NAMA

The brainchild of the government who single handedly sold an entire 3 generations of a country into debt overnight, NAMA is the current Irish governments answer to questions that they don't yet know how to answer. Many would say that the Government strategy at NAMA's inception was to bore a hole straight through to the centre of the earth, where legend has it the King of all Crooks, a Mr. C.J. Haughey lives in palatial grandeur attended by his army of Coir handmaidens.

This strategy suffered from an array of problems synonymous with Irish government plans, lack of planning, accountability, actual figures, direction or timescales lead to the interesting development whereby the optimum strategy was to line the route to Chez Haughey in Tax payers kidneys. This long and protracted effort lead to the reinstignation of 'family values' at the heart f Irish politics, whereby those unable to breed successful future kidney donators were ostracized from public life. The old, the sick, the very young and other marginal groups were written out of Irish history as the government turned Ireland from a sovereign country into an 'Economy'. All things in the new Ireland revolved around the twin gods of 'tax payer' and 'competitiveness' in a race to the bottom.

Future plans for Ireland involve an auctioning off of lesser substates, such as Longford and Cavan, occupants of these boroughs will be available as serfs for the new landlords bidding, although work rates and comely-ness of maidens associated with these burroughs is debatable. The main hub of the 'Country formerly known as Ireland' and soon to be known as 'Diageopromotions.inc' looks less sure, as the NAMA black hole continues to demand fresh organs. The current monkeys who dance for these organ grinders, Messieurs Cowen et Lenihan make an affable double act shrieking and dancing in a desperate but yet unconvincing attempt to show the international community the logic behind the pursuit of the black hole prince.

Future plans for Ireland.inc involve creating an international talent show hub, where the best of light entertainment and mild animal abuse can be broadcasted worldwide hosted by a plethora of stars whose pay packets single them out as the best broadcasters in the world.

This article is also available at Unencyclopedia.com also

To hell or to Carrickstown

I’m turning into a twitter addict, its like all the witty people I ever wanted to hang out with when sober distilled into my pocket. The only thing I despair of is the nightly discussions of shows on TV, for the most part I can slag along, because I know exactly who these people are, despite the fact that I have not seen any of these shows. It doesn’t take much talent, just a matter of recalling whoever was on RTE five, ten, fifteen years ago and making some witty comment. When I hear of the massive figures paid to Pat Kenny in RTE I don’t despair of missing whatever they have to offer me by way of entertainment. They cling to nostalgia like a favourite childhood toy, where is the hope of anything innovative, fresh or new coming to a TV screen near you, when the same old thing gets trotted out again and again?

I disconnected the Sky about 2 years ago, not bothered to revert to RTE. I do have a TV in the house, but watch no TV, I have alternatives that fulfil our entertainment needs, we don’t need 60 channels to watch what we want to watch, we don’t even need to tune the set. The Xbox and a USB is all I need to watch high definition, advert free programmes whenever I want. I’ve been online since 1993, I had my first webpage up within 3 months of starting Computer Applications in DCU that year. While I never had much grá for architecture or code, I did love the web; it was a playground. Things were different back then, everything was shared, the internet was a mess, but a wondrous mess, where you had to know or guess the location of stuff and sponsorship, smiley faces and cookies were a gleam in a programmers eye. I’ve played games since getting hooked on Doom in college and still feel a tingle when I hear the noises from Super Mario Bros. With 40% of US gamers now women, Im hapy to welcome the rest of the girls to the fun.

The early days of the internet were the birthplace of ideas, open source and these values continue today, albeit with increasing pressure from large multinationals to create a monetised internet where you get, but only if you pay for it. Anyone that has used Google images for the past number of years will note the decreasing ammount of images available. There are ways around this problem, like all other obstacles put in the way of users, hackers and geeks have refused to be bowed by barriers. As quickly as code to protect material can be written, somebody is working for FREE to break it. Where and how do these freedom fighters fit in with the Capitalist ethos that now threatens the internet? We, hackers, pirates and open source geeks are the new rebel scum for the interweb overlords to shake angry gloved fists at.

We share the shows we want to watch, with no ad breaks and sponsors messages. We are tuned in, but we have chosen another way of experiencing cultural artefacts. The TV goes on, the show is watched and the TV goes off, we are no longer slaves to the remote, because we have escaped, we have taken the blue pill. On the high seas of P2P, we share with others freely, we support the networked users, we are never leeches. The powers that be want this to be termed stealing but I don’t and wont see it that way, am I stealing if I go to a friends house to watch it on ‘the channels’ without making some sort of monetary donation to the host? The same tired rhetoric of ‘sharing is stealing’ gets trotted out time and time again. If I steal something then I have taken the original, if I copy it the original remains. There is a difference...

