generalspeaking

Ideas/Conclusions

1. Father Raymond J. de Souza writes knowingly of matters religious, he being of the Catholic faithful. He writes of the terrorist group in Gaza styling themselves the Holy Jihad Brigades, and their kidnapping of two Fox news people, a correspondent and a cameraman. (I must confess, personally, that although I have some empathy for anyone unfortunate enough to be in the position of kidnapee, particularly in the nasty care of Islamofascists, my sympathy eroded somewhat in hearing of their casual disregard for the immediate fact that they were forced to abjure their Christian faith in a temporary compromise, as a bargain for their lives left intact. On the other hand what matter dignity in faith, if there is no life to live, after all?) Father deSouza, learned religious that he is, observes in passing that the international furor raised about the purported event where American military personnel desecrated a Koran, was in marked contrast to the forced "conversion" of Christians to Islam. That there resulted no matched outrage over the Holy Jihad Brigades' evangelization tactics. Father deSouza waxes eloquent about the conviction shared by a doctrinally rigorous, zealously organized, well-financed Muslim minority that all others are infidels worthy of destruction if they will not covert, and that the Muslim majority in league with the infidel is also worthy of destruction. Nationalist movements, he points out, can be eventually accommodated with agreement on national institutions and national projects; Islamism does not seek such accommodation - only the capitulation of the infidel, at gunpoint, if necessary. (As in folks, death to the American imperialists! and above all, Kill Jews!)
2. An item published in Slate magazine, written by William Saletan, points out that several months ago the World Health Organization reported that African women who have undergone genital mutiliation (culturally dictated) were up to 69% more likely to hemorrhage after childbirth and up to 55% more likely to deliver a dead or dying baby. More than 50 African nations have now signed a protocol against female mutilation, and it was reported that the practise was declining across the continent. (Of course women in the West have long condemned the practise of mutilation on their African sisters, particularly the nasty aftereffects that young girls have long been exposed to by a male-dominated society that insisted the procedure be done to ensure that females found little pleasure in the act of procreation and would thus be less likely to stray or extend sexual favours beyond the marital boudoir.) Now the issue of male circumcision comes into play as it has become clear through an analysis resulting from 38 studies by the U.S. Agency for International Development which concluded that circumcised men were less than half as likely as uncircumcised men to get HIV, apparently because of the susceptibility of foreskin infection. Scientist further found on a randomized controlled trial in South African that circumcision reduced female-to-male transmission by 60%. (Huh? What about the reverse? It is, after all the predeliction of African males to shop around for their sexual pleasure, thus infecting their unknowing, helpless wives, and in turn infecting their unborn children.) So here we have it: female genital mutilation is, thank the stars that blink, about to be obsolete. Male circumcision, against which righteous "intactivists" of many stripes rail, is to come back into vogue, as a safety, health measure against the scourge of AIDs. And just incidentally, in the interests of hygiene, and infections such as cancer as well.
3. And lastly, it appears that a number of surveys conducted in Britain, the United States and Canada have reached the conclusion that men account for a paltry 20% of the market for fiction. Readers appear to be overwhelmingly female. A 2000 survey found that women comprised a greater percentage of readers than men across all genres: Espionage/Thriller (69%); General (88%); Mystery/Detective (86%) and Science Fiction (52%). There is no indication that men "hate reading" - women just read more fiction. Men out-read women by at least ten percentage points when it comes to non-fiction books. (In attempting to come to terms with these results sociologists suggest that women are more touchy-feely, more empathetic, more interested in trying to learn what makes people tick, how people live their lives, even if through fiction; women appear to be actively interested pseudo psychologists at heart. Men appear to aim higher, wanting to know the facts, M'am, just the facts. Take it or leave it.)

posted by Pieface @ Thursday, August 31, 2006