Magical Thinking

In the Grauniad, Hadley Freeman writes about rape- in relation to the Night Stalker case- and what causes it:

It seems extraordinary in a week when another woman, Eman al-Obeidi, told journalists in Libya that she had been raped and beaten by members of Gaddafi's militia that one needs to say that sexual attacks have nothing to do with desire, but are about the abuse of power, sadism and mental illness. They have nothing to do with the looks of the victim, contrary to what Hollywood movies suggest, in which rape victims are always attractive and usually blond

This is of course unthinking dogma. If rape were purely about power & sadism then the profile of Delroy Grant's victims would not be unusual when clearly it is. The absurdity of the belief that rape isn't about sexual desire can be shown by simply considering two almost indisputable facts, as laid out by Steven Pinker in The Blank Slate:

Think about it. First obvious fact: Men often want to have sex with women who don’t want to have sex with them. They use every tactic that one human being uses to affect the behavior of another: wooing, seducing, flattering, deceiving, sulking, and paying. Second obvious fact: Some men use violence to get what they want, indifferent to the suffering they cause. Men have been known to kidnap children for ransom (sometimes sending their parents an ear or finger to show they mean business), blind the victim of a mugging so the victim can’t identify them in court, shoot out the kneecaps of an associate as punishment for ratting to the police or invading their territory, and kill a stranger for his brand-name athletic footwear. It would be an extraordinary fact, contradicting everything else we know about people, if some men didn’t use violence to get sex.

This seems inarguable. No doubt things like "power" have an effect in so far as presumably a rapist will be more likely to strike in situations where they know that the victim cannot retaliate (for example in war zones) but it is plainly not true that rape is nothing to do with sex.

Ignoring reality to promote dogma is potentially dangerous as refusing to see what motivates a criminal can only put potential victims at more risk

Churchill & Poison Gas.

There is an widely repeated myth that Winston Churchill urged the mass killing of Kurdish tribes people in the 1920s using poison gas, in some versions of the myth he actually carried out the process. The infamous phrase of his which this is based on is "I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes."

I've long been aware of that the claim that he carried out such an atrocity is nonsense, but had vaguely assumed that he probably did urge something like that- after all poison gas wasn't as taboo then as it is now and Churchill did come up with a lot of miserable schemes. However it turns out that even that version wildly distorts what Churchill actually proposed. Paul Bogdanor's list of 200 Chomsky lies (Chomsky is another who has spread this myth) provides the actual context for the phrase:

“It is sheer affectation to lacerate a man with the poisonous fragment of a bursting shell and to boggle at making his eyes water by means of lachrymatory gas. I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes. The moral effect should be so good that the loss of life should be reduced to a minimum. It is not necessary to use only the most deadly gasses: gasses can be used which cause great inconvenience and would spread a lively terror and yet would leave no serious permanent effects on most of those affected.”

In other words Churchill was urging the use of tear gas as a means of minimising fatalities that might be caused with conventional weapons. Tear gas would not routinely be described as "poison gas" nowadays so using the phrase without any context to make it clear that he wasn't referring to stuff like mustard gas or Sarin is deliberately misleading.

Chavs Abroad?

Who says Santa Claus is the only one trying to come down your chimney during the festive season? According to Greek mythology, a gaggle of goblin-like spirits are trying to slide into homes -- and instead of presents they are intent on leaving a trail of destruction.

Isn't it great that in Greece this is the stuff of legend, rather than page two of the local newspaper? The article doesn't say whether this myth is ancient or whether it began at about the same time as package holidays from Britain:

"The Kallikantzaroi cause mischief, they intimidate people, urinate in flowerbeds, spoil food, tip things over and break furniture," Tomkinson said. Opinions differ on what they look like, both because of active imaginations and Greece's once-isolated regions, separated by the Hellenic nation's many mountains and vast seas. As a result, some say the Kallikantzaroi resemble humans with dark complexions, ugly, very tall beings that sport iron clogs. Others say they're short and swarthy, with red eyes, cleft hooves, monkeys' arms, and hair-covered bodies.

How do the Greeks deal with these chavs?

Greek families are keen to ward off the gaggles of goblin louts. Some use the legendary precaution of a black-handled knife.

I prefer the legendary precaution of a large metal torch but whatever.