Nathan Gale is the new Mark Chapman.

I now understand, in part, what it must have been like to hear about Lennon's murder. Murder. That's a harsh way to die. Dimebag Darrell Abbott, of Damageplan and Pantera, was murdered on Wednesday night, Ohio time. On stage. By a militay nut.

This is terrible and there isn't much I can say. Dime would have been immortalized and deified even if he had lived till old age and died of failed kidneys, but this early, tragic death adds another legend to the book of legendary deaths.

For Dime to be murdered is more significant than people might think. In terms of influence, integrity, talent, kindness and other good qualities, Dime was the top dog. This incident will live on as more important than the Euronymous murder, more than Lyn Strait and that moron from Drowning Pool. Also, because of the weight of murder as compared to suicide, this is more tragic than Kurt Cobain's death, despite Dime's best work being behind him (arguably).

Whenever somebody dies, especially tragically, people go over the top in paying tribute, no matter how little talent he or she had (remember when Lyn Strait died?). Dime, however, was a true legend, no exaggerations. If every single member of Metallica had been murdered on Wednesday night, Dime's death would still be the one that people would be talking about.

For rap-fans to understand, this is more significant than Tupac and Biggy combined. More significant than Jeff Buckley's drug induced suicide or a whole other manner of 'the world doesn't love me' deaths. Dime was strong and he had no part in his death, unlike the other deaths I've mentioned. Pantera had a #1 Billboard album in 1994. This is due almost entirely to Dimebag's catchy riffs. Do you know how amazing that is? Compare that to what we see on the charts today.

Pantera toured Australia in 2001 for what would prove to be the last time. We always hoped there would be some kind of reunion tour, but now all we can hope for is a tribute album which seems like such an empty gesture. At least, I guess, I was able to see the legend at work, in the flesh.

My thoughts are with the Abbott family, and I'm still worried about the lack of word about Vinnie's condition, who was also apparently shot. The news hasn't been much help, though. Nobody is saying anything. I'm also waiting for Rex and Phil to make a public statement, but I fear Phil now longer is in full control of his faculties.

I don't like the sudden spirituality that all the condolences have taken on (Mustaine even said 'see you in heaven'), so I'm going to keep it simple. Dime was a legend in life and in death and he will be never be forgotten. Raise a blacktooth, stroke your pink beard and blast those timeless riffs.


(By the way, I haven't heard any yet out of respect for the tragedy, but I have a feeling there will be some Fox News morons or other such tools who will try and draw a line between aggressive music and aggressive behaviour. Please keep this in mind when these foolish statements start to come: Nathan Gale was in the navy, or some other 'we pay people to kill people' organization. For someone to suggest that rock and roll is to blame is ignoring some very important things. I'm pre-empting idiocy)


http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=591630

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=24283

Darrell Abbott, 1966-2004

The Papa! Tradition!

Sometimes, aren't you glad that we don't live in the US? I mean, they may be our biggest ally and all that, but at the end of the day, when I'm watching the O'Reilly Factor and getting flabergasted at the sheer idiocy, at least I can console myself with 'sucks to be you'. And laugh. We're far removed enough. For now.

Truly, it is redundant to comment on this programme, but for posterity something may as well be written. Bill was complaining that specific mention of 'Christmas' was being removed from the public sphere and replaced with generic 'holiday' messages. He said this was stupid because it denied that the US was built on a religious tradition. What he said was tantamount to 'there is a liberal-progressive (oh yeah, when did those words come to mean something bad? Oh no! Not progression!)conspiracy to secularise the world in order to achieve radical aims such as (shock!) gay marriage and partial-birth abortions'. He even had Newt Gingrich (yeah, that guy)to back him up.

Regardless of my views on Christmas - which hasn't been explicitly religious for years and is as secular a season as any other: and that's OK - there is something truly awful with this assumption by Christians that atheists are somehow immoral because they happen to have ethics based on evidence and reason rather than tradition, authority or revelation. Yeah, God forbid (no pun intended) we use our own agency to come up with ethical standpoints rather than rely on 'tradition', which is, as Dawkins says, something that is only observed because it has been around for so long and is exactly as true or false as it was when someone made it up all those years ago.

Oh that's right, Bill and Newt were talking about how Western Europe (you know, those useless guys who came up with those annoying little things, the renaissance, the enlightenment, the theory of evolution by natural selection etc. etc.), which used to be a bastion of Christianity is now the most secular place in the world. Oh, you mean they finally grew up? Shit...

It is scary that we still seem to live in a world where the most powerful nation is teetering on the egde of theocracy and doesn't see anything wrong with that.

Also, back in the real world, Victoria is about to be the first place in the world, apparently, to do random drug testing on the roads. Neil Mitchell had an article in the Herald Sun today where he made some good points but undercut himself, not least by using scarequotes all the time (there is no need to say 'smoke a "cone"' as if nobody understands what you're talking about). Mostly, though, he didn't commit to a point fully. While he did mention that if we went one step further and made driving with any alcohol in your blood illegal, there would be 'social upheavel'.

