Dire Straits, "Money for Nothing", and 'Faggot'...

Hot on the heels of NewSouth Books and the censoring of a Mark Twain classic, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, there is this story out of Canada that seemingly takes 2011 standards of vilification and applies them retroactively to 1985.

The word in question is 'faggot'. There is little doubting that the term is one that is derogatory. It is designed to offend, it is designed to hurt the individual that it is aimed at, and in many places it is now included as language that vilifies a certain group of individuals in the community. In 1985, the word was derogatory but it was used much more freely and perhaps to some degree was considered acceptable.

Interestingly, the song is a Dire Straits classic. In fact, it is a song that has received numerous awards, including a Grammy. Should the fact that the song was released more than 25 years ago  mean that it must be subject to a different standard in terms of the language used? Furthermore, does the fact that the song has been played hundreds of thousands of times throughout the world on radio and television in the most far-flung of locales mean that it is exempt from current applicable standards of the Canadian human rights laws and regulations?

I am not advocating a return to a time when vilifying people was tolerated much more than it is now. I do not use the word and I follow certain protocols when children use it in my classroom in unacceptable ways. However, I am wondering out loud as to whether this kind of revisionism and retroactive application is misplaced.  Nevertheless, this is a case of "sooner or later" as it was only a matter of time before someone lodged a complaint. The word 'faggot' violates the human rights standards that apply in Canada. So, the Broadcast Standards Council, who has authority over these matters, has decided that the word must be censored out of the song.

The line that will have to be edited is ''That little faggot with the earring and the make-up''. Money for Nothing is a song off the 1985 Brothers in Arms album. Mark Knopfler, the lead singer of Dire Straits has commented sparingly on the song. He has said that he wrote it after visiting a hardware store in New York.



I wonder what is next for the censors?

BlackBerry, Blocking Porn, and a Threat from TitS...

Tifatul Sembiring (TitS) has a problem with porn. He does not like it. He wants the porn industry shutdown in Indonesia and he wants to make sure the heathens and infidels in other lands who are the purveyors of porn and hell-bent on the destruction of the Indonesian way of life, can no longer see their objectionable content available to the Indonesian masses who crave it.

According to TitS, his one-man campaign to eradicate porn from Indonesia has successfully seen an 80% reduction in the amount of porn available in Indonesia. Anyways, before hitting the 100% mark TitS has turned his attention to Research In Motion (RIM) the makers of the BlackBerry Smartphone.

TitS has two problems with RIM both are separate yet seemingly related. The first is that TitS wants RIM to set up a server and database in Indonesia. Currently, Indonesians using RIM Smartphones are routed through servers in Canada. The rationale for this first demand is that it will be easier for Indonesia to intercept the encrypted traffic that goes through the local servers than it would be for them in comparison to data going through a Canadian or other off-shore server.

The second issue that TitS has is that RIM has been dragging the chain on agreeing to set up their Smartphones to block pornographic content. The legal basis for the TitS claim is Articles 18 and 19 of the Pornography Law (No. 44 of 2008).

These are clearly two separate issues. Yet, they are linked that a local database and server may make it easier for the heavy-hand of big brother (aka the Indonesian Government) to track (legally intercept?) sex-starved, hot and sweaty, Indonesian consumers of world-wide porn.

Returning to the first issue. RIM heeds to establish a database center and server in Indonesia in order to comply with the prevailing laws and regulations that govern operations in this sector. RIM have been stalling on fulfilling the obligations that the Indonesian government believes RIM has. The latest excuse for avoiding TitS was that it was a public holiday in Canada and therefore they could not attend meetings in Indonesia on a  Canadian Public Holiday. For TitS, this is not good enough and not a legitimate excuse.

If I am not mistaken, the last time I checked the Indonesian Consulate here in Maroubra closed for all the official Indonesian public holidays and all the Australian ones as well. TitS, that is just not good enough, is it?

Anyways, the Minister for [Mis]Communication and [Mis]Information has threatened to shut RIM down in Indonesia if it does not comply in two weeks to, presumably, either demand. How seriously RIM takes this matter might be proportional to how much they value the Indonesian market. Indonesian BlackBerry users account for more than 7% of the total number of BlackBerry users world-wide.

On the blocking of porn. I am no tech wizard and my knowledge is pretty limited. However, I have always been led to believe that "where there is a will, there is a way". In essence, if Indonesians want to access porn then they will always be able to do so. It may require a little more effort and a lot more knowledge to avail one's self of the intricate network of proxy servers that are able to bypass any and all attempts to prohibit access.

