The Prime Minister said on Q&A last night that he wouldn’t mind the drinking age being lifted to 21.

This is probably the dumbest idea since cutting back on the solar panel rebate. Lifting the drinking age would be counter-productive and unfair.

It is stupid for a number of reasons:

1. It would instantly double the number of underage drinkers making the problem that much worse. A problem that is already impossible to police would be even more difficult to stop.
2. Instead of getting drunk under supervision legally at home or in a pub young people will go to the local park instead and get paralytic with a bunch of their friends. Raising the drinking age is supposed to cut down on drunken violence in the city, but all it would do simply shift the drunken violence to the suburbs. In a park there is no bartender to cut you off or bounces to break up fights.
3. It is incompatible with our culture. The drinking age has been 18 now for so long that nobody considers it a bad thing to drink at that age. It is a rite of passage to finally be allowed to drink. At high school I knew the odd person that waited to till 18, but I just can’t imagine anyone waiting for 21.
4. You can’t drink responsibly if you are drinking illegally.
5. May increase access to other illegal drugs. If I remember back to when I used to drink underage in a park or at someone’s house whose parents were not home, there was always a group of guys on the couch smoking pot and a bunch of girls in the corner popping pills. If you are already doing something illegal you may as well do something that is only slightly more illegal.
6. It is bad for the economy. There are many clubs out there that cater solely for those under the age of 21. What would happen to these clubs and the people who work at them?
7. It is moving the goalposts. Many kids have been waiting for 18 and suddenly changing the age to 21 is just unfair. An age has to be picked where a kid is finally accepted as an adult.

Binge drinking, alcohol fuelled violence and drunk driving are all serious problems that kill teenagers, but increasing the drinking age is not the solution and might even make those problems worse.

Driving while drunk is already a criminal offence. Is somebody who habitually drives drunk going to remedy their behaviour if drinking at their current age is now illegal? If you live in the real world the answer is of course no.

All over the TV yesterday was the announcement of Mary McKillop’s second miracle – an important step on the long road to sainthood.

One thing you will know just about many miracles is they tend to exhibit people recovering from cancer.

The interesting thing about cancer, which makes it different from many other diseases, is that spontaneous remission can occur at any time. A person could be a week away from death and they can suddenly start getting better for no readily explainable reason.

Contrast this with my own disease – Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD). No one with my disease has ever undergone a miracle and started walking again. Why do only people with cancer deserve to be saved by miracles? Maybe DMD is an evil disease like AIDS which only evil people suffer from. Why would God be so mean-spirited to cure some diseases and not others?

There are many documented cases of spontaneous remission in cancer and not all of them were religious. Some believe it could be a feature of the immune system suddenly finding the key to destroying cancer cells. Or maybe it is caused by changes in hormonal balance. Scientists may not fully understand the reason why some people undergo spontaneous remission, but this is not a reason to jump to conclusions and proclaim that it must be a miracle. Just because something is not understood does not mean that it must be God that is responsible.

We should not chalk up spontaneous remission under the rare unexplainable miracle banner. Instead we should study these cases in an effort to understand how they happen. The rate of spontaneous remission is probably many times larger than many people realise. There would be those who discover a lump in their breast and then a few months later at it spontaneously vanishes without them ever visiting a doctor.

If the medical profession worked out the reasons behind spontaneous remission we could provide these miracles to anybody with cancer.

Yesterday, I was reading the science-fiction classic Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein. One of the characters in the book does not like religion very much and was complaining about the terrible things written in some holy books. The character mentioned chapter 19 of Genesis verse eight and 2 Kings chapter 2.

In chapter 19 of Genesis Lot offers a crowd of men around his house his two virgin daughters if they would just go away and leave him alone. By the way these men were from the town of Sodom and you know what they do there. These girls would have been brutally raped by the entire male population of the town. The thing is any bible basher will tell you what a great bloke Lot was.

Genesis 19

8: Behold now, I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is good in your eyes: only unto these men do nothing; for therefore came they under the shadow of my roof.