So, where are we? Zero tolerance on drug use and driving - which I agree with - but still allowing .05 BAC, which means that one is still impaired, if only minimally? It seems that Mitchell's point was just that because alcohol has been a significant part of our culture, it should remain at this arbitrary level, which is exactly as safe or dangerous as .06, .07, .08, ad infinitum. So, because our tradition happens to be one of drunk bogans, we're allowed to drive with alcohol in our blood?
I'd like someone to just go balls-out and say 'let's ban drink driving full stop'. Hell, P-platers do it all the time and I can piss it up with the best of them. I'm all for maintaining cultural solidarity, especially in the face of harsh American hegemony (hahaha), but let's not pretend we're being responsible at the same time.

'Who, day and night, must scramble for a living,

Feed a wife and children, say his daily prayers?

And who has the right, as master of the house,

To have the final word at home?'

Shock! Bolt takes Singer out of context!

Well, I think I've managed to find the source of Peter Singer's apparently 'outrageous' statements.
http://www.worldmag.com/subscriber/displayarticle.cfm?id=9987

As we can see reading that article, Bolt's reading of Singer's comments omit certain important things, the least of which being Singer's contention that 'Any activity is ethical as long as it is consensual.' Bolt's sarcastic comment that sex with an animal would surely have to be consensual, then, makes no sense in light of the fact that 'consensual' was a condition already established by Singer before the question of 'inter-species' sex came up.

Where are we then? Bolt sarcastically comments that if humans have sex with animals it has to be conseual. Singer already said that. So, what's Bolt's point?

(By the way, the article with the Singer interview also dissents from his views, but despite being a 'biblical ethics' publication does so in a relatively reasonable manner. Contrast this with Mr. Bolt's hyperbole).

[Also, just for fun, check out http://www.vandruff.com/art_converse.html and over time, see how many devices of 'conversational terrorism' Mr. Bolt uses]

Bolt v. Dawkins (and Singer, sort of)

Imagine a boxing match between Andrew Bolt and Richard Dawkins. I say boxing match instead of debate since it would have to be some kind of physical attack if the former were involved; after all, he and I know that Mr. Bolt isn't one to bother himself with reason and well structured arguments.
Take his recent 'And another thing' piece.
(http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,11516941%255E25717,00.html)

Can anybody find an argument in there? I'm not being facetious. I cannot find anything syllogistic there at all. All he is doing is taking a candidly controversial statement from its context and holding it up for ridicule, as if there was something self-evidently bad about what Singer is saying.

Not only is Bolt demonstrating his abilities as a demagogue to his readership (note his oversimplification of every issue), he is also demonstrating an arrogant lack of intellectual pursuit. It is one thing to form an opinion based on careful consideration of facts, but another to decide on an opinion and mock anything that disagrees with that, without consideration.
Bolt is deliberately misconstruing and decontextualising Peter Singer's words; he is making an assumption that humans are worthy of life regardless, whereas animals are somehow subordinate in every way.

To illustrate, the ever-reliable Richard Dawkins:
'The 'worth' of an animal's life is just its replacement cost to its owner--or, in the case of a rare species, to humanity. But tie the label Homo sapiens even to a tiny piece of insensible, embryonic tissue, and its life suddenly leaps to infinite, uncomputable value.'
(http://articles.animalconcerns.org/ar-voices/archive/mind_gap.html)

With that in mind, note Bolt's comment that 'Singer proves yet again that those who demand that animals be treated like humans, are in fact demanding that humans be treated like animals.'

Well, let's think about that. Bolt suffers from what Dawkins calls the 'discontinuous mind', unable to think outside classification and cannot contend with the sorites paradox. The discontinuous mind cannot bear to think that the human is an animal and realated comletely to the 'animal kingdom'.
Dawkins, once again: '"Human", to the discontinuous mind, is an absolute concept. There can be no half measures. And from this flows much evil.'

Apparently it is self-evident that humans and 'animals' are very different and should not be treated as equal. Well, maybe not equal, but surely there are animals that are smarter, more sentient and more 'alive' than some disabled/imperfect infants. You know, the ones it is apparently self-evident should be 'saved'.
Oh, but we don't want to treats animals and humans are if they are related. Why don't we just go and deny evolution by natural selection while we're at it? After all, if evolution shows us anything it is that you cannot essentialise humanity.

As we can see, this issue is very thorny. I've not even scratched the surface and don't claim to be any authority. But it's more thought than what did Bolt gave to it. This is an important issue and he didn't even give it more thought than 'how do I fill up the bottom of this page?'.

This is a disagreement on principle. I have little problem reading things I disagree with, but it is disingenuous and an insult to my intelligence to read something clearly pandering to those who wouldn't think twice. It's not only unfair on those who might dissent, but on those who might support your cause if you had been more thoughtful.
I have no idea whether, as Bolt suggests (without citing anything, mind you), Singer has said certain things, and if they stand up to reason and argument. The point is that Bolt didn't care about that.
I could be swayed to Bolt's line of thinking if he had bothered to back up his claims. Who knows, maybe Bolt is right. But we can't tell, since he didn't bother to defer to those annoying little things like reason and argument.