Minorities Killing Minorities: the Confronting Reality of Islamic Violence Upon Homosexuals

Omar Mateen has killed 49[1] and wounded 53 at the Pulse nightclub in what is being called the “Orlando shooting”[2], or the “Orlando massacre.”[3] There has been a resulting debate on who was targeted, what the attack actually was, and what it should be called. At Sky News the journalist Owen Jones was badgered and dismissed for calling the massacre “an intentional, attack, upon LGBT people.”[4] As a result, he walked off in disgust, and subsequently wrote an important piece: beginning with the words “Orlando was both a terrorist attack and a homophobic attack on LGBT people.”[5] The truth of this can not, and should not be avoided. Homosexuals were clearly targeted for extermination via massacre. This is not the first time homosexuals have been marked for death by Muslim radicals[6] [7] [8] [9], nor is it the first time gays were hunted like dogs by firearm-wielding terrorists.[10] Not for the first time there is an Islamic connection to violence against homosexuals.

In the Muslim world homosexuality is widely banned with severe punishments. It can and does carry a death sentence in multiple countries[11]. In Islamic countries that execute homosexuals, the governments can kill because of the open and widespread hatred of homosexuals and legal backing for executing homosexuals in Islamic law[12] [13]. With this open cross-country hatred in the Islamic world, the connection becomes clear when a gay-hating Muslim massacres a group of people considered hated enemies in the Islamic world. When Islamists like Omar carry out anti-homosexual attacks they are following a sickening trend we need to recognise.

It is not only terrorists killing homosexuals, crimes against homosexuals have increased in Europe[14] [15] [16], as those that keep their ears to the ground and their eyes not clouded by ignorance know. Milo Yiannopoulos of Breitbart[17] [18] has honestly wrote on the threats to gay people by Muslims (and as we see it goes far beyond mere threats), and Bruce Bawer on the threats to the gay community posed by not just jihadists for Islam, not just the most radical terrorist fringe, but by any group of Muslim gay-hating zealots that act according to the laws of Islam:

“Islamic law, after all, is crystal clear on homosexuality, though the various schools of sharia prescribe a range of penalties: one calls for death by stoning; another demands that the transgressor be thrown from a high place; a third says to drop a building on him. In Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Sudan, Yemen, Mauritania, Pakistan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, as well as in parts of Nigeria, Somalia, Syria and Iraq, homosexuality is indeed punishable by death.”[19] Thus is becomes apparent that lone jihadist gunmen are not the only ones that can kill homosexuals.

Omar was not some lone radical divorced from the Islamic tradition. The problem and threat is real: Orlando is a wake-up call to reality. Omar consumed jihadist/Islamist propaganda, but where do such ideas come from? Look to these Islamic preachers and see how they support the execution of homosexuals and dehumanisation:

Sheikh Khalid Yasin: “God is very straightforward about this — not we Muslims, not subjective, the Sharia is very clear about it, the punishment for homosexuality, bestiality or anything like that is death. We don’t make any excuses about that, it’s not our law — it’s the Koran.”[20]

Farrokh Sekaleshfar. At a lecture in 2013, when asked about homosexuality the Sheik said: "Death is the sentence. There's nothing to be embarrassed about this. Death is the sentence. We have to have that compassion for people. With homosexuals, it's the same. Out of compassion, let's get rid of them now."[21]

“Ayatollah Abdollah Javadi-Amoli, an Islamic scholar based in Iran's holy city of Qom, said in a speech among his followers that homosexuals are inferior to dogs and pigs”[22]

One could go on for days, searching for every Islamic cleric that openly supports getting rid of homosexuals.


For those who know their 20th century history, this may sound familiar. Except it is couched in religious language, Islamic jurisprudence, and it is so widespread throughout the Islamic world and Islamic communities it extends far beyond the hopes and dreams of the Nazis that wanted to execute homosexuals as undesirables. Here, attacking and suppressing gays is cast as a religious duty, not for the state, but for the good of the religious community.

