Show and tell

Remember show and tell? I always brought in my cat. He’d bite and claw everyone but me. I felt special that my cat hated everyone but me (and still does). An eleven year old in Australia decided to bring in a grenade to her morning class and show it off. It had no firing pin, so the girl figured it was inactive or a fake for practice. The teacher, shocked by her item, brought it to the principal of the catholic school and the principal called the bomb squad, which evacuated the school and took the grenade in for examination. I can’t find any articles that say wither or not it was real, so I’m going to assume it was just a practice grenade. The girl, whose name hasn’t been released, is reported to be “bewildered and embarrassed.”

I’d hope she’s embarrassed. She brought a grenade to show and tell. If you did that in the U.S, even if you were eleven, you’d be expelled, even if you were at a private school. Then the cops would be told, and you’d have a record and a lot of counseling. I think it’s pretty cool that she’s getting off with just a pat on the back. She just brought it to show the class. It’s not like she’s a crazy kid who wanted to blow up the school. She just wanted to bring in something unique and cool, and she doesn’t deserve to be punished like she would be here. It was a misunderstanding. Here, you can’t bring in a squirt gun without being screamed at. I hope she can look back at this and laugh.

Just out of curiosity though, why did the bomb squad evacuate the school? Why didn’t they just take the grenade out of the school and let everyone go about their class? Wouldn’t that be easier? Fun fact about grenades: the explosion doesn’t kill, the shrapnel does. That’s why grenades have an array of boxes on the outsides, so that when the gunpowder goes off, the metal will separate easier to be flung out and around to hit people. These arrays are similar to pineapples, so grenades are often referred to as “Word war two pineapples.” Now, you can buy grenades at army surplus stores. Of course they’ve been drilled into and had all the gun powder drained out, but its still a fun thing to scare your friends with!

 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newsvideo/weirdnewsvideo/9723546/Australian-school-evacuated-after-pupil-brings-hand-grenade-to-show-and-tell.html

Ninjas in Newport!

For some reason I can’t get the link to be all link-afied. So just copy paste it. It’s not hard, I promise.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/9742744/Is-it-a-bird-Is-it-a-plane-No-its-the-Newport-vigilante-ninja.html

At one point, we have all have wanted to be a superhero. But 21 year old Tanis Baker of Newport, Wales did it. He made himself a ninja costume and a wooden samurai sword and took to the streets, telling thugs to get going and scaring off underage drinkers and smokers from his area. He was often seen running from building to building, ally to ally, in his ninja suit ready to fight off crime. However one day a cop saw him and his sword, and called in for back up thinking it was an actual sword. Baker ran from the cops, hiding in a bush at a nearby children’s park. After being hauled in, the cops noted he was just trying to help and didn’t mean to frighten anyone. He had been bullied in school, and last year was mugged by some thugs hanging around in his neighborhood. Since then he was keen to help the police in any way possible. However, the surrounding neighbors were not so pleased that he had been patrolling the neighborhood. One neighbor commented, “He was running across it and doing roly-polys. He’s been watching too many films.”. Who calls them roly-polys? Theyre stunts. Parkour. Learn to be educated and cultured, people!

I think his neighbors are just jerks. He just wanted to help, and sometimes cops don’t or can’t get the job done. Cops have trouble getting the evidence they need legally, and if they do it illegally, the evidence is thrown out and the person may not be convicted. Im all for personal freedom, but im willing to sacrifice some to put people behind bars. For example: child pornography. Its on peoples computers, where the law cant reach it legally, and those people watching it are still out free.

He hadn’t hurt anyone; he just took alcohol off some school kids and got rid of some thugs by throwing smoke grenades at their feet. He did flee from the fuzz, but whatever. He had been doing good in the community, it makes me mad that his neighbors were making fun of him for wearing a ninja suit. I want to be a ninja, too. And anyone who makes fun of me is gonna get a round-house to the face. Chuck Norris checks under his bed at night for me. BAM.

