Murder of Zahra Kazemi and time for Tough Talk. November 28, 2007

I really cannot believe that I am having to write this to some educated, seemingly decent, ”Catholic” blonde woman who lives in UK……

 

 

 

After finding THIS BLOG I ended up posting an odd comment there. The one mentioned in my last post about freedom of speech. The simple discussion led me to her other post, ”Amnesty International, Iran and Propaganda” and I am not saying this out of some childish rivalry or anything but I personally found it a very disturbing read. Just visit the link to the post and let me know what you think. But what really disturbed me was this blogger’s insensitive treatment of Zahra Kazemi’s tragedy. I never thought on the other end of the political spectrum there could exist the antithesis of Anne Coulter…. In the true spirit of a friendly debate- which does not mean agreeing to each other, I post this comment for people who might have or harbor such notions:

emberglow Says:
28 November, 2007 at 3:45 am

I appreciate your taking so much time to do a lengthy write up. NO big organization, entity, publication etc. is objective or error,corruption free. If something exists on such a large scale there will always be cracks somewhere. I recently wrote a post about how I like New York Times for many reasons despite it’s obvious or not so obvious misgivings. Amnesty International is a big bureaucracy too. But you cannot trash it altogether and other human rights organizations and reliable sources.

Now let me come to the second point. As much as I admire your resolve to counter ”Islamophobia” I am appalled by your blatant prejudice. I myself hate Islamophobia and its creators. For example this is my lengthy post on Mark Steyn and people like him: CLICK FOR LINK

But at the same time it is important to criticize human rights violations, related crimes in any country of the world. Police torture and custodial deaths are the norm in most eastern countries, not just Iran. You begin talking about Kazemi’s case and then suddenly trash it and move on:

 

 

”The Kazemi case is only a human rights violation if the Iranian version of events is untrue, which AI can’t possibly know. Otherwise it’s just an accidental death in police custody. So why mention it three years on?”

She was a journalist. If she wanted to discover the truth and ”violated” laws or restrictions she should be praised for her bravery. But you make her into a ”criminal” and then you embrace the evidence of Iranian news agency IRNA and Iranian government ”inquiry” and reject the international community, Human rights groups, government of Canada, where Kazemi had gained citizenship and where her family resides. Her son in Canada, Stephan Hachemi, still believes that his mother was tortured, raped and murdered. Is he supporting international anti- Iran propaganda? Maybe he is getting paid for it? huh ?

If you cannot sympathize with the most cruel, unjust, barbaric rape and murder of a woman…,do you also have no sympathy for Kazemi’s surviving family just because you choose to think it is all anti- Iran propaganda? I really don’t know what is driving your maniacal prejudices, and, let’s say, Islamophilia/Iranophilia that so tragically blinds your mind and clouds your judgment.

Please wake up!

On Canada’s BBC and freedom of speech for Neo Nazis November 27, 2007

As a shameless act of self- promotion I felt tempted to post here two of my comments left on two different blogs. There are two reasons for this: first, I wanted to leave a bit of a lighter after some rather dense posts. Second, I wanted to express my opinion for record’s sake. So here they are:

 

 

 

 

1.) This was from some Blog about human rights violations in China that reproduced Canadian newspaper National Post’s news report, ‘‘Covering up slaughter, with a little help from the CBC”. This report mentions rather diabolical allegations that the Chinese government is involved in mass slaughter of Falun Gong members. Not only that, the Chinese authorities are disemboweling them to sell their organs on the market. I know it sounds like a very morbid conspiracy theory, but actually it has been verified by very credible sources like veteran former Canadian member of Parliament Mr. David Kilgour on his website. But of course the initial topic was that Canada’s public broadcaster CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) cowered under Chinese government pressure when it decided not to broadcast a documentary (or the vital parts of it) that investigated the serious allegations. I was tempted to make this short comment:

”If China can kick out BBC, Shut up Rupert Murdoch, Yahoo, Google…. then…. who the hell is CBC?”



2.) Now we come to the other blog whose writer and readers passionately and ”vehemently” supported Holocaust deniers’ freedom of speech. The two of them being, David Irwing and Nick Griffin. This issue has been on my mind for quite some time but was buried under others priorities and concerns. I was fortunate to have come across this post. This gave me an opportunity to suggest a solution to this debate and also express my opinion and sentiments. So here is my humble comment:

 

”Maybe we should send these folks to Iran on a tax payer funded public holiday or call it Sabbatical (nothing to do with Sabbath Day).

 

 

 

I am sure Mr. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would greatly respect their freedom of expression. They can get it out of their system to their heart’s content, maybe go on prime time Al Jazeera and come back safely. What you think?”

 

To this the blogger replies:

 

 

 

”Or maybe having giving a platform to fascist, they should have invited a genuine antifascist, like Ahmadinejad to speak at the Oxford Union. He’d get a more intelligent and polite reception than he did at CUNY”.



To which I yet again humbly reply:


‘‘I don’t think Ahmadinejad would be all that welcome. He would be hooted down and booted out the moment he opens his mouth about Homosexuality.”