Okay so Lot was pretty evil, but now it is God’s turn. In this scene there was this guy Elisha who is travelling from town to town doing good things. Until that is he comes to the town of Bethel where the town’s children run out and start teasing Elisha about his bald head. He then curses the children and two bears come out of the nearby wood and tears the children into 42 pieces or tears 42 children into pieces – I’m not quite sure, but far out how bad is that?

2 Kings, chapter 2

23: And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.

24: And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them.

Many Christians say they believe the Bible literally. If they are reading the same bible that I have how can they possibly believe their God is fair, just and good. If I met that God I would be forced to say, “see you next Tuesday”, if you know what I mean. Even if you don’t take the Bible literally what possible lesson could this passage teach you?

Some may say this is the Old Testament and that it doesn’t really matter any more. But it was the same God then as it was 2000 years ago and today. In my experience leopards do not change their spots.

But the world was a different place back then and who are you to question the will of God? I’m sorry, but there are some things that are wrong in any age if they are committed by any being divine or otherwise. In my opinion killing innocent children is always wrong.

There is a website devoted to evil Bible passages. There are atrocities in there attributed to God and many of his prophets, from mass killings to amateur abortions where mothers were ripped open to kill the growing fetus (Hosea, chapter 13:16).

In my opinion there is only one word to describe this and it is: evil!

The “Allow Bluetooth devices to wake this computer setting” on MacBooks, under certain conditions, could destroy your laptop as Brian X. Chen from Gadget Lab discovered.

I always knew Apple was evil!

I love Australia and I honestly believe it is one of the best countries in the world. Australia is one of the few nations that was not founded in war. Our country is made up of people from hundreds of different nations all living together in relative harmony.

It is amazing to just to walk down the street, your nose will pick up the scent of the best food from many different parts of the world.

Our strongest value is to give people a fair go. We don’t treat new people with suspicion instead we buy them a beer. We make sure everyone is included. In Australia we have no aristocracy, everyone is equal and we don’t call anyone sir – even the Prime Minister.

But again a chain e-mail threatens everything we hold dear. The ideas of Pauline Hanson have been discredited and her racist ideals are no longer fit for the political arena, but her beliefs have not died. Many who think as she does are still around – still spouting their theories.

The e-mail is titled: It’s Our Country! – Australia the right to leave.

It brings up a few examples like Sydney not wanting to put up Christmas lights or a Muslim woman in South Australia who apparently is veiled in her driver’s licence photo.

It goes on to say how many recent immigrants are diluting our sovereignty and our national identity.

This rant starts with: “IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It! I am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali, we have experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians.”

And goes on with: “However, the dust from the attacks had barely settled when the ‘politically correct’ crowd began complaining about the possibility that our patriotism was offending others. I am not against immigration, nor do I hold a grudge against anyone who is seeking a better life by coming to Australia.”

And later: “We speak ENGLISH, not Spanish, Leba…” You get the idea.

There are a few questions I would like to ask the authors of this e-mail. Do you eat salami, kebabs, noodles, pizza or lasagne? You do! Well that must make you a fucking wog. Get out. Leave. I don’t want your kind in Australia. Bloody hypocrites. No seriously you are entitled to your own opinion, but try to keep your beliefs consistent.

The e-mail gets a little strange towards the end with: “’In God We Trust’ is our National Motto. This is not some Christian, right wing, political slogan. We adopted this motto because Christian men and women, on Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented. It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world as your new home, because God is part of our culture.”

I never knew Australia had a motto, but anyway… I would argue one of the best things about Australia is that God is not a large part of our culture. In Australia it is considered rude to judge people according to their beliefs. I am an atheist and I do not believe I’ve ever been criticised for my lack of belief. This is part of our belief in the fair go. No matter if you are black, brown, beige or purple or whether you have unusual religious beliefs or if you are disabled.

The funny thing about this e-mail (as you may have guessed) is that it’s not original. This was originally written for a local newspaper in the American state of Georgia. One or two words have been changed for an Australian audience, but essentially it is exactly the same. The two examples at the top of the e-mail about Sydney Christmas lights and the female Muslim driver were not in the original article. A few things were added and taken out and it was turned into a chain e-mail.

