Beautiful. More than half a million people demonstrated against H.R. 4437 in Los Angeles recently. H.R. 4437, aka “The Border Protection, Antiterrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005”, is a sadly hysterical bigoted bill that makes small immigration offenses “federal crimes”. And most shockingly, that applies to people who know of others who may not have ‘legal’ status. Thus non-governmental organizations and support groups become accessories to commiting federal crime. The US, above all, was and is built on the vibrant incessant motor of immigration, it is the essential heft of its being. Sadly bigotry and hatred is an ingrained crease on our human being, and politicians play brutally callous games, using fear of the “other” to win support as tough do’ers. Facist Germany knew this well, playing on anti-semitism to unify society using hysterical fear of the other.
Remember , remember always, that all of us… are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
For me, the current abuse of fear to gain favour with voters, both in the US and here in the UK, is a pathetically brutal tragedy. The human cost is hidden by flag waving and unfounded fear of alien invasion.
Alien: An American sovereign in his probationary state.
Ambrose Bierce
Immigration has been shown time and time again to be beneficial. Financially it hugely stimulates the economy; immigrants use less public funds and pay more tax. Western companies drop their costs drastically using ‘illegal’ labour and thus further stimulate the economy.
Everywhere immigrants have enriched and strengthened the fabric of American life.
John F. Kennedy
Vastly more important for me (the clear economic advantages frankly disturb me; manipulation of human misfortune to further profit) are the cultural benefits. It is wonderful to live in a community where you can share human experience, no matter where it came from. It is challenging and rewarding to live amongst the huge diverse plethora of fellow humans. Music, food, art and experience all melt in the fermenting stew of our culture. My culture is partly Indian, Caribbean, African, Persian, Latin American, East European, Arab and Asian.
Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore, send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
Emma Larzarus
I am happy to see current American immigrants organising and working to get their voice heard; a voice calling for humanity, compassion and fairness. I wish them all the best in their struggle.
Here is not merely a nation, but a teeming nation of nations.
Walt Whitman
More Than 500,000 Rally in L.A. for Immigrants’ Rights - Los Angeles Times
See individual entry…Most people who try to commit suicide fail (though I doubt it is a high as the 90% value that has been suggested). And sadly, a substantial number of those will suffer the side effects of the unsuccesful attempt, as well as the emotional burdens of the attempt, the guilt and the retributions. I had often thought that there should be not only counselling for those who wanted to commit suicide, but a manual of techniques that minimised the risks if things went wrong. Dying 5 days later, slowly, with your loved ones by your bedside from liver failure regretting your overdose has to be about as traumatic as can be. I obviously wasn’t the only one to think about that, and I just came across an old (1981) article about this :
Some of the stories are tragic. A friend of a friend jumped from a high building and hit a parked car several stories below. She broke most of her bones and punctured several of her inner organs, but didn’t die. Instead she was wheeled, conscious, to the local emergency rom, her most privately conceived act announced to the world by the ambulance siren. She spent the next year in bed, much of it in a hospital ward allocated to critically ill victims of violence, her still suicidal mind the only functioning part of her body.
They also collate a series of suicide notes here …
See individual entry…The insectophile in me is very excited that the first festival celebrating, to quote:
… appreciation of “insects in art and the art of being an insect”, the Pestival aims to create positive PR for this 400-million-year-old, highly evolved taxon that has had thousands of years of bad press.
is happening soon in London. With a humourous title of Pestival the programme includes:
- Dr. Mark Benecke: Adventures in Forensic Entomology — Benecke will enlighten us with his knowledge and understanding of maggot behaviour, illustrating his talk with fresh and juicy demonstrations.
- Dr. Claire Preston: The Art and Allure of the Bee — Claire Preston follows the natural and cultural history of our relationship with the bee and the development of these legends, from ancient political descriptions of the bee to Renaissance debates about monarchy, and the accompanying scientific discoveries about insects, to the modern conversion of the virtuous, civil bee into the dangerous swarm of the Hollywood horror flick.
- Prof. David Rothenberg: Why Do Insects Sing? — Crickets, cicadas, katydids, cecropia moths. They’re the original polyrhythmacists, jammers in the dark, trance tuners of the dark soundwaves of night. Music is at the center of their lives, as they sing to find each other, to celebrate the warming of the seasons, their sonic place in the ecology. Science knows the reasons, but not the grooves. Why do insects synchronize across species lines? Why do they produce sounds we can enjoy, which they are sometimes unable to hear themselves?
- Films including Ladislaw Starewicz’s The Cameraman’s Revenge (1912) and Phase IV, a mesmerising, thoughtful 1974 eco-science fiction film, directed by Saul Bass.
- Insect inspired music.
The overlords are fast approaching. All hail our insect masters…
See individual entry…
Igor is extirpated, and the hefty fabric of reality sighs briefly. Yet his creases, delicate but sharp, remain.
Let us have some fun and read Igor’s obituaries. Let us compare them and then categorise them:
Independent gushes at celebrity links
Guardian effuses at famous people connections
blah blah blah from the Times with celebrity roll call
Who wins? Well, I put the Independent in a box of spoons, while the Guardian sits on the bottom shelf, under a pile of other obituaries. The Times, well, it is not even fit for lining the cutlery draw is it? Funny how tedious you can make someone just by writing an obituary about them. For Igor, that is doubly the case.
Let us ponder, ideally thoughtfully yet directionlessly; and let some of the word combinations he formulated and their effects on our reality live on…
See individual entry…When I do die I shall be glad to get away from loud pop music and motor cars, but I shall miss, insofar as when one is dead one can miss anything, the beautiful kindnesses of those people to whom courtesy comes naturally.