Abhorrently, Muslims of Islam have been suppressing homosexuals openly for years. The Islamic state, not to be overshadowed by Iran’s executions killed nine gay men and a boy in one day in September last year.[23] Yet Orlando is far from ISIS strongholds, and Omar managed to far exceed that day in September. Plainly, clearly, undeniably the true extent of the problem that these two minority communities cannot co-exist without Islamic minorities trying to kill and suppress the other with its most radical members. The truth of this comes to the fore and is now public knowledge. What also becomes clear is that there are those in the media that are prepared to outright lie about the targeting of gays by Muslims. Coupled with these frequent attacks on homosexuals are the recent acknowledgement of the genocides of the Christians[24] [25] in the Middle East, along with the Yazidis[26] and Kurds[27]. Finally, this is getting out after far too long.

Make no mistake, the crimes of Islamic jihadists and those that kill gays due to sharia law are growing not decreasing. The situation is getting worse, not going away. As jihadism and Islamisation grows in France and Jews flee, we see another minority escaping from violence, attacks by Muslims, and massacres.[28] [29] What has been observed and reported is that this “the largest wave of Jewish immigration from western Europe to Israel since 1948”. That is how serious this is.

If the terrorist attacks against homosexuals continue, expect to see gay flight follow Jewish flight. It will not be a parade, it will not be done proudly, it will be a fearful withdrawal done quickly to save their lives. As jihadism and radical Islamisation[30] including its highly questionable sharia courts[31] [32] grow[33], gay flight and further massacres only draw closer as the climate of fear grows, and as a gay man said to me, as the jihadists for Islam become more “confident”. Omar was confident, and look what he did.

The solution is plainly clear: de-Islamisation. The radicals cannot be trusted to peacefully co-exist when Islamic minorities kill gay minorities. Government crackdowns upon jihadism are required, including all sharia law proponents and especially those clerics that sully their names by supporting the rounding up and killing of homosexuals. If these jihadists, terrorists-in-training and manipulative clerics resist, the legal authorities meant for the protection and security of Western democratic countries should break them.

Now is not the time to hide and pretend nothing is wrong. Now is not the time to let brazen jihadists kill minorities. Now is the time to make the jihadists and gay-hating clerics hide in fear, and to be hesitant to even consider killing a single homosexual, or of touching the hair on the head of anyone from a minority or majority group that Islamic regimes deem acceptable to kill. Now this needs to happen, well before the next Orlando or Bataclan-like massacre.


[1] http://www.nytimes.com/live/orlando-nightclub-shooting-live-updates/

[2] http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/13/us/orlando-nightclub-shooting/index.html

[3] http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/orlando-nightclub-massacre/orlando-massacre-what-we-know-about-victims-n591141

[4] http://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/british-journalist-storms-off-tv-set-during-conversation-about-motives-behind-orlando-massacre/news-story/42a41624083271fc3345acd50fac1e66

[5] http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/13/sky-news-homophobia-orlando-sexuality

[6] http://www.latimes.com/world/middleeast/la-fg-islamic-state-anti-gay-violence-20160613-snap-story.html

[7] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/being-gay-in-the-islamic-state-men-reveal-chilling-truth-about-homosexuality-under-isis-10470894.html

[8] http://heavy.com/news/2015/08/new-isis-islamic-state-video-but-who-is-better-than-god-in-judgment-establishing-a-limit-upon-the-people-homs-syria-gay-homosexual-man-executed-executed-uncensored-full-youtube-video/

[9] http://www.news.com.au/world/islamic-state-group-targets-gays-with-brutal-public-killings/news-story/3b55d4e061e005aa8418ca2debc90e92

[10] https://themuslimissue.wordpress.com/2015/12/09/australia-muslim-shooting-outside-sydney-gay-club/

[11] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/06/13/here-are-the-10-countries-where-homosexuality-may-be-punished-by-death-2/