If this is true, then irrespective of how one feels about the legitimacy and intent of the efforts of TitS, it would seem that the man is fighting a losing battle. Maybe it is time that TitS took up the long-standing offer of Vicky Vette to burn off some of his pent up frustrations.

Ho hum...

Kopi Luwak from Thailand in Canada...

It would seem that Indonesians will have another close South East Asian neighbour to take aim at considering this story that has made its way into the Calgary Sun Newspaper. Indonesians are pretty familiar with Malaysian attempts to steal all things Indonesian. Most recently Malaysia has been guilty of thieving the odd song or two and a concerted effort to steal the traditional batik textiles of the islands of Indonesia. However, Indonesia has not had any run-ins with Thailand over the theft of Indonesian cultural heritage or products.

Should Indonesia and Indonesians be angry?

The Calgary Sun newspaper in Canada is reporting that the Bean Stop in Eau Claire Market is about to start serving Kopi Luwak. As most connoisseurs of coffee will know, a good cup of Kopi Luwak requires good beans and the best quality beans come from Indonesia and not Thailand. Kopi Luwak requires the palm civet to munch down the coffee beans. These beans then pass through the civet's digestive system and are partially digested. Bean collectors are then employed to pluck the coffee beans out of the civet feces. The beans are then processed.

Kopi Luwak are Indonesian words. However, the beans being sourced for the Kopi Luwak that is to be served at the Eau Claire come from the Doi Chaang area of northern Thailand. Hmmm, can one really even have legitimate kopi luwak if it is not produced in Indonesia?

In any event, the coffee is not going to be cheap, even if it is not the real thing. A cup of the Thai version of Kopi Luwak will set drinkers back a whopping CND 25 a cup and CND 60 for a 50 gram tin. The owner of the Eau Claire apparently has secured about 10kgs of kopi luwak.

Let's face it, Kopi Luwak is popular. After all, it even made it on to the Oprah Winfrey Show!

Movember...

I am all for good causes, and this is one.

Prostate cancer is a killer of men, and it is killing us in ever-increasingly large numbers. Early detection is key. Any man who is 40-years-old really should consider getting checked out. Movember, the month formally known as November, also raises funds for depression.

Movember started in Australia. It has already spread to a number of other countries, including the USA, The Netherlands, Finland, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, UK, Ireland and Spain. Each of these countries has an official Movember. However, there is plenty of informal support in most other countries throughout the world.

So, if you can get involved, then you should. Men's health is important too!

By the looks of things, I am off to Target to buy a T-Shirt.

Maybe I should post photographs of the facial hair...then again, maybe not!

And...For USD700 You Can Be Old and White Too!

This is interesting.

A young Chinese man goes internet shopping and buys a silicon mask for USD700 or thereabouts. The mask is that of an old white man. He puts it on and gets on an Air Canada plane from Hong Kong bound for Vancouver. It surely is not that simple, right?

To board an international flight surely this young man must have had a passport or two. One passport with a happy snappy of his assumed persona of the old white fellow and his "real" identity as a young man in his twenties. In any event, he undisguised himself mid-flight and someone noticed and the authorities were waiting for him on arrival on Canadian soil. He was promptly arrested and equally prompt was a subsequent claim for asylum.

The implications are pretty big on this one. Why haven't the "terrorists" been using this idea before? Or have they? Perhaps Osama Bin Laden is not holed up in the mountainous regions of Pakistan, but living happily in New York City with the aid of a good silicon mask.

The very idea puts a severe dent in the idea that people should legitimately be concerned of travelling on flights with Muslims who are dressed in full Muslim garb (whatever that might be). There was an instance of this just recently where Juan Williams was fired by NPR and then hired by Fox after suggesting he was concerned in this way.

The reality is that the old white fellow you are sitting next to on your next flight might be none other than Mohammed al-Zawahiri or the main man, Osama Bin Laden or some yet to be identified serial killer or warlord from some despotic regime somewhere. Why, it might even be Barack Obama going undercover in the international interest to test out security procedures.

In all seriousness though, this case highlights that very simple adage "where there is a will, there is a way".

I recall reading somewhere last week that European airline operators were complaining about the over-zealous nature of US flight security measures. I think that the x-ray of shoes was one concern. However, perhaps now passengers aside from having to volunteer for full body scans or the almost porn kind will now also have to allow someone to have a gentle tug on their face to make sure that it does not come off prior to boarding a flight to anywhere. The beauty of Homeland [in]Security.