The source of the Sydney Christmas lights story is about the Lord Mayor of Sydney Clover Moore in 2004 wished to cut down on the expenditure for Christmas decorations. Some right-wing commentators suggested that maybe the real reason was not to offend Muslims. Then Prime Minister John Howard agreed with them. Clover Moore denied this was the reason and in subsequent years emphasised the role of Christianity in Christmas.

In the American chain e-mail it was a Muslim woman in Florida who was veiled on her driver’s licence – she must have emigrated to South Australia. There is also an English version of the e-mail. That Muslim woman gets around a bit.

This e-mail is another sad example of ignorant people trying use lies and so-called “patriotism” to incite hatred of others.

The authors of this e-mail would see Australia a boring place with only meat and three veg to eat. There would be no cafes with tables and chairs in front. Pizza and the most Aussie of all dishes the chicken parmigiana would be banned.

Cultures that are open and flexible are successful. Those that are closed and ignorant die a slow and often painful death. Even our language is a bastard combination of French, Saxon, Latin and many others. This is one of the reasons why it is the most successful language ever known. The very culture you live in was forged by the blending of others.

As soon as someone begins to believe that their culture is superior people start being hurt. I believe that every culture that has come to Australia has improved our society – from the Chinese during the gold rush and the Afghans that opened up the interior of our country to the aboriginals that were here before we came.

Please do not demonstrate your ignorance by forwarding e-mails such as this.

There is a new type of spammer in the world. They take advantage of people’s good nature to spread vicious lies designed to manipulate public opinion.

There are two e-mails that I have received the recently that have greatly angered me. The first I have talked about in my previous post. It is an e-mail titled: That History Does Not Repeat Itself.

In this e-mail is a PowerPoint presentation that really tugs on the heartstrings. It shows terrible photos of the Holocaust. This is followed by the lie that the English school system is forbidden from teaching the Holocaust for fear of upsetting the Muslim population who, supposedly, believe the Holocaust never happened. It is of course completely untrue that the curriculum does not include the Holocaust. In fact teaching of the Holocaust is compulsory in England.

Here is the story that inspired the e-mail. Mid way down it states:”Teaching of the Holocaust is already compulsory in schools…”

Ironically this e-mail uses the Holocaust to stir up racial hatred against Muslims.

There is another similar e-mail on a smaller scale, but almost as nasty. It states:

It is interesting that the federal government provides a single refugee with a monthly allowance of $1,890.00 and each can also get an additional $580.00 in social assistance for a total of $2,470.00.

A single pensioner who, after contributing to the growth and development of Australia for 40 to 50 years, receives only a monthly maximum of $1,012.00 in old age pension and Guaranteed Income Supplement.

Maybe our pensioners should apply as refugees!

What this e-mail asserts is total bullshit. Media watch has debunked this particular e-mail three times in the past few years. According to centrelink refugees are eligible to receive the same benefit as other Australians. Remember they are refugees who came here fairly and squarely – not illegal immigrants. E-mail such as this are also designed to stir up hatred of the least fortunate in our society.

In an age where the dreams of terrorists, nationalists and racists are all, but shattered e-mails such as these are the last effort to make public opinion reflect the baser natures of humanity. Be very suspicious of messages that promote a message of hate – do not send them on instead stick them in the trash where they can join their authors in miserable obscurity.

Over the past few weeks I have received some chain e-mails that really pissed me off. This morning I received two chain e-mails with the following message:

Hi everyone

Ericsson are distributing free laptops for their brand promotion. They hope to increase their popularity and sale by this campaign.

All you need to do is send an email about this to 8 people and you will receive an Ericsson T18 Laptop. However, if you send an email about this to 20 or more people, you will receive an Ericsson R320 Laptop.