[12] http://www.wsj.com/articles/islams-punitive-line-on-homosexuality-1465859532

[13] https://www.jihadwatch.org/2016/04/florida-muslim-speaker-says-killing-gays-is-act-of-compassion

[14] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/figures-reveal-a-shocking-rise-in-homophobic-hate-crimes-a6692991.html

[15] http://www.euronews.com/2013/05/17/eu-poll-reveals-levels-of-violent-homophobia

[16] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/nov/26/rise-violent-homophobic-crimes-reported-police

[17] http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/11/16/im-a-gay-man-and-mass-muslim-immigration-terrifies-me/

[18] http://www.breitbart.com/milo/2016/06/12/left-chose-islam-gays-now-100-people-killed-maimed-orlando/

[19] http://www.city-journal.org/html/brutal-realities-14573.html

[20] https://www.jihadwatch.org/2016/04/florida-muslim-speaker-says-killing-gays-is-act-of-compassion

[21] http://www.sunshinecoastdaily.com.au/news/orlando-shooting-gay-death-cleric-preaching-austra/3044486/

[22] https://www.theguardian.com/world/iran-blog/2012/apr/18/iran-cleric-condemns-homosexuality

[23] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3244736/ISIS-executes-nine-public-homosexual-including-boy-aged-15.html

[24] http://www.nationalreview.com/article/433100/christian-genocide-isis-martyrs-and-heroes-middle-east

[25] http://www.catholic.org/news/international/middle_east/story.php?id=67867

[26] http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2016/03/the-yazidi-genocide

[27] http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/friend-flees-horror-isis

[28] https://www.jihadwatch.org/2016/06/jews-fleeing-paris-suburbs-because-of-islamic-anti-semitism

[29] http://edition.cnn.com/2016/01/22/middleeast/france-israel-jews-immigration/

[30] http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/03/10/world/are-european-fears-of-the-islamization-grounded-in-reality/#.V1-mKrt97IU

[31] http://realfactsmedia.com/17-signs-sharia-law-taking-over-europe/

[32] http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/7562/sharia-law

[33] http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-16522447

The Hypodermic Needle Theory Now Appears to be True... on Social Media

It has been a considerable time since my last post. Since then I have travelled to Japan and I will be writing on that, but I also have been observing and trying to understand large and repeating online events. Social media is an online activity that most of the “always online” and relatively affluent participate in every day. It takes up our time and our attention, and while many articles argued against that years ago, that isn’t what I am doing here. No, what troubles me is that a first year theory that I was taught was incorrect, actually now appears to be accurate and repeating in our social media saturated existence.

There is an old theory that when people read newspapers or listened to the radio (I said it was an old theory) that the messages hit them, entered their minds and changed them. They would, in positions and opinions, accord with the message, come around and accept it, believe it and share it privately and in public life. This was the hypodermic needle model, also known as the hypodermic-syringe theory (which is how I first encountered  it), and also the  magic bullet theory. The audience and receivers are passive and the message clearly enters their minds and is completely accepted. Fair enough, it is a 20th century theory, but how is this relevant today?

To a worrying extent, the messages spread through the public via social media have created examples of uniform thinking, quickly shifted attitudes, positions and opinions with ease and given immense attention upon the newly raised causes (they are informally called trends, or what is trending). Along with all this, once a message gathers real support and spreads through social media, there is hostility towards those that hold a contrary opinion or stance to recently the changed attitude or opinion. Whether they do or do not possess evidence or facts to back up their opposition to these new social media causes, there is hostility, personal attacks and threats against them. The mob of converts eagerly and consistently attacks those that disagree with what is temporarily being espoused very loudly at the moment. People that resist the change or argue against it or say they don't care come under attack.

