't understand a word
she said so I just smiled.
My background in the church? I suppose it was low to middle. Stained glass was OK. Crosses were fine, crucifixes were suspect and incense was popery gone mad. Our Rector was married, to a woman, had children and got drunk. The way it should be. We didn't hold with teetotallers (do you use that word?) or sodomites.
The bomb.
It is a tough call. I have read all about the invasion plans, they make very chilling reading. I have no doubt that the USA would have managed to invade Japan and it would have been far bloodier than any previous US battle. The 370,000 purple hearts ordered in anticipation seems about right. The Japanese casualties saved would have been many times higher. Not the twenty million talked of in the propaganda but certainly well in excess of a million. So lives were saved by not invading, certainly, and by a substantial margin. But would it have been possible to drop the bomb and make the point in another way? Drop it just off the coast, or on Mount Fuji? It is possible but I suppose the project had simply built up an unstoppable momentum and logic all of its own. It was built for a city, it would be used on one. And only by dropping it on a city would you reveal your determination to actually do it, and the true destructive power of it.
The other unasked question about the bomb was why did the US feel the need to demand unconditional surrender? When the Japanese forces were driven out of Okinawa and there was only the mainland left to defeat why was there no attempt to get an armistice? The Japanese must have known they were beaten. I don't know enough about this bit of the history. My conclusion is that if the only choices were invasion or bomb then bomb was the better of the two awful choices. Any comments?
On another note altogether, do you find Japanese women sexy? I do. I have been puzzling recently about which women I find attractive and why. It might end up as a page one day. Titled something like "Why The Corrs aren't attractive". I'd be interested if you want to send a list of internationally known women that you think are sexy and a list of the massively over-rated. And if there is a pattern do you have any explanations. Pure research you understand. Science.
Grroundskipper wully is funny but not quite an authentic accent to my ears, but what do I know? I have only spent about three weeks in Scotland in total.
It seems obvious that we will have a very different list of attractive women if you rate Victoria. Posh Spice is not an intellectual, but she is a genius compared to her overpaid husband, David Beckham, a footballing genius but not the sharpest tool in the box. Posh and Becks jokes are quite common in this country now.
David what was the name of that restaurant you both went to last night?
I can't remember, can you help me? I gisa clue, gi me da name of a London railway station...
Euston? Liverpool Street? Waterloo? Victoria?
Yeah, fanks, 'ere Victoria! What were the name of dat restaurant we went to last night?
Please bear in mind the following two points while you read this:
1] I am married and faithful.
2] Given the opportunity to bed any woman with no negative repercussions (paternity suits, cries of rape, divorce etc.) I would have a crack at most women.
So this is entirely theoretical, I am just giving my ideas as to the relative attraction I personally feel towards these women. I find it very difficult to draw up a pattern for my attractions but I will give it a go. I like red hair, freckles, ringlets, curls, very long hair, natural hair colours, small noses, generous breasts, perky breasts, long legs (actually that is more accurately put to say I like their pudenda above table top height, I'm weird). I am attracted to petite women sometimes and to BIG WOMEN, the kind who look like they could carry a Hereford bull calf over their shoulders and march twenty miles across the moor, just pausing for five minutes to give birth to twins.
I don't find many Irish women attractive for some reason, except redheads. The Corrs totally fail to excite me, I suspect they look too underfed; thin Celtic looking women look like the dispossessed hungry, and are therefore untrustworthy. Or maybe they just look bloody miserable. I like women with unusual personalities. On Friends only the dippy blonde one is attractive, because she is weird. I also have quite a thing for Björk, although I am not normally attracted to pixies, gnomes and fairies.
Very intelligent women can be attractive, it seems I can be attracted by brains as well as bodies, as long as the body is not unattractive. But smart women with unattractive personalities are a turn-off.
When I am working in the shop I find myself being magnetically drawn to some women and I can't always see why. There has got be a degree of liking the person involved, liking the personality. Humour and the peculiar mixture of modesty and arrogance I show myself seem to be attractive to me; I like women who like me and are like me.