So, next time someone wearing a uniform at the airport asks to have a pull of your nose before issuing a boarding pass, remember they are just wanting to make sure that your face is really your face. May Michael Jackson be resting in peace, but could you have imagined what might have transpired there?

Ho hum...

Obesity and Airline Travel...

Obesity is a problem that extends beyond just the health implications. It can be a factor in many matters from employment to travel. In this case, travel.

A Canadian woman has been given a full refund for having to endure a 1 hour and 45 minute flight from Halifax to Ottawa in Canada. The woman, Janet Ogilvie, was forced to squeeze into about 25cm of seat space after the obese woman sitting in the seat next to her also took up half of her seat as well. The plane was fully-booked and Ogilvie decided that she did not have any choice but to endure the very cramped and uncomfortable conditions. In fact, to her credit Ogilvie did this without complaining to the woman sitting almost on top of her in order not to embarrass the obese woman.

Nevertheless, Ogilvie did complain on getting off the Porter Airlines flight. But, in essence she was told to suck it up, get over it, and there was no chance of a refund. Great customer service skills there Porter Airlines. You know what they say, "A happy customer tells five others of their experience, an unhappy customer tells more than twenty people about their experience".

Airlines in Canada have to supply a second seat at no extra cost to passengers with disabilities. Obesity is a disability. However, this does not mean that passengers with disabilities can front up at the airport and just get on the plane. The way the regulations are written require that passengers with disabilities notify the airline of that disability so that appropriate measures can be taken to facilitate the comfort of all passengers on the flight. Technically, it is my understanding, where an obese passenger fronts and check in without having notified the airline of their requirements for an additional seat, the airline can refuse to board that passenger.

Ogilvie received her refund and a more extensive apology of sorts from the CEO of Porter Airlines.

No Ban on BlackBerry in Indonesia?

The Ministry of Communication and Information through its spokesperson, Gatot Dewa Broto, stated that there was no plan to ban BlackBerry or its services in Indonesia.

The push from the Ministry is to only get BlackBerry to open a "data center" in Indonesia so that data did not have to be routed through Canada. The rationale here is that this would lower costs for Indonesian consumers and speed up services because data would presumably not have so far to travel to be processed.

I am not techno wizard, but that sounds like waffle to me, particularly in this age of instantaneous technology.

According to the Ministry, there is no urgency to close off the services. So, this must mean that Indonesia does not hold the same national security concerns that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) or Saudi Arabia. Nevertheless, going on past form, it would seem likely that the Government of Indonesia is prepared to threaten to block BlackBerry imports if it does not get its way with a service center. So, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that the Minister TitS and his Ministry will back flip on this and seek to restrict or ban services.

The other possibility here is that the MUI steps in and issues a fatwa prohibiting Muslims from using BlackBerry smartphones because the phones are deemed to be haram in Islam. And, as one of my commenters to a previous post pointed out, the MUI is prepared to consider anything once a request has been made of it. Perhaps Minister TitS could ask the MUI what they think of the current shenanigans.

Time will tell. But, it would not be the first time the Indonesian government has reversed a previously stated position (Indonesia is not alone in the reversing of positions, I have recently been watching a retrospective on recent Australian government reversals on all manner of things - climate change for example).

I am no longer in Indonesia and I am not a BlackBerry owner. However, the associated privacy issues are interesting.

Ho hum...

More Maria Ozawa (AKA Miyabi) and Her Non-Porn Film Career...

I am a sucker for site visitors, not. But, I could not but help noticing that my blog stats as they relate to visitors searching for particular material and visiting certain pages highlighted that there are a lot of people out there searching for Maria Ozawa and Miyabi. It is also worth noting that the majority of these are from Indonesian IPs.

It seems that Mari Ozawa, the Japanese porn star with Japanese - Canadian heritage, courts as much controversy in keeping her clothes on as she does taking them off. However, this is probably because more people would prefer to see her with her clothes off.

Nevertheless, it appears that Miyabi might be trying to construct a non-porn film career. "Kidnapping Miyabi" is her second clothed film (some might say mainstream film, but who am I to judge) after last year's "Invitation Only", a Taiwanese slasher / horror film.

