Caeden's Finger

So last week and the week before were not Caeden's best. We had had a great weekend at a beautiful swimming pool, but while there he got a graze on one of his fingers. It bled a little, but it basically looked superficial and we didn't think much of it. Unfortunately, when he went to day care during the following week it became infected with streptococcus.

The poor little guy had to have his whole arm bandaged up to help prevent the infection from spreading, as well as all sorts of ointments and antibiotics. It wasn't one of our better parenting moments. In any case, Caeden didn't seem to mind too much. After all, having a cast did give him something with which to bop his sister's head.

So, given in the last couple of weeks Caeden has had Scarlet Fever, a streptococcus infection and a seemingly limitless supply of catarrh, we are hoping to turn a page with spring.

Communism Lives

One of the fascinating things about living in Rostock is that we are surrounded by monuments to a failed communist past. The photo here shows the workers united, facing the future in the East. It is right next to the extremely modern Max Planck offices, and not too far away from rusting, communist-era shipyards that have now been mostly dismantled. A few huge cranes looming over the Warnow are the most obvious reminder of the past and the many thousands of people who used to work here, building ships for the GDR.

But perhaps the most fascinating thing for me is that there are some people who still seem to think that communism was a sound idea, albeit implemented badly. I actually had a discussion in a pub a few weeks ago where we debated this specific idea. My fellow debater, S, was a very nice American PhD student studying aspects of Russian society, so I guess she counts as an educated opinion.

To a certain extent, I am not really that surprised that this opinion lingers. After all, for most Australians or Americans, the events that took place in Russia and Germany and so many other countries were far away and a long time ago. I also think that many people have a visceral dislike of capitalism, and a yearning for there to be some sort of alternative system. Given the disastrous current economic disaster, let alone the many other shortfalls of capitalism, it is hard not to be somewhat sympathetic to this train of thought.

However, to actually think that communism is still a fine idea in the early 21st Century boggles my mind. To me, the evil is built into the original core idea of communism itself. The notion that there will be a revolution, where a subset of society, the bourgeoisie, will be essentially declared non-persons and swept away is profoundly wrong. Are all of the bourgeoisie monsters? Do they all deserve to die or to be sent into exile? Really? And how is this to be judged?

Further, what exactly does communism mean? The sheer nonsense that one reads about this makes one's head swim. Theoretically, the state is supposed to simply wither away. Yet how will schools and roads and hospitals all get built without a state? Did people really understand how silly this was when they were fighting and dying for it? I am honestly not quite sure whether to laugh or cry when I think about it.

Free speech, religion and global warming

Sebastian wrote a nice article that I've put below in its' near entirety. He echoes my own thoughts nicely. At some point I'll put my own thoughts down about this as I think this is a fascinating topic. I'd also bet that it is going to be a significant, recurring issue in this century.

On Friday, the United Nations Human Rights Council passed a resolution that urges members to adopt laws outlawing criticism of religions (read about it here, here, and here).

Now, let's put aside my personal views about religion, and let's just try to analyse this in a pragmatical way (which it won't be, as I am biased anyway).

"Defamation of religious is a serious affront to human dignity leading to a restriction on the freedom of their adherents and incitement to religious violence," the adopted text read, adding that "Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism."

This is wrong. Deeply so. Most sensible countries got rid of blasphemy laws a very long time ago (or never had them, Belgium for instance). A religion is not a person. It doesn't have feelings. It doesn't have an opinion. It cannot be offended, nor defamed. I feel like we have just warped 200 years backwards. Defamation of religion is very different from say, racism. Religion is something you can choose, race is something you are. You can believe there is a god and still not follow him. To deny someone their race is to deny their existence, hardly the same as calling them a fool for their choice in following a deity.

In the Reuters article I linked to above (second link), a representative of Canada says:

"It is individuals who have rights, not religions," Ottawa's representative told the body. "Canada believes that to extend (the notion of) defamation beyond its proper scope would jeopardize the fundamental right to freedom of expression, which includes freedom of expression on religious subjects."

Which makes me feel a bit more better, but still. Making laws to let religious intolerance run rampant is equivalent to committing violence in the name of religion.

I do understand that this is just a UN Forum that passed this non-binding text, as opposed to the UN General Assembly. In other words, you simply have a few guys saying "We think this might be a good idea", but it doesn't change the fact that once again, a lot of countries preferred restricting their power through boycotting the vote, rather than speak up and yell "NO". Why?

I believe that this resolution is aimed at least in part at secular attacks on religion. As Gandhi said, "first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."

Atheists have been given the short shrift for a very long time now. First they were burned at the stake, then persecuted, and now they're gradually gaining mainstream acceptance now. We've gone from Bush the Elder claiming that atheists should be considered neither citizens nor patriots to Obama including non-believers in his inauguration speech. Perhaps in my lifetime, it'll be politically feasible for an atheist to hold an elected office.

It's no wonder that the religious old guard is running scared.

Ann Arbor

So right now my thoughts are somewhat occupied with our house in Ann Arbor. Given that we are living in Germany, we are obviously not living in it and have rented it out. We tried to sell it, but as luck would have it, we managed to time our departure with the end of the housing boom in the US.



This was the first house that I had ever owned, so I am pretty sentimental about it. It is also the house where Aralyn first lived when she was a baby, the house where she learned to walk, the house where we lived when Brienna did her PhD, the house where we shared a lot of wonderful moments with friends and family.

Ann Arbor was a really lovely little place to spend five years or so. I never thought that I would ever live in the Mid-West of America, but I am glad that I did. It meant that I got to explore Detroit, got to live in the American heartland and, even if vicariously, got to experience a little bit of one of America's great public universities.