For those of you still struggling to get past Eircoms laughably weak attempt at censorship I say get thee to hidemyass.com or take my route to the stars straight through the Bays' own proxy server, because what you do on the internet is your business not IRMA's. https://www.ipredator.se/

Image above courtesy of http://morrigan-reborn.blogspot.com/2009/11/jack-o-connor-hurts-pat-kennys-feefees.html check her out!

Smack or whack

The current poll of Irish adults overwhelmingly demonstrates our lack of consideration for children. Repeated efforts on children's rights seem entrenched in petty squabbles and lack of direction. A statement from TV3's Amanda Brunker notes "When the naughty step doesn't work,when the taking the toys away doesn't work I have smacked them hard enough to leave a visible mark. I don't do it often but at least I am honest. People try to be too PC." The smacking debate clearly demonstrates that what happens behind closed doors is not to be interfered with by government.
The Irish times poll indicates that 67% of its online readership consider smacking an acceptable part of raising a child. The comments are, for the most part in favour of smacking as an effective means of raising a child. A well adjusted and suitably chastised child who knows that love and not frustration is the well from which this practice springs.

Lets break down the argument
1: It didn't do me any harm.

Memory, its not as good a record as one imagines it were. It fades, it is notoriously open to interpretation, think back to any event in childhood and more than likely it has been 'polluted' by numerous intrusions, you have a vague recollection but not a crystal clear recall. I urge anyone to read Alice Isens' work on selective memory loss.What happens is that we remember large events but they tend to be 'fuzzy' they lack real clarity, objectiveness and in many cases any basis in reality. I have vivid memories of falling in a pond as a child because I was told about it, not because i remember it.
Think about the last time you fell over, the horrid feeling of loss of control and how frightening it was, you fell over a lot of times as a child but don't remember it so vividly, that is because our minds are designed to protect you from such feelings and they fade, we don't relive them time and time again because it is unpleasant and the nature of memory is use it or loose it. So when you say it did you no harm, it does not mean you remember the harm it did at the time, your just justifying it away.

2:It teaches them right from wrong

Bandura showed that social learning is a more powerful tool than Skinners stimulus:response mechanisms in the 1960's, research since then has proven that what you do is more powerful than what you say. Display it and its a normative behaviour that will be adopted by your children. And its the constant harking back to behaviourism that keeps this mentality alive, children will stop doing what you don't want them to if they associate that behaviour with a painful stimulus. And it has to induce some amount of pain...otherwise its not an effective stimulus, so justification on the basis that its only a 'gentle tap' not only demonstrates a gross misunderstanding of the facts and it shows that your probably lying, to yourself. Children learn more from what they are rewarded for than what they are rejected for, which leads nicely into -

3:I don't want my child to be wandering the streets, if only those kids had been shown some discipline.

Invariably the children wandering the streets were children where a smack and not a word or reward for good behaviour was ever dispensed. So the argument once again falls flat, if those children know that physical punishment will accompany bad behaviour and yet they continue to act in that way then surely the answers lie elsewhere as far as productive parenting.

4: I only do it when I'm calm

I would love to meet the parent who manages to put off punishment until such time as they are completely calm, the idea that one could feel completely in control of ones senses and lovingly smack a child is incomprehensible. When a friend or colleague acts in a way that displeases, you do you suppress all reactions until such a time as you are ready to apply a short sharp smack to their behinds? Why is OK to smack a child and not an adult. If its down to small children's inherent lack of understanding, then why do creche workers not have the 'right' to physically discipline children.?


Lastly I think we need to reassess the use of language, a smack is a hit, smack merely dresses the word up as something benign. Its a well known trick in court for defense council to refer to car crashes with terms like smack, graze and bump. This convinces people that the accident was not as dangerous, careless or serious as words like smash, crash and hit.

The only people that are convinced of carefree childhoods are the ones that have forgotten their own.

Feminists need to hulk out....

Somebody asked Lady Gaga if she was a feminist lately..she replied, 'No, I don't hate men'. Somewhere along the line being a feminist has lost its mojo and meaning, its like saying you vote for Fianna Fail...So a new generation of little girls can grow up knowing its whats on the outside that counts...again.
I have so far resisted open comment on Claire Tully,Ive attempted to admire her tenacity, her ability to spell, her shameless self promotion all features that have been made possible by the rise of feminism in Ireland. 40 years ago women had to cover their heads in church now Clare can get her kit off and still get work in mainstream media. Today's piece by her has finally irked me into action..after tolerating previous articles by this woman I feel a short rant coming on.