People are disgusting

After this incident, New Delhi has been nicknamed “Rape Capital”. As it rightfully is. A 26 year old med student boarded a bus with her male friend, on the way home from classes. Six men on the bus then grabbed her and forced her to the back of the bus after beating her friend for trying to defend her. She was also beaten for struggling against her aggressors. At the back of the bus she was gang raped, and her injuries were so brutal that she later died in the hospital from organ failure after having to have most of her intestines removed due to the severity of her rape. I read on one news site that she was violated with the metal rod used to beat her and her male friend, but have not found it on any other sites. There’s a lot of difference on the details of what happened because of the Indian police’s attempts to keep the victim and her friend’s name out of the public. Five of the six men have been identified and arrested, and are being charged due to the bite marks on them while the woman fought back. The sixth, to my understanding, is a minor. A few articles state that the men threw her from the bus, or that the driver threw the men from the bus. Most of the details are fuzzy, but whatever happened, happened.

There is no penalty large enough for this crime. Death would be a gift to these monsters. If it were up to me, I would turn them over to the family of the girl raped and let them do what they wish with them, since apparently rape has never really been a big deal in India, why bother giving them a trial? Make an example of them. Tear them apart for the public to see, and show the world that India is working to end rape. But not hard enough obviously. I didn’t believe in the death penalty until I heard about this, and I’m done pretending that killing people to show others that killing people is not right. I heard on the radio the other day that every 16 seconds a woman in India is raped. I don’t know if that’s true, but the idea sickens me. Screw these guys. This is just disgusting. I’m freaking done.

wait.. what?

Last Friday, Christy Walsh was fined 700 Euros for having patrons in his bar too late at night. The police came first at 1:45, 45 minutes after closing time, to ensure that everyone was out of the bar. At this time there were 51 ‘nuns’ in the bar, all waiting for rides home. When the police checked by again around 4:00, there were still twenty ‘nuns’ in the bar. At the time of the second check in by the police, Walsh was driving people home because they were too intoxicated to drive, and the small Irish town only had about ten taxis at the time. There were so many ‘nuns’ because of a charity event being hosted by Walsh to raise suicide and self-injury awareness. They chose to dress as nuns to break the world record of most people dressed as nuns in one area. During this event, the town’s population nearly doubled, bringing in 3,000 people for the event. Walsh made sure to discuss the topic of participants dressed as nuns to the local priest, who said it was humorous and beneficial for the cause. Walsh is taking the 700 Euro fine gladly.

Dude. If the pub owner was really driving people home I don’t think they should have been given such a large fine. I mean, he was keeping people from driving home hammered, and it was a charity event. Now maybe he should get a slap on the wrist, but 700 Euros? Really? Come on! It was for charity and they didn’t want to drive home drunk. The owner couldn’t kick them all out when they were so drunk, but he couldn’t let them drive home. What was he supposed to do? Invite all 51 of them to crash at his place while they sobered up?

And for those who don’t know, 700 euros equals about $950, and in the states we have a similar law, that alcohol cannot be sold after two AM. It is also illegal to sell alcohol to someone already clearly intoxicated.

I wonder sometimes if we took away drinking laws if years down the road drinking wouldn’t be such a big deal. Right now, if you drink underage you are cool.. But if we take out the taboo, maybe teenagers wouldn’t drink, or maybe it would become less of a problem. Would abolishing drinking laws or lowering the ages help discourage underage drinking indirectly?

Canadian suprise

So, Canadian woman checks into a hotel, and is fine. Then one night, she acts crazy. Running around the hotel, pushing elevator buttons, screaming, etc. People assumed she was on drugs. Later, this month, people in the hotel were complaining about the hotel’s water pressure. Janitor guy goes to the roof to check out the water tanks. And hey! THERE SHE IS. DEAD CRAMMED UP AGAINST THE DRAIN PART OF THE WATER TANK. The part where the water drains out! She was last seen on January 31st, and then went missing. So she was in that water tank for a little less than a month. For a month, people in the hotel were drinking, bathing, and brushing their teeth with water that a dead body had been in for about a month. The police have run the water, and have proclaimed that there was nothing wrong with it and that it was perfectly clean and safe to drink because the chlorine in the tanks had killed all of the woman’s icky Canadian bacteria. Police have not ruled out a drug related death, but say that her death is indeed suspicious. The water tank was closed when authorities found it, how could she have gotten in there and closed the hatch? Since she was acting frantically in the elevator, I think she was being chased and was stuffed in the water tank. I’ll be interested to see how this all shakes out.