Now, Kidnapping Miyabi has a very basic story line, Miyabi is in Indonesia as a tourist where some infatuated undergraduates decide to kidnap her. The film has all the potential to become a porn flick. Let's face it these undergraduates are infatuated with Miyabi for one reason only; they have watched all her porno films and have probably self-gratified during a few of them, and on seeing her in the flesh, real life flesh, they figured they probably would not mind a few rounds themselves.

Admittedly, I have not seen the script, and I am unlikely to be bothered watching the film when it comes out. The whole premise seems a little silly to me. Maybe I am just getting old, but there is probably a reason why big name porn stars have not been able to successfully cross over into mainstream films. Perhaps Ron Jeremy or Traci Lords have a view or two on this. But, it seems that for most porn stars they lose their allure and charm when they have their gear on.

Although, to be fair to Lords, she has appeared in a number of mainstream movies and TV shows, such as Tommyknockers, Married...with Children, and MacGyver, among others. Ron Jeremy has also done some non-porn stuff that has tended to capitalize on his porn star fame like: Fuck: A Fuckumentary.

So, to all my happy Miyabi searchers, this one is for you.

Enjoy!

The Westboro Baptist Church

I have written about the Westboro Baptist Church formed by the Rev. Fred Phelps in a previous entry. These people are the crazy Christian fundamentalists that have decided that God has given them a mission that revolves around the eradication of homosexuality, abortion, and adultery. The chosen method of eradication is to protest at all manner of funerals and attribute the death of the individual to some tolerance of homosexuality, abortion, and adultery.

The WBC is the group you see on TV holding the signs and placards that read, "God Hates Fags". These people are hate-mongers, vilifiers, and by my reckoning not even remotely representative of the Christian faith.

The latest target of these idiots has been the funeral of Tim McLean. McLean was the young man decapitated on a Greyhound Bus in Canada the other week. The WBC has decided that the decapitation and cannibalism of McLean was God's way of letting Canada know that he is displeased with the tolerance of Canadian policy and law towards the issues of homosexuality, abortion, and adultery.

To suggest that the WBC is a few sandwiches short of a picnic basket seems to ignore the fact that the picnic basket is not a few sandwiches short but rather it is empty, devoid of all sandwiches! There is nothing rational in the positions that the WBC adopts.

Thankfully, the Canadian border guards have been instructed to bar entry to members of the WBC to Canada. The family of Tim McLean has a right to grieve in peace and bury him without interference from the WBC! I am one that normally advocates that people have a right to protest, and even if I do not agree with you, I still would argue for your right to protest. Nevertheless, some lines in the sand need to be drawn, this is one of those times. The idea of targeting specific individuals as having died because of a government policy and then picketing their funerals is offensive.

The WBC is the same group you see picketing the funerals of fallen soldiers throughout the US. For me the message of the WBC constitutes hate speech and they should and must be prosecuted where the law allows for this sort of vilification to be prosecuted.

My guess is that God hates the Westboro Baptist Church!

What Makes A Killer?

This is a story out of Canada and involves a bus, 37 passengers, one of whom is a killer, and one is a victim. What makes this story interesting is the location of the crime and the complete randomness that seems to permeate it.

The killing was a frenzied attack that resulted in multiple stab wounds, a beheading, and the allegations of flesh eating. The allegation of flesh eating would seem to be true as it was made by a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer who was on the scene at the time and relaying information back to other officers.

The RCMP have since issued a statement saying it was aware that the radio transmission had been leaked to the Internet and said that the tape itself was "operational police communications and not meant for public consumption". I am not sure that a pun was intended here.

RCMP officers responded to a call on a remote stretch of the TransCanada Highway near Portage La Prairie, Manitoba, after reports of a killing on a Greyhound bus travelling from Edmonton, Alberta to Winnipeg, Manitoba were reported.

The killer, Vince Weiguang Li, is alleged to have killed Tim McLean. An official identification has not been released but friends and family of McLean have identified him as the victim. McLean's death was as violent as it appears random. Li hacked off McLean's head after a frenzied stabbing attack that involved dozens of stab wounds. Witnesses are saying that they were alerted to the attack by a blood-curdling scream, presumably from the McLean. Most of the passengers were sleeping or watching a movie having just re-boarded the bus after a short break.

What is truly weird about the attack is that the alleged killer, Li, is being spoken about as a kind down to earth man without any previous indications that he was prone to this kind of violent rage. By all accounts he was a simple paper delivery man looking to better his lot in life.

I wonder what makes a seemingly nice person all of a sudden turn into a violent flesh-eating killer?

This is no doubt worthy of further research.