Clare Tully is one of the big draws on Joe.ie Ireland's first men's website, dedicated to manly, manly stuff like sports and cars and sports and women. Women who have tits, who like to get them out, and agree with them, and laugh at their jokes. Men, real men, men who shave and like men's stuff, because theres only one way to be a man...
Clare is employed to get her tits out and churn out sex advice, as of course being a woman with a degree from trinity in Immunology she is vastly experienced in and qualified to offer advice on sex...... I'm not going to draw a parallel there between being sexually promiscuous and being a soft porn model; I would not do that to another woman. Which brings me back to the point, having a degree in microbiology does not a psychologist make, undeterred, Claire notes another string in her bow; social commentary. Claire is a woman with opinions, and shes not afraid to buck stereotypes!..well so says her website! This usually ends in Claire succumbing to lads views, at one stage in this piece she mentions her balls shriveling up...if only she had them....

Today Claire (with the maverick, maverikness of Sarah Palin flowing full and free in her lions) bravely challenged women who cry rape! Oh, what daring, what bravado, giving a shout out loud and clear that Claire and her ilk have no time for lying and liars and the lies they tell!

Clare illustrates this point by quoting American statistics for false reports of rape, and as we all know, Ireland is closer to Boston than Berlin! So any more we can just quote American Statistics and use them to make Irish points, for instance
Did you know that 1/3 of Irish people do not believe in evolution, and 13% of us think the President is really the Antichrist, our population in Ireland can be of course be broken down into white 77.1%, black 12.9%, Asian 4.2%, Amerindian and Alaska native 1.5%, native Hawaiian and other Pacific islander 0.3%, other (The Hawaiian contingent being banished to Achill in the mid 90's)

So Claire, when you decide to side with the people who think most rapes are just a girl looking for attention or being vindictive you forfeit your right to be tolerated. American Statistics do not reflect Irish life and should not be used to illustrate your opinion as facts. Rape is happening every day in this country, and its not just women who are victims, by furthering the belief in lies you side with the community in Listowel who shook hands with Danny Foley after he was convicted of raping a young women. Or the Italian judge who ruled that it was impossible for a young woman to be raped wearing tight jeans.

Its why I despair of Joe.ie with its manly manly stance...I know lots of men who are sensitive, considerate, caring, fathers, parents, lovers... and not just some impulse lead morons that wont read anything without a pair of tits or an arse dangled before him. Grow up Joe and cop on Claire.

The drugs dont work...unless you have chemicals

Substance P, I think they were having a slow day in the lab when they came up with that. Brain chemicals are the building blocks of human beings, yet the majority of us remain blissfully ignorant to their work.

Unless of course a head shop opened up in your fluffy sleepy hamlet. The outcry against headshops is only justified if a similar level of outrage can be mustered outside of pubs and clubs at closing time. My 13 year old has been visited in school by the Gardai and given the 'your brain on drugs' rhetoric, no doubt exacerbated by the new head shop in Ennis. Lately we watched a man so drunk he looked like he was trying to walk into the path of a hurricane and I suggested to him that drink was as harmful a drug as any.

Any drug you take in acts on what you already have. We posess all the necessary chemicals to produce the effects of any drugs, but in a normal state our body regluates the ammount of chemical in your system at any one time. What drugs do is convince it that its doing it wrong and either convinces it to produce more, use less or turn off. Your brain is a highly complex mass of electrical relay systems, how these little buggers light up, how often and for how long depends on chemicals. Specifically neurotransmitters.

Whats a neurotransmitter?
.................................................Glad you asked

Every feeling, sensation, sense, action and behaviour is controlled by these chemical reactions, its like the matrix, there is no spoon... well not if the chemicals don't release and tell your brain to search for the relevant visual cues..

There are different types of neurotransmitters, you may have heard of some of them.

Dopamine	Involved in regulation of movement, reward and punishment, pleasure, energy	Every drug that affects feelings of pleasure, including Cocaine, Amphetamine, opiates, marijuana, heroin and PCP
Epinephrine (also called Adrenaline)	Excitatory neurotransmitter involved in arousal and alertness
Norepinephrine (also called Noradrenaline)	Involved in arousal and alertness, energy and feelings of pleasure	Stimulants
Serotonin	Involved in regulation of mood and impulsivity	Alcohol, Hallucinogens, Stimulants, Anti-depressants
Acetylcholine	Inhibitory neurotransmitter involved in movement, memory function, motivation and sleep	PCP and hallucinogens, Marijuana, Stimulants
GABA (Gamma Aminobutyric Acid)	Inhibitory neurotransmitter involved in arousal, judgment and impulsiveness	Depressant drugs, Marijuana
Glutamate	Excitatory neurotransmitter
Endorphins	Substances involved in pain relief and reward/punishment	Opioids, Depressants

All of these chemicals are present in your brain at all times, all drugs do is activate or suppress them. Drugs make their effects known by acting to enhance or interfere with the activity of neurotransmitters and receptors within the synapses of the brain. A synapse is the gap between one neuron and another, think of it like a series of signal fires on top of hills (I'm thinking of the call to Gondor in Return of the King -Nerd) once one is lit then it tells the next one to light.