Britney Spears and all the other blonde wannabe Britneys with the notable exception of Jessica Simpson are massively over-rated. They are just ordinary girls who have been put on a pedestal and we are told they are fantasy figures. They are ordinary, not unattractive, girls.
I was thinking yesterday about the ideal cartoon woman, she would have to have a mixture of the cynical intelligence of Daria tempered by the rationality and optimism of Lisa Simpson (no I'm not that sick, I know she is a child, I mean her way of thinking) the home making ability of Betty Rubble and the body of Jessica Rabbit, put them all together and you get Jessica Simpson? But we mustn't forget Velma off Scooby Doo, intelligent and rational in the main but then Scooby wasn't the only dog in that van.
I don't like dyed blondes but Debbie Harry is fantastic, and I generally favour big women but I can't help thinking that Kylie Minogue is something special.
Looking at more general categories I do find many Asian women attractive, especially Japanese. Indian and Pakistani women can be OK but some darker skinned coarse featured Indian women are a turn off. I don't find many Australian aboriginal women particularly attractive. Africa covers a huge range, some African women I find spectacularly beautiful, others don't do anything for me. African-Americans are generally attractive to me, I have heard that African Americans are approximately 40-40-20 in their genetic make-up between African, European and American genes, it seems a good mixture that can produce good balanced features. But whether the person is attractive depends on the personality as much as the appearance.
I, like most people, ended up with a partner of the same race who lived within a relatively short distance of my home. Aesthetics are one thing, serendipity is another. I think the fairy-tale idea that our cultures both promote that there is one ideal person out there for us is total nonsense. Some people will never find somebody suitable, others could be happy with any one of millions of potential partners. I think that monogamy is the right way for us as a species, but we must acknowledge that men are naturally out for as many partners as they can get away with. In the name of equality for all men it is better for our societies to be run with the ideal of monogamy. If men are free to have as many partners as they want then some men will lose out in a big way, because men don't want to share their women, every man wants a faithful partner and sexual freedom for himself. More harm will be done to society by denying any sex to many men than by denying extra sex to a few. So I favour a strengthening of marriage for the majority plus the tolerance of prostitution and loose behaviour in unmarried women who choose it. It might also be a good idea to allow couples to choose the nature of their marriage and have it formalized by the state. The rules of my marriage are quite clear; adultery will not be accepted and any violence on either part will be met by full retaliation and the end of the relationship. I screw around and it is over. If I hit her she leaves me, if she hits me I hit her. I suppose you could call it Marital Assured Destruction. The threat of massive retaliation has kept the peace for 11 years and thirty hours so far.
I have to agree about the black ass, or arse. I like women with a decent sized arse, that means both width and depth. Many modern white women have got it all wrong, there is a British female catchphrase, “does my bum look big in this?” with the unspoken assumption that if it did she should change. Keep it if it makes your bum look big, real men like it big. I have a more Pleistocene ideal of female beauty, I like a woman to look well fed and a real woman. Quite often when diet advertisements show the before and after pictures I prefer the before woman.
I too have never had sex with a black woman. I expect that will be a bigger death bed regret than not winning a Nobel prize or [not] swimming the Channel.
To clear up the issue I don't have prejudices about the women I find attractive as such, I just have the honesty to recognize patterns. I was thinking about it again today and I think I overstated the bit about Irish women, I do find quite a lot of them attractive. Jessica Rabbit is way over the top, but I love sultry deep voices. My wife has a sexy deep voice. Hang on...my mother has quite a deep voice and is often mistaken for a man on the 'phone, is this significant? Perhaps. I know my wife will be annoyed when she reads that bit, she hates any comparison to my mother. But it makes perfect evolutionary sense for any individual to seek out a partner of the opposite sex who is not your parent or sibling but is similar to them, this ensures the optimum degree of outbreeding. That is why most black people date other black people much of the time, they are their type, the type they are attracted to, but people who have been adopted by people of other races tend to date people who look nearer their adoptive family than their birth family. It is a trend, not a rule.
Let me make it clear, if you hear my wife's voice you know she is all woman. When I am at work and I get bored I sometimes 'phone home to hear her voice, even on the answer machine.