I discussed this story with my boyfriend, and shared my fear of suddenly becoming a Canadian zombie with him. It was so romantic when he told me if I ever became a Canadian zombie he would kill me. He then for the rest of the evening kept calling me a ‘hoser’ and saying ‘eh’ after everything he said. He must have drank the water. Did the woman get high and think, “HEY! I want to swim in the water supply.” Or did someone chase her through the hotel, and stuff her in the tank to drown? The police haven’t said yet, but I think she was killed. How else would the lid of the tank be closed?

Also, I am aware that the hotel was located in LA, but since the woman was Canadian and Dr. Ayers doesn’t read these anyway, I think it should count. Plus Bryan Lee O’Mally is from Canada, and He wrote Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, which we all know are the greatest books ever.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-57570240-504083/elisa-lam-death-body-of-missing-canadian-tourist-found-in-la-hotel-water-tank-police-say/

But not that kind of club

240 hours to think about fraud. 

Christine Wilson has  joined an unfortunate club. This club is also known as the sex offenders list. Ms. Wilson, or as she would prefer, Mr. Wilson has a disorder known as gender identity disorder. This means that Ms. Wilson was born a woman, but psychologically feels that she is a man. As a man trapped in a female’s body she posed as a male to be able to have an intimate relationship with two minors who were girls. Wilson pleaded guilty to the charges brought upon her and as so the judge sentenced her to probation and community serves, as well as a free spot on the sex offenders list. The official charge however was gender fraud, not statutory rape. This charge had the Equality Network, who fight to protect gay, lesbian, and transgender rights, in a bit of a fit. They felt the charge of “gender fraud” sends a poor message to those who are transgender; that it says, if you are transgender you have committed fraud by being intimate with someone else. This situation has raised some tempers and for Ms. Wilson, 240 hours of community service to think about if its wrong for a transgender person to engage in relations.

Clearly it is wrong for a person to engage in a sexual relationship with a minor. But is it wrong for a transgender to have relations with another person in the form of who they feel most comfortable in. After having read the above article, I do feel that what Christine Wilson did was wrong, but I do feel that she wasn’t wrong in doing it as a man. Gender identity is something that someone is born with. There have been many cases where even children don’t feel that they are right in their skin. Ms. Wilson should be punished for having an intimate relationship with minors, but not for having done so as a man. I also feel that that it was wrong that Ms. Wilson was punished for fraud, and not statutory rape. it does send a poor message to her fellow transgender peoples. In the future these cases should be handled more sensitively and more direct in my opinion. Punish people for what they are guilty of, not what they psychologically think.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-22078298

Excellent soundtracks

One of the most important song writers of all time, Bob Dylan has a message that is still important today. Bob Dylan is folk singer that has written many songs that have impacted the world with their poetic messages. Dylan started back in 1959 and his early works became songs of the civil rights movement and anti-war movements. Of these, The Times They Are a-Changin' became big.

I had heard this song for quite a while, but it wasn't until I heard it in the movie Watchmen did I really start to think of it's meaning. From there I became a fan of it's sound and message. The song has a very folk sound to it, but that's expected from Bob Dylan after all. It's a simple sound, yet one that is catchy and easy to listen to. Bob Dylan's voice isn't one that I would say is above all, but at the same time it adds so much towards the simplistic feel of the song. Aside from it's wonderful sound, it has such a strong foundation for the message of, evolve with the times, and change from the bad. 

The song has many different indications of change within the world and that it's more positive to embrace growth than allow ignorance. One example of this is the very beginning of the song where he sings "And admit that the water around you head grows." This indicates the change within our world. This verse eventually leads to "And you better start swimming or you'll sink like a stone." This is powerful. This shows that if you don't get with the times and move forward, you'll be a chimp amongst humans. Another example of this message is when Bob Dylan sings "Come senators, congressmen, please head the call. Don't stand in the doorway, don't block up the hall." This is basically saying that the government shouldn't get in the way of the change. That the power of change should be within the people and therefore the people should be enabled to bring change. The last example, and my personal favorite line in the whole song, is "Don't criticize what you can't understand." These words are words to live by. They say that you can have your beliefs, but don't tell others what they should love or do. Powerful words and in a time that needed them. These words are still relevant today, with changing society comes the need for change in the world.