Shaped by online trends that spread simplistic positions (never ideal for deep thought) people are not becoming more cynical or critically aware (so much for teaching critical thinking in schools). Instead they pass on the messages and causes, seem to believe them and believe in them. That is until the next cause and social media tidal wave come along, and then positions and attitudes are reset. This is a really worrying thing to see in the public. In the links below they discuss the problems of public shaming and the digital age. Both for those that are targetted by social media “justice” campaigns and pressure and personal attacks upon those that do not agree with or go along with the latest magic-bullet cause that hits the online masses, reverberates through them and then changes their attitudes and what they care about and support.

As the hypodermic-syringe theory has become more evident and encountered online, it impacts daily life, attitudes and opinions beyond online spaces. People are becoming fickle, easily manipulated and willing to chase to support popular causes of the moment, and this is happening over and over again. Online exposure to more injections involves more quickly changing opinions, more sharing and more attacks upon those few that disagree. Then the next online trend comes along and then the next one. It is appearing quite cyclical and it isn’t stopping, nor are people getting tired of spreading the causes and simplified attitudes via social media, or attacking those that resist the mob's message. This fickle behaviour seems to have rewards and keeps people involved and liking, sharing and arguing for whatever new cause comes along.

Here are some examples I have noted down, not in chronological order, including how they manifested:

Save the dolphins with harsh criticisms of centuries of fishing traditions in the Faroe islands, and that they should have their fishing rights removed.

Cecil the lion and hatred towards hunters and hunting, with threats en masse made against a dentist.

Jenner appears on Vanity Fair, widespread sharing and acceptance of a crafted image.

Reports of police violence (in multiple countries), growing hostility towards police and the encouragement of violence and revolt. This one repeats throughout 2015.

Legalise gay marriage campaign circulates, and the rainbow profile change sees considerable sudden support.

Shaming of Men’s Rights Movements, delegitimises the movement, their concerns and damages their voice.

Outrage against Kony, hatred, racism and condemnation years after his active period and fall from considerable power.

The EU migrant crisis, and calls for all states to take more, even as states (Macedonia & Hungary) are overwhelmed.

Domestically, a social-media push that Australia needs to take tens of thousands of Syrian refugees (The Greens party was involved), it is our obligation, or we are being inhumane.

Some of these I have been involved with, other seemed baffling at the time, especially if you emerge in the middle and don’t begin at the start with most others. If you do not share and join the cause it is possible to get a sense of the sudden growth and homogeneity of opinions on an issue while an outsider.

It appears that the hypodermic-syringe theory is exactly what is happening, and that it is being supported by all who participate and share these causes along. While it may seem an initially ridiculous notion that messages can be injected directly into the "bloodstream" of the public, and that these message will create uniform thinking, it seems that again and again on social media, that this is  happening—a repeated push for homogeneity in opinion. A suddenly emerging cause of the fortnight, a sudden overflowing of a message or position through social media has led to observable situations where people suddenly believe in what is said, spread the message, argue for it and attack those that are not behind it.

Mob mentality is alive and well on social media and huge groups of people seem to be hit by the new magic bullets of causes and then they espouse them extremely adamantly. Arguments contrary to the new position face hysterical responses, repeated hyperbole and personal attacks and dehumanisation upon those that do not support the cause of the moment.

Social media trends though, are brief. They last until the next trend comes along. We can observe that they run their course, sink back and are replaced with others. The online public's attentions are short-lived. The hypodermic needle model appears to apply quite well to social media, where messages are quickly accepted, believed and transmitted, but what is also odd is the low rate of retention. People do not stick with these causes forever, indeed while they may burn brightly for them and argue passionately, the interest and outrage fades within a few weeks. This is the good news about people's positions suddenly changing to correspond with trends.

In closing, I ask that we all consider what we are sharing and whether we are quickly accepting an opinion or position we just read and do we actually know anything about this latest trend? Are we helping a new trend spread widely, are we aiding temporary fixation and pushing along simplified narratives of complex issues? Are we simply repeating what all our friends are sharing, and are we once again a part of an internet mob?