Drugs come in two forms, firstly an agonistic drug, it enhances the message carried by neurotransmitters. So a neurotransmitter that is inhibitory (tells the next neuron NOT to fire) becomes more inhibitory (imagine a devout catholic after meeting the pope) or it makes an excitory neurotransmitter more excited (12 year old girl gets a seat on the train next to Jedward on her way to see Lady gaga)

An antagonistoc drug on the other hand interferes with message, think of it as a big tall defender in basketball who blocks the basket. It stops or lessens the action of the neurotransmitter.

Alcohol is an agonist that works on GABA, its action is to slow down or stop the work of other neurons ( the 'cop on' neurons), along with this it also antagonises Glutamate which you need to get your nervous system going, a lack of this lead to that mans difficulty in walking. Glutamate and GABA are your brains most plentiful neurotransmitters, I theorise that cats tend to eat only the heads of mice because of the deliciousness of brains (possible cat - zombie link there to be further explored). You know glutamate cos your chinese take away is full of it (MSG used a flavour enhancer in food). I once had a friend tell me she was allergic to MSG, this is impossible, as it would mean she was allergic to her own brain...then again....

Speed, or amphetamines work by getting dopamine flowing freer and for longer in the brain. Dopamine is the GO drug, normally your driving a one litre... add enough amphetamines and your driving a 3 litre monster. I think its useful to add here that Ritalin does the same thing, but you buy it from a lab and not in a bag. I could write all day about dopamine, it has so many roles, and is crucial in everything from Parkinson's to schizophrenia...let me know in the comments if you want MORE on dopamine

Them Bones, them bones

Oscar season is upon us, roll up the the glittery and the botoxed to listen to James Cameron accept ALL the awards.
For the next few days I'll run you through the films you might want to see or avoid in the coming month as the cinema becomes the only social outlet worth your pocket money (Fags, Drink, Chocolate and Beer still managing to maintain their hold on our guilt strings)

1: The Lovely Bones

There are many books that should never have been filmed, but for each bad book adaptation there are a dozen Gamers that should never have never have offended my hard drive with their presence. I was excited to hear of this adaptation, but as a book it evoked such personalised emotions and images that I had trouble imagining it. Just as the Catcher has never been filmed, somethings are best left your mind. Heathcliff was never Ralph Fiennes when I read Wuthering Heights, Sinead O'Connor did not appear as the mother of Jesus in the butcher boy. Let me also situate myself as the kind of person who cries over the Barrys Tea adverts at Christmas so I tend to avoid 'weepies'. The idea of going to see a film specifically designed to make you cry for an hour is anathema to me. If I want to cry Ill open my bank statements instead of hiding them behind the radiator.


Despite the fact that I blubbed through the book I was looking forward to this emotional heart tug, unfortunately Peter Jackson got lost down the rabbit hole on this one. The Lovely Bones it seems was a foolhardy foray for the good lord of middle earth. Somewhere along the line he decided to make this film about the murder, about catching the killer, about vengeance.
While these are all subtexts in the film they are not the crux of the tale. To me the book was all about the breakdown of Susie's parents' marriage and the building of new lives for the family and friends left in the wake. In Peters' quest to adapt the book to screen he has left out what gave the book its heart, the lovely bones themselves. These are the relationships and lives that grew around her demise.

While everyone who has read the book will find something that personally touched them missing in this film. For me it was the death of Susie's dog years after her own murder which led to them being reunited in her 'heaven'. Much will be made of the stunning visuals in Suzie's heaven but they came at a price, whats imagined and personal is more powerful than anything yet shown.

If your still convinced that sad films are for you then look no further than The Road, its unrelentingly sombre, the ochre tones remind of us how fragile life in all its forms is, in fact watching it feels like you've gone ten rounds with Tyson. The book delivers blow after blow to the reader and Vigo is once again exceptional as the father who loves his son enough to teach him how to put a gun to his head. It leaves you with more questions than answers, a film you never want to see again but somehow need to watch.

Recommendation : Buy the Lovely Bones, read it, then give it to somebody you love. Watch The Road instead but consider yourself warned.