Make sure you send a copy to: anna[do not send]ericsson.com
Cheers

As soon as I read this I knew it was bullshit yet the two people that sent it to me were not your usual stupid ditzy fools. This particular chain e-mail is very different from the usual in that it asks for the supposed author to receive a copy of the message that you send on. That does not sound so bad? But when you think about it (less than a second in my case) there are millions of people connected to the Internet if even a small fraction of these people respond to the chain letter poor Anna will be receiving hundreds of thousands of e-mail messages.

This could just be a very nasty practical joke or could even be something more serious. This could be a denial of service attack designed to bring down the Ericsson mail servers and all of the people sending these messages are contributing to a criminal act.

This all boils down to please don’t send chain letters. The odd funny e-mail is okay – that is what e-mail is for. But any message that says, “send me on,” should immediately be sent to the junk mail folder – even if it is something you think people should hear.

Last week I received a chain e-mail telling me that the English public school system is no longer allowed to teach the Holocaust for fear of offending the Muslim population. This was not only untrue (teaching the Holocaust is compulsory in English public schools) it was, ironically, using the Holocaust to whip up racial hatred against a religious or ethnic group.

So please junk any chain e-mail you receive. This is what I have done for the past 15 years. I should have died in horrendous circumstances thousands of times over from all the bad luck I have generated by deleting these letters. Instead I satisfy myself that I have the strength of character to resist my superstitious urges.

I got an interesting reply from an anonymous person to my post: Will the Olympic Games Be China’s Worst Nightmare?

There are two views of China’s current Olympic crisis and I thought it would only be fair to let the pro-China lobby have their say.

Here is their comment:

“The Chinese government is not the idiotic liar in all of this; its opposition is. The news has shown Tibetans being violent, going against what they’re supposed to believe in, which is peace.

Why protest against China making Tibet more developed? China has helped increase the numbers of tourists going to Tibet, and therefore, the economy has improved. If the Tibetans had to protest, they could just sit down and have a civilized talk. Tibetans had reporters removed from the scenes of violence so that the truth would not get out.

Even in ‘developed countries’, people are also killed during protests. Don’t even try to say you haven’t seen such examples about France, the US..and lots of others on TV. Would you call them accidents? Or are you saying that the governments of these countries are also as ignorant as you’re calling the Chinese? The police would be killed if they did not try to stop the activists. It’s not as if the Chinese are killing on purpose. The Tibetans are burning down shops and vehicles, for goodness’ sake!

China has spent a long time preparing for the Olympics. Why are the Tibetans only acting now if they’re so mad? Why do they need to bring politics into the Olympic Games?

Dali Lama? More like? Lie Lama

I don’t believe I’m wrong in saying you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. How much do you really know about China and Tibet? I’m quoting a previous comment I found on your profile kman Says:
‘August 2nd, 2007 at 4:58 pm
I don’t know why I am wasting my time writing this,but what gets me is your know all attitude to things you have absolutely no clue about.’”

And here is my reply:

“Thanks for your comment. It’s good to hear from people of differing opinions and I hope you leave many more comments in the future.

I am sure there are idiotic liars on all sides Chinese, Tibetan and Westerners. When I wrote this piece I was very careful not to express support for violent protest. The fact is China is in charge of Tibet and it is their responsibility to keep law and order. And you are right some people do die it in protests.

My main issue was with the Chinese government telling us that the Dali Lama was behind the violent protests. It was just so convenient and the Chinese government have a long track record of dishonesty (think of the Tiananmen Square massacre and the Chinese government refusal to recognize it as such). It was just so obviously a lie.

There are several other reasons why I believe that Dali Lama wasn’t behind it. The Dali Lama is a champion of non-violent protest. He knows that non-violent protests work and that any form of violent protest is a complete waste of time and counter-productive.

Non-violent protest has been used many times to defeat totalitarian regimes. Think South Africa, India, Serbia, Russia and Poland. The violent protests in Tibet have most likely set the free Tibet movement back years.

Why protest against China making Tibet more developed?
I would assume that no one would protest about China helping Tibet. What people do protest against is the fact that China invaded Tibet. China continues to import vast numbers of ethnically Chinese people making Tibetans a minority in their own country.