Further good links:

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/07/outrage-rip-cecil-lion/400037/

Thank you Matt Inglish.

http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2015/09/03/4305281.htm?WT.mc_id=Innovation_Radio-Local-Conversations|JonRonsonPublicShamingInTheDigitalAge_GPP|abc

Thank you Ben Glasgow.

Tutoring Among the Sick

Based on very recent tutoring experiences and the choices and challenges that were presented, I was highly motivated to create this post in the hope of helping other tutors. When encountering sick clients or their family the stakes can be high, in both health and financial costs, and decisions may need to be made quickly while minimising offence. While it may seem simple to avoid the sick and reschedule, this isn’t always the case and surprises and resistance can occur.

Here we shall discuss tutoring among the sick. Firstly, entering a home and finding a member of the household ill with something very contagious, next declining to tutor the very sick even while parents are insisting, and thirdly managing client offence.

The Sick Household Member

You arrive to tutor the student/s but a member of the family, whom you are not tutoring, is extremely sick with something very contagious. You must decide how dangerous this is to you, and by extension all other students and family you will encounter after the session. If contact is minimal of course the tutoring can go ahead, otherwise you may need to excuse yourself. This carries a high risk of offending the sick and other members of the household, especially if their patience has been worn away by pain and disturbed sleep.

We should always call ahead prior to a session. This is to ensure the session is on and to check if there is any new information we need to know, but this is no guarantee you will be told about contagious persons in the home. Therefore this surprise can await even a diligent tutor.

If contact is minimal (and the sick family member will probably wish to rest) the tutoring may go ahead. It is important to not use the areas the sick person has been laying or lounging upon, sitting at or eating at. Even so, this is where a very beneficial item all tutors should carry will come in handy—hand sanitiser. I carry a very strong hand sanitiser in my tutoring bag at all times. Use at the beginning of the lesson, try to touch very little furniture or items that are not your own and use it liberally at the end the sessions right before departing.

Following these steps there is still another obstacle the tutor can face other than using a door handle to leave. This is the receiving of payment. Much is done online these days, but for cash and receipt work this presents further difficulties. For the receipt it is best to not trouble the afflicted and have another family sign for it. For money, this presents a problem, but not an insurmountable one.

Receive the payment, thank them and put it aside from your other funds. This cannot be passed to others as a part of change and you will have to clean your hands after handling it. Upon returning home or to an office, make use of hand sanitiser or Dettol, water, a sink and clean the money. Taking such steps has prevented this tutor from contracting the flu from a parent who looked near death upon handing the money to me. It is better to be safe than sorry, and it is important to always manage your own affairs and your health while you are out tutoring.

Declining to Tutor Sick Students

Calling ahead prior to the tuition you discover your students (and perhaps their siblings) are sick. They may be recovering, they may be contagious but they may also infect you and all of your students. This is why tutoring such students presents very high risk and should not be taken lightly or done.

There are two further reasons not to tutor the sick. There is little point tutoring the sick when they will have trouble focusing because their body is suffering or in the process of recovering. Secondly, making $100 from a lengthy session is not worth it if you later lose $400 due to sickness and cancellations. The current session is not the only session in the future, other students are put at risk by tutoring the sick and it can remove a week or more of earnings from a truly sick tutor. Of course tutors also have lives outside of work, and we do not want to hamper them by needlessly falling sick or passing sickness on to family and loved ones.

It is obvious the session should be cancelled, but this can become complicated. Parents or the clients themselves may insist they “only have a fever”, their temperature is going down or that they are “getting better”. An eagerness and willingness for tuition is admirable, but it is a constant risk until the disease or virus has passed. Even if a tutor is careful and sanitises their hands, writing equipment and books infection may occur during the session during conversation.

Therefore a tutor should cancel when students or siblings of the student are seriously ill (due to their constant contact), or still recovering from illnesses.

Parental Insistence and Offence

Realising the household is sick you wish to cancel. In this case you have many reasons to cancel but there is opposition to your decision from a client. This is a challenge for a tutor, and quite different to the normal day-to-day of lesson preparation, motivating students and teaching them. If you back down from your decision they will not respect you or what you say in the future, but by not relenting your risk offending a client. How are we then to proceed?

