Fragments

See also..poems 2010

Yoav
died from burns and shock and loss of blood
after his tank was hit
in the Saluki Valley
Lebanon
aged 21


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Everyone knows that the BBC has a programmatic agenda to demonise and dehumanise Israel and Israelis and that this agenda has been part of its corporate culture for the last 40 years. A young reporter who joins the organisation can quickly gain acceptance and approval from both peers and from those higher up in the hierarchy by producing news items which portray Israelis as brutal oppressors, or as corrupt, or as fanatical zealots, and Palestinians as an exploited indigenous people who nevertheless seek peace and accommodation. By contrast, having the courage to see or say otherwise is a revolt against the tacit concensus, and will quickly lead to punitive sanctions - social ostracision, or being fired on one or other pretext.
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I don't live in Israel because the narrative which took me there in the first place - two months before my 18th birthday - has been contaminated by another narrative to which I do not relate, or which I cannot relate to with enough of my being to make it possible for me to add to and perpetuate myself as part of that narrative.

I don't like the triumphalist discourse which has developed, or the viewing of territory and possession of territory as a value in of itself. territory must serve the people whose lives it was meant to enhance, not the other way round, else the whole thing becomes absurdly circular. Establish the State of Israel to redeem the Jewish people from their powerlessness, but if the Jewish people need always to serve the state of Israel and sacrifice themselves for it in order that it might be there to one day redeem them, then who is benefitting. Nevertheless the energy and vitality there are astounding - much more so than in carrot up the arse upper midle class Australia.

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I like them meat and milk..first the milk, then the meat, which is anyway permissible
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Comic possibility: the serial mangling of the Jewish surnames by the British/ Australian staff @ Emanuel

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Treat your love
to a Valentine day's special
juicy grain fed steak
prodded along with electric prods
to the

Treat her to a blood Diamond from Angola or the Congo

Celebrate!


In this world (and which world is this? It all depends on you...) it's often about choosing the lesser evil rather than the greatest good. I find this thought comforting when having to make difficult "choices" (assuming there is such a thing as choice) where something suffers, no matter what option is chosen.
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Here is a contradiction. How can I (supposedly) care about the whole, when I often resent and dislike many of the whole's component parts? How can I care about saving the earth (what a conceit!) when I resent or want to get rid of the person who parks me in, or the people whose party keeps me awake all night, or the people who left shards of glass on the children's playground, or all the people around me whose actions did not conform to my expectations, or even the ants that have invaded my worm farm, or the cockroaches who have invaded our flat ? Whose left to save the earth for? Riddle me that.

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The spirituality ( a much abused and com modified word) of sustainability. When does the advice about living in the now given by many teachers and traditions clash with the idea of planning for the future. Let the future take care of itself...we know nothing of it and projections and extrapolations based on current data are incomplete and imperfect ("current" is changing even as we "capture' it).

At present the spend on conservation and the environment and sustainability is a grudging afterthought, whereas the spend on a family car, holiday, makeup and home are the main course. Why? Because the latter are all linked to self esteem, to our sense of progress and value and achievement, whereas if a species becomes extinct its not my failure, and if indigenous forests are preserved its not my success, my having "made it". How can we create the same linkage that exists and is used by the devious sellers of unnecessary electronics and clothes and non-utilitarian goods of all kinds - like cosmetics - with their nauseating "You're worth it" slogans.


Is sustainability making you sick. Are you going green with nausea?
(Too much of anything applied inflexibly is generally not in service of freedom.)
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submissiveness is sexy
acquiesence is sexy
power is sexy
but not brutal, humourless, excessive power
power with limits
we all know this, don't we?
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Self esteem (you're worth it)

"wow these two smoking hot blonds are really having a good time"
"don't ignore your premature problems"
"stay regular like me"
"look and feel like a million dollars"
"health in a bottle"
"call and chat to me now"
"
"
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"I was born under the star
of timidity and there's nothing I can do about it...."
so my story goes
early infected by the mono coccus
of self doubt
I have lived my life
suspended over failure

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Article on donor fatigue - the overwhelming number of requests that arrive in my inbox each day, my own very finite resources, and the part of the poor in perpetuating poverty...this could become a Talmudic dialogue with an editor such as Steve Payne

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"Married man desperately looking for someone to share his life with"
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The Jews, backs bent from centuries of persecution, left the Thai restaurant.
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If I was a brilliant inventor
I would invent a ray gun
ZAP!
that softened people's hearts
and removed their fear
allowed them to act
on their deepest knowing
then factory farms would have no-one to sell to
journalists would not enroll others in their resentments
casinos and adult stores would go bust
and poppy growers would only sell their crop to bakers
people would not take out their anger
on the innocent and blind
and blame like smoke
would vanish from the earth
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I am a mouse by say, and a Tiger by write

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