You can now Listen to my posts!!! November 24, 2007

This is a stunner indeed. I got this Odiogo plungin from www.Odiogo.com. It places a little logo on top left of every post. And if you click on it the software actually reads the whole post! Thus my blog posts also become Podcasts. This is just super awesome. But please note that at this moment you cannot use this on my WordPress blog but only Blogger. But since both of these are mirror blogs, if you happen to come across an entry at my WordPress and you would like to listen to it just go to http://freedom-cafe.blogspot.com and find the same entry there.

 

 

I have known text speech technologies for a long time. Most prominent one I knew about was from Microsoft Reader that allows you to download electronic books and also play them. The speech still sounded quite metallic and computerized but you could easily make it out and listen. More recently I noticed International Herald Tribune (www.iht.com) and some other publications have audio link to all their articles where a software reads the entire text in human manner. This trend is catching up.



But what sets Odiogo apart is its real clear and almost near natural speech. (please check and let me have your feedback as well) Although I certainly don’t support any unwarranted digitalization of our reading habits, I must accept how revolutionary these text speech technologies can be for people who cannot read for any number of reasons; ok illiteracy maybe one but there is blindness, other sight related problems that cause blurred vision or dyslexia.

As for my own blog, sometimes my posts can be real long as I like to pack as much information- or in some cases a complete yarn- as possible in a single post. In this case, some people who are not fond of reading long posts or cannot for some reason are welcome to use Odiogo service. I hope the readers of my blog will benefit from it. Once again, I welcome any feedback.

Cheers and Shalom,

Ember.

On blog pimping and letting lose on the internet. November 19, 2007

**Plagiarism Alert** In the true spirit of blog pimping I am stealing my own content and posting the following from my new humor blog. I realize, whatever moderate traffic I get, occurs on this blog, and for this reason I will bare my post on here for the world’s reading pleasure. I think I will reserve my ”humor” blog for posts that maybe too dirty for too many. *wink* Anyhoo, here is my new post on blog pimping.

 

 

 

 

I admit, I’m a pimp. I pimp my blog. This phrase is not my own but the one I found from the entrails of the internet via the mighty Google. It is obvious now that even the best and most popular bloggers pimp their blog. Maybe this is why they got to be so popular indeed? Just a thought. But there are both civilized and sleazy ways to pimp. In the former category would be signing up for blogging communities, making comments on other people’s blogs (You kiss my ass I kiss yours and let the kisses multiply and the ass be happy)

 

 

 

But of course the fastest way to shoot your blog into stardom is to be the whore of the html world. It helps if you’re a woman or pretend to be one. Sexual titillation and enticement will carry you a long way in every sphere of life and nothing is more true about blog pimping. You see, most people on the internet do look for sex in all its manifestations, simply because it is so easy and no one is watching (A GREAT ILLUSION)

 

 

 

For this very reason, most of the adultery being committed today exists in digital form. It is very interesting to see that how even the sincerest people turn into dirty bastards just because they can and no one is watching, (SUPPOSEDLY). Thus people let their hormones, carnality and fetishes run awry on the internet. People get dirty. But why not?

 

 

 

It is better to get it out of your system than to take it to your grave or crematorium and create a great scandal in the spirit world.

Abandoned blog ideas and fighting ”Terrorism” March 30, 2007

Picture: Larry David broods.

Here I am posting another piece. Suddenly I found many blog ideas bubbling in my mind and I was confused what should I blog about! Two main topics that kept pirouetting in my brooding brain were:

1.) The sex scandal in Clinton, Southern Carolina, a 23 year old Caucasian teacher accused of having sexual relations (multiple times and locations) with at least 5 Black boys aged between 11 to 15. It was a very creepy topic but I was not at all thinking about the sensation of the SEX SCANDAL but the side issues that cropped up with more prominence than the sleaze of the story itself. Most important among them was race: CNN (unlike CBS, FOX, ABC etc. ) covered the story (on their website) admirably well and in detail. All of these sourced it from Associated Press.

Yep, it makes me shiver to think what would have been the public reaction had it been a Black teacher and white female students. Wrath and hellfire come to my mind. Another issue is the prejudice, bias taking over the rule of law. Soon after her arrest, this 23 year old teacher was released on an expensive bail. This would not happen in the case of a Black convict, who would never have that much money even if the bail was allowed (very unlikely). In fact such is the intensity of racial prejudice in the deep South that it has given us classics like To Kill a Mockingbird and Green Mile. Well, read on. But it’s really something that baffles me as an outsider. How come third world/ uncultured/ uneducated prejudices like that are well and alive in the world’s ”greatest” and the ”freest” country ?. Hmmm…

2.) Can men and women (especially when they’re single) be JUST friends? I think it’s one of the most asked and pondered questions ever. Apart from whatever exceptions there maybe my answer was NO. I wanted to blog on it from personal perspective and experiences. I had funny stories to tell. But it really began to bore me so much. I hate repeating things especially when so many other people have already dissected and discussed it a lot.

This is why I thought I would bring you a picture blog. (Which I am moving to the next blog as it was getting too long in a single blog) But before I get to Brokeback Mountain blog…. Let’s all– as the good, responsible citizens of this world and also as the angels of light, truth, justice and righteousness– fight terrorism on the sidewalks of New York (or make it Baghdad, London, Madrid or any other place) I dedicate this picture below to our just and good fight against all those evil terrorists with colored skin, preferably Muslim origins, beard and turbans WHO HATE OUR FREEDOMS or whatever is left of them:

We may not find you but we can always pin you down, Uncle Osama.

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