After you have discovered the student/s are sick, all claims that day that it is now okay, that it isn’t so serious, that the student’s temperature has suddenly stabilised should be taken with a grain of salt. Clearly, they want you to tutor even at the risk to yourself and others. If you know that the flu (or worse) has taken hold in the members of a household you should be extremely cautious of tutoring them at all. If you decide to not go ahead with the tuition it is the professional act to clearly communicate your decision with reasons if requested, organise the next session (ideally next week) and thank them for their time or wish them the best. Your decision communicated in a professional manner, is a position you have to adhere to, especially when you are very certain there is a health risk posed to you and your other students with something that could be easily transmitted.

A parent of the client, via phone call or message, may attempt to override your decision and insist you come. They may not take your cancellation seriously, or they may be forceful and assert that it is their judgement call to make, your decision is unwarranted, your rationale baseless. To back down is to face serious risks. Of course you should also be conscious that this discussion is causing offence as it continues, tempers can flare, and you should bow out from the discussion respectfully. People do not like being treated poorly due to sickness, and can react badly if they feel their family is being ignored or marginalised. Share your reasons, but if a client is becoming agitated, do not share your emotions and needlessly argue. We are in sensitive times of quick communication of thoughts, concerns and emotion and it is important to not escalate or argue. You are clear, you know what must be done and you respectfully listen to what they say, but do not argue or relent and expose yourself to a house in the grip of sickness.

This decision may be criticised. If they disagree it is likely they will be critical and may use emotional appeals, appeal to their own authority over yours or seek confrontation to push their way. However, that is not what is most important, and argument helps no one. Instead by staying healthy and non-contagious you show your full commitment to providing excellent tuition, and as you actively lower the risk of your students being exposed to sickness you demonstrate that you care about their health and well-being. That is what is important.

Proverbs That Make You Laugh and Think

I confess to being quite the fan of proverbs, witticisms and wonderful quotes that are either deeply wise or entertaining. As I browsed inside a post office recently I found the most exceptional bargain. Max Cryer's Preposterous Proverbs was on sale for a single dollar. Apparently this normally goes for $22.99 in Australia, so I counted myself quite fortunate. Inside I found a charming coffee table book full of proverbs and commentary.

Cryer takes the reader across cultures with proverbs from China, Russia, Denmark, Spain, Iran and Africa. Some are recent with many from the 20th century, but they are presented alongside the very old, with Euripides, Cicero and Seneca featuring. Generally the dating of the proverb is not given (and dating them exactly must have been a truly daunting task), and they are more identified by their country of origin rather than the most famous person that used them. They are presented as a product of cultures and different worldviews circulating to the extent that proverbs are often contradictory. Cryer takes great pleasure in pointing some of these out, asking the reader 'Take your pick' on whether you prefer 'Seek and ye shall find' to 'Curiosity killed the cat'.

This book proved to be quite enjoyable and thought provoking. Many will have been heard before by the reader, with their bastardised simpler versions used in everyday speak, but I was pleased to find so many new proverbs (African proverbs are not insignificant in number), from a variety of cultural sources. Cryer has done a good job, and while it is easy to blitz through and read them all, some need a lot of unraveling and Cryer does not tell what they all mean. That would take the fun out of it.

Some of my favourites are as follows:

Tell the truth and you ask for a beating (if childhood doesn't teach you this then work life will).

Who keeps company with wolves will learn to howl (a bit of a comment on socialisation there).

Grey hair is a sign of old age, but not wisdom (the young will brighten at this, the old may not).

When bulls fight, woe to the frogs (a bit of macro-political insight there).

Caesar has no authority over the grammarians (even Stalin the editor faced a severe editing after his death).

Never write a letter when you are angry (advice I managed to follow recently, luckily this proverb was in my mind at the time).