Before I continue, I will tell you a bit about how we do things in the ‘developed world.’ Unfortunately, sometimes in this world violence is necessary. If a country is invading their neighbours or killing vast numbers of its own people an invasion might be necessary. Think about Germany after World War II. Germany was occupied, the Allies rebuilt the country, instituted a functioning government and economy. Then over a period of many years they left.

According to the Chinese government Tibet was ruled by a theocracy basically a Buddhist Iran. The Chinese have had years to rebuild the country create a functioning government and economy. Why are they still there?

In the developed world we have a little thing called the right of self-determination. All peoples have the right to freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. It was this principle that allowed for the decolonisation of the developing world. After World War I this principle was used to split Europe into distinct cultural and language groups the way the people wished. This did more than anything to stop the near constant state of war that tore Europe apart in previous centuries. The Tibetan people want China to respect their rights.

It is not all bad news in China. China has the capacity to be one of the greatest nations on earth. They just need to respect the principles that help make the world a better place. The Chinese government needs to learn that not everyone will agree with them. Instead of attacking dissenting voices, trying to discredit them or going on the defensive they need to say: ‘You have the right to your opinion, but we respectfully disagree.’ Instead, we hear the Chinese government attacking one of the most respected leaders in the world – the Dali Lama. How do you feel when somebody verbally attacks someone you respect – you fight back.”

There are multiple things that are giving me the shits at the moment. But the one thing that really tops it off is the Olympic movement. They have done nothing, at least nothing visible in the media, to shame China for their actions in Tibet. Instead protesters get hit hard for their actions against a do nothing Olympic movement.

When I talk about China’s actions in Tibet I am not talking about the violent actions stopping the violent protests. It is the lies that they spread about the Tibetan people and especially the Dali Lama. I fail to believe that someone who has dedicated their life to peace would orchestrate violent protests against the relatively innocent Chinese civilians. If the Dali Lama had organised the protests, they would have been peaceful and on a much larger scale.

I think the Chinese leadership, to a certain degree, believe their own lies – this has to be born of ignorance. The Chinese forget that virtually every world leader has met the Dali Lama and a sizable percentage of the world’s people have actually heard his voice in person. That is why the Chinese lies are so ridiculous. I laughed the first time I heard the Chinese government spokesman accuse the Dali Lama of these crimes. They just look like idiots.

The instant a Chinese leader meets the Dali Lama their whole policy towards Tibet will change. And maybe they know it. Could this be why they’ve refused to meet him for so long? Maybe they just want to save face in that ancient Asian tradition.

I wonder what will happen during the Olympic Games. Will rebellious Chinese students try to protest again – this time with the Chinese government being handcuffed – unable to act because an Olympic games is happening? Maybe Taiwan will unilaterally declare independence. The Olympic Games could either be the greatest thing for China or maybe their worst nightmare. I’m kind of hoping for the nightmare.

Kevin Andrews the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship has done it again. Kevin Andrews was responsible for the private members bill that shot down Northern Territory Euthanasia legislation. Now he has used his power to lock up a man before he has even gone to trial.

Doctor Haneef was given bail with very strict conditions. In this country we practice an idea called innocent until proven guilty. It is one of our highest ideals. But our minister for immigration does not understand this – he considers himself judge jury and executioner. He is able to look over the evidence make up his mind and lock up the assumed perpetrator

This whole thing makes me ashamed to be Australian the power of the entire country is used to fuck up the life of one doctor. I feel there has to be more to this. I think this may be politically motivated similar to the Tampa incident. The Howard government thinks there is political mileage in picking on foreigners – especially the dark ones. But I think this one will backfire. I just don’t think many Australians like the idea of the government fucking around with judicial proceedings – the rest don’t care enough for it to affect the way they vote.

Now even if Doctor Haneef is found innocent he will still be deported. He could find it very difficult to get a job overseas ever again. And why? For the sole reason that some of his colleagues thought it would be a good idea to blow something up. Soon we will be just like America completely ignoring civil rights of our own citizens. It seems our morals are being contracted out to an American idiot.