Marge Simpson, no. That voice could never be associated with anything sexy in my mind. There is an advertisement on British television that features a sultry voiced rabbit (Cadbury's Caramel) with a soft rural voice. That voice is very sexy, even when I know it is being produced by a 50 year old short fat Jewish voice-over actress. Voices have a great power. That is one of the things that attracts me to Japanese women, their quiet, breathy voices.
That has got me thinking about the new industry; the call centre. Many new jobs are being created in rural areas by large companies moving out their complaints and customer services divisions to purpose built telephone call centres employing hundreds of people, mostly young women. They deliberately site them away from cities because their market research has found that customers are more relaxed by rural Welsh, West Country English or rural Scottish accents. If you have a complaint now and you dial up one of these twenty first century sweat shops your call gets handled by a disconcertingly soft and polite voice that handles your complaint, curses you to fuck for a moment under her breath and then presses on with the next call. Is that happening with you? And if so where?
As for IQs I have never been formally tested but I think I must be about the 130 level, but too smart to do the test. I don't score much above average on the supposedly masculine visual perception and mental rotation of 3D objects stuff but my word power and logic is good. I think I must have a brain that tries to find answers in words even when sometimes there is a better way, I hated mathematics at school, now I think this is because the parts of my brain that handle words wouldn't let the bits that can do the sums just get on with it. I can do sums, I can run up stairs, that involves a constant series of changing estimates and calculations, my body knows how to divide thirteen stairs between the optimum number of strides and it just does it, but if I am asked to do it as a sum my brain just gets hung up on the words. So now I always carry a calculator.
This e-mail stuff is great. It is like freeform creativity. I suspect you don't really read half of what I write, in depth, but it helps to have somebody specific to write for. It helps me bring out some ideas and kick them around a bit, to see if they have any potential to expand. This stuff is really about one third for you, one third for them and one third for me. If I wasn't going to publish it I might write a bit more unrestrained but on the other hand I would probably not write anything like as much. It is an interesting literary form, if that is not being too pretentious.
It is traditional that every teenager thinks that they live in the most boring place in the Universe. I certainly expect that a lot of teenagers in CH think that. It's not that bad, but it is not in the Guinness Book of anything for anything. It is a commuter town, it was formed by the junction of two railways in a field, somebody decided to build a station and so CH was born.
I have seen old maps of the pre-railway days and there is nothing here, the railway was the catalyst. You can see quite clearly that there was nothing here before the railway because there is a dead straight length of track for about three or four miles, the track didn't have anywhere much to go or anywhere to avoid going. That is a bit of an exaggeration, there are a few older buildings around but they were obviously just scattered randomly along minor roads, there was no centre before the railway. Behind my back fence there is a carpark, that is bordered by the station and Station Road. Station Road is the centre of the place that is CH, if place is not too grand a word for it.
On station Road there are a few take-away food shops. When the leaves are off the trees I can look straight out into the neon sign of an Indian take-away. There are quite a few trees around. There are six mature trees in my back garden, which are causing some structural damage to my house in dry summers, no problem this year though. Because of a combination of gentle undulations in the ground, generally flat terrain, houses, office buildings and trees we don't get much of an impression of a big sky here in CH, the horizons are close, the whole world is suburban. The daytime sky is full of vapour trails, the night sky is heavily polluted with stray light from a million street lights. This is a difficult place to feel spiritual.
Place name [CH] deleted to make this page harder for stalkers to find using my surname and the place name alone. |
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On the positive side I can take the children for walks and find some little islands of nature within a reasonable distance. On Sunday we went to Bramall Hall. I saw some tattooed smoking working class father with his children, “look at the dog in the water” he said. I think I did a bit better, I pointed out dragonflies, enormous carp, a heron, fish fry, weeds from the Himalayas that have exploding seeds and a teenage mutant ninja turtle. (A red eared terrapin that had been bought as a pet in response to the popularity of the cartoon turtles and then released by it's bored owners into the unnatural but adequate habitat of an English duckpond.)