You're a lady, I'm a lady - who will feed the pigs?

The frog in the well knows nothing of the ocean (but online the frog may have an opinion about the tides).

A bad haircut is two people's shame (this is Danish, and the shame for both parties coming from a terrible haircut is something I remember quite clearly).

This is a useful educational resource as well, and I have been using this as a part of lessons to tutor the young. One of my students agreed with Randle Cotgrave who said in 1611 that 'A growing youth has a wolf in his belly', as did his mother.

Many of these proverbs remain relevant and thought-provoking. I recommend you give Preposterous Proverbs a look, after all, 'He who wishes to eat the kernel must first crack the nut.'

Sickness and Shifting Gears

When I am sick, it is a time of melancholy but also of philosophising. While my brain seems sluggish, and I cannot focus on my common routine, my mind is so clouded it is hard to work on my papers or latest project. This opens up an opportunity rarely taken in the day-to-day. It becomes a time to think on the nature of death and mortality, ask what is moral and what passes for being moral. It can be a time to critique power and hear how others justify the abuses of state power. Being sick is a good time for all of those wonderful questions.

If you cannot speak, it is a time to listen. Sickness and those days off that sickness brings can give us the time to check up on the news regarding things we actually care about. We can read blogs, listen to clips on our interests and take stock of the new developments in the world that we were so ignorant of while we remained locked within our routine. Sickness can give us the opportunity to become more informed citizens. More than "time off" it can be a time to ourselves, and thus a time to improve what we know.

Of course, distraction is so very good when to swallow is to experience pain. When breathing is hard listening completely to a presentation by specialists can take us temporarily away from the concerns of the body. Comedy sites can give some relief in 2,5 or 20 minute intervals, but the better form of distraction is philosophy and broadening our knowledge of the world and current events.We can focus on such "heady" topics with just a bit of time off. If we cannot speak, we may still be able to type.

We are limited while gripped by sickness, our minds do not function so clearly. Yet, there is still an opportunity to do something, to learn something, and to deviate from our typical schedule. Distracting ourselves from the pain, dizziness or trouble breathing is also no bad thing. That is why I think that in being sick once in a while, we can find ourselves open to asking the big questions, and the questions personally important to us. In being stuck at home and unable to go to work we can shift gears and explore part of what it is to be human, and ask the big questions that we push to the side as we carry out our daily lives with all of their obligations and responsibilities.


P.S: apologies for any errors, I was a bit under the weather when I wrote this.

Reviews, Jesting and Pain

For those that write, a new year can mean a year where you will come under review. Assuming of course, that your projects are finally finished. Yesterday I was reading a section of The Writer’s Quotebook by Jim Fisher, when I flipped to the review section. It so impressed me, and had such humour contained within it that I had to include a large portion of it below:

REVIEWS

It’s hard to imagine how a review—say, in Kirkus Reviews—could, in a substantial way, affect the commercial success of a book. Other than writers and a handful of literary types, who reads book reviews? Book reviews, however, are important to the authors under review and to people in the business of dust-jacket blurbs, review excerpts that carry no credibility whatsoever. Still, in the life of a writer, a bad review is a terrible thing; and writers who say they don’t read the reviews of their books or don’t care if a review is good or bad are generally not believed.

Authors are also upset when their books are not reviewed. Isaac Asimov complained that none of his books were ever reviewed in The New Yorker, even though, as a well-known writer, he had been mentioned in the magazine many times. The reason: he was not taken seriously as a novelist because most of his writing was science fiction. Wallace Stegner, a brilliant novelist and nonfiction writer who lived in and wrote about the American West, was never reviewed in the New York Times even though his novels, Angle of Repose (1971) and Spectator Bird (1976), won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award respectively. Why did the Times ignore Wallace Stegner? Probably because he was not a part of the Manhattan literary scene.

I have a friend who says that reviewers are the tickbirds of the literary rhinoceros—but he is being kind. Tickbirds perform a valuable service to the rhino and the rhino hardly notices the birds.

John Irving

I am never much interested in the effects of what I write.. I seldom read with any attention the reviews of my... books. Two times out of three I know something about the reviewer, and in very few cases have I any respect for his judgments. Thus his praise, if he praises me, leaves me unmoved. I can’t recall any review that has even influenced me in the slightest. I live in sort of a vacuum, and I suspect that most other writers do, too. It is hard to imagine one of the great ones paying any serious attention to contemporary opinion.

H. L. Mencken

People who aren’t writers might think that authors would be well advised to study their negative reviews with care, rather than letting a protective skin form. After all, isn’t there something to be learned from the thoughtful analysis of intelligent and knowledgeable critics? Well, maybe, but most of the writers I know don’t take them seriously, and neither do I. It’s not that I don’t respect reviewers. It’s that reviewers don’t write their columns for writers. They write them... with readers in mind, and that’s a different thing.

Aaron Elkins

I can get very depressed by a review that is unfair, unreasonable, and totally destructive.

John O’Hara

I get angry at the stupidity of critics who wilfully refuse to see what my books are really about. I’m aware of malevolence, especially in England. A bad review by a man I admire hurts terribly.

Anthony Burgess

A recent review of one of my books was kind of horrific. It described my work as some sort of terrorist mission—and yet I like it, I like to be controversial in that way. It’s proof that I’m alive.

Robert Coover

I am not alone in bearing grudges against reviewers who have doomed a book’s chances because they’ve missed the point, the tone, the everything.

Ann Beattie

Very often adverse criticism goes to craft, and that sounds an alarm to which attention should be paid.

Dorothy Salisbury Davis

It’s discouraging to be criticized because you can’t contend with it. It’s like someone saying, “Sorry Jim, but you just don’t measure up. We’re looking for someone a bit more handsome than you.”

James Lee Burke

It isn’t infrequent that reviewers get the plot wrong. Am I naïve to have expected more consideration, am I naïve to be disappointed? Even “positive” criticisms so often seems uninformed, ignorant.

Joyce Carol Oates

The critics don’t interest me because they’re concerned with what’s past and done, while I’m concerned with what comes next.

Aldous Huxley

You’re always looking—and it’s very foolish, it really would be better not to read the reviews—but you’re always looking for some reviewer who will tell you something about your book that you didn’t know yourself and at the same time that you think is true. And that very, very rarely happens.

Mary McCarthy

Rotten reviews are the lot of the writer, and selling well is the best revenge.

Isaac Asimov

Never demean yourself by talking back to a critic, never. Write those letters to the editor in your head, but don’t put them on paper.

Truman Capote

My favourite Kirkus review labelled my writing as “awkward and repetitious.” I framed that one.

Charles Knief

I’ve known writers who are absolutely destroyed by adverse opinion, and I think this is a lot of shit. You shouldn’t allow that to happen to yourself, and if you do, then it’s your fault.

James Dickey

Books are savaged and careers destroyed by surly snots who write anonymous reviews and publishers can’t be bothered to protest this institutionalised corruption.

Warren Murphy

Good reviews aren’t helpful, and the bad reviews are less... They’re not creatively critical. I don’t think there’s really any point in reading them. You don’t learn anything from them.

Thomas Tyron

If you ever write something, and it is reviewed, and the reviewer includes a photo of you, and both the photo and the review are bad, you will find that the photo is more painful.

Diane Johnson

The Writer’s Quotebook is an excellent resource, capable of bringing a definite smile and soothing nerves. I am young to the game, but already I have faced unkind reviews, with a reviewer missing the point (Beattie and Carol Oates’ point). With my writings on Islamism and terrorism, I too was as surprised (and pleased?) as Robert Coover when my work was described as some sort of terrorist mission and analogous to terrorist ideology. A harsh review can be entertaining months later, but they hit very hard when we crave the affirmation and praise for our hard work.

Trev